Seven Minutes, No Movie: Musk's AI 'Odyssey' Reshapes the Razzies Race

Seven minutes. That's the actual runtime of Elon Musk's much-touted AI version of The Odyssey — not the "full-length movie" he promised on July 21, but a webisode released Oct. 23 that has nonetheless landed squarely on the Razzies' radar.

"Looks like he's creating a new category — which he'll dominate, of course," Maureen "Mo" Murphy, co-founder of the Golden Raspberry Awards, told Gold Derby after the release. The Razzies, the long-running awards honoring the year's worst in film, don't currently have a Worst Short Film category — at least not yet.

What changed since July?

The saga began when Musk, the X owner, took issue with Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey over its casting of Lupita Nyong'o as Helen of Troy and Elliot Page as a Greek warrior. Musk, who was born in South Africa, argued that Nolan shouldn't have cast Black or trans actors in a film set in ancient Greece, and announced his own "historically accurate" edition of Homer's epic through Grok Imagine, his company's AI generator, promising it by year's end.

"Elon would be adding quite a bit of fodder for our awards season," Murphy said back in July.

What arrived on Oct. 23, built with WonderStudiosX and director Dev Walker, is labeled "Episode 1" — with no word on when, or if, future episodes will follow.

Where can it compete?

Eligibility is the open question. Murphy suggests the seven-minute project could still land in races like:

• Worst Director
• Worst Screenplay
• Worst Remake, Rip-Off, or Sequel

Presumably it's too small for Worst Picture, though Murphy says we'll have to wait and see. The Razzies have nominated documentaries in that top category before — Dinesh D'Souza's Hillary's America (2016) and Mike Lindell's Absolute Proof (2020) both "won" it.

On AI projects generally, Murphy drew a line in July. "The intent behind the storytelling as much as the story itself (no matter the tool telling it) is what catches our attention," she said. "And this certainly does. Elon's South African roots are very apparent."

While "AI is not going away," she added, fully artificial projects are "worthy of our consideration" when they are "used to cheat creative filmmakers out of work — or the storytelling is unoriginal, boring, or indefensible."

What about Nolan's version?

Musk has gone quiet on the casting feud since Nolan's film became a juggernaut. It has earned $1.79 billion worldwide and sits as the front-runner for Best Picture at the 2027 Oscars. It also runs about 165 minutes longer than Musk's version — not that size matters.

Who else is on the Razzies' radar?

Murphy flagged several other contenders:

• The documentary Musk, from director Alex Gibney, a four-hour piece whose subject is eligible in Worst Actor. "Indeed a bad actor on the world stage," Murphy declared.
• Digger, Tom Cruise's box-office flop, expected to lose $250 million. "Digger could certainly be up for our Barry L. Bumstead Award: a movie that cost a lot and lost a lot," Murphy revealed — a dishonor previously given to United Passions (2015), Misconduct (2016), CHiPs (2017), and Billionaire Boys Club (2018).
• A Melania Trump documentary, which the Razzies confirmed in February they were tracking. "We are tracking Melania — that should be a shoo-in!" Murphy said at the time.

For now, the shortest Odyssey in the race is waiting on its rulebook fate. If the Razzies want it, they'll find a category — or, as Murphy hinted, build a new one around it.