welcome to my twisted mind

So.

Rewatched Hercules to the first time in a long time today. (My mother in law is super into Disney Dreamlight Valley which has a Hercules DLC releasing soon? Any it takes only the flimsiest of excuses to get me to watch 90s Disney.)

And like.

Ok.

Setting aside any sort of accuracy to the traditional stories with Hercules (something that the movie is not trying to do and judging it by that merit is an effort in vain) - its such a *weird* movie.

A fun movie. Great music. Stylish. Very funny. I do love it.

But we have to spend SO MUCH TIME trying to explain why Hercules is only a demi-god, and it's *so clunky*. (If Hades has anti-god poison...why can't he use it on Zeus? Can he make more of it? Where did he get that?) It takes up this huge chunk of the beginning of the movie and like....for why?

I dunno if Hercules being born to a single mom was going to be more 'on Disney brand' than all the infidelity, but since we're throwing mythology out the window, we could also have just omitted Hera and Amphitryon and kept Hercules' original parentage? (But oh, Gods can't live on Earth and Humans can't live on Olympus, so Zeus can't be with Alcmene- a nice parallel to the choice Hercules must make for Meg at the end???)

But like, if we cant do the single mom thing for...reasons, if we're already throwing all mythological accuracy to the wind (and we are, because like...)....why can't Hercules just be a human hero who, I dunno, is just prophesied to fuck up Hades' plan? (Hades still has a reason to target him for his plan that....doesn't make any mythological sense, but again, we are abandoning that complaint. But we don't have to have the weird anti-god juice. How important is it that Hercules be Zeus' son for this story and its themes?)

And hey, BONUS POINTS, you could have Hercules be born/saved because of a prayer to the Goddess of mothers (or like, Hera gives him super strength because of that prophesy or something), and then his name *HERACLES* actually makes sense again?

I dunno. Like, again, I don't need the Disney Hercules movie to be mythologically accurate (you'd have to pick a different hero for a kids movie.) But I do wish that it was a little...tighter as a narrative. A little more polished, perhaps. Fewer anti-god potions that appear once and then are forgotten about.

Also, despite the movie never actually establishing that Hades is Hercules' uncle (who sends his incompetent minions to kill him as a child as a bid to take the throne from his brother, but the minions fail and don't tell him about it allowing his nephew to return as a young man and wreck his shit....)....it does feel a little... you know, just some missed opportunities to branch out a little.

"Why can't Hades use the Mortality Poison on Zeus?" I always figured this was because it's only strong enough to work on a baby god, and that it fucks with people's Fate too much for Hades to use it all the time, so he saved it for something REALLY important. Also, it fits Hades' character, as in his personality, to not want to use it on Zeus but to successfully use The Rules against him; like I feel Hades wouldn't find it as satisfying if his victory were just, "I used poison". That doesn't fit his personality at all. Hades is a person that is LAWFUL even in myth. If he weren't lawful he wouldn't BE Hades. Murder breaks The Rules.

"Why futz around with Herc's parentage?" ::loooooooong sigh:: Disney S&P would have demanded it. There is no way any Disney film would ever have adultery in it. That would upset the Lowest Common Denominator, and the LCD is who Disney caters to at all points and times (which is verbatim what I was told in training).

"Why the bit about gods and mortals being separated?" This... actually doesn't really conflict much with myth? Gods have affairs with mortals and that always goes really badly, because invariably the god leaves, because well, they are a god, they have god-things to do.

"Why not just have Hercules be human?" because he's... not? Like he's not. You can't make Hercules human, he's not human. There is no adaptation in the world, no matter how terrible, that makes him human. If you want a human hero it wouldn't BE Hercules anymore, it would be someone else.

"Why spend so much time explaining the demigod thing" Because the audience is expected to be largely not this religion (remember, Disney always prioritises and assumes conservative Christian audience members), so they have to explain a very basic idea that the whole story rests on. But they also decided to make the movie about Hercules' internal journey. Like the movie is very much ABOUT internal shit. I'm not sure what you think the movie SHOULD be about instead of this. It's not about anything else it's about Hercules and his internal journey finding out who he is and what he is and what that means. Most of the Disney Renaissance was stories about the hero's internal journey of self (with the exception of Beauty and the Beast, which was about the beast/Adam being led to self-discovery by the main protagonist, and he is not really the protagonist but he's not... not a protagonist).

I had to turn this off, but it's something that allows Windows and anyone using your device to generate text/images.

Children die, death/murder is not an adult topic.

The Troubled Teen Industry exists, child trafficking is not an adult topic.

Children get raped, sexual assault is not an adult topic.

Children have alcoholic parents, addiction is not an adult topic.

Children get beat to the point of hospitalization at school, that level of violence is not an adult topic.

My brother @transfaguette went missing last Tuesday. (5/12/26) The family was left a suicide note on a hard drive similar to the one posted on this platform 2 nights ago. His last known location was Chittenango Falls, New York, our hometown. You may have seen the selfie of him standing in front of the falls. The park was turned upside down by the most qualified personnel in the state, including SWAT and cadaver dogs. Ansel is nowhere to be found. You may have seen the news reports.

We suspect he may be alive somewhere with somebody. The police have been on top of this investigation 24/7 and have gone to every length to help us. There is one major piece missing to this puzzle that we feel could provide us some answers - his online presence. If you interacted with Ansel on Tumblr, X, and specifically Discord, *please* reach out to me. Accessing this information would require dozens of subpoenas that would take months. If you have any screenshots or anything you’d like to share, pm me and I will give you my personal number. If you would like to just talk to the police, you can call the tip hotline at 315-366-6000.

“But Rue, where will these kids stay? Do you want them on the streets?”

of course not. In an ideal world, a kids would have multiple adults other than their parents they could look to for care, but I recognize that that will never be a reality for every single child. So: youth shelters, if they have nowhere else to go. There should be clean, warm shelters where anyone under 18 can stay for as long as they need, no questions asked. (And of course shelters that aren’t just for kids, but we’re talking about youth rights right now)

“But Rue,” I hear you say, “what if some moody teenager runs away after an argument?”

First of all, I’d rather a thousand moody teenagers run away than one abused child be trapped. Second, so what if one does? A kid needs time away from their parents, so they leave. The vast majority of them will get some time to cool down and then go back home, and if they don’t want to go back, period? Then nine times out of ten, they have a good reason. (Because yes, as hard as it is for you to believe, kids are humans who have common sense.)

“Okay, but what about the one time out of ten the kid doesn’t have a good reason?”