From: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org (chakram-refugees-digest) To: chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Subject: chakram-refugees-digest V3 #317 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 Wednesday, October 22 2003 Volume 03 : Number 317 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [chakram-refugees] When Fates Collide Part 1 [IfeRae@aol.com] [chakram-refugees] When Fates Collide Part 4 [KTL ] Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: When Fates Collide [KTL ] Re: [chakram-refugees] WEEK 3 Tarzan [IfeRae@aol.com] Re: [chakram-refugees] When Fates Collide Part 4 [IfeRae@aol.com] Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: When Fates Collide [IfeRae@aol.com] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 18:10:39 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] When Fates Collide Part 1 In a message dated 10/21/03 3:33:11 PM Central Daylight Time, fsktl@aurora.uaf.edu writes: << But I didn't see that she threatened his power anymore after she met Gabrielle than before. Caesar's actions created the problems--Xena had been willing to maintain the status quo if he would just let Gabrielle go home safely. And also threatens that if he doesn't, she will change things back because as they both know, she has many skills. Caesar however, just couldn't stand to do that and sent Alti off to kill Gabrielle anyway. Why? I guess because he just hates Xena so much that he also wants to destroy those she loves. Gabrielle is in his sights for sure. I doubt she would ever have made it back to her vineyard once Xena was dead. >> I may have disagreed with you on just about everything else re: "Fates," but I like the point you're making here. Caesar brings about his own demise, just as the Gods did, by becoming their own self-fulfilling prophecy. As you say, Xena only threatened them when they threatened someone important to her. It's when she turns from Gabs an catches Caesar whispering to his guards, that she realizes he's about to betray her again. Up until then, the worst she might've done was get the heck out of Dodge. IOW, the gods were due for extinction and Caesar for assassination without Xena's interference. But the mere threat of what she might do made them set in motion events that made her determined not to let them succeed. - -- 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. ========================================================= ------------------------------ Date: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 14:45:05 -0800 (AKDT) From: KTL Subject: [chakram-refugees] When Fates Collide Part 4 KT > subjected to humiliation, pain and agony. Ooooo, let's watch the bad > girl's enemies take great pleasure at seeing her tortured, degraded and > killed, being laughed at by Alti as she's in extremis, having her husband > turn his back on her also laughing at her as he goes off to f*ck the > woman who hates Xena in every timeline and in every world. This was VERY > hard to watch, never mind enjoy. I just don't need to watch an ep that > rips Xena's life and dignity to shreds.> > Cheryl: > Actually isn't it Xena who has the last laugh. Caesar is dead. Alti is blown > to smithereens again. I have always felt that Xena knew exactly what she was > doing when she went to that cross. She knew that the her death and Caesar's > death were connected. Her death on the cross was her way of destroying > Caesar. I believe she sacrificed herself in order to destroy Caesar. > Other people have said that but I don't see how that works, again since the other life was never lived and therefore never existed. So things that happened there never happened. So there's no way Xena could know that her death and Caesar's were linked. But actually that would have made a much better story. First because one of the themes of XWP has always been unintended consequences. People do things for one reason and they wind up getting screwed in ways they never suspected in other areas of their lives. And setting up the story so that if Caesar crucified Xena again, he loses his second change just BECAUSE he specifically crucified her again would have been ironic and just so XWP. (I.e., he crucifies Xena and the world dissolves...uh, because it's essentially the same scenario as the real world?) Anyway, and if Xena figured that out and then gone along with it, that too would have been totally in keeping with her character. We all know the real Xena is willing to die at the drop of a babushka. Another reason this would have made a much better story is that Xena's formidable intelligence and strategic ability is totally missing in this ep. Xena's scheming is what usually saves the day. In this script she doesn't even come up with one idea, never mind two or three to save herself, the newly found love of her life and the whole world which she is going to leave in the hands of a manipulating, vengeance ridden madman. Nope, she just takes things as they are. She just gives up and lets him ride all over her. Now if she had somehow figured out how to best Caesar and