(no subject)

[hpraremod]

Discussion Question #4
Here is a tough one for you. If you could change one thing in the Harry Potter books, what would it be and why?

Comments

[inkpenchantery.livejournal.com]

I would change Snape's fate in DH. In my headcannon, Snape used the opportunity during OotP to develop an antivenin because of Arthur Weasley's wound, and so kept himself secretly pumped full of capsules to release automatically if he was ever attacked. So, during the shrieking shack scene, he gave Harry his memories of Lily, and thus unburdened, whisks himself away to some locale to convalesce and get some fresh air and to finally bury the past.

[deirdre-aithne.livejournal.com]

^this. So very much this.

[masteroftrouble.livejournal.com]

I third this. there is no way Severus Snape remained dead at the end of Deathly Hallows.

[lovegingers.livejournal.com]

I completely agree! And I love your icon :)

[sara-holmes.livejournal.com]

Aside from a swift epilogue removal, I would say a small tweak to Snape's memories at the end - I always thought it would have been good to see a memory of his featuring James and Lily getting on/being together and exploring how Snape reacts and feels.

Most of the James/Lily stuff that Harry encounters along the way is pretty negative (and then jumps to them being married) so I think it would have been nice for Harry to see a bit of the transition from disliking each other to love :)

[deirdre-aithne.livejournal.com]

If I could only pick one, it's a tough call between Snape's 'death' and something from the first movie that has always made me wonder "what if". So I think I'm gonna go that route and say Harry's sort into Gryffindor.

I want to know what would have been different if Harry had been sorted into Slytherin. I imagine he'd have become Draco's friend, had he given it the chance. Severus would have had an easier time keeping an eye on him and actually would have been able to help him more, I think, as his head of house. And during Voldemort's return, well... things could have gotten much more interesting with how that could have effected things. Would the Death Eater children still rally behind the Dark Lord and their parents? Or would they have stood up for a fellow Slytherin? There is so much that could have been different and changed everything for the story, and I want to see the results of that.

[dragonhideboot.livejournal.com]

This is something I've wanted to see for a long time. I've seen one interesting fic where Harry gets sorted (along with Hermione) into Ravenclaw, but Harry's character in that fic is substantially different.

Harry in Slytherin brings up a lot of interesting possibilities.

[gamma-x-orionis.livejournal.com]

I would change the way in which Bellatrix Lestrange died.
Being killed by Molly bloody Weasley was neither a fitting nor a logical end for her - I mean, really, such a powerful witch was not going to be overpowered by a housewife.
If I had my way, either Neville or Andromeda would have been the ones to kill her - they had actual reasons for revenge, and actually knew how to fight.
It's a bit of a pet peeve of mine ;)
(Her death in the books wasn't half as bad as her death in the movies, but if I start ranting on that, I'll be here all day...)

[dragonhideboot.livejournal.com]

I definitely get what you're saying. Part of me wants Neville to have gotten it, but the other part me worries that Neville would have questioned himself a lot afterward. I like the idea of Andromeda being the one to do the deed. We get introduced to her and then she just kinda disappears again. :/

[dragonhideboot.livejournal.com]

I would replace the epilogue with an 8th book, possibly from Hermione's PoV so that the plot could return to the familiar Hogwarts grounds. I want to know too much more information. What kind of upheaval did the Ministry go through? What did Hogwarts do about the following school year? HP and RW didn't return to school but HG did, who did she socialize with and how did they stay in contact? How did everyone get set on their career paths? If we're going to stick with the ships that eventually sail in the epilogue then I want to see significant development in them (this is my main gripe with HP/GW and HG/RW, I don't feel like we've seen them enough together *as a couple*).

There's a lot more than this, but this gets it started. I keep deluding myself we'll get some answers along these lines whenever Pottermore gets running again **pokes pink site with a stick**

And another thing!

[dragonhideboot.livejournal.com]

Ok so my "one thing" is kinda a lot of things so let me try for something smaller.

If the epilogue must remain, if Snape/Remus/hedwig/Fred/etc. must stay dead, then I just want to see Snape show up at the Resurrection Stone scene.

