You don’t hear the defenders of so-called Western civilization talk much about The Odyssey these days.

Maybe that’s because their rabid denunciations of Christopher Nolan’s film adaptation of Homer’s epic were buried in an avalanche of money. The July blockbuster has grossed nearly $1.8 billion worldwide, silencing the right-wingers who predicted a massive flop due to diverse casting and deviations from the source material.

Perhaps the loudest of these preemptive critics was Elon Musk. The world’s richest man spared no vitriol for what he considered a desecration of the ancient Greek narrative; four days after its release, he vowed to produce a superior version.…