The Debt II

Debt II was a hit-or-miss episode for me. There were some stunningly good moments, and other ones that left me tossing Cheetos at the screen. Some things worked, some didn't, which left the episode feeling uneven. On balance, I do like the episode a lot, but boy, some of those scenes still throw me right out of the story.

Lao Ma surprised me: she turned out to be a (mostly) good lady. Heck, they painted her to be practically saintly. But this saint had serious bite. She had power coursing under that calm facade like a lava flow, which gave extra punch to the calm statements she made. I don't think it was meant to be, but I found chilling the scene when Lao Ma shows Lao Tsu to Xena. She was keeping a man alive by a thread, using pressure points and comas, destroying his life's work to change it into something he would have despised, and she called it a gift to him? Brrrr. Remind me not to go knocking over there at Christmas time.

Xena offered to serve Lao Ma. In a throw-away moment. As far as we've seen, Xena has always commanded, always led. Even as a young and inexperienced warrior, she was the rallier of her village against Cortese. She captained the ship we saw in Destiny as she expanded her conquests. Even in Debt I, when Borias led the army, Xena wasn't much of a subordinate. But she was willing to give ground to Lao Ma. However much Xena may have failed to take all of Lao Ma's advice to heart, Xena definitely recognized her as a leader and a mentor.

Once again, photography kudos all around! These two episodes have had cinematography that beats most of the junk that reaches the big screen. My two favorite Kodak moments: the scene between Lao Ma and Xena with the bottles on the table and the gorgeous golden silhouettes behind them, and the distant shot in that weird floating scene, with yellow and purple robes and scarves blowing in front of red walls. Beautiful, beautiful work.

Phew, what a relief. Not even a minute into Debt II, Gabrielle said the words I had been waiting to hear: "You said you would let Xena go!" Gab turned over Xena with the belief that she was going to be able to negotiate them both out of there. Unfortunately, the road to hell is paved with good intentions, and naive Gab found herself smack in the middle of Tartarus when she realized she hadn't counted on two things: Ming T'ien's cruelty and Xena's stubbornness-plus-sense-of-honor. "The pathetic thing is I thought I was saving you," she confesses in the dungeon. She thought she had hit on the perfect plan; keep Xena from assassinating Ming T'ien despite her best efforts, turn around, and go home with everyone's soul in one piece. Reality check time for the amazon princess.

Where is the moment when Gabrielle realized that she had seriously misjudged what was going to happen? When did she finally figure out that this wasn't going according to plan? I was waiting to see it hit her and never spotted it. In the dungeon, she told Xena she hated herself for what had happened, and I didn't believe her. It should have been one of the gut-punches of the episode, it got pulled, and I have no idea why.

Also in the "what th-?" department: One little polearm stood between Gabrielle and Xena's execution? And then when Xena did burst free on her own, Gabrielle still stood aside without helping? It was time for some serious crash and bashing, and Gabrielle stood rooted to the spot. (But great surprise reaction when the torture implements started flying.) If we want to put the Xena reality editor through some serious gymnastics, the best conclusion I can come up with is that Gabrielle is still reeling from having killed and doesn't want to go anywhere near a fight; we haven't seen her swing a fist since Deliverer. Maybe the writers just seriously tripped up on that one; I had expected it would have taken a lot more than one guy with a stick to hold Gabrielle at bay.

I *loved* the irony of Xena earnestly telling Gabrielle about her beating of Borias. She was healing the damage with one person who had betrayed her to Ming while retelling her vicious retribution on another person who had done the same thing.

