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A general thread for discussion of the Harry Potter books. Any new books set in the same world are also on-topic.

Games, films and other adaptations may be more appropriate for other threads if they're being discussed in isolation.

The HBO tv series has its own thread.

Mod Notes:

  • Media threads are primarily for fans of the works they cover. Not everyone will like everything, of course, and that's especially true in a franchise like Harry Potter. It's fine to say a particular story within the franchise doesn't work for you, or to talk about why it doesn't work for you. But please try not to dwell on the negativity for too long. Complaints shouldn't take up too much space on a thread that's intended for fans.
  • This is a thread to talk about Harry Potter and the content of the stories, not a place to talk about J. K. Rowling's more controversial views. If there's something newsworthy where Rowling's activities become relevant (e.g. it affects her relationship to new Potter works and adaptations), that's fair enough. Otherwise it's all been said already and we don't need to repeat it.

    Original text of OP 

there doesn't seem to be a general HP topic...

Edited by Mrph1 on May 27th 2025 at 9:17:24 AM

JulianLapostat Since: Feb, 2014
#10051: Aug 26th 2016 at 8:47:09 PM

That means hypothetically there could have been a situation where different versions of Voldemort fought each other for dominance.

MadSkillz Destroyer of Worlds Since: Mar, 2013 Relationship Status: I only want you gone
Destroyer of Worlds
#10052: Aug 26th 2016 at 10:51:43 PM

Yeah I think they're separate entities.

But the Diary! Riddle would have most likely been resurrected as 16 year old Tom Riddle rather than Lord Voldemort. Diary! Riddle needed Ginny to tell him what was going on in the world.

So it's possible that Diary! Riddle would tried to merge with Voldemort Prime to gain access to all his powers or he would've had to re-do Voldemort's journey to learn as much Dark Magic as possible.

edited 26th Aug '16 10:54:53 PM by MadSkillz

JulianLapostat Since: Feb, 2014
#10053: Aug 26th 2016 at 11:58:40 PM

This Horcrux magic and the whole splitting of souls stuff is something that should have been introduced earlier. At least the idea of a magical soul and splitting part, she left it too late and it came on as too video-game like.

And the stuff about Riddle and the Diary should have been explored deeper in depth. At the very least, I would have made Riddle disappear so suddenly. He was a very effective villain in Book 2, more scarier than Voldemort was. Imagine if Riddle disappeared into the books, and you have this suspense that every mysterious text and note could be written by Riddle. Like we wouldn't know if the Marauder's Map is Riddle or not, it would have been a great suspense.

That's how I pictured it when I read the books...I read PS first, then Prisoner of Azkaban and then Chamber of Secrets, so I assumed that the Diary was related to the Marauder's Map (that book makes very few references to Chamber of Secrets and the plot twist there) so I assumed a better story than what turned out.

Nikkolas from Texas Since: Dec, 2009 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#10054: Aug 29th 2016 at 1:32:00 PM

I like Voldemort as a villain apart from his Stupicide.

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#10055: Aug 29th 2016 at 5:09:15 PM

The only thing that almost saves Quiddich as a concept is the fact that the scores are cumulative, and you win at the end of the year by total score rather than number of wins. So if you and another team each won every game except one, it doesn't matter if you got the Snitch every time if you didn't have chasers good enough to add more to your score than the other team.

It's also means it's possible for a team that missed the Snitch once could still beat a team that got it all four times if they outscore them by at least fifteen times across all of their matches (which, given the kind of slaughters that tended to happen in the series, is actually possible).

But that supposed balance is held back by the fact that they only play like four games a year, cutting down the number of chances to actually make that work as its supposed to, so it's still down to the teams that caught the Snitch more times than everyone else in the end. And also that the Quiddich League we see doesn't actually work that way, and Krum losing despite catching the Snitch is entirely due to his team besides him being crap in comparison to the other guys.

