Warrior Xena Outshines Hercules In New Animation Tale

He may be able to move mountains and take on bad-breathed dogs from hell, but Hercules can’t hold a Titan to that warrior princess Xena.

The leggy, war-crying goddess is one incredible Amazon. Even an animated Xena like the one in “Hercules & Xena: The Animated Movie” ($19.98) makes Herc look like an empty-headed golden boy plucked from an Athens beach. OK, I’ll stop slobbering.

Not only does Xena (voiced by Lucy Lawless, star of the popular live-action “Xena” TV show) dispatch the bad guys with more ingenuity and spunk than Hercules (voiced by Kevin Sorbo, star of the not-as-popular live-action “Hercules” TV show), she even sings in their first animated adventure. Try that, Sorbo. On second thought, please don’t.

The Xena and Hercules phenomenon has been good, very good, to Universal. The TV series are popular worldwide, and action figures have been huge sellers. With this movie, the hero worship will continue.

First impressions of this venture into animation weren’t promising. From the brief snippets on TV commercials, the prospect of chintzy animation put a chill in the hearts of either shows’ fans.

When viewed as a whole, however, the cartoon movie is better than what you’d expect. Still, the transformation from live-action to animation-action figures is hardly smooth. Hercules looks like he’s juiced up on steroids with a chest that’s as round as a Minotaur’s rump. Ditto Xena, if you get what I mean.

But let’s move beyond that. The first animated outing with the heroic duo is fun, small-scale entertainment that captures the spirit, if not the physicality, of its two lead characters.

The simple plot, gussied up with a few tuneful musical numbers, finds Hercules trying to get Mom back from Pops - a k a Zeus. The relentless philanderer whisked her off to the Sheraton of the Gods, Mount Olympus, under mysterious circumstances. This, of course, doesn’t sit well with that miffed and jealous Hera, Hercules’ stepmom. Spitefully, she conjures up the demonic Titans - carefully stowed away in the center of the earth - to help her wrest control of Olympus.

Herc can’t handle it alone, so he calls on Xena as well as his pal Iolaus and her chum Gabrielle, to turn the Titans back into dirt clods.

All of the mayhem and god blustering is executed with a light, calculated touch. While it can’t compare to the two syndicated series, Universal’s “The Animated Movie” is an entertaining bit of fluff for young fans. And it’s certainly better than the lumbering, gaudy “Hercules” film that Disney tried to foist off on children last summer.