For some background...
I'm going into this blind. I had planned on watching another BBC iPlayer show (Civilisations if you are interested) but I saw this and thought "Sure, that sounds fun!" and since I've not really blogged in forever, I thought I'd do a post about it too.
I am currently doing my Masters degree in Classical Studies. I have also done by BA in Classical Studies, Archaeology, and Creative Writing. I utterly adore literature, as you may know. I studied the Aeneid and the Odyssey for my A Levels in Classics, and I've mostly read the Iliad. I've not read it cover to cover or in depth like the other two epics, but I do know what happens when.
Let's begin, shall we?
Awwww horse!
OK so Cassandra is a child and is already having visions? That seems odd. Cassandra was only given visions when she turned down the god Apollo , so he gave them as a punishment - knowing the truth but never being believed.
Oh no poor horse is spooked! Beautiful wolf though.
If someone with a deity says "It's just a game" never ever believe them. Besides, one correct answer to that question would be Persephone.
And this is why you never anger a Classical deity...
Oh yay the cow is back!
OK so Hector is just another mortal human by the looks of it... I hope Patroclus appears soon.
Right. Not quite. The Paris/Alexander part is true, to an extent, but he was not captured by wolves. He was supposed to be killed by his parents, as his birth would signal the fall of the kingdom. He was sent to Agelaus because Priam and Hecuba were unable to kill him. Instead, the baby survived and Aeglaus raised him as his own. Admittedly, this could be dramatic irony, not letting Pairs know what really happened.
King Menelaus of Sparta... It begins...
The horses are just so beautiful.
OK so according to the rules of xenia (which is impossible to translate, but think of it as the rules of hospitality) Menelaus should also be giving gifts to Paris. Not so far though.
And there she is, Helen, daughter of Zeus.
Paris doesn't know the story of a famous hunter. This is a mistake. Even the common people would have known the story of their deities, it was religion.
DIANA?!?!?!?!?!?!?! No. Artemis. Diana is the Roman version, Artemis is Greek. What?! Why?! No!
The daughter of a king, alone with a prince. Nope, it would be too much of a risk. Also, Diana? Seriously?
OK so... Episode One done. It was... an episode. It has some good things about it, like how Helen is shown making the choice herself. This is a key part of Euripides' play Trojan Women that is often overlooked. That part, I'm happy about. Getting some myths wrong, that's acceptable; more often than not myths were adapted and changed for the audience. This is how we have different (ancient) retellings of the same stories.
Getting a detail like Diana wrong? Gah.
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