okay maybe i’m toxic or didn’t pick up the hints but can you maybe elaborate more on what makes the readers behavior w aventurine manipulative? bc i feel like lwk i would do the same but i didn’t realize it was bad behavior 😭😭😭 like if he was saying stuff in his sleep i didn’t understand i would totally try to translate it 😭😭 and how they know he might not be comfortable w doing some things like teaching them avgin but asking anyway i took it as a bid for connection almost?? IDK im just gobsmacked bc i totally thought i was a healthy secure individual but if this is toxic behavior maybe im not 😭😭
FKDJSAKSHJA I won't lie anon I love getting chonky questions about my fics so thank you for reaching out about your confusion with this particular subject . in your defense I understand why it might be confusing on a first read because it IS fundamentally a story about two lovers wanting connection. the catch is that they are too messed up to actually achieve it in a mutual manner 😞
SADLY I must write an essay about this because I'm unbearable. but before I do I'd like to share screenshots from a couple of my readers (SHOUTOUT TO LEEHI ANON AND MIN !) that explains it succinctly
okay now my unbearable essay
so basically. I think the mc's first weird thing that they did was wanting to know what aventurine was saying in his sleep and not just asking him LMFAOOO instead they fucking went about learning it in a roundabout way, without his permission, and just did not care about his boundaries gkdhdsldhsmsj
but while that is whack dishonest behaviour, the real crux of the manipulation in this dynamic is that the reader gave the impression to aventurine that he would be able to understand them better via language exchange, but they set him up for failure in this regard. from the outset, they had no intention of revealing anything about their inner world to him because they planned to deceive him in their native tongue. on the other hand, through learning aventurine's mother tongue, they are able to access a deeply vulnerable part of him. and they do it without him knowing.
so they use this knowledge of his mother tongue and his weakness to it to manipulate him into treating them better: crying in it to gain his pity (just as they did with their captors) and asking for gestures of affection using his language because they know he can't say no. they can use his first language to control him, but aventurine cannot do the same. it's very one-sided.
but as you said, it's ultimately a bid for connection. and they resort to this behaviour to achieve connection because, put frankly, aventurine has already created a one-sided dynamic where he has killed any potential for true connection. like tl;dr he really does treat them like garbage 😭😭😭 the mc just got kinda tired of that and wanted to girlboss him back so that he'd be actually affectionate to them. though they also just want to find a way to make him happy.
ANYWAY SORRY THIS WAS SO LONG.... thank you for reading my fic . I appreciate you so much!!!!!!
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Hello there 👋👀,
So I just found your blog and had a lot of fun scrolling through all the pjo show crit😂 I couldn't help but notice that one tag you left on a post where you said you had some beef with Annabeth's portrayal in the books 👀 Would you mind elaborating on that if you're comfortable with it🙈? Because I absolutely share that sentiment, but it's sooo veeeery rare that I see other people express anything like it... I've found that trying to be a part of the fandom can be pretty alienating most of the time, if you're not exactly the biggest most devoted Percabeth shipper...😅 And often any criticism leveled at Annabeth just gets you a smack with the "internalized-misogyny" hammer... it's even worse in the tv show now due to... obvious reasons...
Again just if you're comfortable with answering of course🙈 There is a reason I stayed on anon after all...😅😂
Really glad you asked because i finally get to ramble about this heheheh (going forward, know that i skimmed over The Last Olympian to have a clearer sense of what I meant because that's the book where Rick fumbles her character more than the others)
i'm gonna try to make as much sense as possible but short answer would be, she's underdeveloped. Long answer:
She really got on my nerves in the last two books, with the whole Rachel debacle and then the Battle of New York. I can't really remember a single moment in those books where she and Percy aren't bickering or having heated discussions, which really made me question their friendship status. Of course, it's not like friends can't fight and it obviously builds up the (romantic) tension between them, but it got unbearable at one point.
I understand she's a teenager in an incredibly stressful situation that didn't even get to have a normal upbringing- she grew up way too fast (run away at 7, head counselor at 12) while also not really maturing, which is not a problem for a character, if it is handled properly. Given the fact that I am writing this, Riordan did not.
