Why Doesn't Odysseus Make Us Feel More? | Kinolime Fix It 4
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Show Notes
Can changing just one part of a story accidentally break the entire character?
Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey has captivated audiences with its breathtaking IMAX visuals, beautiful set pieces, and an all-star cast including Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, Robert Pattinson, Zendaya, Lupita Nyong'o, and Charlize Theron. Based on Homer's legendary epic and Emily Wilson’s 2017 translation, the film has become one of the biggest cinematic events of the year. But beneath the spectacle lies a fascinating screenwriting question.
In this episode of Fix It, Kinolime’s Meara breaks down why Matt Damon's Odysseus doesn't leave the same emotional impact as the legendary hero from Homer's story. He argues that one key writing decision creates a ripple effect throughout the screenplay, transforming Odysseus from an active protagonist who shapes his own destiny into a reactive protagonist swept along by events. As the protagonist changes, so do the antagonists, the conflicts, the tension, and ultimately the emotional payoff.
This isn't simply a review of Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey. It's a deep dive into screenwriting, story structure, and how removing or changing one element of a story can unintentionally create inconsistencies that affect every scene that follows.
Full Transcript
[00:00]
Hey, do you say telemocus or telemocus?
[00:09]
Let's start an argument about it in the comments section and boost the algorithm a little.
[00:13]
Christopher Nolan's 2026 adaptation of the Odyssey is receiving plaudits from critics
[00:17]
and from fans alike.
[00:19]
The A-list cast, the natural lighting, the sprawling set pieces, and those moments of its fixating
[00:25]
tension.
[00:26]
We've heard all that praise by now, I'm sure, so there's no point in us beating that
[00:30]
dead trojan horse.
[00:32]
We're not here to talk about any of that superficial stuff, we're talking about character and story.
[00:37]
Particularly, I want to look at why Matt Damon's Odysseus is nobody's favorite part of
[00:41]
this blockbuster and how we can trace that all the way back to Nolan's writing decisions.
[00:45]
Why does Odysseus not engender stronger emotions?
[00:48]
Why does he fail to capture the imagination required of this Homeric adventure?
[00:53]
This video will argue that it's because he's been shifted from an agent of his own destiny
[00:56]
to a victim of society, this vague and nebulous force that you can never truly overcome.
[01:02]
It positions Odysseus as a tool for Nolan to direct, rather than someone with the self-determination
[01:08]
required to actually challenge the gods.
[01:11]
I'm Mira, screenwriter and creative executive here at Kunalin.
[01:14]
Welcome to Fixed.
[01:17]
Perhaps the greatest singular change to the source material is Nolan's transposing of
[01:22]
guilt and trauma onto the King of Ethic as character for his actions in Troy.
[01:26]
Rather than strengthening Odysseus's character, I feel that this decision weakens his motivations.
[01:31]
Translators and authors Emily Wilson and Daniel Mendelssohn have speculated that Nolan's
[01:36]
desire to make a Christopher Nolan movie led to unfortunate shortcomings in the adaptation.
[01:41]
It's ironic in a way when Wilson herself has been criticized for her highly contemporary
[01:46]
translation of the text.
[01:47]
Consequently, her work seems to be the foundation for Nolan's interpretation.
[01:51]
Everything is a copy of a copy of a copy.
[01:54]
In the dog-eared Robert Fakles' print I maintain from my school days, the conclusion
[01:58]
of the Trojan Wars is described to us.
[02:00]
Odysseus march right up to Deothabus' house like the God of War on attack with diehard
[02:05]
menal house.
[02:06]
There, he sang.
[02:08]
Odysseus fought the grimaced fight he had ever braved, but he won through at last thanks
[02:12]
to Athena's superhuman power.
[02:15]
This makes it seem like there is some valor in it.
[02:17]
No pleasure, but no regret either.
[02:20]
It was the task at hand and the gods aided his victory.
[02:23]
Now see Wilson's translation of the same passage.
