I'm back to ruin your childhood by telling you about the true origins of your favorite stories from, well, childhood. This week, I'm going to focus on mythology and things that draw from literature, specifically Shakespeare.
1. Thor and Loki aren't brothers and Thor didn't have to be worthy to wield Mjolnir.
So, the first Thor establishes that Thor and Loki aren't brothers. However, according to Norse mythology, they are at least a biologically related. Loki is Thor's uncle and is the reason that Thor has Mjolnir. See, Loki, being the Trickster god, cut Sif's hair.
Sif is Thor's wife and Thor told Loki that, if he didn't fix it, He'd break every bone in Loki's body. Short version, dwarves made a wig, the deadliest spear ever created, and a ship that could be folded to fit in your pocket and Loki started bragging that his friends were the best craftsmen in the universe.
Another dwarf challenged Loki and Loki said that the dwarf could have his head if his creations were deemed better than what Loki had. The new dwarf makes Mjolnir, a golden boar that gave off its own light, and a golden ring that creates 8 new rings ever 9 days.
The dwarves gave these gifts to the gods and they decided that the new dwarves won. So, Thor just kind of ended up with his iconic weapon.
2. Lion King = Hamlet
This one doesn't really ruin anyone's childhood until they have read or seen Hamlet. It's also not much of a shock since even Disney supported the theory when they put out Lion King 2 and it was literally Romeo and Juliet. Lion King is just a far less morbid Shakespeare universe.
3. Poor Pocahontas...
Bless her heart. Disney just got her all wrong. John Smith was kind of gross and deserved punishment. It is widely believed that she saved him from execution because she loved him but that just was not the case.
Pocahontas was probably about 9 years old when this took place. NINE YEARS OLD! Want to know how old John Smith was? You probably don't but he was in his 30's. That was disgusting even for those times.
She was kidnapped and forced to marry John Rolfe, then forced to convert to Christianity and changed her name to Rebecca Rolfe. She had one son, was considered a freak and oddity, then died of strep throat in a foreign land and buried so far away from her people that it is disgusting.
4.Happy ending for Aurora... Sort of
Sleeping Beauty. Her story is pretty much the Disney version until she pricks her finger. She was still cursed but the evil fairy poisoned the wood just to make sure that the curse stuck.
True Love's kiss wasn't exactly what woke her up either. Some creepy king came through and impregnated her with twins, who she gave birth to. She only woke up when one of the twins sucked the poisoned splinter out of her finger.
She went to find the creepy king, twins in tow. When she found him, he fell in love because he thought she was just some beautiful dead body, which makes everything so much better, right? Well, the queen, his wife, tries to kill Sleeping Beauty and her kids but that backfires and she gets killed and the creepy king and Sleeping Beauty live happily ever after.