[cleodoxa.livejournal.com]

HBP always felt like marking time for me, and then the main problem I had with DH was that it felt crowded what with the Horcruxes, the Hallows and the wandlore. I'd have liked to move some of the Horcruxes and foreshadowing of the wand stuff into HBP to allow DH to concentrate on what I think JKR was most interested in doing with that book, showing the other shoe dropping emotionally. I'd have liked the war to be longer.

[lovegingers.livejournal.com]

I agree, DH was too crammed. I think that it would have been interesting to see more of the war, too, especially because DH focused more on searching for the horcruxes with only snippets of what was happening with the fighting. Great idea :)

[scarletladyy.livejournal.com]

I would change Draco to marry Pansy. JK Rowling only brought in Astoria because she was being spiteful and didn't want Pansy to have Draco, she's even admitted that, so I would definitely change it. She said she didn't want Pansy to have her happy ending with Draco because she was a bully, yet several other bullies in the series are shown to be good guys and to be remembered happily. I am not happy that she's singled Pansy out just to be spiteful.

Harry married Ginny, Ron married Hermione, so it only makes sense that Draco would marry Pansy.

[masteroftrouble.livejournal.com]

There are so many things here I already agree with!

1- Remove the Epilogue. I'd be okay if JKR came out after and said, "Okay, so this is what I was thinking for everyone..." (like she did for various other characters). Then Fandom could take that as they wanted and not have to worry about "epilogue compliant" or "ewe" as warnings.

2- Rearrange the deaths OR change how each and every one of them happened. My roommates and I have a silly song we sing called "The 12 Days of Reading" where we remade an obvious Christmas song into DH style. One of the lines is "Five pointless deaths" because seriously, really? I know there are deaths in a war, but when you're an author and kill well-known characters, you need to show on the page that they weren't pointless. And if they WERE pointless, have your main character react accordingly. Hedwig, Snape, Fred, Colin, and Remus OR Tonks -- five pointless deaths. Actually, that list changed variably between them, haha. Anyway, the first three are always on that list because Hedwig's death was pretty much getting her out of the way (I've heard "loss of innocence" a lot, but Harry lost that when his Godfather died), Snape was a friggin potion's master, and I'm sorry, but if Fred actually died, George wouldn't have made it to the epilogue. I live with twins that are as close as Fred and George (oh boy, it's an adventure) and when they read the book, they both shut down and it took me weeks to get them normal again. Just reading about a twinship getting separated like that made them upset beyond anything; they told me later that JKR had no clue what she was writing because George wouldn't have been able to move on. It's like losing your second half. :/ Anyway, the other three are interchangeable because Colin could easily been seen as "this is what happens when you get in deeper than you can handle." Remus/Tonks, well, I always went for Tonks because she's my least favorite (she went from Bad Ass in OotP to love-sick annoyance in HBP), but at the same point she shouldn't have even been at the battle (like Colin), so it would have been Remus. In my mind, Teddy should have only lost one parent. The only point to him as an orphan was to remind Harry of himself. Boy this was a long thing.

3- Take out 90% of HBP. To me, that book was pretty much a "we're going to shove these characters together as a couple." I agree with the comment of moving more of the Horecruxes there (Harry could have found the ones in the castle) and making the war longer. I think it would have been more jarring and closer to real life if he didn't get to finish out the school year. Voldemort wouldn't have waited the whole summer to move, so it's ridiculous that it took so long for them to even START the hunt. :/

4- Have something happen to the Dursley (except for Dudley) to reflect that they had it coming. Harry lived in an abusive home until he was eleven -- that has effects on people. In the end, Dudley comes back to say "I'm sorry" in a way, but Vernon doesn't at all (Petunia is a between-the-lines gal). I don't mean kill them, but just have SOMETHING happen.

5- Ginny gets over her crush on Harry. Seriously, Neville/Ginny all the way (for a Gryffindor pairing).

I think that's it for now, lol.

[theshadowpanther]

I agree with everything. Especially for 3). It makes me think that JKR got stuck in a formula for writing the HP books and thus wasn't flexible enough to consider alternatives, such as cutting the year off and casting The Trio into the world early. Not that anybody else pointed it out, either, but still.

Just thinking about the possibilities that open up if the Trio had fled before sixth year was up makes me want to write it....

