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1* How does the Hydra's body grow that many heads? By the battle's end the Hydra has already gained dozens of heads, and except for the claw it grabs Hercules with its body is never shown onscreen anymore. How are all those necks even attached to the body?
2** Either the body grows to accommodate the new heads, or some of the new heads sprout from the necks of previous heads.
3** If the video game's interpretation of the scene is to be taken as "gospel", new heads sprout from the Hydra's backside when its neck space runs out of room.
4* More importantly, ''why didn't Hercules just attack the body?'' Sure, chopping off its heads just grew more heads, so maybe striking the body all those heads are connected to would be a pretty sound bet.
5** Remember that the heads grow back in increasingly higher numbers than they did in the myths. Hercules isn't the brightest bulb, and could be forgiven the first couple times for thinking it could only regenerate its heads a certain number of times. Once things got out of hand, he was acting pretty much on impulse - a head lunges at him, he cuts it off. Definitely not the smartest move, but in the heat of battle, he would've died otherwise. And it was only his second heroic battle, keep in mind. He's still learning the ropes a little bit.
6* So, was Hades actually defeated for good in the ending, or was getting knocked into the giant whirlpool with all the dead souls just a final coup de grace thats meant to be one last humiliation on top of his whole scheme going down the drain rather than something that actually harms him (especially since he's a god)? Would he actually remain stuck down there, unable to die because he's an immortal god [[AndIMustScream but still remain trapped in a limbo of the dead]], and if that's the case, who's gonna run the underworld in his absence? And considering all the crap he pulled on the other gods, would they actually try to do something about him if he managed to get out, or would they just have to put up with him on even more sour terms solely because of his duties?
7** There was little punishment for Gods when they were jerks in Greek Mythology. After all, they were gods. But Zeus was pretty pally towards Hades before. That's not going to be the case any more... Perhaps in the position of being a God, being incredibly unpopular among your fellow deities is enough?
8** Believe it or not, Hades was hardly the first Olympian to attempt to overthrow Zeus; even Hera tried her hand at that in the myths. Him needing to dole out punishments for such behavior wasn't a foreign concept, and since the TV series demonstrates he still has a nasty temper, it's unlikely he'd have trouble with it in this continuity either.
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10* How did Hercules manage to grab the Tornado Titan in the climax? Funnel clouds aren't remotely solid, much less one unified object...
11** The beginning of the movie showed that Zeus could form clouds into all sorts of different things, like columns, his own throne, or Hercules's horse Pegasus. Either being able to handle clouds is something all gods (even ex-gods) have, or Hercules inherited it from his father.
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13* Why did they make up Philoctetes? Actual Greek Mythology ''already has'' a half-human wise elderly hero-training mentor, the centaur Chiron. What was the ''point'' of creating an {{Expy}} instead of using him?
14** [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philoctetes They didn't make him up]]. The mythical Philoctetes is associated with Hercules, having lit his funeral pyre and inherited his bows and arrows. Which is to say, he's directly responsible for Hercules' ascent to godhood in the myths.
15** The change was most likely because Chiron was a capable warrior in his own right, he wasn't just the trainer of Hercules. Putting him in the film would've killed the tension of any fight Hercules got into because he always would've had a reliable ally in the event that anything went wrong. Hence, they replaced him with someone less capable to act solely as Herc's mentor.
16** In addition, they had to limit the size of Hercules's trainer once Pegasus got thrown into the mix, as a full-fledged centaur like Chiron wouldn't have been able to ride around a winged horse, and even if that weren't an issue, it would've seemed silly to have Herc be accompanied by ''two'' equine creatures all the time. All of that to accommodate an attribute that's not at all necessary to the trainer's role in the story, so they made him a satyr instead of a centaur and changed his name into something that, while still still relevant to the Hercules myth, could be shortened into a quippy nickname.
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18* How does Hercules know Hades, and vice versa, in the Animated Series? They both met when Hercules was already an adult in the film, Hades literally introduces himself to Herc. Yet in the Animated Series, they act as if Hercules knew about Hades since day 1.
19** Just an issue of continuity,I guess. Besides,Hercules had met Zeus by the time of the animated series,and I would suspect his mortal parents taught him about the Pantheon (hard to miss with all the various temples). Even if he had never met Hades at that point,it doesn't mean he didn't know who he was.
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21* Even if reuniting Meg's soul to her body brings her back to life, how does it bring her back to full health? Her body was, and is, still crushed from the falling pillar.
22** Hercules was a god at the time so maybe he healed her magically.
23* Hercules was getting his arse kicked considerably hard during that first part of the fight with the Cyclops, after Hades took his godlike strength. Did just his strength get taken away, or both strength and endurance?
24** The only thing that got taken away from Hercules was his godborn strength; he'd still have all the endurance and stamina he earned through training with Phil. Also bear in mind that the Cyclops was toying with him for a lot of encounter, rather than actively trying to kill him, and that Hercules still shows signs of the beatdown he's suffered even so, what with the bruising, exhaustion, and the black eye.
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26* Why is Hercules able to ascend Mount Olympus to fight off the Titans, but was told that the only way to ascend Olympus was to become a god?
27** Zeus never said you had to be a god in order to ascend Mount Olympus; he said you needed to be a god in order to ''live there.''
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29* Despite all the stuff Hercules did, he wasn't worthy of godhood until he risked his life to save his love, correct? But Meg, not only risked her life, she LOST her life saving Hercules from the falling pillar. She had no way of knowing that Hercules was going to go to the Underworld and save her. So...how come Meg doesn't get to qualify as a goddess? Instead of Hercules giving up godhood to be with Meg, how come he didn't ask if Meg could be a goddess with him?
