#percy jackson.thoughts

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Okay, so looking at the facts, Percy was missing for roughly two weeks before they even had the notion that Percy and Jason were swapped. And they were also really really worried. What I’m getting at is that a missing persons report was probably placed. (As it should have been) Can you imagine how funny that would be? Percy’s been in the news before, he’s well known and unpopular at every school he’s gone to. 

News Anchor: And in other news, Perseus “Percy” Jackson, who at twelve years old was kidnapped along with his mother, and taken across the country where he battled his captor with a shotgun, has gone missing again. 

Percy’s acquaintances at Goode: haha... what the fuck

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Kid 1: Wait, who’s missing?

Kid 2: That Jackson kid, he went here in eighth grade.

Kid 1: ???

Kid 2: He was on the basketball team with us.

Kid 1: Oh, the kid with the

Kid 2: With the hair, yeah

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*Beginning of SoN*

News Anchor: Perseus Jackson, who has been missing for seven months, was spotted stealing a police cruiser today in Sacramento. Please be on the lookout for the sixteen year old and call the authorities if you see him.

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*Upon Percy coming back*

News Anchor: Sixteen year old Percy Jackson who went missing nine months ago reappeared at his home last week. When asked what happened he said... Wait is this real? Yeah? He said he received amnesia and lived with wolves for most of the time. 

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In tlt Percy says Gabe was nice for “the first thirty seconds we knew him” and obviously Gabe sucks, but I can’t stop thinking about those first thirty seconds. Percy is roughly three when Sally and Gabe meet, and Sally knows Gabe is a bad person from that first second, she knows it because she’s getting with him on purpose to protect Percy. But Percy, baby Percy, didn’t know for those first thirty seconds, equivalent to a couple months. Imagine Percy, three years old, walking over to Gabe with a drawing, “look it’s you me and mama” and Gabe doesn’t like kids, in fact he already hates Percy, but he wants to get with this “exotic” woman, so he humors the kid: “thanks.” Percy, three years old, learning that his mom is getting married “Are you going to be my dad now?” “No.” and maybe thats not what Percy was expecting, but he's a kid. He’s a little kid, he doesn’t have trust issues yet, he loves people. And little kids have short memories. See Percy, three and a half, walking up to Gabe a month after him and Sally got married, “It’s us!” and Gabe just grunts. And a month later Percy tries again, he wants to believe people are good, but this time Gabe crumples it up and throws it away. When Percy is four he makes his final attempt, another drawing, he spent a lot of time on it, maybe experimented with shading for the first time, and Gabe backhands him. By the time Percy starts school he knows that people aren’t nice, he knows that people don’t want to see his drawings, he’s learning to not trust people. And school just makes this all the more apparent. Do you realize how much worse those thirty seconds make everything?

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Okay, I know this is going to sound a little odd, but hear me out: Annabeth Chase does not have trust issues.

She has abandonment issues, which are very clear in cannon and accepted by fandom, and a lot of people rope trust issues into this as well. But the thing is, Annabeth actually trusts pretty easily, it’s a ‘innocent until proven guilty’ type of thing. However, she does not express her emotions easily, this doesn’t mean she doesn’t trust them, she trusted Percy almost immediately, but it took her a lot longer to be open with him. This is a ‘guilty until proven innocent’ thing. The only people it has been explicit she does not trust, are Nico, and Jason and Quintus to some extent each. Her hubris can also make it seem like she has trust issues, she doesn’t easily accept others plans, but even with Rachel, who Annabeth did not like, Annabeth trusted. Trusted her enough to lead them through a death maze, even if it took a little coaxing. Annabeth trusts people, but she keeps her feelings to herself. 

Percy though, Percy has trust issues. He loves people, he loves quick and fast and deep, he’d give his life for anyone in a heartbeat, he’s open about his emotions and communicates them verbally and well. Percy loves people, but he doesn’t trust them. He grew up having almost every supposed support system turn against him, from his first stepfather, to the school system. And he’s been betrayed over and over again, by Luke, by the gods. He’s ready for his world to be turned on its axis the same way Annabeth is for people to leave her. He doesn’t even trust himself, we see that in the dream he mentions in the demigod diaries, where he’s holding the whole camp hostage. Percy doesn’t trust people, but he shares his love with them. 

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I started with analysis of the Percy Jackson books and now I’m here analyzing the Percy Jackson fandom. The reason I feel like the fandom/certain people and groups in the fandom got attached to to jokes and head cannons like “not my type” or “Sally getting mad at Percy after HOO for getting a tattoo because it shows he’s grown up” and things like that is because there wasn’t the same acknowledgment of the actual events that led up to those things. Those jokes remain to be in poor taste, but the events that led up to those things were seriously messed up, and it’s likely that people wanted to not think about it. 

