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OUR FIRST ANNIVERSARY (the continuing saga)
THE EVER-ADVANCING WHOOSH!
XENA BANNED!
THE GOOD AND THE BAD
OUR FIRST ANNIVERSARY (the continuing saga)
Hey, Duchovny got married. Imagine that! This raises more issues than it -- oops, this is a XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS magazine. Silly me. My mistake.
Speaking of anniversaries, June 1st is my birthday. Thirty-nine years ago in a sleepy hamlet called Kalamazoo, Michigan, I was brought into this world. Little did anyone know that MY DESTINY would be to edit an obsessive on-line fan publication which would be making jokes about THE X-FILES in its editorial section for no apparent reason. Back in 1958, science fiction really WAS science fiction. It was pre-STAR TREK, pre- STAR WARS. We are talking dark ages to many Xenites. The internet, personal computers, and even the benign television remote were beyond the ken of most American citizens. Technology is currently evolving so quickly that James Burke is unable to keep making enough CONNECTIONS shows. This is a good thing, because technology has made us a culture of incredibly hip and canny citizens, the type of citizen BORN to appreciate and obsess over XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS.
As everyone should know BY NOW, May 31, 1997 marked the first anniversary of IAXS (The International Association of Xena Studies). IAXS is the sponsoring organization of WHOOSH! You know, what you are reading NOW. Good. Well, we have been here a year.
We here at Muppet Labs are always trying to improve our product for YOU, the reader. This month we introduce some features which we hope will become regular additions to the usual compliment of articles in WHOOSH!
We have decided to offer interviews from the movers and shakers of XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS down through the ranks to the spearholder second to the right. We want to cover people both in front of the camera and behind. Kicking off this great event will be interviews with R. J. Stewart, the developer, co-executive producer, and ofttimes writer for the show and Robert Mellette, who used to be a producer's assistant at Renaissance Pictures and was known as VCU on-line on the NetForum and Universal Chat area.
If you have any suggestions as to who you would like to read an interview from, please send me a note. If you have any interview questions to suggest, feel free to add that as well. The reason we are beginning this project is that the staff at WHOOSH has been mighty disappointed by most interviews conducted with XENA: WARRIOR PRINCESS cast and crew. We will endeavor to represent fan interests and ask the questions which will elicit real information, not just the same old material. We will approach our subjects prepared and with an understanding of the not just the individual's work but also of the whole Xenaverse phenomenon. The professional media has for the most part failed to meet fan needs, so we hope WHOOSH! will be able to fill some of that void.
Many months ago we brought to our readership's attention that the IAXS homepage was being blocked at an Indiana Vocational School. This month we were informed by a reader that their place of business is blocking the MCA Xena page (http://www.univer salstudios.com/tv/xena/). The error message read: "Error 403 Access Restricted by Amgen Policy Reason(s): Sex". There you have it, Amgen has decided to restrict its employees access to the MCA Xena website because of SEX! Bet you did not realize it was such a racy websight. It is probably the sound of that incessant 5 second opening of the Xena theme that is causing adolescent males to get too excited and Amgen is going to put a stop to it! Bully for Amgen.
This past month WHOOSH! was reviewed by two different magazines with very different conclusions.
THE SAN FRANCISCO BAY GUARDIAN of May 14, 1997, on page 51, in the article, "Myth Behavin'" by Gillian G. Gaar, in a sidebar called "Xena-Spotting on the Web" by Laura Irvine and Laurie Sosna, stated:
"Under the guise of academia, Whoosh! combines highbrow analysis with a wicked sense of humor. It never forgets that Xena does not exist in the real world but that we would be much better off it she did."
It is heartening to find someone who gets it.
The recent issue of BRILLO (http://www.virago-net.com/brillo/xena.htm), stated:
"The Cult of Xena
"One would hope, for instance, that The Journal of Xena Studies would be a beacon of hope in a sea of 'creative anachronism,' but the sentimental descriptions of onscreen kisses shared by Xena and Gabrielle, and jumbled gushing paragraphs about the wonders of Lucy are, frankly, disappointing. One bizarre rant, however, discusses the 'foreshadowing' of modern day law and economics in Xena: Warrior Princess. Has anyone told this man that television isn't real? And that Greek mythological figures didn't run around New Zeland [sic] in the middle ages?"
It is disheartening to find someone who does not get it. But, when you start getting bad reviews you know you have made it, because if you were really that bad, they wouldn't even be bothering to review you...RIGHT?
Kym Masera Taborn
Editor-in-Chief, WHOOSH!
Chairman of the Board,
International Association of Xena Studies
May 30, 1997
NOTE TO IAXS MEMBERS: The e-mail edition of Whoosh #9 will be released whenever I get around to it!!! Bwahahahhaha.
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