HBP Chapter Twenty-Eight: "Flight of the Prince"

[for-diddled.livejournal.com]

* The deed done, the Death Eaters all prepare to escape. I like the way it’s Snape specifically who takes Draco away. Always concerned for his students’ safety, that man.

* Harry realises that the Petrificus Totalus Dumbledore cast on him has worn off, and casts one of his own on the final Death Eater. So for those of you who are keeping track, murdering Harry’s favourite teacher: freezing spell; spitting at Professor McGonagall: sadistic torture.

* Although why none of the other DEs heard Harry’s shouting and turned back to see what the commotion was I don’t know.

* Harry leaps over the bottom ten steps of the staircase. Wow that kid’s athletic.

* Unfortunately Harry in his rage leaves behind the invisibility cloak. Or then again, maybe that’s deliberate. He wants the Death Eaters to see who it is who’s avenging Dumbledore!

* Props to JK for proper use of the pronoun “whom”. Too few people nowadays are able to accurately tell their nominative from their accusative.

* Fenrir is introduced as “the werewolf, Greyback,” in case we’ve forgotten his introduction last chapter.

* Ginny is described as being “locked in combat with the lumpy Death Eater, Amycus”, presumably because this makes her sound much better and more skilful than “Ginny was desperately trying to dodge the hexes Amycus was casting.”

* Wow, I know these Death Eaters are meant to be sadistic thugs (or maybe righteously angry avengers of headmistresses’ honour; it can be quite difficult to tell the two apart sometimes), but casting Crucio in the middle of an ongoing battle? Really? Surely it would be better to stun her or something to neutralise her quickly and then turn your attention to other potential threats. At least Harry only ever tortured somebody when there was no other enemy in the vicinity.

* Also, Ginny’s such a super-hot Mary Sue that even Amycus comments on her looks.

* “[A]n enormous blond wizard” keeps missing with his curses, which in turn are ricocheting off the walls. Interesting, does anybody know if there are any other references in the series to spells bouncing off walls? I think I’ve seen a fanfic where a spell gets reflected by a mirror, but I don’t recall anything about walls, even ones made of really shiny polished stone.

* It seems that one of the escaping Death Eaters has launched a spell at the Gryffindor hour-glass, which is now spilling its rubies onto the floor. Because even when you’re an élite agent of the Dark Lord carrying out a critically important mission against his biggest foe, it’s still important to get one over the rival house at your old school.

* Hagrid should’ve been killed here. It would make “Hagrid’s Tale” so much more bearable in retrospect.

* Harry gets attacked from behind, but “miraculously” manages to hex one of his assailants and resume pursuit of Snape and Malfoy. TBH I think that an actual miracle – or maybe a whole series of them – is probably the most plausible way of explaining Harry’s survival through these books.

* It’s kind of sweet the way Snape sends Draco ahead to safety while turning round to cover his retreat. Admittedly Harry isn’t much of a threat, but there would still be other, more competent, people coming after him.

* I love the way Snape totally kicks Harry’s arse whilst also giving him a practical demonstration of why listening in DADA class is a good idea. See how pitifully easy it is to block you when you shout out what you’re doing? That’s why non-verbal spells are useful to know, Potter.

* Let’s all pause a while to savour this moment, shall we?

* Next year Harry will be wishing for the opportunity to face Snape in a “fair fight”, totally forgetting the fair fight they’re actually having now, and how painfully obvious Snape’s superiority in duelling is.

* Not only does Harry get his arse handed to him, but Snape has to protect him from the other Death Eaters. Ouch.

* The big blond Death Eater tortures Harry, which is a sign he’s evil. Harry just tried to torture Severus, which is a sign he’s totally righteous and badass. Yeah, go Harry!

* Although we’ll have to wait till next year for Harry to reach the stage where he can pepper his torture sessions with badass quips. Got to have some area for character development, I suppose.

* “You dare to use my own spells against me, Potter? It was I who invented them – I, the Half-Blood Prince!” Oh, that seems… curiously anticlimactic. I mean, sure, I don’t think I saw the reveal coming when I first read through the book, but the resolution to the titular mystery really ought to be given more prominence than a single paragraph in the middle of much more interesting and important things. (Oddly enough, seeing the hero of the good side getting murdered tends to make questions about who doodled in your second-hand high school textbook seem rather unimportant.) It would be one thing if this came back in the next book and had some important effect on the storyline or on Harry’s character development, but as it is it just seems like something tacked on to justify the book’s title.

