Disney’s fantasy series “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” is heading towards its season finale as the leads – (Walker Scobell), Annabeth Chase (Leah Jeffries), and Grover Underwood (Aryan Simhadri) – find their way to the underworld. There, they must face the God of the Dead to retrieve Zeus’ bolt and negotiate the safe return of Percy’s mother. However, a bunch of twists await the young heroes.
Aptly titled “We Find Out The Truth, Sort of”, episode seven of “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” starts with Percy entering what looks like a mattress shop, but is actually a front for an alternative entrance to Hades’ realm. Two parallel plots run through this edition, one focusing on the trio’s attempt to get to Hades palace by fighting/outwitting the ferocious Cerberus who guards the underworld; while the other consists of flashbacks were Percy’s mother Sally Jackson (Virginia Kull) attempts to enroll a younger Percy into a boarding school against his will.
The casting directors (and make-up team) have done a fantastic job in selecting Azriel Dalman as the younger Percy. The child actor looks so much like Walker Scobell that, for a moment, you wonder if it’s a digitally altered version of the actor or if they are related (they aren’t). And the flashback scenes help in establishing the deep connection between Percy and his mother, even though Virginia Kull still isn’t very convincing as Sally. Meanwhile, Jay Duplass makes his first appearance in the show as Hades, who was quite amusing as the God of the Dead. However, I was expecting somebody a little more intimidating, even if it didn’t fit the traditional depiction of the character. For example, Gwendoline Christie made such a fantastic Lucifer, the ruler of hell, in “The Sandman” series—a departure from the usual male characterization of the fallen angel.
Despite the kids finally making it to the underworld, episode seven wasn’t very exciting, maintaining a tepid mood throughout the runtime. While the underworld is obviously a cold, dark, foreboding place, even otherwise the cinematography is unnecessarily dominated by low-lit scenes, including the flashback moments, where little Percy and his mom are at a restaurant having milkshakes, but it looks like a scene from a horror movie. The color schemes and poor lighting make the show seem a lot more depressing than it really is, which is quite the downer, given the script is even otherwise pretty serious.
For a penultimate episode, “We Find Out The Truth, Sort of” doesn’t set an exciting groundwork for the season finale, but some pretty wicked revelations are made in the second-half, and things do end on a tense cliffhanger. Perhaps the last episode will make up for the slackening in pace and mood of the tale.
‘Percy Jackson and the Olympians’ is available to stream on Disney Plus.
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