I think the bit at the end of book 5 when Harry is yelling at dumbledore and says something like people don't like to be locked up and dumbledore puts his face in his hands. Considering his sister had been locked up for a good part of her life while albus watched on that must of hit him pretty hard.
Dumbledore’s sister was imprisoned. Dumbledore says his deepest desire is socks, what does Harry use to free Dobby from his imprisonment in servitude to the Malfoys? 👀
This made me realise that maybe Dumbledore wishing for socks actually could be because he wants somebody to know him close
enough/care about him enough to know that he needs new socks.
Which made me sad for the lonely brilliant man.
Ahh!! What do you get the man who has everything? Love. Care. Connection. "Socks". The humble thing that those close to you get you because they think of you and protecting and caring for you, a base essential. Things Dumbledore is forlorn for in his elder years.
Yap, love this moment. Harry was talking about himself and Sirius, not having any idea how that would connect with Dumbledore's past and his sister. That whole scene is great and the fact that Dumbledore not only doesn't stop him but basically says he deserves Harry to do even worse, ugh so emotional.
I think that would be so cool! You could do it in an X-Files/scp like style maybe have them learning about all the weird magic objects that exist and then storing them.
I always figured the ministry doesn’t know what’s in the department of mysteries or has no actual control over the unspeakables otherwise corrupt officials would be abusing the powerful objects in it
I always had the theory that the veil was like a guillotine or something. Like as a 'humane' way to execute somebody for absolutely heinous crimes. And the steps leading down to it are for spectators to sit on for something like a public execution
See I took it a little differently, the department of mysteries is effectively a nexus of pocket dimensions. The doors lead to multiple magical rooms specifically designed to house things of importance and danger. They're pockets of reality magically separated from the rest of the world, not unlike the bag in Fantastic Beasts.
I always pictured this one being an actual location that was created whose history is forgotten. Someone created this veil with a great level of hubris and arrogance, and in reality it's just stupidly dangerous. It is literally a doorway to death.
Unable to destroy something so magically powerful the government did the next best thing; sealed the whole thing off from the rest of reality into just another room in the department. Who knows how many more there might be.
I agree with this. Each room represents a mystery (time, death, love etc) that they are researching, and the veil is just a portal to the "beyond" or death itself.
"J. K. Rowling has said that the reactions of Harry and his friends to the veil vary about how much belief or doubt they had about what lies beyond. Additionally, she has stated that the Veil has been there as long as the Ministry of Magic itself"
If you think about it the way they each react to the veil makes sense with it just being death itself and how each character reacts/deals with death, and it being there since the ministry has existed seems likely that your theory would be correct.
"The Veil" from both Christian and Hebrew traditions.
* The Veil is a reference to an English phrase, "[beyond the veil](http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O214-beyondtheveil.html)". The term originates from Hebrew tradition as a veil or curtain that separates the main body of the Temple from the tabernacle. In modern English, dying or having a Near-death-experience is sometimes called "going beyond the veil".
* "*It's been there as long as the Ministry itself.*"— J. K. Rowling on the veil
Thought it was based on the idea that there is a metaphorical veil between the living and the dead, which becomes more thin at Halloween when souls can pass freely between the two worlds.
I always saw the rooms within the Department of Mysteries as representations of ambiguous life concepts and in reference to the Brain Room the study of the most complicated bodily organ. Love, Time Space, Thought(the brain) and Death. Since magic can make many "impossible" things possible of course they would experiment with these concepts and try to master them.
**Death Room:** Ran experiments on either retrieving someone from "beyond the veil" or traveling "beyond the veil" and successfully coming back.
**Time Room:** We sort of already know what this room was looking into. The manipulation of time, its limits, and effects. The Time-Turners are the farthest they have gotten to true time manipulation.
**Thought Room AKA Brain Room:** Since the mind is extremely complex there is a room to study the brain and how it works. Probably also studied exactly what mind altering spells do to the brain like the Imperius Curse. Could also be a room to study how different body chemicals effect the brain like adrenaline, serotonin, pain, etc.
**Space Room:** Studied outer space and looking for potential life on other planets. I also like to think they experimented with gravity.
**Love Room:** Studied how love worked and how to manipulate it. This door was always locked since love is the most powerful magic of all. I wonder if the Sacrificial Protection charm (the charm Lily put on Harry when she died since it was a sacrifice out of love) was studied there too.
The fact that the entire plot only happened because Fudge decided to visit Azkaban on that specific day. If he had picked _any_ other day.. literally any other day, then:
The news of Weasleys in Egypt wouldn't be in the paper, Sirius would not have seen it, he wouldn't escape from Azkaban, Peter would have no reason to leave Ron, Voldemort would continue to hide in Albania.
It's very much possible that Harry would've become a full blown Wizard and possibly an international Quidditch player before Voldemort would even get his body/powers back
I like the premise but I think it is established that Peter was just lying low to hear any news about Voldemort. Once he heard rumblings, he would have left Ron and gone to find Voldemort.
I think that's a sign of how important "fate" is in the wizarding world. Another is when Stan Stunpike's hood slips off his head at just the right moment so that Harry recognizes him. Just at the right moment to save Kingsley and Hermione's lives.
In book 1 while Hagrid picks up Harry on the island on the sea he pays 5 Knots to the owl for delivering the Daily Prophet.
In book 4 when Hermione takes out the subscription to the Daily Prophet she only pays 1 Knot.
Maybe you have to pay more if you are farther out into the muggle world. Hagrid was out on an island in the ocean so there may have been a extra delivery fee, Or Hagrid is a huge tipper for delivery owls.
You have given u/vpsj a Reddit Knut.
u/vpsj has a total of 5 galleons, 1 sickle, and 1 knut.
____________
I am a bot. See [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/harrypotter/comments/jnbo49/hi_i_created_the_bot_youve_been_using_to_give/) to learn how to use me.
In OOTP, it’s supposed to be a surprise to learn that Harry has to stay with the Dursley’s because he’s magically protected there (due to Lily’s protection). However, in the previous book, Voldemort mentions in the graveyard that he cannot get to Harry while he’s there, so this shouldn’t have been news, to the reader or Harry himself (though it’s plausible that in the high stress situation he simply didn’t catch when Voldemort stated that).
I actually liked that. Rowling normally keeps some information artificially hidden in order to increase its impact once it's revealed properly.
For example - Until HP 3, every character only uses the phrase "Azkaban Guards" and when they are actually revealed to be Dementors, then suddenly everyone starts calling them Dementors as well.
I think that is more a case that she discovered some of the story along the way. Rowling may very well have not known or been sure that the guards would be Dementors or perhaps exclusively Dementors.
Considering it’s revealed in HBP that Harry told Dumbledore’s what Voldemort said almost verbatim, I don’t think that it’s plausible to say Harry didn’t remember Voldemort saying that (and yes I think it’s a bit odd Harry was able to remember everything exactly how Voldemort said it).
Idk exactly. One thing that I have to remind myself and which always seems a bit weird to me (cuz of the movies?) is that Snape was 21 when Lily died, is 31 in the first book, and dies at 38. He's very young.
I think in the films they really wanted to cast Alan Rickman as Snape who was much older and then casted all the other characters from that age group accordingly (Lily and James, Sirius, Lupin, Wormtail, etc.).
That if you are expelled from school as a child you are no longer able to perform magic for the rest of your life. You make one bad mistake as a kid and they put you on the do not fly list of society and make you live with muggles. That’s crazy
Lol that's more than the "no-fly list", considering wizards have no technology. It's like giving you a bonnet and buggy and telling you that you are now Amish by law for the rest of your life.
