A confused mess

Rating: 3/10 (27 July 2010)

I have to admit that I saw the original in the cinema when it was first released. I had high hopes for this when I saw that they were going to make another film.
When the trailers were released however, I was disappointed. I decided to wait to rent a DVD. I am glad I did. For an adventure story it is curiously devoid of drama. There's no passion, no real soul to it. Perseus' motivation to save Andromeda seems non-existent. They barely spoke. No chemistry, no connection between them. Yet in mythology Perseus and Andromeda are husband and wife.
Bubo's miniscule cameo appearance was a shame, the mechanical owl was the charm and light relief of the original. And this film sadly needed some light relief.
I was also curious as to the addition of the Djinn, as other commentators have pointed out, they are not part of Graeco-Roman Mythology. Beyond providing the ridden scorpions (which did not make a great deal of sense, the scorpions grew from Calabos' spilled blood), they didn't seem to have any real purpose. It was unfortunate that the scorpion sequence also seemed to have been lifted directly from Michael Bey's original Transformers movie.
I was confused as to why Pegasus was black, that really didn't make a great deal of sense, virtually every depiction and description I have seen and read states that Pegasus was white.
I found it very difficult to connect with the human characters. Perseus was grumpy. The soldiers who accompany him on his quest were interchangeable, lacking in distinct character.
The gods were worse. Liam Neeson really had nothing to do other than pose in some rather crummy-looking armour and look miserably- uncomfortable doing it. Ralph Fiennes reprised his role of Voldemort with a very hammy turn as Hades.
On the upside, the Kraken (from Norse mythology but at least he was in the original film) was suitably scary, and the climatic scene was intense, but this does not make up for the po-faced trudge to get to that point.