Transcript for MuggleCast Episode #381, Chair Today, Gone Tomorrow (HBP Chapter 4, Horace Slughorn)
Show Intro
[Show music plays]
Andrew Sims: Welcome to MuggleCast 381. I’m Andrew.
Eric Scull: I’m Eric.
Micah Tannnbaum: I’m Micah.
Andrew: We’re going to continue Chapter by Chapter this week; we’re going to head through Chapter 4 of Half-Blood Prince. But first, we have somebody special on the show.
Eric: Aww.
Andrew: My boyfriend is joining us, Patrick. Hi, Patrick.
Pat: Hey, guys.
Andrew: How’s the room next to the room that I’m in?
Pat: [laughs] It’s good. Brooklyn is sleeping behind me.
Andrew: Okay. Lovely, lovely. Please keep me posted on him.
Micah: Patrick, I don’t know if we’ve met.
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Pat: I vaguely remember, but Andrew might be able to tell us more.
Andrew: You two did meet. Okay, I forgot. Sorry. So the reason we’re having Pat on this week is because him and I visited the Wizarding World a couple weeks ago, and it was his first time. It was his first time in Orlando, which is pretty crazy. I don’t know anybody who hasn’t been to Florida before. [laughs] So Pat, you got the entire Wizarding World experience for the first time, and I thought that was interesting to talk about. But also, Pat has actually been a longtime MuggleCast listener. And here’s a fun fact for everybody who listens to the podcast: I save literally every email that comes into the MuggleCast gmail account over the past… over the entire history of the show.
Eric: That’s deliberate? I thought that it was just overrun and we couldn’t control it. [laughs]
Andrew: Well, I have always had the MuggleCast stuff forward to my personal gmail address…
Eric: Ohh.
Andrew: … and I don’t delete anything. I love to keep it all; I just keep buying more and more space from Google because I don’t want to delete it. So sometimes what I like to do is if we have a friend of the show or something who we start talking with, I like to Google their names or go into my gmail and search their name, see if they used to email us. And Pat was one of those people. Pat, when did you start listening to the show? Do you remember?
Pat: I was a junior in high school, so it would have been 2006 or 2007.
Andrew: Okay. Well, of course, I searched for Patrick’s name, and he did email us back in the day.
Eric: Aw.
Andrew: And one of the first emails we got from you was November 7, 2007. And Pat, I’m very excited we’re going to finally respond to one of your emails! How does that sound?
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Pat: I have no recollection of sending any email, so this is going to be real exciting.
Andrew: [laughs] So we’re just going to read one, and we can answer this for you. It says… okay, so this is from 17-year-old Patrick.
“I was thinking that maybe Rowling will write another book besides the encyclopedia, to be out to buy around the time that the epolouge takes place 19 years later that could be about the lives of the characters in their later years. Just wondering what all your thoughts are about this. Signed, Patrick, 17.”
Eric: You were pretty close, dude, with the Cursed Child.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Pretty darn close. You prophesized… you’re the reason the Cursed Child is here, is a thing.
Andrew: Yeah, yeah.
Pat: The only thing I got wrong was that she didn’t write it.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: Ouch.
Eric: Nice.
Andrew: You did also misspell “epilogue,” sweetie. I’m very sorry.
Pat: Well, I’m still not good at spelling, so at least one thing is the same.
Andrew: [laughs] E-P-O-L-O-U-G-E.
Pat: Oh, geez.
Andrew: [laughs] That’s okay.
Pat goes to the Wizarding World
Andrew: Anyway, it’s nice to have you on. Tell us… so like I said, you went to the Wizarding World for the first time, and it’s interesting because we’ve always spoken about the parks from like, just Hogsmeade being open. “Oh, now Diagon Alley is open. Let’s just talk about that.” You got the whole experience – as a lot of people are getting now – for the first time. We were actually debating – and I think this is an important question that people have to ask themselves now, if they’re going for the first time – which theme park do you start at? Which land? Do you start with Hogsmeade or do you start a Diagon Alley? We were actually debating this. Eric, Micah, if you were going for your first time, what do you think you would pick? Hogsmeade or Diagon Alley?
