Twenty-Seven Grilled Bards and One Reviewer: jenbob

Interviews by Fans
Title:	Twenty-Seven Grilled Bards and One Reviewer: jenbob
Interviewer:
Interviewee:	jenbob
Date(s):	August 15, 1998
Medium:	online
Fandom(s):	Xena: Warrior Princess
External Links:	full interview is here, Archived version
Click here for related articles on Fanlore.

Twenty-Seven Grilled Bards and One Reviewer: jenbob is a 1998 Xena: Warrior Princess fan interview at Whoosh!.

Series

For others in this series, see Whoosh! Interview Series.

Some Excerpts

I think at least part of my inspiration for writing fanfiction has been as a way for me to "fix" what I saw in the episodes that drove me nuts. I wrote my first story, "The Third Wheel", after I saw the episode RETURN OF CALLISTO. Gabrielle's willingness to abandon Xena and the traveling way of life to go back to Poteidaia with the "dull and stupid" man she had originally run away from just seemed so wrong to me. I kept trying to "justify" that behavior in my mind and, before I knew it, I had written a story. "A Fine Line" came about a little differently, mainly when I started wondering about how Xena would react to the loss of Gabrielle and because I wanted to explore her dark side, something that hadn't been looked into as much at the time I wrote that story. The piece I'm currently working on, though, is another example of writing so that I can "get what I want" from the characters. Although I basically liked the Rift Arc, I thought they tried to do too much too quickly and I feel that in some ways we've been cheated out of getting to see the "healing" that would have to have occurred between Xena and Gabrielle. By writing my story, I can get them to say out loud all the things that we're apparently supposed to believe were said "during the commercials".

I think it's best when it's a romantic show, although that's not what it always is. I was actually attracted to the show not because I thought that Xena and Gabrielle were lovers, but because I thought it was fantastic to see these two women who obviously cared deeply about the other. Although I enjoy the drama and the adventure, what ultimately draws me to the show is the relationship between the leads. For me, the most amazing moments of the show have always been when Xena and/or Gabrielle open up part of themselves and we can see the incredible love that they each have for the other.

For me, Uber-fiction is fiction that clearly "borrows" from XWP. It is not necessary for us to know what the exact relationship the characters have to Xena and Gabrielle (reincarnation or descendents for example) and it's not necessary to ever mention Xena. However, I think if these "conditions" aren't met, then the story needs to include similar issues and problems to what Xena and Gabrielle have faced in the show because otherwise, it's just a story about a woman who kicks butt. I would be extremely hard pressed to consider a story about a man and a woman to be Uber no matter how close the match because I think that the idea of two woman as partners is one of the most important cornerstones to XWP that there is.