Daddy's Home And You're All In Trouble

The Five-Minute Iliad, #8

This is another ongoing series as I do a slow-read of THE ILIAD by Homer, translated by Rouse. Previous installments: book 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 |

Zeus vs Olympus

We’ve seen some spats between the gods in Olympus before, but today Zeus wakes up and reminds them all who their daddy is (this includes you, Hera.) He delivers a mighty ultimatum: the next god who goes down to Troy and helps out either side is going to get the highest-voltage boot in their cheeks that they have ever received, and it will not be consensual. I assume that he then proceeds to strike several flexing poses to make his point.

Athena goes into full-spoiled-daddy’s-favorite-daughter-mode and bats her eyes at him and says “But Dad, can we at least just, like…give them advice? What if we don’t actually do any fighting, is that cool?”

Zeus can’t stay mad at his little princess, so he pats her on the head and says he was just kidding. Still, the order stands.

The Scales Have Spoken

Zeus hops into his totally badass Ντότζ Τσάρτζερ, does a sick burnout, pops a wheelie, and races down from Olympus to Troy where he powerslides into the clouds and drops in on one of his temples to watch the battle. He picks up some scales, loads a stone in each side (one for Greece, one for Troy) and watches as the Greek side plummets.

“Welp, the fates have spoken, that’s just science,” says Zeus.

Troy, all of a sudden and out of nowhere, starts kicking levels of glute that they haven’t achieved since this whole episode started nine years ago. Eat your vegetables and say your prayers, kids.

Rare Diomedes L

Agamemnon? Pwn’d. Odysseus? Pwn’d. Idomeneus? Who cares, pwn’d. Diomedes? Okay slow down, hold your horses—he’s beaten a god or two, and even though he can’t beat Zeus or the Fates, he still doesn’t take home any Ls in his lunchbox. Diomedes runs into battle—even passing Nestor and talking mad trash on him for being old—only to run into Hector, who talks even madder trash on Diomedes and calls him a woman.

Hector more or less has the powers that Diomedes got when Athena equipped him with legendary buffs just a few chapters ago. With Zeus’ active favor on the field, Hector stunts on Diomedes, and the best the Greeks can do is injure the driver of Hector’s chariot. (Even that was a hard call because the Greek archer who did it had his arrows deflected by Apollo, that butthole.) That’s too close for Zeus’ liking so he sends down a literal lightning bolt to deter Diomedes, who then has to go rescue Nestor.

We are all sleeping on Diomedes, bro.

Hera, watching from Olympus, is completely incensed at all of this and she takes out her frustrations on—of all people—Poseidon, for not sending earthquakes to help the Greeks. Poseidon throws his hands up and is like “SHUT UP MOM, DAD WILL KILL ME” and he lets Zeus push Troy to their first victory in nine years.

I say “victory” but really it’s the first night that they haven’t had to retreat to their own city walls since the siege started. This shakes the Greeks. Athena and Hera both chirp at Zeus for slapping their loyalists around, but he just smiles because he had a good day.

Victory Lap for Hector

The Trojans flex their victory by camping out on the plains between the city and the beach, lighting big bonfires like it’s White Boy Summer. They’re probably even blasting Λάνα Ντελ Ρέι albums on their JBL speakers.

Back on his ship, Agamemnon is profoundly shooketh, to such an extent that he does the unthinkable, and considers apologizing to the man he really needs on the battlefield: Achilles.

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