November 16 «» 9:00pm BEOWULF BASH 2026 black and white line drawing of a greek warrior with shield, helmet, and upraised spear

Let’s first talk about The Odyssey — not the minivan, but the movie with Jason Bourne¹ wearing a scrub brush on his head, giving away toy horses to complete strangers, and then playing bow and arrows with his guests. Yeah, that Odyssey ². Since all of the ancient Greek-themed Odyssey venues in Chicago were booked this year, we decided to call the 2026 Beowulf Bash “The Oddity” because it made more sense than trying to culturally appropriate this year’s big hit ³.

Fear not. Fun ancient Greek games will be available to play at this year’s venue:

Centaur Ball: This ancient sport involved Centaurs gathering on the Greek FIFA soccer4 pitch to scoop up rock balls and throw them at each other. Not having hands, this sport quickly faded. The modern equivalent is now called WHIRLYBALL.

Rolling Things Down a Hill: This ancient Greek pastime involved rolling rocks and logs down a hill at oncoming soldiers or in-laws. Having to haul all the heavy items back up the hill caused the sport to fall from favor, so it’s now called BOWLING.

Spear Tag: A widely popular game amongst ancient Greek youth. Once tagged with a spear, the participant could then choose to crawl to the sidelines or bleed out in the arena, creating an obstacle for the other team. Today we have replaced this sport with LASERTAG.

9:00 PM – Midnight

WhirlyBall

1825 W. Webster Avenue
10 minutes by car from McCormick Place

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Notes:

[1] Astute readers will remember the first time we met Jason Bourne, who looks remarkably like Odysseus, as he was pulled from the Mediterranean Sea. We don’t think this was a coincidence.
[2] Although you have to admit that Jason and the Argonauts set a pretty high bar back in the day: the golden fleece, Hercules (for a bit), clashing rocks, Triton, harpies, Hydra’s teeth, skeleton warriors, and 1960s-style buff actors and actresses.
[3] Our standard practice is to piggyback on current popular memes and trends to help boost our promotion and make sarcastic jokes. (Okay, based on the movie, we admit using the word “piggy” is in poor taste.)
[4] Yes, we know it is called football over there, but here we call it soccer to avoid confusion because we have real football.