#pre-relationship solangelo is so specially to me

[fuckingyrs]

maybe when we're older

Rated: T (for language) Word Count: 5.5k

Just before Will could contemplate any longer on the possibilities of performing various organ transplants in the middle of monster-infested paintball fields, the infirmary doors swung open again. “Where are you taking me? What is this place?” “The infirmary,” Travis Stoll said as he dragged a limping camper behind him. Will instantly recognized him as one of the two new campers mentioned earlier. He had seen him around the past couple of days, usually with a group of Hermes kids. Usually going in the opposite direction from Will. Today, his jeans were stained with a dark patch of blood and he was clutching something in his left hand. “Remember when your leg met the wrong end of a sword five minutes ago?”

A day over winter break leads to eleven-year-old Will witnessing two of his siblings fight, meeting a new camper, and having an interesting phone call with his mom.

[problematiquecritique]

@sweets-books-and-anime replied to your post “Solangelo is just so bad??? And not healthy?? I absolutely love Rick Riordan but...”

Would you mind explaining why you think so? I've always thought they were really cute and I just wanted to know why you think that 

So I truthfully think that Solangelo has potential and could have been a lot better had Rick paired them the way he did. I've read some better explanations that I really liked and they go really in depth to certain aspects too and I'll link them because I recommend reading them.

My problem with Solangelo is what I think is a lot of anti-Solangelo's problem. The relationship is so rushed and it's not portrayed as the most healthy relationship in the world. Now, when I mean unhealthy, I don't mean that Will is out there actively mentally, physically, and/or emotionally abusing Nico or vice versa. By unhealthy I really mean it in the context in which their relationship happens.

Nico is a kid born in the 1940's where homosexuality was condemned and is not only struggling with his sexuality and his romantic feelings for his friend, he's also having to deal with his sister's death, his father's neglect and deceitful nature, isolation for being a child of the Big Three, and feeling put out for literally being from a different century. The boy is troubled and tortured and that's just from the events of Percy Jackson & the Olympians. That's not mentioning having to hide himself and become a social outcast for going back and forth between the Roman and Greek camps without tipping one off of the other, handling the revival of another sister, helping accomplish a prophecy, surviving Tartarus,  and being forcibly outed. The poor boy has gone through so much trauma and he just needs a warm blanket and years to rest himself emotionally and mentally.

That being said, I don't think Rick handled Nico's sexuality well. The Heroes of Olympus was a mess beginning with The Mark of Athena. There was so much focus on romance and the plot was unnecessarily complex due to all of the subplots and there were way too many characters to keep track of. I think I would have been much happier with five kids for the prophecy if not three. It would have been much simpler. But anyway, Rick didn't handle a lot well in the books, one of them being Nico's sexuality. Rick has Nico forcibly outed which while does absolutely happen to tons of closeted LGBT+ people, it was very painful to read. I kind of apologized it, though, as Rick trying to amplify the pain in Nico's life and trying to portray a realistic route that some coming out's have taken. What really made me uncomfortable, though, was the way Nico just so seamlessly accepted his sexuality after being forcibly outed within a few weeks? days? (it's been a while since I read the last two books so my timeline is off but so is Rick's and he wrote the books) by coming up to Percy and admitting his crush on him, saying that he's over the childish crush, and then quickly moving on from Percy to Will after a few moments of interaction. I think I reread the parts involving Nico and Will several times because I did not believe what I was reading. How the hell does someone who's been so tortured in life by everyone including himself, just suddenly accept something as big as sexuality within a few moments because he met a cute boy that told him (rather rudely) that he needs to get over it because he's being delusional?

What I really don't like about the relationship is just, Nico is suddenly accepting of his sexuality because Will told him to get over himself. Not only was Will's comment very rude and unnecessary, it's just so improbable that Nico would fully believe that he's accepted for being a son of Hades and that his sexuality is very much ok because Will told him to get over it and that he's just being an angsty teen. If someone told me something like that, I wouldn't even consider dating them and would probably isolate myself further from people as it would feel pretty obvious that nobody is fully accepting as they're not trying to understand what I've gone through.

