In a Time of Ancient Gods: The Xena Podcast
A Xena: Warrior Princess rewatch podcast! Join Justine and Hayley as they research the truth behind myths, histories, and characters we meet in the Xenaverse.
Doing their best to release episodes monthly!
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In a Time of Ancient Gods: The Xena Podcast
Fins, Femmes and Gems
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Go catch a fish with Xena & Gabby and never insult Aphrodite in her own temple! MEANWHILE Justine and Hayley rewatch Xena season 3's "Fins, Femmes and Gems" and research Tarzan!
Visit our Patreon for Hayley's research on Constellations and the Myth of Pisces!
Check out our Patreon for Research References
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Re chord re chord cord re da da cord da da da da da da da It's our new jazz number.
SPEAKER_00Hello! We are in a time of ancient gods, the Xena podcast, where we are re-watching every episode of our favorite TV show, Xena Warrior Princess, and we are researching the myths, the heroes, the themes we meet in the Xenaverse. I'm Justine, and my dearest co-host with me today is I'm Hayley. It's Haley!
SPEAKER_02So happy to be here.
SPEAKER_00So happy to be here as well. Top of the episode, we want to thank everyone who is supporting us on Patreon. You guys are amazing. Anybody who's not over there already, we post screenshots from the episodes. We post our research references for every episode, and little mini sodes with extra research. There's a link in the description of this episode, but you can also go to our website.
SPEAKER_02Oh, I know the address. Yeah, where is that, Haley? Well, you can just go straight to in a timeofancient gods.com.
SPEAKER_00Oh, phew. Okay, great.
SPEAKER_02Mm-hmm. You'll spell it out. I don't have to do it for you. I trust you. Oh, hilarious. We've done it before, surely. We've done it before. You can scroll up and down. You can click on the links in there.
SPEAKER_00It's all in there. You got links to every episode and info on all the research from every single episode of In a Time of Ancient Gods. What have you been up to since we last chatted, Haley?
SPEAKER_02Oh my gosh. I always forget to mentally prepare for this section. Okay. What have I been up to? I went outside.
SPEAKER_01You did.
SPEAKER_02I uh took some seeds that I found in the basement and sprinkled them around the yard. So who knows what's gonna happen? We'll see. Oh, that's fun. Yeah, it should be fun. And yeah, I've just been, you know, doing your thing. Getting into it, doing my thing. Just doing your thing.
SPEAKER_00Listening to some audiobooks, exploring my library. Doing your end of summer life. Yeah. That's great. Wonderful. Well, I went to a lovely concert through the Early Music Festival in Berkeley. Sequentia. They're a vocal ensemble. And they're performing the music of the spheres. So it was very Grecian. There was some harp. Uh it was great vibes. Other fun stuff. Oh, you and I have been having a lot of fun doing a little writing group meeting every so often talking about our project. That's been great. That's been great.
SPEAKER_02I recommend it. If you like writing and you have someone that you love to talk to about writing, start a little writing.
SPEAKER_00Just hang out with them.
SPEAKER_02It doesn't have to be more than two.
SPEAKER_00No, it's great. That's been really wonderful. But the biggest news in my life, I don't think I've shared on the pod yet. But I was waiting at the Ashby Bart station for a train and a pigeon landed on my head.
SPEAKER_02No, I don't think you shared it on the pod. Can you believe it? Right on your head. In your hair. That's the worst.
SPEAKER_00I felt this little, I was just like my headphones vibing. And then I hear feel this like little like crickle feeling on my head. And my in my brain, I was like, oh, it's just a friend messing with me. So I turned around, saw no one. But within this like split second of seeing no one and kind of seeing like a little flash of a wing in the corner of my hair, I realized a pigeon had landed on my head, screamed through my headphones and the bird to the ground, was like just screaming at heart. Nobody around me had seen the bird land on my head. Except like I was like, there was a bird, it landed on my head.
SPEAKER_01There's a stupid pigeon just like walking around. And then one guy was like, that was wild.
SPEAKER_02It's just one of those things that's like nobody, you can't connect with people over it really, because it's like so random. And nobody knows exactly how you feel about having a bird land on your head.
SPEAKER_01Everyone should know it was awful.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, there was one guy who just looked at me like so angry that I was like making a scene as if I was like making it all about me.
SPEAKER_01Honestly, he's like, what about the bird? It was like such a nightmare situation.
SPEAKER_02Well, the best part about that for me was that I received a call while wandering in a local graveyard with my sister. Oh, yeah. I was looking at the old gravestones, and here I get a call from Justine early in the morning.
SPEAKER_00Just like panic. Like, oh my god. Like, oh good. Her sister's there too? Great. She's gonna love this.
SPEAKER_02We did. We loved it. We talked about it for a while afterwards.
SPEAKER_01Gross.
SPEAKER_02All right.
SPEAKER_01So now that we're all up to date.
SPEAKER_02It must have been some kind of omen. You'll have to look it up.
SPEAKER_00Um, I think I did look up. Pigeons, I think, are all about like home and some type of like home safety, something. Something was happening that it was not a bad omen.
SPEAKER_02No, but it was not claw your hair pleasant. It just landed. Yeah. It was saying, I love your house, and then lightly going away. Probably.
SPEAKER_01It's like you seem safe. I don't know. Like, I hate you so much. Ugh.
SPEAKER_02Don't do that. Don't do that. Yeah. Okay. Sometimes they don't know how to express love. That's okay. No one does. No one does. Pigeons, it's the same with the rest of us.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Well, so today we're scaling down from the heavens, the land of feathers and claw, and sinking down to fins, femmes, and gems.
SPEAKER_02Everyone remembers this episode.
SPEAKER_00This was definitely one of our favorite episodes as kids, obsessed. It was written by Adam Armis and Nora K. Foster, who we know from Chariots of War, Death in Chains, Girls Just Want to Have Fun, The Xena Scrolls, King of Assassins, Warrior Pieces Tramp. And today, uh, they are a deep Xenoverse lore duo. They're taking care of us.
SPEAKER_02They are top-notch. I mean, those are all fave episodes. None of them is a myth.
SPEAKER_00No, neither is this one. This was written by Josh Becker. Or sorry, this was directed by Josh Becker, uh, who directed Fistful of Dinars, Warrior Princess Tramp, for him the Bell Tolls, Blind Faith. And today, we'll and we'll meet him again in the Xenoverse. The original air date was April 11th, 1998. Oh my god. And I do have I do have the IMDB description for you if you're ready for it. Uh-huh. I'm ready. Okay. Aphrodite sends her pet thugs with a stolen diamond to her temple at Parnassus and distracts the pursuers, Xina, Gabrielle, and Joxer, with a potion that makes them obsess about whatever they were thinking when they smell it.
