‘Percy Jackson’ Boss Reveals How Percabeth Intensifies in Season 3

Percy Jackson and the Olympians fans will be pleased to be told (again) that the “Percabeth” ship is still a top priority for the Disney+ series. The middle grade fantasy novels foretell that Percy Jackson (Walker Scobell) and Annabeth Chase (Leah Sava Jeffries) end up together, with some other romantic relationships in between. And the TV show has been slowly bread-crumbing their connection since Season 1. In our Percy Jackson Season 3 cover story, we got the scoop on where this season falls on that relationship timeline.

Now that a nightmare scenario — Annabeth being kidnapped by the forces of Kronos — is coming true, Percy is figuring out how to balance his strengthening powers with the knowledge that A) his loyalty makes him act out, and B) he would burn all of Olympus down to save her, Great Prophecy be damned.

The Great Prophecy says that a Forbidden Child of one of the big three Olympian gods — Zeus (Courtney B. Vance), Poseidon (Toby Stephens), and Hades (Jay Duplass) — will either save or destroy Olympus. In the brewing battle between revived titan king Kronos (Nick Boraine) and his Olympian children, this prophecy is their biggest threat. Annabeth becomes fearful that Percy’s loyalty will put him and their friends in danger in the Season 3 premiere, which comes out on November 20 on Disney+ and Hulu (two episodes weekly).

Percy and Annabeth are still just friends, like in the first two seasons, but in Season 3, each of them knows that their friendship means the world to each other. Reality sets in for them in Season 3 as they start to understand what their feelings mean for the first time.

“We are in the meat of it” developing, executive producer Jonathan E. Steinberg told TV Insider of Percy and Annabeth’s relationship timeline.

Related

Why 'Percy Jackson' Episodes Are Getting Longer in Season 3

“[We’re] in the moment in which two kids who were kids who found each other and saw someone else who knew what it was like to be lonely and became dependent on each other are growing up and starting to have different feelings,” he explained. “We’re getting the beginnings of how much that can complicate a friendship as close as they are at that age. We’re seeing them realizing, ‘There are questions we’re going to have to answer that we do not have the vocabulary to really figure out. We’re flying by the seat of our pants.’ I like the feeling of that starting to take flight.”

“That’s where it’s going” should the series be renewed, Steinberg added. “You know when you sign up for this show that this is about how the two of them are going to navigate going from 12, 13-year-old best friends to people who have feelings for each other while they have to do their job and save the world at the same time…We’re seeing the moment where the sparks start getting thrown off of that machine as you realize they don’t know how to talk about this and it’s going to have to get dealt with.”

Percy didn’t know that he was a demigod until he was 12 years old. With that comes an ability to hold onto his human side. Annabeth, meanwhile, has lived at demigod safe haven Camp Half-Blood for most of her life and believes that she can’t be a normal human, try as she might.

Disney+

They’ve been teaching each other how to be both since Season 1. Now, a monster fight leads to Annabeth’s kidnapping in Season 3 Episode 1, and the quest to save her tests Percy’s ability to hold onto his humanity, according to Steinberg.

“The story, when you stand back from it across all five books, across the whole show, is the balancing between at first coming to terms with what it means to have that side of him, to have those powers, and then to start to realize that his humanity is just as important and sometimes harder to hold onto,” Steinberg explains. “[The books are] so explicit about his loyalty being the thing that he knows can and will get him in trouble, that his love for his friends is something that both makes him who he is and something he has to be careful of. In Season 3, you’re watching it start to build to a real fever pitch in what would be the climax of the whole story: What happens when I have to choose?”

“What happens when the dilemma that’s put to me is not obvious about what the right thing to do is when it’s come to save a friend or do my job essentially,” Steinberg continues. “The relationship that Walker and Leah have built in the spaces of that, I think, really fills it out and gives it substance and make you feel like nothing is simple and everything is really important because you love them together and you get the sense that they do, too.”

Learn more about Percy Jackson Season 3 in our digital cover story in link above.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians, Season 3 Premiere, Friday, November 20, Disney+ and Hulu