The Odyssey with Dan Snow; Jesy Nelson: Life Changing; Fake or Fortune?

“It was an entertaining 90 minutes, which was educational, even if it was sometimes in an “open top bus tour” basic kind of way. I liked being reminded of all the words Homer used to describe the sea, a character in its own right, such as “wine dark”, “broad backed” and “boundless”. And Snow is right that The Odyssey is an exhilarating time machine, a portal taking us back to the people and the landscape 3,000 years ago. He did include a humorous bit that has apparently been axed from Nolan’s film for some reason (I haven’t seen it yet). This is the part when Odysseus and his men have been trapped in a cave by the Cyclops, who has already eaten some of them as a snack. Odysseus tells the Cyclops that his name is “Nobody” so that when he pokes a red hot stick through his one eye and the Cyclops calls out for help from his neighbours, he cries “Nobody is hurting me!” so the neighbours think all is well. We visited some of the real places mentioned in the epic to find the history within the myth, such as the ancient Greek cities of Mycenae and Ithaca, the home of Odysseus and the place he was trying to get back to. Despite performing a ritual, however, Snow failed to open the Underworld, possibly because he decided against sacrificing a cute little goat. I was very glad about that because it saved me putting a complaint into Ofcom.”
Carol Midgley, The Times

“In many ways, Nelson’s close bond with her mother is the heart of the documentary. You suspect it is whatkeeps her going. There is such clear love between them, coupled with gallows humour that will be familiar to anyone who has been through anything similar. In one scene, the two laugh at their friends’ concern that they will have “bad luck” because they’ve still got their Christmas tree up after Twelfth Night. “I don’t think a tree’s going to matter at this point,” Nelson deadpans. Occasionally, the bravery briefly slips. “One day, are [the twins] going to be mad at me because I didn’t see the signs earlier?” Nelson asks the producer behind the camera before apologising for “the outburst”. You just want to reach through the screen and hug her.”
Frances Ryan, The Guardian

“Defeat thrust into the outstretched hands of victory. Disbelief and disappointment, pain and gall etched on their faces. Fake 1, Fortune 0. It’s difficult to imagine urbane art dealer Philip Mould bellowing at the sports screen in a pub. And Fiona Bruce is half-Scottish, which perhaps makes England’s World Cup exit more bearable for her. But the duo looked as heartbroken as any football fans as they stood on the steps of the Society of Antiquaries in Piccadilly, after a seemingly certain win slipped out of reach, in the first of a new series of Fake or Fortune?.”
Christopher Stevens, Daily Mail