Delcast said:
Her independence comes more from her alien-hood than her womanhood.
This is why I don't get why people are saying she's a "strong female character". As you say, her "independence" comes from the fact that she's been zergified, not because she's a woman standing on her own. Her story arc would fit just as easily to a male as it would for a female. Character starts as a loyal soldier, character gets viciously betrayed and left to a horrific fate, character gains untold amounts of power, character uses that power to seek revenge on those that betrayed her. Upon getting said revenge, character fully embraces the darkness inherent in their power and decides she wants to become the evil overlord of the galaxy.
She doesn't change the Zerg when she takes over, she rather just fully embraces her role as the leader of the Zerg. Once the Overmind has been dealt with, she basically just wants to take its place as the ruler of the Zerg and go on to accomplish what the Overmind was already trying to do: consume and assimilate everything. As I said, you could just as easily stick a male into that role and the story wouldn't change at all. With a character like Ellie, you could stick a little boy into her role and suddenly it becomes an entirely different story. It goes from being a story of innocence lost to being a "how to become a man" story. Same thing with Elizabeth, if you slap a young man into her role, he'd likely be blasting away with a shotgun side-by-side with Booker as they try to break out of Columbia.
Kerrigan is only a "strong female character" in the sense that she's a female that's obscenely powerful. She doesn't really "advance the cause" in any way, shape, or form other than saying "Hey check it out! Our main bad-guy is actually a girl!" The concept of a powerful villainess, however, is certainly nothing new or unique to the universe of StarCraft.
As for the episode itself:
RIIIIIGGED! You just wanted Hermon to win because he was a guest on the show! You start out by giving him one sentence on his first turn resulting in no points, then give him two points in another turn in which he didn't even make two good points, then just edit out him drinking so that he gets to win the drinking round! I call shenanigans!