maverickk

Not only would you avoid having a virgin goddess being utterly disrespected for no good reason, but it would justify way better why people constantly underestimate Annabeth. Because, oh dear, do Aphrodite's sons and daughters get dragged through the mud in these series!

Annabeth being a child of Aphrodite would be a ruthless situation to be in at first; she would more often than not be judged on her looks rather than her wits.

In Rick's very nature-deterministic world where the Dionysus kids will hand you energy juice bottles while all the Ares kids are on the frontline and all the Apollo kids are archers and/or medics, Annabeth Chase would be expected to sit nice and look pretty and break some hearts and maybe fix other campers' armors.

And she'd understandably hate the idea.

Annabeth would attempt to deny and escape her parentage, such as by avoiding her siblings or trying way too hard to make an impression on Athena. She'd despise pink and femininity, just like Uncle Rick did with all of his other main female characters, because there's only one way to be a likeable girl and it's by not wearing any makeup and not trying 'too hard'.

Annabeth's pride, which she would take after Aphrodite's, would have her deliberately avoid learning about the numerous myths relating to her mother, and that could prove dangerous in missions.

Then she would learn to embrace her divine parentage. She'd stop running away from the parts of herself that society had conditioned her to hate, she'd learn about the actual Aphrodite, about her mother's cunning and bravery which has her not think twice before thrusting herself into a decade-long war, about how feared she was even on Olympus.

Annabeth would learn to let her heart lead her on, as she'd realise how remarkably good of a compass it can be when the entire world seems dark and hopeless.

It would also be far more powerful message than what we're currently working with.

That's pretty hard to rate since so much of the Riordanverse comes from ancient mythology, not Riordan himself. What Riordan did was combine the modern world with the mythological one. And there are... issues there.

- Why is a summer camp the best the gods can do for their kids? Even if they're disallowed direct intervention they should still want their kids to have more safety and experience than a few months out of the year!

- I'm not even gonna get into the problems with the "Heart of the West" thing.

- Hitler being a son of Hades and the US Civil War being Greeks vs Romans isn't just stupid from a historical perspective (and it conflicts with the above-mentioned Heart of the West thing) but it also seems pretty disrespectful to overwrite the real causes of those wars, especially considering how many people irl try to claim the US Civil War wasn't about slavery.

- There's a lot of unanswered questions about how the 12th Legion went from a lost Roman military unit to having a city in California with its own senate.

- Rick makes up a lot of stuff about Rome for the sake of plot convenience, specifically their hatred of Greeks, hatred of Minerva, and hatred of the sea. Greek was the lingua franca in a lot of the empire, Minerva was highly respected, and while it was never their specialty, Romans were more than capable of building and using boats.

But, I don't want to be a total downer all the time, so some things I did appreciate:

- The Land of the Lotus Eaters being a casino in Vegas. Considering how casinos are designed to get you to stay and lose your money, it's a perfect fit.

- The Sea of Monsters being the Bermuda Triangle is cool explanation for it imo.

...is that really all I've got for positive world building? Everything else is mostly just ancient stuff Rick put in a place or combos I don't think we're particularly interesting. Like, Medusa selling statues is such an obvious choice, you know?

annabeth being almost more inherently or naturally ‘human’ (as an attribute like having humanity not biological) than Percy because athena is linked to civilisation and humanity

whereas Percy being colder and maybe more objective towards humans (Annabeth can be objective as well but like it’s different) and motivations and stuff because his father doesn’t have the same inherent link to civilisation, instead he understands humans desperate desire and need for things like water and food and escape (like survival)

YESSSSSSS!!!! i’ve thought about this so much before. but it’s definitely an au LMAO

but i love the thought of annabeth being way more human and way more feeling and way more outgoing and good at being a leader etc etc. due to her mother and her domains. versus percy being way more cold and “cruel” in the way that nature is cruel with survival of the fittest.

like the dichotomy of you have to be strong in nature to survive and if you aren’t strong then you’re already dead versus the first sign of civilization being a healed femur fracture, taking care of each other and helping one another survive.

percy standing by and watching a younger demigod struggle in a fight against a monster, almost apathetic as he watches because his mentality is “if they can’t survive this then they aren’t made for this world. this is a test they have to pass on their own.” and annabeth comes in and sees and barely thinks twice before jumping in to help defend the kid because his life is important and means something