Doylldonmagar Rants - Tumblr Posts

Introduction to my blog:

I will blog and reblog whatever, but I do have a couple fandoms and a couple topics I come back to.

Recently it's been 90% six of crows.

Fandoms: Ninjago, The Hunger Games, The Queen's Thief (this'll randomly popup consistently, it's my #1 go to recommendation for everyone), Percy Jackson, Carmen Sandiego, Shadow and Bone/Six of Crows, Maxton Hall.

(I was updating my notes about fandom frequency and basically I'm not huge on fandom posting much anymore)

Topics: I love analyzing, including books, movies, media, fandoms. Sociology and psychology.

My posts are getting increasingly deranged.

I use the tag "no tags" for when I want to be able to find it later (maybe to delete)

Anything tagged #marsplastic is for my beloved @marsplastic13

Writing blog @olivevermore

Here's my post about pjo trauma:

And my post about women and violence in media:

So I saw @hermesmyplatonicbeloved 's post and had some thoughts. I agree and disagree. I am a percabeth fan but I also know that some of it is screwy, and if you are familiar with my blog, you know this. I think RR screwed up and wrote out a LOT of trauma, I think he really should have dealt with that better. I think it's not good that he wrote trauma and mental issues and abuse into the foundation of many characters and then has ignored it when it became convenient for the plot.

I would love to see specific quotes and books for these because some of them I have no memory of and would like to revisit them.

I'm gonna talk my way through all of this so I'm gonna text break here

The first point is Percy scaring her to tears. I can only imagine in Tartarus? Like when they're both in their worst state? I don't know. I agree they should have talked about it, but I think they should have talked about all of HoH, which brings me back to saying: Rick really failed at dealing with trauma and processing and long term effects. Honestly, being scared *of* him, yeah I agree that's bad, but is that the situation? If she's scared by his power, then I'm not sure of where I stand on this, I don't know anyone with demigod powers, but I don't think I'd be scared simply because I know someone is capable of hurting me. Plenty of people are capable of hurting me. Like I don't know, what situation is this?

"Percy has been suicidal the whole time annabeth has known him, in BoO Percy attempts suicide and annabeth said nothing, noticed nothing" I'd really like a page or quote because i remember him being suicidal but never attempting. (Im rereading what i wrote, is this maybe referring to percy deciding it would be better if he drowned when hes with Jason? If so, I thought the book said annabeth wasn't told that he wanted to give up) But really my bigger issue with this statement is the fact that it's not necessarily a bad relationship just because a person doesn't realize someone is suicidal, or if their suicidal thoughts are fluctuating. If he's been suicidal the entire time she's known him, how should she know? And why is it the girlfriend's job to stop him from suicide? Like yeah she should care, but that's not her responsibility. No one should feel responsible for a significant other's suicide unless they encouraged the SO to do it.

The judo flip, I agree, annabeth should have been more sensitive to Percy's past and again, I blame Rick for conveniently forgetting that an abused kid is not going to laugh or even take well to being thrown on the ground. This also reminds me of a post I made a while back, because I was so frustrated by media portrayals of women getting upset (usually worried) about another character and shaking them or hitting them or using some form of violence, and that's portrayed as acceptable and normal and as a sign of love. I'm not a fan of that.

"Annabeth likes to keep percy on his toes" this point, I want specific quotes, cause I'd like to go over it again. I agree this is funky. Percy says he feels more comfortable with annabeth and feels like he can talk to her blah blah, but yeah, I think I remember him saying she makes him anxious and that's a problem for me. Like genuinely, to anyone who reads this: if your SO makes you feel uncomfortable, anxious, nervous, or unsafe, please reevaluate your relationship and be safe. That's not good. And back to percabeth, I'm really not sure why RR would say that.

