The Classical Soap Opera, Part Two
I finished Son of Neptune a few days ago (the joys of not having the internet), and I want to write ALL THE THINGS.
Because reading this book was like READING FIC, I SWEAR TO GOD. Overall, I really liked it.
And by "it" I mean NICO MOTHERFUCKING DI ANGELO. And Percy. And the epic bromances and incesty tension everywhere and Percy--did I mention Percy?--being such a bamf.
But first things first.
THE NICO/BIANCA. CAN WE TALK ABOUT THAT FOR A MINUTE? Nico went to Asphodel with the sole purpose of finding Bianca and resurrecting her now that no one would know about it? To what end, Nico? She is your dead older sister whose death you supposedly made peace with. How is this not the plotline of every Nico/Bianca fic ever? And he calls Hazel 'Bianca' by accident and really, deep down, only sees her as a replacement for Bianca (AND HAZEL KNOWS IT). This is fanfic at its incesty best, folks. Thank you, Riordan.
OTOH, there is a complete lack of anything resembling fic on the Percy/Nico front. I swear (and this isn't just the fangirl in me talking, I don't think) that Percy and Nico have one of the most interesting histories in the whole friggen series (pretty sure this is why we all ship them in the first place, yeah?) and EVERY TIME Riordan writes the two of them nowadays, it's like he completely forgot that Percy and Nico ever even knew each other. Nico comes in and he's a complete badass and so morbid and everything I love about him, and there's some good tension/interaction with him and Percy when Nico first shows up, but then Nico drops out of everything, and suddenly Percy's only connection with the kid is that Nico is Hazel's brother.
I mean, what?
It killed me--killed me--when I first realized during Lost Hero that Percy was going to lose his memories, because I didn't want him to lose his history with Nico. But then when Percy's memory finally comes back, it's like he lost that history anyway. He doesn't seem in the least bit concerned that Nico's missing (except where Hazel's upset about it) and there's not even a mention of Nico being part of the memories that resurfaced, save for where he's mad Nico pretended to not know him (which I love, for the record. Percy wants to "wring the kid's neck," which is lolarious. I can totally imagine that conversation and it makes me happy). It just came off like he didn't care about Nico at all, which seemed wrong to me.
I'm not saying I expected a huge deal or anything, but at least some recognition of Nico as his friend, since Percy is all about his friends, after all.
However, the only sort of comforting thing about this is that Luke got zero mentions, as well. Sure, there was even less of a chance for a Luke mention than a Nico-friendship mention, I guess, but it still kind of hurt a little to see Percy talk so carelessly about Kronos and fighting Kronos in Manhattan with no throwback to Luke or his sacrifice. The story didn't really have room for it, I realize that, something could have been said, even if it was Percy saying "Long story" and pointedly not talking about it, or maybe Hazel or Frank could have seen a look on Percy's face as he talked about Kronos and "they couldn't have known that he wasn't thinking of the Titan at all, but of another demigod who gave his life in this war," or something. But yeah, it makes me feel a little better that Nico isn't brought up when Percy's talking about the things that really matter to him if Luke isn't, either.
Maybe this is the actual fanfic rotting my brain, though. Idk.
But this book--this whole fucking series--is so shippy! Good lord. There's so many pairings and so many characters that all work together in so many dynamic ways, it is GLORIOUS. Let's think about this for a minute ever.
There are the trios. (Three is a good, solid Greek number, after all). You got your Percy/Annabeth/Nico, of course, and after TLH we got Jason/Piper/Leo. SoN (tangent: these have the worst acronyms ever. HOO, for one, and now SON, which I will write as SoN just to prevent it looking like the actual word that is in the title of the book, end tangent) complicates matters a little, in that we now have Percy/Hazel/Frank, but it doesn't seem as OT3ish as the other two.
But NEVER FEAR, because SoN does lots of other things for shippers the world over.
Hazel/Frank is obvious (and cute, IMO). Percy seems to be stretched a little thin to get involved, but we still have a pretty sweet Percy/Frank bromance and one kick-ass three-way friendship. In my mind, though, this leads to an epic setup where the TLH threesome is kickin' it on the Argo II and Hazel/Frank are happily in Camp Jupiter, but the EPIC OT3 is scattered and disjointed; Percy and Annabeth are about to be reunited, but they're one missing-and-quite-possibly-abducted-son-of-Hades down. (I love the angst, we all know this). So the threesomes (and one duo) break down in different ways. Cool.
