Deathly Hallows Chapter 4

[montavilla.livejournal.com]

The Seven Potters

Harry runs upstairs after the Dursleys leave and sees the car pulling out of the drive through the window. I may have spoken too soon last week when I said the Dursleys weren’t eaten by dragons. Here is the sentence: “The car turned right at the end of Privet Drive, its windows burned scarlet for a moment in the now setting sun, and then it was gone.” Eaten by dragons? You decide.

Without the Dursleys, Harry takes a tour with Hedwig in her cage, remembering all the good times he had when he was alone in the house. Hedwig, by the way, is still ignoring him. She isn’t really that much different from the Dursleys, is she?

In going over his memories, Harry takes pains to remind us of all the Dursley stuff from books past—and the stuff that happened in the last chapter. I wonder if this is going to continue for the whole book—each chapter going, “Hey, remember what happened six pages ago? You sure? Let me just recap it for you.”

The highlight of the tour is a return to Harry’s old cupboard bedroom. Harry remembers the strange dreams he used to have in there, with green flashes and a flying motorbike. He remembers how he mentioned that motorbike once to Vernon, nearly causing his uncle to crash the car from chagrin. Ah, good times. Good times.

I’m not sure why Vernon would react so strongly to the flying motorbike. It’s a dream for goodness sake. It’s not like Vernon even saw the motorbike, unless maybe James and Sirius used to buzz the house with it before James died. I could see them doing that.

Harry bangs his head on the low doorframe of the cupboard and uses “a few of Uncle Vernon’s choicest swear words.” It’s nice to know he learned something from his uncle.

The air outside the house shimmers as a dozen or so people appear. That’s a good image and it’ll be wonderful in the movie. But I can’t help thinking it would have been smarter to keep their Disillusion Charms up a bit longer, since they’re pretty sure the Death Eaters are watching the house.

In fact, I would have had people trickle in by ones and twos much earlier in the day if I had been Mad-Eye Moody. Why give your numbers away to the enemy like that? And it would be much easier to sneak people in while the Dursleys were there, opening doors and such.

JKR gives us a rundown on everybody in the room. More importantly, she gives us a rundown of their hair. Now I know that Mundungus has matted hair! I’ve been wondering for years!

Kingsley Shacklebolt makes sure we realize that Harry Potter is more important than the Prime Minister of England. As if we didn’t know that already. The Prime Minister is merely the Elected One. Harry is the Chosen One.

Tonks continues her character trait of demanding attention at inappropriate times by flashing a wedding ring. Harry realizes at once that she’s gotten married to Lupin. Maybe the ring is shabby and grey.

Lupin then apologizes for the seven hundredth time to Harry for having a life that doesn’t involve Harry.

Mad-Eye Moody explains that Pius Thicknesse (gone over to the “other side”) has placed Floo, Apparition, and Portkey restrictions on the house. These, Moody claims, are unnecessary because of the Lily’s love charm, which protects the house. I still don’t understand how Voldemort can’t get around that charm after using Harry’s blood. Lily’s charm never stopped Vernon (not a blood relative) or Petunia (a blood relative) from attacking Harry.

Mad-Eye then explains that Harry has a “Trace” on him, which tells the Ministry any time Harry (or any underage wizard) uses magic. So… is the Ministry tracking Harry’s magic usage, or the house’s magic usage? Or is it both? Maybe it is both because Harry’s so darn special?

So, instead of using any spells, the Order is using things that don’t require them: Brooms, thestrals, and motorbikes. Harry sees flaws in this plan. So do I. For one thing, the brooms are bound to be a lot slower than the thestrals. Why not just have everyone use the super-sonic horsy things?

Moody explains that he’s going to have six people polyjuiced to look like Harry, making it harder to follow as they go in seven different directions. Harry continues to find this a stupid plan and I agree with him. How about polyjuicing Harry to look like Dudley and walking him right out the front door?

At this point all of Harry’s good friends explain that he can give them the hairs, or they’ll simply take them by force. Yep. That sounds like wizard reasoning.

Harry drops his hairs into the potion and it turns clear gold, causing Hermione to coo, “Ooh, you look much tastier than Crabbe and Goyle, Harry.”

