PoA Chapter Three

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

Sure enough, a few streets away Harry collapses, unable to pull his trunk. Soon he’s panicking since he’s got nowhere to go and has just done serious magic that’s against the law. I’m sure by the end of the series Harry will have learned to control these kinds of impulsive outbursts. It’s not like he’ll come close to killing someone or throw any Crucios or be complimented for same.

While he waits for a deus ex machina, Harry indulges in another “life as an outcast” fantasy. These fantasies actually work early in the series, though, because he still believably feels genuinely powerless.

Props to Harry for his plan to bewitch his trunk, tie it to his broom, cover himself with the cloak and fly to London. Try to imagine DH Harry coming up with a plan that practical and proactive. It can’t be done.

This scene where Harry and Sirius first come face to face is surprisingly touching when you know the end. Except shouldn’t Sirius be stalking the Weasleys instead? Maybe he was just pulled in Harry’s direction because everything revolves around him eventually.

The Knight Bus appears, run by a teenaged, pimply Stan Shunpike, future Death Eater.

Stan drops his professional manner and starts talking in a cockney accent. With a delightful speech pattern like that he could never be evil!

Harry gives his name as Neville Longbottom, which is, like, symbolic because Neville could have been the prophecy boy. And also because we now know that Neville is much more heroic.

Let’s think about Stan for a minute here, since he did become kind of a confusing character for people like me who think the good guys are very often nuts. The only thing we know about Stan’s politics is that he once “bragged” to a girl that he was a DE. Which would indicate he thinks that’s something impressive. But everyone on the good side seemed to dismiss the idea he could be straight off—why? Because Stan’s stupid and bumbling? Aren’t many DEs the same? Because he has an accent and speaks in slang? Like Crabbe and Goyle? Why are people like Harry so convinced he couldn’t join Voldemort based on a few conversations as he drove a bus? Harry’s offended anyone would even investigate him.

Stan refers to the Muggles contemptuously as “Them.” Nope, no possible bigotry there.

Okay, to be fair, being contemptuous of people for not having magic isn’t considered bigotry in this universe. After all, Muggles really are inferior. And they really don’t notice nuffink, they don’—especially when it’s magically invisible. And if they do notice, they don’t remember they did once they’ve been memory charmed. Idiots.

Harry recognizes Sirius from the Muggle news. Again—who is this boy? He saw that news report a week ago. DH Harry can’t place a picture of Grindelwald from one chapter to the next.

Sirius is the most infamous prisoner ever? Is that just because everyone Harry knows must be described in exaggerated terms? Given what we see Wizards do it doesn’t seem like he should be that big a deal.

I love the little dig at Muggle guns here: “a kind of metal wand that Muggles use to kill each other”—as if Wizards don’t use wooden wands to do everything but kill each other several times a day. Muggles are just so violent.

Harry thinks Sirius looks like a vampire. Must be because he’s the sexiest of the Marauders.

Sirius allegedly murdered 13 people with one curse. Kind of puts Avada Kedavra to shame, doesn’t he? How come the DEs weren’t throwing those around in the final battle? Or at the MoM?

Come on, nobody mentions that Sirius was James Potter’s best friend? Wouldn’t that be part of the story any time it was told? Given how interested people allegedly are in the minutia of Harry’s life you’d think all the stories would include that. But it’s like everyone’s interested in Harry and not at all interested in anybody with any relationship to him except briefly Hermione. (And even she gets forgotten soon enough.)

Harry refers to Hagrid as one of the bravest people he knows. Hmmm. He’s also the stupidest. I think the two are related.

Of course Hagrid’s braveness will be outstripped by Snape, the bravest man Harry ever knew blah blah blah.

Harry worries on the bus about whether he’ll be put in jail for what he did. In a shocking twist, no one immediately appears to take the focus off his own wrongdoing and put it on someone wronging him. He actually sits there thinking that he’s in trouble without drowning it in thoughts of how justified he was and the pleasure he feels at Aunt Marge’s suffering. Who is this kid?

