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“The Game”
Good episode, not too farcical, bit like a Season 3 episode with just the correct amount of Lexx surrealness to elevate it above all the other worthy sci-fi out there. Have you seen Enterprise. So PC it hurts at times.
PS Just got my UK X-Box. Excellent!
How about some spoiler type description of the the ep. Hate to wait till next week to watch this one.
Alright, then, synopsis-me-do:
-SPOILERS-
Kai ferries the television containing Prince in a moth towards the moon, while Prince tries to reason with Kai that they should finish their game of chess. Kai replies that he will do what Stan and Xev request, and Prince says “I’m evil, yet I keep my word. You are not evil so how can you justify breaking yours?” He goes on to suggest that they play for stakes; He will return Kai’s living soul to him if Kai can beat him in a game of chess, so Kai can live out the rest of his life and die properly, and if Prince wins then Xev and Stan forfeit their lives (and presumably the Key).
Kai agrees to this, to the outrage of his other crewmates. “I thought the dead didn’t have wants!” Stan fumes.
“Just one.” Kai replies, placidly. “The dead want to be dead.”
To avoid distractions, Kai takes Prince to “The Other Zone”, which is a half-formed Universe that was used by the Brunnen-G to play with some piece and quiet. The landscape is rather distinctively snow and rock, white and black, and changes depending on which colour is dominating the chess board. The board itself contains miniature living pieces that taunt each other and the players, and are as follows:
Black set (Kai):
Pawns – Moth Breeders
Knights – Stan
Rook – 790
Bishop – Time Prophet
King – Kai
Queen – XevWhite set (Prince):
Pawns – ATF agents
Knights – Priest
Rook – His Devine Shadow
Bishop – Vlad
King – Prince
Queen – BunnyThe game is then played out much as one would expect, with the slight twist of Stan and Xev’s various body parts starting to vanish as Kai loses his pieces.
Prince leads for the more aggressive approach, taking control of the centre and quickly building a defensive wall – but thanks to a clever strategy that I won’t spoil here, Kai emerges victorious. As in “Battle”, he comments, Prince got overconfident and made a mistake.
“You agreed that if I defeated you in a game of chess you would return my body’s essence.” he reprimands – but Prince merely laughs, walks to an outcropping of the now snowless landscape, and vanishes. Kai dumps the empty TV out of the moth and returns to the Dark Zone, still dead. Apparently Prince has broken his first ever deal … for now.
Some interesting points:
* There were no season two characters in this episode. Given that Vlad would have made a far more suitable Queen for Prince’s pieces, I suspect that they were hoping to ask Dieter Laser back to play the Bishops.* The Devine Shadow pieces are voiced by Tom Wossname, the His Shadow who killed Kai, and not Walter Borden. This seems like an odd casting choice given that Walter’s been around for series 4 already but I suspect they were trying to minimise the His Shadow / Wozzard / Longbore link.
* Unusual to see the Time Prophet after all this time, one would have expected maybe Lyekka…
Thank you for the the spoilers. They are needed by those of us that read the end of a book before the beginning.
Yeah, it wasn’t bad. It’s close to the best episode this season. I liked how they twisted around when they thought they won something. I could tell that they were trying to explain the intricacies of chess, which was annoying at first but became necessary when the strategies had to be explained. The flashing lights around the sqaures were helpful. Stan and Bunny were great for the comic relief.
I thought this episode was great for the simple reason it didn’t really simplify anything. I mean even with the small explanations here and there you’d still have to have some knowledge of chess to follow.
Plus we got to see:HDS,Time Prophet,and Vlad again.
And I think the Other Zone was an interesting twist(and the Dream Zone? how many bloody zones are there?).
Personally I’d just like to visit the other zone…I some how suspect that it will be useful in the future(and anyway it seems Prince is trapped there.)
