Universal Studios is making an interesting shift with its marketing for The Odyssey, and the timing does not look accidental. The studio will reportedly skip early screenings for influencers, bloggers, and fan sites, choosing instead to show the film only to professional critics, according to The Hollywood Reporter. That decision lands as trust in influencer hype appears to be slipping.
For years, studios leaned on online personalities to build early excitement. Those reactions often came fast and glowing, sometimes too glowing. Audiences have started to notice the pattern. What once looked like organic buzz now reads to many as coordinated promotion, and in some cases, outright spin.
This weekend’s rollout of Supergirl is adding fuel to that skepticism. The film is struggling with critics, holding a 57 percent score on Rotten Tomatoes, while select social media accounts are still calling it a must-see hit. The gap between those reactions is hard to ignore, and it is raising skepticism about how much weight influencer praise actually carries.
Universal has seen this problem up close. Its own release Disclosure Day, directed by Steven Spielberg, drew strong early reactions online but failed to match that energy with critics. That kind of mismatch can hurt credibility, especially when audiences feel misled.
Against that backdrop, the decision to cut influencers out of The Odyssey looks less like confidence and more like damage control. The film has already been under pressure well before release. Critics have zeroed in on its creative direction, from modernized costume design to dialogue that feels out of place for an ancient Greek setting.
Casting choices have drawn the most attention. Elon Musk publicly criticized the casting of Lupita Nyong’o as Helen of Troy, arguing it breaks from the source material. A Greek cultural outlet also pointed out that a story rooted in Greek history does not feature notable Greek actors, despite production benefiting from filming incentives tied to the region.
There’s also been growing scrutiny over the film’s source material. Reports indicate the adaptation leans on a modern, feminist reinterpretation of Homer’s epic rather than a more traditional translation. That shift has raised concerns among some fans who expected a closer connection to the original text.
All of this appears to be affecting early interest. Data from The Quorum shows declining audience enthusiasm as controversy builds. That trend suggests the conversation around the film is shaping public perception before most people have seen a single frame.
By sidelining influencers, Universal may be trying to reset the narrative and avoid another wave of overly polished early reactions. The move signals a broader shift in Hollywood, where studios are starting to recognize that audiences are no longer buying every glowing post that shows up in their feed. If anything, those posts are beginning to trigger more skepticism than excitement.
Whether that strategy helps The Odyssey recover remains to be seen. For now, the studio appears to be betting that fewer voices, and more credible ones, will give the film a better shot at winning over an audience that is growing harder to convince.
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English (US) · 