Fallen Angel
story by Rob Tapert and RJ. Stewart
teleplay by R.J. Stewart
written by R.J. Stewart - Executive Producer
The Chakram Newsletter: Issue 10
SD: Caesar is dead.
RJ: Has Rob ever said anything to you about the triumvirate? That Xena is responsible for the killing of the triumvirate - Caesar, Pompey and Crassus?
SD (laughing): The unwritten story of Roman politics. I love it.
When you killed Xena and Gabrielle at the end of last season, did you already know how you would bring them back?
RJ: We had that pretty well worked out. Introducing Eli early on was for the purpose of getting them back.
SD: Who raised them from the dead?
RJ: God.
SD: He’s not been mentioned by name.
RJ: The Supreme Being, the Devine Power, whoever set up Heaven and Hell raised them up. Callisto was part of it. But someone was working through her.
SD (smiling): I don't want to look a gift horse in the mouth, but why were they brought back?
RJ: That’s going to play out over the fifth season. They have a purpose and it will be very apparent why they had to come back. There might be some question about Gabrielle, but Xena had to come back.
SD: Was there any of Xena left in the Demon Xena?
RJ: Are you kidding? Xena has a huge amount of Demon Xena in her all the time. So the bit of good stuff that Xena clings to was gone. Xena became a demon real easy.
SD: It was noticeable that Demon Xena was quite similar to regular Xena, but Demon Gabrielle was very different from her regular self.
RJ: A lot of good had to die for Demon Gabrielle to come out. The Christian tradition would suggest we all have a demon inside of us. And real life would suggest that, too. Even Gabrielle had the capability of becoming demonic.
SD: Lucy seemed to revel in her time spent as a demon when she was rallying the troops to invade Heaven. Demon Gabrielle was just oozing venom. And Hudson was fascinating with her clicking fingernails. Actors frequently say they like to play bad guys and you can’t get much badder than those three! I think you gave these actors some delightful stuff to play with. Even with the physical hardships they went through with makeup and prosthetics.
Where did you get the rules for Heaven and Hell — Demon Gabrielle could be saved. Demon Xena had to be chopped up, etc.?
RJ (chuckling): I made them up.
SD: One of the discussions about this episode after it aired was focused on the idea that if Xena took on Demon Callisto's guilt, there is no way she should have been punished for doing that. But others said the whole point of sacrifice is that you have to give up something.
RJ: The idea I was tapping into was taking on someone’s guilt. Xena went to Hell for Callisto. When Rob pitched this idea to me, I said, let’s do MIlton. All of Paradise Lost is based on the fact that the Devil and Satan do have an army and they can fight back. And they can win. So the idea that there are some tricky rules in Hell that can totally screw up a decent person is totally consistent with the whole tradition of Heaven and Hell and devils and angels.
Of course it's unfair — it’s Hell!
SD: I like the fact that in a sacrifice, you make the choice to get the short end of the stick. If you knew there was an out, it wouldn't be a sacrifice.
RJ: Right. One of the reasons — and it’s certainly not the only reason as you'll see as the season plays out — that Callisto was filled with the desire of raising Xena from the dead is because the Heavens were so touched by Xena's sacrifice. They wanted her raised from the dead in order to give her another opportunity to redeem herself.
SD: Gabrielle was really struggling hard against believing Callisto had become good.
RJ: Yeah. She couldn’t believe it — was incapable of believing it! She also didn't like Callisto getting off the hook. Talk about unfair. It’s interesting some people were upset that Xena was punished unfairly, but not upset that Callisto was redeemed unfairly.
If the word "fairness” is brought into punishment, retribution and redemption - if it’s unfair for someone who did a great sacrifice to be punished, then it would also be absolutely unfair for someone who did nothing to earn it to be saved! And that’s where Gabrielle was coming from. What Gabrielle finally saw was the person Callisto would have been if not for Xena.
SD: Callisto's face filled with such innocence.
RJ: Hudson did a really nice job.
SD: Do you like the Angel Callisto as much as you liked the old Callisto?
RJ: I like it in this show. I think making her evil again would be totally impossible.
SD: Archangel Michael tells Gabrielle Demon Xena can’t be saved. That she has to be chopped into little pieces. And Gabrielle doesn’t argue with him. In the past, Gabrielle has been willing to go through anything to save Xena.
RJ: She does try to reason with the Demon Xena. She still clings to the hope that she can save her. But taking friendship to the point where you're willing to betray the entire cosmos! Xena was willing to give up herself to save Gabrielle, but I think Gabrielle has a goodness in her that she knew she had to stop Xena from taking over Heaven.
Xena was willing to dive into Hell to be with Gabrielle. She would have stayed with her if she couldn’t get her out. No question about that. Gabrielle knew she might have to give up Xena in order to save Heaven. She would have been responsible for the death of the person she loves most in life. But Gabrielle would still be hoping she could somehow save Xena. I don’t think that means Gabrielle’s love for Xena is less than Xena’s love for her. But she recognized that the thing she’s fighting is no longer Xena.
SD: As Xena was once willing to kill Gabrielle when she was taken over by the demon Tataka in "Devi."
At the end of "Ides," Xena says to Callisto her Master will be upset with her because she was not supposed to cause physical harm to Xena. Just bring her soul back to Hell. But she was responsible for Xena being killed. Were there any consequences for Callisto?
RJ: I did think about that when I was writing "Fallen," but we had so much to do. I just assumed she got her butt kicked when she got back to Hell.
SD: Gabrielle has grown so much over the past four years. Where does she go now?
RJ: She keeps growing and evolving. I think Gabrielle’s evolution has to be evaluated in the context of Xena. And Xena’s going to go through a lot this year.
SD: I loved Callisto crawling up on the rock and settling her wings.
RJ: Wasn't it amazing how those wings turned out?
SD: Joxer has now made it known to Gabrielle how he feels about her. Where are they headed?
RJ: We just did an episode where a lot is going to be settled between Joxer and Gabrielle in a positive way.
SD: How is having a child going to affect Xena and Gabrielle?
RJ: We’re going to do a major arc on this. They’ll talk about settling down. Xena struggles with how do you be a warrior with a baby? How does she protect the baby? This has a major effect on her. But. it has a limited run. We definitely do deal with this.