If you're a Xena fan and want to see her in the crossover episodes, then don't miss this one. It's Xena's first appearance on television. Lucy Lawless has such a screen presence that she totally steals this episode.
Here we have a bad Xena. She's not the Xena you see in her series. Everything that takes place here, takes place while she is still bad. She wants to kill Hercules and plans on using Hercules' friend, Iolaus, to do it. She's manipulative and scheming.
At first, she acts helpless about a lame horse when Iolaus comes upon her. Later she praises him a lot and flirts with him. She then uses sex seducing Iolaus and gets him to fall for her. Apparently, she manipulates her own soldiers the same way seemingly with the promise of getting some and making them think that she loves them. They also fall in love with her. She then manipulates them to do stuff for her. Later she sends someone to kill Hercules knowing that Hercules will defeat them. She wants Hercules to come after her. Her plan is to have Hercules kill Iolaus(as he defends of her), and then while Hercules is devastated by killing his best friend, she'll move in to kill him.
The story is kind of immature, to be honest. I heard both Michael Hurst and Sorbo voiced their concern that it wasn't very believable that these two life-long friends could all of a sudden have their friendship broken-up by Xena. You know what, I think they have a point. There was really no build-up of any difficulties between Iolaus and Hercules. If they had that then maybe this would have worked better. But overall the story seemed very teenagerly, the big bad woman coming in between two best buds. See what I mean, immature. One of the scenes I didn't like is when Xena harms her horse in order to have Iolaus come upon her and help her. I don't like seeing animals being harmed on screen, especially deliberately, and it seemed so-not-Xena given her love for her horse Argo later in her own series. But then again she was still evil here and not a fully developed character until she got her own series.
Xena is referred to as 'The Warrior Princess' here for the first time too. Hercules is actually the first to call her that in a mocking way to Iolaus. Yet later villagers are also referring to her as 'The Warrior Princess'. So she is already known by that name. This appears to be an oddity in the script that Hercules would call her that, yet seemingly never heard of her before, yet this a name she is known for. I sometimes see people asking how Xena was this big 'Destroyer of Nations,' supposedly well-known and feared everywhere in her series, yet she seems more of a smalltime warrior here, and Hercules(or Iolaus) had never heard of her before. The simple explanation is this: Xena was not fully developed yet as a character. That didn't happen until she got her own show. This is her first appearance for goodness sakes. I'm always amazed at how some people go backwards and don't seem to have any basic common sense about this. She's not a real person ok. She's a fictional character that developed later.
The best parts of this episode really isn't the story itself, but seeing Lawless' screen presence as she takes over the episode. There's a great scene where she trains with her soldiers. They try to attack her and she fights them. You get a sense of how powerful and bad she is, as she declares how pathetic they are and how she wants Hercules dead. OMG, so much fun. All the other scenes where she is being manipulative and scheming are also so much fun to watch. Weak immature plot, but Lucy Lawless as Xena is what made this episode wonderful. I gave it an 8/10
Here we have a bad Xena. She's not the Xena you see in her series. Everything that takes place here, takes place while she is still bad. She wants to kill Hercules and plans on using Hercules' friend, Iolaus, to do it. She's manipulative and scheming.
At first, she acts helpless about a lame horse when Iolaus comes upon her. Later she praises him a lot and flirts with him. She then uses sex seducing Iolaus and gets him to fall for her. Apparently, she manipulates her own soldiers the same way seemingly with the promise of getting some and making them think that she loves them. They also fall in love with her. She then manipulates them to do stuff for her. Later she sends someone to kill Hercules knowing that Hercules will defeat them. She wants Hercules to come after her. Her plan is to have Hercules kill Iolaus(as he defends of her), and then while Hercules is devastated by killing his best friend, she'll move in to kill him.
The story is kind of immature, to be honest. I heard both Michael Hurst and Sorbo voiced their concern that it wasn't very believable that these two life-long friends could all of a sudden have their friendship broken-up by Xena. You know what, I think they have a point. There was really no build-up of any difficulties between Iolaus and Hercules. If they had that then maybe this would have worked better. But overall the story seemed very teenagerly, the big bad woman coming in between two best buds. See what I mean, immature. One of the scenes I didn't like is when Xena harms her horse in order to have Iolaus come upon her and help her. I don't like seeing animals being harmed on screen, especially deliberately, and it seemed so-not-Xena given her love for her horse Argo later in her own series. But then again she was still evil here and not a fully developed character until she got her own series.
Xena is referred to as 'The Warrior Princess' here for the first time too. Hercules is actually the first to call her that in a mocking way to Iolaus. Yet later villagers are also referring to her as 'The Warrior Princess'. So she is already known by that name. This appears to be an oddity in the script that Hercules would call her that, yet seemingly never heard of her before, yet this a name she is known for. I sometimes see people asking how Xena was this big 'Destroyer of Nations,' supposedly well-known and feared everywhere in her series, yet she seems more of a smalltime warrior here, and Hercules(or Iolaus) had never heard of her before. The simple explanation is this: Xena was not fully developed yet as a character. That didn't happen until she got her own show. This is her first appearance for goodness sakes. I'm always amazed at how some people go backwards and don't seem to have any basic common sense about this. She's not a real person ok. She's a fictional character that developed later.
The best parts of this episode really isn't the story itself, but seeing Lawless' screen presence as she takes over the episode. There's a great scene where she trains with her soldiers. They try to attack her and she fights them. You get a sense of how powerful and bad she is, as she declares how pathetic they are and how she wants Hercules dead. OMG, so much fun. All the other scenes where she is being manipulative and scheming are also so much fun to watch. Weak immature plot, but Lucy Lawless as Xena is what made this episode wonderful. I gave it an 8/10