SPEAKER_02I say it's pretty good.
SPEAKER_00I liked it. Yeah, B plus A for me.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I'd say so. Yeah. It's it's like I like it. Gets me enough like fun texture. Like I get that there's like a weird obsessive potion and the diamond.
SPEAKER_00I'm I'm a pleased by it. Yeah, it's like it's funny, it's chaotic. We get it mentions Zina. We're happy. We're happy. Great. So who is the big bad in this episode?
SPEAKER_02Oh, let's see. What did I write down? Oh. Um, Aphrodite, but also not facing something that's troubling us.
SPEAKER_00Totally.
SPEAKER_02Turning to obsessions rather than expressing what we need. Yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00I said Aphrodite and our unconscious desires and shame. Mm-hmm. Totally. The gods we see here, Aphrodite. Absolutely. No one else, I think. I think it's just her.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Villagers? Not that I noticed. Did you notice any?
SPEAKER_00No, we mentioned them. Gabby has some imaginary potential villagers, but um from the imaginal realm. But none here. None present. Uh no Dr. Xina. No real cults, no dungeon. But as far as a love interest, this is 100% Gabby love interest episode. So our research for today, I researched Tarzan, and it's gonna be a good conversation. I hope it doesn't come off too preachy, but uh I think it'll be fine.
SPEAKER_02And then it's gonna be fine.
SPEAKER_00And then Haley, what'd you research for Patreon?
SPEAKER_02Oh, for Patreon, I researched uh Aphrodite and Fish and the Pisces myth.
SPEAKER_00Oh, so exciting. Okay, should we just launch in? Let me readjust myself on my chair.
SPEAKER_02I just did that. Okay, good.
unknownGood, good, good.
SPEAKER_02I've got a nice blanket behind me offering me some lumbar support.
SPEAKER_00Ah, love it. I'm just sitting sitting upright. Okay. We start off. We're in Aphreite's temple. It's beautiful. There's lit candles, a soft glow, sumptuous fabrics, uh, tables and altars with abundant offerings, statues, and artwork of like beautiful women lining the walls. We love it.
SPEAKER_02It's gorgeous. There's ornate brickwork on the outside. It's kind of domed temple again. So we're getting the sense that we're moving into a very sacred space.
SPEAKER_00So sacred. And then inside the sacred space, Aphrodite appears wearing her like pink diaphanous teddy, and she's wearing these like super cool headphones that are seashells. Yeah. She's like dancing to some super cool music.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, it's like these kind of demo songs. They remind me of the like synthesizer song that came available on the synthesizer, and she's loving it. She's loving a great time.
SPEAKER_00She takes the headphones off, she trots over to check out the new offerings. There's some cool trinkets and a pile of fish. She hates fish, but people keep giving it to her. Weird. Maybe we'll find out in Haley's research.
SPEAKER_02I'll tell ya.
SPEAKER_00And Aphrodite's henchmen show up. We have Myconus and like two other boys, and they're pretty standard issue Xenoverse henchmen. Uh, they're wearing black studded leather. One has like a little leather cap. And these guys have secured a mystic diamond for Aphrodite. This is the most beautiful north star from the night sky. And she tells Myconus to take the diamond to her priest in Parnassus, who's gonna shoot it into the night sky for her, and it's to become the center of her constellation, which is such a great plot.
SPEAKER_02It is a great plot. What I love this construction. It's yeah, so beautiful.
SPEAKER_00Right, so wonderful.
SPEAKER_02It's fun, evocative, mythic. We're into it. Everything's into it.
SPEAKER_00So then Mykiness flirts with her a little, she deflects, uh, she tells him to leave quickly because Zina and the crew are on the trail, and she has a plan. What's her plan?
SPEAKER_02Well, she wants to try to stop Zina. Wait, what plan? She has a satisfying pink bottle full of the magic serum.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_02And when it's a plan, Well, she's got a secret plan that she's gonna reveal as they arrive. Okay, okay, cool, cool.
SPEAKER_00So the boys run out the back, Aphrodite like makes herself invisible, and Zina and Gabby and Joxer run in. It's like so fun. I love starting the scene with like the antagonist, and then Zina drops in to save the day. It's like really nice story structure.
SPEAKER_02I know.
SPEAKER_00So uh Zina knows that they have the North Star, um, and she knows they have to get it back in the sky before nightfall. So the world, otherwise, the world won't be able to navigate. It's gonna be a crisis.
SPEAKER_02Destabilize all navigation in the ancient world. They're all using that north star.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so all karma will fall, safeties, everyone's gonna be in danger. It's crazy. So they're like poking around the temple to see if the diamond's just like hidden somewhere. Aphrodite is invisible to them, but not to us. And she's getting more and more irritated and is like feeling justified for what she's about to do because she's watching them go through all of her stuff and saying mean things about her.
SPEAKER_02Totally. And so she And like Gabby's kind of like a little bit insulting to Aphrodite as she goes around. She's questioning Aphrodite's opinion of herself, and we're all thinking, Gabby, you're in a temple to Aphrodite. You've all read the Greek myths before. Yeah. So you probably stopped a little bit.
SPEAKER_00She shouldn't tease or belittle the goddess of love. And Joxer's like looking at this artwork that's depicting Addis the Ape Man and Princess Gaia, which Gabby describes this story as being about it's a beautiful love story of a man swinging through the trees with the love of his life.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I love that that's in the temple. This is yeah, part of this Aphrodite temple. And uh just as he's looking at that painting, Aphrodite sneaks up with the bottle that she's been concealing. Well, she's been hiding with her invisible self and blows a little bit of the potion up on Jocker and he turns to the camera, transformed.
SPEAKER_00He's now the ape-man addis.
SPEAKER_01No surprise.
SPEAKER_00So Gabby kind of walks away and she's feeling a little inferior for not being perceived as like such a worldly beauty as Zina and Aphrodite. Um, she kind of looks in the mirror at herself, and then Aphrodite blows this potion on Gabby, and then we see her just like pawing at the mirror at her own reflection.
SPEAKER_02And then suddenly obsessed.