5) all the way. Poor Neville, shunted aside before he got a chance to begin...

[nutmeg-44.livejournal.com]

Ginny to have a stronger presence besides being 'Harry's Fan Club President'. She had personality and skill but she was always sidelined.

[wwmrsweasleydo.livejournal.com]

Fred's death. It was completely unnecessary and so near to the end of the last book that there wasn't even time to process it. JKR is a wonderful woman who built an amazing world full of great characters and she got nearly everything right. But not that.

[silentauror.livejournal.com]

YES! And so fucking tragic! :/ I still hate that she killed fred!

[kyriaofdelphi.livejournal.com]

Ron dies instead of Lupin and Tonks. Hermione marries Viktor.

[nevrafire.livejournal.com]

krum didnt seemed to mind much setting his eyes on getting a new girlfriend, the way he was oggling ginny at the weasley wedding. ;p

i actually thought krum was going to get killed to punish karakroff for deserting the Death eaters.

[theshadowpanther]

So many things to agree with in here, but here's one that no one has thought up yet.

1. Remove the Deathly Hallows. They are a) totally irrelevant to the story as a whole, and only serve as a bit of "distraction" for Harry when he's on the Horcrux quest (that bit with Ollivander where he has to decide between getting the Deathly Hallows and hunt the Horcruxes) and b) dei ex machina, since they allow Harry a way out of killing Voldemort with no real effort put into it. These are my main complaints about it.

Now, since I am an academic masochist, I can say that if the Deathly Hallows had been introduced in HBP instead of in DH, as someone above suggested, then I probably could have been able to stomach them. The Resurrection Stone scene at the end of DH is one of my favorites, and not having it would be a loss, in my opinion. I just don't see any point to making the Invisibility Cloak and the Elder Wand Deathly Hallows, especially when Harry only won because of his circuitous mastery of the Elder Wand..... (plus it seems to me to send a message about not taking responsibility for ending a life, no matter how it happens. I'm sure JKR did not mean it that way, but, yeah.) The Invisibility Cloak was awesome on its own, why did JKR have to glorify it up? I don't understand.

2) Godric Gryffindor's sword. I wish JKR had not put so much emphasis on Godric Gryffindor's sword. The conflict she set up by having it be goblin-made was, again, a distraction (and a cliche!) and not even a plot that was resolved at the end. In addition, Harry was an absolute jerk to Griphook (are there any other goblins besides Griphook????), which considering the lesson he learned with Kreacher seems really weird and a bit uncharacteristic. I think JKR could have introduced another method of elimination besides the already-familiar Gryffindor sword that would be as complex but not in such a weird way.

2.b) Sort of related, it seems that JKR intended for different people to eliminate each Horcrux, based on love. Why couldn't Neville and co. have defeated the Ravenclaw Horcrux? They were at Hogwarts....... JKR could have made use of the Order a lot more, instead of having them disappear behind the curtain. They could have retrieved a Horcrux, say the Slytherin locket, from the Ministry much easier than Harry and co. could have. Bill and Charlie could have handled the dragon for the Hufflepuff Cup. By limiting all the legwork and elimination to Harry, Ron, and Hermione, JKR made it at once difficult and too easy for the Trio to get rid of the Horcruxes, and implausible on top of it.

ETA: I, er, got permission from the mods to post the original rant to my journal, and I, er, expanded it a bit. If anyone is interested, it's here. ::shifty look::

[masteroftrouble.livejournal.com]

Yes, yes, yes. Everything here! I haven't re-read HBP or DH (I ignore them, mostly), so I don't get as much detail in my head from those as I do the others. But this reminded me of EVERYTHING that I feel is wrong with the last book.

[nevrafire.livejournal.com]

The Deaths. I would have Hedwig survive (that was so mean and stupid. Harry "lost his innocence" when he saw cedric get murdered because he was the spare, and then used to bring voldemort back to life.), Sirius (i dont care that the father figures had to go, it was So cruel to have sirius imprisoned for 12 years and then when he gets out he gets stuck in his childhood home that he ran away from, and then gets killed. So Unfair.

