Hades

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"Did you forget who you're talking to? I am the Lord of the Dead!"

—Hades

Hades is an antagonist from the Kingdom Hearts series, originally from the 1997 Disney animated feature Hercules. Hot-headed literally and emotionally, he will stop at nothing to see the end of Hercules.

Story

Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep

Hades tries to convince Terra to give in to his darkness by having him duel Zack in the Coliseum. He flees when Zack is defeated, but reappears when Aqua arrives. He is surprised to see that the person winning the games is a "little bluebird", and calls Terra a coward for not using his darkness. Hades challenges Aqua, fighting her alongside the Ice Colossus, but flees when he is defeated, vowing to return.

Kingdom Hearts

When Maleficent began her conquest of the worlds, Hades became one of her allies. He utilized the Heartless by supplying them as monsters to the Olympus Coliseum, for heroes to battle as usual. However, he also gained the assistance of Cloud Strife by making a deal: if Cloud kills Hercules, Hades will lead him to Sephiroth (who he apparently does know the location of, as Sephiroth is indeed at the Coliseum). Hades additionally provided Sora with a pass to enter the Coliseum games. When Sora appeared to be winning in the Coliseum however, Hades instructed Cloud to kill Sora as well. When the plan failed (either with Cloud refusing to deal the final blow to Sora, or with Sora defeating Cloud; it depends on the result of the battle), Hades had Cerberus attack Cloud. However, Hercules rescued Cloud and Sora defeated Cerberus.

As Sora left the Coliseum, Maleficent warned Hades not to be overcome by the darkness. Hades sent Maleficent away, claiming he could handle it. He ironically was not overcome at all (while the rest of Maleficent's followers and Maleficent herself ended up being overcome, with the other exception of Captain Hook). Strangely, Maleficent overlooked the fact that Hades was the immortal god of the dark underworld. This lead to the inevitable irony of Hades outliving Maleficent as well as being currently the only villain in the whole series to show up in all the games and survive and will probably continue to survive due to him being a god.

When Hades learned of Maleficent's demise, he took matters into his own hands. Hades, determined on personally defeating both Hercules and Sora, opened the Hades Cup in the Coliseum. The long, grueling tournament had a battle with him near the end. Unfortunately for Hades, Sora defeated him in the battle, knocking him into a cell where he was beaten up by someone. After a few more battles in the cup, though, Hades decided on a way for revenge.

Hades unleashed the four Titans upon the world (although only two are seen). When Sora reached the final rank in the tournament, he had to combat the Rock Titan. Upon its defeat, Hades apparently went into hiding.

Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories

When Sora and his friends are in Castle Oblivion, Hades makes an appearance as a figment of Sora's memories. He, like before, hired Cloud to defeat Hercules. Hades made a deal with Cloud to restore Cloud's lost memories. Eventually Cloud was unable to defeat Hercules, so the Lord of the Dead was forced to fight Hercules personally. Sora intervenes which leads to a battle against him. Defeating him grants you his character card.

Kingdom Hearts II

Hades again appears as an antagonist when a re-awakened Sora visits the Coliseum, but most of his dealings take place in the Underworld in this game. This time, in an effort to destroy Hercules, he tries to strike a deal with the dead Auron. He offers him his life back with a clean slate, on the condition that he "Fight Hercules. In the Coliseum. To the death!" Auron refuses this offer. When Hades reminds him that he is talking to the Lord of the Dead, he responds "No wonder no one wants to die." Hades becomes enraged, and almost strikes Auron down until Sora arrives, needing to speak to him. However, it ends up with Sora and gang running for it as Hades is invincible within his domain, and they are weakened by the Underworld's curse.

Pete suggests waiting for the Heartless to take care of Sora and company, but Hades knows better and dispatches Cerberus to take care of them instead. However, Sora and Auron defeat Cerberus and escape when Sora unlocks a door with the Keyblade. Learning that the Keyblade can open any lock, Hades decides to steal it and reopen the Underdrome, a coliseum locked up by Zeus long ago that makes the Olympus Coliseum itself "look like an Olympic kiddie pool". When Pete informs him that the Keyblade won't work for just anyone and the fact that Sora is a lot tougher than he looks, Hades decides to apply "a woman's touch" to his plans. To this end, he kidnaps Meg and traps her in the Underdrome. This means Sora must use the Keyblade to rescue her, unsealing the Underdrome in the process. Hades also sent a Hydra after Hercules so he would be out of the way. Hades's plan works and Sora opens the Underdrome to save Meg. Pete waits in ambush, but Sora still manages to save Meg with Hercules's help. He tells Sora to take Meg as he confronts Pete, but Sora, after taking Meg to safety, returns and together they beat Pete who retreats. At the exit of the Underworld Hades confronts them and reminds Hercules about the Hydra which he had neglected to finish off completely. They enter the Coliseum to see it in ruins with the Hydra towering over it. The Hydra is defeated, but Hercules lost his strength and will, because of the guilt that he had since he had not completely destroyed the Hydra.