Xena's interrogation by Gabrielle was one of the moments that really worked for me. How gut-wrenching can you get? It opened with Gabrielle's sudden strike at Xena's head, which snatched my attention as forcefully as an actual slap would have. Xena's cold, unfocused silence combined with the tears falling from her eyes was sock-knocking. Xena's tears weren't for the pain of the imprisonment, the stocks, or the blow. They were for the pain of feeling so thoroughly betrayed by Gabrielle. Gabrielle knew it, too, but kept driving towards the single goal she had left; to get Xena to promise what they needed to be able to leave the place behind. Her words when she finally knelt close and pleaded were reminiscent of what she said in The Execution when she realized how much trouble was ahead for them: let's just turn our backs on this issue, and we can ride away and never look back. Gabrielle has a tendency to play ostrich with trouble when it gets too personal, and she doesn't even realize that in both these cases, it would have meant that she would win the issue (Meleager would have been free, Ming would have been unmolested). Xena, on the other hand, has no such inclination; the more personally painful the problem, the more Xena bulls into it chin-first. Gabrielle never had a chance of getting that promise out of Xena.

The greatest Xenaverse tweak to history yet: the Tao Te Ching was actually written by Lao Tsu's wife under his name. Cracks me up every time. I've said it before, I'll say it again: there is NO mythos or historical event that Xena can't resist turning inside out.

When Lao Ma healed Xena's legs, the first thought that occurred to me as Xena laid down on the mat was "Wow, she's actually still." It was the first time in those flashbacks that Xena wasn't fidgeting, champing at the bit, and lunging forward. Xena's manner had become much more subdued around Lao Ma, but she still raged under the surface. I guess that was supposed to be the point of the healing; Xena had managed to find enough control to allow her legs to be healed. I'm sure Lao Ma's plan was that eventually the same would be true for her soul.

The leg-healing and floating-in-the-air scenes totally lost me. Lao Ma and Xena's emotions escaped me - I didn't buy much of the elation I was expecting Xena to feel at being healed. And then suddenly we were in Willie Wonka's chocolate factory and floating through the air. At the end, we get the hint that it must have something to do with losing desire and will, since Xena loses altitude the moment she sees Borias, but I couldn't figure that while I was watching the scene. There must have been some heavy symbolism and parallels with Chinese or Hong Kong films, but it left me scratching my head.

The gambling scene, on the other hand, was brilliant. I love the pacing and the acting all around. Watch how perfectly Xena and Borias work in tandem. Neither of them batted an eye in surprise when Borias offered his heart and Xena immediately accepted. They read each others' intentions, leapt to their swords, and made short work of Ming and his guards. Lao Ma had reunited a highly dangerous combination; it wasn't the wisest thing she ever did. And the scene foreshadowed a bit of the switch that was in place by the time they reached Greece; Xena was now charging into the fore, and Borias was backing her up. And I'm betting he took the gift of his heart with dead seriousness.

"Scratch my nose, will you?" It was cheesy, it was manipulatively emotional. Even the music was soft, warm, and fuzzy. And blast it all, it worked. What a perfect response from emotions-always-on-hold Xena to let Gabrielle know that she could forgive her. Emotions-never-in-check Gabrielle nearly breaks down in relief and immediately helps with bearing the weight of the stocks. I reveled in it. There's still lots of Rift trouble brewing for our heroines, but that was a nice moment to heal up some of the fractures and get them back on the road together again.

The origin of the Warrior Princess title is revealed; it was Lao Ma's plan to make her the Warrior Princess of China. And sitting beside Xena at the time the plan is revealed was Borias, who, as the only other witness, was probably responsible for spreading that title to Greece.

Those Mortal Combat-style chi attacks were weird, but boy, Xena sure looked cool throwing them around. When Gabrielle dressed in sackcloth, she got a potato sack. Xena got a cool robe including rope sash, and looked kick-butt as all get-out as she brought the Ming dynasty down around her own ears. Renee needs to start bringing doughnuts to the wardrobe department.

