Percy Jackson Season 1: Per Episode Budget Similar to The Mandalorian

Disney+ is sparing no expense with Percy Jackson and the Olympians. The serialized adaptation of Rick Riordan’s best-selling novels went into development as far back as Spring 2020, with Riordan himself announcing that he was leading an early pre-production process. 18 months later, Disney gave the green light to Percy Jackson and the Olympians Season 1, an eight-episode adaptation of the first book in the pentalogy, The Lightning Thief. Internal hopes at the house of mouse are high for Percy Jackson, as the entertainment giant looks for it to pioneer a brand-new franchise on their streaming service that has previously relied on already-established worlds like Marvel and Star Wars to boost it.

Disney+ Bets Big on Percy Jackson

Mickey Mouse is all in on the world of demigods and monsters.

According to Variety, Percy Jackson and the Olympians‘ per episode budget is between $12-15 million. This puts it on par with The Mandalorian, the critically-acclaimed Pedro Pascal-led series set in the fantastical Star Wars galaxy. Like The Mandalorian, Percy Jackson is operating with eight-episode seasons.

This budget puts Percy Jackson in the realm of $120 million for its complete Season 1 cost, roughly $30 million cheaper than Marvel Studios productions The Falcon and the Winter Soldier and Moon Knight.

Disney+ is putting more money into this serialized Percy Jackson adaptation than its previous feature films. 20th Century Fox spent $95 million on Percy Jackson & the Olympians: The Lightning Thief (2010) and even less on its critically-panned sequel, Percy Jackson: Sea of Monsters (2013).

While not all episodes go to mystical locations, Percy Jackson is very much a cross-country adventure. Practical locations like Yancy Academy and Camp Half-Blood were constructed for the series while other-worldly spots like the Underworld and Mount Olympus utilized Industrial Light & Magic’s Volume stage to create their massive landscapes.

“For Percy Jackson, this has been an incredible partnership with 20th and the filmmaking team. They are using the Volume in a similar way to The Mandalorian,” ILM Senior Vice President Janet Lewin told ComicBook.com in Summer 2022. “It is a run-of-show project. It’s not just a couple of sequences. It’s not just a pick-up shoot or an installation. They are trying to leverage all of the bells and whistles that come with a fully tricked out extra large Volume.”

Percy Jackson and the Olympians premieres on December 20th on Disney+.

Percy Jackson and the Olympians Season 1 is based off of the first novel in Rick Riordan’s critically-acclaimed book series, The Lightning Thief. Starring Walker Scobell (The Adam Project) as the titular demigod, this eight-episode first season embarks Percy on a quest to return Zeus’s stolen master bolt, as he is framed as the prime suspect. If he is not successful by the Summer Solstice deadline, the world bears the consequences of Mount Olympus in-fighting. The series also stars Aryan Simhadri (Grover Underwood), Leah Jeffries (Annabeth Chase), Glynn Turman (Chiron), Jason Mantzoukas (Dionysus), Dior Goodjohn (Clarisse La Rue), Charlie Bushnell (Luke), Adam “Edge” Copeland (Ares), Jay Duplass (Hades), Lin-Manuel Miranda (Hermes), Timothy Omundson (Hephaestus), Lance Reddick (Zeus), and Toby Stephens (Poseidon).