HIGHLA-L Digest - 30 Oct 2004 to 1 Nov 2004 (#2004-200)
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Mon, 1 Nov 2004 22:00:04 -0500
There are 5 messages totalling 610 lines in this issue.
Topics of the day:
1. Season Five DVDs: Comes a Horseman (pt 1/2)
2. Season Five DVDs: Comes A Horseman (pt 2/2)
3. 'Best Of' Really? (3)
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Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 18:26:13 -0500
From: kageorge <kageorge@erols.com>
Subject: Season Five DVDs: Comes a Horseman (pt 1/2)
This one is broken into two parts because of length. The entire
commentary, with screen captures, is at:
http://www.wordsmiths.net/MacGeorge/episodes/Season5/CAH.htm
COMMENTARY: David A. tells us that CAH was “the quintessential
Highlander episode.” Great locations, great sex, incredible villains,
wonderful drama, great surprises. Putting CAH and Rev. 6 together and
spending $20 million dollars on it would have made an incredible feature
film. David says he doesn’t remember who had the original idea, but that
the best story discussions were where no one was “keeping score,” and
there was a free flow of ideas. The general idea was, what if the Four
Horsemen of the Apocalypse were four evil Immortals who “cut a swatch
through Arabia and the entire world”? We know that Methos is 5,000 years
old, and it made sense – especially since the Methos we know now is not
a saint – that he would be evil for some portion of his life. David said
Peter Wingfield was the perfect guy to play it because not only did he
have the strength to play the villain, he also had the ability to shrug
his shoulders and say, “shit happens” and move on. David was
particularly fond of the jimmy scene where MacLeod is up against the
car, unwilling or unable to believe that Methos had done such evil in
his past, and Methos turns on him, saying yes, he did it because he
*liked* it.
Valentine Pelka comments that he doesn’t understand why, despite
budgetary differences and time constraints, television drama cannot be
shot like a film. He says that was what the 99th and 100th episodes of
Highlander were shot as and, “were fantastic.” He tells us that if he
were defined by the roles he played, including Kronos, he would be a
really twisted individual, so “thank God, hopefully, I’m not that.” Val
opines that he didn’t really see Kronos as strictly a stock bad guy.
Kronos was put on earth to fulfill a certain function, and one of the
most liberating things about playing the character, in comparison with
playing someone like Hamlet, who is a man with scruples, was to play
someone without scruples. There are no constraints, and there was an
enjoyable liberation about playing Kronos, “coupled with the fact that
the four of us got on like a house on fire.” He says the only thing
Kronos truly needs is Methos, and the scene where he greets and stabs
Methos to death is an apocalyptic/Immortal version of saying,
“Surprise!” and punching him in the stomach.
Peter W. says the whole idea was “fantastic” and a reflection on the
strength of the Methos character for people to be able to look at the
character and say, “Oh, my goodness, it’s possible.” It was exciting to
do, and the script was terrific, with many great scenes. Playing Methos
was, for Peter, like going to drama school because the challenges were
always different. In a practical sense, the swordfights were a
challenge, and in the Horsemen episode, he had to get on a horse, and
Peter couldn’t ride. Then there were emotional challenges, where he
encountered a huge range of vulnerable places: falling in love, great
grief, then to show the anger, the rage and violence demanded an
enormous stretch for him as an actor. In the meeting where he and
Cassandra first see each other, and that, “Okay, I’m in *big* trouble,
here,” moment, Peter wasn’t sure how in control Methos was from the
moment he sees Cassandra, and from the moment that Kronos appears in his
life, rekindling all those parts in Methos that loved that life (and
Kronos knows it).
Roger Bellon, the composer, who says he wasn’t just a composer, he was
also a fan of the show, tells us that not only was the script great, but
you were dealing with the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, which is a
very operatic, dark and deep subject. Also the shots were big and
filmic, and the music had to be dark and poignant and sound interesting.
He remembers having to find an interesting “hook”, which ended up being
a dark piano arpeggio which could underlie the Horsemen, but could also
be interesting and provide a unique approach to the almost hell-like
emotional aspect of the movie. For the flashback, it was supposed to
give an impression of an ancient time and presented a different kind of
problem. He used references to old American Indian chants, wooden pipes
and percussive sounds that he could find on recordings of ancient tribal
hymns.
