Critical response
On Rotten Tomatoes, the film has an approval rating of 42% based on reviews from 117 critics, with an average rating of 5.20/10. The website's consensus reads, "It's pretty and packed with action; unfortunately, Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters is also waterlogged with characters and plots that can't help but feel derivative."[31] On Metacritic, the film has a weighted average score of 39 based on 33 collected reviews, indicating "generally unfavorable reviews".[32] Audiences polled by CinemaScore gave the film an average grade of "B+" on a scale from A+ to F, the same grade earned by the previous film.[33]
Jim Vejvoda of IGN rated the movie a six out of ten: "There are worse sequels than the CG-heavy Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters, but it's just such overly familiar territory."[34] Gary Goldstein of the Los Angeles Times gave the film a positive review, saying that "tweens and young teens should be sufficiently distracted by the movie's brisk pace and heroic mayhem — if they're not too unnerved by its at times nightmarish imagery".[35] James Rocchi of ScreenCrush wrote that the film "is hardly the stuff of legend, but by keeping the plot straightforward and the storytelling clean, it's an odyssey the intended young audience will be glad to take."[36] Marsha McCreadie on RogerEbert.com rated the film two and a half stars out of four, calling it "a gentler-spirited, less flashy enterprise, though it still presents a natural world that can morph at the whim of a god."[37]
Andy Webster of The New York Times commented: "Sea of Monsters is diverting enough — the director, Thor Freudenthal ... is savvy with effects and keeps his young cast on point — but it doesn’t begin to approach the biting adolescent tension of the Harry Potter movies."[38] However, Michael Rechtshaffen of The Hollywood Reporter criticized the film as "lack[ing] the energetic zip of its predecessor,"[39] while Bruce Ingram of Chicago Sun-Times opined that "faithful fans of the novels will be unhappy with the liberties taken with the adaptation like they were with the first film."[40] Connie Ogle of The Miami Herald wrote, "[Are] these characters merely prisoners — much like the audience — of a script so uninspired that it demands their stupidity?"[41] Josh Bell of Las Vegas Weekly lambasted the series as a whole as "a thoroughly second-rate franchise ... with movies like Sea of Monsters, it can probably continue in acceptable mediocrity for years to come".[42]
Box office
Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters grossed $68,559,554 in North America and $133,688,197 internationally for a worldwide total of $202,247,751.
The film grossed $5.4 million on its opening day, taking the second spot at the domestic box office.[43] During its extended five-day opening weekend, the film debuted at number four and grossed $23,258,113.[44]
Accolades
Katelyn Mager was nominated for her performance at the 2014 Young Artist Award as Best Supporting Young Actress in a Feature Film.[45]
