Todd Jensen writes...

Thanks for the early Christmas present in the form of the ramble on "The Green", Greg!

One thing that stands out to me now about this episode is that we get another look at the difference between Jackal and Hyena. Hyena just wants to charge in on the Mayan gargoyles and wipe them out. Jackal, rather than going for a simple all-out attack, comes up with an actual strategy, namely, having Hyena destroying the Mayan Sun Amulet so that he can then dispose of the clan while it's in stone sleep. Again showing that he's the more cunning one.

(I liked your method of having Jackal winding up attacking the gargoyles at night after that - when Vogel uses a bit of his own cunning and points out to Jackal that he won't get paid as much if the Mayan gargoyles do more damage to the Cyberbiotics operation - meaning that now Jackal doesn't have the option of just waiting for dawn after all, not if he wants a full paycheck!)

And I get a kick out of their response to Goliath showing up - "Must Goliath follow us everywhere?" "Hey, he's a fan!"

In some ways, Jackal's fantasy about altering Goliath's features is even more disturbing than his death-god phase in "Grief". Truly chilling.

The episode may be a bit on the preachy side (I know that many of the fans see it that way), but I think that it still has a good message. I particularly liked Elisa's uneasiness with the Mayan gargoyles' tactics and wanting to find a way of saving the rain forest that was within the law - and at the end, coming up with the solution of planting some of the rain forest plants on Avalon.

I find the "Quetzalcoatl" design for Zafiro interesting, in that it fits in with one additional aspect of gargoyles that revealed itself during the World Tour. Before the World Tour, we'd simply seen gargoyles in a "conventional gargoyle" form. However, when we were introduced to other gargoyles during Goliath's odyssey (and even the legacies of other gargoyles), we saw that they'd inspired other myths and legends besides just the familiar gargoyles of medieval Europe - unicorns and griffons in "M.I.A.", the "black dogs" of the British Isles in "The Hound of Ulster", and now Quetzalcoatl. (Not to mention that the Ishimura gargoyles of "Bushido" also have a certain evocation of tengu about them.) It gives an additional dimension to them that I think is neat.

I'd caught the significance of Broadway using "mothers" and how that fits into gargoyle parentage.

That was a nice touch about Broadway and Lexington considering the possibility of destroying the Sun Amulet - but, fortunately, not doing so after all.

Again, thanks for the ramble.