Building a Better Voldemort

[sunnyskywalker]

Last December, charlottehywd asked if there was a list of things that would make Voldemort a more effective villain. I figured there's no better place to compile one!

Some initial ideas to kick things off:

He could have Apparated into the Potters' house right past the anti-Apparition wards which would stop any normal wizard.

He could have actually killed Arthur with Nagini.

He could have arrested one or more Weasleys in DH and released stories about how they were being subjected to "enhanced interrogation techniques" on suspicion of blood treason in the Daily Prophet to lure Harry out. (Hey, dangling a loved one as bait worked on the kid before, why not give it another shot? It's not like it'll cost Voldemort much even if it doesn't work.)

He could have Imperiused someone close to Harry - Ron, Hermione, Lupin, Molly - making it hard for Harry to know whom to trust.

He could have turned someone close to Harry to his side by other means, either coercion or brilliant manipulation.

He could have unleashed the Inferi instead of leaving them boxed up in the garage.

We could have seen more of the damage the Dementors caused after they went AWOL after the DE breakout from Azkaban.

I'd love to hear more ideas!

Comments

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

These are all good ideas, but for me, what it all boils down to is giving Voldemort an actual personality and clear goals, rather than have him be simply a stock evil overlord. Actually give him a logical reason for going evil and hating those without magic, or else show how the rest of the Wizarding World shares his same prejudices and could become like him. Make him do genuinely horrible things to magic people on a regular basis, which are actually relevant to the story, rather than making Nazi allusions for no clear reason. Don't make him born evil; make him born okay and go evil at some future point. And so on.

[mary-j-59.livejournal.com]

Actually give him a logical reason for going evil and hating those without magic, or else show how the rest of the Wizarding World shares his same prejudices and could become like him.

Yes! And the thing is, Rowling was so close to managing that. It's clear that Tom is miserable in the orphanage and fearful of being locked up as insane; it's equally clear that prejudice against Muggleborns comes directly from the widespread prejudice against normal people (aka Muggles). Yet Rowling does absolutely nothing with these ideas. She just lets them sit there, and many readers actually do not notice them.

Getting back to my first point - Voldemort as a seducer - this is why the teenage Tom Riddle of COS is so much more effective as a villain than the grown-up Lord Voldemort. It would have been nice had we seen some damage to Ginny (and to Harry, eventually) from being possessed by him. Something only they could fully understand, and which they had to help each other fight. This would, at one stroke, have given depth to their characters, made Voldemort more scary, and made their relationship less paint-by-numbers and more probable.

My two cents.

[oryx_leucoryx]

I think the last time we *see* Tom being seductive (successfully) is with Hepzibah Smith. He makes a half-arsed attempt with Harry in the dungeon in PS, but that's it.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Yes. There was a fic where he was bullied at the orphanage and was prevented from using magic to retaliate (or even protect himself) because of the Statute of Secrecy, so he had a reason to hate both Muggles and the Ministry that let him be victimized by them. Then in HBP it turned out he was the one terrorizing the non-magical kids all along.

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

Yes, and the thing is, that's such an obvious explanation, too! Yet Rowling just HAD to make him out to have been a bad seed right from the start. Because she's a slavering determinist, or something.

This is all reminding me of another bad book I'm looking at, in which the protagonist, a super powerful magical creature, frequently "just happens" to do something unduly sadistic or cruel, which does NOTHING to drive the plot but only serves to make him look bad; yet he gets praised for it. If he has to do something, he'll accomplish it in the most sadistic manner possible, and yet he's still presented as a hero. That's kind of like what the copouts regarding Voldemort's backstory feel like: Rowling being offensive by ignoring more innocuous and logical roads she could have taken.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Mind you, environmental determinism isn't better than biological determinism nor is it more correct. Nor do I expect an author write a statistically representative sample of people in every situation and have x% of them react one way and y% some other way. But some narratives are more satisfying and sense-making than others.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

Yes, the setup of a back-story that we got in CoS and GoF seemed to be leading towards something more...and then was promptly squashed by the Pensieve sessions that we saw in HBP.

By the way, what is the name of the book you're referring to? *is curious*

[sweettalkeress.livejournal.com]

The book is called Twisted! and it follows the adventures of talking amusement-park rides. And it's horrible! It basically takes everything that was wrong with Harry Potter and ramps it up to eleven. It is so anti-human that the protagonist sees fit to brutally slaughter police officers for daring to hold him accountable for destroying people's property and attempting to murder and eat them. It is so deterministic that the protagonist has the right mother and that literally makes him the king and god of everything; meanwhile there's a whole class of characters who were doomed to be evil from the moment they came to life, just because they were destroyed at one point when they were ordinary non-talking rides (since only rides that were put out of commission by being put into storage or destroyed gain the ability to come to life). The protagonist-centered morality is so strong that anyone who does not worship the protagonist is treated as a dastardly villain who deserves to be destroyed (unless they see the light and start worshiping him down the road, the sooner the better). The protagonist himself, meanwhile, is so heinous and vile that Harry at his worst still looks better than him! And this isn't even getting into the writing, which is so outstandingly awful that I'm pretty sure it would make even Stephenie Meyer blush.

I'm actually planning to spork it over at that sporking comm, as soon as I've finished with my current job and a second, shorter Pokemon fanfic which I decided to spork by popular demand.

[kahran042]

I was intrigued by your description, so I decided to look it up, and let's just say that I'll be looking forward to that spork. :)

[charlottehywd.livejournal.com]

Wow, that sounds horrendous.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

Which fic was this?

[oryx_leucoryx]

It's a SSHG fic named 'The Cloak of Courage'. Can't remember the author's name. It's rather dark and has a lot of use of blood, so not for the easily disgusted. Also a Marriage Law Challenge fic, so not to anyone who is disturbed by this. But there is a lot of exploration of why Unforgivables are such - the author decided performing these spells does something to the caster's soul such that s/he would feel a constant 'call' to cast those spells again (worsening the more time one does it... you see where it goes) - and this was written before HBP introduced the idea that murder rips the soul.

Anyway, Tom's story is brought up by Ginny, who remembered what he told her when he possessed her in COS (and this turns out to be an important clue).

There are a few other interesting developments of characters - eg Viktor is a DE, but he still loves Hermione and wants to help her, Severus leads the DEs into an ambush, but he still wants to help the one or two he sees as real friends.

[sunnyskywalker]

Now that sounds like an interesting fic! And it allows for more Harry/Tom parallels. Harry could wonder what might have happened if he'd ever given into the temptation to really get back at the Dursleys for everything they'd done to him - how far could he have gone? And would he have been tempted to keep going with others he thought needed a "lesson" or "motivation" to stop or start doing something "for the greater good"?