Past Imperfect

You can say “going to war against the Trojans because their Prince kidnapped and raped the Queen of Sparta was still wrong, so many innocent Trojans died and the surviving Greeks (or at least Odysseus) feel so sad about it.” You can say “Agamemnon was a tyrant warmonger who didn’t care about protecting Greek institutions at all, he just wanted to get rich from war, he’s the ultimate villain!” You can say “Odysseus is King of Ithaca and supposed to be the moral guardian of the lands, he can’t murder the suitors just because they assumed he was dead and wanted to fuck his wife.”

But if you’re going to say that — if you decide that things ancient culture considered morally neutral/just part of life/righteously justified are going to be treated as morally questionable or reprehensible, according to modern values and ethics — then you’re going to have to make that your moral baseline for the whole film.

If we’re applying modern views of war and leadership and duty, we should also apply modern views of gender and ethics and human rights. We can’t just maintain the original Odyssey’s stance of “this is just part of life and something everyone does with no real moral value” because that was also how the Greeks viewed war.

(Like, for all that there are stories about men being affected by war, or doing things many considered horrifying, most of the time the sentiment was that it was fine as long as you were the winner. Ancient Greece did not have war crimes or conventions! Xenia, or “Zeus’s law” as it’s misrepresented in the film), was a custom followed with peaceful travelers — it did not apply to siege warfare. Even the morals they did have surrounding proper conduct at war would not have condemned Odysseus for his trick with the horse. The crime Nolan invents for Odysseus to be divinely punished for utilizes an ancient law and custom he bastardized, but it only makes even one iota of sense when looked at from a modern perspective.)

So, for example, saying all that also means you can't condemn Penelope for exercising autonomy, refusing to remarry, or wanting to rule in her husband’s stead. Because when we apply our modern values and ethics rather than ancient ones, we can understand that Penelope is every bit as competent as Odysseus, because we as modern viewers know it’s true that women can be good leaders all on their own.

And since we are applying our modern morals rather than ancient Greek ones, we should judge and question what Odysseus did after he came home. Does it suit our modern morals that a leader returned to his office and immediately killed dozens of his own citizens? Does it suit our modern morals that people were murdered en mass because some of them were crass and rude about it when they said "hey we've had no real leadership for 20 years, someone else should formally take office?" slaves. Does it suit our modern morals that the main protagonists own people and treat them like property?

Like, this film was already theoretically condemning Odysseus for going on a war of conquest. Theoretically, Nolan understands that his protagonist is morally questionable. But the ending of the Odyssey movie ultimately just validates a lot of the stuff Odysseus does, because there's no actual feeling that he's doing anything wrong after returning to Ithaca. He's punished for the Trojan War, for what he did to foreigners, but not for what he did to people who were his own responsibility, whom he was sworn sovereign of.

If you're applying modern morality to the Odyssey's portrayals of war, that does mean you have to condemn Odysseus and Penelope and Temelachus for owning slaves.

Why is Nolan so unwilling to face the fact that slavery was one of the many atrocities common in ancient times? Why does he shy away from admitting that his protagonist is a slaveowner?

The fact that Nolan will made some of Odysseus' worst deeds (which were in fact things that were considered fine by ancient standards, and only offend according to modern morals) a huge plot point, but glossed over or erased or outright celebrated other awful things he did....I find it extremely suspect. More specifically, I find it concerning to see what Nolan deemed worth condemning, and how Odysseus then gets absolved for those deeds, versus what he felt no need to look further into from canon.

Melantho is the easiest litmus test for this, in my eyes. She's not just a great test for the adaptation, but a good reminder when reading the Odyssey that ancient vs. modern morals differ wildly.

You may not even remember her name — she's got a minor role in the original Odyssey, and Nolan's allergy to depicting morally questionable women with real depth or nuance means she has even less substance in his adaptation. But here's the quick summary: Melantho is a slave. She's specifically the "bad slavewoman," presented in contrast to the "good slavewoman" Eurycleia — their brothers, Melanthius and Eumaeus, are the "good" and "bad" herders/male slaves. (The Greek prefix "ευ" actually means well/good, so it's literally in the names that these slaves are some of "the good ones.")

Eurycleia and Eumaeus both kindly welcome Odysseus when he appears before them in the guise of a beggar. They properly welcome this foreigner with as much grace and comfort as they can, despite the fact he's cloaked in rags and can clearly offer nothing in return (Odysseus' disguise being described as filthy, foul, poor, base, and basically every negative adjective in the book). They follow Penelope's orders. They openly insult and scorn the suitors as much as they can. And when they recognize this traveling beggar as Odysseus, they weep with joy.

Melantho and Melanthius are...not that. They both violate xenia, treating Odysseus (in his beggar disguise) with contempt and derision. It's also noted that Melantho is one of the traitorous slavewomen who dares to share a bed with some of the suitors, despite the fact she was so kindly taken in and raised by Penelope. She's a sexually promiscuous traitor in the original Odyssey, and as such Odysseus brutally executes her once he's done slaughtering the suitors.

In the original epic poem, it's righteous for Odysseus to kill Melantho. But if we apply modern morals, we understand that she is a victim, albeit an imperfect one. Her death is a tragedy, and her "wrongdoings" are actually very understandable.

Of course Melantho isn't actually all that loyal or attached to her slaveowners, because there is no such thing as a "good" slaver; no matter how nice they are about it, Odysseus and Penelope are fundamentally in a massive position of power over Melantho where she's taken advantage of. Of course Melantho (and her brother) is hostile to another guest in the palace, because that's another man who she has to serve and feed and subserviently obey. Of course she doesn't want to welcome Odysseus, disguised as a beggar, when she's already constantly dealing with the suitors. Of course she's sleeping with the suitors, who are noblemen and citizens while she is a slave and therefore Melantho has no power to refuse them. Of course she takes their side when Odysseus and the suitors come into conflict; both in the (initially hypothetical) conflict between her presumably-dead slaver and the men likeliest to co-opt his fortune and property (including Melantho), and in the conflict she witnesses between a beggar and these noblemen, the suitors are the obvious winners.

Melantho is not a vicious traitorous bitch as the original Odyssey states; she's a woman in an unbelievably vulnerable position, who does what she sees as the best way to protect herself. It's insane to condemn her for not being loyal to her slavemasters/owners Odysseus and Penelope, or for not wanting to piss off the suitors when they're a very immediate physical threat.

And yet, Nolan does that anyway. His version of Melantho is a giggly girlfriend to Antinous the wicked suitor, who betrays Penelope. Thus, Nolan's Melantho is punished when Penelope triumphantly leaves Melantho to be slaughtered by Odysseus along with the suitors, complete with a witty one-liner!

It is so deeply concerning to me that Nolan can portray Melantho's condemnation and doom as a morally righteous victory. Especially when the rest of his film is already reframing things the Greeks assigned no moral value to as unethical according to modern ethics.