A Friend in Need Part 1 (B)
They're at the tower finally, and Xena watches as Gabs begins to turn the huge valve. I was struck again by Xena's letting Gabs run the show, not because I don't feel Xena doesn't trust her...it was just...odd. Gabs is slowly turning the valve, but apparently not quick enough for Xena, because finally, she draws her sword and strikes the tower beneath them. Water gushes forth and quickly widens into a torrent to douse the fires burning all around them. Xena's mouth and eyes open wide in a joyous laugh as the sound of "Retreat!" is heard. Her eyes are on Gabbers for the longest time, but finally she turns at sounds "Whoo hoo!" with a raise of her sword. There are relieved cries of happiness all around them.
Gabs finally looks back at Xena, and steps forward. Their hands clasp in triumph, and Xena slides her other one around Gabs's shoulders. For anyone who has seen any reports on the last day of shooting, this is the very last scene filmed, and because of that, it was almost sad to watch. The camera slowly pans out, as Gabs proclaims, "Higuchi is saved." "Not quite the way I would have done it, Gabrielle, but it sure worked." Even the delivery sounds forboding to me, and while the commercials ran, I figured out what was really bothering me.
I could not figure out why Xena wanted Gabs to get them to the water tower. It's not because Gabrielle had a greater knowledge of the danger...it was simply because Xena wanted Gabrielle to be able to get herself out of a similar situation without Xena's help. The only reason Xena would want that, would be because she doesn't think she's going to be around to teach Gabrielle much longer. Oh gods!
It gets worse. Xena and Gabs are walking through the still smouldering village. Gabrielle still doesn't understand why Xena showed Akemi the pinch. "Did she ever use it?" Xena stops. "Unfortunately, she did." She tells the story as we move back to the past. After many days of walking, they reached Akemi's father's fortress. Inside a large room, two Japanese men sit on stools. They are surrounded by geishas, and there are guards there. Apparently, the men are being entertained, but everyone in the room is startled as a person in a white kimono enters, a menacing mask on its face. The figure seemingly floats about, then stops and points a finger at the younger man, who looks very familiar. The masked figure beckons for the man to come closer, but he doesn't move.
Slowly the figure removes the mask. It is Akemi, and she doesn't look happy. The man calls out her name, and a sword is thrust through the cloth material on one of the walls as EX enters the room. She doesn't look happy either. "Akemi, what are you doing?" Her anger grows as she watches Akemi put the pinch she has just learned on the man. EX can't take the time to react though, as the guards now rush her. EX uses the sword to slice and dice as Akemi calmly kneels by the man, telling him he has thirty seconds left. She claps her hands three times again, and takes the prayer position. "My brothers, my sisters, my mother, and my gentle grandparents, I avenge all your deaths at the hands of this monster." EX finishes off the guards, and stalks forward, obviously to release the pinch on the twitching man, but stops cold when she hears Akemi say, "Father." "Father?" EX echoes, but Akemi continues, "I pray you suffer in death, the way your family suffered in life." EX watches in horror as the man dies, and Akemi stands and tells her, "It is my duty. He had to die." But EX has a one-track mind, and I was almost relieved when she called angrily after Akemi, "I don't care about that...what about the ransom?" Akemi is outside now, making some graceful movement, then sinking to her knees. "Where' s my money?" EX demands behind her, like a petulant child.
EX is circling Akemi now, who asks for forgiveness. "I don't suppose there's any inheritance in this?" EX snarls, still sidetracked. Akemi's got a lot of guts though. She has still one thing to ask of EX. She wants her honor restored. Akemi looks toward EX's hand, saying, "The sacred kitana." Then she pulls her hair away from the back of her neck, once again, baring it towards EX.
EX's anger fades rapidly. "You want me to cut off-" she stops, with a shake of her head, as if she can't say the words. "That's why you wanted me to take the kitana?" Akemi doesn't disagree. After EX's work is done, she wants EX to take her ashes, and place them in the family shrine. EX is taken aback. She's telling Akemi she won't do that, but Akemi apparently expected that. She draws a hidden sword and plunges it into her own stomach before EX can stop her. Akemi is suffering, but she smiles..."The snow melts, the flowers fade, and I pass." Behind her, EX is overcome with emotion. She tries to speak, but cannot. Somehow, I find prophecy in Akemy's final words. "The time...thy love...they go on. Restore my honor, Xena." Akemi gasps and shivers, and behind her, EX's face changes. She slowly draws back the kitana, and with a mighty cry of pure anguish and brief shots of her travels with Akemi, she whirls in a complete circle and beheads the young woman. We see a splash of blood hitting water, and then we're back in the present.
