Reviewed Thursday, 23 November 2000

Hindi music abounds as clouds roll and a quote appears: "What we sow in this life, we reap in our future lives. This is our karma." It's apparently from "the Xena 'Blue' Scroll", which has no known author.

Fade to Xena and Gabrielle attempting to fit in with the natives, dressing all Indian-like. Gabby's in a yellow wrap-thing which nicely shows off her abs, Xena is in basic blue. Turns out that she can still do flips in the thing, so she's well placated. Gabrielle's philosophical murmerings are interrupted by an odd procession winding its way through town - a corpse and a very much alive, if dazed-looking woman. The corpse is thrown into the fire while the town looks on. Xena and Gabrielle watch, interested, until the point when the woman, Naiyima, looks like she's next for the pyre, at which point Xena can take no more and moves to intercede, demanding to know what the woman has done. Little more than marry a man who died before her, it turns out, but Xena could care less for ancient laws and rescues the woman, making handy use of a scarf while she's at it, not to mention ruining the local architecture by shoving a spear into a column and using it as a gymnastics bar.

The three flee for safety, hiding in a nearby house and barring the door after them. While Gabrielle moves more furniture in front of the door, Xena looks for another way out to no avail. Naiyima joins Xena in a back room, and opens her shawl, which is covered with an interesting henna design. She begins to do an odd dance before conjuring up an energy ball and releasing it at Xena. The Warrior Princess stands, entranced at the light show, until it hits her, making Xena explode into a thousand pieces and then implode, forming an energy ball that returns to Naiyima, entering another tattoo on her chest.

We're treated to a series of images: Someone (Xena?) repeatedly striking at something or someone, a row of crucified people, the top of a cross, a newly-born baby, a village burning, what looks to be a Centurion stabbing something in a large basket, another baby, and then an old Indian woman with the image of a vast army on horseback in the background. The light moves towards the old woman as the picture zooms in on her. There is a flash, and then Xena jerks, wearing the same outfit as the old woman we just saw. The caption reads "A future life," and Xena looks around, as bewildered as Sam ever looked in Quantum Leap, particularly when she spots the spear she impaled in the buildilng earlier.

Xena's attention is quickly drawn to the warlord standing in front of her, who refers to Xena as "Arminestra" and indicates that she is there to listen to a proposal that she has thus far not found too appealing. Xena remains confused, but after catching a glimpse at her reflection in a well-polished sheild, understanding begins to dawn.

My, what a productive teaser.

"Is the great peacemaker deaf as well?" the warlord taunts. Xena replies by asking for situation backstory, which leads to an order to kill the men and take the rest captured. Xena doesn't care for that too much, though, and the warlord comments that the "Mother of Peace" may have a backbone after all, but it matters little. A fireball coming from seemingly nowhere, however, breaks up the slaughter, and fighting errupts. A man in yellow rides in, ordering his men to find the Mother of Peace and leaping into the fray, kicking serious ass in the process. Xena looks around for some way to be of help in an obviously crippled body and spys a sword, but it gets ripped from her. Instead, she lunges for the warlord, grabbing her arm as she goes to strike. There is a flash, and suddenly the warlord's face changes into ... Alti! "Xena! I knew I'd find your soul eventually!" Alti says, delighted.

Xena is saved by a villager (who gets slashed for his trouble) and then rescued by the yellow-clad man. She doesn't want to leave, watching as Yellow Dude runs back into battle saying that his people need him, but the horseman insists -- "You're the only hope the people have, Arminestra."

Yellow Dude is shot by Alti, and the army retreats. Alti doesn't much care, though, she's too tickled by the irony of Xena being in the body of a peacekeeper.

Meanwhile, Gabrielle wonders where the heck Xena's gotten to. She must also be wondering just what Naiyima's on, I sure did. Another light show errupts.

Back to Alti's House of Fun, complete with burning skeletons. She's questioning a villager, trying to find out where Arminestra has gone. She uses her old Alti powers to convince the man (who was clearly a Xena extra in his past lives) to talk, but he doesn't know anything of use. Alti dreams of finding Arminestra/Xena, absorbing all her power and becoming the Destroyer of Nations.

