{"id":15298,"date":"2026-07-24T03:28:03","date_gmt":"2026-07-23T22:28:03","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=15298"},"modified":"2026-07-24T03:28:03","modified_gmt":"2026-07-23T22:28:03","slug":"elon-musks-ai-version-of-the-odyssey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/?p=15298","title":{"rendered":"Elon Musk\u2019s AI Version of &#8216;The Odyssey&#8217;"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><script>\r\n  atOptions = {\r\n    'key' : '644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6',\r\n    'format' : 'iframe',\r\n    'height' : 90,\r\n    'width' : 728,\r\n    'params' : {}\r\n  };\r\n<\/script>\r\n<script src=\"https:\/\/www.highperformanceformat.com\/644b717812d811d6a1c1fc5b6ccd6fa6\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"paywall\">While it\u2019s highly unlikely that either of these two projects will actually come to fruition, it\u2019s worth wondering what Musk\u2019s \u201chistorically accurate\u201d <em>Odyssey<\/em> might look like, whether AI-generated or Gibson-directed. Never mind the fact that a \u201chistorically accurate\u201d adaptation of <em>The Odyssey<\/em> is, in and of itself, a logical fallacy: Homer\u2019s nearly 3,000-year-old epic is populated by mythical Greek gods like Zeus, Poseidon, and Athena, as well as imaginary mythical monsters like Cyclopes, giants, sirens, and a witch who can turn men into pigs. The opening chyron of Nolan\u2019s film acknowledges this: His story takes place \u201cin a time of apparent magic.\u201d But if you were to take Musk and his cronies at face value, you\u2019d have to believe not only that all of these magical, mythical beings could be found in documented history, but also that Nolan did a piss-poor job of rendering them onscreen. Apologies to Bill Irwin\u2019s towering and vulnerable performance as the one-eyed Polyphemus. (Yes, that <em>was<\/em> Bill Irwin!)<\/p>\n<p class=\"paywall\">If Musk <em>really<\/em> wanted to make a historically accurate version of <em>The Odyssey,<\/em> he\u2019d film a guy named Homer wearing a robe and reciting a poem around a fire for hours upon hours. But even that version might not cut the mustard when it comes to \u201chistorical accuracy.\u201d There\u2019s a vibrant scholarly debate as to whether Homer was a single person or many people; it\u2019s called the Homeric question. Thus, Musk\u2019s promise to stay \u201ctrue to the art of Homer\u201d is not as simple as he or his followers would like to believe.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paywall\">It\u2019s clear that what bothers Musk and company the most in regard to the \u201caccuracy\u201d of <em>The Odyssey<\/em> is the diversity of Nolan\u2019s cast. \u201cThere were no Black people or trans people in ancient Greek mythology,\u201d they furiously type on their crumb-covered keyboards. (They\u2019re wrong on both counts: In Greek mythology, Aethiopia was a kingdom often associated with sub-Saharan Africa, and Hermaphroditos, the offspring of Hermes and Aphrodite, quite famously had both male and female characteristics after fusing with the water nymph Salmacis. But I digress.) Nevertheless, it seems that, in either movie, Musk would be looking for not only a white, cisgender cast, but also a Greek cast at that. (For what it\u2019s worth, some Greek people <a data-offer-url=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/film\/2026\/jun\/03\/christopher-nolan-no-greek-actors-the-odyssey-matt-damon-zendaya-charlize-theron\" class=\"external-link text link\" data-event-click=\"{&quot;element&quot;:&quot;ExternalLink&quot;,&quot;outgoingURL&quot;:&quot;https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/film\/2026\/jun\/03\/christopher-nolan-no-greek-actors-the-odyssey-matt-damon-zendaya-charlize-theron&quot;}\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theguardian.com\/film\/2026\/jun\/03\/christopher-nolan-no-greek-actors-the-odyssey-matt-damon-zendaya-charlize-theron\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">are actually mad<\/a> about the Greek-actor erasure in Nolan\u2019s version.) Thankfully, he\u2019s got a bevy of Greek stars available to replace A-listers like Anne Hathaway, Tom Holland, and Zendaya.<\/p>\n<p class=\"paywall\">There\u2019s Nia Vardalos, writer and star of <em>My Big Fat Greek Wedding;<\/em> given that she\u2019s the reigning queen of Greek-themed cinema, it only makes sense that she\u2019d slot in for Hathaway\u2019s Queen Penelope. Her king and long-lost husband, Odysseus, could be played by none other than Uncle Jesse: John Stamos. America\u2019s sweetheart Jennifer Aniston has Greek origins: Her dad, John Aniston, n\u00e9e Yannis Anastassakis, was born on the island of Crete. All that time spent shilling Smartwater would make her a shoo-in for Calypso. Tina Fey, whose mother was born in Piraeus, would make an incredible Circe\u2014turning men into pigs sounds like something straight out of the Liz Lemon playbook.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<script async=\"async\" data-cfasync=\"false\" src=\"https:\/\/pl30214220.effectivecpmnetwork.com\/9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\/invoke.js\"><\/script>\r\n<div id=\"container-9ab3d4df8a7e1a6171e16ddbf732cc19\"><\/div>\r\n\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>While it\u2019s highly unlikely that either of these two projects will actually come to fruition, it\u2019s worth wondering what Musk\u2019s \u201chistorically accurate\u201d Odyssey might look like, whether AI-generated or Gibson-directed. Never mind the fact that a \u201chistorically accurate\u201d adaptation of The Odyssey is, in and of itself, a logical fallacy: Homer\u2019s nearly 3,000-year-old epic is&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":15299,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"fifu_image_url":"https:\/\/media.vanityfair.com\/photos\/6a626b625398f689564e723c\/16:9\/w_1280,c_limit\/GettyImages-2200061390.jpg","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15298","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-celebrity-gossip"],"brizy_media":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15298","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=15298"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15298\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/15299"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=15298"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=15298"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/usnews-14267fa.ingress-comporellon.ewp.live\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=15298"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}