Bonus features in the Blu-Ray Disc includes a Blu-Ray, DVD and Digital Copy for your iPod combo pack, 10 deleted scenes, 6 featurettes and a quiz!

Here are a few more details you might find interesting:

According to our friend Bill Hunt over at The Digital Bits, FOX has plans to bring the Chris Columbus directed film “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief” to Blu-ray Disc on June 22nd. The film is based on the novel by Rick Riordan. This will come in a “combo” style release and include the Blu-ray + DVD + Digital Copy.

Tech specs include full 1080p Hi-Def and DTS-HD 5.1 Master Audio sound. The title is not yet available for pre-order but stay tuned and we will keep you updated. Bonus materials are set to include 10 deleted scenes, 6 featurettes and a quiz. We’ll have full details on the bonus materials once we get the press release for this (likely later today or later this week).

What do you think? I’m excited for the combo pack, because it’s like a $70 value (if you buy it all separate), and on amazon.com it’s usually like $25. We’ll post a link to amazon once you can pre-order it!

[Source: HighDefDiscNews]

We look forward to The Red Pyramid, and as always wish Mr. Riordan continued success. Here’s a quick update from his blog:

In case you missed it, Publishers Weekly ran a nice article last week about my upcoming projects.

One month exactly until The Red Pyramid is released. I’m getting really excited! The first review just came out from Shelf Awareness, and I couldn’t ask for better:

“Rick Riordan will launch a new middle-grade series on May 4. For anyone who was afraid he couldn’t top his Percy Jackson series or his initial title in the 39 Clues, fear no more. Readers will be clamoring for the next installment.”

I hope you all agree when it comes out! Be sure to check out the cover and first chapter on Disney’s Kane Chronicles website.

Rick Riordan, the author the bestselling “Percy Jackson & the Olympians” series of books for young readers, paid a visit on Sunday to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York City to discuss some of his classical inspirations.

The first book in his series, “Percy Jackson & The Olympians: The Lightning Thief,” tells the story of a troubled young boy with ADHD and dyslexia who discovers that the Greek gods are real, and that he’s actually the son of a mortal woman and Poseidon, god of the sea.

Riordan kicked off his talk at the Met’s Grace Rainey Rogers Auditorium by apologizing for the rainy weather outside. “Thanks for braving Zeus’s storm!” he told the audience, which was largely made up of young children and parents.

During the presentation, Riordan said he planned to launch a new “Camp Half Blood” series in the Fall of 2010, most likely in October, though the final details haven’t been set. In his books, Camp Half Blood is a special area that shelters and trains the children of gods and mortals.

He also talked about his coming book “The Kane Chronicles, Book One: The Red Pyramid.” The new series draws on the myths of Egypt, and is due out May 4.

“I was fascinated by how magic works in Egypt,” Riordan told Speakeasy in an interview after the event. He said he was intrigued by the section in the Bible in which Moses confronts Egyptian magicians. “I wanted to explore the Egyptian idea of magic,” he said.

Recently, a big-screen adaptation of “The Lightning Thief” was released into theaters. Riordan said he hasn’t seen the film and doesn’t plan to. “Books and movies are so different,” he said. He said he wanted to keep his own images of his characters in his head and didn’t want them to be replaced by someone else’s interpretation.

[Source: WSJ]

That’s pretty cool. Although other films like Alice In Wonderland could quickly de-throne it. Hopefully it’ll stay for a while, but we’ll just have to see.

Also, the film has been estimated to have made about $9,800,000 this weekend and was #5 in the top films this weekend. With about a 36% fall from last weekend it seems to be holding alright.

These books have something for everyone, and if you’re on this site just looking up Percy Jackson and the Olympians, and wondering if you should read these books, I think that the numbers speak for themselves! All five books in USA Today’s Top 10 books. Quite an impressive feat. Anyways, you can read the excerpt on PJO below!

