4 Mistakes That Cursed Percy Jackson Movies (But The Show Can Fix Them)
Let's hope this quest proves to be a more successful one.
In 2005, as the world was going crazy for J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter books and their film adaptations, author Rick Riordan released The Lightning Thief. The book was immediately named the American version of The Boy Who Lived.
After the success with the readers, it was decided to transfer the books to the screen. The first part was directed by Chris Columbus, the same director who made the first two Harry Potter films. Unfortunately, the new franchise was not destined to repeat the success of its British counterpart, and after an anticlimactic sequel, the franchise died.
On December 19, the first two episodes of Percy Jackson and The Olympians were released on Disney Plus, and while we wait for the release of the next episode on December 27, let's remember what buried the franchise about the children of the Greek gods.
Percy Jackson Movies Didn't Care About the Books
As you know, you cannot just take a book and transfer it to the screen – inevitably some parts of the original source will be cut out or changed to make it look good on the big screen. But in the movie Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief, it seemed that the creators completely forgot about the source material. Starting with the age of the main characters – Percy is sixteen in the movie (and twelve in the book), and ending with the main antagonist.
The suspenseful adventure for which the book was praised turned into a rather primitive quest in the movie. In the book, the main characters did not know what to expect, and many of the trials were truly a surprise. In the movie, everything is predictable – Percy is even given a map showing where and with whom he must fight.
Percy Jackson Movies Didn't Bother to Find The Right Audience
In the movies, the characters were made several years older in order to attract an older audience – teenagers. At the same time, however, the creators lowered the level of action, making it too simple and childish. The book, intended for children, tells a much more fascinating and serious story, raising issues of family and friendship.
It is unclear what the creators wanted to focus on – either the relationships of Percy and Annabeth or the adventure itself. But in the end, not a single storyline was fully revealed.
Percy Jackson Movies Butchered Their Characters
Since the book begins when Percy is twelve years old, the protagonist gradually goes through the process of growing up. Even in the first book, Percy transforms from a typical troubled teenager to a more mature, responsible, and aware version of himself. There is no such development in the movie – Percy is a typical protagonist for whom everything works out simply because it cannot be otherwise.
Annabeth suffered the curse of Ginny Weasley – while in the books she was no less a developed and complex character than Percy, in the movies she became a typical faceless girlfriend of the main character.
Percy Jackson Movies' Universe Turned Out to Be Flat
Rick Riordan is a history teacher with a special interest in Greek mythology. Therefore, it is not surprising that he has built the world, the system of magical creatures, and the lore with a great deal of thought. From the very beginning of the first book, one event follows logically from another, but in the movies there are a lot of inconsistencies.
In The Lightning Thief, the audience was not properly introduced to the structure of the world at all, so in The Sea of Monsters, some facts just pop up unexpectedly, and the viewers are supposed to believe that this is really the case.