30** Considering the heroism of Hercules's various deeds and labors was tainted because he performed them with slight selfish intent, it could very well be that Meg sacrificing herself for him didn't count toward attaining immortality because it was viewed as comeuppance for her helping Hades to plot his downfall, rather than being out of wholly selfless intent like Hercules giving up his life for hers'. In other words, it might've counted if Meg hadn't owed him anything, but she was really saving him from something she had an indirect role in.
31** Alternatively, while Herc's slightly-selfish heroics weren't enough for him to attain godhood on their own, there's nothing saying that they didn't help at all. Being worthy of immortality probably would require something more than a single act of self-sacrifice, so that Herc's previous deeds did take him ''most'' of the way, even if they didn't get him into the endzone, so to speak.
32** A third explanation is that godhood via true heroism is only attainable by gods who lost their divinity, not normal people.
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34* Why was Phil so obsessed about the constellation thing? We clearly saw in his hall of heroes the statue of Perseus which also has one.
35** Simple: in the mythos of the film, Perseus was never honored with a constellation. All of the heroes Phil trained previous to Hercules were portrayed as failures, so there's no reason to think they would've had the same famed reputation they do in our world.
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37* How did Hades not know Hercules was alive as he was growing up? He's in charge of the Underworld!
38** Hades is just administration. He oversees the underworld but doesn't know the name of every single person in there. Sort of like the top administrator at a hospital doesn't know the name of every single patient in his building. Multiply that times the millions of people who have already died plus the thousands that die every single day and Pain and Panic [[BlatantLies could just]] ''[[BlatantLies tell]]'' [[BlatantLies him Hercules was dead]] (which they did) and he would just go with that.
39*** He didn't have any trouble finding Meg.
40*** Meg had sold him her soul - he may have been able to keep tabs on her through their deal somehow.
41** This is an even bigger issue if you attempt to regard the spin-off midquel TV series (set while Hercules was still in-training with Phil) as canon - there, he and Hades encountered each other in just about every episode.
42*** They did address this in the series. Hades knew that he was alive -- after all, it would be hard not to find out. In the last or second to last episode they introduced a younger Megara, and she enlists Hercules's help in finding the PlotDevice, which is an urn full of Lethe water, which gives you amnesia. The urn is dumped over on Hades, Pain, Panic, and Megara, resulting in them developing LaserGuidedAmnesia.
43** Bear in mind that Hercules was a ''baby'' at the time, and babies tend to all look pretty much the same. How's Hades gonna tell Herc apart from all the other infants headed down to the Underworld that day?
44** I can think of a couple reasons--probably not the reasons the writers intended, but No Prize worthy anyway--for one, Hercules is "biologically" (as far as that term counts) a god, not mortal. It's possible he doesn't actually ''have'' a soul in the traditional sense. Even if he does, Hades might not know that unless he's seen another god die before, or a god-turned-mortal.
45** For what it's worth, in the ''House of Mouse'' TV series, Hades says at one point: "Maleficent… a name to warm my soul. You know, if I had one." So yes, perhaps Hades believes that gods don't have souls proper.[[note]]That does make sense: the gods do not seem to be really physical in the movie, more like made of smoke. It's reasonable to assume that they might not be "a body with a soul in it" but rather "a powered-up soul"… Destroying a god would be destroying the soul, there's no searching for an inner soul of the first soul.[[/note]]
46** Plus, it's not beyond Pain and Panic to have found another baby's soul to present to Hades claiming that it was Hercules. It wouldn't even need to resemble him that closely, since Hades didn't spend enough time at the celebration to know Hercules that well; any slightly chubby infant with lots of hair probably would have done the trick.
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48* As Hercules was growing up, Zeus and all the other gods on Olympus knew that he was alive but mortal. Why didn't they tell Hades? Did it not even come up in conversation? I get that Hades doesn't see them much, but over the course of 18 years it seems like Zeus would bring up the fact that his son had turned mortal and has to live on Earth.
49** It's not just that Hades doesn't see them much -- it's implied that he only attended Hercules's baby shower to gauge how much of a threat the kid might be to his takeover plans, seeing as he leaves right after meeting him. He's not the kind of estranged relative who still stops in once every year or two. He's planning on overthrowing his own family; why would he care about stopping by to chat with them?
50** They might not have checked with Hades at all, since they first searched the earth for Hercules, and Hades's dominion is the Underworld - so they might have avoided checking there out of Adult Fear. And time might move differently to the Gods on Olympus. They're immortal, so maybe eighteen years is a drop in the bucket to them, and they hadn't mentioned it to Hades yet.
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52* So did Hercules actually do any of the Labors in the original myth? The most we see is that he tames Cerberus for a moment and he kicks what's presumably the Nemean Lion over a goalpost in the Zero To Hero montage, but otherwise, he doesn't perform any of the labors that made him famous.
53** Yes, he does. In addition to killing the Nemean Lion and the Hydra and taming Cerberus, "Zero to Hero" shows him slaying the Erymanthian Boar and caging up one of the Stymphalian Boar. There are also feats of his that weren't part of the 12 Labors, like killing a giant sea monster. Him saving Megara from death harkens back to how he wrestled Thanatos for the soul of Alcestis, who was a wife of one of Hercules's friends who had died for her husband. He also wrestled the centaur Nessus who was assaulting his second wife, Deianira, in the myths. Him helping the gods defeat the Titans is taken from the Gigantomachy...And then there are other labors alluded to by Phil after Hercules's second meeting with Zeus at the temple -- the cleaning of the stables of King Augeas and stealing the girdle of the Amazon queen.
