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I have made so many posts on this, and I am so glad many other blogs are pointing this out. Percy is way better at Annabeth than strategizing, and that's a pill that the fandom can't seem to be able to swallow. Let's go over some of them (I might have missed a few):
1. Tricking and trapping Crusty using his own creations
2. Figuring out Ares's scheme
3. Figuring out Luke's plan
4. Figuring out the use for Hermes's gift in SoM
5. Procuring proof for the camp of Luke's betrayal by tricking him into confessing it
6. Tricking Atlas into lifting the weight of the sky
7. Figuring out Kronos's plan
8. Planning the entire strategy of Battle of Manhattan
9. Tricking Gaea into helping him over Phineas
10. Tricking Chrysaour and his entire fleet into fleeing for their lives
11. Outwitting Geras
12. Outwitting Octavian in front of the entire Roman Senate
13. Manipulating Bob into siding with them over his own brother
14. Planning the strategy of dealing with Polybotes and executing it singlehandedly
15. Figured out how to kill Antaeus in his own arena
16. Convinced the river gods into offering their allegiance to the Olympians
No matter what situation you put Percy in, he always adapts. He is almost never operating with full intel on the situation or his opponents, and yet he manages to survive and even defeat them because of his quick thinking and battle iq.
I know most people remember the books as Annabeth and Percy working together, but it's almost always Percy going solo after Annabeth's plans fail and her scolding him for actually getting the job done, which is ridiculous.
Now, I don't think I need to quote Darwin on how adaptation is the key to survival and evolution, but you get the gist of it. No one in the entire series thinks better on their feet than Percy, no one.
Annabeth has all the knowledge, sure, but it's worth very little if she can't apply it. Knowledge by itself isn't power. Applied knowledge is power. Annabeth rarely has any concrete feats in this regard or even in the category of wisdom. She is extremely emotional and impulsive, more so than even Percy, which people tend to forget.
Annabeth gets worked up and gets them trapped with the Sphinx after the puzzle isn't what she expected and because someone else solved it over her, letting her pride rule her.
She underestimates her opponents. She once again let her emotions take over when they needed Rachel's help on Annabeth's own quest but she didn't want it out of jealousy.
Despite repeatedly having proof of Luke being hell bent on killing Percy and destroying CHB and after having been tricked by him herself, she still repeatedly lets her emotions cloud her judgement and dismisses any proper advice given by Percy about Luke as him being jealous and him being angry at Luke for no reason when Luke's literally tried to kill him multiple times.
Then, once again, she judo flips Percy, a Roman Praetor in a diplomatic setting in front of all the Roman legions because she can't control her emotions.
She lets it happen again in MoA when her pride takes over and she sits wrapped up in webs instead of cutting them off her and escaping first because she is too busy reciting the tale of her quest to the rest of the Seven.
And again in Tartarus, when she almost gets herself and Percy killed because she stops Percy from defending himself and her in front of Akhyls.
She is said to be a leader, but we never ever see her display any proper leadership qualities. Percy is the one who leads the camp during the fight at BoTL, during the actual second Titan War, during the fight in Blood of Olympus and even during Son of Sobek the campers all follow his orders and advice, showing how much of a natural leader he is. Even the seven during the pirate attack all follow Percy's lead, Annabeth herself included, and Percy in Son of Neptune is the de facto leader between himself, Frank, and Hazel. We only see the Seven following general orders from her on Argo-II, but it's never during times of crisis.
I know Annabeth is a teenager and prone to emotional outbursts. But she is supposed to be a child of Athena and her literal power is supposed to be being level headed in times of danger, being clever and wise and getting herself out of them because otherwise she is hopelessly outmatched against everyone else who has powers. She could have been so iconic if she had been just a smidge better written. Literally just a smidge. But she displays neither of the qualities she says she possesses nor any she should be displaying as an experienced strategist or a strategic fighter.
(I swear she should've had more good feats. Show her making amazing plans with actual back-up plans, not just references. Display her war strategy more. Make her opponents smarter and not brick-dumb)
can i just like vent for a second? i just saw an anti percy take that just pissed me off so bad bc i forget not everyone separates percy's real characterization (pjo books and son) and throw out the very terribly written one boo and post hoo books like i do. percy antis can only speak of his character from the text where rick decided percy needed to suddenly be this horrible character and friend (to this day i hate that the narrative genuinely blamed percy for bob and calypso) and the nico thing gets so misinterpreted and was a total retcon to percy and nico's canon progression in the og books. everyone is allowed to have their opinions obviously but there's this thing in the pjo fandom where everyone wants to take a single moment in which the author's writing was so weak and turn it into an actual real character moment when all prev texts in past books show that it's simply just character assassination
You are not the only one, anon. Thankfully, all my mutuals are of similar opinion, so I rarely am alone in my frustrations over this. I have made posts on most of the points you mentioned, but I swear the reading comprehension the fandom has is akin to a bottomless bag. No matter how many facts, rational explanations, and canon examples you feed in, it will all just fall down in vain. The same old incorrect takes and terrible biases will keep circulating and spawn even worse, zero comprehension takes, and "headcanons." I would say you could play a drinking game with it, but you will be dead not even quarter way through all the misinformation.