But then it gets kinky. Take, for example, Nico/Hazel--it's like Nico/Bianca, but with added guilt and emotional projection. Then there's Percy/Reyna--I ship that shit like crazy (and I wouldn't say no to jealous-and-possessive!Jason/Percy). You can throw in some Hazel/Leo, just because Leo's the spitting image of Hazel's dead boyfriend.
Then you can mix and match across the divides. You want Percy/Annabeth and Jason/Piper? Awesome--you get bonus Nico/Leo angst. The obvious couples of the new OT3s get together? You're left with Percy/Leo(/Nico), which isn't something immediately obvious, but still has a lot of material work with (like most of these ships. Srsly, this series is like a motherfucking shipping puzzle with endless possible solutions). There is also Percy/Jason, which has never seemed like a bad idea, but is getting better with time. I cannot motherfucking wait for their first interaction, what with Percy betting his life on the fact that him and Jason are going to be immediate BFFs and work together flawlessly and be two of the most powerful living demigods known to ANYBODY.
THERE ARE SO MANY LADIES NOW, TOO. FEMME FOR EVERYBODY! Reyna/Annabeth hate!sex as they fight over Percy? Yes, plz. Hazel/Piper as the girls of the OT3s? Sure! Annabeth/Piper as they angst over their heroic men who prefer their sidekicks? I'll take it. There's also Piper/Rachel, which I've wanted for some time because I think when Riordan was writing Piper, he'd forgotten that he'd already written Rachel, since they're THE SAME PERSON. And let's not forget Thalia, because sure, she's a Hunter, but fuck, she's had a sibling for a while now with whom she's got tangled emotional history, and if that's not an excuse for shipping, I don't know what is. (So add Hylla/Reyna to that list, plz and ty).
I'M SURE THERE ARE MORE. THIS IS RIDICULOUS IN THE BEST OF WAYS.
On the simpler end of things, we can always just ship Percy/Jason/Nico and have a sons-of-the-Big-Three threesome.
Alternatively, we could always just have, like, an 11-way orgy. THAT'S A GREEK(ISH) THING TO DO, RIGHT?
Oh, and Nico/Thanatos. I want that like burning. And have already written some.
But okay, onto more serious matters. I have a serious bone to pick with Rick Riordan. Something I've always respected about PJO and HoO (really, with the acronyms?) is that they've never shied away from diversity in their characters. It may seem pointed and forced at times (like Annabeth being blonde) but at the end of the day, it's there and that's awesome, not least of all because this series is popular and it's getting out there. So is it really too much to ask for a gay character? I feel like because RR never really makes a big deal about or comments on the identity of his characters, it would be easier than it could be elsewhere to have one be gay--it wouldn't need explanation, or justification, or anything.
There was a moment in SoN, when they're at the picnic table in Alaska, I'm pretty sure, when Percy looked at Hazel and Frank and thought to himself, "Those two needed to get together." It was a cute moment, because Hazel and Frank had been obviously awkwardly flirting and Percy was just so okay with it, you know? And it's how Riordan writes shit like that that would have made something like this such an epic gay-is-okay moment in YA fiction. To have Percy (Percy fucking Jackson, of all title heroes) see two people who obviously like each other and immediately support a relationship between them regardless of who they were would have been an awesome way to casually and nonchalantly acknowledge a gay character the same way RR acknowledges the diversity of the rest of his cast.
Idk, it just seems like if it's gonna happen in popular, mainstream YA fiction anytime soon, it could happen here. HE'S GOT MOTHERFUCKING GREEK MYTHS TO WORK WITH, WHAT ELSE DOES HE NEED?
Okay, angsting and politicizing is now over.
I think what I really want, knee-jerk post-SoN reaction, is a kinky Percy/Nico wherein there is lots of obsessing over Percy losing the Achilles Curse and the fact that he can bleed and feel things on his skin and that Nico's betraying him in the Underworld is really ~in the past now and also the fact that in sort-of-in-exchange for losing his invincibility, Percy now has the tattoos of a Roman demigod. Just give me Percy and Nico loving each other and sexing the shit out of each other and REVELLING IN THEIR SHARED PAST, OKAY? Yes, that is what I want.
UNRELATED, and I know I've complained about this before, but srsly, LJ? This new update screen font (which I'd sort of be fine with if it didn't make HTML look ridiculous) doesn't have a valid character for dashes that copy over from Word. :| SO MUCH PREVIOUSLY-UNNECESSARY EDITING. THIS IS MY UNAMUSED FACE.
