Shané van Blerk

If I could give zero stars, I would. Let's just say the one star is for the fact that it's...watchable. The people who say that this series is better than the movies "because it's more faithful to the books" are morons. Of course it feels that way, because it's a series with more time to add situations than a movie. I mean seriously: A whole series dedicated to one book vs one movie dedicated to a book. But NONE of those moments felt faithful to the book. Literally everything was changed it seems, and I'm not talking about necessary, acceptable changes that happens from book to screen; they really just took a concept and made a whole new, terrible version. (BTW, the movies didn't do much better with regards to staying faithful to the books overall, but at least it felt much more like Percy Jackson that this series) Secondly, the characters and fight scenes are beyond bland. I think I had exactly zero 'on-the-edge-of-my-seat moments'. That fight with Ares was just embarrassing. Neither was there any comedy... at least the movies got that right. Let's move on to the 'gods'. Actually, what gods? There were none in this series. They literally did not even feel powerful enough to stand on two feet. Ares just seemed like an idiot (in the books he was portrayed as pretty terrifying with fire for eyes). Poseidon was blegh, but at least had somewhat decent moments. And Zeus? That was just a guy in a business suit that honestly seemed more like he was the villain in the five seconds of screen time he had (he was no kind soul in the books either, but at least he wasn't...whatever this series is trying to make him). Again, the movies did waaay better in this regard. The main cast: I could get around the kids playing Percy and Grover, though their acting needs some work, especially Grover. He needs more personality. But Annabeth? I'm sorry, but that's NOT Annabeth. Look people, if you wanna change characters' races, by all means, change supporting, background characters. But get the main cast as close to the original as possible. Besides fans falling in love with original characters, main characters' looks and personalities are often chosen by an author for a reason! I was pretty excited for this to come out...then the trailer chipped away some of that excitement...and the final result after watching the series is just...disappointment. I partly blame the authors of books when series end up this bad depending on how they act. I'm sure it is very exciting to be offered for your books to be made into a movie or series, but I feel like authors either end up on one of two paths. One: they realise the directors and whoever is messing up their original story, so they try to correct it and if that doesn't happen, they simply walk away and refuse to be part of it. Or two: they are so caught up in the idea of their work being brought to screen, they lose sight of the amazing world and characters they originally built, allowing the producers to do whatever the hell they want.