adding to the "there should have been more genuine tension within the seven" train of thought, it would have been funny if the Argo II, technically being a ship, meant it fell under Percy's power domain and he could control it all at whim, rendering all the carefully crafted controls Leo built useless if Percy felt like being an asshole

like real talk we could have gotten a part where the seven disagreed on where they should be going next (honestly you could even rework the "should was save Nico?" part in MOA a bit to fit the bill), its a 4-3 split with Leo and Percy on opposing sides, and everyone's just getting more and more heated, and it turns into this thing where both Leo and Percy are trying to take control of the ship.... a Leo "this ship is my destiny" Valdez vs Percy "ships fall under my daddy's domain which means I'M the captain now" Jackson shit show and the ship is caught in a (very imbalanced) power struggle, wildly changing directions, which only gets the others even more involved and pissed...

but no matter the scenario the seven are arguing over, its just very important to me that Percy is in the minority vote. it a key element of the mess.

piper tries to use charm speak to diffuse the situation and get percy to back off, except this time its not a possessed Percy she's attempting to charmspeak but a fully cognizant, very angry Percy who does not like that....

oh and ANOTHER interesting thing that Riordan does with Percy in the tartarus chapters to never ever bring up again is Percy achieving seemingly impossible(?) physical feats.

Like when Percy kills Arachne, he does so so quickly that Annabeth can't comprehend it. She literally asks him "How did you move so fast?" and he just shrugs and is like "Gotta watch out for each other right? Anyways..." and immediately changes the subject.

Then later he jumps over a river with Annabeth on his back and again, right before it, she's like "How are you going to do this??? It's twenty feet across. How can you possibly do that?" and he straight up is just like "yeah I can do it just close your eyes" and then does it???

of course these moments happen during Annabeth's pov so we'll never know for sure but its just so fascinating cause Riordan goes out of his way to indicate that Percy was displaying strength, speed, agility, etc way beyond his typical threshold while also implying that not only was Percy aware of it but he was either trying to downplay it to Annabeth or avoid discussing it altogether.

okay there has been a lot of great discussion in the notes/tags on whether Percy was aware of what he was doing or not (and if he was purposefully trying to downplay it) and like on one hand I do agree that Percy is often oblivious or very nonchalant when it comes to his power threshold suddenly increasing... but idk idk there's also just something about the way these specific moments in Tartarus that feels different. Aware. Intentional. Like Riordan (through Annabeth) goes out of his way to emphasize the impossibility of it all.

Like in the part where Percy kills Arachne, Annabeth specifically asks Percy how he moved so fast. This is Annabeth's reaction, who has seen Percy make hurricanes and blow up volcanoes and fight with the curse of achilles. And Percy shrugs and says "Gotta watch each other's backs, right? Now, you were saying..." and if this was the only instance of Percy doing something he shouldn't be able to, then yeah, his response could def read like he hadn't realized how fast he was moving and thus doesn't quite understand what annabeth is asking. Sure.

But then we get to the scene where Percy and Annabeth are about to get attacked by the children of Nyx and its Percy who says that they'll have to jump the river. It's entirely premeditated. And again, Annabeth recognizes the impossibility of it. "You said it was twenty feet!" "Yeah" "How can you possibly-" and then Percy just does it. And even Annabeth tries to theorize how he does it -- maybe using the force of the river, maybe through pure adrenaline -- but she thinks about he leaped with more strength than she would have thought possible.

And I'm just dying to know what was in Riordan's head when he was writing this. Because these parts, paired with the Akhlys scene... its not just that Percy was scary powerful or strong or fast, its specifically portrayed as if Percy shouldn't have been able to do these things. But he did.

No lube, no protection, all night, all day, from the kitchen floor to the toilet seat, from the dining table to the bedroom, from the bathroom sink to the shower, from the front porch to the balcony, vertically, horizontally, quadratic, exponential, logarithmic, while I gasp for air, scream and see the light, missionary, cowgirl, reverse cowgirl, doggy, backward, sideways, upside down, on the floor, in the bed, on the couch, on a chair, being carried against the wall, outside, in the rain, in a train, on a plane, in a car, on a motorcycle, the back of a truck, on a trampoline, in a bounce house, in the pool, bent over, in the basement, against the window, have the most toe curling, back arching, leg shaking, dick throbbing, fist clenching, ear ringing, mouth drooling, ass clenching, nose sniffing, eye watering, eye rolling, hip thrusting, earth quaking, sheet gripping, knuckle cracking, jaw dropping, hair pulling, teeth jittering, vile, sloppy, moan inducing, heart wrenching, spine tingling, back breaking, atrocious, gushy, creamy, beastly, lip biting, gravity defying, nail biting, sweaty, feet kicking, mind blowing, body shivering, orgasmic, bone breaking, world ending, black hole creating, universe destroying, devious, scrumptious, amazing, delightful, detectable, unbelievable, body numbing, bark worthy, can't walk, head nodding, soul evaporating, volcano erupting, sweat rolling, voice cracking, trembling, sheets soaked, hair drenched, flabbergasting, lip locking, skin peeling, eyelash removing, eye widening, pussy popping, nail scratching, back cuts, spectacular, brain cell dissolving, hair ripping, show stopping, magnificent, unique, extraordinary, splendid, phenomenal, mouth foaming, heavenly awakening, devils tango ever bro could cause a nuclear bomb inside me and id still ride.

