~Many thanks to Petra de Jong for the transcript and the translation~
Leidsch Dagblad
September 28
(one day after The Debt II aired):
(translated from Dutch)
A nice kill by Wil Buys
There aren't many women that play a violent lead part. Yes, in the movies every now and then. Like Glenn Close in 'Basic Instinct'. As for the rest, it's all Arnold Schwarzenegger, Bruce Willis and Sylvester Stallone that trade punches and kicks. In tv series it's only the men that take the lead. It's hard to find fighting and hitting women there. There's only one big exception: Xena. In this series, bought by the Veronica network, kicks, squeezes, stabs, hits and headbutts the leading lady like crazy. She doesn't shoot but only because the show takes place just before our era. Had she been living now, the bullets would be flying. Now she keeps it to honourable handwork. Fortunately every now and then there's time for a drink or a talk because one gets tired of all that fighting. Also of the storyline by the way: it's a mix of myths, legends and twisted historical facts and images from her past. Our Xena grows up in a village somewhere in Greece. When her village gets attacked by a looting army Xena succesfully defends it but a lot of her fellow villagers got killed. A major disappointment for a young girl that also looses parts of her family. So, what to do in your anger (even more so when your lovers leave you as well). A normal human being would visit the psychiatrist, find a shoulder to cry on among friends or get some sedatives from the doctor. Not Xena. She starts killing and plundering herself. Yes, she even captures Julius Caesar. After a short romance this famous prisoner buys himself free. Julius takes revence and crucifies her. She does escape but she's, of course, furious. She takes that anger out on passers-by episode after episode. "Killing is in her blood" says an extra who knows those things. The only positive thing is that all men, muscled or not, loose against her. But it's all a little bit too much. More lines from yesterday's episode, from Xena herself: "I like a good kill every now and then" "I'm the curse your gods send on you to punish you" Including the viewers.
Return to The XIP News Archive