Micah: I don’t know. I would probably go with Hogsmeade.
Andrew: But see, that’s not Harry’s journey.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: He went to Diagon Alley first. Don’t you want to follow Harry’s journey? That’s the debate! This is what we were debating.
Eric: It’s crazy because the genesis… if you know the history of the park, Hogsmeade came first, and Hogsmeade was the distinctive on-the-horizon silhouette that you get, and the magic, and you go through just the archway to get into the park, and it’s all very magical. But then later they built Diagon Alley, which you’re right, chronologically happens first, and has a little bit more of an entrance, a little bit more of a pizzang, you know? Bazinga, when you go in through the bricks. I couldn’t possibly choose now.
Andrew: Patrick, why’d you pick Hogsmeade?
Pat: I picked it because it was the first part of the park. Basically, it’s kind of like, “This is what they thought of first, so let’s do this first.”
Eric: I love that.
Andrew: Yeah, and I agree. I mean, starting with Hogwarts, it just seems more appropriate, doesn’t it? Like, “Okay, I’m finally going into the wizarding world; let’s start with Hogwarts.”
Pat: I think going back, I would do Diagon Alley first, just because I know them now. But for the first time, definitely I think Hogsmeade was the best because the way that they have it laid out is just… it is that spectacle, which I’ve been waiting to see for years now.
Andrew: Yeah. So what was your first impression when you turned that first corner and saw Hogsmeade with Hogwarts in the distance?
Pat: I mean, I was speechless for, what, the first ten minutes in the park?
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah.
Pat: Because obviously I’ve seen pictures, but seeing it in person is so different, and I don’t think a smile left my face for at least the first hour we were in there, because just everything was literally just so magical, just smacking you in the face with magic, and it was great.
Andrew: And then it was really cute when… you know that final corner you turn to see Hogwarts in all its glory? For whatever reason, Pat was looking a different direction when we turned that corner, so then he finally looked to the left and saw Hogwarts, and he let out a little gasp. [laughs] It was really sweet.
Pat: I mean, a part of that was on purpose because I did want the spectacle, so I didn’t want to be peeking around beforehand, but yeah.
Andrew: So we ended up riding Forbidden Journey and Escape From Gringotts, I think three times each. Which do you think was the better…? If you could only pick one, which would you ride?
Pat: Gringotts for sure.
Andrew: Why?
Pat: The entire experience from the time you walk in the front doors of Gringotts to the time you finish the ride, the entire thing is an experience, so it feels like the ride starts as soon as you walk in. And then there’s the little pre-ride; there’s the actual ride…
Eric: But Forbidden Journey is exactly the same way, though.
Pat: Kind of. I don’t know.
Andrew: There is a lot to see.
Eric: Well, I think what it… there’s just not as long… was there a line for Gringotts, and was there not a line for Forbidden Journey?
Pat: Well, we have the express passes, so we didn’t have to deal with too much lines.
Eric: Oh, okay.
Andrew: Eric is right, though; there’s a lot of stuff to see in the Forbidden Journey line.
Eric: And I’m not just talking about props, but the founders of Hogwarts…
Andrew: Talking to each other.
Eric: There’s a narrative going… back when it was a three-hour wait to get on Forbidden Journey, that was a lot clearer.
[Andrew laughs]
Pat: True.
Eric: So I’m not harassing you; I’m just saying… it is funny to see what gets lost over the years, because Forbidden Journey does have a narrative of, I don’t know, Muggles being allowed at Hogwarts for the first time. And when you guys were walking through the first time, did you stay and watch the Dumbledore speech and the trio speech in the Defense Against the Dark Arts classroom?
Andrew: Yes.
Pat: Yeah, we did.
Eric: Okay, because those are cool, and I still don’t know how they did that technology.
Micah: I mean, I think Gringotts overall is the better ride.
Eric: Yeah, it came later.
Andrew: I think so too. They also recently upgraded the screens on Forbidden Journey; they’re 4k now.