SPEAKER_00Suddenly obsessed with herself. And then Aphrodite blows the potion on Xina. Well, Zina is admiring a walleyed pike pile on Aphrodite's offerings altar, which is a fish native to North America along the Mississippi, not Greece, but that's okay. Well, that's okay. It's for the bit. And then Zina says, I've got it. I know what to do. The North Star is on the verge of extinction. The fate of the world lies in our hands. We've got no choice. We're going fishing. And we catch Gabby and Zina in a field. Zina's trying to fly a kite. And we love Zina with a kite. I completely believe Lucy Lawless, I believe her acting skills, completely believe she's controlling a kite. Um, and if you're interested in kites, you can check out Haley's research from season two episode A Day in the Life. Haley went all out.
SPEAKER_02I love kites.
SPEAKER_00Gabby's just hilariously comparing the clouds to the slope of her own nose. Uh Zina's not really paying attention to her and is like hyper-fixated on testing this kite contraption and making Gabby like jump up and grab to release the clip. And she's just antagonizing Gabby into doing it by implying she's short and imperfect.
SPEAKER_02Well, because Gabby at first is like, I don't think I want to. Yeah. I'm kind of busy admiring myself. I don't think I can jump up fat.
SPEAKER_00And she's like, oh yeah, just because you're, you know, your condition or whatever of like being short.
SPEAKER_02And Gabby tries, there's some great little whoosh noises while Gabby's jumping up.
SPEAKER_01Oh yes.
SPEAKER_02Uh but she does easily lose interest until Xina teases her into doing it.
SPEAKER_00And then uh Gabby jumps up, grabs it, the whole thing comes crashing down on her. Zina runs up, worried the kite is broken, and she's like, Oh, I can fix it down at the lake. What lake?
SPEAKER_02Oh, we're gonna find out. This is all just an excuse to get down to the lake on this later.
SPEAKER_00So we notice Joxer is kind of at the edge of the forest, crouching, eating bugs, sniffing stuff, acting like an ape man. Mm-hmm. And Gabby and Zina are both disgusted, uh, but they don't stop him.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_02He's an adult, he's allowed to eat bugs if he wants to.
SPEAKER_00Gabby's just being like such a great popular girl, and she's like, he's being so weird. I don't want to be seen in public with.
SPEAKER_02I love popular Gabby.
SPEAKER_01I know. This is like just uh Haley and I love the like popular girl trope.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. I think I mean I I feel like most of us millennials who watched a lot of teen stuff at the turn of the century really loved it.
SPEAKER_02This is so great. I love also that Gabby in this episode has like kind of a higher half ponytail than usual, so it makes a little bump. Yeah, totally sure. And she's got like very smooth hair.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, she's way more, she's been brushing that hair. Mm-hmm. And so, and Zina's like, you know, you got the obsession thing too, and accuses her of being obsessed with herself, and Gabby's like, no way. And Zina pulls out her sword, and Gabby gets like caught up in her own reflection.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and we're all proud of Zina for noticing it right away.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, totally.
SPEAKER_02And she's like, And we're wondering at this point, does Zina recognize her own obsession?
SPEAKER_00No, she's so funny. I mean, my just Zina being like, I haven't been affected at all. So I'm gonna take care of this. So let's go fishing. So Zina gets everyone moving, they're heading to the lake. She tells Joxer to bring some of whatever you're eating. It might be good bait. Joxter's like, okay, and then columns after them. Yeah. And uh, so we're on the way to the lake. Gabby's complaining about not bringing Argo.
unknownRight.
SPEAKER_00She says she has perfect calluses. And then Gabby's just like chatterboxing about rewriting a scroll. Zina says, whatever. Gabby's ignoring Zina and kind of she gets lost in her own thoughts and sings a little song to herself. And then Zina like slaps her hand over Gabby's mouth. She's like, I don't know, I thought this bit was funny. She's like, Are you out of your mind? And Gabby says, Too loud? Are you worried we're gonna get there and the fish will be gone? And Zina says, I'm worried we're gonna get there and the fish will be armed.
SPEAKER_01Classic. So good.
SPEAKER_00Okay, so they walk over to like a rocky cliff edge. Gabby's brushing her hair a million times. But Zina has a new phase of the plan. She's focused on the diamond and she kind of is like squaring her fingers to figure out all the right chakram angles. And Joxer is like just sniffing around making monkey sounds, just not helping at all. And Zina's going to cause an avalanche with a chakra to force Aphrodite's henchmen to divert towards the lake. And she throws her chakra, causes the avalanche. Gabby loses count of her hair brushing. She has to start over, and then they go back to the lake so Zina can fish.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, she's buying time for a little more fishing time. Exactly. Right now we're thinking she is obsessed with fishing. Are they gonna get that star back? I'm not sure. But we trust her because she's Zina.
SPEAKER_00She's Zina, and it's an Aphrodite episode, so this is low stakes. Probably no one's gonna die. Yeah. Zina is so excited to take all of her gear off and dive into the water. She's yelling at Gabby to join her. Gabby starts like taking off her top, kind of waxing poetic about how beautiful she is and how her beauty would kill Joxer. And Joxer's just like sniffing her, trying to lick her. She punches him. He barely notices. And then Xena's swimming in the lake, and we are gifted with, I think, one of the most hilarious scenes in this universe. Yeah. Where Zina pops out of the water, a giant fish wiggling on her right hand. She's so thrilled. The fish is making these like goofy, high-pitched squealing sounds. Little dolphin screams. Gabby's disgusted.
SPEAKER_02She flips it up and it flies, and it's like all the way into the bag.
SPEAKER_00And Zina's like, I used to do this all the time.
SPEAKER_02And she's noodling, which until I was an adult, I didn't know it was a thing. Many people probably know this already. But you can catch catfish by going down underwater. It's actually quite dangerous. Oh. Putting your hand in a little hole and wiggling your fingers until a catfish comes and gets it. How is it dangerous?
SPEAKER_00Just if like an alligator.
SPEAKER_02You don't know what's in the hole.
SPEAKER_00Oh, you don't know what's in the hole. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And you might get stuck in the hole. Who knows? You're underwater. Zina. Putting your hand in a hole. Zena's safe, though. But Zina knows what she's doing. And they probably don't have snapping turtles there.
SPEAKER_00She's yeah, she's a lifetime noodler. She knows what's up. Yeah, she's just like, you gotta stick your fingers underneath. And then Gabby says, You punch the fish in the face. Why would I want to do that? And Zina says, Because it's fun. And they're the just like feistiness between them, the tension between them in this episode. It's so funny. That's really, really, really great. It's lovely. Also, the music is this like plinky plunky midifile sea shanty. Zina dives back underwater, pops back up with two fish on both hands, yells twins, then throws them to the land, and then they uh land in the sack. Perfect. She gets out of the water, runs off screen to like gut some kills. Gabby walks out onto a log into the lake. A little fishing ledge. She's laughing about how silly Zina is and how she doesn't appreciate how beautiful Gabby is. And Joxer's just like watching her from the shore, being obsessed. And he pulls a maggot out of his hair and calls it Wiggily Food. So gross.
