Harry Potter & The Deathly Hallows - POTENTIAL SPOILERS

[Donovan Morningfire]

More characters (Hagrid, Percy, Neville and McGonagall for example) should have died... but then I always think that.

Seems funny that just about everyone was predicting Hagrid's death, but he managed to survive it all. Makes me curious if Rowling will ever comment on who got the reprieve and who the two additional deaths were...[/QUOTE]

The government had to have been in shambles after the story.

Given how we're shown it operates, maybe tearing it down and starting over wasn't such a bad thing. I'm sure Kingsley had some pretty good ideas for improvements. And if Harry, now the true darling of the Wizarding World, was willing to support the man publicly, then Kingsley would have little trouble getting the Ministry in order. Seems Dumbledore made a very good guess about the people best suited for positions of power and leadership are the ones that don't go seeking it

 

[RigaMortus2]

Never read the books, but is it ever explained why the Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers always turn up to be bad guys? Or why there is always a new one each year? Is there some reason behind it?

I also thought Harry would end up being the new (permanent) DAtDA teacher after he graduated.

 

[Shalimar]

Never read the books, but is it ever explained why the Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers always turn up to be bad guys? Or why there is always a new one each year? Is there some reason behind it?

I also thought Harry would end up being the new (permanent) DAtDA teacher after he graduated.

That was semi-explained in book 6, but they didn't ever give the actual mechanics. Just that ever since Dumbledore turned down Voldemort that no one ever lasted more than a year. We are left to assume that its just a string of unfortunate events possibly helped along by a curse. The curse is just conjecture though.

 

[kingpaul]

Never read the books, but is it ever explained why the Defense Against the Dark Arts teachers always turn up to be bad guys?

They weren't all bad guys. Lupin was a good guy.

Or why there is always a new one each year? Is there some reason behind it?

As Shalimar said, Dumbledore told Harry that after Voldemort was refused the post, they haven't been able to keep a teacher for more than a year. But I'm pretty sure Dumbledore said that Voldemort did place a curse. I'm going to have to dig through HBP to find that conversation now.

I also thought Harry would end up being the new (permanent) DAtDA teacher after he graduated.

That's something that I had assumed as well before reading the last book.

 

[Vocenoctum]

Seriously, do we need spoiler tags when the whole thread is going to discuss the books? Let alone using blackout and the spoiler box interchangeably?I mean hell, how are you even supposed to know how much of a spoiler it is without clicking it, since no one ever gives a non-spoiler frame of reference.


I liked the book as a finale, but it doesn't really stand on it's own much. It focused on the trio a bit too much for my taste, as they're wandering around camping out. I'd have preferred seeing some of the other ordeals going on. (I'd suspect a "sideline" book, but it's been widely said the series ends, so blah)

It was sort of amusing when Vold dies and everyone just kind of congratulates each other and goes about their business, I guess the other death eaters just disappeared right away.

Too many times, you got to read a long passage explaining details, but they weren't all accurate details. You also got stories about things, rather than the character discovering details.

Overall, I think this book was written with a movie in mind, plenty of action scene's, plot exposition in simple blocks, trimmable camping.

The 19 year scene, at the least, reveals that Potter and group don't end up at the school. I didn't care for the Harry/ Ron split (what, is it required in every book?) and didn't like bringing Umbridge back.

I do think it did a good job of filling in all the details of the plot, even if it didn't go a lot more forward and explain more in the "19 years passed" thing. (well, except that it was a few years before any of them had kids, I suppose. I'd have figured they'd start um.. "working on" that right way...)

 

[Shalimar]

I would figure that Harry, Hermione, and Ron would actually go back to Hogwarts the next year and finish out their Schooling. I mean Harry loves Hogwarts, and Hermione loves learning, and Ron loves Hermione. After they graduated with their NEWTS (with Ginny) I'd just assume that they did the usual young wizard/witch thing for a couple of years before settling down and starting their families.

 

[Ace32]

*** This whole post is a potential spoiler ***

Well, I just finished off my copy of the book.

To be honest, I was a bit disappointed. Once again, Rowling proves that she is quite capable of coming up with an extremely detailed world and complex characters - but she is utterly unable to make them likable. It seemed every single character had some sort of pressing flaw that made them whiny, emotional, and angst-ridden. I understand that the horcrux, the rising death toll, and other factors could explain these feelings - but were they even needed in the first place? After the distasteful moaning Harry and gang had in book 5, I would've been fine with a number of them getting the axe. Instead, we are given another round of Harry-Ron fighting, more pining about not knowing things, and entirely wasted chapters about camping and discussions about where horcruxes were that led nowhere. To add insult to injury, she then adds other characters to the list of shady and less than heroic types... including Dumbledore.

