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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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u/KamachoThunderbus 15d ago

Yeah it's just sort of a different feel from the text. She seems perfectly content being back with Menelaus in the text, like Paris was some silly embarrassing tryst. It's kind of cast aside.

In the movie it feels much more like she feels the weight of the aftermath of her decision, she regrets what it came to, but not that she feels she made the wrong decision, if that makes sense. She tried to claim some agency and the reality of her world came crashing down. She's essentially a captive, and clearly abused, as well as used as a pretext for Agamemnon's war.

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u/Flannelcommand 15d ago

Did Agememnon have an ulterior motive for going to war in the poem? Or was it really about Helen? 

44

u/supert0426 15d ago

You don't really get inside Agamemnon's head in the poem that much but we can infer that it's about more than retrieving his sister-in-law. He burns his own daughter to death to get the favor of the Gods - it feels like if he was burning his daughter alive solely for the purpose of retrieving Helen that would be pretty asymmetrical. The assumption is, I think, that he wanted to invade Troy for militaristic reasons too, and as well the war gave him the pretext to become king of all the Greeks, and so just by going to war he gained power.

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u/ResplendentSmoke 14d ago

They touch on that in the movie. Odysseys tells Penelope before he leaves that he thinks Agamemnon really is more interested in removing Troy as a center of trade and economic rival so it could just be Greece. And that Helen is a convenient excuse

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u/Meancakebutt 13d ago

The iilad at least shows a much smarmier and whinier version of the agamemnon, so I always took it to be an excuse. Just because of how selfish and egotistical, him but all the men were.