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13 Episodes 1995 - 1995
Episode 1
Mon, Jan 16, 199544 mins
After a routine brawl aided by Iolaus to prevent a hanging, Hercules returns home and sees his beloved wife and little boys burnt to a crisp by a fire ball while Hera laughs, and swears revenge. After some reminiscing about happier family days sitting by the river, he tells his cruel fate to Iolaus, who expected him to help in the forge, curses the cowardice of his foul father Zeus and tells his friend to stay back. Farmer Lycus from Ister seeks Hercules' help, is turned away and foul-mouths him in the bar, where Iolaus verbally takes him on and yet promises to come help himself against the she-demon who turns the village men into stone and gives their souls to Hera's sister Hekate, as punishment for not sacrificing their first-born sons to the queen of gods. Meanwhile Hercules sets fire to his home and visits his mother Alcmene who was told by Zeus and insists he grieves first, then warns Hera will attack anyone he loves because of Zeus' infidelity. He sets out to destroy Hera's seven temples. On the way to Ister Iolaus does his usual bragging to incredulous Lycus, then they witness village adolescent Orestes being petrified by the demon's tail; he enters her cave hoping to cut it off, but is turned into stone himself. In a mountain temple Hera's guards are no match for Hercules, even while he has his hands full with slave-girl Agina he saves from human sacrifice; he accepts to take her back to Ister, as it has a Hera-temple. Old Thoas greets them, insisting they flee and reports Iolaus' death, so the hero feels guilty. Lycus meets them, planning to run from his doomed home. Hercules enters the cave to revenge his friend, and dodges her tail which however grabs his stake, nearly gets him but finally gets stuck, and misses him to petrify her, which reverts her curse.
Episode 2
Mon, Jan 23, 199544 mins
Hercules runs from king Thespius' 50 daughters, all horny for his seed, so he's game when Androcles reports a cyclops who chases and wounds villagers to protect Hera's sacred vineyards. He first meets traveling toga-salesman Salmoneus, who 'elects' him as sponsored hero. Trachis' village leader Atreus' men, who tried to re-divert the river to their fields, are scared off by the cyclops and get Hercules to join; he ducks when the maidens turn up at their campfire, which makes the villagers doubt his courage, but that's easily cured in a fist-fight. Castor, Hera's evil slave-master, who enjoys whipping slaves in the winery, thinks Hercules comes just in time to be decapitated for Hera's feast, but the captain of her guards warns him not to fail. Hercules easily decks the giant, but learns his temper comes from being bullied as a child for being a 'freak' and stays while the villagers divert the river. After the maidens stripped Salmoneus for selling them bad togas, Hercules tells them he only mates for love. Now Castor and his cyclops have failed, the captain kills him and conjures up skeleton-executioners. The cyclops comes to the villagers in good faith, but is immediately pelted and runs off; the one girl he has an eye on follows him to his cave, where he tells her and Hercules, who catches up, the executioners are more dangerous, but offers to help them...
Episode 3
Mon, Jan 30, 199544 mins
On the road, Hercules is startled by terrible lightning; an eerily laughing blind seer says it announces much suffering trough pure evil, the doom of Hera's rage and comes along. In the largely deserted nearest town they find the boy Ixion, hiding for the storm demons, and fellow outcast orphan Jana, unwilling to tell what's wrong, unlike Broteas, leader of the recently arrived group of refugees from the fighting at Telyte; water turning to blood proves the curse is still active. Hercules stops Broteas sacrificing bread the hungry people crave for. In Hera's temple the seer learns the goddess annihilated people in the village after a thief took a golden chalice Hera got from Zeus, who fell for a local girl Hera transformed into a wolf-dog while damning the whole town. Hercules offers to guide everyone trough the Stymfalian swamp to Calydon, a curse-free city under Apollo's divine protection, which means braving a murderous winged monster- the people choose to follow him. From Hera's temple arise skeleton warriors, who track the pilgrims underground; a rock rain drives everyone for shelter into the Minoan caves. The skeletons, emerging to attack the pilgrims back on the road, are no match for Hercules, who smashes them into pieces. Now the seer says Hera has send them after the chalice-thief among them. Broteas convinces others Hera is only after Hercules and catches Jana going trough his things, but proves it's not in his pack and promises to sacrifice Jana in the next Hera-temple, which Hercules forbids. In the swamp, the dog trips Broteas- the chalice falls out of his robes; Hercules simultaneously fights the dragon and saves Ixion and Jana from quicksand, into which he then trows the chalice. The seer follows Hercules, as the pilgrims, arriving in Calydon, face less evil and suffering, and adopts the dog.