[02:26]
Odysseus, with menal house, rushed to find Deothabus' house and there he won at last through
[02:31]
dreadful violence thanks to Athena, so the poet sang.
[02:35]
Dreadful violence is loaded language indeed.
[02:38]
Was Odysseus a brilliant wartime leader of men, this badass who or a farmed as Troy burned,
[02:43]
or was he ashamed of what he did?
[02:45]
Is dreadful violence the experience of the man himself or the opinion of the external
[02:49]
third person a raider?
[02:51]
His intent is fundamentally changed by this interpretation, and this has knock-on effects
[02:55]
that reverberate through every facet of his character.
[03:01]
He original telling about Odysseus' return to pick him as someone almost singularly
[03:05]
driven by his desperation to return home to his family.
[03:08]
Each obstacle he encounters, be it a god, a monster, an ally or an enemy, reveals a
[03:14]
little bit about his character beyond his objective.
[03:17]
Heliance, Cunning, loyalty to his men, pride in excess, each encounter tests his humanity.
[03:24]
vitally he learns to overcome the hubris that afforded him the advantage in Troy.
[03:29]
Nolan's alterations position Odysseus has defining character moment has passed tense,
[03:33]
something that has already occurred when the story begins, shifting him from a proactive
[03:37]
hero to a largely reactive one.
[03:39]
The siege of Troy is more defining than the return to Ithaca.
[03:43]
His past informs his present rather than the future he wants in forming his actions.
[03:47]
The hubris he's known for is wavering from the very moment we meet him, except for when
[03:52]
the plot necessitates its inclusion.
[03:54]
During their journey, he is not completely abandoned in his ego and bloodloose as evidenced
[03:59]
by the juvenile shot he takes at the Cyclops as they flee.
[04:02]
Odysseus is also stripped of his silver tongue and his guile.
[04:06]
The archetypal contemporary, witty hero think Iron Man, think Captain Jack Sparrow.
[04:13]
He's owe a lot to the character, but Nolan's version couldn't feel further away.
[04:17]
Instead, as Mendelssohn says, this tormented, guilt-ridden Odysseus, stripped of humor
[04:23]
and wit, seductiveness and cleverness, is a sibling of a Memento's anguished amnesiac,
[04:28]
of Batman, of Oppenheimer, men tormented by pasts they wrestle with in different ways.
[04:34]
Nolan giving Odysseus the Oppenheimer treatment feels particularly apt, whereby the protagonist
[04:39]
achieved something great, but something also terrible, and they are unable to put the
[04:44]
cat back in the bag.
[04:46]
But unlike inventing the atomic bomb, we never really see the spiraling consequences of
[04:50]
the siege of Troy.
[04:51]
Odysseus is not Paula Traede's unleashing a holy crusade.
[04:55]
Let's be clear, many great tales have been told about the ethical consequences of war,
[04:59]
many more are yet to be spun.
[05:01]
Does this ancient epic make for suitable terrain?
[05:04]
The effects of the violence of Troy would have on a man are undeniable, pillaging the city,
[05:09]
executing the citizens, yeah, these factors could all feasibly contribute to an unshakable
[05:13]
guilt and mental instability.
[05:14]
Yet, we're forgetting that Odysseus is already a seasoned warrior before he leaves for Troy.
[05:19]
Remember the quote about the grimaced fight he had ever braved?
[05:23]
Homer never describes these experiences in detail and Nolan doesn't bother at all, but
[05:27]
how does he become such a capable and cunning leader if not for trials and tribulations
[05:31]
of the past?
[05:33]
This should not be his first rodeo effectively.
[05:35]
Even if he doesn't wield the blade himself, he has experience to wanton violence, including
[05:40]
in likelihood of women and children.
[05:42]
The fact that the people of Troy were fooled by a trick Odysseus dreamed up was heavy because
[05:47]
he is a just man.
[05:49]
This is reflected in his habit of giving foes a fair shot by alerting them with the twang
[05:52]
of his bowstring.
