Jim Morrison was correct. People are strange. I have a friend that always tells me I am too optimistic about people and their level of intelligence. The Odyssey reviews started to flood in and the reactions have been predictable. So much of how we consume art these days is beyond dumb. People make up their mind about a work before seeing it based on their political beliefs and those political beliefs are extra dumb.
The loudest critics that haven’t seen the movie keep showing just how dumb they are. It is really strange. The biggest and worst complaint is that a black actress was cast to play Helen of Sparta. First off there is no historical record that a Helen of Sparta ever existed and secondly her father was a swan. Zeus was often a black swan event for the ancient Greeks.
In order to provide cover for themselves the next complaint is that there are no Greek actors in the film. They never mention which Greeks. Are we talking about the Mycenean Greeks that actually participated in the battle that proceeds this film, the ancient Greeks, like Homer, who spread the story, the Macedonian Greeks that spread Greek culture to the eastern world, or the Roman Greeks that greeted Paul when he preached in Athens? And how many other changes have happened in the next 2000 years?
After this comes the complaints about costuming. This one is easy to simply say that Homer, himself, was full of historical inaccuracies when writing the story. It is also interesting that this movie is never compared to 300. It is always shown alongside Troy. Again different Greeks during the Peloponnesian Wars but I don’t hear much complaints about the historical accuracy of the customs in 300.
I have no idea if the movie is good. What I do know is the complaints of people online that don’t seem to know the difference between The Iliad and The Odyssey aren’t worth listening to.
David Huzzard Writes 