The gang takes on greedy developer Mr. King, who wants to cut down a historic tree in order to make room for a new shopping center. Meanwhile, having been abducted by David's little sister and taken to the tree in question, Wishbone remembers a man who was similarly held captive and just wanted to get home, and imagines himself as Odysseus in The Odyssey by Homer.
Two tie-in books were released — Wishbone Classics #2: The Odyssey, featuring a less compressed adaptation of the original story with comments by Wishbone rather than the modern-day segments; and The Adventures of Wishbone #13: Homer Sweet Homer, a straight adaptation of the episode. The 1996 computer game Wishbone and the Amazing Odyssey is also a tie-in to this episode.
Tropes
- Adaptational Context Change: In the poem The Odyssey, Penelope was forced to set a challenge for the suitors and so gave them an Impossible Task that only Odysseus could do: shoot an arrow through twenty battle-axes. Fortunately, Odysseus had already arrived, won the challenge with ease, and slaughtered everyone for violating Sacred Hospitality. Here, Odysseus reunites with her and they hatch the plan for him to kick the suitors out and establish himself as the real Odysseus. After she sets the challenge, Penelope whispers for her husband to have courage before she gracefully exits.
- Adaptational Heroism: Odysseus on-screen at least doesn't submit to Calypso's forceful advances, is much less arrogant when Poseidon confronts him and he chases away the suitors with slapstick combat rather than brutally slaughtering them and the maids that betrayed his wife to them.
- Bowdlerize: Odysseus and his son expel the suitors with a slapstick fight rather than killing them.
- Compressed Adaptation: The Odyssey is reduced to just three events: Odysseus leaving Calypso's island, the storm sent by Poseidon, and the battle with the suitors. At the end, Odysseus does refer to the cyclops as one of the dangers he faced, but that's just a brief in-passing reference.
- Edible Bludgeon: Odysseus's son uses a large ham as a club while driving the freeloading suitors out of Odysseus's home.
- Everyone Has Standards: The bulldozer operator was hired to do a job and is not a bad guy. When he realizes a dog got into the bulldozer scoop, he's horrified and immediately lowers it. This allows Wanda to issue a court summons to Mr. King before the tree is knocked down.
- Jerkass Gods: Poseidon sinks Odysseus's raft simply because he doesn't like him (in the original tale, Poseidon hates Odysseus for blinding his son).
- Loophole Abuse: Mr. King used sneaky tactics to get his development approved before the neighborhood could object and before a new law protecting large trees was scheduled to take effect.
- Saving the Orphanage: The contemporary story centers around saving a beloved section of Jackson Park from Mr. King's plans for a shopping center. Its connection to The Odyssey is a bit tenuous to say the least.
- Spared by the Adaptation: The suitors in The Odyssey; in the poem, Odysseus brutally murders them for the crime of invading his home and pressuring his wife to marry them. Here, Odysseus and Telemachus merely humiliate them in a food fight and allow them to leave.
