When she first appeared in the Hercules:The Legendary Journeys episode The Warrior Princess, Xena was as touch as they come, in command of an army that had destroyed countless villages, and when Hercules routed her she still escaped to continue her crusade. However, when Xena went against her second-in-command, Darphus, and ordered her army not to kill women and children and indeed saved a baby from death, she was forced to take part in a Gauntlet when her actions branded her leadership weak.

ONLY THE STRONGEST WILL SURVIVE

Being a strong leader doesn't simply mean violence, and this is the first time we see Xena's true power; her strength of character and courage. The gauntlet, which results in a severe beating from each man in her army, is a vicious test that only the strongest could survive, and although she has taken major injuries, Xena still manages to make her way out of her camp and survive, vowing to retake her army from Darphus. Further demonstrating her strong character, Xena actually helps Hercules beat back her army and destroy Darphus when they next meet in Unchained Heart, finally using her impressive skills in the fight to help others.

Over the last four years of her own series, Xena has grown immensely as she has learnt the ways of good with the help of her constant companion Gabrielle, a young innocent later to show some guts of her own. To understand more about Xena's power, let's examine some of the moment that have shown the warrior princess at her strongest, physically, mentally or emotionally.

One of Xena's earliest tests of character is when she faces off with Ares, the god of war, in The Reckoning. While she was destroying villages, Xena was Ares's most apt pupil, and her transformation doesn't please the god, whose connection to Xena Doesn't become clear until much later in the show's run. In the story, Ares frames Xena for a bloodbath, and the villagers decide to kill her in revenge for what she apparently did to many of their friends and family. Aware that this could have happened to her long ago for her crimes, Xena is more than ready to submit to their justice, turning down all of Ares's attempts to seduce her and bring her back to his way of thinking.

Turning down an actual god good enough for you? Well, that's nothing to some of the other events Xena has been through.

TWO CAN PLAY AT THAT GAME

In Prometheus, Xena teams up once again with Hercules to free the captured Prometheus by breaking the chains which bind him. However, breaking the chains will kill whoever attempts the task, but both Xena and Hercules are willing to lay down their lives to help the world. Once again, the fact that Xena is willing to face off against the mightiest man on Earth shows her courage, and you don't doubt for a minute that she would beat him.

Xena's courage and strength are even more evident in her attempts to take care of Gabrielle. She is willing to become a vampiric Bacchae to save her friend in Girls Just Wanna Have Fun, and earlier in their relationship induces a dreamlike state in herself to take on Morpheus, the god of dreams, in Dreamworker, just so that Gabrielle will not have to kill. In the most recent season, Gabrielle has returned these kinds of favour, defending Xena from insurmountable odds in an attempt to stop a prophecy from coming true.

Xena is often at her best when taking on overwhelming odds, and we get an insight into her pre-transformation darker side in The Price. Discovering a garrison under siege by the unintelligible and vicious Horde, Xena must fight with as much ferociousness as them to save lives. A truly disturbing episode, Xena is shown at her most powerful and most frightening as she begins to loose the respect of her bets friend through the necessity of fighting the Horde on their own terms merely to win the day.

It's not just in battle that we get to see just how touch Xena is. When struck by one of Cupid's arrows fired by his son Bliss in A Comedy of Eros, we are introduced to Xena in love... and she likes it rough. From her massaging to enjoying a fist-fight with her potential paramour, this is one woman you wouldn't want to mess around with. Or maybe you would...

RULE BRITANNIA

The third and fourth seasons of Xena's adventures have put our plucky heroine in her most unpleasant situation yet, and pitted her against some of her most ferocious adversaries, both men and women. In The Deliverer, Xena joins Boadicea in a fight to stop Britannia being overwhelmed by the forces of Julius Caesar, leading to her becoming number one on Caesar's 'most wanted' list. Since then, she has taken on incredible odds to beat back his advances, especially in his attempts to take Greece, arranging a fight between two opposing forces of the Roman army in A Good Day in the hope that the in-fighting will stop anything from happening to her homeland. In The Ides of March, it seems that Xena has finally lost, however, as just before his murder, Caesar arranges for the warrior and Gabrielle to be crucified, which is where the most recent season left them. Not that this is necessarily a problem for Xena. After all, she's already returned from the dead several times. And what is more impressive than breaking free from the Underworld itself.