used one of the greatest torments of her life, him crucifying her to best him this time--that would most certainly have been in character. And would have made a good story too. And I think that would have been a MUCH stronger ending. If when it ended, we went back to the beach in Destiny. And we see a close-up of Xena staring up at the cross. As the scene widens, we see that her arms are being held by Caesar's men. And we get to see Lucy show Xena realizing that she's now back where the past diverged. And then we see her make the decision to let them crucify her once again, so that the rest of this life works out as it did before. Such deliberate choosing to take on that suffering again would have been an absolutely true validation of Xena's life in all it's aspects. And I've love to have watched Lucy play that. And they could have shown the Furies just fast forwarding the threads to get to where we were before Caesar stepped in. That's what they did in Remember Nothing, returned Xena to the moment when time diverged. And that makes a lot more sense to me. Cheryl: > Look it no one can argue anyone into liking an episode they don't like. Hey Ife--you listening? Grin. Cheryl: I > have criticisms of the episode myself. I dislike that Caesar is seems to be a > dunderhead - he knows that his death and Xena's death are tied together yet he > still kills her. He knows Alti is unreliable and yet he takes her to bed. > There is no earthly reason to kill Brutus but he does anyway. Caesar never > seems to ponder that there may be consequences to killing a popular Empress > and a loyal friend. Hey-even I didn't think of some of those.... Cheryl: I however never thought the episode did an injustice to > Xena or Gabrielle. Xena is a little softer but then her life has been easier > and with less hardships. Again, I doubt that very much. The only true torture she seems to have escaped from her real warlord years is having to give up Solon. Gabrielle isn't pounding people with her stick but I > saw that inner strength there. They were to me the same people - a bit > changed because of circumstances but they were Xena and Gabrielle. > > CherylA Well, I wish I had seen Xena as Xena. If I had, this would be just another okay but not great ep to me. But I just cannot buy any scenario that has that young Xena grow up to be a woman who gives up the fight and lets her enemies beat her. Never, never, ever. KT ========================================================= 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: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 17:33:55 -0800 (AKDT) From: KTL Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: When Fates Collide > From: cr > > Huh? I can't answer for lfe, but I don't get upset when Xena gets beat up. > Y'know, I don't mind the battle in FIN or the fight in Between the Lines, at > all. Great stuff. Or the crucifixions in Destiny or Ides. I cringe a > bit in The Way, simply 'cos it's a bit horrific, but I don't object to it. > I don't care for the fight in Crusader, not because of any 'ethical' > objections so to speak, but simply 'cos I don't believe a little girl like > Najara could lay a finger on Xena. I hate Gurkhan, and to a lesser extent > dislike Xena *allowing* herself to be crucified in WFC, because it shows Xena > as helpless. That, I don't like at all. > CR > > Actually I don't think Xena's crucifixtion shows she is helpless. In > the jail scene Xena says to Gabrielle that everything that happened in > the real world happened precisely as it should. I think Xena decides > that her crucifixtion is actually necessary. It is what happened in > the "real" world and she now going to go through it with some idea > that this is the path to straightening things out. > > CherylA Hey-if Fugate offered to sell you a hundred year old bridge in New York, would you buy that too? All through the series we had Xena defying her fate. Gabrielle literally says in one ep, which I can't remember at the moment and so can't watch to get the correct quote, something along the lines of, "You have always said that we write our own destiny" Xena being cruxified did NOT affect anything. Everything continued just as it had been. The only thing that happened was that Xena accepted this fate. However, Fugate's mealy-mouthed Gabby refused to accept that this was their fate and thus CHANGED their fate by destroying the world and all the people in it, to save her soulmate. Nothing changed when Xena accepted the cross. Nothing changed until Gabrielle pulled the plug. Yeah, Fugate writes, "Everything happened just as it should". But, and this is exactly the problem I have with this episode, I don't agree that Xena would agree that EVERYTHING happens as it should. Not the woman she was when she was young and on that beach and not the woman whom she grew up to be. In ANY timeline or overwriting universe. I don't think for example, any Xena accepts that Solon was brutally murdered so young just because it "was meant to be". Or that Callisto had her whole world destroyed as a young girl because Xena needed to