Though I think I also remember something about the Snitch being released well into the game in professional matches in Quiddich Through The Ages, apparently so that the chasers actually have the ability to make it a tense game before the big money comes along. So I guess there's that as well.

Imagine if Riddle disappeared into the books, and you have this suspense that every mysterious text and note could be written by Riddle. Like we wouldn't know if the Marauder's Map is Riddle or not, it would have been a great suspense.

That's actually a really cool idea, and I'm a bit disappointed that nobody ever brings it up. Harry grouses about it a bit in Azkaban, and Ginny gives Harry a brief hard time in Half Blood Prince about having a harmless textbook doodled on by a genius (well, comparatively harmless. It's still a book about magic full of the occasionally violent thoughts of an antisocial asshole, but it's not enchanted or anything), but what if JK really did make the possibility of the Map being one of Voldemort's tricks a concrete mystery before The Reveal, drawing it out more?

Or even still doing the Reveal, but making it more ominous. There's a period of time where Hermione knows Lupin is a werewolf and is unsure if he's evil, and where Moony has the Map. What if they discovered he and Sirius made the Map, and the story seriously played with the idea that they were trying to manipulate Harry and co with it the whole year before telling us the real truth?

edited 29th Aug '16 5:18:03 PM by KnownUnknown

Eagal Since: Apr, 2012
#10056: Aug 29th 2016 at 7:16:59 PM

If there's one thing I'd like to see expanded upon, it's the HUGE difference between James Potter as a giant asshole of a Hogwarts student and James as an actually responsible adult.

JulianLapostat Since: Feb, 2014
#10057: Aug 29th 2016 at 7:45:57 PM

I actually don't think there was a great deal of difference or change. James was basically The Ace to his friends and a total asshole to his enemies and the people he disliked. He had a gift for making more friends than enemies which is why he has an in-universe Historical Hero Upgrade, where everyone thought that later events and overall trajectory made the point in his life where he bullied and hexed students into a marginal footnote (and I guess once it was revealed that Sirius was a "traitor" they felt it was Sirius who had a "bad influence" on him). He was a brilliant student, good at Transfiguration and Quidditch which won McGonagall's respect but his prankster ways distressed her until he graduated, where he was no longer her problem. The same James Potter who went out of his way to be a bro to Remus Lupin was the same one who bullied Snape and hexed others for fun. And he must have had some sense of responsibility since 1) The Marauders never got caught despite the dangerous magic they got involved in, 2) He did save Snape's life from "Sirius" prank. And obviously he eventually swept Lily off her feet since her Patronus was a "doe" and everything, and she seemed to have bonded with the Marauders (if her affectionate letter to Padfoot is any indication).

Basically, James was the anti-Draco. Rich but Spoiled Sweet, a bully but also a Loveable Rogue, a Big Man on Campus who was the height of cool, arrogant yet anti-racistnote  He was smarter than Hermione and more deadlier than the Weasley Twins and overall you can see him as a good-guy Tom Riddle, complete with alter-ego Prongs (a good deal more humble handle admittedly) but also commanding his own Gang of Bullies and treating Hogwarts as his private kingdom, and ending up as Head Boy (somehow). Quite unintentionally, Rowling made James into a really interesting character.

I personally think Rowling's use of backstory with the Marauders is very obviously manipulative. Like on re-reading the books, you have 1-4 where James is consistently regarded as the Big Good, and his shade appears at the end of GF at the graveyard giving Harry courage, which is quite dissonant if you read with the later knowledge from Book 5. Rowling never clarified that. I think that the shape of the backstory between Snape-Lily (which only comes in the final three books in terms of setup and Foreshadowing) was a later revelation. Obviously Snape definitely had a crush on Lily from the get-go, which is just really obvious in terms of explaining his envy for James but the particular form in which she deployed it came in the writing and the overall effect weakens the series on the whole. I mean at the end of Prisoner of Azkaban, when Dumbledore tells Harry that Prongs was great and it's cool that it's his Patronus and that he was great, was he lying in that scene and manipulating him, because to me from a Doylist perspective that weakens the emotional climax of the book in itself.