Tonks and Lupin. Equally So totally unfair. Lupin had such a crappy deal. lost his best friend, his other best friend he thought was a murderer. he was a werewolf and shunned by society. couldnt keep a job. Finally has someone who loves him no matter what, gets a family and Stupid rowling kills them both for a stupid parallel thing.

and Fred. percy should have been the one.

also kill more Bad guys. it{s so unfair that a lot of good guys died, but not that many bad guys. I would have killed lucius or Draco too.

also ron and hermione would have gotten together earlier. none of that stupid Lav lav thing. (even when i dont hate lavender i hated her as clingy girlfriend).

[slytherinjunkie.livejournal.com]

I love Ginny Weasley and therefore hated how JKR put her with Harry at the end.

Just ... no ... Ginny/Snape forever! (Alright, I'm biased)

I also would have loved to see more about how Ginny was impacted by being possessed by Tom Riddle. I mean, if it fucked up Harry when he dreamed about him, it surly would have fucked up Ginny to have been possessed by him for a whole year as an 11 year old!

I would have also found it interesting to see how the things in the story would have progressed with Ginny being sorted into Slytherin ... possible betrayal maybe?

Also, I would have either killed both Fred and George together or have both of them live. Its just not right otherwise.

I wouldn't have paired Remus with Tonks without having a more suitable exploration on how their relationship evolved. To me, it seemed like one moment they were together, the next moment they weren't and then the next moment they were married and had a baby. Way too quick for someone like me who loves to read about relationships.

Snape would have never died because he would have had to be with Ginny eventually (well, that and I love Snape :D)

And yeah, that's what I would change!

[masteroftrouble.livejournal.com]

Oh wow, I've never read Ginny/Snape. What are some of your favorites?

[freakingcrups.livejournal.com]

One thing I would change would be Ginny and Harry's happily ever after. I like Ginny, don't get me wrong, but I find her too much a 'fan' of Harry more than anything else. I don't think Harry related to her very well and I found that he had more of a connection with Luna. Luna didn't judge him and she understood him in ways I didn't think anyone else did. I felt as though JK put Harry with Ginny in an attempt to relate them to James and Lily. And I love James and Lily, I do, but I just don't see Ginny as being the one for Harry.

[theshadowpanther]

Agreed.

[alley-skywalker.livejournal.com]

Better, more rounded, more realistic antagonists. Yea, I know, that's not really a single thing, but it's what bugs me the most. JKR gave us cardboard, flat, unrealistic antagonists...basically fairytale villains, which is a big reason why I still see HP as a series more targeted at an audience of children and young teens rather than an older, more mature audience. The black-and-white approach JRK has in this whole thing really bugs me.

Re:

[magic-knickers.livejournal.com]

I agree so much. She started to add some depth to Voldemort in HBP and went about fifty steps backwards during DH. Shades of grey would have been nice.

[magic-knickers.livejournal.com]

From an academic standpoint, I love Rowling's parallels. All of the Marauders die in the reverse order of how they're listed on the map, Harry/Ginny (don't even get me started on them both being posessed by Voldemort at one point, because that was a stroke of genius) in relation to James/Lily, the father figures all dying, Teddy left an orphan like Harry--it's all brilliant, I like the ties because that's how I think, but. I don't know. A lot of it felt forced or odd or badly placed. I just feel like a lot of it was sort of unnecessary and heartbreaking. I saw Lupin's death coming at the end of Order of the Phoenix and I was still just torn up about it when it actually happened.

With that said, if I could only change one thing in the entire series, it would be the endgame pairings. A lot of them are unrealistic and forced, for one. Draco/Astoria, Rolf/Luna, and Neville/Hannah make more sense than school sweethearts being happily married for however many years. And to make it so final, what with the epilogue firmly in place, really bothers me. Harry couldn't have gone soul-searching and found some Muggle girl or something equally random? Ginny couldn't have fallen in love fifty more times before settling with Neville? Ron couldn't have dated Pansy or Cho or Gabrielle? Hermione couldn't have fallen for Remus or whoever (oh, I ship Remus/Hermione so hard)? So, I guess I want the epilogue gone.

[theshadowpanther]

Agreed. We just don't see what happens in those 19 years, and then what we do see is too pat to swallow. Argh.

