Homer's hero survives a cyclops, a sorceress and a pair of sea monsters before he ever gets close to home. Christopher Nolan's version had to survive something else first: months of online noise, arriving before a single official review existed. That storm has passed now, and on the other side of it sits a number that would have seemed impossible a few weeks ago.
Now, The Odyssey on Rotten Tomatoes sits in the mid-90s and is still "counting": a way of flagging that more reviews are being added by the hour. Kalshi's own forecast for where the number lands is tracking almost exactly with it, in the mid-90s as well.
That's a sharp turn from where things stood earlier in the year, when the score line sat closer to the mid-80s during the uncertain stretch before anyone had actually seen the film.
The Odyssey's Rotten Tomatoes Score Keeps Climbing
Part of why this number is getting so much attention: Nolan doesn't really have "bad" movies, critically speaking.
Across a filmography that includes Batman movies, dream heists and a three-hour physics biopic, he has never landed a film in outright "Rotten" territory on the aggregator. That's a rare streak for any director working at blockbuster scale, and it's exactly why a new Nolan release showing up with the best score of his career is being treated as a genuine milestone rather than just another good opening for a big movie.
Every Christopher Nolan Movie's Rotten Tomatoes Score, Ranked
Here's where Nolan's filmography has landed on the Tomatometer over time:
- Memento (2000): 94%
- The Dark Knight (2008): 94%
- Oppenheimer (2023): 93%
- Dunkirk (2017): 92%
- Insomnia (2002): 92%
- Inception (2010): 87%
- The Dark Knight Rises (2012): 87%
- Batman Begins (2005): 85%
- The Prestige (2006): 76%
- Interstellar (2014): 73%
- Tenet (2020): 69%
The Odyssey now sits above all of them with 96%.
What The Odyssey Is About, and Who's In It
The film follows Odysseus (Matt Damon), King of Ithaca, on his long and treacherous voyage home after the Trojan War, trying to reunite with his wife Penelope (Anne Hathaway) and his now-grown son Telemachus (Tom Holland), whom he left behind as an infant.
Along the way he crosses paths with figures out of Greek myth, including Athena (Zendaya), the nymph Calypso (Charlize Theron) and the sorceress Circe (Samantha Morton), while Robert Pattinson plays Antinous, the most persistent of the suitors circling Penelope back home. Lupita Nyong'o takes on a dual role as Helen of Troy and her sister Clytemnestra, with Elliot Page, Jon Bernthal, Himesh Patel, John Leguizamo and Mia Goth rounding out the ensemble.
How the Tomatometer Works, and Why This Score Isn't Final
Rotten Tomatoes doesn't average star ratings: the Tomatometer simply measures what share of counted reviews are "Fresh" (positive) versus "Rotten," out of critics the site has vetted. That's why the market doesn't close the moment an embargo lifts: even though the first wave of reviews landed with near-unanimous praise.
USA Today's four-star take joked the studio should "just give him the best actor Oscar now, for Zeus' sake", plenty of outlets only publish once the film is actually in theaters for the public.
That's also why not everyone is on board: Time's Stephanie Zacharek broke from the pack, calling the film "just another reason for despair" and taking issue with its pacing and its handling of Nyong'o's role.
With well over 100 reviews already logged, a dramatic swing is unlikely, but the count keeps moving through the weekend, which is exactly why the market stays open into Monday instead of settling the day the embargo lifted.
The Backlash That Almost Overshadowed the Reviews
None of this acclaim was guaranteed.
The Odyssey arrived carrying an unusually loud wave of pre-release criticism, reportedly drawing more disliked reactions to its trailers than any other release of Nolan's career. Much of it centered on casting: pointed criticism aimed at Nyong'o as Helen of Troy, along with Zendaya and Elliot Page in their roles, plus complaints about how faithfully the film's armor, costumes and ships recreated the Bronze Age setting.
None of that controversy shows up in the reviews themselves, which is part of what makes the score such a striking reversal from where the conversation stood just a few months ago.
Odysseus needed twenty years, a fair number of gods on his side, and more than a little luck to make it home. Nolan's Odyssey needed a few days of reviews… and so far, almost nobody watching has voted to keep him away from the harbor.