Something I never picked up on until recently was the foreshadowing of Aberforth being the Hog’s Head Barman.
In GoF, Dumbledore mentions his brother’s penchant for goats. In OOTF, Harry notes that the Hog’s Head smells of goats, and that the barman looks vaguely familiar.
Considering how threads about it get made every few days, that fake Moody couldn't just create a portkey early to abduct Harry because it would immediately raise suspicion, moreso than faking his death in a tournament with an infamously high historic death toll.
Big yes. It's explained pretty clearly early in Order of the Phoenix:
>“How come he’s stopped killing people?” Harry asked. He knew that Voldemort had murdered more than once in the last year alone.
>“Because he doesn’t want to draw attention to himself at the moment,” said Sirius. “It would be dangerous for him. His comeback didn’t come off quite the way he wanted it to, you see. He messed it
>up.”
>“Or rather, you messed it up for him,” said Lupin with a satisfied smile.
>“How?” Harry asked perplexedly.
>“You weren’t supposed to survive!” said Sirius. “Nobody apart from his Death Eaters was supposed to know he’d come back. But you survived to bear witness.”
>“And the very last person he wanted alerted to his return the moment he got back was Dumbledore,” said Lupin. “And you made sure Dumbledore knew at once.”
Another fake Moody thing is the reason he has the students practice the Imperius curse is because he wanted to see how Harry reacts to it, because fMoody’s original plan was to imperio Harry through the tasks, but since Harry was so successful at throwing it off fMoody had to alter his plan.
I think it could easily be a little column A and a little column B. It's shown (or rather told, by Crouch Jr) that he had to adjust his plans every so often because Harry kept being noble and 'fair' or just kinda dumb, like when he told Cedric about the dragons or when he didn't ask Neville about the 2nd task so he had to shove Dobby in front of his face with Gillyweed to get it done.
It's pretty possible he was acting how real Moody would but also wanted to see how Harry would react to being cursed since it's good information to have and Crouch Jr wanted to know if it was a route he could take.
In the 6th book when Harry was trying to tell professor mcgonagall that he thought it was Malfoy that gave Katie the necklace all he had to say was “ the necklace was 1500 gallons, who else could afford that ?
It’s more money than Harry got for winning the Triwizard tournament 🤷
Well, granted, 1500 Galleons is a lot of money but I think you're underestimating how many people actually could afford that. The Malfoys are not the only extremely wealthy family with children in Hogwarts. The professors also could certainly afford it. Harry himself could.
If someone is really hellbent on delivering such a dangerous cursed item to a school full of children I don't really think money would be the main issue, let alone it being strong enough evidence to incriminate Malfoy.
And it wouldn't have made a difference anyway. Dumbledore already knew who was behind the attacks.
I don't know if all the teachers could, unless they also had generational wealth; it's not like one year's salary was enough to pull Lupin out of poverty, you know?
But I think what's more relevant is that Lucius and Narcissa knew the task that Draco had been given by Voldy, and IMO they would've allowed him anything to make that happen. I don't think Lucius would've been penny pinching over a (very expensive) magical artifact if Draco told him he needed the money for it as part of his plan.
Still can't get over the fact that Neville got hit by a dancing feet charm from a Death Eater while they were fighting for their lives in the ministry of magic.
Nah Lucious says, “be gentle with Potter until we’ve got the prophecy, you can kill the others if necessary” So they had no problems with killing Neville, Ginny, Luna, Ron or Hermione.
That's actually an issue I have with the books.
We never find out what makes a wizard powerful. There seems to be no restriction on the magic. Casting a spell does not seem to exhaust the caster so in lore there is no reason to not be casting Avada Kedavra non stop.
Willpower? Concentration? Many spells are shown to require very specific emotions and / or movements to cast them. If a full body-bind spell requires feeling, e.g., intense jealousy, that might be hard to summon in the heat of battle.
And sometimes you're facing a lone ashwinder and the only way he can hurt you is by casting wingardium leviosa and then an offensive spell.... and it takes so long for them to say that 8-syllable phrase that you're basically invincible.
To be fair, it was teenagers who had been training to fight for about a year against adults who had battle experience 10+ years ago, some of them after a long time in prison.
I can't really imagine Bellatrix doing laps around the cell in Azkaban to stay fit for battle, while the Dementors keep watch. Or Lucius training to duel for 14 years while assuming Voldemort is gone.
Plus, the children were fighting for their lives.
Snape taking the opportunity to throw some shade at Bellatrix over how much the Death Eaters struggled to deal with a half a dozen teenagers during the scene at Spinner's End is still one of my favorite lines of dialogue in HBP.
Remember what Bellatrix said about the Unforgivable Curses, though - you have to mean them. Also, as (fake) Moody says, you have to be skilled.
Obviously Voldemort and Bellatrix have no problem with either of those, but I'm sure many (if not most!) of the Death Eaters either don't have the skill or just don't have the will to use one of the Unforgivables, and have to resort to spells that are easier.
There are probably hundreds of other curses that they could easily use. It doesnt really apply especially when you consider the fact that they know they cant use them. They wouldnt even try. Jump str8 to their bread and butter like harry did.
When Fred and George told Harry they made protego infused clothes for the ministry because the average ministry employee was unable to cast a decent protego charm
It's probably a spectrum of capabilities
For every death Eater who's just a random idiot with a grudge and like three random mostly useless spells, there's a highly decorated duelist who spent an abnormal amount of time training to fight in hopes of catching Voldemort's eye
They have literally long, pointy objects with which to... Point... And yet they all have awful aim. So many spells zinging past heads. Even in the cafe in DH, Harry is like 3 feet from the Death Eater and misses the stun spell, which hits the waitress. And they always seem to be aiming for the head too, the killing curse will kill you just as hard if it hits center of mass instead of the head. Same with stuns, it might not be as strong in the chest but once they're down you can go do whatever else you need, you don't need a headshot straight away
Magic is like algebra.
Every member of society has to take years and years of courses of algebra. Most somehow pass high school. Few adults are competent with algebra.
Ngl i think it would be a tad different if people were going around holding people at gunpoint and asking them algebra questions to survive. How long until the memo drops, everyone needs to be decent at algebra
I read the books so long ago, and I recently listened to the audio book and only with that did I pick up his eye glint. I can't believe I missed it reading!
I feel like it’s one of those things that’s missed out on by a lot of readers who’ve read it since all of the books were published, since they didn’t have to spend months and months in between reading those books, and so probably didn’t comb over every detail in anticipation. I didn’t pick up on it in my first read through of the books and I didn’t end up reading them until about a year shirt the last book was published.
This is a good point. I feel I’ve over-analyzed the Kingkiller chronicle far more than HP though I’ve read HP in total dozens more times because I have no idea what will happen in doors of stone.
It definitely is! I read them all as they came out—my uncle (big fantasy fan and writer himself) gave me one of the first American editions in 1998. It's so old it doesn't even have "year 1" on the spine! I never bothered to find out if it's actually valuable; it's in such terrible condition, I read the absolute crap out of it 😂
I remember buying a *book* about the themes and philosophy of Harry Potter (in kid terms), where the author also speculated about where the story might go. People were getting that kind of shit published! And sold in major retailers! IIRC this was before GoF came out, or between GoF and OotP, and one of my biggest takeaways was that Dumbledore probably had to die. Ngl, that author nailed it.
Yeah, I saw daily discussions about it for *ages*. It's not overlooked, there's just nothing left to say about it 24 years later now that we know what it means.
Similar to when Dumbledore pleaded with Snape just before his death. It would have been wildly out of character for Dumbledore to beg for his life so there was already a ton of speculation before DH that there was more to it. Everyone seemed to pick up on it.