I think tonight we got a glimpse at where things are headed for the next 6 episodes.
thanx for the most excellent synopsis chris a, this was truly worth waiting for! and makes up for a lot of the less illustrious episodes this season…
Best episode ever. HDS, Time Prophet, Vlad, Kai, Xev, Priest, Prince, Bunny, ATF agents, Moth Breeders, 790 as chess pieces in a game for Kai’s live vs Xev/Stans? An episode where (a real)Kai claims “I want” not really heard since Series 1. “Dream Planes” as the place all Brunnin-G come from and return to (So was this the place on Water that Kai saw when sinking?) A brilliant vision, its hard to encompass just how much was in this episode. I know most wont feel this way, but you cant convince me otherwise. Watching it for the 4th time now
FANTASTIC episode. I almost agree with LexxLurker, it’s definetly in my top five episodes of all time. I just wanted the pay-off here and now, I wanted to know whether Prince WAS going to keep his deal or not !
I just loved the smashing off the heads – the entire chess board game was wonderfully played out. Just six to go…..can this be topped before season end ?
YDNA
I wish I knew Chess.
quote:
Originally posted by Ydna:
FANTASTIC episode. …I wanted to know whether Prince WAS going to keep his deal or not !YDNA
Well ya know how sneaky Prince is, and he may keep his deal but he is more of a ‘letter of the law’ kinda guy.
Anyhow, must dash, work is screaming. But it was a great episode! Good work every one!
I hated how the game was played.
Kai and Prince can not play very well.
But I assume that they wanted to strech out the game.
Although it was still a good episode(I want that chess board!)
I didn’t know who the Black Bishop was(I didn’t see all of the musical episode) but Lyekka would have made a good choice as well.
Still a good episode.
I really enjoyed “The Game”. My chess is a little rusty so I also appreciated the explantions the assorted pieces and people offered. By the way, the black bishop was played by the woman who played Vlad before she was renewed by Kai’s protoblood. One of the things I liked most was watching the facial expressions of Kai King and, for that matter, player Kai as well. McManus has a great smile and it was wonderful to see it flickering in and out as pieces fell and plays were made. It was nice to see Stan Knight get to kill King Prince! Did anyone else notice Prince’s lip clip was there and wasn’t and then was there again? I’m very curious about next week’s episode and would love to read any spoilers that may be out there!
[ 16-03-2002: Message edited by: nwmonikr ]
the black bishop was played by the woman who played Vlad before she was renewed by Kai’s protoblood
She also played the Time Prophet in IWHS and Super Nova.
This was one of their best episodes, IMO. I expect the only one that can top it is the very last one.
How this episode annoyed me.
1) The constant cranking of gears and gyros each time they moved a chess piece.
2) The non-stop whining and trash talk made by the chess pieces.
3) The introduction of “The Other Zone”, wtf? This made no sense at all.
Wasnt exactly an exciting episode, it reminded me of watching a tennis match between cloned John McEnroe players. Im sure it will play a role in a latter episode and Prince will eventually give Kai a soul.
I give it a 6 (out of 10). I liked the Mort and Ridgetown Massacre episode better than this one.
[ 17-03-2002: Message edited by: Evil_Lister ]
Once again Lexx entertains us with a plot nicked from Doctor Who. The Game was pretty good. Finally we get away from Earth for an episode. It was a little weird for my taste, but quite above average in many respects.
The special effects were exquisite, but not done in a dazzling/showy fashion. The best was planet in the Other Zone, with the shifting scenery. It was as creative as it was visually intriguing. I wonder if it was shot on location, or against green screens with digital environments added in post-production. At any rate, they went all out with this episode. Do the actions of the black and white elements of the landscape reflect the progress of the game? Probably not, since right after Kai (the black side) lost his first rook, a small black cliff was looming over Prince. It would seem to be contradictory. The planet wasn’t really explored much (was it even given a name?), but perhaps we can hope it will show up in a later episode. I was glad it didn’t blow up at the end, like so many well-conceived Lexx planets with sequel potential do. The grid implied something synthetic. Did somebody make the Other Zone? Is it digitized, like the Matrix? Was the singularity leading to it synthetic? How does the “dark” nature of the Dark Zone relate to its quantum properties and other universes?