[05:54]
Remorse, it tends to twist him once a good, and cause him to see connections where there
[05:57]
are not, but Odysseus' wild assumption that he is somehow a responsibility for the apocalyptic
[06:03]
fall of a beautiful age of peace, this feels exaggerated beyond belief.
[06:08]
But okay whatever, let's say his prior campaigns were clean and cheerful, everyone went
[06:12]
home friends and the population somehow increased.
[06:15]
Troy, let's say, is the first time Odysseus truly experiences the horror of war.
[06:20]
That's right, we're going to stick with it.
[06:22]
So how can we now position this change so that it feels complementary to his objectives
[06:28]
rather than antithetical?
[06:29]
Number one, Odysseus should want to control his own narrative.
[06:33]
In a story about stories, retaining authorship of your own tale is vital.
[06:38]
Odysseus is introspective, yes, but his men are not.
[06:41]
They are already singing songs about his heroics and how he gave them free reign to do as
[06:45]
they pleased, which he fears will reach ethical long before he does.
[06:50]
Racing against his fast traveling legacy could be a powerful alteration.
[06:54]
He wants his wife and the son that he barely knows to hear that he's done these terrible
[06:59]
things because he could not bear the thought of them idolizing him for the very things
[07:03]
that keep him up at night.
[07:05]
Yet an obstacle with Nolan's adaptation prevails and one that this change doesn't really
[07:09]
fix.
[07:10]
Damon's Odysseus overcomes the trauma he received through this mass execution by executing
[07:16]
a heap more people.
[07:17]
I'll be honest, this does not track with me whatsoever and the twang of his bow does
[07:22]
not make this any less of a trick than his tactics in Troy.
[07:29]
The film completely fails to depict the suitors as the den of lions and thieves that it really
[07:33]
must be and it never bothers to establish the fast disappearing, unadulterated world
[07:38]
of the Bronze Age we're told about.
[07:40]
Right now it feels as though the suitors' transgressions are minor compared to the
[07:44]
Ethicans who tortured Troy.
[07:46]
If Nolan is making an argument, for this return to a kinder and more romantic eager
[07:51]
of virtue, then why is it entirely theoretical on screen and how can it be achieved by the
[07:56]
slaughter of a hundred men?
[07:58]
Penelope has patiently waited twenty years for her husband's return and in this time
[08:03]
she is acquired a pantheon of suitors to replace Odysseus.
[08:07]
Cheek for mong them is Antinous, a sleazy power-hungry draft-adger who is prepared to kill
[08:12]
Telamakus, Penelope's son for a clear shot at the throne.
[08:16]
But it's all theoretical.
[08:18]
Antinous has waited twenty years to seize power and he's got this any day now approach that
[08:23]
doesn't feel threatening to me in the slightest.
[08:25]
We don't see him nor any of the suitors as an unreal threat to Telamakus or Penelope.
[08:31]
As such, what is Odysseus' big rush home?
[08:34]
In the text these suitors are truly detestable as they should be, gluttonous, insolent,
[08:39]
entitled.
[08:40]
They're parasitic young aristocrats that come from far and wide taking advantage of Penelope's
[08:45]
hospitality.
[08:46]
Nolan fails to depict them as truly feral and hedonistic beyond Antinous and his sidekick.
[08:52]
They're annoying, sure, they're pressuring and they're inconveniencing Penelope and
[08:56]
Telamakus, but compared to the mass executions in Troy, what's effectively a social violation
[09:02]
feels like a pretty minor offense.
[09:05]
Odysseus returns and slays them unarmed because they maintain the hubris, you literally
[09:10]
just overcame.
[09:11]
It would be very easy for me to just say this could be improved by sticking closer to
[09:15]
the source material, but to do so would hinder Nolan's vision.
[09:19]
I'm not as condemning of his modern moralizing as some, so I'm willing to play ball.
[09:24]
However, one must always be careful.
