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Coming from a discussion with ![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
artaxastra, and after reading her awesome meta on Helen-as-Persephone. These are just my impressions on who the Sanctuary cast matches with in Graeco-Roman mythology (on which I'm quite shaky in places, keep in mind):
artaxastra, and after reading her awesome meta on Helen-as-Persephone. These are just my impressions on who the Sanctuary cast matches with in Graeco-Roman mythology (on which I'm quite shaky in places, keep in mind): Sanctuary Pantheon
John - Ares
Asartaxastra pointed out, there is a delight in violence in John. Not necessarily a sadism, though perhaps some of that too, in his more Ripper moments, but deeper than that. A love of fighting, of blades, of testing and being tested by an opponent (Ashley, physically, Helen, in every other sense). In that sense, he's very Ares. Not war for the sake of strategy, of higher goals, as with Athena, but war, battle, the fight, purely for the sake of the fight. And that's more, I think, than the energy elemental. That's purely John.
There's also the air of distrust surrounding Ares that John echoes. Terror and Fear are his companions, and his sister is Eris, goddess of discord. All fitting for John, in his madder moments, in how he is seen, and how he reacts to that. John, like Ares, is courageous and brave, but something to be unleashed (as on the Cabal), not trusted.
James - Athena
Wisdom. Civilisation. Warfare, but strategic, not immediate. Justice. The companion of heroes. James, I think, is very Athena. I'll admit, in part I like the comparison because then you have an interesting balance between John and James, Athena and Ares, and an echoing distaste-to-enmity on ideological grounds that fits them very, very nicely. But even standing alone, Athena suits James very well. The goddess of war who disliked fighting, prefering wisdom and cunning to sort things out, but at the same time an arranger, a strategist, who paves the path for heroes, as James is for Helen, has been for decades. I also find it interesting, given James' gift from the source blood, that Athena was born fully-formed from Zeus' mind.
Helen - Persephone
Persephone as the Iron Queen, in her aspect as ruler of Hades, not as the maiden aspect from the pomegranate myth. Though she was that too, in her time. She was an innocent once, lured into a darker world. But Helen as Persephone is explored much better and in much more detail than I could bring to bear inartaxastra's post above.
Nikola - Hermes, Dionysus, Pan
Nikola I'll admit I'm very, very undecided about. He's a little bit of a grab bag, not fitting exactly in any one aspect.artaxastra I know favours Dionysus, and I can see it. In vino veritas, the god wandering in exile between worlds, the beautiful and decadent youth luring those around him into blood and truth and transformation. The Dionysian mysteries, a transcendant state of primal being achieved through the wine, the blood, not unlike the vampires Nikola represents.
On the other hand, I also favour Hermes, myself. To quote a Homeric hymn: "of many shifts (polytropos), blandly cunning, a robber, a cattle driver, a bringer of dreams, a watcher by night, a thief at the gates, one who was soon to show forth wonderful deeds among the deathless gods." A psychopomp, wandering again between worlds. A trickster and genius, patron of miscreants. Eloquent. An inventor, the creator of fire, analogous to Prometheus. *grins* Sounds a bit like Nikola, no?
Pan, too, I see a little of in Nikola. Mostly as the sower of discord, the spreader of panic, Nikola in his darker aspects as troublemonger, sometimes unintentionally.
Nigel - Janus
Nigel I waffled on altogether, and if anyone has any clearer ideas, please feel free to tell me -_-; In the end I settled on Janus mostly for his limnality. The god of doorways and the between, as Nigel slips between two planes, the visible and invisible. The god of the concrete and the abstract, against for the duality of his invisibility, and also for his status as what looks like the most grounded of the Five. The god of time, not as a static thing but as a progression between states, changes, as Nigel was the only one among the Five to follow time's proper progression (more or less), the only one among them to really change. The god holding access to all other gods, all places, which Nigel as a thief might echo, some.
Heh. Again, though, as I said, that's tenuous. If anyone has any better matches, speak up, yes?
Henry - Hephaestus
Among the easiest, this one. Hephaestus, the engineer, the builder, the god of technology. The one doing the actual work around Olympus, the one kitting the other gods out with all their cool and deadly gear. The maker, the fixer. That much is obvious. But there's also a nice parallel with Henry's HAP nature and Hephaestus' lamed leg, in that for a long time, both thought themselves ugly for their 'deformity', thought themselves unusual, weird, outcast. In Hephaestus' case, this was largely because everyone else thought so, and you can see that in Henry with Will, with the Big Guy in part, until Biggie slaps him out of it. You can see that Henry fears the same reaction that Hephaestus actually got. There's some very nice thematic echoes between Henry and the volcano god.
The only thing I don't like about that is that it makes whats-her-name, the werewolf girl, Aphrodite, and that just can't end well.
Big Guy - Charon, Hestia
As the ferryman, the gatekeeper to the Underworld that is the world of Sanctuary. The one who ushers everyone else in and around, the one 'of keen gaze', who knows what the hell is going on around here. Not, perhaps, the more sordid aspects of Charon, though. I'm fairly sure Biggie both grooms and bathes. Though the beard echoes well enough.