I suspect the Dream Plane (was that what it was called? kai was talking so fast in that line I think I missed about half of what he was saying) is a place on Water reserved for noble Brunnen-G warriors. Something like Valhalla in Norse myth. Either that or another continuity error.
The Kai king seemed living. Did anybody else notice that? All the pieces seemed to have about half the I.Q. of the real people and an annoying sense of humor. Maybe that was the only way they could make the board scenes interesting. Some other people could’ve been pieces, like May (for Prince’s queen), or Lyekka. “Bunny-queen” was funny, though. How come 790 sparks when killed, but moth breeders don’t? Also, there is a rather obvious error in the destruction of the second 790 rook. The cut is perpendicular to where the axe actually hit.
And we all knew Prince wouldn’t keep his promise to Kai, so that ending was no surprise.
Prince’s lip ring disappears and reappears, like in that one third season episode. Apparently the wardrobe department is as unstable as the planet.
I loved “The Game” from beginning to end and sat on the edge of my seat not wanting to miss a second of it… I love the way Bunny-Queen reacts like those around her…she sort of takes her cues from what the other characters do, like she laughs when they do but I don’t think she really understands why they are laughing..
If Kai does get his living soul back, do you think he will kill himself then? Or do you think maybe he will want to go on a little further…? Can Kai really die unless he knows Xev and Stan have found a home?? At least die peacfully??
Does Canada have any acting awards they give out and would’nt it be great if some of the Lexx actors were nominated..After all, they were good enough to capture our imagination and spark some great debates and friendly conversation…
Maybe we should get together and give the awards in various catagories…That would be fun, I think and really recognize the accomplishments of Lexx, sort of our own “People’s Choice Awards”.
Of course, on the other hand, there were so many good performances I would hate to leave anyone out…. But I think “Best Performance as a Metal Head” – Jeff Hirshfield would have wrapped up…
And nobody portrays a cannibal like Ellen …
The Other Zone, as described in the Game was a failed universe with apparent psychoactive properties.
Those scenes were shot in Iceland, not in studio. Paul Donovan, Nigel Bennet and Michael McManus travelled there over a long weekend in July. They hired a local cameraman, focus puller and sound technician, and then they spent the weekend tromping all over volcanic slopes and glaciers picking up shots. Obviously, the minimal technical crew had to carry their own gear, so McManus and Bennet were stuck lugging the heavy chessbox, table and chairs all over. Apparently, at the end, Paul shot footage of the two of them trashing the box.
Valdron, What does a focus puller do?? Thanks for that info…….
This is a technical camera position. I’m not 100% clear. I believe that a focus puller is similar to a camera assistant. Their job is to measure and adjust the focus to ensure adequate depth of field.
The Brunnen-G had extensive knowledge of trans-dimension travel. Interesting. They originated in the Dark Zone universe and migrated to the Light Zone universe. Why? There sun was unstable but why not just find a new planet elsewhere in the Dark Zone universe? Why travel to a completely different dimension? What were they attempting to get away from?
Once the Brunnen-G settled in the Light Zone universe, they wound up fighting a great war with the Insect Civilization. As it turned out, His Divine Shadow was a remnant of the Insects (as seen in 1.4 Gigashadow). But as seen in 4.18 The Game, His Shadow and Vlad along with Priest, Bunny, and the ATF, are merely pawns in Prince’s game.
On the other hand, the connections between the black playing pieces and Kai are clear. Although it makes sense to have the Time Prophet associated with Kai, it seems to me that Lyekka would have made more sense as Kai’s black bishops. As has been pointed out, Anna Cameron played the part of both the Time Prophet and Vlad. Maybe they faced each other off as bishops because they are the same person?
Questions, questions….
