Season Review: Blood of Zeus Season One

Overview (Spoilers Below):

Heron is a bastard son living in a polis as he mines for a living until one day a group of soldiers hunting down two demons appears with news of a demon army to the east. Soon after Heron learns that he’s the illegitimate son of Zeus and that the king of the gods was with them in the form of a familiar face. Furious at his father’s actions, Heron stormed off and threw away the sword Zeus forged for him. Unfortunately during the evacuation, his mother is killed by the leader of demons, Seraphim while Heron is taken by the demons as a slave. However, does Heron have what it takes to be a demigod of Zeus? Can he stop the demons from terrorizing everyone while avoiding a vengeful goddess bent on killing him?

Our Take:

Blood of Zeus like Castlevania is a bloody show about revenge produced by Powerhouse Animation Studios. It was an epic tale for Heron going from a bastard to a demigod of Zeus. However, the show was short and had a few issues which I will get to in a minute. For now, I’ll discuss what makes this show epic to me.

First, the animation from the fights were good like when Heron was battling Seraphim at his polis and the rebellion on the demon ship. Those scenes to me showed the studios’ best work in the visuals and music. Admittedly for the storyline, I expected in the first few episodes for Heron to join the quest for the giant’s remains, but the storyline morphed into a tale of tragedy and revenge with the emotional death scene of Heron’s mother and Heron’s imprisonment as the quest for the giant remains turned secondary to the revenge plot. Now the character designs are lovely, I particularly liked Alexia, Apollo, and the little mechanical owl that Hephaestus had with him. I’m glad they didn’t have Alexia’s armor emphasis on her breasts like some other shows would with their female warriors. Apollo’s design showed how he is the god of the sun along with the brief scene of him covering for Zeus and his threesome. The voice acting is great and I especially liked Alexia’s voice actor, Jessica Henwick, and Hermes’s actor, Matthew Mercer.

Then there’s the tragedy of Greek heroes in the series. Heron and Seraphim’s tragic past as the brothers were tormented by others because of their lineage. Later on, they’re forced to battle each other even though they knew the other was their half brother. The reversal of fortune that Heron’s storyline receives from being the bastard of a former queen who brought a dark cloud with her arrival to a heroic demigod that sealed the giants at the cost of killing his only brother. Meanwhile, his brother Seraphim after killing their mother is manipulated by Hera and forced to work under her and later Hades to avoid his punishment in the underworld. Their tragic storylines were classic and both of them reminded me of the myth of Tantalus, who was also a demigod of Zeus. Hera’s wrath on one of Zeus’s affairs is also a staple of Greek myths. Her wrath is justified in this series for me in the beginning, but she really took it to the extremes by releasing the giants, the beings that even the gods couldn’t kill and instead had to seal their souls away. This couple certainly brings out their reflection of humans with their selfishness and wrath. Seraphim’s words at the gods being flawed is such a mic drop moment especially with Zeus and Hera’s actions at that point in the show.

Now is Blood of Zeus accurate in its mythology? Not really. I’ll start with Hera who in this series can control and transform into crows. Anyone who knows the bare minimum of Greek mythology knows that Hera’s sacred animal is the peacock, not crows. I understand that the crows are there because of artistic license, but that scene with Hera and her crows gave me whiplash as a fan of Greek mythology. Then there’s the technicality on the giants while they were born from a titan, it wasn’t the last one actually it was Uranus, the sky primordial deity before Zeus with his blood according to Hesiod’s Theogony. Additionally, it’s a shame that the other gods and goddesses from the pantheon didn’t have any other role than just standing up to Zeus’s selfish wish and the war against the giants and Hera’s group, but there’s only so much a studio can fit into eight episodes. The fact that Zeus was essentially a very horny god was one of the aspects that carried over from the original mythology. In addition, there were a few monsters like the minotaur and satyrs. Personally, there could have been more monsters that weren’t demons like a hydra or a sphinx. However, I was surprised to see a Cerberus as nothing more than a tracking hound, and I was disappointed with that.

The show’s short episodes didn’t really give me much of a chance to connect with Kofi and Evios, even Alexia especially with the Fields of Dead scene. I only got tidbits from their introductions and a basis on their skills from the battle on the ship, but Kofi and Evio’s crime on trading the giant’s remains came out of nowhere for me. Also, the Fields of Dead was an interesting twist on the original underworld rules and it gave a bit of backstory to Alexia, but there wasn’t enough time to that tragic moment to really sink in when there’s an angry centaur guarding the place.

Overall, Blood of Zeus is a revenge-driven show that adds a few creative twists to the original mythology that you might not like at the end. Despite its twists, it does have a solid story on Heron’s tragic journey. Hopefully, there’s a second season to develop all the relationships, but with the giants sealed it’d be hard to top that war with another quest that wouldn’t make the show feel like it’s repeating itself.