HIGHLA-L Digest - 9 Mar 2001 to 11 Mar 2001 (#2001-93)
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Sun, 11 Mar 2001 22:00:06 -0500
There are 5 messages totalling 358 lines in this issue.
Topics of the day:
1. EG SPOILER: One for Wendy... (3)
2. Looking for Duncan Pic...
3. Endgame DVD
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Date: Sun, 11 Mar 2001 00:57:48 -0500
From: "Claire L. Maier, Ph.D." <bioaw124@emory.edu>
Subject: Re: EG SPOILER: One for Wendy...
On Wed, 7 Mar 2001 jjswbt@EARTHLINK.NET wrote:
> >> >Since, IIRC, Wendy was one who was in the middle of this particular
> >> >debate, I think she will find it interesting that...
> >> >S
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> >> >/
> >> >/
> me:
> >> That was a nice change. Now it just appears that all the Immortals
> >> involved in Sanctuary were incredibly stupid and/or suicidal. That's
> >> life <eg>
>
> Claire:
> >I daresay they *were* suicidal. But they were interested enough in the
> >fate of the world that they still wanted to do their bit to help keep an
> >evil immie from being the last one, provided they didn't actually have to
> >experience life any more. So, when presented with Sanctuary, they went
> >with it.
>
> But..but..it seems pretty clear in the movie that Sanctuary was *not*
> always about preventing the Prize from being won. The Watcher dude
Not to me. What else were those immies being warehoused for? It doesn't
seem like they were free to change their minds and say they wanted out--
they were all drugged. And apparently all volunteers who agreed to be
drugged out of their minds for an indefinite period of time.
> says that recently the mission had changed- i.e. when Kell went
> "renegade". So..before Kell, those who went into Sanctuary did so for
> the reasons Methos tells Duncan - those who were were unwilling to
> kill any more and, by Connor's example, those too tired to fight
> anymore. So we have a bunch of Immortals (at least 12) who decide
> (individually) that they can't stand the Game any more..but they
> aren't quite willing to shuffle off this (Im)mortal coil either.
> Wouldn't they choose a *safe* place - since their ultimate goal is to
> stay alive? What is the only safe ground for Immortals who don't wish
That assumes that their ultimate goal is living, rather than surviving in
the event they might be needed. If they just didn't want to fight, they
could pull a Darius and just stay on holy ground. But it seems that these
immies didn't just want to stay out of the Game-- they wanted oblivion.
I didn't get the impression that the reason for warehousing immies had
changed because of Kell. What had changed was their method-- instead of
taking volunteers, as they had in the past, they took any immie they could
get (ie., Duncan) because they had to have *someone* in Sanctuary, *now.*
Their previous band of volunteers was gone and they couldn't wait for
another volunteer to show up. But I had the impression that the goal of
Sanctuary was always to have a hedge against an evil immie becoming the
final one. The only difference was that before Kell, the last conscious
immie maybe being evil was rather hypothetical. With Kell and the death
of their volunteers, the need to have an immie in Sanctuary specifically
to prevent Kell from being the last one became pressing and immediate.
> to die? Holy Ground. So..either they knew it wasn't HG and allowed
> themselves to be kept there anyway- risking death at any time. Or they
> were told it *was* HG and were lied to - and didn't bother to check?.
> >Perhaps they didn't particularly care where it was. Perhaps it
> >got moved periodically, while they were drugged.
>
> Again... *why* were they drugged? Everyone up until Duncan was a
> *volunteer*..they could have just been held in "cells" ..with TV and
> books and open doors. Brother Paul's monastery was as safe as anyone
> could want ..they wouldn't have to fight and no one could reach them.
> What was it about Sanctuary that attracted them? I'm just not seeing
> it. They volunteered to be shackled on back-boards for decades with IV
> drips and blue gunk up their nose? Why?
Apparently because they didn't want to be conscious any more. Which is
why I think they were basically suicides who decided to stay available for
the sake of the Game if needed.
> > And with Watchers
> >running it, it does make a sort of weird sense for it to be off holy
> >ground.
>
> Not to me....they would never be safe unless it was HG. The
Only if the Watchers always stayed there. If they wanted to go home at
night, they were dogmeat if the Sanctuary itself was holy ground. Having
the Sanctuary be a secret, non-holy ground place was safer for the
Watchers who wanted to be able to enter and leave the grounds at will,
without being in danger from immies waiting at the fringes.
> *only*place they couldn't be killed (by other Immortals) was on HG. If
> you wanted to be sure to keep a few alive and well forever...chaining
> them and drugging them senseless on *non* HG was mind bogglingly
> stupid. *Any* Immortal with an urge to kill them was free to do so.
The immortal would have to find them first. But I think the Watchers may
have been more concerned about their own welfare than that of their
immies. Prior to Kell, the need for their unconscious volunteers was in
the far future, and theoretical. Now, if at some point in the past,
Sanctuary had been run by immies, rather than Watchers, I would expect it
to be on HG. (Perhaps it was the "before Duncan was born" that Methos was
referring to when he said Sanctuary was on Holy Ground.)