Gabrielle delights to the Lucky Charms floating around her as Naiyima babbles about time. "There is a great evil in the future that is hunting Xena's soul," Naiyima tells Gabrielle, and confesses that she's sent Xena in the future to fight it. Gabby insists that Naiyima send her to the future as well, as their futures must be intertwined. Naiyima studies Gabrielle and says that it's true, many past and future lives. She will sent Gabby, but first she needs a weapon -- the mendi.

Xena/Arminestra forces her way in to see the Yellow Dude (Shakti) and tends to his wounds and disgusses battle strategy with him. He talks about surrendering to the warlord. Although he will most certainly be executed, his people will only be made into slaves instead of killed, which will keep hope alive in some form. But Xena insists that this train of thought won't work with this warlord.

Naiyima teachs Gabrielle the mendi, body paintings. The paint will be hidden in the wall of the house they're hiding in for the future, but they don't have a lot of time left to discuss as the men outside are still intent on burning the widow. "Tell Xena that the evil can only be fought here, where she's still powerful," Naiyima says before sending Gabby on a funkadelic journey.

Gabrielle's visions: short-haired Gabby facing off against a guy in a mask and calling for Xena, long-haired Gabby donning the Amazon Queen headdress, Gabby being crucified, a close-up of long-haired Gabby as horns are played, and then the light zooms in on Shakti.

Shakti jerks and almost immediately noticed that he's bare-chested. He gasps, covers himself, and then grabs his shirt. Xena/Arminestra asks if something's wrong, but he says that he's just thinking about someone he needs to find and asks if the warlord they're talking about is "tall, black hair, a particular war cry when she attacks?" Xena is stunned, and asks to be left alone with Shakti. She grabs his arm and there's a flash before Shakti becomes Gabrielle. Gabby is shocked that Xena looks so different, and then shocked that SHE looks so different. They compare notes and try to form a plan.

Alti's one step ahead of them, though, having captured a village that she knows will bring Xena. She singles out a little girl to be a sacrifice. Nearby, Xena and Gabby muse that if they can't get out of this, it's the end of everything. Xena finds it funny that in this life, Gabrielle is the warrior and hero, but Gabby says that from where she's sitting, the Mother of Peace is the hero here. Gabrielle leads her troops off, and a soldier, Acklin, says that he doesn't understand, what the Mother of Peace has asked him to do, but it will be done.

Below, Alti is enjoying feeding on the fear the little girl is providing her, but Xena says that innocent blood gives power to no one, and that she knows better than anyone about that. Still curious to know how Xena got into her future life, Alti lets the girl go at the promise of information.

Gabrielle leads her troops further into the village.

Alti talks about how much she's enjoying a strong warrior's body, but she wants more of her spiritual power back from her old life to capitalize on the whole thing. But first, she needs to know who's her enemy in the past. "Is it an Enlightened One?" she asks. "A Darsham?" Before Xena can answer, Gabrielle and the calvary arrive to kick ass. Xena sets about freeing the villagers in the confusion while Gabby pretty well beats up everybody.

To Naiyima's voiceover, Acklin finds the dust-ladden paint box Naiyima left and runs off with it.

Back in the battle, Alti once more takes aim on Gabrielle/Shakti, a detail which does not escape Xena. She scoops up a dagger and makes her way to Alti, prepared to strike her down, but Acklin arrives. Horrified, he cries out "No, Mother! You can't kill!" Alti shoots him instead. Gabrielle is distracted by the proceedings and is knocked unconscious. Xena rushes to Acklin, where he apologies for stopping her, but says that he couldn't let her destroy her soul. She gets the paint box from him just before he dies, but finds herself surrounded by Alti and her men.

Gabrielle is lying on a bed, but still unconscious. Xena dabs at her forehead with a cloth as Alti comes in to gloat. She is surprised that Xena has found her friend, but notes that Gabrielle is very powerful. "Her past lives have filled her," she says, "and soon that power will be mine." Alti reaches out a hand to touch Gabrielle, but Xena swats it away, earning herself another choke hold. But no, she can't kill Xena now, the people have to see the death of their heroes. She promises that their deaths will be slow and painful, and it looks like they'll be crucified. Gabrielle wakes up and Xena says that it's now or never. Gabby wonders if she'll remember everything, but Xena says that she has confidence.