OUTAKES: They show twenty minutes worth of the jimmy scene outtakes, one
after another. Each is slightly different, but each is incredibly
intense. There are no words sufficient to describe the subtleties of them.
THE EPISODE: Duncan and Methos emerge from a building where “Adam
Pierson” had gone to tryout for a new game show, the “Wheel of History”.
Duncan derides his efforts, accusing Methos of doing it out of an
“oversized ego”. As they walk to Duncan’s car exchanging quips, they
feel the presence of another Immortal. Methos’ reaction is to split, and
he is disdainful of Duncan’s desire to find out “who’s around.”
Amid some steam, Duncan spots a man with a scar down his face, and
recognizes the Immortal. In a flashback to South Texas, in1867, where
Duncan is a scout for the Texas Rangers, he tracks down a group of
marauders led by Immortal Melvin Koren. In a classic old west
confrontation, the Rangers and the bad guys fight, and Koren almost
manages to behead MacLeod, but is shot by another Ranger. Koren is
buried, and escapes.
In the present, Koren slips away and Duncan continues to explore the
area, feeling an Immortal once again. It is Cassandra, who is also
hunting Koren, whom she calls Kronos. Cassandra is distraught in her
obsessive zeal to find and kill Kronos. Back at the loft she tells
Duncan about her first death at Kronos’ hands when he was one of the
Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse. She was a healer, and the Horsemen
“were monsters,” bringing terror and death to her entire world. “Where
they were, life ceased. They were without mercy. They were without fear.”
In a flashback to the Bronze Age, we watch four masked riders descend on
a peaceful village where Cassandra lived with her adoptive father and
both were the village’s healers. When Cassandra’s father pleads with
them, saying they have nothing the Horsemen want, the leader takes off
his mask. It is Kronos. “Then you die,” he announces, and kills him, and
the other Horsemen proceed to slaughter everyone in the village.
Weeping, Cassandra tells Duncan that that day was the end of her world.
She says she had tried to forget what had happened but when she learned
that Kronos was alive, all the hate and pain returned. They go to Joe,
who is initially dubious about the whole notion of four Immortals being
the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse, but he ultimately agrees to look
into what the Watchers know about Melvin Koren.
Methos is headed to his GMC truck that evening, when he feels another
Immortal, turns and is stabbed through the heart. “Greetings, Brother,”
Kronos moves in as Methos gasps his name and dies. Methos revives inside
a deserted power station, with Kronos standing over him holding a length
of heavy chain. Kronos cheerily comments about it having been a long
time and asks if Methos has gone soft.
“I just passed through my angry adolescence a little quicker than you,
Kronos!” Methos snarls back.
Kronos tells Methos that he had thought Methos was dead until he heard
rumors and went looking. He says he shouldn’t have been surprised, that
Methos wasn’t the strongest or the toughest, but he was a survivor.
“It’s what you do best.” He offers Methos a choice: Losing his head, or
joining him.
“Since you put it that way,” Methos answers grimly. “Welcome back, brother.”
Methos goes to see Duncan at the dojo, and starts to tell Duncan about
“something unexpected” coming up but Duncan interrupts, asking Methos if
he ever heard of Kronos. Methos is taken aback and hesitates, then they
both feel Cassandra as she enters. She takes one look at Methos and
attacks him. (Methos: “You don’t know me!” Cassandra: “Do you think I
could ever forget you?!”) Duncan puts himself between them.
In another flashback, we are in the Horsemen’s camp. One of the Horsemen
has taken Cassandra as a slave, and when he takes off his mask it is
Methos. He tells her they had killed her entire village, “including
you,” saying that she lived because he wished it and that she would stay
alive as long as she pleased him. When she resists he hits her. “That
did not please me.” Then he strokes her, telling her he was Methos, and
that she should never forget that she lived to serve him. She spits at
him as he walks away, intervening between two other Horsemen arguing
over a robe. They are on the verge of violence when Methos threatens
Caspian, saying if he had to “lose one, it will be you.” When Kronos
steps up, asking if there is a problem, the men step back deferentially.