> >Real HG attracts immies, and the Watcher keepers do want to go
> >home at night without being bait for evil immies.
>
> But..even if HG "attracts" Immortals..they can't kill another Immortal
> there. What was the Watchers goal here.? To keep these volunteers
> alive.Where are Immortals safe? HG. They (the Watchers) might be
> killed but the Immortals would be safe. And..after all...Watchers can
> be "bait" anywhere any time. ..holy ground or no.
I think the goal of the Watchers may have been more to do with themselves
than their "cause." Watchers are like that. :)
--
Claire Maier, Ph.D. bioaw124@emory.edu CLMaier (within AOL only)
To be different is not necessarily to be ugly;
to have a different idea is not necessarily to be wrong.
The worst possible thing is for all of us to begin
to look and act and think alike.
-- Gene Roddenberry
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Date: Sun, 11 Mar 2001 12:54:18 -0500
From: jjswbt@earthlink.net
Subject: Re: EG SPOILER: One for Wendy...
Beating a necrotic equine firmly into the ground<eg>
>> >> >S
>> >> >P
>> >> >O
>> >> >I
>> >> >L
>> >> >E
>> >> >R
>> >> >S
>> >> >F
>> >> >O
>> >> >R
>> >> >E
>> >> >N
>> >> >D
>> >> >G
>> >> >A
>> >> >M
>> >> >E
>> >> >B
>> >> >E
>> >> >L
>> >> >O
>> >> >W
>> >> >/
>> >> >/
Me:
>> So we have a bunch of Immortals (at least 12) who decide
>> (individually) that they can't stand the Game any more..but they
>> aren't quite willing to shuffle off this (Im)mortal coil either.
>> Wouldn't they choose a *safe* place - since their ultimate goal is to
>> stay alive? What is the only safe ground for Immortals who don't wish
Claire:
>That assumes that their ultimate goal is living, rather than surviving in
>the event they might be needed. If they just didn't want to fight, they
>could pull a Darius and just stay on holy ground. But it seems that these
>immies didn't just want to stay out of the Game-- they wanted oblivion.
But as was clearly demonstrated by Connor and his 10 year long dream/nightmare..the Immortals *aren't* oblivious. They are merely asleep. Did none of them think to wonder about that before agreeing to be drugged? The older ones might not have thought about it..but the modern ones? No one asked what drugs were being used? No one asked if any the Immortals showed any signs of "awareness" while drugged (moaning, squirming, the odd tear rolling out from under the eye-guard)? These are people supposedly desperate to retreat from everything and they leave this one big element to chance?
Claire:
>But I had the impression that the goal of
>Sanctuary was always to have a hedge against an evil immie becoming the
>final one.
Guess I'll have to watch it again. That wasn't my impression.
*********
I wonder if Horton knew about Sanctuary? If he had known that there were Immortals locked away to prevent the Prize from ever being won, would he have changed his plans? Been less crazy?
Come to think of it ..what the hell *was* Horton's plan? He starts out having Xavier whack Immortals for him..which, if Endgame is to be believed, is only making Xavier more and more powerful. Had Horton carried on successfully..some day it would be down to Xavier and one other Immortal (assuming no Sanctuary) .Was Horton planning to have Xavier kill that other Immortal and then Horton would kill Xavier? How did he know that he *could* kill Xavier once the Prize was won? Was he planning on getting down to 2 and then killing them simultaneously in hopes of thwarting the Prize? Or..did he know about Sanctuary and his plan was to kill all the Immortals *outside* Sanctuary.and then keep the remaining group asleep forever?
**********
Claire:
>The only difference was that before Kell, the last conscious
>immie maybe being evil was rather hypothetical. With Kell and the death
>of their volunteers, the need to have an immie in Sanctuary specifically
>to prevent Kell from being the last one became pressing and immediate.
Perhaps. Of course we'd have to believe that the Watchers really thought Kell was the worst Immortal they had ever seen...which is hard to accept given all the bad ass Immortals we know about. How many bad Immortals have we seen? Kurgan, Kalas, Grayson. Kronos, Kane, etc etc etc. How many are alive? None..because the good guys always win <g> . So...why did the Watcher suddenly lose faith in the power of the good guys? How did the Watchers..who knew that Duncan had killed every bad guy around for the past 15 years..who had killed (or at least terminally bored) Ahriman (a demon for heaven's sake!) ..how did they come to the conclusion that Duncan was a non-starter in this fight? Oh ye of little faith.....
Me:
>> Not to me....they would never be safe unless it was HG. The
Claire:
>Only if the Watchers always stayed there. If they wanted to go home at
>night, they were dogmeat if the Sanctuary itself was holy ground. Having
>the Sanctuary be a secret, non-holy ground place was safer for the
>Watchers who wanted to be able to enter and leave the grounds at will,
>without being in danger from immies waiting at the fringes.