JulianLapostat Since: Feb, 2014
#10058: Aug 29th 2016 at 7:54:01 PM

Speaking of the Marauders, I remember reading a theory floating around that the Marauders experimenting with animagus transformations at such a young age caused them to take animal attributes to their personality. i.e. James became very stag-like, openly picking fights to anyone interested in his chosen mate and preferring direct conflict and having a clannish idea of loyalty which inspired his decision to choose Sirius as his Secret-Keeper rather than Dumbledore (who was not part of the clan), Sirius became dog-like, ferociously loyal but single minded and territorial while Pettigrew became excessively ratlike. They mention that animal emotions are simpler than humans and Sirius spent whole parts of his time in Azkaban as a dog when the Dementors were getting too much for him.

It's an amazing theory because it explains the Marauders incredible self-destructive and reckless choices, it is consistent to their later character development and overall story, and it has some basis in the text. The problem is that this isn't addressed in the books itself by the characters and it amounts to doing Rowling's work for herself.

Nikkolas from Texas Since: Dec, 2009 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#10059: Aug 29th 2016 at 7:56:21 PM

I have no idea what you're talking about with your last point. Snape sets the score straight in POZ. Dumbledore tried to make what James did sound super heroic but, well:

“And did the headmaster tell you the circumstances in which your father saved my life?” he whispered. “Or did he consider the details too unpleasant for precious Potter's delicate ears?”

Harry bit his lip. He didn't know what had happened and didn't want to admit it—but Snape seemed to have guessed the truth.

I would hate for you to run away with a false idea of your father, Potter,” he said, a terrible grin twisting his face. “Have you been imagining some act of glorious heroism? Then let me correct you—your saintly father and his friends played a highly amusing joke on me that would have resulted in my death if your father hadn't got cold feet at the last moment. There was nothing brave about what he did. He was saving his own skin as much as mine. Had their joke succeeded, he would have been expelled from Hogwarts.”

Dumbledore was lying to Harry but only about the why of things since Snape didn't work so hardto keep Harry alive out of some nonexistent debt to James.

JulianLapostat Since: Feb, 2014
#10060: Aug 29th 2016 at 8:07:45 PM

I have no idea what you're talking about with your last point

If you read Prisoner of Azkaban from beginning to end as a book (and despite all claims to a saga, the first five books are fairly standalone, only the final two are truly interconnected to be incapable of standing as a whole), the book is entirely about Harry being an orphan and wanting some connection to his parents. He has no parents to sign permission for him to go to Hogsmeade, he has to listen to Aunt Marge insult his family, comes and listens to more insults from Snape, and then he has this issue with the Dementors triggering memories of his family's deaths and he has to struggle to shut out those memories because its the first time he's hearing his parents voices, and of course Sirius represents another return from the past. The Reveal is that his father was within him all that time, and that's treated as a very positive moment at the end of what is after all considered by a wide consensus to be the best HP book.

Later revelations about James and Snape don't fundamentally change all that, but structurally the climax of the series, with Snape being easily let off the hook with that "bravest man" garbage means that you kind of have to forget later revelations when re-reading it.

One thing that DH does do very well is clarify Snape's feelings in that scene you excerpted. Like when Harry calls Snape for being ungrateful to James for saving his life, he's unintentionally echoing teenage Lily telling Snape the same thing in the Prince's Tale flashback. So if you try and put yourself in Snape's shoes, and him virtually parroting the same garbage he repeated as a kid (and also using some of Lily's insults for James back to young Harry), it's quite an amazing internal moment. Because once again those same green eyes are repeating a basic truth he couldn't bring himself to accept and so he decides to once again malign James by using the same argument hoping to win again since he obviously lost the first time. It just makes him even more pathetic.