Although we saw more of the designs that match the chakram, we didn't find out anything more about the weapon's origin. Like M'lila's shirt design on Xena's armor, the design on (one side of) the chakram must be a remembrance of Lao Ma, but not directly from her. Does that mean that Xena designed the chakram? At the least, it means whoever gave it to her knew of her association with Lao Ma. (Another possibility is that Lao Ma *was* the source of the chakram, just sometime after this episode's flashbacks have ended. But personally, I'm betting that after that attack on Ming T'ien, Lao Ma pitched Xena and Borias outta there and they rode hell for leather to overrun half of Greece.)

Yet another person gives Xena the "you made me" speech. Ming T'ien's accusation is almost a duplicate of what Callisto has snarled. Xena's "I've learned to clean up after myself" response is telling. She tortured herself after allowing Callisto to die, but given the results with Ming, maybe she would do it all again if she had to - and maybe even do it earlier if given the chance. She doesn't give Ming T'ien the opportunity to make her regret letting him go free.

This probably marks me as a truly weird person, but I cheered when I saw that hairpin driven into Ming T'ien's skull. THERE'S the Xena we know - not this enlightened, let-'em-beat-me-up-and-imprison-me-while-I-tell-stories woman. That was Xena's return to blood, her failure to live up to the standard that Lao Ma and Gabrielle want to set up for her, but darn it, it's the don'-MESS-with-me warrior that I love to watch. Vigilante justice lives on in the Xenaverse.

It's Xena's turn to totally pull the wool over Gabrielle's eyes. As best as I can piece together what happened, Xena really was going to make it out of the temple without killing Ming until he called her back. He bragged about torturing Lao Ma to death, which was when Xena embroidered his temples together. And she must have THEN - here's the kicker - set him up in his throne and spoke to him, knowing that Gabrielle was going to return. She staged it so Gabrielle never got close, and led them both away while talking about how killing him wasn't necessary (self-recriminations begin already!). The whole scene is a cold setup to rival Gabrielle's story about Hope-pitching. It's interesting to note that while one lied about killing someone, the other lied about letting someone live.

And what kind of vicious twist of fate is it that this led to the moment when Xena was finally able to get the word "love" past her teeth for Gabrielle? Watch the sick look on Xena's face almost the moment she said it. She hated the fact that she could tell Gabrielle she loves her in the same breath as deceiving her. This was also the first time that Gabrielle, who has talked about loving Xena without problems, really pushed a button to try to get that response from her. She's searching big-time for some reassurance, and Xena provides it, even though she's hating herself at the same time.

Is Xena going to keep her superpowers? I sure hope not; I don't want her eating ambrosia, I don't need her to be Ares' daughter, and I don't want her throwing energy blasts at anything that annoys her. I don't think she will; XenaStaff seems to agree that Xena should be kept within the realms of mere mortals (though just barely). It will probably be explained like that weird floating scene, which she lost when Borias came in. This time, she lost it when she shish-ka-bobbed Ming T'ien's brain; the effect will probably be the same.

So let's take a look at Rift status. Giving my best attempt to predict the writers' plans, we've laid the Rift groundwork. Now it's a matter of dealing with consequences and repairs. Who would have thought that the SMALLER worries would be Xena turning her back on Gabrielle in Brittania and Gabrielle betraying Xena to her enemies in the kingdom of Chin? These "little" matters are mostly forgiven (though not forgotten), and our favorite duo is on the way back to Greece, wobbling as if on eggshells. Now they have to deal with the land mines they've laid for themselves. We can be pretty sure that Hope is going to reappear. Will word ever reach Gabrielle that Ming T'ien was killed in the attack on his palace?

Love is not a problem for these two; even in their worst moments so far, their care for each other has never even come close to being severed. This has boiled down to a matter of trust. Gabrielle didn't trust Xena to find a method other than bloodshed to deal with Hope. Xena didn't trust Gabrielle to understand that killing may have been the only option left for taking care of Ming. And they're both right. And they're both probably going to be left defending wrong actions they took for the right reasons with disastrous consequences for each other. Angst ahoy!

Return to the Wool-Gatherings.

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