Hercules: Hero or Zero?

Hercules is one of the household characters in Greek mythology—particularly one of the most well-known mortals (or demigod?) out there. Either from Disney's loose adaptation of his story or the Greek books we got when we were kids, Hercules is undoubtedly one of the most infamous characters in Greek and Roman mythology.

Hercules: A hero?

When we think of Hercules, we all think of a demigod guy who has superstrength and tries to prove himself a hero (thanks, Disney). From Disney's sanitized adaptation of the story, Hercules is this seemingly righteous guy placed in a world where he doesn't belong. However, the real story of Hercules doesn't seem Disney-friendly at all. The entire myth of Hercules being a hero appears quite far from being an actual hero. The question now is: Is Hercules a person worthy of the "hero" title?

To answer the question, we must look into Hercules' real story (Greek version) and compare it to Joseph Campbell's "monomyth" concept, or the Hero's Journey.

Joseph Campbell recalled three main stages of the hero's journey divided into ten steps. For the first stage, we have the departure or the call to the adventure. This is where the hero usually gets the awakening or the mysterious invitation to the quest they didn't usually sign up for. This is followed by the initiation. In the second stage, the hero gets tested, encounters different trials and tribulations, and encounters their mentor, allies, and enemies along the way. After this, the last of the three main stages occur: "the return." This happens after the hero's central climax or fight, where they gain some sort of enlightenment from their adventure. Here, they either return to their everyday life (but with significant attitude or physical changes) or pursue another journey with their allies. 

Based on that, let's look at the structure of Hercules' journey and see whether he deserves to be called a hero or not.

Hercules: A Summary

With Zeus and his casual habit of impregnating women, Hercules was born (long story short: Zeus disguised himself as Alcmene's husbando, got pregnant, and voila!). As he is a demigod, he possessed impressive strength and power no humans had. With Hera constantly trying to kill him and Hercules avoiding it, he grew up not fully knowing his power (funny how Hera tries to kill the illegitimate son of his adulterous husband, but not the husband himself). Eventually, he gets recognized for some of his heroic deeds and lives a great life.

Unfortunately, Hera will not allow that.

At some point, our just and merciful queen of the ancient gods decided to drive Hercules mad, causing him to kill his wife and sons (Disney, where did this go?). Upon realizing what he did, Hercules decides to atone for his sin by approaching the oracle of Delphi and asking what he should do. Cue: the twelve labors of Hercules. He did them (minus the two King Eurystheus didn't consider) all the while, making a name for himself. In a more complicated version of the ending, Hercules does finish his labors, returns to his home, accidentally kills a person, atones for it again, marries Deianira, accidentally kills another person again, settling down, fights another battle, meets another girl, then dies (from Deianira's insecurity and a centaur's trickery). This is the unsanitized version of Hercules.

Knowing this, we see that his story did follow the basic template of a hero's journey: the call for the quest, the trials and tribulations, and the eventual return (happened twice to Hercules, though). So, yeah, our Hercules fits the criteria of a hero's journey. 

Hercules: The Answer

We now turn to his questionable deeds: the accidental deaths. While this may seem unsettling, especially since this is the very reason why he goes to his 12 labors, we must see Hercules as a human. He is a human (...partly?) before he is a hero. And as half-human, he makes mistakes, has a dark and tragic beginning, just like everybody else. He did get a character transformation at the end anyway (despite having a season 2 of Hera's madness). We see him as the end product of his entire being, not just who he was initially. Basically, kudos to Hercules overcame his struggles and the divine interventions and became a demigod worthy of a hero's title.

So I guess, at the end, Hercules really is a hero. A human hero.