Disclaimer: I absolutely *LOATHED* this episode, and I have really nothing positive to say about it, and two days after watching it, I'm still pretty much incoherent with rage and depression, so if you don't want to listen to me ranting and raving and fuming, then you'd probably best read no further.
There is no way that I can do my usual kind of commentary on Ides Of March... that demands an attachment to, an affection for the ep, which I certainly don't have in this case. I have never been made so *ANGRY* and *UPSET* by a fictional television presentation. Being a serious fan of a television show has much in common with entering into a relationship with a person, or with subscribing to a religion. Note, I'm not saying that it's a substitute for those things - just that it has much in common with them. And when you become attached to a show, just as when you give your heart to a person, you naturally make yourself vulnerable. I guess, really, I'm just trying to rationalise why I feel so violated and betrayed by Ides Of March. I mean, I think it was a pile of crap, but then there's a lot of crap on TV, and generally I don't get upset about it...
To say that I hated this episode is a massive understatement... I loathed it, I despised it, I abhorred it. I could not *BELIEVE* they would do something like this. And presumably they actually planned it, and did it deliberately. All season I've put up with endless foreshadowings of that bloody crucifixion scene... and for WHAT? For this pile of horse doo-doo??!!
Can I explain why I hated it so much? Well not very well, at this point. I just can't bear to focus on it enough to dissect it intellectually. I hated pretty much every minute of it. But I suppose some things in particular stand out. I suppose the main, underlying reason I just felt like vomiting all through it was that I found its essential premise absolutely abhorrent and terminally destructive to the whole basis of the Xenaverse as we've known it (well as I've known it, anyhow...) The idea that everything is going to be reduced to a stupid battle against the devil in hell just makes me want to puke! They completely lost my sympathy and my willingness to buy into their conceits as soon as they went there. The strength of the show was always its humanistic basis, its strong foundation in basic human truths, and its essential simplicity. To reduce the whole thing to some stupid game full of arbitrary rules against a bad abstract absolute in a nasty hole is an obscene insult. WHO CARES anymore, if that's the way they're going??!! If they expect me to care whether Xena should do this or should do that because it's the right move according to whatever arbitrary rules they dream up for this game against the devil... well I don't care, I just don't care at all in that context. It doesn't MATTER anymore whether Xena or Gabrielle live or die... it doesn't matter whether they kill or refrain from killing... it doesn't matter if they gouge each other's eyes out... because in the context of this STUPID PREMISE NOTHING MATTERS! This drivel has absolutely *nothing* *zero* *nada* to do with the world I live in. And drivel it certainly was. In the context of this ep Eli just seemed like a complete barking idiot. I've never heard pacifism expressed in a way which made me feel it was so utterly trivial and stupid. Even the beautiful Indian music seemed cheap and tawdry, used as a signature tune for a moron. (And BTW, I don't think that pacifism *is* trivial, stupid and moronic - I just think this ep made it seem that way.) In fact the character who came out of it best by a massive distance was Amarice. And why? Not because she's a tremendously fascinating character, or greatly admirable or anything. But just because she was actually *HUMAN*, which nothing and nobody else in this *STUPID* *STUPID* episode was!!
I probably wouldn't have been happy with any season-ending episode in which Xena and Gabrielle were killed, since it seems to me a cheap tactic, and disrespectful and sadistic towards the show's fans. But this went *way* beyond that! This wasn't just an injury, it was also a massive insult. They not only killed Xena - they chopped her up and shat on her grave! If we were going to see Xena defeated and dying it should have been in a way in which we could see the grandeur and the squalor of real death... something we could respond to with honest emotion... not in a piece of despicable, nonsensical, garbled, muddied-metaphysical, pseudo-transcendent horse-shit like this!!
