Who's DC's Hercules?

Who's This? A future demi-god.

The facts: Because Hercules is a character from Greco-Roman myth, he of course appears in Wonder Woman stories as early as 1941's All-Star Comics #8. But Hercules Unbound (#1 cover-dated October 1975) is a reinterpretation of the character as a comics lead, in 12-issue series set during the Great Disaster, a postapocalyptic future that may or may not be the same as Kamandi's. The series was created by Gerry Conway and José Luis Garcia-Lopez (praise be his name), and ended by Cary Bates and Walt Simonson. The timeline didn't survive the Crisis, but Hercules did get an action figure in RemCo's Lost World of the Warlord line. Later versions of Hercules do not interest us here.
How you could have heard of him: He's a famous mythological hero!
Example story: Hercules Unbound #11 (July 1977) "The Dark Side of the Gods" by Cary Bates and Walt Simonson

Perhaps as a way to keep the series going after low sales, Hercules Unbound gets a make-over in this issue, with Walt Simonson swooping in and redesigning the demi-god's armor out of an indestructible, impossible ore fused from auto parts from a plant in Detroit. That's some good postapocalypse recycling, right there!

So WW3 was only "many months ago", so relatively early in the Great Disaster, though the Atomic Knights are credited for forging it. Herc is a rather vain character, begging his supporting cast (the blind Kevin and Herc's girlfriend Jennifer, there's also a dog called Basil) to comment on his new look in the positive (yes, Kevin is blind, but he has ESP that allows him to "see"). But the factory falls apart and they all have to book it before they're crushed. This is no time for compliments! They decide to drop the Atomic Knights home using their "Flying Wing" (piloted by Kevin, of course), but then Kev starts to glow and energy shoots out of his hand, throwing the Knights out of the plane. A feat of strength is required!

Hercules pulls on the cables until he can deposit the Knights safely in Lake Ontario, but it shakes him off the aircraft too. As he crashes to the ground, the power that's taken over Kevin is magically creating weapons on the plane, which blast at the Knights' HQ. Herc throws a huge boulder into the lake to create a tidal wave to hit the Flying Wing!

I supposed it's safer for Jennifer and Basil that a direct throw at the plane, but it still seems pretty hairy. The Wing crashes, hopefully with no hands loss. But wait, what do the other Greek gods think of all this? We find out!

Very cool: They look like they stepped out of a Grecian urn. They worry that having kept Hercules in the dark about the "Anti-Gods" could lead to tragedy, and now it's too late because Mount Olympus is caught in a temporal storm. Though Simonson has been pencilling the book for months, it really feels like this new mythical direction (none of this was addressed in previous issues that I can see) is like Bates brainstorming with the artist in a way that just wasn't done before. We're sort of seeing a prototype for his Thor run here. Anyway, the Gods combine forces to send a psychic warning to Zeus' son, which is received by Jennifer, but Athena's voice is interrupted by some kind of monster, summoned from the campfire.

The creature spits fire that melts the Atomic Knights' armor, but Hercules' new duds pass the test. Punching the demon does nothing, but Hercules isn't a one-trick pony. Well, unless you consider slinging boulders the "trick".

Unfortunately, the divine message has fried Jennifer's brain and she's dead. Just like that. I guess she's not part of this "new direction". EMOTE!

They sort of blame the demon and the "scourge" that possessed Kevin, but we know what's really happening here. And besides, the entity hasn't been exorcised like they think it has and Kev flies off in the plane, glowing like a will-o’-the-wisp. Hercules catches up to it, crashes it for what looks like the last time, and then gets jumped by Ares who, after decades of tangling with Wonder Woman, is now here trying to unleash the Anti-Gods. To be continued.

There would only be one more issue (in which Jennifer is resurrected, so I was wrong, but then, there's no direction needed at that point), looping back to explain Hercules' exile and ending the story. Well, I, for one, liked this one sample issue. Hard to go wrong with Simonson doing big action, after all. But DC was imploding and this little SF-fantasy series at least got to end on its own terms. Marvel's Hercules would have more success.

Who's Next? An old New God.