I had no memory of a second series of The Feathered Serpent even existing, despite loving the first season - I think I was probably in the middle of exams when it was on TV in 1978. When I sent off for the DVD, though, both seasons were included and I finally got to see the end of the story.
At the end of the first season, the baddies are killed and the Princess seems to be about to marry the Toltec Prince Heumac, but it turns out that they have further problems to solve before they can get to the happy ending....
Nasca the Evil High Priest was far too good a character to kill off (played by Patrick Troughton with great relish), so he immediately gets resurrected, with the help of new baddy Xipec, Governor of the Gold Province. He was far more fun than Nasca's accomplice in the first season (the rather boring Jaguar General) - silver-tongued, elegant, tall, with long black hair and lots of gold eye paint, and dressed in dark green and gold, a bit like a 1970s version of Loki. He's also quite happy to torture young Tozo, Prince Heumac's servant, who does a very good job of showing how much he's suffering when he's tied up on the terrace baking in the hot sun.
Here he is with the mad witch Keelag who brings Nasca back to life - a good meaty female role, but not one that passes the Beschdel Test - she and Empress Chimalma never meet, and the only other female "speaking part" is a city woman who has been driven mad by poisoned water, who only screams.
Xipec was played by Granville Saxton, who has appeared more recently as a Death Eater in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and one of the Patricians in The Eagle (the film version of Rosemary Sutcliff's book Eagle of the Ninth).
I don't think I learned much about Aztec/Toltec civilisation from the series, but it was great fun to watch, and I don't think there's ever been anything else quite like it on British children's TV.
No comments:
Post a Comment