Xena has been apparently killed by a poison dart fired by Callisto in the episode of the same name, and died in Destiney as the result of saving a young girl's life and taking the fatal blow herself instead. Luckily, Xena's spirit was as feisty as the warrior princess herself, taking over the body of Autolycus, self-styled king of thieves, and using it to steal her body in order to reunite it with her essence. Another instance of slight-of-hand from Callisto left Xena trapped in Tartarus, from which she was once again able to escape through trickery of the woman who had brought her there in Intimate Stranger. Then of course there's her recent apparent death on a cross, but it'll take more than a spirited outlook on life to survive that one.

Whilst going about her daily life though, Xena has had to take on a whole new set of challenges. In One Against an Army, she must fight against hundreds of troops while attempting to keep Gabrielle alive when her young companion is hit with a poison arrow, and during the last season Xena has discovered that her path in life is that of a warrior, and proven as much by taking on an unusual mission. When Xena discovered that a prophetess named Alti will be reincarnated as her foe over and over again, Xena travels in Time in an attempt to stop the seer in the future. So you see, even Xena's descendants measure up, an idea backed up in the Season Four clip show finale Déjà Vu All Over Again. This episode tells the story of a woman in present day LA who is having dreams that make her think she is the reincarnation of Xena. And many people she knows seem to be the reincarnations of others from Xena's lifetime.

GIVE PEACE A CHANCE

Of course every good fighter has to have her own sidekick, and Gabrielle acts first as her counterpoint and educator to Xena, until their positions switch and the bard finds herself becoming more of a warrior, finally loosing her long-held blood innocence (ie she never killed anyone). The changes began when Gabrielle was taught to fight as part of her training as an Amazon in Hooves and Harlots, and since then has certainly spoken softly and carried a big stick, which she has frequently put into use. In more recent seasons, Gabrielle has discovered that it isn't always possible to talk your way out of a situation, and has had to resort to violence, her feelings gradually changing when Callisto kills the man she married mere hours earlier and she vows revenge in Return of Callisto.

Her pregnancy brought about by a dark lord changed Gabrielle the most, however, as she was forced to choose between love of her child and the knowledge of the evil it carried inside it that could one day lead to her daughter destroying everything Gabrielle stands for. The death of the child, Hope, caused an almost irreparable rift between her and Xena that now seems resolved, although Hope has still returned in various forms to seek her revenge. Since then Gabrielle has discovered new desire to change the world through non-violence, a mission that requires no little feistiness in itself, as the ability to stick to you principles can take more self control than a straightforward punch-up.

KILLER!

Xena: Warrior Princess is full of feisty females though, and its worth mentioning a couple of others. Where many of the villains Hercules meets are redeemable, Xena has contended with the utterly evil, including the merciless Callisto. Callisto is Xena's dark self, her family killed when she was a child in one of Xena's raids and Callisto is now out for violent revenge. Feisty is hardly the word when psychopathic is far closer to reality for this woman, who has made it her life's mission to kill friends and family of Xena until she finally gets to the warrior herself.

One of the most unpleasant characters on TV, Callisto can only be stopped by the most extreme measures, and invariably returns for more killing. So far she has murdered Gabrielle's husband (Return of Callisto) and Xena's son (Maternal Instincts), and forges alliances with Ares and Gabrielle's evil daughter Hope, born with the help of Dahak, the force of darkness. Thanks to her immortality, Callisto can only ever be trapped, never killed, and therefore returns to plague Xena again and again. Despite being sent to Tartarus and buried in a pit of lava amongst other things, she still comes back to cause as much havoc and unpleasantness as she can.

LOVE IS THE LAW

On a less unpleasant but no less dangerous note, there's Aphrodite, goddess of love, who flies into a rage whenever she feel she is not getting enough worship. It is possible to reason with her, but when she sets her mind to it, Aphrodite's outward appearance can hide a formidable challenge, using her obvious charms to control whoever she wishes to, such as the unfortunate Joxer in For Him the Bell Tolls who is turned into a swashbuckling hero every time a bell rings for the goddess's amusement and to break up a couple who aren't paying her enough attention. She has also bewitched Gabrielle's scrolls so that whatever the bard writes becomes true (The Quill is Mightier), and made Xena, Gabrielle and Joxer become obsessed with a fish, Gabrielle herself and a gemstone respectively in Fins, Femms and Gems in order to distract them from their pursuit of a jewel that Aphrodite wishes to use to create her own personal constellation.

And that's only a sample. Xena: Warrior Princess contains more feisty females than you can shack a staff at (although that's probably an inadvisable move unless you're very brave), and with the series continuing on for at least another season, it seems likely that the causes of feminism, equality and, of course, lesbianism, will be bolstered by this group of strong and powerful women.

BONUS IMAGES

Back to the Lucy Lawless Library

Back to the Xena Picture Library