Flamegrape:
The answer to that might be in the Game itself. The game was “Bishops Classical” a game where Bishops are more important than any other piece initially. Time Prophet vs Vlad seemed appropriate to me after that. Of course it could be a simple as who was available for hire for that ep, but who knows
edit
PS I also still think Vlad is the Time Prophet, so there’s that too that bias me[ 18-03-2002: Message edited by: LexxLurker ]
QUOTE] Once again Lexx entertains us with a plot nicked from Doctor Who. [/QUOTE]
It’s also from Bill&ted’s bogus journey and countless other stories that play chess(or Battleship) with Death or Satan. A famous Swedish director did it way before doctor who also. The name escapes me at the moment. So it’s not like it’s a new concept. Give Lexx a little credit.
quote:
Originally posted by Warsaw:
QUOTE] Once again Lexx entertains us with a plot nicked from Doctor Who.
A famous Swedish director did it way before doctor who also. The name escapes me at the moment. So it’s not like it’s a new concept. Give Lexx a little credit.
[/QUOTE]
that would be ingmar bergman…the chess game as an analogy for life is as old as the game itself, but since we are all science fiction fans, it’s natural to look for references to other science fiction works…
It’s Bergman, the movie is the Seventh Seal.
Set in the time of the Black Plague, Death
plays Chess with a Knight for the fate of humanity.The scene’s been parodied and quoted endless times. One noteworthy moment is Shwarzeneggers “The Last Action Hero”
I’m sorry if I was out of line in that last post. The six degrees of Doctor Who is a tough reality to accept.
“I am the Lexx. I am the most powerful weapon of destruction in the two-and-one-eighth universes.”
I thought the setup premises for this episode were a bit weak (the Dream Zone, the Other Zone, and getting there by flying through a big space grid), and the effect of Stan and Xev’s body parts fading out was (imho) a bit lame, but the game itself was truly excellent.
Kai made a grand total of THREE out-of-character remarks in this episode:
1. He said he “wants” to be dead.
2. He says he would “like” his life to return to the Dream Zone.
3. He says he has no will (when, in IWHS, he replies to a Predecessor, “Wrong. I have will power. You have given it to me.”)Any takes on these?
Here’s a further thought on #2. Kai says:
“Sometimes the life-essence of a Brunnen-G who died made it to the Dream Zone. A time and space from where our consciousness derives. It is where my life came from, and where I would like it to return. But it can never return there until my body has properly died.”
Perhaps Kai has already unwittingly visited this Dream Zone: the theatre in Brigadoom! They all looked Brunnen-G, and as Stanley observed, they were all just like the Brunnen-G. And they certainly seemed particularly interested in telling Kai’s story.
I agree with your Bunny observation, NB1. Here’s a few more:
1. Bunny says she doesn’t want to kill anyone, but isn’t sure she can control her actions.
2. At one point Stanley Knight tells her she’s playing on the wrong team.
3. Bunny is killed, but gets brought back later and is alive at the end of the game.Chris A., you said the Divine Shadow that killed Kai was voiced by “Tom Wossname.” Do you mean Tom Gallant (voice of the Lexx)? Others have said that this original Divine Shadow was voiced by Jeffery Hirschfield. I’ve always thought the original HDS’s voice was really cool, and have been trying to nail down for sure who did it.
Flamegrape and Lexxlurker, I also quite enjoyed the symetry of the Time Prophet and Vlad both being Bishops, and mirroring each other’s moves at first. After seeing 4.08: Vlad, I too throught/hoped the Time Prophet and Vlad might turn out to be the same person, but I suspected it was simply another of the Beans’ coincidental castings. But after this episode, maybe there’s something to it after all!
btw, Flamegrape, I believe it’s been made pretty clear that the Insect Wars took place in the Dark Zone, before the Brunnen-G abandoned their original home planet. Of course, the last surviving Insect escaped and hid in the Light Universe. Perhaps the Brunnen-G made their journey into the Light Universe specifically attempting to locate any Insects that might have escaped destruction.
Oh, I almost forgot. VALDRON! Who are you? You seem to know an awful lot. Information most casual fans would not have access to, from behind the scenes annectdotes, to incredibly obscure knowledge of extras casting and Dark Zone demos from 1994. Are you… the Time Prophet?
