As a refresher, what I'm doing is trying my hand at the hilarious breakdown format of www.videogum.com by mocking Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief. I started this as a project to get myself through a long double shift at work, (I was not very busy.) and after it took me five hours to watch half a movie, I realized a new respect for my favorite hate-watcher. For an example of some of Gabe's finest work, the series finale of LOST, check out http://videogum.com/184161/lost-s06e18-series-finale/tv/recaps/ . And now, unapologetic creative theft!
Our heroic trio has defeated the Medusa and collected one of the three magic travel pearls, and now the map tells them they need to go to Nashville. Partially Goat Black Friend scowls and complains, because even half a black character must express great disdain for country music. The goat half has nothing to say. While driving, PGBF begins to fall asleep while listening to the hated country music, because he hasn't got any Partially Goat Hip Hop Mp3s. At the last moment, he swerves out of the path of an oncoming truck and the trio decides to get a motel room.
We stop at a motel and luckily, they have an extremely clean pool! This shot was too good to only use once.
Percy spends a little time beneath the heavily chlorinated waves and thinks about his mom. When he surfaces, Romantic Lead is sitting beside the pool and looking all expositiony. Her wrist is all banged up from the Medusa fight, so Percy uses the pool water (which has got to be nearly all piss) and heals her wound. Romantic Lead explains that her mom doesn't like Percy's dad because they both wanted to be the ruler of a city that is now globally irrelevant, and that gods aren't allowed to visit their half-human kids just because. Why do gods have to follow so many rules? Partially Goat Black Friend calls them back inside.
Evidently Cypher has recovered from his critical testicle injuries and has called out Percy on national television, because minor domestic disputes in Manhattan are always broadcast during prime news hours in Nashville. Percy realizes he's a fugitive now. Um, no Percy. Your friend kicked your stepdad in the nuts. Maybe it's different in the book. Meanwhile, PGBF eats a can because goats eat cans and he's half a goat. This character is an Uncle Tom for goats, too. Fulfill our expectations more, Goat Boy.
PGBF is playing with Medusa's head, which is in the bathroom sink for some reason, and the latina maid looks in through the window and screams at the sight of Uma Thurman. Now we have to leave, you guys. Percy got no rest at all. Way to go, PGBF.
We drive all night to the Parthenon, a park in Nashville with a perfect copy of the Greek Parthenon that's in Greece. I would never have thought to look for Greek Mythology Items at a place that is deliberately evocative of Greek Mythology. Clever spot to hide a Magic Pearl. The Pearl is hidden on the front of the ornate golden crown worn by the forty-foot marble statue that dominates the back of the extremely popular tourist attraction. Wait so it's not hidden at all. Fair enough. But as Romantic Lead points out in a tone of defeat, it's really high up you guys, now what are we gonna do?
That night, our heroes come back to sneak in but are stymied by a pack of janitors. Romantic Lead does the humane thing and kills them all with arrows.
"No you guys, don't freak out, they're just Tranquilizer Arrows." Oh really? Good thing you didn't knock anyone off any tall ladders or anything.
So now our heroes have to reach the Pearl which is really high up, you guys. But wait! I almost forgot about Magic Converse of The Gods!
Percy flies up and snatches the Pearl. All right! Time to go! But oh no, janitors. And they're so mad, they could just melt together into a horrific five-headed Janitor Hydra.
Has this platoon of Hydra Janitors always worked here? Romantic Lead should have used the real arrows, I guess. So now we fight the Janitor Hydra and Percy lops all of its heads off, but of course they grow back because that part of the story rearranged itself while Percy was trying to read it in Greek Mythology Class. I'm kind of pissed at how little Greek Mythology our heroes are familiar with. It's kind of like how Harry Potter was all baffled and surprised by magic for like four of the seven books - this is Disney stuff. Get with the program.
Percy learns that he has magic water-control powers Of The Gods and fights the Janitor Hydra for a minute and then Partially Goat Black Friend slays it with the might of Uma Thurman.
So now we have a gigantic ten-headed Janitor Hydra Statue in the middle of the lobby, and there's water everywhere, but oh no the janitors were all part of the Hydra Squad so who's gonna clean this mess up?
And not our problem. We're off, to the beautiful city of Las Vegas. Now I know what you are thinking, and it's "Oh, they're gonna go to Ceasar's Palace!" but you're wrong. Ceasar was Roman, you imbecile. Obviously in this Greek Mythology movie we're bound for the Lotus Hotel and Casino, where twelve-year-old Percy Jackson and his friends are totally welcome to drink and gamble and use mind-altering substances.
Some cocktail waitresses offer our heroes something called Lotus Flowers, which immediately cause our heroes to trip balls... Of The Gods.
I should point out that Poker Face by Lady GaGa begins to play subtly in the background while this is going on. Our heroes proceed to candy flip their way around the casino, partying and gambling and chowing down on more MDMA Lotus Flowers. Oh and then this happens.
I think something's up. Turns out these Lotus Flowers are from Greek Mythology, much to our surprise. I would have never guessed that. Sure, the garden supply store had a Medusa Uma Thurman and the picnic park had a Janitor Hydra, but I figured these free, insanely hallucinogenic drug flowers were on the level.
