Percy Jackson Book Club discussion

Luke Castellan is, in my opinion, one of the best morally grey characters I've read.
On the deep dive "luke's hatred of the gods - a deep dive" (liked here ) I've talked about how Luke started to join Kronos' side and hate the gods.
And I'll continue this later because I have to go to the shops right now as they will be closed soon.

Anyway, after the commentary on Luke's evil side, we must also address his big brotherly side, which is why he was able to manipulate Silena, have Annabeth hold up the sky and gain the trust of many.

He was on the streets for a long time and when he was 14 he took care of a 7 years old Annabeth and helped a 12 years old Thalia survive.

Back again - please excuse me.
Anyway, he was conventionally attractive - everyone's crush. He was the fun head of the Hermes cabin. He was an amazing swordsman. It was hard to believe that he could be bad intentioned.

As I have stated in the other deep dive about Luke: he had a somewhat good reason to turn evil. The gods didn't care about their children. But that didn't change the fact that he turned to manipulation and harm to try to do this change.

In my opinion, he is both evil and misunderstood. He had the same feelings about the gods as Percy, but Percy didn't resort to wickedness to change something. He fought by the gods side and then told them to pay their child support (iconic).
This is the worst deep dive yet, but I've summed everything up in the other one.
What do you guys think about Luke?

People say he’s a hero but I think he was a villain, but definitely misunderstood. It was sad that Hermes knew and understood tho

Honestly, I’m like right in the middle. Yes, he was misunderstood but because of that reason, then he turned evil I get it that he repented at the end before yk ☠️ But he still had real intent of doing everything that he did, so he was evil because he was misunderstood.

I think he was misunderstood and evil. He needed help and wanted to change how demigods were treated

Evil cause he sacerficed so many people for it, like maybe almost KILLING thalia. He might have found others way

I don’t think Luke is evil at the root though I don’t think any one is. I think for Luke (like many people) it’s complicated.
He’s had a lot of trama with his parents and thalia and just being a halfbood in general so I think he never really got a grasp of who he was. And yes him being mad at the gods is completely understandable- though what he did he shouldn’t have done.
I don’t think he’s evil but I don’t think he was just “misunderstood”- he knew what he was doing and he could have stoped.
This is one of the many reasons a love Luke- it’s because he’s so relatable in that he doesn’t know who he is but people are telling him different versions of who he is.

@sofi true

i agree

He gives off who’s afraid of little old me vibes

yes yes yes

both for me like in the end he did the right thing but the things he did were awful. Again tho, I understand his hatred against the gods after his neglection by Hermes. if only Hermes had tried just a little bit harder...

if hermes would have been at least somewhat present in his kids’ lives (or at least given luke an original quest), luke wouldn’t have joined kronos.

I think Luke has completely thought out whether or not to help Kronos. From Luke's perspective, Hermes had never been there. Not when his mom went crazy, not when he needed support the most. When Luke finally met his dad, Hermes wouldn't tell Luke what his destiny was, or reasons of why he wasn't telling. Luke grew up, unloved, with no family to care for him- until Thalia and Annabeth came along. But then Thalia was killed. Watching so many kids get ignored by their parents, just like him, Luke got angry. Parents should be there, or at the very least, acknowledge they had kids in the first place. Luke went on a quest, and on it, he got hurt, and Hermes didn't do a thing. Didn't care that Luke got hirt, at least from Luke's perspective. When Kronos whispered to Luke about he could justify all of this, tear down the gods, and build something new, Luke jumped at the oppourtunity to make them pay. He didn't know how Kronos was going to do it, but he knew he wanted justification. When Luke realized how truly evil Kronos was in Last Olympian, he regretted his actions, but couldn't fight Kronos out of his body and stay alive. This led to Luke's suicide at the end. I feel like I would've gone down his same path, if I was him. I feel like Luke had great reasoning, but it doesn't excuse poisoning Thalia's pine tree. But he is one of my favorite villians to this day. I think he is misunderstood, but a villian nonetheless.

yes, exactly! that’s exactly why i felt it was important to have a deep dive on both luke’s decision to join kronos and his big brotherly side. i think that it was obvious why the unclaimed demigods joined kronos - their parents couldn’t care less about them.

Sorry if this is kind of off topic, but I think it would be cool if you did a deep dive on Hermes. Hermes seems like the most human god, one with regrets. I mean sure Apollo is humanized in ToA but still I think it’d be cool if you at least thought about adding him.

thank you for the suggestion! i'll do it tomorrow:)
this is such a great idea because i love how rick portrayed hermes

Yay, glad I could help 😄

I mean, because of him, minor gods' children got cabins. Percy was a hero, but he, kind of, allowed the gods to ignore their children

@Fabulous yes, Luke was misunderstood. He had good intentions, but his actions were bad.

Yes! That is exactly what I think!
Also, I feel like a lot of villains/bad guys are like that- doing the wrong things for the right reasons.

i feel like luke and all the other demigods who joined Kronos had very valid reasons but it can't excuse his decisions

Yes, they had valid reasons and things wouldn't have changed if it weren't for them, however we cannot use this as a way to excuse the fact that he manipulated and killed

True, true.

I mean, he was evil, but what he did worked. Demigods are claimed now, AND minor God/goddess have cabins now

yes, too bad that a riot had to take place for the gods to claim their kids

Thats more on the gods though

I think Luke is definitely not a "good" person, but he isn't evil. He was trying to get the gods to pay attention to their kids, but he just didn't know how to go about it. He was then approached by Kronos, who manipulated him into doing everything. In the end, I do think he was sorry for all the chaos and damage he caused, and if he had survived, it would've been interesting to see his redemption arc that I think would have happened.

I think he is misunderstood and Kronos is the evil that took over him. Because in the beginning he was a good guy but the pull to evil was too strong.

I think that Luke at first was misunderstood, he just wanted revenge on the gods he thought didn't care about him, but overtime i think he became more corrupt and horrible, slowly turning him evil and at the end of the book he became good by killing himself to saving the world, my opinion.

I think in the beginning he wasn’t bad he was a good guy. But later he is definitely evil

I feel like Luke definitely had his reasons and experiences to back up his hatred for the gods. Also, I love the deep dives—they’re really helpful and I enjoy thinking deeper about the characters! Could you maybe do one on either Will or Octavian? I don’t know much depth about either of them so that would be cool 😁

Luke's character is a bit complex. He obviously had the main idea of what he, and his army, wanted to achieve but was corrupted by Kronos in the beginning. I honestly can empathize, understand, and could justify his and the others actions, throughout the series.

You cannot just *turn* evil, you can be corrupted but you aren't evil from the start. That's what happened in Luke's case.

His hatred towards the gods and need to be SEEN played a big part into it. Kronos, even if with different intentions, was the only higher being, Titan, who actually saw his value and him. No wonder it was easy to instantly persuade him into the "evil" side of the war.

Ellis wrote: "I feel like Luke definitely had his reasons and experiences to back up his hatred for the gods. Also, I love the deep dives—they’re really helpful and I enjoy thinking deeper about the characters! ..."

I will soon:)

enid wrote: "Luke's character is a bit complex. He obviously had the main idea of what he, and his army, wanted to achieve but was corrupted by Kronos in the beginning. I honestly can empathize, understand, and..."

EXACTLYY