Because reading this book was like READING FIC, I SWEAR TO GOD. Overall, I really liked it.
And by "it" I mean NICO MOTHERFUCKING DI ANGELO. And Percy. And the epic bromances and incesty tension everywhere and Percy--did I mention Percy?--being such a bamf.
But first things first.
THE NICO/BIANCA. CAN WE TALK ABOUT THAT FOR A MINUTE? Nico went to Asphodel with the sole purpose of finding Bianca and resurrecting her now that no one would know about it? To what end, Nico? She is your dead older sister whose death you supposedly made peace with. How is this not the plotline of every Nico/Bianca fic ever? And he calls Hazel 'Bianca' by accident and really, deep down, only sees her as a replacement for Bianca (AND HAZEL KNOWS IT). This is fanfic at its incesty best, folks. Thank you, Riordan.
OTOH, there is a complete lack of anything resembling fic on the Percy/Nico front. I swear (and this isn't just the fangirl in me talking, I don't think) that Percy and Nico have one of the most interesting histories in the whole friggen series (pretty sure this is why we all ship them in the first place, yeah?) and EVERY TIME Riordan writes the two of them nowadays, it's like he completely forgot that Percy and Nico ever even knew each other. Nico comes in and he's a complete badass and so morbid and everything I love about him, and there's some good tension/interaction with him and Percy when Nico first shows up, but then Nico drops out of everything, and suddenly Percy's only connection with the kid is that Nico is Hazel's brother.
I mean, what?
It killed me--killed me--when I first realized during Lost Hero that Percy was going to lose his memories, because I didn't want him to lose his history with Nico. But then when Percy's memory finally comes back, it's like he lost that history anyway. He doesn't seem in the least bit concerned that Nico's missing (except where Hazel's upset about it) and there's not even a mention of Nico being part of the memories that resurfaced, save for where he's mad Nico pretended to not know him (which I love, for the record. Percy wants to "wring the kid's neck," which is lolarious. I can totally imagine that conversation and it makes me happy). It just came off like he didn't care about Nico at all, which seemed wrong to me.
I'm not saying I expected a huge deal or anything, but at least some recognition of Nico as his friend, since Percy is all about his friends, after all.
However, the only sort of comforting thing about this is that Luke got zero mentions, as well. Sure, there was even less of a chance for a Luke mention than a Nico-friendship mention, I guess, but it still kind of hurt a little to see Percy talk so carelessly about Kronos and fighting Kronos in Manhattan with no throwback to Luke or his sacrifice. The story didn't really have room for it, I realize that, something could have been said, even if it was Percy saying "Long story" and pointedly not talking about it, or maybe Hazel or Frank could have seen a look on Percy's face as he talked about Kronos and "they couldn't have known that he wasn't thinking of the Titan at all, but of another demigod who gave his life in this war," or something. But yeah, it makes me feel a little better that Nico isn't brought up when Percy's talking about the things that really matter to him if Luke isn't, either.
Maybe this is the actual fanfic rotting my brain, though. Idk.
But this book--this whole fucking series--is so shippy! Good lord. There's so many pairings and so many characters that all work together in so many dynamic ways, it is GLORIOUS. Let's think about this for a minute ever.
There are the trios. (Three is a good, solid Greek number, after all). You got your Percy/Annabeth/Nico, of course, and after TLH we got Jason/Piper/Leo. SoN (tangent: these have the worst acronyms ever. HOO, for one, and now SON, which I will write as SoN just to prevent it looking like the actual word that is in the title of the book, end tangent) complicates matters a little, in that we now have Percy/Hazel/Frank, but it doesn't seem as OT3ish as the other two.
But NEVER FEAR, because SoN does lots of other things for shippers the world over.
Hazel/Frank is obvious (and cute, IMO). Percy seems to be stretched a little thin to get involved, but we still have a pretty sweet Percy/Frank bromance and one kick-ass three-way friendship. In my mind, though, this leads to an epic setup where the TLH threesome is kickin' it on the Argo II and Hazel/Frank are happily in Camp Jupiter, but the EPIC OT3 is scattered and disjointed; Percy and Annabeth are about to be reunited, but they're one missing-and-quite-possibly-abducted-son-of-Hades down. (I love the angst, we all know this). So the threesomes (and one duo) break down in different ways. Cool.