I guess part of growing up is growing out of that childish notion that everyone might not validate your rightness all the time.

Don’t worry, this Harry hasn’t gone completely insane. He’s not, like, worried about Aunt Marge or feeling disturbed by the loss of control, whatever the cause. He’s not disturbed by the kind of violence his rage wrought or planning to control himself in the future. But just the fact that he’s expecting punishment without getting all the more angry and therefore getting even angrier at Aunt Marge herself is, well, strange for Harry.

Fudge assures Harry Marge’s memory has been modified. For some reason they don’t modify the Dursleys’ memories. As badly as the Dursleys behave, they do somehow get themselves better treatment than most Muggles. Maybe constantly lobotomizing the Dursleys would be too creepy even for JKR.

Harry actually reminds Fudge he ought to be punished. Just think about that for a second. Harry’s reminded someone he *ought to be punished.*

Fudge explains that justice in the Wizarding World is completely based on who you know and what they need from you at the moment, and right now Fudge wants to suck up to him. Harry’s fragile sense of accountability gives up the ghost, never to be seen again.

The shocks just keep coming. Harry thinks it’s unusual that the Minister of Magic would get involved in a matter of underage magic. By DH he’d find it odd if the Minister of Magic wasn’t involved in anything Harry did.

Fudge refuses to sign Harry’s permission slip for Hogsmeade, though, because he’s not his parent or guardian and rules are rules even if laws are suggestions. W.T.F.?

I’m assuming his refusal is really a hint that he’s trying to keep him at school because of Sirius, but I love that it can be hidden because this is actually believable in this world, that the MoM would have powers that extend to arbitrarily applying laws to suit himself, but not so far as to signing school permission slips.

Hedwig’s waiting for Harry. She’s a very smart owl. Just not smart enough to ditch Harry before she gets killed.


Things that happen twice:

We hear again about Hedwig being an awesome pet who loves Harry because of the animal theme—a theme that also applies to Sirius the animagus too.

Harry dreams of a life of woe after his mistake, much like he did in PS/SS after he went after Neville’s Rememberall.

This is the second time Harry gets hauled in for underaged magic so that we can see that Fudge is giving him special treatment.

The first of many false name scenes. This time Harry gives his name as Neville Longbottom, the other boy born at the end of July to people who thrice defied Voldemort.

By the end of this chapter Harry has already worried far more about getting in trouble for accidentally blowing up Aunt Marge than he worried about accidentally eviscerating Malfoy. For those who think he shows no development.

It’s a gun. No it isn’t! It’s Chekov! No it isn’t!

Stan Shunpike
Status: If you think it was fired you're probably a bad guy. He's so obviously innocent!
Stan winds up some sort of poster child for unfair arrests, but might also be one of the few people in Potter history arrested while actually being guilty.

Sirius Black
Status: Fired.
Remember when his name was mentioned in PS/SS? Bang!

Ripper
Status: Fired.
When Snape sees this memory in Harry’s head we can totally say, OMG, I remember that story about Ripper from back in PoA!





Atomic Grenade
Invented by Peter Pettigrew, apparently.

"Fruit Cart, Fruit Cart!"
I’m sure plenty of fruit went rolling when the carts jumped out of the way of the Knight Bus.

Idiot World
Seriously, the Minister of Magic shouldn’t be getting involved in cases of underage magic. Yes, even if the kid was involved with some weirdness involving Voldemort or is possibly being stalked by the prisoner you’re trying to capture only for some reason you don’t just tell him that.

IITS
I guess maybe Peter just never taught the other DEs how to easily take out a dozen people with one spell without even aiming at them.

Nut o’ Fun
If Harry’s got to sit and stew about his problems, he might as well do it in a purple bus with magical powers.

Jabutoo Score: 5

Comments

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

I just love the snark in these reviews; you're taking such wonderful advantage of knowing what's to come and contrasting this novel with the huge fall in quality as the series progressed. It's great fun to read! :-)

While he waits for a deus ex machina ...

