Eve

The "Last week on Xena" clips showed a different final line than what was actually aired on Livia. In the show, Xena said Livia was going to "do something terrible." In the catch-up clips, she said "We gotta save her from herself... and the gods." That kinda sums up the change in the focus of the two episodes.

Gabrielle's horse has changed since last episode, too. Last week, the horse was brown with a white blaze on the nose, kinda like her old horse looked. This one was mottled white.

Livia apparently decided to rise beyond Mommy's old rule about killing women and children. It's nice to see ambition in one so young.

The ironic line of the season goes to Eve when she informs the helpless villager she's about to slaughter that "I'm not Callisto." Double that with Joxer's line that introduced the whole scene of "With you as a mother, how bad can she be?", and we're just about wallowing in the references to her nasty-tending parentage.

My main beef with this episode is that in all its focus on Xena's attempts to redeem Eve, the story pretty much forgets Gabrielle. What happened to Gabrielle's love for Eve, too? Xena even shakes off Gabrielle when they discover the destroyed village. Gabrielle is the one who loses faith and tells Xena that Eve's as good as dead. Other than one ill-fated attempt to talk to Eve, the bard is pretty much relegated to background status in this episode. That sucks.

The grieving woman in the village really grabbed the gusto with her thirty seconds of screen time. "And the Emmy for most melodrama in a walk-on part goes to..."

Xena's line "She's my daughter, you sick bastard" was good, but it didn't match it's almost-matching "My son is dead, you soulless bastard" of two seasons ago. No matter what's going on with Xena's kids, Ares finds a way to take the backlash for it.

Speaking of which, Ares hasn't lost his total inability to deal with his favorite women. He screws up and says all the wrong things to Eve pretty much like he did to Xena, and again fails to see the persuasiveness of love instead of power and might. Guess you can't teach an old god new tricks.

When the Romans camp, listen for the "About TIME we got a break!" background line. The foley artists have been having fun again.

Ares is still the one talking sense about this twilight business. Eve has been running around healthy for 25 years now, and the only damage the gods have suffered has been done to themselves. The only flaw in his logic is that the fates never said that the twilight would happen immediately after Eve's birth or Xena's death. (The next prophecy might be "Eve's death of old age and her remains' skeleton will bring about the twilight of the gods.")

The "Ares might have opened the door, but Eve had to walk through" conversation almost seems like it was cut from a different scene, or a stock scene to be inserted later in production. Xena and Gabrielle were walking with Joxer and Virgil. Suddenly they're standing still and having a heart-to-heart in close focus. It's a static, setup conversation that could have been tacked anywhere in the first half of the episode.

Crucifixion as "arts and crafts": great superhero wisecrack from Xena!

There's two very nice touches within five seconds in the village battle: the falling nail as Joxer scrambles away from Eve, and Eve managing a MUCH better dagger throw at Xena than she did last week. That one would have gone right into Xena's eye. (It's all fun and games until...)

Ares does score some major hits on Xena during this episode. His "how does it feel knowing the person you love despises you" speech was a good one, and he absolutely cuts her off at the knees with his later suggestion that just because Xena doesn't care for sleeping with him, Joxer and many others have to die. Ouch.

Livia is TOUGH on the furniture when she's upset. She must be the pre-Mycenean version of the rockers who trash their hotel rooms.

Gabrielle, the one who killed Hope, asks Xena if she could kill Eve. Xena says she could, and the voice of experience worries that she has to "Keep Xena from doing something she'd never forgive herself for." But despite the greater good, Xena can't kill Eve. In the end, Xena's decision is borne up, because Eve was miraculously redeemed while Hope wasn't. But it still makes the whole Hope mess even uglier.

Wow, Joxer gave an order when he sent Virgil to get Xena. And it was impressive. And it was obeyed. And then he manages to bonk a guard and sneak into Livia's camp. AND count to twenty. The years have been good to Joxer.

Once again in this episode, Eve shows an incredibly strong leaning toward that pesky Callisto soul. She even has the annoyed-but-fascinated head tilt down pat as Xena's tearing through her camp.

Joxer got the hero's end he always would have wanted, saving Gabrielle. Of course, it was unnecessary and Xena would have had it taken care of, but that part's kind of fitting for Joxer, too. All in all, a suitable way for the guy to go.

Eli's message has changed drastically in the last 25 years. Virgil is a follower of Eli? That explains quite a few things about the last two episodes (like how he knew all these people), but Virgil's been fighting people left and right. The last we heard from Eli, that was a big no-no in his book. And since when does Xena follow Eli? I thought The Way had settled that Eli's was the Way of Love and Xena's was the Way of the Warrior.

The two times Xena has ever prayed has been for the salvation of those she loves the most during their darkest hours - once for Gabrielle, now for Eve.

Eve is like the little ant with high hopes. Xena has kicked her butt twice. The fights weren't even really close. But Eve still seems convinced that THIS time, Mom's toast. I hope conversion gives the woman some brains.

I wasn't big on the first two Xena-Eve fights, but the final one rocked. FANTASTIC moment when Eve split the chakram with her sword and caught the pieces. (Hilarious "WHO'S MY GIRL?!?" cheer from Ares.) The only two who have ever wielded the chakram are Xena and Callisto. Eve was literally born to do it.

When the soldiers were revealed, Gabrielle did one of those awesome flips of the sais into battle stance. But it was a bit TOO memorable, because it made it more obvious that when Eve gave the order to attack, Gab suddenly had a sword in her hand instead of the sais.

I'm not sure that seeing my own birth and my mother breast-feeding me would convince me of any great conversion to love - that qualifies as way too much information.

The Christian symbolism continues: Eli's temple is covered in drawings of a fish. And speaking of Christian references:

Meanwhile, Saul was still breathing out murderous threats against the Lord's disciples. He went to the high priest and asked him for letters to the synagogues in Damascus, so that if he found any there who belonged to the Way, whether men or women, he might take them as prisoners to Jerusalem. As he neared Damascus on his journey, suddenly a light from heaven flashed around him.
   -- Acts 9:1-3

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