We’re going to do something a bit different on tonight’s Showcase. I’m going to show you a pilot and then review it because it’s a good example of something I talk about a lot on this site. A show, movie, or whatever story can be good, but there can still be a reason you don’t like it. Something about it just doesn’t connect with you. You can see the quality and effort. They clearly wanted to make something good, and people rally behind it. And yet for you it doesn’t work. You don’t hate it, it’s not an insult, it’s not you wondering what people see in it. You know what they saw and understand it, and yet it doesn’t work for you, possibly for the same reasons others like it.
That’s me and Gameoverse.
With The Amazing Digital Circus coming to an end, Glitch needs a new series to rally audiences. No TV or streaming animation studio or distributor survived on one show. That’s another show everybody praises but just isn’t for me. I’ve never been interested in watching it. I’ve watched Film Theory episodes about it just for curiosity, but I just wasn’t interested in watching a comedic version of I Have No Mouth And I Must Scream. At least that’s what it looks like to me as an outsider. I only have so much time and my tastes are fully formed. It’s rare that something outside my usual interests works for me, but it has happened. So I watched the Gameoverse pilot an open minded try…and while I see the quality it just wasn’t for me. Why?
Well, let’s watch the pilot first so everyone has seen the same thing. Created by Ross O’Donovan of the Game Grumps, I’ve seen this show compared to Reboot, the Mainframe Entertainment series that on occasion had the heroes going into game worlds as the opponent characters, trying to stop the user from winning in order to keep part of their city of Mainframe (where the animation studio got its name, or maybe in honor of it) from being nullified in the area where a “game cube” fell into and around that section of the city.
This show has a similar premise, but from the pilot it appears to be the main plot instead of an occasional one. Kit is the survivor of such a place. She was her game world’s hero, and she won…so the planet blew up. Now she and her friends, including fellow survivor Kaboodle (a robot backpack), travel to other worlds to stop those heroes from beating the final boss and game overing their world (see what they did there?) However, a group called the Syntax wants the hero to win and the world destroyed…to save their worlds. No, it doesn’t make complete sense, but that’s the mystery surrounding this pilot. Enjoy…and I’ll explain why I didn’t.
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BW Media Spotlight 
How Nolan’s Batman Warned Us About Nolan’s Odysseus
Before I start this commentary I want it on the record that I am not trashing “a movie you haven’t seen yet” or Christopher Nolan at all. He’s earned his fanbase and every accolade he’s received. I am going by the marketing alone, including interviews and reports by film experts, and the realization that not every person is the right fit for every project. John Hughes shouldn’t remake A Nightmare On Elm Street and Wes Anderson shouldn’t remake Sixteen Candles. Even if they were both still alive and in the business. In the same perspective I’m not sure Nolan was the right fit for Batman and based on what’s out there now he’s not the right fit for The Odyssey at all.
We’re not talking about some of the culture war related issues, but let’s get that out of the way now. Elliot Page playing Achilles is still just rumor and a way to clown on the fact that Hollywood would indeed make a decision that dumb. Whatever your views on the former Ellen Page changing forms, Page is skinner than me and I’m make a terrible Achilles because he didn’t have a gut but did have actual muscles. The man was a Greek soldier. It goes with the territory. All the Styx dip did was make him invulnerable except in the one place he got shot, but we’ll come back to him. As far as the Helen race swap, that’s a level of cultural and historical stupidity I’m not even going to touch lest we go off-topic for this site. It’s inaccurate whatever someone’s attorney’s neighbor’s second cousin twice removed told them, though I’ll note for the topic that he did the same for Commissioner Gordon and Catwoman. Anything else, like the translation Nolan has been seen praising, JesterBell has already covered.
No, it’s that Nolan wants to “ground” the story in “historical accuracy”, except for the parts he doesn’t, but I point you to the link in the previous sentence. The Odyssey is not really a myth. It’s not even religion. Homer is not St. Matthew, he’s the guy who wrote the Olympian version of Touched By An Angel, a story inspired by religion. Even The Iliad starts with three goddesses forcing a man to judge their beauty pageant and then bribing said judge, but you could almost ground that one just by having Paris and Helen run off together. The only other magical element is a man who can’t be stabbed or shot depending on his footwear to cover his one weak point. (I tried to find the “maximum damage” quote but Google Search AI isn’t as smart as Google thinks it is.) Just make really good armor…it’s not like they’re getting that historically accurate. Just don’t go full Iron Man…although I admittedly would watch that movie. However, The Odyssey, it’s sequel, is totally filled with the very things Nolan wants to avoid.
At issue here isn’t whether or not Nolan is a good director, or even if his Batman movies were good. I own Batman Begins on DVD with no regrets. It’s whether or not his gritty, grounded takes fit the world of Batman or the adventures of Odysseus. While Batman doesn’t deal with the fantastic as often, it’s still very much there even if it isn’t close to Odysseus’s level, unless you count the times Batman hangs out with the Justice League thanks to Wonder Woman being a member. He’s met the Greek gods and goddesses and one dude who thinks he’s Zeus. (I wonder if Maxie Zeus ever met the real deal?) That’s why Nolan’s take on Batman should have prepared you for the same adaptation errors he’s talking about making, and we can start with the Clown Prince Of Crime himself.
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Posted by ShadowWing Tronix on May 22, 2026 in Book Spotlight, DC Spotlight, Movie Spotlight and tagged Batman, book to movie adaptation, Christopher Nolan, comic to movie adaptation, commentary, Odysseus, The Odyssey.
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