Hee. :-)

Why, though, did we enjoy the first few books of the series, when they, too, were riddled with one-shot wonders? (Is the Knight Bus ever used again (much)?).

I know our hatred for DH is justified in how Rowling just dropped any pretence at quality or common sense and went to town on the use of the dei ex machinis, saturating DH with them, but even the early books fit the pattern of at least one never-seen-before gimmick being hauled out at the very end to finish the story and save Harry. Why weren't we screaming back then?

Try to imagine DH Harry coming up with a plan that practical and proactive. It can’t be done.

Good God, no. No, DH!Harry would sit in a tent and wait months until one day he makes a horribly huge and stupid mistake, like saying that Taboo word.

Harry’s offended anyone would even investigate him.

Given how he's NEVER taken to task for that - not even Hermione suggests that the Ministry might be correct, or at least that due process could be followed in investigating claims that Stan's a DE - I guess we're supposed to assume that Stan is innocent. Since the series - and its moral centre - revolves around Harry.

Again—who is this boy? He saw that news report a week ago. DH Harry can’t place a picture of Grindelwald from one chapter to the next.

HA HA HA!!! *applause*

These reviews carry two separate payloads ... criticism of PoA but also condemnation of the desperate measures Rowling took in trying to jury-rig the ending of the series.

It's so sad that she felt forced to write Harry as being so dumb in DH just so she could get her plot to go where she wanted it to go.

Sirius allegedly murdered 13 people with one curse. Kind of puts Avada Kedavra to shame, doesn’t he? How come the DEs weren’t throwing those around in the final battle? Or at the MoM?

Magic really got frozen - or regressed - after book 5, didn't it? In HBP they kids all start learning how to do non-verbal spells (Harry's fairly incompetent in this new skill) but in DH the magic is all pedestrian, 4th year stuff. Polyjuice and invisibility cloak and polyjuice and invisibility cloak and Expelliarmus and polyjuice and ...

In a 'real' book - or fanfic - magic wouldn't be frozen at fourth year level. The Trio would have come across some post-seventh-year magic that completely outclassed them, end of story.

Come on, nobody mentions that Sirius was James Potter’s best friend?

That's interesting, because I *do* think that Rowling knew the story arc of her first few books back at the start; they hang together so much more than the last two or three (which are quite detached and have no real foreshadowing). I guess her huge drive to keep her secrets until the last chapter might have interfered with laying down some more talk of Sirius before PoA?

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

It is kind of interesting to realize how the magic shifts--mostly I guess because of course it was never planned out in a way to get everybody more adept at magic. Like, in many fantasy books you'd have a progression going somewhere. Here it's just kind of mimicking a school year with everybody learning...stuff. The closest we get to a class that actually seems harder or more advanced is the NEWT Potions, but even there they're pretty much doing the same things.

My favorite is always the Patronus, which of course gets introduced in this book, because sometimes it's supposed to be way hard to the point where people are impressed Harry can produce a corporal one in OotP (oddly not so much in PoA when he does it in front of a crowd...), at the same time Harry himself is teaching a roomful of students to do them, and most of the students are pretty average. Meanwhile according to JKR the Patronus is "so advanced" they don't even teach it at Hogwarts, the only school. So why do most characters have one? I think on her website somebody asked what Draco's was and she said he'd have no idea how to produce one--maybe even wouldn't know what one was? But Aberforth and Umbridge and Ernie are zapping them around no problem? Why is it so advanced?

Re: Sirius I do think it's definitely about keeping the secret. I mean, the whole book really turns on it. First he's just a crazy murderer. Then Harry learns he's after him. Then he learns he killed his parents/was his dad's best friend. But it's only in that one conversation that McGonagall suddenly starts talking about them as people she knew well as students. She's all "they were never apart!" Wouldn't that have been in all the papers?

