seekquaze

Good review.  You touched on a few topics I had not considered.  A few thoughts of my own I posted elsewhere:
 
 

I know SIEGE and its tie-ins are the big deals this week, but a few other things came out. Among them is the continuation of the story of Amadeus Cho. In the wake of the death of Hercules he has been charged by Athena as the new Prince of Power to prepare for the coming the embodiment of primary darkness Amatsu-Mikaboshi and the remains of the Skrull slave-army. This was made clear in the opening issues of "Assault on Olympus" in case anyone missed it. What do I think about this issue? Well, I think its mixed. It was not great, but at the same time it was not horrible. It might be too soon to tell about it. Cho is shown filling the role of Prince of Power through technology. He is shown kicking butt despite limited physical training. His use of technology goes to show how powerful someone like Reed Richards should in theory be. Fans of Banner will like this issue as he seems to be supplying Cho's technology among other scientific endeavors. I'm not sure how this fits with me yet considering the apparent ease he defeated the opening villain. I'll have to wait till next issue to decide. The second half of the issue is setting up the quest them I think the series is going to be about. A character well-versed Hulk fans will know of shows up and as his own plans for godhood. This leads into the question of the gods themselves. Due to recent events the greatness of godhood in the MU has come into serious doubt. Once upon a time they were something you shouldn't mess with, but since Thor's return the gods have sort of gotten the low end of the stick. How low depends on who you ask, but I think just about everyone can agree that the gods of the MU are somewhat shadows of what they once were. Which brings up the problem with the coming war with Mikaboshi and his army of gods. In light of recent events how great a threat are they supposed to be? Pak and Lente appear to be trying to promote godhood as something greater than we have seen. They appear to be indicating great knowledge and power does come with godhood. Again, this is a wait and see aspect. About the only thing I did find interesting is the commentary on the Council of Godheads. Specifically the possible reasoning on why it never appears to do anything. The gods have all this power, but they just sit around and debate the whole time. I think the reasoning in this holds some water if you apply it to the real world. The gods in mythology are often thought of as being similar to humans, but with greater powers. The flaws that keep us from working together apply the same to them. Artwise, again I'm not sure about it. Reilly Brown is doing the pencils for this series. I have liked his art in the past, but something about it is different or off this time around. I think it might be different inkers or colorists. Overall, this was a set-up issue. Those are difficult to pull off well. This issue raised a lot of good possibilities, but depending on how Pak and Lente pull them off will determine how it sits overall. Story: 7/10 Art: 7/10 Overall: 7/10

The Perseus from the Pantheon is not related to Hercules.
 
The mythological hero Perseus should be related to him due to being his ancestor.  The current Hercules series has been taking most of the myths as mostly factual.

This has often been debated.  Some say it is regular lightning summoned by magic.  Others say it is magic.  Since it can harm beings as powerful as Thor or the Hulk I would say it is a bit of both.  I would say magic summons it and it is for most part like regular lightning.  The difference is a bolt if it can be fare more powerful than a bolt of regular lightning by Thor's choosing.

Wasn't it mentioned that Darkseid used time travel technology to go back in time before he was born.  The New gods had a different understanding of time than other beings?  Most timelines I've seen place Darkseid around a few thousand to around thirty-thousand years old at most.  Sometimes he and the other new gods are shown as older, but this is rare.

Its from the "Death of the New Gods" story by Jim Starlin in the last one or two issues.  A tale many (if not all) fans of the New gods I know of would prefer had never happened and a story that for the most part was generally ignored by other writers.  The main reasons being for the plot holes and Starlin disregarding many long-established facts about the New gods and twisting their personalities into a story he could write among other reasons.
 
