Married with Fishsticks
In a nutshell: Gabrielle gets konked on the head and thinks she's a mermaid married to Joxer.
I've been stunned speechless. In every episode, the
ones I love and the ones I'm not thrilled with, I try to point out the
good as well as the bad. But I'm stumped. The closest I can come
to good things to say is that a) Discord doesn't do
a bad Fran Drescher impersonation (talk about a left-handed compliment),
and b) I liked some of the insults Aphrodite and Discord traded at the
beginning and the end.
That's it. I'm sure this episode was supposed to be a comedy, but I spent the whole time waiting for something make me smile, let alone laugh. Nothing even outraged me like In Sickness and In Hell. I was just bored.
The episode was patterned after the movie Overboard. Not a piece of filmmaking genius, but I at least liked it for its heart and the warmth of the characters. The episode took the plot ideas but left out the heart. Other than a little bit of Roe, when did Gabrielle win over the kids? Or Hagar? Why would she come to like the place or decide to stick around past the first five minutes? Was this a dream (hence the horrid hair) or an actual underwater world (hence all the "going back" and memory business)? And when was it going to get funny?
Orci and Kurtzman have had the reins of Xena for a half-season now, and have blatantly proved that they don't have the foggiest idea what the show is about. This was an appropriate final act for them. May your keyboards rest in Tartarus, O&K. Don't let the door hit you on the ass on the way out.
I'm going to go watch Aphipolis Under Siege again.
Return to the Wool-Gatherings.
Rate-A-Xena is brought to you by the letter omega, the number IV, and Beth Griese. Feel free to send any comments or questions my way!