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The Battle For Mt. Olympus


Animated Feature Video
Written by
Directed by

Writers
DebR
Katrina
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DebR on The Battle for Mount Olympus :

I'm glad that I rented it before I got a chance to impulsively spend money I don't have on it. Not very good in my opinion. The story didn't make much sense at all. They cut Gabrielle out of most of it by making her a non-speaking eagle. Sorbo is an even worse voice actor than live action, if you can imagine that! The best parts were, of course when our gals were in the fore. They managed to slip a whole bunch of subtext in the cracks and even some very obvious stuff. The pre-eagle Gabrielle has her hands all over Xena. Xena nuzzles the sad eagle Gabrielle, lingering petting. Xena's love song is to Gabrielle, so much so that it seemed like a non-sequiter to have Herc show up to believe it was about him.

I found it strange that Artemis showed no particular feeling for Gabrielle, made no reference at all to the Amazons, and was willing to screw Gabrielle *way* up just for the hell of it. I thought that was particularly odd given Valasca's speech marking Artemis as the Goddess of the Amazons. I mean it's not only an idea from fan fiction. Wasn't there another episode that mentioned a link between Artemis and the Amazons?

c. 1998 DebR
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Katrina on The Battle For Mt. Olympus:

You know, after reading all the reviews I expected this show to be putrid. But. .It was a lot better than I expected. I will admit, some of the animation was kind of "hmm, interesting choice." But the script was pretty fun. Aphrodite had some kool lines and there was some definite subtext between Xena and Gabrielle (Xena as Gabrielle's white knight. .how subtexty can you get?)

I thought the choices they made as far as Artemis' character (her manipulations) was interesting. I thought the choice of totem animals was intriguing. Gabrielle as eagle, brave eagle who saves their butts. . .Gabrielle ..hero. .in the long run, was very very thought provoking.

I thought the titans were goofy (since they really didn't do much more than growl and stomp around. . Primitive Gods indeed). I thought the snow whitish bad guy makeup for Hera was a bit too much. The character, as played now, is obviously incredibly monogamous dealing with a polyamorous spouse. They really need to sit down and talk. . .

(Aphrodite as therapist might be a goodthing)

I liked Aphrodite's character, thought I think they played up her fear too much. Love is brave, very brave and I would have liked to see that play out more.

Xena was definitely Ares daughter/love interest in this show. She has the powers of a demigod (did ya see her take down the titans!) and the determination of a lover (for Gabrielle)

I have seen worse animation. The Herculoids come to mind. . boy do they come to mind. .but I could see what they were attempting to do. They were bringing "Myth" to life and tried to work the symbology of that (interesting foreshadowing of the Tarot cards, hmm)

The songs. .were. .okay. .I think Bitter Suite was better.

I laughed several times. I noticed they tried to pace the animation the way they do the tv shows. It worked mostly, save for a few times. .

It would be interesting to compare Disney's Herc to this one. I think the "singers" at the beginning was definitely reminiscent of the Disney version. I might have made some different choices there.

I note the song emphasized Hercules, so I suspect that originally this was going to be a piece about muscleboy rather than a Herc and Xena and then they changed their mind and said, Hey, lets bring in. .

That's how it sounded at least.

I enjoyed the show overall, but could see why it wasn't released in theaters. I saw several moments when I thought "place commercial here." That could have been fun, if they'd tried it. I might have liked seeing it play as a tv special whatever.

Subtext : POSITIVE Let's call it maintext.

Thought it was humorous that it was PG. . .hmm

So, that's my review. .LOL!

c. 1998 Katrina prosper4@ix.netcom.com
Katrina's Xena Fanfiction at: http://bearblue.simplenet.com/xenafic.html

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