From: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org (chakram-refugees-digest) To: chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Subject: chakram-refugees-digest V2 #281 Reply-To: chakram-refugees@smoe.org Sender: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk chakram-refugees-digest Friday, October 11 2002 Volume 02 : Number 281 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: chakram-refugees-digest V2 #279 [cr > [cr ] [chakram-refugees] Birds Of Prey O/S [] Re: [chakram-refugees] Birds Of Prey O/S [Lynn W Ribaud > [IfeRae@aol.com] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2002 20:27:19 +1300 From: cr Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: chakram-refugees-digest V2 #279 On Thursday 10 October 2002 09:31, cande@sunlink.net wrote: > > From: cr > > "Hell, if Bellerophon was going to attack the > Amazon camp again, that gave them the perfect chance for an ambush." > > That's a big if. There would be no reason to attack the Amazon camp again. > He got what he wanted the first time around - Varia as hostage. The only > way to entice him into attacking again was to do nothing about Varia. If > he couldn't get the Amazons to come to him he would have to come to him. > If this happened he would be prepared for an ambush. OK, this was in reply to a comment that was made (on the other list?) that Bellerophon would just keep on attacking the Amazons till there were none left. I agree it's a big if. > "He was only impregnable while he > stayed in his castle. Siege tactics would > work. Amazons surround the castle in the forest and pick off anyone who > pokes their nose far outside the walls. That's what Amazons were > supposed to be *good* at. That's what bows and arrows are good at." > > True a sige would work if you had the time and manpower to maintain the > seige. For a successful seige you have to be prepared to stay there for a > really long time remember the sege of Troy took ten years. Did the Amzons > have the resourches to keep their troops in the field for that long and > would the Amazons have the patience for this. Well, my impression is, this group of Amazons *lived* in the forest. They should certainly have been better at fighting in it than Bellerophon's mounted troops. Bellerophon's troops being male had physical strength. The Amazons had the agility. So, where do they have the best advantage? Not in a pitched battle, I'm sure. > If Bellephone had prepared > for the seige he could just out waited the Amazons added to that he also > had a hostage. So what stops him from dangling Varia from a parapet to > just to get the Amazons riled up. So they would be forced to try to storm > the castle and that takes seige machines which the Amzons would have build. Well, if he dangled Varia from a parapet too long she'd die and lose all hostage value. All the time they were trying to storm the castle, they were playing his game. They could, actually, certainly have built a trebuchet ('catapult') though it takes a lot of (wo)manpower. And possibly rather more to collect the 200-lb stone balls to fire from it. However, such a machine was devastatingly effective against thick stone castle walls, it could probably demolish B's castle in a week or so, once they had it built. (Trouble was, really powerful trebuchets weren't developed until the 13th (?) century, but then we know Xena has many skills ;) > "Fighting in forests with lots of > cover. Armed men on horseback lose most of > their advantage in a forest. > Head-on attacks against a fortified castle > was *not* what Amazons were good > at." > > The problem with Halicon was not that the Amazon's attacked head on. They > were actually trying to attack from the rear. Sneak up on the castle from > the sea. The trouble was that they lacked information on Bellephone > motives for his orginal attack. They didn't know until Xena sneaked into > the castle that he was luring them into a trap and by then it was too late. I think the exercise would have been futile even if they hadn't been bombarded on the beach. They would have reached the castle walls and then what? Scale them - how? > "Just to elaborate on that.... consider a pine > forest (which is what Bellerophon's castle was in). A few narrow tracks > through it, which horses could use, but above all lots of trees close > together and plenty of cover. The whole place is built for ambushes." > > Isn't that what happened. Xena lured him into the forest and the Amazon's > ambushed him. Eventually, yes. That's what they should have done in the first place. Ignore Varia. Once they did that, she lost her value to Bellerophon. > The error Bellephone made was letting Varia go. As long he > had her, he forced the Amazons to attack the castle. Once he let her go > the Amazons could have left and he would have had to leave the castle to > get at them. Bellephone's plan to use Varia to kill Gabrielle was very > iffy at best with Xena watching Gabrielle's back - Varia had very little > hope of succeeding. Well, what they *should* have done was erect a nice memorial to Varia and elect a new Queen. Varia was only useful to Bellerophon as long as the Amazons let her be. > The criticism about this episode centers a lot around the battle tactics > used here. And they are all valid - Xena, a