Eric: Wow.
Andrew: They are frickin’ gorgeous.
Pat: Yeah, they’re really good.
Andrew: I mean, the detail. It’s so much more vibrant and detailed than from what I remember before. I was very impressed with that. But Gringotts, I always leave Gringotts with a smile on my face. It’s just so satisfying, that ride. I just think it’s so cool, the story, and I love seeing Voldemort and Bellatrix, and then Bill, when he’s like, “After all, it is the safest place! Gringotts is the safest place!” Or something like that.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: He says it with a smile. I’m like, “Aw, it’s cute.”
Micah: Now, the three times that you went on that ride, where did you sit? Because depending on where you sit, it can be a little dicey.
Andrew: [laughs] “Dicey.”
Pat: Yeah, the first time, we were in the very front row.
Micah: Oh, okay. How’d you like that little pivot forward?
Pat: Oh, yeah. [laughs] Yeah, the second time was in the middle of one of the cars, and then the third time was the very, very back.
Eric: Oh, cool.
Andrew: Yeah, I think the second time was when we really felt the whiplash during the coaster. [laughs] But that was okay; I didn’t mind that. Does it spook you a little bit, Micah?
Micah: Well, I just think that front row, especially when it kind of dips forward…
Andrew: Oh.
Micah: … you feel like you don’t know; are you going to hit the floor or fall all the way down to…?
[Andrew laughs]
Pat: Yeah, because it was pitch black.
Andrew: It is so impressive. It is just so impressive, though. And then like you said, you’ve been looking forward forever, Pat, to going to the park. Did the butterbeer live up to the expectations?
Pat: Yes, the butterbeer was everything I imagined it to be. From the first taste to the last, it was so good. And just all the different iterations of butterbeer that they have – granted, we only drank the normal one – but getting butterbeer ice cream and stuff like that, that it still holds that same flavor across the board is really impressive.
Andrew: Yeah, and on a related note… so they’re building that new Harry Potter attraction where Dragon Challenge used to be. Oh my God, it is massive. I could not believe the size of the construction site. It really blew me away. And you can kind of get a good look at what they’re doing when you go to board the Hogwarts Express from the Hogsmeade station; you can kind of get a good peek over the fences. Wow, does it look very large. I cannot wait for that.
Eric: I’m glad to hear that.
Pat: I still can’t believe the amount of detail that there is in the parks. I mean, I have gone to some theme parks, but Universal as a whole just has so much detail in everything, and then details in the details that you would never expect. My favorite one – which I don’t think is a spoiler or anything for people who haven’t gone – but in Diagon Alley, where you have the Leaky Cauldron sign, you’re like, “Oh, cool, that’s a sign, a witch stirring a cauldron.” And then you see there’s a crack in it, and I didn’t even notice it, but then Andrew was like, “Hey, look at the crack for a second,” and then you can see a tiny drip of water coming from the crack of the leaking cauldron. So many details that you could be in there just for days on end, and I still think you would find new stuff.
Micah: Did you stay for the nighttime show?
Andrew: Yes, so Universal Studios is doing a nighttime water show. This is relatively new, and it’s got lots of different highlights from various Universal films and/or films that appear in the Universal parks. And of course, Harry Potter has a section in the show; it’s on the lagoon in Universal. It is really stunning. They’ve got these giant fountains that are shooting up water; they’ve got these giant projection screens shooting onto water. They have a lot of fireworks too. I was not expecting that. [laughs] It was quite the extravaganza. So if you go, definitely stay for this nighttime water show. The Harry Potter section was really cool. At one point, they split all of the fountains up into the different House colors; I think that was towards the end of the show. That was a really nice surprise. That was one of those “Oh my God, I’ve got to take a picture.”
Pat: Yeah, it was a solid 20 minutes of the classic film scores you can think of for Harry Potter, but then also Back to the Future and E.T.. But then the new stuff from the new musical animated movies they’re doing, but a solid 20 minutes of just spectacle, and I would have stayed and watched it again in a second.
Eric: That’s cool.