* I’m not sure why Snape gets so worked up about being called a coward. He’s just shown that he can handily defeat Harry without even breaking a sweat, he really shouldn’t need the boy’s approval right now.

* Nor am I sure why he can’t fight off Buckbeak, or for that matter why Buckbeak is here in the first place. It’s not like he’s had any meaningful recent interaction with Harry that could make him want to defend the boy.

* Harry looks down on “the greatest wizard [he] had ever, or would ever, meet.” I can’t decide which is more depressing, the fact that Harry thinks Dumbledore’s the greatest wizard he’s met, or the fact that he’s probably right.

* “[N]ever again would Dumbledore speak to him, never again could he help…” So basically Harry’s life from now on will be like the 99% of the time before the Headmaster’s death when Dumbledore was pretty much ignoring him and every other student and staff member at Hogwarts.

* I’m not sure why Regulus didn’t just sign of his letter “Regulus Black” instead of the “RAB” business. From a Doylist perspective it’s clearly to keep us guessing as to who it is, but in-universe there doesn’t seem to be much reason for it.

Comments

[attilathepbnun.livejournal.com]

Perhaps that's simply the way poor Regulus always signed his letters?

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Yeah, he was hoping that Voldemort himself would go to the Birdbath and find the fake locket and go "OMFG now I won't be immortal anymore!?!?!"

[snapes-witch.livejournal.com]

* Hagrid should’ve been killed here. It would make “Hagrid’s Tale” so much more bearable in retrospect.

But, but Hagrid had to survive so we could see him carry Harry's dead body in the movie!

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Oh, that seems… curiously anticlimactic

Snape doesn't know if he'll see Potter anytime soon, and he seriously needs to let off some steam here. And he'd just had concrete proof that two generations of Potter f@ckheads would be willing to screw him over with his own spells. One of them is a saint now because the dead can do no wrong, and the other one is their world's saviour. Very comforting thought, that.

[josephinestone.livejournal.com]

Also, Ginny’s such a super-hot Mary Sue that even Amycus comments on her looks.

You're fucking kidding me. I know your not...just...ugh.

Next year Harry will be wishing for the opportunity to face Snape in a “fair fight”, totally forgetting the fair fight they’re actually having now, and how painfully obvious Snape’s superiority in duelling is.

Right! I was like: what?

Although thinking about it now, maybe he meant because then he'd be of age, but seriously one year isn't going to do that much.

Not only does Harry get his arse handed to him, but Snape has to protect him from the other Death Eaters. Ouch.

This is one of the reasons why when everyone thought Snape was evil, I was like: did you read the book; like any of them? What idiot actually does/follows the whole: only the Dark Lord is allowed to kill him. Seriously, if it were me, I'd be sending everyone except myself out to kill the person who is supposed to kill me. I would not be wanting to duel them.

but casting Crucio in the middle of an ongoing battle? Really?

This has never ever made sense to me. From a writer's point of view, I can sort of see them trying to show that in real life war death isn't quick and painless. But from the character's point of view...with magic it is. And the goal is to kill them, just do it. If we could aim right and kill quick and with the least amount of pain in our wars that is what we'd do.

Let’s all pause a while to savour this moment, shall we?

Yes.

[aikaterini.livejournal.com]

/So for those of you who are keeping track, murdering Harry’s favourite teacher: freezing spell; spitting at Professor McGonagall: sadistic torture./

And murdering Harry’s parents? Disarming spell.

/but casting Crucio in the middle of an ongoing battle?/

Again, JKR doesn’t seem to understand that torture happens away from the battlefield, not on it. Soldiers are too busy trying to not get themselves killed to worry about getting information or seeking revenge on their enemies or whatever the rationale for torture is. The time that Harry or Draco or any other person is spending trying to torture another person is time that an opponent can use to kill or harm them while their attention is focused on the person they’re trying to torture.

/even Amycus comments on her looks./

But of course none of the bad guys will ever comment on Harry’s looks. If Bellatrix did, she’d come off as an ephebophile, but if Amycus does it, it just goes to show how pretty Ginny is.

/Because even when you’re an élite agent of the Dark Lord carrying out a critically important mission against his biggest foe, it’s still important to get one over the rival house at your old school./

As other posters have pointed out, do the students even care about the House Cup anymore?

/the hero of the good side getting murdered tends to make questions about who doodled in your second-hand high school textbook seem rather unimportant/

Exactly. People said that the reveal in the HBP movie came off as half-hearted because the audience didn’t spend a lot of time with Snape or the Half Blood Prince, but neither did the readers of the book.

