Hollywood’s Villainous Masculinities - A Study of Hades and Set from Clash of the Titans and Gods of Egypt

Aug 22, 2026

The study investigates how Hollywood constructs villainy and “non-ideal” masculinities through cinematic portrayals of the Greek god Hades and the Egyptian god Set. Focusing on Clash of the Titans (2010) and Gods of Egypt (2016), the analysis examines the antagonists’ relationship to heroism and masculinity, including how villains can embody traits associated with heroes while remaining “unheroic.” Grounded in textual reading and supported by Masculinity Studies and Film Studies, the work also contextualizes these films within post-9/11 geopolitical and cultural discourses.

LanguageEnglish

CategoryResearch & Report

FormatPDF

Pages20

Reading Time50 min

AccessFree to download

Introduction

Popular culture, zeitgeist, and ideological contradictions

Heroism, villainy, and “ideal” vs “non-ideal” masculinity

Post-9/11 Hollywood film context

Theoretical framing and approach

Hollywood’s Villainous Masculinities: A Study of Hades and Set from Clash of the Titans and Gods of Egypt By Jyoti Mishra * Gods, Goddesses, Heroes and other mythical figures from religious mythologies have made continued appearances in Hollywood films since the 20th century, with many of them reflecting the times and era of their production in the guise of depicting the “ancient” world and dealing with “sacred” themes in a secular manner. While a cinematic text invites us to identify with the hero, the antagonist is imbued with qualities that require judgement from the hero. This paper seeks to undertake a character study of the Greek God Hades from Clash of the Titans (2010) and the Egyptian God Set from Gods of Egypt (2016) to understand the ways in which the cinematic imagination constructs them as antagonists and condemns their ways. While the hero and his masculinity is generally propagated as a form of “ideal” masculinity, the villain forms a more complex characterization as he may embody qualities possessed by the hero himself and yet be termed “unheroic”. Reading the texts as embodiments of popular culture, and thus, as sites for interrogating contemporary socio-political and cultural concerns, the paper would like to explore the construction of villainous and“non-ideal” masculinities in the figures of Hades and Set. Utilizing a textual reading of the films, the analysis would be supported by theories derived from Masculinity Studies and Film Studies. Keywords: Hollywood, mythology, masculinities, heroism and villainy Introduction Clark (2007, p. 9) argues that popular culture sometimes expresses the zeitgeist of an era,“speaking to deep-seated beliefs that are consistent with what we believe are the best qualities of our collective society”, and at the same time also reflects the unconscious and sometimes negative (be it racist, classist or sexist) views that we have internalised and “prefer not to admit to ourselves”. Thus, sites of popular culture such as film, television, novels etc. are in her words locations in which these “contradictions and negotiations are constantly played out through narrative and representation”(Clark 2007, p. 9). Big-budget popular Hollywood films with their ability to advertise, distribute and attract mass audiences at a global level have the potential to influence a large number of people. This paper therefore, aims to study the depiction of heroism and villainy with reference to the cinematic projection of images and conceptions of “ideal” and “non-ideal” masculinities in two popular big-budget Hollywood mythology-based films, namely Clash of the Titans (2010) and Gods of Egypt (2016). The paper specially focuses on the depiction of the cinematic villain as the figure of the villain is hypothesised as cinematically subverting and/or inducing the audience to interrogate Hollywood’s * PhD Research Scholar, Indian Institute of Technology-Madras, India. representation of the hero, the currently accepted ideals of heroism in popular culture, and highlighting hegemonic and dominant forms of “heroic” ideal masculinity in post 9/11 cinema. After the devastating terrorist attacks on the World Trade Center in September 2001 and the subsequent “War on Terror” led by the United States of America’s President George Bush led administration, a plethora of movies across multiple genres were being produced and released by Hollywood which directly or indirectly engaged with the events, its aftermath and its continued influence on the American and global psyche (McSweeney 2017, Boggs and Pollard 2006), be it films directly dealing with the events and aftermath of the 11 September attacks (United 93 2006, World Trade Center 2006, etc.), the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (The Hurt Locker 2008, Zero Dark Thirty 2012, etc.) or allegorical films engaging with the geopolitical events and time of their production and expressing the anxieties of the age (for instance science fiction films like W

FAQs

Which films and mythological figures does the paper study to analyze villainous masculinities?

The paper focuses on Clash of the Titans (2010) and Gods of Egypt (2016), studying the Greek god Hades and the Egyptian god Set as cinematic antagonists.

How does the paper connect heroism and villainy to different forms of masculinity?

It argues that “ideal” masculinity is generally associated with heroes, while villains develop more complex characterization—sometimes incorporating traits found in heroes but still being treated as “unheroic.”

Why does the paper emphasize the post-9/11 and “War on Terror” context for these mythological films?

The study links the films’ depiction of heroic narratives to a cultural environment shaped by 9/11 and the ongoing war discourse, suggesting the movies may carry ideological agendas that support American geopolitical supremacy.

Aug 22, 2026

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