very good general, would never > have allowed troops to attack withoutproper intelligence about her enemy. > The point of the episode was however a character study of Gabrielle under > stress and to emphasis her growing independence from Xena. It was also > calculated to show a change in Xena's character. To be frank (I'm about > stick my head out to be shot by numerous Amazon arrows) is that I have > found in fan fiction at least that women don't write battles very well. Men > do a much better job (Jim Kuntz and Leonard Fox come to mind). Women are > interested in developing the characters and spend a lot of time preparing > for battle but the battles themselves are never very realistic. The men > write the battles better and use them in a better way to demonstrated > character than women writers. > > CherylA I don't know the fan fiction but maybe you're right. Probably because of the fact that men seem to be more interested in military tactics etc. I know Gabfans often complain that her character is mistreated to further the plot, I think in this ep Xenafans could make a similar complaint about Xena's acquiescence with Gabby's plan. cr ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2002 22:59:32 +1300 From: cr Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] <> On Thursday 10 October 2002 04:55, cande@sunlink.net wrote: > # > # > # > # > # > # > > This is unfortunately a vaguely disappointing episode. It is, I suppose, a > sequel to The debt and perhaps therein lies the problem. When you have an > episode as great as The Debt you have to make sure your follow up is > equally impressive and this just doesn't measure up. I think maybe 'Them Bones' and this ep suffered from the same phenomenon - that of comparison with the originals. I guess, realistically, if the original episode is one of the very best of the entire series, it's too much to expect that the sequel will be as good. It's possible, but the odds are against it. Personally, I liked 'Purity'. Colourful, plenty of action, and I actually liked Marie Matiko better than Jacqueline Kim. (OK, so it's personal preference). Sure it didn't have quite the weight or the brilliant ironic lines of The Debt, but IMO it was an entirely watchable ep. > Lets start with the writing. I usually am pretty YAXI proof - I don't care > that last week Xena said she would never eat blueberry pie and then the > next week she wants blueberry pie - but here the YAXI are so blatant that > they can't be ignored. It would have been nice the writer of this episode > had at least paid attention when he'd watched The Debt (if he did watch > it). There's a point when Xena is the woods with Lao Mao's good daughter > and we see a flashback of Xena running through the woods being chased by > dogs. She turns to the daughter and says "This is where I first I met your > mother" and then there's a flash of Lao Ma meeting Tien's train with the > captive Xena. Everyone knows that's not when Xena met Lao Ma and if Xena > had said "this is where your mother saved my life" the scene would have > made more sense - its just plain annoying when an error like that is made. My (rather weak) explanation for this is that Xena couldn't be bothered explaining "This is where I met your mother for the second time" and having to explain about Borias yadda yadda.... OK, so I said it was weak. But it's better than a YAXI. ;) > Then we have the issue of why Lao Mao hid her daughters. If she had hidden > them from their father so they wouldn't have been used a pawn by him to > further his goals it would have made sense. But to hid them from Ming Tien > doesn't make sense - Ming Tien must have been a mere toddler when the twins > were born - was Lao Ma clairvoyant to know he would hate them and why > should he - it was made clear in The Debt that women had no political power > (Lao Mao basically used her husband as a front for her power) so why would > Ming Tien fear his sisters. Well, there I must disagree. If Lao Ma could successfully rule using the pretext of her never-seen husband, it must have occurred to Ming that one of her daughters could pull the same stunt with him. Murderous and fanatical rulers didn't need much incentive to remove potential complications from the scene, I think hiding them from Ming sounds like an excellent scheme. > > Speaking of odd there are a number of huh moments here. I don't quit > exactly know the nature of Xena relationship with Lao Mao but when evil > daughter said Xena was Lao Mao surrogate daughter I went huh. Whatever > there relationship was mother and daughter doesn't spring to mind. That actually made sense to me. Lao Ma had hidden her daughters safely away, and doesn't dare contact them in case Ming Tzu finds out... now here's this young woman with a lot of potential who can look after herself rather better than her daughters... I can quite see it as a foster-mother - daughter relationship. > Then we > have Gabrielle go off with Joxer to find the missing ingredient for the > black powder because Joxer knows all about spices and is by implication a > good cook. Since when - last time he cooked (ISAIH) he gave a whole army > the trots. Errr, no, I guess one could be knowledgeable about cooking without being very good at it. In fact I imagine one of the main