Will Nico di Angelo appear in the new episode of Percy Jackson?

‘We Take a Zebra to Vegas’, the sixth episode of Percy Jackson and the Olympians, is one that fans of the book series have been waiting for. Percy (Walker Scobell), Annabeth (Leah Jeffries) and Grover (Aryan Simhadri) make their way to Las Vegas and enter the infamous Lotus Hotel and Casino – where fans were hoping a specific fan-favorite character would appear, because of what they already know about this location from Rick Riordan’s Percy Jackson novels.

(Ed. remark: Minor spoilers for the Percy Jackson books.)

Introduced indoors The Titan’s Curse, book three of the Percy Jackson series, Nico and Bianca di Angelo are at the Lotus Hotel and Casino at the same time as Percy and his friends, at least in the canon of the books. That’s why many fans have theorized that Di Angelo’s siblings may have cameos in this episode.

Nico and Bianca are mysterious siblings with unknown origins. Eventually, Percy and his friends discover that Nico and Bianca, even though they look like young teenagers, were actually born in the 1930s, some seventy years before the events of The Titan’s Curse. They spent decades of their lives at the Lotus Hotel and Casino, not realizing how much time had passed.

Nico becomes a major player in the Percy Jackson series and the Riordan books that follow. As for Bianca…let’s just say she doesn’t get much past the third book.

Will the Di Angelo siblings appear in Percy Jackson episode 6?

Short answer: no, they don’t!

Long answer – although there are also some children and teenagers at the casino when Percy and his friends are there in “We Take a Zebra to Vegas”, the episode does not focus on them or emphasize them in any way. They just appear in the background.

But we do get to see another important character: Hermes (played by Lin-Manuel Miranda) has a long conversation with Percy and Annabeth. This is new to the series, as Hermes only appears in the second Percy Jackson book, The sea of ​​monsters. (Also, Grover encounters an old satyr friend named Augustus, who has no book equivalent.)

Photo: David Bukach/Disney

Overall, this episode plays out very differently than the equivalent chapter in the books. In the first book of the Percy Jackson series, The lightning thiefPercy and his friends initially stumble upon the casino and fall victim to the gimmick: designed by the lotus eaters from mythologywho give up everything else in life to eat narcotic, pleasure-inducing lotus flowers, the casino also offers hedonistic treats so travelers never want to leave.

The trio is drawn into the casino’s cool arcade games: Annabeth in particular spends €1.50 lot spent some time with a 3D city builder simulation, which sounded like the coolest stuff when I read the books at age 12. Percy doesn’t realize what’s going on until he notices one of his gamer friends using very archaic jargon, and then starts looking at all the anachronistic outfits around him and his friends. The gang ends up losing five days at the casino.

But in the show, Grover realizes quite quickly the connection between the Lotus Hotel and Casino and the Lotus Eaters. He warns the others from the start not to eat anything in the casino, but it turns out that the lotus aroma is in the air. The friends still lose a few days, but this time they are more aware of it and more knowledgeable about genres.

Enough about the book differences – where are the di Angelos?

It’s unlikely that the production team would commit to casting these two characters so far into a hypothetical third season Percy Jackson and the Olympians – especially Nico, considering how big his role in the series ends up being. Given the fuss surrounding the casting of the three main characters, I’m sure Rick Riordan shall make a lot of attention to Nico’s first appearance and don’t just leave it in as a short cameo.

But the di Angelos might make a little appearance on the show! Well, their name do. In the first episode, Percy’s mother, Sally (Virginia Kull), tells her loser husband that she’s going to pick up sandwiches at a place called di Angelo’s on the way back from Montauk. The captions spell it ‘D’Angelos’, not ‘di Angelos’, but still. It’s a bit of an Easter egg for eagle-eyed (or eagle-eared) fans.

“We Take a Zebra to Vegas” is now available on Disney Plus. New episodes of Percy Jackson and the Olympians drop on Disney Plus on Tuesdays at 9pm EST/6pm PST.