David Xanatos threatens to destroy an Indian sand carving, but it’s really an elaborate trap for the trickster Coyote, a fey. Why? Immortality, of course. Ignoring previous setbacks in this goal (turning the city to stone, turning his right-hand man’s left hand to stone…), he forges on. Besides facing Xanatos, Goliath and Co will also have to fight the new and improved robot Coyote 4.0. Its magic-imbued iron claws are the least of their worries, though. With all his advantages, will Xanatos finally achieve immortality?
Miss last week’s? Read Cloud Fathers episode review.
Spoilers are in the 20/20 moments. Info from Ask Greg is in the According to Greg bits.
Xanatos takes a rather creepy moment to stroke Angela’s chin and compliment her beauty. He says G must be proud. Xanatos heard from Severus that Angela is Goliath’s kid, remember.
The Mazas arrived on scene. Not surprising, they don’t stand much of a chance. Xanatos points the staple gun at them and says he’ll “add them to the pot.” Whoa, slow down now. You’re going to kidnap these people? Including two cops? Then you’re going to attempt to murder them? All right, the writers made a big deal about his stolen property, and even gave him a few months in jail for it. So what’s going to happen after this? Or is it because there’s no proof? It’s assault (threatening to do something not okay to someone else) at the least.
Bronx lunges at Xanatos, latching onto the armor’s forearm laser. Welp, this’ll be the second one Xanatos has lost Bronx.
The Mazas can’t help pull G and Angela’s staples, though. Worse, the acid vat is about to drop. So Elisa calls Bronx over to help pull out a staple.
Xanatos rights himself and takes aim at the group. Uh, lemme stop you right there, David ol’ buddy ol’ pal, and ask WTH do you think you’re doing?! You’re going to shoot humans, two of whom are cops? Are you out of your nut? Cliche villain indeed!
Fortunately for him and everyone else, the laser blows up since it’s all dog-goyle chewed. Ah, there was a time when everything I owned had lab-puppy teeth marks in it.
Goliath and Angela free themselves, and not a moment too late, because the acid vat timer is about to go off. Angela has a throwdown with Xanatos, who can’t keep his finger off the trigger.
A random staple goes into the timer. Another goes through the bottom of the acid vat. Now there’s acid dripping on the carving.
Xanatos looks around and wonders if his luck’s really that bad. No, it’s not. The guard, or rather young Peter, is present. Coyote takes off after him.
Goliath knocks Xanatos out of the way before dashing outside with everybody else.
On the way back to town, Beth and Elisa decide the guard must be coyote. The Indian spirit. Especially because coyotes a shape shifter. Well now we know it’s a fey.
Peter insist that no, this is just a rich guy trying to bulldoze a landmark to put up a building. But why? Indian reservations aren’t the most profitable places to build. Unless it’s putting up a casino, in which case the Indian tribe would be doing that.
The Mazas go to town to call the cops. There they find a group of four dancers in traditional Indian garb performing the rare dance to the Coyote Kachina. The Kachina are Cloud Fathers that come down when their dances are danced. Peter used to be the Coyote Kachina in the dance.
Speak of the devil, the coyote dancer breaks off from the group and comes over to Peter. When he removes his headdress, we see the dancer is the guard. He doesn’t have time to discuss anything, because Coyote 4.0 swoops down and grabs him.
Note: There is no Owen in this episode. I’m rather sad. But I’m sure it’s because Owen is holding the fort back in New York. Fox would do a fine job, but she’s probably busy being pregnant and doing whatever it is Fox does.
20/20 moment: I wonder if one of the reasons he didn’t take Owen along is that it would be weird for Owen to help catch one of his fey brethren. I don’t think Owen / Puck would really care, but it would still be awkward, especially if Coyote and Owen / Puck met. Besides, if you’ve got Coyote 4.0, you don’t really need Owen. Especially since there’s just a lot of fighting going on, and Owen doesn’t have exo armor. Be kind of cool if he did. And yes, I really want to see Owen again.
The other dancers are the tribal cops. They come out of a daze and say the last thing they remember was ordering pizza. Odd, I thought the fey couldn’t meddle in human affairs? I’m thinking this is a lot of meddling. Or is it because Xanatos touched the soil carving that now Coyote can step in? Sort of like, “He started, and I’m going to finish it”?
Back to the construction site, Coyote lands with Coyote. The fey wants to know how the robot can hold him. Well, first off it’s iron. Second, the iron comes from the Cauldron of Life, which Xanatos melted down. There’s magic inherent in the metal. I’m not sure how Xanatos figured out that this was going to work.
Coyote wants to know what the heck Xanatos wants with him.
Xanatos replies, “Immortality is a good place to start.”
Slow down. Now, I’m all aboard with the immortality wish, but…you’re going to get immortality from a fey, and not only a fey, but one known for being a trickster. Aaaand you pissed him off by abducting him. You’re acting like a cliche villain, all right.
