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Sir Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is largely faithful to Homer’s text, but the Oscar-winner does cut out the bloody, brutal ending. After Matt Damon’s Odysseus and Tom Holland’s Telemachus have slaughtered the suitors, we don’t see the famous scene where Penelope gives him one final test.
In the original poem, she asks about moving their bed, but, of course, Odysseus knows this is impossible, since the head is a tree, and they retreat to make love there. Meanwhile, a wrathful Telemachus carries out bloody vengeance.
Firstly, Telemachus has the 12 female maids, who slept with the suitors and were insolent to him and his mother, clear up all the bodies and clean the great hall of all its blood-splattered gore. Odysseus had ordered him to drive a sword through them afterwards outside, but his son viewed this to be too swift a death for them. Instead, he raises a ship’s cable and hangs all the treacherous women for it. But the worst fate would be left for Melanthius, another brutal scene that didn’t make it into Nolan’s film.
Melanthius was the disloyal goatherd who betrayed Odysseus by aligning with the suitors, insulting his disguised master and attempting to arm the enemy for the final battle. Telemachus, in his fury, drags him outside, where he, Eumaeus and Philoetius slice off his nose and ears. They then castrate him and throw his genitals to be eaten by dogs, before lopping off his hands and feet. Melanthius is left bleeding and it’s unclear if he dies from his wound. Such a harsh punishment was for violating the household loyalty of Xenia.
The climax of The Odyssey, also not included in the movie, is a final confrontation when the families of the dead suitors march to seek revenge. However, just after Odysseus kills Antinous’ father Eupeithes, Athena intervenes and commands peace.
