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Don't have time for a full review right now, but the "hate" part of my love/hate relationship with this episode starts with a K and, actually, rhymes with "hate."

Argh! pushed the wrong button and lost my long review. That'll teach me to compose them in Word, from now on.

I have to get back to work now so this will have to wait until tomorrow.

Hmm, I think that Isabella shares with Guy a really strong reaction to real or perceived betrayal (witness her treatment of poor Meg!), and she sees Robin as having betrayed her. I think that in this episode she also sees him as just another male trying to dominate her and control her life and her choices. Btw, Robin's accusation of "murder" when she so clearly killed Thornton in self-defense was rather mind-boggling. I can't believe that the writers/producers expected us to sympathize with Robin in this instance -- otherwise they would have at least made Isabella's actions more ambiguous.

Guy/Meg: It's really amazing that this storyline works so well, because if you summarize it, it honestly sounds like a Mary Sue fic written by a teenage Guy of Gisborne fangirl: Guy gets locked up with a feisty teenage girl who manages to touch his heart, reconnect him to his inner nice guy (nice Guy? sorry...) and give him his first glimpse of redemption. And then saves his life and expires in his arms after a tender kiss. And yet somehow it does work; I'm not sure if it's the writing that lifts it above cliché, or the performances. Holly Grainger definitely did a great job of conveying both Meg's sometimes charming, sometimes annoying innocence, and Richard Armitage was just superb in those scenes.

I've previous mentioned a fanfic called There Is Too Much, a kind of ballad-style commentary on the episodes chapter-by-chapter, and the Dangerous Deal one (just posted yesterday) has some very interesting insights -- but there was one I loved in particular, that after so many years of believing that the only way to show his love for someone was to share his wealth and power with them, Guy finally starts on the road to redemption by sharing his last piece of moldy maggot-infested bread (ew) with a girl in a dungeon. It's also fitting that after Guy has spent years of building up defenses and rationalizations around his actions, the simple and almost childlike words of an innocent girl cut right through them (I think that when she says "It is your fault, all of it!" it applies, in his mind, to much more than Isabella's situation). Of course it's possible that by then he's prepared to hear those things, having truly hit rock bottom and being hours away from death. I love the moment when Meg frees Guy from the dungeon and he says, with a look of joy and disbelief in his face, "You'd do this for me" -- I think it's not so much gratitude for his rescue (I'm sure he probably knows he won't get very far) as gratitude and amazement that a good person can care about him. I agree that mourning Meg is Guy's chance to mourn Marian by proxy, so to speak (someone in a LiveJournal discussion, I think, has also made the interesting point that Guy gets to mourn his "Marian" in the traditional Robin Hood setting of Sherwood Forest, while Robin mourns and buries Marian in the Holy Land). Also, I wonder if her last words to him -- "I always quite liked you" -- are meant to counterbalance Marian's final words of rejection. (Interesting that even when Meg was berating Guy in the beginning, her "the man in black on his black horse" sounded rather dreamy ... sounds like she always had a bit of a crush on him.)

Isabella ... hm, not sure I like where they're taking her here. I mean, I like the fact that she is at least partly a sympathetic villain, because while she's clearly "bad" and duplicitous one can also see what made her that way when we see what a sadistic, terrifying creep Thornton is. (Until this episode a lot of people thought that Isabella might be lying about how abusive her marriage was and that maybe she just ran away because her husband was a boring decrepit old man.) I don't like that they basically make her go off the deep end, toward the end of the episode. Ambiguous, opportunistic, practical, devious Isabella is far more interesting to me than crazy Isabella.

I do find it interesting that while Meg gives Guy a push toward redemption, she gives Isabella a push toward damnation -- the sympathy Izzy gains as Thornton's victim is quickly squandered when she condemns Meg. I can see, though, how Meg's actions are a total betrayal in Isabella's eyes.