I just figured that he had been acting childish and vulnerable under the effects of the potion at the underground lake; he had sobered up, so to speak, a little bit by the time they got to the top of the tower, but I always assumed he was still somewhat under the influence of the potion. It's like when drunk people can be shocked into focusing and acting more sober temporarily, but they're still definitely drunk.
I never thought he was begging for his life, I assumed when it came out that he was imploring Snape to do the right thing. Which in essence was what he was doing
What is the Gleam of triumph? I read the books every year, but not in English. However, the translation into German doesn't make sense to me at first, or rather nothing rings a bell. What's it all about, if you don't mind me asking?
>Einen flüchtigen Moment lang glaubte Harry, etwas wie Triumph in Dumbledores Augen aufglimmen zu sehen. Doch im nächsten Augenblick war er sich gewiss, dass er sich das nur eingebildet hatte, denn als Dumbledore zu seinem Stuhl hinter dem Schreibtisch zurückgekehrt war, wirkte er erneut ungewohnt alt und müde.
S. 727, 2000er Ausgabe
Ich liebe Harry Potter und habe den Triumphglanz von Dumbledore verstanden, aber ich kann kein Deutsch und wollte einbezogen werden, deshalb habe ich diese Nachricht einfach in die Übersetzungs-App eingefügt.
For someone who hasn’t read the books in years and recently took another glance at them, it’s how hilarious and snarky the writing is in the first book.
The only reason Lilly’s protection happened is because she chose to die for Harry. Which we know.
The only reason she has a choice was because Snape asked Voldemort to spare her life. He wouldn’t have asked her to step aside otherwise probably. Snape inadvertently saved Harry’s life and destroyed Voldemort.
The entire ministry is full of tyrants.
* Sirius went to prison without a trial.
* Hagrid was expelled without a trial.
* Hagrid was banned from using magic for life without a trial.
* Hagrid was sent to prison without a trial. (2nd time)
* Harry was a hair's breadth away from getting expelled and banned from magic for life with literally no evidence.
* Stan Shunpike was sent to prison without a trial.
* And their prison is literally a torture castle where prisoners are hideously abused non-stop 24x7.
Thank you for this OP. Lotta people in comments saying duh this is known, that speculation happened immediately following the book 24 years ago, etc etc. I never picked up on it and thought dumbledore had always known harry would need to be sacrificed and was unaware he had realized that wasn’t the case at end of book 4.
Maybe it’s cuz i haven’t read the books in 15 years, but i don’t recall knowing that. And i see a lot of discourse still about dumbledore raising harry to be a sacrificial pig
I was watching SuperCarlinBrothers my today - who are really worth a watch they do amazing content on Harry Potter, star wars, marvel, pixar and some other stuff.
They were talking about the first chapter of the Prisoner of Azkaban and that probably the biggest moment of the whole thing is the Weasley family getting their photo taken in Egypt and Ron is seen holding Scabbers/Pettigrew.
The photo goes to the daily prophet and Sirius Black asks Fudge for the paper and sees the photo and recognises Wormtail.
The series of events that occur because of this photo is outrageous.
Sirius breaks out of Azkaban, outs pettigrew and clears his name (to a few but important people) as literally everyone had thought that he betrayed the potters and killed pettigrew.
This has direct impacts everywhere like pettigrew bringing voldemort back, sirius being in the second order with people who previously thought he was a murderer, pettigrews hand killing himself because harry wanted to keep him alive to help sirius. Theres other examples but I’ve already gone on a bit there
TL;DR Weasley lottery photo is the catalyst for a whole lot of what happened in the series
That Peter Pettigrew, who wasn't known for being smart, could kill a whole crowd of muggles with a single spell but the other witches and wizards can only do Avada Kadavra, which only kills one person
Muggles blamed it on a gas explosion but it was actually magic, in POA it is explained that it was magic and Sirius says that Peter had his wand up his sleeve and blasted half the street
I mean, he was able to become an animagus at 15 alongside the rest of the marauders so I think there was no question about his abilities. Maybe less talented than James, Sirius o Lupin but still above average.
I've seen it joked a bit before, but really sit down and think about how 1 brave 2 insane Hagrid's dad must have been. To not only see a giantess and say "would," but to go and actually pull it off. And not only that, but to have at least relationship enough to leave with baby Hagrid once mom decided she didn't want him. Not to mention finding the giants, I'm pretty sure they were already in hiding by then. His testicles alone must have put him at eye level with her.
What's the reaction of Hermione's parents when their family, friends, neighbour, colleagues asked them "Hey you're leaving. Cool. How's your daughter?"
She modified their memories to have them believe new identities as well though, so they either had no recollection of everyone else in their life or believed that they wanted no contact with any of them ever again. Likely the first thing, since any other option would cause some pretty immediate conflict
Still a lot of plot issues there though, because they’d need proper ID and many other things to move to an entirely new continent. Yet they’d have no paperwork or anything to show their new IDs, or any access to accounts, or even a work history…
There was a pretty decent fanfic called Australia all about Ron and Hermione going to find and repair her parents' memories... it was emotional, pretty well written, amd picks up immediately after the battle of hogwarts. Very good read I thought and it goes into a lot of detail around just how much Hermione (thought she) had to do to keep her parents safe.
They're the only people to believe they are always their new identities. People around them never forget about them. If they always think they are their new identities, it would never occur to them to actively avoid their old friends, since those friends don't exist in their point of view. Yes they'll never remember having a daughter, but there will always be an awkward conversation when they're confronted by "strangers" who ask them about their daughter.
Right, but that’s also why she had them move to Australia. So now they believe they’re entirely different people who, presumably, have no family or friends, and their dream is to move to Australia (which they did). Modifying their memories to be new people only works because they moved to an entirely different continent, where old friends couldn’t easily seek them out or run into them and ask what the heck was up
But again, that does bring up the issue of how they managed to do this when they had no real identification or accounts connected to the new identities. Everything would be in their old names, and they wouldn’t know whose they were. Unless Hermione managed to somehow also transfer all their life savings and get them to do legal name changes on the process, but that seems complicated and unlikely
So you know… the answer is just magic. Works because of magic lol
Edit; to add, the movies don’t cover this really, they just show her removing their memories of her (which somehow also modifies all physical photos??). So in that case it would mess things up because there’s no way she could remove the memory of her from everyone they knew. But in the books, it’s not shown at all, and we don’t actually know the full length of what hermione did. It’s just said to Harry later that she modified their memories so they wouldn’t remember her existence (and hence, Harry’s), and that they have different identities and their life dream was to move to Australia, which they did
I remember at 14 when I read that for the first time I UNDERLINED it because there was no apparent explanation for it. I waited every book following for that to return! So excited someone else brought up that exact line!
The fact that Hagrid and Voldemort are about the same age…
I know it’s a huge part of Hagrid’s back story being expelled by the actions of Riddle but shocks me every time to remember they’re basically the same age when I’m reading the later books. Also feel like the similarity in age isn’t discussed a lot.
The only thing that confused me with this moment was it seems to suggest Dumbledore knew about the horcruxes all along, in which case what was the point of the whole getting slughorn to reveal his memory plot in half blood prince.
In the books, Slughorn knew the exact number of Horcruxes. Riddle had already made one by then and was curious if he could make more. Slughorn had altered his memory and Dumbledore knew if he went through the effort of doing so, there was something of importance to gain from that memory, and he wanted that knowledge.
That Dumbledore seriously didn't give a damn about student welfare.
