User blog comment:SayuriDarling/Percy Jackson's Greek Gods Official Discussion/@comment-25290156-20140810124429/@comment-3146930-20140810173308

From a certain perspective, Gaea has always been good. Gaea hated what her husband had done to their children by tossing them into Tartarus, so she asked her children to take over (the Titans). Only Kronos was brave enough to do it and eventually he took the place of his father, only to become worse. So Gaea did the same thing and asked her grandchildren (the gods) to take control, which Zeus did and eventually took over. However she didn't like how they did things either so made the Gigantes, but that failed.

Gaea is more of a control freak with good intentions, but is depicted as a villain because she is going against our heroes. In reality, Gaea is just a worse option when compared to the gods, as the gods aren't completely good either.