The Old Gods of Supernatural
I’ve been a fan of the show Supernatural for many years now, and have rarely entered into “discourse” on it, preferring to let it speak for itself. I have often mentioned my distaste for hate watching and those who are “professionally offended”. But rewatching as an adult, I feel compelled both as a nerd and a Pagan, to say something on behalf of the gods. From inaccurate depictions, to the hubris of humans being able to wipe out a deity in all their aspects, the show has not done right by the old gods.
Let’s start with the most egregious example, The Elysian Fields Hotel dinner, at which the gods are portrayed as feasting at a table of human flesh. I will go deity by deity and untangle this web of lies and scare tactics.
First, Mercury, of the … well he was portrayed as Greek but that’s actually his Roman name so I don’t even know where they were going with that. There are multiple examples of mortals who tried to offer human sacrifice to the gods and are struck with curses for it. One man punished in Tartarus, another turned with all his sons into the first werewolves. Given how many times that monster features in Supernatural one would think the writers would be more careful. The one myth where the gods accept a human sacrifice is the case of Artemis and Iphigenia, where Iphigenia is not food but rather an addition to Artemis’s devotees.
Then the Norse gods, Odin and Baldur. I cannot find any record at all of Baldur accepting human sacrifices nor being anything but a force of benevolence. As for Odin, there is an ancient Norse tradition that involved ceremonial killing of one’s enemies in battle, but again, this does not seem to be for food. More a show of strength. And certainly not random innocents such as meet their fate in the Hotel.
Kali may be the closest to cannibalistic among the gods, but even that is taken out of its proper context here. Traditionally, Kali is a Hindu goddess of war and female power. Her many armed form wields both swords and a chalice filled with the blood of her enemies. As with Odin, this is a battlefield ritual, not a random slaughter of civilians.
Isis is the Egyptian goddess of motherhood, healing, fertility, and rebirth. There are no recorded instances of humans being a required sacrifice in her worship. Given that her domain is life, it might not even be a stretch to say such an offering would be an offense to everything she stands for.
Zao Shen is the Chinese god of the kitchen. Just an ordinary kitchen. He is a patron of chefs. Ganesha is the Hindu elephant headed god. Why would he even be eating meat, let alone human flesh? The portrayals of these two are just absurd and robbed of both historical precedent and common sense.
Baron Samedi is a Loa from Voodoo, and despite having a somewhat fearsome reputation, he is not a malevolent figure. There is a good amount of information on his required offerings as Voodoo is still fairly popular in practice. These sacrifices include meat, but only of animals, as well as indulgences like black coffee and cigars.
This whole episode was a deeply disappointing handling of the old gods and their lore. Unfortunately it was not the last, though perhaps the most shocking in terms of gore.
Ek Chuah and Maize God are the next two sufferers in the line up; both Mayan gods associated with the Cacao plant, they are conflated with a non existent deity named simply “Cacao”. While the human sacrifice aspect isn’t so far off in this case, it is overplayed. The ancient Mayan gods had other rites and sacrifices, and in modern times these have replaced the need for the taking of human life. The Mayan gods are still worshipped today by certain indigenous people groups, and honored with offerings like maize, honey, and yes, cacao.
Next Osiris, consort of Isis, ruler of the underworld and judge of the dead. Nothing about his story makes sense. The dead who practice his faith come to him in their afterlife, he would have no need to roam the earth looking for still living souls to torment and toy with. Such acts are more in line with the characterization of his brother Set.
Chronos, the Greek god of time, is only that in name. Traveling from time to time draining people of life force in the process makes no sense for his actual mythology.
Veritas and Vesta are both Roman goddesses done extremely dirty by the writers. In the show Veritas is depicted as a cannibalistic monster who forces people to blurt out violently cruel truths. This is laughably contrary to her myth, in which she is a hidden goddess, evasive rather than blatant.
Vesta’s Supernatural crimes have some slight roots in genuine mythos, as Vestal virgins who broke their vows did in fact receive horrific punishments. That’s where the similarities end however. Once again, the Greeks and Romans did not practice human sacrifice, and a benevolent goddess of hearth and home would have no need to eat the livers of her faithful.
The Prometheus storyline stays somewhat accurate until Artemis and Zeus show up, at which point I feel like whoever wrote that episode threw their lore book into the garbage.
Having Artemis, the virgin goddess of the hunt, for some inexplicable reason be in love with a Titan who defied the Olympians, was insulting enough. Depicting Zeus as so dementedly embittered that he was willing to play sadistic games with a little kid just to see Prometheus squirm was also distasteful.
And then the show fully jumped the shark by having Artemis just up and kill her father, the king of the gods. Apparently with no repercussions or worry that any other members of the Greek pantheon might take issue with that, and after being easily manipulated by the Winchesters, mere mortal men.
Zeus did so many questionable things in the old lore that I can somewhat see how the writers would want to portray him the way that they did, but their treatment of Artemis was downright disgusting and misogynistic. An icon of ancient power and female sovereignty reduced to a side character love interest is sad indeed.
Overall Supernatural is willing to subvert spiritual themes; lovable demons, evil angels, and god being sadistically capricious isn’t exactly orthodox conformity. So why couldn’t they have extended some of that creativity and critical thinking to the old Pagan lore?