Kronos splits the robe in two pieces, one for each man, stating flatly
that they “share everything.” During the distraction, Cassandra tries to
escape but Methos stops her, telling her he will kill her as many times
as it takes to tame her.
In the present, as Cassandra attacks, Methos denies it was him and calls
upon MacLeod to “Do something!” Duncan holds onto Cassandra, yelling at
Methos to get out of there. Cassandra is incensed that Duncan
interfered, insisting that Methos is lying, that he was one of the
Horsemen, killing and raping alongside Kronos.
At the bar, Joe tells Duncan he’s not buying Methos and Kronos being the
Horsemen, saying that Methos was the one Immortal he knew who never
looked for a fight, that Cassandra had lived with her obsession for
thousands of years, that maybe she’s delusional, or a liar, asking
Duncan what he really knows about Cassandra. “What do I really know
about Methos?” Duncan asks in return.
“Can you imagine him murdering women and children for pleasure?” Joe asks.
“No,” Duncan answers.
Joe says Duncan should listen to his gut, but Duncan says that his
instincts are not enough, and Joe says there is no proof either way.
“Then I’m just going to have to find my own,” Duncan responds.
Methos goes back to Kronos at his warehouse hideout, and Kronos
acknowledges that Methos was smart to come back, that he knows Kronos
would track him down, no matter how long it took, and kill him. “It’s
nice to feel wanted,” Methos says snidely.
“Not want! NEED!” Kronos tells Methos that he had tried to “take up the
old ways” many times, but always failed because the others were “scum”,
and he didn’t have anyone to plan his raids, anyone “who understood the
true use of terror.” He says Methos is one of a kind, that never in
history was there a band like theirs. As he speaks, Methos walks up
behind him, sword drawn, but as he swings, Kronos is ready for him,
having anticipated the move.
Methos protests that he has changed, that he isn’t “like that anymore,”
but Kronos says while he might have convinced himself he had changed,
but inside he was still the same, that he had missed, “The Freedom! The
Power! Riding out of the sun knowing that you’re the most terrifying
they’d ever seen. Knowing that their weapons and their gods are useless
against you. That you’re the last thing they’ll ever see.” As Methos
closes his eyes against the memories and looks like he’s about to lose
it, Kronos urges him not to fight the urges, but to feel them. Then he
tells Methos that he will kill Cassandra for him, but in return Methos
has to kill MacLeod.
“But he’s my friend. He’s nothing to you. Why?”
“Because he’s your friend. Because you still have to prove yourself and
because YOU OWE ME!” Then he slices his palm and gives the blade to
Methos, telling him to swear he will kill MacLeod. Methos slices his own
palm, and they join hands, blood seeping through their fingers as Methos
swears.
Then we have the Jimmy scene, where Methos is storing things in his
truck, evidently preparing to leave. MacLeod drives up, looking tense
and stiff, asking what Methos was running from. Methos urges him to “let
it be,” but Duncan asks if what Cassandra had told him was true. Methos
tries to leave without answering, but Duncan physically stops him,
demanding to know. Methos placatingly says that the times, the world and
he was different. Duncan insists, “Did you kill all those people?” in a
choked voice.
Methos’ discomfort seems to resolve itself, his expression clears and he
answers, “Yes!” Then Methos proceeds to pound the truth home again,
saying killing was all he knew, “Is that what you want to hear?”
“It’s enough,” Duncan answers, meeting his hard stare for a moment
before turning away. But Methos grabs Duncan and slams him against the
truck.
“No, it is Not enough!” With a certain angry satisfaction, he tells
Duncan he didn’t just kill a few, or even a lot, he killed ten thousand,
and he was good at it.” Then he smilingly adds that it wasn’t for
vengeance or greed, it was because he liked it, that Cassandra and her
village were nothing to him and even laughs as he tells Duncan that he
was Death on a horse. Duncan reverses their positions, slamming Methos
against the truck in return as Methos smilingly relates that he was the
monster that mothers scared their children with at night. “Is that what
you want to hear!?” Methos demands again. “The answer is yes. Oh, yes.”