20/20 moment: The only explanation for why he didn’t get immortality from Puck, also a trickster but who likes / loves him, is that he wanted Owen and he figured he could get immortality from another place. Good help is extremely hard to find, after all. In fact, immortality might actually be easier to find. David is the only antagonist I know of who really values having a good right-hand man. No stupid minion for him. Though Bruno’s gang is a little dumb.
It still slays me that Xanatos is going to trust a fey, whom he captured by force, to give him immortality. Yes, he tries to get a little camaraderie going – and brag, which is actually isn’t a brag but the truth – by saying he’s always considered himself a trickster at heart, but come on, that’s not gonna undo the baiting and kidnapping. It doesn’t even sound very Xanatos in that he’s just pretty much holding a gun to the coyote’s head and demanding it. Yeah, the trap was pretty slick, and classic of what we’ve come to expect from David. But…what’s to stop Coyote from doing some really horrible version of immortality? Like, you’re immortal but you can’t move. Or, you’re immortal, but no one can see you and you can’t do anything. Like a ghost but with less chains and moaning. I don’t know. There’s an infinite number of ways you can screw somebody over in this department.
About this time, the gargoyles and everyone shows up. Coyote sticks Coyote into the little iron chamber in the center of the robot.
The throwdown ensues, with Xanatos struggling with Bronx. Coyote and Goliath go at it. There’s a lot of zapping and whacking.
Xanatos and coyote eventually get the upper hand. That is, until Xanatos spots the Coyote Kachina dancer. Did Coyote get loose?
In his infinite wisdom, Coyote 4.0 opens the little door, even as Xanatos yells at him not to. Coyote the spirit jumps out.
“It’s so difficult to program good help these days,” Xanatos laments. I love how he keeps a sense of humor even when he’s about to lose the game.
More fighting. The fey tricks the robot into shooting the building structure down on top of itself. Ooh, destroyed by falling masonry. Coyote vs Coyote. Coyote vs Roadrunner.
Xanatos also gets hit by falling masonry, but this suit keeps him from getting knocked out again.
He pushes himself up and says that “these last minute upsets” Goliath keeps handing him are getting irritating. Wow, understatement of the century. By the way, his forearm laser blows up, but it’s somehow repaired two seconds later. That’s just an error in animation. I would really put an extra weapon on that suit, though.
After Xanatos flies off, the dancer reveals himself. It’s Peter Maza. He’s come to see the truth.
The fey Coyote says he wanted Peter to come back after Peter danced the Kachina dance. Uh, okay.
Then they all head out to Peter’s dad‘s grave. There he makes peace with him, and says that he always loved and respected him. Yay.
Final Thoughts
So Xanatos has been skunked again. I’m not sure why he thought this whole idea was a good one. But like I said, I’ll take whatever I can get of him since he hasn’t been around for the last however many episodes. And it’s nice to see him try to get immortality again. It’s a continuity thing. I really wish he had gotten immortality. In my fantasy world, he does. But then, my fantasy world is also linked with the Cthulhu Mythos, so take that as you will.
If I ever got time, I would write an epic fan fiction about this crossover. But I have enough to do writing my own book series. First book is out 10/15/17. Get a copy of it. It’s only $0.99! Think of it as a tip for all the entertainment you’ve derived from my posts. The main characters are very similar to my favorite characters in Gargoyles: Xanatos and Owen. If you enjoyed the villains and action of Gargoyles, you’ll enjoy my series Wolves of the Apocalypse. There are cannibals, gore, manipulation, intrigue, and adventure. No magic, though. But really. Science when it is sufficiently advanced is indistinguishable from magic, right? (Name the source of that quote!) Oh, it’s rated M for Mature, but I’m sure pretty everybody reading this is my age or older.
I wonder if Xanatos collected any of the remains from Coyote 4.0? I also wonder what the new Coyote will look like. I’m sure David’s not just going to abandon the Coyote concept. I wonder if he’ll go lower profile this time? ‘Cuz it doesn’t seem like making the bot bigger and stronger has helped. I think improving the programming would be a better idea. This is the second time Coyote’s faulty logic has caused an issue. Well, more than the second time, but during the Avalon Arc I mean. In Grief, his decision to let the gargoyles live and to let Jackal be the Pack’s representative (to go in alone and watch the Emir) caused the deaths of many, many people. And crocodiles. Now his decision to open his compartment rather than using the sensors that are probably inside has lost Xanatos the game and his chance at immortality.
Side note: I wonder if Fox knew about his plan for immortality, or if he was just gonna surprise her when it worked?
Next Friday, tune in for Ill Met by Moonlight. Goliath and Co are back at Avalon, but this time they’re not alone. The king and queen of the island have returned! And Lord Oberon isn’t happy about finding a clan of gargoyles has moved in during his absence. To make matters worse, he has demi-god-like powers.
Thoughts? Comment!
I personally like to think that Xanatos had a script written down stating what kind of immortality he wanted, exactly. He went over it a few times, had a lawyer look at it, had Fox look at it, had Owen look at it, and removed all possible loopholes and was going to read that to Coyote before the heroes showed up.
I love this idea!