Biggest mistake I think Rick made writing the Seven-Plus-Two:
- Reyna: I love aroace representation but for Reyna it smells like a retcon where Rick slapped on the label to score woke points but didn't actually intend her character to be that way. She had a crush on Jason, and Percy, and in the same book where she says she's ace she also says she doesn't want to risk her friendship with Thalia. You could explore how maybe Reyna had a lot of respect for those people and an allonormative society made her think what she felt was a crush, but is that what happened?
- Nico: My knee jerk reaction is the toxic aspects of Solangelo, but I think the biggest issue is Nico's character basically getting reset between PJO and HoO. By the end of PJO, he's reconciled with Percy, made peace with Bianca, and Percy is making a concerted effort for Hades kids to be more accepted at camp alongside the children of the minor gods. At the beginning of HoO, Percy and Nico aren't close at all, Nico revived Hazel because he couldn't bring back Bianca, and he feels unwelcome at CHB.
- Frank: Having his body type get magically changed and having that be framed as a good thing. I can absolutely see Mars/Ares doing this to him as a reward, but the narrative frames Frank being fat as a problem that needs to be fixed or a weakness that needs to be overcome. I'd love to see something about Frank feeling conflicted about his new body because it's a gift from his dad and everybody seems to subconsciously respect him more, but it's not HIS body.
- Hazel: Hazel is only from the 1930s when she's having flashbacks to the 1930s. Nico at least has the excuse of being memory wiped and living in the casino, but Hazel's POV doesn't reflect her background in the modern era in a serious way. He certainly could have written Hazel worse, but ultimately being born in the 30s feels like a fun piece of trivia and not a core aspect of her character.
- Piper: Rick cannot decide how he wants Piper's relationship to femininity to be problematic. Is she a tough tomboy who's better than her sisters because she doesn't wear makeup? Or is she another Aphrodite girl who's focused on her boyfriend and didn't want to learn how to fight until she was already in the Mediterranean? You can see how neither option is great, right? Also, shout-out to charmspeak for being the most inconsistent and lazily written deus-ex-machina in the riordanverse.
- Leo: On the surface, Caleo, but I think the root of the issue is him being the PG-13 version of the Latin Lover stereotype. Maybe if it was approached as Leo feeling insecure in his masculinity because he's significantly scrawnier than the other boys in The Seven so he compensates for his insecurities with these loud displays of flirtatiousness to assert his manhood, and the solution was Leo becoming more confident on his own rather than desiring validation from having a girlfriend. But instead it's just "ha ha, Leo flirts with everyone until they yell at him and the solution is for him to date a titaness."
- Jason: I think the biggest problem with Jason, and why so many people say he's bland and boring, is because he's supposed to be the Roman equivalent of Percy at the beginning of HoO. We've had 5+ books of development for Percy, Jason gets like, a few paragraphs. But the narrative treats them as equals, and maybe in-universe they are, but to the reader, no way we treat Jason and Percy the same. Of course we think Percy's childhood with Sally and Gabe is more interesting and impactful than Jason being raised by Lupa, we saw Percy but were told about Jason. Of course we care more about Hyperion than Krios, we saw Hyperion. There's lots of other issues with Jason, but I think the biggest is expecting him to be treated the same as a character who has so much more previous content than him.
- Annabeth: She has some significant personality changes between PJO and HoO. I think the biggest one is that PJO Annabeth likes, respects, and trusts Percy. They have their arguments and disagreements, but Annabeth follows him into battle, is willing to take a knife for him, and shows no signs of being afraid OF him when he does things like blow up a volcano, knock down a suspension bridge, or battle Hyperion one on one. In HoO she joins in with everyone else in making "dumb Percy" jokes and has the "some things aren't meant to be controlled" thing. There are other changes, too, but I think that is the one that has done the most damage.
- Percy: At the end of PJO, Percy passes up on godhood and makes the gods promise to be better. Hermes straight up asks Perxy if he really thinks the gods can change, and Percy says yes. And every book after that has proved Percy wrong. Every demigod left ignorant and vulnerable like Leo and Piper, every callous disruption of someone's life by giving them amnesia and a 6 month coma, every child who dies fighting their parent's battles proves that Percy was wrong and that all the suffering he and the other campers went through was for nothing. The gods can't change and Percy would have done more good if he had ascended and focused on being "one of the good ones" rather than trusting the gods. Of course, Percy wouldn't do that because it goes against everything he is, but still. With every book, Rick retcons The Last Olympian into a tragedy.