[oryx_leucoryx]

The Patronus was used originally to repel dementors and since 1782 also Lethifolds. Up until POA the only people exposed to dementors were Azkaban prisoners, jailers and some Ministry workers dealing with dangerous prisoners. So perhaps it was a spell normally learned and used only by people in those Ministry positions (Umbridge's Patronus protects other courtroom staff but they don't conjure their own ones). Dumbledore adapted the spell to serve for sending messages and taught the modified spell to the Order members. Most people have no idea what a Patronus is when they see Harry's in the Quidditch game (or Dumbledore's in the previous game, for that matter). Later Harry teaches the DA (and maybe in DH they practiced it when Hogsmeade got swarmed with them). Casting a Patronus isn't actually that hard but being able to cast it under adverse conditions, such as while being attacked by dementors, is.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

I guess because of course it was never planned out in a way to get everybody more adept at magic.

Yes. Rowling never bothered to think out her magic, to give it any structure. Except for the thing about non-verbal spells in sixth year, which seemed to be something 'advanced' for a senior class to learn ... but that was dropped after that book. I wonder why she introduced that, when everyone in the wizarding world were back at 4th year level in DH? Am I forgetting something critical to the story of HBP? Because the whole 'non verbal spellcasting' thing would fit in beautifully as another Rowling one-book wonder.

Yes, the Patronus, which we're led to believe is super-colossal-awesome in PoA, isn't that big a deal really, everyone can do them - Harry, Ron, Hermione, Ernie, Justin, Luna, Cho, James, Lily, Snape, Remus, Tonks, Dumbledore, Arthur, Umbridge, Kingsley, Aberforth ... so I'd say your 'according to JKR' thing is just another bit of extraneous non-book nonsense, something she said without due regard for her canon or even memory of it.

(I think she once said that 'none of the death eaters' could cast a Patronus - they're all EVIL, natch - but she forgot about Snape. And Umbridge, who was certainly death eater class.)

[mmmarcusz.livejournal.com]

Bellatrix casts a non-verbal AK in HBP (in ch. 2), but for some reason Voldemort uses the incantation. Even Molly can kill with a nonverbal spell, but LV can't?

[kitrinlu.livejournal.com]

Voldie's a bit of a drama queen though - maybe he just likes the shouting?

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Yeah, the magic just plain stopped developing after this book. We got a few more spell names in GoF, but other than Accio, none of them seem to have made much impression on Rowling when she had to think of any later. And it's all very well for her to stand there on her hind legs and declaim that "magic doesn't solve your problems!" But it's a bit rich when you refuse to let a wizard actually know any magic that serves a practical use. The big magical challenge of OotP was the skill that Harry *wouldn't* learn, and it was all downhill from there.

And we still don't know whether you actually need to be holding a wand in order to Apparate.

But yeah, why *was * Padfoot down in Surrey when the Weasleys were off in Ottery-St. Catchpole? Had he already been there and they weren't back from Egypt yet, so he decided to check on Harry?

Speaking of which:

>She's all "they were never apart!" Wouldn't that have been in all the papers?<

About the only thing that might go some way toward explaining it is that the Ministry put a gag on the Prophet at the time. They had the perp, they were absolutely convinced he was the one, and he wasn't ever coming back. A fine write-up of how wonderful the Ministry's Aurors were (since, face it, they don't seem to have been all that effective in taking Voldemort out of the picture), and then put a cork in it. "Don't worry, be happy! It's safe now!"

And the public was demoralized enough to not want to ask questions -- which no one was about to answer

But then the timing, and handling, of the whole issue is such that apart from attention directed at a symbolic (and conveniently absent) Boy-Who-Lived, the whole nasty business might have been induced to slip through the cracks. After all, who was left alive to make an issue of it? Other than Remus Lupin, that is. Can you see Remus making an issue of it? *Did* we see Remus making an issue of it?

Instead we are given an impression of an immediate circus of DE trials as soon as Tom was gone -- which doesn't really seem to fit what we actually *know*. No one in the Ministry on the morning of November 1, 1981 had any more idea of who was or wasn't a DE than they had the day before.