The “not my type” jokes are not funny for many reasons, and have a basis in the deep homophobia of the 1930s/40s and today, and Nico’s drastic amounts of internalized homophobia and other trauma. I must say, the way that Rick dumps trauma onto Nico doesn’t add to or make his character any more interesting, but when you add that with Percy’s own queer subtext as well as his self esteem issues (the first series was about him gaining confidence for BoM, then for some reason Rick bumped him up to arrogant in MoA, and tore him down after Tartarus) it should be clear that he is not confused by Nico not finding him attractive, but at Nico liking him as a person in the first place. And in regards to the Sally head cannon, I can see it as a comfort after watching a character going through so many more traumatic experiences, like going back to a sense of normalcy. Ultimately, though, Sally was never about keeping Percy from growing up, she was about letting him grow naturally, and she did her best, but he was still forced to mature fast, both by his experiences being abused by his stepfather/peers/school system/systematic racism and the pressure of the first great prophecy. 

Jokes like these simplify the riordanverse characters so much that their cores are lost. They are crude and infantilizing and make me deeply uncomfortable. But in Heroes of Olympus, when Rick took more characters and more trauma and less time, restraining a story for a younger audience instead of letting it grow with his readers like the first series, there is only so much to expect. When he treats his own characters like jokes, has them put each other down for a laugh and doesn’t explore the emotions behind those actions, you will doubtlessly find people who do not want to dig deeper than what is quick and easy to process. And often those people, for at least a short while, will be cranking out jokes and the like that prolong harmful messages both inside and out of fandom. 

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Here’s a list of things that would’ve made HOO better because I’m rereading House of Hades and am bitter

Lupa telling Percy his name was Perseus, not Percy

Percy not getting his memories back right away or all at once

Percy being Praetor for longer

On that note, Percy arriving at CJ sooner

Percy & Reyna friendship

Percy & Hazel actively calling each other their sister/brother

Percy remembering that he actually goes by Percy

Percabeth not being romantically together (yet) 

Or, Percy remembering Annabeth but not remembering they were in a romantic relationship (yes, i love tension)

More Hazel, Frank, and Percy friendship moments

Frank jokingly calling Percy his Great-great-great-(however many greats)-uncle

Percy in turn referring to Frank as his however-many-greats-nephew

People realizing that Percy and Leo are infact quite intelligent

Cutting out Annabeth’s “im oppressed because im blonde” thing

More Frank and Hazel POVs

Calypso and Leo not becoming romantically involved

Nico and Percy having an actual discussion after the “not my type” thing, especially if Percy came out as bi

Percy drawing parallels between Luke and Jason and being very wary of Jason

Simultaneously, Percy being attracted to Jason and panicking because he’s still in love with Annabeth

Nico & Leo friendship

More Reyna POV (idk where, but i want it)

Percy and Hazel bonding over being BIPOC, further sparking their sibling feelings

Fewer “Seaweed Brain”’s and “Wise Girl”’s

Instead replaced with “Perce” “Annie” and “Beth”

More nicknames between friends. Ex: Percy and Frank calling Hazel “Hazy” or Piper and Leo calling Jason “Jace”

Percy and Hazel completely dominating the battlefield together

Percy and Leo “we’re only real friends in the most serious moments”

Leo not blaming Percy for anything involving Calypso

Jason actually being concerned after Percy said “I thought I deserved it[to die]” and talking to someone about it

Percy’s scars from Mt. St. Helens being uncovered and the crew just being like “wtf dude??? you okay?” 

Percy actually dealing with his trauma from Gabe, which is clearly still there

Hazel & Leo friendship

Frank not turning from fat to buff, that’s fatphobic, he can still be just as strong

Leo not teasing and bullying Frank after the first few times

Frank kicking Jason’s ass while sparing

Hazel kicking Jason’s ass while sparing

Percy kicking Jason’s ass while sparing

Percy & Nico bonding over being afraid of their powers

Nico asserting himself as Percy’s friend, because everyone seems to doubt it even though they’ve known each other for 3+ years???

Nico, Reyna, and Percy friendship, they’d just be iconic

Reyna, Percy, Frank, and Hazel friendship, also iconic

Percy’s sacrifice in HOO not being stepping out of the spotlight (that was never a problem for him??? he has literally 0 self-esteem)

Reyna and Percy switching places (Jason is definitely not Percy’s equivalent)

Percy being the “storm” in the prophecy (Poseidon is also the god of storms, why were they certain Jason was the only other option??) (Then his sacrifice would be letting someone else die because his fatal flaw would keep him from letting that happen normally)

GROVER

Jason’s character being further developed (currently he’s the spice equivalent of flour)

Annabeth NOT telling Percy to not manipulate other fluids

Percy and Nico learning and expanding their abilities and not almost dying/being killed

Annabeth not complimenting her own intelligence by degrading Percy’s

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In regards to the “Why do you think Kronos is a failure at manipulation?” question from an earlier ask, I apparently have more thoughts, so strap in. 