Andrew: Including Jurassic World. I got excited about that one.
Pat: Yes.
Eric: Oooh.
Micah: And Andrew, are they still doing the projection onto the castle?
Andrew: Yes, we actually didn’t… because of our schedule, we didn’t get a chance to see that. But yes, they are still running the nighttime lights at Hogwarts Castle. You have to check the website for the dates. I’m not sure they do it nightly, but pretty close to nightly. And then they’ve also got that holiday show, which obviously isn’t running right now, but presumably this holiday it’s going to be back. And same thing where it’s a holiday show on Hogwarts Castle.
Pat: Yeah, that’s the one thing I really, really wish we could have seen, but hopefully next time. [laughs]
Andrew: So that was the Wizarding World.
Hogwarts Mystery
Andrew: Since you’re on, I also wanted to talk Hogwarts Mystery. This is that iOS/Android game that was released a few months ago. We haven’t really spoken about it much because Eric and Micah, you’re not playing it either, right?
Eric: Not keeping up with it, no, unfortunately. I’m still year one. It’s just… I don’t know. I’m not the right mind… the discipline to be on that game.
Andrew: Well, you have to be like Pat. Pat, how many times a day do you play Hogwarts Mystery? [laughs]
Pat: I really just go on when it tells me my energy is full. I don’t just sit on the app and poke around. I go on it, I do the thing, so it takes two minutes, and I just wait until it tells me my energy is full and then go on and do it again. It’s basically… I’m just powering through it that way because I want to know what the story is.
Andrew: So for anyone who doesn’t know, this is… the game is set during the ’80s. It’s just kind of a lot of tapping; you’re not really doing much, so it underwhelmed most people. But okay, so Pat, you’re saying you do it because you want to know what the story is. What year are you?
Pat: I’m the end of my fourth year… yeah, because I just went through all the process, so I’m a prefect for next year.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: That’s cool.
Andrew: He was so excited last night; he found out he was going to be a prefect.
[Eric and Pat laugh]
Andrew: “I’m going to be a prefect!” No context. He just texts me, “I’m going to be a prefect!” without context. I’m like, “What are you talking about?”
[Eric laughs]
Pat: I’m pretty sure it’s the storyline for everybody, but…
Andrew: Of course it is.
Eric: How can you be a prefect after what your brother did? Ooh.
Pat: Right?
Andrew: [laughs] But Pat will plan his day around this, really. I mean, he’ll drop everything to go and tap away once his energy is ready.
Pat: True.
Andrew: It’s damaging our relationship.
Pat: Oh my gosh.
Andrew: [laughs] Do you think longtime Harry Potter fans would enjoy it? Do you recommend we start playing it?
Pat: I mean, they’ve added stuff so it does make it a little more fun. You can get pets now; I have an owl. I’m saving up enough diamond jewel things to get a cat. They do dueling competitions every other week, or once a week, where it does match you with another random player, and you do have to kind of strategize how you can win your duel; otherwise, you can’t do any more duels after so long. And you get awards for how many you win.
Eric: Oh.
Pat: I mean, there’s parts of the story that get a little frustrating because it just doesn’t follow what I imagine the actual story would. The biggest example recently that I saw was that Dumbledore completely just knows and accepts that Rita Skeeter is an Animagus.
Eric: Ugh.
Pat: And obviously we don’t know that in Goblet of Fire, so…
Eric: You can’t know it in the ’80s.
[Andrew laughs]
Pat: Right, and he’s just like, “She does this, but it’s how she gets her news.” Doesn’t want to force her to register or anything like that.
Andrew: What? And then, what were some of the other inconsistencies? There was a big one.
Pat: Honestly, I don’t remember.
Micah: I was going to ask, did Dumbledore give that information while he was teaching Defense against the Dark Arts?
[Everyone laughs]
Pat: No, no.
Andrew: Wasn’t there something…? We had reported on it previously, I think. I’m forgetting. Whatever.
Eric: Well, how are the teachers that we know, like Snape, Flitwick? Is it fun to be in their classes? Is it not fun?
