Elliot Page may not be playing Achilles in Christopher Nolan's The Odyssey, after all.
Following the debut of the film's latest trailer, speculation mounted that the 39-year-old actor is playing Achilles, the great warrior of the Trojan War. With no confirmation from Nolan or the studio, the idea alone of Page stepping into a role previously made famous by Brad Pitt in Wolfgang Petersen's 2004 film Troy was enough to send parts of the internet into a frenzy.
As it turns out, those initial rumors may have missed the mark.
Again, there's been no official update on who Elliot Page will be playing in The Odyssey, but yet another new rumor has popped up online. This time it's reported that Page is expected to be playing Elpenor, the youngest member of Odysseus's crew.
The rumor appears to have stemmed from the X/Twitter account Nolan Archives, but there was also a speculative post on Reddit a few days ago that made the claim.
Again, this hasn't been confirmed by Nolan, Page, or the studio, so treat it with a grain of salt.
Unlike Achilles, Elpenor isn't exactly a great hero. In fact, he's described as one of the youngest and least distinguished men in the crew. That's not to say that he doesn't play a significant role in the story. While staying with the sorceress Circe, Elpenor gets drunk and falls asleep on the roof. He later wakes up disoriented, forgets where he is, and falls from the roof ladder, breaking his neck and dying instantly. While Odysseus and the crew notice his absence, they are too busy to search for him and leave.
Elpenor is the first ghostly spirit that Odysseus encounters when he travels to the Underworld. He begs Odysseus to return and give him a proper burial, warning that leaving him unburied could anger the gods.
Page was seen only briefly in the latest trailer for The Odyssey. Appearing muddied in what looks to be the Underworld, the mysterious character asks Odysseus: "Who’s looking after your wife and son?”
Elpenor is a fairly minor character in The Odyssey, but then again, so is Achilles. The difference, however, is the centuries of cultural mythology that Achilles carries. Elpenor is mostly remembered for dying drunk and confused on a rooftop. Will this be enough to calm the outrage that formented after those initial rumors?