Greek Myth Retellings - Blog Posts

The Three Giant Lords

When the Gigantes attacked the Mountain of the Gods, many imagined it to be a mindless attack, instigated by barbarians, but it was far from such a thing. The assault was led by three brothers, mirrors of the Three Kings, each armed with enough power to turn the lands of said kings upsidedown.

Porphyrion: The Ruin of Zeus, the Dark Thunderer, King of the Giants, he has gone by many titles, many of which are deserved, yet over the centuries his resolve has faded. He's been betrayed, abandoned, and has been without a champion for years. This has rendered his soul as a spirit forced to wander the mortal world, after all he can't enter the underworld after Hades' put a curse on the Gigantes. Although he has found some solace with the few beings that can see and commincate with him.

He, like many of the giants is considered Zeus' opposite and equal. The power he wields, which many call Dark Lightning is some sort of electrokinetic energy that can withstand, absorb and redirect lightning. There are other possible powers, every champion has a different style.

He was a better king and father than Zeus could ever be, and that made the thunderdick pissed. They HATE each other but for different reasons.

Weapon: Gauntlets that can channel and control Dark Lightning (think Atlas gauntlets combined with Titanstone Knuckles)

Polybotes: Poseidon's Boiler, The Storm Burner, Lord of the Earth's blood. He was one of few beings who could stand in the way of Poseidon's temper tantrums, although he is not as strong as he used to be. The battle between Polybotes and Poseidon shook the oceans, and the rage the giant unleashed on the god of the seas has left burns that have never healed, but eventually Poseidon was able to trap Polybotes' underneath the ocean floor in the deepest part of the sea. Though his body was destroyed his esscence lived on in in the undersea volcanoes, and the champions he choose often have personnal grudges against Poseidon, including a certain king who the sea god hates with a passion.

While most of his abilities center around heat; such as the abilites of lava control, and to create fires so hot they burn even underwater, he is also able to control water and storms too. Such powers seem to act as neutralizer's to Poseidon powers, after all the god of the seas is someone who depends on unleashing devastating attacks on his enemies.

Where Poseidon was seen as a god whose emotions controlled his judgement, Polybotes was often seen as stern and collected, like an unbreaking undersea mountain, but when he allows his emotions to be free, you will know.

Weapon: A pitch-black trident made from Phelegethon Steel, metal that is infused with the power of the river of fire. Hot to the touch, only Polybotes and his chosen can wield it.

Alcyoneus: Bane of Hades, He who gives way for the fallen, The First Necromancer. The youngest of the three giant brothers, Alcyoneus is a shinging light to many beings, and many see him as the greatest of the giants, which unfortunatly has gone to his head.... frequently. He was a frequent believer in "death is not the end" concept, often raising ghosts and spirits from the underworld and removing their restrictions to certain realms, much to the dismay of Hades. Before his body was destroyed, he was the one who managed to cast a spell that allowed the other Gigantes to live on as spirits in the mortal world, the ability of choosing champions abilities is another story. He and his champions are seen as those who can bring light to the darkest of places.

Alcyoneus is often considered the Bane of Hades, this may be for a number of reasons:

1. He has a habit of raising the bodies and spirits of the dead from the Underworld.

2. He can access the Underworld without using the gates (Like Hades, Persephone, and Thanatos)

3. He essentially can't die, he can survive fatal injuries like they're nothing, (although he remains a spirit after the Gigantomachy) and

4. Darkness powers and magic of the night have almost no affect on him, he can also create light so powerful the could drive even the strongest children of Erebus away.

Compared to his brothers, he is seen as more of a carefree trickster and troublemaker, probaly since his goals center around "liberating" souls from the underworld. Although he is often seen as an optomistic and suprisingly happy, even if it's often morbid.

Weapon: Staff made from some ancient material, and engraved with symbols from the Golden Age

(This is from a story I'm working on, it's basically Avatar, and other YA animated series combined with Percy Jackson, which is also where I got alot of the inspirations for the Giants and their abilities. The story is basically after the giants were killed in Gigantomachy their spirits lingered on in the mortal world and over the centuries they have chosen champions in the hopes of bringing the gods down. If anyone wants to add these aspects to any greek mythology media, go ahead.)

