Episode: “Girls
Just Wanna Have Fun”, in which fanged bloodsuckers terrorize a town and Xena
and Gabrielle swoop in to save the day like a couple of Van Helsings. The twist
is that the villains aren’t vampires; they’re the minions of Bacchus, the God
of Wine (a dead ringer for the demon in Fantasia).
The thing is, they’re totally vampires. I’ve always wondered how directly
involved “executive producer” Sam Raimi was in Xena. This episode has a real Evil Dead feel with its babbling severed
head, Army of Darkness-style Dryads,
jerky editing, and heroes who get infected by evil forces. Nothing is as evil
as the episode’s hip-hop bacchanalia, though. Try not to cringe yourself to
death watching it. I always considered Xena to be the missing link between Batman and Buffy. Since yesterday’s show was Batman, you can probably
guess what tomorrow’s will be…