/I’m not sure why Snape gets so worked up about being called a coward./

Because courage is so important and cowardice is so contemptible that even the bad guys have to have the same values as the heroes in this case. We are supposed to view Voldemort’s contempt of Peter as contempt for his cowardice and Snape flips out of being called a coward here.

[oryx_leucoryx]

And in DH we see the Slytherin hourglass broken with its emeralds scattered. All symbolic like that.

[lynn-waterfall.livejournal.com]

* Harry leaps over the bottom ten steps of the staircase. Wow that kid’s athletic.

Such a crazy thing to put in. How does he not break a leg? Also, a "jump" of that distance on a staircase, rather than merely falling, would usually involve bashing your head on the ceiling. If he's still on the stairs in the *tower*, there *has* to be a ceiling, because that ceiling is the underside of the stairs higher up.

Obviously not the biggest problem with this book, but still.

[josephinestone.livejournal.com]

The things I never notice...

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

In JKR's world, courage encompasses every other virtue. In fanfic I'm always seeing references to this or that character's "Gryffindor loyalty" or "Gryffindor altruism," or "Gryffindor honesty," or even "Gryffindor sentimentality." None of those characteristics have anything to do with courage, which is the only trait Godric asks for. Individual Gryffindors may or may not be loyal or altruistic or honest or what-have-you, but those are not defining characteristics of the House.

Peter was one of the more competent Death Eaters, and his betrayal of James may have had less to do with cowardice than with the fact that he had no real reason to face torture and death for the sake of someone who clearly treated him like a third-class friend.

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

Superhero contamination. People in action/adventure stories are always doing things that are either impossible, or if attempted would end up getting them injured or killed.

[lynn-waterfall.livejournal.com]

Yeah, and we see some of that in the word "chivalry" that's used in the Sorting Hat's song in the first book. The other songs we hear only mention bravery, but "chivalry" invokes various other virtues -- and as part of a whole warrior ethos, too. As though being honorable and behaving nobly also requires you to be a brave warrior.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

This is one of the reasons why when everyone thought Snape was evil, I was like: did you read the book; like any of them? What idiot actually does/follows the whole: only the Dark Lord is allowed to kill him. Seriously, if it were me, I'd be sending everyone except myself out to kill the person who is supposed to kill me. I would not be wanting to duel them.

Have you heard of the plot for the famous DC comic, "Knightfall"? Bane (a skilled mercenary with a chemical apparatus on his body that can enhance his muscle power to a scary, scary degree) decides that he wants to "break the Bat" and show Gotham who really is the mightiest person. There's no prophecy in this, but Bane makes damn sure that the good cards are on his side: first, he stages a massive breakout in Arkham Asylum (which houses all of the supervillians like Two-Face, the Joker etc.) so that Batman ended up spending an entire month trying to bring them back behind bars. During which Bane also discovered the Batcave. When an untterly exhausted Batman returned, Bane was waiting, and he was ready, culminating in the iconic "I must... BREAK YOU!" (CRACK!) splash-page.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

I tried leaping from six steps of stairs in my elementary school (and each one is only about 16 cm high) once, but ended up cracking my ankle.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Quoting myself above the thread:

/Oh, that seems… curiously anticlimactic/

Snape doesn't know if he'll see Potter anytime soon, and he seriously needs to let off some steam here. And he'd just had concrete proof that two generations of Potter f@ckheads would be willing to screw him over with his own spells. One of them is a saint now because the dead can do no wrong, and the other one is their world's saviour. Very comforting thought, that.

(I've only very recently joined LJ, but I've been seeing lots of your posts, Marionros. I, uh, loved your indignant exasperation regarding the ills of the Potterverse society. I've recently finished reading 1984 in the original English and do you know which two parts really made me scream? The part when the old prole gut could not remember worth a damn to figure out of life was better of worse before the revolution, and the part where O'Brien very confidently said "I do not remember." after he'd just sent the back-up files of Jones, Aaronson and Rutherford into the Memory Hole.)

[hwyla.livejournal.com]

Because to Gryffindors, anyone who does not hex back is a coward. This is our first view of a 'fight' between Snape and a Gryffindor that he doesn't want to hurt. One cannot stand there in a fight and NOT hex back, expecting it to all go away. IF you are only going to defend (no offensive attacks), then you will either eventually lose (and be captured) or you must leave. We see it happen again in the next book and Minerva refers to it as his doing a runner.