i have such mixed feelings about the sirens scene because the vision is really interesting in how it deals with her wanting these two aspects of her life to coexist, her old family and her new family. luke coming back to her. percy and luke putting aside their differences and getting along. annabeth being the one able to bridge the gap and find a resolution to the war. and then being able to resist the siren-induced hallucination and slay them with her knife. athena (who looked gorgeous by the way) showing up to assist her and assuring her she’s always looking out for her.

but the exclusion of frederick is both funny (because FUCK that guy) and not very believable because she innately craves his attention and validation, likely more so than her mother’s. this was the mortal who watched her grow up and was supposed to raise her and love her. this was the parent who didn’t have the excuse of being a divine being with godly duties and adherence to tradition that hinders connecting with your children. i guess they hadn’t cast a frederick at this point, but her being a kid who just wants to be wanted was never exclusive to making athena proud of her. her father is the original source of her wounds.

additionally, we were ROBBED of seeing what Manhattan Skyline (Annabeth’s version)™️ would have looked like because i trust that anything she envisions would be beautiful. this diva would’ve definitely demolished 432 park avenue (or prevented it from ever happening if this is 2006). annabeth’s vision was about family, set in a backdrop of her ambitions and determination. she shares luke’s vision of a rebuilt world in that way. she’s not disillusioned by the gods, she’s very cognizant of their shortcomings and just how much things could be improved and redone. so it’s sad we didn’t get any of her intellectual passion and optimistic dreaming translated into this new version.

all that aside, even if the show’s version of annabeth’s vision has some potential, they completely ran a tank through the emotional aftermath. in the book, annabeth was so devastated by the vision because she had her dream world just within reach and had it taken from her at the last moment, death be damned. she was inconsolable. which led to percy holding her underwater in a bubble while she sobbed, heartbroken and unraveled in a way we’d never seen from her before, while he lended true comfort to her for the first time in their most intimate moment yet. this scene felt so pivotal for their friendship. instead, we get relief, an acknowledgment of them saving each other (which is nice in its own way because it’s soulmateism at its finest), but the emotional gravity of the original scene was completely undermined. there are no tears or anguish from annabeth. she’s smiling and laughing almost immediately afterwards (i was admittedly glad to see her smile since we rarely ever get to see that from her in the show), which cheapens the double-edged danger the sirens posed to annabeth. the trial of the siren scene was never just about annabeth getting saved from physical danger. the show celebrates her physically getting saved and percy getting saved in his own way, but there is meant to be an emotional toll as a result of hearing the sirens’ song. if they wanted to make this new version of her vision cut as deep, they should’ve shed light on her grief once she broke out of the trance. where is her reaction to what she saw? i don’t like how everything is suddenly fine just because she was rescued. that moment under the sea, just the two of them (and some gossiping fish), felt so important to the foundation of their friendship and illustrating annabeth’s emotional vulnerability.

finally, i’ve said this before many times, but painting annabeth as less intelligent than she is for thinking she could get past the sirens completely unprotected (the plot point of waiting til the last second to prepare themselves too?) is deeply bothersome. her pride doesn’t often put her in more dangerous situations, but if it does, her intelligence always perseveres. annabeth’s more aware of her fatal flaw than percy is. she’s smarter than they’re giving her credit for and i’m not sure why she and percy were sailing away on the boat without annabeth immediately making a plan and backup plan in the midst of their escape before they even managed to get on the boat, in true annabeth fashion. percy wasn’t saved from the dumbing down because why did it take so long for him to realize he had access to a sword he could cut himself loose with…. overall, even with the modifications to her vision, this scene had potential but it falls short in its failure to fully capture annabeth’s motivations and the weight they bear on her soul.

percy saying he’d burn olympus down if it meant saving annabeth: yes. obviously. of course he would. annabeth’s wide eyes were really cute. BUT the show is allergic to subtext. this is the kind of thing that’s supposed to be understood over time, not said out loud this early. in the books you realize percy would do that because of how he acts, and then athena spells it out for him at the end of book 3. he would also never have the balls to announce it to her like a vow. the most romantic thing this guy had the guts to say to her before they got together was “If i was going to pick one person in the world to reattach my head, I’d pick you.” it’s like the show is trying to make up for the loss of percy’s narration so they’re turning his thoughts and innermost desires into dialogue rather than letting his actions speak for themselves, which in turn makes him a lot more emotionally brave and competent than he really is.

getting rid of the moment that changed lives (mine) where annabeth, still in her goddess getup, holds her knife to circe’s throat and says “How about turning me into a panther instead? One that has her claws at your throat!”…why are we declawing her in her most divatastic moments

the great analytical minds of pjo clearly reside on twitter

sure, when we meet Annabeth in the lightning thief she has both (a) not concretely been in the mortal world since she was seven and (b) has a horrible relationship with her mortal father, but why is this being snowballed into this to "oh, Annabeth doesn't know how to be human/emotional/vulnerable/etc" characterization?