But then it gets kinky. Take, for example, Nico/Hazel--it's like Nico/Bianca, but with added guilt and emotional projection. Then there's Percy/Reyna--I ship that shit like crazy (and I wouldn't say no to jealous-and-possessive!Jason/Percy). You can throw in some Hazel/Leo, just because Leo's the spitting image of Hazel's dead boyfriend.
Then you can mix and match across the divides. You want Percy/Annabeth and Jason/Piper? Awesome--you get bonus Nico/Leo angst. The obvious couples of the new OT3s get together? You're left with Percy/Leo(/Nico), which isn't something immediately obvious, but still has a lot of material work with (like most of these ships. Srsly, this series is like a motherfucking shipping puzzle with endless possible solutions). There is also Percy/Jason, which has never seemed like a bad idea, but is getting better with time. I cannot motherfucking wait for their first interaction, what with Percy betting his life on the fact that him and Jason are going to be immediate BFFs and work together flawlessly and be two of the most powerful living demigods known to ANYBODY.
THERE ARE SO MANY LADIES NOW, TOO. FEMME FOR EVERYBODY! Reyna/Annabeth hate!sex as they fight over Percy? Yes, plz. Hazel/Piper as the girls of the OT3s? Sure! Annabeth/Piper as they angst over their heroic men who prefer their sidekicks? I'll take it. There's also Piper/Rachel, which I've wanted for some time because I think when Riordan was writing Piper, he'd forgotten that he'd already written Rachel, since they're THE SAME PERSON. And let's not forget Thalia, because sure, she's a Hunter, but fuck, she's had a sibling for a while now with whom she's got tangled emotional history, and if that's not an excuse for shipping, I don't know what is. (So add Hylla/Reyna to that list, plz and ty).
I'M SURE THERE ARE MORE. THIS IS RIDICULOUS IN THE BEST OF WAYS.
On the simpler end of things, we can always just ship Percy/Jason/Nico and have a sons-of-the-Big-Three threesome.
Alternatively, we could always just have, like, an 11-way orgy. THAT'S A GREEK(ISH) THING TO DO, RIGHT?
Oh, and Nico/Thanatos. I want that like burning. And have already written some.
But okay, onto more serious matters. I have a serious bone to pick with Rick Riordan. Something I've always respected about PJO and HoO (really, with the acronyms?) is that they've never shied away from diversity in their characters. It may seem pointed and forced at times (like Annabeth being blonde) but at the end of the day, it's there and that's awesome, not least of all because this series is popular and it's getting out there. So is it really too much to ask for a gay character? I feel like because RR never really makes a big deal about or comments on the identity of his characters, it would be easier than it could be elsewhere to have one be gay--it wouldn't need explanation, or justification, or anything.
There was a moment in SoN, when they're at the picnic table in Alaska, I'm pretty sure, when Percy looked at Hazel and Frank and thought to himself, "Those two needed to get together." It was a cute moment, because Hazel and Frank had been obviously awkwardly flirting and Percy was just so okay with it, you know? And it's how Riordan writes shit like that that would have made something like this such an epic gay-is-okay moment in YA fiction. To have Percy (Percy fucking Jackson, of all title heroes) see two people who obviously like each other and immediately support a relationship between them regardless of who they were would have been an awesome way to casually and nonchalantly acknowledge a gay character the same way RR acknowledges the diversity of the rest of his cast.
Idk, it just seems like if it's gonna happen in popular, mainstream YA fiction anytime soon, it could happen here. HE'S GOT MOTHERFUCKING GREEK MYTHS TO WORK WITH, WHAT ELSE DOES HE NEED?
Okay, angsting and politicizing is now over.
I think what I really want, knee-jerk post-SoN reaction, is a kinky Percy/Nico wherein there is lots of obsessing over Percy losing the Achilles Curse and the fact that he can bleed and feel things on his skin and that Nico's betraying him in the Underworld is really ~in the past now and also the fact that in sort-of-in-exchange for losing his invincibility, Percy now has the tattoos of a Roman demigod. Just give me Percy and Nico loving each other and sexing the shit out of each other and REVELLING IN THEIR SHARED PAST, OKAY? Yes, that is what I want.
UNRELATED, and I know I've complained about this before, but srsly, LJ? This new update screen font (which I'd sort of be fine with if it didn't make HTML look ridiculous) doesn't have a valid character for dashes that copy over from Word. :| SO MUCH PREVIOUSLY-UNNECESSARY EDITING. THIS IS MY UNAMUSED FACE.