deathtocapslock | HBP Chapter Six: "Draco's Detour" (Reply)

* Harry spends his days mostly playing Quidditch, i.e., sitting on a broomstick, and his evenings pigging out on Mrs. Weasley’s cooking. Somehow, though, he never seems to become overweight. Normally I’d fanwank this as a sign that using magic takes up a lot of energy, so wizards need to consume more calories than muggles do, but we never get any indication that casting spells actually does use up any energy. Possibly Harry just caught tapeworms due to the insanitary conditions of his bedroom.

* Also, if the Weasleys can afford four-plus brooms, an orchard big enough to play Quidditch in, and enough food for triple helpings every teatime, they’re clearly not as poor as they like to make out.

* Come to think of it, how would one play Quidditch in an orchard? I mean, wouldn’t all the trees get in the way a bit?

* Igor Karkaroff’s body has been found “up north” – any ideas why he’d be hiding out in northern England instead of the generic Scandinavia/Germany/Transylvania mash-up he comes from?

* Bill is being “plied with wine by Fleur”. IDK why, but that just seems like a weird choice of word to use. “Plying” somebody seems (in my opinion) to carry connotations of trying to seduce them, and I’m not sure why Fleur would need to seduce Bill, given that they’re already engaged. Still, I suppose we know what these French women are like, don’t we, always trying to seduce our menfolk with their wine and their accents.

* Foretescue’s been dragged off by the Death Eaters, apparently. You remember, Florean Fortescue, that guy who used to give Harry free ice-cream. Although I’m not sure why the Death Eaters would bother abducting him. Maybe they’re just too tight to pay for ice-cream, and want to keep him prisoner so they can force him to make the stuff for free.

* This whole Fortescue subplot cracks me up, because it’s just so obviously an attempt to appeal to the children in the audience. “OMG kiddies, Voldie’s like, so evil! Look, he even kidnapped the ice-cream guy! We’ve got to stop him, or no-one will have any ice cream ever again!”

* Oh no, Ollivander’s gone as well! Looks like everyone will have to make do with “other makers”. You know, those wand makers who totally exist, honest, but who we’ve never heard of before.

* This scene is faintly annoying for some reason I can’t quite put my finger on it. I suppose that JKR’s trying to create a sense that people are being killed and abducted and nobody knows who’ll be next, but the idea of the two shopkeepers who the readers know already being the ones to vanish seems unlikely and contrived. The authorial intervention to generate a cheap shot of drama is just too obvious.

* Harry’s made captain of the Quidditch Team – odd, since he’s never shown any real aptitude for leadership – which gives him equal status with the prefects – why am I not surprised? – and hence, as Hermione says, the right to use the prefects’ bathroom. Not that this really means anything, as Harry never has a bath anyway.

* Maybe that’s why Dumbles made Harry captain – he was hoping that the boy would finally be motivated to go and wash himself once in a while, and wouldn’t stink up the Headmaster’s Office during their secret lessons.

* Hagrid’s here. Bugger.

* “Buckbeak – Witherwings, I mean…” *facepalm* And the first thing Hagrid says is, naturally, a big security risk which anybody with more brain cells than fingers would be able to avoid. Yes, Hagrid, go shout out the name of the escaped hippogriff you’re secretly guarding, that’s a really good idea.

* “We didn’t know ‘security’ meant you!” Me neither, Harry, I’d been assuming that the Ministry would send someone half-way competent to protect their one hope of victory in the current war, but then, the wizarding world is constantly excelling itself in the stupidity department.

* “See, the Ministry wanted ter send a bunch o’ Aurors, but Dumbledore said I’d do.” Oh, so it’s Dumbledore we’ve got to blame for sending this irritating monstrosity to trouble our pages. Maybe he was secretly hoping that Hagrid would mess up somehow, the Death Eaters would kill Harry, and there would be one less horcrux to worry about.

* I can’t see what covering up all the shop fronts in Diagon Alley with security posters would achieve, other than perhaps spreading panic throughout the magical population. Maybe whoever ordered them to go up is secretly being controlled by Voldemort, and is deliberately trying to make people freak out in order to undermine their resistance.

