Chapter Nine

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

* Seriously, is Dumbledore intentionally trying to get Harry angrier and more reckless? He's acting like those girls in jr. high who decide overnight they don't like somebody and suddenly start snubbing them, leaving them to figure out what they did wrong.

*Percy's walking past Arthur and Harry is pretty understandable and kind of professional. He didn't start a row.

*I really hate the way Arthur's given that little "I'm SO not prejudiced!" speech about Muggle baiting just so they can run into Lucius. Arthur, you spend your 9-5 hours friggin' giving Muggles brain damage. Please stop patting yourself on the back for occasionally trying to direct Twin-type pranks towards other wizards instead of Muggles.

*Lucius' face is pale and pointed now. Did it used to be pointed? He seems to be growing to look more like his son.

*Love Lucius' lines about Harry being "snake-like" and Dumbledore's favorite (I suspect Draco has no idea Lucius knows much about Harry at all besides what Draco has told him, btw).

*His best line's the one about Muggle artefacts, though. Not that Arthur took it to heart. When he's not actually bringing artefacts home and bewitching them he's all about keeping people from doing that.

*Ultimately I have very little clue what all the "Draco looks just like Lucius" stuff is supposed to mean, except that Draco happens to look like his father. There's that scene in DH where Harry is yet again hit with the fact that they look alike as if it's new information, but notices that while Lucius is an eager DE Draco is reluctant and scared. Which would be okay except that it goes no place whatsoever. Ultimately the differences between them don't seem to matter at all, since neither characters matters.

* The clink of gold in Lucius' pocket is just too funny. I wonder if he bewitches it to clink ominously at just the right moment: Montgomerius Burnsus!

*I think, btw, that this clinking of gold is often blown up into Lucius being vulgar, like he's rattling change in his pocket, but I think it's more just the natural result of having a money system based entirely on coins, because paper money isn't funderful enough.(How did JKR miss putting moving people on her paper money?!)

*Btw again, coins? Forged presumably by goblins. Who therefore think the coins belong to them. No, I don't get why Wizards use the Indian Giver (sorry, that's the phrase!) race as their bankers either. Seems a bit counter-intuitive to me too.

*I also love how only Arthur can say, "Malfoy's been giving generously to all sorts of things for years..." angrily. Damn orphans and sick people! Poor Lucius has to use his money to delay laws he doesn't want passed. A gentleman writes the laws so they don't apply to him.

*Harry suggests Fudge might be Imperiused, but if Dumbledore says he's acting on his own then he is. Am I the only one who thinks Dumbledore knows and approves of every single thing going on and is maybe manipulating it to suit his purposes?

*When Dumbledore died he left Harry is power to say who's under Imperius and who isn't in his will along with the other stupid stuff. That's how Harry gets to just tell us whether or not Stan Shunpike is Imperiused. He was nice to Harry and he speaks with the funny bus driver accent--of course he's not a DE!

*Harry is wise enough to see the lie that is the Fountain of Symbolism. It really ought to be him up there at the top with everybody looking on adoringly. This way it's just embarassing.

* Shut up, Ginny.

* People seem strangely comforted by the fact that Dumbledore "swung it" for Harry--as always, having a Big Dog beats having a justice system that's fair. It's not like you could ever find yourself without that big dog, right?

* Shut up, Hermione. Seriously, shut up. And btw, how big is this house? I hope it's re-dirtying itself as they clean.

*Hermione still denies that house elves appear to enjoy cleaning: if I don't like it, they don't like it. I wish the house elves would start an organization so Hermione didn't have to study anymore. I mean hey, Ron doesn't like it, they don't like it--she must be miserable!

*ETA: Nice of Hermione to finally agree with me in DH. Not sure why she suddenly agrees with me, but she does. Unfortunately, Kreacher sticks a knife in my heart, taking away the joy of that.

* Harry and Sirius=still not talking. They really don't have much of a relationship.

*Jesus, Hermione. I can understand thinking Harry's prefect because he's holding the badge, but the "Are you sure...?" is just pathetic. She might as well have said, "But you and I are the superior ones, Harry, aren't we?"

*Throughout the book Hermione seems to have decided that she and Harry are going to rule the world together with Ron as mascot. I still think Dean would be a better prefect.

*A second after Hermione insults Ron about the prefecture, she's defending him like Neville to his brothers. And so begins Ron's long emasculation in OotP. Welcome to your future, Ron.

* Awwwww....poor Hawwwy. Not. I just so can not relate to Harry's feelings here. Harry really does just think everything is about him--which is understandable given everything usually is, but still. Snort of laughter? Harry, face the asshole within.

*Luckily Harry eventually finds a way to be kind by remembering that this is the first time Ron had beaten him at something. Kind of puts Ron back in his place, doesn't it, given Harry's never actually respected Prefects at all? Really, if Harry had acted like a jerk about it Ron would have looked better. Personally, I could have done much better convincing Ron there was a reason for his being picked over me if I were Harry. "I've caused too much trouble," is totally like saying, "I'm better than you but for reasons that make me cooler than you they couldn't give it to me." That's eventually the conclusion everyone comes to--I think that's why Ron slinks around all year like he should be ashamed of himself.

