#anti dionysus

[alatismeni-theitsa]

In "KAOS" nothing is anything, and everything is wrong

Two disclaimers: I am no stranger to modern art, and I have no issue with queerness in shows, or in my own mythology (I'm Greek). I am also aware that KAOS is a comedy. It's in the gutter of British comedy, but still part of the genre. At least I laughed every time they said "Oh God!". I don't believe this is the same person who wrote the great and amusing "End of the F**king World"! The premise of "The gods in our modern world" appeals to me a lot, so that wasn't my problem either. My general issue with KAOS is its horrible delivery, bad writing, and piss-poor Greek representation.

This is gonna be long and full of stupid gifs, so sit comfortably, grab a coffee or some popcorn and... pame!

The "ILoveGreekMythology" Kid

Art without context is just a pretty thing to look at. Most of the time, this context can be found within the art piece itself, as the artist has taken care to weave it in. KAOS refuses to connect itself to any context besides the names and a few vague powers. It aims to exist outside of those "boring old stories of the Greek myth" and be entirely "fresh and modern". Something impossible when the entire show and the meanings are based on ancient recorded material. In other words, KAOS is so meta that it ends up being nothing. KAOS cannot stand on its own because you need more than the viewers being familiar with the Greek myth basics to pull such a show off.

KAOS tells us "See? I know all the names of the gods, and what they did, and I know all the locations, so I am qualified to tackle this". More or less like any Western kid who takes all their knowledge from PJO and Marvel and proceeds to unironically hate ancient deities and make a girlboss out of Medusa.

Here's a Greek word for you guys, ημιμάθεια, meaning "half-knowledge". Α Greek saying very well declares "Half-knowledge is worse than no knowledge". The confidence of thinking you know enough often leads you to grave mistakes whereas the humility of not knowing prevents you from touching shit that you shouldn't. When you have no idea what the original myth is trying to say and spit on its meaning, knowing a few names and locations is just smoke and mirrors. I don't believe the audience fell for that.

And don't get me started on the "subversions". A good subversion is intriguing and thought-provoking. In KAOS, every twist was hollow - Greek myth related or otherwise.

"What if Euridice doesn't love Orpheus?" I don't know, babe. What if??? What was the point of that? What did you show us? That women's stories are dominated by men and men don't listen to women, perhaps? And you chose to twist... the love story of Orpheus and Euridice to show this?? One of the best and most tragic love stories Greek mythology has to offer?? You just mocked the myth, you didn't make anything profound out of it.

The Greek Stuff (Nothing salvageable)

I was surprised to see they had a Consulting Producer (Georgia Christou) and an Assistant Script Editor (Isabella Yianni) who happen to be Greek. And I stress that because those people probably weren't hired or utilized for being Greek. We are not sure they were involved in cultural decisions because we have no evidence and because shows with no Greek elements can have more Greeks than that on their staff.

Okay, perhaps they took 5 seconds to ask Isabella about a greeting - which they proceeded to say in a wrong intonation 🙄🤌It's where Poseidon says "ya sás" in the Fates, by the way. How he said it sounds more like "for you (pl.)" than "health to you (pl.)".

Surprise! The only Greek actor present (Peter Polycarpou) has less than 5 minutes of screen time and plays the caricature of an immigrant with a thick (and inaccurate Greek) accent. He has a canteen, selling falafel which is not Greek, and Dionysus buys from him an unidentified tortilla wrap (which... is also not Greek, if you haven't caught up).

For the show they brought in actors of Maori, Nigerian and Sierra Leonean, Pakistani, Black American, Latvian-Jewish, Iranian, Egyptian, Indo-Fijian and Malay descent and you tell me it was impossible for them to seek and find an English-speaking, skilled actor of Greek descent in a show regarding Greek heritage. Sometimes I wonder, do y'all hate us so much?

They considered Greeks only to give us a simple (and wrong) greeting and a stereotype. Crumbs, we are supposed to be happy with. By the way, there are over 70.000 Greek immigrants just in the UK, usually in the urban centers, many of them students or fairly young employees in the corporate workforce. Not the largest minority but not hard to spot either.

Another plague of Anglophone shows: Almost everyone's Greek name is shortened. Yes, we know their full names but we are told that we will use the short ones. Greeks and their "long and difficult" names am I right fellas? Because saying "Ariadne" apparently requires 5 years of Greek language training, and no English word ever has more than two syllables.

