Ides of March

Let me say this part right off the bat: I love Callisto. I think she's one of the best villains to gleefully trot across my TV screen, ever. That's partially thanks to a great character idea, partially thanks to some mighty fine writing, and mostly thanks to the way Hudson Leick took that character, ran into the endzone, and then danced for the next thirty plays. And she does it again this episode, ripping into every scene with astounding glee.

Now, with that said: Bringing Callisto back cheapens the character and cheapens the killing-off they gave her last season. I can't take her seriously in this episode. Her only purpose is as a Callisto ex machina. I can't take Xena and Gabrielle's "death" seriously, either, when proof is running around the screen that we can hit people with god-killers and still bring them back.

I liked the taunting-Xena-n-Gabrielle in hell. Vicious "right here" point at the throat from Gabrielle, LOVED the saucy wink from Xena with the "Gotta love the irony" line. It was a good excuse to see the gals looking smug as all get-out.

Now we're combining Hell, Heaven, Tartarus, Elysium, an Amazon paradise, AND reincarnation? The afterlife is getting ridiculously crowded. And who is this "Him" running Hell? Callisto's temptations of Xena ("invite me into your soul"), her acknowledgement of her "Lord" (there's a first!), sure sound Satanic. Or maybe this is Dahak still running around?

To bookend (pardon the phrase) with the season-opener Xena-under-the-bearskin scene, we have Xena playing cowboy with Caesar to wind things up. Nice hip action, Lucy and Karl! That must have been an interesting day on the set. ("More ice water, please!")

The "Because whatever Gabrielle wants, Gabrielle gets" line confused me. I couldn't tell from Xena and Gab's reactions if that was a joke, a tease, an old argument... I'm not sure WHAT it was supposed to be.

Amarice has the symbol for woman on the pommel of her sword, just like Ephiny did in Maternal Instincts. Is this something all the amazons have, or is Amarice toting Ephiny's sword now?

This episode gave some of the best examples I've seen yet of Gabrielle's strength with this Way of Non-Violence (before Gabrielle ends up pitching it out the window). She succeeds in really taking someone out of a fight without hurting them, by dumping them in a river. She uses her importance and quick thinking to save Amarice. She gives Brutus a lot to think about. Very nice. Of course, then she vaults to the other side of the pendulum with a jump that would make Olympians envious.

Teeny camera blooper: When Xena asks Gabrielle to promise she won't follow her, Xena puts her hand on Gabrielle's shoulder. When the camera angle changes to Gabrielle's promise that she won't, the hand is gone.

Caesar gets a chuckle award for his flip "take Xena with you" line as a would-be assassin is dragged out of the room.

Eli's beliefs continue to be a bizarre hodgepodge of ideas. He's still praying to Abba, but now he's talking about emptying yourself of everything in order to truly love? Where'd that come from? And how does it match to his prayers, talk of pure hearts, and unwitting demon exorcisms that started him on this whole gig?

Xena's assassination attempt is pretty smooth - she throws an awfully snappy Roman salute. If it just weren't for that darned Callisto ex machina...

Gabrielle and Brutus have a lot of similarities to each other. Brutus's passionate defenses of Caesar in Endgame reminded me of the way Gabrielle defends Xena. The parallels continued in this episode as Brutus continued to believe fearlessly in his hero. But he, like Gabrielle, had to decide how his beliefs matched up to Caesar's, and whether they could coexist. Poor Brutus doesn't end up with quite the happy conclusion that Gabrielle does.

Xena rides hell for leather right into her own death vision. But her only other option was to stay away - and most likely avoid the vision by letting Gabrielle die alone. Xena chose to die with her. She's believed the vision was going to happen from the moment she saw it; I don't think she really believed she could save Gabrielle. But she sure wasn't going to let her die alone.

Who the heck was that horse that Xena rode to save Gabrielle? Where's Argo?