So it could have only been once people like Karkaroff decided to buy their way out of Azkaban by giving the Ministry names, and any additional names that turned up in the investigation of *those* that got DE trials. And Sirius Black was inside already by then. And consequently, he was old news. There was so much fresher scandal to occupy the public eye, and Rita's pen.

Ergo, while there was a whole sentimental cult that sprang up over "poor little Harry Potter", and I'm sure there was a tasteful memorial write-up of poor brave Peter Pettigrew, and his poshumous Order of Merlin, I don't really think that Sirius Black's arrest and imprisonment got much space in the Prophet at all (and the Black Family probably saw to it that what there was got hidden on a back page).

If anyone had believed that the was innocent it would have been different. But by the time the knives were out, and the media was in place he was already mostly forgotten, and once the Longbottom Affair hit the fan the Black family couldn't hush that up and everything had spun out of control to the point that the whole WW had had enough of DEs and anyone who had anything to do with them. Including the people who were still trying to find and punish them.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Instead we are given an impression of an immediate circus of DE trials as soon as Tom was gone -- which doesn't really seem to fit what we actually *know*. No one in the Ministry on the morning of November 1, 1981 had any more idea of who was or wasn't a DE than they had the day before.

It is hard to understand what criteria were used to decide to arrest or release suspected DEs. On the one hand we have Sirius, arrested without trial (though Dumbledore did give some kind of evidence against him, probably specifically about him being the Potters' chosen Secret Keeper), on the other hand there is Nott, whom Dumbledore identified as DE as far back as 1956-7, who managed to get cleared. So what gives?

[sistermagpie.livejournal.com]

In that case I tend to think the throughline is that evil people are always so sneaky and get off because the good guys are disadvantages, where good people are at the mercy of the corrupt system.

[tevye-cat.livejournal.com]

Where are you getting the timeline for Nott? I haven't heard any of this. Is it from an interview, or something? Sorry to just jump in here, but I'm genuinely curious.

[eir-de-scania.livejournal.com]

The only thing that makes sense is that revealing the thruth about the marauder's school years would ruin the whole plot.

People in Stalin's Soviet gossiped more than the wizworld. Not only is the Potters never talked about, and they even had a bloody statue up. No-one talks about school at home. It's a small community - it would be impossible to keep anything secret.

Had the wizworld been like the Muggle one every child would know about the Potters, from their friends and enemies,tho what grades they got at school. Everyone would know about DD's family as well.
sure, some things aren't told in front of children, but children overhear. And older kids tell the younger.

Actually, had they been Muggles, Ron would have told Harry loads about Hogwarts on that very first train ride, things he'd picked up from his brothers. And on his first day, Harry would have been approached by some child to some old friend of James&Lily.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

>Actually, had they been Muggles, Ron would have told Harry loads about Hogwarts on that very first train ride, things he'd picked up from his brothers. And on his first day, Harry would have been approached by some child to some old friend of James&Lily.<

But that's really the hidden question, isn't it? *Did* James and Lily have all that many friends?

Lily supposedly did. Although it took us all the way to the "Prince's Tale" chapter to even discover one name. But, on consideration, I frankly don't think James did. He was "popular" in that everyone knew who e was, and many of them looked up to him, or envied him, but I think he moved inside his own little charmed circle with Sirius Black, and hadn't really much time for anyone he didn't also have to share a dorm with for 10 months of the year. Much like the twins and Lee Jordan. Apart from the rest of the Quidditch team, the twins scacely can be observed to speak to anyone they aren't trying to use as guinea pigs.

[madderbrad.livejournal.com]

The only thing that makes sense is that revealing the thruth about the marauder's school years would ruin the whole plot.

That's the essence of it, isn't it? Another slab of common sense sacrificed to set up Rowling's artificial plot.

I love this thread examining all of the gossip/ways that Harry should have learnt about his family way beyond it was revealed as the BIG SURPRISE!! in this book.