Coincidentally, short names are cool in Anglophone imaginary universes and the "long" names are not. it's so strange Anglophones never make universes where it's cool for Greek names to be spoken in full hmmm... They don't even want to practice saying a whole Greek name for just 2 minutes in preparation for a show full of Greek names. And don't give me that "Greek is hard" shit when we only talk about a few syllables. If Greek kids can learn English since first grade and people here can sing English songs and spell English names, you have no excuse.

They also said the name "Fotis" means light, which is close enough but... ugh.. It's like saying Sebastian means "respect". I am not sure if they asked anyone or what their research was here. If I had the writers in front of me, I'd be like:

(This character from an all-time favorite Greek show is called Fotis)

They also made the flag of "Krete" an alteration of the Greek flag and the local Cretan flag. Which is the stupidest move, because they had to remove the religious symbol of the cross to make the flag fit the universe. These are flags created based on 1) Christianity 2) the Greek Revolution of 1821.

National Greek flag to the left, local Cretan flag to the right:

Flag of the KAOS' "Krete":

The only time they seriously took into account anything Greek, was the time when they decided to remove the religious symbol of our ethnoreligion AND (from what I could observe) keep the nine stripes?? The nine stripes of our national flag represent the syllables in "Freedom or Death". The colors are from the white foustanela of the mainland attire and the dark blue vraka of the island attire, the clothing of the Revolution fighters. (That's more of a meta explanation but the characteristics of the flag were decided during and nearly after the Revolution.)

I think I don't have to explain it more but it's not a homage to put the nine stripes in an ancient era where they have no meaning, and to replace a cross??? Let's... not replace religious symbols on national flags, okay? Thank you.

Another cultural element they changed was making everyone have a dedicated coin to pay Charon. Orpheus has Euridice's coin, "her coin", and he's meant to put it on her before she got buried. In Greek culture, any coin would do. Sorry that our culture restricts your script, dear writers. I guess you had to bend this too, in order to create a cohesive plot with a semblance of a twist.

Finally, the many "Kerberus" dogs were cute and I can understand the creative decision behind that. However, in a show full of inaccuracies, this made me roll my eyes a little. I think the showrunners know that Kerveros is not a breed of dog, and there can only be one of him because he doesn't have any other "Kerveros" to breed with. On the other hand, as demonstrated from art/writing on the internet, quite a lot of Westerners are not exactly aware of how our monsters work, so forgive my uncertainty 😅

Nothing is Anything

Every element KAOS played with ended up meaningless. In the words of a Lifo article:

“Zeus is a paranoid authoritarian dictator in mid-life crisis who fears losing his power and murders his aides to vent. Hera is a promiscuous goddess who repeatedly betrays Zeus and has mutilated mute priestesses for protection. Dionysos is a spoiled and immature zoomer who, apart from pranks, indulges in orgies with all genders. Poseidon a sadistic god of the sea, who tortures the crew on his ship for fun. Prometheus is gay and killed his lover so he could overthrow Zeus. Orpheus is a famous pop singer and Eurydice does not love him. Theseus is black and gay. The Erinyes are tough-as-nails mechs that look like they stepped out of ‘Sons of Anarchy’. The Fates resemble a three-member jury in a talent show. The Trojans are a terrorist group that acts against the gods. Crete is more reminiscent of California than the Mediterranean.”

The "River Styx" is a sea, the "River Lethe" is a lake, the gods are nothing more than spoiled humans, the Moirai are drag queens, the Cave is a club where you have to take a quiz to enter the underworld, and generally everything is modern, flat, mundane and anticlimactic. The producers aimed to achieve a work so meta that a "river" is now a concept, a metaphor, whatever you have in your heart. And those who want to see a river when we speak of a river are probably uncultured swines and don't understand postmodernism. Never mind that rivers are rivers in Greek mythology for a reason. That's not culturally interesting enough to explore compared to the new, cool approach of not assigning meaning to anything. That totally shows love for the original rich and meaningful material...

And the reason behind all this subversion? Probably the shock factor. They brought the characters to a point where they said "We have to save the world from Zeus" - Zeus! The father of gods, heroes and humans! - just because they could. It gives off a certain type of smugness that I personally don't like. I mean, I would like the smugness and cheekiness of KAOS if it wasn't a vapid and practically meaningless show. As nothing symbolizes anything anymore, we are just led from hollow plot point to hollow plot point.

