Return of the Valkyrie

Okay, campers, what happened last time: thirty-seven winters ago, Xena rode into the North, made a fool out of Odin and stole the Rheingold, forged a Ring from it (why do they keep referring to this as "forged", I don't know, she melted the gold and poured it into a mold, I do believe this is technically known as "casting", but maybe casting doesn't sound quite evil enough), then when Grinhilde took the Ring and used it, she turned into Tree, and she was pregnant at the time, highly questionable behaviour on her part, and Xena won the fight and got the Ring back and locked up Tree in an abandoned mineshaft, but Tree got the Ring back somehow, never say die, and Xena left town. Then when she came back recently, all good now and stuff, she hooked up with Beowulf to whup up on Tree (you could just read the two previous low rents) since Tree escaped the mine and has since been turning mead halls into abattoirs, and ends up killing Tree's offspring instead, hardly useful, except that Little Tree had the Ring and was really the one laying waste to Viking pubs, having Ultimate Power is its own reward, and so now Xena has the Ring back finally, and Gabrielle fell in with Brunnhilde, a Valkyrie in disguise, and Brunnhilde fell for Gabrielle, so did Beowulf, Odin didn't, Odin ordered the Valks to kill Gabrielle to score off Xena, he's still sore over her dumping him, so even though Xena got the Ring back from Little Tree with only the best of intentions, she has to use it (for the Ultimate Power Pack) to get past Odin and the Valkyries and she keeps it on too long, loses her mind, so Brunnhilde gets the Ring from her (Xena gives it to her freely, she may have lost her mind but at least she's not going to turn into Gollum) and gives it to Gabrielle to keep safe, and then turns herself into a Ring of Fire to make sure Gabrielle stays safe, only her soulmate can pass through the flames, so that fairly does for Odin and he and the Valks stump back to Valhalla, which unaccountably looks like a termite hill, and that makes no sense, not metaphorically nor mythically.

Current events open with the caption One Year Later. The moon is FULL! Yes! We're back in the swampforest; a band of Viking warriors led by someone hight Lord Eric is forcing its way toward Gabrielle's platform. Also running after them is Beowulf and his sidekick, Wiglaf. Beowulf tries to dissuade Eric from challenging the BrunnFlame, but Eric's all full of himself and sneers haughtily. Before he can jump heroically into certain fiery death (Beowulf has a burn-scarred hand; apparently he gave it a go at one point and knows what he's talking about, Eric's kinda young, though), Grindl/Tree jumps into the middle of the party and whups up on Vikings right and left. Eric immediately runs headlong into the fire, and there's a way cool FX bit where he's flash-burned to his skeleton, and then even his skeleton is turned to powder. Evidently, when Brunnhilde learned to do the Eternal Flame spell in Valkyrie School, she studied all the way up to Nuclear level.

Beowulf calls retreat, and they all race back for their ship. Beowulf is planning to go to Denmark and enlist help from King Hrothgar to kill Tree. Once there, he and Wiglaf run smack into a wedding feast, There's lots of merriment and so forth, including a woman juggling chakrams (Chakram Classic rather than New Chakram) Hrothgar's marrying someone named Wealthea, not a Norse name, as Wiglaf notes. Beowulf speculates that it's Celtic for... the doors burst open and a heifer, I thought it was a Holstein but it turns out to be an Angus-Friesian cross, strolls into the hall, with Xena on its back, and Beowulf amends his thought: Weathea is apparently Celtic for "warrior princess". Cue titles!

Man, this show has sure gotten complicated. Beowulf thought she'd died in the swampforest, so he's pretty shocked to see her there, I'm pretty shocked at the amount of thigh she's showing, considering that she's supposed to be a bride of some sort and this isn't one of those clothing-optional cultures.

There's a woman in the crowd who also doesn't approve, either. Turns out to be Hrothgar's sister, and it's not so much the expanse of thigh as the existence of the thigh's owner that she objects to.

Meanwhile Xena fetches up next to Hrothgar in front of a holy personage, who says insipid stuff about joining two hearts, the whole ceremony is a potent argument against couples writing their own vows. Hrothgar puts the wedding ring on Xena's finger and triggers a flashback to That Damn Ring Bit, but it's mercifully truncated and then she remembers the crap she and he worked out last week while on a picnic ("I promise to, um, have his children, and, um, be a mother to his people, and... oh, hell."). She likewise puts a ring on his finger, and we get more flashbacks, this time to her fight with Grinhilde and Grinhilde turning into Tree, bit off-putting, getting married is so stressful already without all this extra stuff, but luckily they're done and married and all that's left is the dancing and feasting and consummation. We keep seeing flashes of chakrams in the crowd, they're as ubiquitous as phosphorescent wands at county fairs. Hm.