Pat: Yeah, I mean, it is kind of the same every time. And I think they make Snape way too snarky, because really, he just hates every single student, apparently.
Andrew: [laughs] That Snape.
Pat: He doesn’t even give special accommodations to Slytherin. Yeah, so that’s the only part I don’t super like. And Professor Kettleburn, the one who does Care of Magical Creatures, is just a nutcase, which is kind of funny because he is so derpy and is just like, “Oh, this monster is loose. It might kill everyone, but whatever.”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: That’s a good lead-in to our discussion on Slughorn later today. I think Dumbledore picks bad teachers, but we’ll get to that later.
[Pat laughs]
Andrew: You haven’t really convinced me to start playing Hogwarts Mystery, but that’s okay.
Micah: I’m opening it up right now.
Andrew: Are you?
[Pat laughs]
Micah: It asks me – first question – “Are you enjoying the game?”
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Eric: Just saying, “Please rate the game.”
Micah: It’s been a couple months, but sure.
Andrew: Probably not the best thing to ask if you haven’t played it in a couple months. I’m still waiting for this Harry Potter: Wizards Unite game. I don’t know. I’m not even confident it’s coming out this year like they previously said it would.
Pat: Yeah, I really thought it was going to come out on the two-year anniversary of Pokémon Go, because they’re the same company, but apparently not.
Andrew: Yeah, this is… yeah.
Eric: This is the what now?
Andrew: This is the one that’s going to be the Pokémon Go Harry Potter game.
Pat: The things that I wish they could improve on – but I don’t know if they can, just because of the amount of space the game would take up on devices then – would be when you’re becoming better friends with your friends in the castle and in your year and stuff, you answer these questions, but they’re the same questions every time, they have the same responses every time, and your character is just like, “Oh, you’re my best friend; of course I know this” every single time.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Pat: So I wish they could give a little bit of variety in the dialogue, but I don’t know if they actually can with the technicality of the game.
Andrew: I know you saw baby Fang.
Pat: Yes.
Andrew: You got excited about that.
Pat: Baby Fang is adorable, and I wish I could see him more often.
Andrew: And I guess that’s one cool benefit of this. It is nice seeing Hogwarts during this time period when certain characters are younger.
Pat: Yeah, and I think it’s cool that you can actually… you’re friends with Bill and Charlie Weasley.
Eric: Oh!
Andrew: Okay.
Pat: And my goal is to be best friends with Charlie Weasley.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: All right. Well, let’s move on. Thank you, Pat, for enlightening us here.
Pat: Oh, you’re welcome.
Andrew: Just don’t play Hogwarts Mystery too much while recording. It’s best to stay focused.
Pat: [laughs] I did it before we started, so don’t worry.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Oh, good. The energy takes how much time to…?
Pat: Well, I’m at 35 now because of being in the fourth year, so that’s two hours, two and a half hours.
Andrew: 35 what? What is…?
Pat: Energy points.
News
Andrew: Anyway, let’s move on to some news now.
Micah: I think we touched on it last week’s episode; we said that Eddie Redmayne had done an interview with a French outlet. It’s called “Melty,” so it sounds real professional.
Andrew: Hot?
[Eric laughs]
Micah: I don’t know how else to refer to it. And then one of our followers, Rashiya, she went ahead and translated a lot of the answers that Eddie had given. And there’s some interesting bits of information here as it relates to Fantastic Beasts 2, and I thought we could just go through them and see if there’s anything we want to talk about a little more. One of the big pieces of speculation around Fantastic Beasts 2 is that Newt was going to have this big book signing where people were going to show up and want to get a copy of his book, and Eddie actually said that the book signing was done as a photoshoot, and it’s going to be used in a newspaper. So we won’t actually, at least from the sound of this, be going to the signing itself; we’ll see a news clipping of it.
Andrew: Okay. That’s a little disappointing.
Micah: It is, isn’t it?
Andrew: I would have liked to have seen the book release party.
Micah: Because that’s how we thought everybody was going to be brought back together. At least it would be an easy way to bring everyone together.
