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Any time the character is in a moral quandary is interesting. That's been true from the Greeks on down.

I love the Greeks. There's no messing around - it's all do or die with them.

A heroic nature is very Greek.

While the willingness of the ancient Greeks to sacrifice their lives for glory brings tears to my eyes, I cannot ultimately condone the choice of Achilles.

Many people have been pontificating, and patronizing, and moralizing, and scapegoating, saying you Greeks, you are the problem. I would say we Greeks have a problem. We are not the problem.

People have their complexities. They have their heroic moments and their villainous moments, too.

The Greeks already understood that there was more interest in portraying an unusual character than a usual character - that is the purpose of films and theatre.

To a degree, the Greek and Roman mythological heroes are just the first superheroes. They appeal to children for much the same reason. These gods and heroes may have powers, but they get angry and they do the wrong thing. They are human too.

Heroes, whatever high ideas we may have of them, are mortal and not divine. We are all as God made us and many of us much worse.