#AND HOLD THEM DOWN AND ODYSSEUS!!!!!!!

[bitter-goodbyes]

Finally finished listening to EPIC I’m sobbing <333

[murasaki-cha]

Antonius: Only the ocean and I will know~

Poseidon: Oh Tartarus nah!

Poseidon: The ocean will snitch! The ocean will snitch so hard!

Poseidon: The ocean will be pulling up to your king with a clipboard, tell him to sit down, and explain in incredible detail everything that happened with bullet points.

Poseidon: The ocean will be showing a PowerPoint presentation of the event.

[time-for-opinions]

odysseus actually saying the word rape in the song freed me of all the discomfort hold them down made me feel

idk why but it's just so. sexual assault has always been something that should have clear boundaries - and instead, you see the people in power, people who should punish and uphold the law, shift around definitions and wordplay.

as if it isn't a disgusting violation of a person, of their life, of their trust.

metaphors are beautiful, they're my favourite figure of speech. but metaphors, skirting around the topic, when it comes to rape, is what, to me, truly makes that feeling of disgust and discomfort, and yes, even panic, rise.

because the truth is? i know there are people who can excuse and disregard "taking her love and more". not consider it rape. not consider it assault. there are, unfortunately, people who can disregard a metaphor this clear. justify it, even.

but most of those people can't justify the word rape.

I dont know if this makes sense. forgive me if it doesn't. but to me, the intense nausea that hold them down brought about was erased and hell, even comforted, by the rage and protectiveness and bluntness of that one line in odysseus.

jay did a fucking fantastic job.

[fairytalesofstarlight]

Antinous: When the crown wonders where the prince is, only the ocean and I will know!

Poseidon, still recovering from his encounter with Ody: HE IS NOT AFFILIATED WITH ME

[fireheartwraith]

Let's set the scene: it's Hold Them Down, the stage had been filled with table to mimic a dining hall. The suitors are trying to string the bow, unsuccessfully. Antinous stands up on a central table and begins firing up the men while their plan is projected in the background. While this is happening, a cloaked figure begins taking some props away. A stage hand, perhaps? An observant person might notice, however, that the food on the tables remains untouched, only the weapons have been moved. While everyone, including the audience, is distracted by the musical number, this same cloaked figure steps into the stage once again, taking the king's bow that had been discarded in a corner. They calmly string the bow, shooting through the twelve axes and Antinous throat in a single shot. As he falls choking on his own blood, all the lights are abruptly cut, leaving only the mysterious figure spotlighted in red. He removes his cloak, revealing Odysseus. The red light also goes out, leaving the stage shrouded in darkness.

The hunt has begun.

[thebrazilianfairy]

How about the "I heard today is telemachus birthday" Au

The suitors are actually nice, and just help penelope around with Telemachus and the kingdom

Odysseus is red with anger just to com home and everyone is helping penelope plan a birthday party to his son and helping her with ithaca while he is gone.

No bloodshed

And he gets to see penelope again and they have their emotional meeting.

The suitors are like

"SO THE KING IS ALIVE"

"I told you we should have belived the queen"

"Telemachus will be so happy to see you here"

"HEY, it became a legend that only you could string that old bow, since then everyohe tried but no one could do, can you show us?"

"Hey, let the king have a moment with his wife, they havent seen eachother in 20 years"

"Hey you two can have your moment alone, we will warn when we see your son boat on the horizon"

And then on their room

"What was that?"

"Oh yeah, telemachus' friends,they are pretty nice, they helped us around the palace."

And odysseus is like: ":0"

[killer-queen-k]

I love the evolution of the seriousness of the suitors intent towards Penelope. Tw: SA

So in "Legendary" it begins with Telemachus saying the suitors are "they're trying to win the heart of my mom." This is framed as a naive boys version of the situation. He doesn't understand the severity situation regarding his mother. He knows the situation is bad but he doesn't recognise how bad it is.

But that instantly changes when the suitors first speak. Antinous makes a joke of it saying "Open her room and we can have fun with her." It's framed as more of a lewd joke with the intent of provoking Telemachus rather than a direct threat of rape.

Then we get to Hold them Down. The threat has turned from a disgusting joke to a real plan. The song does everything but say the word "Rape." It uses a strong innuendos to convey what it needs to.

