The Odyssey and Media Illiteracy

本站添加: 2026-05-24

[00:00:00]What is mythology? According to the Collins dictionary, mythology is a group of myths, especially all the myths from a particular country, region, or culture. Now, what is a myth? A myth, according to the Oxford dictionary, is a traditional story, especially one concerning the early history of a people or explaining a natural or social phenomenon and typically involving supernatural beings or events. They also have a second definition which is a widely held but false belief or idea.

[00:00:31]The key word there being false. Director Christopher Nolan is taking on the great epic poem The Odyssey by Homer. And since we're in the modern day, people have come up with such strong opinions just based on two thrillers. I hear people complaining about the American accent. Why didn't they use the Asian Greek accent like how it was done in Gladiator? Firstly, Gladiator used a posh British accent to make the movie feel archaic and a bit grand. Gladiator was set in a specific historic time period with even real historical characters. So, there was more of an incentive to make it sound like it came from that time period, but Gladiator still failed at that. It just made it sound old. The Odyssey is a mythological story that never happened with entirely fictional characters. Sure, the story was told in a very ancient Greek time period, but it's almost near impossible to get the actual way they were talking and translated to an English rhythm.

[00:01:27]Then it was also spoken in home Greek, which was an artificial dialect specifically used for reciting the poems. And if it was in English, it would sound like a musical. At the end of the day, it's near impossible to get an actual authentic accent for the time period. Sure, no one could have hired Greek actors to speak English in their normal accent, but let's be honest, that still won't be the same because the language and speaking patterns in Greece over the years have changed. Funny enough, geographically speaking, also Greece has changed over the past 2,000 years. Like in the modern day now, Troy is in Turkey. Maybe at the end of the day, you're just angry that Nolan gave you something you aren't used to. And that is totally fine. But then again, we can't go ahead complaining that Hollywood just can't stop regurgitating the same thing over and over again. But when they give us something slightly different or where they try to challenge us in a different way, just slightly, we start to complain as if the whole world is against us or hell just froze over.

[00:02:23]People even complained about the armor.

[00:02:25]So, let me talk about the first part of the complaints that is the way Odysius looks and the way the soldiers look. I don't really know much about how the armor of that time period is supposed to look. So I won't be defending it as strongly as I'm going to defend the next section of the armor and talking about that part. But now for the other side of the complaint and the giant in the trailer went silver armor that's different from how they were described in the poem and probably not possible in that time historically. Here's what I have to say about it. If it was trying to be a historical movie about an actual time period like let's say the Punic was then that would be a very good criticism but guys the Odyssey didn't actually happen. at the end of the day is a fantastical story about larger than life characters and events. So scientific accuracy or historical accuracy should really be out the window. Also because there isn't actually a set time period for this story. So it could be very malleable. And my second point is that if Nolan is changing it, then it has to be for some good reason. Narratively speaking, adaptations can change things.

[00:03:25]Mythology is malleable as long as it sticks to the essence of the story being told. With that being said, I haven't watched the movie, so I'm not going to say it was good. I'm not going to say it was bad. But if this change was for a good reason or story-wise, then I'll gladly excuse it. But if it ends up being bad, then I won't defend it. Now, let's get into the meat and the bones of the whole thing. That is the casting.

[00:03:46]Here's my two cents. Ideally, this movie should have been made by a Greek person and with Greek actors. But for one reason or another, no Greek filmmaker decided to do it on a ground level. And to cut Hollywood a bit of slack, they do have the resources and the actors to make this a movie and by extension the poem that can resonate with the whole world. And the use of al-ist actors who are popular also help with that fact. As long as the actors are willing to portray these characters well, then it's fine. So we got Christopher Nolan who decided he wanted to add his own spin on it and he wanted to twist it in a different way. He might have something to say with the source material and he might want to depict the themes of the poem to a different audience. So another ideal is that we refrain from judgment until the movie is actually out so that we could know the end goal of why he wanted to make this film and if it's good we can applaud it for it and if it's bad we can criticize him for it.

[00:04:46]But let's talk about how people complain about the diversification of the cast.

[00:04:51]If you say people of color can't be in ancient Greece, then you're just wrong on multiple levels, and this is the part of the media literacy and pseudo intellectualism I'll get to later. So, like I said before, the actually never happened in real life ancient Greece where the story is believed to be told by Homer. The concept of race wasn't actually a thing, let alone a thing for discrimination. Greece at the time was a hub for trades between the Phoenicians, the Egyptians, even subsaharan Africa, which are mostly black people. So in ancient Greece, you would see lots of people of color. Modernday Caucasians are the wrong type of people to cast in this because like I said before, geographically, Greece as a place has changed over the last 2,000 years. And at the point where the Odyssey as a poem was originally recited, the most dominant group of indigens were the Mediterranean. Even in the early chapters of the poem, specifically chapter one, funny enough, Homer describes subsaharan Africans as people who live at the end of the earth and are constantly being visited by Poseidon and he also name dropped Ethiopia. For the case of Helen of Troy, her race is never actually established. She's just described as the most beautiful in the land. And if Nolan translated that to mean a black queen, then good for him.