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55* About Herc's contract with Hades. If Meg was injured in any way ("he promised I wouldn't get hurt"), Herc gets his strength back. Why couldn't Meg hurt herself in some small way to give Hercules his strength back? Like tripping down the stairs or something? If any kind of pain, big or small, counts as "getting hurt", it didn't have to be as drastic as a [[TheresNoKillLikeOverkill a giant pillar]]!
56** When Hades promised that Meg would be safe from harm, he meant that ''as far as he was concerned.'' It wasn't any harm that would revoke the deal, it was harm that was attributed specifically to him. If he hadn't sent the cyclops to attack Thebes, then Meg wouldn't have been crushed by the fallen pillar. He went against his word by allowing that harm to come to her.
57** It's also possible that Meg simply didn't think of it at the time; she was more concerned over the fact that Hercules is rushing off on a suicide mission. Not to mention that she could have assumed that Hades would have something set up to ''actively'' prevent her from getting hurt; sure, she's been working for Hades long enough to know that LoopholeAbuse is a thing, but considering just how much work Hades had been putting into his Titan plan, it's pretty reasonable to make the assumption that he would be taking precautions to ensure that his end of the deal doesn't get broken.
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59* During the training montage, Phil orders Hercules to get down and do push-ups. Hercules is strong enough that he can easily pick up and fling a giant stone arm and discus out to sea. Push-ups would be useless unless they stacked statues on his back (which they didn't -- in that scene, at least).
60** It might the difference in training endurance versus strength. Sure, Hercules is strong, but he really only exerted himself for a few seconds or minutes when lifting those things. Even a minor activity like push-ups, when done for a half hour, might be tiring.
61** The reason it's exerting is because you're lifting your own weight. Hercules can lift things that weight well over a ton--he will exert himself lifting his own weight.
62** Repetitive exercise develops not only strength, but muscle tone. If you rewatch the scene, right before Herc starts pushing, Phil measures his bicep and shakes his head. Part of being the Disney hero is looking the part, and that includes having the proper physique.
63** Granting Herc's ridiculous strength, it would take him a very long time to start getting tired from push-ups. However, the thing about doing push-ups is that he will eventually get tired from it. It might take him a day or week or something, but his muscles are doing work, and will continually expend their stored energy. Do an experiment. Holding your arm straight out from you is a very simple and easy task. Now, do it for ten minutes, without moving it at all. You can probably do it, but it will get more difficult as time passes, because your muscles are expending their energy stores even though it's an easy thing to do. Further, this sort of training will exercise the weaker muscles before the large ones, because the large ones will have more energy, so it's probably a way to specifically build Herc's less developed musculature and build endurance, rather than a method of building his power, which, frankly, doesn't really need it. Note, however, that it might be more effective with weights on his back anyhow, since he is so obscenely strong to begin with, to wear his muscles down faster. On that note, it may also be a method of teaching Herc self-discipline. Even though Herc will get bored and, eventually, tired, he has to keep doing it anyway. Deal with it.
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65* The little potion that turns gods mortal... Where did Hades get it, and why didn't he use it before?
66** Possibly too risky to try and drop all the gods just like that. It could potentially throw them onto his trail.
67*** Considering that how mortal one becomes is proportional how much of the potion one drinks, it would be too hard to get one of the gods to drink the whole bottle without them noticing.
68*** Considering how gradual baby Hercules turned mortal, an adult god would have to be really clueless not to notice that suddenly parts of him were no longer glowing.
69*** The gods are also much bigger than baby Hercules and every drop of the potion was needed to make him fully mortal. Maybe the potion works the under the same rules as medication and Hades would need a higher dosage for adults. As far as we know he couldn't get any more.
70*** Another reason might be that he just couldn't use it any other time. At that moment he only had EXACTLY the amount needed to work on a newborn baby god and even a single drop less would make an incomplete effect. It's easy to assume that however the potion is made it can only be done so in extremely limited amounts (extremely rare ingredients and/or very long brewing time) and perhaps he was planning an adult dosage in a few centuries but lucked out that his main obstacle was just a baby vulnerable to the amount he had at the time.
71** I've always assumed that the potion is actually the water of some magical Underworld river. The film changes it around so that swimming in the Styx will kill you instead of making you immortal - if not that one, there could be some other river that does something similar to gods. There were five of them in Greek mythology, and the Lethe is mentioned in the TV series.
72** Since there's only a little bottle and there are twelve Olympians to deal with, Hades probably figured it wasn't suitable for his takeover plan. The Fates told him he'd be able to free the Titans and take over Olympus that way, whereas the potion was only to take Hercules out of the equation.
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74* So if Zeus was able to beat all of the Titans by himself, why did he and the rest of the gods have such a problem defeating them at the end of the movie?
75** And at the same time, Hercules, who hadn't regained his godhood yet, was able to defeat the four that attacked Olympus by grabbing the tornado titan, sucking the other three into it, and throwing the whole thing into space...
76** This time, the Titans had the element of surprise working for them. Hermes didn't notice the Titans until they were literally on the doorstep, then add in the time it would take for him to flit around Olympus telling the others. Plus, once Hephaestus was captured, Zeus ran out of lightning bolts and couldn't fight back anymore. As for Hercules...I got nothing.