Looking sucker-punched and near tears, Duncan barely manages to tell
Methos, “We’re through.” Each man nods at the other, and Duncan turns
and walks away.
Duncan turns for one last look before he jerks off his coat and throws
it in the car, getting in and speeding away. Methos looks after him,
slams his coat into the truck, gets in and puts his head up against the
steering wheel.
Back at the loft, Joe tells a distraught Duncan that he’s not defending
what Methos did, he’s just trying to understand it. Duncan is beside
himself at the thought of Methos’ reign of death, but Joe insists they
were “different times, different rules, different morals.” Duncan says
he won’t compare it or excuse it, but Joe asks how much blood Duncan had
shed in anger. Duncan says he knows what he’s done, and he has to live
with it, but that this was different, that this was a “bunch of
murdering bastards that burned and raped across two continents,” and
that they butchered innocent women and children.
Joe reminds Duncan that in Vietnam, he had seen innocents die in the
crossfire.
“This is different,” Duncan responds, relating with disgust that Methos
enjoyed what he did, that he got pleasure from the killing. Then Joe
gets a call. Cassandra’s Watcher had led them to Kronos at the old power
station.
At the power station, Kronos feels another Immortal. Assuming it is
Methos, he calls out, “I hope you brought me his sword.” But it is
Cassandra. Kronos is unimpressed, taunting her, telling her that Methos
isn’t there, that he’s out “killing MacLeod.” She tries using the power
of her Voice on him, but he is unaffected. She is no match for him as a
fighter, and he disarms her. She slips away, but runs into Methos, who
cold cocks her and dumps her into the river.
Kronos is looking for Cassandra, but this time it is MacLeod he finds.
It is a long, brutal battle, and as they fight, we see Methos starting
several fires in the building. Finally, he pours a whole can of gasoline
out and lights it. The fire spreads, finally dramatically exploding
between the two fighters, separating them. Methos hits the fire alarm,
and Kronos stares across the flames at MacLeod. “I can wait!” he calls.
Back at the loft, a weary-looking Duncan is relieved to find Cassandra
still alive. When she learns Duncan wasn’t able to kill Kronos, she says
it “will never be over until they’re both dead.”
“Then we’ll find them,” Duncan says resolutely, holding her.
By the docks, Kronos has a sword to Methos’ neck, demanding to know why
he stopped the fight, accusing him of saving MacLeod. “It could have
gone either way,” Methos answers calmly. “I couldn’t take the chance.”
“Are you afraid of me losing? Or him?” Kronos asks. When Methos is
silent, Kronos suggests that he should kill Methos now to be sure he
wasn’t wrong about him, but Methos says if does, Kronos will never have
the Four Horsemen again, and announces that the remaining two horsemen,
Silas and Caspian, are still alive, offering to lead Kronos to them.
“Then you live,” Kronos acknowledges. “The Four Horsemen ride again,” he
grins as “to be continued…” displays across the screen.
MY COMMENTARY: In part 2.
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 18:28:28 -0500
From: kageorge <kageorge@erols.com>
Subject: Season Five DVDs: Comes A Horseman (pt 2/2)
MY COMMENTARY: So much has been said over the years about this and the
following episode, there is little new insight to be brought to it, I
think. I can only express my own interpretations and opinions about what
internal monologue may have been going on with the characters, and
address some of the disagreements in interpretation of events or
emotions or motivations that always seem to surface.
#1: Did Methos recognize Cassandra when she first attacked him, or was
he telling what he thought was the truth when he insisted he wasn’t the
person she was after?
My view: This one isn’t even a close call, for me. He knew her
instantly. In the first place, he knew Caspian and Silas were alive, so
he has obviously been tracking Immortals from the “old days” over the
years. For him not to have similarly tracked Cassandra, who has good
reason to wish him dead, is nonsensical. Second, he has all-too-recently
been reminded of those events of so long ago, so they would be fresh on
his mind. Methos is a quick thinker, the consummate survivor, and he
instantly did the one thing that would guarantee his survival at that
moment – he appealed to MacLeod to protect him. Yes, it was a lie, and
in the long run it would deeply damage MacLeod’s trust in him and make
the ultimate revelation about his past much, much more problematic, but
rational discourse and truth-telling didn’t seem like an option at that
particular moment.