Hestia, of course, for his role as guardian of the hearth, and the closest the Sanctuary has to a domestic figure. Unmoveable, the foundation of the home, the surest and calmest of them (when not in virus-induced rage, anyway).
Will - Echo
... Possibly that's just cruel of me. But looking at Will's journey ... Echo, young and beautiful, told stories to Hera to distract her from Zeus' exploits, which rather echoes Will's function in the Sanctuary, in that he's the diplomatic voice trying to smoothe things over while Helen and Kate go blow up shit and make various people very, very annoyed. When Hera discovered Echo's trickery, she stole her voice and made it so that Echo could only echo what others said, and say nothing original of her own. That ... compared to the young, outspoken, independant profiler of the pilot, I think Will has become more and more a mouthpiece for other people, though he does still manage to speak up for himself every once in a while, in his more awesome moments.
Thankfully, Will has yet to find a Narcissus or a Pan to break his heart. And wow, considering Nikola above, I didn't need that thought ...
Kate - Orion?
Kate is another I waffled on altogether. I went with Orion in the end mostly for his status as a hunter, which Kate seems to have been in the past, given her views on selling abnormals, but also because the story of his blinding by Oenepion and how Hephaestus' helped guide him towards healing has interesting echoes with Kate's following of the Cabal, injury by them, and then Henry's helping her find a place in the Sanctuary. But that's fairly shaky, I know.
Ashley - Artemis?
Ashley I had no idea for ages. But Artemis ... goddess of the hunt, of wilderness ... Doubt the virginity thing, mind, given Ashley. But the rest of it. How Artemis spent her childhood seeking out what she would need to be a huntress, how alone of her group she had the courage to approach Hephaestus and Cyclops to ask for a bow and arrows, how she captured six golden-horned deer to pull her chariot for herself. Not sure about later, because I don't think Ashley was anywhere near as vengeful and vindictive as Artemis could turn out to be, but the young Artemis and the young Ashley are quite alike, I think.
All Told:
That's all I got, for the moment. Heh. *smiles ruefully* Graeco-Roman myth actually isn't my strongest mythology, but there are some fascinating echoes in Sanctuary, so it's worth investigating.
One thing that did interest me, looking back over the list, is the balance between male and female archetypes. In that we have a number of very powerful female archetypes belong to women (Helen, Ashley), and a number of female archetypes falling to men (James, Will, Big Guy). Same with the male ones. Strongly male falling to men (John, Henry), some falling to women (Kate). And some in between, like Nikola (given Dionysus' ... complicated relationship with gender, and Hermes trickster status). *muses* Sanctuary actually has quite a range of archetypes going around, in multiple directions and incarnations. Interesting ...
And shutting up now, yes? *grins*
John - Ares
As
artaxastra pointed out, there is a delight in violence in John. Not necessarily a sadism, though perhaps some of that too, in his more Ripper moments, but deeper than that. A love of fighting, of blades, of testing and being tested by an opponent (Ashley, physically, Helen, in every other sense). In that sense, he's very Ares. Not war for the sake of strategy, of higher goals, as with Athena, but war, battle, the fight, purely for the sake of the fight. And that's more, I think, than the energy elemental. That's purely John. There's also the air of distrust surrounding Ares that John echoes. Terror and Fear are his companions, and his sister is Eris, goddess of discord. All fitting for John, in his madder moments, in how he is seen, and how he reacts to that. John, like Ares, is courageous and brave, but something to be unleashed (as on the Cabal), not trusted.
James - Athena
Wisdom. Civilisation. Warfare, but strategic, not immediate. Justice. The companion of heroes. James, I think, is very Athena. I'll admit, in part I like the comparison because then you have an interesting balance between John and James, Athena and Ares, and an echoing distaste-to-enmity on ideological grounds that fits them very, very nicely. But even standing alone, Athena suits James very well. The goddess of war who disliked fighting, prefering wisdom and cunning to sort things out, but at the same time an arranger, a strategist, who paves the path for heroes, as James is for Helen, has been for decades. I also find it interesting, given James' gift from the source blood, that Athena was born fully-formed from Zeus' mind.
Helen - Persephone
Persephone as the Iron Queen, in her aspect as ruler of Hades, not as the maiden aspect from the pomegranate myth. Though she was that too, in her time. She was an innocent once, lured into a darker world. But Helen as Persephone is explored much better and in much more detail than I could bring to bear in
artaxastra's post above. Nikola - Hermes, Dionysus, Pan
Nikola I'll admit I'm very, very undecided about. He's a little bit of a grab bag, not fitting exactly in any one aspect.
artaxastra I know favours Dionysus, and I can see it. In vino veritas, the god wandering in exile between worlds, the beautiful and decadent youth luring those around him into blood and truth and transformation. The Dionysian mysteries, a transcendant state of primal being achieved through the wine, the blood, not unlike the vampires Nikola represents. On the other hand, I also favour Hermes, myself. To quote a Homeric hymn: "of many shifts (polytropos), blandly cunning, a robber, a cattle driver, a bringer of dreams, a watcher by night, a thief at the gates, one who was soon to show forth wonderful deeds among the deathless gods." A psychopomp, wandering again between worlds. A trickster and genius, patron of miscreants. Eloquent. An inventor, the creator of fire, analogous to Prometheus. *grins* Sounds a bit like Nikola, no?