[ 18-03-2002: Message edited by: sgtdraino ]
[ 18-03-2002: Message edited by: sgtdraino ]
According to an internet chat with Paul Donovan and Lex Gigeroff on the US Sci Fi site, the Insect Wars definitely took place in the light universe. No question. The
beans spoke.Really? That’s funny, I thought I remembered the exact opposite: That they said, in a chat, that the Wars were in the Dark Zone.
Where’s that chat at? I’ve just been through all the archived scifi.com chats back to 1996, and the only Paul and Lex chat I could find is the latest 2002 chat, in which they really don’t reveal anything substancial about anything.
Sorry, I can’t quote you the site. I recall the Beans were quite definitive in the chat though, which punctured my argument that the Insect Wars had taken place in the Dark Zone. The sting left a memory. They may well have said somewhere else that the wars actually were in the Dark Zone, they can be mischievous that way.
As to ‘who’ I am? I *was* a guy writing a book about LEXX, and perhaps I will be again someday. In the meantime, I’ve conducted lots of interviews and accumulated lots of fascinating and useless trivia. The Dark Zone demo? That’s nothing. I’ve got stuff so obcure it makes the Dark Zone demo look like an exhibitionist stripper with DDD implants crashing a Vatican monastic retreat and doing a lap dance on the pope.
So all the scenes on that weird planet were shot on location? I figured those would’ve had to have been at least partly digital. So surreal.
About Prince: I figure every location has a certain degree of mutability. Mutability may be equivalent to “darkness,” which may be a physical property of matter like “strangeness” or “charm.” Since Prince is a metaphysical being, he can take advantage of universes’ inherent mutability, and shape them to his whims. The Other Zone is highly mutable, since it is an incompletely formed universe. The Dark Zone is more mutable than the Light Universe, and this was greatest in the twin worlds of Water and Fire, where the laws of physics ceased to apply. This has partly extended to Earth, at least at the time of the Soul Migration when essences from the planets were infused into terran bodies. The Light Universe was mostly fixed, but had zones of localized mutability. There were the nodes.
In addition to metaphysical beings, physical yet powerful ones, such as the Insects, appear to have the ability to benefit from universe mutability. His Shadow apparently did (“…I can command the heavens and urge comets change their course…”), and even the Lexx can fold the time-space fabric (a process largely dependent on the placement of nodes) to travel between star systems in short periods of time.
Far out, DT! I’ll have to think about that one.
quote:
Originally posted by DalekTek790:
So all the scenes on that weird planet were shot on location? I figured those would’ve had to have been at least partly digital. So surreal.
Iceland, the land of fire and ice, is a weird place. Have you ever seen Björk? She’s the weirdest of them all! (And I worship her, too!) Have you seen her latest video, Coccoon? Someone posted a link to it here on SadBoard. She looks like a Brunnen-G, with the black bun hair style!
Anyway, someday I want to spend some time exploring Iceland. I want to check out the fissures, the glaciers, volcanos, hot springs, etc.
Björk did another song called Joga. The video for it featured animated Icelandic land masses grinding away. It’s one of my favorites.
Joga
Björkall the accidents that happen
follow the dot
confidence makes sense
only with you
you don’t have to speak
i feel
emotional landscapes
they puzzle methen the riddle gets solved and you push me up to this:
…state of emergency…
…how beatuiful to be!…
…state of emergency…
…is where i want to be…all that no-one sees
you see
what’s inside of me
every nerve that hurts you heal
deep inside of me
you don’t have to speak – i feel
emotional landscapes
they puzzle me
confusethen the riddle gets solved and you push me up to this:
…state of emergency…
…how beatuiful to be!…
…state of emergency…
…is where i want to be……state of emergency…
…state of emergency…
Who cares about Bjork? “The Game” kicked ass!
quote:
Originally posted by :
Who cares about Bjork? “The Game” kicked ass!