functions of spices is to hide the taste of the food... so Jox oughta know all about them. > > The acting itself can't be faulted. Marie Matiko was so good playing the > sisters Pao Ssu (evil) and K'ao Hsin (good) that originally I thought they > were being played by two separate actresses. That's exactly what I thought too. It wasn't till I read the credits on Whoosh, and even then I had to go back and take another look to persuade myself that Whoosh hadn't made a mistake. Excellent acting, IMO. And incidentally, I like Kao Hsin better than Pao Ssu - one of the few cases where I like 'good' better than 'evil' in supporting characters. ;) > > The two high points of the episode were Gabrielle and Joxer. They seem to > be having a great time. I love Gabby's line in the Chinese market place > that the natives will feel more comfortable if she and Joxer dress like > natives - yep I see her point the short green-eyed blond and the tall geek > now blend right in. Also when she and Joxer get captured and lock in stocks > I liked Gabby using her contortionist skills to pick Joxer's pant leg to > with her foot to retrieve a bag of black powder - Gabby was wonderfully > disgusted and Joxer happily thrilled when she bumped into a certain part > of his anatomy. As I recall it, certain noisy contingents of fans were equally disgusted about that. I laughed at it. But then I'm disgusting. ;) What I thought was very weak was Gabby blowing the padlock apart with the black powder. Quite aside from the fact that any explosive powerful enough to do that would have blown her hand off (or sent the padlock through her head!), it would have to be a high explosive like PETN or nitroglycerine etc. Gunpowder is a bulk explosive, it only has any explosive force when confined or in a very large quantity (like, tons. The explosion that killed Pao S'su was possible, though I doubt if black powder would have been as colourful, I think RenPics explosive expert mixed some strontium salts into the brew). A small quantity like that shown would just have flashed off and maybe left Gabby with minor burns. I just realised - just like The Debt, it starts with a wounded messenger appearing out of the bushes. Same thing happened in Friend in Need except the guy was just clumsy, not wounded. Memo to Xena in her next incarnation: You hear someone stumbling about in the bushes searching for you, chacky them quick and *do not* read any bits of paper they're carrying. Your life insurance company will love you for it. cr ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2002 13:29:25 -0400 From: Subject: [chakram-refugees] Birds Of Prey O/S I watched Birds Of Prey last night and enjoyed it very much. I thought however I saw a few similarities or perhaps homages to Xena - besides the new chatty and persistant sidekick there's the round throwing disks and at the end a villianess that looked and sounded a lot like a short haired Callisto. CherylA ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2002 13:36:06 -0400 (EDT) From: Lynn W Ribaud Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] Birds Of Prey O/S On Thu, 10 Oct 2002 cande@sunlink.net wrote: > I watched Birds Of Prey last night and enjoyed it very much. I thought > however I saw a few similarities or perhaps homages to Xena - besides the new > chatty and persistant sidekick there's the round throwing disks and at the end > a villianess that looked and sounded a lot like a short haired Callisto. And for those of us mourning the loss of Dark Angel, Ashley Scott (the Huntress of Birds of Prey) was Asha of Dark Angel. Lynn Lynn Ribaud, Local Contact X3A Beamline, National Synchrotron Light Source, Brookhaven National Lab ribaud@bnl.gov or ribaud@acsu.buffalo.edu ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Thu, 10 Oct 2002 23:58:33 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] <> In a message dated 10/9/2002 9:36:06 PM Central Daylight Time, cande@sunlink.net writes: > I think she was just stunned that the sisters thought Lao Ma was a mother to > her. I have a more subtexty interpretation of that relationship - I just > think Xena just didn't know how to break the news to the girl that she and > Lao Ma had a very different kind of relationship. Perhaps that why Xena was > acting so strangely - she was just in shock at the girl's naivety. > LOL! Actually, I don't see the subtext and mentor relationships as being mutually exclusive. In many ways, Lao Ma was like a surrogate mother. Though she had ulterior motives in her plans for Xena's future, that wasn't unlike the stage mothers who live through their children. The lack of backstory notwithstanding, it's plausible to me that Xena would accept Lao Ma's daughter as a sister in spirit. I attribute any "fortune cookie" strangeness more to plot holes and Lucy's pregnancy. - -- Ife ========================================================= This has been a message to the chakram-refugees list. To unsubscribe, send a message to majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe chakram-refugees" in the message body. Contact meth@smoe.org with any questions or problems. ========================================================= ------------------------------ End of chakram-refugees-digest V2 #281 **************************************