77** It's all very simple. In the very beginning, the Fates foretell that Zeus will finally fall if Hades attacks Olympus with the Titans. They also add that if Hercules fights, Hades will fail. Since in Greek mythology, YouCantFightFate, not only was Zeus predestined to be defeated by the Titans no matter what pull he had over them earlier, Hercules was predestined to make Hades fail simply by choosing to fight. Zeus was therefore incapable of defeating the Titans if his son did not fight.
78** Zeus also didn't truly defeat the Titans. He only imprisoned them. Presumably after months of careful planning and also with the benefit of surprise. Zeus's power was the lightning bolts. Hercules however had the physical strength to defeat the Titans for good.
79** Adding to the "taken by surprise" thing, it seems that before they were sealed away the first time, the Titans occupied themselves with ravaging the earth until Zeus surprise-atracked them from a better vantage point, making his bolts more effective. Once they're freed, though, they head straight for Olympus unexpected, suck the other gods into a tornado, and have the forethought to put [[DishingOutDirt Rocky]] in front for Zeus to waste his remaining thunderbolts on.
80** Complacency was probably a factor, too. The opening song goes that Zeus tamed the world while still in his youth, and after the Titans were sealed away, there wasn't much for the gods to actually feel threatened by. Case in point, if Hephaestus had had more thunderbolts on hand for Zeus to use, the Olympians probably wouldn't have fared so poorly.
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82* The river of souls starts out high enough for Hercules to dip his hands in as he reaches for Meg, and then a few seconds later, he has to dive off the edge to grab Meg's soul.
83** Dramatic Effect?
84** Easy, the water receded. Probably at Hades' will to make things worse.
85** She was sucked down into one of the underworlds. The River Styx is simply the way in which the dead get there.
86** I've always figured that the river of souls is something akin to a giant toilet...of death. It waits until it's filled up with souls, and then 'flushes' them all down toward...wherever it is where souls go, and then refills itself with more.
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88* Blue fire is at a higher temperature than orange fire, yet Hades' flame hair turns from blue to orange when he gets angry. His head cools off when he's irate?
89** What makes you think what happens to Hades' head has anything to do with physics?
90** Maybe blue fire requires some control from him, and anger makes him lose focus.
91** Blue fire is hotter but it's a lot dimmer too. It makes more sense to express emotion via light than heat. Also you could see it as his flames growing more uncontrolled, less efficient. That's precisely how fire usually works.
92** Red is the color of rage, so it makes perfect sense Hades would get angry and have raging fire spurting out everywhere.
93** Might just be magic fire too. It sounds like a cop-out answer but blue or purple flames are commonly associated with spirits and souls with little regard to the heat (if any) they produce.
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95* The Fates? Sure, it's understandable that they tell Hades a "it can go either way" prophecy, but [[spoiler:if they actually knew all, including the future, then why were they surprised when Hercules became a God]]?
96** They can see all, but that doesn't mean they HAVE seen all, perhaps? All they needed to do was tell Hades the 'either or' prophecy, then they were done with their responsibility, and really didn't care to find out what happened beyond. Hey, if you have the ability to know what happens, why not leave some things unknown on occasion? Why take all the surprise out of eternity?
97** Maybe they don't have the ability to know everything at once. Rather they have to look specifically. Like Hades arranged to meet them so they looked into that particular timeline (knowing he'd be late). And they could have just been very cocky that they were about to cut the life thread of a friggin Demi-God that they didn't bother to look into his future.
98** Given the nature of the original prophecy, it's possible some things they cannot foretell. For instance, godhood is something cosmic that shapes destinies forever, so perhaps it's something that they cannot predict.
99** The fates ''claim'' to know everything, but maybe they exaggerate. Maybe they just know a lot of things but not every thing. This would explain why they gave Hades an if/then prophecy, and why Hades didn't immediately complain that they were clearly withholding information. They honestly didn't know which way the prophecy would go; they just had it narrowed down to these two options and they knew that Hercules was the key. Likewise they didn't know about his impending godhood.
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101* The "pillars fall down and ruin everything" scene. Some kid throws a discus, Herc leaps hella high to catch it, ''its inertia is unchanged by the gangly 140-pounder catching it,'' and Herc collides with a pillar, dislodging it. This isn't exactly a cartoony movie, what the hell was going on with the physics there? Either "godly strength" includes being light enough to be carried by a discus and heavy enough to knock over a huge pillar, or that wasn't remotely his fault and that discus would've done just as much damage without him.
102** I just saw that scene, and it looks like Herc propelled himself forward with his own power. It definitely didn't look like he jumped straight up and was carried by the discus. So, if Herc was throwing himself forward, it makes sense that he'd dislodge the pillar.
103*** Eh, it's not like he launched himself at high velocity. And again, he was skinny. If bumping into that column at that speed knocked it over, it must have been pretty precarious to begin with.
104*** He wouldn't need to launch himself at high velocity - he's a demigod who can't control his strength.
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106* What's the point in Meg selling her soul to Hades? It's shown she wants freedom, but she's also shown that she can disobey Hades any time she pleases. She clearly has her free will, so what's the big issue? And it's not like she's screwed in the afterlife either since everybody goes to Hades when they die.
107** No, she's just shown talking back to Hades, not disobeying him. So, he tied her up with smoke and apparently had it tightening. The Greek gods being rather less omnipotent than the Christian God, it's likely he couldn't have that done to just anybody. But he ''owned'' Meg. It's quite likely that whether she wanted to or not, in the end he would ''make'' her.
108** Remember when he says, "I say, 'I want Wonder Boy's head on a silver platter,' and you say..." And she finishes, "Medium or well done?" This when she was actively defying him. It seems obvious that he actually ''made'' her say it, just by willing it so. Which he could do because he literally owned her.