Now I’m taking it’s partner question, one of my own making: Since Kronos is a failure at manipulation, how did he manipulate Luke? And oh by do I want to talk about this. I’m sticking with there's ~2 years between Luke’s failed quest and Percy showing up, and oh boy, those were an interesting two years for Luke. These are two years of Kronos laying groundwork. Because Luke was a smart kid, he was angry, but he was smart. And he probably wasn’t angry right away. He was in pain, he was disappointed, he felt ashamed, but he wasn’t angry yet. Like I’ve said, Kronos isn’t good at manipulation, but he’s not powerful right now, the only thing he can really do is whisper to Luke in his dreams. This is far different from snapping his fingers and bending someone to his will. So yeah, there’s this sad kid, seeming pretty susceptible, and maybe Kronos can use this kid to get out, to get strong. 

From both perspectives, these years are pretty rough. Mostly because Kronos isn’t great at talking, and he makes a lot of slip ups, and he needs Luke to trust him. They talk pretty often, but when Kronos reveal himself as being, well, Kronos, there’s a big setback. And this big setback comes in the form of freshly seventeen year old Luke Castellan freaking the fuck out because a knowingly evil titan lord has been talking to him every night in his dreams. Understandable, but the thing is, Kronos has gained some strength, not a lot, but a little. Enough where coming back into power seems feasible if he continues, and Luke telling everybody about him is detrimental to these plans. So, while Luke tries his hardest to shut Kronos out, there is just this incessant pounding on his head. He can’t eat, he can’t sleep, he can’t rest for a second because then he’s done for, and most of all, he’s scared. What will his friends think if they know he’s been talking to such an evil thing, even if he didn’t know? He comes down with ‘the flu’ aka he can’t bear being around anyone, and after five days he literally passes out, and then Kronos gets to work. He apologizes for hiding his identity, but that doesn’t change anything in between us right? We’re just talking. And Luke barely has the mental capacity to think, so Kronos just keeps talking, and maybe he makes some good points about the gods, and maybe when Luke wakes up he doesn’t feel quite so much like a bag of shit that’s fallen out of an air plane at 30,000 feet only to be run over by a dozen eighteen wheelers on a highway in Arizona.

And he also doesn’t feel Kronos. Not the same way he did before. So maybe things are alright. But then Kronos starts talking to him outside of his dreams. Just little comments here and there, about what Chiron is saying, or what “really” happened all those years ago, or isn’t it unfair that Luke got tortured like that? And by the time Luke can see his nineteenth birthday on the year calendar that Annabeth hangs up in her bunk, a lot of things are making sense, in a way they haven’t since his quest. And he’s getting better at sneaking out of camp. And he’s getting better at setting his own groundwork. What does he want his life to be like? He doesn’t know, but Kronos does. 

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Percy would wear ripped jeans with fishnets under them, you can't change my mind.

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I love your "Luke takes over Kronos' evil plan" AU. Why do you think Kronos is a failure at manipulation? Does this manipulative Luke have basis on canon,or did you come up with it(honestly,it might make a better history than canon itself,lol)?

I know this is kinda ironic given that he’s the titan of time, but honestly I think part of the reason he sucked at manipulation was because he was impatient. It’s unclear exactly when he started talking to Luke, but it can’t have been for more than three years, and Kronos was pretty low in power at the time. The gods/titans/primordials aren’t used to doing things without their powers. We see it in the Percy Jackson books and we see it in actual mythology. Which means this was probably the first time Kronos was forced to really talk in order to get someone to do something. (You can also consider lack of experience as a factor of why he’s so bad at manipulation.) Luke already was doubting the gods, which was an advantage, but Kronos was forced to spend that time to talk to and convince Luke. I’m not saying Luke isn’t responsible for his own actions, but he is the one person that Kronos actually manipulated.

Luke being manipulative is semi-cannon. In that kinda AU thing I wrote up, he’s definitely more active. I drew inspiration for that from Palpatine and Anakin’s relationship in the star wars prequels, and I definitely think that Kronos was working Luke in a similar way when Luke was younger. Part of Kronos’ plan was using monsters to get what he wanted, Luke and Kronos’ wants only vaguely overlapped with the desire to change the order of things. One of the ways we can tell Luke was manipulated is from the lack of sense that his (or rather Kronos’) plan had. Destroying the world obviously wouldn’t make anything better, but Luke was blind to that until he was in too deep. Although he was ‘in charge’ he was just as trapped as the other turned demigods, if not more so. His view was corrupted and it took away a lot of his autonomy. Luke was a good kid, he had valid issues with the gods, and unfortunately the only way to get thing to improve was to get their attention, which was one of the problems in the first place! And because he was (unknowingly) manipulated he picked up on what he probably thought was convincing people. He was using people the same way Kronos was using him. He definitely manipulated Silena into giving him information, and I think he was good at making Kronos’ Army look inviting for kids who already had issues. 

tldr: Kronos sucks at manipulation because he’s not used to working without his powers and because he is impatient. Luke himself was manipulated by Kronos which affected how he used other people, and Luke is slightly manipulative in cannon, but because of the restrictions Kronos put on him, he wasn’t actually that good at it.