COS Chapter Seventeen: "The Heir of Slytherin"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

 

* I’ve got to hand it to JKR, this part of the book is genuinely frightening and tense.

* Still, you’ve got to wonder at how poorly thought-out Harry’s plan is. “Shutting your eyes” is not a good strategy when in the presence of a huge poisonous snake that’s trying to kill you.

* Salazar’s statue looks like a monkey. Because Slytherin House is just so evil, even their founder was sub-human.

* Harry flings his wand aside. After all, it’s not like it could be of any conceivable use in a hidden chamber with a deadly monster somewhere nearby.

* “For a second, Harry wondered how [the diary] had got there” – wait, Harry’s showing signs of curiosity? Are we sure that the real Harry hasn’t been temporarily kidnapped and replaced with a doppelgänger?

* Now Tom’s got Harry’s wand, leaving him practically defenceless. D’oh!

* Good God, but Harry’s slow on the uptake here. So he’s found Tom Riddle standing next to Ginny’s almost-dead body, Tom’s taken his wand, is refusing to help Harry, talks calmly about calling the basilisk, pockets his wand and doesn’t seem keen on leaving the Chamber. Hey, Harry, do you think that Tom might possibly not be a good guy?

* I believe it’s been noted here that Harry seems to feel a natural affinity to dark wizards and magic. It seems that Ginny’s the same (“No one’s ever understood me like you, Tom”), which gives her and Harry something in common to form a basis of their future relationship (ha! And you thought JKR just threw them together without laying any groundwork or bothering to give them any common interests! :p). ESE!Ginny would also explain things like her happiness to hex people for little or no provocation, or her willingness to defend her bf’s attempted murder in HBP.

* Now I’m imagining a fic where Harry and Ginny try and take over the WW and rule as dark king and queen. And fail miserably because they don’t have Hermione to help them.

* “If I say it myself, Harry, I’ve always been able to charm the people I needed.” A bit like Dumbledore, in fact, or for that matter Harry himself…

* “‘Haven’t you guessed yet, Harry Potter?’ said Riddle softly.” Really, Tom, a boy who still hasn’t guessed that you’re a bad guy is hardly likely to have worked out that Ginny was the one attacking people, is he?

* So Ginny knew (or at least suspected) that she was the one behind the attacks, but still didn’t tell anyone. Gryffindor courage, anyone?

* DD persuaded Dippet to keep Hagrid as gamekeeper. Given that Hagrid had allegedly killed someone, I wonder how he managed to do this? Blackmail? Imperius? After DH, I don’t think anything would surprise me.

* “‘I bet Dumbledore saw right through you,’ said Harry, his teeth gritted,” without stopping to wonder why Dumbledore didn’t tell anyone of his suspicions or do anything to try and confirm them.

* “For many months now,” said Tom, “my new target has been – you.”

“Wait,” said Harry. “You mean you don’t want to be my friend?”

* Harry’s little pro-Dumbledore speech is actually quite inspiring. Or would be, if we didn’t now know that DD has essentially been raising him for the past eleven years as a mindlessly obedient soldier, which makes it look rather creepy.

* Fawkes is here! Luckily he’s recovered from his rebirth in time to save Harry the indignity of being rescued by something ugly. Only the beautiful are worthy of saving Our Hero’s life!

* “We even look something alike,” says Tom, foreshadowing the dishy!Harry of HBP onwards.

* Sill, Tom’s really naïve to think that he and Harry are at all similar. Harry’s in Gryffindor, remember? That alone outweighs any petty similarities in background, looks, morals or behaviour that Tom could ever come up with.

* Now this is where Tom’s Pureblood mania really comes back to bite him on the bum. If he’d been more familiar with Muggle fiction like James Bond, he’d know that villains who kill their opponents in really long-winded and theatrical ways always end up being defeated at the last moment. Much better just to AK Harry and Fawkes, then magically burn their bodies along with the Hat, just to be on the safe side.

* Even with Fawkes’ and Tom’s help, Harry would still have been snake-food were it not for the fact that God JK Rowling the basilisk sweeps the Sorting Hat into his arms.

* No, Tom, don’t take your time! Learn from all those Bond villains, finish him off quickly!

* Fawkes gives Harry Tom’s diary, when surely a real Gryffindor would let him fight it out, man-to-man. Christ, DD, what were you thinking of, getting this cissy pet bird? It’s probably some cowardly Ravenclaw. Those Gryffindor-coloured feathers are just a disguise to try and make it look brave!

* JK Rowling pulls her trick of having characters crying to distract from the fact that their behaviour has been pretty shoddy. She’ll do it again with Hagrid in POA.

* Interesting to see how Ginny’s main concern is that she’ll get expelled, rather than, say, whether she’s hurt anyone. Good to see she’s got her priorities right.

* Back off, Ron, only the Chosen One’s good enough to comfort Ginny!

* Ron’s “grinning” at Lockhart’s predicament. Yay, let’s laugh at the person with serious brain damage! You can tell he’s a true Gryffindor, alright.

* It would be sort of ironic if Harry had beaten Tom without needing Fawkes or the Hat, and then died of starvation along with Lockhart, Ron and Ginny because they couldn’t get out. Any bets on how long it’d take before they resorted to cannibalism?

* Harry goes to Professor McGonagall’s office. If only he’d thought of this sooner, we might have had a more believable book.

 

Comments

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

I just realized that if there were an additional basilisk attack right before this - one that, say, incapacitated McGonagall and maybe Flitwick as they patrolled the corridors (or better as they came out of McGonagall's office with Hermione after Hermione told them she'd figured it out - then Harry would have more reason to think he needed to do the rescuing, and even to ask Lockhart for help since the capable teachers (at fighting/defense) are unavailable and he sure as hell isn't going to ask Snape. Easy fix!