*In the next scene everybody brags how they weren't/couldn't have been prefect--you notice? Everybody associates the job with being a goody-goody and possibly getting hexed for it. Even Lupin, the one ex-prefect in the group, immediately apologizes for it, claiming Dumbledore just wanted him to control his friends and he FAILED MISERABLY AT IT (read: did not do it) SO HE'S STILL COOL!

*And it has the right effect. Harry realizes super cool guys are not prefects. This will come in handy when he sees Draco is one, because he has not only decided he is better than Malfoy by being nice to Ron for taking his prefecture, but he's decided he's better than Malfoy by not being a prefect to begin with. Sort of. Basically Harry's position is he wanted to have his cake and eat it too, and lucky for him he really might as well have been called Harry Potter: The Boy Who Has His Cake And Eats It Too.

*Meanwhile, Molly tries in vain to reward one of her children for actually doing something other than playing mean practical jokes. Good luck, Molly.

*Anvil #2 about wizards thinking they're superior to other magical creatures (as opposed to just superior to Muggles who can only understand things like prefects right Hermione?).

*Meanwhile, the twins traffic in stolen goods in the corner. Harry, blessedly free of any prefect-type morality, worries only that if Mrs. Weasley finds out he gave them the money for their joke shop she might not think of him as her better-than-son. Well done, Harry!

*The Boggart's scene set up well with Molly being so outwardly happy--interesting it's the title of the chapter to hammer it home: HEARTBREAK WITHIN!

*As I said before, I just don't buy Molly seeing Harry in the boggart. It changes the meaning of the whole thing. Anyway, Harry Understands because he, too, feels the chilling hand of death in looking at the pictures of the people in the Order. All those people dead. Not like, say, the family in whose house he's living in, because they only cared about money and Evil.

*Really, I think every Wizard should see Dead!Harry as their Boggart if they're good people.



Pretty low this time, as bad movies don't usually deal with prefects.

Designated Hero
Harry!

Foley Work
clink clink clink

Nut o’ Fun
Love that painting!

Final score: 3

Comments

[lachlanm.livejournal.com]

And you know Stan would find it thrilling to be a Death Eater.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Yes. Yet another distortion that snuck past us by letting us assume that DEs were all like Lucius Malfoy. I mean. when considered, there really isn't *that* much to choose between Stan and, say, Craqbbe and Goyle.

Although why Scringeour didn't just flat-out *tell* Harry that Stan had the bloody Dark Mark when Harry started ragging on about him I don't know...

[lachlanm.livejournal.com]

Does the Ministry know about the Dark Mark? I thought that was one of those pieces of information Dumbledore was inexplicably still sitting on. Fudge didn't seem to know what it was in GoF.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

No Fudge didn't know about it at all. But he came in from the Dept of Magical Catastrophies, and evidently wasn;t on the "need to know" list when Barty Crouch was in charge of the DMLE. But Scrimgrour had moved up from Chief Auror or somesuch, so if he didn't know there is just no excuse whatsoever.

He would have served under Crouch for at least part of his career, even if he is young enough not to have done it during the war, but I don't get the feeling that he is to young to have taken an active part in VoldWar I. I think he came on board well before 1980.

[(Anonymous)]

Yes, Stan fits very well into one or two categories of people who could be attracted to Voldy's movement according to DD. He is a loser in a dead-end job, but with aspirations for something better and possibly a "weak seeking protection", too. And yes, he is superbly positioned for information gathering. Also, why would the DEs imperius anybody to help with such a delicate and important mission?? And choose Stan to force fighting for them, of all people? They'd have their pick of recruits in DH.


"Although why Scringeour didn't just flat-out *tell* Harry that Stan had the bloody Dark Mark when Harry started ragging on about him I don't know..."

One would hope that there are ways to hide the Mark. I mean, I know MoM is supposed to be dumb as dirt, but would something like "show of hands" be really beyond them? Besides, not everybody working for LV needs to be marked, IIRC it's just the "inner circle" or something.

Aargh! why do I try to inject sense into proceedings?! In the end, Rowling just saw Shunpike as yet another prop to demonstrate Harry's incomparable nobility and didn't even deign to clarify his allegiances...

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Yes. Actually, if you overlook the Nazi masquerade that Rowling insists upon, and take a closer look at my own prefered parallel (the KKK) Stan suddenly looks like a top candadate for recruitment as a grunt. Ignorant, poor and determined to be regarded as naturally better than *somebody*.

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

And you'd at least think Harry would consider that Stan was arrested because he was bragging about being a DE, right? Isn't that her reasoning for why Snape wanted to be one, that it made him cool? Doesn't that indicate right there that Stan thinks the DEs are cool? So why wouldn't he be one? You don't brag about your KKK membership unless you see that as something that would impress people.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

*sigh*

Absolutely. What a perfect waste of an opportunity to make a fool of Harry...