If you cut it out of any cultural influence and see it as a story then it's... okay, I guess. But when you consider that it's meant to derive from certain material and it fails spectacularly, it's not a good story. It forgets its bases and doesn't play with the ancient elements at all. Disney's Hercules did it better, FFS!

Bad Writing (pt.1)

KAOS is not without recognizable themes but their demonstration is so juvenile and heavy-handed that it fails to influence a viewer of average intelligence. For instance, "Riddy" says to her religious mother "You dedicated your whole life to Hera, what about me?" Okay, KAOS, we get it. At the same time, this theme nulls itself because it turns out that Ridy's mother was right to do what she did, as she had a greater goal in mind. (And this, kiddos, is called Bad Writing, because your themes and scenes contradict each other)

The biggest theme I spotted was a criticism of religion and religious people who say "Do as I say, not as I do" and create exceptions for themselves. Only, it's not a criticism of anything real, in this case. It's a fact that some people in the clergy tend to preach peace and love and then they do harm, but we don't know, for example, that The Goddess of Marriage is a cheater and yet she pressures everyone into strict marriages. By focusing their wrath on divine beings who are not known for their hypocrisy, the creators missed the mark.

I can give KAOS props for how it handled Trojans to reflect real issues regarding how immigrants and war refugees are mistreated and blamed. I'd argue it was the only (nearly) well-done theme in the whole show because it had the least on-the-nose delivery and some genuine/serious scenes. But that's it.

More Bad Writing!

Jeff Goldblum's Zeus is shit. He'd crap his pants in an argument with a stern Greek dad/uncle his age. Is this character supposed to be intimidating? (Laughs in Mediterranean) That's not to say that Goldblum is not a good actor, but this role wasn't for him. The same can be said for the other actors, too. They are competent but they only give off the air of "The Greek gods if they lived in London, from the minds of people who think beards and body hair are an affliction". In addition to being misplaced, the actors cannot show their talent when following a script that resembles a children's book.

Why does THE GOD Dionysus have the maturity of a 15-year-old? I repeat, The God Dionysus. He's a freaking deity, and a very old one at that. He is not a teenager neither in appearance nor in experience. In our culture, he is mystical, mighty, wise. Why did they downgrade him so? Just for the plot? This is not Dionysus just because you named him so.

The dialogue rarely takes itself seriously to the point it has you wondering at times "Do people talk and behave like that?". In a comedy where everything is meant to be already extreme and parodied. Even in comedies, something must occasionally be serious so there is a healthy fluctuation in tone and the funny moments can hit you. In KAOS very few scenes treated their impactful dialogue as it should be treated.

The queerness and diversity (good elements, in general) were worse off for being in KAOS. Like, I want these elements to be there. I'm just sad about the whole situation. It's not enough that the show is shit, now you also give an additional reason for conservatives to shit on diverse and queer characters because they are part of a stupid narrative.

I'm the type of person who doesn't mind the queerness of Astyanax and Theseus being lovers in the context of this specific show but they're still the oddest pairing to me because they're from the most irrelevant myths and eras. Also, Astyanax in my mind is a baby who died tragically, for little reason if we are honest, so to bring him back and make him a love interest is... ekh.

In addition, isn't Astyanax supposed to be crippled after a fall from the city walls when he was a baby? Sorry to change subjects but the show is so convoluted and with so many issues that it's extremely difficult to stay on track with what's wrong.

To the person who thought this show was a good idea:

Whatever. Bye. I'm fucking done.

[lo-shouldve-been-an-email]

Let’s take a moment to think about these children that got left with neglectful ass mfs as parents.

[sarafangirlart]

No but now that I think about it the writers of Kaos are absolute cowards for not faithfully adapting Semele’s hilarious demise and instead simply turn her (and all Zeus’s lovers) into a bee, how boring can you be?

[mythsandheather]

TW FOR STRANGULATION!!! It’s on a Perse plush but still.

My “baby Dionysus as Stewie Griffin collection so far. My favourite LO HC is that Dio is actually already fully capable of rational thought, speech and action and that (plus Thanatos) is the reason he’s still thriving despite his neglectful ass “parents”.

Inevitably this spiralled into Stewie comparisons and now I just enjoy imagining Dio doing his own thing the second P+H’s heads are turned.

