Analyzing Apollo’s Big 5 Personality Traits
I made this giant text in my notes app a year ago and only just made a tumblr today, so enjoy my sheer amount of blabber here (which I also have not edited since last year). Feel free to agree or disagree with the content since I only wrote this after learning about the Big 5 in my college psychology class. I am not a psychologist.
Apollo is the epitome of openness and open-mindedness. He’s always inquisitive and wants to learn new things, he has very broad interests as indicated by his domains, and he’s very creative and imaginative as one would expect from the patron of the arts.
This one might be a little harder to pinpoint. Conscientiousness is how organized, structured, and thoughtful someone is. Conscientious people are goal-oriented, have good impulse control, rational, responsible and follow through with what they want to do; they are careful and diligent. Remind you of a certain son of Jupiter?
As a god, Apollo is somewhat irresponsible and ignores his duties. He’s swayed by Octavian and allows him to attack Camp Half-Blood, the place where his children live and that he literally founded. And while he’s not the worst of the godly parents (in fact, he’s probably the best out of all of them), he could still stand to be a better father.
But as a mortal, Apollo consistently follows through with his duties, even if a lot of complaining is involved in the process. He is undoubtedly reliable when it comes down to it, like when he fights alongside Frank in the duel in TTT. Although, I guess you could probably argue that he’s impulsive in this situation.
He also has a strong sense of responsibility towards Meg and the people he cares about, blaming himself if things go wrong.
While Apollo’s narration depicts himself as weak-willed and quick to give up, his actions seem to contradict this perception, because he always goes along with everything despite his fears.
I also think he is organized — although he is often thrust into situations where he cannot formulate a plan, he tries to plan ahead when he can (even though Meg always says “no spoilers” when he tries to talk about his plans). Compared to Meg, he’s pretty rational and takes the time to think things through properly. I mean, he is the god of reason.
….Perhaps I’m giving him more credit than he deserves because I’m comparing him to Meg.
For me, the biggest moment where Apollo lacks conscientiousness is when he throws a temper tantrum on the beach in THO while everyone is depending on him to defeat the Colossus. It’s impulsive and irresponsible, especially in such a critical moment. And, of course, he’s extremely impulsive when he makes that rash oath to the Styx in THO.
This trait is the hardest for me to figure out. There could be more examples of Apollo being impulsive or disorganized or rash in the series, but I’m not sure where they would be. There are times where he comes off as disorganized/impulsive and has no plan, but that’s because he’s constantly put in situations where he has no time to actually formulate one.
All things considered, he’s good at thinking on his feet and is not afraid to be impulsive and spontaneous when plans inevitably fail. So I’d say he’s conscientious, but not excessively so. Jason would probably be an example of excessive conscientiousness; his sense of duty overwhelms him.
This one’s easy. He’s very extroverted. No surprises there.
In ancient times, he was not as agreeable as he would be today. As shown with the cases of Coronis and the Sybil of Cumae, he has a real vengeful streak. He also acts rather disagreeable towards Leo in BOO and Grover in Singer of Apollo.
At the beginning of THO, he appears disagreeable, but he also isn’t vengeful or ruthless like he was before. He’s just kind of rude and lacks self awareness as well as empathy. We know this is a facade, but he does act this way outwardly to others.
His agreeableness rapidly changes once the facade is broken.He’s quick to forgive, as shown with Lityerses and Crest; in fact, he’s even more forgiving than Leo and Piper and Jason are (not that this is a bad thing in their cases, but it does show the strength of Apollo’s character). He’s empathetic and clearly cares a lot about others. He latches onto people very quickly, risking his life for Meg after only knowing her for a few days. He’s a selfless and kind hero.
In addition, Apollo’s always been shown as a good-natured guy who’s rather laid-back, even way back in his introduction in TTC. It’s hard to irritate him; Meg’s jabs barely bother him despite her abrasive personality. He didn’t even seem to care much when Reyna brutally rejected him. That was harsh, Reyna.
Apollo starts off as a pretty neurotic guy. He’s so insecure that he’s built up an entire facade to push people away and make himself feel better. He literally says “You’re beautiful and people love you” to himself in the mirror. He throws a self-pitying tantrum on the beach in THO when everyone is depending on him to defeat the Colossus. He’s emotionally unstable.
He exhibits low self-esteem throughout the books. He blames himself for everything even when it makes no sense to do so, like when he blames himself for the wildfires in TBM or when he takes all the blame for Daphne and Hyacinthus’s deaths, even though those deaths were more or less caused by Eros and Zephyros, respectively. Sure, Apollo can say that their deaths were the consequences of his hubris, but these consequences were disproportionately horrible compared to his fairly innocuous actions. Also, when I was rereading TTT and TON, I was a little surprised at how harsh he was towards himself in his narration (not that it was all undeserved, but still).
As for the nervous and high-strung aspects, I suppose he does act rather nervous and scared at times compared to his peers. But I don’t think he is overall that nervous or high-strung, especially since his peers are usually experienced in demigod affairs while he’s just some guy. And when the situation calls for it, his nervousness sheds away.
As with the other traits, his neuroticism changes. He becomes less neurotic over time and more sure of himself, coming to terms with his past in TTT. As stated in TON, he holds himself up straighter and is far more confident by the end of his trials.
While I don’t think his neuroticism is completely gone by the end of the series, he’s certainly improved drastically. By the time he confronts his father, he’s completely calm and collected. He’s the one in control.
Well, who knows, maybe his trials ended up giving him a ridiculous amount of trauma and he becomes more neurotic than before because of PTSD or something. I doubt it would make that much of a difference, though. I do believe he has permanently changed for good.
Three out of five of Apollo’s traits change dramatically throughout the series. He becomes more conscientious after the events of THO, more agreeable after the facade breaks, less neurotic overall throughout his trials.
This is why I love TOA. We don’t always realize it because we often think personality is set in stone, but we can change all these negative parts of ourselves for the better. And ironically enough, by changing ourselves, we can embrace our true selves in the process.
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