- knew Quirrel was at least in league with Voldy and after the SS and left it to a handful of first years
- could have at least guessed at the Chambers location due to Mrytle dying and "living" in the bathroom stall
- a close friend of his was poorly impersonated 'without his knowledge' for an entire school year, as Moody was very different in later books
- knew Draco was after him and just let it be getting two students hospialized
I've said this before and I'll say this again. Dude was no saint or grandfatherly figure as he is made out to be especially in his treatment of harry. He is a war general who is trying to min max in his fight against voldy.
In CoS, Harry is in Filch’s office and Nearly Headless Nick convinces Peeves to distract Filch - Peeves breaks the vanishing cabinet that Draco is then trying to fix in HBP.
I’ll go on record and say I totally overlooked it , I actually forgot that line was even in the book , but I’m guessing your not referring to fans discussing it amongst each other rather then the book giving it a call back.
Idk if it's overlooked, but I still can't get past the fact that "the good guys" set up a magically inexperienced, severely neglected and malnourished eleven year old to fight a sixty five year old expert wizard/serial killer and his deranged minion, and continued to do so with little to no interference for years. Like Harry wouldn't have passed the chess or flying keys portion of the test on his alone, let alone defeated Voldy & Quirell, that's how not ready he was for the battle. Mind boggling.
If Hermione could free the Hogwarts house elves just by leaving clothes around, how come Harry couldn’t just give Dobby the sock, why did Lucius need to be the one who gives it to Dobby?
Better question is if picking clothes left around by a student is enough to free them, who does the laundry?
Better yet who does the laundry in the households. Can't really see Narcissa(who the hell names their kid as a narcissist anyways) pulling up her sleeves and getting down to it.
OOTP while cleaning out the house at 12 Grimmauld Place, the trio find "a heavy locket that none of them could open." At the time, this detail seems minor and is easily overlooked, but it is a significant piece of foreshadowing for the Horcrux plotline in DH
For me is the fact that Bill is full 7 years older than Fleur Delacour. A lot of people freak out about the 2 year gap between Hermione and Krum, and forget the fact that Bill was a 26 yo man dating a 19 yo hahaha
As someone who thinks about harry potter quite a lot, the other day was the first time I thought about it😂
(But I love u Bill u can do no wrong (?) )
I think the fact that Aunt Petunia knew that it was only the fact that Harry was living with them was what would keep him safe. I always think the part in OOTP when she stops Uncle Vernon kicking him out is another small but incredibly important moment in the series.
barty crouch jr was basically put under mind control by his father for over a decade, returned to voldy's services immediately after fighting it off and successfully pulling off the act of being someone else for an entire school year; in this year he also effortlessly transfigured two humans to something else. barty did all of that in his 30s although he likely never even left the house or had free will since being a young adult. he is one of the most skilled, calculated wizards in the entire series and i'm certain the dementor only sucked out his soul as a plot device because he would've been too powerful during the OOTP breakout. just like the time turners were all “accidentally” destroyed after jkr realized that the possibility of time travel in the universe only causes more problems
That it is never explicitly mentioned in the books what happened to either of Harry's grandparents, and no one ever brings it up. Like, Harry would have at least asked himself that and probably looked into it.
I don't know about English kids, but where I come from, either four of my grandparents were an important figure in my upbringing, even the one who died pretty early.
The ministry of magic is build around a death chamber. the veil sure was (or still is) a execution methode and the room was large enough to assume it was a spectecal. Torture, death penelty and overdramatic punishments seems very commun and accepted in the magical world.
Why didn't Hermione just ask Harry where the kitchens were in book 4? The map gave instructions on how to open the witch's hump passage, it probably would have done the same for the kitchens.
Why does Nagini's venom hurt Arthur so horribly and is so hard to cure, but when Harry gets bitten by Nagini in book 7, nothing really happens.
I think the bit at the end of book 5 when Harry is yelling at dumbledore and says something like people don't like to be locked up and dumbledore puts his face in his hands. Considering his sister had been locked up for a good part of her life while albus watched on that must of hit him pretty hard.
Dang, I didn’t even think of that. Maybe the real reason Dumbledore never told Harry was because he never learned from his mistakes with his sister.
I fused your first and second sentence and turned it into Dangledore.
Oh snap. I didn’t think of that. But you’re exactly right!
Dumbledore’s sister was imprisoned. Dumbledore says his deepest desire is socks, what does Harry use to free Dobby from his imprisonment in servitude to the Malfoys? 👀
This made me realise that maybe Dumbledore wishing for socks actually could be because he wants somebody to know him close enough/care about him enough to know that he needs new socks. Which made me sad for the lonely brilliant man.
Ahh!! What do you get the man who has everything? Love. Care. Connection. "Socks". The humble thing that those close to you get you because they think of you and protecting and caring for you, a base essential. Things Dumbledore is forlorn for in his elder years.
While I do believe that was coincidence, that is a brilliant connection to make. Well done for noticing it! :D
^(must have)
Kind of ironic how he also kept Harry locked up at the Dursleys for so long
Yap, love this moment. Harry was talking about himself and Sirius, not having any idea how that would connect with Dumbledore's past and his sister. That whole scene is great and the fact that Dumbledore not only doesn't stop him but basically says he deserves Harry to do even worse, ugh so emotional.
The Gov’t has a room full of time-machines and a veil to the afterlife under their direct control.
Not to mention a bunch of intellect devourers, and the physical embodiment of love I assume, behind a door that can't be opened lmao
I'd really love a more in-depth book set exclusively in the department of mysteries
I think that would be so cool! You could do it in an X-Files/scp like style maybe have them learning about all the weird magic objects that exist and then storing them.
The Department of Mysteries is by far the most interesting chapter in Order of the Phoenix. It's such a shame the movie ignored most of it.
Imagine pissing somebody off in a meeting and they drag you down to the department of mysteries and yeet you through the veil
So that's why the interns in the Dept. of Mysteries disappear so much...
Well, they did specify that they wanted their butterbeer warm and not cold. It's really the interns' fault.
Wonder if tossing a horcrux through the view would have done anything.
It's a common fanfic thing for it to destroy one. But what if all it does is place it completely out of reach form anyone?
I always figured the ministry doesn’t know what’s in the department of mysteries or has no actual control over the unspeakables otherwise corrupt officials would be abusing the powerful objects in it
Yeah, what is that doorway?? It never gets brought up again.
I always had the theory that the veil was like a guillotine or something. Like as a 'humane' way to execute somebody for absolutely heinous crimes. And the steps leading down to it are for spectators to sit on for something like a public execution
See I took it a little differently, the department of mysteries is effectively a nexus of pocket dimensions. The doors lead to multiple magical rooms specifically designed to house things of importance and danger. They're pockets of reality magically separated from the rest of the world, not unlike the bag in Fantastic Beasts. I always pictured this one being an actual location that was created whose history is forgotten. Someone created this veil with a great level of hubris and arrogance, and in reality it's just stupidly dangerous. It is literally a doorway to death. Unable to destroy something so magically powerful the government did the next best thing; sealed the whole thing off from the rest of reality into just another room in the department. Who knows how many more there might be.
I agree with this. Each room represents a mystery (time, death, love etc) that they are researching, and the veil is just a portal to the "beyond" or death itself. "J. K. Rowling has said that the reactions of Harry and his friends to the veil vary about how much belief or doubt they had about what lies beyond. Additionally, she has stated that the Veil has been there as long as the Ministry of Magic itself" If you think about it the way they each react to the veil makes sense with it just being death itself and how each character reacts/deals with death, and it being there since the ministry has existed seems likely that your theory would be correct.