Rick Riordan’s series reaches Olympian heights; Charles Pellegrino gets a Hiroshima history lesson; and a big buzz surrounds ‘Little Bee.’
‘Lightning’ strikes: Sales of Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson novels are reaching Olympian heights. All five books in the kids’ series are in USA TODAY’s top 10. It’s the first time that has happened, and sales are being driven by the movie version of the first book. (In its first two weeks, Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief has earned $58.7 million.)

Accounting for half of the top 10 is impressive, but Riordan has a long way to go to break Stephenie Meyer’s record. The four books in her Twilight series have been in the top 10 a total of 66 weeks. J.K. Rowling had six of the seven Harry Potter titles in the top 10 just one week in 2007.

But rankings on the list don’t tell the whole story. Numbers in print in the USA for Rowling, 143 million; Meyer, 45 million; Riordan, 12 million.

[Source: USAToday]

BUT, until we get an official announcement please treat this as a RUMOR! We will definitely keep you updated on this news story.

Inside sources say that Percy Jackson star, Logan Lerman has been cast in the Sony reboot of the Spider-Man film series. Director Marc Webb (500 Days of Summer) is set to helm the first film in what I’m guessing will be another trilogy although that has not been confirmed at this time.

The story takes the characters back to high school in the New York City borough of Queens. No word yet on who has been cast as Peter Parker’s love interest Mary Jane Watson formerly played by Kirsten Dunst or his best friend Harry Osborn previously played by Mr. James Franco.

Webb is in talks with Avatar director James Cameron to use his cameras and technique to film the entire movie in 3-D.

The official announcement will no doubt come shortly along with more details to follow.

[Source: thecinemasource]

They also talk about how people are angry about the plot changes, and character changes from the book. I would like to say I was worried they would do what they did, but the film was done in a way that was surprising and spectacular with the CGI. It kept me guessing the whole time, and I’ve read the book like 5 times.

It also seems, after this article, that the Logan Lerman for Spider-Man rumors are squashed.

Anyways, here’s the article!

There’s been a lot of Percy Jackson 2 talk in recent weeks. So what has been said and how likely is a sequel?

There are five books in the Percy Jackson series, so far. The next installment is ‘The Sea Of Monsters’ which sees Percy, Annabeth, and his half-brother Tyson the cyclopes sailing across a dangerous ocean to save the kidnapped Grover and retrieve the Golden Fleece (the only thing that can stop Camp Half-Blood being made vulnerable to an attack by the Titans).

At the London press conference last week director Chris Columbus said “If we are successful enough, I’d love to make another film almost immediately with these guys. We had a wonderful time. I love the enthusiasm and lack of cynicism. I want to go back to work quickly.”

And despite recent Spider-Man casting rumours, it doesn’t sound like star Logan Lerman is going anywhere either. “I’m invested into the whole series. I’m crazy about the story and crazy about the character, I’d love to do all the films.”

The reaction to the first film has been mixed. Critics gave it a 49% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. Casual members of the public seemed to half enjoy it. But many fans are angry. According to the feedback on this site and elsewhere, the book wasn’t just compressed (ala Harry Potter), it was “butchered”, its “heart taken out” with major plot re-routing, some characters altered beyond recognition, other key ones dropped entirely, etc. How this will affect repeat viewings and word of mouth we will have to see.

Lightning Thief has made $31 million on its opening weekend in the U.S. Not terrible, but not spectacular either. Internationally it opened with $28 million, which is underwhelming. It cost around $95 million. As of today, it needs to hold on well domestically and internationally to become a hit. If it does, there will be more.

[Source: Movie-Moron]

And he also talks about how there was a scene in the script where Percy and Poseidon hug, but Logan felt that that wouldn’t work since this was the start of the father/son relationship. And it’s also funny reading how Sean Bean (Zeus) while filming would just start cracking up, and couldn’t stop. It’s strange reading that, because I’ve always seen Mr. Bean as a serious man. And Mr. McKidd, the movie was awesome, and I think it will do fantastic in the box office!

Anyways, here’s the article on Mr. McKidd!