Xena and Gabrielle are still walking through the town. Behind them, Xena's name is being cried out in triumph and the people of Higuchi are following them almost like a parade. Gabrielle asks Xena how she will feel when Xena comes face-to-face with Akemi's ghost. They stop walking though, because the man who had been watching their actions earlier is standing in front of them. He has a better question. How will Xena feel when she comes face-to-face with all the ghosts of the people of Higuchi that she killed? Xena is shocked. "What?" Gabs asks who the man is. He says his family name is Harokata. Kenji, who is beside him adds, "But he is known as the Killer of Ghosts." Gabrielle is nonplussed. "Xena saved your city." "This time," the ghost killer agrees. But it can't make up for what happened the last time.
Gabs looks doubtfully at Xena wanting to know what the man is talking about. Xena doesn't look very comfortable as she explains, "I was fulfilling Akemi's dying wish." She was taking the ashes to the family shrine in Higuchi. The scene fades to a woman stumbling on an ice covered street. She has some kind of awkward sandals on, and has on white geisha makeup and it is smeared. Her hair is shorn very short and ragged, and the woman is drinking from a wineskin. Xena's voiceover explains that word had gotten out that
she had gotten the ashes of a girl who had killed her father. The townfolk felt she would be defiling the graveyard and banded together to stop her.
If it weren't for the cranky sneer on her face, and the way she spit the alcohol at the men, I never would have believed that
was Lucy Lawless in that getup. This is a grieving Xena, a drunk Xena, and a broken-hearted Xena, as I've never seen her
before. Was it a show of her mourning that made her cut her hair so short? She looks lost and disoriented. The men are
approaching with torches as Xena says, "I tried to ignore them, but they came after me." EX may be dazed, but she had
the presence of mind to toss the urn from one hand to the other, while simultaneously delivering a kick that procurs her one of the torches. But the angry mob strikes her repeatedly from behind, and as she jumps to avoid the attack, the urn slips from her grasp and breaks on the ice before her. EX cries out in sorrow as the ashes blow away, her hand catching just a trace of the dust. The music in this episode is phenomenal! It swells up as EX pushes herself to her knees, her face changing from sorrow to determination, and she takes a long drink from the wineskin. She whirls on the men, and blows fire at them, setting two of them on fire. They stumble backward, and the building they crash through begins to burn. As EX staggers away, taking another drink, panic breaks out in the city behind her.
"The wind took the fire," the ghost killer is now saying in the present, "from house to house. 40,000 of my town's folk perished in the flames!" "No, it's not possible," Xena gasps. The ghost killler snaps back that it was only the beginning. Kenji speaks up again, telling Xena and Gabs that Akemi told him that her father's spirit was not allowed to enter the underworld, for he was too evil. He became Yodoshi, the Lord of the Darkworld, the Eater of Souls. That's why Akemi's father looked so familiar. His face was contorted to become the Demon that appeared at the beginning of the episode. He holds the 40,000 spirits of Higuchi inside him now, enslaved.
Xena is shocked. "Then I am guilty of a greater evil than I ever thought possible." Gabrielle, in true Gabrielle fashion, tells her "Xena, it was a horrible accident." "No," is Xena's heartfelt response, "No, I must put things right."
It seems like every shot after the commercial breaks is of a misty landscape, and this one is no exception. Gabrielle is standing facing the horizon, but her eyes are closed. Xena is behind her. "Can you hear them?" she asks Gabrielle. Gabs concentrates and she says, "I thought a heard a horse before." "Listen not just to the sounds," Xena whispers behind her, "But to what's behind the sounds." She's studying the back of Gabrielle's head, and I felt my heart sink a bit. Gabs' eyes are still closed as she hears, and we see, an approaching army marching steadfastly toward them. Xena and Gabs are standing in some kind of forrtress, and Gabs eyes open as she turns to Xena, letting her silently know she has heard.
Gabs asks Xena how many there are, and Xena watches her as the blonde turns toward the horizon again. Xena's eyes blink rapidly, as if she's fighting back tears, but she answers three armies are gathering. Gabrielle tells her she'll warn the others, and goes to do so.