* So Mrs. Weasley’s been delaying going to Diagon Alley until Arthur can come too because she wants as many people as possible to protect the kids… and then as soon as they get there, they immediately split up. Okay.

* And now Hagrid proves how right Dumbledore was to trust him with security by letting the kids go into Madam Malkin’s on their own. *rolls eyes*

* Draco’s here! Yay! Unfortunately he ruins his entrance by making a “you smell” joke about Hermione. Still, I suppose I shouldn’t be too hard on the poor boy: given that he’s spent all his life in a society that thinks “U-No-Poo” is the height of comedic genius, it’s no wonder his sense of humour is a little deficient.

* “‘Harry, no!’ moaned Hermione.” “Moaned”? That’s a… rather odd choice of verb there. Surely “cried” or something would be more appropriate?

* Apparently the Malfoys will do better at Twilfitt and Tatting’s, which takes its place alongside the other wand makers as one of the shops which people apparently use despite our never having been given any indication of their existence before.

* Hagrid says the Malfoys “wouldn’ dare make trouble in the middle o’ Diagon Alley, Harry, don’ worry abou’ them.” Yeah, just like the Death Eaters didn’t dare make trouble against Fortescue and Olivander, an— no, wait…

* They come to Fred and George’s shop, the front window of which is full of “an assortment of goods that revolved, popped, flashed, bounced, and shrieked.” Gosh, sounds a bit much. I think I’d get a headache if I stayed in there too long.

* Apparently instead of worrying about You-Know-Who, we should be worrying about U-No-Poo, “the constipation sensation that’s gripping the nation”. I’m rather worried that so many grown adults in the wizarding world seem to find this funny, does that count?

* One of the products available is a little wooden man who gets hanged when you play a game of hangman. Aside from being a waste of money (what’s wrong with a scrap of paper and a pencil? Oh, yeah, not zany enough), this strikes me as faintly sadistic. Not that that’s surprising for the wizarding world.

* Fred and George stock muggle magic tricks, for “freaks like Dad” who are into that sort of thing. Odd, if a Slytherin described people who like muggle objects as freaks, we’d all be expected to gasp with horror at their bigotry. IOIAGDI, I suppose.

* I’m not sure if Rowling’s aware of the irony of having her two rule-breaking rebels addressed as “Mr. Weasley”.

* Ginny’s raising her eyebrows sceptically, like the sassy little Mary Sue that she is.

* Fred and George are marketing their love potions exclusively to girls, it seems. Which seems odd, given that boys would surely want them as well. Or maybe that’s just in the muggle world: wizard boys seem much less highly sexed, hence why Harry only notices Ginny when she’s literally sitting in front of him snogging someone else. Possibly all those centuries of inbreeding have sapped their libido or something.

* Also, the fact that you can openly sell what are essentially date-rape drugs in the wizarding world… no, just no.

* Say what you like about the Draco Trilogy, at least the characters there were shocked at the thought of using love potions on someone, and the use of them was strictly illegal, which is a much more realistic and healthy attitude IMHO.

* Ginny’s got loads of (well, two) boyfriends! Yeah, because she’s, like, totally cool and attractive and all the boys want her which is why she’s totally worthy of the Chosen One.

* Oh, but don’t bring it up, else you’ll be subjected to her awesome feminist girl power rant. See, she’s strong and feisty as well as hot. She just keeps getting more and more perfect.

* Ron’s reaction on being told he has to pay for stuff is to drop the boxes and start swearing. Yep, the characters in this novel are definitely less mature than they were earlier in the series.

* So the Invisibility Cloak is able to fit three sixteen-year-olds under it, and cover them all up entirely? Gosh, it sounds less an Invisibility Cloak, more an Invisibility Bedsheet. Maybe it’s charmed to expand and shrink (within a certain degree) depending on how many people need to use it.

* “They had drawn level with the only shop in Knockturn Alley that Harry had ever visited.” I know I’ve gone on about this before, but having everything happen in places or to people Harry already knows is just weird. It makes it seem so artificial, like there’s nothing in the world outside of what Harry sees.

* Wow, Hermione’s attempt to find out what Malfoy reserved is so pathetic. I really can’t believe she’d be so stupid. She’d managed to trick Umbridge the previous year, after all, and she was under much more pressure than she is now.