Idea for the Giants/Gigantes (Grk Myth FanFic? AU? IDK)

I've had this idea for a while now; what if the Giants that attacked Mt. Olympus almost suceeded but they were defeated they're bodies were destroyed/imprisoned and they chose champions to fight back against the gods.

Here, the Giants themselves are NOT the direct children of Gaea and Tartarus or Ouranos, it's more like how Gaea sees all beings as her children/grandchildren (also some of these primordials may have aided).

Giants, as a group, have been around since the Golden Age and come in a variety of types (like nymphs), they also posessed great power. Not quite on the level of the gods, but with the magic given to the Giants leading the charge on Olympus, the Dodekatheon feared them. Rather than just mindless beasts created from rock and earth, these "Gigantes" as they were dubbed, wielded powers that could knock the gods off their thrones, which they almost did. But like so many revolutions that would come later, this fight for freedom was silenced by the gods.

Each of the Olympians fought one the Gigantes until they either, killed them, or imprisoned their bodies beneath earth, mountains or even under the ocean.

Yet despite the gods' propaganda, the fight never ended.

Over the decades the giants would influence mortals with particular hatred for the gods and bestow upon them powers to fight back against Olympus, the first few centuries they just gave some mortals a one-up or two so they can fight back against the gods, but as the centuries turned to millenia, the Giants realized these little nudges weren't really stopping Olympus, so the Giants gifted their champions slivers of their magic, bestowing these "Champions" great power. Throughout history, these champions have been fighting back against the gods, constantly trying to push back the rule of Olympus, but the power of the gods is great and the fates of these champions often end in tradgedy and death. But they aren't alone.

As the centuries marched on the gods turned their gaze away from the other mortal races and focused solely on humanity, leaving races like centaurs, satyrs, etc. neglected or worse. Many groups turned to the Giants and began to help them in a secret rebellion against Olympus. Now, champions are seen as great heroes to everyone but the gods, their followers, and their spoiled children.

(Disclaimer: this is a personal project and not a "theory" for PJO, Epic the Musical, Hades the game, or greek myth in general, but if anyone wants to do their own take on this, add this idea to any of the mentioned universes, give feedback/critiscms, or add anything, go ahead! :3 )

I have an idea for something… a perfectly terrible idea for something MWAHAHA!

Updated my Epic the Musical oc fanfic. I write an og song for every chapter.

Tell me what y'all think.

In defense of Demeter (who seems constantly villainized in recent interpretations)

hello my fellow writers and really anyone who has knowledge abt dealing with anachronisms in historical fiction- i am writing my first draft of a novel centered around the life of penelope from the odyssey and i’ve come to realize avoiding modern slang and phrases is extremely difficult to do altogether. SO! i was wondering what you guys considered too far when including anachronisms in a book that takes place in ancient times? i would really appreciate any feedback you have!

a quick psa to anyone recently getting into greek mythology and is a victim of tumblr and/or tiktok misconceptions:

-there is no shame in being introduced to mytholgy from something like percy jackson, epic the musical or anything like that, but keep in mind that actual myths are going to be VERY different from modern retellings

-the myth of medusa you probably know (her being a victim of poseidon and being cursed by athena) isn't 100% accurate to GREEK mythology (look up ovid)

-there is no version of persephone's abduction in which persephone willingly stays with hades, that's a tumblr invention (look up homeric hymn to demeter)

-as much as i would like it, no, cerberus' name does not mean "spot" (probably a misunderstanding from this wikipedia article)

-zeus isn't the only god who does terrible things to women, your fav male god probably has done the same

-on that note, your fav greek hero has probably done some heinous shit as well

-gods are more complicated than simply being "god of [insert thing]", many titles overlap between gods and some may even change depending on where they were worshipped

-also, apollo and artemis being the gods of the sun and the moon isn't 100% accurate, their main aspects as deities originally were music and the hunt

-titans and gods aren't two wholly different concepts, titan is just the word used to decribe the generation of gods before the olympians

-hector isn't the villain some people make him out to be

-hephaestus WAS married to aphrodite. they divorced. yes, divorce was a thing in ancient greece. hephaestus' wife is aglaia

