LOS ANGELES—Drawing widespread condemnation from classics students all over the world, the brand new Odyssey adaptation The Return was criticized this week for dropping the unique work’s group dance scene ending. “Homer’s choice to shut his epic poem with a blowout ensemble dance quantity is important to the story of Odysseus’ journey, and any adaptation that omits the entire forged coming collectively to bust a groove can hardly be thought-about a trustworthy retelling,” mentioned famous classicist Phyllis Ballantine, including that Penelope’s executed suitors coming back from the useless to launch right into a raucous kickline had been the very passage that first drew her to historical Greek poetry. “Whenever you excise Polyphemus the cyclops doing the electrical slide along with his sheep whereas the sirens sing an uptempo doo-wop quantity about love, you lose an important a part of The Odyssey’s soul. We have to see Telemachus do the working man. We have to see Circe lead the lotus-eaters in a soul prepare between Scylla and Charybdis. However sadly, The Return has little curiosity in staying true to the unique textual content.” Critics nonetheless praised The Return for its post-credits scene by which Odysseus asks what the viewers remains to be doing there earlier than telling them to go residence.