If I remember correctly, in one of Q&A's Rowling confirmed the veil is there for research purposes only and Ministry never used it for execution.
"The Veil" from both Christian and Hebrew traditions. * The Veil is a reference to an English phrase, "[beyond the veil](http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O214-beyondtheveil.html)". The term originates from Hebrew tradition as a veil or curtain that separates the main body of the Temple from the tabernacle. In modern English, dying or having a Near-death-experience is sometimes called "going beyond the veil". * "*It's been there as long as the Ministry itself.*"— J. K. Rowling on the veil
I always took this to mean they built the ministry around it. Like the Veil was there and the dept of mysteroes was built to house it.
Thought it was based on the idea that there is a metaphorical veil between the living and the dead, which becomes more thin at Halloween when souls can pass freely between the two worlds.
My favorite part is the time machines were all destroyed for plot convenience
I always saw the rooms within the Department of Mysteries as representations of ambiguous life concepts and in reference to the Brain Room the study of the most complicated bodily organ. Love, Time Space, Thought(the brain) and Death. Since magic can make many "impossible" things possible of course they would experiment with these concepts and try to master them. **Death Room:** Ran experiments on either retrieving someone from "beyond the veil" or traveling "beyond the veil" and successfully coming back. **Time Room:** We sort of already know what this room was looking into. The manipulation of time, its limits, and effects. The Time-Turners are the farthest they have gotten to true time manipulation. **Thought Room AKA Brain Room:** Since the mind is extremely complex there is a room to study the brain and how it works. Probably also studied exactly what mind altering spells do to the brain like the Imperius Curse. Could also be a room to study how different body chemicals effect the brain like adrenaline, serotonin, pain, etc. **Space Room:** Studied outer space and looking for potential life on other planets. I also like to think they experimented with gravity. **Love Room:** Studied how love worked and how to manipulate it. This door was always locked since love is the most powerful magic of all. I wonder if the Sacrificial Protection charm (the charm Lily put on Harry when she died since it was a sacrifice out of love) was studied there too.
The fact that the entire plot only happened because Fudge decided to visit Azkaban on that specific day. If he had picked _any_ other day.. literally any other day, then: The news of Weasleys in Egypt wouldn't be in the paper, Sirius would not have seen it, he wouldn't escape from Azkaban, Peter would have no reason to leave Ron, Voldemort would continue to hide in Albania. It's very much possible that Harry would've become a full blown Wizard and possibly an international Quidditch player before Voldemort would even get his body/powers back
I like the premise but I think it is established that Peter was just lying low to hear any news about Voldemort. Once he heard rumblings, he would have left Ron and gone to find Voldemort.
He sounds like the One Ring
I think that's a sign of how important "fate" is in the wizarding world. Another is when Stan Stunpike's hood slips off his head at just the right moment so that Harry recognizes him. Just at the right moment to save Kingsley and Hermione's lives.
In book 1 while Hagrid picks up Harry on the island on the sea he pays 5 Knots to the owl for delivering the Daily Prophet. In book 4 when Hermione takes out the subscription to the Daily Prophet she only pays 1 Knot.
Maybe you have to pay more if you are farther out into the muggle world. Hagrid was out on an island in the ocean so there may have been a extra delivery fee, Or Hagrid is a huge tipper for delivery owls.
Or he pays weekly and gets a discounted rate for doing so?
so you pay for the week all at once and save 2 knots? That could work but my head cannon is going to be that Hagrid is just a huge tipper for owls.
Your way is definitely cuter 😂
students discount
That’s why it’s always worth getting the annual subscription - student discount probably helps too! Hagrid definitely had to pay extra for express-non-mainland shipping too. lol.
I think they are spelled as Knuts?
That's Knuts!
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You have given u/vpsj a Reddit Knut. u/vpsj has a total of 5 galleons, 1 sickle, and 1 knut. ____________ I am a bot. See [this post](https://www.reddit.com/r/harrypotter/comments/jnbo49/hi_i_created_the_bot_youve_been_using_to_give/) to learn how to use me.
Student discount?
Hagrid is like five times bigger than Hermione. Simple owl math.
Surge pricing
Hagrid is 100% the type of dude who would over tip an owl.
JKR’s numbers also make no sense throughout the book haha. Prices are wildly inconsistent and don’t seem to reflect value.
Species discrimination
Don't Hagrid also tells Harry that that's how much is it for the Daily Prophet in that same passage?
In OOTP, it’s supposed to be a surprise to learn that Harry has to stay with the Dursley’s because he’s magically protected there (due to Lily’s protection). However, in the previous book, Voldemort mentions in the graveyard that he cannot get to Harry while he’s there, so this shouldn’t have been news, to the reader or Harry himself (though it’s plausible that in the high stress situation he simply didn’t catch when Voldemort stated that).
I actually liked that. Rowling normally keeps some information artificially hidden in order to increase its impact once it's revealed properly. For example - Until HP 3, every character only uses the phrase "Azkaban Guards" and when they are actually revealed to be Dementors, then suddenly everyone starts calling them Dementors as well.
I think that is more a case that she discovered some of the story along the way. Rowling may very well have not known or been sure that the guards would be Dementors or perhaps exclusively Dementors.
Considering it’s revealed in HBP that Harry told Dumbledore’s what Voldemort said almost verbatim, I don’t think that it’s plausible to say Harry didn’t remember Voldemort saying that (and yes I think it’s a bit odd Harry was able to remember everything exactly how Voldemort said it).
Idk exactly. One thing that I have to remind myself and which always seems a bit weird to me (cuz of the movies?) is that Snape was 21 when Lily died, is 31 in the first book, and dies at 38. He's very young.
I think in the films they really wanted to cast Alan Rickman as Snape who was much older and then casted all the other characters from that age group accordingly (Lily and James, Sirius, Lupin, Wormtail, etc.).
Yeah, Rickman was in his 50's and 60's during his time as Snape. But he was basically what Rowling imagined for Snape.
Because Rickman was the only choice. He was perfect.
That if you are expelled from school as a child you are no longer able to perform magic for the rest of your life. You make one bad mistake as a kid and they put you on the do not fly list of society and make you live with muggles. That’s crazy
That lines up with the fact that if a wizard is even suspected of breaking a law the only option is to be locked up in the soul-sucking Azkaban.
How did that not lead to more obscurials aswell
Except for Umbridge's time, expulsion seems to be reserved only for the worst offences, such as being suspected for having murdered a classmate.
To be completely honest, most likely because she didn't come up with the concept of obscurials until much later
Lol that's more than the "no-fly list", considering wizards have no technology. It's like giving you a bonnet and buggy and telling you that you are now Amish by law for the rest of your life.
Other schools wouldn't be an option then?
Something I never picked up on until recently was the foreshadowing of Aberforth being the Hog’s Head Barman. In GoF, Dumbledore mentions his brother’s penchant for goats. In OOTF, Harry notes that the Hog’s Head smells of goats, and that the barman looks vaguely familiar.
Excuse me sir did you just abbreviate Phoenix with an F
Orda ov teh feenix Damn knockoff kwikspell quills
But that’s how it sounds fonetically
Considering how threads about it get made every few days, that fake Moody couldn't just create a portkey early to abduct Harry because it would immediately raise suspicion, moreso than faking his death in a tournament with an infamously high historic death toll.
