Christopher Nolan’s ‘The Odyssey’ Just Sparked A Rival TV Series, And ‘Stranger Things’ And ‘Halo’ Alums Are Behind It
Christopher Nolan’s big screen take on Homer’s epic has dominated conversation across the entertainment world this month, with ‘The Odyssey’ pulling audiences back into the myth of the wandering king of Ithaca. The film’s box office run and critical response have reignited interest in ancient Greek storytelling in a way few adaptations manage. That renewed appetite for Bronze Age legend, it turns out, was already being quietly courted behind the scenes.
As reviews for Nolan’s film continued to roll in, word broke that the mythology was about to get a second life on the small screen. Deadline reported that an independent European-U.S. series titled ‘Odysseus’ is now being readied, arriving in the wake of the acclaim surrounding Nolan’s movie even though the two projects are described as entirely unrelated. The show is being produced out of Athens by Tanweer, the very Greek distributor handling Nolan’s film in the region.
The project brings together Tanweer with the newly launched U.S. label Tectonic and the U.S.-Armenian company USATV, and it already has serious pedigree attached. Karl Gajdusek, who served as showrunner and executive producer on the first season of Netflix’s ‘Stranger Things,’ is aboard as showrunner, giving the series an immediate hook for fans tracking where ‘Stranger Things’ talent lands next. The pilot script comes from Sean Finegan, Scott Windhauser, Noah Lang and Blake Hoss.
Directing duties fall to Roel Reiné, whose credits include the historical dramas Washington and Black Sails along with Paramount+’s ‘Halo’ and Netflix’s Wu Assassins. That mix of grounded period work and prestige genre television suggests ‘Odysseus’ is aiming for something tonally distinct from Nolan’s blockbuster treatment. Gajdusek offered a taste of that direction himself, framing the approach as a deliberate departure from myth for myth’s sake.
There’s something huge about taking on this epic story in the most grounded and realpolitik way possible, Gajdusek explained in comments shared with Deadline, adding that the mythical stations of Odysseus’s journey have long been rendered as metaphorical, but that the show wants to find the reality underneath the legend. The series itself is being pitched with similar language, described as visceral and muscular, a Bronze Age world of blood, ships and betrayal built around the collapse of the era that inspired Homer’s epic.
Development on ‘Odysseus’ has reportedly been underway for a number of years, with production now targeting a start next year across Greece and Armenia. Those behind the project are said to be hoping it can eventually grow into a wider expanded series universe, a notably ambitious goal for a show still finding its footing. Producers have been careful to stress that despite sharing a myth and a distributor with Nolan’s film, the two projects otherwise have little in common.
Whether audiences have room in their hearts for two very different visions of Odysseus’s voyage home in the same year remains to be seen, especially with Nolan’s version still fresh in theaters. For now, the overlap in timing feels less like competition and more like proof of just how hungry viewers currently are for this particular myth. With a showrunner fresh off ‘Stranger Things’ and a director who cut his teeth on ‘Halo,’ does this Bronze Age retelling sound like the companion piece ‘The Odyssey’ deserves, or an unnecessary rival sailing in its wake?
