First of all, let me make it clear to you. I don't hate Leo, nor do I love him. He's pretty much a neutral character for me. But I also can't say that I don't have any strong feelings about him. It's complicated, that's all you need to know. Let's just say that I have moments where I love him, but I also have times where I despise his existence.
Second, I don't know what reason this post serves. It's just me writing an overly emotional post about Leo while crying inside. It's a rant, an appreciation post, a criticism, an analysis, looking at his potential, about his relationships, almost everything that comes to my mind about him.
Third, if you are going to try to be rude on the comments, I suggest you not to reply. I don't want unnecessary notifications of some toddler being butthurt over a fictional character.
Fourth, don't take anything to heart. It's my opinion, and I will stand by it. You are free to try to disagree respectfully, and you may also drop your own thoughts.
Let's start now, the intro was long in itself.
My first impression of Leo was that he would be a comic relief, the ever optimist, the anchor of the group, the light in the dark. He reminded me of the loveable idiot dumb side character in lots of mainstream shounen anime. Boy, I was wrong. My opinion of Leo is now extremely different from what I first felt about him, and that's an understatement.
Leo's POVs
Leo's POV was always a weird sense of comfort to me. The contrast between the Leo in other character POVs and the Leo in his POV, it was drastic for me. Leo was always happy go lucky, cracking jokes in untimely circumstances, and he did a ton of other stupid things in other POVs. But him in his own POV, it was kinda depressing. How do I say it, it always gave me a feeling of discomfort and loneliness whenever I read his POVs. The fact that he was internally struggling and almost no one ever noticed it because he always put on a smile, it just hit me too hard. His POVs were extremely interesting and gave him layers which is something I admire Rick for, since as an aspiring writer, it's difficult for me to do that properly in my works.
His backstory was genuine art.
His backstory, god, his backstory. It was a masterpiece. Sure, I may be exaggerating, but let me explain. Leo, Nico and Hazel's backstories were the only characters who had backstories which genuinely made me feel uneasy and sad to the core. After I read what happened to him, the only thing I could think was, "How is he still able to smile and pretend that nothing happened?" It was...terrifying. The eeriness and darkness of his mom's death, his experiences with Tia Callida/Hera, it all felt like it was a nightmare which was difficult to wake up from. A backstory which makes me feel complicated and inexplicable emotions is one which I value. Once again, I admire Rick for that too.
His sense of humour
You all are going to hate me, but I am saying it. I love his sense of humour. His sense of humour was rude, I know. But somehow, I found it on character for him. He suffered from self esteem issues, and his coping mechanism was to make derogatory jokes. In multiple circumstances, he made jokes during serious situations, and it was clear that he was doing it because he was stressed and nervous during those times. I wouldn't have minded it if that wasn't the only case. The problem is that no one ever called him out for his hurtful jokes seriously. That's one of my problems with Rick's characters. The main characters get away with a lot of rude things they say without consequences.
How I relate to him; Low self esteem and why it sucks to have it.
I have a self esteem which is low, not extremely low, but still low. And of course, I have the worst coping mechanism for it too. Convincing myself that I am the best. I have the same dumb sense of humour, but I try not to hurt others seriously. Honestly, low self esteem is one of the worst things to have. I feel powerless, sad, weak and a ton of other things because I don't believe in myself much. Which is why I relate to Leo. He just seems so....so relatable to the point that it hurts. And it's also why I hate him sometimes. I see a bit of myself in him, and as much as I would like to deny it, I hate myself. Some of the parts which I hate about him are exactly what I hate about myself, and the parts which I like about him are what I don't have. I once read a quote which said, "Fiction always has a hint of reality to it." It's undeniably true. In more circumstances than once, I have seen similarities of fictional societies/characters to real societies/humans. Somewhere out there, there would inevitably be people who relate to Leo, and also people who find comfort in him.
His powers
His powers are fire, both literally and figuratively. I like his powers, that's pretty much it. I don't have much to say about it. I like how effortless and easy to understand it is.
