“Well, they're just fine. You know, a little dark, a little gloomy. And, as always, hey, full of dead people. What are you gonna do?”
―Hades describing how things are in the Underworld
The Underworld is a location in Disney's 1997 animated feature film Hercules. It is the afterlife of the Disney Animated Canon and is ruled by the Olympian GodHades. The location has also appeared in other Disney related media.
River Styx: Also known as the Pit of Death, this river carries the dead to the Underworld, where they spend the rest of eternity floating in its waters. The River Styx can be deadly to mortals and causes them to swiftly age and kill them if they spend too long in it. In the episode "Hercules and the River Styx" of the animated series, it is revealed that the river is also a Goddess that only reveals herself to those who wield Poseidon's Trident. It is also revealed that the river marks the border of Hades' domain. Technically, Styx is in fact a nymph and will live for as long as her river flows.
Tartarus: is the deepest, darkest, and most sinister area of the Underworld. It is here where the souls of the wicked and evil are sent and it is also the place where Zeus imprisoned most of the Titans and a giant Cyclops after he ended their reign of destruction. It is a dark and ominous dungeon-like place located deep beneath the ocean, a few jagged rocks can be seen rising from the sea where Tartarus lies. There is also a small island filled with jagged mountains where the Titan Prometheus is imprisoned and each day a giant eagle comes to eat his liver.
Elysian Fields: The final resting place for the good and the heroic. It is a paradise filled with beautiful valleys and temples. This part of the Underworld is protected by Zeus, but Hades attempted to win it from Zeus in a bet in the episode "Hercules and the Driving Test", but he lost the bet however.
Sora, Donald, and Goofy emerge in the Underworld when they first arrive, meeting Megara, who is on a quest to convince Hades to stop bothering Hercules. When Sora confronts Hades, he summons Auron, who quickly switches to Sora's side. Hades cannot be hurt in the Underworld, so the team attempts to escape, and Auron and Sora are forced to take on Cerberus before they can leave the Underworld. Back up top, Hercules offers the junior heroes the Olympus Stone, which stops the Underworld from draining all their strength, however, the stone has been stolen by someone in a black cloak. Looking for the stone, they encounter and have their first confrontation with Demyx. The team then rescues Meg with the help of Hercules and Pegasus before opening another gateway with the Olympus Stone.
When the team enters the world for a second time, the Underdrome has been unlocked, presumably when Sora used his Keyblade to open a wall during the first visit. Hades kidnaps Meg to bait Hercules into the games. The group enters the Pain and Panic Cup, and the final competitor is Auron, who is being controlled by Hades. Hercules faces Auron alone while Sora, Donald, and Goofy retrieve the statue Hades is using to control Auron. By returning the statue, Auron regains his free will and refuses to fight. Hades, as Hercules' punishment, drops Meg into the River Styx and Hercules jumps in after her. Hades believes he is dead, but Hercules returns for the final battle with Hades, a true hero at last. They defeat Hades, everyone is reunited, Auron is freed, and Sora, Donald, and Goofy are immortalized as constellations to mark them as true heroes, much to Phil's disbelief.
After beating some Heartless in a competition, Xehanort, Eraqus Bragi, Hermod, Urd, and Baldr get all sent in the Underworld, as promised by Hades. The group gets separated, leaving Xehanort with Bragi and Eraqus. Hades asks them why they wanted to come there, and Xehanort tells him they wanted to speak to someone who disappeared, someone named Hoder. Hades tells the group he prefers referring to these people as "dead". Xehanort then tells Hades the name of their friend is Hoder, and Hades verifies if she is in fact in the Underworld, then confirms it. He then tells the group the path to find her and looks away with an evil look, wondering how many of Xehanort's classmates could possibly become his pawns.
Xehanort, Eraqus and Bragi then meet up with Cerberus blocking their way and see Baldr fighting him. Bragi joins Baldr in on the fight, and Xehanort and Eraqus leaves them with the beast.