SPEAKER_02No, no.
SPEAKER_00And he eats it. We're really grossed out. So gross. Zina comes back, she starts a fire, drops her fish with Joxer, and Joxer's like talking to the fish, calls him his trout brother. Uh the fish talks back like a little gremlin. Joxer laughs at the joke and throws the fish back into the water for him to be free. And Zina's demands tribute. Yeah, he does demand tribute. And Xina almost kills him for that because you can't be throwing away Xina's fish.
SPEAKER_02She just caught that fish.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And then she looks like It's gonna be a good meal. She looks around for Gabby, but Gabby's gone. She's fallen into the water. She was trying to kiss her own reflection. Zina dives in, saves her, was wondering if there's any fish down there. And then there's a moment where we think Gabby is about to confess her undying love for Zina, but instead Gabby confesses that she's obsessed with herself.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00And Zina's very irritated and gets up and leaves. As Gabby's drying off, Joxter's like scratching his back on a rock and grunting. And she's brushing her hair again, talking to him. And then we kind of cut to Joxer's point of view. And he sees Gabby.
SPEAKER_02Gabby's like all aglow. She's wearing like kind of a leafy tiara and kind of lit with this golden light.
SPEAKER_00But she's also kind of speaking in this broken English and grunting back at him.
SPEAKER_02Yes, right. Yeah. She's it's this is like a Tarzan, Joxer, ape man love story. Vision love story. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And in his fantasy, Gabby's calling him like a mighty man monkey, and she's a lady monkey. He's really into it. But in real life, Gabby's a little worried about Xena's fishing obsession.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00But Joxer's just hearing what he wants to hear, and he he's yeah, he's it's gross.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_02We don't need to reenact.
SPEAKER_00We're not gonna read it, okay.
SPEAKER_02But we get it. Like he's he's uh inhabiting this particular character.
SPEAKER_00Inhabiting this particular character, and then he she's there's like this running joke of like him wanting to have sex with her, and it's like with our lens now, it's very gross, and it was like kind of funny then, but still not really. Yeah, I don't know. Okay, so they're really pushing Joxer and Gabby in these last few episodes, um, in this like 90s non-consensual way. Remember the last episode where she would like she lost all of her memory and he was trying to make her believe she was he was she was in love with them.
SPEAKER_02But yeah, my note here was that Joxer is terrifying as Ape Man. I am uncomfortable about this ape charade and I don't know what to say.
SPEAKER_01No, we're all uncomfortable with the ape charades.
SPEAKER_00Yeah so let's step away from the ape charade and talk about Tarzan, shall we? Yeah, just dive deep into it because Haley and I are clearly like uncomfortable.
unknownI know.
SPEAKER_02First of all, like I am terrified of like apes in general. Like I have a fear.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we don't apes are really frightening, monkeys are frightening.
SPEAKER_02The like the ape when they're in like out in the loose in a city. Yeah, like I love them if they're doing their own thing in the forests where they live naturally with other apes. But when people put clothes on them, deeply terrifying.
SPEAKER_00The deep terror comes from the human relationship and the human interaction with other primates.
SPEAKER_02Exploitative reaction or interaction with apes that turns them into something that's that they're not doesn't recognize their essence.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah. It's horrifying. It's so horrifying, the ultimate horror. Okay, so today I read uh multiple articles. I read Tarzan of the Apes, U.S. Foreign Policy in the 20th Century from American Literary History by Eric Scheifitz. I read The Imperial Superhero from Political Science and Politics by Chris Gaveler. Uh, I read Tarzan, the untamed image of the perfect savage by Bram Wetterink. And then I read Tarzan Must Die, Black Panther is Anti-Tarzan by Will N. Space. So who is this guy? I've had a lot of exposure to Tarzan due to having like white boomer parents, especially a dad who loved comic books and adventure books. And again, the reason I even watched Cena was because my dad was like, hey, this is really great. So also, like at this time this episode came out, Georgia the Jungle, starring Brendan Frasier, had come out in 1997, which was a parody of Tarzan and had been in the box office success. And the Disney movie Tarzan came out in 1999. So we're in the midst of this like ape man 90s craze, I think, of like boomers kind of recapturing youth sort of thing. So Tarzan is a fictional character. He was created by the author Edgar Rice Burroughs and first appeared in Tarzan of the Apes, which was at first a magazine publication in 1912, then it was a book publication in 1914. Burroughs for his work was heavily influenced by Rudyard Kipling's 1894 book, The Jungle Book. And notably, even though the Tarzan world is set in Central Africa, Burroughs had never actually been there. So all of it is his fantasy completely. Sure. So at the start of Tarzan's story, he's this white child of British nobility named John Clayton, aka the Viscount Greystoke. And through a series of events, he's orphaned, then raised by the fictional tribe of great apes called the Mengani in the Congo Basin, which is pretty central on the African continent. His ape family named him Tarzan, which in their language translates to white skin. Tarzan has like greater strength than the average man. He can swing from vines, he wrestles lions and gorillas, he runs shoeless, he's a skilled tracker, he can talk to animals. And in the original books, he's like extremely literate. He can speak in perfect English. Later on in the TV show, he's given this like broken English quality that we see jocks are mimicking in this episode. Burrow's novel was translated into 56 languages. Uh it was followed by 20 sequels, huge hit. Tarzan went on to be one of the most recognized fictional characters in the world for a time. Books followed by radio programs, movies, TV shows, over 80 movies released between 1918 and 2008. And Tarzan is an inspiration and source for this superhero genre that developed in the 20th century, which is interesting. Interesting. So kind of thinking like he was so much more though. There's so much going on with Tarzan. So in Gavelar's article, The Imperial Superhero, uh, he talks about Gavlar talks about Western superheroes of the early 20th century being very tied to this idea of American exceptionalism. So the first Tarzan book illustrates this like rejection of British imperialism and transition to the escalation of the empire of the United States. So in the book, Tarzan is like rejecting his British heritage. He follows a young American girl, Jane, to Baltimore and Wisconsin, and he becomes an American hero of the growing American empire. And also, these are written in uh this like post-Darwin era where Western readers were obsessed with explorers, learning about different cultures. Kind of in Western pop culture, the African continent was depicted as like full of danger and adventure and horror. To them, it was unexplored, you know. But as we said, the author Burroughs never actually went to Africa. You know, he wasn't reporting on anything real, uh, you know, in actual like he was depicting, you know, just uh just like tribal warfare and all sorts of stuff.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And the origin story is so heavily fictionalized and racialized that completely. Completely, completely not drawn from your reality. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. So in like, yeah, 20th century African countries were going through like post-colonial modernization and urbanization. It's like not at all what's being depicted in these books.
