1.50 - Valley of the Shadow

« Previous Episode

Back to Season 1 Episode List »

Title Valley of the Shadows Episode # Season 1, Episode 50 First aired March 14, 1999 Directed by Simon Raby Written by Mark Edens Vanessa Place (Teleplay) Summary Hercules, Iolaus, and Theseus are lured into Hera's sacred valley. Zeus watches over them.

FoxKids Spoilers

• Hercules, Iolaus and Theseus take the word of an old man and hunt an area rich with game, unaware that it is protected by a monster and that the old man is really Hercules' father, Zeus, who is testing his son with the dangerous challenge.
• Hercules, Iolaus, and Theseus, out on a hunting/fishing/camping trip, find themselves, as darkness falls, in a mysterious valley, which was recommended to them by a crotchety old man. What they don't know is that this is a valley sacred to HERA and home to her Predator - like monster (THE PROTECTOR), who is the valley's guardian. At night, around their campfire, they are attacked. Things look grim until they manage to get to safety in a small cave. There they find the same man who sent them to this valley! Fighting an urge to feed the old guy to the monster, they instead find themselves risking their lives to save the man who sent them into this death trap. They survive the night and make it out of the valley. What Hercules doesn't know is that the old man was his father, Zeus -- who had set up this challenge for a son who had begun to doubt himself.

TV Guide Promo

• Hercules, Iolaus and Theseus follow the advice of a mysterious old man and go hunting in an area rich with game. What they don't know, however, is that the area is Hera's Valley, which is protected by a dangerous monster. Another fact that they're unaware of is that the strange old man is really Zeus, King of the Gods, Hercules's father and that he is testing his son with this challenge.

Synopsis

Title card - End credits can be found here.

To Be Added

Characters (in order of appearance)

• Iolaus
• Theseus
• Aegeus
• Vendor Christine
• Hercules
• Protector
• Zeus
• Hera

Characters (mention only)

• Poseidon
• Marco

Places

• Marketplace
• Polonus - (mention only)
• Hera's Valley
• Cheiron's Academy - (mention only)

Items

• Dinars
  • More items from this episode...

Other Pages

• Sand Sharks - (mention only)

Television Tropes

• Plot Tropes:
  • Ghost Story
  • Heroes Gone Fishing
  • Horrible Camping Trip

Trivia & References

This is the only appearance of Zeus in the whole series, fitting in with the continuity of Hercules: The Legendary Journeys, which establishes that while Zeus rarely interacted with Hercules, he was always watching out for him.

Guides, Scripts, Transcripts, & Reviews

• Valley of the Shadow Shooting Draft
• Valley of the Shadow Transcript (Dialogue Only)
• IMDB's Episode Guide
• TV.com's Episode Guide
• ShareTV's Episode Guide
• Watch the full episode online at Hulu.com.

« Previous Episode

Back to Season 1 Episode List »