Kate... geez, where to begin. I really had to roll my eyes when Robin tells her at the end that he has seen her as the woman she is -- "compassionate, brave, beautiful." (Heh -- I used to think this episode ended with Guy crying over Meg.) Compassionate? to whom? Isabella, whom she would have left to the tender mercies of her horrific husband? Much, whom she so charmingly asked to talk to Robin and give the green light for her romance with him? Can't recall her displaying too much bravery during this episode either, and I guess beauty is in the eye of the beholder but she's no Marian or even Meg, that's for sure. The Kate I saw spent most of the episode being a sulky, whiny, annoying, self-centered rhymes-with-rich. I really, really do not see the point of the Robin/Kate "romance," and the fact that it's so heartbreaking to Much makes it worse than pointless. Finally we get some good Much material (I love that he gets to save the day!), but in the process his poor heart gets totally trampled on. As for Little John, I wonder if his attempts to set up Robin and Kate were due simply to his dislike and mistrust of Isabella.

Nice to see a couple of cheeky moments from Allan, but I kind of cringed at his "Yeah, and they'll make a donkey an Archbishop" comment; since when is Allan such a sexist? Also, shouldn't there be a bit more reaction from him to the prospect of Guy's execution? Yeah, Guy tried to have Allan killed in 3x01 and all that, but still, they do have a pretty complicated history that included a real friendship. I'm sure he wouldn't show any regret in front of the gang, but it would have been nice to have at least a reaction shot.

It was also a bit odd that Robin seemed so indifferent to Guy's impending demise. This is the man who arguably ruined his life but to whom he also has an undeniable connection, albeit one rooted in rivalry. You'd think that he would want to be there for the big moment, or maybe even try to get into the dungeon to confront Gisborne one final time about Marian's death. Actually, that might have been a better way to handle Guy's rescue -- if Guy asked Robin to get Meg out of the dungeon and Meg refused to leave without Guy. I guess one possible way to explain Robin's indifference is that maybe by this time he is no longer sure how he feels about Guy getting chopped up, so he can't exactly be gleeful about it but it's also not like he's going to mourn his death ... so he simply avoids dealing with it. Which sort of makes sense, but also feels like a bit of a rationalization for something that was basically an oversight from the writers, the director, and maybe even the actor.

All in all, a mixed bag. 10 out of 10 arrows for Guy and Meg, 7 for Isabella, one for Robin/Kate ... eh, these calculations are getting complicated, but all in all I'll rate it an 8 out of 10 just because I love the Guy material so much and Isabella has some great moments (and while the Much material was heartbreaking, it was also well-acted).

Well ... I can sort of see that Allan would not want to openly show any concern for or loyalty to Guy, since he obviously values the fact that the gang has accepted him back and trusts him again.

I would have been happy with a single close-up shot of Allan looking troubled when he hears the news of Guy's upcoming execution.

Wow, NL -- you didn't find Thornton scary? I most certainly did -- more so than if he had openly slapped Isabella around or something. I got a very cold sadistic vibe from him.

There is some basis, historically, for him taking over from his wife as the Sheriff. There were instances when a woman was the castellan (governor of a castle, basically) and after she married, her husband basically assumed the duties of that office. However, I also agree that Isabella was a little too easily intimidated by his threat to go to Prince John -- maybe we're supposed to think that she has been so terrorized by him she can't think straight in his presence? That was sort of the impression I got. But wait, if she can't order her guards to kill him because if he doesn't return to his men by a certain time they'll go to Prince John, then why is it okay for Robin Hood to either kill him or pack him off to a madhouse? That didn't make sense. Neither did the whole bit with Meg knowing the location of a Viking burial with lots of gold ... really, does it make any sense that neither Vaisey nor Gisborne would ever know about this place, and this teenage girl does? Ah well.

As for Meg ... hah, "Meg" actually makes me think of Meg from Xena, totally wrong associations for a plucky young virgin... or any kind of virgin really.

Oh - and the kiss was nicely handled - I was quite moved by how the actress softly pleaded for it in her dieing breaths - it was just as a plucky defiant young virgin who knows she's not long for this world would insist she experience that.
I thought Armitage might've played it a bit tooooo chaste, but I would rather it be so than be a tad on the sexually passionate side and not "fit" the rather fraternal vibe I was getting from Guy towards her in the dungeon.

I thought the kiss was just right. For Guy to lay a big passionate kiss on a girl half his age as she lies dying would have been a bit creepy, IMO. Or a lot creepy. You're quite right, too, about the "fraternal" vibe. I definitely don't think that they would have gotten together as a couple if Meg had survived, though that's a fairly popular fanfiction scenario. I can see him being her protector and her friend ... maybe even making himself into the protective older brother that he wasn't to Isabella. But not a boyfriend.