#2: Why did Methos reveal his past to MacLeod in a way virtually
guaranteed to generate the worst possible reaction? Was he trying to
push MacLeod away to protect him, or was it just a defensive response to
an old, painful accusation?
My view: I don’t think there is one, straightforward reason Methos
reacted the way he did, or that Duncan reacted the way *he* did. These
are two complex men in a complex relationship that has, as its
foundation, the general notion that they are destined to possibly meet
someday in combat to the death, and that their friendship is in defiance
of that destiny. I refuse to make any broad generalizations about either
character because that denigrates the wonderful subtleties that make
this scene such great, great drama. I *do* think Methos is a
manipulator, but that most of his manipulations are done on the fly,
because they amuse him, and especially amuse him when his manipulations
have unexpected results as they sometimes do with MacLeod. In my
opinion, Methos gave up trying to formulate large-scale schemes when he
walked away from the Horsemen, but he certainly still has all the
instincts for it.
As a result, when Methos physically grabs Duncan, refusing to let him
walk away after the first confirmation that Methos was who Cassandra had
said he was, I think it was fraught with multiple motivations. One was
that he didn’t want to let Duncan go, that his friendship was something
Methos truly treasured. Another was that he was angry that Duncan
believed he understood when he didn’t understand at all. A third was the
knowledge that he was still under an edict to kill MacLeod. If he
succeeded in *really* pissing Duncan off, one of two things could
happen: Duncan could challenge him, and Methos could kill him (assuming
he could win that battle, but Methos isn’t known as an ‘honorable’
fighter), thereby fulfilling his promise to Kronos; or, Duncan would
hate him so much that he would walk away and never speak to him again,
which would also get him away from Kronos. Then, of course, Methos would
have a different problem, but he could only deal with one crisis at a time.
Methos couldn’t be positive of either outcome, but you combine all those
urges, needs and motivations, and instinct has him grabbing MacLeod and
slamming against the truck and forcing Duncan to understand just how
alien, how ugly, how very, very different he was so long ago, and
watching Duncan’s face as it moves from cold anger to disgust and
dismay, with a very strong dose of betrayal thrown in for good measure.
Methos is both relieved and horribly grieved when Duncan says their
friendship is over and walks away. On the one had, that Duncan *hadn’t*
challenged him, knowing that Methos had pushed virtually every one of
Duncan’s hot buttons, must’ve been a revelation about just how much
Duncan had treasured their friendship, and how much Methos had just
lost. On the other hand, now Methos had to deal with Kronos, having not
killed MacLeod, so he had to come up with a whole new survival strategy
– ergo, the re-grouping of the Horsemen.
As for Duncan’s reactions, he is being pushed from so many different
directions, he can hardly tell where he stands from moment to moment.
For all that he had his own dark past, Duncan had never killed strictly
for pleasure, and never deliberately killed innocents. His own village
had been devastated and his father killed by marauders. And Cassandra
was an icon from his past, a woman who had appealed to him for
protection, further confusing his own sense of where his duties and
responsibilities lay. So Methos reveling in his tale of killing ten
thousand innocents just because he enjoyed the killing, and that
Cassandra and her village were “nothing” to him, was appalling,
especially coming from someone he considered a good and trusted friend,
someone he could lean on, someone he could go to for advice, even if it
was usually couched in sometimes-unpleasant cynicism and sarcasm. So he
walked away, brimming with anger and a sense of betrayal, knowing that
Methos had lied to him about Cassandra, wondering how many other things
Methos had said were lies, filled with horror at Methos’ words, and with
his gleeful attitude about all that death.
#3: Duncan was unfair in judging Methos’ actions harshly, when he knew
Darius was also had a killing past, but considered Darius practically a
saint.
My view: This assertion ends up on my ‘gimme a break’ list. Geez. You
can argue that Darius was also a general, and that a conqueror isn’t
doing so for the personal pleasure of killing individuals. But that
argument is frequently met with philosophical discourse on the evils of
war, etc., which I find tiresome – as though somehow because I don’t
consider killing in war as evil an act as personal murder, I am de facto
approving war, or that I don’t think that war itself is evil, which is
absurd.
