HBP Chapter Sixteen
Jun. 30th, 2006 11:32 am![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
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deathtocapslock*Ron reveals what an Unbreakable Vow is, though as far as I’ve seen this is still a big debate in fandom. Like it’s got to be Dark Magic because Slytherins do it so it’s a sign of how they don’t really love each other, but the Twins almost had Ron do one, and how could little kids perform something like that and so forth etc. The main thing is: are we to believe Ron that you die if you break a UV? I’m willing to go with him on this. After all, what’s the point of it if it’s not that?
*You know, since HBP I’ve seen a number of references in fandom to Harry’s wicked sense of humor, always with references to sprouts and Fred’s left buttock and err…those lines aren’t even jokes.
*The Twins come in and play a practical joke by making Ron slice his thumb open on a knife. Um…ha ha?
*Ginny’s told the Twins about Lavender, and Ron’s not displeased. As, frankly, I don’t think Ginny was displeased to have them know about her own popularity, especially when given a chance to look good and be a feminist at the same time.
*Ron throws a knife at the Twins—I can’t help but think this scene is more interesting knowing that Sectumsempra’s coming up.
*If you asked fandom five years ago which family was most likely to throw knives at each other at Christmas, do you think they’d have said the Weasleys?
*Fred asks if Percy is showing his ugly face at Christmas. I’m going to give Fred the benefit of the doubt here and say he’s covering up his true desire for Percy to come home and feeling guilty for how badly he always treated him. Benefit of the doubt? Positive spin? Delusions? You decide.
*Naturally Fred is the one to make jokes about how difficult life is for Muggles and Squibs, since he likes to engage in a little Muggle-baiting now and then.
*"If you want people to help you, you shouldn’t throw knives at them, just a hint," says George. I really hope that’s foreshadowing for Harry in the next book.
*George gets a line about some pretty girl he’s impressing with Magic. JKR is trying really hard to make Fred and George not seem like Twins out of a David Cronenberg film, with limited success.
*Ron warns Harry that everyone will say Snape isn’t really trying to help Draco, he’s just pretending to help him. Ron gets a lot smarter when Hermione isn’t around, I notice.
*Harry sort of proves my point by imagining what Hermione would have said in this situation. She’d say exactly what Ron said, only in a much more obnoxious way that would have got Harry’s back up and probably made him not tell DD at all.
*Ron almost gets himself in trouble by sounding like he doesn’t agree with Harry 100%—yipes! He backs off from that one fast.
*I really hope, though, that Harry’s "Nobody’s that good of an actor" is again laying out another one of those Jane Austen twists. After all, Snape isn’t lying about really wanting to help Malfoy. Just, imo, not by helping him kill Dumbledore and be a DE. Snape’s sincere concern seems more like proof he’s DDM to me.
*Harry hadn’t gotten a chance to talk to Hermione about what he overheard with Snape and Malfoy which is…well, pretty unbelievable nice of the author to address it with one of those passages where you feel like she just grabbed your arm and led you where she wanted you.
*Harry’s been telling Ron he told him so about Draco over and over—again, lucky this isn’t Hermione or she would have started sabotaging him somehow in response.
*Still, shouldn’t Ron and Hermione know he’s right? It’s not like Harry’s working on nothing here. He thinks Malfoy’s up to something because he’s seen and heard Malfoy is up to something.
*Ginny has over-decorated the sitting room, which is a sign of the Weasleys inner good-breeding and something Maya, if not JKR, will be able to make endearing to me.
*As it wouldn’t be a Weasley Christmas without a little cruelty, there’s a sentient creature petrified and humiliated sitting at the top of their tree. How apt.
*Fleur and Mrs. Weasley have a passive-aggressive fight over the radio. On one hand I can sympathize with Molly’s irritation at somebody talking during her program. Otoh, this is what happens when you insist that everyone has to listen to something just because you like it.
*Ron’s watching Bill and Fleur hoping to pick up tips. Awww.
*I hear that in the HBP movie Remus will be played by an actual scarecrow.
*So to review, nobody in the room enjoys the radio programme, but they all pretend to because they love Molly. Except Fleur, who dislikes Molly and knows Molly dislikes her. Nothing shocking there.