On the surface, my biggest beef is that Annabeth is not exactly held accountable for her actions (ie. treating Rachel a bit like shit and going off on Percy for a bunch of stuff.) I know Percy is to blame a bit here: as far as we know, in TLO he basically cuts the greek world out of his life as much as he can as a coping mechanism. And while yes, he never apologizes either, he doesn't give her nearly half the hard time she gives him: always either giving him the cold shoulder (there must be at least one example of this in the entire series but i cant be bothered to look it up sorry) or starting an argument only to then storm off (see the "you're a coward, Percy Jackson!" scene, which is not the fairest example since she was confronting Percy about ignoring camp but also was a bit too harsh about it) (especially after finally reading the prophecy and being under the impression that he was absolutely going to die when he turned 16 lmao) or just straight up storming off (see, Annabeth reacting when Rachel shows up for the first time during the battle of new york). While most of these feel, at least to some degree, fairly justified given how the entire situation does an absolute number on her emotions, she comes off a bit brattish and like she's trying to rile Percy up, especially when it comes to Rachel, which in the context of a battle that could mean the destruction of the world.... Well, it reads as a bit childish to me, and i wouldn't exactly have that much of a problem with it if it was dealt with in some way (a two-way apology would be nice).
After that first impression, i realized that Annabeth is barely ever anything else other than a plot device (when relating to Luke) or a love interest (when relating to Percy). This might be because the books are on Percy's POV. Hell, on the third book he's even conflicted when Annabeth is considering joining the Hunters of Artemis, aka, when making a choice for herself would mean he loses her (which is fine and dandy but it feels like Percy is more upset about her choosing her own path rather than being sad about not seeing her as often); we really only get a few glimpses of her, as in, actually her when she's on her own.
Obviously it's impossible to talk about Annabeth without touching on percabeth, which also is, in my opinion, what hinders Annabeth's character the most. On paper they sound great. The guy whose fatal flaw is loyalty falls in love with a girl whose been let down by people over and over, and she decides to never give up on the boy whose always had people give up on him (can't find one of the million posts that talks about this right now but it always goes something like that) And yeah, the bickering is really well written! But that's literally as far as it ever goes: they don't ever seem to have fun together, because 8 times out of 10 the bickering ends up being passive aggressive, and mostly done by Annabeth. My biggest gripe about percabeth is that their friendship seems to be based off... shared trauma. Literally. Other than going on quests together we are given no examples of them hanging out, nor a reason why they would want to spend time together in the first place, not even a shared hobby. Yes, in the fourth book they had a movie "date" planned but of course they didn't even get to it, and surprise surprise, they had a minor discussion, and surprise surprise, Annabeth was passive aggressive again. It's hard to picture them having fun together when even the author doesn't write in any scenes in which they get along smoothly (and before you say anything, a scene in which they get along where neither of them is about to die, and they're not talking about previous adventures. Gets a bit hard then, doesn't it?) It's even harder to picture them as a couple when the moment she gets upset about something, she starts coming off as emotionally manipulative (see, again, literally any conversation with Rachel or about Rachel)
To be fair, the books are relatively short and don't allow many "filler" chapters, if you will; there's always something happening to keep the main plot or a minor plot point moving forward, but it's not like there is no room to develop the characters' relationships, especially when we're talking about the main char and what is essentially his endgame. As an example we have Percy and Clarisse, or Percy and Beckendorf. Their interactions are brief but still hold so much weight.
Worst of all, Annabeth could be one hell of a character; what's most interesting of all is how being a daughter of Athena she is still incredibly emotionally driven, which is displayed very clearly with her fatal flaw being pride: her telling the Sphynx that her questions were too easy was not smart nor strategic: it was completely impulsive. I seriously think she wasn't far from being the best character in the series had she been given more time.
I guess i have as much beef with Annabeth as i have with Rick for doing her dirty. I really could sum this up with: while her emotions are justified, she acts upon them quite poorly. And this is what i mean when i say she's underdeveloped, because it would've been nice to see her come to her senses a bit.
Would love to read anyone's opinions on her character though, feel free to comment, even (or especially) if you don't agree with me!
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