I guess I'm getting close to the nub of why I am so *MASSIVELY* angry and depressed about this ep. It did the absolute *WORST* thing that the creators of the show could *POSSIBLY* have done, in that it combined an attempt to crank up the *MAXIMUM* emotions the show possibly could by tragically killing the heroes, and at the same time *COMPLETELY* trashed and trivialised and made garbage and nonsense of the whole premise of the show. To crank up the emotions that way would be dangerous in itself - it's pretty manipulative, and really quite nasty as a way to treat the show's fans to do that in a season ender. But if the core values and premises of the show had been maintained, it might have been tolerable... nasty, unpleasant, offensive, and manipulative, but acceptable. *BUT* they most certainly *DIDN'T* maintain the core values and premises of the show. Likewise, if they'd screwed around with the core values and premises of the show, but done it mid-season, and without cranking up the emotional threshold so high, they might have got away with it. Well they already did that, so far as I'm concerned - I always felt that The Deliverer / Gabrielle's Hope / Maternal Instincts basically trashed the core values and premises of the show, and I said so quite vehemently at the time, and repeatedly since. BUT, since they did it mid-season, and pulled out of it well, the show survived. Or I guess what I really mean is, my ability to hang in with the show survived, albeit that it had been severely wounded. But *THIS*! This is like the offence of Deliverer/GH/MI magnified off the scale, and cranked up with immense emotional demands. I *want* to respond to the emotional demands of this episode - I'm invested in the characters, and I feel the pull - but the script, the whole premise of the episode is such fatuous, offensive, insulting garbage that I'm just totally alienated from it.
So far as I can see, they really blew it this time. This ep was an utter, unmitigated disaster. Truly, both figuratively and literally, in this ep the show went to hell. Essentially they've just trashed all that they've done... they've filthied and besmirched everything they spent years building.
I mourn for the Warrior Princess and the Bard I knew, pointlessly thrown to worthless deaths by those who should have cared for them, all for a cheap and stupid idea.
***
I found it completely impossible to see the premises and plot of this episode as anything other than grotesque and insulting, an appalling, unpleasant travesty which I couldn't watch without gagging. So to see characters I actually care about depicted and then ultimately killed within this context... well, it was disgusting... sort of like having members of your family kicked to death by a troupe of extremely bad mimes... there was something really obscene about it.
I just can't take this nonsense - sending Greek gods to hell, having Callisto bouncing around muttering about "my Lord" like some cheap-ass, lame-brained Satanist... puh-lease! I just can't take any script involving this kind of thing seriously - but then I *do* (or at least did) take the characters of Xena and Gab seriously... so I really resent them being put through the emotional wringer and ultimately killed in the context of drivel like this. And I really don't think that I want to visit the Xenaverse anymore if it's going to be populated with Satanic pixies randomly materialising wherever and whenever they feel like it! Bah!
***
So who was who in Ides Of March?
* Callisto was played once more by Hudson Leick. Apart from playing Callisto in various eps of X:WP and HTLJ, Hudson has also played Liz Friedman, the Renpics staffer (now sadly no longer working on our shows) in the HTLJ eps Yes Virginia There Is A Hercules and For Those Of You Just Joining Us.
Hudson has played semi-regular roles in several TV shows - Shelly Hanson in Melrose Place, Tracy Stone in University Hospital, and Hannah in Knight Rider 2010. She also appeared in the TV movie Hijacked: Flight 285 in 1996, and has guested on eps of 7th Heaven (playing Ms. Hunter in Homecoming), Touched By An Angel (playing Celeste in Labor Of Love and The Angel Of Death), and Law & Order (playing Kathy Rogers in Black Tie).
It's a little harder to see Hudson at the movies. She was apparently in a 1997 film called After The Game, but I can't find out much about that one. She appeared in the comedy Denial, with Angie Everhart and Adam Rifkin. All I've seen of that one was a brief video clip - *not* quite the way we're accustomed to seeing Hudson. I believe it was made for US cable, and apparently it's now been released to video under the title Something About Sex.
Hudson has two movies currently somewhere in the production process, and hence, presumably to be released soon - Blood Type, a comedy, and Chill Factor, a thriller, in which she stars with Cuba Gooding Jr. and Skeet Ulrich.
* Brutus, that honourable man, was played again, as in Endgame, by David Franklin. Previously Brutus was played by Grant Triplow in Destiny and When In Rome, and Dusen Young in A Good Day, thereby, I would suggest, winning him the prize as the most confusing character in the Xenaverse.
David had not played any other roles in the Xenaverse before appearing as Brutus in Endgame, but I have now been able to confirm, with the assistance of various helpful Xenites, that this *is* the same David Franklin who appeared in The Flood: Who Will Save Our Children? with Reneé O'Connor (which, alas, I haven't seen), and also in the Australian TV movie Fable with Monroe Reimers (the ill-fated priest Vikram in Devi).
