I haz new iconz

[janne_d]

Gone a bit mad with the HL iconnage, but damn there are some pretty ones out there. So I'm using Darius since he keeps popping up in the episodes, much to my delight.

And in this week's exciting episodes we have: why absinthe is bad for you, a very nice hat on a very bad man, why being a diva is bad plan, and the sideburns that ate Paris.

Masken des Todes
Another title about death, yay! Though it seems to be the last one so that is good.

After watching this I had an irresistible urge to reread the MacGeorge fic that covers the flashbacks to Duncan meeting Tessa but crosses it over with Bond and M (Judi Dench M) being awesome. So I didn't resist!

Anyway, the life lesson I learned from this episode is that drinking absinthe gives you a penchant for white silk scarves and mime, so clearly it is to be avoided at all costs. (Well, also it tastes disgusting.) The dad of a friend of mine once punched a mime who was imitating him in the street after being asked to go away - we were all so proud. And it probably saved his life since it is clear that all French mimes (it was in Provence) are actually assassins (not necessarily very good ones though).

I liked seeing Duncan and Tessa meet - I don't remember if there are any other flashbacks to their shared past but I would love it if there were.

And we are introduced to yet another policeman who is suspicious of Duncan - LeBrun this time who is balding and sarcastic and generally annoyed by everything Duncan says or does. I would have thought Duncan would be better at dealing with police without pissing them off by now, but apparently he is incapable of lying convincingly so he doesn't even try! And I notice despite LeBrun being all bitter about his arm he seems perfectly capable in the next episode again.

Ooh, and Really Stupid Policeman turned out to be a bad guy which serves him right for being unable to tell the difference between someone with white makeup and a clothes dummy.

The English title is 'For Evil's Sake' and given it features mimes that seems appropriate (in case you haven't gathered, I don't like mimes).



Beichtgeheimnis
Confession. Or 'For Tomorrow We Die' and starring Roland Gift from Fine Young Cannibals in a very nice hat as the bad guy, who likes to gas people to death and then steal their stuff. The phrase 'insult to injury' springs to mind.

And yay, there was lots more Darius in this one because like most bad guys, Xavier StCloud likes to go and taunt Darius because he betrayed the Evil Immie Gang by turning good. I rather liked the explanation for Darius respecting the rules of the confessional - it's not that he's Christian particularly but he takes his oaths and role seriously and abides by them.

I did get quite tense when Xavier was smarming around Tessa, but it was good to see a bad guy being smart and planning one step ahead of Duncan like that. And I had completely forgotten that it was Duncan who chopped his hand off - I remembered the episode where he only had one but I had blanked on this one.

In a last point of note, Richie managed some surprising maturity in dealing with the woman he was seeing turning out to be married. I think the Paris air has improved him.



Der Damon des Waldes
'The Demon of the Forest' or 'The Beast Below' (ooh, DW reference!)

Well this one was just... silly. But kind of fun. Very Phantom of the Opera-ish in some ways but it taught me that being a diva is bad because you have to wear a really appalling purple cloak, Duncan tells you off, and if that wasn't enough, you get hit by a car. So don't do it, kids - Duncan's tellings off are not fun.

I do love how Duncan just wanders about history doing random acts of kindness to strange Immortals - and I loved his flashback outfit, especially the hair. That was obviously a good hair century or something.



Der Konig von Amazonas
which is 'The King of the Amazon'. And the English title ('Saving Grace') is way, way better because first of all it is a good, well-known phrase and second of all the story is about Grace not Sendaro and his Amazonian estate.

I liked Grace and it was interesting to see her relationship with the mortal fall apart as a comparison with Duncan and Tessa, because the idea of the mortal partner growing old while the immortal stays looking young has come up with them already too.

Apart from that, the main delight of the episode was Duncan's truly ridiculous sideburns in the flashback. It was like two small hamsters had attached themselves to his face!



Right, I'm off to look for more icons...

Comments

[jya-bd-cp-ttgb.livejournal.com]

I miss Werner Stocker so much. If he'd lived, oh what Highlander could've been.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

He is fantastic. I hadn't seen the series in years and I'd forgotten what a warm presence he was in it. I am going to be very sad when it is his last episode - I would have been anyway because I remember the plot and I love the character but now I know he died in real life (which I didn't last time around) it's going to be really hard to watch.

[jya-bd-cp-ttgb.livejournal.com]

You hadn't heard about the direction Highlander would've taken if he'd lived?

Oh man, now I don't know if telling you would make it worse or better to see Hunters.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

No - obviously I assumed they had different plans for Darius but I've never heard anything about what the plan was. Would there not have been Hunters otherwise? It seems an fairly inevitable result of introducing Watchers - or were the Hunters how the Watchers came into it?

Like I said, I've not seen the series for years and even when I was watching there was a lot I missed because it was scheduled appallingly where I live. And though I read a lot of fanfic it was after the series had finished and I wasn't really in fandom back then.

So what direction would they have gone?

[jya-bd-cp-ttgb.livejournal.com]

Darius defended himself from the hunters, leaves the church. All the stuff from Revelations 6.8 & Comes a Horseman from 4th? Season Methos would've been Darius's story.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

Huh. So would there have been a Methos at all then? Or would he have just been a one or two-shot character?