[09:26]
If a fix, and I say this with little air quotes you can't see, requires more fixes, you
[09:31]
risk spinning out of control, constantly counting for the domino effect you created by removing
[09:36]
a piece of the puzzle.
[09:37]
But changes, begot changes, so if we are reinterpreting the story, let's do that.
[09:43]
Homer be damned.
[09:45]
Imagine that Antinus now joins Odysseus in the siege of Troy and he personifies the issues
[09:49]
that horrify Odysseus.
[09:51]
He rapes, pillages, executes.
[09:54]
He is the one who beheads the unnamed priestess played by Zendaya, unprompted.
[09:58]
He is gleeful in conquest, a genuine physical and ideological threat.
[10:03]
And to make it worse, he seems to thank Odysseus for affording him this opportunity, metastasizing
[10:08]
Odysseus' guilt.
[10:10]
Following their victory, Odysseus disturbed by the behavior of the men he conscripted,
[10:14]
defects.
[10:15]
He gathers some loyal ethikans who share his sentiments and they take their own ship, choosing
[10:19]
to travel independently of the larger legion.
[10:22]
In part, he wants to return home directly, without stopping for a victory tour along the
[10:26]
way.
[10:27]
And in part, because Odysseus wants to control the narrative about what orders he gave,
[10:32]
what he commanded versus what his men did of their own accord.
[10:35]
Now Odysseus and his men are diverted by the events, prevailing winds, shortages of
[10:40]
provisions, as it is at the moment.
[10:42]
Antinous and his band of war criminals, however, make it back to ethika without delay.
[10:47]
Even if it takes him say a year, he's now got like a nine year head start on our hero.
[10:52]
What difference is there between 9 and 20, really, when he doesn't do anything anyway?
[10:56]
Returning, he initially showers Odysseus with praise, eagerly awaits his return.
[11:01]
Telemacus and Penelope are delighted to hear he survived and he's being celebrated.
[11:06]
But quickly, everyone begins to fear the king shall not return.
[11:10]
Antinous is now a yardstick by which we measure Odysseus's delay.
[11:14]
And newly accustomed to just taking whatever he wants, Antinous begins to make a play
[11:18]
through the throne.
[11:19]
With each passing month, he becomes more obsessive and his narrative morphs.
[11:24]
While at first he portrayed Odysseus as a heroic war general, he was now cowardly, and
[11:28]
now he hid behind Agamemnon, the true leader of the men.
[11:33]
He remained in Troy and Tinous tells his audience, or cast himself into the sea out of guilt.
[11:39]
This now feels like psychological warfare on Penelope, and it means Telemacus' opinion
[11:44]
of his father's legacy is almost entirely based on equivocated tales.
[11:49]
Antinous is now a much more personal antagonist too.
[11:52]
He represents Odysseus' failings and shows what Odysseus could be if he decided to take
[11:56]
pride in his actions rather than regressing into his guilt.
[12:00]
Having the societal structure that Nolan injects into the story of face means we have something
[12:04]
to punch.
[12:06]
Antinous controls information and the audience sees the effects this has on both Penelope
[12:10]
and Telemacus.
[12:11]
There is a dramatic irony in knowing Odysseus' actively returning while Antinous convinces
[12:16]
himself he isn't.
[12:18]
This psychological warfare he's waging, it's a much more pointed attack versus the current,
[12:23]
oh you drank all of Penelope's wine.
[12:25]
Do you see how all of this complements Nolan's changes, but channels them into a narrative
[12:29]
purpose?
[12:30]
Now, Odysseus has additional motivations to return home post-haste.
[12:35]
Every second he's delayed, he's left his throne open for Antinous to steal.
[12:39]
He knows what Antinous is capable of first hand and he fears that Ithaca could devolve
[12:43]
into barbaric pillaging if he doesn't provide proof of life.
[12:47]
If the island does burn, what then?
[12:49]
They invade the next one?
[12:50]
They become the moroting sea people at everyone fears so much?
[12:54]
From afar, the fear of this escalation should really light a fire beneath him.