A prolonged sequence with more hindi music. Alti's men erect the crosses, Xena and Gabby paint and learn each other's mendi, Naiyima is led once more to sacrifice.

"It's judgement day," Alti says as she enters the cell. "Today I realize what it was I was truly meant to be." Xena and Gabby have no answer for her, however. With Gabrielle facing Alti and Xena standing behind her, they mimic each others moves and combine to create a light show similar to Naiyima's. Alti watches, surprised, as the beam hits and disintegrates her into the light. Boomerang-like, the ball returns to our duo, disintegrating THEM as well.

Back home, Naiyima is tossed into the fire with relatively little ceremony. To the onlookers' surprise, however, Niyima, Xena and Gabrielle emerge from it. Right behind them, though, the pyre errupts. Xena yells for everyone to run, and Gabby takes Niyima to saftey as Alti appears, laughing all the while.

"Another chance!" she crows, and immediately sets to using the old "past pain" trick, making Xena experience the most painful memories of her past. She opens with a log trap (which I can't for the life of me place) slamming into Xena and sending her flying.

Post commercial, and Xena gets another quick beating at the hands of Rahl from "Daughter of Pomira", but this time she manages to land a few blows on the shamaness. These blows are countered by Callisto's attacks on the ladder bridge, the gladiator ass-whuppins from "When in Rome...", Rahl again, and Khrafstar from "The Deliverer".

Xena's in a bad way, a detail that does not escape Gabrielle when she returns. With a cry, she runs at Alti, staff poised and ready. It avails to naught, as Alti effortlessly catches the staff, breaks it in two, and then proceedes to beat the snot out of Gabby with it. To add insult to injury, Alti yanks Gabrielle to her knees by her hair, and demands to know what Xena's told her friend about this great evil. "Has she told you about my powers? Has she told you about this?"

Cue the now-familiar crucification scene -- the first time Gabrielle's sampled it in all its glory. "That's my gift to you. That's your future! SHE'S responsible for your death!" Xena is less than pleased with Alti's generosity, however, and screams with every ounce of fury she can muster. Alti counters with Xena's most painful moment, her legs being crushed by Ceasar's men. Xena crumples in a heap, crying and holding her shattered leg while Alti continues with the crucificaton, demanding Gabrielle's pain. Gabby's hands and feet suddenly start bleeding where the future nails will be. Desperate to save her bard, Xena lets the Chakram fly. It cuts Gabrielle's hair, breaking Alti's spell. She reaches for the Chakram on its return course, but Alti destracts her with another brutal hit from Callisto and the Chakram instead slices Xena across the neck. Alti laughs uproariously.

Xena and Gabby are in a bad way when Naiyima returns. Temporarily forgotten, they look on as Alti says that this must be the Darsham who sent them to the future. She's very powerful, and Alti wants that power for herself, but Naiyima's too strong, and it's Alti who gives first. Naiyima raises her hands, and the paintings on Xena and Gabby start to glow. Xena cries that the mendi is Alti's true enemy, so Gabrielle focuses that energy into a chain that is temporarily incapacitates the shamaness. Xena struggles to her feet and focuses her own power into some pretty cool-looking energy Chakrams. Alti bats the first away, then the second. Gabrielle strengthens her grip and the third and fourth find their mark. Alti explodes in a fireball of death.

Exhausted, Xena and Gabby collapse, but slowly crawl towards each other and embrace. The villagers emerge from their homes and begin to kneel as Naiyima approaches the beaten duo. She congratulates them for defeating Alti at the one time when her karma was the most powerful, but there are lots of other battles between them to come down the timeline. "You both walk a path together. Think of yourselves as lines in the mendi," she tells them. "Separated, but always connected." Then she does some more funky stuff, healing Gabby and Xena in the process, before turning into a glowing ball and floating off.

Outside the town, Xena admires her Chakram mendi while Gabby explores the wonders of short hair. She notes that her hair was short in the vision as well, but contends that there's no real reason why someone as evil as Alti would show them the truth. They ponder on how they will recognize each other in their future lives, and Xena draws a cross below the circle of the Chakram. Gabby approves.

