Awakening Part Two

"Awakening: Part Two" is the second televised episode of the series Gargoyles, and the second episode of Season 1. It originally aired on October 25, 1994.

• Producer: Frank Paur
• Co-Producer: Greg Weisman (Uncredited)
• Story: Eric Luke, Michael Reaves
• Teleplay: Michael Reaves
• Story Edited by: Michael Reaves
• Directed by: Kazuo Terada, Takamitsu Kawamura
• Animation by: Walt Disney Animation Japan
• Backgrounds by: Studio Fuga
• Additional Production Facilities: Nakamura Production, Thai Wang Production

Summary

Main Plot

Goliath and the other survivors, seeking revenge, attack the Viking camp. Goliath is robbed of his revenge when both Hakon and the Captain of the Guard fall from a cliff to their death. The Magus blames the gargoyles for what he believes is Princess Katharine's death, and casts a spell that locks them in their stone sleep "until the castle rises above the clouds." Everything now taken from him, Goliath convinces the Magus to freeze him in stone alongside his clan. A thousand years later, David Xanatos takes what remains of the Castle - including the gargoyles - to the top of the Eyrie Building in Manhattan, breaking the spell. Later, they repel an attack on the building by a group of commandos.

Subplots

Goliath confronts Hakon and the Captain on the cliff, and Hakon blames the Captain for destroying the clan. Driven mad with fury, the Captain attacks the Viking leader, causing both of them to fall. They knock Princess Katharine over, and Goliath saves her instead of carrying out his desired revenge. After Goliath and the Princess return, the Magus feels true regret for turning the others to stone, but can't return them to normal because Hakon had burned the counter-spell.

Katharine tells Goliath that she will take her people away to King Kenneth's kingdom, leaving the castle forever. Goliath asks her to watch over the gargoyle eggs, to which she agrees.

Xanatos puts on an act to the gargoyles, pretending to want to help them, but really wanting to use them for his own purposes. He informs them of how he broke the spell after acquiring the Grimorum Arcanorum containing the Magus's story of the gargoyles' curse. The gargoyles agree to stay at the castle, though Goliath swears to never trust humans again.

Elisa Maza vows to find out what the commotion on top of the Eyrie Building was all about.

The Story

Act One

As Goliath mourns for his love, the elder gargoyle examines a bowstring and realizes that the castle’s defenses were sabotaged. The three young gargoyles and the beast emerge from the rookery to the sight of their home in flames. The gargoyles regroup and confirm that the six of them are the only survivors of the massacre. Goliath decides to take his remaining gargoyles to rescue the captured humans and take their revenge on the Vikings.

At their camp, the Vikings celebrate their victory. The refugee boy Tom tries to comfort his weeping mother. He tells her that his friends the gargoyles will rescue them, but she replies that the gargoyles were destroyed. In a cave above the refugees and their captors, the tied up princess and Magus glare hatefully at Hakon and the Captain of the Guard. The Viking and the Captain discuss their plans to ransom the pair and Hakon taunts the Magus by burning pages from his spell book. At the sound of a roar and yells from the Viking troops, Hakon and the Captain run out of the cave to see the surviving gargoyles approaching. They exchange blame for the gargoyles’ arrival. Hakon grabs hold of the still bound princess, intending to kill her, but she breaks free of his grip and runs. Hakon and the Captain give chase while the Magus yells for help and rubs the ropes binding him against a rock. Goliath catches sight of the two men chasing the princess and soars after them while the other gargoyles rout the Viking camp. As the gargoyles drive the Vikings away, the Magus appears on the cliff above. Thinking he is too late to save the princess, the Magus turns his rage on the gargoyles, who he blames for provoking Hakon to kill the princess rather than ransom her. He flips open his spell book and casts a sleep spell that turns the five gargoyles to stone.