I’m just going to let you contemplate that line for a moment, because there’s really no way to top it.

By the way, Ron looks at Hermione and she blushes, feeding into the Ron-jealous-of-Hermione-and-Harry thing. Wow. Who would have thunk it? Ron’s a Harmonian. Anvil-sized hints, Ron! Anvil-sized hints!

Mundungus is forced into the line of Harry-posers, causing Fleur to wrinkle her nose and move in between Fred and George. I would have thought that a bad idea on Fleur’s part (I wouldn’t move nearer to the twins for a thousand pounds), but now I pause to consider the odd absence of Fleur-harassment from the twins. Why aren’t they susceptible to her Veela-charms? Is this a hint of Twincest?

Despite Hermione’s admiration of Harry’s essence, all the Harry-posers gasp and grimace as they drink the potion. So, I’m going to go ahead and conclude that Harry tastes like urine.

Hmmm. Hermione and Mundungus get taller as they drink the potion. The twins and Ron get shorter. In previous books, the twins were described as short and stocky, like Charlie. Ron, Percy, and Bill were tall. Either the twins went through a major growth spurt after leaving school, or I’m seeing movie-bleed.

True to form, the twins make stupid jokes, Ron says something idiotic, Fleur says something insulting, and Hermione makes a meaningless observation. Moody impatiently tries to hurry the plot along and I silently thank him for it.

Several million fans cheer as Sirius’s flying motorbike makes a comeback, but the moment is immediately dampened when Harry has to sit in a sidecar and finds it humiliating. Yes, Harry. Your friends are risking their lives for you. Whining about sitting in the kiddie car is the proper response.

Moody let us know that there’s no use in locking the backdoor because the lock wouldn’t keep the Death Eaters out. Yes, but it might help prevent number 4 Privet Drive from becoming the local crack house. Geez.

Everyone assembles in the back garden, giving the Death Eaters plenty of time to realize that there are seven Potters down below. But maybe the darkness helps?

In any case, Tonks helpfully calls Ron by name. It will only be the hearing-impaired Death Eaters who follow that pair.

Even more helpfully, Moody shouts to everyone that they’ll meet up at the Burrow in an hour. I have no words….

Meanwhile, Harry is still whining about sitting in the sidecar.

They are almost immediately surrounded by Death Eaters on broomsticks and the chase begins!

Hedwig is killed within seconds. Oddly, I used to love that owl and now I just don’t care. I must be suffering from post-Charity Burbage trauma.


Harry and Hagrid are followed by four Death Eaters. That’s about right, since the Death Eaters number roughly twice as many as Order members. Which means that either the Death Eaters weren’t all that surprised by the seven Potters (they did have several minutes to figure out what was up while the party was assembling in the garden), or they react really quickly to new information.

They are, however, terrible shots. None of the spells hit Hagrid, even though he is roughly the size of a barn.

Speaking of which, Hagrid conjures a brick wall and one of the Death Eaters flies into it. He plummets down as a second Death Eater tries to help him. Guess who’s getting a spanking from Voldemort tonight!

Harry, who didn’t have brainspace to contemplate Hedwig’s death instead contemplates the Muggles who might be watching the battle and assuming that someone is doing fireworks.

Hagrid pushes the Purple Button, which sends the motorbike into hyperdrive. And, like the Millenion Falcon, this tears the vehicle apart.

Harry hits a Death Eater with Impendimenta. The man is comically frozen in air before he starts to fall. There’s no description of anyone going to save his guy. So, I’m going to assume he simply fell to his death.

Harry finally manages to process the pain of Hedwig’s death by using her as an IED, taking out another Death Eater. This one is luckier than the Impendimenta guy, as the third Death Eater helps him.

Two more Death Eaters show up. Where they came from is anyone’s guess, since they should have been following another group. But the important thing is that one guy’s hood slips and Harry recognizes STAN SHUNPIKE!

Let us pause and consider Stan Shunpike. Harry sees that his face is “strangely blank.” This doesn’t seem strange to me, since Stan Shunpike was always a little blank. But what the hey, let’s just say he’s blanker than usual. Harry assumes then that Stan is under Imperius.

