Another from We Who Are About to Die, a #Xena Virtual Season 7 ep from 2002. Here, Gab, disguised as Gahilda (queen of the north—maybe the Picts?) faces off against archangel Michael, who feels Xena has failed as Defender of the faith, & wants Gab to play that role, but Gab has other ideas. 

You can see that Gab still has the dragon tattoo of the dragon on her back, from Japa. I made a mistake with Michael’s wings, though. I made them a classic grey color, but on the show, archangels have odd green wings. I didn’t understand why, at the time, so I disregarded that detail, but I 

now believe it’s very important, in fact, that ties in with Eve & Eli!

From the #Xena Virtual Season, the gladiator-themed We Who Are About to Die ep. This was my only ep with Eve, who is forced to be a gladiator against Gab-in-disguise. I think I got this wrong because I gave her Livia’s look, instead of using the editorial team’s model sheet for her. 

I’m going to see if I can make a new drawing this weekend to fix that. Also, the action is correct, but not the attitude: Eve should be reluctant to fight. I have to say: this ep foreshadowed RenPic’s involvement in Spartacus, years later.

Towards the end of my time in the #Xena Virtual Season 7, I had less time to illustrate a full ep, so I worked with a team of illustrators, which was a lot of fun. I supplied inspirational references, & made model sheets when needed. This was a 2-parter inspired by season 6’s The God You Know, & the Norse trilogy.

Titled We Who Are About to Die, in which #Xena, Gab, Eve , Hercules, Beowulf & archangel Michael all appear in combat, there were no scenes that weren’t awesome to illustrate. Gab disguises herself as a Nordic queen,  & the model sheet I made outlines a simple version of her gold costume. Usually the editorial staff supplies the costume model sheets, but in this case, I needed to design this one, which is roughly similar to Grunhilda’s silver costume in the Norse triligy.

This final drawing from Truth or Dare, from the #Xena Virtual Season 7, shows Gab reading her scrolls about Warrior…Princess, I believe, the ep that this story is a sequel to.  That’s the princess on the right, Diana, 25 years later or so. Since she’s a Xena look-alike, that was my 2002 impression of what #Xena would look like right about now. I guess if you squint your eyes (a lot) , she almost looks a little like Lucy in My Life is Murder? 

From the Truth or Dare episode for the #Xena Virtual Season 7, this is a flashback showing Gab’s progress with the staff. I chose this scene because it gave me a chance to depict Gab’s famous “bilious green bra”. (I muted the color since this is a hazily bright memory). I love the foreshortened staff up the guy’s nose!

Shortly after Battle of Amphipolis, I illustrated another #Xena Virtual Season  ep by the same author: Truth or Dare, which explored Gabrielle’s younger days. I changed my style & added color this time. This scene shows a 12 year old Gab meeting a traveling bard, Thea, in her 30s who encourages Gab to believe in herself & her dreams.

My task was to portray a bard who exuded confidence & fearless independence, qualities that Gab herself would demonstrate in #Xena’s pilot ep. I don’t remember if I based Thea on an actress, or just tried to summon those qualities & that’s what I ended up with. She’s described as blond, but red-gold hair seemed right. To me, this looks more like an animation cell, than a comic book panel.

I’ll wrap up the #Xena Virtual Season ep I illustrated, The Battle of Amphipolis, with this drawing, which I believe is the 1st one in the story: Xena & Gabrielle return to Amphipolis a year after the events of season 6’s Haunting of Amphipolis to find the city now flourishing.

It’s Winter Solstice, so I included market place details reflecting that: moon pies, sun cookies, & a villager dressed as Chronos (aka Father Time). I believe #Xena & Gab are dressed in outfits designed by the editorial staff, which I used for reference.

Back in 2020, after I 1st got the idea to write up my Rock of Ages idea, I looked for a shorter #Xena project that’d help me ease into the challenge. I remembered I could’ve done much better to live up to this script, so I decided to give it another try.

I reread it, took notes, assembled references & screenshots, & incorporated all I learned about #Xena over the years, which is way more than I knew at the time. I realized I could recognize references the writer used from the show that I didn’t catch at the time, & I could add layers by tying it in further.

By the time I was ready to start drawing, I hit upon a workable approach for my own script, & that took priority, but I’m still intrigued by the idea. In the scene above, I’d add more detail to the market so it included references to a later Amphipolis ep, Heart of Darkness. 

