Percy Jackson scored a second season on Disney+

The final episode of Percy Jackson and the Olympians has only just landed on Disney+, but we learn (via the Disney Q1 financials update) it has scored a renewal. There’s plenty of information in the official press release, but it boils down to popularity as measured across a number of metrics.

Just how popular was it?

From the press release (linked above) we learn:

“Percy Jackson and the Olympians” was one of the top 5 season premieres of 2023, with the first episode garnering 26.2 million views in its first three weeks on Disney+ and Hulu. On social, the #percyjackson hashtag earned over 1 billion views on TikTok in the U.S. over the last 30 days, while series-owned social handles have amassed a cumulative 4.6 million followers.

If that wasn’t enough, there’s insight into the knock-on benefit to the brand (something we at Cultbox wish we had more examples of from other franchises) with the original Rick Riordan books returning to the #1 spot on the New York Times Bestseller list for Middle Grade series following the series’ debut. The second season will take it’s inspiration from The Sea of Monsters (the second book). It clearly helps the books are published by a Disney owned company (Hyperion).

Percy Jackson also scored well with reviewers

We like to take Rotten Tomatoes as a barometer of opinion — here the show scores a very respectable 92% with critics and 81% with the audience. Yet more reason for the Disney hierarchy to be pleased.

Given the speed of the renewal, we suspect some pre-production has already happened for season 2, and imagine it will film later this year. We would be surprised were it to arrive late December (as did season 1), with 2025 being more likely. Whatever happens, we’ll bring you the details when we have them.