Yep, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Sea of Monsters has been given the green light to go into production.
I know that they messed up the first movie pretty badly...well, to say, completely messed up the plot line. So, like, if you didn't read The Lightning Thief, the movie would have been pretty awesome, but if you did read the book...well, the whole Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief just as well have failed.
One half of me agrees with you people out there who hated the movie version of The Lightning Thief. The movie makers completely messed it up. The Hydra, for one, appeared in The Sea of Monsters and another nasty point of the movie was that the whole quest wasn't about finding the pearls so that they could escape from the Underworld, it was about going to the Underworld to confront Hades and shove him to the swordpoint to get him to tell you where in Styx did you take Zeus's Master Bolt?! Oh, and did you notice that near the end of the movie adaption, Luke Castellan, the primary antagonist of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians series said that he wanted demigods to rule Olympus, not Kronos? Stuff like that can really piss off a Percy Jackson fanatic. Me, for instance.
But on the other hand, the movie adaption could draw you in pretty well. It was full of action and suspense (in my opinion, of course) and was pretty funny at times.
Brunner: "This is a powerful weapon, Percy." *Holds out a clicky pen.* "Guard it well."
Percy: *Takes pen with bemused expression on face.* "This is a pen. This is a pen!"
Stuff like that can really get some people busting up.
So, getting back to the point of the sequel movie.
Apparently, Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Sea of Monsters will start filming as early as...well, this summer. It was verified that Logan Lerman will be returning as the star son of Poseidon, Perseus "Percy" Jackson. It is rumored that Alexandra Daddario and Brandon T. Jackson will be returning as Annabeth Chase, daughter of Athena and Grover Underwood, the satyr (respectively).
One of the things that I believe they absolutely have to do is that they have to find actors for Clarisse La Rue and Thalia Grace. For one thing about Clarisse, how could they forget about the toilet incident? I think that that was one of the best parts of the book! It probably would have really gotten the audience laughing. I mean, your average son of Poseidon sticks the mean daughter of Ares's head in the scummy and moldy, not-really-classy-joint toilet. It would have been hilarious. Besides, Clarisse is one of the main characters in The Sea of Monsters, and excluding her would have been probably jeopardizing the sucuess of Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Sea of Monsters entirely.
As for the whole "Thalia's-tree-not-being-mentioned-in-the-movie-and-replacing-it-with-a-stupid-gate" incident, that was a completely lame move on Chris Columbus's part. (Did he decide what would be there and what would not, or was that the scriptwriters?) That tree, that's the subject of the whole The Sea of Monsters: to cure Thalia's tree. That's what the whole point of the quest is about, along with rescuing Grover Underwood. Besides, even though Thalia herself plays a very small part in The Sea of Monsters book and the people making the movie might want to make a Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Titan's Curse movie, how are they going to cover up one of the main characters of that book? I'd like to see them try and make a new character to fill in, which would be completely pointless, idiotic, and lame.
So after hearing me rant about all the movies, here's the summary of Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Sea of Monsters.
"There’s been a lot of Percy Jackson 2 talk in recent weeks. So what has been said and how likely is a sequel?
There are five books in the Percy Jackson series, so far. The next installment is ‘The Sea Of Monsters’ which sees Percy, Annabeth, and his half-brother Tyson the cyclopes sailing across a dangerous ocean to save the kidnapped Grover and retrieve the Golden Fleece (the only thing that can stop Camp Half-Blood being made vulnerable to an attack by the Titans).
At the London press conference last week director Chris Columbus said “If we are successful enough, I’d love to make another film almost immediately with these guys. We had a wonderful time. I love the enthusiasm and lack of cynicism. I want to go back to work quickly.”
And despite recent Spider-Man casting rumors, it doesn’t sound like star Logan Lerman is going anywhere either. “I’m invested into the whole series. I’m crazy about the story and crazy about the character, I’d love to do all the films.”
The reaction to the first film has been mixed. Critics gave it a 49% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Casual members of the public seemed to half enjoy it. But many fans are angry. According to the feedback on this site and elsewhere, the book wasn’t just compressed (ala Harry Potter), it was “butchered”, its “heart taken out” with major plot re-routing, some characters altered beyond recognition, other key ones dropped entirely, etc. How this will affect repeat viewings and word of mouth we will have to see.
The Lightning Thief has made $31 million on its opening weekend in the U.S. Not terrible, but not spectacular either. Internationally it opened with $28 million, which is underwhelming. It cost around $95 million. As of today, it needs to hold on well domestically and internationally to become a hit. If it does, there will be more."