Pan, too, I see a little of in Nikola. Mostly as the sower of discord, the spreader of panic, Nikola in his darker aspects as troublemonger, sometimes unintentionally.
Nigel - Janus
Nigel I waffled on altogether, and if anyone has any clearer ideas, please feel free to tell me -_-; In the end I settled on Janus mostly for his limnality. The god of doorways and the between, as Nigel slips between two planes, the visible and invisible. The god of the concrete and the abstract, against for the duality of his invisibility, and also for his status as what looks like the most grounded of the Five. The god of time, not as a static thing but as a progression between states, changes, as Nigel was the only one among the Five to follow time's proper progression (more or less), the only one among them to really change. The god holding access to all other gods, all places, which Nigel as a thief might echo, some.
Heh. Again, though, as I said, that's tenuous. If anyone has any better matches, speak up, yes?
Henry - Hephaestus
Among the easiest, this one. Hephaestus, the engineer, the builder, the god of technology. The one doing the actual work around Olympus, the one kitting the other gods out with all their cool and deadly gear. The maker, the fixer. That much is obvious. But there's also a nice parallel with Henry's HAP nature and Hephaestus' lamed leg, in that for a long time, both thought themselves ugly for their 'deformity', thought themselves unusual, weird, outcast. In Hephaestus' case, this was largely because everyone else thought so, and you can see that in Henry with Will, with the Big Guy in part, until Biggie slaps him out of it. You can see that Henry fears the same reaction that Hephaestus actually got. There's some very nice thematic echoes between Henry and the volcano god.
The only thing I don't like about that is that it makes whats-her-name, the werewolf girl, Aphrodite, and that just can't end well.
Big Guy - Charon, Hestia
As the ferryman, the gatekeeper to the Underworld that is the world of Sanctuary. The one who ushers everyone else in and around, the one 'of keen gaze', who knows what the hell is going on around here. Not, perhaps, the more sordid aspects of Charon, though. I'm fairly sure Biggie both grooms and bathes. Though the beard echoes well enough.
Hestia, of course, for his role as guardian of the hearth, and the closest the Sanctuary has to a domestic figure. Unmoveable, the foundation of the home, the surest and calmest of them (when not in virus-induced rage, anyway).
Will - Echo
... Possibly that's just cruel of me. But looking at Will's journey ... Echo, young and beautiful, told stories to Hera to distract her from Zeus' exploits, which rather echoes Will's function in the Sanctuary, in that he's the diplomatic voice trying to smoothe things over while Helen and Kate go blow up shit and make various people very, very annoyed. When Hera discovered Echo's trickery, she stole her voice and made it so that Echo could only echo what others said, and say nothing original of her own. That ... compared to the young, outspoken, independant profiler of the pilot, I think Will has become more and more a mouthpiece for other people, though he does still manage to speak up for himself every once in a while, in his more awesome moments.
Thankfully, Will has yet to find a Narcissus or a Pan to break his heart. And wow, considering Nikola above, I didn't need that thought ...
Kate - Orion?
Kate is another I waffled on altogether. I went with Orion in the end mostly for his status as a hunter, which Kate seems to have been in the past, given her views on selling abnormals, but also because the story of his blinding by Oenepion and how Hephaestus' helped guide him towards healing has interesting echoes with Kate's following of the Cabal, injury by them, and then Henry's helping her find a place in the Sanctuary. But that's fairly shaky, I know.
Ashley - Artemis?
Ashley I had no idea for ages. But Artemis ... goddess of the hunt, of wilderness ... Doubt the virginity thing, mind, given Ashley. But the rest of it. How Artemis spent her childhood seeking out what she would need to be a huntress, how alone of her group she had the courage to approach Hephaestus and Cyclops to ask for a bow and arrows, how she captured six golden-horned deer to pull her chariot for herself. Not sure about later, because I don't think Ashley was anywhere near as vengeful and vindictive as Artemis could turn out to be, but the young Artemis and the young Ashley are quite alike, I think.
All Told:
That's all I got, for the moment. Heh. *smiles ruefully* Graeco-Roman myth actually isn't my strongest mythology, but there are some fascinating echoes in Sanctuary, so it's worth investigating.
One thing that did interest me, looking back over the list, is the balance between male and female archetypes. In that we have a number of very powerful female archetypes belong to women (Helen, Ashley), and a number of female archetypes falling to men (James, Will, Big Guy). Same with the male ones. Strongly male falling to men (John, Henry), some falling to women (Kate). And some in between, like Nikola (given Dionysus' ... complicated relationship with gender, and Hermes trickster status). *muses* Sanctuary actually has quite a range of archetypes going around, in multiple directions and incarnations. Interesting ...
And shutting up now, yes? *grins*
