Movie Review: “Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters”
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iStockphoto/Thinkstock(NEW YORK) — It didn’t do particularly well in the United States, but 2010’s Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief raked in enough cash at the international box office to warrant a sequel. Since the popular book series could easily be mistaken for a Harry Potter-style rip-off, so could a movie based on those books, and while Lightning Thief felt a bit Potterish, Percy Jackson himself — the excellent Logan Lerman — does nothing to remind us of Daniel Radcliffe. Likewise, Lightning Thief director Chris Columbus, who also directed the first two Harry Potter movies, kept us immersed in Percy’s mythological world, never giving us reason to believe we were watching Harry Potter lite.
Not so with director Thor Freudenthal’s Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters. It not only feels like a Harry Potter rip-off, it feels like a Percy Jackson rip-off. This time, Percy — the son of a human woman and Poseidon, Greek god of the sea — is suffering from demigod self-esteem issues. Some fierce competition from Clarisse — daughter of Ares, the god of war — has Percy calling into question whether it was he who was responsible for getting Zeus’ lightning bolt back in the first film, or if it was his friends. In fact, his inability to communicate with his Olympian father has Percy questioning whether he’s a demigod at all.
Then an oracle tells Percy that he’s part of a prophecy that will bring down Olympus before he turns twenty. No time for therapy now; instead, Percy will have to work out his issues while attempting to retrieve the Golden Fleece before Jake Abel’s Luke, Percy’s nemesis in The Lightning Thief, can get his hands on it with the intention of resurrecting Kronos, the long-dispatched god of Hades. Before that happens, Percy, along with his Cyclops half-brother, Tyson, and the easy on the eyes Annabeth (Alexandra Daddario, also back from Lightning Thief), is going to have to traverse the Sea of Monsters, known to us humans as the Bermuda Triangle, while attempting to rescue his best pal, the satyr Grover (Brandon T. Jackson).
Castle star Nathan Fillion, who plays the messenger god Hermes (here disguised as a UPS-type store owner), supplies the best moment. At least it is for people familiar with his career, when he cracks a joke that’s a clear reference to his short-lived cult hit TV show Firefly. If that’s your best moment in a movie, we have a problem.
Directed as noted by Thor Freudenthal, who also directed Diary of a Wimpy Kid, Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters feels, well, wimpy. At some point, I fully expected Greg Heffley to emerge, realize the error of his self-absorbed ways and apologize. On the other hand, the kids who love the Percy Jackson books will probably also love the deft CGI and the talented young actors’ commitment to their characters, most notably Logan Lerman. If you haven’t already, do yourself a favor and check him out in The Perks of Being a Wallflower.
Two out of five stars.
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