* Caesar, Julius Caesar, was played as usual, but presumably for the last time, by Karl Urban, whose other Xenaverse roles are Cupid (in For Him The Bell Tolls and A Comedy Of Eros, and the HTLJ ep The Green-Eyed Monster), and Maell in Altared States.
At the movies, Karl (who is a Kiwi, born in Wellington in 1972) can be seen in the 1998 thriller Heaven, which also features Clint Sharplin (Opakas in Sky High, Kenickus in Regrets I've Had A Few, and a Celtic Villager in Resurrection), and in the NZ war movie Chunuk Bair, with Geoff Dolan (who headed the Fashion Police in Greece Is Burning and who was also the chief goon in And Fancy Free, and Orenth in The Lady and the Dragon) and Norman Forsey (King Lias in W.P and W.P.T1, Casca in BTDT, Megas the old prisoner in Key To The Kingdom, Tiresias in The Road to Calydon, The Festival of Dionysus and The Outcast, Old Merlin in Once Upon A Future King).
* The feisty but immature young Amazon Americe, first seen in Endgame, was played by Jennifer Sky, who is new to the Xenaverse. If you recognised her, it was most likely from her stint on General Hospital, playing Sarah Webber, from 1997-98. She was also in the TV series Emerald Cove, and the TV feature Our Son, The Matchmaker. Or perhaps you recognised her from the Buffy The Vampire Slayer episode The Pack, in which she guested as Heidi. She has also appeared in episodes of Sins Of The City and Out Of The Blue.
And Anne Warfield wrote "You can add an appearance on SeaQuest--she had a bit part in the 2nd season episode The Fear that Follows."
* Timothy Omundson, who reprised his role as Eli the avatar in this ep, can be seen in Starship Troopers (a dreadful movie, I thought - the sort of thing that gets Science Fiction a bad name...), playing a Psychic. He also appeared in the Frasier ep Good Grief as the Director (he didn't direct the ep - he played a director in it). Timothy is an American, born in Missouri and raised in Seattle. He was featured in a Fox series called Medicine Ball (I mistakenly identified this as forthcoming previously, based on an undated release, but apparently it has been and gone). He played the recurring role of Dr. Joshua Levin on Seaquest, and has also done guest spots on Seinfeld (don't know which ep) and Legacy (in the ep Search Party).
* John Leigh was credited as "Nabcot" according to the best of my ability in reading those darned scrunched-up end credits. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I believe, basically by process of elimination, that this must have been the guy talking to Callisto in hell. John has never appeared in a credited role in the Xenaverse before, but he has some fairly typical credits for a NZ actor. He did a stint on the NZ soap Shortland Street (as Lionel Skeggins 1995-) He appeared in the movie The Frighteners, which starred Michael J. Fox, and also featured Stuart Devenie (Asterius the Magistrate in And Fancy Free, Count Von Verminhaven in Greece Is Burning, and Kernunnos in Resurrection and Render Unto Caesar), Danny Lineham (Drinker #2 in The Warrior Princess, Grathios in The Reckoning, Lycus in The Sword of Veracity, Johe in Prodigal Sister, and the School Teacher in Let There Be Light), George Port (the First Critic in The Play's The Thing), and Jim McLarty (Myles in Eye of the Beholder, Pankos in Armageddon Now part 2, the Teacher in Reunions, the eye popping Fish Merchant in Love On The Rocks).
John also appeared in the 1996 NZ movie Chicken, in which Hori Ahipene, the zany thug leader Brutus in Love On The Rocks, can also be seen. And John was also in the 1992 NZ war movie Chunuk Bair along with quite a few other actors we know (see under Karl Urban above).
* The jailer was played by Sean Ashton-Peach (quite a name to go through life with - at least his credits are distinctive). Sean was previously seen as Zealot #1 in Altared States.
* Did you think that the burly warlord who came in and plonked what he claimed was Xena's head in front of Caesar looked at all familiar? You might well have... he was played by Jim Ngaata, who previously took a very big role in the Xenaverse - Gareth, the giant, in A Day in the Life! Jim also played a guard in the HTLJ ep Under The Broken Sky.