Seeing Snape defend himself in 2 books in a row without actually attacking back leaves me to wonder a bit about those supposed 'holding his own' fights with the Marauders. Did he just 'defend' himself in those as well? Did he ever curse them back on a regular basis? Is that the reason that most of the spells in the potions book did little harm, but would prove rather distracting in a duel? No wonder he got so irate about having them used against him IF he specifically invented them to be a defense against the Marauders as opposed to an offensive prank?

Not saying that's ALL he intended with them. I do think he thought they would be 'funny' - that may have even been the real purpose - to have the bystanders laugh at his hexes instead of his humiliation by the Marauders (however I am not convinced that he didn't invent them as a way to earn some friends among his dorm mates).

[josephinestone.livejournal.com]

No, I've never heard of Knightfall.

I can understand the idea that someone just wants to be the person to destroy a specific person, but I don't get why you would both believe in a prophecy that says this person might destroy you, be so obsessed with it you track down a baby so they can't get you as an adult, lose to the baby destroying your body; and then still try to be the person that kills them instead of just letting someone else do it.

[seductivedark.livejournal.com]

I seem to remember that 'chivalry' is a trait that a brave warrior should cultivate in order to be, or become, a 'perfect knight.' He's already a brave warrior, but chivalry will make him sterling.

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

Technically chivalry didn't exist in Godric's time; it was invented a couple of centuries later. However...

1) History doesn't exist in the Potterverse. Everything has always been just the way it is in the present, and...

2) In a world where history does exist, whatever the Houses meant in the tenth century can have almost nothing to do with what they have evolved to mean over the course of the succeeding thousand years. An understanding of England under the rule of Ethelred the Unready tells one almost nothing about life in the UK today.

[jana-ch.livejournal.com]

--it Must Be that the Slyth was a Cowardly Coward who applied his superior knowledge and studious appliance to the art of duelling and is therefore Cheating.

Yes, Severus was always cheating like that, wasn't he? Why didn't he let his second best friend do all his work for him, like an honest hero?

[attilathepbnun.livejournal.com]

I agree it doesn't make sense, really, but that does sound like what the writer of the note was hoping.

It's a pity we have so little information about Regulus, especially about his mental state just before his death. I always thought 'the note' sounded .... well, a bit irrational

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

But that was why I made the comparison. Bane wanted to screw Batman up, there was no prophecy for or against that, he was a new villian in that story and Batman wouldn't be prepared for him or know any of his weaknesses, he's very confident in his strength and martial arts, and yet he still took measures to weaken Batman beforehand.

Compare that with voldemort. He tries to give Harry a sporting chance in the graveyard, tells his goons to leave Harry alone, and ended up making multiple fools out of himself.

After Bane broke Batman's back he didn't kill him, and Batman spent a veeery long time nursing himself back to health. He asked some other character to take on the mantle for the time being (and I think that person defeated Bane later), but afterwards that guy sunk into the dark side and a healed Batman had to go subdue *him* instead. This comic was one of the instances where Batman suffered a very crippling defeat, and eventually came back; a big credit to the villian who could achive that in the first place.

[josephinestone.livejournal.com]

This comic was one of the instances where Batman suffered a very crippling defeat, and eventually came back; a big credit to the villian who could achive that in the first place.

Yes! I love smart villians...and I like that (in the story you mentioned) Batman did let another character take his place while he healed. I like smart heroes too.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Someone else theorized that Regulus decided to die because he feared that if he let Kreacher zap him home as well, his Dark Mark might compromise the security at his family house. Possible, but WHY DIDN'T HE LET KREACHER GO TO DUMBLEDORE WITH THE DAMN THING AND CONFESS? Dumbledore would've destroyed it, and then still fall into the false sense of security because he didn't know there was more (a heavily-protected Horcrux doesn't indicate more like the careless diary did in canon), and then Godric's Hollow happens and the Harrycrux would still be created.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Batman has an excellent Rogues Gallery, and it further enhances his own character when he battles them and saves Gotham in the end.

[nx74defiant.livejournal.com]

WHY DIDN'T HE LET KREACHER GO TO DUMBLEDORE WITH THE DAMN THING AND CONFESS?

Because after spending 7 years as a Slytherin under Dumbledore at Hogwarts, Regulus had ZERO respect for Dumbledore.

[vermouth1991.livejournal.com]

Fair enough.

[terri-testing.livejournal.com]

Oh, goddess, re-reading this is great. Yes, cheating by doing your own work! You two are great.