There, we see Eve preach to the villagers, & set up an Elijian church in town. So here, I’d add some Elijian touches, such as fish-shaped baked goods, heart & dove shaped items & figurines that resemble what we’d recognize as magi, in green.

The only thing I think the story is missing to make it an authentic tv ep is a more explicit portrayal of the warlord threatening the town. It doesn’t need to be in the script, but as illustrator I could’ve filled in that gap with distinctive designs of the invaders that brought them to life, no dialogue needed.

Toris embraces the grandchildren he thought were lost, in Battle of Amphipolis, a #Xena Virtual Season ep I illustrated 21 years ago. Here, Toris is about the same age as “Old Joxer”, & the actor has been aged to match the description in the script. Of course, the actor, Joseph Kell, is now that very age, & looks in great shape! Same with Ted Raimi, who looks nothing like Old Joxer, despite being the same age.

Older #Xena fans may identify with both Xena & Toris in this story: this time, it’s Xena who resents Toris for not looking in on mom often enough instead of the other way around in season 2’s Death Mask.

This drawing from Battle of Amphipolis (from the #Xena Virtual Season) shows teen Xena in her mother’s tavern trying to convince her fellow villagers to defend themselves against the warlord Cortese en route with his army. Her admiring brother, the noble Lyceus, looks on. It’s a sequel to Death Mask, but I thought it did well to incorporate what we learned in other eps, like Sins of the Past & Forgiven. It helps shed light on her dilemma: in Death Mask, Xena explains that her pursuit of Cortese led her down the path to warlordism. But here, we see that there’s more going on.

We see that the qualities that make her such a formidable opponent of Cortese also alienates her fellow villagers. Xena’s no role model. She’s a lot like Tara, from Forgiven, a wild girl who’s regarded with suspicion by the others. She thinks the villagers are cowards, but they think she’s reckless. 

The more she argues, the more she pushes them away. She’s right, but it costs her dearly. Her brother dies fighting at her side, & she’s blamed for that. This script picks up on some of the complexities of Xena’s character that Death Mask hints at. In Xena’s mind, Lyceus is forever young, innocent & trusting.

Toris is not: he’s angry, judgmental & bitter. He & Xena blame each other, but they’re more alike than they’d like to admit. Their relationship rings true to me. The question I have with Death Mask is what would’ve happened if Lyceus survived? I think there’s 3 possibilities. 

1st, he continues to follow Xena in her quest against Cortese until he gets killed. 2nd: he continues until he becomes like her, a warlord. 3rd: the most likely scenario, he parts ways with her at some point, & becomes repulsed by the person she’s become. In other words, he becomes like Toris.

There’s a 4th option: he convinces her to give up her obsession with Cortese, but this is unlikely.  Xena is just  too big for her village, & Cortese is also a pretext for her to leave it. To not answer that call is to deny herself. We see a similar scenario play out in Remember Nothing, where she’s given the option to do just that. Walking away from her dark side means walking away from her better side. In a way, her 2 brothers represent the light & the dark, & she struggles to accept balance in that as well, in Battle of Amphipolis.

The next ep I illustrated for the Xena virtual season was The Battle of Amphipolis. I very much liked this story, & it ended up influencing my current project, a Xena webcomic, Rock of Ages. Xena reunites with her brother Toris in season 7, both wrestling with guilt over the death of their mother, burned as a witch years ago.

There’s a lot of flashbacks to Xena’s teen years predating the warlord attack that would come to define her. I thought her psychological portrait connected the dots in her story, from the pilot to AFIN. This inspired me to take a similar approach with Eve.

My drawing skills aren’t as sharp in this ep, so I’ll only post a few. I had begun to spend more time researching, since my knowledge of the show at this time (21 years ago) was mostly seasons 4-6, since that’s when I began watching.

The 1st Xena dvd wasn’t released until 2002, after I’d left the vs, so I depended on vhs tapes of select eps, & relied a lot on Whoosh & the many screenshot libraries that existed back then. This vs ep was based on Death Mask, a season 1 ep, not popular with the fandom so difficult to find.

The drawing above is a teenage #Xena bickering with her mom, Cyrene. I really liked these scenes, & I think they very likely inspired my portrayal of Salmoneus’s difficulties with his daughter in my upcoming project.