July 23, 2010

"Hercules, hero of song and story"

Man, I used to eat this cartoon up when I was a wee lad back in days when we got only two and a half channels. It was in black and white back then, or so I thought. It came on on Sunday mornings, during that time after I had been readied for church and before my dad was ready to leave. My dad shares my resistance to situations wherein one might be obligated to be civil to people on weekends, but he had a greater sense of tradition and duty, so we went to church religiously (if you will) ... but we weren't in any hurry about it, and we didn't tend to stay a minute longer than necessary.



Disney version? Don't make me laugh. Literally, the Disney version didn't make me laugh. Much. I'm sure some of you were very fond of it, but it pales in comparison to this cartoon. IMHO badabimbo.

So, yeah, Herc and his annoying little centaur buddy came on before Davey and Goliath, which I didn't like that much anyhow, since I found it both tedious and painful to watch the characters work their way from error to correction. Brady Bunch anxiety, if you know what I mean. I never saw much D & G, since we had a 25 minute or so drive to church (driving past two other churches of the same denomination for reasons that escape me to this day).

Joseph Campbell would probably have something to say about the degree to which I associate the 60s cartoon Hercules with church--two of the hero's thousand faces converging, or something-- or make it three, since Herc and Superman are kind of twinny as drawn. I do not believe that the New Testament would be improved by the inclusion of a shrill, hippogynous centaur, but deep down in the dusty church basement of my unconscious, Jesus and the assertively pagan Hercules are at a pot luck supper, enjoying a nice crock pot of chunky primordial Jungian soup.

Made from centaur stock.

3 comments:

Michael said...

Did I hear that right: "The softness in his eyes/The iron in his thighs"????

Rosemary said...

"Fire in *every* part of the mighty Hercules," Mike.

My Sunday morning cartoon routine included back-to-back episodes of "Rocky and Bullwinkle," punctuated by the occasional infomercial for Paul Anka records or the Ronco rhinestone and stud setter. If there's a Campbellian/Jungian connection there, I'll be damned if I know what it is.

yarmando said...

Points for the Disney version: Meg, the only suicidal Disney princess, and the Menken/Ashman muses-as-girl-group.