It isn't until "Odysseus" that their plan is called out for what it is. The suitors wanted to rape her. End of story. And it's said with all the vitriol and hate it deserves and it's paid back tenfold by The King of Ithaca.

[sydneyofalltrades]

how many of us are in agreement that odysseus strung up his bow and shot through the twelve axes with EASE to get to his real target, antinous’ throat?

[timeforsomeimprovising]

[chapollynh]

In the spirit of the Ithaca Saga release here's some OdyPen! I cried SO much at the line "There's a girl I have to see" and at Would you Fall in Love with Me Again so it was only fair I made then crying too. Anyways, it was amazing being part of the fandom during the realeases (although I only arrived this year) so I wanted to make something for it!

[xxtani16]

If none of the animatics for Hold Them Down has Odysseus shooting that arrow that killed Antinous right through the twelve axes, It'll be a missed opportunity

[curiouslymyown]

Telemachus being the only thing stopping the suitors from getting to Penelope makes me SICK

[epicthemusicalstuff]

Which song do you think Athena will turn up in?

[messymoonmad]

This was the highlight of my day ✨️💛

[raguonmynieceandnephew]

The Hell of Wait

Imagine this: You are the Queen of Ithaca. You gave birth at most like 5 months ago and your husband is gone to fight a war. You are now to raise this kid by yourself. The war itself takes ten years. You get the news he won, and the other kings are back in their homes, but yours is still there. He probably died. Now you have to entertain suitors who believe he and all the 600 men he took to war died and they turn out to be the a gang of assholes that pester you and your son. You wait.

You and your mother in law still believe he will come but he takes so fucking long she dies of a broken heart. You keep waiting.

You are forced to keep serving the suitors, forced to spend stupid amounts of money everyday on food and wine, throw banquets, parties, allow your home to be desecrated and is forced to house the freeloaders, no matter how much unsufferable they are, because of divine law. And you can't even complain because said divine law is the only thing that protects you from them aswell, at least for now, but you know it's only for a while. They are dangerous power hungry monsters, led by a fucking sociopath who bullies your teenage son and jokingly threatens to SA you on a daily basis, and he is so bold he does it to your son's face. Still you wait, no matter how much it hurts, you wait.

Yes, you know Zeus will punish them if they do anything, but the punishment means the crime has already been committed, so you are fucked either way. The safest thing to do would give in, but you refuse. Instead you risk your life and plot a whole scheme to fool those men and buy time for his arrival, if he's still even alive. Night after night you unthread that shroud, knowing that if any of them see you do it you are done for (ayyy). But you do it because you have faith, and you prefer to suffer the consequences that forsake the man you love. You choose to wait some more

The day you feared the most finally arrives, you have to pick and there's no running from it anymore, but you still find a way to buy more time, even if it's a few more days: The Challenge. String a bow, shoot an arrow through some axes and voilá. Perfect plan, doable enough so they can't question it but hard enough so they won't be able to do it. It works, but now the suitors are pissed and are about to raid the castle. It's over. But still, you remain waiting. if that's the last day of your life, you will spend it steadfast, unbroken, unwaivering. Waiting.

I love this part, not only because it's beatiful, but because we see that she is fucking pissed. She is very fucking angry at all she's been through these goddamn 20 years. Miraculously your husband arrives just in time, and deals with the situation, the wait has paid off, You can finally see the man you love after 20 years, you can finally RELAX and the first thing he does is fix his lips to question your love? Shit, i'd be fucking pissed too!

And i love how Ody gets angry at the bed thing but instantly recognizes her feelings when she claps back and he just pipes down and shuts up. He recognizes that he might be just a man, but she is just a woman too. She was fighting monsters and storms of her own, and she knows that if he went through half of what she's been through (and she can see he's been through A LOT) and fought as hard as she did for their love, then it doesn't matter what horrible things he has done, cause if she was in his shoes, she'd do 10x worse.

I fucking love this damn musical.

[literallyjustapebble]

I can’t animate so I probably won’t do this, but I just want to get it out into the wind.

EPIC THE ITHACA SAGA IDEA:

The end of hold them down is playing, it cuts to Odysseus slowly stringing his bow while they’re all distracted. Then he gets an arrow and takes a second to aim, before shooting the arrow through the twelve axe heads and into Antinous’s neck 🤗

Just to flex

I think it’d be neat. Thank you for coming to my Ted talk.