SPEAKER_03Right.
SPEAKER_00So in the 1920s and 30s, like American pop culture saw themes of American and British heroes going east, kind of going to countries in Africa, places where immigrants to America were coming from, and then we're like seeing these themes of heroes gaining their superpowers by learning like ancient traditional psychic powers or whatever, exactly like what you're saying, of like, yeah, just these stereotypes, ideas of, you know, um like foreign exceptionalism or whatever. And they're just like taking those qualities and applying them to themselves, even if it's like just all a lie, you know, it's all just like these ideas in their heads.
SPEAKER_02The idea of kind of mastery. Yeah. And, you know, thinking about that moment in immigration, you also have quite a lot of like in the late kind of keeping with the inverse American immigrant idea.
SPEAKER_00There's a lot of like lost planet, lost land motifs of these like morless characters, kind of strangers in a strange land. Superheroes are often these like other characters, like Superman's an alien. Tarzan is this human among apes. Um, but they're like really exemplifying this conservative American value of strength and power, like wrapped in whiteness, that conservative talking point of like pulling yourself up by your bootstraps, like this whole idea. And Tarzan's also really linked to this like noble savage trope, which we talked about before. But uh, so the definition from Wikipedia is in Western culture, he's uh the noble savage is a stock character who's uncorrupted by civilization. The like quote unquote noble savage symbolizes the innate goodness and moral superiority of a primitive people living in harmony with nature. I mean, the concept of noble savage is like patronizing and racist, but uh it was really popular trope in books and everything in this like kind of post-Darwin era. And Tarzan is this like perfect fit for Western culture to profit from this trope because he white American readers could have this like white noble savage, you know, it's like kind of turning this idea on its head. And it makes me think of like just how the entertainment industry will make money off of uh like white bodies utilizing black culture, even if like here it's this invented and projected idea of an African culture. It's like not even real.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I mean, I assume it's also connected to all of those elements, even minstrelcy, even that's a different kind of um aspect of that type of exploitation, the projection of a particular stereotype using white bodies to kind of mock and then elevate mock black culture and then elevate the white appropriation of it.
SPEAKER_00Exactly, Haley. So well said. Um, and this all really made me think about like other superheroes and really made me think about Black Panther, who is, you know, so like a man from the African continent who uses technology. He's like totally, you know, uh completely capable and you know, of that world. Um and I found this blog, Tarzan Must Die, that had an entry called Black Panther is Anti-Tarzan. It was really interesting. Um, I would say go check it out if you're intrigued. Uh there's a I'll put a link in the Patreon post. Um, but it gives like great examples of how the Marvel superhero Black Panther is the inverse of Tarzan. Uh and also like there was some fun stuff about Tarzan. You know, he's a handsome young man who fights Nazis at some point, he fights dinosaurs, like the story goes all over the place. Um, and the Disney movie soundtrack is pretty fun. So I'm not trying, I don't know. I think we it's important to have the context of Tarzan, but like you know, I'm not trying to cancel Tarzan today.
SPEAKER_02Like Well, yeah, and I think that the Yeah, it's it's so much a part of a rec recognizable cultural truth that those parts are what comes into the Xena episode, and of course, you know, they play into it. So it's good to have that context.
SPEAKER_00It's good to have the context, and then yeah, for the whole given the demographic, who was like writing Xena, it totally makes sense that Tarzan would be this common character for everyone to riff off. And it's not like it was outdated at the time because it was so in the in the culture, pop culture at that moment, you know, like I said, with George of the Jungle and Tarzan already happening. So um it just makes everyone would understand what they're referencing, everyone would get all of it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And I think, you know, for those of us who maybe didn't grow up with the deeper context and with without like recognizing and understanding the deeper context, it probably read for many people as Tarzan is, you know, somebody who grew up without culture around him. And so the broken English is because he grew up among animals or whatever. And so it has this really troublesome troubling context that is the setup for it. But for the writers and probably for most of the viewers, it likely wasn't meant as racialized, even though now we can understand that that's kind of where it's coming from. But yeah, that's where we're at. Yeah, that's where we're that's where we are with Charles. That's why we're so uncomfortable when Josh are. I mean, it's not doesn't read great um on revisiting it, especially with the understanding that we could bring to it. But that's where we are with him, and it's part of this kind of lighthearted episode, and it certainly is, as you were mentioning, part of that comic book context that Xena has already. So it's bringing in this legacy comic book character that has all these other origins, but is kind of part of the lighthearted emphasis of the episode, is kind of this playoff of comic book characterization. Yeah. Sorry, go back into it. Let's get back into it. So, I mean, we're there. We're like, I don't, I don't love it. I'm really can like weirded out by Jobser talking about Zug Zug all the time and jumping around like an ape. We don't like it. Don't like it. We don't like it. But here we are. Aphrodite's done this, she spread that obsession around. And um here we go.
SPEAKER_00Here we go. Gina's back in her armor, she walks to the lake shore, and she gets caught up in a memory of being a kid with her younger brother Lysias. They used to fish there, and we learned the zine lore of like the biggest fish, Solaris, had always evaded them. Uh, Gabby interrupts her, running up to ask her something that's so important. Do her boots work with this skirt? LOL. Zina goes in for a hug, but she pulls out a knife and slices off some of Gabby's hair.
SPEAKER_02She's making a lure, and we're all remembering the trips to your local fishing store as a kid. There was a great one that we went to as kids. And those lures are beautiful. So she's getting them ready.
SPEAKER_00Gabby says, My little golden fleece. And she Zina knows that Solaris is smart, he's cunning, he's a great opponent. This time he's not gonna evade. But Gabby's like, but not with my hair, and she grabs it back. And then we cut to Gabby and Zina sitting on some rocks. Gabby's trying to reattach her trimmed hair. Zina's clutching her kite, looking like so sad at Gabby. And then she's talking about how Gabby's hair is just like Lyceus. There's a lot of like Zina projecting her dead brother onto Gabby here.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and I guess I also was thinking here too. I mean, this is gonna make us sad. And suddenly we're a boo down.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. Oh yeah, it is about solid.
