Retrospective Rants “Iliad” Script. Intro: Welcome to Retrospective Rants! With me, Joey Huff, as your host. (whispers) Why no opening sketch? Because life is a comedy sketch. And because I’ve decided to get on the olde bandwagon, the “adaptation” bandwagon. The blinders have been pulled from my eyes, and I understand that the classic Greek legends of old must be cleansed and remade for the ever glorious and ever infallible modern audience. Behold as I summarize to you: Joseph Huff’s Iliad. First topic is the format. Movies are the way of the past. And unfortunately, too few people can see the benefits of watching thousands of short form clips in a single sitting. If you meet such an individual, be sure to pity them. Thus, my epic will told in 9 25-minute episodes. Why not 45 minutes or an hour? That’s a good question. First Episode: Instead of Helen starting out as the most beautiful woman in the world, she’s gonna be a total girl-failure, and she hates her responsibilities as princess of Sparta and is so done with her family. Because they won’t shut up about how her sister, Penelope, scored a hot boyfriend named Odysseus. All Helen wants is to build a laser cannon, just like her pen pal, Archimedes. But no one takes her seriously, because she only wear pajama robes, her hair is all messy, there’s always grease and food on her clothes, and sometimes she forgets to shower. It’s just too much effort. But she’s still the eldest princess of Sparta and she must marry a prince. On her 18th birthday, all the heroes and kings of Greece come to Sparta to woo the girl-failure. Not because they like her, but because most of them want a shot at Gerard Butler, I mean Leonidas. When they discover that Leonidas won’t be born for a few centuries, a riot breaks out. But Odysseus comes up with a plan. He gives Helen a total makeover, and she looks so hot that she turns all the Greek Kings bisexual. But now, all of them want Helen. So, to prevent another riot, Odysseus makes them all promise to share Helen on different days of the month. And if anyone tries to get with her on unassigned day, the other heroes will kill him. The proposal is accepted, and among all the heroes present, Menelaus is chosen as the husband. Why? Because Menelaus is also a big nerd, and he wants to build a laser cannon too. So, Helen and Menelaus marry, and she decides to only wear her total makeover fit for him. Thus, disgusting all the other suitors, and convincing them to leave her to Menelaus. 2nd Episode: The gods are having a big party but nobody invited Eris, goddess of Chaos. In retaliation, she crashes the party and serves all the women Pumpkin Spice Lattes, until there’s only one left. But the bottle and straw are cursed, so that only the most beautiful goddess can drink from it. Artemis, Hestia, Demeter, and Persephone are pretty sure they could just gather a bunch of ingredients and make enough Pumpkin Spice for everyone. But their mix skills aren’t up to snuff. So, the snobbier goddess: Aphrodite, Athena, and Hera continue to fight over the last latte. None of the gods want to get involved, but Zeus is tired of hearing about Pumpkin Spice. So he points at a random mortal, Paris of Troy, who’s stalking sheep for…reasons best left unsaid, and tells the goddesses “ask that idiot to choose the hottest goddess.” The three basic goddesses ambush Paris before he can do something horrific, and offer him different gifts if only they’ll choose them as most beautiful and most deserving of the pumpkin spice. Hera offers him all of Asia, Athena promises to teach him how to work Excell, but Aphrodite knows that Paris is a freaky-deeky boy and promises to teach him dancing moves so stylish and sexy that no woman, or sheep, can resist him. Paris agrees to the last one, and Aphrodite claims the final pumpkin spice. But it’s been in that cup for weeks at this point so it’s nasty. Armed with his new dance moves, Paris solves the Trojan Population Crisis, and his father, King Priam, reluctantly acknowledges him as a true prince. Hector, the eldest prince thinks his brother needs to do some actual work, so he sends him on a diplomatic mission to Sparta. After all, Helen, Queen of Sparta, is so mid that Paris wouldn’t even think of seducing her. Right? 3rd episode: Unfortunately, Paris arrived on the Spartan Monarch’s date night, and he sees Helen all dressed up and sexy. Paris starts dancing, and Helen is powerless against the sheer rizz before her. The new couple flees Sparta, leaving Menelaus with the check. Menelaus invokes the agreement that all the Greeks signed, reminding them that if he has no wife, Gerard But-I mean Leonidas will never be born. All the Greek kings rush to his aid, and Athena and Hera promise all manner of blessings and boons on the condition that Troy burns. But the boats can’t sail to Troy. Because the wind is still. You see, Aphrodite told Artemis that she actually loved her homemade Pumpkin Spice and it was only Athena and Hera who hated it. So Artemis is keeping the wind out of the Greek sails as payback. Agamemnon, older brother of Menelaus and most senior king among the Greeks, decides that the only way to save a girl-failure is to sacrifice another girl-failure. He decides that the best candidate would be Iphigenia, his own daughter. The other Greeks don’t think he has the balls to do it, so they’re all like “go ahead, we dare you!”