Iceland kicks ass! A frozen wasteland, yet filled with volcanic fury. I don’t think there is a land on this Earth with more stark a contrast. Thus a perfect location for The Game.
In all seriousness, Björk = Iceland. She is Icelandic through-and-through and very, very, proud of it. In that country, I’m sure she’s regarded as a national treasure. When I think of Iceland, I think of Björk. I believe she has a strong animistic (is that the right word?) connection with the land itself. She is a reflection of it.
Im sorry but the best Icelandic band is Sigur Ros. Their album is simply one of the best records ever made. Bjork was okay at first but got really boring.
I don’t listen to Icelandic music. Mainly all I know about Iceland are the sagas.
—————–
Here’s an extension of my mutability theory:
Okay, you have the Megaverse. It is composed of two big universes: light and dark (now light is gone). Then you have the Other Zone, the largest of the microverses. Then there are a bunch of little universes, less fully formed than it, floating around. Universes and microverses link into each other at various points.
I think the theater in Brigadoom (was the theater itself called “Brigadoom?” Is that why the episode is called that?) was one of these tiny universes. It is incompletely formed, thus very mutable (but with limitations). The actors were (and are, since it probably still exists) manifestations of the universe, like the pieces in The Game, controlled by an intelligence, Prince’s position in The Game. This intelligence may be the Master of Ceremonies (he was the only one that seemed self-aware), or may be something else unseen. The instantly-appearing costumes were further mutable elements, shaped to the visions of this controller’s mind. It’s a very small, self-contained universe, like a T.A.R.D.I.S. No stars. No planets. No moons. No vacuum. The theater is all there is.
BrigadooN (with an “N” was a 1954 musical about a town that surfaced every 600 years or so named Brigadoom, presumably) discovered by two wanderers. Don’t ask me how I know that. I think I saw it in a video store and looked at it because of the similarity to the title of the Lexx episode.
quote:
Originally posted by Warsaw:
BrigadooN (with an “N” was a 1954 musical about a town that surfaced every 600 years or so named Brigadoom, presumably) discovered by two wanderers. Don’t ask me how I know that. I think I saw it in a video store and looked at it because of the similarity to the title of the Lexx episode.
Thank-you! Trying to figure out where the name “Brigadoom” came from, had been bugging me for almost a year.
Yeah Id have to say those locations helped a lot. I especially liked the shot where there was a Stone wall shaped like an ocean wave behind Prince as if to show his momentum. Incredible episode.
quote:
Originally posted by Headgehog:
Thank-you! Trying to figure out where the name “Brigadoom” came from, had been bugging me for almost a year.
HOLY COW! You didn’t know that? I guess I took it for granted. I grew up hanging around theater people. When I saw Brigadoom, I instantly saw the connection. Sorry about that!
Great episode, visually and storywise. Those axes through the head were a bit gruesome though. So is Prince free of the TV now? He seemed to have taken off to somewhere when he lost.
Kai also says he can ‘feel’ where the Other Zone is. Pretty good for a dead guy to be able to feel anything.
quote:
Originally posted by sgtdraino:
[QB]
Kai made a grand total of THREE out-of-character remarks in this episode:
1. He said he “wants” to be dead.
2. He says he would “like” his life to return to the Dream Zone.
3. He says he has no will (when, in IWHS, he replies to a Predecessor, “Wrong. I have will power. You have given it to me.”)Any takes on these?
QB]
Focus Puller – the person whose responsibility it is to move the camera (by pulling it on rails, usually) at the correct speed so that the moving actors remain in the zone of focus. I believe they also have something to do with the setting up of this kind of shot, calculating the exact depth of focus. There are probably lots of other things they do, this is the primary thing giving them their name.
I’ve got a friend who’s a focus puller. From what I’ve seen, he does a lot of calculations of depth of focus. I watched him work with a handheld camera, and he literally was adjusting the focus as the camera moved in. He’s got this slide rule or wheel chart thingy that he works with.
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