A couple Shakespeare notes:

• "Beware the Ides of March" does get spoken, but as a warning to Brutus instead of a warning to Caesar.
• Caesar meets the same death that Shakespeare gave him, with a round of stabbings from his own people, ended with "And you, Brutus?" (Et tu, Brute?) and Brutus striking the final, killing blow.

When Xena leads the group out of the prison, she throws her sword back, we hear the sound of it being sheathed... but she missed the scabbard. You can see the sword bounce off her back as she moves off-camera.

Honestly, this episode hadn't grabbed me all that much. Until the moment the chakram broke across Xena's back, ending it and Xena's fighting at the same time. And I realized that the reason Xena was being dragged in that darned vision was because her legs were paralyzed. And Gabrielle grabbed that staff. And I started to cheer like crazy because our Gab had her Gabwhacker again. Until the Gabwhacker turned out to be pointy, Gabrielle skewered a guy with it, picked up Xena's own sword, and turned into the Energizer killing bunny. My jaw hit the floor, and it didn't make it back up for a good ten minutes or so. I had to get up and walk around during the commercial break. What a scene. After six episodes of refusing to swing a fist, after a day or so of staring Xena's death vision in the face, Gabrielle finally snaps in a BIG ol' way and decides that no Way of Non-Violence is worth watching Xena die. Gabrielle gets medieval on seven guys by my count, each death more brutal than the next, as Gab urges Xena to get up and escape with each kill. Xena, meanwhile, who can barely move, seems to be dying by inches as she watches Gabrielle destroy everything around her and, to Xena's eyes, everything she's put her faith in. Wow. Gripping scene, fantastically played.

(My neighbors must have loved me during this scene. What the heck does "YEAH, Gab! Wha'.. no, wait! Hold on! WHOOAAAHHH! Too far, back up, backup, BACKUP! GEEZ!" mean?)

The camera work is wonderful when Xena wakes up with someone holding her... I was as unsure as Xena of who it was. It turns out to be Gabrielle, the person it should be, and Xena breathes a sigh of relief. Those scenes in the prison were amazing work by our two leading ladies - they had almost no physical action to go off of (other than the amazing sight of, for once, Gabrielle cradling Xena instead of the other way around). But with nothing but their lines and their faces they conveyed some pretty incredible deathbed emotions.

Xena's never read Gabrielle's scrolls? Ouch. Xena SHOULD apologize for that. She owes Gab a whole banquet of afterlife cookies for that one.

This Way of Non-Violence stuff had some serious problems. Now, the Way of Friendship? *That* fits Gabrielle in a heartbeat. That's my idea of a real Way of love, and that's the Way Gabrielle has been following since day one. So while it was brutal, vicious, and amazingly violent, I don't think Gabrielle's destruction of an entire Roman squad was an abandoning of her Way. I think it was her discovery of her real Way. Not that she's normally going to be slaughtering baddies left and right, but that in the name of protecting those she loves, the world should tremble.

Great imagery: Callisto catches snowflakes while Xena and Gabrielle head for the cross.

Gabrielle's afterlife wind-blown appearance and the cloudy-sky background match her Alti vision with the trumpets. Alti seems to have nailed it all the way around.

Callisto's a three-time loser in this episode. Caesar's not emperor (he's not even alive), Xena's not corrupted (she's even tighter with her Way than ever, and her bard with her), and she broke rank and physically hurt Xena. She's in biiig trouble with this mysterious "Him"-dude.

So... our heroes are dead. Deadski. In the afterlife. Which, as we know from this show, means zilch for whether they'll be back. The only question is HOW they'll be back. Will the cosmic referees decide that Callisto mucked with things too much and call a do-over? Will Eli and Amarice return to the scene and Eli will pull some of his mojo to save them? Will the XenaStaff do something REALLY bizarre like reincarnating our stars as instant adults in their next life? Only four short months to find out. (Har de har.)

Return to the Wool-Gatherings.

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