man, the pjo gods, amiright?
i really appreciate the trials of apollo for fleshing out the gods some more. while we are mostly focused on the titular character, his perspective lets us glean what the rest of the pantheon is like.
riordan’s gods are incredibly human. they are humans that have been given so much power and have overstayed their welcome for so long, and have never known anything different. their inhumaness is mostly characterized by those facts: they are powerful, they have and will be around for thousands of years, and they have never known anything different.
thats the only thing that separates the gods from their children, or hell, any other mortal. personality wise at least.
the snag is is that their power comes from belief: what they can do is completely up to what their believers think.
its like if you tell someone youre a college student majoring in business and someone goes “oh you must have a minor in math!” and suddenly oh shit you gotta pretend like you totally have a minor in math also. or if you say youre an artist and someone goes “obviously you know graphic design and thats what youre working in specifically” even if youre like. a hobbyist mostly doing illustration work. and you go “yeah man i love graphic design. its my passion also”. this is how youd reply if you are someone who wants to fit everyone’s expectations and have low to no self esteem. or just dont care what people think what you do.
however this is worse for the gods because they literally cant go “haha no i dont have a minor in math” or “oh i do illustration not graphic design”, they just gotta roll with that perception. like oh you think im the sun? okay i guess its my job now fuck! alright!
the nice thing is that they mostly automatically get that knowledge so they dont fuck up too bad but also yeesh. Yearsh. if they dont measure up to that perception, than what about the things that are true? if apollo isnt the sun, is he even the god of music? or as powerful as he says? is his epithet even phoebus? so on and so forth.
so like the gods are saddled with the worst golden child expectations and are told to fuckin ball with it. which explains why they are all so terrible. girl id be too, honestly.
