I’m surprised to admit that, for the most part, “Wrath of the Titans” is a rather entertaining and exciting follow-up to “Clash of the Titans.” In fact, it’s every bit as superior to the awful remake as possible, and often times manages to surpass the first film in the realm of storytelling and characterization. Granted, the film is not without its list of faults. The dialogue is anachronistic, and Perseus’s relationship with Andromeda and his beloved son is painfully under developed and trite, but “Wrath of the Titans” fixes most of the problems with the first film and forges a path for a respectable trilogy. I’m not going to rush out to purchase the “Titans” trilogy set when it’s unleashed years from now, but I’m not above re-watching these films again to see where it continues to improve.
This time around Sam Worthington presents much more of a personality and isn’t so wooden or monotonous in the role of Perseus. For once he seems to really try to invoke some emotions and sense of urgency with his role as Perseus, and with the addition of a son to act as emotional bait for his mission, Worthington uses that to keep Perseus as an inadvertent hero who will forever battle monsters beyond the realm, but finds the duty of a father most important in his life. This sequel isn’t so much concerned with fetishizing Worthington as his past films have, and places Perseus in a more grounded level with the audiences.
When we meet him again, Perseus is now a father and a humble fisherman. With his wife conveniently dead, Perseus keeps his faith and strength for his son and devotes his entire life to raising him as a good man and keeping to himself. This time around there’s much less focus on the fact that Zeus spent the entirety of the first film trying to kill his son, and now he seeks the help of his illegitimate half god son. It seems his legal child Ares has teamed up with brother Hades to release the evil Kronos from hell to potentially wreak havoc on Earth.
Now with Poseidon gone, Perseus travels across the world to find Poseidon’s illegitimate half son and help him discover his potential as a hero. Those gods really dig Earth women, don’t they? Perseus’ journey is brief but often exciting with trips in to the Greek mythos that are often interesting to witness. Perseus is powered down this time around where he’s not some beef cake jumping high and slaying monsters. Perseus struggles to battle all sorts of beasts this time around and it makes his journey all the more interesting. Oddly enough Perseus and his apparent half cousin Argenon still sound as if they just came off the streets of East London, along with Zeus who sounds like he jumped out of an Irish pub.
And Ralph Fiennes still doesn’t seem to be one committing to a role as the dark lord of the underworld, often delivering his dialogue with stilted urgency. However a really good replacement for Gemma Arterton is Rosamund Pike who manages to grab a lot of screen time as Perseus’ travel companion who leads a massive army against monsters and demons, and is often characterized by her actions rather than her dialogue. We don’t spend much time hearing her talk, but her battle savvy tactics and wise strategy make her a protagonist worth rooting for, in the end. “Wrath of the Titans” is not a perfect film, and it clearly isn’t the action film of 2012, but compared to the utterly dismal, “Wrath” is a notch above and much more worth your time.
Featured in the Blu-Ray release of “Wrath” is Maximum Movie Mode, where you can watch the film and learn about the production, the sets, and the mythology behind a lot of the creatures and monsters who appear in the film. There’s also a thirty minute featurettes section which include “Battling the Chimera,” “Agenor: The Other Demi-God,” “The Cyclops Fight,” “Prison of the Titans,” “Minotaur: The Human Nightmare,” “The Heavens Raise Hell on Earth,” “Who Are the Titans?,” “Hephaestus: God of Fire,” “Lost in Tartarus’ Labyrinth” and “Creatures of the Titans.” There’s also eleven minutes of deleted scenes.
The twelve year old in me loved the romps with the gods and the gorgons and director Jonathan Liebsman transforms the romps in to the fantasy world with awe and excitement. I loved the battles with the cyclops, chimera’s and minotaurs, and I appreciated that Perseus was less Braveheart and more average Joe this time around. It’s not a masterpiece, but it’s a worthy bit of action fantasy fodder.