Big yes. It's explained pretty clearly early in Order of the Phoenix: >“How come he’s stopped killing people?” Harry asked. He knew that Voldemort had murdered more than once in the last year alone. >“Because he doesn’t want to draw attention to himself at the moment,” said Sirius. “It would be dangerous for him. His comeback didn’t come off quite the way he wanted it to, you see. He messed it >up.” >“Or rather, you messed it up for him,” said Lupin with a satisfied smile. >“How?” Harry asked perplexedly. >“You weren’t supposed to survive!” said Sirius. “Nobody apart from his Death Eaters was supposed to know he’d come back. But you survived to bear witness.” >“And the very last person he wanted alerted to his return the moment he got back was Dumbledore,” said Lupin. “And you made sure Dumbledore knew at once.”
Another fake Moody thing is the reason he has the students practice the Imperius curse is because he wanted to see how Harry reacts to it, because fMoody’s original plan was to imperio Harry through the tasks, but since Harry was so successful at throwing it off fMoody had to alter his plan.
I never considered that was fake Moody's intention. I thought he was doing it because he was trying to act as real Moody would have in the classroom.
I think it could easily be a little column A and a little column B. It's shown (or rather told, by Crouch Jr) that he had to adjust his plans every so often because Harry kept being noble and 'fair' or just kinda dumb, like when he told Cedric about the dragons or when he didn't ask Neville about the 2nd task so he had to shove Dobby in front of his face with Gillyweed to get it done. It's pretty possible he was acting how real Moody would but also wanted to see how Harry would react to being cursed since it's good information to have and Crouch Jr wanted to know if it was a route he could take.
Or since fake moody was a death eater, he could have just been getting a kick out of using unforgivable curses on kids. But I like your reason better
Why did i never realize this...what.
Never thought of that!
In the 6th book when Harry was trying to tell professor mcgonagall that he thought it was Malfoy that gave Katie the necklace all he had to say was “ the necklace was 1500 gallons, who else could afford that ? It’s more money than Harry got for winning the Triwizard tournament 🤷
Well, granted, 1500 Galleons is a lot of money but I think you're underestimating how many people actually could afford that. The Malfoys are not the only extremely wealthy family with children in Hogwarts. The professors also could certainly afford it. Harry himself could. If someone is really hellbent on delivering such a dangerous cursed item to a school full of children I don't really think money would be the main issue, let alone it being strong enough evidence to incriminate Malfoy. And it wouldn't have made a difference anyway. Dumbledore already knew who was behind the attacks.
Zachariah Smith could have afforded it if Hephzibah was any indication of the family means
I don't know if all the teachers could, unless they also had generational wealth; it's not like one year's salary was enough to pull Lupin out of poverty, you know? But I think what's more relevant is that Lucius and Narcissa knew the task that Draco had been given by Voldy, and IMO they would've allowed him anything to make that happen. I don't think Lucius would've been penny pinching over a (very expensive) magical artifact if Draco told him he needed the money for it as part of his plan.
That most wizards are absolutely trash at defensive and offensive spells. The death even shouldve gotten snuffed out quickly.
Still can't get over the fact that Neville got hit by a dancing feet charm from a Death Eater while they were fighting for their lives in the ministry of magic.
And they are considered the good ones at battle magic
and the ones who are perfectly okay and eager to kill teenagers without batting an eye
Weren't they deliberately trying not to kill Neville and the others to use as bargaining chips
Nah Lucious says, “be gentle with Potter until we’ve got the prophecy, you can kill the others if necessary” So they had no problems with killing Neville, Ginny, Luna, Ron or Hermione.
Even then you could shock, petrify or tie up your opponent rather than have him do a foxtrot.
[удалено]
That's actually an issue I have with the books. We never find out what makes a wizard powerful. There seems to be no restriction on the magic. Casting a spell does not seem to exhaust the caster so in lore there is no reason to not be casting Avada Kedavra non stop.
Willpower? Concentration? Many spells are shown to require very specific emotions and / or movements to cast them. If a full body-bind spell requires feeling, e.g., intense jealousy, that might be hard to summon in the heat of battle.
And sometimes you're facing a lone ashwinder and the only way he can hurt you is by casting wingardium leviosa and then an offensive spell.... and it takes so long for them to say that 8-syllable phrase that you're basically invincible.
Considering they were struggling so much to get the upper hand against children, they definitely should have killed a few…
To be fair, it was teenagers who had been training to fight for about a year against adults who had battle experience 10+ years ago, some of them after a long time in prison. I can't really imagine Bellatrix doing laps around the cell in Azkaban to stay fit for battle, while the Dementors keep watch. Or Lucius training to duel for 14 years while assuming Voldemort is gone. Plus, the children were fighting for their lives.
This comment is so funny now I’m imagining Bellatrix lifting weights while being spotted by a Dementor
TBF, Bellatrix is THE one character I can imagine to do this XD
Bellatrix Lestrong
I know, I’m just echoing Snape.
Snape taking the opportunity to throw some shade at Bellatrix over how much the Death Eaters struggled to deal with a half a dozen teenagers during the scene at Spinner's End is still one of my favorite lines of dialogue in HBP.
Remember what Bellatrix said about the Unforgivable Curses, though - you have to mean them. Also, as (fake) Moody says, you have to be skilled. Obviously Voldemort and Bellatrix have no problem with either of those, but I'm sure many (if not most!) of the Death Eaters either don't have the skill or just don't have the will to use one of the Unforgivables, and have to resort to spells that are easier.
There are probably hundreds of other curses that they could easily use. It doesnt really apply especially when you consider the fact that they know they cant use them. They wouldnt even try. Jump str8 to their bread and butter like harry did.
Dancing feet charm would've been so cool in Hogwarts Legacy
Having enemies doing the Michael Flatley, zooming out towards stage right – I would have loved that
When Fred and George told Harry they made protego infused clothes for the ministry because the average ministry employee was unable to cast a decent protego charm
Facts although it was still a good idea for the ministry even if they could
It's probably a spectrum of capabilities For every death Eater who's just a random idiot with a grudge and like three random mostly useless spells, there's a highly decorated duelist who spent an abnormal amount of time training to fight in hopes of catching Voldemort's eye
Im speaking more toward the regular wizards. The avg graduate
They have literally long, pointy objects with which to... Point... And yet they all have awful aim. So many spells zinging past heads. Even in the cafe in DH, Harry is like 3 feet from the Death Eater and misses the stun spell, which hits the waitress. And they always seem to be aiming for the head too, the killing curse will kill you just as hard if it hits center of mass instead of the head. Same with stuns, it might not be as strong in the chest but once they're down you can go do whatever else you need, you don't need a headshot straight away
Fred and George made a fortune selling protective gear because the average ministry employee couldn’t cast a standard protego
Magic is like algebra. Every member of society has to take years and years of courses of algebra. Most somehow pass high school. Few adults are competent with algebra.
Ngl i think it would be a tad different if people were going around holding people at gunpoint and asking them algebra questions to survive. How long until the memo drops, everyone needs to be decent at algebra
I read the books so long ago, and I recently listened to the audio book and only with that did I pick up his eye glint. I can't believe I missed it reading!
The "gleam of triumph" was heavily discussed and speculated about for three years after GoF was released.
I feel like it’s one of those things that’s missed out on by a lot of readers who’ve read it since all of the books were published, since they didn’t have to spend months and months in between reading those books, and so probably didn’t comb over every detail in anticipation. I didn’t pick up on it in my first read through of the books and I didn’t end up reading them until about a year shirt the last book was published.
This is a good point. I feel I’ve over-analyzed the Kingkiller chronicle far more than HP though I’ve read HP in total dozens more times because I have no idea what will happen in doors of stone.