I can't help wondering what either of those changes plus Rev6.8/CaH being about Darius would have done to the HL fandom. I have a feeling there would have been a lot less of it for a start - every HL fan I know loves Darius, but I don't think even with that longer run the character would have been the same catnip for fangirls that Methos is, not unless his character drastically veered off from the foundations that were laid in the early seasons.

There are so many elements of Rev6.8/CaH in particular that would have played out differently with Darius rather than Methos, and his dynamic with Duncan as a whole is very different too. I'm sure they could have done some very interesting things with Darius but I'm not sure they would have had the same impact on the fandom and fanfic that the combination of Methos + the Horsemen did.

And I really wonder if Duncan/Darius would have become the juggernaut slash pairing of HL the same way D/M is. The fact that I can't remember reading a single fic (and I once read my way through pretty much every slashfic on Seventh Dimension) that was Duncan/Darius kind of makes me doubt it, but with time to morph their dynamic after Tessa died maybe they would have grabbed the top spot after all.

Fascinating to think about - thank you! (And if you know any Duncan/Darius fics, let me know because now I really do want to read one, darn it.)

[jya-bd-cp-ttgb.livejournal.com]

Only knew one Darius slash fic, Maygra - I think - and it was Darius/Grayson. That out of the way, it makes me sad to think how different Highlander would've been if Connor had been around more, if Darius and/or Tessa had lived. If Joe had died at any point, or Amanda. Towards the end, I checked the opening two minutes to see if Amanda or Methos or Cory Raines (Nick Lea) appeared. If not, I didn't watch. There's no season 6 *swims the River for Clan Denial*

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

if Connor had been around more, if Darius and/or Tessa had lived. If Joe had died at any point, or Amanda

Any of those would certainly have made a large difference. I did always wish Christopher Lambert had been available for more episodes - it does seem odd that Duncan's teacher never dropped by after all the awful things that happened to him!

There's no season 6

Not even the 1930s murder mystery episode with Fitz? I remember that one as being pretty funny.

I'm right there with you in Clan Denial though - I'm in two minds about whether to watch those episodes when my rewatching gets that far. As long as I don't see it, I can firmly state that it didn't happen!

[jya-bd-cp-ttgb.livejournal.com]

That episode isn't 6 in my brain. It was a 5 I missed the first time it came on. *wink*

[trobadora]

There are so many elements of Rev6.8/CaH in particular that would have played out differently with Darius rather than Methos, and his dynamic with Duncan as a whole is very different too. I'm sure they could have done some very interesting things with Darius but I'm not sure they would have had the same impact on the fandom and fanfic that the combination of Methos + the Horsemen did.

Yeah, I'm completely with you on that. For one, we always knew Darius had taken a Light Quickening and used to be a villain; we even already met one of his old buddies. It wouldn't have been much of a shock to find out about his "bad old days" the way it was with Methos - either for the viewer or for Duncan.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

It wouldn't have been much of a shock to find out about his "bad old days" the way it was with Methos

Exactly. Methos is ambiguous in a way that Darius simply isn't. There is no revelation to be had with Darius, whereas with Methos it prompts a complete reevaluation of his character by the viewer and the other characters.

And as far as Duncan is concerned, there is very little angst or betrayal from Darius' past resurfacing except possibly a struggle with actually meeting one of his victims. There isn't going to be that doubt over who he is now - with Darius taking that storyline I can see Duncan going straight into convincing Cassandra he's changed without a pause, though probably followed by some really awkward conversations with Darius afterwards. But there would be no split, and you know what that means? No struggle over motivations and what side Darius is on, no ambiguity in how the plot plays out and most importantly, no post-CaH reconciliation fics!

[trobadora]

Yes, exactly, all of this! I mean, it would have been interesting to actually see some of Darius's past - but it would have been a completely different story, and you'd have had to add something else to give it a proper punch. With Methos, the revelation in and of itself provides that punch.

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

Where did the information that this was the planned storyline come from, btw? I was wandering about wikipedia and there's a quote from a production person there saying that they had always planned for Darius to die in 'The Hunters' and then have him continue to show up in flashbacks like they did with Fitz.

[jya-bd-cp-ttgb.livejournal.com]

Highlander Official Season 4 Companion, when they talked about Rev 6.8 and CaH. The episode writer? - I don't own the book anymore - said he pitched the storyline for Darius, but they hadn't made a decision before Warner passed on. So it went on the back burner and they used it for Methos in Season 4 with adjustments.

[trobadora]

Catching up on things!

I always liked Xavier St. Cloud as a villain - he was great, and I was a bit sad when he eventually died. *sighs*

Btw. "Der König von Amazonas" is not just a stupid title, it's bad German too. (It should be "Der König vom Amazonas" or "Der König des Amazonas".) *headdesk*

[janne-d.livejournal.com]

Wait, so you're telling me they got the German wrong? My respect for these translators has reached a new low!

Xavier St Cloud has the benefit of being pretty and a natty dresser as well as evil. Always a plus.

[trobadora]

They really did! *headdesk*

And yes, very pretty. Definitely a plus. :D