From: owner-chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org (chakram-refugees-digest) To: chakram-refugees-digest@smoe.org Subject: chakram-refugees-digest V5 #104 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 Thursday, April 21 2005 Volume 05 : Number 104 Today's Subjects: ----------------- Re: [chakram-refugees] RE: Best of Xena [IfeRae@aol.com] Re: [chakram-refugees] The Debt - gotta ask [IfeRae@aol.com] Re: [chakram-refugees] RE: Best of Xena [KTL ] [chakram-refugees] LUCY LOCUSTS RADIO TOUR, THURSDAY, APRIL 21 ["Creation] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 20 Apr 2005 01:49:43 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] RE: Best of Xena In a message dated 4/19/2005 1:55:38 AM Pacific Daylight Time, cr@orcon.net.nz writes: > > On Tue, 19 Apr 2005 16:59, IfeRae@aol.com wrote: > > Getting back on that cross when you've remembered > >how previous crucifixions felt? Deciding that nails hammered through your > >body parts is a better way to go, than trying to take out some guards you > >can whip with one hand? Insane, naive maybe. Cowardly? That's just not a > >word that comes to my mind either. > > > >-- Ife > > Cowardly, no. Just suicidally, insanely stupid. > > Heck, the Xena of 'Destiny' might have been fooled by Caesar, but she wasn't > > mentally defective. So where did this one come from? > Exactly. Either you believe she was uncharacteristiclaly stupid/insane, or you believe she (as usual) must've had a good reason. - -- 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: Wed, 20 Apr 2005 01:49:42 EDT From: IfeRae@aol.com Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] The Debt - gotta ask In a message dated 4/19/2005 1:55:46 AM Pacific Daylight Time, cr@orcon.net.nz writes: > Hmmm... didn't like The Price, didn't like The Execution, didn't mind > Dirty > Half Dozen (though nobody else seems to like it), loved Debt, liked When in > Rome.... > > but I could make a case for those strains having been provoked by external > factors and hostile forces just as much in those eps, as in the Dahak or > Olympian eps. Different hostile forces, but same effect. Same thing with > > the Callisto eps - Xena and Gabs always disagreed over Callisto. >> Agreed. I simply meant that I preferred mortal provocations to supernatural ones, and that there were indeed enough in the former category to keep things lively. > >I think TPTB wanted the threats to the relationship to be reflected in an > >epic way, same as everything about Xena had epic consequences. I don't > >quarrel with that. I agree Dakak and the Olympians brought in a new > >aspect. I just don't happen to think the girls' issyews necessarily had > >supernatural causes or wouldn't have occurred anyway. > > Yes, but without external dangers to raise the stakes, they would have just > been trivial squabbles of no interest to anyone except fanatical subtexters. > > Well, to qualify that, maybe of no more intrinsic interest than the > squabbles > between characters in soaps - and I do NOT watch soaps. :) >> I'm not a "fanatical subtexter," yet I did not find the personal issues mere "trivial squabbles." I didn't need the addition of gods to make them more substantive. Jealousy, protection of one's child, loyalty, etc. interested me precisely because human beings were involved, with the possibility that the issues might have relevance to me. That's the stuff of most drama, regardless of who happens to be involved. Battles with the gods are irrelevant to me (and of less interest) because I don't expect I'll be encountering that anytime soon. XWP interested me because of the provocative questions raised about the human condition, not because I have a desire to imagine the influence of beings over whom I have little or no control. Besides, the Greek gods were depicted as having fairly "human" foilbles. I didn't regard them as "superior" beings worthy of any more signficance than the humans they tried to control. Again, I do believe external forces exacerbated the schisms and dramatised them, but they weren't necessary for me personally. > Crusader is one of my all-time favorites, even > >though it didn't make my 10 best list. I though Najara was a beautifully > >appropriate villain at that stage, just as Cally was earlier on. Najara > >stuck her toe in so many of the cracks that X&G tried to pretend they'd > >sealed in Bitter Suite. I guess that's why I liked Alti as a supernatural > >villain -- because she also played on Xena's fears -- used psychological > >weapons to exploit what was going on in Xena's head, more than physical > >threats like killing Xena or her child. > > No, there was no similarity between Najara and Alti's weapons, IMO. Alti's > > psychological weapons had real physical consequences - watch the fight in > Between The Lines. That's a whole different category from Najara's > attempts > to psych Xena out.