Deathly Hallows, chapter 1

[anehan]

The Dark Lord Ascending

* Am I the only one who considers the Aeschylus quote rather hilarious in the context of DH? Is "the grinding scream of death" with Harry like a presence?

* Yaxley's features are blunt. All the baddies are ugly.

* If you haven't already realized it, the Death Eaters are like Nazis. Sieg Heil.

* And we arrive at Malfoy Manor. I've always imagined the Manor looking more like Avebury Manor than Burghley House. Unfortunately JKR seems to disagree with me. No doubt the Manor is decorated with bad taste.

* A meeting of the DEs? Check. Voldemort sitting on a throne? Check. A minor character to be killed? Check. What is this, a cliché parade?

* Voldemort orders Snape to sit on his right. Usually that seat is reserved for an honoured guest. Just observing.

* Poor Dawlish. He is fated to play the role of an incompetent Auror.

* Snape the Super Spy! Wheeeeeee!

* "A squat man" speaks up and giggles wheezily. I mention it in case you forgot the ugliness of the baddies.

* Note how the DE succeed in placing the Imperius Curse on an important Ministry official. And it took them only two years. I'm rather impressed. After all, the Order doesn't manage to concoct anything resembling a plan in three years.

* Poor Pius Thicknesse. Fated from birth to become a DE puppet.

* The DEs have several people planted within the Department of Magical Transport and therefore immediately know if Harry Apparates. Am I the only one who wonders how that works? Does the Department know when anyone Apparates, or just underaged wizards?

* "I shall attend to the boy in person. There have been too many mistakes where Harry Potter is concerned. Some of them have been my own. That Potter lives is due more to my errors, than to his triumphs."

Darling Voldie, how naïve you are. It's his nobility and selfless nature that have, and always will, carry him through.

* Go, Narcissa! I've always known she was the one who ruled the roost. Farewell trophy-wife!Cissy!

* Voldemort is stroking his snake. Has it, by any chance, ever entered Ginny's chamber of secrets?

* Yes, we know the Malfoys are not in Voldemort's graces. We don't need this drawn-out taunting. Oh, sorry, I forgot. There's the exposition dump on the latest news on the Tonks-Lupin courtship to be given. They are so important to the plot that even Voldemort is interested in them.

* And we come to Charity Burbage, the respected and well-known Muggle Studies teacher. No doubt you all feel her death like a presence.

* Poor Draco. At least his character development from HBP still seems to be going somewhere. Enjoy it while it lasts.



Day-for-Night:
"It was a dark and stormy night."

IITS:
So why did it take Voldemort two years to Imperio a Ministry official? IITS!

Informed Attributes:
Voldemort is scary. Death is with us like a presence.

Misdirected Answering:
Did you hear Tonks and Lupin got married?

Nut o' Fun:
Peacocks!

Final score: 5.

Comments

[anehan]

Oh, rant away. DTCL is an ideal place for that. No canon-whores here to spoil a perfectly enjoyable rant.

This truly is an Idiot World. Voldemort has been back for two years, and it's only now that he manages to take over the Ministry. Bitch, please!

Your version of why Voldemort insists on killing Harry himself makes a lot of sense. Too bad JKR didn't emphasize that aspect of it.

[tdotm.livejournal.com]

I discovered DTCL a couple of months ago and love it! Thanks for letting me get it off my chest - here’s rant no. 2.…

Do you know what’s really wrong with this series? (Boy is that a rhetorical question!) Editing. She really should have got a non-fan, or at least a freelance not linked to her publishers to edit it, because poor editing destroyed Deathly Hallows, almost as much as the plot-free plot (which would take a lot more fixing). Sadly everyone else around her seems too scared, or in awe to correct her. If it’s true they were pressuring her to release in Summer 2007, couldn’t they have used the same pressure to force her to let someone actually EDIT the damn book?

JKR never thought things through. This is already apparent in ‘The Dark Lord Ascending‘. She had a truly fantastic idea that really went to waste in the later books, which is such a shame because it could have been totally deserving of all the praise. She isn’t the best writer (duh!) but I don’t think that was the worst problem. She needed a lot more planning and a lot less interviews. She never tidied up after herself. She left vast amounts of silly things unexplained and raised more questions than she answered - totally unnecessarily! As I read the book, I was constantly coming up with theories and answers. I’m no writer, so what does that make JKR? A real editor should have sorted all this out. Here are some examples - all from Chapter One!!

1. Why did they take so long to target the Ministry? (I suggested an answer in my earlier post)

2. Why did Voldemort insist on killing Harry Potter himself (I suggested an answer in my earlier post)

3. How was Draco punished for his failure? (This could have been touched on, or better shown - forced to kill Burbage? For someone obviously not at all keen to be where he was, forcing him to kill would be a real act of cruelty, raise the stakes and easily make up in emotional investment for the fact that victim is a complete stranger)

4. Who on earth is this Burbage person? (Again, I covered this in my earlier post. I’m happy enough as to why she was chosen, but she shouldn’t have been a stranger. V kills at random all the time - why should we care? )

5. Was Snape punished for helping Draco fail, or rewarded for killing Voldemort’s other greatest enemy? (Voldemort could have indicated in a couple of lines that Snape, had made the whole DE attack on Hogwarts worthwhile and earned his trust even more than before. Or something.)

6. Was there ever any sort of trial re:Dumbledore’s death? Was Harry interviewed by the Aurors? Were his memories taken and analysed? Was the Malfoy House raided in order to find Draco who’d mysteriously gone on the run? (Look over here Sir, it’s The Dark Lord hiding in the cellar!) Did they just all presume he’d slipped on some owl droppings and fallen?

(Ch2 could have had a couple of paragraphs of Harry remembering the investigation, (after the funeral). Maybe being angry that it looked like Snape/Draco were off the hook, or relieved if they were wanted men. Snape/Malfoy could have contacted the Ministry blaming other DEs. It would have been their word against his and Scrimegeour hated Harry. Surely Snape can fake a memory? Might need planning, but it’s her story. It’d have been better if we’d actually witnessed it happening in Book 6, before the funeral, but this is about Hallows. Show don’t Tell is important, but telling is a damn sight better than ignoring completely!)

As I said before, the answers don’t all have to be brilliant (though that’d be nice). Leaving them unanswered, however, is terrible writing, and the story itself can’t take that level of questioning.

Editing would have sorted out all the sloppiness and the books, while never masterpieces would be fine. After all, the plots have never been brilliant, though Azkaban was pretty good. Self inflicted failure in my opinion.

[anehan]

She isn’t the best writer (duh!) but I don’t think that was the worst problem.

I definitely agree. She isn't the best writer, but her earlier books show that she can be a compelling story-teller, and for me, that would have been enough.

She needed a lot more planning and a lot less interviews. She never tidied up after herself. She left vast amounts of silly things unexplained and raised more questions than she answered - totally unnecessarily!

Yes, yes! I think that's part of the problem with DH. JKR had all these unresolved storylines from the earlier books, and she should have concentrated on them. Instead, she came up with new things, like Dumbledore's storyline and the Deathly Hallows. It all had the effect of making DH feel fractured and random, while leaving all kinds of interesting questions unanswered.