So let's finally talk about it. There's very few things that can actually make me mad on PJO fandom. Calling Percy dumb is the first one. It makes me seethe in rage. And among the other ones is calling Jason Grace boring.
What do you think is worse than trauma? You guessed it. Childhood trauma. Jason Grace is one of the most tragic PJO characters ever. You could almost say the quest with the Seven was one of the better things that happened to him.
Let's recap his life real quick.
Absolutely terrible mother who dumped him near Lupas territory when he was literally 2 years old. And the fact that he would be better off with Lupa than with Beryl Grace is just a testament to how shit of a mother and person she was.
Then he had to win Lupa's approval while she trained him when he was a literal toddler. If you think that's the end of it, it's not even close. Then he was sent to the camp. It was pleasant, as pleasant as a child-soldier factory can be. Which is not at all.
Being the son of Jupiter, he had insane expectations and prejudices forced upon him, along with a certain caged way of living. Fight a certain way, behave a certain way, think a certain way, and repeat. A monotonous, cyclic existence with no escape and no way for self thinking. After all, the Romans are about as creative as a marble is sharp. Imagine it, a child being raised in the legion, by the legion, molded to be the perfect soldier and Praetor who should have only the Legions benefit in mind with no opinions of his own.
Anyone, anyone would go insane and lose their mind because this is torture, complete, and utter torture. But do you know what's worse, that Jason didn't know how the world was supposed to be. Whatever he was used to living, he believed to be the normal thing. He had no idea the things that happened to him were wrong for a long time. In fact, he strived to be even more perfect, all for what? The approval of a god that was his father? A god he had never seen or heard from? That in itself is the tragedy of most Roman demigods or just demigods in general. But at least the Greek ones get to see them every once in a while.
I think Reyna was the first to see his as his own person and to give his individual opinions actual importance. Because she knew what it felt like to live a life of servitude and imprisonment. Under Circe and the pirates. I like to think that's how they bonded. By making each other's lives a bit happier than their former bleak prospects. And I bet they were super close. You can't convince me otherwise. Which is why I will never forgive Rick for ruining their relationship over Piper of all people.
4.
Then, of course, he was demigod too on top of that, so his life was obviously and decidedly terrible. Being sent on fatal missions? Having the responsibility of not only his own life but his comrades life thrust upon him? CAN YOU IMAGINE LIVING LIKE THAT?? THE ABJECT HORROR OF A LIFE LIKE THAT?
5.
If that's not enough his even more repulsive and terrible godly father fucking offers him to Hera to appease her rage like he is some sort of bloody object. An object to be sold. A fuckinhg APOLOGY GIFT. And then what does Hera do to him? She wipes his memories, sends him to a foreign land which was previously considered enemy territory by the Camp he grew up in, forces fake memories upon him of fake friends, and sent him on another death quest. But at least Leo was one of the nicer things about that whole situation. I won't be touching the wreck that is Jiper with a ten foot pole.
And on, of course, he also gets nearly killed by the same goddess he was offered to as an apology gift. If that was enough, he would find out about the existence of his sister who had grown up and gone her own way, thinking he was dead and now was basically a stranger to him? Yeah wow.
And then everything else from the series happens like dear God, him and Percy are practically drowning in trauma. With Hazel, Nico and then Leo after them.
But at least Percy had Sally (even though the reason he put up with Gabe and his mental and physical abuse was Sally) and even though he felt like Sally was always sending him away and no longer wanted him which was fair of him to think but a grave misunderstanding. Sally was still the best thing in his life. Percy had someone to live for something to live forward to even though he was practically almost dying every year, which kept adding to his trauma. And Poseidon, he cared, acknowledged, and helped Percy. The bare minimum and Poseidon actually did even more.
We can assume Jason also had similar experiences with neither a mother's unconditional love nor a god's genuine care and love.
I am not going to say the Camp point because being the son of Jupiter, Jason had certain assurances, but Percy was practically ostracized or badly treated till book 3.
The only good thing that happened in Jason's life was meeting Reyna, the other Seven, and being friends with them, Nico and his sister, and also not falling in Tartarus, so yeah man's living his best life.
So no Jason Grace isn't boring, he is the most in depth character who had his autonomy and childhood stolen, his interests and opinions razed and his entire life molded and shaped for him, turning his mind and body into a tool to serve so called greater interests of Gods and Camp Jupiter. It's like ridiculing a blind man for not being able to see.
Next time, think twice before making that absolutely thoughtless, mindless, wildly inaccurate and cruel comment ever again.
There's no need to blindly hate Jason cause you love Percy or on Percy cause you love Jason. Hell, Percy is my absolute favorite, 90% of my posts are about him, but Percy is awesome and arguably the best all by himself. This is also true for Jason's character. (I am probably the only one who thinks Jason is stronger than Nico just due to greater experience and stamina.) We don't need to be like Rick or ship stans who demean Percy to prop up Annabeth or other characters. They are both iconic and great friends despite whatever rivalry Rick was trying to project.
You are definitely prophetic, and I have to admit I have never looked at Jason's death that way. It might all be spot on even. Personally, I am no fan of Jiper or Piper in general, so I am just a little ticked off over it and especially how her character arc progressed after his death. The other thing I had in mind was that the thing with all of the big three is that Rick has them either in a stagnant place, cast aside or dead, as with Jason's case. I think so many big three children together could have helped them share the burden, move on from it, and help each other due to the similarity in their insecurities and fears. To me when Jason chose to agree with Kym and perosnally take over the responsibility of building shrines for Gods like her and when he stood up to Jupiter by standing his ground, he had overcome his fatal flaw in entirety. In a way, to me, Percy and Jason really mirror each other and I am sure that Percy could have helped Jason see the merit in standing by his own opinions and making firm choices any Jason could have helped Percy with his trauma and lack of self-esteem. All these dynamics could have been explored and would have done better justice to their characters rather than the end road that is death and not only because for all his suffering, he deserved a happy and stable life to a degree. Isn't the PJO series all about subverting the tragedy that follows with being a hero? It just would have been more meaningful in my eyes, is all.
But Rick is Rick, and he won't stop until he ruins all things good about his books.
Okay, people, can we just all stop collectively losing it over Rick's recent shitty characterizations and writing in wottg and tsats and so on? For our own mental peace and happiness , let's just collectively agree that anything written after Trials of Apollo is non-canon and loosely based on the orignal lore and full of inconsistent characterization and unnecessary dilution of the same plot.
In not so polite words: Everything after that is a bloody abomination of the original work that I wouldn't touch with a ten foot pole, but it does give me the urge to strangle Rick for ruining a masterpiece.
Everything before that more or less has to be canon cause then we would have nothing to go off of. Even though characterizations begin to be inconsistent ever since HoO and Blood of Olympus is dodgy as hell but let's give it a pass. Everything released after Trials of Apollo, though? Absolutely not.
Also also one exception from Trials of Apollo: Jason's death is non canon and done by Rick for no plot or character development reasons at all and was an entirely unnecessary and illogical move.
So everything after ToA, along with Jason's death, is non-canon. That's it. That's the new canon.
We just have to do that, at least for all our collective sanity and mental peace. I wasn't even on posting schedule today, but one of the wottg excerpts made me so mad that I just couldn't stop myself. Come on, people, let's just agree on it for our mental peace.