Let's cut right to the chase, I love this episode. It's among the first that I ever saw, and to this day, the battle between Alti and Xena gives me goose bumps. Now that I've come to experience so much more of the Xenaverse, I conceed that it's not the best crafted episode, nor does it even deal particularly much with the Xenaverse as we know it. But as far as I'm concerned, it's worthe the price of admission alone for the fight sequence.

I'll get into that in more detail in a bit.

This episode is important in its own way to the well-being of the Xenaverse and its nucleus, the friendship between Xena and Gabrielle. It's been hinted before (in "The Xena Scrolls") that reincarnation is not only a theory, but a way of life (pun semi-intended) for the dwellers in this world. Now we have definitive proof that the Scrolls wasn't just a fluke, Xena and Gabby have been together before in the past, and they'll be together again in the future. What's more, it seems there's no escape for them, so I hope they're settled in nice and comfy, it's going to be a long ride. This sort of takes risks to an entirely different level as well. No longer do they have to worry about what they do in the sense of immediate consequences, they've got an ever-lasting karma that can be destroyed by a single wrong step. That's a pretty hefty price to pay for a boo-boo.

Need I even mention that with the shoring of Gabby's locks that the terrible vision that has been plaguing Xena since episode two of this season suddenly becomes much more likely? Unfortunately, I saw episode four in a completely disjointed order (actually seeing the crucification episode before any other), so the impact was much lessened on me, but I can imagine how it must've felt to see that happen, and that was almost good enough for me.

In terms of their future selves, Arminestra and Shakti, I find I have little to say. Most of their actions were directly influenced by their past karmic lives for a specific purpose, which sort of robbed them of any sense of self ... ironic when you consider that their selves were the heart and soul of the matter (oo, there I go with the puns again). But Xena's warrior self so obviously dominated the Mother of Peace that I have trouble seeing her as anything but Xena in another body. Gabrielle as the battle leader actually did much better at convincing me, but perhaps that was because she never seemed to hesitate or flinch away from Shakti's duties as a fighter, despite her own beliefs in the matter. Does that mean that Gabrielle's will is weaker than Xena's? Was it a hint of the more violent Gabby to emerge in season five? Perhaps she just accepted the idea of reincarnation better than Xena. I believe it could be all, or none of these. Unfortunately, we don't get much of a chance to explore how they feel about this flash into their future selves, what with needing to take Alti down and all. It would've been a matter of great interest.

Which leaves us with Alti. I've always liked this villain, though as this was my first look at her, that may have had something to do with it. It just seems that every time she shows up, she seriously lays the hurt on, and I appreciate that. A hero is only as good as their villains, after all, and Alti proves once again that Xena's da man.

So what do we learn from this? You take some great action, interesting foundation ideas and a cool villain, and the end result is a fine little episode.

Score: Four Chakram Tattoos out of Five

Wet Towels, Weapons of the Future.  Alright, granted, she has many skills, but I have my doubts that being able to take a wet scarf and make a staff as strong as Gabby's is one of them. A whip, perhaps I could buy, but something that looks like a broomhandle neatly wrapped up in swaddling? Nice try, but even I can't buy that one.

I'll have what she's having.  I don't know if Naiyima hit her secret stash of angel dust after sending Xena to the future, but I do know that if I were Gabrielle and saw her walking around in a daze, plucking nothing from seemingly thin air, I'd be concerned. When she called me "sweet thing," I'd've thumped her. THIS is the force that Alti was so fixated on? What was her power, to act like a brain-dead bimbo? Naiyima was cool enough when she was acting like the paint wasn't laced with a narcotic, but otherwise, I wouldn't have relied on her to make me a cheese sandwich, let alone detach my karma, fling it into the future, and then bring me back again.

Mendi contains truth.  And the power of whoop-ass, apparently. I sacrifice much in the spirit of Xena and suspend reality often enough, but even I have trouble in buying this one. I'm all for the power of one's will, but attribute that much power to a tattoo stikes me as at least a little ridiculous. If I were Alti, I'd be quite upset that THAT eventually led to my downfall.

Destroyer of Nations.  A nice little touch back to "Sins of the Past" that Alti is still fixated on the Destroyer of Nations, whether it be someone of her own choosing or herself. I always felt that was an awesome.

I'm Nekkid!  Kudos to the actor who played Shakti. When Gabrielle first awakens in his body, her modesty leaps to the forefront. The actor manages to pull this off with subtlety and a somehow feminine air which I appreciated.

