Todd Jensen writes...

My thoughts on "Monsters":

I agree with you on the animation issue (although I never noticed the parallels with "Heritage" prior to your mentioning of them), but I will admit that I thought the episode a rather fun one (if not one of the greats). Part of it, I suppose, is my fondness for British settings. (In fact, I visited Loch Ness with my parents briefly as a boy, back when we lived in Britain; didn't see anything unusual in its waters, though).

I did find it appropriate that the gargoyles would encounter the Loch Ness Monster at some point. After all, the gargoyles are Scottish "monsters" - and who's the most famous monster in all of Scotland? Made the same amount of sense as Macbeth getting in earlier, and for a similar reason.

Alas for Brendan and Margot! They run into the gargoyles even while they're on vacation! (Come to think of it, Margot also pops up briefly in Paris in "Sanctuary").

Got to agree with you over Sevarius's over-the-top performance; always a lot of fun to hear.

Count me as another one of the people who mistook Nessie for Big Daddy's daughter (partly because of the Goliath-Angela parallel).

I definitely recalled Matt's answering machine scene: either the guy doesn't clear out his phone very often, or he gets a lot of calls. At least Goliath and Elisa finally get a message home via Renard in the very next episode.

Sevarius's speculations over the Loch Ness clan (more accurate than he thought, after all) certainly become even more interesting in the aftermath of the Clans Contest (and like you, I can't help but wonder now where the local gargoyles were during this episode). We also definitely find out that Angela is Goliath's daughter (although I doubt that that surprised anybody in the audience).

I wonder if that ruined castle over Sevarius's headquarters was based on the real-life Castle Urquhart, at Loch Ness. (Probably is).

And, as you pointed out, that marked the end of the Xanatos Goon Squad, except for Bruno (and I don't recall ever seeing him again, either, after this episode); although I'll admit that I never realized that they were dead at the time. If I had, no doubt it would have impacted me much the way that the destruction of the Grimorum Arcanorum did in "Avalon" - the startlement at seeing another familiar element that had been in the series from the beginning suddenly gone. (Was the blonde female member among the casualties? She was the only member besides Bruno that really came out as much of an individual, to me).

At any rate, thanks for the latest ramble, Greg.