The first Percy Jackson movie, The Lightning Thief, had a pantheon of A-Listers from Sean Bean and Pierce Brosnan to Uma Thurman (what a lovely Medusa she made!). The sequel, directed by German director Thor Freudenthal (what a cool name just like Nimrod Antal!), has scaled down on star power.
Like the previous movie, fans of Rick Riordan’s series are going to be upset with the liberties taken. The tree that protects Camp Half Blood is poisoned and dying. The only way to save the tree is by getting the magic fleece from the Sea of Monsters. Clarisse, daughter of Ares, the god of war sets off on the quest. Percy Jackson, demigod and son of Poseidon, Annabeth, the daughter of Athena, and Tyson, Percy’s Cyclops half-brother, also try and get the fleece and in the process need to save the satyr Grover from Polyphemus, the Cyclops that is guarding the Golden Fleece.
All comes right in a flurry of special effects with the mandatory 3D. Logan Lerman as Percy Jackson, Brandon T. Jackson as Grover, Alexandra Daddario as Annabeth Chase and Jake Abel as Luke reprise their roles. Stanley Tucci as Dionysus joins the cast and has one of the few funny lines in the movie. Sea of Monsters with its resurrecting-Cronos theme reminds one of that truly awful film — The Wrath of the Titans (naturally since both talk of Perseus). While Sea of Monsters is not as bad as that film, it is not particularly memorable either.
Genre: Fantasy
Director: Thor Freudenthal
Cast: Logan Lerman, Brandon T. Jackson, Alexandra Daddario, Stanley Tucci
Storyline: Percy Jackson has to get the Golden Fleece and save Camp Half Blood
Bottomline: Checks all the boxes
