Herc #2 – Review

By: Greg Pak & Fred Van Lente (writers), Neil Edwards & Scott Hanna (artists), Jesus Aburtov (colorist)

The Story: Step right up and have your drink shaken, not stirred by a living legend!  Seriously.

The Review: There are plenty of mythological figures running around in comics, two of the biggest being Thor and Wonder Woman (who isn’t really part of mythic canon, but whose roots are so deeply embedded in myth she might as well be).  What sets Hercules apart from these characters, and also what makes him so special, is his enthusiastic embracing of modern life and pop culture, things from which Thor and Diana still tend to keep their distance—and thereby us.

By comparison, Herc’s so much more relatable, even more so now that he’s been rendered mortal, with mortal concerns, such as trying to find a job and a place to live.  In spite of all this, he remains a hero to the core, and to be worth his salt, he needs a mission.  Since he can’t always depend on villains like Hobgoblin to pop up on a regular basis, Hercules makes up his own agenda to protect a New York City borough from the Ares-devoted mobsters, the Warhawks.

This perfectly balanced melding of mortal concerns infected with mythic influences has been a great trademark for Pak-Van Lente’s conception of Hercules and his stories.  Not only do they use Herc’s ancient origins largely to comic effect (“Who’s thy daddy, now?”), they also make some clever parallels between his famous exploits (the lifting of the world on his shoulders) and the current action (his inability to keep a building from collapsing on him).  These are fun details for mythology buffs, but they also highlight the uphill battles he’ll have to fight from now on.