Bringing up abusive stepfather. If annabeth didn't already know about Gabe...I don't know, that says to me that percy was too traumatized to talk about it, in which case, why can annabeth see it in his actions, his comments, his reactions? I don't know that either. But I do know that having met my fair share of traumatized kids, it's not at all uncommon for them to share trauma as a joke and for multiple kids to laugh it off, not to mention suicidal jokes or jokes about their own abuse. Now I want to be clear, I'm not saying that's healthy, I think that's bad, but I also think it's common. And if annabeth doesn't realize what he's really talking about, or is caught up in her own experience, or is uncomfortable, laughing is not an uncommon response. And I don't think that makes their relationship toxic. (And I'm saying it again: I think Rick wrote that so that people could say oh poor percy and feel strongly about how horrible the situation is, but he didn't want to get into the trauma, so by annabeth laughing it off, he can move on with the scene but include little details that show how bad tartarus is)

I don't remember any comments about poseiden, but I agree her interactions with Tyson are problematic. I have zero explanation or excuse, I really don't know what rick was thinking with that, unless it was maybe a way to signify how all halfbloods feel about monsters? (Now that I've said that, that kinda makes sense, if percy sees a monster who was his human friend, but everyone else just sees a monster who is just like the other monsters who have killed their siblings. But still. Annabeth saying he was gross was uncalled for, Rick could have said she was scared or concerned this was a trick or something, but disgust?)

I agree about Percy's unresolved trauma manifesting as fear of annabeth. I already commented on the judo flip, see comments above.

Percy absolutely has horrible self asteem. I'm not sure that's annabeths problem. Yeah she should support him in every way she can, but it's not her responsibility or anyone else's to make him feel better about himself. She should want to, and she should be positive and encouraging, but I don't think Percy's lack of growth is her problem or necessarily a sign of a toxic relationship. It can be, but I'm not certain it is in this case. I think, as I'm sure you know if you've read this much, Rick doesn't know how to write characters who are further along in their trauma- processing, healing, discussing- rick fails to deal with anything besides a currently traumatized kid and a unresolved but out of the directly abusive situation. (This is where I'd like to note, the whole seaweed brain thing, not funny to me, not cute. I'm not a fan because I do think that encourages negative self image. I am aware that that could be link to annabeths childhood, but again, I would expect her to be hyperaware of this sort of emotional abuse. And I blame Rick. Why does she never have her actual abuse mentioned?)

I don't recall annabeth pushing percy to choose between them. I would have said she had doubts about him still wanting to go to CA and he said that he regretted not being there for Estelle but didn't want to be without annabeth (which is kinda cute, kinda codependent to me, and I agree, codependency is not cute)

I would argue the last point "Percy has no interest in going to New Rome or University" is clearly false. In SoN (2nd book of HOO) Percy discovers there are full families living in New Rome, and how it's safe there, and he says multiple times that he wants that, how he remembers he had a girlfriend named annabeth and he wants her to be there and wants to be able to settle down *there*. And in ChaliceotG he's torn, because he does want to stay in New York for his mom and sister, but he really wants to be with annabeth and he loves new Rome. He says multiple times how he wants to go to New Rome. Its true, if the only reason he wants to go is for annabeth, that's a bit funky. But new Rome is the safest place for demigods, and he's been in wars for years, of course he wants that. And wanting to be out of school- okay? New Rome isn't just about the university, not to mention the New Rome university is focused on kids with dyslexia and adhd, obviously. So it will be tailored to him, his struggles are understood, accepted, and aided. Who wouldn't see the appeal in that?

And finally, I agree, that if a character or couple is going to have broad reach, they should be healthy. That's a problem i have with Colleen hoover and all her toxic relationships that have a large audience and are so loved by that audience. And back to this, I hate that the pjo hoo couples are so focused on in the books because fans always pay attention to the couples, but the focus amplifies them, and I think having a relationship be the main focus of a kids/teen/ya book sets up horrible mindsets, and idolizes relationships and all in all is not good for kids. Percabeth or not, healthy or not, I don't think the emphasis on relationships is good.

I might link some of my other posts that I mentioned or that address similar issues in the reblogs

Fake relationships in books and movies make me really mad because the characters suck at it. Like do they know they can be chill about it? Do they realize that by fake dating they have essentially an inside joke?? I would be so much better at this stuff. You could randomly assign me a person and bam are we getting engaged tomorrow?? They've gotta get better about pda and not catching feels and not being awkward and uncomfy. Like actually when a third party is like oh kiss (first of all that's kinda weird why do you want to watch people kiss but also) the fake dating couple knows it's fake so you don't need to be like oh my gosh oh noOoo like just kiss who cares?

