The first teaser trailer for Oscar winner Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey is playing in theaters, paired with fellow Universal release Jurassic World Rebirth, but if the director and the studio were hoping to keep the first look video as an exclusively theatrical experience that’s now how it’s playing out. Cell phone recordings of people watching it in cinemas are popping up all over social media and on YouTube (IGN doesn’t link out to pirated material).
We’ve inquired with Universal Pictures about whether they plan on officially releasing the teaser trailer for The Odyssey online.
The trailer opens with what seems to be voiceover from Eumaeus, who was Odysseus’ slave and friend as the character refers to him as “my master.” It’s not clear who is voicing the role.
The teaser shows quick shots of the Mediterranean Sea and the Trojan Horse on a beach before cutting to Telemachus, Odysseus’s son played by Tom Holland, meeting with Jon Bernthal’s King Menelaus.
Telemachus seeks information on the fate of his long-missing father Odysseus (Matt Damon), who fought alongside Menelaus in the Trojan War.
Menelaus tells Telemachus of the different rumors about what happened to his father and when imprisonment is mentioned, Menelaus scoffs at that notion, saying, “What prison could hold a man like that?”
Odysseus himself is only glimpsed from a distance or from behind, playing on the mystique of a man who has become a legend.
There’s also a quick glimpse of Lupita N’yongo who appears to be playing Menelaus’ wife, Helen of Troy, whose beauty launched a thousand ships and sparked the Trojan War.
For more coverage on this highly anticipated 2026 release, read why Christopher Nolan is the perfect filmmaker to make an Odyssey movie and remind yourselves of the movie’s absolutely stacked, all-star cast.
