I wrote this episode directly after I saw the finale of Xena, and except for a few small line corrections and tweeks from Tango, the episode is basically the way I envisioned it.
We incorporated many interesting themes into the episode--Ares wanting to get Xena back using the contract, bringing in the Japanese underworld, Eli and Eve bringing back Xena's soul and using the legend of the Twin Streams to restore her body--and though, at the time, we may have been a little green when it came to writing episodes, (I was only 18 at the time and very new to writing myself), I think Letting Go turned out very well for our first ever episode of the Shipper Seasons.
I remember that we first considered doing a virtual continuation of the show in April while season 6 was still airing. There were already rumors floating around that Xena might die in the finale but none of us were completely sure that what we were hearing would turn out to be true. We knew that if Xena died at the end of the series, we would have to figure out how to bring her back and that might complicate matters.
As the finale came closer to airing, we realized that the rumors of Xena's death were unfortunately true so we had to deal with that for the premiere episode of the Shipper Seasons.
Probably one of the things we struggled with the most in the beginning was how to deal with the issue of Xena no longer having a body.
We finally decided that we needed to restore Xena's ashes as well as her soul which, at first, proved to be a complicated situation because none of us knew how we could do that without it seeming too contrived.
I remember that one of the ideas we batted around was that somehow we could use one of the Xena look-a-likes currently still alive (we were considering Diana or Leah) and somehow use her body for Xena's soul. Of course, that meant that we would have to figure out how to deal with the age gap, since Diana and Leah were sure to have aged over the 25 years, and how Xena's soul would end up inhabiting a body that technically wasn't hers. Needless to say, this idea didn't last very long.
Finally, we settled on the idea of the Twin Streams and that's what we stuck with for the premiere. Skkye Blue, who was with us at the very beginning but then drifted away from the staff, came up with the idea and Tango contributed to it. The Twin Streams legend was actually a Scandinavian folktale and the fact that we could use it to restore Xena's body and soul worked very well for us.
Tango and I came up with the idea that Ares uses the contract that Xena signed in Soul Possession as the binding force that would allow him to gain access to Xena's soul even if she was a possession of another culture's afterlife. My original reason for bringing back the contract was because I wanted to somehow make the flashbacks in Soul Possession mean something. I never really liked Soul Possession but I really hated the present day parts of that episode the most so I figured I would use the premiere of the Shipper Seasons as a way to disprove the existence of the present day parts of SP by having Ares actually destroy the contract at the end of Letting Go.
A small tidbit is that the original draft of this episode (first titled "Redemption Fulfilled" and was written in regular past tense novel or fanfic form) has Ares taking the contract and placing it inside of the same jar that it is found in during the present day parts of Soul Possession. As much as I wanted to disprove the events of SP, I did not want to stray too far away from "canon", as it were. For reasons I do not remember, it was changed after editing to show that the contract is truly destroyed by ripping it to pieces and letting the wind carry it away. I am glad now that it was changed.
Ares' importance in this plot was a big point for me, given that this was the Shipper Seasons and I believe, fully, that if Ares had been in the finale of XWP, Xena probably would not have stayed dead. His convictions to bringing her back, perhaps even against her will (in a way that I can't see happening with Gabrielle) is a driving force for this episode. He'd do whatever he could to bring her back, and as a god, he has a lot more far-reaching options to achieving this than a mortal might.
We also wanted to include Eve in this episode not only because she should find out about her mother's death but also because that was one of the issues we wanted to deal with during season 7 – making Eve into a much more involved and likable character. She really didn't get enough screen time in season 6 and she was severely lacking in character development. She deserved more given that she was Xena's daughter so we decided to make her a regular character for our seasons.
Bringing in Eli as the one to initiate the return of Xena's soul seemed like a logical way to bring her back since Eve was the God of Love's messenger. It worked very well, I think.
Maureen came up with the idea to use the Japanese underworld as the place where Xena went after she died. It allowed us to bring in a different set of rules and gods into the show and gave us some interesting ideas to deal with, especially when Ares ventured into their domain to visit Xena's soul. He couldn't remove her even as a god and he was forced into a confrontation with the guardians of the Japanese underworld.
I've recently thought that the premiere of the SS could have been more meaty, with a more detailed plot to Xena's revival but looking back, I think it makes sense that the focus is so much on Xena's revival and not on anything else. There is no other plot, or action, to distract from the current mission at hand--which is a deeply personal and important one--and I think that's a strong point here. I still feel it could be longer than it turned out but the focus of it being souly on bringing Xena back to life is good.
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