Athena Stone (The Hunt)

**Athena Stone** (Hilary Swank) was the main villainess from the 2020 film, *The Hunt*.

## Backstory

Athena Stone was an executive at a major corporation, and her backstory revealed that a year prior to the events, she (along with Miranda and Liberty) participated in a group text with a number of liberal elites complaining about the President, with the group voicing their excitement over "the hunt," which had them hunting down "deplorables" for sport.

News of the group text reached Athena's superiors, due to the fact that a dozen people found out and accused Athena of habitually hunting down conservatives for sport at her lavish manor. Athena stated that the texts were a joke and that she didn't even own a manor, but she--along with her co-workers who participated--ended up fired as a result.

## Events

    After losing her job, Athena turned heel and planned to do the very thing she was accused of doing:  hunting people for sport, with the 12 whistleblowers (one of them being main protagonist Crystal May Creasey) being her intended victims. She colluded with her fired co-workers in the plan, and while they voiced their disgust with the dozen's conservative viewpoints, the main objective was based on the false rumor rather than politics. The villainess and her hunters trained for a year for their hunt, which had them drugging and abducting the group to place in a hunting ground in Croatia. Athena killed one of the members on a plane, doing so with one of her high heels, and the film's progression saw a number of the others killed by the hunters, all on Athena's orders.

Crystal had figured out that she was being hunted, and ended up killing Miranda and her husband Julius at the convenience store, and later eliminated Liberty and the others inside the bunker. Athena later called via radio and spoke to Don (who had been assisting Crystal) in a manner that had Crystal believing that Don was alligned with Athena, leading to Crystal killing him as well. Athena's first on-screen appearance was in the flashback scenes that led to her revenge plot, and the film's climax saw Crystal enter Athena's home and engage in a confronation.

During their encounter, the evil Athena blamed Crystal and the others for ruining her life with false accusations that she was hunting people for sport, and added that it was because of her that she started doing it for real. After the villainess taunted Crystal with her backstory, Crystal revealed to Athena that there was another woman with that same name, but she went by Crystal *Mae* Creasey, meaning that Athena had the wrong woman. Athena disbelieved Crystal's statement, and they later engaged in a lengthy fight that went all over the house, with various weapons used. The villainess took out a rifle and fired shots at Crystal, who avoided the shots and continued going after Athena. Later on, as both women were back in the kitchen, Athena stabbed Crystal's shoulder with a meat thermometer, and stabbed her stomach with a blender blade; only for Crystal to grab Athena and placed the other end through her stomach.

After both women collapsed, Crystal asked Athena why she referred to her as Snowball, with the villainess stating that Snowball was a character from George Orwell's *Animal Farm*. However, Crystal reminded Athena that Snowball was trying to make the world a better place, but was the victim of a smear campaign, after which she said that Athena was actually Snowball. The villainess expressed surprise that Crystal read *Animal Farm*, and when asked if Crystal was the one who posted about her online, Crystal again said she wasn't and that Athena pursued the wrong woman, leaving the villainess disappointed before she died of her wounds.

## Trivia

* This was Hilary Swank's first villainous role.
* Later that year, Hilary Swank appeared as the evil Val Quinlan in *Fatale*.