To celebrate the Underdrome re-opening, Hades decides to hold the Hades Cup, in the hopes of killing the weakened Hercules once again. Trapping Auron's soul in a statue, he orders him to take care of Hercules and Sora once and for all. But inevitably, the scheme fails, as Sora finds Auron's statue and gave him back his soul. A furious Hades dumps Meg into the River Styx with Hercules diving after her. Confident they'll be dead within moments, Hades overpowers Sora and gang until Hercules emerges, his full power restored by willing to risk his life to save Meg. Hades is soon quickly defeated and, while attempting to avoid a hit from Sora, loses his footing and falls down into the River Styx. Despite this, Hades manages to escape, though he doesn't appear to cause Hercules and company much trouble after that. Later in the game, Hades opens his Paradox tournaments. After Sora wins the Hades Paradox Cup, a scene is shown where Sora, Donald, Goofy, Hercules, and Auron are celebrating with the trophy. Hades looks at them furiously, but is then kicked by Pegasus, which sends him flying across the Underdome.

Kingdom Hearts coded

Within in the Datascape, a Data version of Hades makes a deal with the Data Cloud: if Cloud destroys Sora and Hercules, Hades will give him the power to go to other worlds by telling him "The Secret of Heroes", and make him become stronger. However, he later double crosses Cloud, and reveals that he isn't the source of Olympus Coliseum's Bug Blox. After the defeat of the Data Cerberus, the real source of the world's Bug Blox, Hades battles the trio of data heroes.

Appearance

In his normal state, Hades has blue skin and blue flaming "hair". His eyes are completely yellow except for his black pupils. He has very sharp teeth and an unnatural black mouth. His face is quite long and thin, with his chin jutting out abruptly. His fingers are long, thin, and clawed. He wears what appears to be a dark grey shirt underneath a black toga, the latter of which seems to be held up by a small skull pin on his right shoulder. Hades's feet are never visible, due to the length of his robes.

When Hades gets angry, he quite literally erupts with anger: his skin turns red-orange and his "hair" flares up in a red, orange, and yellow flame that can stretch quite a ways up, seemingly based on the intensity of his rage at the time. The light this fire gives off also bathes his clothes (and the surroundings) in a red hue.

Personality

"What is so funny, you imbeciles! How dare you get a happy ending... HOW DARE YOU!"

—Hades, after Hercules saved Meg

Hades is one of the most temperamental characters in the series. Although others are shown to be temperamental, Hades bursts out in anger on a more regular basis. When Hades gets angry, he explodes into a red pillar of fire and his normal blue colored "hair" burns red (which is ironic since blue fire is warmer than red fire). Also, when Hades is angry, it is shown that he is invulnerable and much more powerful than in his normal state.

Hades is also shown to be very cunning and smooth when calm and tends to talk a lot; for instance, when he tricked Sora into opening the Underdrome to save Meg. He also shows this trait when talking to Hercules, most of the time giving indirect answers and eerie hints that usually lead Hercules to danger. Also, unlike other Disney antagonists, Hades never seems to lie directly, instead never telling the whole truth of the matter. Hades also has childlike tendencies, like blocking his ears with his fingers and pretending he doesn't hear Sora when he tries to talk to him. Interestingly, he admitted that he has an ambition to rule the world in Kingdom Hearts Re:coded.

Abilities

Hades is a powerful boss in the Kingdom Hearts series, using fire as a weapon, with which he can deal great amounts of damage. The Lord of the Dead has high amounts of HP, and can even become invulnerable for short periods of time. In the first Kingdom Hearts, Hades is fought only in the final rounds of the Hades Cup. In Kingdom Hearts II he is fought not only as a scripted boss, but also in the Hades Paradox Cup.

Origin

Hades, like many characters from Hercules, is based on a person from Greek mythology. While the Greek version of this deity has a humanoid depiction and is for the most part a relatively passive but unmerciful deity, the Disney version is depicted as an evil, satanic god with a hatred for his brother Zeus, jealous of being assigned to the Underworld while the Sky God became ruler of Olympus. Both versions of Hades also have a series of demonic beasts at their disposal, and reign supreme over the souls of the dead. Believers in the Grecian Hades would show their devotion to their god by going as far as to bang on the ground to ensure he was listening to their prayers. Major differences between these two depictions of Hades are that the Disney Hades is trying to overthrow Zeus, has an affiliation with fire, and is served by the demons Pain and Panic, qualities that were actually associated with Alcyoneus, Hephaestus, and Ares, respectively, in the original mythology.

In the Disney film, Hades crashes an infant Hercules's party, only to return to the Underworld and learn from the Fates that the boy would be the only thing that stood in the way of the Lord of the Dead's stealing his brother Zeus's job as Ruler of the Gods. He later had sidekicks Pain and Panic kidnap the baby and turn him mortal so that he could be killed, the dark god plotting while Hercules aged. Hades eventually found a girl named Megara in his ownership, using her to lure Hercules into his traps once he learned the hero had lived. Hades succeeded in freeing the Titans and taking over Olympus as prophesied 18 years ago, yet was defeated at Hercules's hand. The god was then sent tumbling into the River Styx.

Trivia

• Unlike some other Disney characters voiced/played by a celebrity (e.g. Genie, Phil, Simba, Timon, Scar, and Jack Sparrow), Hades retained the same voice actor as his original appearance. This is in part because he had the same voice actor in his television spin-off as in his movie, while Genie, Phil, and Simba had different voice actors in their spin-offs, which they used in the Kingdom Hearts series.
• In all of his appearances, Hades tries using a character from Final Fantasy to get rid of Hercules. In Kingdom Hearts, Kingdom Hearts: Chain of Memories, and Kingdom Hearts coded, it is Cloud, in Kingdom Hearts II, it is Auron. In Kingdom Hearts Birth by Sleep, he does use Zack in this manner, as well as to display the power of darkness to Terra.