OOTP Chapter Thirty-Three: "Fight and Flight"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

* A mercifully short chapter, this – only eleven pages long.

* Umbridge’s breathing is “ragged” now. Is this meant to be another example of Sadist!Umbridge? Like getting a thrill of pleasure at the prospect of using the weapon on the students?

* It “seemed incredible to Harry that twenty feet away there were people enjoying dinner, celebrating the end of exams, not a care in the world…” Meanwhile, it seems incredible to me that JKR has to keep resorting to this sort of contrast to emphasise Harry’s emotional state. Couldn’t she try something new once in a while?

* What’s with this emphasis on Umbridge struggling to keep up with Hermione? It’s been mentioned twice now on the first two pages (“Hermione marched purposefully across the grass – Umbridge jogging to keep up” and “She… plunged straight into the trees, moving at such a pace that Umbridge, with her shorter legs, had difficulty in keeping up”). Is it just meant to belittle Umbridge even more by making her seem physically weak and weedy, since constantly comparing her to a toad just isn’t enough?

* Umbridge isn’t doing a very good job controlling Harry and Hermione, is she? You’d have thought that as the person with the wand and no moral scruples about using it, she’d be able to force Hermione to slow down and tell her what exactly the weapon is.

* Also, how does the school make sure that no animals ever run out of the Forest and endanger pupils? There don’t seem to be any physical fences or other boundaries which could prove a hindrance, and we’re never told of any invisible magical field either. What if the Acromantulas (say) grow too numerous to support themselves off what they can catch in the Forest, and decide to spill over into the Hogwarts grounds?

* Maybe the plan is to just keep feeding them Hufflepuffs so that they’re too full to go after any of the more important students. That’s why the school authorities keep Hufflepuff as a sort of rag-bag House with no real distinguishing characteristics; it’s so that they know who can be sacrificed without real loss.

* In the finest tradition of HP villains, Umbridge suddenly has an attack of stupidity and angers the centaurs enough to make them all go after her.

* “Nooooo!” shouts Umbridge as the centaurs drag her off. Is it just me, or is that the sort of dialogue you’d expect in a comic book rather than a (supposedly grown-up) novel?

* Hermione’s worried lest Grawp kill the centaurs. Personally my money would be on the centaurs winning: they’re faster, more intelligent, more numerous, and their bows give them greater range.

* Now Harry’s started spitting at Hermione, who’s just saved Harry from being tortured and got rid of Umbridge for them. What a charming boy he is.

* Harry and Hermione’s friends appear, and say that Ginny was the best out of all of them at fighting off the Slytherins. As if we needed to be told.

* Ginny’s set her jaw “so that the resemblance to Fred and George was suddenly striking.” There is a striking resemblance, but probably not in the way JKR thinks.

* Ginny’s acting “coolly” again, a sure sign of danger.

* So Harry was all upset a few pages back because he and Hermione supposedly didn’t have enough time to go back to Hogwarts and retrieve their wands, but now they’ve got enough time to fly all the way to London? Seriously? Isn’t there a better plan they could think of? Like, I don’t know, going back and trying to convince Snape? Or using Umbridge’s fireplace to try and contact the Weasleys? Are they really stupid enough not to think of any alternatives? On second thoughts, don’t answer that last one.

Comments

[oryx_leucoryx]

I only watched a Percy Jackson movie, haven't read the book. My impression was that 'Muggles' are treated as collateral damage or hostages to be held at ransom in the gods' internal bickering. I couldn't care less who had Zeus' lightning, nor did I get the feeling Percy went after it because he cared about the fate of humanity rather than the danger to himself and his mother. (And the way he arranged his step-father's death is worthy of Hermione. Was that in the book?)

[oneandthetruth.livejournal.com]

Wow, they must have really corrupted that book in the translation! That bigotry towards Mortals does not exist in the books, as I stated above. Percy went after the lightning for a variety of reasons, but one of the major ones was that he was trying to prevent a war among the gods that would wreak havoc on Earth. And he did not, repeat, NOT kill his stepfather! He thought about it. He seriously considered it, in fact, in large part because step-dad was beating Percy's mother. But he ultimately decided not to do it, even though that's what traditional Greek heroes would have done, because he didn't want to be a murderer. I wish I could remember what it said in the book because it was put really well. He also decided his mother was an adult, so it was up to her to deal with her abusive husband. It wasn't Percy's place to treat her like a helpless damsel and rescue her. After Percy went back to Camp Half-Blood, his mother received a lot of money for her "amazingly realistic statue" of a man playing cards. She used the money to go back to school.

There's also a great scene near the end of the book where Percy meets his father, Poseidon, who tells Percy that, even though he's a great kid, Poseidon wishes he'd never been born because "a hero's life is never anything but tragic." That's a message you don't see in conventional fantasies that deserves a book all its own.

GDMFING HARRY POTTER!!! I know damned well this corrupt morality was lifted from that series to make the PJ movie more "marketable" (i.e., similar to HP) because everything you've written is CONTRARY to the morality of the books! It's bad enough HP has to corrupt the people who read it. Now it's corrupting movies made from better book series as well. THIS SUCKS!