How is that Harry has Imperidar and no one else does? Rosmerta was under Imperius for months and no one realized it. Apparently, Moody can’t tell that Thicknesse is Imperiused, nor could Dumbledore tell that Crouch was Imperiused. But Harry can tell just by looking?

So, instead of using Stupefy, Harry shoots an Expelliarmus at Stan, revealing himself as the real Potter. (Because no one else ever heard of that spell, right?) Harry, not realizing the significance of his spell choice, wonders what gave him away. He wonders for a couple paragraphs in fact, as though this might turn out to be important…

It’s not really. But we’ll pretend that it is to be nice. After all, Harry just lost his pet.

Now Voldemort appears, flying sans broomstick or thestral and certainly without the fruity sidecar. This is probably going to be very impressive in the film, but it’s not all that impressive in the book. Sure, no one else can fly without a broom or a horsy, but so what? You can buy a broom anywhere—or just send a stray cat to pick up one for you.

Harry stuns one of the Death Eaters, who presumably falls to his death. Wow. At this point, Harry’s killed more people than Snape. Take that, Half-Blood Prince!

Hagrid tackles the second Death Eater and they both plummet downwards. It looks like it’s curtains for Hagrid! I imagine Sistermagpie giving a premature cheer as she read this book back in 2007.

Voldemort starts to cast the killing curse, but Harry’s wand--of its own accord--shoots a “golden” spell at Voldemort. We find out later that this spell destroys Lucius Malfoy’s wand. Back at Malfoy Manor, Malfoy is cursing Dobby for not killing Harry back in CoS.

Harry hears Voldemort calling for Selwyn’s wand as Harry passes through the protective barrier surrounding the Tonks house and crashes into a mud pond. Which totally cushions the impact of the fall from several hundred feet. Totally.

Just before he crashes, Harry sees Hagrid lying spread-eagle on the ground. I wonder what happened to the Death Eater Hagrid tackled. Did he bounce off the barrier and land somewhere outside of it? Or is he squashed like a bug under Hagrid?

Fan Service:
People polyjuiced into Harry, complete with sexual innuendoes.
Twincest!
The return of the flying motorbike!
Lupin and Tonks are married!

Fan Slappage:
The motorbike? Pretty lame.
Lupin and Tonks? Pretty lame.
Hedwig’s a bitch and then she dies.

DVD Extras:
TITLE CARD:

The Shop

INT. DAY – WEASLEY’S WIZARDLY WHEEZES
GEORGE leans on the counter, reading the Daily Prophet as VERITY restocks the shelves.

FRED runs into the front room, clutching a vial of polyjuice potion. He plucks a hair from George, puts it in the potion, and drinks it down. His features contort and meld into George’s, leaving him looking exactly the same as he was before.

FRED
Look! I’m George! Geddit? I’m George!

George and Verity stare deadpan at him for a moment, then go back to their tasks.

FRED
Oh come on. That’s funny! I’m George!

CUT TO:

STOCKROOM

Through the open door, we can see Fred accosting the shoppers and insisting that they address him as “George.”

Verity, holding a cardboard box, addresses the camera.

VERITY
Yes, we got in a shipment of polyjuice about a month ago. Since then, Mr. Fred has pulled that joke approximately…. (She thinks for a moment) eight hundred times.

CUT TO:

FRONT ROOM

Verity unpacks the box on the counter near George, who is still reading the paper. Off-screen, Fred can be heard laughing hysterically. Verity smiles at George.

GEORGE
Careful. I might be Fred.

VERITY
I know the difference.

She brushes her arm next to him for a millisecond before taking the box back to the storeroom. George glances up self-consciously at the camera, then turns back to his paper with a quiet smile.

Comments

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

This was so horribly out of character. No way Harry would either (a) care, or (b) correctly identify Tonks' ring as a wedding ring. Frankly, I doubt he'd realize it was the ring she was trying to show him and would instead be looking for something weird about her hand.

Obviously it's another clue that she's actually polyjuiced!Draco!