Nikkolas from Texas Since: Dec, 2009 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#10061: Aug 29th 2016 at 9:08:34 PM

Yeah, sorry, don't agree. Snape is hands down the best-written character in the series as far as I'm concerned. As someone who recognizes Harry was a sham, I figure you would appreciate the one character ho constantly calls Harry out on his lack of talent and loads of Plot Armor aka "luck."

Snape is really the character that grows the most over the series. He's such a fascinating study in contrasting personalities. He is at once more cool and collected than most people yet at the same time ias also more unstable than most people. I'll always remember his speech to Harry in Book 5 because it's like Snape is both talking about himself and not talking about himself.

"I told you to empty yourself of emotion!"

"Yeah? Well, I'm finding that hard at the moment," Harry snarled.

"Then you will find yourself easy prey for the Dark Lord!" said Snape savagely. "Fools who wear their hearts proudly on their sleeves, who cannot control their emotions, who wallow in sad memories and allow themselves to be provoked this easily — weak people, in other words — they stand no chance against his powers! He will penetrate your mind with absurd ease, Potter!"

I've always thought, that if it had been Snape there when Voldemort came a callin', he wouldn't be a moron and forget his wand. It wouldn't do him much good but it might at least buy Lily and the baby a few moments. James just rushed to his entirely useless death.

JulianLapostat Since: Feb, 2014
#10062: Aug 29th 2016 at 9:59:30 PM

As someone who recognizes Harry was a sham, I figure you would appreciate the one character ho constantly calls Harry out on his lack of talent and loads of Plot Armor aka "luck."

Well I am personally not like Snape. I can appreciate that a Jerkass Has a Point, while separating the Point and the Jerkass part. Snape can't appreciate that James Potter who bullied him saved his life and that he was a petty ingrate. Me I can appreciate that Snape has some valid points about Harry and being bullied as a teenager while not neglecting that Snape is a Jerkass and an essentially indefensible human being, a rotten teacher and a pathetic "Nice Guy" who did not truly respect Lily's consent. I can even sympathize that James Create Your Own Villain with him and also Peter, but that doesn't change the fact that James is still the hero, Snape and Peter are still villains. You might say that's not fair, but then it wasn't fair that James died so young and left his son orphaned either, and that's Snape's fault which he never owned up to. James saved his life and rather than express a little remorse at his culpability in his death, he continues to talk smack afterwards to a kid who had no idea about any of this, all to feed his ego. There's nothing fundamentally defensible about that.

Snape is really the character that grows the most over the series.

You are confusing backstory revelations with Character Development. Our understanding of Snape and his position grows more complicated thanks to strategically timed revelations but Snape doesn't develop as a character. That's his whole point. For Snape to have Character Development, would involve him being generous to Harry and telling him what a nice girl his mother was a teenager. But no he stays a petty egomaniac and tears apart a family photograph to take an image of Lily out (for what I assume is private time later). Snape exists for Harry to have Character Development or at least the nearest approximations the books can provide.

I've always thought, that if it had been Snape there when Voldemort came a callin', he wouldn't be a moron and forget his wand.

Well when Voldemort came a callin for Snape in DH, Snape had his wand, he fell down like a chump having a rather hilarious anti-climactic death. And at the Shrieking Shack moreover, the same place Sirius sent him for that prank ages ago. No James Potter to pull him out this time.

It wouldn't do him much good but it might at least buy Lily and the baby a few moments. James just rushed to his entirely useless death.

Well you forget that Lily didn't have her wand with her either. James did buy Lily and Harry a few moments. She had gotten up the stairs and barricaded the door physically. If she had her wand with her, she could have perhaps portkeyed or apparated out (risky in any case with an infant, so she was stuck in a bind). If she had James' Invisibility Cloak which Dumbledore borrowed, maybe she could have escaped somehow. I don't know what you mean by useless death anyway. Obviously Lily's death was more "useful" but that's because of a complex Gambit Pileup more than any skill on Lily's part. If Snape hadn't told Voldemort that prophecy, if he didn't ask Voldemort to spare her, if Voldemort wasn't in a decent enough mood to think "Sure okay, I can spare the Mudblood for you to keep as a Sex Slave, you sly dog you", and if Lily didn't value her son with James Potter more than her life, her death would have been just as useless.