[massiveladycat]

okay nvm dionabeth exists too. annabeth met dionysus when she was like seven or smth!! dionysus is a grown ass man!! he's lived long enough to meet her greatgreatgreatgreatgreatgreatgreat grandmother!! he practically raised her with chiron!! why the fuck cant you people just do some healthy ships with NOT WEIRD dynamics like 23-year-old manipulator x 16-year-old girl who met him when she was 7. there are hundreds of different rarepairs than pedophilia. ships i do not tolerate: dionercy/dionabeth/dionysus x any camper: he met them when they were children. he is 1000x their age. he practically raised them with chiron. artemis x anyone: artemis is aroace nico di angelo x any girl character: once again quit the lgbtq+ erasure feel free to add the ships you think are absolutely horrible in the reblogs

[bugwolfsstuff]

I will never like or forgive Luke mostly because he is the reason Castor is never gonna see their dad again

Like its assumed that Dionysus had a good relationship with his kids.

And yeah Castor will have Pollux in the future but they're never gonna see their dad again.

They're dead and Dionysus is deathless

They're dead and never gets to see the parent they loved because Luke hated his parent

[tipped-rigby]

I'm still not completely onboard with the term (and the little existing theory around) "transandrophobia" and I'm hesitant about discourse surrounding it. I've spent a while now just combing through discourse about it, and specifically I never see people engage with the actual points he (the coiner) makes about what transandrophobia is and isn't. Or at least that one specific post I come back to, I dunno. I've searched "transandrodorks" even for it and I've never seen a comprehensive rebuttal that these things don't specifically impact trans men and transmasculine people.

But one thing I see a lot about is how people don't like the term because it implies "androphobia." But doesn't that indisputably exist? Like the term in of itself, the literal meaning you could take out of it. Fear of men/masculinity.

Granted, I believe the literal definition is that a phobia is irrational, but I don't necessarily believe that of "androphobia." I think someone could be completely justified in their fear. But having that fear even in a completely rational and reasonable way doesn't change the fact that it can manifest in ways that harm people.

Also, even if "androphobia" implies that men are/masculinity is oppressed (i.e. how homophobia relates to homosexuality, homophobia not always being caused by literal fear), would cisgender men really adopt a term used by transgender men and transmasculine people like this? Am I not conceptualizing the doom that would be upon us if "transandrophobia" were even a little bit known? I don't know.

I'm still reading about transmisogyny and just the idea of transmasculinity at all, so this is not my #1 concern right now. But everytime I see a post about trans male and transmasculine specific oppression, I often feel it's written in bad faith. Could this be my own transmisogyny and unwillingness to give transfeminists the benefit of the doubt? Am I tone policing in my head? I don't know.

I'm not incredibly knowledgeable about theory at all. This topic has only been on my radar since I started following twitter discourse but I think it started on Tumblr.

[my-pjo-stuff]

gen question, what are your opinions on each of the Olympians (you don't have to but plz separate for each god cause I'm really interested

Lmao dw, although I should warn you many of my opinions are the same or very similar on them, so I shortened parts and left others out (elaboration at the end) ZEUS - Tyrannt king who's no better than Kronos in terms of personality who deserves to be overthrown. HERA - Cruel woman who yes, is hurt and props mistreated by Zeus and his actions, but still takes her anger out on innocent people. Also deserves to be overthrown

HADES - Upholding and unjust system who may somewhat be okay to Nico, but still is a shitty parent. He litteraly wanted to force Nico to become the Hero of the Great Prophecy for his own gain despite believing the hero would die. Deserves to be overthrown, and have CPS called on him. POSEIDON - A "nice" dictator is still a dictator y'all. Uses and treats mortal life just as carelessly as everyone else. Him being a good father to Percy does not make him a good guy or someone who is a good ruler. I mean just look at his r*pe bodycount plz DEMETER - Negelctful parent who uses her children as much as canon fodder as everyone else. Helps to uphold an unjust system that uses and abuses literal children and their mortal parents while activley benefiting from it.

APHRODITE - Negelctful parent who also uses and abuses her children. Just because she talked to Piper and helped her dad doesn't make her a good person or mother. The main reason for that is that she does not give that same level of attention and care to the rest of her children- picking favorites is not suddenly "okay" or "cool" just because your favorite character happens to be the favorite child.

