If the response to Elon Musk’s take on The Odyssey is any indication, Hollywood’s human filmmakers and actors don’t need to panic about AI pillaging their jobs any time soon.

The tech mogul – who waged war on Oscar-winning director Christopher Nolan’s widely acclaimed blockbuster for being “woke” – pledged several months ago that his AI tool Grok Imagine would make an “historically accurate” full-length version of Homer’s epic poem before the end of the year.

This week, Musk shared what is described as episode one of the planned “Odyssey series” – a seven-minute video clip created in collaboration with entertainment company Wonder Studios and director Dev Walker.

But with more than seven million views so far on X, it has left most social media users unimpressed.

“Complete garbage,” declared one. “You’d have to pay me to watch more of this and even then I’d question my life choices. Colorless, lifeless, and forgettable in all the worst ways possible.”

Others dubbed it “soulless slop”, “Grok slop” and “an empty shell”, suggesting it “looks like a film made by someone who has never watched a film”.

Homer’s The Odyssey, which follows Odysseus, the King of Ithaca, on his long and perilous 10-year journey home after the Trojan War, was a poem in 24 books.

Wonder Studios, which is based in the UK and specialises in AI films, shared the Grok Imagine adaptation on its own X account with the caption: “Homer didn’t have Grok… we do”.

The new “episode” opens with scenes featuring Odysseus and wife Penelope (played by Matt Damon and Anne Hathaway in Nolan’s film) as the king of Ithaca prepares to leave their home and baby son to set sail for Troy. There are brief scenes from the fighting at Troy before it fast forwards 10 years into the future.

@elonmusk I can’t believe Homer wrote this https://t.co/cpmauPk7w8

— Divergent (@fakedivergents) October 24, 2026

While a few of those commenting on Musk’s post argue that it’s not a bad early attempt at an AI film, common complaints centre on the stilted speech, awkward acting with a lack of “real human expression” and emotional depth, audio and continuity issues, and the absence of a narrative arc or any kind of suspense.

“Though it is technological (sic) advanced and impressive, the outcome is bizarrely flat and boring … reminds me of the first movies 120 years ago,” one X user commented.

Additional problems highlighted by Mashable are that the characters have “unnaturally perfect teeth” and look too similar – or “way too similar to real people”.

“The backgrounds also suffer from something akin to texture pop-in, where video games load low-resolution textures before the detailed ones, so the screen isn’t just black,” it noted.

Many X users also point out that despite Musk’s pledge to make an “historically accurate” Odyssey, the ancient Greeks in the episode he posted all have an Anglo-Saxon appearance and speak with English accents.

“They don’t even wear proper armour, and dress up like what I can only describe as Viking hobos,” one observed.

Musk, who previously released a short Odyssey dialogue scene created using Grok Imagine that was also widely panned, led a right-wing backlash against Nolan’s adaptation of The Odyssey before it hit cinemas in July.

The SpaceX and Tesla CEO attacked the casting of Lupita Nyong’o (Helen of Troy) and Elliot Page (Sinon), dubbing the film’s director an “anti-white racist” who had “desecrated Homer just to meet the woke rules required to win an Oscar”.

As it turns out, Nolan has had the last laugh.

His adaptation of The Odyssey has made more than $US1.8 billion (SA2.56 billion) worldwide at the box office. Universal Pictures announced last month that the film had become its highest-grossing release – beating previous blockbuster Jurassic Park.

It is also considered a frontrunner in several categories for the 2027 Academy Awards, including best picture, best director and best actor. Nolan already has two Oscars under his belt for 2023’s Oppenheimer and was also nominated for Dunkirk and Inception.

The British-American director has his own thoughts on artificial intelligence, having previously labelled as “nonsense” the idea that it could completely replace human creativity.

“I think AI is a Trojan horse that everybody knows the Greeks are inside …”, he said in an interview earlier this year, adding that the technology was “a transparent horse – it’s made of glass”.

“I’ve never seen a technology advancing so rapidly, so completely rejected by the public,” he told French journalist Hugo Travers of YouTube channel HugoDécrypte.

“Everybody’s suspicion of it is so insane and extreme, particularly young people. The reactions to AI videos online and people my children’s age just immediately calling it AI slop … which I think is a very healthy scepticism.

“Because technology is always going to give us great gifts, but it has to be viewed with scepticism. The motives of the people giving it to us also have to be viewed with scepticism.”