Episode 4
Mon, Feb 6, 199544 mins
When beloved pacifist king Iphicles of Meliad refuses to cancel the new wine festival of Dionysus after his queen Camilla dreamed the virgins will, as the law allows them, kill him instead of prolong his reign by a year and then crown his firstborn heir Pentheus, she sends their junior son Nestor to Hercules, who had just been cheated by Centaur twins who sneakingly trade places at each drinking duel, without explaining. In Meliad they find the blind seer, who reluctantly predicts another bloodbath. Pentheus prays to war-god Ares. Captain Gudrun's guards fail to overpower Hercules and Nestor but he tricks them into secret underground water, then Pentheus tells them his plan to fix the maidens' wine and leaves, expecting the hydra to kill them off, but Hercules slays it and pins the corps down as a stepladder, just too late to stop the maidens drinking the new wine Ares poisoned, so they rush to the palace, seen by Pentheus and Gudrun...
Episode 5
Mon, Feb 13, 199544 mins
The dying warrior Gregor gets Hercules's promise to give his wife Janista and teenage son Titus in Fallia a jewel and sword, and tell Titus the art of war is not about killing but defending the innocent. When Titus and his young village friend Ximenos go stag-hunting, a Trojan war-veteran in Ares's service hands the kids heavy clubs to duel 'to the death'; in fact they run but Ximenos is recruited for the god's bloodthirsty troop after a ritual brand mark on the arm. Janista is embarrassed to receive the son of Zeus in her shambled home, but he even helps her fix the roof. The blacksmith Atalanta then challenges and beats Hercules at arm wrestling but while forging is magically branded by Ares and makes weapons for his bloodthirsty troop in a semi-conscious trance, then reports to Hercules there were mysterious killings in neighboring villages. Hercules finds Hera's nearest temple empty except for a war god-symbol. When Titus chickens out of joining, captain Aurelius invokes Ares, the hero's evil half-brother makes him use the kid to lure Hercules to their cave, where he's buried under rocks; Atalanta nurses and follows him, till Ares's blood allows Aurelius to turn Atalanta bad, but Hercules throws her in the water which reverses the curse. Jacinta joins the rescue party for her Titus an the other boys, which incurs more of Ares's magic and the appearance of the evil divinity...
Episode 6
Mon, Feb 20, 199544 mins
Nemis the Centaur desperately wants to possess Penelope. Hera provides a drug to blind Hercules and a club to kill him. Lyla slips the drug into Hercules' drink. Penelope and her bridesmaid Cheris are kidnapped from Penelope's wedding, and Salmoneus must guide a blinded Hercules to rescue them.
Episode 7
Mon, Feb 27, 199544 mins
Hercules would have saved time by going around a toll bridge on the road to the games in Thrace, but Iolaus started a fight with the guardian gang, which they both enjoy anyway. Lydia is chased and captured by a gang of road bandits masquerading as satyrs. Hercules follows a sign to Thrace, Iolaus insists to bet it's a trap and splits. A ferryman claims the lake is filled with all kinds of deadly monsters, as is the only alternative land road; Hercules spares himself the fair by carrying a boat which would have taken ten ordinary men. In no time Iolaus is lost and captured, in the same hole as Lydia, who was only on the road as only volunteer to go look for Hercules, the region's only hope. On the boat, Hercules is visited by Nemesis, who is invisible to mortals and explains she just executes orders to deliver divine justice, while Hercules claims to judge fairly himself, then she admits her next mission is to make arrogant Iolaus cause his own death by an arrow on Hera's command. Iolaus and Lydia escape; Rankor's bandits chase them with hounds to avoid being exposed as mortals; Iolaus' mud trick works, but they are tracked to the lake, where a giant eel attacks Lydia but is defeated by Iolaus, who next sets efficient traps for the bandits. Arrows chase them into a cave, where Iolaus must fight a hydra. Hercules finds and knocks down the bandits, helped by Nemesis, who convinces him not to intervene. Lydia's father's hunting trick to make fire chases the hydra till Rankor has entered and gets attacked while they escape, but catches up after the joined Hercules in the village, where Nemesis...
Episode 8
Mon, Mar 6, 199544 mins
Cyrus and his betrothed were hoping to be taken safely to Calydon, but are betrayed by their traitorous 'guide' Belus, attacked by horsemen on the beach and captured for the slave trade. Hercules was visiting his mother Alcmene and his wife and sons' graves. Bringing her grain to the market, his fist cheerfully bumps into Iolaus who was bringing the pig Penelope to the butcher. A hideous one-eyed hag offers Hercules money to spend some time with her. He attends Belus' slave sale just in time for the prize piece, oriental Oi-Lan and buys her for the grain's value, frees her and finds she's also on the way to save her lover Cyrus, who was in the lot just sold to Inias, for the Libyan games, but stolen back by Belus to sell them again there himself. They travel together, she remains rude and un-trusting first but saves him from a poisonous spider, proves as good a masseuse as she is at martial arts and says Cyrus helped her flee her father's palace. Cyrus escapes, defeating Belus's strong man Mudo, goes looking for Oi-Lan, catches up, sees them kissing and knocks him off a cliff with a tree log, only to get both chained again by the slave traders, till Hercules climbs up and sells Belus instead to... .