I will admit that the Potter attack is poorly staged. Voldemort in GF mentioned that James died "striaght backed and proud" and in Book 1, Voldemort said that James put up a fight. There's absolutely no reason for him to lie in those situations and say this stuff. So i think Rowling made a Retcon there. Understandably I think because if James had a protracted duel with Voldemort, Lily could have plausibly escaped somehow via Portkey/Apparation or simply climbing down from the window and walking away. James fighting with a wand and Lily not having hers makes the scene even more gendered (she's a great and powerful witch but now she's a mother) then it already is. Giving them both wands, only beggars disbelief that Lily didn't barricade that room better. The better option is that Lily knew what would happen to Voldemort by triggering that charm, and deliberately sacrificed herself to make Harry the Chosen One. But that's not what happens.

SonOfSharknado Love is Love is Love Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Love is Love is Love
#10063: Aug 29th 2016 at 10:42:42 PM

Snape is a guy who tried to impress the Jewish girl he was into by joining the Hitler Youth and couldn't understand why she was upset when he said she had a big nosed and controlled the economy.

My various fanfics.
SonOfSharknado Love is Love is Love Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Love is Love is Love
#10065: Aug 29th 2016 at 10:47:34 PM

And then when Magical Hitler breaks into her house and her husband heroically risks his life to go fight Magic Hitler with his fists and they both die because of it, leaving the child an orphan, Snape decides it's somehow James's fault and treats the orphan boy like shit because he looks like the guy who was a dick to him in high school.

My various fanfics.
Nikkolas from Texas Since: Dec, 2009 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#10066: Aug 29th 2016 at 10:52:26 PM

[up][up][up][up]1. No one defends Snape's treatment of the children in his care, although I'm more bothered by his actions with regard to Hermione and Neville. But name-calling is a rather minor offense and is kind of completely outweighed by the fact Snape was instrumental in stopping the greatest evil in the country, maybe on the planet. That is not a retcon, it has been consistent for most of the series, if not all of it.

2. Please don't make up things. Snape had no intention of keeping Lily as a "sex slave" and nothing says that.

3. James' death was useless because his wand was right there but he forgot it, and instead charged at the guy who can kill you with a wave of a stick. Charging a man with a weapon while unarmed is ill-advised at the best of times. Being faced down by a powerful mage with instant death in his grasp is possibly the worst scenario an unarmed person could find themselves in. If James had stopped to think for a half-second, maybe he could use all that talent you keep saying he has to actually give Voldemort some pause.

[up][up][up] He had no choice but to join the Riddle Youth. Or did you forget where he slept and lived most of his young life? Blood Traitors are hated almost as much as Mudbloods. Snape could either fit in or he could suffer Hell for seven years.

We know Snape wasn't a racist, ever.

And he obviously understand why Lily was upset.

edited 29th Aug '16 10:57:33 PM by Nikkolas

SonOfSharknado Love is Love is Love Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Love is Love is Love
#10067: Aug 29th 2016 at 10:57:48 PM

He still called Lily a mudblood. TO HER FACE.

My various fanfics.
Nikkolas from Texas Since: Dec, 2009 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#10068: Aug 29th 2016 at 10:59:04 PM

And I've threatened to kill my sister and she's threatened to kill me.

When you're really angry? You say things you don't mean.

Cross (Don’t ask)
#10069: Aug 29th 2016 at 10:59:41 PM

[up][up]Not trying to defend him there, but Snape wasn't in the best headspace at the moment.