109*** Not necessarily. She could've meant it sarcastically, like in a "I know what you're expecting me to say right now, even though I don't really mean it." If Hades were able to make her say (or, by extension, ''do'') whatever he liked, he wouldn't need to bribe her with promises of shortening her sentence to get her to do things for him.
110** A not-exactly-canonical sequel novel about Meg needing to become a god describes how Hades was able to keep her in line. When she sold her soul to him, he gained ownership of her thread of life, which he would use as leverage to make her to do as he said. Any disobedience and he would threaten to hand the thread over to the Fates to be severed, killing her.
111*** Novel? Do you mean "Go the distance"?
112*** [[Literature/ATwistedTale Yes]].
113** The entire concept of selling souls comes from Christian and not Greek mythology, and Hades is basically just treated as the devil here for the most part in general, so it's likely that the writers either didn't consider this or just assumed that, in their setting, only bad people go to the underworld (or at least are actively under Hades' domination) when they die.
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115* The Titans were doing a pretty good job of beating Zeus before Hercules showed up. But then Hercules frees Zeus and they run away like little girls?
116** They don't start running away until their main heavy, the rock Titan, takes a fistful of thunderbolts to the face from Zeus. Even then, not all of them run -- the wind Titan, who successfully captured the other gods the first time, tries to overcome Hercules, but didn't count on Hercules using him to dispose of all the others.
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118* Since Hades is a god, even if evil, shouldn't he have an aura?
119** I always assumed centuries of living underground dampened Hades' glow.
120** Maybe that's what his fire is.
121** Some of the gods shown on Olympus have auras that are less noticeable than others; it seems to depend on their overall color scheme, since Hephaestus, Apollo, and Bacchus are all dark-colored and have much dimmer auras, although not to the extent that Hades is.
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123* So does Zeus just have the power to take away the divinity of anyone he likes? How exactly did Hercules go back to being "Mortal with super strength (presumably)" after he decided to stay on earth and Zeus nodded? Do gods just have the ability to give up their immortality? Or if it was Zeus, why didn't he use this to stop Hades the second he found out he was initiating the coup?
124** I think maybe ''every'' god has the ability to give up their own immortality, should they so desire, and Zeus nodding was only a way of showing that he would respect his son's decision and support him no matter what he chose to do. Or maybe Zeus's approval and a god's own willingness to become mortal are both required for it to happen.
125** It's possible Zeus can't even do it himself. Hercules's aura appears by itself without any apparent intervention by Zeus, so it could be assumed it's all down to him. It vanishes as he goes to Meg, which counted as the indicator that he wanted to give up his godhood
126** I always thought that Hercules ''didn't'' give up his godhood in the end. I figured that the glow only faded because he consciously turned it off, to indicate that he had decided to live on earth with Meg. So now he's just a god who doesn't look like a god.
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128* How were Pain and Panic able to kidnap Hercules from his crib on Olympus without being severely injured in the process, yet when they try to attack his adoptive parents later on as snakes he pretty much curb-stomps them. Even if he'd been caught by surprise the first time and wasn't able to properly fight against them, it's shown later that his strength extends to tasks as simple and nonchalant as opening a door. Wouldn't he have struggled even the slightest bit as they tried to take him?
129** Could just be that Hercules was asleep when they were kidnapping him, and Pain and Panic were careful enough on Olympus to not wake him up.
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131* Why does Phil start laughing at the idea of Hercules being the son of Zeus when he mentioned earlier that one of the heroes he trained was Perseus, who was also a son of Zeus? Does he just laugh at the idea every time he meets one of them?
132** Perseus might not have been the son of Zeus in this verse. After all, here Zeus actually is a loving father and not the cheating jerk he was in the myths.
133** Alternatively, none of the ancient heroes we know of have managed to live up to their reputations in this universe, as Phil explains -- "none o' them could go the distance." It's possible he's heard the "I can become a legendary hero, I'm the son of Zeus!" schtick so many times before that it doesn't even hold any weight or meaning to him at this point, if he believes it at all.
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135* Why doesn't Herc keep his promise with Hades at the end of the film? He said that he'd stay as his prisoner if he was able to get Meg free - Hades assumed he'd die before he got to her and he ended up becoming a god instead, but even gods have to hold themselves to what they've promised others. Yet when Hades starts asking him for mercy, Hercules just punches him in the face. Twice.
136** When Hercules struck his deal, the spirit of it was that he offered himself up to ''die'' in Meg's place, not just become Hades's prisoner. You could therefore argue that the deal became void once his godhood was restored, as a god is literally incapable of resigning themselves to die. And for what it's worth, saying Hades is more honorable because he held himself to the deal he made where Hercules didn't is disingenuous; when Meg injured herself to save Hercules, Hades probably wouldn't have given his strength back if not for the fact that the magic through which the deal was struck was contingent upon Meg being safe from harm.
137** Well, think of it like someone who offers their first born child as a payment...only to discover they're infertile or something. Unable to provide any children to fulfil the deal. Hercules intended to stay in the Underworld as exchange for Meg's soul. But he became a God, so it's impossible for him to stay in the lake of souls. And it's not as though Hades makes honest deals either - he tricked Hercules into giving up his strength by making him believe Meg was in danger, only revealing she was working for him specifically once the strength was given up - and also leaving out the nuance that Meg literally had no choice in the matter. So it's not like Hades is a paragon of virtue; he just got a taste of his own medicine.
138** And isn't Hercules about to die before he even gets to Meg's soul? The only reason he doesn't is because he achieves godhood by nature of his sacrifice. Notice Hades doesn't fish Meg's soul out himself. He was expecting Hercules to die in there, so he made the deal intending for Hercules to be screwed over. Thus everything that happens to him is LaserGuidedKarma.
