From: daviderl31@yahoo.com   
      
   3-20  Vanishing Act   
      
   First air date Apr 27, 1998   
      
   The episode starts out with Gabrielle and Xena going in separate directions.   
   Gabrielle goes into a village that is celebrating 20 years of peace where a   
   gold female statue called Pax stands next to the docks. Gabrielle tells the   
   mayor Xena will be there in the morning.   
      
   Then next day they discover the statue is missing (and the pedestal?). Xena   
   guesses it was stolen. She spies a suspicious old lady. When the old lady   
   tries to get away, Xena kicks her cane out from under her. And when she   
   tries to scramble up a gangplank to a ship, Xena lassoes her feet and drags   
   her back down. It is Autolycus in disguise. He says it's because with his   
   reputation he has to or will be accused of thievery. He says he didn't steal   
   the statue, but will let Xena work with him to get it back.   
      
   They interrogate the wharf-master about who might have a ship. Xena uses the   
   Pinch but takes it off at Autolycus' insistence.   
   They are told Tarses stole it and lives on an island. They catch a ship to   
   the island. Gabrielle is to pose as Myopia, a fence for stolen items. Tarses   
   decides to have the statue melted down.   
      
   Xena shows up disguised as Ezra, another fence. She insists on seeing the   
   statue. Autolycus is disguised as her manservant with an eye patch and a   
   humpback. Autolycus turns over a series of torches to allow Xena to use her   
   Chakram to close (or open) some kind of lever on the furnace, causing it to   
   lose heat.   
      
   Tarses decides they will go back inside to wait for the furnace to get hot   
   enough, but Xena needs time for Autolycus to look around. She and Gabrielle   
   start bidding on the gold after the statue is melted down. Xena wins with a   
   bid of 400,000 dinars and the Ring of Apollo. Autolycus has seen what he   
   needs to (a fake wall painted to look like a hallway) and has a plan.   
      
   Xena and Autolycus send Gabrielle to a party while they find supplies to   
   implement Autolycus' plan. Later they join the party. Tarses figures out who   
   Autolycus is and reminds Autolycus he killed his brother. Xena pretends   
   everything was Autolycus' fault and she (Ezra) just fell in love with the   
   wrong man. They are taken away. Autolycus is chained with 20 feet of chain   
   and 200 locks.   
   Ezra is tied to a chair.   
      
   Tarses tells Myopia she can bid again in the morning against a Silosian   
   general who also wants the statue.   
      
   Xena gets out of the chair and is back in her leathers, and Gabrielle is out   
   of her disguise. Xena goes to find Autolycus, but he has escaped. He tells   
   Gabrielle he is going to kill Tarses for killing his brother.   
      
   Autolycus finds Tarses and starts to kill him, but Xena talks him out of it,   
   saying it's not what Autolycus' brother would want him to do. Tarses'   
   soldiers come in and Xena and Autolycus escape.   
      
   Outside they fight again, and Tarses' soldiers run away when the Silosian   
   general shows up with his soldiers. Tarses says they (Autolycus, Xena and   
   Gabrielle ) are trying to get his gold. But they are nowhere to be seen, nor   
   is the statue. The general threatens Tarses' life about offering goods he   
   doesn't have. The statue has been hidden behind a panel painted to look   
   like the wall it was next to.   
      
   The next morning, the statue (and pedestal) is back in the village. Xena and   
   Autolycus pay each other compliments about being the best or second best   
   thieves.   
      
   ..................................................   
      
   Not a particularly great episode. Many plot holes. But some things weren't   
   so bad.   
      
   First the good things ---   
      
   Anytime both Xena and Gabrielle are in disguise we know they are gong to   
   have fun with it. Gabrielle/Myopia was using her   
   Marquessa accent. I always like to see Gabrielle wearing blue.   
      
   Xena/Ezra was kind of Meg-like with a New York accent and personality. Lucy   
   sure knows how to put on a show. Loved that huge mole that Myopia couldn't   
   keep her eyes off of.   
      
   The two double flips with Xena and Autolycus was kind of cool.   
      
   And Autolycus was back to his old King-of-Thieves self, having fun with the   
   200 locks.   
      
   Kind of liked Gabrielle counting off the seconds while Xena and Autolycus   
   argued about interrogating the wharf-master.   
      
   Gabrielle and Xena trying to outbid each other for the gold with dinars they   
   didn't have. Was that amount of gold worth 400,000 dinars?   
      
   Things I didn't care for/understand ---   
      
   The statue and the pedestal --- At first the statue seemed to be "as tall as   
   a house" but at the end, the pedestal was the tall item and not the statue -   
   what happened? And where was the pedestal all this time?   
      
   What was Autolycus doing in the village in the first place?   
      
   Gabrielle had her staff back. Since she was fiddling with it on the dock,   
   maybe she made another one and was just finishing it up?   
      
   How did they get the statue (and pedestal?) back to the village and get it   
   put back in place in one night?   
      
   Also ---   
      
   During the interview for this episode, Andrew Merrifield (the director),   
   Rob, Lucy and Renee all agreed this was a stinker of an episode. Rob said   
   there is bound to be a bad episode in every season. He (or maybe the   
   director) mentioned the different sizes of the pedestal/statue. Lucy thought   
   this was the worst one of the series, but Renee mentioned a fifth season   
   episode involving Eeyore (which I take to mean Lachrymose and the episode   
   'Punch Lines') as being the worst one she remembered. (I don't remember too   
   much about that one, unless it's the one where Argo and Gabrielle are shrunk   
   down very small. But more on it six or seven months from now.)   
      
   Even with all the fun Lucy and Renee were having in their  disguises   
   couldn't raise this one higher than a 7 out of 10 rating.   
      
   ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~   
      
   3-20 Vanishing Act             7   
   3-19  Tsunami                  7   
   3-18  Fins, Femmes and Gems    8   
   3-17 Forget Me Not .           8   
   3-16 When In Rome .            8   
   3-15  King Con                 6   
   3-14  Forgiven                 8   
   3-13 One Against An Army       9.5   
   3-12 The Bitter Suite          9.5   
   3-11 Maternal Instincts        9.5   
   3-10  The Quill is Mightier..  8   
   3-09  Warrior-Priestess-Tramp  8   
   3-08  King of Assassins        6.5   
   3-07  The Debt Part II         9   
   3-06  The Debt Part I          9.5   
   3-05  Gabrielle's Hope         9   
   3-04  The Deliverer            9   
   3-03  The Dirty Half Dozen     8   
   3-02  Been There, Done That    9   
   3-01  The Furies               6.5   
         Average                  8.2   
      
      
   David   
      
   --- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)