ATHENA - Negelectful parent who uses her kids as cannon fodder. And not only that but she's also exceptionally irresponsible considering how she just dumps kids on completely unprepared parents and leaves not helping any further. Ontop of that she's also incredibly prideful and assumes she has some right to meddle with her kids' lives. 90% of the gods deserve to be overthrown but she also deserves a kick in the balls from Annabeth ontop. ARTEMIS - I made multiple posts about how creepy she is already. Borderline creep in her way of specifically going after younger girls. Also not yet sure she ain't leading a borderline cult with the Hunters of Artemis. Also the way she is about men violates so many human rights. Joining her Hunters would be a living nightmare for me, knowing she'd be my patron goddess if I lived in PJO makes me glad she's fictional. Helps to uphold and profits from a system literally killing kids. APOLLO - Helps to uphold a system that's literally killing kids and benefits from it. He uses demigod lives as cannon fodder too. Him "loving" his partners and children does not change the fact that he just leaves/abandons both of them if the kid doesn't happen to be a favorite of his. Jury's still out on him post-TOA and redemtion. If he actively does something against the system to help the demigods or atleast attempts to do we're god. If he doesn't he's even worse than the rest bc now he doesn't even have the "he didn't know any better" excuse. ARES - OG reason I wish Luke won unironically. Tyrant, jerk, probably abusive and misogynistic????? Also the typical case of using his kids as cannon fodder. Neglectful parent 101. HEPHAESTUS - IDK if he talked and helped Leo and said he "watches all his children". He did not help any other of his kids like that, no good father EVER employs even a SMIGE of favoritism. You can watch your kids all you want, if you continue to ignore them, use them as cannon fodder, and actively benefit from the system killing them that makes you a weird stalker at best. But most certainly not a good father OR person. HERMES - I have never seen someone fumble the bag so hard like??? Honestly he deserve a TROPHY for being able to mess up so incredibily much with Luke and May 💀 At this point you can really only describe the guy as inept. He for real just left his innocent newborn son with a woman he KNEW was insane completely alone for no reason??? AND THEN BLAMED LUKE FOR LEAVING HIS MOM/NOT LIKING HER????? Listen idk if he "couldn't have interfered without making it worse" and if it was against some ancient law. Poseidon interferes with Percy a BUNCH even when he was under a prophecy for multiple of his quests and everything turned out fine. Hermes loved Luke, unfortunately he just had a room-temperature IQ. He is also a neglectful parent who uses his kids as cannon fodder- he couldn't care less about any other child of his not named "Luke Castellan". Favoritism still ain't cool my man DIONYSUS - May genuinly care about his kids and all, but he still basically trains up a demigod child army and uses them as cannon fodder. Helps to uphold the system. Litteraly shoves his job at camp off to the kids while being a straight up asshole- no wonder did so many kids turn when HE was their one and only example for a god. EXTRA INFO

I think that "helps to uphold an unjust system" and "actively benifits from a system that uses kids as cannon fodder with no regards for them" honestly applies to EVERY god with exception of Hestia and the minor gods who joined the TA. They are also all dictators to some degree- remember everybody: A NICE DICTATOR IS STILL A DICTATOR. IF THEY WERE A GOOD PERSON THEY WOULDN'T BE A DICTATOR! I hate the gods for real. Although personally in terms of hate everyone get's an equal amount, but Artemis creeps me out the MOST. (Can I get a restraining order against a goddess?)

[flower1622]

I was listening to some songs and i had an ideia to write a perachel fanfic with Peter Pan.

Percy and Rachel would find an old book of fairytales in the Hecate's cabin and they would open it in a specific one about a boy that never wanted to grow up. But, there is something written under it, a question "Would you want to live many adventures and stay forever young?". Rachel would answer yes animated because of the heat of the moment. It was not totally serious, just a little part since she always wanted to experience the same thing Percy and the demigods had. So, the book shines a bright light around the camp.

Both are sent to Peter Pan's world with no memories of themselves. They are Peter and Wendy. My story will have some things from Peter Pan's, but i'll try to change many things maybe (or not. I don't know. I usually don't plan my stories, so i don't know how they will go)

Will (Michael) and Jason (John) would be Rachel's brothers. Luke (Felix) would be Percy's right hand or best friend maybe, the second in command. There could be some original lost boys, the ones from Peter Pan's story and other characters from PJO like Leo and Nico (All the characters from PJO would have different names in the story). Will likes Nico when he arrives in neverland. Clarisse could be a friend of Rachel at school. They would be considered the excluded or weird ones. Annabeth and Piper would be.... i can't say here to not get people mad. Sorry.