reach this point in her life. Xena absolutely believes in free will and making choices. This is exactly why she takes the responsibility for those lost souls in FIN and stays dead for their sake. The belief that a person cannot escape what the fates have decreed for you, no matter what you do is purely the old Greek religious belief. No one was ever able to escape the life that Fate wrote for them. But when Xena forgave Gabrielle in Bitter Suite (with the help of her dead child who also forgave Gabrielle), she shattered those religious and cultural mores, deciding that whole Greek system of "Fate deciding destiny" only worked if individuals bought into it and perpetuated it. Instead, Xena turned to a whole new way of responding to people who have caused you grevious harm. Forgive them, cut your losses and go on from there. So I would say that enslaving yourself to the destiny the Fates weave for you is most definitely no part of Xena's philosophy. Yes, Xena was meant to be a warrior in this life as she learns from Krishna. And any steps that made her that warrior were important. But other steps could just as well lead to her becoming that warrior also. I think "Everything happens precisely as it should" can work if it refers more to broad strokes than to details. What if in Destiny she had been crucified on a Monday? And in Fates it was Tuesday? Does it still match? Hmmm? Krishna goes with the big picture. And so does Xena, as shown in ep after ep after ep. Except here in Fates. Xena was meant to be a warrior. She is the person she is because she fell to the dark side but then began to reform herself back into a good person. But she still needs to remain a warrior. That's the story of her life this time around. And that's the story she lived. And THAT'S what is precisely as it should be. And warriors never give up the battle-they fight to the death as Xena did so spectacularly in FIN Again, I think that's part of why Xena is so quiet and somber when they get back. She's MORTIFIED at how she acted in that alternative life. A woman who gets the vapors when she meets her soulmate, who gives up and lets her enemies do what they will to her, who dies without a fight for no good reason. Gads, no wonder she doesn't want to discuss it. KT ========================================================= 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: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 21:35:37 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] WEEK 3 Tarzan In a message dated 10/20/2003 7:46:31 PM Pacific Daylight Time, cjlnh@webtv.net writes: > I am in for a few more eps, mostly because after all the refusals, I > gotta believe Lucy saw something in this part... she certainly doesn't > need the money. > LOL! I don't think it hurts, especially with three children and the vagaries of entertainment life. But the work, hours, exposure, fun, travel, deal for her own series, etc. probably weighed in heavily. She's been pretty open and honest about that. I doubt she sees it as schlock. Heck, she could've thought the same about XWP at first. No doubt she wouldn't mind if it far exceeded expectations, as long as she could maintain the current family-friendly work schedule. But if it doesn't, she's still gotten exactly what she wanted from it -- maybe more. We're probably a lot more worried about things improving than she is. It's certainly not the worst thing on TV. We're just used to seeing better. ========================================================= 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: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 22:58:22 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] When Fates Collide Part 4 In a message dated 10/21/2003 3:46:41 PM Pacific Daylight Time, fsktl@aurora.uaf.edu writes: > >Look it no one can argue anyone into liking an episode they don't like. > > > Hey Ife--you listening? Grin. > Heh, I figured that out awhile back, once I realized it wasn't about ep we saw, so much as about the ep you'd rather have seen. ========================================================= 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: Tue, 21 Oct 2003 22:58:18 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] Re: When Fates Collide In a message dated 10/21/2003 6:34:59 PM Pacific Daylight Time, fsktl@aurora.uaf.edu writes: > So I would say that enslaving yourself to the destiny the Fates weave > for you is most definitely no part of Xena's philosophy. > > Yes, Xena was meant to be a warrior in this life as she learns from > Krishna. And any steps that made her that warrior were important. But > other steps could just as well lead to her becoming that warrior also. I > think "Everything happens precisely as it should" can work if it refers > more to broad strokes than to details. I happen to agree with this. Are you saying "Fates" contradicts your interpretation of that line? Do you believe Xena was referring only to the crucifixion when she said that? - -- 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 V3 #317 **************************************