Then Hrothgar kills the heifer.

Not by anything so clean and subtle as a scalpel to its jugular, but executioner-style—he apparently lops its head off. Guys, this is messy, all right? There's gonna be blood spurting and shooting off in every direction, and this is supposed to be a feast, a celebration to which everyone's worn their good clothes, but maybe Hrothgar needs to remind everyone that he ain't no effete subtle southern king, but a real feisty brawling northern he-Viking, especially with his sister always hanging around, being taller than him and smarter and steelier...

Lordy. So the camera cuts back to the swampforest before we see half a hundred lords and ladies tot up their dry-cleaning bills for Hrothgar, and it seems the Valkyries are going through the corpses left (they're checking their fillings and all but rifling their pockets) laying about after Tree got done seeing to Eric's band. This is interesting, most legends of Valkyries leading the fallen heroes to Valhalla assume that the fallen are hale and hearty (considing the circumstances), and these guys are so obviously dead that it takes two Valks to carry one corpse. They consider these deaths to be a waste of potential, personally I think they're giving Eric's Lads more credit than they deserve, but whatever. One thing's for sure, they don't like Xena.

Back at the feast hall, someone's cleaned up the mess from the heifer kill, but they can't do anything to make Hrothgar any less of a boor than he is naturally. He tries to do Xena in an alcove, despite tradition and good taste (first feast, then consummation, it's not nearly so much fun for the guests when you get the order mixed up), and gets all pissy when she tries to talk to him about the flashbacks. Beowulf interrupts his clumsy groping and Hrothgar introduces his new wife, Wealthea, to him. She doesn't seem to recognize Beowulf, but Hrothgar's sister notices, she's the kind of woman who notices stuff, and she pushes Beowulf to spill any beans he's got to her. Not that that matters even a little bit.

Cut to Xena in her bridal bedroom, she's brushing her hair, or trying to, she's got one of those brushes that are too soft and thick to get down to one's scalp, really annoying they are, and there's a knock at the door. Xena thinks it's Hrothgar, and she has to let him in, so she does, but it isn't, it's Beowulf in disguise, puts them both in an awkward position. How awkward we see when, despite his using words like "Gabrielle," "save," "Odin's raven" (one of them landed on the window ledge just then) it's not enough to jog her memory before the door bursts open again (no one has less privacy than a bride on her wedding night, I tell you.) and this time it's Hrothgar, his sister, and some guarddudes. His sister puts the worst possible construction on Beowulf's presence, surprise.

From what happens next, I'm guessing the marriage is annulled. Maybe Hrothgar goes on to marry his sister, but meanwhile, Beowulf and Xena break free of the guards and he says the magic word ("Gabrielle") again and she sees a Gab-vision, just like Adventures in the Sin Trade, except without the spider, this time it's Gabrielle bending over her saying, "I'm lost without you, Xena."

Next thing you know, she and Beowulf are on a Viking boat plying the high seas back for Norseland and the swampforest. Xena's outfitted in the manner of a Hollywood glamour queen, in white fur-edged coat and hat, and protests that she remembers nothing of what Beowulf's talking about, there's a sale at Macy's that she has to get to, but she's still got those Warrior Princess reflexes. (Can you imagine someone with those reflexes at a Macy's sale?) Beowulf says Hrothgar made up that stuff about her being a sole survivor of a shipwreck, and even made up her name, shows the kind of unimaginative ponce he is, I mean, "Wealthea"? Give me a break.

Cut to the termite hill, seems Odin knows the score, and he clues in Waltraute, head Valkyrie (well, after Grinhilde and then Brunnhilde, and the one Brunnhilde skewered, he's kind of down to the dregs and has to settle for the best of an increasingly poor lot). They get ready to hunt Xena down.

The boat has landed, and on the shore Wiglaf and the boys get into one of those good-natured brawls so common in Aussie pubs, turns out they're traditional. Xena finally breaks it up, and there's some more "jog the warrior princess' memory" dialogue, doesn't seem to help much, and then the remainder of the Valkyries descend. Commercial time!

Xena gets Beowulf to have his men throw down their weapons. She tries to sweet-talk the Valkyries, but Waltraute is having none of it, and attacks. Xena dodges her every swing, then Odin shows up. He assures himself that Xena is still forgetful, and calls off the Valks. He tells them later that they are to make sure Xena gets the Ring, cos in her present state it'll be way easy to take it from her. Waltraute notices he's leaving out key bits, like the part where he promised she could have the Ring, and calls him on it. He basically tells her to sit on it and spin. Why the Valkyries still hang around him, I don't know.