*Mr. Weasley’s office hasn’t caught a single DE. There’s a shock. I hope he’s at least gotten some nice stuff for keeping his friends from being bothered with investigations.
*Really the Ministry should just let Harry say who belongs in jail and not. Then Stan would be free and Narcissa would be in jail—it’s a foolproof system of justice!
*So does Mr. Weasley know about the secret place under the Malfoy’s floor? I ask because someone recently said Harry makes a mistake by not telling Arthur to look there, after Ron forgot to tell him about it in CoS. I’ve always assumed Ron did tell Arthur is CoS. But then, CoS is the book where Lucius refused to buy Draco the Hand of Glory we were later to assume he had so…
*Lupin turns to listen as Harry tells Arthur about Snape and the UV. I kind of love that Lupin does that for some reason.
*Seriously, what is going on with Lupin here? He’s staring into the flames thinking about okay maybe Tonks but maybe something more interesting about his spying. But he gets interested when he hears about this storyline, and then jumps in with “It’s not our business! We follow Dumbledore!” like he’s trying to convince himself. *Hopes for interesting Lupin story in Book VII.*
*Lupin neither likes nor dislikes Snape. How do people not think this guy is evil? Everyone must pick sides on this sort of thing and declare them! How can he both be friends with James and Sirius and side with them against Snape but also respect and appreciate the man’s making him Wolfsbane? You can’t be fair about someone you dislike or who has been nasty to you or the world will crumble!
*Harry tries valiantly to show Remus the proper way to spin everything Snape does into something bad, but gets nowhere. Werewolves. What are you going to do?
*Remus also refers to Draco by his first name. Can’t help but like to follow Remus’ personal code of names, which seem significant and different from other peoples.’
*Fleur starts to say something bad about the radio concert, which is either evil or funny depending on how you feel about Fleur.
*Lupin apologizes for not being able to write Harry (like he did for all those years before—oh wait, he never did), having been forced into a horrible life with the man who traumatized him as a child on Dumbledore’s orders. For Lupin this is like smashing everything in the room and Crucio-ing somebody in anger.
*Hearing he sounds bitter, Lupin gives all the reasons it’s a good thing he’s doing. I’m beginning to understand the appeal of Snupin. I think both of them feel surrounded by idiots a lot, just for opposite reasons. It’s the HMS Spies Like Us.
*How come the werewolves like Voldemort? Harry wants to know. Why do I sadly think that Harry assumes they’ve got reason to like his guys?
*You haven’t heard of Greyback? asks Lupin, gently chastising Harry for not remembering the parts of chapter six he didn’t embellish himself.
*Harry’s tunnel vision really strikes again, doesn’t it? Here he’s obsessed with finding out what Malfoy’s up to and never thinks to check out the name he dropped?
*Greyback’s plan is to bite kids young and raise them away from wizards. Do most wizard parents send their kids away when they’ve been bitten?
*Naturally Lupin had felt pity for the werewolf that bit him, unable to help seeing other points of view. He admits his own brand of reasoned argument doesn’t make much headway amongst Greyback’s hoards. I hear ya, Remus!
*Lupin laughingly remembers James referring to his werewolfism as his “furry little problem” in company, so people thought he owned a badly behaved rabbit. I know the point here is that James didn’t shun Remus because of his problem. Unfortunately having read OotP I just get this impression of James loving to talk about Remus’ being a werewolf in company because of the risk/secret factor, which I’m sure isn’t the intention.
*Lupin asks Harry if "The Half-Blood Prince" is a title he’s thinking of adopting—nice little nod to the real person who thought to adopt the title, Snape.
*Score one for Harry—Levicorpus was indeed invented when he was at school. I’m surprised it’s not studied in History of Magic, given Wizarding Culture. It’s like the wizard equivalent of the invention of penicillin or something.
*Harry reveals he sort of wanted the Prince to be Remus, Sirius (Who?) or James because he’s helped him out in his classes. Which is a little weird. It’s not like the Prince as a person has offered to help Harry with his homework. The help was purely accidental on his part.
*Harry’s never checked how old the book is. *smacks Harry in the back of his thick head*
*Harry goes to sleep thinking of the cries of bitten children. This book is really heavy on the werewolf stuff. Is it just for Greyback’s appearance and Remus/Tonks? Because it sounds like a set up for some good werewolf stuff in Book VII.