[aikawa-akihiko.livejournal.com]

i remember distinctly when reading book five thinking FINALLY! Harry's getting angry! or at least feeling SOMETHING! that's what i would change about the books. harry is so passive. dumbledore knew he would have to fight voldemort and never mentioned it, never taught him extra, barely even mentioned horcruxes or what they would be or how to destroy them. even at the end when he finds out Dumbledore was just raising him to die properly, he still didn't seem to be all that upset about it. even going so far as to name his son after the man? that is just bazar to me.

[chameleon-irony.livejournal.com]

OotP was my favorite of the books because of angry!Harry.
http://chameleon_irony.livejournal.com/33865.html

[silentauror.livejournal.com]

A lot of my thoughts have already been expressed, or partially so, but here goes anyway:

1. The damned epilogue. BARF.

2. Harry/Ginny. I realize I'm a slasher and therefore biased, but there is absolutey no basis for H/G and so many reasons why it doesn't work, including: 1) she had a crush on him since before she knew him. That childhood obsession just developed into whiny-left-out-little-sister-who-had-no-place-in-the-trio. A childhood crush/hero complex is not grounds for a marriage! 2) She is exactly like miniature Mrs. Weasley, who drives Harry bananas with her micro-management and mother-henning, except she's also more demanding and less understanding. Wtf! And 3) the similarities to Lily (only less cool) are uncomfortably Freudian. I don't see Harry as being particularly gifted at relationships in general and see him as staying on his own or else going in a new direction (a gay new direction, that is), but if he was ever going to be with a Hogwarts character that we all knew and loved, and who was female, it was obviously Luna. Luna always understood Harry, gave him space when he needed space, was there when he needed a friend and no one else noticed that he did, and can relate to Harry's frequent sense of being the odd one who isn't like other people, in a way that Ginny (aka Ms. Popular) could never understand. Harry also isn't a particularly empathetic character (only under extreme duress!) and yet he empathizes with Luna in a way that he doesn't with most other people.

3) The deaths, as other people said. Remus and Tonks were pointless deaths and so glossed over that I frequently forget they even happened. That's not fair. Snape's. Not cool. A character as cool as Snape should have lived. Hedwig was just plain cruel. And Fred? WHY? Percy's death, particularly just after his final redemption, would have been far more poignant and frankly, stronger writing. To kill Fred and leave George alive? Heartbreaking. Unnecessarily so.

There is so much more. GRAWP and all of the space, literally and literarily, that he wasted. Much of the meandering backstory in places. The last-minute planning feel to so much of the series. The lack of editing. But those points were my main beefs.

re: If you could change one thing in the Harry Potter books, what would it be and why?

[vaysh]

I would change one thing. It's big, but it's not the Epilogue. I can happily live with EWE fics, and I'd hate to lose the kids.

I'd change DH to tell all the action taking part in Hogwarts from another pov than Harry's. I realise that JK did not want to lose Harry's as the main narrator but plot-wise, it would have made so much more sense to have the Hogwarts parts of DH be told by a narrator who was involved. The pov could have been Ginny (to get a girl's pov for a change) or Luna, or Neville or even Draco (would have been interesting to get a Death Eater's pov, too). JK would have gone for Neville, most likely, and it could have worked awesomely. It is my humble opinion that DH would have been a better book if we were allowed to see the Hogwarts action live, and not be told in hindsight.

[rose_stonewall]

Two things that really irritate me:

1. "All Slytherins are evil". The only Death Eater identified as a non-Slytherin is Pettigrew. All the rest are Slytherins (Lucius Malfoy) or probably Slytherins (Nott, Crabbe, Goyle, etc.). There are some good Slytherins, but they mostly seem to be pretty nasty personally - Snape, Draco Malfoy (he did help Harry by pretending not to know him in the Manor, after all) and Regulus Black. Why not have a few Slytherin students defect? Or Gryffindor/Hufflepuff/Ravenclaw students join the Death Eaters?

2. Ginny Weasley was possessed by Voldemort. Ginny Weasley became a popular, well-adjusted student. How about Dark!Ginny? Ginny joining the Death Eaters? Ginny finding the diadem on an adventure into the ROR and being possessed again? Ginny having, at the very least, some kind of moral struggle in the years after her possession? But no. :(