With just a few days left of filming to do on the new Disney+ Original series, “Percy Jackson And The Olympians”, Disney has announced that Lance Reddick is going to be playing the role of Zeus and Toby Stephens is going to be playing the role of Poseidon.

The new Disney+ series is based on Disney Hyperion’s best-selling book series by award-winning author Rick Riordan, “Percy Jackson and the Olympians” tells the fantastical story of a 12-year-old modern demigod, Percy Jackson, who’s just coming to terms with his newfound divine powers when the sky god Zeus accuses him of stealing his master lightning bolt. With help from his friends Grover and Annabeth, Percy must embark on an adventure of a lifetime to find it and restore order to Olympus.

Lance Reddick has previously starred in the HBO series “The Wire” and the “John Wick” film franchise.  He has also appeared in many popular video games like “Destiny 2” and “Horizon Zero Dawn.”  Toby Stephens has previously starred in “Lost in Space” and “Black Sails.”

The new series will star Walker Scobell as Percy Jackson, along with Aryan Simhadri and Leah Sava Jeffries. Also starring in the series are Lin-Manuel Miranda, Adam Copeland, Suzanne Cryer, and Jessica Parker Kennedy, along with Virginia Kull, Glynn Turman, Jason Mantzoukas, Megan Mullally, Jay Duplass, Timothy Omundson, and Timm Sharp, as well as Dior Goodjohn, Charlie Bushnell, and Olivea Morton.

The show’s creator, Rick Riordan shared some thoughts on the casting of each of these characters on his blog:

King of Olympus, god of the sky, Zeus is the Deus Optimus Maximus of the Greek pantheon, and Lance is the perfect actor to channel his personality. Lance has appeared in numerous projects, from The Wire to Law & Order to my personal favorite: Bosch, in which he plays Chief Irving (Immovable Object) to Titus Welliver’s Detective Bosch (Unstoppable Force). Lance is also well known as Charon the hotel manager in the John Wick movies, and it seems a natural promotion to go from Charon to Zeus!  In all his roles, Lance projects an aura of authority and power that makes him perfect for the king of Olympus. As I told him when we met, he has so much gravitas he could pull planets out of alignment, and when he makes his displeasure known to Percy Jackson . . . wow, wait until you see that scene. If you were Zeus, king of the gods, and you could be anyone you wanted, you would definitely choose to be Lance Reddick. (I’m pretty sure he’s Zeus’ favorite actor irl.) Nobody would dare mess with you, except maybe . . .

An unstoppable force in his own right, Toby Stephens was riveting as John Robinson, the family patriarch in Netflix’s Lost in Space. Before that, he played a different sort of sea god as Captain John Flint, the swashbuckling pirate lord in Black Sails. He is British acting royalty, and has done everything from Shakespearian drama to playing Rochester in Jane Eyre to voicing James Bond in a series of audio dramas. When we finally meet Poseidon toward the end of season one (just as we do in the book), Toby is incredible on screen. When he delivered some of Poseidon’s iconic lines, I got chills. And seeing him and Walker together, you can absolutely believe they are father and son. Not many actors have the sheer power to stand toe-to-toe with one another and convince you they are the manifestations of the sky and the sea, about the tear one another apart. Lance and Toby absolutely have that godly aura.

The Percy Jackson’s creator also shared an update on how much filming is left and what they have to do next with the show.

We have done almost all the photography for our eight episodes. Right now, we are just doing some pick-up scenes to fill in different angles and expand some of the sequences. I have seen early director’s cuts for episodes 1-6 and all the dailies for episodes seven and eight, so I am now confident in predicting . . . yeah, if you’re a fan of the books or even if you just love a good adventure, you are going to love this show. We still have months and months of post-production work to do, but the team is wrapping up in Vancouver with a sense of pride and accomplishment.

Rick Riordan and Jon Steinberg will serve as writers of the pilot, and James Bobin will direct. Steinberg will oversee the series with his producing partner Dan Shotz. Steinberg and Shotz serve as executive producers alongside Bobin, Riordan, Rebecca Riordan, Bert Salke, Monica Owusu-Breen, Jim Rowe, Anders Engström, Jet Wilkinson and The Gotham Group’s Ellen Goldsmith-Vein, Jeremy Bell and D.J. Goldberg.

Back at the D23 Expo in September, a short teaser trailer of the new series was revealed:

What do you think of this casting news for the “Percy Jackson” Disney+ series? Let us know on social media!

Roger Palmer

Roger has been a Disney fan since he was a kid and this interest has grown over the years. He has visited Disney Parks around the globe and has a vast collection of Disney movies and collectibles. He is the owner of What's On Disney Plus & DisKingdom. Email: Roger@WhatsOnDisneyPlus.com Twitter: Twitter.com/RogPalmerUK Facebook: Facebook.com/rogpalmeruk

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