Ron Does Stuff

Three more episodes left, and if I manage to keep this up, I’ll be done with the first season just in time for the premiere of the second!

Percy should have fallen to his death in the previous episode, but his father finally intervenes and saves him from going splat beneath the Gateway Arch. Speaking of the Gateway Arch, emergency services are gathered around it because of the hole that Echidna blew through it and the fire that the Chimera made. Grover and Annabeth walk away from that mess, and away from the Fates as well, because I remember enough of my Greek myths to know who those three ladies were.

Grover and Annabeth eventually find Percy, and Annabeth hugs him in spite of herself. Are we becoming friends? But determining what the two of them are exactly will have to wait, as they need to go to Santa Monica, where Percy’s father Poseidon is waiting to help them. But since the police already think they thrashed their train cabin and blew a hole through the Gateway Arch, they’ll have to hoof it. According to Google Maps, that’s going to take them almost a month by foot.

Since they’re not exactly awash with options, the three of them start walking, but this time around Percy has his head in the game, so to speak. His father’s saved him after all, and now he needs to take the quest seriously if he wants to really make his father proud.

ALSO DID SOMEONE SAY GET’CHA HEAD IN THE GAME?

Annabeth, on the other hand, is a little more shaken than Percy is, because she saw the Fates cut off the thread of someone’s life, which she takes as a sign that one of them is going to die soon. But that’s something that she’ll have to think about some other time, because Ares has found them and is offering them his help. Also, that whole bit where the top of their head pop up the concrete barriers as they talk with Ares was funny to me.

When the three of them finally sit down to talk with Ares, he tells them the bad news. Even the FBI is looking for the three of them, and Percy’s stepfather isn’t making things any better as he hogs the media spotlight to make himself look better. They’re not going to be hitchhiking anytime soon because there’s probably APBs out there for them or something. I wonder how all of this is going to be explained away by the end of the show?

Ares further explains how messed up the family is, which anyone who knows even the most basic Greek mythology would know about. He thinks that there’s going to be a war whether Percy retrieves the master bolt or not, but even then he’s still willing to help out Percy and the gang if they retrieve his shield from an amusement park. He’ll even get them to Hades with a plan. However, they have to do this without Grover, because Ares is holding him hostage to make sure they don’t make a run for it.

As Percy and Annabeth make their way to the amusement park, Annabeth figures out that it’s an amusement park built by Hephaestus, and again, I remember enough of my Greek myths to know that Hephaestus and Ares don’t get along. Is the shield even Ares’, or is he just asking the kids to steal from Hephaestus? Meanwhile, Grover is charming Ares by talking about his admiration for his “deep cuts”, wars that people hardly ever talk about.

While Percy and Annabeth explore Hephaestus’ amusement park, can I just complain about how badly-lit it is? This isn’t unique to this show, by the way. It’s just the way media is lit now. I’m old and nearly blind, they might as well have just shown me a black screen, and it wouldn’t have been any different.

Percy and Annabeth are directed towards the ~Tunnel of Love~ ride, and they get to see Hephaestus story on the walls. It’s also where Percy realizes that his mom had been keeping him away from all of this, because this family is messed-up. Annabeth tells him that maybe keeping him away from the family wasn’t so bad, because now he isn’t like them and can maybe start a change.

But any future changes will have to wait, because they see Ares’s shield and after a brief time in the water where Percy gets to use his water powers, the two get onto the platform where the shiel is and now have to figure out how to get it down.

Meanwhile, Grover is figuring some things out on his own as well. Charming Ares was just the start of the plan, because now he’s trying to piece together who could have possibly stolen Zeus’ master bolt. What he says before the scene switches to Percy and Annabeth, though. I didn’t quite get what he meant by that. Maybe those who read the book will?

Percy and Annabeth, on the other hand, figured out that the machine requires a sacrifice so that the shield is let go. Percy volunteers himself despite Annabeth’s protests because he acknowledges that she’s better at quests than he is and will probably successfully retrieve the master bolt.

We then get to see Percy sacrifice himself for the larger mission at hand, and I gotta say, this was probably terrifying for any young kids watching. But that’s what makes it great, I think. Not the terrifying kids part, but the part where they respect the emotions of the audience.

Anyway, with the sacrifice done, and the shield released, Annabeth could have just left, since she promised that she’d come back anyway to figure out a way to get Percy out of there. But having been influenced by Percy, Annabeth sticks around and even talks back to Hephaestus, telling him that maybe it’s time for the old ways to change and that they should be maybe better relatives to one another. This moves Hephaestus enough to let Percy go.

With his shield retrieved, Ares gives them their ride that’ll get them to the Lotus Casino in Vegas, where they can have Hermes and his personal driver get them to LA in minutes. There’s a tense confrontation between Ares and Percy, where Percy threatens the literal god of war, but Ares at least doesn’t smite him where he stands.

On their way to Vegas, Grover tells Percy and Annabeth that Ares might not be telling the whole truth, as well as one important thing — Grover thinks he’s figured out who stole the master bolt.

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