Wren Maxwell
Satire of the Iliad
A.N. This work is in no way affiliated with "Something Funny Happened on the Way to the Forum" simply because I had no idea what that was until after my father read this. Also, flame at your own risk, I had fun with this after much frustration in my Honors Colloquium class. No, I don't have a beta.
And so it begins…
Ever wish your life was a sitcom? Well now it can be! Just build yourself a time machine and head back to ancient Greece! 'What' you say? No H.G. Wells or Einstein to work that out for you? Well, no matter. It would probably be best to take a look at how the show would go, barring that whole space/time continuum… thing.
So let's get started! Taking a look at the characters in the most exciting episode: "Ilium"! Ok, so there are way too many to look at and plenty of expendable extras along the way, but to start off we have the Fabio-esque Achilles, Greek warrior and golden boy; Achilles' boss, greedy takeover dude Agamemnon; and his brother, enraged 'husband that came home early', Menelaus.
Playing for the other team are defenders Hector 'I inherit this city' of Troy; his father 'I don't really follow prophecy' Priam; 'lover, definitely not a fighter' Paris; and 'supermodel' Helen, formerly of Greece.
The situation? Glad you asked! Here's where it gets complicated if I haven't lost you already! The whole reason for the episode is in the hands of the producers. Who are they? All Powerful Inc., the Gods and Goddesses of the famed Studio Olympus. The producers of this particular episode? They happen to be Hera, 'Queen of the Gods'; Athena, 'I'm smarted than you'; and Aphrodite, 'Hello, goddess of beauty'. Running interference are Zeus, 'my wife's gonna kill me;' and Achilles agent, 'I love my son' Thetis.
So enough about them. Here's how it got started. At a producer's wedding, crazy cousin Eris 'I'm going to destroy the world' isn't invited. She decides to crash instead. Up comes the question of who is the prettiest. The three ladies call up the handsome, yet unknown actor, Paris. Several bribes later he picks Aphrodite who promised to set him up with Helen. So set him up they did. Little does he know she's married.
And so the stage is set. Paris and Helen get one preview of romance, and during the commercial break all Hades breaks loose! The losers of the beauty contest set up the show to ruin Paris' world as punishment. Hey, I never said these people weren't petty.
Jealous and with insulted manhood, Menelaus immediately runs to big brother Agi for help. Since he has been plotting to get his hands on Troy for years, he courteously agrees. So grabbing around 50,000 extras and golden boy, off they go to get back Helen's rather tarnished virtue.
At Troy, Hector 'What have you done!', defender of Troy is freaking out on his brother Paris for bringing Helen home. Nothing good ever comes of stealing another man's wife you know… Either way, a war is going to start, because hey, this is ancient Greece.
After ten years and much time spent by Thetis trying to keep Achilles on the show, Zeus trying to keep his family from killing off all each others' characters, and a vicious cycle of kill, retribution, kill, retribution, 'I'm not playing, you took my toy' and even more killing, the extras can't reproduce fast enough and the stage crew is tired of burying people out back. (Note that in ancient Greece, if your character dies, guess what, so do you! And we just don't have that much firewood.) Things finally draw to a close when loud mouth schemer Odysseus, a fairly low key character until then, comes up with a plan. The Trojan Horse.
'Huh', you say? Well, it's a big ass abandoned horse statue full of smelly Greek guys. Of course the 'horse-taming' Trojans are going to take this in the city. Then they're going to party like its 1100BC, thinking they'd won. Too bad that after the keggar the Greeks come out and destroy the city.
As you can see, the show got a little out of hand and took on a life of its own. It also took the lives of most of the characters as well.
Looking back I can see that this probably isn't the best show to pick if you ever want to get back to real life. There is no fairy tale ending. The Trojans lose, golden boy dies, no one 'gets' the girl and even if you survive you probably ain't going to get the warmest reception when you come back home. coughAgamemnoncough.
But hey! As long as you choose to play Odysseus you could get home in another ten years, after you get done shooting the much loved spin-off : "Storytelling for the Perpetual Schemer: Or Explaining Why Everyone With Me is Dead and I Lost Everything". Doesn't ancient Greece sound like fun?