But the most compelling difference between Darius and Methos is the
simple fact that Darius never hid his past – and actually frequently
used it as an object lesson for how *not* to live, and lived a life that
was a polar opposite of what he had been.
#4: At one point on various lists, someone who shall be nameless
strongly argued, and there were even a few who purported to be persuaded
(I think. I have blessedly forgotten most of that ‘conversation’) that
Methos was the actual leader of the Horsemen and that some (unknown)
momentous event occurred to elevate Kronos to the dominant member of
that group. We don’t know what the momentous event was, but, according
to the proponent of the theory, the evidence is clear and obvious that
Methos was the original leader of the Horsemen.
My view: I can’t recall all the minutiae from which this scenario was
inferred, but it is patently absurd. All you have to do is watch that
first scene, where the instant Kronos inquires what is going on all
three men defer to Kronos, who unhesitatingly acts as Solomon, splitting
the robe and declaring the rule that they all share everything.
#5: Cassandra was a vengeful bitch who was utterly unreasonable and
irrational in her single-minded pursuit of Methos.
My view: Cassandra was a character with many possible interpretations,
but I had no trouble believing that her first-death and post-death
experiences were horrifying and would have left life-long scars,
regardless of how long that life was. It was made clear that Methos used
whatever methods were most painful to ensure her cooperation, and that
he treated her as property to be used for his own benefit and pleasure.
I thought her character as revealed in Prophecy was ambiguous as to
whether she was a cold, manipulative predator or a fearful woman getting
by as best she could. There is also ambiguity here since she pursues
both Kronos and Methos even in the face of her own probable death. She
can’t have hoped to win against either of them physically, so she had
only her demonstrably unreliable Voice. Both Kronos and Methos were
significantly older than she, had survived for thousands of years and
were likely to be extraordinarily powerful. To rely totally on her Voice
as her defense against them was tenuous, at best. She had to have known
she was putting her life on the line – although she sure didn’t hesitate
a moment to rely once again on Duncan as her defender.
That she sees Methos as evil incarnate is in part a result of his own
evil deeds, and in part a result of her guilt and disgust at her
ultimate acquiescence and servitude to him under duress. She is blinded
by both her history and her guilt. Was she irrational? Yes. Was it
understandable? Completely.
#6: Methos was never *really* bad, not in context of the times. Ten
thousand wasn’t that many, after all, if you extrapolate out over a
thousand or so years, and that’s just the way people lived way back then.
My view: Hogwash. Kronos describes them as being the ultimate in evil,
even for the times. Methos describes them as being living nightmares,
and his use of the killing of “ten thousand” was merely metaphor for “a
whole, whole, whole lot of people.” To minimize and trivialize what they
were is to take away the sting of the whole episode and to paint Methos
as simply a minor bad guy who eventually saw the error of his ways.
Phooey on that. I want a *real* bad guy. I want a monumentally,
seriously bad, bad guy who now lives with the reality of what he once
was. That’s Drama!
Finally, I’ve always thought Joe’s stance on Methos was utterly
inconsistent with the Vengeful!Joe who strongly urged Duncan to kill
John Kiernan. In that instance, it was Duncan who was gradually coming
to grips with the fact that a former conscienceless murderer had not
only changed, but was now trying to redeem himself. It took time, and
some real soul-searching, but ultimately Duncan acknowledged that
Kiernan deserved that opportunity. Joe never did.
I think Joe’s initial dismissal of even the possibility that Methos
might have a truly evil past was born of knowing him as Adam Pierson
long before he knew him as Methos. He was unable to see that person as
doing truly evil deeds, and perhaps has never grasped the true
complexity inherent in living for 5,000 years. It is a very mortal
reaction, as was Joe’s comparison of the acts of the Four Horsemen to
his experience in Vietnam – which demonstrated that Joe was operating
from as different a reality from Duncan as Duncan was from Methos.
