With a certain young man about to hang up his pointy hat and wand and head off to Hogwarts Home for Retired Wizards, there’s an opening for a new, youthful screen hero. Percy Jackson could well be the natural successor to Potter’s magical, money-making throne.

Percy (Logan Lerman) is your fairly average American teen. He struggles a bit in the classroom, probably due to his Dyslexia and ADHD (Attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder), but is bright enough to stay on top of things.

As his father (Kevin McKidd) disappeared when he was only a baby, it’s been up to his mom (Catherine Keener) to raise him on her own. They both live in the apartment of her obnoxious boyfriend (Joe Pantoliano), which is annoying for Percy as they don’t exactly see eye to eye.

On a school trip to an exhibition of Greek and Roman art, Percy gets pulled to one side by a substitute teacher and before you can say Mount Olympus, she has turned into an ugly, winged beastie known as a Fury. She wants the lightning bolt and she wants it now. Problem is, Percy has no idea what she’s on about. Thankfully he is saved by his Latin teacher Mr Brunner (Pierce Brosnan), who tells Percy and his disabled best friend Grover (Brandon T. Jackson) that they must leave for camp immediately.

It is there that Percy understands what all the fuss is about. Apparently, not only is Grover his best friend, he’s also his protector; and he’s not really disabled either, he’s actually half-man, half-goat, making him a satyr. And he needs to protect Percy because unbeknownst to him, his father is none other than the Greek God Poseidon, making Percy a valuable and powerful demi-God. The camp he’s at is no ordinary summer camp either; Camp Half-Blood is a training camp for all the children of the gods.

It is there that he learns of his current state of peril: someone has stolen the lightning bolt of Zeus (Sean Bean) and Percy has been accused of stealing it. Zeus has declared that if Percy doesn’t return it to him before his deadline, there will be a God almighty war.

With Grover and his new-found girly chum Annabeth (Alexandra Daddario) – daughter of Athena – in tow, Percy begins his quest to not only return the lightning bolt he doesn’t have, but also save his mother from the evil clutches of Hades (Steve Coogan) in the Underworld.

Tell me honestly, is this really how the young actresses are wearing their hair these days?

Like Potter, Jackson is born from a series of novels aimed at the über lucrative youth market, written by American author Rick Riordan. However the character has had a few more years added to him for his screen debut, as the filmmakers thought that a fifteen year old demi-god would reach a wider audience.

One other thing he has in common with Hogwart’s most famous son is that Chris Columbus, who helmed the first Harry Potter film, also directs Jackson’s screen debut.

In terms of everything else however, Jackson’s and Potter’s adventures are most definitely worlds apart. What we have here is essentially Clash of the Teen Titans. Despite being set in the real world, the interweaving of Greek mythology works particularly well. No need for wardrobes or train journeys here to transport audiences to a magical world; the Gods make their mark on our world with remarkable affect.

What Columbus manages to do with this film is inject it with a cracking pace and exuberant energy. He also gets extremely grounded performances from his young cast; there’s no whiff of over-the-top, Sylvia Young-trained oiks here, thank the Gods. They’re also well supported by some seasoned pro’s, such as Bean, McKidd, Brosnan, Coogan and Uma Thurman as Medusa.

The story never falls second place to the special effects either. And who knows, it may even inspire some to look into the magic of Greek mythology, as opposed to, say, silly spell books.

What’s even more promising for eager fans is that Riordan wrote the first Jackson book back in 2005, and has since written a further five in the series; this means that there’s the distinct possibility that there are plenty more mythical sequels on the way.

With Hollywood in bit of a lazy funk of late, this book series could easily have gone the way of a mythical magic-by-numbers affair; instead, Columbus and Co have created a thoroughly entertaining mix of good-humoured fun and mythological monsters. This first adventure is completely enthralling, and unlike other long-running ‘magical’ series that have clearly run out of puff, Percy’s return would most certainly be a welcome one.