marycrawford: 13 hour clock icon (beefcake)
marycrawford ([personal profile] marycrawford) wrote2005-03-12 01:42 pm

Hercules season 5 DVD burblings

I am not feeling very organized, or indeed sentient, and am also very behind on self-imposed Things I Should Be Doing, like rec posts for [livejournal.com profile] herc_iolaus, writing and vidding and ugh, cleaning house, so instead I'll throw up some random thoughts on the Hercules season 5 DVDs. Screencaps to follow, I think. Anything that doesn't require a brain seems like a worthwhile undertaking right now. Hmm. Icons? *g*

- I found a small Easter Egg on the first of the season 5 discs (any version, not necessarily Best Buy). Put the disc in, wait til the main menu comes up, then go through the navigation options until nothing is selected. There are links to three episodes, a Gallery, a Weblink and a mysterious dot that turns out to link to the credits - you want none of these highlighted. When you have succesfully selected nothing at all, press enter, or play, or whatever button seems appropriate, and you'll get an outtake followed by some dailies with and without blue screen effects. As far as I know, there are no Easter Eggs on any of the other season sets, but I've not searched for them exhaustively. If you know of any, tell me!

- On the Stranger and Stranger commentary, Paul Robert Coyle talks about what they originally had planned for this episode. It's true, some of the shots make a lot more sense when you know they were intended to be 3-D. You also have to wonder what Tapert was smoking, but never mind. And then there's the whole Pregnant!Sovereign thing I talked about earlier. Eeek. I was fascinated to learn that there was talk of setting part of this episode in the parallel Underworld, and that AU!Strife had the role of Hades there as King of the Underworld (what with being dead and everything, he seemed suitable, as Coyle says). I would have loved to see that.

- On the CD-Rom included with the set, the only interesting bit I could find are the production notes and call sheets for several episodes in .pdf format, under 'Extras'. Unfortunately, they've created some kind of shell for these which makes them extremely difficult to navigate. But if you just look at the contents of the CD-Rom in your file browser, you'll find the complete .pdf file in the folder media>scripts, called script01.pdf. It doesn't contain any scripts, though, just notes, but some of those are fascinating:
"IOLAUS 2 - Michael Hurst and Bruce request discussion and clarification of the Iolaus 2 character ie. he will now be Hercules' new sidekick for episodes to come. What is he like? What bonds them other than the fact that he looks like dead Iolaus? Should he be less whining, complaining, bumbling?"
- I still foolishly want the Best Buy extra for this season, even though I know it'll be lame. My trade offer is still open.

- I didn't notice this before, but in Greece Is Burning, Michael Hurst plays another role beside the Widow Twanky. He's only on screen for half a minute, but it's unquestionably him - even though he's listed in the credits as 'Billy Wagstaff'. (Sounds like a pun on Shakespeare to me. *eg*) Also, while Hercules is building up the stage for Twanky's show, he lifts a block of stone with a bas-relief depicting a blonde, blue-eyed man in a purple vest with a manaia in his hands...

[identity profile] ltlj.livejournal.com 2005-03-12 01:51 pm (UTC)(link)


I noticed the Billy Wagstaf character at the time -- he c rawls out from under something, right? I can't quite remember it well enough to visualize it. I didn't see the bas-relief, though, that's really sweet.

This was the last episode I watc hed when it aired. I'd given up on the show by that point since we hadn't heard anything about the real Iolaus coming back yet. (According to stuff I've read, I don't think that decision had been made yet.) I watched "Just Passing Through" on tape, and that was about the time I think Bruce Campbell talked on his web site about how the scenes with him and real Iolaus were actually filmed to be the first episode of the fifth season, before Tapert started firing people. (Though the Tapertnistas will still try to tell you that All This had been planned from the b eginning.) I think it's interesting to contrast the produc tion values in it with the Jester scenes and the other eps filmed for the last half of the fifth season. I think they were already starting to decline, but not as badly as the sixth season.

[identity profile] marycrawford.livejournal.com 2005-03-12 02:26 pm (UTC)(link)
I noticed the Billy Wagstaf character at the time -- he crawls out from under something, right?

Yeah, he does. He's a legless beggar, looking rather like a Monty Python hermit, and he tells Hercules what happened to Twanky, I think.

I didn't see this episode until reruns, and I think there are a couple of eps on this set that I never saw at all - I was too fed up with the way the show had put me through the mangle by that point.

I just had a look at Bruce Campbell's site. He's got some cool stuff on there, but then he's a cool guy. I notice that he needs a screencap for Just Passing Through, too. I think I can help with that...

[identity profile] falzalot.livejournal.com 2005-03-12 04:22 pm (UTC)(link)
There's an easter egg? How cool is that! And I love the bit about I2. Nice to see not everybody just bent over and took it.

I need to curl up and watch some more episodes, but if I'm home, I appear to be glued to the computer. Like now. With a cat asleep on me. I can't move! I'm trapped! Send help!

Er - sorry. Haven't had any caffiene yet this morning.

[identity profile] marycrawford.livejournal.com 2005-03-13 11:01 am (UTC)(link)
Heh. I always have trouble with that too - I solve the problem by making screencaps, which means I can rewatch the ep at the same time. :-)

[identity profile] mythdefied.livejournal.com 2005-03-13 03:46 am (UTC)(link)
AU!Strife had the role of Hades there as King of the Underworld (what with being dead and everything, he seemed suitable, as Coyle says). I would have loved to see that.

I don't know whether to cry or curse. Yeah, I really would've loved to have seen that, but on the other hand, that just killed so many AUs I had ideas for. But on yet another hand, at least AU Strife had it better than the other Strife, being one of the 12. That kind of rocks. I wonder what he would've been like.

[identity profile] marycrawford.livejournal.com 2005-03-13 11:26 am (UTC)(link)
Aw! Don't let your story ideas die! I mean, this was just a gleam in the writers' eye, that doesn't make it canon.
I wonder if Strife, as King of Hades, might not have been very staid and sober, full of dignity and pomp, and relentlessly pessimistic.