If you want to know what it’s like to be a television star, walk down a Los Angeles sidewalk with Kevin McKidd, who “Grey’s Anatomy” fans instantly recognize as the tortured trauma surgeon Owen Hunt. If you want to know what it’s like to be a movie star, listen to McKidd describe a solitary stroll he took on a New York street during the filming of “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lighting Thief.”

“There’s a shot where I arrive in the city and walk up out of the ocean,” says McKidd, who portrays Poseidon in the modern-day adventure with gods of Greek myth. “It was one of those moments as an actor where you say, ‘Wow, I am making a big movie.’ There was a huge crane for this one big, long shot of me and the city skyline as I’m walking toward the Empire State building. The preliminary work was, like, two or three weeks getting the lighting just right on all of these buildings.”

McKidd, with a wink and a sly smile, said it’s a day at the office he won’t soon forget. “I felt pretty special after that shot.”

The 36-year-old McKidd has high hopes that “Percy Jackson,” which opened Friday, might become a franchise just like the bestselling bookshelf series of the same name by author Rick Riordan. The film chronicles the adventures of a young boy who might remind some moviegoers of Harry Potter — both are young outsiders who discover they have a supernatural heritage and then get an education at a magical sanctuary while battling mysterious forces with the help of young friends.

Instead of a boy-wizard, young Percy (played by teen heartthrob Logan Lerman) is a demi-god, the son of mortal woman (Catherine Keener) and Poseidon, the god of the seas. If the movie does click and becomes a trilogy as hoped, it would mark another new chapter in McKidd’s peripatetic career, which began with a memorable turn as a member of the hard-luck junkie crew in “Trainspotting” and reached its zenith, as least in the eyes of critics, with his lead performance as Lucius Vorenus on the HBO series “Rome.”

The Scotsman said he has a sort of compartmentalized celebrity now. Women know him from “Grey’s,” men for “Rome” and youngsters, he suspects, will soon be referring to him as “Percy’s father.” With two children of his own, ages 7 and 9, he’s finding that the tour of duty holding the trident has a lot of traction with the elementary- and middle-school crowd.

“My son has read all of the books and he is immersed in it, like a lot of kids,” McKidd said. “It’s going to be interesting to see how the film does.the hope it will be a trilogy.”

Poseidon is an absentee father to Jackson in the film and that strained relationship is the defining theme in the movie, which finds Percy and his friends caught in the middle of impending war between the gods, who never left earth even though they keep a far lower profile. McKidd said that young Lerman, who was also in “3:10 to Yuma,” is a star in making — the elder actor was impressed that the teenager spoke up about a pivotal scene where his character and Poseidon were supposed to embrace for the first time.

“It’s this ‘Kramer vs. Kramer’ moment and Logan said, ‘I don’t think at this point my character would do that, I think he would just go as far a shaking hands, this is the start of their relationship’ and I was impressed that someone of his age would recognize that and not just go along with what on the script page,” McKidd said. “At that age, I would have said, ‘The script says hug, let’s hug.’ His instincts for his age are amazing. I was so uncomfortable at that age in front of a camera. He’s very grown up in his choices.”

Director Chris Columbus, who also directed the first two “Potter” films, said that McKidd brought a “quiet power” to the role fo the sea god and that his experience in historical roles gave him the gravity needed to be a Greek statue come to life. Still, Mckidd said he Sean Bean, who plays Zeus, had a rough time during one scene keeping a straight face despite their years of experience.

“There’s a scene where we meet and we glare each other and the music is going and the lightning and I walk up and say, ‘Zeus,’ and he greets me, ‘Poseidon,’ and and after a couple of takes we started chatting just about how silly it all is,” McKidd said. “Now Sean is a real giggler. Once he starts he can’t stop. He’s this intense actor, right, but when he starts giggling…and that happens and this not a cheap scene, this is expensive. And there we are laughing…”

McKidd moved stateside almost three years ago to take on the lead role in “Journeyman,” the short-lived NBC time-travel series. That opportunity sprung from his acclaimed work in “Rome,” but it was “Grey’s,” where he plays a former battlefield doctor, that he connected with his largest audience. His character is dealing with post-traumatic stress and relationship challenges with his girlfriend, Cristina Yang, played by, Sandra Oh. McKidd arrived on the show in 2008 and has found it a life-changing role.