SPEAKER_02And he's his like blonde hair too, and so that's probably echoing there also. I was like, oh, that's where he got his blonde hair, also, is Lyceus, and yeah. So we're kind we're starting to get a hint that this may be like not just fishing. We were having so much fun and now everything's terrible.
SPEAKER_03So much fun.
SPEAKER_02Oh well, but we do love Gabby trying to put her hair back on and insisting on keeping it.
SPEAKER_00And Gabby is like, okay, fine, and she gives the hair back to her. And then Zina explains her plan, which is she's gonna make Solaris think he's alone. She has to reduce line drag, so they have to attack from the air. Obviously.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. We were before we were like, I don't even know why you need two kites and a clip. This is not how I can.
SPEAKER_00But now I'm kind of understanding that Solaris is too smart for that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, he's gonna need something really special.
SPEAKER_00And then um, Gabby's like, why don't I just get some local villagers to fall in love with me and like do whatever I want them to do? I'll just get them to catch the fish for you. And Zina's like, no, I'm the only one who's gonna catch Solaris. And then Zina reminds Gabby that they have to get the magic diamond before nightfall.
SPEAKER_01And um, they're just being really hilarious and chaotic.
SPEAKER_00Aphrodite's henchmen get to the avalanche and they have some jokes wildly.
SPEAKER_02Oh my gosh, I know. Steen Stealers. I know.
SPEAKER_00One guy says, it must have been an avalanche. McKenna says, Your talents are wasted as a thug. You should have been an astronomer. Other guy says, I don't know anything about rocks.
SPEAKER_01I was like, what?
SPEAKER_00Set up punchline. Okay, so then Gabby's like walking out in the lake. She's at the end of her little pier, helping Zina get her kite into the air, and it works. She keeps telling Gabby to hold it higher. She's so irritated. Uh it's kind of hard to tell exactly what's happening with the kites.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but now that I know they're attacking from the air, I'm kind of piecing it together that like they've got to drop the lure in from the air. They can't like drag it along. And so they're they've gotta pull the clip and finally it works.
SPEAKER_00Um but then Gabby pulls the clip too hard and she falls into the lake. Yeah. Gabby's mad. She has little like wet, squeak, squeaky footsteps, and she accuses Zina of doing all of this because she's jealous.
SPEAKER_02And she's like, Yeah, you know she's like, You brought me out here, no one can see my radiance, and now I'm wet.
SPEAKER_00You just using this fish as an excuse. And then Zina says, I brought you here because I thought you would enjoy a good day's we could enjoy a good day's fishing together. She sounds like uh Calvin's dad from Calvin and Hobbes.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, she's trying to build some character. She's like, I thought this would be fun, a memory we could share. And she's and Gabby's like, There's no such thing as a good day's fishing, which now we know something is really off with Gabby because this is someone who's looking for fish cakes every time she's gonna be able to do it.
SPEAKER_00She's always looking for fish cakes, and she's also always looking for like moments of like parallel play connection, you know? Like fishing would be a great opportunity for her and Zina to talk about their feelings.
SPEAKER_02And totally normal Gabby would be delving right in, she'd be asking about Solon, asking about Lyceus. She would be deep into conversation by now.
SPEAKER_00But Zina shares that Lyceus hated fishing too, and she could tell that he had the same fire in his eyes that you and I've got, which is so funny that like Zina's projection on Gabby that she's all like she just assumes that she's also as into fishing as she is, and then also so sweet that Xina considers Gabby such dear family that like she would take her fishing with her, with this like sacred thing for her. Totally. And then Gabby's like, no, I hate this, actually. I'm not like your brother. And Joxer is now naked, except for a crown of leaves, swings in on a vine, introduces himself as Addis. He now he says he's gonna take Gabby as his bride, calls to the animals, grabs Gabby, they swing away. Gabby screams, and Zina's happy for the peace and quiet. And she's cackling and she holds the kite.
SPEAKER_02Finally, she can get back to fishing.
SPEAKER_00I know. This is like such an insane episode to recap because it's just like yes, we've been on the string of emotional journey episodes where we had like nuanced conversations about growth and human condition. Uh, and this is just like so goofy and like lightly problematic, and we're just like gearing up.
SPEAKER_02I know, I know. And we're not even at the end of the season. We'll be getting there. We're not there yet.
SPEAKER_00Um, okay, so Joxer and Gabby are swinging through the trees. Gabby's trying to get away. It becomes a series of bits where like Joxer's addis is trying to have sex with Gabby. Uh, it's like kind of funny, mostly icky. Uh, it's mostly just like a bummer. So we will skip over that, I think. Yeah. Um, and then go to Xina's kite.
SPEAKER_02She puts some clothes on. She does put some clothes on. Like a teddy that she has somehow been carrying around. So he gets to wear that. Um, so just listeners know that he's now closed. And so you wrote if you were nervous about that.
SPEAKER_00So we cut back to Zina's uh Zina, her kite fails. She's so mad. She's screaming for Gabby, and she's like, you know, you two are beginning to irritate me with these obsessions of yours. Fish don't just catch themselves, and we're all unraveling.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. We're dysregulated across the board.
SPEAKER_01Okay.
SPEAKER_02So Joxar and Gabby are like wandering back through the forest. They go to he's wearing her negligent and a leaf crown and looking for bugs.
SPEAKER_00And they're like eating some bugs together. Uh, there's some really great public domain footage of animals on like the plains. Yes. Uh, not in a jungle or in Greece. Uh, there's a goat, and he's just like kind of calling out to the animals to like go do whatever.
SPEAKER_02Follow him. He's he's getting he's trying to get them to do what he wants, and the yeah, footage is just the animals ignoring him, which is really cool. I do like that.
SPEAKER_00And which I think is kind of nice with like if we're doing this Tarzantrope because it's imp It's more of a joke on Joxer than like him embodying this concept of that. I think so too. And then as Joxter like curses everyone and swings away with Gabby, which I'm 100% sure was a scene on the DVD menu, it's like imprinted on my brain.
SPEAKER_01Do you not remember this? I was, oh my God.
SPEAKER_00I feel like I fell asleep to this and like just like woke up being like, what is happening?
SPEAKER_01She's like joxer swinging back and forth.