Behind Xena, the Ghost Killer approaches. Kenji watches from a distance. Xena tells the man she knows he thinks of her as the enemy, "But you must believe this, my spirit aches for the torment that I have caused." The Ghost Killer gives her the once over, and slowly nods in agreement. He knows they both want the same thing. Xena looks relieved, then asks if the man has devoted his life to stopping Yodoshi, why hasn't he succeeded? GK tells her he has the power to kill the Dark Lord, but cannot get close enough to do it. "Why?" Xena breathes, and my heart really sank when he responded, "Because...I am mortal." Xena listens intently as GK continues that only another ghost could stop Yodoshi. Xena's eyes scan the horizon. She gives a look back at him, a brief nod, and leaves. Oh gods! I do not like the feeling of dread I have!
Xena has sought solace in a large room. She is kneeling in the center of it. Her eyes stare before her as she whispers, "Akemi, I know what I must do. But I am afraid that this day, what's done may not be undone." She is in the black abbreviated outfit again, and by her side rests a golden piece of armor, in the shape of a bikini top. Xena stares ahead with tear filled eyes, as Gabrielle enters. "Xena, the militia is prepared." She stops. "Why aren't you ready?" Gabrielle is wearing her own silver colored armor. It covers her torso. She's wearing her regular skirt and looks great.
Xena sniffles, and tells Gabrielle to come to her. "Give me your hands." Gabs kneels before her and does so. Xena pauses again, and then pulls Gabrielle's hands to her neck. She wants Gabrielle to feel the surge of blood under her skin..."and just behind." I started to protest immediately, and thank the gods, Gabrielle did to! "Xena," she says, trying to jerk her hands free. "You don't have to do this. I understand why you never wanted to teach me the pinch." Unfortunately, Gabrielle was on the wrong track. Xena wasn't showing her the pinch so Gabs wouldn't be jealous of Akemi. Xena voices it for me. "No, today, more than ever, I want you to know what I know." She places Gabrielle's hands back on her neck.
Xena gives a small reassuring smile, then jerks the hands forward, and reacts as the pinch works. Gabrielle stares into her best friend's face. "Why are you doing this?" Xena is SO noble. She manages another smile as the tears shine again. "If I only had thirty seconds to live, this is how I would want to live them," she answers. Gabrielle is searching her face, "Stop this!" she whispers, as she begins to panic. Then a little louder, more scared now, "Stop it!"
Xena is beginning to sway a bit, but the smile returns yet again. "Always remember that I love you," she tells Gabrielle. I really thought she was going to to it, but using Gabrielle's hands again, she releases the pinch, and leans forward coughing for air. Gabrielle grabs her shoulders. There are tears glistening on the bard's face. "Why would you teach me this right now?" she asks angrily, shaking Xena's shoulders. "I don't understand!"
This is so hard for me to write about. Xena regains her bearings and wipes the trickle of blood from her nose. "There's nothing for you to understand," she replies. "I just want you to know everything that I know." Her tone changes then, as she moves to stand. "Let's go, we've got a battle to win." Gabrielle stares after her, her mouth open, shaking her head as she looks devastated.
The episode gets worse...much worse. Kenji and Gabrielle are marching forward. Kenji asks Gabs if it wouldn't be better if they went with Xena. Gabrielle's response is, "Xena wants us to lead a contingency to the east flank.She says a group of Yodoshi's archers are gathering there." Gabrielle sounds fearless and self-assured. A few men march behind them.
As they disappear from the screen, Xena appears out of the mist, looking glorious in her golden armor. I have never seen her look more magnificent! She holds at her waist, the kitana. She watches Gabrielle march ahead, and as the music swells up with a very familiar Amazon song of mourning, Xena's look is full of pain, regret, and bitter sadness. It is the single most tragic look I have ever seen on Xena's features. She walks off camera as the ominous words "To Be Continued", appear in the mist.
I had confided to some earlier in the week, that I wouldn't be upset if Xena were dead at the end of part one of Friend in Need. I thought it would be a good way to prove the rumors true, and still provide a happy ending. I am not saying that a happy ending is out of the realms of possibility, but I will say that I have a horrible sense of forboding that is going to make this week the hardest seven days of my life.
This episode was superb, from start to finish. No doubt about it. But as some of the more angst-ridden episodes before it, including The Ides of March and The Debt, it is also extremely difficult to watch. One of the hardest things to accept is the fact that Gabrielle doesn't seem aware of what Xena has in mind. If Xena truly does become a ghost, will Gabrielle feel betrayed? Dunno, but whatever's in store, this episode is easily living up to the hype. Most of the shots in the finale preview haven't been shown yet, and it's already easily one of the finest episodes of television ever.
As always, I welcome all comments and questions.
A Friend in Need Part 1 (A)
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