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When I first watched X:WP's take on Wagner's Ring cycle, I was quite amused by the idea of Xena being both Alberich, the evil dwarf who renounces love in order to steal the Rheingold, and Siegfried, the hero of the cycle (insofar as this epic actually has a hero). After further viewings, I remain amused - the trilogy certainly has its lumpy spots, but after the Toontown stylings of The Abyss it's good to return to episodes that actually develop characters, and the melding of two epics (The Ring and Beowulf) is cleverly done.

Evil Xena had one hell of a busy schedule, didn't she? Now she's wearing a silly helmet with wings and dealing with some rubber monster. As rubber monsters go, though Grendel ain't bad - like its porcupine cousin in AFA, Grendel is capable of displaying some human feelings, far more so than, say the Dahak-monster in H:TLJ's Redemption. EX cages Grendel, but loses her golden ring in the process - time to move on to Corinth and reunite with Borias, I guess. Come to think of it, what happened to Borias between Ch'in and Corinth, anyway? Brunhilda tells us that Xena came from Ch'in, so it appears that EX hasn't been to Corinth yet, and I also doubt that Xena could sincerely renounce love after she bore Solan. As toxic64 points out, the chakram suggests that EX had already met Ares, but there's nothing else in her development to indicate this, and I can't imagine EX hiving off after Odin if she was already a disciple of the GOW. In short, RJS said to hell with continuity and did whatever he wanted to do with the story, as happened so often in this YAXI-plagued season.

We flash forward to the present ("35 years later," to be precise) to find Xena and Gab chowing down in the local tavern, only to be interrupted by Beowulf holding yet another Grim Token of Xena's Wicked Past. Naturally, Xena sneaks away to spare Gab certain death, and just as naturally Gab says phooey to that and rides after her. I could have done without Gab's internal monologue - it would have been enough to have her read Xena's note, smile sardonically, slowly mutter, "R-i-g-h-t!" and saddle up. Gab ends up in the Norselands and meets Brunhilda, who proceeds to launch into a lengthy backstory exposition - hey, somebody's got to do it!

I think I was understating the situation earlier when I said that EX had a busy schedule. We find out from Brunhilda that in the course of a couple of months (at least if we try to cram everything into the existing EX timeline) Xena rode all the way from Ch'in to the Norselands, met and corrupted an existentially tormented Odin, turned the Valkyries and Norsemen into homicidal maniacs, outmaneuvered and mashed Grunhilda, infiltrated the Rhinemaidens, swiped their gold and forged the ring. She must have been taking vitamin supplements! Did anyone else snicker at the sight of Odin dangling from that tree? In Norse mythology, Odin hung himself from Yggdrasil, the World Tree for 9 days and nights to acquire the knowledge of the runes; here, he sounds like a refugee from a Bergman movie. Didn't take long for Xena to put some new lead in his pencil, did it?

I know how important the X/G relationship is to the series, but I got a little tired of the explicit drumbeating in this ep (Gab feeling sorry for EX renouncing love, Brunhilda commenting on their love, Beowulf talking about how much Xena misses Gab, etc., etc.). I'm someone who prefers to see relationships expressed on film through gestures, actions and decisions, as opposed to verbal declamations. After 6 years, we know damn well how much these two mean to each other - we don't need a bunch of dialogue telling us about it. Granted, Beowulf is already thinking about Gab in less-than-pure terms, Brunhilda is Xena-obsessed, and the whole thing is supposed to build to a hyper-romantic rescue scene later in the arc, but it still struck me as overkill.

Good fight between Gab and Brunhilda, but how come Gab gets fooled by that simple leg-whip takedown? I'd think it was a move she'd seen a thousand times before, and would know how to guard against. The big 3-way fight between Xena + Beowulf and Grendel, OTOH was quite spectacular and well-staged, and of course we have the cliffhanger ending, with Gab holding Xena's bloody armor and gasping in dismay - stay tuned for next week's exciting installment!

John Fawcett's direction was decent, although perhaps not quite up to his work in FA; the opening scene with EX and Grendel was excellently staged and shot, and the final fight scene was similarly dark and eery. I agree with athenasword that the costumes were rather dull in this one by comparison with other exotic X:WP eps; OTOH, Germanic and Norse garb doesn't lend itself to the same extravagant color schemes that Indian or Chinese clothing does. The flying-horse scenes were quite cheesy, but at least they were using real horses and riders against the blue screen rather than CGI images; it helped keep the horsie scenes from becoming completely ridiculous. I found RJS's script to be rather more pedantic than usual; there was a lot of exposition to get through, to be sure, but I also wasn't crazy about the relationship material as I mentioned earlier. Show me, don't tell me! I did like the exchange between disillusioned Odin and brash EX, as well as EX taking advantage of the poor, dumb Rhinemaidens, although the subtext felt a little "troweled-on" to me there (I guess I'm just a sucker for subtlety). Odin is much less striking here than he was in the S5 H:TLJ eps - he seems pretty weak and malleable for such a powerful god. Too bad Baldur isn't around to help him stay on the straight-and-narrow!

This one rates 7.5/10 chakrams - it's a good set-up ep for the arc, with just enough action to keep one's attention from flagging too much during the extended exposition.