Season Three

By the time S3 came around I had made contact with friends in the US(hi Joann!) and saw most of these uncut. So far these episodes have only aired on Sky. Channel 5 begin S3 in the very near future.
I am probably missing some still though! Do EMAIL me

BEWARE OF SPOILERS

= heavily cut.
= quite a few cuts.
= one or two cuts.

The Furies

Xena taking the pinch off a guy at the start was cut, as was a little of the opening fight with Xena in 3 Stooges mode. A funny line went, sadly. In her nuttiness Xena responds to Cyrene's suggestion that Gabrielle might be able to help by calling her a 'useless little pissant' who couldn't save a cat in a sack without her(Xena). I laughed. All these restored by C5.

Been There, Done That

Very minor cuts by Sky during the free for all fight near the end. As Xena is measuring up for had super chakram toss, one of the women really lays into someone. This was the only notable cut. Restored by C5. Fans in the know appreciated Xena's comment that Joxer woulf "crawl 50 miles on broken glass to sweat in (Gabrielle's) shadow", as Xena had jokingly said the same thing about gay producer Liz Friedman a few years previously, only she didn't say sweat!!

The Dirty Half Dozen

The bit where Xena kills one of the half dozen by impaling him on a knife was cut. As was the end part where Agathon gets his own weapon in the head and some nasty cuts. Also, when Xena is crawling through a tunnel and throws her chakram at a guard, getting him in the chest. Agathon picks up the bloody chakram before trapping Xena. Only Sky cut the bloody bits, of course! Their summer repeat restored this ep, as did C5.

The Deliverer

This sequence of episodes was cut a fair bit. The most annoying in this pivotal episode was in the crucial scene where Gabrielle is conned into killing. She waves around a bloody dagger. She screams in agonised remorse and holds up her bloodied hands in a very powerful scene. The daft cutting of the blood made this a jerky and uneven scene on Sky. Another "bastard" got cut, and it was sooo obvious! Xena yells, "what have you done to her you ..." Well we could all shout out the word that Sky cut! Summer 99 saw an uncut repeat. C5 resored them once again.

Gabrielle's Hope

One of the most heavily edited of S3, the very start was considerably shortened when Gabrielle dreams of meeting Meridian but the dream turns into a bloody nightmare. This was not the case on Sky. The birth of Hope was much, much more disturbing originally. More strobe lighting and flashing imagery. Several minutes were cut in this scene. The part where Xena has her sword over baby Hope's hea after the dark haired knight has died was another one where the cut was obvious due to the music not fitting. I think it was Xena saying what a demon the child was and she must die that caused the cuts. Sky's summer repeat and C5 gave us uncut eps.

The Debt 1 and 2

This excellent episode had a few cuts. Not sure if the opening nighttime fight was cut. Possibly. The leg break from Destiny was back, but the angry old Xena sticking her sword through a few Chinese soldiers was edited during the opening gallop across the plains. One of the stupidest cuts was when Borias trapped Xena to hand her over to Ming Tsu. She gets whacked over the head, and Borias punches her. However, Sky cut the punch. So Xena can punch and kick, but no one can hit her? The other cuts were at the very end when part of Ming Tien's description of how he killed his mother was cut for being a bit gory sounding, and the final shot of the hairpin in Ming Tien's head was edited also. Sky showed The Deby uncut this summer.
Autumn 99 and C5 decide to show this as a Xena Movie by splicing the 2 parts together, however, this meant that all the bits where a name was flashed onscreen in Debt 2 got edited out. Julian spotted these:
Opening scene after the title music...Gabby & Ming Tien sit at opposite ends of a table.....
Under the title Debt II & Guest Starring Jacqueline Kim
Gabby "If you had her promise...then you would let her go...right?"
Ming Tien "It would take more than that"
Gabby "Xena would never go back on a promise"
Ming Tien "Of course she would"
Gabby "I want to see her" Which is the first line spoken in C5's version.
Same scene a few lines later....
Under the credits for Marton Csokas......Grant McFarland, Daniel Sing......
Gabby "You are wrong.....Cut to "Look...... .....you don't know her"
Ming Tien "I know her.............Tell me......Why did you do it, if you love her so?"
Gabby "I felt that she was betraying herself.....if she went back to the way of murder"
Ming Tien "Murder is in her blood, Gabrielle.... Her soul....It is more natural to her than love"
Gabby "Look....I know what Xena did to you was a terrible thing......" this is the next line spoken in C5's version.
Under the credit for Jo LoDuca, part of the scene with Xena tormenting the young Ming Tien is cut. Where Xena takes a BIG bite from the chop she is eating.
Under the credit for R J Stewart, Tronk(?) stomps in whilst Xena is eating in the cave.....
Xena "What do you want?" to Tronk(?)
Tronk(?)"It's Borias....He's riding this way" The first words spoken in C5's version
Under the credit for Bernadette Joyce......Xena starts walling in the young Ming...viewed from the outside....
Ming Tien "She understood how to send fear flooding into your very soul....."
View from inside... shown on C5
Ming Tien "And when that kind of terror lives deep inside people........"
Under the credit for Chloe Smith........Xena places stone in gap...winks and makes a clicking sound through her teeth
Ming Tien "They are yours forever"...shown on C5
Under the credits for Liz Freidmann & Eric Gruendemann...parts of the ransom scene with Ming Tsu walking towards the packhorse with Ming Tien and freeing him are cut. The spacing between the narrated lines is cut, and the action slowed right down, so that there is time for all of the lines to be heard.
Ming Tien "When he ransomed me that night.......He held me to him...like a foolish woman.....Tears in his eyes"
Under the credits for Steven L Sears & R J Stewart........Scene with Ming Tien standing and Gabby viewed over his left shoulder, still sitting at the table....
Gabby "You can't blame your father for being emotional at a time like that"
Ming Tien "He was a fraud.....just like Xena said".........
.........."He cared about me only because a king needs an heir" Shown by C5
Under the credits for Sam Rami & Rob Tapert.....Xena in the dungeon....long shot with her & the man from the Kingdom of Lao...the scene is cut from there to where the man from Lao says "He is giving you his shirt. "In this cut scene, two prisoners walk past the camera, from left to right, one approaches Xena who says"What do you want?"
Further in the scene, one prisoner has given Xena his shirt. Just after Xena says "I don't want your clothes", there are credits for John Schulian, Rob Tapert and R J Stewart. The scene is cut from that point, to where Xena says "What are they doing?"