Also because both of you are in on it, it's like an inside joke. You two are keeping a secret from everyone else and that, I promise, is an instant bond.

But actually why do characters suck at fake relationships? This person has to be your friend for the time being, use it. You can steal their food, hold their hand, frame them for a crime, use them as a headrest. And if you end up having to share a room, big deal. Some authors clearly never had to share a bed with a sibling, because unless it's a small bed, you can probably fit 2 people without much contact. And if you can't, either person can be like oh dude let me take the floor, I don't mind. Why do the characters take it so seriously?? Where is the chill?? You guys have terrible social skills if you can't even pretend to be comfortable

It would make him so insufferable if he was stoic. It would be too childish, because anyone who has been in some pain knows it's a lot, and it's way better to play it up than to play it down. If it's about attention, you'll get more attention if you play it down and everyone still knows you're injured.

This goes hand in hand with his character. It allows him to pass under the radar because everyone is used to ignoring his moans. It also is a part of his goofier, less mature self, which is why you see as the books go on he becomes more chill. In The Thief he flips out at Pol for cleaning his injured hands. In the Queen of Attolia, he's depressed for the majority of the book, and everyone acknowledges he's not himself, no jokes, grinning, he becomes stoic. The in King of Attolia, he's getting back into his groove and freaks out after the attempt on his life, whining the entire walk back to his room, as well as flipping out at Petrus when he starts doing the stitches (only to show how much control he actually has by calming down and not reacting at all to the stitches), and in a smaller way, he also complains about sword practice. In conspiracy of kings, he's less present, but he has his moments with sword practice. Think as thieves, he briefly complains about brinna hitting him, but again, he doesn't appear much. Then in return of the thief, he complains for the show of it mostly. He walks in on the ambassador kissing Irene and positively flips out, but when Irene gets sick, he doesn't waste any time talking about himself, he doesn't complain about the food that's brought to him (this is before he goes to the kitchens, so it still has sand, jars he can't open, etc) but he puts up with it silently. Then later when they go to war, he has his fair share of poor health. He gets a fever 2 days into riding and he blows it off, saying oh it's just this dumb coat makes me so hot, I'm not sick, and follows it up with complaints about the doctors. And later he's unconscious for several days and reassures the important people that he's alright. Over the course of the 6 books, he goes from complaining about everything to using complaints as a form of communication and only complaining when it's appropriate/acceptable. He whines as they get home after months away because they all know he's happy to be home and excited to see his wife and kids. He knows when he can and can't complain.

Anyway I don't really know where I was going with this but one other thing. Ages ago, I read the false Prince by Jennifer Nielsen. People said the main character was like gen. No hes not. Dont let anyone lie to you. He demonstrates the difference between Gen as a whiner and Gen as a stoic because the main character, Jaron is supposed to be all tough and stoic and LITERALLY CLIMBS A CLIFF WITH BOTH LEGS BROKEN, not to mention he then gets into a sword fight with his arch nemesis and fights until he passes out and then when he regains consciousness, his arch nemesis is like well I beat you but I decided you can have control of the pirates anyway. And since some people obviously have no idea what is plausible, they should really not be trying. That's something that's great about gen. Is it possible for him to just chill no matter the injury? Yeah probably. But would he? No. It adds so much more to him to not walk off every inconvenience and I love his complaining

One of the things that makes Eugenides such a fantastic character is that he’s brave and loyal and noble, but not even a little bit stoic.

He spends so much time moaning and complaining. He gets scared and he cries and he feels no shame about any of it. He broods and wallows. The gods themselves tell him to stop whining.

I know a certain amount of it is a calculated act, but also, he’s mostly leaning into his strengths in those cases. It’s just so rare to see genuine heroism in a character with such traditionally unheroic traits, and I love it. It’s not something to overcome, it’s just who he is — the most inspiring man you’ll ever meet, openly nursing grudges and dishing out petty insults by the dozen.