Percy Jackson is coming back to our screens in the form of a new Disney+ TV show, and we’ve got a fresh development update from Rick Riordan – author of the novels and a writer on the upcoming series. Taking to Twitter, he emphasized that writing is still at a very early stage, saying:
https://twitter.com/rickriordan/status/1272559357725749253?s=20
Riordan also looks keen to emphasize that he’s very much involved with casting discussions (and one imagines creative decisions of any kind). That’s in stark contrast to the two Percy Jackson movies developed and distributed by Fox, on which he effectively had no input.
His parting pledge to do fans proud will not be lost on those who have followed the franchise’s development. The writer has made no secret of his disdain for Fox’s aforementioned adaptations, recently likening them to having his life’s work “put through a meat grinder.” This time around, he wants to get things right and today’s tweet looks aimed at assuaging fears that Disney could repeat the mistakes of the films. After all, he believes that his creative input will prevent that from happening, so fingers crossed for all involved that that proves to be the case.
Looking forward to Percy Jackson on Disney+? Happy to see Riordan on the team? Whatever your thoughts are (optimistic or otherwise), leave them in the comments section. I have to say I passed over the novels, and indeed the films, with the sense they were off-brand Harry Potter gigs. J.K. Rowling’s success spawned a deluge of YA fantasy clones in the mid-2000s. That said, if anyone can mine Percy Jackson’s source material successfully for TV, it’s the guy who wrote the books.
