Rick's Studio

I've heard a few people mention LL's appearance on The Simpsons, saying how much they like it, but not much in detail. So I'll jump in (leave now if you don't want any Simpson's Spoilers!)....

Compare this to the H&G Animated Movie. I always try to give that movie the benefit of the doubt (after all, my favorite two actress's voices are in it), but after seeing the Simpsons, that movie looks really, really bad! There was more wit in the writing in 10 minutes of Simpsons than the whole movie put together. I tried to tell myself maybe the animated characters in the movie looked so ugly because the real people are so attractive there's no way to capture that spark in animation, but the Simpson's Xena was very beautiful (in a cartoon way) and really captured Lucy/Xena's charm.

Seeing Xena's tongue do the trade mark Simpson's wiggle during her battle cry was simply hilarious. It was also cute the way they tweaked the fans a bit, although it was pretty close to the famous SNL skit with William Shatner telling the Trekkies to get a life. But that was only a few seconds of time. Even the battle scene was very Xena-like in its very unusualness: Lucy fighting her way out of a plastic bag!

And of course the ending was simply fabulous. We all knew Xena had incredible skills, but Lucy Lawless flying off into the sky ("Xena doesn't have superpowers, but I'm not Xena!") was simply inspired. I wonder if that's how she and Rob get to work every day?

My only complaints: no Gabrielle, and the Lucy segment was only a third of the show! Oh, well. I've heard some vague rumors through the Whoosh! site about a possible episode of Xena that will be animated. Let's hope they team up with the Simpson's people for that, if it comes about!