The opening scene from the execution of Lao Ma, there is a credit for Rob Tapert & R J Stewart, just after the doors open. We don't see the doors opening, the scene is cut from the man from Lao hanging his head after Xena asks "When was the last time you saw her?", to Lao Ma half way along the aisle. Later in the scene, as the man from Lao turns his head to watch, Ming Tien, dressed in the executioners robes enters from the right. The camera switches back to the man from Lao and then is cut to the close up of Lao Ma lying down on the Chinese symbol being used as the block. There is another few second shot of Ming Tien in costume under the credit for Oley Sassone, which is in this cut.

King of Assassins.

One of the daftest knife at throat edits was in this rather weak episode. Cleopatra finds Autolycus hiding and holds a knife to him as she asks him questions. Because of the knife, Sky just faded to black and went onto the next scene. Silly. Not sure if C5 put it back as I don't like this ep.

Warrior..Priestess..Tramp

All the smutty jokes survived the scissors, just a few cuts to the end fight from what I remember.

The Quill is Mightier

Can't remember any offhand. Anyone?

Maternal Instincts

One of the grimmest and most tragic episodes ever was actually not heavily cut because there is little actual onscreen violence. There were a few cuts in the final fight in the cave between Xena and Callisto. Xena head butts Callisto and knees her in the groin. Both these were not seen in the original Sky showing. I think there were edits in the scene where Callisto is shot full of arrows and then she pops them back, killing quite a few village men. Another episode repeated uncut this summer. Now why couldn't they just do it first time round! C5 didn't cut.

The Bitter Suite

The infamous 'Gabdrag!' This was always going to be cut, and was indeed considerably less graphic in the Sky showing. Ironically, comments since made by the producers that this scene was too long and graphic probably mean that the Sky version was probably closer to what they were intending. One of the wierdest UK version changes was in Callisto's poem as Xena is entering Illusia. It's the one that begins, "Absorb thyself in the elemental waters..." We have a slightly different ending. The US version ends with "..as in a fish therein." The UK one though, ended,"...and was a fish therein." Also, one of the singing soldiers in the War and Peace song has a different voice. There were further Sky edits when Xena kills Gabrielle with a sword in the belly. Also, at the end, Xena yells at Ming Tien, "I killed you, you bastard." Guess which word we missed.
Another episode Sky did repeat uncut this summer.
Shocks here as Channel 5 cut even more from the Gabdrag than Sky! The opening where Xena uses the word 'bastard' was cut, as was the later one to Ming Tien, but the drag on C5 lasted about 5 seconds. Xena set off, Gab was seen mying on her back, then we see the horse pulling up at the cliff. No drag at all really!

One Against an Army

Another one to annoy the fans due to the poor attempt to edit. The offending scene was the arrow removal scene. We saw Xena begin to remove the arrow before we faded to black and came back to see Gab recovering. Presumably this was considered too gory. We also missed a great little bit from Gabrielle's nightmare when Xena gets her throat cut. We saw the soldier grab her but missed the cut.(left). Finally, a bizzaro one, when the traitorous soldier returns to kill Gabrielle, we see him twirl his dagger and say, 'told you I'd be back' This was edited by Sky.
Channel 5 showed everything!

Forgiven

The opening fight between Gabrielle and the terrible Tara was cut a huge amount! The fight was cut from about 2 or 3 minutes to less than one minute. The ear bite - a gag to do with Mike Tyson biting part of Evander Holyfield's ear off - was snipped, amongst others.
Channel 5 showed it pretty much uncut as far as I could see.

King Con

Can't remember if the beating up of Joxer was cut. How could I forget this one! When Xena confronts Rafe and Eldon near the start, she grabs Rafe's hand and does a dagger trick pinched straight from Aliens where she stabs between Rafe's fingers very quickly. Sky cut out the dagger in close proximity to Rafe's hand.

When in Rome

The drag of Crassus was left untouched! However, I think - from what I remember - that the fight between Xena and the gladiators in the arena near the end was edited. I am trying to remember if the opening fight between Vercinix' men and the Romans was cut.

Forget Me Not

The part where Gabrielle goes through those different rivers was cut a little. The bit where we see flashes of Gab on fire and Gab's bum was cut I think. The priestess of Mnemosyne -THE worst actress ever IMO - was not cut unfortunately.

Fins, Femmes and Gems

Can't remember any cuts. Inuendo seems fine by the censors. Look very closely during the fade out at the end as Gab reaches over for Xena's hand. Aah! There is a photo of what happened next - they arm wrestle sort of!

Tsunami

Can't remember any obvious cuts. Can you?

Vanishing Act

Xena puts the pinch on a man, which was once again edited slightly. Can't remember any others.

Sacrifice 1&2

Not too many big ones. The first appearence of Callisto has her slit a man's throat, which was edited by Sky. Later, Xena and Callisto fight, and Xena chops off her hand and stabs her in the belly in the US version. Also, the very end where Xena sticks the hind's blood dagger in Callisto was cut slightly.

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