History Main / SadlyMythTaken

* ''LightNovel/{{Baccano}}'':

* ''LightNovel/{{Campione}}'':

* ''LightNovel/SwordArtOnline'' explains that this trope is from the Cardinal System, a type of artificial intelligence that controls the eponymous [[MassivelyMultiplayerOnlineRolePlayingGame MMORPG]] (and later Alfheim Online). It scours human mythology for various characters, items, and tropes; then throws them into barely recognizable, randomly generated quest-lines to keep things interesting for the players.

* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'': In ''Twilight'', Meyer describes varacolaci as being "a powerful undead being who could appear as a beautiful, pale-skinned human", while they are more famously known as wolf demons that cause solar and lunar eclipses by swallowing the sun and moon respectively. They also appear as ''dry'' pale-skinned humans, not beautiful. In ''Breaking Dawn'' and ''Midnight Sun'', Meyer cites the incubus and succubus as vampires who are known in mythology as being promiscuous and seduced women and men, respectively. Both of them were demons who were believed to be the cause of nightmares and wet dreams. Also in ''Breaking Dawn'', the cleaning lady at Bella and Edward's honeymoon site believes that Edward is a "libishomen", described as "a blood-drinking demon who preys exclusively on beautiful women". In reality, lobisomen (the real name of the "libishomen" in Myth/BrazilianFolklore) are the Iberic version of the werewolves, and while they do drink blood in oral tradition, they are never said to target beautiful women in any way, at the very most pregnant women. One of those is actually justified; Edward implied that myths about incubi were made up by humans based on vampires like him. The other cases are valid, though, and there was also a mention of 'actual' werewolves that operate on 'full moon and silver bullets' logic. The silver bullets are more of a Hollywood concept.

* ''Literature/{{Twilight}}'': In ''Twilight'', Meyer describes varacolaci as being "a powerful undead being who could appear as a beautiful, pale-skinned human", while they are more famously known as wolf demons that cause solar and lunar eclipses by swallowing the sun and moon respectively. They also appear as ''dry'' pale-skinned humans, not beautiful. In ''Breaking Dawn'' and ''Midnight Sun'', Meyer cites the incubus and succubus as vampires who are known in mythology as being promiscuous and seduced women and men, respectively. Both of them were demons who were believed to be the cause of nightmares and wet dreams. Also in ''Breaking Dawn'', the cleaning lady at Bella and Edward's honeymoon site believes that Edward is a "libishomen", described as "a blood-drinking demon who preys exclusively on beautiful women". In reality, lobishomen (the real name of the libishomen in mythology) were monkey-like werewolves. One of those is actually justified; Edward implied that myths about incubi were made up by humans based on vampires like him. The other cases are valid, though, and there was also a mention of 'actual' werewolves that operate on 'full moon and silver bullets' logic. The silver bullets are more of a Hollywood concept.

[[caption-width-right:350:Myth/NorseMythology, meet [[Creator/MarvelComics Marvel]] [[ComicBook/TheMightyThor Comics]].]]

* In the ''Franchise/{{Godzilla}}'' films, King Ghidorah is partly [[ShoutOut based off of]] Orochi. And, in ''Film/GodzillaMothraKingGhidorahGiantMonstersAllOutAttack'', he's stated to be a juvenile Orochi that has been purified (somehow) and now protects Japan from evil. However, Ghidorah has only three heads whereas Orochi has eight. The film [[JustifiedTrope explains that Ghidorah hasn't matured enough to grow all of his heads back.]] [[Film/GodzillaVsBiollante Biollante]] is said to be named after a Norse nature spirit; while there ''are'' numerous Norse nature deities, none of them are called Biollante (the name was made up for the monster). Averted with ''Film/GodzillaVsMechagodzilla'' which actually does a fairly accurate representation of the Okinawa mythologies of the Shisa in regards with the daikaiju King Caesar.

** The minotaur being a guy with a wire-mesh bull mask instead of a [[HalfHumanHybrid half-human/half-bull,]] [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Theseus Theseus]] being a mortal instead the son of Poseidon, Hyperion being a evil king instead of the Titan of Light, the complete invention of the Epirus Bow.

** Neith is a goddess of many things, including being war goddess, hunting goddess, weaving the universe. What becomes a liberal interpretation is that in here, Neith is [[GenkiGirl extremely bubbly]] [[TheCutie and cheerfully cute]].

* The fact that the explicitly [[BeardOfBarbarism bearded]] red-head [[HornyVikings Viking]] thunder-god Thor is portrayed as clean-shaven and towheaded like [[WesternAnimation/Shrek2 Prince Charming]] probably didn't help dissuade the MasterRace proponents that interpret ''Art/ThorsFightWithTheGiants'' as proto-Fascist/Nationalist propaganda.

* ''Series/{{Charmed|1998}}'': In "Oh My Goddess!" it's said that the Greek gods were actually mortals the Elders infused with power in order to stop the Titans. This is not a problem in itself -- the problem is that Gaea was stated to be one of these mortals, when in mythology she wasn't an Olympian, but the ''mother of the Titans.''

* ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'': Changelings, rather than being fairy children swapped out for human infants, are shapeshifters capable of taking on any form.

This frequently happens to any god, no matter how benign, who [[EverybodyHatesHades happens to have any dominion over death or the underworld]], due to BadPowersBadPeople.

* ''Art/{{Primavera}}'': It is unknown why Botticelli chose this grouping of Roman mythology characters to hang out in a garden, since there aren't any myths that have them all together.

* ''Franchise/MarvelUniverse'': The setting's versions Ares and Achilles both mention fighting side by side at Troy. In ''Literature/TheIliad'' Ares was in the Trojan camp.

