“The Odyssey” inspires unprecedented levels of coping

For months, Elon. Musk and the right wing that caters to their needs X They are thrown into a berserk rage over the supposed desecration of an ancient Greek poem by one of the most successful film directors alive.

Now that there has been a backlash from them BombedThey are looking for ways to deal with the fact that they are increasingly disconnected from public opinion.

Christopher NolanArtistic crimes in fetch Odyssey According to Musk and others in exasperation, there were examples of what they called “historical inaccuracy” in a lavish fantasy teeming with monsters, witches and undead spirits — primarily the casting of Lupita Nyong’o, who is black, as Helen of Troy, and Elliot Page, who is trans, as Sinon. A total of nearly 10 minutes of screen time between these actors in the three-hour epic, along with general hysteria about Hollywood “wokeness,” the rejection of Americanized dialogue, and the ongoing misogyny regarding… Scholar Emily Wilson’s 2017 translation of Homer’s Odyssey (the first by a woman), resulted in countless teeth-gnashing posts and calls for a boycott that never materialized.

Instead, the mythological drama went spectacularly well $264 million With its opening last weekend, it’s cruising toward continued box office dominance and, most likely, a slew of awards. A few conservative commentators, incl Ben Shapiro— no fan of DEI or “woke” values ​​— acknowledged it as a historic achievement. But while some who predicted its doom knew enough to move on from this battle to other fronts in the culture war, many sank deeper into denial.

“break,” broke out One anonymous X account on Monday. “Odyssey Is faking ticket sales by buying up theaters/seats (scam) to make the movie look like a hit (already $400 million in the hole) Moviegoers report having to take terrible seats (because they are full) but when they show up the theaters are mostly empty. The post included screenshots of unverifiable tales from Reddit about quiet movie theaters and ticket holders not showing up.

It wasn’t entirely clear what Universal Pictures, the studio behind the film, would gain by spending millions beyond its $250 million production budget and $125 million marketing costs to make it a flop. And again, these are the same conspirators who find it doubtful that all critics’ reviews are like that Published at the same time.

Musk, for his part, appears to have been inspired by User X who posted Three minutes of AI-generated scenes In which the characters are from Odyssey They are all white and speak with British accents. Commenting on the clip, which at best resembles a montage from a 1970s movie, the richest man in the world Announce: “Before the end of this year, Grok Imagine will make a full-length film of The Odyssey that is historically accurate and true to Homer’s art.”

People familiar with Musk know that when he pledges to reach a milestone by the end of the year, he delivers Basically never It is happening. Grok cartoon promise OdysseyAnd while its ambitions are small compared to most — he even predicted in 2025 that an xAI model might “discover new technologies” within several months — it’s also certain to fail. Not only is it a tired idea that won’t appeal to any moviegoer (who has seen or will see Nolan’s version soon), but it’s also unoriginal: AI studio Fountain 0 plans to release an artificially generated feature online titled Odyssey: The Fall This summer.