Frank and Leo
These two have quite a bit of similarities. They both have significance in Hazel's life, they both liked Hazel romantically at some point in the story, they both hated each other at first and they both had issues with self esteem. However, both their coping mechanisms were different. Frank chose to lash out at himself, Leo chose to indirectly lash out at others, which are both really bad (Seriously, they need group therapy). I sometimes think that they had friendship potential, though it's a shame that their relationship wasn't really developed.
Percy and Leo
Percy and Leo both have/had deep loving relationships with their mothers, and are pretty good at trolling others. Their differences are that Percy has water dominant powers due to him being a son of Poseidon and Leo having fire dominant powers due to him being a son of Hephaestus. I think Perleo had potential as a meme duo. I mean, I can imagine them saying the punchlines to each other's jokes. Anyways, I have some things to say about this scene-
I know some of you all use this as a scene against Leo, but I honestly like this scene. It made me laugh when I first read it, and I didn't read much into it because it's a joke, and it's not anything offensive. Something about imaging Leo blowing up a tour bus and Percy just staring at his with a "Wtf" expression made me die from laughing when I read it while pulling an all nighter.
Leo and Annabeth
YOU ALL HAVE NO IDEA HOW MUCH I CRAVED FOR INTERACTIONS BETWEEN THEM. They both are the brains of the team, and though their personalities are different, with Annabeth being more straight laced while Leo being more goofy, I could see them being friends. Again, shame that their friendship wasn't developed.
Leo and Nico
I know I said this for the last few sections but these two had platonic potential too. They both are extroverted in my opinion, and despite having differing personalities, I could have seen them being friends.
Jason and Leo
Jason and Leo's relationship is wholesome tbh. Although it started as an illusion of the mist, it was heartwarming to see them grow closer to each other, though some aspects of the relationship did fall short.
Leo and Calypso
I know a lot of you here aren't blind to the shortcomings of Caleo. The basics being:-
Calypso and Leo have a large age gap which is extremely harmful.
They both don't really treat each other with respect, with Calypso being mean and abusive to Leo and him calling her names which she doesn't like being called. I hate everything about it.
Leo and Hazel
I don't have much to say about their relationship. I just feel like his crush on Hazel was unnecessary and weird, that's all. They do have a cute friendship though.
Leo and Piper
As much as I liked his relationship with Jason, his friendship with Piper is one which I treasure. They both have been friends before the whole "We never really dated/were friends and everything was an illusion of the mist" thing. Yes, Piper was a jerk for seeing Leo as a hindrance, but the way they looked out for each other as time went by was heartwarming and kinda wholesome. They had the realness. This is one of the only Leo relationships I genuinely like.
Leo and his relationship status
I will repeat it until the day I die. NOT EVERY CHARACTER NEEDS A GODDAMN LOVE INTEREST. The amount of platonic potential Leo had with the other characters of Argo II but he just HAD to be forced into a relationship with a random character annoys me to no ends. For me, the best ending to Leo's character arc would have been him realising that he doesn't need a romantic relationship to be worthy. That being single is ok, and romance isn't everything. I would much rather have had Leo having queerplatonic relationships with other Argo II members other than whatever the hell Caleo is. Being single isn't wrong, and Leo was the perfect character to portray that, but it ended as a wasted opportunity.
I sometimes wish Rick concentrated more on friendships than romance.
"All da ladies luv Leo!!"
This statement is kinda untrue for me lmao. I have met more fanboys in real life than fangirls for Leo. Somehow, he kinda reminds me of Zenitsu Agatsuma from Kimetsu no Yaiba. These two characters seem like the type to get a crush in 4 seconds but if they get in a serious relationship, they would be extremely loyal. He has the one of the least chance to cheat on his s/o.
Conclusion
Leo had potential to be one of my favourite characters, he has the charm and the powers for that. The problem is that the endings of his arc wasn't really well written. All his problems were just ended abruptly after Calypso came into the scene, which is....bad, because having a girlfriend doesn't solve much. But then again, I also can't hate him. As I said at the starting of this post, it's complicated. And this is the end of the extremely long post about Bad Boy Supreme which I wrote while being sleep deprived and bored. Bye ig.