Episode 9
Mon, Mar 13, 199544 mins
After Hercules helped him forge a swell knife, Iolaus finds out his village sweetheart Syreene just married another. On the rebound he falls for Xena; Hercules' distrust at first sight is waved by his mother Almene. Xena tells Iolaus she was preparing with some men to chase war lord Petrakis, who terrorizes her native Arcadian fields, to get him to come help; meanwhile she pushes her actual lover Theodorus to go kill Hercules, but he falls to his death in the duel, saying he regrets failing Xena. As Alcmene predicted, Iolaus won't believe his friend over his lover, so Hercules refuses to help the countrymen shed the warrior princess's oppression, till he meets Petrakis, actually an old farmer whose son died another victim of Xena's seduction...
Episode 10
Mon, Mar 20, 199544 mins
Hercules and Iolaus help Felicita fight off bandits and repair a wheel on her wagon, then learn she was banished by filthy rich Menus Maxius, who illegally keeps her equally black husband Gladius the gladiator enslaved in Apropus for his arena to Hera's honor, and decide to join her so he can finally see their baby. Hercules sends the mother to the inn and gets him and Iolaus imprisoned on purpose, then learns all sentences are endlessly prolonged hard labor, better conditions are reserved for gladiators. Gladius refuses to believe they have news from Felicita, he was told she died in child-birth so he would stay as champion gladiator, as he was given her as a reward. As Maxius' wife Postera is bored with animal-fights, he introduces duels to the death- still anonymous Hercules against giant Skoros. Hercules's refusal to kill the loser gets him condemned to death, but Maxius's wife Postera rather has him brought and stripped before her; refusing to become her 'private' slave, he's whipped and incarcerated and told he's to be held to his word he would rather sleep with beasts then share her bed. Next eager Turkos is to be pitted against Gladius, but as he's still too badly wounded from a bear-fight, noble Leutis knocks him out and voluntarily takes his place, wins but also refuses to kill, so Protera has both executed on the spot. Next Iolaus is kept hostage to make Hercules fight Gladius, whose wife and son are otherwise to return to the worst slavish abuse, too much for the gladiator to risk keeping his word not to fight, until he has Hercules at sword-point...
Episode 11
Mon, Apr 24, 199544 mins
When young warrior Aelon, fallen on the field of honor, appears to them as a ghost, like other soldiers before in Tantalus since the recent death of king Memnos, their mother sends his kid brother Krytus, who would rather become a scholar like his father, to enlist Hercules and Iolaus's help. They get a good reception from the new king, their friend Daulin, Memnos's son, who is fighting off an armed revolt by his sister Poena's mercenaries commanded by Jarton, another friend from the field. Poena claims Daulin committed fratricide for the throne, both sides see their dead stolen. Hercules finds footprints from Graegus, Ares's dog of war, who feeds only on the blood of the fallen, but neither side is prepared to stop the senseless war. Hercules takes on his full-divine but evil half-brother, the real regicide with an assumed identity...
Episode 12
Mon, May 1, 199544 mins
Xena Warrior Princess is back, still raiding and conquering, she butts heads with a top lieutenant in her army as she objects to the killing of women and children. She saves a baby, captures Hercules' friend, Salmoneus, who sees that there is some good in Xena. Later she is forced to walk "the gauntlet." Meanwhile, Hercules is hot on her heels leading to a confrontation between the two.
Episode 13
Mon, May 8, 199544 mins
Darphus, Xena's renegade, even crueler mercenaries captain, deliberately raids the innocent village Elysia and sends one man away to challenge Hercules, after showing him the scar left by his divine resurrection from death, then starts throwing human sacrifices to Graegus, the monster Ares gave him to defeat the half-god they both hate. When Salmoneus presents the picnic carpet and offers to catch some quail, provided Hercules cooks it for them and Xena, he gets caught himself by Iolaus, who still thought Xena was the problem, but happily joins the fight against Ares' stooge Darphus, although reluctant to believe Xena's turn for the good. Xena finds and defeats one of Darphus' plundering parties; she lets Quintus go to tell their approach to Darphus, who throws the man to Graegus 'for fleeing from his post'. Darphus' ravine trap succeeds in burying Hercules' party under a rock avalanche, but alive, so his celebration drink on the nearly full-grown Graegus, now unhindered, can help them establish Ares' worldwide rule of terror, is premature. Hercules gets everyone out, just in time, even Salmoneus who froze in fear. They successfully fight off Darphus' attack on a diamond mine, but Salmoneus goes missing, taking a cart-ride from an old peddler who accidentally heads for Elysia, where both are seized. Xena becomes Hercules' lover again. Iolaus sees Salmoneus dining with Darphus -actually just fattened to be eaten himself as last sacrifice- and notices Ares' nasty pet Graegus. The trio mounts the final attack on the mercenaries, Hercules handles the mighty monster...