That's good stuff. It ranks up there with the simple but powerful fix of the movie people to the DH nonsense that Rowling inserted about Harry's 'signature spell' combined with Hedwig's death. Something that removes a big weakness of the plot.

[sunnyskywalker]

It's always a sad day when a simplified, sanitized movie adaptation actually improves on the original book, but I'm glad they exist just so we can get an idea of how things might have looked with a really on the ball author. Not that the movies are super-masterpieces, but they do take out some of the more ridiculous and convoluted parts!

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

I haven't seen the movie yet, but I was wondering with the trailers - Ollivander's talk about the Elder Wand - if the movie script had tidied up that particular Rowling error as well. It'll be interesting to see the final movie. They surely won't have the final confrontation between Harry and Voldemort, for example, consist of a long-winded boring melodramatic farcical monologue and then a single spell exchange with the dark lord killed by the fine print of suddenly introduced wand lore that no-one - in the movie or out - understands. No. I look forward to more improvements!

[sunnyskywalker]

Maybe they'll have the Elder Wand just have a propensity to work less well the more tattered the bearer's soul is. (This would explain why an "unbeatable" wand keeps getting passed on after its bearer is murdered. It's only unbeatable so long as there's a whole person/soul using it, and only the bearer's choices - not the wand's - would change the situation.) Fits with Voldemort's bad choices and doesn't require long-distance psychic communication between wands that have never "met."

Or maybe they'll have a deleted scene where Draco's wand calls up the Elder Wand for a planning session XD

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

Maybe they'll have the Elder Wand just have a propensity to work less well the more tattered the bearer's soul is.

That's a neat idea; much better than Harry's/Rowling's desperate creation of 'Transitive Wand Mastery' in very last chapter.

[majorjune.livejournal.com]

Or maybe they'll have a deleted scene where Draco's wand calls up the Elder Wand for a planning session XD

DRACO'S WAND: Hi...I'd like to speak to the Elder Wand, please...

ELDER WAND: Speaking.

DRACO'S WAND: Hi...you don't know me...

ELDER WAND: No, no...I recognize your vibe...your wizard is Draco Malfoy, right?

DRACO'S WAND: Uh, yeah, well...

ELDER WAND: What do you want?

DRACO'S WAND: We really need to talk.

ELDER WAND: About what?

DRACO'S WAND: About Tom Riddle...he goes by "Lord Voldemort" now...

ELDER WAND: That "Dark Lord" asshole? Yeah, I know, Dumbledore wouldn't stop talking about him.

DRACO'S WAND: Exactly. Well you see, I have it on good authority that he's looking for you, he wants to make you HIS wand...

ELDER WAND: Won't happen. He'd have to defeat my wizard...my old wizard's rotting away here, I tell you reception is CRAP here, I'm surprised your signal got through!

DRACO'S WAND: Well that's what I wanted to run by you...you see, point of fact, it was Draco Malfoy who disarmed Dumbledore, so shouldn't HE have become your new master?

ELDER WAND: Hmmmmm...I'd forgotten about that...long fall from that tower, y'know, sort of lost my short-term memory of what happened that night...so DRACO'S my new master...

DRACO'S WAND: Uh...not really...at least I don't think so...

ELDER WAND: What do you mean?

DRACO'S WAND: Well you see, Draco and Harry Potter got into a sort of scuffle, and, well...

ELDER WAND: Oh no! Don't tell me that Harry Potter defeated Draco, meaning HE is now my master!

DRACO'S WAND: It would seem so...

ELDER WAND: I am SOOOOO screwed!

[karentheunicorn.livejournal.com]

The girls wands discuss:

Molly's wand: You look lovely dear, I love what you'd done with that scrollwork design. I wish my maker would have carved that pattern into me.

Hermione's wand: I know, this pattern is devine. What do you think Ginny? OH crap are you still sulking?

Ginny Wand: Harry-wand still is not notice me. Oh...he's broken in half and he still will not notice me!!

Hermione's wand: Just shoot some hexes by him so he'll notice your magical ability.

Bellatrix wand: I don't care what she wants me to do..I'm not killing that redheaded little girl...can someone get this bitch witch off me. I'm tired of hearing her pout and moan about her dearest love Voldemort.

Molly's wand: Sure, hold on, I can get my witch to take out your witch. (sends the danger vibration to Molly) there...you'll be free shortly dear.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Speaking of which. WHose wand was Bell using in that last duel? Hermione still had hers. Was she using Hemione's (which i think had been left at the manor)?

[karentheunicorn.livejournal.com]

I don't remember. I was mostly going for cheesy laughs and not 100% canon on that post but yea, with all the wand switching between characters it's hard to tell who has what wand. It's like musical chairs on who gets what wand at what particular moment in DH.

Maybe Bellatrix was using Voldie's old wand!

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

I wondered about that. Of course Tom is such a drama queen that he'd have been perfectly capable of snapping the old one when he finally got the Elder one. Indeed our Tom's-eye-view of his thought processes suggested that he intended to do exactly that.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Can you please remind me where this is implied?

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

In the breaking of Dumbledore's tomb. There's a passage about how fitting it was that this would be the 'last act' of the old yew wand.

[sharaz-jek.livejournal.com]

I assumed he left it in the tomb, as a symbol of yet again beating Dumbledore and as a great big clue for the next person to seek the wand.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

That's another possibility. But since he didn't close the tomb back up (or at any rate, we weren't told he did) I don't see much sense in leaving a wand behind. Not that anyone other than Olivander is likely to be able to identiy it. But Olivander *had* been rescued by then.

Whatever. Rowling didn't feel a need to account for it, so she didn't.