In the story Darkseid stated it has been an experiment Desaad had been working on one time that failed to produce the desired results so it was abandoned.  Darkseid later used it against the Source.  The Source had been killing New gods and capturing their souls because as a power source the souls of New gods were unique and unrivaled.  This power greatly multiples with each soul.  Two souls would not be 2x as powerful.  It would be more like four or five times as powerful.   Darkseid discovered the Source's stash and stole the souls .  The soulfire formula granted him access to the power of those souls making him even if not superior to the Source, the creator of the New gods and a supposedly omnipotent being. The battle with the Source was underwhelming as far as these powers go, but it was enough to tear a hole in reality and Superman admitted Darkseid was beyond him at the moment.  Darkseid even defeated the Source and stated he was not supreme.  Darkseid only lost because of the necessary story reason Orion’s soul was able to tap into the same power forcing Darkseid to flee.

So, it was supposed to make Darkeid omnipotent by tapping into the power of all of the souls of the New gods.   It did not come across nearly that impressive to me, but it might have just been the story.   “Death of the New Gods” was al in all considered a letdown that has been ignored and forgotten.

The following link includes a few scans of Darkseid discussing it himself:

http://image.politicalbase.com:8000/forums/battles/33/dark-schneider-vs-darkseid-sff/313983/?page=1

 
1. Considering his traditional womanizing attitudes and Wonder Woman's own views how much does she traditionally respect him? Is it just the due respect of him being king of the gods and she personally cares for him little? Something else?

2. How powerful is Zeus? Earth-bound? Cosmic-level power? Equal to WW or Superman physically? Higher? Lower? General magical abilities (powers as plot requires almost) besides weather control?

3. How consistent is the "mortal faith" aspect of his power and the power of the rest of the gods? Has it always sort of been there or does it change based on the story? Does Zeus and and the other gods have a "base" level they start out at and the faith aspect can only increase it and their power does not go below that ? (Ex. Zeus starts out at 10 and Ares 8. Faith can increase Ares to 12, but even without worship Zeus will still be 10) As the god of justice and morals would Zeus gain power from people working for justice and morals along with prayer for rain?

Following the "mortal faith" aspect. In theory, if an alien god was worshipped by hundreds of billions across an interstellar empire would their power be far beyond all of the Olympian gods combined or is there a limit to it?

4. Why did Zeus allow the worship of the Olympian gods to die out on a large scale especially if his power is so dependent on worship?

5. How immortal is Zeus and the rest of the Olympians? If they are killed, but still worshipped would they eventually return to life?

thanks



 

" @seekquaze: Hercules was considered the God of Strength and Labor by the Romans before they embraced Christianity.  This information can be found in several books about classical mythology.  Marvel has listed " God of Strength" as one of  Hercules's occupations in the Official Handbook of the Marvel Universe: Avengers 2005, the current hardcover edtion Vol. #5 and as part of Herc's official bio entry at Marvel .com.  Marvel has also stated Herc's strength was greater than Thor's in the very first OHOTMU in 1983 which stated Hercules could lift 100 tons and  Thor could lift 95.  The later (1990 or 1991) Master Edition OHOTMU rated Herc's strength as "Incalcuable - able to lift over 100 tons"  (the highest class) and rated Thor as being "Class 100 - able to lift between 90 and 100 tons (the second highest class).  The Marvel Superheroes - Avengers Roster Book TSR 1998 listed the strength of Hercules as 19B and Thor as 19B with his belt of strength and 17B without it.  The Deluxe Edition OHOTMU '85-'87, The latest handbooks (comic and hardcover), the official website, the new Thor/Hercules Encyclopedia Mythologica, the 1993 Skybox trading cards and the Marvel Universe RPG (2005) all place Herc and Thor in the same strength class, giving neither the advantage.  It has indeed been stated officially  that Hercules is stronger than Thor  several times.  The only time I've ever seen where Thor rated higher than Herc was at classicmarvel.com and that was only using his belt of strength.  Every other definition/categorization of their strength places them at the same level.    "

I got it and liked it.  Ares's speech near the beginning summarizes his character perfectly.  He is not the type to strategize, develop the best way to take down the enemy, learn all the  fighting styles or anything else important to modern warfare.  He is the part of war that is all about destroying your enemy through any means necessary while taking crap from no one.  It kind of explains why he looses most of the time.