At this point, my media literacy test in pjo fandom is the opinion someone has on Percy and Nico's relationship. At least Nico has the excuse of being a literal hurt child for him lashing out at Percy and misplacing his anger on Percy, but I wonder what's the fandom's excuse. I have disproved everything I believe wrong about that take in my post here.
What I think has happened is everyone in the fandom has read these books years ago and hasn't bothered rereading the source material properly after when they got older or have only reread their favorite "shipping scenes." And during this time everyone in the fandom has been over indulging themselves on fanfics and now there is a large disconnect between the actual character in the books and the fanon version everyone has affixed in their heads. And no amount of external feedback will convince anyone to rectify and authenticate their version. Same with the ships. Especially with the ships.
Throw in some childhood nostalgia and a bit of projection, and you have a bunch of extremely single-minded opinions from people who would rather resort to death threats than actually acknowledge any other point of view exists. And gods forbid, an alternative ship exists, and people don't like their ship; the fandom which claims to hate itself is perpetuating its own miserable condition. Either way, my advice? Stick to tags you like. Try and ignore the monopoly in the fandom. Find a circle that shares your niche interests. And you will have fewer frustrations to deal with, at least usually.
As for Percy, he has become such a face of iconic and epic character and obviously the heart of the series that Rick thinks for any other character to be good, they somehow need to be better than Percy in some way or that he needs to put Percy down in some way to uplift others. And he has been doing that post Son of Neptune till today, and Percy is still the absolute fan favorite. Imagine the author and half the fandom doing everything they can to soil a character's arc and achievements and still not succeeding, hah.
I recommend you 'Percy jackson supremacy' or 'Percy jackson defense squad' tag on tumblr. At least half your frustrations will settle down. I recommend the first tag personally. I use that tag so often in my own posts, and it's the one Percy tag page where I am sure the posts will not disappoint. Those two tags with a side of powerful Percy jackson and smart percy jackson are the only fandom tags worth scrolling. Take my advice on it.
The monopoly in the fandom is so bad that if you block percabeth tag, then almost three quarter's of fandoms content is inaccessible. I checked into this and realized that posts that have absolutely nothing to do with shipping or even Percy and Annabeth are tagged with it for the sake of larger exposure. It's absolute bullshit. So now you need to check every percabeth tag post so see if it's actual ship content or just general content tagged that way.
I have no delusions of changing anyone's mind in the fandom. But a few years ago this place was even worse and death threats were almost a common situation for everyone outside popular takes and only now is there a relative safe space for new blogs to make anti posts about popular media in the fandom and not get absolutely flayed for it. Just trying to contribute to that circle. Cause I didn't have to deal with the absolute worst of the fandom because of older blogs that kept on making enough content for there to be a community by the time I joined two years ago. Would like to do the same to some extent. Cause here if you are in any unpopular branch of the fandom, then you will have to make your own content for it. That's just how it is.
Most people now however are getting more and more into alternative opinions and ships and rightfully criticizing Rick for not only character assassinations but the stereotypical things he perpetuated by selling them in the name of diversity and representation.
As I said, the fandom has more problems than it has people, lol. But you just need to find one niche group that fits with you and see if it lasts. By the looks of it, I am not going to be too active in this fandom for very long either. Doesn't seem to be worth it. But you can vent on here anytime about anything. It's definitely the sort of space for that. And I like seeing people finally vent out their frustrations, so you are welcome anytime.
Rick Riordan try not to make every "strong" female character be snarky and mean and insult and be obsessively toxic and hurt other characters, especially male character challenge extreme.
Rick Riordan try not to make all male characters stupid or unable to function without their significant others only to raise the status of other female characters under a fake, fragile mask of feminism challenge impossible.
Rick Riordan try not to pair up every single character and/or force them into the Hunters of Artemis and make them aro/ace challenge extremely impossible.
Rick Riordan try to write a book without piss jokes, pedophilia, victim blaming, excusing rapists, grooming, child trafficking, weirdly suggestive manipulation (not in a good way), ABSOLUTELY NERF complex characters, incorrect representation of Greek, Roman, Norse and Egyptian mythology, incorrect representation of minorities and smaller ethnicities/POC/culture, fake feminism, LGBTQIA+ community challenge MISSION ABSOLUTELY IMPOSSIBLE.
Rick Riordan try not to nerf your own plot and timelines and your own characters only to create cash-grabs that appease all fans by creating something "fanon" and promoting bullying, stereotypes, stupidity and toxicity and forget why the hell you wrote the series in the first place CHALLENGE. ABSOLUTELY. EXTREMELY. IMPOSSIBLE.