Ok, I took a nap and feel better about everything now. Here we go (major spoilers)!
- Was it me or did this one go by really fast? A whole lotta stuff felt out of place and/or rushed. The romances seemed especially botched, although when I read David’s comments about the “little monster”, I couldn’t stop laughing. I didn’t notice that at all while I was reading!
- More sloppiness: Oh yeah we destroyed all the deus ex machina time machines, sorry. There are no more in the entire universe, they happened to all be in the same room at the same time. Same with all our backup servers.
- Who the hell is R.A.B.? He/She’s probably sitting somewhere like, “Oops, my bad Dumbledore…”
- I think Rowlings did a great job with Malfoy in this book. His development was the most complete and interesting by far this time. A whole lotta characters (except Cho Chang!) got page-time simply because we had to know that Love is Teh Roxxor.
- The whole Dumbledore thing really made me sad. It’s like someone slipped him some anti-Felix. I’m guessing he’s really dead, but now the good guys have no powerful studs. I’m reminded of that scene in Spaceballs when Rick Moranis suddenly breaks into a Jamaican accent.
- So what did Dumbledore have on Snape? Like blackmail memories of him making out with the Fat Lady? I know Snape’s all evil now and stuff, but I also think that there will be some kind of tremendously angsty reconciliation. Wormtail’s reconciliation will probably be more along the lines of Golem, and no one will care when he dies.
- If you’re in Slytherin, do you feel all like Germany after WWII?
- I can’t help shaking the feeling that James Potter was a total jerk. Although Lily seems good through and through, what evidence has there been to suggest that James was anything other than some meathead jock who bullied Snape? It was funny how Ron and Harry felt like the Half-Blood Prince was their best friend. At least Hermione saw through it!
- Harry Potter steeling up for a showdown has limitless possibilities. Will he go into training with some mysterious, previously unmentioned powerful wizard who will put him through harsh training and turn him out all zen, buff, and ready to kick some ass?
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Whoa, excellent point on the destruction of the time-turners — I totally missed that; Maybe this is just me, but it seemed like the Felix potion was tripping on the deux-ex-machina side as well (i.e. drink potion = impossible to get hit by an attack). For that matter, the Room of Requirements be also a little too unbalanced, given that it gives anything to the user (maybe one could get the Sorceror’s Stone from the Room, if one *really* wanted infinite life & gold)
Ditto James Potter = jerk — it would have been nice to nice to see some backstory here, definately. Rowling’s really good at showing the ‘good side’ of a person (i.e. she made me empathize with Malfoy and Sirius), so I’m not sure why James Potter was skipped ~_~
Having said all this, I’m also pretty excited to see how Harry’s training for teh win is going to work, if Hogwarts is closed *and* his wand doesn’t work against Voldemort (Prio Incantio). I have a suspicion that R.A.B. is going to bust in and make Harry the roxxors, but this seems a bit rushed, imo.
Last thing: Slightly old, but there was a great article comparing HP with pre-WWII England — it’s quite intriguing, so you might want to check it out
Haha, I can just imagine Harry trying to get into the Room of Requirements thinking something ridiculous like Up, Up, Down, Down, Left, Right, Left, Right, B, A, Start…
*Hal 9000 voice*You forgot a B,A in there I think, Dave.
And yeah some excellent points, but y’know what? I doubt dumbledore’s dead. Something tell’s me the man had this planned from the start and Snape was in on it.
“Hmm ot recover this Horcrux I’ll need to drink this POTION!! Better make sure to drink ALL of this POTION!!
Ten bucks says that Dumbledore had been there before, swiped the Horcrux, and after talking with Snape about the Vow, had him set up the whole thing.
The man pulled a Dark Knight Returns, people. Mark my words.
P.S. Harry under a waterfall seems like a cool idea.>:)
That’s a good point, and I suspected that Dumbledore might have faked his death somehow, but until you put it like that I wasn’t sure how. It really would be the perfect way to get Snape into everyone’s inner circle, and throw Harry into yet another loop. Then it will finally be revealed once and for all that James was a huge jerk and Snape is Harry’s real father after an illicit affair with Lily! Ok, maybe not… but the Darth Vader aspects would be awesome.
Quick update: RAB stands for Regulus A Black, Sirus’ brother. The plot thickens…
!!!! Wow, wasn’t he supposed to also be some locked up Death Eater? He must really want his house back. Nice update, Rufus!
Yeah I know I’m the last one to read this but I just had to chip in. The comment referenced on David’s site about how uncharacteristic it was for DumDum to be begging for his life got me thinking; he was probably actually begging for Snape to go through with the killing! As in, a)do him in so Snape could continue spying on the Death Eater club or b) Dumbledore knew something like this was going to happen (after all, he knew about Malfoy’s situation), and had prearranged this agreement with Snape. Either way, Snape’s not totally evil for sure (he didn’t kill Hermoine at the end when he had the chance…telling her to help the unconscious professor inside his office), plus he saved Harry with his excuse to leave him for Voldemort. This also implies that Dumbledore is dead for good, which I thoroughly am convinced of. Bringing him back to life would just be too cheesy.
Also, that Felix potion is so awesome, so why don’t the other professors get their hands on some? Dumbledore certainly could have used some near the end, and it’s hard to imagine that he *doesn’t* have some stashed away somewhere.
Also, his living portrait in the headmaster’s office…will it start talking n stuff? Will it be able to give pertinent advice?
And another thing…you’d think Harry living with Dean would be kinda uncomfortable, given that he kicked him off the team AND got his girl !