How do you feel like when someone changes myths?

[Rotsab M. Hyolf]

I_Write_Ivre

It's not like that's new for vampires or myths. No one cared two hundred years ago and no one cares now.

This hits it on the head exactly.

Myths are changed constantly, both because of shifting views and the fact they vary amongst people at their base. Trying to find a concrete myth is like trying to find a perfectly explained urban legend; you can't. It picks up pieces here and there in retellings, localizations, so on. One thing that comes to mind is Theseus and the Minotaur, who in some legends stabs the beast but in others actually has to pierce it with its own horn to break through its tough leathery hide. That is a very large difference, in my mind. Additionally, there are interpretations where the Minotaur is closer to a centaur in appearance, and this is something that was never necessarily dispelled.

Additionally, no one blinked when Suzanne Collins used the Theseus myth as the basis behind her Hunger Games. Myths speak to core values and nature; the finer details aren't quite as important.

A lot of people tend to compare Meyer's vampires negatively to Bram Stoker's, saying that she has 'warped' the source material or what have you. What those people fail to realize is that Bram Stoker was just as ruthless, if not moreso, with his own interpretation of vampires.

That said, I am a bit of a d**k about how certain myths go and tend to get peeved when (what I feel are) important aspects are altered or changed. Take the recent depiction of the Greek Pantheon in modern blockbusters.

As others have said, if you can come from the original place and appreciate why things were a certain way, I guess you can pull it off. It goes back to breaking rules; so long as you know why they are there, you know when it's appropriate to break them.

[Kita-Ysabell]

Rotsab M. Hyolf

That said, I am a bit of a d**k about how certain myths go and tend to get peeved when (what I feel are) important aspects are altered or changed. Take the recent depiction of the Greek Pantheon in modern blockbusters.

You know what bugs the heck out of me? Arbitrary bad guys. Especially if it's a Death God. Osiris, Hades, Anubis, all not bad guys. It's like the Christian-ish projection that got it's hands all over the Children's Classics my grandfather gave me when I was really little (they're kind of hilariously bad) had to go and project a fear of death where there really wasn't one. It's just weird and awkward and horrible.

[Rotsab M. Hyolf]

Kita-Ysabell

Rotsab M. Hyolf

That said, I am a bit of a d**k about how certain myths go and tend to get peeved when (what I feel are) important aspects are altered or changed. Take the recent depiction of the Greek Pantheon in modern blockbusters.

You know what bugs the heck out of me? Arbitrary bad guys. Especially if it's a Death God. Osiris, Hades, Anubis, all not bad guys. It's like the Christian-ish projection that got it's hands all over the Children's Classics my grandfather gave me when I was really little (they're kind of hilariously bad) had to go and project a fear of death where there really wasn't one. It's just weird and awkward and horrible.

Yes.

To be wholly frank, the complete Christian face-lift they've been tossing onto it has been driving me mad beyond belief. I hate the assumption that modern audiences can't possibly comprehend a moral greyzone where the guys you root for aren't good and the people you hate are simply the weak and vulnerable. I was watching the Immortals the other day and it really struck me how the villain would have been the hero by classical Greek standards (passionate, powerful, over-coming odds).

This problem of 'There must be a good character' has bled into other genres as well. A pack of wolves attacks the most feared ex-convict/hero in the universe and he... tames them? Two horrible bogeymen get into a blood war and one of them decides to work with people? Two alien monsters that enjoy ripping humans apart decide to bring humans in and the more intelligent side starts to defend them?!

I miss the days where the good guy chopped off someone's hand and fed it to a crocodile just to see the look on the person's face. When winning wasn't about saving the girl or the universe but just an ego run rampant. I want to hate the hero, and know that at the end of the day it's still the person I'd choose to band with.

xD Sorry for the rant.

But yeah, definitely the opposite is true too (oh this guy is evil because we say so/it helps our plot/he played a badguy in a famous Liam Neeson movie before) and it's just... tasteless.

[I_Write_Ivre]

Kita-Ysabell

Rotsab M. Hyolf

That said, I am a bit of a d**k about how certain myths go and tend to get peeved when (what I feel are) important aspects are altered or changed. Take the recent depiction of the Greek Pantheon in modern blockbusters.

You know what bugs the heck out of me? Arbitrary bad guys. Especially if it's a Death God. Osiris, Hades, Anubis, all not bad guys. It's like the Christian-ish projection that got it's hands all over the Children's Classics my grandfather gave me when I was really little (they're kind of hilariously bad) had to go and project a fear of death where there really wasn't one. It's just weird and awkward and horrible.

This confused the hell out of me for years (I knew more about pagan stuff than Christian stuff).

Do you know much of an improvement it was when Xena and Hercules aired? Hades was just slightly cranky, Hera mad Herc go mad and kill his family and Ares was a bad guy for wanting to create eternal war.

[Cogent Dream]

Anything done well is acceptable.

[Cogent Dream]

I_Write_Ivre

Kita-Ysabell

Rotsab M. Hyolf

That said, I am a bit of a d**k about how certain myths go and tend to get peeved when (what I feel are) important aspects are altered or changed. Take the recent depiction of the Greek Pantheon in modern blockbusters.

You know what bugs the heck out of me? Arbitrary bad guys. Especially if it's a Death God. Osiris, Hades, Anubis, all not bad guys. It's like the Christian-ish projection that got it's hands all over the Children's Classics my grandfather gave me when I was really little (they're kind of hilariously bad) had to go and project a fear of death where there really wasn't one. It's just weird and awkward and horrible.

This confused the hell out of me for years (I knew more about pagan stuff than Christian stuff).

