Well, when I say finished....couldn't bring myself to watch AFIN...so for me the series finished with Soul Possession...which i'm not sure is a good
thing! 
General thoughts? What about episodes left out? This wasn't a strict "must-watch-every-ep" type re-watch....and I thought the number of eps left out would be a good indication of how I felt about each season.
So the season award for least amount of eps not watched goes to..........surprise, surprise...SEASON 4! Just the two eps left out...Daughter Of Pomira
and Key To The Kingdom. Well....I suppose if you count AFIN as a single ep (Director's Cut), then it's a draw, as it was just this and Who's
Gurkhan? missed from S6
Season with MOST eps missed out........poor old S1....very closely followed by S5....just couldn't bring myself to watch eps like The Titans and Death Mask again.
Biggest surpises? A couple of eps stand out as ones I really didn't appreciate before until I watched them again. Crusader was one....The Last Centaur another....and I even found myself really enjoying For Him The Bell Tolls!
Ok, so Season 6. I'm finding this really difficult to put my finger on....but I think S6 doesn't add up to the sum of its parts. Individually, there's some outstanding eps, indeed some of my favourites from the whole series, but as a season it's less satisfying than seasons 3, 4 or even 2. On my S4 thread, Laura was saying that even though she agreed with most of my arguments about S4 being the best, she still liked S3 best because of its "feel". and although "feel" or maybe "tone" is difficult to pin down, I know exactly what she means.
Most seasons do have a "feel" to them.....but if S6 has one...it's a feel of something of a hodge-podge (to use a technical term)
Because they knew S6 was probably going to be the last, it was a chance to cram in all the things they'd been wanting to do in previous seasons. It
was..."we must wrap that bit up" ...."we must do a story set there" ...."why don't we get in a fan fiction writer to do a couple
of eps?"
Now i'm not saying there's anything wrong with any of that...in fact Missy Good's two eps are among my favourites of the series....it's just that in the hurry to do everything they hadn't done before I think they forgot about the arc....the over-riding theme, that I think gave S3, S4 and even S5 their identities.
So as a season from which to choose random eps to watch...it's rich pickings....but as an entire season watch I thought it was a little unsatisfying. Though you may justifiably point out that without watching AFIN, that view is incomplete. Depends on your opinion of AFIN, I suppose.
As to individual eps loved Coming Home, Legacy, The Abyss, Norse trilogy, Old Ares Had A Farm, Path Of Vengeance, You Are There, Send In The Clones & When Fates Collide. Was surprised how much I enjoyed Haunting Of Amphipolis, To Helicon and Back and, as mentioned The Last Centaur.
It has to be said though that some eps came perilously close to pure pantomime! The God You Know for me was the worst ep of the season as no matter how many times I watch it (and that's not a lot) it doesn't seem to make any kind of sense at all...just what is Michael's plan?!? I mean I can enjoy a story with plot holes if everything else in the ep compensates for it a' la WFC....but TGYK was just silly in the extreme...and MHR had a warlord that looked like he'd trained in the "Aaaah Jim lad" school of acting. And much as I enjoyed Annie, Mattie and Harry's re-appearence and all the fan references in Soul Possession, it was ruined by a ridiculous back-story that didn't know whether it was comedy or drama and that unforgivable gaff of the changing Chakrams.
You could even make a case that the more outrageous eps like Send In The Clones and You Are There (as enjoyable as they are) actually detract from the drama and "reality" of the rest of the show.
But let me not get too negative here....i've spent the last month once again totally enraptured by Xena's story and would advise any lapsed Xenites such as myself to give it a go...you won't regret it.
I feel myself now on a sort of Xena plateau.....not the obsessive I used to be (which is probably a good thing), but definitely a bona fide Xena fan once again....and do you know what? I think i'll give myself a couple of weeks and start all over again....I might even watch Death Mask this time.
General thoughts? What about episodes left out? This wasn't a strict "must-watch-every-ep" type re-watch....and I thought the number of eps left out would be a good indication of how I felt about each season.
So the season award for least amount of eps not watched goes to..........surprise, surprise...SEASON 4!
Just the two eps left out...Daughter Of Pomira
and Key To The Kingdom. Well....I suppose if you count AFIN as a single ep (Director's Cut), then it's a draw, as it was just this and Who's
Gurkhan? missed from S6
Season with MOST eps missed out........poor old S1....very closely followed by S5....just couldn't bring myself to watch eps like The Titans and Death Mask again.
Biggest surpises? A couple of eps stand out as ones I really didn't appreciate before until I watched them again. Crusader was one....The Last Centaur another....and I even found myself really enjoying For Him The Bell Tolls!
Ok, so Season 6. I'm finding this really difficult to put my finger on....but I think S6 doesn't add up to the sum of its parts. Individually, there's some outstanding eps, indeed some of my favourites from the whole series, but as a season it's less satisfying than seasons 3, 4 or even 2. On my S4 thread, Laura was saying that even though she agreed with most of my arguments about S4 being the best, she still liked S3 best because of its "feel". and although "feel" or maybe "tone" is difficult to pin down, I know exactly what she means.
Most seasons do have a "feel" to them.....but if S6 has one...it's a feel of something of a hodge-podge (to use a technical term)
Because they knew S6 was probably going to be the last, it was a chance to cram in all the things they'd been wanting to do in previous seasons. It
was..."we must wrap that bit up" ...."we must do a story set there" ...."why don't we get in a fan fiction writer to do a couple
of eps?"
Now i'm not saying there's anything wrong with any of that...in fact Missy Good's two eps are among my favourites of the series....it's just that in the hurry to do everything they hadn't done before I think they forgot about the arc....the over-riding theme, that I think gave S3, S4 and even S5 their identities.
So as a season from which to choose random eps to watch...it's rich pickings....but as an entire season watch I thought it was a little unsatisfying. Though you may justifiably point out that without watching AFIN, that view is incomplete. Depends on your opinion of AFIN, I suppose.
As to individual eps loved Coming Home, Legacy, The Abyss, Norse trilogy, Old Ares Had A Farm, Path Of Vengeance, You Are There, Send In The Clones & When Fates Collide. Was surprised how much I enjoyed Haunting Of Amphipolis, To Helicon and Back and, as mentioned The Last Centaur.
It has to be said though that some eps came perilously close to pure pantomime! The God You Know for me was the worst ep of the season as no matter how many times I watch it (and that's not a lot) it doesn't seem to make any kind of sense at all...just what is Michael's plan?!? I mean I can enjoy a story with plot holes if everything else in the ep compensates for it a' la WFC....but TGYK was just silly in the extreme...and MHR had a warlord that looked like he'd trained in the "Aaaah Jim lad" school of acting. And much as I enjoyed Annie, Mattie and Harry's re-appearence and all the fan references in Soul Possession, it was ruined by a ridiculous back-story that didn't know whether it was comedy or drama and that unforgivable gaff of the changing Chakrams.
You could even make a case that the more outrageous eps like Send In The Clones and You Are There (as enjoyable as they are) actually detract from the drama and "reality" of the rest of the show.
But let me not get too negative here....i've spent the last month once again totally enraptured by Xena's story and would advise any lapsed Xenites such as myself to give it a go...you won't regret it.
I feel myself now on a sort of Xena plateau.....not the obsessive I used to be (which is probably a good thing), but definitely a bona fide Xena fan once again....and do you know what? I think i'll give myself a couple of weeks and start all over again....I might even watch Death Mask this time.