[oryx_leucoryx]

So it could have only been once people like Karkaroff decided to buy their way out of Azkaban by giving the Ministry names, and any additional names that turned up in the investigation of *those* that got DE trials.

Since in GOF Voldemort only threatens Karkaroff and Severus we know that if there was anyone else that person was dead by then.

It looks like having someone, even if that one was Dumbledore, say 'X is a Death Eater' was not enough for lasting imprisonment, they did need some kind of specific crime with which to accuse the person. That may have been why it took Moody 6 months to finally arrest Karkaroff (he was arrested around July-August 1981, so the original tip-off about him came around January-February, consistent with it coming from the newly turned Severus). But in HBP mere suspicion got 3 people arrested (with no trial) for months.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

That is a good point. Evidently Rookwood was very centrally placed in the DE heierarchy and when they started investigating him (since his was about the only name Karkaroff gave them that they didn;t already know about) rather a lot of things started unraveling.

[the-bitter-word.livejournal.com]

I wonder if the rumors and newspaper articles were more of Dumbledore's manipulations, but then the question is, what did Dumbledore have to gain by letting people think Voldemort was dead and by making Harry famous, and thus not safe? The cynic in me says Dumbledore gained followers who became alienated from the larger society and thus more dependent on him. Similarly, by seeing to it that Sirius Black was secured in Azkaban and then Grimmauld Place, Dumbledore insured Harry had no magical family to counter Dumbledore's influence.

Or maybe Rowling never had an explanation for the missing 24 hours. This was one of the holes I wish she had filled in DH. Or maybe not, considering what we got.

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Nope, no explanation on the missing 24-hours. Rowling just can't count.

[oryx_leucoryx]

Or maybe Rowling never had an explanation for the missing 24 hours.

In her Pottercast appearance after DH she still wasn't sure there *were* 24 lost hours. She said she'd look it up for the 'Scottish Book', and there will either be the story of what happened or an explanation of why those hours aren't really lost. IOW she still had no idea.

[eir-de-scania.livejournal.com]

Why, though, did we enjoy the first few books of the series, when they, too, were riddled with one-shot wonders?

***We didn't know then they were one-shot wonders, did we? JKR was still world-building at this time.

not even Hermione suggests that the Ministry might be correct, or at least that due process could be followed in investigating claims that Stan's a DE

***There is a due process to be followed? I doubt it.

[sunnyskywalker]

Why weren't we screaming back then?

Because with four books to go, we thought surely those things weren't forgotten, just waiting until the other shoe dropped. Major points of plot and worldbuilding can't just disappear, right? It would be like if everyone in real life suddenly forgot about highways or something - just can't happen.

If only we'd known...

[tdotm.livejournal.com]

---"I know our hatred for DH is justified in how Rowling just dropped any pretence at quality or common sense and went to town on the use of the dei ex machinis, saturating DH with them, but even the early books fit the pattern of at least one never-seen-before gimmick being hauled out at the very end to finish the story and save Harry. Why weren't we screaming back then?"

I thought the Knight Bus was charming! I didn't mind (and still don't) that it wasn't really used again. It was quite an effective piece of World Building - she did that quite well in those days. How many fan-fics etc have included the Knight Bus? The Deluminator, however, was a steaming pile of poo that dropped out of her arse. The difference (I think) is that the early ones made sense, the later ones - not so much, even when they didn't actively contradict what went before. Her world was basically coherent as well as enjoyable at this point - so she could get away with it. JKR was never a brilliant writer, but a good storyteller. Once that ability deserted her, more and more people started to analyse the writing which got even worse. The result? Deathly Hallows!

[jodel-from-aol.livejournal.com]

Well, yes and no. Whatever the gimmick for the adventure du jour might have been was usually introduced pretty early on, and the spells that were going to prove to be pivotal were introduced anything up to two books earlier. Over the first four books anyway.