As for the plot itself, one could tell that she was rushing to wrap up 6 books worth of storylines. I imagine some of these revelations could've been put into other books simply to save space for this one. Percy's return is noble, but rather short. Dobby appears for almost as many pages as it takes for Harry to dig his grave and hold his funeral. Snape's ultimate sacrifice is forced, short, and ultimately pointless - he serves as Dumbledore's post-it note. Remus and Tonks make a few brief appearances and then get offed to serve as some sort of parallel to Harry's parents - ironic, considering Harry attempted to spare little Teddy that fate earlier in the book. In fact, the constant reappearance of formerly important characters in throwaway roles did little to make the book feel alive. If anything, it emphasized just how many strange coincidences were necessary for the whole plot to occur.

Then of course, there is the issue of Harry's survival as the 7th horcrux. Ok, I get that Harry needed to die for it to be destroyed... I suppose. But if it was so easy to just zap him, kill the Voldemort bit, and then let him wake up back - why did it need to be Voldy who did it? Either the two souls were one (meaning both should die) or they were not (meaning it could be seperated and destroyed somehow). To have Harry 'die', chill with Dumbledore a bit (in a dream, which was real, and apparently means Harry is strong with the force), and then return to heroicly 'disarm' Voldemort and ONCE AGAIN have him get attacked by his own magic seemed... rather pained. While I can understand that a bit of deus ex machina was necessary considering how powerful Rowling had made her villain (how could Voldy fly? did they ever address that?), this just seemed a bit much. At least give us the satisfaction of having Harry duel with Voldemort a bit before he was killed by accident for the upteenth time.

Finally, the epilogue. Wow. That was the most pointless chapter I'd read in the whole book. For starters, it took a bit to realize who the hell all the children were - as all the names are tossed at you without any really description of their appearance or age. Then as other posters have mentioned, we are given a few brief teasers about the fate of a few characters, but the majority of the chapter is spent characterizing entirely new people who we will (theoretically, considering JKL's stance on future books) never meet again. No mention of what anybody is up to, who actually survived the final battle, and what happened to the government, the death eaters, or anybody else involved in the war. If she were leading into a new series of books, this would be a fitting conclusion. Considering she isn't, she just blew a load of worthless pages that could've been spent on actually concluding the characters' storyline.

All in all, I did actually like the book. I just felt like it suffered a bit under its own weight. To be honest, I've prefered the movie portrayals of the characters and the simplified plotlines a bit more, if only because they actually make the story feel somewhat heroic.

Edit: Struck the 'potential'

 

[Steel_Wind]

Maybe

Spoiler

because he has nothing left to prove he wants to live in "retirement". He has enough gold from the Potters and the Blacks to be able to not work.

While that is true, I don't think people who turn 18 think "well - it's time to retire".

An interesting point to this are the lives and career aspirations of Daniel Radcliff, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson. By the end of the movie series, They should be 21, 20 and 19, yeas old, respectively. All with substantial fortunes in the bank (Radcliff should be worth about $50 million alone).

Imagine that for a moment. 20 years old, the star of seven blockbuster movies, typecast probably forever and wealthy beyond the dreams of 99.99% of the population. You are 20 years old and it's over.

Wow. Pretty remarkable when you stop and think about it.

But Radcliff and Grint both want to work as actors. "Retirement" is never entertained by either of them. It does seem that Emma Watson, who is as bookish in life as Hermione is in the series, wants to go to university and leave acting behind her.

But "retire" as such? No. Being a well-funded slacker and "retirement" are not the same things. It's not the age for such goals.

 

[drothgery]

*** This whole post is a potential spoiler ***

Percy's return is noble, but rather short.

This is the one thing that kind of bugged me (the short part, that is). I always expected Percy back, but I was figuring we'd get a bit of explanation that Percy's rift with his family was always something of a sham, and he'd been the Order's inside man with the Ministry (until the Thiksennse coup made that pointless).

 

[Piratecat]

Well, I just finished off my copy of the book.

To be honest, I was a bit disappointed.

Huh. I disagree with most of your points; I think my reading experience was very different from yours.

I need to chew on it a bit longer before analyzing it, though.