SPEAKER_00Okay, so then Gabby. Okay, so they're swinging, swinging, swinging. Then we hear Xina yell, and she swoops in on a vine. Joxer swings into a tree, falls down, but Xina has grabbed Gabby and rescued her. And now they're gonna go fish. And people are just like really in their obsession psychoses now.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, right. They're fully committed. Completely. Gabby's like, you're gonna be known forever, and I'm gonna be known forever. You'll be known for rescuing me, Gabrielle the Great. And then Zina's like, hey, fishy, fishy, fishy. They're like totally talking past each other.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's really great. Um, so Zina gets the kite back in the air, and Gabby's sitting on the beach, like mushing, it looks like maybe red berries, mushing them onto her lips just to like bring out their natural beauty. She's using Zina's sword as a mirror. Zina looks back at her, disgusted, and lets Gabby know those are not berries, those are bug guts that she's mushing all over her mouth. Probably Coach and Heal. Oh yeah. But no, maybe not in ancient Greece, but still uh Zina's getting a little tricky. She reminds Gabby of the diamond, and she's lazy laying it on thick, that it's perfect, just like Gabby. And Afri Gabby wanted to wear it as a badge of how beautiful she is. So, really, like Gabby deserves it, right? She wants it for herself. Zina convinces her to go after the henchman, get the diamond while she stays there and fishes because Zina just needs a little peace and quiet. Really, she does. That's all she needs. And then we cut to some just hilarious nonsense of Gabby in a tree watching the henchman walking and joking. And one says, Yeah, he's like telling a joke, and he's like, Oh, your sandal. I thought that was my dinner. And my canus says, I don't get it. The other guy says, His sandal? I thought, I don't get it. He ate it because he thought it was, you know, when he kicked it off his foot, you know, the sandal. It landed. What is this joke?
SPEAKER_02I gotta know. Is this a classic joke? Or is it invented for this episode? You'll never know.
SPEAKER_00Gabby jumps down on them, yodeling. She fights all three of them with her little stick, gets the diamond, and the henchmen run after her. Zina can hear the whole thing. She's cheering Gabby on, commenting that Gabby's beautiful when she's angry. And uh, she convinces Joxer to go help Gabby. Um, and then Gabby's still running ahead of the henchmen. They run all the way to the avalanche, they stop. Gabby's like, hold it, boys. This is old news. Men are always chasing me. And um, they're like about to kill her, and she calls out to Zina for help. But Zina is just whistling her own theme song and fishling, fishing happily. She's busy, yeah. Joxer drops in, grabs Gabby, the spring of the vine snaps them back into the air, and the henchmen run after him. They're swinging back to a tree. It's like it's crazy.
SPEAKER_02I do like when they're like, give us a diamond, and we'll make sure your loved ones can identify the body. And Gabby goes, This body.
SPEAKER_00It's funny.
SPEAKER_02She's then shocks her, whisks her away.
SPEAKER_01Oh my god. She's really funny in this one.
SPEAKER_02She's great. Yeah.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_02So back at the pond, Zina's got a bite. It's a big one, and she's like, Solaris. And Gabby comes running up. Gabby comes running in. Zina, she throws the diamond to Zina.
SPEAKER_00And then the henchmen lassue, Gabby and Joxer, tie them up. Zina tucks the pouch into her waist, and then everyone's fighting. It's like only three guys, but Zina has this like delicate dance going with the fishing line as she's fighting them, so she can't like change the tension on the fishing line. She can say. She takes them all down, one-handed. Gabby's yelling, forget about Solaris, but Zina won't ever. But then McKenis's neck gets wrapped up in the fishing line. He goes flying, hits his head on a pole. Zina's bereft because Solaris got off the hook.
SPEAKER_02Ugh. She frees. Gabby's bereft because her dress is wrinkled.
SPEAKER_00Oh, and Joxa runs into the woods. They were so close to having it all. Zina pulls out the diamond, and it's so pretty that Zina has an idea. She does. She makes a giant slingshot. She's gonna send the North Star back into the sky. This is mythic. This is so beautiful.
SPEAKER_01Thinking of Zina doing this.
SPEAKER_00Right. Gabby wants to keep it, but Zina's like, you know, if it's up in the sky, everyone will see it and be reminded of your perfection every night. And Gabby likes that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And Zina's just like rolling her eyes behind her back. So she pulls the slingshot back, and we see she's waiting for some bubbles in the water because she's using the diamond as bait. She lets it lets loose the catapult. Solaris jumps for the diamond, and then he catches the diamond with such force it sends the fish and the diamond into the night sky. Huge success. Back up into the head. And then she dedicates the sky fish to her brother Lysias, and her obsession is gone. But then she gets a headache. Yay! She says, I was obsessed with fishing, wasn't I? And then Gabby says, I'm sorry, Zina, but I really don't pay that much attention to you.
SPEAKER_03So funny.
unknownOh my god.
SPEAKER_02And then we get the big reveal that Xina has been on track the whole time. She thought she knew about the obsession thing. She thought it was maybe fishing, but she's realized that it's really the unresolved business between herself and Lyceus.
SPEAKER_00She still owed him something. And then she's like, Gabby, you gotta acknowledge the unconscious need, and then the spell will be over. And she gets Gabby to admit that Gabby's felt like no one gives her credit for anything, and then people just see her as a silly sidekick, and the spell is broken.
SPEAKER_02And we say, Oops, sorry, Gabby. Sorry, Gabby. We did. We didn't mean to.
SPEAKER_01I'm sorry. We did this to you. We're sorry.
SPEAKER_02We love you.
SPEAKER_00And then Zina apologizes and says she's gonna give Gabby more credit from now on. And so are we. We're Zina in this moment. So are we. This is our whole thing now. This is we're the entire reason for the podcast.
SPEAKER_02You know what? We're learning. We're learning a lot here. Gabby's teaching us a lot.
SPEAKER_00Should we start incorporating what has Gabby taught us in this episode?
SPEAKER_02In the episodes, that's uh that's what I was just thinking. All right, let's we'll start. We'll put it in the end. Add another 50 minutes to the recording session.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Okay, so we cut to nighttime. We're looking up at the fish constellation, the North Star. Gabby's glad they figured out all the insight stuff. And Zina compliments Gabby again for all she does and how much she helps Zina do good in the world. So Gabby's like, I don't need the world to know. I just need to know you value me. Aw. And then uh Joxer jumps in making monkey sounds, and they're like, oh, we'll deal with that tomorrow. And we're all satisfied.
SPEAKER_02Bye. Final thoughts. Uh yeah. I love this episode.