Honestly, Will Solace used to be one of my favorite characters. After The Last Olympian, I basically devoured The Lost Hero in hopes of getting to read more about him and I was happy to have those small snippets of him in that book. And I actually still like Will, only the pre-Blood of Olympus Will as he might as well be a different character in Blood of Olympus and forward as his personality is entirely different. And I'll admit, I did, and still do, ship Will with another character (Nyssa Barrera, thanks toff.net) but I could get behind Solangelo if it weren't for how Rick treated the characters.

I don't like how Nico was just paired with someone for the sake of pairing him with someone. Just about every main character ends up with someone by the end of Blood of Olympus, except Reyna and Leo doesn't explicitly end up with Calypso but it's pretty much implied (upset about that because I very much ship Leyna and would have loved to see I believe two of four of Rick's only explicitly Latinx characters get together, plus I feel like they're pretty compatible for each other). And sure, fine, I'm a sucker for romance but Nico didn't need to jump straight into a relationship right after being forcibly outed. He needed what Jason gave him: friendship and support (and I am not a Jasico shipper btw, I know a lot of Solangelo shippers claim that anti Solangelo shippers are all Jasico or Perico shippers which isn't always the case as some of us are neither). I feel like it would have not only made more sense, but also been healthier for Nico to focus less on romance and instead try to find solace in friends, not in Will (no pun intended). Nico needed time to heal and accept who he is and then slowly get into a relationship. Nico has had so many people use and manipulate him, I highly doubt he would immediately jump into a relationship with someone he just met. I think I would have felt slightly more comfortable had Nico and Will known each other personally for a while but none of the books give us any indication that they had a real conversation before the Blood of Olympus. I would have been happier with Solangelo being hinted at in the end of the series and then several months later, with the appearance of Lester/Apollo, Nico and Will having finally gotten together in a relationship that started out as a friendship and slowly developed into romance.

I think that fanon Solangelo is so much better than canon Solangelo. I still don't ship it, just an a preference, but fanon Solangelo I have to admit is cute. It's very sweet and adorable and that typical light and dark trope that a lot of people love. However, it's just fanon. And I feel like people forget that fact. A lot of Solangelo shippers get caught up in all of the cute headcanons they make up and stuff but they forget what's actually canon and I think that's kind of bad. Will doesn't treat Nico well. He bosses and pushes Nico around and it's treated as a joke and you know what, it could definitely have been funny and cute had Nico not gone through all of the traumatic experiences he had gone through. He needs to be treated with kid gloves because if Rick hadn't botched his character, it would have been obvious that Nico could have a huge mental break at any moment, if he hasn't already. And I don't like Nico's compliance to Will. Sure, I love Nico's rather dry and dark humor in The Trials of Apollo, it feels nature and like his sense of humor considering everything he's gone through, but he's so accepting of Will's rudeness and pushiness and it doesn't feel right. I've had some people that had been in abusive relationships say that Nico's compliance reminds them of themselves whenever they would get pushed around by their abusers. Now, I'm not a psychologist and really know abuse from what Law & Order: Special Victims Unit has taught me, but it's telling when an abuse survivor tells you that a fictional relationship reminds them of their abusive relationship(s).

I really think Solangelo could have been such a great ship had Rick not handled it the way he did. It's just a lot of layers to why I don't ship it and if Rick had done things differently, Solangelo could have been such a great relationship for LGBT+ readers to admire. As I tend to say about a lot of things: great idea, terrible execution.I highly recommend asking @artem-ace, @billyxkaplan, and @nikthan as they can give you some really good anti Solangelo explanations that isn't just "I don't like them because I like x ship/they're toxic/I just don't like it" and really dig deep into the story, although I fee like some of them come off as slightly anti-Will, they’re very thorough and well-spoken. I'll link you at the bottom to a few of my favorite posts of theirs but definitely check out their blogs.

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