Grok Releases Seven Minutes of Its AI-Made 'Odyssey' Series

Three months after Elon Musk said Grok would release a full-length, "historically accurate" film version of "The Odyssey," the company has published seven minutes of it. It now calls the clip "Episode 1 of our Odyssey series."

The footage was made with Grok Imagine in collaboration with Wonder Studios and director Dev Walker. The company offered a full breakdown of how it was done if viewers ask for one in the comments.

A rival to Nolan's film

Musk had earlier criticized Christopher Nolan's version of "The Odyssey" because Nolan cast nonwhite and transgender actors. Nolan's film is largely practical filmmaking, shot across six countries with thousands of cast and crew. After its July release it became a major box office success, sold out Imax screenings for months and is seen as a likely front-runner at the next Academy Awards. Nolan has also called himself "a techno-skeptic" and said he had never seen a technology "so completely rejected by the public" as AI.

How the AI version looks

The visuals are better than many might expect, and better than other videos Musk has posted recently. Some moments could pass for real actors sailing on a real sea. The characters all have a Musk-approved skin color, and the narrator speaks in the British accent familiar from fantasy games and Hollywood epics.

The weak points are story and feeling. A long voiceover delivers the backstory before a series of bearded faces shout stilted lines. Individual shots hold up as a passable simulation of reality, but the whole lacks momentum and gives viewers little reason to care about anyone on screen.

For now, the release shows how far AI video has come in realism, and how far it still is from sustaining a feature-length narrative. Whether Grok will deliver further episodes or a complete film has not been stated.