Andrew: Right, right.
Pat: I’m wondering if they’re just thinking it would be too close to what we saw with Lockhart in Chamber of Secrets.
Eric: That’s a good point. Because it has been said elsewhere that Newt really is famous for the first time now that his book is out, so it’s interesting. I mean, suddenly… look, I’m disappointed there’s not going to be a signing scene, but now the film got slightly less crowded, so I also think that’s a positive.
Andrew: [laughs] Right. This next one is interesting.
Micah: Yeah, so apparently Newt has a London apartment, which we will get to see, whose basement pretty much mirrors the inside of his suitcase.
Andrew: Hmm.
Micah: So there’s quite the zoo going on beneath Newt’s apartment in London.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: So he’s got multiple zoos, I guess we could say. What happens when he brings the suitcase into the basement? Is it like Inception? Like he’s got a zoo inside a zoo?
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Eric: The case is like a travel zoo, and then he just unloads the beasts into his apartment, I bet.
Andrew: I see.
Micah: Yeah, they said that the shed from inside of his suitcase is actually in the basement, so I don’t know if he is able to kind of take that in and out of his suitcase.
Eric: Whoa.
Micah: And then there are beasts that are just kind of roaming around. And he’s got an assistant whose name is Bunty, who’s got a bit of a crush on him, but he is completely ignorant to it.
Andrew: That’s interesting. I know I keep bringing this up, but why? Why do we need this Bunty? Okay, so Bunty maintains the London zoo – that makes sense – but also has a crush on him. That’s interesting. Why does that have to be a thing? Again, I’m just worried about…
Eric: More love angles. Love, love, love, love angles.
Andrew: I’m just worried about being overwhelmed with story in this movie, but okay.
Eric: Yeah, I don’t immediately see the need for Bunty as a character.
Andrew: I don’t think we’ve seen this girl presumably yet either.
Eric: It’s probably the girl in the coffee shop from Half-Blood Prince the movie.
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Eric: Just an extra.
Andrew: What if the suitcase was a Portkey to the London basement? I feel like that could have been interesting. He could immediately get back to London just by climbing into his suitcase.
Pat: Then why get on a boat?
Eric and Micah: Yeah.
Eric: Great, we broke in the film, you guys. Took us just one interview. We did it.
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: Also got a bit of information on the relationship between Newt and his brother. Eddie says that it really takes shape, and the stakes are more important with the rise of Grindelwald and his supporters wanting a pure-blood world. Theseus is very successful; he’s a great war hero and Auror. He follows the rules, but he’s also a hero of the school in many ways, and Newt is the antithesis of all that and the black sheep of the family. The fact that Newt was not on the right path is deeply frustrating for his brother. And Eddie also pointed out in the interview that Theseus was a little bit too… at least the actor who plays Theseus. I guess they were a little bit too jovial with each other initially, and Jo came in and said, “No, Theseus needs to be this way.” And Eddie refers to him as being a damaged man, so we’ll see what that all means in the context of Crimes of Grindelwald.
Andrew: Is anyone else getting a Percy Weasley vibe from Theseus based on this description?
Eric: Yeah, a little bit. Glad you said it.
Andrew: Follows the rules. The fact that Newt was not on the right path is deeply frustrating for his brother. But what makes Newt’s life not the correct path? Because it’s not by the books? It’s not book smarts? It’s just out in the wild learning about beasts? I don’t really get why he would be frustrated.
Micah: Sounds like that. It also references that family is extremely important in this film, both with respect to Newt and his brother, as well as the Lestranges. So I just wonder if there’s a very clearcut view of how Newt should have gone about his life post-Hogwarts, and he’s completely gone off in the most opposite of directions that you could have thought of.
Eric: Yeah. I mean, some people just can’t wrap their brain around forging your own path and doing something nonconformist, and it seems like these guys are just fundamentally different dudes. They love each other; they’re brothers, but it just seems like that’s a good source for tension. I’m really glad that the tension isn’t necessarily coming from a woman specifically, that there’s this added pressure of they’re just different people, that it’s not just all very much love triangle-y. I’m glad that there’s more to it than that.