* The guy who got the pinch put on him after Xena was attacked near the beginning of the ep probably looked familiar too. He was played by Rodney Cooke (or "Cook" - they just don't seem to be able to make up their minds about that final "e") who has previously been seen as "Man #1" in Been There Done That, and, over on HTLJ, as a "Worried Villager" in Armageddon Now Part 1 and as a farmer in Stranger And Stranger.
* For the other two credited actors, Jane Fullerton-Smith as "Woman in hell" and Alan Poppleton as "Hanged man", I was able to find no prior credits.
* The writer was R.J. Stewart, who still holds the record as the most credited writer for X:WP... he wrote The Titans, Prometheus, ACAOTPB, AFOD, MB, Callisto, RoC, Warrior...Princess...Tramp, ADITL, Ulysses, The Furies, Gabrielle's Hope, Forgiven, Crusader, and The Way, plus being credited as Teleplay Writer for SOTP, Destiny, The Debt 1 & 2, and AITST 1 & 2, and as Story Writer for The Quest, both Debts and both parts of AITST.
* The ep was directed by Ken Girotti, who is new to the Xenaverse, but who appears to be a *very* busy and successful TV director, having directed for Total Recall 2070, Earth: Final Conflict, Fast Track, Stargate SG-1, La Femme Nikita, Dead Man's Gun, Psi Factor: Chronicles of the Paranormal, Poltergeist: The Legacy, Black Harbour, Two, Mysterious Island, The Outer Limits, Hawkeye, Side Effects, TekWar, Beyond Reality, Catwalk, Top Cops, Inside Stories, E.N.G., Captain Power: The Beginning, T. and T., The Campbells, My Secret Identity, Captain Power and the Soldiers of the Future, The Littlest Hobo, and Nightstick.
***
The disclaimer was:
Xena and Gabrielle were killed during the production of this motion picture.
(And so, I'm afraid, so far as I'm concerned, was any dignity and credibility that the show Xena: Warrior Princess ever had...)
***
And who was who in My Best Girl's Wedding?
* Alexandra Tydings is well known to us as the lovely Aphrodite, to say nothing of the fetching Katherine the Pig (about the only saving grace of One Fowl Day, for me). She can also be seen as Victoria Reynolds in The Sunchaser, and in two eps of The Red Shoe Diaries entitled Burning Up and Love At First Sight (in both of which, I should perhaps caution you, even more of her is seen than in her role as 'Dite).
* The fetching amphibian, Nautica, herself was played by Angela Dotchin who may seem familiar for a couple of reasons. Xena fans will of course recognise her as Suraya, the young bride from last season's ep Tsunami. And those who watch Young Hercules will recognise her from her regular role as Kora. She also appeared on the NZ soap Shortland Street (along with most of the NZ acting profession), playing Kirsty Knight from 1992 to 1998.
* I bet the ugly bridegroom Lysaca looked familiar to you. He certainly should have, although admittedly it's been a little while since we saw him. The actor was Patrick Wilson, who was most recently seen as Captain Gerard in Les Contemptibles. Patrick also played Big Titus in The Power, Estragon in The Warrior Princess, and Pilgrim #1 in The Wrong Path, and he played the Chief Monk in the pre series TV movie Hercules And The Lost Kingdom. Over on X:WP Patrick only played one role, but it was quite a memorable one - the Cyclops who almost ate Gabrielle in Sins of the Past!
Patrick can also be seen in the NZ movie Broken English, which can now be found on video shelves. This film also features Marton Csokas (Borias, Khrafstar), Gilbert Goldie (the Town Elder in LUATD, Nevus in Hercules And The Lost Kingdom), Amanda Rees (Mina in The Sword of Veracity, Marpessa in We'll Always Have Cyprus), and Stephen Hall (Hector in SOTP, Thelonius in TQIM, the Captain in Tsunami, Therax in The Play's The Thing, Purces in The Fire Down Below).
* The love of Herc's life, Serena, was appropriately enough played by the love of Kevin Sorbo's life (well hopefully anyway, since they're married) Sam Sorbo. Sam, previously credited as Sam Jenkins, first appeared on HTLJ as Kirin in the ep Prince Hercules, and has played Serena (also sometimes the Golden Hind) in Encounter, When A Man Loves A Woman, and Judgement Day.
Sam was a regular on the medical drama Chicago Hope, as Dr. Caroline Eggert, and she guested on the shows JAG (playing Pvt. Whitley in Boot), and SeaQuest DSV, on which Ted Raimi (Joxer) was a regular (playing Maria in Daggers, Dagger Redux).