[00:06:16]So, is the problem the fact that she's black or the fact that she's not just white? Now, let's forget that her race wasn't explicitly stated. Let's say it was, it wouldn't matter because she's a fictional character and if she was race swapped, it would be to serve a certain framework of the narrative Christopher Nolan is going for. Look at Wonderman for example. People were complaining about the fact that Simon Williams was race swapped. But then as we got the good story out of it, all of the criticisms regarding the race swapping were drowned out by the praise of the actual good show that we got because it served the plot. As long as the changes serve for a good narrative, then that's what matters in these adaptations. But in this case, it kind of doesn't because her race was never even stated. And I've established that people of color existed in ancient Greece. Now this is where the media illiteracy is the strongest Elliot Page. Firstly, he's not even playing Achilles. He's playing Elen or a completely different character. Now, people are complaining that he's playing Achilles when he's not. And it's the fact that people are so quick to complain and misinform others without actually going out of their way to do the research to confirm this their complaints or confirm this their thoughts is what pisses me the most.

[00:07:34]Because at the end of the day, you're just spreading BS and misinformation around. And then the misinformation will now be used as a means to come and fuel a hateful agenda against a certain type of people. I mean, even if he was playing Achilles, there's no crime in that. In the poems, Achilles was described to be a young, lean, feminine, and energetic person. Now, people who haven't read the Iliad or any text with Achilles use Brad Pit's stoic and mature portrayal as their benchmark for Achilles. Even though Troy is not a good adaptation of the Iliad in terms of the story, Troy was a good story that still portrayed the main themes of the Iliad well, but it was not a good adaptation.

[00:08:14]But now people are using Brad Pitt as the benchmark when that's wrong cuz Brad Pit's Achilles is not really the actual Achilles. And from what I just described, Elliot Page now would be a way better fit to play Achilles than Brad Pitt in 2004. Maybe Brad Pit in the 90s could have had a chance, but no, Brad Pitt in 2004 was already old and tenured by then. And let me acknowledge the elephant in the room. People don't want to see a trans person play a masculine character of power. Here's the thing, though. Achilles wasn't masculine by the strict definition of today's standards. Achilles was a crossdresser.

[00:08:53]You could call him a crybaby, too. He's really attuned with his artistic side.

[00:08:57]And now let me shock you with the part that he's also gay or he may be bisexual. His sexuality is implied in the Iliad. It's mentioned in the symposium by Plato and it is greatly touched on in the song of Achilles. And also Helen of Troy and Achilles barely even appear in the Odyssey. At best you see them as cameos in a few scenes. For the most part they are both main stays in the Iliad but then again this is the Odyssey. So their appearances in this movie will be inoffensive at worst.

[00:09:27]Beyond race and gender, let's not act as if Lupita Yongo or Elliot Page are just diversity actors or diversity hires.

[00:09:35]These people are very good working actors and they know how to pull emotions necessary for a particular movie. So let's cut the crap and let's look past the hateful behavior. At the end of the day, the Odyssey is a story that has been reimagined and retold in different ways over the years to suit the sensibilities of the people at the time. So yeah, sure the movie is set in Greece, but the presence of people of color and different romantic orientations, which still wasn't unusual there in the movie represents our current values and sensibilities as a society. This is where I enter my main problem surrounding the discourse about this movie. The media illiteracy and pseudo intellectualism. In this image and clip, you see Agamemnon who was wearing black armor.

[00:10:22]>> Throughout the discourse on this film, people have acted like the Odyssey was an actual event in history, which it's not. People have acted like they know about these stories and their characters, which clearly they don't.

[00:10:35]And they seem to have bold claims about the historic nature of Greece, which is also wrong. Except for the ammo. I can give them a pass on that one. Look, if you're seeing things in the trailer that are turning you off from the movie based on your own understanding of the source material, that's fine. If you don't like the tone of the way the trailer looks, if you don't like the story, if you have genuine criticisms, or if the Odyssey isn't just your jam, then all that is very fine. But what I don't want is for people who haven't read the poems. People who don't actually know history to be coming online and making bold claims that are often wrong and are derogatory towards people of different backgrounds. That is a problem because it will lead to misinformation, spreading of hate and just result in [ __ ] being spread and at the end of the day we're not just going to go anywhere as a society. So at the end let's watch the movie before we make actual judgments and let's try to go into it with an open mind. At the end of the day, mythology is meant to be retold for different civilizations and society. That's why it remains relevant.

[00:11:40]Look at Veil's the Aniard. Look at Dante's Dante's Inferno or even as recently as Ulyses by James Joyce in 1922 or even Oh Brother where Da by the Cohen brothers. Now to end it off, I know this video isn't going to do much because not only am I a small channel, but negativity also sells on the internet and is pushed out to more people. But if you see this video and you see the kernel of truth in this video, then please let's engage in these conversations in a more respectful manner. Thank you so much for watching and I'll see you next time.