As for the overall quality of this episode, it was first-rate in all
respects. Val Pelka was brilliant casting, Tracy Scoggins less so, but
they were stuck with her after they had established her in “Prophecy”. I
didn’t like her mostly because I felt she manipulated Duncan even more
than Methos did, and to questionable ends for questionable motives, but
I felt that as a character, she was interesting and effective.
The flashbacks, both the one to Texas and to the Bronze Age, were
wonderful. The “stick boy” who initially spots the Horsemen and dashes
towards the village has achieved a small bit of notoriety, and
Cassandra’s long talon-like nails have received criticism (although they
tried to disguise them). Mostly, though, the atmospherics were wonderful
– the power plant was dark, grim and threatening, full of sharp edges
and mysterious machines, and the music matched the emotional context
really well, adding to the power of the scenes.
All the characters were fabulously complex, their motives unclear and
their actions fraught with unforeseen consequences – just like life. <g>
Of course, there is much more to come in the finale to this brilliant
two-part epic.
MacGeorge
All episode commentaries can be found at:
http://www.wordsmiths.net/MacGeorge/episodes/indexframeset.htm
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 18:46:30 -0500
From: Heidi <heidi@bronze.lcs.mit.edu>
Subject: Re: 'Best Of' Really?
From: Prodipto Roy <proy@microsoft.com>
[..] got the Best of Highlander DVD set. These are the episodes they used:
The Gathering - First Episode. Passing of the torch from Connor to Duncan.
Do people really think of `The Gathering' as one of the `Best'? While
it introduced Duncan, his story, and had Connor as a guest character,
Slan was so bad that it did alot to offset the good parts of the episode.
The character seemed more like something from a comic book or cartoon
and he was so over-acted that he just seemed silly and changed the `tone'
of the episode. It's a shame that what could have been a really good
episode had that for the `evil-Immortal-of-the-week'. Or do some of you
actually like the character and thought it fit in? (while they had it
as one of the 14 `best', I wouldn't be suprised if a fair number would
count it as one of the worst if a list of those was done.)
Duende - IMO the weakest of the episodes on the Best of Series
That seems to get alot of mixed opinions. It seems to mostly depend on
how interested in the sword aspects of the series the person in question is.
=}{=
(heidi@bronze.lcs.mit.edu)
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 19:25:49 EST
From: Highlandmg@aol.com
Subject: Re: 'Best Of' Really?
well The Gathering will always be on my top ten and is one I will always get
to rewatch. I have to say it was my favote for a long time and somethimes it
still is. I love how Duncan facical expressions in the kitch with Tessa and
Connor. I love Tessa is this as well as well as Richie being a teenager.
Mary will always love the gathering
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 1 Nov 2004 15:26:06 -1000
From: MacWestie <mac.westie@verizon.net>
Subject: Re: 'Best Of' Really?
> Do people really think of `The Gathering' as one of the `Best'? While
> it introduced Duncan, his story, and had Connor as a guest character,
> Slan was so bad that it did alot to offset the good parts of the episode.
The Gathering has a special place in my heart (well, it _would_ if I had a
heart). It was the first ep & started something amazing. Parts of it
clearly showed the potential of both the concept & the ensemble. And, in an
entertainment rarity, the potential was reached (& even exceeded in a few
season 5 eps). Yes, Slan was a buffoon, the plot was shaky, & AP's take on
Duncan there was frequently wooden. Doesn't matter--the ep is still
something special. Same w/ the Farscape pilot ep--at times brilliant, yet
laughable in some areas--but still, it was the riveting beginning of
something great.
I think any polling TPTB did for the "Best of" collection was largely a
formality. Certain eps were sure to be included just because they afforded
so much room for comment & exploration in the various extras the set
offered. Duende, for instance, had an odd genesis & included both AP's
flamenco dancing & the unique sword style--lots to talk about & demonstrate
there in the extras. Studies in Light, on the other hand--a nice show but
not offering much to explore in the extras for this set. The eps used
weren't so much the best (in the sense of favorites) of the series as they
were landmark episodes--& surely the pilot ep is a must-have in that
category.
Nina
mac.westie@verizon.net
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End of HIGHLA-L Digest - 30 Oct 2004 to 1 Nov 2004 (#2004-200)
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