Like Annabeth was not ostracized or an outcast at chb. She has a cabin full of siblings. She has lived in a camp full of other children and teenagers her age for five years. She was clearly cared for by the older/adult figures present (Luke, Chiron). Like I promise you this girl is not lacking in socialization lmao.

actually its kind of funny because in contrast, Percy spent the first twelve years of his life pretty much only being bullied and ostracized by his peers. in the mortal world he only ever has like, one friend and said friend ends up not being mortal two out of three times. once percy gets to chb he's only there for like? a couple weeks ? before he's revealed as a son of Poseidon and then he's immediately an outcast again? like the dude is straight up othered in a camp full of others. (and to be clear, I'm not saying Percy should have a "doesn't know how to be human" characterization either, but if we were looking for a character that doesn't have a lot of good standing with others their age... well, between the two of them its not annabeth lmao)

no one’s surprised the show is back at its “percy has to know everything already because we hate the element of surprise” agenda, but robbing us of stalkerbeth busting down the gymnasium walls and kicking matt sloan’s ass should be enough to land rick’s ass in scylla’s maw.

and then annabeth only finding out about the great prophecy now is extra stupid because suddenly she has this covert agenda with chiron to protect percy (in a way that inevitably causes friction with him) when that’s always been her overt goal…sworn on the styx in front of him. annabeth’s always had knowledge percy wasn’t privy to but they’ve never made a secret of looking out for one another, and having to prevent him from going on the quest in the first place just feels so out of character for someone who’d believe in their ability to save grover together and get back safely. the dramatized “we can’t ever return to camp half blood” is also soooo…like it’s never THAT serious; why are we upping the stakes in all the unnecessary ways?

and if annabeth had no inkling of percy’s supposed impending death on his 16th birthday prior to this summer, this further cheapens the random ass percabeth communication issues subplot because if she’s writing letters anyway, what’s holding her back from a simple iris message…? this feels like angst for the sake of angst without solid reasoning behind it. don’t even get me started on annabeth not being able to enjoy anything in the mortal world that adds to the “annabeth doesn’t know how to be human” narrative when she’s actually the most human part of that whole series. she was robbed of 5 formative years of her life in the mortal world, but to act like she’s never stepped foot outside camp before is a gross overexaggeration that makes her character more serious and one dimensional than she deserves to be.

that’s not to say there aren’t little moments that i enjoy, but the gravity of those moments pale in comparison to what really matters. tyson outing percy’s obsession with annabeth’s photo and annabeth crying and begging at thalia’s tree are the only scenes i’ve got no notes for. the bottom line is this show craves drama where there is none and undermines the dramatic elements that have already been textually established in order to create what’s essentially glorified percy jackson fanfiction. and the nail in the coffin is the wedding dress is deeply fugly :(

Some Annabeth lore

My last post was about this old 2014 Rick Riordan article i've found, that featured 13 y/o Percy discussing his interests, the kind of books he likes etc, so this is some snippet from Annabeth's !

Paul uses one of those razor blade subscription services and, since it's cheap, sends Percy at New Rome University a spare pack every time he gets a delivery. Percy keeps a MUCH cleaner shave than Paul does, who kind of keeps it scruffy. Unfortunately, one time, there's a shipping error as Paul's package is lost in the mail, so nobody gets razors.

Percy doesn't consider it much initially, but as days go by without a shave, he starts to build up stubble - something incredibly uncommon for him. People turn their heads and tease him a bit until the stubble grows into a shadow, grows into a beard.

Suddenly, nobody teases Percy. They give him a wide berth, and on more than one occasion, a younger New Roman called him "Sir" reverently. Now, when Percy delivers some Classic Snark during a lecture or between classes, it's not met with snickers and eye-rolls. It feels scathing in a way it never had before. Now things that Percy pokes fun at are corrected, and people nod along to his comments as though they were suggestions - no, expectations.

Sure enough, people relax a bit when some new razor cartridges come in, and Percy shaves again, and things go back to normal. Percy isn't sure why people acted odd for a week or two there. Then Annabeth, who (tactfully) avoided kissing him for that duration, points out, "You look a lot like your dad."

*writes two paragraphs after months of literally nothing and it took three hours*

anyone know if this guy is ok