*Lavender blows it with Ron by giving him a pimp necklace that says "My Sweetheart." Unlike Hermione’s more appropriate Ron presents, like homework calendars. At least the necklace doesn’t talk, Ron!
*It’s sad that given what I’ve seen of the love stuff in this book, I wouldn’t be at all surprised if Lavender asked Hermione what Ron would like and she picked that.
*Ron reveals he and Lavender don’t talk much. Phew! That’s simple enough. You can have either Hermione or someone you can’t talk to at all even though from what we’ve seen of Lavender and Ron they probably could talk just fine. This is much simpler.
*Luckily the hideousness of Ron’s necklace is immediately outdone by the ridiculousness of Harry’s new sweater with a Snitch on the front.
*Yay Kreacher with the maggots!!
*Everyone’s wearing sweaters except Fleur upon whom Mrs. Weasley didn’t want to "waste one" which is probably best for everyone.
*Mrs. Weasley is also wearing ugly clothes, given to her by Fred and George. I wonder if the tacky gene will get passed on to Harry and Ginny’s children.
*Fred and George are so trying to take Percy’s place with Molly. And I love the way they can sort of turn into Percy incrementally without anyone noticing, because they make such a show of not being him.
*Ginny takes a maggot out of Harry’s hair and he shivers. I’ll point out here that Harry’s now been living at home with the girl he’s supposedly got the hots for, and not only doesn’t he try to chat her up (too noble? Yeah, right) but doesn’t notice her until the plot allows for it.
*Not that I’m complaining. I’m quite grateful for the H/G reprieve while we deal with the storylines that might go somewhere.
*Mrs. Weasley looks at Remus, Harry thinks, as if it’s his fault she’s getting Fleur instead of Tonks in the family. Is it his fault? I mean, is Harry just completely off-base here in mistaking Molly’s push for R/T for B/T, or did Molly entertain the idea at some point before getting involved in R/T?
*Harry asks Remus about Tonks’ Patronus and he takes his time chewing. I have to admit, reading this chapter for the second time really makes you feel for Remus. It’s like having this one really interesting character with a lot going on camouflaged by the usual Weasley white noise.
*Percy shows no interest in greeting anybody except Molly. Good for you, Percy!
*Scrimgeour and Harry, garden, blah blah, Harry won’t help Ministry blah…mascot, scapegoat, gnome…
*Harry thinks Scrimgeour’s doing just what Crouch did. Harry’s very good at noticing when people he doesn’t like do that. Not so much his own group.
*Harry holds up his fist with the scarred words on it. Please let there be a similar scene with Marietta in the next book.
*Harry acts the badass about how Scrimgeour should leave Dumbledore alone. Too bad at the end of this year Scrimgeour will still be in power while Dumbledore takes a header off a Tower, huh?
*Harry perfectly ends the scene about being his own man by declaring himself Dumbledore’s man. After all, Dumbledore’s never manipulated him. Bwahahaha!
*I guess I’ll have to wait until the next chapter to be reminded about the parsnips thrown at Percy. Joy.
*This is stellar chapter for Ginny. She gets one line and it’s not an insult! No wonder Harry barely notices her.
Idiot World
So Arthur’s team can’t catch a single DE even though we know who most of the DEs are, Harry’s overheard a little bit of a current plot and he knows about at least one secret chamber in the Malfoy house. Are we sure Stan’s not a DE? Because with his ability to drive straight I think he could take over this world pretty quickly.
Misdirected Answering
Quick Lupin, while the radio’s playing, give us some news from your interesting storyline! Please!
Final score: 2
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Date: 2006-06-30 07:22 pm (UTC)I'd be interested in reading that. It could bring up interesting questions about & connections between the two remaining Marauders – on opposing sides of the game, yet each is an outcast from the side he's chosen.
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Date: 2006-06-30 07:34 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-07-01 06:04 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2006-11-12 03:54 am (UTC)http://wkad-staff.livejournal.com/955.html#cutid1
Same essay, different discussion. Connected to the upcomming book;
'Who Killed Albus Dumbledore?' Zossima Press November, 2006.