News The Odyssey The Odyssey Trailer Is Visually Dull but Full of Promise Odysseus’ journey will see him battle the elements, monsters, and bad YouTube uploads By Matthew Byrd | Published on December 22, 2025 Photo: Universal Pictures Comment 0 Share New Share Photo: Universal Pictures We’ve all been wondering what Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey will look like. One of our great epic film directors is adapting one of the great literary epics with help from a massive budget, IMAX cameras, and a stacked cast? They’ll have to kick us out of the theater, because we are already seated. Well, we finally got a proper trailer for The Odyssey and, to tell you the truth, it’s still hard to tell what Christopher Nolan’s movie looks like. To be very fair, it seems like something may have gone wrong when uploading this trailer to YouTube. It is incredibly blurry and dark even when viewed on the highest allowed YouTube resolution (which, for some reason, is limited to 1080p, at least for free users). This is seemingly not the ideal way to view this preview, so all comments about its looks have to be taken with that grain of salt. That said, Nolan may not be beating certain allegations anytime soon. Production photos of The Odyssey have been criticized in some circles for their lack of color and generally dull designs. The same criticisms could certainly be applied to this trailer, even if we only get the briefest glimpses of some of the movie’s potentially grander sequences. There are lovely shots spread throughout, though they are spread somewhat thin among other, simply serviceable glimpses of fairly mundane moments. The night scenes in particular are pretty rough, though it’s worth noting again that YouTube could be a co-conspirator for that particular crime. Still, the style debate will continue. That said, there is a lot to love here. The storm sequence, in particular, looks appropriately horrifying, as do the shots of the soldiers cowering in fear in a desperate attempt to avoid what appears to be a massive sword. Ludwig Göransson’s score is simply magical, and the sheer wattage of star power fueling this thing remains impressive. Matt Damon, Tom Holland, Anne Hathaway, Charlize Theron, Robert Pattinson, Jon Bernthal, Mia Goth…hell, Lupita Nyong’o is in this movie, and we don’t even know her role yet. Perhaps most importantly, this is still The Odyssey we’re talking about. Reasonable concerns about what certainly seems to be a dark, dour, and dude-driven take on that story aside, The Odyssey remains both an incredible collection of potentially cinematic moments and a story that has rarely received a direct adaptation, much less one on this scale. We’ll all find out if The Odyssey lives up to that potential when the movie is released on July 17, 2026. [end-mark] The post <i>The Odyssey</i> Trailer Is Visually Dull but Full of Promise appeared first on Reactor.