#Jason and The Argonauts

[ironmaidenhead]

JASON AND THE ARGONAUTS (1963) Visual Effects by Ray Harryhausen Dir. Don Chaffey

[mouse-romance]

Just watched Jason and the Argonauts and holy shit

I really crave whimsical fantasy.

I feel that today everything is poisoned with irony and smugness, even high fantasy. Everything has to be cynical or "a parody of", and it kills the romance.

This is the most epic shit i've seen in years in a movie, and that saddens me.

[oldschoolfrp]

Jason and the Argonauts, Columbia Pictures, 1963, directed by Don Chaffey, starring Todd Armstrong and Douglas Wilmer -- but really starring the animated creations of Ray Harryhausen (born June 29, 1920)

[the-evil-clergyman]

The Golden Fleece by Herbert James Draper (1904)

[chernobog13]

Jason battles the Ray Harryhausen-animated hydra in the 1963 film Jason and the Argonauts.

[madamshogunassassin]

Jason and The Argonauts (1963)

[hecates-corner]

I had an epiphany.

In “My Goodbye” from Epic - The Musical, Athena is referencing past heroes who she too abandoned, whether that was Jorge’s intention or not.

“This day, you sever your own head”

Perseus, who had slain Medusa

“This day, you cut the line”

Bellerophon, who was crippled/who died when he fell from the back of Pegasus, due to the crossing of the line of Olympus’s high heavens and the earth he wished to impress

“This day, you lost it all”

Jason, who’s wife, Medea, murdered his new wife, the woman’s father, and her very own children, and then he was forgotten

Consider this as my goodbye! This came to me in a dawning realization.

[odyssiaca]

one must sometimes spare a thought for circe. not the circe found in madeline miller's novel, but the one homer spoke about.

born to a powerful titan in the age of the olympians, a sister to thousands of siblings. yet never important enough to guard helios' cattle, never pretty enough to be married off to a human king of crete. never smart enough to stand beside her father. simply circe. young, unspecial, forgotten circe.

of how she saw kinship form for her siblings, and how strongly they loved. her mother forgotten by her father, simply another nymph, or the man she loved so dearly but who never glanced at her.

the rage that must have filled her veins when glaucus dared to appear before her and beg for a potion to trick a woman into loving him. how she loved him so purely, but was rejected and used. the regret that came when scylla no longer looked like herself, and how even then glaucus did not want her.

never good enough. replacable. easily cast out by her father, banished to an island where she will mother neither sons nor daughters, and constantly be forced to raise the daughters of gods who wanted sons.

will they become her daughters one day? will she go above and beyond to protect them as her own mother did not protect her?

what did she think, i wonder, when her niece appeared before her grasping a sword bearing the blood of her nephew? what could have possibly gone through her head when she saw the insincere look hidden within jason's eyes? i wonder if the gods told her how he scorned medea eventually, the same way glaucus did her.

and then he appears and he is everything she has ever wanted. but day and night he speaks of his wife, even as he lays in the warmth of her arms, in her silken sheets, hidden behind her wooden door held up by the walls of her home.

he sails away and that is that. another chapter. another empty nothingness.

one must spare a thought for the goddess waiting alone on the shores of a forgotten island amidst daughters she did not mother waiting for a destiny she will never find.

[ditoob]

I think that one of my favorite parts of studying the Iliad and the Trojan war is how incredible the world building is. The fact that you can research any of the characters and find their life prior to and (in some cases) after the Trojan War, their families and typically fathers which themselves form parts of different epics (Telamon, Peleus and Laertes all being Argonauts who sailed with Jason for the golden fleece) (Depending on the version Herakles, Orpheus, Theseus and Atalanta could’ve also been there with them), and just how much content there is about each figure in the war that you wouldn’t know just by reading the Iliad.

Why was Paris chosen by the gods to pick which goddess was the most beautiful? He proved to the gods on a previous ocassion in a bull competition he hosted which Ares won that he was a fair and honest judge (I guess he lost that fairness in judgement by the time the goddesses appeared before him)

How did Achilles become such an almost undefeatable warrior? He was the son of an Argonaut and a sea-nymph raised by Hera whom both Poseidon and Zeus wanted to bed, and was trained by mighty Chiron who taught heroes like Orpheus and Herakles.

Why are the walls of Troy “impenetrable”? They were built by Apollo and Poseidon disguised as humans due to a punishment from Zeus.

And this is all known with thousands of lines of the Trojan War’s story being lost to time. Imagine if we had more of the Nostoi or Cypria or Little Iliad, if we still had plays like “Myrmidons” or had a better historical understanding of Mycenaean Greece.

And still, with all this content, the Trojan War is just a section of the greater greek myths. The mythologized greek world existed far before Troy, and it continued to push forward far after.

[imaginal-ai]

"Hercules and Jason"

[sarafangirlart]

Another problem with retellings (as if there aren’t countless lol) is that most have the same “this male character was portrayed as a hero in ancient/modern times but he’s actually terrible” is that like… it ignores that the term “hero” has changed a lot from antiquity to the modern day, in ancient times it just meant an important person who did cool deeds, not necessarily a good/noble person like in the modern day. The ancients KNEW their heroes were horrible ppl, hell the Romans hated Odysseus for the Sack of Troy. These figures doing evil deeds is by design, they didn’t care about making “likable” characters, they cared about showing human complexity and flaws, they cared about creating cautionary tales or explaining history and nature, it’s why so many heroes get divine punishment.

The only reason these heroes are portrayed as “heroic” (as in the modern sense) nowadays is bc Hollywood and other adaptions just can’t help but take these stories and water down or remove all the gross stuff to make these heroes more likable to a modern audience.