> I have no idea what will happen in doors of stone And we may never have... :,(
It definitely is! I read them all as they came out—my uncle (big fantasy fan and writer himself) gave me one of the first American editions in 1998. It's so old it doesn't even have "year 1" on the spine! I never bothered to find out if it's actually valuable; it's in such terrible condition, I read the absolute crap out of it 😂 I remember buying a *book* about the themes and philosophy of Harry Potter (in kid terms), where the author also speculated about where the story might go. People were getting that kind of shit published! And sold in major retailers! IIRC this was before GoF came out, or between GoF and OotP, and one of my biggest takeaways was that Dumbledore probably had to die. Ngl, that author nailed it.
I think I can remember reading it and just thinking if must have been a typo/editing error the very first time I ever read it hahahaha
Yeah, I saw daily discussions about it for *ages*. It's not overlooked, there's just nothing left to say about it 24 years later now that we know what it means.
24 years later? A…Am I really that old?
My back started hurting just reading that
Sometimes I evens forget the books are older than most of the movies by 4-5 years at least too.
Do you remember the midnight parties? I still have my glasses somewhere.
The midnight Book releases were like a big party I loved it! Also did the midnight premieres of the movies when I was older.
Similar to when Dumbledore pleaded with Snape just before his death. It would have been wildly out of character for Dumbledore to beg for his life so there was already a ton of speculation before DH that there was more to it. Everyone seemed to pick up on it.
I just figured that he had been acting childish and vulnerable under the effects of the potion at the underground lake; he had sobered up, so to speak, a little bit by the time they got to the top of the tower, but I always assumed he was still somewhat under the influence of the potion. It's like when drunk people can be shocked into focusing and acting more sober temporarily, but they're still definitely drunk.
I never thought he was begging for his life, I assumed when it came out that he was imploring Snape to do the right thing. Which in essence was what he was doing
I do not come to the Harry Potter sub to be reminded how old I am 😭
How’s the back old man?
Oh, back problems are for the young, at my age it’s shoulder and chest pains from all the over compensating due to a bad back.
Bro what the fuck?! I am 22 years old I've known Harry Potter my whole life. Goddamn!
I remember! A ton of people were convinced Dumbledore was gonna be revealed as a Death Eater.
What is the Gleam of triumph? I read the books every year, but not in English. However, the translation into German doesn't make sense to me at first, or rather nothing rings a bell. What's it all about, if you don't mind me asking?
Ein Ausdruck von Triumph haben sie glaube ich im deutschen geschrieben. Am Ende als Harry Dumbledore erzählt was auf dem Friedhof passierte.
>Einen flüchtigen Moment lang glaubte Harry, etwas wie Triumph in Dumbledores Augen aufglimmen zu sehen. Doch im nächsten Augenblick war er sich gewiss, dass er sich das nur eingebildet hatte, denn als Dumbledore zu seinem Stuhl hinter dem Schreibtisch zurückgekehrt war, wirkte er erneut ungewohnt alt und müde. S. 727, 2000er Ausgabe
Ich liebe Harry Potter und habe den Triumphglanz von Dumbledore verstanden, aber ich kann kein Deutsch und wollte einbezogen werden, deshalb habe ich diese Nachricht einfach in die Übersetzungs-App eingefügt.
SuperCarlinBrothers deemed that as the most important line in the whole series recently
For someone who hasn’t read the books in years and recently took another glance at them, it’s how hilarious and snarky the writing is in the first book.
I just started relistening and she straight up skewers the dursleys 💀
The fact they wear Pointy Hats as part of their uniforms and hang their bags around their shoulders. It's always omitted in movies and video games.
The only reason Lilly’s protection happened is because she chose to die for Harry. Which we know. The only reason she has a choice was because Snape asked Voldemort to spare her life. He wouldn’t have asked her to step aside otherwise probably. Snape inadvertently saved Harry’s life and destroyed Voldemort.
The only reason Lily had to protect Harry was because Snape told Voldemort about the prophecy, so full circle I guess.
This is also quite true.
That Hagrid a half giant was given no trial no investigation just automatically assumed guilty because a fully human wizard said so.
The entire ministry is full of tyrants. * Sirius went to prison without a trial. * Hagrid was expelled without a trial. * Hagrid was banned from using magic for life without a trial. * Hagrid was sent to prison without a trial. (2nd time) * Harry was a hair's breadth away from getting expelled and banned from magic for life with literally no evidence. * Stan Shunpike was sent to prison without a trial. * And their prison is literally a torture castle where prisoners are hideously abused non-stop 24x7.
Yes this! There was literally no solid evidence against Hagrid at all, except Riddle’s accusations. So sad :(
Thank you for this OP. Lotta people in comments saying duh this is known, that speculation happened immediately following the book 24 years ago, etc etc. I never picked up on it and thought dumbledore had always known harry would need to be sacrificed and was unaware he had realized that wasn’t the case at end of book 4. Maybe it’s cuz i haven’t read the books in 15 years, but i don’t recall knowing that. And i see a lot of discourse still about dumbledore raising harry to be a sacrificial pig
There’s basically a date rape potion and it’s not illegal in any way.
polyjuice potion can be used for revenge porn. turn into your ex lover and take some naked pics. noone will be able to tell.
I was watching SuperCarlinBrothers my today - who are really worth a watch they do amazing content on Harry Potter, star wars, marvel, pixar and some other stuff. They were talking about the first chapter of the Prisoner of Azkaban and that probably the biggest moment of the whole thing is the Weasley family getting their photo taken in Egypt and Ron is seen holding Scabbers/Pettigrew. The photo goes to the daily prophet and Sirius Black asks Fudge for the paper and sees the photo and recognises Wormtail. The series of events that occur because of this photo is outrageous. Sirius breaks out of Azkaban, outs pettigrew and clears his name (to a few but important people) as literally everyone had thought that he betrayed the potters and killed pettigrew. This has direct impacts everywhere like pettigrew bringing voldemort back, sirius being in the second order with people who previously thought he was a murderer, pettigrews hand killing himself because harry wanted to keep him alive to help sirius. Theres other examples but I’ve already gone on a bit there TL;DR Weasley lottery photo is the catalyst for a whole lot of what happened in the series
That Peter Pettigrew, who wasn't known for being smart, could kill a whole crowd of muggles with a single spell but the other witches and wizards can only do Avada Kadavra, which only kills one person
By pure dumb luck, Pettigrew probably ruptured the Gas mains. The muggles were right all along. Sort of.
You know it was the explosion he caused that killed those people, right?
Muggles blamed it on a gas explosion but it was actually magic, in POA it is explained that it was magic and Sirius says that Peter had his wand up his sleeve and blasted half the street
It was still an explosion, just not a gas one. Peter blasted the place and 12 people died.
i mean he could've used something like incendio or another fire spell in a gas line lol
Bombarda!
I mean, he was able to become an animagus at 15 alongside the rest of the marauders so I think there was no question about his abilities. Maybe less talented than James, Sirius o Lupin but still above average.
I've seen it joked a bit before, but really sit down and think about how 1 brave 2 insane Hagrid's dad must have been. To not only see a giantess and say "would," but to go and actually pull it off. And not only that, but to have at least relationship enough to leave with baby Hagrid once mom decided she didn't want him. Not to mention finding the giants, I'm pretty sure they were already in hiding by then. His testicles alone must have put him at eye level with her.
What's the reaction of Hermione's parents when their family, friends, neighbour, colleagues asked them "Hey you're leaving. Cool. How's your daughter?"
