Season two of XENA is spread out over 7 DVDs.
© Anchor Bay Entertainment

Mania Grade: B
Disc Grade: B
Reviewed Format: DVD
Rated: Not Rated
Stars: Lucy Lawless, Renee O'Connor, Ted Raimi, Hudson Leick, Kevin Smith, Bruce Campbell
Writers: various
Directors: various
Distributor: Anchor Bay Entertainment
Original Years of Release: 1996-1997
Retail Price: $69.98
Extras: audio/video commentary with Lucy Lawless and Renee O'Connor; director and actor bios; series trivia; season two photo gallery; "The Xena Chronicles"

Buy it now!

Related Links

0

XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS - SEASON TWO

Back when the series was still on the air, one of my guilty pleasures was to watch an episode of XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS on a Saturday afternoon. I was never an avid follower of the Warrior Princess' adventures but when I did happen to catch the show on, I nearly always put down the remote and watched the remainder of the episode. Who am I to argue with tongue-in-cheek action delivered by two women dressed in sexy armor battling Greek gods and monsters?

So when I had the chance to review the XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS SEASON TWO DVD set, it was an opportunity to revisit the show and see if it could still hold my interest. I was surprised to see that a good chunk of the episodes that were my favorites were in fact from this season. When viewed as a season overall, you could see the writers filling out the backstory of Xena's troubled past, her family heritage and setting the seeds for Gabrielle's maturing into holding her own in a fight.

The more I watched the season progress, the more impressed I became of just how talented Lucy Lawless is. No one's going to say that the material she's given is Shakespeare but for the lead character in a TV show, she's got the chops and smarts to know when to play it serious and when to have fun with it. Look at an episode like "Destiny" and compare her work in that with "The Xena Scrolls" (my favorite of the season) and ask yourself how many stars would be able to switch between playing a killer and then an innocent the next week? XENA was one of those shows that you never knew what would be coming next week, and the fact that it's remembered so well today is testament to not just the ability of the show's writers to come up with these crazy ideas, but Lawless' ability to execute them on-screen perfectly.

(Did I mention she also looks good in armor?)

While each disc has its own bonus material, there's only three episodes with commentary tracks, which is OK for the casual XENA fan like myself but for the real enthusiast it may be a little light. I would have enjoyed a track from a couple of the show's writers, just to find out more about the challenges they faced coming up with their material. There's also cast bios, a trivia game on CD-ROM and a still gallery, but the extra feature I enjoyed the most was "The Xena Chronicles," a neat little database that you can refer to in order to find out which character/actor was in which episode, what happened and so on.

If you're someone who must have all the episodes of XENA on DVD, you're going to get this no matter what. For casual people like myself, I'd recommend the disc if you want to fill in the missing adventures from this enjoyable series.