Xena: Season 2, Episode 09: "A Solstice Carol"

It’s Easter weekend and what better way to celebrate the death of Christ than to celebrate his birth with the Xena Xmas episode, “A Solstice Carol.” It seems like it’s been years and years since I watched this episode, but it’s only been since late 2009. Regardless, I was totally giddy watching it this time.

First of all, this episode touches me in a special way, as it’s about eviction notices, one of which I recently received, myself.

"A Solstice Carol," of course, is a bon mot for "A Christmas Carol," a novel by Charles Dickens, which has been adapted up and down the streets millions of times over. (Two favorites of mine are Scrooged and Mickey's Christmas Carol.) In this wonderful Xena rendition, King Silvus fills the role of Ebenezer Scrooge, while Senticles fills the shoes of Bob Cratchit. Instead of the three spirits, we have the three fates, which is brilliant, really. I love this episode; it always puts me in a good mood.

I saw the guy who played Senticles as unfit for Santa Claus, until the end when we see him decked out as such. I wonder if he’s a professional Santa; he's great. And the sight of Senticles' toys... God, I love toys.

I also love the way this show continuously ties important events to our characters, such as Gabrielle helping Mary, Joseph, and Jesus get to Bethlehem (or wherever they're going) at the end of this episode. And this isn't the first time. It happened before when Gabrielle met King David and encouraged him to share his psalms, Xena tried to help Goliath, Gabrielle helped Homer tell better stories, Xena aided in the battle of Troy, etc.

The ending fight scene is phenomenal. Nice, creative use of the toys as weapons. We see Xena use star ornaments as throwing stars, marbles to trip people, even a Hercules puppet to whack some poor soldier. Gabrielle traps two soldiers with a hula hoop and pounds another two with hand bells. Senticles also throws ornaments like baseballs and fires a candy cane out of a crossbow. All of it makes me feel so good. I’d like to live my life according to this episode. 

SPOILERS: My reviews are full of them! I'll try to note when I'm about to spoil the series by posting [SERIES SPOILER] before said item and [END SPOILER] after. Please don't read the review, unless you've seen the episode under discussion or don't care if I spoil it. 

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EXTRAS:

1) G: “Now, no spying. And if one of us sees the other shopping in a stall, then she turns and walks the other way. Agreed?” X: “Yeah.” G: “No peeking into other peoples’ bags, too. I mean, being surprised is half the fun, right?” X: “Right.” G: “Ah, nothing can cost more than five dinars.” X: “Then why don’t I just give you five dinars, and you can buy something that you really like?” G: “Because, then it wouldn’t be a gift.” – This may be my most favorite dialogue ever from this show.

2) X: “Coming through!” – I wonder if ancients really said this as casually as we do.

3) Girl: “The round thing looks like the king’s crest.” L: “In honor of his cold heart.” – I know this line by rote, but never really understood it, until now.

4) X: “You signed the order yourself.” S: “Maybe so. I issue so many, time’s being what they are.” X: “And whose fault is that?” – This is such a universal theme, especially today.

5) Girl: “I wish we could have a big Solstice dinner with all the trimmings.” – Nothing against this child, but there’s no way in hell that people talked like this (like a valley girl) back then. It was a little distracting.

6) G: “Tobias, good job, boy. Now where’s Senticles? What? Are you trying to tell me something? Do you know where Senticles is? OK. Let’s find him. Smart donkey.” – I love the way Gabrielle says all this. And I love Tobias, so of course I’m going to put his “lines” in my EXTRAS section, whore. 

7) SC: “No, I won’t risk going to prison.” G: “Look, you say you’re afraid of small spaces. Well, that’s exactly how you live your whole life, in a small space, afraid to stand up for yourself or anyone else. Don’t you see? What you’re most afraid will happen, has happened? The question is, what are you going to do about it?” – I love this, personally.

8) L: “This is an orphanage. And, ‘cause we can’t pay our taxes, King Silvus is kicking us out of here at midnight. What kind of king does that to kids on Solstice Eve?” X/L: “Good question.” – Xena makes the simplest line sound like sex on a stick.

9) X: “Gabrielle, get me a sword.” [Gabrielle hands her a rubber sword] G: “This guy’s driving me nuts!” – When they face the human blender, as I like to call him. This ham-handedness seals the deal; this episode’s tone is perfect!

Senticles quotes Clint Eastwood and gets all Dirty Harry on everyone's asses, except he does it with a candy cane instead of a gun (as seen here):

Mickey's Christmas Carol (1983), the trailer:

Bill Murray's character is actually producing a TV adaptation of "A Christmas Carol" in Scrooged, an 80s telling of said story: 

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