From: daviderl31@yahoo.com   
      
   1-11 -- The Black Wolf   
      
   First Air Date –Jan 8, 1996   
      
   The episode starts out with soldiers taking taxes in the form of silver from   
   a man. Ninja types attack the guards and recover the money and give it back   
   to the man.   
      
       **The impression I got was that the soldiers were collecting money,   
   silver, whatever, from everyone but when the silver was returned the ninja   
   reached into a large bag and got out exactly what belonged to the guy. How   
   did he know how much to return?**   
      
       Xena is riding along without Gabrielle. She stops to look at Argo's hoof   
   and says she (Argo) needs new shoes.   
      
       **So where was Gabrielle? We see Xena riding on ahead all the time, but   
   she didn't seem to be in very much of a hurry.**   
      
       Next we see Xerxes and his men arresting a group of villagers, and   
   demanding to know who the Black Wolf is. A woman wants to see her daughter,   
   who was arrested, but a guard throws her down. Xena comes to her rescue, and   
   beats up several guards. It turns out the woman knew Xena ten years ago.   
      
       **Apparently, the woman, Hermia, lived in Amphipolis when Xena was   
   growing up there. But is ten years long enough for all of Xena's adventures   
   to have happened?**   
      
       Xena goes to see Xerxes to offer to expose the Black Wolf for 10,000   
   dinars, and a new pair of boots. She lets herself get thrown into the   
   dungeon after beating up on Koulos. It doesn't take long before Xena finds   
   Flora, Hermia's daughter after going through a couple of dungeon bullies.   
      
       In the meantime, Gabrielle arrives in town with no explanation of where   
   she had been, or how she knew to go to the village. She finds Argo at the   
   blacksmith's and has to pay 20 dinars before the smithy tells her that Xena   
   has been thrown into the dungeon.   
      
       **It's odd that Xena would let Gabrielle travel alone with a pouch full   
   of money.**   
      
        Xena finds Flora, and offers to get her out of the dungeon, but Flora   
   refuses to go without the other Black Wolves. So Xena has a plan.   
      
       Back to the village and we see Salmoneus, who has a souvenir/fruit and   
   vegetable stand. And Gabrielle, wearing a goofy hat, tries to throw tomatoes   
   at the guards, but they think it's Sal and he is arrested.   
      
       Back in the dungeon, Koulos has Xena thrown into a water pit with a   
   couple of skeletons. He locks the top and has it filled with water. Xena   
   goes under and grabs a sword from one of the guards who is poking in the   
   water trying to find her. She cuts the wooden top, and with an underwater   
   war cry, comes flying out of the pit, but is surrounded.   
      
       **Later, Sal is put into the pit and the cage top is repaired. When did   
   that happen?**   
      
       Xena figures out who the Black Wolf is – Flora. She has plan to get them   
   out. Xena and Flora talk about when Xena was younger and Flora was the   
   closest thing Xena had to a sister.   
      
       **Flora must have been a much younger sister, since Xena looks to be at   
   least fifteen years older. Doing math, if Xena was, say, about 20 when   
   Cortese's army attacked Amphipolis, then Flora couldn't have been much older   
   than 5.**   
      
   Sal collects belts which they tie together and climb up to the top of the   
   dungeon and when the guards come to feed them the Black Wolves drop down on   
   them and escape.   
      
       **Xena is suspicious, saying it was too easy. But if the guards were   
   only there to bring food, why wouldn't they be caught unaware and easy to   
   overpower?**   
      
       But they all are re-captured anyway, thanks to a spy planted by Xerxes.   
   But Diomedes, Flora's boyfriend, thinks Xena is the spy and tries to beat   
   her up. But Xena lets him live.   
      
       Finally, Gabrielle get arrested when she throws a bowl of some kind of   
   gruel or oatmeal or something on a guard.   
      
       **I just loved her line to the guard, "It's really nice of you to walk   
   me down here personally."**   
      
       Gabrielle finds Xena and has the Chakram in her goofy hat, and the whip   
   wrapped around her waist. But when Gabrielle asks Xena why she was in the   
   dungeon, Xena blows her off and has Sal explain it.   
      
       Koulos gets impatient and decides to have Sal thrown into the pit, so   
   Xena exposes Flora as the leader of the Black Wolves. They bring her out to   
   be executed by having her head chopped off. Gabrielle throws Xena's Chakram   
   to her and Xena then throws the Chakram and breaks the executioner's ax. It   
   (Chakram) then ricochets and cuts through the prisoner's chains. Everyone   
   fights and even Gabrielle gets in a couple of licks with a short staff.   
   Xerxes dies when Xena kicks him away and he falls on the broken ax handle.   
      
   .........................   
      
   I have to say, this isn't one of my favorite episodes, and I'm not really   
   sure why. I would have like to have seen more of Gabrielle, but I guess   
   there really wasn't much for her to do.   
      
   Salmoneus took over from Gabrielle as the comedy relief. And he was pretty   
   good at it. I do like Sal, but too much of him could really get tiring.   
   I wasn't too crazy about Flora for some reason.   
      
   Also, Xena's voice bothered me. Almost the entire episode she sounded like   
   she'd been taking Valium or smoking pot or something. She was just TOO   
   mellow when she spoke.   
      
       There was no disclaimer for this episode, which makes me wonder if this   
   one was supposed to air before "Prometheus" (ep #8) which I believe had the   
   first disclaimer.   
      
   Except for the few things I've already mentioned, I didn't find too much   
   else to nit pick about. Even so, I only rated this one a 5 out of 10.   
      
      
   David   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)