"She would have been a goddess to me."  It doesn't matter who she is or what she does, Xena is always Gabrielle's hero.

The Devoted Flunky.  I have no idea why and no particular point to base this on, but I really liked Acklin. I usually hate blind devotion, but this guy wore it well. I was sorry to see him die, but the fact that he did so to save the Mother of Peace's soul seems very fitting indeed.

Synchronized Mendi.  There can be no denying it, the sequence where Xena and Gabrielle move in perfect sync to blast Alti back into the past is a great one. I don't know how many takes it took and it may have only lasted about 2 seconds, but boy, what great two seconds.

Xena's Greatest Hits.  Oh boy. Oh boy, oh boy. This is it, folks, this is the Xena fight as far as I'm concerned. I haven't seen anything this apocalyptic outside of comic books, and it was this very fight scene that I used to bait our very own Jox Box reviewer into the Xenaverse. Lucy and Renee pulled out all the stops on this one, and I found myself wincing in sympathy more than once during thing thing. I don't know if I would've enjoyed this less if I'd seen any of the episodes that they draw clips when I first viewed the fight. It's entirely possible, but let me tell you, from the standpoint of this then-newbie, it was heavenly, and it was decided. Any show that not only would kill off its stars but beat them half to death beforehand was a show I needed to be part of. It closed the door behind me, but I've not looked back once.

Pure Energy.  But bluntly, the Energy Chakrams kicked ass. The look of semi-evil delight on Xena's face was also a trip. Say no more.

Quote of the Episode:

"You BIIIIIIITCH!!!"   --Xena to Alti, post crucifiction revelation.

Lots of ponderings to be found here, a few actually deeper than a mere pondering.

If the Xena "Blue" Scroll had no known author, does that mean that Gabrielle isn't remembered in the future? "The Xena Scrolls" certainly tend to dispute that fact. So is there another Bard to come? Does Xena maybe write it herself, or do they pick it up somewhere along the way and it gets mistaken for a Xena scroll? And why is it blue? Food for thought. In light of recent sixth season developments, I find myself wondering if maybe Virgil didn't write it, as he's the only other Bard I've seen to get wrapped up in our duo. But I admit it, I'm really reaching here.

Unfortunately, looking back on this episode in light of the current season, the images that we're shown aren't anywhere near as thought-provoking as they could have been. But still, I ponder a few things. The babies in Xena's images for starters. Was one of them Eve? I think the first might have been, but how about the second? I contemplated that perhaps that was Xena herself being reborn, but if such is the case then this baby was white, while Arminestra was most definitely black. So did they skip over a life? Maybe two? Another thing that's tickling my mind is who the Centurion was stabbing. That didn't particularly seem symbolic of anything I could think of (except murderous Rome, which could possibly be Eve, but I don't think so). So was this something that they were planning to do at one point but got waylaid with Lucy Lawless's pregnancy? And how about Gabrielle's images. I had no problem with anything except for the seemingly irregular future, to past, to future jumps. I don't think that Gabrielle is going to get long hair again before the series ends this season, nor do I think that she'll be reclaiming control of the Amazons again, so what the heck was that? Even in the context of purely the fourth season, I don't see where that fit in. Best I can think was that it was a flub.

I was intrigued by the fact that while we, the viewer, saw Gabrielle and Xena, they obviously saw each other as they were in that timeline, Arminestra and Shakti. Were it me, I think I'd have at least a little bit of adjusting to do, talking to somebody that didn't look, act or sound a bit like your best friend, yet treating them as though they did. They certainly were better at, ahem, reading between the lines than I.

Gabby sure knows how to fix that staff up well. I never saw a crack in the thing later on.

So what was that cross that Xena drew at the end all about? The first thing that came to my mind was that the cross, coupled with the circle above it produced the symbol for females. My next thought was that it was symbolic of their crucifiction in the near future. We know from this episode that the two of them won't always be female. So does that mean that they get crucified every life? I doubt that very much. So I guess it's just as well that I'm not either of them, because if that was the sign, I think I'd miss it.

Questions, comments or Elmer's glue to fix broken staffs? Send them to jetwolf@jetwolf.com.