Pat: Yeah, it seems like they kind of mirror Sirius and Regulus in a way, where Regulus kind of followed the family path, but Sirius deviated. So kind of… if that makes sense.
Eric: It does. Yeah, that’s a good reference.
Micah: Yeah, it’s a great point. And this next part, I think, is relevant as we get into the discussion of Chapter 4 of Half-Blood Prince, because it’s talking about Dumbledore and his ability to manipulate. And in the interview, Eddie says that Dumbledore “saw a big heart and empathy in Newt. We find ourselves in a strange situation where I am close to my teacher at school, then I leave, grow up, and we call each other by our first names. But we still have respect for other teachers. There is a sort of master/student relationship, without being equal. These two characters are challenging each other.”
Eric: Yeah, I like the way that’s put into perspective. If you ever had that close teacher relationship, where as you both become an adult – as in, when you get older – they ask you to call them by their first name, and that’s weird to you. [laughs] I think it is a good way of phrasing what it must be like for Newt, for me.
Micah: And this is in Eddie’s interview, but also in an interview that David Heyman did, he says that Newt is aware of being manipulated by Dumbledore and is less tolerant of it than Harry.
Andrew: Hmm. Well, that’s good. So maybe Newt will be calling Dumbledore out on it.
Eric and Micah: Yeah.
Eric: If that happens, I hope it happens more so than just that moment in the trailer where it’s just like, “But wait!” [laughs] Then Dumbledore is gone. I’d like to see a confrontation between Newt and Dumbledore.
Andrew: Yeah, finally. I mean, just putting Dumbledore in his place. [laughs]
Micah: And then just the last piece from the interview with Eddie Redmayne: He said that he did not film any scenes at Hogwarts. His younger version did, although he did sneak off to the set just so that he could get the experience of being there.
Andrew: Aww. I read, and I think… so a bunch of set reports came out this past week, and we’re going to get to those in next week’s episode. But I read in one of them that I think we’re going to spend 10-15 minutes at Hogwarts in the movie?
Eric: Yeah, and I think it was David Heyman. He said it’s in the middle of the movie.
Andrew: Okay.
Eric: He said ten minutes in the middle of the film.
Andrew: Oooh, they’re going to be teasing us for a while. We’re going to have to wait.
Eric: I know.
Andrew: But what are we getting at the start of the movie, Micah? According to Heyman.
Micah: Yeah, so David Heyman confirmed in an interview that Grindelwald does, in fact, escape at the beginning of Fantastic Beasts 2. And this made sense in his mind, at least, because we’re teased with Grindelwald coming back at the end of the first film, and you immediately want that payoff at the start of the second film.
Andrew: [laughs] We want that payoff? We want him to get out right at the beginning? I don’t know.
Micah: Well, it’s also not going so long a period of time without seeing Grindelwald, right? You got him at the end of the first film; it would be weird, because he was absent pretty much for the entirety of that film, to then go into the second film and wait an hour and a half before you finally come face to face with him and him breaking out.
Andrew: I feel like it might be a little awkward to watch these two movies back to back, because you end it with Grindelwald getting arrested, and then you get a couple more scenes, and then if you watch the second movie immediately, presumably you’re going to see Grindelwald get out right away. That seems a little rushed, but that’s, of course, in the rare occasion that you’re watching these movies back to back.
Micah: Definitely. And then…
Andrew: That’s okay, though.
Micah: Yeah, I think so. But it gives that sort of action sequence right at the start, and I think in a way it’s a little bit similar to what we got with the first movie, where it’s kind of rolling through those newspaper headlines, and you see Grindelwald. I wonder if it’s going to be much the same.
Andrew: Well, I guess it’s good we’re seeing him break out instead of just reading the headlines, as we were forced to do so many times with Movies 5 and 6. [laughs]
Eric: Yeah, the Yates tactic.
Andrew: “Look at all these things happening!” Through the scope of the Daily Prophet.
[Eric laughs]
Micah: Slow the film down.