That's one of the things that threw me in OotP when Protego was suddenly thrown at us without a proper introduction. Yes, it was refered to a couple of chapters earlier, but not by name. And it was identified after the fact abnd pointed out as being that spell that was refered to in passing a couple of chapters earlier, but it seemed as if Rowling was trying *not* to let the reader know about it until she had used it.

And that was a complete departure from how she had been working previously. It's long enough ago that we've largely forgotten about it, but she had actually built herself a very good reputation for "playing fair" up to that point. Because over the whole first half of the series she *didn't* suddenly throw things at the reader without having made sure that the reader knew about them beforehand. A reader familiar with folklore *might* have figured out that Slytherin's monster was a Basilisk, and even the average reader wasn't astonished to be told so by the time that happened. It is unlikely that anyone would have, but Rowling certainly didn't cheat us over that. No one would have figured out Imposter!Moody, but she did lay a plausible backtrail that led up to him.

Admittdly the Time-Turner was a little different. The reader wasn't told about Time-Turners beforehand. But there were instead a lot of hints and clues that something funny was going on with Hermione's schedule, so that when Albus suddenly told her to use it, the reader wasn't all that much at sea to discover that there was a hitherto unknown "it" to be used.

[tdotm.livejournal.com]

Oh I agree, her preparation was good in the beginning. She seemed to take much more (or any) care then. I liked the way she originally handled the things you mentioned. Especially as by the end she apparently forgot the spells she'd already established - the spell Hermione used on Nevile in Book One would have been a far better way of dealing with Carrow in Book 7. I appreciated the fact that she introduced certain characters earlier than necessary - eg Cedric before making him a Champion. She avoided the 'Star Trek' RedShirt scenario! (I don't mind extras being killed, but I can't be expected to care)

I liked the Knight Bus because it seemed like an interesting part of the Wizarding Community, not a desparate attempt to move Harry/the plot on after the Marge Incident - she could easily have had Harry broomstick it out of there. The problem with the later books was that she seemed to introduce new things suddenly, just to get herself/the plot out of a corner. Previously she chose what to introduce and when, but by the end she'd lost control. That's hardly a newsflash, but things like the Deluminator (a real pet hate) or that mirror could so easily have been cut out/handled better. Why bring in silly Deus Ex Machina, when they could both have been replaced by better use of the House Elves which she'd established so well and so early on? I'll stop now - House Elves in Deathly Hallows is a real flash point of mine.

[lynn-waterfall.livejournal.com]

Why, though, did we enjoy the first few books of the series, when they, too, were riddled with one-shot wonders? (Is the Knight Bus ever used again (much)?).

Not much, although of course Stan becomes an issue in HBP. Still, in OotP, Hermione did use the Knight Bus to get to Grimmauld Place (presumably from the train station), and all of the kids take it back to Hogwarts, with Remus and Tonks to guard them.

I guess it was a simple way for Hermione to get to Grimmauld Place without having to arrange it with anyone else. I don't see why it would be a better choice returning than the train, though. Surely it's less secure for the kids to be traveling with random strangers than with other kids who they've been around and will be around for months. Remus and Tonks could've managed to ride the train with the kids, somehow.

So yeah, the Bus is never relevant to the plot again.

[oryx_leucoryx]

I don't see why it would be a better choice returning than the train, though.

It's just one of Rowling's gimmicks. In each book Harry has to leave 4PD by a different method of transportation (Dursleys' car, flying Ford Anglia, Knight Bus, improvised floo connection, broom, side-along Apparition, flying motorbike). In each of the first 6 books he arrives at King's Cross in a somewhat different way - even the twice he arrives in Ministry cars (books 3 and 6) he is arriving from different places. If Rowling had Harry take the train twice in Book 5 he'd be walking twice from 12GP to King's Cross and that would have broken the pattern. Alternately, it's one of the many things she has repeating from book 3 in book 5, though only a few of them are significant (like the fact that both books give the wordings of prophecies and that they are the places where Sirius enters and leaves Harry's story).