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Hercules Hero's Journey

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Despite how the Disney movie portrays him, Hercules was not an upstanding demigod. This wasn’t until he finally learned his lesson after he was reborn and made immortal in the Greek myth, where his name was instead Heracles. The myth of Heracles follows a writing template called “A Hero’s Journey” created by Christopher Vogler. This template includes 12 stages which are commonly found in Greek myths. The three major portions of the “Hero’s Journey” greatly align with the story of Heracles. These can be seen as a story's beginning, middle, and end, but these segments contain smaller and more specific stages. Although this journey may not connect perfectly with the template, the departure, initiation, and return are all parts of Vogler’s work …show more content…

Although this could be seen as the ordeal of his journey, this final act prepares him for the most difficult challenge. The “ordeal” of the hero’s journey is when he faces some form of death, and then rebirth. For Heracles, this is when he dies agonizingly from putting on the poisonous shirt of Nessus, then “was finally at peace, freed from his life of almost unendurable torment and toil” (Fry 114). This marks the end of his grueling journey, and further finishing the “Initiation.” The final part of Heracles’ hero’s journey is his return, where he goes back to the ordinary world. In this case, Heracles begins his “road back” when he’s finally on good terms with Hera, despite the anger she held against him initially. Hera finally rewards him, aligning with the journey’s final stage. This is the “Return to the Elixir,” which is his ultimate reward. To Heracles, this reward is a wife, the goddess Hebe, given to him by Hera. This concludes Heracles’ return and brings the end of his journey. Ultimately, the audience can understand that the myth of Heracles almost perfectly aligns with Christopher Vogler’s Hero’s Journey

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