Nope. These cocktail waitresses have been capturing people and keeping them all gurned up for a hundred years. But Percy gets a psychic wake up call from his dad Poseidon, and he slaps the other two out of their wicked trip, and they make their escape. Oh and black people are pros at stealing cars.
Turns out we've been in that casino for FIVE DAYS, and tomorrow is the Summer Solstice. Drugs are BAD, kids.
So we discover that the entrance to Hell is behind the Hollywood sign and head on up there. Behind the sign is Charon, who looks like he's thinking of switching jobs.
Charon takes them to Hell, where they learn that everybody goes to Hell when they die. Hell seriously sucks in this movie. What Dreams May Come has got NOTHING on Percy Jackson and the Lightning Thief.
We get dropped off at Hell's Front Office, where the water feature is a Fire Feature, and go to meet Hades, who appears to be Mick Jagger. And Rosario Dawson, who must have caused a dramatic increase in teen suicide by appearing in Hell in this movie. Hades thinks it's rad that Percy has brought him the Bolt... except he hasn't.
Hades asks the obvious question, which is "So why in the world would you come to HELL without the thing that you'd need to give me in order to get your mom back? Um, welcome to Hell I guess. Your room is down the hall next to the ice machine." But he summons Mom anyway for some reason, to make a point I guess, and while Percy hugs her it turns out that the Bolt was stuffed in his shield the whole time.
Oh cool. So, being a man of his word, Hades condemns our heroes to an eternity in Hell even though they brought him the Bolt, albeit unintentionally. Wait, what? The GODDAMN DEVIL can't be trusted? What is this underworld coming to? Luckily, Rosario Dawson is unsatisfied with her life and takes it out on Hades. Women, I tell you. You give them an inch and they blast you with lightning.
Rosario Dawson lets them go, but since they have only three Pearls of GTFO, Partially Goat Black Friend volunteers to stay behind with an extremely horny Rosario Dawson. What a brave and noble sacrifice.
Percy, Mom, and Romantic Lead stomp the Pearls and decide to go to Olympus, which is nothing like Floo Powder at all, and teleport to the Empire State Building Observation Deck of The Gods. They have like six minutes to get the Bolt back to Zeus, even though Mount Olympus is in Greece and midnight happens like twenty five times in a given day in various places and there's absolutely no reason that New York should be the critical location. Let's try to focus.
Douchebag shows up with Magic Converse and crows that his plan has come to fruition. He fights Percy for awhile and nabs the Bolt, then Percy whips out his own Magic Converse and they battle in the skies of New York.
Percy remembers his extremely comprehensive battle training, which was one game of Capture the Flag, and attempts to capture the Bolt. Their long and somewhat silly battle ends up on top of a tenement with a suspicious number of large water towers, and Douchebag essentially seals his own fate by loudly reminding Percy of his superpowers. "You're a demigod, dummy. You can easily kill me with magic water." (paraphrasing.) I guess that's a taunt in ancient Greece. Percy crushes him in a huge torrent of water and then knocks him into a river.
Is the day saved? Not just yet. Percy flutters back to the Empire State Building and his mom leads them into the Elevator of The Gods.
They head up to Olympus to return the Bolt, where the gods are standing around bickering as they have presumably been doing for two weeks straight. Poseidon keeps yammering and all of a sudden I recognize him as the voice of Soap McTavish from Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2. Which is what Douchebag was playing in his tent. There are forces at work here we may never understand.
Percy gets himself off the hook and explains that Douchebag stole the Bolt so that the Gods would fight and it's pretty much their own fault for abandoning their many, many children. Poseidon tries to explain to Percy that when Percy was born, Poseidon lived with him and his mother for seven months until Zeus decided he was not spending enough time at work and made some new rules. There is a perfect opportunity for redemption here, where Poseidon could commit to his son and leave Olympus and be a father again.
But he goes back to work and Percy goes back to camp. I guess the overall meaning of this story is, "Your parents are gonna disappoint you, and that's just life. Go back to camp, I'm working right now."
Zeus begrudgingly brings Partially Goat Black Friend back from Hell, which probably wasn't as kind of a deed as he thinks (Rosario Dawson!), and PGBF gets his horns! He's a real Guardian now!
Percy gets the standard "You disobeyed the rules and went off and did your own thing but you know what, that's actually pretty awesome so you're my Favorite Student now" speech, which the Wheelchair Horse learned from Albus Dumbledore I think, and goes to practice sword battling with Romantic Lead. Romantic Lead does not kiss Percy, she just pretends to so she can nab his sword and be an arrogant bitch.
And then they start to sword battle and the movie is over.
It was better than I made it sound, but still kind of stupid. And the blatant, unapologetic ripoff of Harry Potter in both cast and story structure seems almost too obvious for words. I appreciate that this may generate increased interest in Greek Mythology, although Clash of the Titans probably did it better and also had Sam Worthington in it.
I hope this has been as much fun to read as it was to write. Cheers!
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