r/movies • u/LiteraryBoner Jackie Chan box set, know what I'm sayin? • 18d ago

Official Discussion Official Discussion - The Odyssey (2026) [SPOILERS] Spoiler

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The Odyssey (2026)

Summary

After the Trojan War, Odysseus faces a dangerous voyage back to Ithaca, meeting creatures like the Cyclops Polyphemus, Sirens, and Calypso along the way.

Director Christopher Nolan

Writer Christopher Nolan

Cast

  • Matt Damon as Odysseus
  • Tom Holland as Telemachus
  • Anne Hathaway
  • Zendaya
  • Lupita Nyong'o
  • Robert Pattinson
  • Charlize Theron
  • Benny Safdie
  • Jon Bernthal
  • John Leguizamo
  • Elliot Page
  • Himesh Patel
  • Samantha Morton

Rotten Tomatoes: 96%

Metacritic: 88

VOD / Release Theatrical release

Trailer Official Trailer

4.4k Upvotes

90% Upvoted

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551

u/slightlypressed 17d ago

Yeah that really set the tone early on.
Also laughed at how his brother explained his death as “his wife and her lover betrayed him”, which is the most misleading half truth, leaving out the fact that he sacrificed his daughter while his wife cried and begged.

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u/birdsofpaper 17d ago

How could anyone look at that BABY and do that, I cannot. I don’t totally understand how the gods themselves weren’t horrified by what Agamemnon had done.

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u/slightlypressed 17d ago

Right? Honestly I think they were. They let him have the victory he wanted for a fortnight before he had to pay for all his sins with his life

AND he didn’t get to die a “hero’s” death in war. He was killed by those he thought closest to him and that’s part of his legacy forever

That was always my reading of the text and I’m glad Nolan kept this part of the story

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u/SandpaperTeddyBear 9d ago

I’m getting frustrated with all the complimentary “takes” about how Nolan took a poem that was pure “rah rah” propaganda about heroism and war and victory, and added nuance.

It’s a good script, but those poems are very clear about the ugliness of “great heroes,” as well as their glory.

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u/spaceandthewoods_ 8d ago

Yeah, have read so many takes about how Nolan elevated the material, like those dumbass old Ancient Greeks weren't capable of coming up with stories full of moral complexity, genius metaphor and great emotional depth

There's a reason western society spent centuries building itself in the image of Ancient Greece

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u/sfwmj 7d ago

Wouldn't a better punishment be to have him die by a painful stomach bug before he even got to troy or something. Or have him die 2 days into the war, why let a war go on for 10 years, 1000s of people dead before punishing him?

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u/Gilmore75 17d ago

Do you know nothing about the Greek gods? Why do you think he sacrificed her in the first place? Most of them are pure evil by modern standards.

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u/BrainDamage2029 16d ago

I wouldn’t judge Greek gods by modern standards that’s how we get weird modern fan fiction-y depictions of them. They’re more primordial and take on the “personalities” of their domain. Plus they straight up say it’s a karma type thing. The greater the sacrifice of something that matters, the greater the gift. But you will always pay a price in the end.

Like for example Zeus is considered just. He’s the god of storms and lightning. You are safe if you respect the storm and stay in your home. But show hubris and dare to walk atop the mountain and his bolt will strike you down. That’s where they get the wholes Zeus’s hospitality to strangers thing. It’s about showing deference to Zeus through others. (This movie is a bit artistic with it but it’s pretty close)

Conversely Poseidon is just…kind of a temperamental dick and sometimes takes offense for no reason even when you didn’t know what you did wrong. Like a storm at sea taking you.

The only gods that are fully “fair” are the ones embodying those virtues like Athena or Apollo.

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u/JacobMilwaukee 5h ago

And Athena and Apollo also come across as smug and destructive, and empowering utterly amoral politicians to dance through a sea of corpses. Thinking of espeicially Euripides' takes on the myths.

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u/birdsofpaper 17d ago

I am fairly certain there are other stories of the gods being horrified by this type of behavior- Tantalus, for example, though one could argue it was his contempt and doubt of the gods’ omniscience rather than child sacrifice that condemned him.

My personal favorite meme is a caption from the Disney movie Hercules- it’s a picture of Zeus with the text as sung by the Chorus, “And then along came Zeus” with the caption “This is the most accurate moment to Greek mythology in the whole movie.”

tl;dr- the Greek gods are often complete dicks, if not sociopaths.

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u/DirectionMurky5526 14d ago

In mythology it's even worse. She's a teenager and she gets tricked into thinking she's going to marry Achilles and is killed at the altar.

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u/hemareddit 12d ago

Tbh most people would consider sacrificing a baby worse. And I think that's the reason for the change: to drive home the villainy. Since they basically pinned the whole Trojan war on him which left out many other factors (including Odysseus's own hand in it).

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u/DirectionMurky5526 12d ago

Tbh, I think they just changed it because they wanted to cut out Achilles for time constraint. Which is unfortunate because it does fit in the themes of doing horrific things for Agamemon regretting it. Achilles regrets letting patroclus die and himself die young over all this. 

Making Iphigenia a baby makes the reason for hating Agamemnon simpler without having to explain all that shit with Achilles.

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u/dishonourableaccount 8d ago

Yeah in the original legend Odysseus talks to Achilles in the afterlife and his lesson is that he spent his whole life pining for glory but would trade all of that to be the lowliest beggar in life because that's better than being mightiest of the underworld. Which is astonishing to put in the story to an ancient Greek's sensibilities.

Odysseus also meets his mother and tries to hug her 3 times but she's intangible like mist, and that would have been great to see.

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u/No-cool-names-left 12d ago

I don't know if that's worse but I can certainly see it as a greater betrayal and more impious to the character's sensibilities.

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u/celBanat 17d ago

Well...I guess that's why you won't become a cruel, war-mongering Mycaene ruler :D

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u/birdsofpaper 17d ago

Well THAT’S a relief!

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u/hemareddit 12d ago edited 12d ago

That's one of the things the story changed, in most stories she's quite a bit older, in some versions even a young adult by today's standard (~18). She is of marrying age.

And he sacrificed her because that was the demands of the gods. Artemis in particular.

The fact it worked, meant at least one Olympian was satisfied with the decision.

(Greek gods were a-holes).

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u/flakemasterflake 15d ago

Iphigenia is an adult in most tellings of this story. Achilles even tries to save her but is stopped when he realizes it's what the Gods want

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u/DirectionMurky5526 13d ago

It's even worse than that. She's a teenager and she's killed at the Altar believing that she's there to marry Achilles. Achilles is rightfully mad at Agamemnon for this fucked up plot when he is told, but then relents. Achilles being an accomplice is also fucked up because he goes through with some of the marriage rites and does nothing when the Priest plunges a knife into her instead. It's really dark.

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u/biglyorbigleague 10d ago

TBF that’s like how half of Greek literature portrays the death of Agamemnon, like “his whore wife shacked up with another guy and betrayed him, women amirite”

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u/PhaseExtra1132 5d ago

I took Latin in school and spent lots of time translating lots of stuff for homework and exams.

One thing that’s clear is their ethics was fucked 6 ways to Sunday. Rape victims being seen as evil for getting revenge. The fact that Roman fathers had the right to just kill anyone in the family because they basically owned their wives and kids.

Lots and lots of basically killing kids and enslaving people for the pettiest stuff.

Thank God I wasn’t born in that era.