139** I think the rule here is that promises among Gods are not magically (or morally) binding unless they physically shake hands on it. That's what we saw when Hercules gave up his powers earlier; nothing happened until the handshake. But in the second deal Herc was in such a rush that he didn't bother with a handshake, and Hades assumed that Herc would die anyway so he didn't bother to insist on it. Once Herc attained godhood and got Meg out, there was technically no deal for him to break, because technically they never had a deal in the first place.
140
141* Could Zeus and Hera have done nothing to try and reclaim their son while he was growing up, instead of just watching over him from afar? Why don't they just go visit his adoptive parents and tell them, "Hello, we're the king and queen of the gods, and that baby boy you found near Mt. Olympus just happens to be our son."
142** Hm, they might have been worried about what kind of attitude Hercules would develop if he knew his parents were Divine Royalty, at least when they're not around to influence him for good.
143** When Hercules first meets Zeus at his temple, Zeus tells him "By thunder, you're old enough to know the truth!" They were just waiting until he was old enough to handle the news.
144*** But it couldn't ''simply'' be a matter of age, or else Zeus would have shown up the instant he thought Hercules was old enough. Instead he waits for Herc to journey to his temple and pray to his statue, and he only ''ever'' talks to Herc via that same statue while Herc is on Earth. I think the "only Gods can live on Mount Olympus" bit actually works both ways, to some extent. It's not just that mortals can't live on Mount Olympus; it's also a rule that Gods can't live on Earth! Granted this is very vague, because obviously Hades hangs around on Earth all the time, and Herc himself is on Earth right after he regains his Godhood, but they might be the exceptions to the rule. For whatever magical reason, Zeus can't just show up on Earth whenever he likes. He can only show up in special places an circumstances, like when he animates the statue of himself in his temple. So I think he was waiting for that circumstance to occur all this time, and the "you're old enough now" remark was mostly incidental.
145
146* So Hades' driving motivation throughout this film is his job - he claims to be so busy down in the Underworld that he doesn't ever have a chance to spend time on Olympus with the other gods, and he despises Zeus for forcing his duties upon him. But what work is he really talking about that keeps him so preoccupied and hateful? He apparently doesn't really oversee the passage of the dead, as he didn't know Hercules hadn't been killed as a baby, and we never see him in the Underworld throughout the rest of the movie until the end, meaning there presumably wouldn't be much that he's neglecting to do down there.
147** Not liking his job may just have been an excuse to grab power, which is what he really wanted. Although, frankly, being Lord of the Dead seems like a more powerful job than Zeus', and IIRC, in Greek mythology this is considered to be true.
148** In Greek mythology, the Olympian gods hate the Underworld - it's dark, it's underground, and it's full of dead people. Maybe Disney!Hades just hates having to work and live there at all.
149** True, but in Greek mythology, their hatred of the Underworld seemed to extend to Hades himself, hence, he was generally ostracized. In the film, the other gods seem happy to have him on Olympus and are actually ''upset'' that he "prefers" to spend so much time in the Underworld. So even if his home is there, it stands to reason that he could at least spend most of his time on Olympus, if he wanted.
150** It's possible that Hades is deliberately skimping on his underworldly duties whenever we see him in the film, since he would be doing so in pursuit of his goal of freeing the Titans and taking control of Olympus. Sort of like holding off on a rent payment while you try to find a better place to move into. It's also worth noting that not all of the gods on Olympus are welcoming of Hades -- in fact, Zeus is ironically the only one there who seems happy to see him at Hercules's party.
151** He's not annoyed that the underworld keeps him ''busy''; all the talk about being busy was just an excuse to leave the party early. (The simple fact was that he hated everybody there and couldn't stand to spend more than a few minutes with them). I think he actually hates his job not because it's tedious but because it's ''powerless''. He doesn't get to ''do'' anything. He just stands around all day while souls drift in. Other Gods get to raise the sun or toss huricanes around. Other gods get to aid people in war or build mountains or whatnot. Other Gods get to mess around with stuff and people ''worship'' them for it. Meanwhile Hades gets to sit around all day and he never gets any worship. He's jealous.
152
153* When Hercules is busy celebrating with the other gods and Meg starts to wonder off, where exactly did she think she was going?
154** I don't think she was thinking that far ahead. She's probably used to having Hades teleport her around and such, and was more concerned over having Hercules taken away than what she was going to do next.
155
156* Why doesn't Hades just kill Hercules himself? He seems capable enough, given that Hercules can't directly challenge him until he attains godhood. And if he's worried about Zeus or the other gods finding out then it'd seem ill-advised to personally meet with Hercules at all. He could have waited until moments before the titans were due to be released, offed the demigod, then continued on with his plan unmolested.
157** The Greek gods were pictured as being flawed, imperfect, and most of all, ''not'' all-powerful. As mighty as they were, they still couldn't do whatever they wanted to whoever they wanted, hence why Hades made that deal with Hercules in the end. As for confronting him in person, the Titans were to be released soon at that point, meaning Hades didn't have time to think up another way of exploiting Hercules' weakness, and that the gods would be done away with soon enough once he succeeded in taking over.
158** It's also implied that even as a baby, Hercules was ''already'' stronger than Hades, mangling his finger. Hades might not have been able to take adult Hercules in a real fight. When his powers are gone, Hades lifts those weights with his smoke, and even then it seems to be an effort, since Hades' specialty isn't strength.