> Alti did not fight Xena physically. She conjured up images from Xena's own experiences, especially having her legs broken. The vision was not physical, but a representation of Xena's fear that she would cause Gabrielle's death. Alti's power ultimately came from psychological power - trying to cause Xena to hurt and defeat herself. Najara similarly used Xena's fears and insecurities to make Xena vulnerable in ways she typically was not. Neither Alti nor Najara had to physically touch Xena, even though Xena suffered severe physical injuries in her battles with them. In both cases, Xena's opponents used what was in Xena's head to make her vulnerable. I much prefer it when Xena is defeated by superior > > strength (whether natural or supernatural) rather than just falling victim > to > her own totally un-Xena-like dithering. >> Superior physical strength is not interesting to me. Anybody can be a bully with sufficient strength. The motivation is pretty simple -- brute, animalistic self-preservation. I can watch nature shows for that. When I watch shows about human beings, I want to see the thoughtfulness that supposedly distinguishes us from rats or robots -- thoughtfulness about our motives, generosity toward those who are weaker, the will to overcome our own flaws, the selflessness to put others before ourselves. Xena's "dithering" is precisely what made her human -- and a hero -- to me, as opposed to a rat or a robot. > But because Sins was the first ep of the > >series, I make myself put Gauntlet to the side. > > > >-- Ife > > Why? I could make a darn good case that the Warrior Princess trilogy was > far more typical Xena than, say, When Fates Collide or even Deja Vu et al... > > >> Yes, so could I. I simply meant that I rarely see the trilogy included when discussing "favorite" or "the best of" Xena eps. Is that "fair?" Who's to say? - -- 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: Wed, 20 Apr 2005 01:48:25 -0800 (AKDT) From: KTL Subject: Re: [chakram-refugees] RE: Best of Xena snip snip snip previously discussed points Cande: > > Again we disagree. Gabrielle is obviously not in the hands of Xena's > > enemies since she is free to ride off and burn down the loom of fate. > > Caesar and Alti don't give a crap about Gabrielle onces Xena is in their > > clutches - she is perfectly safe. I also don't see Xena as cowardly at all. > > She believes that by dying on the cross she is somehow going to make things > > right - she may be wrong but she certainly is not cowardly. >> > Ife: > I'm with ya here too. Getting back on that cross when you've remembered how > previous crucifixions felt? BUZZZZZZZZZZZZ! (That's the sound of the "incorrect" buzzer from game shows.) Nope. Xena was never crucified. So she has no personal knowledge of how being crucified would feel. Being Caesar's wife, I'm sure she's seen lots of crucifixions. But she's never "had one". Deciding that nails hammered through your body > parts is a better way to go, than trying to take out some guards you can whip > with one hand? In this so well plotted and logical ep, Xena can only whip these guys sometimes. If she could whip the guards with one hand, she should have beaten them off when trying to save Gabrielle's life after Caesar reneged on their deal. If she could have prevented it, why would she leave Gabrielle behind, helpless and in danger in that field with her intended assassin, Alti? If she could have, she should have beaten them all up, said, "C'mon little blond kid--get up on the horse behind me", and galloped off to safety and a new life. Gabrielle would probably have answered, "I beg your pardon. I'm fifty years old--treat me with a little respect, wouldja?" (An answer which makes Xena wonder if she dyes her hair. All over.) But Fugate said at a con that she wanted to pay Xena back for the Gabdrag. In order to do that, she lets the guards win this time so they can drag Xena off as Alti cackles in a close-up in delight. But in doing this, Fugate carelessly sets up an argument against her intended presentation. Since the guards took Xena out once, it's possible that it's not purely her free choice to die on the cross--that instead of choosing to be defeated, humiliated and hanging around whimpering while her worst enemies jeer happily at her, because of something that never happened