Films and Feelings

     I have wondered if I was the only one who thought that "Sea of Monsters" was the weakest of the Percy Jackson and the Olympians pentalogy, but I have seen my reading echoed by other book loyalists.      This second installment is perhaps penalized partially because it marks several major junctions in the larger series. This is, for example, the part of the series where the scope of the adventure really starts to enlarge. We know going in that there's an angry, deceased titan out to destroy Olympus, and that he's amassing an army, and so we need a sense that this threat is growing stronger. But this also marks a turning point in how series author, Rick Riordan, chooses to develop his main character. And so, season 2 of the Disney+ television adaptation faces similar crossroads.     Season 3 of this show is already filming as we speak, so its immediate future is already spoken for, as far as production goes. But stylistically, this second seas...

     There's a quote from critic Mark Caro that I think about a lot. I shared it back when I did my critical survey of Pixar movies . Writing about Finding Nemo , Caro wrote in the  Chicago Tribune in 2003 , "Classic film eras tend to get recognized in retrospect while we take for granted timeless works passing before our eyes. So let's pause to appreciate what's been going on at Pixar Animation Studios."      I think that captures the aspirations of all active-minded media consumers. Or at least, it ought to. "This good thing won't last forever, so savor it before the sun goes down."  Modern Times (1936)      But this is also a very hard mindset to access in an online culture that is always seeking to stamp labels and scores on a thing before we shove it on the conveyor belt and move on to the next parcel.       It's something I have been thinking about for the last year or so as the completion of the Stranger ...

   The YA scene in the late 2000s and early 2010s was stuffed full of failed book-to-movie adaptations, desperate attempts to ride the Harry Potter train.  Percy Jackson and the Olympians: The Lightning Thief  was not the first book to receive this treatment. Yet it somehow became the most infamous.      We can speculate as to why it is that Percy Jackson never really exited the discourse the way properties like Eragon or Inkheart did. Perhaps it's because Rick Riordan continued to add to the lore with two follow-up sagas set in the same universe. (As of this writing, Riordan is preparing a whole additional Percy Jackson trilogy.) Perhaps it's because, while those other movie adaptations merely tried to replicate the Harry Potter effect , Percy Jackson admittedly borrowed generously from the Harry Potter story template. Whatever the reason, young millennials have never really been allowed to forget the crimes committed by FOX back in 2010 ...