Based on the first of five books in the series by Rick Riordan - who has also produced various spin-off titles - Percy Jackson (Lerman) is a teenage bpy who, he discovers, is actually the son of Poseidon, the god of the sea and earthquakes. Nice. He also discovers that all those Greek gods are still with us, many of them living on the, eh, 600th floor of the Empire State Building. The only problem is, being the offspring of one of the 'Big Three' (the other two being Zeus and Hades), Percy finds himself under attack from scary monsters and super creeps.
THE VERDICT: I know they're being true to the original book, but with a title like Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief, Fox are just asking for trouble. Most teenagers will have lost interest before they've even gotten to stumbling over the word 'Olympians'.
It's nice to see the likes of Thurman, Bean, Coogan and our own Pierce pop by, but this has the distinct smell of an also-ran. I'd be surprised if the rest of the books made it to the big screen...
Rating : 2/5
Review By Paul Byrne