. But he calls their bluff and tries to burn his daughter. Athena is so horrified by this act that she kills Agamemnon and makes his daughter the new leader of the Greeks. The heroes think Iphigenia is silly name though, so they just call her Agamemnon II and sail off to Troy. Episode 4: Some charlatans will try and convince you that Homer’s decision to set the Iliad in the final year of a ten year war had some point to. Something about the cost of war, or longing for home or whatever. Those people are liars! Obviously, Homer made a huge oversight by skipping over ten years worth of content, I mean story, and I alone can correct it! On the way to Troy, Achilles meets Patroclus. Now there’s a lot of controversy surrounding Patroclus. Some people say he’s Achilles’ brother or cousin. Other people who’ve never had real friends insist that Achilles would never get angry about Patroclus’ death unless they were f*****g. But the enlightened few, such as myself, know the truth. Patroclus and Achille were Legendary, Greek figures, therefore they were related and f*****g. And my epic retelling will spread that truth. Wait, what was I talking about? Oh yeah. Achilles meets Patroclus, his cousin-brother-lover, on the way to Troy. They haven’t seen each other in years and Patroclus says: “I’m stuck on the Reef, come help me out cousin-brother-lover-senpai”. And Achilles obliges. Meanwhile in Troy, Helen is tired of cleaning wool out of her new bedroom. But Aphrodite teaches Paris new dance moves keeping the queen of Sparta in a state of mad lust. Helen also discovers that the real Hector has been dead for years. His wife Andromache has been running around disguised as him and going on all sorts of adventures. She’ll fight big lions, exterminate armies of goat people, tutor young Socrates, and watch a German Opera in one sitting. Very feats indeed. Until finally, the Greeks arrive in Present day. Episode 5: At last we’re at the Trojan war. But because we blew most of the budget on Pumpkin Spice, we have to save what little money for the final episodes. We’re gonna take a bunch of close stills of random extras sitting around a campfire, and they’re going to talk about how horrible the fighting has been. It’s genius. Then we’ll break to the Greek Kings dividing the spoils. Only for Covid to hit, because none of them obeyed Apollo’s Mask Mandate. Thus the sun god is punishing them for their sins. And the only way to fix everything, is another human sacrifice. Now some of you might wonder why a human sacrifice would change anything when hundreds of people die every day in the war. And you know what? That’s a good question. Anyway, Agamemnon II says that they need to kill Briseis, a member of Achilles’ polycule. The Greek Queen claims this is for the gods, but really, she’s just mad because Achilles not only refused to attend her weekly orgy, but set up a competing one on the other side of war camp. And all the cool Greeks went to that one instead of hers. Thus earning her enmity. Achilles recognizes this as a personal attack and declares that he will not fight alongside his countrymen unless Agamemnon II apologizes. Which she refuses to do. Episode 6: The Greeks and Trojans form their battle lines and Paris presents an idea. He and Menelaus will duel, and the victor will take Helen. The Spartan King is surprised, but accepts. Unfortunately, Paris meant a dance duel. And before the power of the trojan prince’s groovy voodoo, Menelaus falters. Then a portal to the future opens and Chris Tucker comes through to teach Menelaus how to dance like Michael Jackson. With his new arsenal, Menelaus styles all over Paris and not even Aphrodite can save him from the shame. But she does teleport him away from the battle and put him back with Helen. She saw the dance battle from afar though and witnessing Menelaus’ skills give her resistance to Paris’ inferior groove. This anger’s Paris, who sentences her to herd his very personal herd of sheep. The Greeks call Paris a cheater and a crybaby and begin their on Troy. Episode 7: The fighting continues, but neither side gains the upper hand. For the Greeks, Odysseus uses his anti-material rifle to no scope dozens of Trojan healers, but Ajax and Diomedes don’t have enough piercing resistance to make it past the Trojan archers. Meanwhile, Andromache, who everyone still thinks is Hector, promises Zeus that she’ll discover the Americas and bring hundreds of big booty Latinas to Mt