[12:58]
Furthermore, if we know that Odysseus' crew are the Marley just among his army, he now
[13:03]
has extra reason to want to protect them, something he cannot actually accomplish.
[13:07]
This further rags him with guilt.
[13:10]
Finally arriving home, Ithaca is depicted as much worse off than in the current iteration,
[13:14]
with lollusiness spreading like wildfire, not just within the chambers of the castle but
[13:19]
from shore to shore.
[13:20]
The hedonism that Odysseus allowed and even encouraged has proliferated.
[13:24]
Decenters are executed, Zeus' law is laughed at.
[13:28]
In the same way he tricked Troy into inviting him into their city walls, men have weaseled
[13:32]
their way into his castle.
[13:34]
They sleep in the corridors, abuse the maiden's servants, it is fallen into a den of gambling,
[13:39]
prostitution, fighting, it's unsafe.
[13:42]
Those under Penelope's employer victims, not co-conspirators.
[13:46]
Antinous is last scheming figure now, but one who is effectively already ruling.
[13:51]
His ascension is merely a formality and Penelope's existence is made miserable by his presence.
[13:56]
Odysseus now positions himself as a beggar to infiltrate the castle, working his way up
[14:01]
through the rungs of society to determine the damage, assess what truths have made the
[14:05]
voyage home and what favours have already usurped them.
[14:09]
In order to stop the rot spreading, Odysseus challenges the suitors.
[14:12]
Importantly, this can no longer be a massacre.
[14:15]
If Odysseus carries tremendous guilt, he needs to offer some opportunity for redemption.
[14:20]
Otherwise why does he deserve it himself?
[14:23]
He allows Antinous and his cronies the opportunity to repent and kills them only when they refuse.
[14:29]
We see this as an acknowledgement that he left the door a jar for them to sneak through.
[14:33]
Once the mare is bolted, it's too late to lock up the stable.
[14:36]
So only now does he feel forced to employ violence to prevent violence.
[14:40]
To borrow from another Greek myth, Odysseus opens up Pandora's box when he teaches his
[14:45]
men that treachery can be employed to give oneself advantage in war.
[14:49]
And now if you'll excuse the continual references, he has given fire to humanity like Prometheus
[14:53]
before him.
[14:55]
He has to strip it from their greedy hands and reassert himself so that some morals can
[14:59]
prevail.
[15:00]
He is an imperfect ruler but one fit to set a good example for his song.
[15:04]
Now Athena, or more accurately the manifestation of Odysseus' guilt, can be let go due to
[15:10]
this conclusion rather than just disappearing the second Odysseus shares the weight of his
[15:14]
guilt with Penelope.
[15:15]
Odysseus has closed the loop he began in Troy, bringing this addition to a much tidier
[15:20]
conclusion.
[15:23]
So what do we think?
[15:25]
Do we like the changes?
[15:26]
I feel like they maintain what no one has already changed but they offer a more cinematic
[15:30]
conclusion.
[15:31]
I actually believe that even if these alterations make like a 1% improvement to Odysseus as
[15:36]
a character, how human we find him, how much we can connect to him on a personal level,
[15:41]
then they've got to be worthwhile.
[15:43]
The lesson I would like you screenwriters at home to take away from this video is that
[15:46]
when you make a change to your screenplay anywhere along the timeline, it has ripple effects
[15:50]
that permeate throughout.
[15:52]
If you don't justify your alteration and all of its knock-on effects, it's not going
[15:56]
to feel like a worthwhile addition.
[15:58]
Take that as you will and see how you can apply it to your own writing.
[16:01]
So what were your thoughts on the Odyssey?
[16:03]
Do you like the changes that we made today or are you strictly in the Bravo Nolan camp?
[16:07]
Either way, let us know in the comments below.
[16:10]
See you next time.
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If you got something out of today's podcast, please share it with your filmmaking and
[16:14]
screenwriting community and hit subscribe.
[16:16]
It genuinely helps us keep making these.
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We need them and we'll see you in the next one.