159** In Greek mythology, the gods very rarely killed people, because everybody went to the Styx regardless. They were into ironic punishments, humiliation, and sending others to do the work so that they could watch from a leisurely distance. Hercules was powerless and heartbroken, and Hades sent the Cyclops to humiliate him before his death.
160with his smoke, and even then it seems to be an effort, since Hades' specialty isn't strength.
161** The Fates have specially told Hades that if Hercules chose to fight him, he would fail. Therefore Hades had a reason to not try to kill Hercules by his own hands, but using monsters and Cyclop instead.
162
163* How did Hades know that Meg was dying after the battle with the Titans? The deal only said that Herc's strength would return if she got hurt, not if she outright suffered a fatal blow, so that couldn't have tipped him off. And if he can just sense when someone dies, he shouldn't done the same thing when Hercules was a baby.
164** ''A marble pillar landed on her''. That's not something most mortals can survive. He might have also been told by Pain and Panic.
165** I'm talking about right after the battle had ended, as he was fleeing from Olympus. He calls out to Herc that he has a "consolation prize; a friend of [Herc's], who's ''dying'' to see [Hades]." He couldn't have known that she was actually dying by that point, let alone how it had happened.
166** Hades still owned her soul, so it makes sense he would immediately know she was dying. He's collecting what Meg gave him in the last capacity he can, as another soul in the Underworld rather than just being able to have her serve him in her mortal life.
167** But he wouldn't have owned her soul anymore -- he promised her her freedom if she helped him defeat Hercules, and then told her she was "off the hook" once Herc gave up his strength. Unless he was lying, but he's kept his word at other points in the movie (like when Herc got his strength back) and there was no reason for him to go back on it at this point.
168*** He may have still owned her soul in a technical sense, since she did ''sell'' it to him, and him telling her "You're off the hook" was meant more as, "I still technically own you, but I won't be calling on you to do my dirty work anymore, so you're ''basically'' free to go." Especially since he didn't have Meg's willing cooperation when it came to blackmailing Hercules, so it's not like he would've felt she was owed her freedom. And as described above, he didn't "keep his deal" when it came to giving Hercules his strength back -- that was just the magic the deal was struck in.
169*** He offered to give Meg her freedom if she discovered Herc's weakness. But she didn't actually ''do'' that, did she? She attempted to, at one point. She asked if he had any weaknesses, and he said no, and she gave up. ("Wonderboy, you are perfect"). Attempting to find a weakness isn't good enough; she actually has to succeed at it, or the deal's off. Hades realizes that Meg ''is'' Herc's weakness, but this isn't something Meg discovered and then revealed to Hades; it's something that Hades figured out all by himself. So again, it's not enough to trigger the deal. And when Hades uses this to get Herc to trade away his freedom, Meg is completely uncooperative. ("Don't listen to him!") So no, she was never entitled to freedom under the terms of that deal. If Hades ever lost ownership of Meg, it was under a separate prexisting clause along the lines of "I will serve you until my time has expired or until the end of my life, whichever comes first."
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171* Did Hercules really have to give up his godhood to stay with Meg? He could have just asked his parents if he could stay with Meg while retaining his godhood and Herc could just come up to Mt. Olympus to visit his family and the rest of the gods whenever he felt like doing so. Heck, he could have told his parents that he could stay with the rest of the mortals and keep them safe with his godhood just in case anyone would be stupid enough to threaten Greece.
172** Hercules spells out that any life without Meg, even an ''immortal'' life, would be empty to him. It's not about wanting to spend a bit more time with her before she grows old and dies. It's about not wanting to live another day without her at his side.
173** Hercules had likewise spent his whole life searching for a place to belong, as he didn't fit in at home. He assumed he would belong on Olympus, his birth place. But all the significant friendships he made were on earth, and he fell in love with Meg. Having her in his life gave him what he wanted most, and godhood wouldn't fill any void or need because Meg had already filled it.
174** Looking at it logically, considering the fact that “only gods can live on Mount Olympus”, and that Zeus and Hera never visited Hercules to inform him of his godly birthright, it’s easy to surmise that in the movie’s universe, gods and mortals aren’t supposed to intermingle outside of praying at temples, prophecies, oracles and the like. Just as mortals aren’t allowed to live on Olympus, there’s probably a rule saying that gods aren’t allowed to live amongst mortals.
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176* "We're not supposed to reveal the future!" Then why did he Fates agree to meet up with Hades in the first place? Why else would he schedule a meeting with them? And, since they can see into the future, they should have known he'd ask about the future in the first place! What, did they think he was inviting them over for tea and crumpets or something?
177** If they can foresee events that will happen in the future, then presumably they're also all-knowing with regard to things from the past. Maybe Hades fooled them into coming by saying he needed info about a past event, possibly a misdeed of someone who ended up in the underworld, or something like that.
178** Alternatively, "We're not supposed to reveal the future!" is just a rule one of the Fates made up and tries to impose on the other two, not a cosmic law that they're expected to follow.
179** Well the thing about knowing the future is that they know what's going to happen. Even if they know they're not supposed to, they can suspect that by revealing what happens to Hades, he's inspired to kidnap Hercules and make him mortal. Hercules is able to stop Hades precisely because he's gone through such rigorous hero training, and got so much experience fighting monsters and saving the day. Had he remained on Olympus all his life, maybe he wouldn't have been able to stop Hades or he would have been ambushed like the rest of the Gods? So the Fates knew that by revealing the future like they weren't supposed to, they were ensuring it would happen the way it was meant to.
180
181* Did anyone ''ever'' find out Hades was the one who kidnapped Hercules and made him mortal?
