The Gods-- you are taking on one of the most profound issues in the Iliad!   But don't be shy-- the poem forces it on you from the outset, when Apollo starts the plot/conflict by sending the plague and Athena prevents its resolution by stopping Achilles from killing Agamemnon.  Apollo is awesome, or, in the old sense of the word, awful:

                          Phoibos Apollo heard him,
and strode down along the pinnacles of Olympos, angered
in his heart, carrying across his shoulders the  bow and the hooded
quiver, and the shafts clashed on the shoulders of the god walking
angrily.  He came as night comes down and knelt then
apart and opposite the ships and let go an arrow.
Terrible was the clash that rose from the bow of silver.

So, the gods have tremendous power.  No human could withstand them.  Helen, who is the daughter of Zeus and thus, like Achilles, at least half divine, tries to refuse Aphrodite in Iliad 3, but despite the fact that Helen seems to be trying to do what she perceives as right, she is overpowered by Aphrodite, who does not appeal to any moral argument, but simply informs her of who is boss:


Then in anger Aphrodite the shining spoke to her:
"Wretched girl, do not tease me, lest in anger I forsake you
and grow to hate you as much as now I terribly love you,
lest I encompass you in hard hate, caught between both sides,
Danaans and Trojans alike, and you terribly perish."

Reading the Iliad requires a great leap of imagination-- imagine if you lived in a world where there were supernatural powers everywhere, whom you could sometimes experience directly (as Achilles when he talks to Athena  and Thetis) but more often only indirectly (Agamemnon in the film, who is told by the priest what he has to do).  And imagine that you were in a desperate situation and perceived that the gods that you had worshiped your whole life had turned against you-- this is Hektor's situation, and his confusion as he realizes this is horrifying.

There seems to be a general assumption in the Homeric poems that if you treat the gods properly (worship, sacrifice, proper behavior), then they will treat you properly (help you in times of trouble), as Apollo helps Chryses in Book 1, and Zeus appears to agree to help Achilles--but then things get much more complicated, and the humans find themselves in hopeless situations.

Some questions as you read the end of the Iliad:

Do you think Homer wants us to think of the gods as upholding morality and justice?
Do you think he wants us to think his human characters are ethical, moral actors? 

What evidence is there in the Iliad that the gods are just?
What evidence is there that they are bound by fate? (specific passages?)
Are the humans or the gods are more moral or ethical? 
Does Zeus prevail?  Should he?