Almost in the end or in the middle of my story, Percy and Rachel would have that kiss and they would remember about themselves. But, they are still stuck in the story and have to think a way to get out. Hazel, Frank and Reyna weren't affected since they were in Jupiter Camp. They are trying to think about how they can help their friends. Will they be able to find a survivor from Camp Half Blood like a daughter of Hecate maybe? Or will they be able to do this by themselves? 🤔🤔

Obs: Luke is still dead, so the one in the story is a fake one. If or when Percy and his friends are saved, Percy would remember the Luke he met in the story as Peter. The one who never betrayed them. Percy knows that the friendship he had with the fake Luke could be almost the same he would have had with the real Luke.

I gave some spoilers? Yes. But, who cares? Only few people read my stories, so i'm good. This is just a note of my ideias for my next story. I got inspired by the live actions of Peter Pan. I already said that movies and songs inspire me...literally! The characters from PJO could also be deaged inside Peter Pan's story since many of them are adults. If or when they return back, they would come back to normal with their real ages and everything. Chiron could be Captain Hook and Dionysus... Mr.Smee 😅😊. After getting her memories back, Rachel would feel bad since it all happened because of her and Percy would comfort Rachel and show her that she doesn't need to have adventures in her life to be someone special. The fake Luke would be created by the island because it saw that deep down in "Peter's heart", he missed the friendship he could have had with "Felix (Luke)."

Unfortunately, Percy and Annabeth are still dating. So, i don't know if i make the couple break up since both liked Rachel and Piper in the story a little bit. Or Percabeth could still be together and Percy and Rachel stare at each other, knowing that something happened between them in the story. They understand that everything that happened in the story, it stays there. Both didn't know this would be their last time together. Percy and Annabeth come back to their college. Percy and Rachel never forgot what happened to them. Percy and Annabeth get killed months later by monsters. They could have a last moment together smiling at each other or maybe holding hands(I don't know. Not a big fan of the couple. Percabeth's death would have something very significative behind it). Rachel gets sad and moves on with her life as an oracle. Percy becomes a memory of a boy Rachel met once...a boy that wanted to grow up. She kept drawing all her times together with Percy that happened real life and in Peter Pan's story. She would also tell her stories about the boy that wanted to grow up for the new kids of the camp.

[xxthedragonrebornxx]

fuck this. I'm making a new religion. it'll be called the cult of dionysus and I'm accepting everyone who is normal about trans people and wants capitalism to die.

[masked-loser]

Dionysus and Chiron are gonna have to have a special talk with Leo if he and calypso ever go to camp. Or if he just goes on his own.

He'd 100% ask Nico how he handles fighting with Will and Nico gives advice that only works in healthy functional relationships then asks how often they fight. Nico would then take Leo to dionysus bc Leo buddy.... your gf isn't meant to treat you like that....

[clown-cult]

Finalised Dionysus designs for my comic centred around him, which is called Frenzy, and I’ll begin soon. Plus bonus Hera again. She and Dio do not get along. It started with him being yet another illegitimate child of Zeus and escalated when he found out what happened to Semele.

Click for better resolution! Reblogs > likes.

[lo-shouldve-been-an-email]

Why Dionysus was actually clever but got botched.

Okay,this is my first big LO essay so please don’t mind a bit of awkwardness.

The thing with Dionysus is that on paper it’s actually really smart.

Let me explain-

To understand why Dionysus in particular was chosen we need to understand the original myth of his birth,or welll,the original myths.there’s technically two of them but I’ll explain it later-

Let’s start off with the simpler one,aka:

Semele is the mother.

The myth goes like this:

Zeus falls in love with a mortal named semele,and tells her he’s Zeus.

Semele gets pregnant and Hera gets jealous.

Hera turns into an old lady and implants the idea that Zeus might be lying to her about being Zeus,so she must ask him to show her his divine form.

Semele does this and is-unsurprisingly- burnt to ashes,but Zeus saves baby dio and puts him in his thigh until he’s born,by then being upgraded from demigod to straight up god.

Who raises him afterwards depends on the story,sometimes it’s Hermes,sometimes it’s nymphs,and sometimes it’s-you guessed it-Persephone.

So you already have some inkling on why Persephone is raising dio,but oh wait there’s more.

So let’s gets into another version:

Persephone is the mother(?)

Okay,so have any of you played hades?go play it.

