Welcome to Six Damn Fine Degrees. These instalments will be inspired by the idea of six degrees of separation in the loosest sense. The only rule: it connects – in some way – to the previous instalment. So come join us on our weekly foray into interconnectedness!
I admit that I needed the help of the next generation in writing this post. This is because there are only two experts on Epic: The Musical in the house and neither of them is me. The fifteen-year-old is currently studying for her biology exam, but the twelve-year-old was kind enough to assist.
Epic is a musical about Homer’s Odyssey that has gone viral without ever having hit a stage. It is a nine-part series of album musicals (called ‘sagas’) written and produced by the Puerto Rican actor and singer-songwriter Jorge Rivera-Herrans. It was released between 2022 and 2024 and gained widespread popularity on TikTok in 2021.
I can’t tell you how delighted I am that kids these days are into Homer.
What is fascinating about it is not just the music itself, but its entire production economy. Epic has never been performed on stage. In fact, before 2026 it wasn’t even available on CD. And yet Jorge has managed to pay off his student loan with the proceeds. “Proceeds of what?” I ask my kid in confusion. “Streaming,” she says. “And merch.”
Epic took off when Jorge started posting about his creative process on TikTok. I’m not surprised: His online persona is a fetching mix of goofy and excitable. According to Wikipedia: “Within the first week of release, The Troy Saga surpassed three million streams, reaching second-place on the Billboard Cast Album Chart (behind Hamilton) and becoming the number one Soundtrack Album on iTunes on the day of release. Since then, Epic has had consistent popularity, with each saga reaching the number one spot in the week of its release.”
According to Atlantic Records, by September 2025 the project had amassed over one million album equivalents and more than three billion streams globally. The record label promptly went on to sign an exclusive partnership with the creator gone viral.
Jorge is a one-man musical powerhouse. He found and commissioned the other voice actors via TikTok duets, inviting the ones he liked to auditions. One of them, Talya Sindel, who originally auditioned for Zeus but ended up singing Circe, went on to become his girlfriend. He hired his mom to sing Odysseus’ mother and his dad to sing Hephaestos. He himself, of course, is Odysseus.
The videos that popularised his songs on YouTube were illustrated by animatic artists for free and because they really dig the collaboration. I’ve embedded a few. There are more artists with different styles, but we like those best.
At this point, you may be wondering what any of this has to do with Matt, our noble leader and the subject of last week’s post. Well, it doesn’t. But a) Sam has luckily illustrated his post with numerous scenes from Greek mythology, and b) I am adding to the meta-discussion about the Six-Degrees fellowship by pointing out that it is full of extremely knowledgeable people. Meanwhile, here I am, blithely posting about stuff I only heard about last week. This post is proof of that.
As a former Greek mythology nerd, I do know a couple of things about the Odyssey and I can say that I really enjoyed Jorge’s take. Homer’s epic poem is long, and Jorge had to make some artistic choices about what kind of story he was going to tell. He focuses on the character arc of a man who is willing to do anything – to sacrifice everything, including his ethical humanity – in order to return to his wife. Will it make him into a monster? His single-minded obsession is an interesting and not unwelcome redirection of the original tale.
Either way, we haven’t seen the last of Epic. “More than four billion global streams and over seven billion short-form views later, what began as viral social content evolved into a global phenomenon, redefining how music, storytelling, and audience engagement can intersect at scale”, enthused Hollywood Reporter in April, following the announcement that Jerry Bruckheimer is now slated to turn Epic into an animated movie.
Meanwhile, its creator has already started working on a prequel: it is called Ilium, and it’s based on Homer’s other epic poem, the Iliad. The Saga continues!
A Damn Fine Cup of Culture 