Name’s Hades, Lord of the dead. Hi, how ya doin’?

Dynamite Comics has gone all Greek mythology on us with the newest entry in their Disney Villains comics series. The Disney Villains Hades miniseries will run for five comically evil issues. Yes, Hades rules!

Today, we will take a look at Disney Villains Hades #1 published by Dynamite Comics.

Release Date: August 16th, 2023.

Writer: Elliot Kalan

Illustrator: Alessandro Ranaldi

Letterer: Jeff Eckleberry

Editor: Nate Cosby

Covers by: Karen Darboe, Jae Lee, Trish Forstner, Francesco Tomaselli, Miriana Puglia

Official Synopsis:

FROM THE CLASSIC DISNEY FILM HERCULES – THE LORD OF THE UNDERWORLD FINALLY TAKES CENTER STAGE!

Hades – the lord of darkness! The most deceitful and scheming of the Greek gods! 

The one god not invited to the weekly brunch at Mount Olympus! 

Obviously, a slight like this calls for the total destruction of the gods of Olympus. To make that happen, the hot-tempered ruler of the underworld needs to acquire the magical Golden Fleece of Colchis. Unfortunately, the Fleece is guarded by a sleepless dragon and soldiers made out of teeth, so Hades assembles a ragtag group of morally questionable adventurers to help him steal the Fleece before some dude named Jason and his Argonaut bros swoop in and ruin his perfectly logical plan. It’s absolute chaotic hilarity courtesy of writer ELLIOTT KALAN (Spider-Man & The X-Men) and artist ALESSANDRO RANALDI (Zorro)!

Covers

This is a Dynamite Comics release. So there is going to be a Mount Olympus amount of covers enough for everyone in the Underworld. In this section, I am going to highlight some of the hot tempered covers for Disney Villains Hades #1.

Any one of these covers would please the gods.

My Review

*STOP READING HERE IF YOU WANT TO AVOID ALL SPOILERS*

Hades is not invited to the weekly God brunch. That really fires him up. He seeks out the three witch Fates to help him find a way to destroy all of the Olympian Gods for good. Their answer is for Hades to seek out the Golden Fleece of Colchis. The fleece grants the power of transformation. Hades sends out his minions Pain and Panic to retrieve the fleece, but he forgot to mention the dragon that guards the treasure.

Hades decides that if you want something done right then you have to do it yourself by selecting a more competent new team of minions to fetch him the fleece. The newly assembled team for the fleece heist includes Medusa, Arachne, Orpheus, and Icarus. These are fun classic Greek Mythology characters that we did not get to see in the Hercules movie. Their main competition for the Golden Fleece besides the dragon is….no, not Hercules…Hades’ squad will have to get to the fleece before Jason of Iolcos (and the Argonauts).

Hades is definitely one of my favorite top tier Disney Villains. The art and writing in this issue have a very authentic feel connecting with the 1997 Disney animated classic Hercules. All of Hades’ dialogue written by Elliot Kalan in this comic is hilarious, and it all sounds just like something that Hades would say from the movie in the same sarcastic tone. Alessandro Ranaldi’s art is wonderfully colorful, and his Hades expressions are perfection. I love the character designs for Hades’ new gang of minions. We are in for a fun ride with this comic series. Hades rules!

Note: There was a Golden Fleece episode of the Hercules Animated Series titled “Hercules and the Argonauts”, but this comic is not related to that story.

Dynamite Comics has another Herculean sized hit with their Greek Comedy Disney Villains Hades.

The next issue of Disney Villains Hades will rise from the Underworld tentatively on September 20th, 2023. Please make sure to support the Dynamite Comics Darkwing Duck, Gargoyles, and Disney Villains Maleficent comic series while you are out buying Disney Villains Hades. You can also preorder the new Negaduck comic series which debuts in September.

Let us know what you thought of Disney Villains Hades #1 in the comments below. What cover(s) did you get?

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