“I’m really just like acting I’m not always aware of what is hip and what is popular and what is zeitgeist,” McKidd said. “But ‘Grey’s’ is just a machine. I wasn’t really prepared for the epic nature of how popular the show is. I’ve never been involved in anything with that kind of reach. It’s worldwide now.It’s weird.”

In person, McKidd has a strong accent from his native Elgin, a city on the River Lossie, and he modulates it for his different roles. It’s a bit of a challenge for any actor playing a role of antiquity to pick a voice to speak in, but instead of obsessing about it, he said, the most successful approach is to “keep the regional sound in each actor’s voice” but add a certain formality in the cadence.

“You don’t want to sound like some posh British guy but you do want this heightened, slightly classical form,” McKidd said, who was also in sword-swinging territory with his roles in “The Last Legion” and Ridley Scott’s “Kingdom of Heaven.” “You can’t just walk around acting like you’re in ‘Trainspotting.’ It’s about tone and tonality but if the actors hold on to some of their own regional background it sounds more natural to the audience over the course the movie.”

McKidd left drama school in 1994 and, right away, found himself in the vile and sublime heroin epic “Trainspotting,” based on the Irvine Welsh novel, which was directed by Danny Boyle and featured an Oscar-nominated script by John Hodge. Mckidd played Tommy, a jock who goes into a needle spiral after his girlfriend ditches him for losing a sex tape.

“It was an amazing thing to be part of,” McKidd said. “It was so low-budget, nobody knew it would be that big, not even Danny Boyle. It was a great early gig for an actor… I saw Danny the night he won the Oscar for ‘Slumdog Millionaire ‘ and we had a good laugh and I told him, ‘Do you remember, we had no money at all?’ I was so happy for him. He’s one of the best directors. He was offered a lot of the big franchises but he turned them down so he could do what he wants to do.”

Walking the career line between commercial success and critical satisfaction is an interesting topic.

The early reviews for “Percy” have not been especially kind and there has been a backlash for major plot changes and eliminated characters. “It’s not just that it’s a lot less funny than the book,” Michael O’ Sullivan wrote in the Washington Post, “It’s also a lot less fun.” Kenneth Turan, in the Los Angeles Times, dismissed the film as “generic filmmaking at its most banal.”

McKidd (who was interviewed before the film was screened) said his personal goal is to put together a career that keeps him energized by its surprises. That’s clear with his next big screen appearance: McKidd is also part of the cast of Guy Moshe’s “Bunraku,” a film that melds live-action and animation for a surreal noir tale. The $30 million movie, to be released later this year, takes its name from a Japanese form of puppetry. The cast includes Josh Harnett, Woody Harrelson, Ron Perlman and Demi Moore.

“It’s a very, very strange film,” McKidd said. “It’s a hybrid of a western and a martial arts film. It was also shot in Bucharest on green-screen stages. The world it’s set in is almost circus-like in the feel of it, and it’s all origami. The whole universe is constantly folding paper to create a cityscape or interiors of rooms or the sunrise…. I play a very effeminate master killer who’s almost like a Fred Astaire tap-dancing his way through the movie. It’s so different than anything I’ve done.”

More than anything, McKidd aspires to return to his “Rome” character. The series, which lasted only 22 episodes, was created by Bruno Heller, John Milius and William J. MacDonald and set in the roiling days when Rome was transitioning from a republic to an empire. Heller, the architect behind the CBS hit “The Mentalist,” has a film project in mind that would carry on the tale of the noble, duty-bound solider Vorenus and his friend Titus Pullo (Ray Stevenson), who has more of a pirate’s soul.

“I spoke to Bruno a few days ago and it’s looking good, but the problem is money’s tight in the independent film world right now,” McKidd said. “I hope it will happen, though. If things work, ‘Percy Jackson’ will do well, and then I can do a second one and the ‘Rome’ movie, too. If the gods are willing….”