in her non-existant past, she's there simply because she couldn't fight her way out of it. Ife: Insane, naive maybe. Insanity is probably too strong and engaging a state for this Xena. Naive? I don't think anyone is naive enough to think that dying on a cross is a "good thing" to quote Martha Stewart. However, writing Xena giving up to her enemies without a fight and without any Greater Good reason does indeed bring the word insane to mind. Ife: Cowardly? That's just not a word that > comes to my mind either. Xena's physical courage is not in doubt. Fugate postulates that Xena got her heart's desire--that of being a ruthless conquerer. And so Xena still got to be a excellent, dangerous, exciting warrior. At least until Fugate's storyline called for what? a dozen or so boys to be able to defeat her. And of course, these were the same guys about whom Gabrielle said, "They say that the army would follow you through the gates of Hades." The same guys about whom Brutus said, ""She's very popular. The troops look up to her." As I've said before, they were probably just REAL tired of the Warrior Empress beating the snot out of them every time she came back from her morning ride. It's obvious after this fight that they had just been letting her win every morning. Poor deluded, foolish empress. Gullible too. Didn't I say she was gullible? (As apparently were Brutus and Gabrielle also.) No, it's her moral courage that's lacking in this ep. This Xena hasn't got the ovaries to trust that she can define herself and make her own destiny. That she can recreate herself every day and be whatever she decides to be. That she not only has the right, but the duty to make her own life choices. It takes courage to never give up in the face of the daily challenges life throws at you, to never stop working at shaping your own fate as much as possible, through your own responses and decisions. And this Xena does not have that courage. If she wants to be a simpering girl in love, then hell, be it. Run away with Gabrielle, find a balcony and sit out mooning on it every night. That's apparently what Fugate thinks she really wants to do. It should seem obvious that once Caesar reneged on their deal, she was certainly free to do that. But she didn't have the guts to follow her heart's desire. That's why to me, her handing the right of making choices for her life over to Caesar and getting up on that cross just 'cause he wants her to, accepting his agenda and dying at his whim, is ultimately the act of a coward. And then, her big act of defiance--she whines out at the end, "I love you Gabrielle!" To which Gabrielle is probably thinking, "Yeah. Thanks a lot, hon." I bet THAT'S why Gabrielle destroyed this world--she was just so PISSED at Xena's cowardly self-defeat. So pissed that she didn't even care if she killed everyone who'd ever lived. "I'll give her dying just for Caesar's hell of it!" This storyline is way more lame than even Xena was after Caesar broke her legs in that now non-existent world. Uh-huh! I don't want her, you can have her, she's too Fates for me. 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: Wed, 20 Apr 2005 15:43:38 -0700 From: "Creation (Sharon Delaney)" Subject: [chakram-refugees] LUCY LOCUSTS RADIO TOUR, THURSDAY, APRIL 21 LUCY LOCUSTS RADIO TOUR, THURSDAY, APRIL 21 STARTING AT 5:30 AM PACIFIC TIME 5:30-5:38 LIVE NEW YORK, WKTU-FM BALTAZAR & GOUMBA JOHNNY 5:40-5:48 LIVE DETROIT, WRIF-FM DREW & MIKE 5:50-5:58 LIVE DENVER, KRFX-FM LEWIS & FLOORWAX 6:00-6:08 LIVE MINNEAPOLIS, KQRS-FM TOM BARNARD 6:10-6:18 LIVE CHICAGO, WKQX-FM MANCOW 6:20-6:28 TAPE HOUSTON, KHMX-FM ROULA & RYAN 6:30-6:38 TAPE WESTWOOD ONE ENTERTAINMENT NEWSFEED BILL BREGOLI NEWSFEED - SOUNDBITES WILL BE FED TO OVER 1700 STATIONS 6:40-6:48 LIVE ORLANDO, WTKS-FM Russ Rollins, Dirty Jim, The Sexy Savannah, Daniel, and Blackbean 6:50-6:58 TAPE PITTSBURGH, WZPT-FM JOHN, J.R. & KATE 7:00-7:08 LIVE PHOENIX, KEDJ-FM CHUCK & VINCE 7:10-7:18 TAPE SEATTLE, KBKS-FM JACKIE & BENDER 7:20-7:28 TAPE WASHINGTON, D.C. WWDC-FM ELLIOT & DIANE 7:30-7:38 TAPE DENVER, KXKL-FM JJ & COACH 7:40-7:48 TAPE BOSTON, WROR-FM LOREN OWENS, WALLY BRINE, TOM DOYLE & SUE COPE 7:50-7:58 LIVE PITTSBURGH, KDKA-AM LARRY RICHERT 8:00-8:08 TAPE WASHINGTON, D.C. WBIG-FM MURPHY & CASH 8:10-8:18 TAPE SAN JOSE, KEZR-FM BILL & MARLA 8:20-8:28 TAPE BALTIMORE, WWMX-FM JOJO & KENNY Everyone tune in those radios! Sharon outback@creationent.com Official Xena Fan Club ========================================================= 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 V5 #104 **************************************