(Xena's still wearing her wedding dress, by the way. Considering all the skirmishing she's had to do since she said, "I do," it's probably a good thing it's cut so high up on the leg.)

That night, in her tent, Xena has another Gab-vision (she also plays with her wedding ring. It's a "one size fits all". Need I say more?). Beowulf comes in and tells her that Gabrielle truly loved her, as she's beginning to guess, and will till the end of time. Then he gives her back her chakram.

They make their way through the swampforest to the BrunnFire, and Xena starts to go through it. She is not burned to powder, and Brunnhilde speaks to her out of the flame, basically blessing her. Then the Valkyries attack again. Well, someone had to, it was either them or Grindl/Tree.

The wedding dress comes with a convenient chakram-holder, but Xena doesn't use it, she weaves and dodges till Wiglaf tosses her his sword. Then Waltraute throws a dagger into him, and that pisses Xena off. Two more parries, and she kicks Waltraute into the BrunnFlame. The Valks are gonna have to audition for another xylophone player, looks like. (For those of us who got tired of her permanent sneer as early as last ep, it's really a catharsis of sorts, to see her burn.)

Ah, there's Tree! Wondered where she was keeping herself. Tree's skewered Beowulf on a branch, he's not dead but he's not happy, and lifted him off the ground in an homage to Alien, even though Beowulf is really too short and stocky to be a convincing Ripley, he wouldn't make a bad Dallas, though, anyway, he's trying to get Xena to move her arse into the BrunnFlame already but she's hesitating. He insists, and she makes up her mind finally and dives through a montage of tender Gab-moments to fetch up somersaulting by Gabrielle's platform. As she kisses Gabrielle awake (Gab's hair is shoulder length and braided just like Brunnhilde's, hm), more memories flood back, and her wedding dress turns into her old leathers and armour, and even her sword is back, sheathed on her back. Brunnhilde reminds her about the Ring, and Gabrielle insists that she not put it on again, I am so there for that, and as Xena turns to face Grindl/Tree (it's tossed Beowulf aside by now, he's still alive), the BrunnFlame is sucked up into the Ring and Xena tucks it away.

She pulls it out a minute later, Tree's got her backed into a tight spot, and picks her up. The Ring is a ball of flame in Xena's hand, as she begs Grinhilde to look into her heart, find the woman she once was, and forgive. Grinhilde does so, and the fire becomes a fireball filling the clearing in a huge explosion, this is not what they told me would happen in that twelve-step meeting when one asks folks to forgive one.

Xena emerges first, and shows the Ring, no longer a ring, but the raw lump of gold it started out as (this is the real difference between casting and forging, I'm thinking; if it had been forged, like Xena was, it would've only been a bit crumpled. Casting is the way to go if you need to keep your undo options open.). Then Grinhilde, in her old form, comes out whole and well. They say goodbye to Beowulf and Wiglaf (he's okay now, so is Wiglaf, the explosion of forgiveness healed them both, I am never asking for forgiveness, not ever again, who knows what'll happen) and mount a pair of Valkyrie flying horsies (Gabrielle needs a mounting block) and head for Valhalla.

Odin wants the Ring, but when Xena presents Grinhilde he's willing to settle. He's missed her. He's really missed her. His missing her was what got him hot on the Ring wagon in the first place, well, that and the fling he had with Xena. That's water under the bridge now, and speaking of bridges and water, one last thing Xena's got to do before they can head south is stop by the Rhein and return the Rheingold. "What magic has made Xena give up the power of the Rheingold?" they want to know, and Xena says it wasn't magic, then she looks at where Gabrielle is standing on the bank smiling at them. Anything left to talk about? No? We're done, then.

Cool ep, mostly loose-end tying, decent amount of butt-kicking, serious amount of reaffirmation of the worlds without end connection between Xena and Gabrielle that puts the vows Hrothgar dreamed up in their place, and none of the good guys died. Actually, now that I think of it, only Lord Eric and Waltraute died, and no one misses them. Okay, maybe the remainder of the Valkyries miss the extra pair of hands to drag corpes around, they don't have enough to handle even a pickpocketing gone wrong anymore, but still, she looked like a pouty piglet when she sneered and that can't have been terribly inspirational to most of the Viking warriors. Beowulf still doesn't win any fights, though he gets credit for two assists.