Herc and his li'l buddy Iolaus
A classic
Nineties Adventure Show,
Hercules: The Legendary Journeys followed the life of the legendary hero throughout ancient Greece as he fought tyrants, monsters, and the machinations of the Olympian gods with the help of his trusty sidekick Iolaus. It put a new spin on
Greek Mythology, deliberately avoiding the white togas normally associated with this time period. It was delightfully tongue-in-cheek (including plenty of
Anachronism Stews and
Incredibly Lame Puns) and impressively epic in its scope, using a lot of
Wire Fu action sequences and this was one of the first television series to make extensive use of
CG creatures.
It was created by Sam Raimi of
Evil Dead fame, who would later go on to direct the
Spider-Man movies. Speaking of Evil Dead, Bruce Campbell (Ash) directed a few episodes (Including the series finale), and played Autolycus.
The show started out cheesy and got campier and campier as it went on, but it retained a good sense of humor throughout its run. (And it had a kickass theme song.)
Hercules was closely tied to its spinoff
Xena Warrior Princess, which soon overshadowed it in popularity. It also spawned
another spinoff,
Young Hercules, starring a young Ryan Gosling, which didn't fare quite as well.
As an interest note, the writing duo Alex Kurtzman and Roberto Orci got their start on this show, and have continued to complete a nerd trifecta of scripting movies for
Mission Impossible,
Transformers and
Star Trek.
This series provides examples of:
- A Day In The Limelight: There are several episodes primarily starring Iolaus, Autolycus, and/or Salmoneus.
- All Amazons Want Hercules: No kidding.
- Seriously, if a trope mentions "amazons" in its title, it probably showed up in this series. Or in the Xena spinoff
- Acting For Two: In two episodes, Iolaus' actor Michael Hurst plays an unrelated female character based on a pantomime character. In one episode he played his look-alike distant cousin.
- All The Myriad Ways: Subverted; Iolaus's alternate-universe twin gets developed into a main character in his own right for about a season.
- Anachronism Stew
- Back From The Dead: Iolaus, repeatedly.
- Baleful Polymorph: "Porkules"
- Badass Normal: Iolaus, Autolycus and of course Xena.
- Big Bad: Hera in the earlier seasons, Dahak in the later ones.
- Big No
- Camp: And how!
- Boring Invincible Hero: 100 ft tall monster? Piece of piss. Immortal God? No sweat. The monsters might be okay, but how a mortal half god can kick the hell out of an immortal full god not just once but on a regular basis is a mystery to me
- California Doubling: New Zealand for ancient Greece.
- Classical Mythology: Chewed up, spit out, and hung out to dry.
- Clip Show: One of the most clever uses of this trope, ever. All of the supporting actors play a part in the modern day as actual members of the production staff, panicking over Kevin Sorbo going missing. Pretty much epitomizes the humor of this show. Bruce Campbell as Robert Tapert, etc.
- Crossover Cosmology: Herc spends a season hanging out with the Celtic and Norse gods, and later fights the Babylonian ones.
- Crowning Moment Of Heartwarming: After Iolaus' death, a distraught Hercules states that Iolaus was his hero.
- Dark Action Girl: Xena before the Heel Face Turn
- Elseworld: Hercules in the French Revolution!
- Evil Counterpart: The Sovereign
- The Faceless: Hera, until the fourth season and the final episode.
- Fan Service: Pretty much every female character on the show... and the male heroes as well. This show had some of the skimpyist clothes on television since Star Trek The Original Series.
- Gladiator Revolt
- Guise Will Be Guise: In two episodes Iolaus has to stand in for his lookalike King Orestes.
- Heel Face Turn: Xena, when she got her own series. Also, Hera, the former Big Bad, turned good in the last season just in time for Zeus to turn bad.
- Heroic Fantasy
- Honest Johns Dealership: Salmoneus.
- Hot Amazon: Atalanta (see below), Nemesis, and of course Xena.
- Ho Yay: Herc and Iolaus aren't quite as explicit as Xena and Gabrielle (not that this is saying much), but have you read some of the Fan Fiction?
- Instrumental Theme Tune
- Improvised Weapon: Iolaus - he was especially good with frying pans
- James Bondage: Iolaus, the male damsel in distress.
- Jerkass Gods: The show got that part of the mythology right, anyway.
- Literary Agent Hypothesis: "Yes Virginia, There is a Hercules" claims that Kevin Sorbo is the real Hercules, subtly influencing his real adventures into the show.
- Loveable Rogue: Autolycus.
- Manly Tears: To be shed whenever someone dies, isn't dead anymore or when your best friend tells you you're his family.
- Mirror Universe: The Alternate Universe ruled by the Sovereign, Herc's Evil Counterpart (complete with beard).
- No Guy Wants An Amazon: One episode centers around legendary femme athlete Atalanta hiding her strength so not to intimidate men; it ends with An Aesop about being true to yourself.
- Ooh Me Accent's Slipping: Actor Michael Hurst (Iolaus) was supposed to sound ambiguous (read: American), but his native Kiwi accent slipped in every now and then, especially in the beginning.
- Opening Narration: See the page quote
- The Other Darrin: Around four different actors played Zeus. Possibly The Nth Doctor, considering he's a god and can change forms.
- Please Spare Him, My Liege!: Works only partly with the Sovereign.
- The Power Of Friendship
- The Rival: Ares.
- Sand Worm
- Shirtless Scene
- Sidekick: Iolaus.
- Spinoff: Xena Warrior Princess, then later...
- Spinoff Babies: ...Young Hercules.
- Stripperiffic: Anything worn by Aphrodite.
- The Time Of Myths
- Walking The Earth
- Worlds Strongest Man
- You Look Familiar: Herc's two half-brothers Ares and Iphicles bore an awfully strong remarkable resemblance to each other, despite not sharing any blood relation.(Out of universe, both were of course played by the late Kevin Smith.)