Goliath catches up to the princess, the Captain, and Hakon at the edge of a cliff. Realizing that the Captain was the one who betrayed Castle Wyvern, Goliath vows to kill his former friend and the Viking leader. The Captain protests that he never meant for the gargoyles to be shattered while Hakon tries to blame the Captain for the massacre of the clan. The Captain turns on Hakon and their ensuing scuffle knocks all three humans off the side of the cliff. Goliath manages to save the princess while the Captain and Hakon plummet to their deaths. ‘I’ve been denied everything,’ roars Goliath. ‘Even my revenge!’ While the princess struggles with what to say to her rescuer, Tom rushes over and tells Goliath he must come and help his friends. All three return to the Viking camp to find the other five gargoyles turned to stone. The Magus plans to do the same to Goliath until the princess steps out from behind the gargoyle. Goliath demands that the Magus reverse the spell, but the page with the counter spell was burned and the terms of the spell curse the gargoyles to sleep until the castle rises above the clouds, a seemingly impossible feat.

Back at Castle Wyvern, Goliath sets the stone forms of his friends on pedestals around the highest tower. The princess and the Magus tell Goliath how sorry they are for the harm they have done. The princess intends to leads her people to a safe haven with her uncle the king. Goliath asks two things of the pair: that they watch over the eggs in the rookery and the young gargoyles who will soon hatch from them, and that the Magus cast his spell one last time. The humans agree to both requests and Goliath is left frozen in stone with the remainder of his clan, seemingly forever.

First Appearances

Characters

• David Xanatos
• Owen Burnett
• Bruno
• Female Commando

Magic

• Sleep Spell

Object

• Hudson's Sword

Quotes

• "Magic spells, ha! Makes me glad I can't read." - Hakon

• "You're a dead man, Hakon."

"Maybe, but not before you!" - Katharine and Hakon

• "All of my kind are dead. And now, you two will join them!" - Goliath

• "I've been denied everything, even my revenge'!" - Goliath

• "Now I am truly alone." - Goliath

• "There is something you can do for me, Magus. Cast your spell one more time." - Goliath

• "Pay a man enough, and he'll walk barefoot into Hell." - Xanatos

• "The eggs in the rookery?"

"Gone, I'm afraid. You are the last of your kind." - Lexington and Xanatos

• "There is much we can do for each other, Goliath."

"Such as?" - Xanatos and Goliath

• "They're attacking the castle, that's all we need to know!" - Hudson

• "Are you a viking?" - Lexington

• "Without you and your friends, who knows what those thugs might have done?"

"Someone I once trusted said the same thing to me, and then destroyed my people." - Xanatos and Goliath

• "What do you figure that was all about, detective?"

"I don't know, but I'm going to find out." - Morgan and Elisa

Tidbits

Hudson acquires his sword during the fight with the Vikings in their camp at the start of this episode; however, occasional animation errors would portray him as already having it in scenes set before this battle.

As Hakon burns the page from the Grimorum with the counter-spell on it, he comments sneeringly, "Magic spells, hah! Makes me glad I can't read!" It is tempting to wonder if this line of his (linking his pride in his illiteracy to the act which will ensure the gargoyles' entrapment in stone sleep for the next thousand years) could have originated, in part, out of Greg Weisman's well-known belief in the importance of literacy (which would come, of course, to the fore in "A Lighthouse in the Sea of Time").

In the original version of "Awakening", it was the Magus who made the offer to place Goliath under the sleeping spell, as the best way of making amends that he could think of. Gary Krisel, one of Greg Weisman's higher-ups, argued against this, suggesting that instead Goliath, as a result of his absolute devastation over being alone now, should make this request of the Magus. Greg and his colleagues at once accepted this suggestion, realizing that this dramatically improved the story.

Greg Weisman makes a brief "voice-actor cameo" in the episode as one of the commandos, uttering the line "Nice mask".

This detail was possibly unintentional, but Xanatos' remark, "Pay a man enough, and he'll walk barefoot into Hell", is immediately succeeded by a close-up of the feet of one of the workmen dismantling the castle (though they're in robotic boots rather than bare).

Xanatos' surname is derived from the Greek word thanatos, meaning "death"; ironically appropriate, since we will learn in Season Two that one of Xanatos's chief goals is to defy death by attaining immortality.

VHS/DVD Release

• Gargoyles The Movie: The Heroes Awaken
• Gargoyles: The Complete First Season

Links

• Greg's Ramble
• Extensive Synopsis and Review

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