*No* secret ever stays secret. An operation that entailed the support of 12 bed-ridden Immortal "patients" who, under your hypothesis, needed to be moved en masse periodically seems unlikely to remain secret for too long. The Watchers involved knew about it. Those Watchers' superiors knew. Joe, who doesn't seem to have been involved, or totally in favor, knew about it. The Immortals - or at least some of them - knew about it- or else how did the volunteers find Sanctuary? It looks like it must have been an "open" secret..meaning lots of people knew . And all of *those* people had friends and relatives and acquaintances..who may have leaned of Sanctuary over the centuries. So..I'm just not buying the idea that secrecy alone is enough to protect the group.
Let's see.
HG:
Immortals safe from other Immortals
Watchers safe from Immortals while in Sanctuary
Immortals *not* safe from mortals
Watchers *not* safe when they left Sanctuary
Not-HG
Immortals *not* safe from other Immortals
Watchers *not* safe from Immortals while in Sanctuary
Immortals *not* safe from mortals
Watchers *not* safe when they left Sanctuary
So..explain to me again why non-HG is better?
me:
>> But..even if HG "attracts" Immortals..they can't kill another Immortal
>> there. What was the Watchers goal here.? To keep these volunteers
>> alive.Where are Immortals safe? HG. They (the Watchers) might be
>> killed but the Immortals would be safe. And..after all...Watchers can
>> be "bait" anywhere any time. ..holy ground or no.
Claire:
>I think the goal of the Watchers may have been more to do with themselves
>than their "cause." Watchers are like that. :)
I'm still not getting it.
I understand that once the Watchers left Sanctuary (assuming it was HG) they could be captured or killed by Immortals bent on getting at the Immortals in Sanctuary. But, if Sanctuary is *not* on HG , those Immortals don't even have to wait for the Watchers to go home at night...they can waltz in at any time. In one case, the Watchers have at least one safe place (HG) - in the other they have *none* (only the hope that no one will find them).
And..if you were going to rely on secrecy alone to save you...wouldn't you at least consider what was going to happen if you were found? Form contingency plans? Doomsday scenarios? The Watchers seem to have been relying on a few guys with guns to keep out all comers. As has been asked before..where were the internal security systems? Where were the guards behind bullet proof glass..the sleeping gas ready to be pumped in..the steel doors ready to slam shut around the Immortals..*anything* designed to thwart an attack that got past the guards outside?
For me....the original idea, shown in the theatrical release, that Sanctuary was on HG makes 100% more sense than the revised edition. I didn't like the idea that Kell could walk in and kill on HG..but at least it made "sense" in terns of the Watchers not being idiots..and of Kell being extraordinarily *bad*. With Sanctuary on non-HG...the Watchers come off as remarkably dim-bulbs...and Kell is reduced to being just another Immortal.
Wendy(If there have been Immortals in Sanctuary for centuries...how did anyone even *think* Connor'd won the Prize in HL 1and 3?)
Fairy Killer
jjswbt@earthlink.net
http://home.earthlink.net/~jjswbt/index.html
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Date: Sun, 11 Mar 2001 13:10:46 -0500
From: Sandy Fields <diamonique@earthlink.net>
Subject: Re: EG SPOILER: One for Wendy...
At 12:57 AM 03/11/01, Claire L. Maier, Ph.D. wrote:
> > >> >S
> > >> >P
> > >> >O
> > >> >I
> > >> >L
> > >> >E
> > >> >R
> > >> >S
> > >> >F
> > >> >O
> > >> >R
> > >> >E
> > >> >N
> > >> >D
> > >> >G
> > >> >A
> > >> >M
> > >> >E
> > >> >B
> > >> >E
> > >> >L
> > >> >O
> > >> >W
> > >> >/
> > >> >/
>But I had the impression that the goal of Sanctuary was always to have a
>hedge against an evil immie becoming the final one.
I thought the goal eventually became that, but it started out as a place
where immies could go and get away from everything. An immie who wanted
out but who wasn't ready to die (permanently die) could go to Sanctuary and
be put into that suspended animation state (or whatever it was). I think
the goal changed -- at some point after the original startup of sanctuary
-- to that of a hedge against an evil immie winning the prize . Whether
this change was the result of Kell's activities or something else, I'm not
sure. But I never got the impression that this was the original purpose of
the sanctuary.
-- Sandy
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Date: Sun, 11 Mar 2001 15:48:44 EST
From: JenG519@aol.com
Subject: Looking for Duncan Pic...
Hey all!
Does anyone know where I can find a picture of Duncan from the montage of Not to Be, when the flashback of Duncan on a horse (from Prodigal Son) is combined with Duncan in the present walking away?
I've only been able to find the Prodigal Son pic alone...thanks!
-Jennifer
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Date: Mon, 12 Mar 2001 06:46:45 +0800
From: Gerry Alanguilan <gerry@alanguilan.com>
Subject: Endgame DVD
Whoo hoo!
I'm finally going to get the Endgame DVD! Since I'm here in the
Philippines, the DVD isn't being sold here, and there's no guarantee that a
Region 3 equivalent will be released and sold here at all. So when I saw an
sealed copy up for auction at a local Internet site, I bid for it and won.
Good thing my player can play Region 1. I'll post a review later on...
Gerry
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End of HIGHLA-L Digest - 9 Mar 2001 to 11 Mar 2001 (#2001-93)
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