Do you know much of an improvement it was when Xena and Hercules aired? Hades was just slightly cranky, Hera mad Herc go mad and kill his family and Ares was a bad guy for wanting to create eternal war.

I just read this and totally agree with you both. Arbitrary bad guys are a huge example of ignorance and undermine the story's integrity.

[marshmallowcreampie]

I don't mind changes, in fact, they can help keep an older idea fresh and new. But I wasn't exactly a fan of the Twilight vampires. Not an "OMG VAMPIRES DON'T SPARKLE" thing, but because they didn't really resemble any vampires from any myth I could find. They seemed more like an original creature the author made up but then she decided to tack on the word "vampire" because she thought it seemed sexier or whatever. Really, imagine if I made a fire-breathing purple dolphin with red parrot wings and called it a unicorn for no logical reason.

[marshmallowcreampie]

Kita-Ysabell

Rotsab M. Hyolf

That said, I am a bit of a d**k about how certain myths go and tend to get peeved when (what I feel are) important aspects are altered or changed. Take the recent depiction of the Greek Pantheon in modern blockbusters.

You know what bugs the heck out of me? Arbitrary bad guys. Especially if it's a Death God. Osiris, Hades, Anubis, all not bad guys. It's like the Christian-ish projection that got it's hands all over the Children's Classics my grandfather gave me when I was really little (they're kind of hilariously bad) had to go and project a fear of death where there really wasn't one. It's just weird and awkward and horrible.

Oh, I absolutely HATE that. It's basically the writer taking the source material and then messing with it so it fits the Western/Christian formula, usually for "good vs. evil", "light vs. dark", "life vs. death", etc. It makes me wonder, why bother even doing that if you're just gonna ignore most of the material and change everything?

[Taivaspoika]

If you take a look at Norse mythology... there are actually many versions of the same myth. Same goes for vampires - originally they were more like zombies than the vampires we know now.

But you got to keep it in context and not throw all out of the window. Anything done with common sense has potential to be great.

[DarknessofHeavenandDreams]

marshmallowcreampie

Kita-Ysabell

Rotsab M. Hyolf

That said, I am a bit of a d**k about how certain myths go and tend to get peeved when (what I feel are) important aspects are altered or changed. Take the recent depiction of the Greek Pantheon in modern blockbusters.

You know what bugs the heck out of me? Arbitrary bad guys. Especially if it's a Death God. Osiris, Hades, Anubis, all not bad guys. It's like the Christian-ish projection that got it's hands all over the Children's Classics my grandfather gave me when I was really little (they're kind of hilariously bad) had to go and project a fear of death where there really wasn't one. It's just weird and awkward and horrible.

Oh, I absolutely HATE that. It's basically the writer taking the source material and then messing with it so it fits the Western/Christian formula, usually for "good vs. evil", "light vs. dark", "life vs. death", etc. It makes me wonder, why bother even doing that if you're just gonna ignore most of the material and change everything?

Hell, what's worse than taking a non-evil god and saying it's evil is saying 'yin and yang' are good and evil'.

Why bother even looking up the names if you're not going to research further?

[Canterellare]

The only thing I hate changes in is Greek mythology. The rest I couldn't careless about.

[Pirate Gigue]

I don't mind changes in that, even. In Venus and Adonis by Shakespeare, you never hear mention of Venus's husband. She's not how she is in the myths. But I honestly don't mind it.

As Cogent Dream said, anything done well is acceptable. That's all I ask.

[Mortok]

Myths are public domain. I don't care how much you ******** with them, as long as the internal logic makes sense.

Immortals raped Greek mythology mercilessly, but I don't care about that. What I care about is s**t that makes no sense even within the context of the story itself, like Zeus forbidding the other gods from helping Theseus without any sort of explanation as to why, going so far as to kill one for disobeying, when he knows full well that his own life, the lives of his family and the fate of the universe are at stake and that they really can't afford to gamble it all on the actions of one mortal.

That's a problem with having any sort of deities appear in your stories. Most of the time either they solve everything in the blink of an eye, which is a cop-out, or they don't do anything at all, in which case, what the ******** are they doing here?

But myth-warping is more common than you think. Marvel Comics has the deities of various mythologies manifest as advanced aliens, and I think that's a completely valid interpretation. In fact, people have been doing it for years and years. H.P. Lovecraft did it back in the 1930s or so.

Fictional works that incorporate Norse mythology (my own included), frequently choose to interpret Valkyries as badass warrior women, because that's more fun and itneresting than being a divine waitress in a heavenly mead hall.

There's probably a billion examples I could come up with, given time to research, but I'm lazy

[I_Write_Ivre]

Mortok

H.P. Lovecraft did it back in the 1930s or so.

I still have no idea how one logically goes 'corn god = rape tentatcles'.

[Rotsab M. Hyolf]

Mortok

...

Fictional works that incorporate Norse mythology (my own included), frequently choose to interpret Valkyries as badass warrior women, because that's more fun and itneresting than being a divine waitress in a heavenly mead hall.

...

Actually, valkyries weren't waitresses; they were divine beings who lifted/collected fallen soldiers from the battlefield to bring to Valhalla. Given the 'valk' in the word (which means wolf) it's very likely the Norse were referring to the wolves and crows who were eating the dead carcasses.

Naturally, very few people make use of this cannibalism = spiritual acension in modern works. I just wanted to clarify they were never divine waitresses, and also accent how far them being warrior women is from the original thought.

Not that I don't like warrior women! I just... secretly wish people wouldn't call them valkyries. Or at least incorporate cannibalism.

I_Write_Ivre

I still have no idea how one logically goes 'corn god = rape tentatcles'.

Clearly he had deep-seated feelings about his mother and tigers. Corn = niblets > nipples > mom's breasts > mom is an octopus.

Makes sense to me!