Beyond obvious talents

TV heroine Xena is used to overcoming opponents, but can she survive academic scrutiny?

In the latest issue of the Journal for Cultural and Religious Theory, David Adcock, a religious studies graduate student at Rice University in the United States, ponders: "Xena is a performative between - a between that is multi-layered at the very least - that becomes another between in the very experience of Xena, a between between, a virtualisation of virtuality, which does not merely subvert 'the real' but opens upon a strange - or brave - new world." For most viewers, Xena's attractions are a bit more obvious.