-ancient greek society didn't have the same concepts of sexuality that we have now, it's incorrect to describe virgin goddesses like artemis and athena as lesbians, BUT it's also not wholly accurate to describe them as aromantic/asexual, it's more complex than that

-you can never fully understand certain myths if you don't understand the societal context in which they were told

-myths have lots and lots of retellings, there isn't one singular "canon", but we can try to distinguish between older and newer versions and bewteen greek and roman versions

-most of what you know about sparta is probably incorrect

-reading/waching retellings is not a substitute to reading the original myths, read the iliad! read the odyssey! i know they may seem intimidating, but they're much more entertaining than you may think

greek mythology is so complex and interesting, don't go into it with preconcieved notions! try to be open to learn!

“And perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone.”

- Madeline Miller, Song of Achilles

Chant I in a nutshell…

(OG meme under the cut!)

Athena's redesign!

I put EPIC on shuffle and this makes it look like Hermes showed up to help Odysseus kill the suitors by giving him the Holy Moly HAHAHA

okay, i thought i will just draw some doodle, but here we are..how does it feel that your question ended up causing me to produce such a masterpiece?

“Steadily, my love, steadily. Keep those fingers strong and gentle. Know that you have never truly held my heart until this moment.” -from the fic “Someones Son” by PlotlessWanderer

Happy Valentine’s Day!!

[Athena & Apollo]

This is an absolutely shit doodle but all I can think abt is how funny it was that Apollo just went "Idk he killed some sirens and I like songs so that kinda sucks" and Athena was like "they were gonna kill him" and Apollo like "Damn ur right"

Love in Paradise (but not really)

My favourite moment 😮‍💨

Don’t tell me you’re not the same person You’re always my husband And I’ve been waiting, waiting

WIP of Penelope with her forever-unfinished shroud.

(click on the image for a better image quality)    

okay, Greek mytho or mytho/fairy tale retellings but with versions other than than the most popular one,

like hades and presophone but with the older version, where shes called kore meaning little girl because she's someone so sinister people are afraid to say her name, posiedon is the god of the underworld and hades some random guy who may and maynot be her love intrest in her quest to overthrowing posidon

aphrodite where shes a war goddess as she was in sparta

older versions of Cinderella and co. than grimms

"The heat of the sun rested on me like a blanket of molten gold." - Luna McNamara, Psyche and Eros

Writing tips

in my opinion, many modern greek retellings/stories inspired by greek mythology don't fail because they're inaccurate. they fail because they have nothing new to say.

i don't mind changes to the original myths, as long as they make sense and they have a narrative purpose! i understand that making changes is sometimes necessary to convey a certain narrative, especially to modern audiences.

is epic the musical mythologically accurate? hell no! but the changes serve to tell a specific story and to convey a certain message. also, epic the musical is self aware about its "inaccuracies". and the music just bangs.

is hadestown accurate? no! does it make the change that I always dread, removing the kidnapping from the hades/persephone myth? yeah. but hadestown is barely about them, and it uses greek mythology as a "narrative frame" to tell a certain story. it has a point. it has a message.

what are stories like lore olympus trying to say? what is the messagge of the hundredth persephone/hades retelling? what are we supposed to take from them? "don't listen to your mother she's a bitch"? "mothers are irrational and you should forsake her for a man"? very feminist.

why are we still doing the medusa "feminist" retellings? it's BEEN done. too many times. and they're ALL the same. it's a worse crime than being bad: they are boring.

i'm tired of retellings that are just "what if this very famous story was THE OPPOSITE and the protagonist was an ASSHOLE the whole time and the villain was MISUNDERSTOOD and the real VICTIM" okay but why. why would that be the case. what's the point of the story you want to tell. or do you just want to use shock value.

of course, i dislike retellings that are so different from the myth that they go AGAINST the spirit/message of the original, because in that case what's even the point of retelling the myth? just tell an original story. but i would take stabbed poseidon and capitalist hades any day over the same basic story of medusa being a girlboss or demeter being bad because of... reasons?

tl;dr: stop being unoriginal and tell a good story. or at least an entertaining one. i beg you