182** It wasn't shown in the movie, but Meg could've easily told Herc and the other gods about it. Pain and Panic could've as well, but they probably wouldn't want to reveal their own involvement.
183
184* When Hercules first started training with Phil he was possibly sixteen at most but at the end of his training he looks to be in his early 20s. Can anyone change so much in 2 short years?
185** We know that the oldest Hercules could have been at the end of his training was 18, since that was the year in which the Fates prophesized that the Titans would return, which they did back when Herc was still a baby. As for whether it's possible for him to have grown and developed that much, we don't know his exact age before he started training, and more to the point, he's a powerful demigod undergoing strenuous hero training in an animated Disney movie about classical mythology. The regular rules of reality need not always apply.
186** And yep, perfectly possible for someone to change that much. Hercules looks older because he's putting on muscle. He bulked up through consistent training, dieting etc. Creator/ChristianBale went from rail thin in ''Film/TheMachinist'' to bulky in ''Film/BatmanBegins'' in only six months. Check out many pro wrestlers who began their training young, and end up looking significantly older as a result.
187* Why would Hercules be called on to clean the filthy stables of King Augeas, as alluded to by Phil before his secret date with Meg? In the myths, it happened because the guy assigning Heracles his labors wanted to try humiliating him with menial work if he couldn't get him killed fighting monsters -- the task being unheroic was the entire point. But in the movie's context, there's no reason for King Augeas to request it and even less for Hercules or Phil to accept.
188** Since this iteration of Hercules boasts some pastoral origins that the mythological version didn't have, it's possible it was done as some kind of publicity stunt. "Farm Boy-Turned Hero Returns to His Roots and Commits to Clean an Uncleanable Stable!" Plus, the mention of this labor comes right after Zeus told Hercules that his preceding heroics weren't enough to make him a god, so it's possible he was just trying something different to see if being humble would do the trick.
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190* Why did they mix the Fates/Moirai (the Goddesses of Fate) with the Graiai(a trio of hag sisters who share a single eye and tooth between them, and who are sisters to the Gorgons)? Also...why did they make them evil?
191** Because for the purposes of adapting the myths, the two are similar enough that there isn't much need to differentiate between them. And what do they do that makes them evil, exactly? They foretell the outcome of an either/or prophecy for Hades, but that's just them foreseeing things that are already fated to happen. And them cutting the thread of each mortal life is something the Fates of mythology already did.
192* If Hades fell down the river of souls at the end, who runs the underworld now?
193** Hades still does, probably. He's still an immortal god. At worst, he'd just have to swim his way up and out of the river, and he would be fine.
194* Aside from how taboo the plot would have gone for a Disney movie, why DIDN'T Pain and Panic just tell Hades the truth about why they failed to kill baby Hercules? They did successfully kidnap Herc, and feed him 99% of the potion to turn him mortal. 1.99/3 steps completed isn't anything Hades would hold a grudge over, especially since they still had 18 YEARS to finish the job. Just have a much bigger monster attack. A strong baby can kick the butts of two snakes, but something as big as the Hydra? Hades really has nothing to worry about. He was probably mad at Pain and Panic for lying to him years ago about killing Herc, and he has now grown into a fit young man who's trained to kick monster ass, when the deadline to conquer Olympus is nearing.
195** Hades's intention was presumably to have Hercules kidnapped and killed before Zeus found out he was gone. It would not have taken long for the gods to find the baby after he became mortal -- Pain and Panic appear to have left him in the immediate vicinity of Mount Olympus. And once they found him, Zeus undoubtedly would have watched over him, and kept him safe from any monsters that may have posed a threat. In that regard, waiting 18 years turned out to be a benefit to Hades, since by then Herc had resorted to fighting monsters on his own and was trying to become a true hero without Zeus's direct help.
196** Hades is not a good boss -- Pain and Panic had two choices: telling him the truth and may get a punishment, or not telling him the truth and SURELY not get a punishment. They chose the latter.
197
198* At the end of the film, Hercules bursts into the Underworld to rescue Meg’s soul. How did he know where the entrance was?
199** In real life, the ancient Greeks had their theory about where the entrance to the underworld was, which in the movie's universe would probably prove to be true. Barring that, Hercules might've just asked Zeus how to get there.
200
201* Pain and Panic note that Hades will be really mad ''[[UncertainDoom if]]'' he escapes the River Styx. This raises an interesting question, what happens if the God of '''Death''' loses his soul? Does somebody else take over duties? Does the concept of death cease to exist? Or does the concept of life and death remain with Hades [[AndIMustScream simply trapped in the river for all eternity]]?
202** Hades is the ruler of the dead and the underworld, and while he does have some power over the subject, he’s not the god ''of'' death, the one who makes death happen. It was Thanatos who did that. All that happens while Hades is stuck in the river of souls is that the underworld has no leader.
203
204* The Titans are depicted as elemental monsters that represent natural disasters like earthquakes, blizzards, volcanoes, and tornadoes. But the Cyclops clearly doesn't fit this criteria. Which leaves one to wonder if he's really a titan, or just some monster who was imprisoned in the same underground cell as the others.
205
206* What ''is'' that potion that Hades uses to turn Hercules mortal? It's never expanded upon -- he just has it from somewhere, he's had it for who knows how long, and didn't try to use it on the other gods beforehand for some reason.
207* Zeus explains that Hercules can be god again by becoming a "true hero" -- but we never find out ''why'', or how. Is it something to do with his last drop of godliness, or did heroes like Perseus and Jason ''also'' become gods when they died?

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