Compare And Contrast Perseus And Percy Jackson

📌Category: Entertainment, Greek mythology, Literature, Movies
📌Words: 512
📌Pages: 2
📌Published: 11 May 2021

Movie versions always differ from the books just to attract a certain audience and the perfect example that demonstrates this is the difference between the book of the original myth of Perseus and its movie version “Percy Jackson and the Lightning theft.” Although Perseus and Percy Jackson supposed to be the same character they are displayed differently in the movie and the book; even though they were both displayed as great and humble heroes, in the movie Percy seemed to struggle more during his journey in his early stages while Perseus in the book didn’t seem to receive many struggles, so I believe that the movie is more relatable and exciting to follow along with.

One of the main reasons why I think Percy struggled more in the movie is 

because he mostly receives help from mortals and humans like his friends(Annabeth, Grover, and Luke at some point), while Perseus was guided by the gods during his whole journey as he got help from Hermes to find the grey sisters like said in the book “he would himself guide Perseus to them”(p.150)he also gave him a sword to cut Medusa’s head with; besides of all this assistance from Hermes, Perseus was also guided by the goddess Athena and Apollo. Even though both versions of the hero gained help from different sources they both had one common source which was their fathers.

Known that both Percy and Perseus received aid from their fathers, each version had a different father; Percy was shown as the son of Poseidon in the movie, while Perseus was the son of Zeus in the book. They both had pretty similar family situations, Percy’s mother played a huge role in raising and supporting him so as Perseus too, they both saved their mothers. Also, both of them had to face cruel stepfathers, for Percy was “Gabe” and for Perseus was “Polydectes”(almost a stepfather); he wanted Perseus gone permanently like said in the book “this seems practically certain from the plan he devised for killing Perseus.”(p.148)

Clearly, Percy went through a lot of struggling during his journey as he was displayed at a younger age than Perseus was in the book, consequently, that makes the movie more exciting to watch; we could relate to his struggling at the beginning of his journey and that targets the younger audience. Moreover, Perseus was an adult who already knew what he was doing and didn’t make many mistakes or struggle as much as Percy did in the movie, so it makes the movie more fun to follow along with Percy’s progress. Despite that Percy struggled more in his journey, both of them ended up with a common accomplishment which is cutting off Medusa’s head, as mentioned in the book “with a single sweep of his sword he cut through her neck.”(p.151)

As stated previously, Percy and Perseus are the same characters, however, they are so different depending on the book vs the movie; each had his or her targeted audience and each had their different journey depending on the writer/ producers point of view or the massage that they want to send, but in the end, they both show how good of a hero Perseus was and how these differences and similarities between the same hero could make much difference for the reader or the viewer.

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