Review #2 by Amanda

If you think being a teenager is hard, try finding out your father is one of the Greek gods—and being accused of stealing Zeus's famous lightning bolt. Percy Jackson (Logan Lerman) never dreamed his average life would come crashing down around him with mythological creatures around every corner out to get him. When his mother is taken by Hades (Steve Coogan), he sets out to get her back, even if he doesn't have the lightning bolt everyone seems to want. His protector Grover (Brandon T. Jackson) and new friend Annabeth (Alexandra Daddario) join him on his quest across the United States and into the Underworld.

There are a few things you need to know about this movie, which was based on the Rick Riordan novel.

The first is that the cast is pretty amazing. Pierce Brosnan, Uma Thurman, Kevin McKidd, Sean Bean, and Rosario Dawson are all featured in small roles, and they all are fantastic. (Uma Thurman and Rosario Dawson were definitely my favorites in their limited amount of screen time.) That's just the adult characters; the kids in the cast hold their own against the heavyweights. I could easily see Alexandra Daddario as the daughter of Athena; she wields a mean sword. And Brandon T. Jackson did an excellent job keeping the mood light in what could otherwise be very dark scenes, although it's a shame that a lot of the jokes his character makes in the book didn't find their way into the film. I think he would have pulled them off really well. With his performance in this film, Logan Lerman could well be poised to be the newest action hero. I've always thought he was a decent actor, but I think this movie will open a lot of doors for him.

Now, second is that the special effects are pretty great for a movie aimed at a younger audience. Studios tend to think that the younger the viewers for their films are, the lower the budget for special effects needs to be, because younger people don't need their effects to look real. The Harry Potter films, also originally helmed by Christopher Columbus like Percy, showed that family films could make use of CGI in a convincing way, and the mythological creatures and locations here certainly hold up realism. You get glimpses of Medusa, the Hydra, the Underworld, and even Mount Olympus, and they are all pretty much flawless. I found Medusa particularly well done because, well, I imagine snakes for hair to be an incredibly difficult image to create.

The last thing you need to know, and this is for all you novel purists out there—those of you who like your movies to come to you verbatim from their source material—is that the movie has a lot of differences from the book it is based on. On the one hand, I would say that the script still holds true to the story, that the spirit of the book and the characters is still there, but on the other hand, well, there are going to be quite a few problems if the studio decides to green-light the sequels to The Lightning Thief. There are five novels that tell Percy's overarching story, and a lot of major plot points in the later novels originate in the first story (the one this film was based on), plot points which were skipped over in the movie. They probably could be fixed with minor alterations in later films, but it will definitely be interesting to see what road the studio decides to take if plans move forward. (The story, though, is still action-packed and fast-moving, keeping you watching whether you've read the book or not.) I know as someone who enjoyed the books, there are a few minor things that I would love to have seen included in the film, but ones that I didn't really miss too much while I was watching. Annabeth's baseball cap that makes her invisible, for example, would have been a great addition. All of the differences aside, I, for one, would love to see all of Percy's adventures on the big screen.

So, with a great cast, great special effects, and a great story, why wouldn't you want to see this movie?