SPEAKER_00I think it's so fun and like it was always one of my favorites, and it's still so I feel like it's really an earned episode because you can't just this isn't one you would show people who have never watched CN.
SPEAKER_02Like you have to have been This is the secret vault episode that you show after they've gone through seasons two and three.
SPEAKER_00Completely mostly like you have to have gone through every journey and seen everyone at their darkest to get to the nonsense, and then the nonsense is so delicious.
SPEAKER_02I know, and even just like the imagery that remains with you of the diamond flying up into the sky and the fish catching it, and Zina emerging with two fish on her hands. It's so wonderful. The best that and we get to know Xina's fishing obsession, which is important here that she loves to find out.
SPEAKER_00Like Zina just loves a challenge and she loves a worthy opponent.
SPEAKER_02And you know what? She can relax for a day. She doesn't have to be, you know, hunting. No, she can just sit and hold a fishing kite and have a great time. And just whistle a little tune and think her thoughts for a minute.
SPEAKER_00Ugh. That's right. Love it. What do you think Zina learned in this episode?
SPEAKER_02Um, I think she learned that she had some childhood aches that needed attention to. She needed to, she has an inner child. Oh, yeah. And she can find joy in remembering and revisiting loved places and joyful memories. Um, completely agreed.
SPEAKER_00I think she also learned that fish can live for over 10 years for sure. Oh, yeah. It's an old fish. That fish is old. That's why she got him. He's so old. I think Zina taught us that inner insight will release us from our obsessive spells. Uh, made me think about why do we doom scroll? What feelings are we trying to escape all the time? Oh, totally.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Like, um, I put down like pulling out, you know, poison oak or poison ivy, like trying to weave. Sometimes, you know, you get into these obsessive cleaning modes, or you're like, ants, I've got to kill all of them. Why?
SPEAKER_00Oh, you do have to kill all of them though.
SPEAKER_02With that one. That's what I'm thinking. That one, I know. But like, you know, do you all have to do it all at once in one weekend? Does it have to be maybe it doesn't have to be?
SPEAKER_00It doesn't have to be your whole world.
SPEAKER_02Mm-hmm. Killing ants does not have to be your whole world, is what I learned this episode. Stop doing it and just take a break everyone. Every once in a while, just come up. I actually haven't been killing ants really, but you know, it's just one of those things that can kind of take over your mental world and think about are there other things that you're trying to avoid, I guess.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think. I agree. Agreed. Mm-hmm. Who's your extra Oscar?
SPEAKER_02Oh my gosh. I love the jokester with the sandal jokes. Yeah, I was just like sandal jokes.
SPEAKER_00Or like, this is I was so I was like, what is I don't understand.
SPEAKER_02I had to go back a couple of times. Also a scene stealer, it took, I was like fully invested in that particular conversation. Oh, yeah.
SPEAKER_00All they were really good henchmen, they were definitely scene stealers, uh, scene queens. Absolutely. I would say also for scene queens, all the animal work, the CGI Solaris was really nice.
SPEAKER_02So good.
SPEAKER_00The sound the fish were making when Zina threw them to the shore, those were big scene stealers for me.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely. All of those. I mean, that's also what makes this episode so great, is that you have multiple like clear extra Oscars, clear multiple scene queens, just everything.
SPEAKER_00And it was very like, I mean, the things I love about the Muppet world, to bring it all back to Muppets, is like in good Muppet content, the entire world is alive, right? Like everything is kind of anthropomorphic.
SPEAKER_02And like there's like a little puppet bird that's sitting on the tree. It's not just a regular bird.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, there's like there's infinite stories everywhere you look and really brings the world alive and like sets it apart and kind of creates this like elevated idea of what our world could be like. And I feel like they do that so well in Xena too, with like, especially with the sound design, just like giving just little voices to things that wouldn't necessarily have voices, it's just so good at creating the Xenoverse, particularly. Absolutely. Okay, Xenoverse, the Sybil Recurring Actor Award. You ready? Yeah, I'm ready. Lawrence Makuare as my canus. We met him before in the Quill is Mightier as the barbarian leader. He is uh he's just in like Aphrodite spell episodes. Um great. I loved him. He did a great job. Jason Tahu plays thug number one in this episode, and he's been a stunt performer in pretty much every episode of Xena. So he's the guy who was making the sandal jokes. Right. I'm tempted to give it to him because I think we've given it to Lawrence before. So let's give it to Jason.
SPEAKER_02And we also don't get to see many of the stunt performers, you know, named. It's hard to kind of figure out who they are from. That's lovely. So lovely. Great. Mm-hmm. And the stunts make the show in the scenes, too.
SPEAKER_00Completely. Were they on Star Trek?
unknownNo.
SPEAKER_00Were they in Lord of the Rings? Our boy Lawrence. Uh, we just covered it in uh the quill is mightier, but I'm still impressed that he played Lurts, the commanding Urukai in Fellowship. He's the one. Oh, right. Scene Stealer all over the place. Favorite Gabby moments.
SPEAKER_02Oh, yeah. Okay. I loved when they're about to kill her and they've got the crossbows out and they're like, kill her, and she goes, that's funny. I just love popular, like unconcerned Gabby where she's just like self-obsessed.
SPEAKER_00I love it. Yeah, I love her trying to like kiss herself and falling into the water. Mm-hmm. I really loved when Zina was like kind of coming out of her obsession, and Gabby says, Zina, you know I never pay attention to anything you do. Her throwaway lines were so funny.
SPEAKER_02I think we also we love these moments when Zabby, Gabby is like fully I'm I'm just so enhanced. When she's like fully, she has her own boundaries with Zina that are like fun boundaries.
SPEAKER_00We love it. Yeah, we just love seeing the depth of their relationship and being able to like say no to each other and knowing that it's okay.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah. They're gonna come back and be everything will be great.
SPEAKER_00That depth is true. So fun. Okay, guys. Well, if you like what we're doing here, please like, subscribe, follow, share episodes with your friends, leave a review, check us out on Patreon. We have t-shirts and bags on uh our website too. You can buy stuff that says in a time of ancient gods on it. Well it was great. Why wouldn't you? I love it. Stay tuned for our next episode, tsunami. Bruce Campbell's back. Get prepared. Awesome. I'm so excited.
SPEAKER_02Anything else?
SPEAKER_00Is that where we get to see Poseidon again? You know, from IMDB you'd think so, but I think we're gonna have to listen, yeah, hold off a little longer. We'll talk about it.
SPEAKER_02Great. I'm excited.
SPEAKER_00All right, guys, until next time.
SPEAKER_02All right.
