{"id":88450,"date":"2026-07-20T10:56:58","date_gmt":"2026-07-20T00:56:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/?p=88450"},"modified":"2026-07-20T10:56:59","modified_gmt":"2026-07-20T00:56:59","slug":"every-afl-team-as-a-character-from-the-odyssey","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/2026\/07\/every-afl-team-as-a-character-from-the-odyssey\/","title":{"rendered":"Every AFL Team as a Character from The Odyssey"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I saw Christopher Nolan\u2019s The Odyssey <\/em>last night. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

From a guy that didn\u2019t like Oppenheimer <\/em>and hasn\u2019t loved a Nolan film since The Dark Knight, <\/em>holy shit it was so good. Every story beat felt incredibly familiar but it was somehow fresh because of Nolan\u2019s freakish ability to do kind of just enough re-imagining to make himself different. You saw it in the Batman trilogy just like you saw it in putting the Trojan Horse in the water rather than on wheels to make it seem more believable.<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

I don\u2019t generally love his movies, but this one was so good. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

As is my want I couldn\u2019t help but relate it to the AFL this season which has, in a way, felt like our own personal Odyssey through ARC controversies,<\/a> to amateurish timekeeping blunders, to changing draft rules without any lead time for clubs.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But it also applies on a character\/club level. Who is every club as a character in Homer\u2019s epic poem? Let\u2019s find out. And to give myself a challenge, I get a two-sentence maximum to explain the comparison<\/p>\n\n\n\n

    \n
  1. Fremantle \u2013 Odysseus:<\/a> They\u2019ve been away from the premiership for longer than Odysseus was away from Ithaca. This year feels like they\u2019re about to come back and kill everyone before heading back to the unknown west.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  2. Sydney \u2013 Penelope: Just like Penelope can keep on unravelling her burial shroud every night, the Swans can keep on trying to handball their way through pressure. At some point, unless a miracle bails them out, it\u2019s going to end soon.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  3. Hawthorn \u2013 Melantho<\/a>: You can\u2019t trust this bastard. They\u2019ll chase your captain and then chase him again.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  4. Brisbane \u2013 The Trojan Horse: Don\u2019t let them in. They might look like an offering from the Gods, but they\u2019ll slit your throat and take away your humanity.<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  5. Adelaide \u2013 Poseidon: Despite the Crows sitting pretty at third on the ladder and fourth in score differential over their last five, nobody is talking about them. Not a lot of people talk about Poseidon either, but he really did a number on Odysseus\u2019 journey home.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  6. Melbourne \u2013 Calypso:<\/a> What are you going to do? Look away from Charlize Theron? But ultimately the fate of the season won\u2019t lie with them.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  7. Western Bulldogs \u2013 Helen of Troy: Beautiful at the start of the year but viciously hurt across the year to the point of unrecognizability.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  8. Collingwood \u2013 Eumaeus<\/a>: This wily old blind fella still has some tricks, even when it feels like he doesn\u2019t.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  9. Geelong \u2013 Agamemnon:<\/a> The Cats are a fading king who must have sacrificed a number of babies for their good fortune over the last 20 years. The injuries to Cameron and now Holmes feel like the worm beginning to turn.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  10. St Kilda \u2013 Sinon<\/a>: Like the Saints, Sinon is a warrior but is simply outgunned despite his bravery.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  11. GWS \u2013 Telemachus<\/a>: GWS\u2019 season is threatening to be a bit Telemachus. They started slowly, are growing into what they should be, but are ultimately a massive disappointment.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  12. Carlton \u2013 The sirens: Can you hear the Josh Fraser shaped sirens singing? It\u2019s so beautiful! Hire that interim coach! Do it again even though you know what\u2019s going to happen.<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n
  13. North Melbourne \u2013 Charybdis: After the win against Gold Coast, I got sucked into the North Melbourne whirlpool. After the worst three game win-streak in history followed by a loss to Port, I\u2019ve been spat back out.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  14. Gold Coast \u2013 Circe<\/a>: Gold Coast has brought in star coaches and players over the last few years, but the hellish environment that they exist in turns everyone into a pig.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  15. Port Adelaide \u2013 Cyclops Polyphemus: Everyone else has two eyes but this team has one. They\u2019re 14th in scoring and third in points against.\u00a0<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  16. West Coast \u2013 The bow<\/a>: You can feel this team getting close, but it\u2019s going to take a special person to string it.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  17. Essendon \u2013 Antinous<\/a>: Useless in a spiritually evil way and a coward.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
  18. Richmond \u2013 Argos the dog: Constantly getting kicked and not giving much of a yelp.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I saw Christopher Nolan\u2019s The Odyssey last night.  From a guy that didn\u2019t like Oppenheimer and hasn\u2019t loved a Nolan film since The Dark Knight, holy shit it was so good. Every story beat felt incredibly familiar but it was somehow fresh because of Nolan\u2019s freakish ability to do kind of just enough re-imagining to make himself different. You saw it in the Batman trilogy just like you saw it in putting the Trojan Horse in the water rather than on wheels to make it seem more believable. I don\u2019t generally love his movies, but this one was so good. …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":37,"featured_media":88451,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[7,8298,598],"tags":[],"hub_post_cat":[],"class_list":["post-88450","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-australian-rules","category-guywholikessport","category-special-interest"],"acf":{"md_tip_date":"","md_tip_date_end":"","md_market_url":"","tip_date":"20\/07\/2026","event_country":"Australia"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88450","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/37"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=88450"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88450\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":88452,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/88450\/revisions\/88452"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/88451"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=88450"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=88450"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=88450"},{"taxonomy":"hub_post_cat","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.neds.com.au\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/hub_post_cat?post=88450"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}