There's no way that was the Original ending.

I swear the proper ending would've been Hebe dying then Hercules going on his adventures into the world.

The set up to Hebe surviving was done with the dialogue off screen (The actors faces are hidden when they speak to cover it up) over what i'm sure was the original ending of her dying. They fade to black before her eyes finally close then BAM baby scene.

I'm thinking for some reason, either the studio or test audiences wanted a happy ending. So with no money left to do reshoots, they had to come up with this new new ending on the fly and have Herc marrying and ruling with what footage they had plus a cheaper than reshoots ADR fix. I think it all comes down to, too many cooks in the kitchen yielding to outrageous demands of others.

That being said I liked the movie. I'm praying that on the blu-ray, either with deleted scenes or Renny's audio commentary it will shed more light on my theory and help salvage the filmmakers reputations.

I also think this would have been better if it was an R rated film. These filmmakers come from a straight to dvd market where they do R rated action really well. It's a shame, that under better guidance i think this film could've done better.