[up]Pretty much. What makes that moment important is that it's suppose the be the final straw for Lily.

edited 29th Aug '16 11:02:13 PM by Cross

Nikkolas from Texas Since: Dec, 2009 Relationship Status: Anime is my true love
#10070: Aug 29th 2016 at 11:12:34 PM

Also when people accuse Snape of Comforting the Widow, they really must not remember the flashback where we see him confessing to Dumbledore about accidentally sicking Voldemort on the Potters. Harry describes Snape's behavior and mindset as highly agitated, to the extent he "looks a little mad."

This is not the demeanor of the diabolical mastermind people characterize him as.He asked Voldemort to spare only Lily because...he likes only Lily! SHOCKING, I know. That's really all there was to the scene. Snape wanted Lily to live, couldn't care less about the other two. I have no doubt in my mind that was all that was going through his frantic brain. "Save Lily, Save Lily, Save Lily." Because that's all the scene shows or implies.

It's still absolutely horrible but not some cunning machination on his part.

edited 29th Aug '16 11:14:00 PM by Nikkolas

unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#10071: Aug 29th 2016 at 11:17:15 PM

"Snape is a guy who tried to impress the Jewish girl he was into by joining the Hitler Youth and couldn't understand why she was upset when he said she had a big nosed and controlled the economy. "

the issue is in that scene snape wasn bullied for being hitler youth, he was bullied because he cockblock James potter, who didnt understand why lily didnt choice him for being the best cock in the block.

"that's Snape's fault which he never owned up to. James saved his life"

Well is dificult to express thanks for not being eaten by his friend werewolf, in fact the real issue is why Lupin continue to be with this two when thanks to Sirius prank he almost end with a death on his hands, the fact this even didnt damage the friendship between Sirius,Lupin and James come as....wrorrying.

the reason why Snape is so intersting is because he let his on flaw direct EVERYTHING he does: he cant let the past go, he cant let his love for lily but at the same time he cant overcome his flaws, he cant forget she choice another man or that man have become better, he cant overcome the treatment of his parent, or that lily die...in sort, Snape cant really overcome anything bad that happen in his life and in some part he is self aware of this, he protect Harry because he cant let go lily and become a full villian but he cant be full hero by pretty much the same reason.

In sort Snape is anti-hero of the worst kind, one trap between the worst part of being villian and hero, it suck to be him but that make him a good chararter.

On the other hand, James just is background note, he look more like the typical 90 rebel who go the cute girl after being soft a little bit.

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"
SonOfSharknado Love is Love is Love Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: And they all lived happily ever after <3
Love is Love is Love
#10072: Aug 29th 2016 at 11:33:54 PM

[up][up] It's really hard for me to sympathize with Snape when he constantly bullied Harry for the crime of living

My various fanfics.
unknowing from somewhere.. Since: Mar, 2014
#10073: Aug 29th 2016 at 11:39:39 PM

[up]And yet he work out is way to save him so he can live...for the same reason he hate him in the first place

"My Name is Bolt, Bolt Crank and I dont care if you believe or not"
KarkatTheDalek Not as angry as the name would suggest. from Somwhere in Time/Space Since: Mar, 2012 Relationship Status: You're a beautiful woman, probably
Not as angry as the name would suggest.
#10074: Aug 29th 2016 at 11:52:41 PM

[up][up] And does the same to Neville for no real reason.

And is perfectly alright with insulting Hermione should the opportunity present itself.

He is a very unpleasant man.

edited 29th Aug '16 11:53:00 PM by KarkatTheDalek

Oh God! Natural light!
blkwhtrbbt The Dragon of the Eastern Sea from Doesn't take orders from Vladimir Putin Since: Aug, 2010 Relationship Status: I'm just a poor boy, nobody loves me
The Dragon of the Eastern Sea
#10075: Aug 30th 2016 at 6:07:56 AM

Rowling herself stated that Snape was "not a good man". He's petty, he's a bully, and he's an all around jackass.

He's also an illustration of Good Is Not Nice, since he did spent a large part of his life fighting against his former master.

Say to the others who did not follow through You're still our brothers, and we will fight for you

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