[Source: LATimes]

When Chris Columbus decided to adapt a popular children’s book, Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief, he went for the gold.

He optioned Rick Riordan’s best-selling kid lit novel about a teen who discovers he’s the descendant of a Greek god.

It wasn’t until he tested the final product on 8-year-olds could his universe finally relax.

“I screened it a few times for kids just to make sure, and it was a great response. What’s better than a woman with snakes coming out of her head,” says Columbus, referring to Uma Thurman’s Medusa character. “The kids went nuts. I think this is the film I made for my 12-year-old self.”

Calling from Rome on his press tour, Columbus certainly doesn’t have to worry about having his finger on young pulses. After all, he did direct the first two Harry Potter films, not to mention a little Chicago-based movie called “Home Alone.”

Dabbling in Greek mythology was a whole other world for Columbus. “It’s not every movie where you have Uma Thurman running around in a blue shower cap and later animating those snakes that would come out of her head,” he says. “She was thrilled, too, because she wanted to do something for her kids.”

Columbus, whose own kids range in age from 13 to 21, wanted to make a family-friendly film with a few jokes thrown in for the parents. (Medusa tells the son of Poseidon: “I used to date your daddy.”)

In the movie, the gods of Mount Olympus (and assorted creatures) literally walk out of the pages of Percy Jackson’s Greek mythology text and infiltrate his life. Zeus’ (Sean Bean) lightning bolt goes missing and he thinks Percy is to blame, so Percy and his friends have to find the real thief.

“When I first read the book, I loved the idea of combining Greek mythology in a modern, contemporary setting,” Columbus says. “It’s something new because I don’t think kids today have much knowledge of Greek myths.

“I remember learning about it in school, … but first, I had to do my own reading. What I found is that the Greek myths still work on so many different levels.”

Columbus also liked to link the idea that these young Greek gods have the same problems as modern high school students. “There’s nothing really different about what kids struggle through today and what the Greek gods went through,” says actor Logan Lerman, who plays Percy. “It’s all about having people understand you — no matter what. It’s about finding your own power.”

Lerman admits he wasn’t a Greek buff. “My knowledge of Greek mythology is based in eighth-grade history class,” he says. “I didn’t take the time to study it further until this movie.”

Columbus didn’t just make his cast read. They also had to get physical in front of green screens.

“The toughest part of this movie after doing the ‘Harry Potter’ films was to get the special effects just the way I wanted them,” Columbus says.

I didn’t just want to put the kids in front of green screens, but built real sets.”

Columbus is hoping for a good audience response. “We worked on this movie for two years and now comes the hardest part, which is waiting to see if people go to see it,” the director says. “Once I get over that hurdle, I’d love to do the next book in the series, which is called ‘Sea of Monsters.’ But we’ll see.”

One film Columbus won’t be returning to is “Harry Potter.”

“My kids are in high school and I just couldn’t take them out of school and move them to London for three years,” he says. “We did that on the first Potter films when they were young. To do it again and you get that weird Hollywood childhood. I want them to have a regular childhood and they have a good life in San Francisco.”

[Source]

Logan Lerman, the star of “Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief,” says he’s in talks to play Peter Parker in the upcoming “Spider-Man” movie that will reboot the blockbuster superhero franchise.

“There have been a few discussions, it’s definitely something I’m looking into,” Logan told Access Hollywood.

At 18 years old, Lerman would seem a good fit for the role of a teenage web-slinger in director Marc Webb’s film, though nothing is official at this point regarding his attachment. However, Lerman said he was a big fan of the famous Marvel hero.

What do you all think… could you see Logan in this role? I guess time will tell.

“It’s one of my favorite characters ever and I’m a huge fan of the series,” he said. “I’d love to have more conversations about it. I’m definitely very interested in it.”

“It’s just, you know, conversations are starting,” he added. “It’s a long process with the studio and the producers and everything. But it’s definitely a project that I’m really interested in, of course. I’d love to focus on the human element a little bit more. It’d be such a fun experience.”

[Source: MTV]