[k-i-l-l-e-r-b-e-e-6-9]

[facts-i-just-made-up]

Who even were Jason and the argonauts?

Jason was a great mythological hero who went on a journey where he mated with all the women on the isle of smelly women, fought the bears of bear mountain, killed the pigeon people who stole the sandwiches of salami-desu, escaped doom at the violent shores of Violentshoreland, and planted the teeth of a dragon to marry some lady other than his wife— All on a quest for some hair.

Once he got the hair, he returned home to his first wife Medea who was thankfully not at all bitter about his new marriage, and they all lived happily ever after.

The argonauts were his crew on board the ship “Argus” which because I had played Zelda on Super Nintendo before reading the myth I assumed looked like this:

All in all, some of the most famous people in Aztec mythology.

[pelideswhore]

timeline

@a-chaotic-dumbass @nysus-temple here it is!! also tagging @godsofhumanity because you said something about calydonian boar hunt which i mention ever so briefly. the links will take you to fics i have written about the aforementioned occurrence since i will shamelessly take any chance to plug my writing.

Telamon (22) kills his younger half-brother, so both he and Peleus (19) are exiled by their father. Peleus is taken in by his uncle and marries his cousin. He eventually joins the Calydonian Boar Hunt, and accidentally kills his uncle/father-in-law, resulting in his fleeing for a second time. In this second exile he is accused of attempted infidelity by the King’s wife, whom he shunned. The news reaches his own wife, who kills herself, leaving the throne of Pthia to him. The King chases Peleus for revenge, organizing an attack on him by centaurs on Mount Pelion. Chiron aids Peleus and saves his life. This whole fiasco takes 9 years to unfold.

Peleus’ (28) success during the Boar Hunt results in his marriage to Thetis. A year after the wedding, he joins Jason on the Argo. Thetis gives birth to 6 boys before Achilles is born but they all die in infancy.

Priam (27) and Hecuba (25) introduce Paris (0) into the world and almost immediately abandon him into the wild. So far they’ve had Hector (8), his sister (7), Deiphobus (5) and the twins Cassandra and Helenus (4)

4 years later, Achilles (0) is born and dunked in the Styx; Thetis then leaves Peleus (34).

Phoenix (35) gets exiled and comes Phthia because Peleus (35) is his friend, Achilles (1) is living with his dad, he and childless Phoenix bond.

Patroclus (8) kills his playmate over losing a game of petteia; his father sends him away, Peleus (40) empathizes and takes him in, Patroclus and Achilles (5) meet for the first time (ROUGH SEAS)

Menelaus (16) and Agamemnon (21) seek asylum in Sparta, Clytemnestra (14) is immediately infatuated by Agamemnon, Helen (14) not so much. Castor and Pollux (14) are interested in the stories they have to tell.

Agamemnon (22) leaves Sparta to overthrow Aegisthus (20) in Mycenae; he (23) returns to ask for Clytemnestra’s (16) hand in marriage but she’s already married. He kills Tantalus and son (<1) and gets engaged to her (BLOOD-RED HANDS).

Helen (16) gets kidnapped by Theseus about a month later, the Dioscuri (16) bring her back; Clytemnestra (16) and Agamemnon’s (23) wedding gets pulled forward despite the mourning period out of fear for Clytemnestra’s wellbeing and because she is displaying symptoms of pregnancy. Peleus (43) leaves Achilles (9) and Patroclus (12) to go on a military expedition to Troy with Hercules and Telamon (46). When he returns it’s all he talks about and Achilles becomes obsessed with the idea of Troy. Podarkes/Priam (40) earns his epithet when his father (65) gets killed, Hector (21) has his first experiences with war. Telamon takes Priam’s sister as a concubine and she births Teucer, Ajax is 14 at the time.

Helen (18) gets wed off to Menelaus (20). Odysseus (22) marries Penelope (20), Agamemnon (25) and Clytemnestra (18) already have Iphigenia (1) and she’s heavily pregnant (OLIVE TREE)

Achilles (11) gets sent to Charon as a method of education, by now he and Patroclus (14) are inseparable.

Achilles (13) comes back home from Charon and teaches Patroclus everything he learned.

Helen (25) leaves Sparta with Paris (22) (WATCH THE STARS COLLAPSE), Hector (30) freaks out (GATES OF TROY); Achilles (18) impregnates Deidamia (17); Odysseus (29), Agamemnon (32), and Menelaus (27) come and get him for war (SKYROS); Penelope (27) is left alone with Telemachus (1) (CRAZY FOR YOU) and Orestes (10) and Pylades (12) are sent to Sparta to stay with Hermione (6) for her protection.

Achilles (18) goes to Phthia, his father (52) gives him gifts and weapons, Achilles takes Patroclus (21) and Phoenix (52) with him (SAY YOU REMEMBER ME). At Aulis, Iphigenia (11) is brought in as a supposed bride for Achilles, but she is sacrificed (WEDDING ALTARS AND SACRIFICIAL SHRINES). Electra (10) and Chrysothemis (4) are now alone with their mother.

Achilles (25) kills Andromache’s (35) family and she flees to Troy, where she remeets Hector (37) whom she knows from 29 years prior. They get married and a year later Andromache gives birth to Scamandrius/Astyanax.

[darkstarknight03]

There’s something poetic about Thalia being saved by the Golden Fleece, the original Jason’s discovery.

[angelicathedaisy]

Ok but can we talk about how absolutely gorgeous Hera (played by Honor Blackman) is in Jason and the argonauts 1962 because she is stunning!