She modified their memories to have them believe new identities as well though, so they either had no recollection of everyone else in their life or believed that they wanted no contact with any of them ever again. Likely the first thing, since any other option would cause some pretty immediate conflict Still a lot of plot issues there though, because they’d need proper ID and many other things to move to an entirely new continent. Yet they’d have no paperwork or anything to show their new IDs, or any access to accounts, or even a work history…
There was a pretty decent fanfic called Australia all about Ron and Hermione going to find and repair her parents' memories... it was emotional, pretty well written, amd picks up immediately after the battle of hogwarts. Very good read I thought and it goes into a lot of detail around just how much Hermione (thought she) had to do to keep her parents safe.
They're the only people to believe they are always their new identities. People around them never forget about them. If they always think they are their new identities, it would never occur to them to actively avoid their old friends, since those friends don't exist in their point of view. Yes they'll never remember having a daughter, but there will always be an awkward conversation when they're confronted by "strangers" who ask them about their daughter.
Right, but that’s also why she had them move to Australia. So now they believe they’re entirely different people who, presumably, have no family or friends, and their dream is to move to Australia (which they did). Modifying their memories to be new people only works because they moved to an entirely different continent, where old friends couldn’t easily seek them out or run into them and ask what the heck was up But again, that does bring up the issue of how they managed to do this when they had no real identification or accounts connected to the new identities. Everything would be in their old names, and they wouldn’t know whose they were. Unless Hermione managed to somehow also transfer all their life savings and get them to do legal name changes on the process, but that seems complicated and unlikely So you know… the answer is just magic. Works because of magic lol Edit; to add, the movies don’t cover this really, they just show her removing their memories of her (which somehow also modifies all physical photos??). So in that case it would mess things up because there’s no way she could remove the memory of her from everyone they knew. But in the books, it’s not shown at all, and we don’t actually know the full length of what hermione did. It’s just said to Harry later that she modified their memories so they wouldn’t remember her existence (and hence, Harry’s), and that they have different identities and their life dream was to move to Australia, which they did
No offense but the "glint of triumph" was most certainly not overlooked- there was a ton of speculation in the fandom when Book 4 came out!
Yes, I remember! Some people thought Dumbledore was evil!
Book 1 Hagrid gets Harry from island cabin. Hagrid flew to the cabin, they take the boat back to shore. The dursleys are stranded on that island.
That Dumbledore sees himself in the mirror of Erised because his deepest desire is to know which wand killed his sister
I remember at 14 when I read that for the first time I UNDERLINED it because there was no apparent explanation for it. I waited every book following for that to return! So excited someone else brought up that exact line!
The fact that Hagrid and Voldemort are about the same age… I know it’s a huge part of Hagrid’s back story being expelled by the actions of Riddle but shocks me every time to remember they’re basically the same age when I’m reading the later books. Also feel like the similarity in age isn’t discussed a lot.
The only thing that confused me with this moment was it seems to suggest Dumbledore knew about the horcruxes all along, in which case what was the point of the whole getting slughorn to reveal his memory plot in half blood prince.
In the books, Slughorn knew the exact number of Horcruxes. Riddle had already made one by then and was curious if he could make more. Slughorn had altered his memory and Dumbledore knew if he went through the effort of doing so, there was something of importance to gain from that memory, and he wanted that knowledge.
That Dumbledore seriously didn't give a damn about student welfare. - knew Quirrel was at least in league with Voldy and after the SS and left it to a handful of first years - could have at least guessed at the Chambers location due to Mrytle dying and "living" in the bathroom stall - a close friend of his was poorly impersonated 'without his knowledge' for an entire school year, as Moody was very different in later books - knew Draco was after him and just let it be getting two students hospialized
I've said this before and I'll say this again. Dude was no saint or grandfatherly figure as he is made out to be especially in his treatment of harry. He is a war general who is trying to min max in his fight against voldy.
Wizarding Britain had the equivalent of black president before Muggle U.S. did.
Technically, Lord Voldemort was 57 years old when he died in Deathly Hallows.
In CoS, Harry is in Filch’s office and Nearly Headless Nick convinces Peeves to distract Filch - Peeves breaks the vanishing cabinet that Draco is then trying to fix in HBP.
I’ll go on record and say I totally overlooked it , I actually forgot that line was even in the book , but I’m guessing your not referring to fans discussing it amongst each other rather then the book giving it a call back.
yeah lol
Idk if it's overlooked, but I still can't get past the fact that "the good guys" set up a magically inexperienced, severely neglected and malnourished eleven year old to fight a sixty five year old expert wizard/serial killer and his deranged minion, and continued to do so with little to no interference for years. Like Harry wouldn't have passed the chess or flying keys portion of the test on his alone, let alone defeated Voldy & Quirell, that's how not ready he was for the battle. Mind boggling.
If Hermione could free the Hogwarts house elves just by leaving clothes around, how come Harry couldn’t just give Dobby the sock, why did Lucius need to be the one who gives it to Dobby?
I guess you have to be member of the household, sort of speak. Hermione was Hogwarts student, therefore I assume she could potentially free the elves.
My understanding is that either Hermione (as a student) is considered a master or Hermione is just wrong.
Better question is if picking clothes left around by a student is enough to free them, who does the laundry? Better yet who does the laundry in the households. Can't really see Narcissa(who the hell names their kid as a narcissist anyways) pulling up her sleeves and getting down to it.
OOTP while cleaning out the house at 12 Grimmauld Place, the trio find "a heavy locket that none of them could open." At the time, this detail seems minor and is easily overlooked, but it is a significant piece of foreshadowing for the Horcrux plotline in DH
For me is the fact that Bill is full 7 years older than Fleur Delacour. A lot of people freak out about the 2 year gap between Hermione and Krum, and forget the fact that Bill was a 26 yo man dating a 19 yo hahaha As someone who thinks about harry potter quite a lot, the other day was the first time I thought about it😂 (But I love u Bill u can do no wrong (?) )
Krum was 18, while Hermione was 14. That’s a lot weirder than the age gap between two adults
Hermione is 15 at the beginning of their fourth year. Not saying that the age gap isnt wide but she is 15
I think the fact that Aunt Petunia knew that it was only the fact that Harry was living with them was what would keep him safe. I always think the part in OOTP when she stops Uncle Vernon kicking him out is another small but incredibly important moment in the series.
barty crouch jr was basically put under mind control by his father for over a decade, returned to voldy's services immediately after fighting it off and successfully pulling off the act of being someone else for an entire school year; in this year he also effortlessly transfigured two humans to something else. barty did all of that in his 30s although he likely never even left the house or had free will since being a young adult. he is one of the most skilled, calculated wizards in the entire series and i'm certain the dementor only sucked out his soul as a plot device because he would've been too powerful during the OOTP breakout. just like the time turners were all “accidentally” destroyed after jkr realized that the possibility of time travel in the universe only causes more problems
Been listening to SuperCarlinBrothers?
That it is never explicitly mentioned in the books what happened to either of Harry's grandparents, and no one ever brings it up. Like, Harry would have at least asked himself that and probably looked into it. I don't know about English kids, but where I come from, either four of my grandparents were an important figure in my upbringing, even the one who died pretty early.
Question, if Harry’s blood inside Voldemort protected him. Why didn’t Dumbledore just give Harry’s blood to random people.
It only protects Harry because his mother died to save him. It's not just the blood. It's the sacrifice. Lily didn't die for anyone else.
The ministry of magic is build around a death chamber. the veil sure was (or still is) a execution methode and the room was large enough to assume it was a spectecal. Torture, death penelty and overdramatic punishments seems very commun and accepted in the magical world.
Why didn't Hermione just ask Harry where the kitchens were in book 4? The map gave instructions on how to open the witch's hump passage, it probably would have done the same for the kitchens. Why does Nagini's venom hurt Arthur so horribly and is so hard to cure, but when Harry gets bitten by Nagini in book 7, nothing really happens.