Alright, another day at school; you’ll need a backpack, check. A sandwich without cheese, check. A pen that can turn into a sword … now that wasn’t on the list. “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” is a new live-action television series that is currently streaming on Disney+ and Hulu and is based on Rick Riordan’s young adult book series, also named Percy Jackson. The TV show follows a 12-year-old boy who discovers that his father is the Greek god Poseidon and his new life at Camp Half-Blood.
With the show first premiering with two episodes on December 20, 2023, the series will have a total of eight episodes airing every Tuesday at 9 p.m. EST. Although the second season has not yet been confirmed, to many Percy Jackson fans, it is more aligned with the original storyline compared to the movie franchise that first aired in 2010.
The movie series, distributed by 20th Century Fox and produced by 1492 Pictures, had overall lower ratings on Rotten Tomatoes compared to the TV show. As of January 2024, the first movie, “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief”, received a 49% rating from 152 critics and a 53% in the “audience score” category with 250,000+ ratings. After being released for less than a month, “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” received a 96% rating and 85% in the “audience score” category.
Before the movie’s release, Riordan once wrote to 20th Century Fox, outlining some changes that would make more sense in the grand scheme of the story. For example, the movie adaptation ages the characters from 12 to 17 years old. With the main demographic of readers of Percy Jackson being 9 to 12-year-olds, he thought that aging up the characters and marketing the movie toward teens instead of kids and families would “risk pleasing no one” as the demographic for the book series was children and their families.
After the movie was released, Anthony Quinn, from The Independent, rated the movie Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief a 1/5 on Rotten Tomatoes and said, “If they’d played it for laughs it might just have worked, but in fact, its earnest tone and digimation effects stick pretty close to the Potter model. We could be in for a very long haul.” With the current Disney+ adaptation, there are very few worries about the production of the TV series as Riordan and his wife, Rebecca Riordan, are credited as executive producers.
As someone who knows little to nothing about the Percy Jackson lore, besides little facts and tidbits, I continue to enjoy the watching experience every week I tune in. The TV show was able to hold my hand, walk me through and immerse me in the world of Percy Jackson. It was able to answer any questions I had. It did so incredibly, and it was comical how quickly it answered my questions like, “what is Annabeth doing with that tree in episode three?” Well, it’s her “sister,” Thalia, whose form changed because it was her father’s, the Greek god Zeus’s, way to protect her.
Even after rewatching the first four episodes, finding the hidden messages and Easter eggs might’ve been my favorite part of the Percy Jackson series, and I felt it was well-portrayed in the Disney+ adaptation. For example, Percy’s ADHD and dyslexia aren’t Percy’s weaknesses but his strengths. This explains how he and other demigods (people who are born of one human and one god or goddess) have battle instincts and an innate ability to read ancient Greek. It also explains how Chiron’s gift to Percy from Poseidon, soon to be discovered, is Percy’s dad’s ballpoint pen, which, when uncapped, can turn into a sword, suggesting that pen is mightier than a sword.
All of this combined, makes me wish I read the series during my elementary school days and geek out with the other readers of the Percy Jackson series. But now with this new series, maybe I still can.