Xehanort and Eraqus then manage to find Hermod and Urd. After Eraqus tells them what happened, Hermod and Urd decide to join Bragi and Baldr in on their fight against Cerberus. Urd then tells Eraqus to not join them in on the fight, and to instead focus on talking to the upper classmen to know what happened to them.
The upper classmen, Heimall, Sigrun, Helgi and Hoder then reveal that they all got defeated by Maleficent in her castle, and their spirits were now trapped in the Underworld because of it, Hoder being the first killed. Xehanort and Eraqus ask the upper classmen if they think Maleficent was the formless Darkness they were searching, but Helgi replies that since she transformed into a dragon, she was clearly not formless, therefore not being the one they were looking for. Eraqus then ask them if Maleficent was one of the Darknesses they had to defeat. Heimdall then tells them that there might not be a clear difference between Light and Darkness in people's hearts, the real problem is people's beliefs, if they think they are right or not, making people with different opinions looking like they hold Darkness.
Eraqus, Xehanort and Urd ask Hades where their other friends could be, since they want to leave the Underworld, but Hades tells them he isn't a babysitter, altough one of them was now a permanent resident of the Underworld. Urd and Eraqus then told Hades they would never leave without their friend, making him angry. He then fought the three Keyblade wielders, then Eraqus was about to strike Hades, interrupted by Hermod who suddenly came, and told them they shouldn't fight a resident of this world to not mess with the world orders. Urd and Eraqus then convinced Hermod that they had to fight Hades to bring Baldr and Bragi back, but the four Keyblade wielders got absorbed by a Dark Corridor before the fight could continue.
After Emma, Hook, Regina, and the group return to Storybrooke after their visit in Camelot, a Fury, a dangerous creature absorbing life-force, attacks Robin Hood and tries to take him to the Underworld. A mysterious ferryman Charon waiting the soul. However, he vanish when Regina, combining her force with her allies, eliminates the creature.
Hades' domain in Once Upon a Time
After Hook is killed, Emma, Rumplestiltskin, Regina, Snow, Charming, Robin Hood, and Henry enter the Underworld to bring Hook back from the dead. The Underworld resembles Storybrooke with the exception of the broken clock tower and the charred remains of Emma's car. Cora serves as the mayor until she fails her assigned mission from Hades. After her demotion, Cruella De Vil is chosen as the new mayor.
It was revealed that Hades made the Underworld look like Storybrooke for Zelena, so she could have her own Storybrooke to rule, as she felt Regina got everything.
Regina and the group have dubbed the Underworld as "Underbrooke".
According to the creators of Once, the Underworld is not Hell, but rather a place for people with unfinished business,[1] which is why characters who are not villains such as Hook[2] are there. This is explained in the second half of the fifth season, as several people such as Hercules or Liam Jones are kept in the "Underbrooke" for so long since they have unfinished business. Once the characters succeed in finding their unfinished business, they either go to Mount Olympus, known as "a better place" or Hell, known as "a worse place".
Long before Hercules, the Underworld was depicted with Hades, here called Pluto, ruling over it. Persephone is also shown to inhabit it, at least only during the Winter. The depiction of the Underworld is much more in line with modern Christian depictions of Hell where it is a dark cavernous place with brimming red fire all over.
The Underworld appears in the episode "We Find Out the Truth, Sort Of". The entrance is through a waterbed store that is owned by Procrustes, going by the name "Crusty". Upon entering, the Underworld is split into parts with the area before the River Styx being a barren ashy-grey wasteland with large black rock formations. Charon and Cerberus are here with the latter acting as a guard of sorts for the former. When Percy Jackson, Annabeth Chase, and Grover Underwood get passed them, they encounter the Asphodel fields which is composed of the deceased who are rooted to the ground based on their regrets. Annabeth is forced to leave the Underworld when she is nearly caught by the fields. Percy and Grover continue on and encounter the Pit of Tartarus which, compared to the rest of the Underworld is located in the middle of a giant brightly lit desert-like area. In the distance is Hades' castle, a large dark marbled structure.
Interestingly, the entrance to the Underworld is a stark departure from the books where it is at a record studio called DOA Recording Studios. Charon was also at the front desk as an odd-accented man.