At the movies Sam can be seen in The Crew, Ed And His Dead Mother, Fortunes Of War, Twenty Bucks, Obiettivo Indiscreto, Night Of The Warrior, and The Bonfire Of The Vanities.
* Nautica's largely moribund dad, Triton, was played by Bruce Hopkins. His most recent Xenaverse role other than Triton was also as a dad - Rahl, Vanessa / Pilee's father in the X:WP ep Daughter Of Pomira. On HTLJ he also played Pylon (no doubt he was electric in the role ) in Cast A Giant Shadow, Jordis in Heedless Hearts, and Nehemiah in Regrets I've Had A Few, and on X:WP we first saw him in Dreamworker as Termin, the first person Xena ever killed, and he also appeared in Ten Little Warlords as Tegason.
* David Goodwin was credited as Mego. I believe he was one of Lysaca's henchmen. David hasn't appeared on HTLJ before, but on X:WP he played a thief in Girls Just Wanna Have Fun and Lark, one of the delinquents in Forgiven.
* Did the voice of the supernatural entity the Cabiri sound at all familiar to you? It might well have, since it was that of Donogh Rees, who was most recently heard (but not seen) playing the somewhat similar role of the Titan Mnemosyne in Let There Be Light. Donogh also played the dreadfully tragic (and *very* strangely accented) Frigga, in the eps Norse By Norsevest and Somewhere Over Rainbow Bridge.
Donogh has several NZ movie credits. She can be seen in Sinking Of The Rainbow Warrior, along with Lucy Lawless, and several other folks who've shown up in the Xenaverse - Donogh played the Lab Supervisor. Donogh is also in the 1987 NZ film, Starlight Hotel (1987), which also features Norman Forsey (King Lias in W.P and W.P.T1, Casca in BTDT, Megas the old prisoner in Key To The Kingdom, Tiresias in The Road To Calydon, The Festival Of Dionysus and The Outcast, Old Merlin in Once Upon A Future King), and she starred in the 1984 NZ film Constance, which also featured Mark Hadlow (Zera's unctuous sidekick Milo in The Play's The Thing), Yvonne Lawley (Gryphia in Key To The Kingdom, Woman in Hercules And The Circle of Fire, Old Woman in Market in Hercules In The Underworld, Alyssa in Beanstalks And Bad Eggs, the Norn in Norse By Norsevest and Somewhere Over Rainbow Bridge) and William Kircher (the Prison Overseer in LUATD). Donogh can also be seen in 1992 NZ film Crush, together with Terry Batchelor ("Burly Man" in Greece Is Burning, Trikonis in Hercules In The Maze Of The Minotaur, Mudo in The March To Freedom, and Segallus in All That Glitters).
Donogh also appeared in the NZ TV series City Life, together with Katrina Browne (Mendala in When In Rome, Thelassa in Locked Up And Tied Down), Lisa Chappell (Daughter #1 in Hercules And The Circle of Fire, Lydia in Pride Comes Before A Brawl, Dirce in The King Of Thieves and The Wedding Of Alcmene, Princess Melissa in War Brides, Queen Melissa and Dirce in Hercules On Trial, and Melissa Blake in Yes Virginia There Is A Hercules and For Those Of You Just Joining Us), Peter Muller (Deric in As Darkness Falls, The Outcast and The Wedding Of Alcmene, Dustinus Hoofmanus in The Play's The Thing), and Charles Mesure (Mercer in The Price, Darnelle in TDHD and Johnny Pinto in Yes Virginia There Is A Hercules).
* The other two credited cast members were Dave Collins as Tewtle (?) and Georgina Linney as Serena's child, and I could find no prior credits for them.
* The ep was written by Gerry Conway, who previously wrote the eps Stranger and Stranger (with Paul Robert Coyle), Norse by Norsevest (with Paul Robert Coyle), Somewhere Over Rainbow Bridge, and Fade Out.
* The director was Andrew Merrifield, who has not previously directed for HTLJ, but who directed the X:WP eps Been There Done That, Gabrielle's Hope, The Quill Is Mightier, Vanishing Act, and The Convert.
***
The disclaimer was:
No floundering fish were filleted during the production of this motion picture.