But,there’s a character that has an story tied to Dionysus,and people who’ve done a certain side quest might already have an inkling:

Zagreus,the prince of the underworld.

Now,you may be wondering wtf zag has to do with this but I can explain.

Basically here’s the ancient Orphic version of the myth:

Persephone and Zeus have a son named Zagreus.(it’s important to note that hades didn’t really exist at this point or at least he was merged with Zeus,hence why it’s Zeus and Persephone and not hades and Persephone,since yes Persephone actually predates hades)

Zagreus is the golden boy of Olympus and Hera gets jealous.

Hera RELEASES TITANS FROM TARTARUS and they tear Zagreus apart,the part remaining being his heart.

And dio is made with that.

There’s more to the general ancient Orphic origins of Dionysus but that’s just the basics.

I highly recommend overly sarcastic productions video of Dionysus if you want an in depth look at this explaining his origins to his cult.so yeah.check it out.

Why it fails within LO.

I admit,dio is a good reference.

He’s a good nod and a fun idea,it’s just the execution that leads it to having as many positives as a house fire.

First of all,it definitely wasn’t planned from the start.

Other have talked about this but RS has a habit of bullshitting things into the story to reference a real world date.

In this case,dio was supposed to be a Mother’s Day thing,but when matched up to the timeline?well…I don’t know why it’s such a bad decision on Persephone’s part…may be it’s because HER AND HADES HAVE BEEN MARRIED FOR LESS THAN A DAY.

Also the whole thing comes out of nowhere.

Zeus just bust into persie’s house,says he’s giving birth and instead of going to a doctor(Asclepius isn’t the only one,zeus)

Then,Persephone straight up refuses to give him to Zeus AFTER HE GAVE BIRTH and takes the baby for herself because “he looks like hades”.

Never mind the fact he’s literally purple-

After that Persephone realised she’s fucked up and ignores hades,but he bursts in and she explain how she basically kidnapped a child.

And it’s supposed to be romantic.

Anyways,I’m probably gonna make another of these rants soon,just with Apollo,but this is why the dio plot point…frustrates me.

On paper it’s an interesting reference but in the end it just ends up being stupid.

[sarafangirlart]

Ok so, there is this interesting part of the Achilleid where Zeus and Hera’s relationship is compared to Achilles and Deidamia

When I first heard of it I thought it was funny. Then I read the poem a bit more and I’m a li disturbed and confused.

So tldr Achilles disguised himself as a woman to draft dodge and he stays with Deidamia’s family and falls in love with her, at first it’s cute, Achilles teaches her music while she teaches him weaving and other feminine things. She realizes he’s in love with her but is too shy to reciprocate those feelings. Over time Achilles couldn’t take hiding his manhood anymore and… r*ped Deidamia.

Yeah…

The implication that Hera and Zeus grew up together is pretty interesting, there are multiple sources about both of them escaping their father but not much on them actually growing up together. Hera being shy about having a relationship with her brother is also interesting bc it reminds me of how, in one version of the cuckoo story, Hera brought up Rhea as a reason why she can’t be with him. It’s this whole thing that Hera and Zeus had a secret relationship hidden from their parents.

This also kinda implies a bit of… dubious consent (to put it mildly) in how Zeus got Hera to marry him. Ironically the cuckoo story doesn’t technically imply assault tho I’m surprised this part of the Achilleid isn’t brought up more.

Now this next part is more of a crack theory so don’t take it too seriously.

So you know how Thetis disguised Achilles as a girl to protect him? There is this story that Dionysus was disguised as a girl to avoid Hera’s wrath:

There is also this amusing parallel between Kronos and Hera (screenshot from @deathlessathanasia ):

With both being scared of by the Kouretes.

There are also some sources that state that Kronos spared his daughters and lets Rhea raise them, so what if… (and again this is a crack theory) Rhea disguised Zeus as a girl in order to protect him from Kronos?

[mythsandheather]

My version of Ganymede/Aquarius. I really hope he never shows up in LO cuz RS is lowkey homophobic and she’ll do him dirty.

He likes wine, dropping back into the mortal realm to show his human family the constellation named after him, playing with baby Dio and pressing people’s buttons.

He has several pet roosters from Zeus. They are attack trained. If he’s not bothering Zeus or following Hebe around, he’ll be with the nymphs. Mans is a nymph apologist. Might draw more with him yet.

[massiveladycat]

just found out dionercy exists im actually gonna cry