City of Stone Part Three
Story Editor: Michael Reaves
Story: Michael Reaves
Teleplay: Brynne Chandler Reaves & Lydia Marano
Summary
Tidbits
Travis Marshall makes another guest appearance here, delivering a news report on the mysterious events of the previous night. There may be a second guest appearance in this episode as well; the man pleading with the Weird Sisters (in their policewoman disguise) to explain to him about his "lost night" looks very much like Billy and Susan's father from The Thrill of the Hunt, though I am not certain as to whether their designs are identical.
Duncan's red-haired second-in-command is left nameless in the dialogue, but called "Macduff" in the ending credits - a reference to the "Macduff, Thane of Fife" in Shakespeare's play who slays Macbeth.
Macbeth and Gruoch's son Luach is introduced in this episode. In actual history his name was Lulach (the second l was somehow lost during the creation of City of Stone), and he was really Macbeth's stepson, the product of Gruoch's first marriage to Gillecomgain. Greg Weisman has mentioned seeing Luach's actual parentage in the Gargoyles Universe as uncertain; his father might have been Macbeth, or might have been Gillecomgain, but nobody knows for certain.
Macbeth anachronistically calls the Weird Sisters "three old bedlams"; the word "bedlam", associated with madness, derives from the mental hospital of St. Mary of Bethlehem - which did not become a mental hospital, however, until 1547, a little over five hundred years after Macbeth's victory over Duncan. Although, arguably, since all of the City of Stone took place in a Gaelic-speaking period of Scottish history, this is not so much an anachronism as an anachronistic translation.
City of Stone Part Three provides the only scene in Gargoyles where one of the Weird Sisters acts separately from the other two, when Selene gives Macbeth the glowing ball that will bring about Duncan's doom, while informing him that Duncan had employed Gillecomgain to murder Findlaech. (Since Selene represents the Weird Sisters' vengeance aspect, it is appropriate that she should be the one to take on this role.)
Duncan's fiery death was designed to provide some variety from the "falling off a great height" deaths that had already befallen Hakon, the Captain of the Guard, Findlaech, and Gillecomgain, while still being acceptable to Standards and Practices (in the way that Macbeth running Duncan through with a sword would not). Ironically, in his death-throes, Duncan falls off the ledge upon which he and Macbeth were standing; apparently some habits are hard to break.
Macbeth is crowned upon the Stone of Destiny (also known as the Stone of Scone), according to ancient Scottish custom. The Stone would make two more appearances in the series, the second one of particular note.
Xanatos's remark that "mixing magics is dangerous" is another hint about Owen's true identity (the "mixing magics" part deriving from the fact that Puck's magic comes from his being one of the Third Race, while Demona's spell came from a source of human magic, the Grimorum).
Links
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