Perhaps, but I don’t even think we need to blame Homer for spinning....he likely inherited a story that was somewhat spun already.
Greeks returning from an Anatolian war would have retold what happened from their perspective. Their Greek listeners, who likely had never been to Anatolia, then imagined the city based on what they knew in Greece.
Some people still argue that some of Shakespeare’s works were written by someone else, so it’s not surprising that Homer would be in dispute.
I expect so, but then today’s media has inherited a lot of spin too.