As someone who got into greek myths when I was 10, because of pjo ^^^ no notes : perfection even

a quick psa to anyone recently getting into greek mythology and is a victim of tumblr and/or tiktok misconceptions:

-there is no shame in being introduced to mytholgy from something like percy jackson, epic the musical or anything like that, but keep in mind that actual myths are going to be VERY different from modern retellings

-the myth of medusa you probably know (her being a victim of poseidon and being cursed by athena) isn't 100% accurate to GREEK mythology (look up ovid)

-there is no version of persephone's abduction in which persephone willingly stays with hades, that's a tumblr invention (look up homeric hymn to demeter)

-as much as i would like it, no, cerberus' name does not mean "spot" (probably a misunderstanding from this wikipedia article)

-zeus isn't the only god who does terrible things to women, your fav male god probably has done the same

-on that note, your fav greek hero has probably done some heinous shit as well

-gods are more complicated than simply being "god of [insert thing]", many titles overlap between gods and some may even change depending on where they were worshipped

-also, apollo and artemis being the gods of the sun and the moon isn't 100% accurate, their main aspects as deities originally were music and the hunt

-titans and gods aren't two wholly different concepts, titan is just the word used to decribe the generation of gods before the olympians

-hector isn't the villain some people make him out to be

-hephaestus WAS married to aphrodite. they divorced. yes, divorce was a thing in ancient greece. hephaestus' wife is aglaia

-ancient greek society didn't have the same concepts of sexuality that we have now, it's incorrect to describe virgin goddesses like artemis and athena as lesbians, BUT it's also not wholly accurate to describe them as aromantic/asexual, it's more complex than that

-you can never fully understand certain myths if you don't understand the societal context in which they were told

-myths have lots and lots of retellings, there isn't one singular "canon", but we can try to distinguish between older and newer versions and bewteen greek and roman versions

-most of what you know about sparta is probably incorrect

-reading/waching retellings is not a substitute to reading the original myths, read the iliad! read the odyssey! i know they may seem intimidating, but they're much more entertaining than you may think

greek mythology is so complex and interesting, don't go into it with preconcieved notions! try to be open to learn!

oh to be a maenad

Had the most British conversation in my classical civilisation class

teacher: can anyone give a good modern day example of epic poetry like homer's Iliad? here's what we came up with: gangster granny the minecraft movie Mulan kung fu panda Narnia

Reblogging my art with folk songs I feel are fitting part 2

after “The Song of Achilles” by Madeline Miller (warning: violence)

Heliotropic soul who smells of spring.

Sunshine hair with gold-leafed summer irises,

Bright, shining from alabaster flesh.

Chiseled hands over carved wood,

Sinew-plucked strings.

They would never draw blood.

Winter is a minimalist,

Warmed by our roseate love,

Thawed anew.

"these flowers suit your hair so well"

I know the story of Icarus is supposed to be a cautionary tale about the dangers of getting ahead of yourself...

But has anyone thought about whether Icarus intended to fall? What if when he flew high above, out of the awful labyrinth that had entrapped him and his father all this time, he finally felt free in the endless sky with the ocean under him? What if he looked beyond and saw a city on the horizon and while his father flying beside him shouts that it is safe haven, that they have found a place to land, all Icarus could see was another maze, with its walls and paths and crossroads. Only this one seemed to have more people caught in it. What if he looked at it all and refused to be one of them, refused to live the rest of his life in another labyrinth after just escaping one. What if the sun wasn't his doom but the bright burning possibility of freedom.

You must understand, I'm not saying he definitely wanted to fall. But maybe he never wanted to stop flying. Maybe he never wanted to be parted from the sky and sea. Maybe he just wanted to be free.

When the rocks seem miles away and the shore steeping and breathless, the desire to keep falling and falling overcomes the cause, when the sky flew faster than you, all the light was just blinding, never golden and when you lay by the riverbank, scarlet red seeping into clear eyes, scarlet red from where carnations grew, only does your breath turn tragic, turning poetic, when love struck jewels emerge, careful fingers touch the rubies, and this is all the power I have, to only lament words I cannot fathom and trace the fall over and over till only golden ichor flows anew.

Andrew is medusa,

Renee is Athena.

Kevin is Icarus,

Riko is his sun.