** A few of the monsters lifted straight from the medieval bestiaries are given heavy artistic license due to RuleOfCool. Bestiary 4's Barometz refers to a gigantic ram-shaped mass of vegetation created by druids as a nature guardian whereas the mythical one was simply a very odd plant with a lamb attached to it like an umbilical cord. Also from Bestiary 4, the Myremecoleon is an elephant-sized insect that spews acid while the mythical inspiration was a giant ant with a lion's head whose gimmick was it could not eat plants or meat, so it always starved to death.
* Rakshasa in Hindu scripture are demon-like demigods who are generally evil. Raksha in ''TabletopGame/{{Exalted}}'' are [[EldritchAbomination sapient vortexes of chaotic energy]] that happen to take human form, and serve as TheFairFolk. This came about in part because of [[http://nobilis.me/quotes:secret-history-of-the-raksha a writing issue]]: a lot of material for the first edition Fair Folk book came in way too close to publication for a proper rewrite, yet not delivering anything near what the line developer wanted, meaning that the developer and one writer on hand ended up slotting in Hindu mythological concepts and Sanskrit words just to get something other than the European fae clichés they'd been given.
* ''Golden Age TabletopGame/{{Champions}}'': An InUniverse example in the Fourth Edition. The sample villains included The Doberman, a less-than-competent "master villain" obsessed with dogs and dog-themed crimes, who dresses like the god Anubis (who he believes to be the Egyptian god of dogs). Justified in that:

** At one point has a character make the claim that "every religion has a devil who was originally a fallen angel." This is roughly on the same level of accuracy as claiming that every religion is monotheistic. Many religions have no Satan analogue, and most of the ones that do (aside from Christianity and Islam) don't depict that being as having been cast from heaven- more commonly it's just an outside antagonist.

* ''Series/TheLibrarians2014'' season four episode ''The Steal of Fortune'' states that Jupiter had a contest between his four favorites, Minerva, Mars, Saturn, and Fortuna to see who would rule over humanity. Fortuna is a minor goddess in Roman Mythology, and Saturn is the father Jupiter deposed. Neither would be considered his favorites, or a candidate for such a contest.

* In ''Series/AmericanHorrorStoryCoven'', the Voodoo deity Papa Legba is a demonic being who snorts coke, EatsBabies, and makes [[DealWithTheDevil Faustian deals]] for immortality. [[http://www.ezilikonnen.com/the_lwa/legba.html In actual religion]], he's most often presented as a humble, good-natured old man, and the show's portrayal of the figure's snarky personality much more resembles Baron Samedi from the same mythology (but even he is not as devil-like as this version of Legba).

* In ''Series/AmericanHorrorStoryCoven'', the Voodoo deity Papa Legba is a demonic being who snorts coke, EatsBabies, and makes [[DealWithTheDevil Faustian deals]] for immortality. [[http://www.ezilikonnen.com/the_lwa/legba.html In actual religion]], he's most often presented as a humble, good-natured old man, and the show's portrayal of the figure much more resembles Baron Samedi from the same mythology.

** One of the cryptids in the show was the Jersey Devil, who looked like a devil. This would have been fine, had not the Jersey Devil looked like a long-necked horse with bat wings.

* ''VideoGame/EndlessOcean: Blue World'''s final area, the Cavern of the Gods, takes its cues from Egyptian mythology, with alters dedicated to Osiris, Horus, Isis and Nephthys. Except that all the related statues are male (complete with beard postiches), Osiris is depicted with a papyrus scepter (which is traditionally feminine), and Isis has Osiris' trademark crook. Horus is also missing his trademark falcon head, but depictions of him as fully human aren't unheard of.

* Daedalus was a skilled and cunning craftsman in Greek Mythology, not the flying sorcerer whose only motivation is [[ForTheEvulz The Evulz]] that ''WesternAnimation/TheMightyHercules'' would have you believe.

* In ''VideoGame/MortalKombatDeadlyAlliance'', ThatOneBoss Moloch is not a Canaanite god who [[ReligionOfEvil eats babies]], but rather someone who gets to be controlled by Quan Chi and Shang Tsung.

* Daedalus was a skilled and cunning craftsman in Greek Mythology, not the flying sorcerer who's only motivation is [[ForTheEvulz The Evulz]] that ''WesternAnimation/TheMightyHercules'' would have you believe.

* ''Series/{{Lucifer|2016}}'' at one point has a character make the claim that "every religion has a devil who was originally a fallen angel." This is roughly on the same level of accuracy as claiming that every religion is monotheistic. Many religions have no Satan analogue, and most of the ones that do (aside from Christianity and Islam) don't depict that being as having been cast from heaven- more commonly it's just an outside antagonist.

* ''VideoGame/ImmortalsFenyxRising'' largely averts this, with GeniusBonus and ShownTheirWork being predominant in its prominent and subtle accurate citations of Greek myth. However, it still makes a few departures, such as depicting Athena, one of whose most famous traits is her grey eyes, with blue eyes instead.

** The series falls into this a few times, although the strangest example by far is [[VideoGame/CastlevaniaChroniclesOfSorrow Zephyr]], a time-controlling boss whose namesake was a Greek wind god (the boss itself is a ShoutOut to Dio Brando of ''Manga/JoJosBizarreAdventure'').

** The Egyptian god Seth is traditionally depicted as an animal that somewhat resembles a jackal, an aardvark, a fox, or a combination all of the above. Not in SMT, however; here, he's depicted as a ''gigantic black dragon''. This is in contrast to all the other Egyptian gods in the series that are accurately portrayed (for example, Horus, Seth's foil, is portrayed as a falcon like in the myths). This may also be another artifact of ''Literature/DigitalDevilStory'' where he had a serpentine and draconic appearance.