The New Hercules

Ever since Kevin Sorbo's Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, I've been a huge Hercules fan.  Yeah, so Hercules is a big beefy sort of warrior, but he's also struggling to survive Hera's attempts to wipe him off the face of the earth.  I think what struck me in that old series is how much Hercules suffered when his family and friends were always targets of the gods.  He could survive.  They could not.  So most often, he ended up alone.

We went to see the new Hercules with Dwayne Johnson last week.  First, let me say that I'll see ANYTHING with the Rock in it.  The man makes milk look sexy.  He certainly seems to be made for the role of Hercules.  I follow the Rock on Twitter and I've been absolutely drooling over the photos he shared for months, itching for this movie to come out.  In that regard, it absolutely did not disappoint! 

If you're a Big Bang Theory fan, you remember that sound when Amy shakes hands with Zack? I always thought that sound was hilarious.  Until I actually made a suspiciously similar sound when I saw the massive expanse of the Rock's back as he waded through the lake and attacked the Hydra.  Ahem. 

Anyway, yes, I enjoyed the movie.  I didn't absolutely love the story itself, though.  I loved the way they played with the idea of legend and how those stories can be magnified and spread over time...sometimes for not so good reasons.  That came to play with the villain's role and how Hercules's family was slaughtered.  I loved the *idea* of a three-headed Cerebus being almost rationally explained by three slobbering ravenous wolves an idiot tried to tame.

But for me, I love the legend and the bigger than life strength and magic of someone who's not wholly human.  It all did come together at the end, but it still seemed as though something was missing in the story.  I needed something else to take it from entertaining to O.M.G.  For me, that probably would have been a love interest.  I'm glad they didn't go that route with the Princess, don't get me wrong.  I didn't like her much and I'm also glad they let Atalanta be a warrior without any romantic attachments to Hercules.

But it really needed a love story to take it over the edge for me.

And what's with all the violence toward horses in these fantasy adventure movies?!?  First Conan punches a horse and now Hercules THROWS a horse!  I suppose it was probably a hat-tip sort of element to that iconic scene from Conan the Barbarian but I could have done without it.

What about you - have you seen Hercules?  What did you think of it?