Andrew: Though I guess we are going to get that because of the newspaper headlines about Newt’s book, but oh well.
Micah: And just one final point to bring up here from David Heyman’s interview; I don’t think that it’s anything that we didn’t know already, but he does bring up the fact that Dumbledore is battling demons.
Andrew: His sister’s loss? The loss of his sister? His love for Big G?
[Eric laughs]
Micah: Big G?
Andrew: [laughs] Okay, well, so like I said, a couple set reports came out this week, but since we got a lot to get to this week, we’re going to save those for next week. We’ll dive into what else we learned. We’re learning a lot right now, for better or for worse.
Eric: There’s a lot of stuff. We might have to do a spoiler section of next week’s episode, because there are actual real… there are some for real spoilers in those set reports, so that’s kind of cool.
Andrew: Yeah, it’s interesting how they choose what to share and what not to share. It’s very interesting.
Eric: They’ve all but confirmed Abernathy’s loyalties.
Chapter by Chapter: Seven-Word Summary
Andrew: All right, so Chapter 4 of Half-Blood Prince. I thought it would be fun to introduce this chapter with a game, and maybe we’ll do this for future chapters too. We’ll see how it goes. We’re going to collectively write a summary of the chapter in seven words, and we’re going to do it by each taking turns contributing a single word. So we’re going to create a sentence together without planning, and no take-backs. You submit your word and that’s it. So this could be a trainwreck, but that’s the fun of it, okay?
Eric: [laughs] Okay.
Micah: All right. I like this.
Andrew: So we’re going to do Andrew, Eric, Micah, Pat, Andrew, Eric, Micah. All right? [laughs] So I’m going to write down each word as we create it. So this is a summary of the chapter. My word is “Dumbledore.”
Eric: My word is “reveals.”
Micah: My word is “Slughorn.”
[Andrew laughs]
Pat: Well, I feel like the only thing that makes sense is “is.”
Andrew: [laughs] I think all I can say is “a.” So we’ve got “Dumbledore reveals Slughorn is a,” and we’ve got two more words.
Eric: Good, I get the word I wanted to say: “chair.”
Andrew: “Chair.” Uh-oh. Well, what does Micah say? [laughs]
Micah: You needed to use an adjective, Eric.
Andrew: Yeah, you did. But no take-backs. We’re screwed. [laughs] Nothing’s going to work.
Micah: “Today.”
Andrew: Okay, okay.
[Micah laughs]
Andrew: Wow, that is a great description of the chapter. So ladies and gentlemen, we’re here to tell you that Dumbledore reveals Slughorn is a chair today. [laughs] I love it.
Micah: It’s true, though, isn’t it?
Andrew: It is. Yeah, that’s not the worst description of the chapter.
[Micah and Pat laugh]
Andrew: All right, that was fun.
Chapter by Chapter: Main Discussion
Andrew: Micah, do you want to start us off? This is an interesting chapter because Harry is kind of free to do magic, isn’t he? Outside of school.
Micah: Yeah, he’s given direct permission by Dumbledore to do magic should the situation call for it. Though, Dumbledore is very much of the mindset that he doesn’t think Harry is going to need to because he’s with him. So Dumbledore has a very high opinion of himself.
[Eric laughs]
Micah: That they won’t be attacked.
Andrew: But deserved, right?
Micah: Yeah, I think so.
Eric: Well, that’s an important line because that’s what’s mirrored at the end of the book as well. Because Dumbledore tells Harry that Dumbledore is not afraid “because I am with you,” meaning Harry, at the end of the book.
Andrew: Yeah, which is so sweet. Aww, yeah. I want those two quotes on a poster now.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: But Eric, you bring up a good point. So Harry thinks it’s his first time Apparating, but maybe it’s not?
Eric: Yeah, I don’t want to dwell on this too much, because it’s the way that J.K. Rowling is writing it. It’s a throwaway, “Oh, and Harry just Apparated for the first time.” Apparating is this very uncomfortable experience in Half-Blood Prince. He’s twisting, and the descriptors that she uses are insane. He’s being squeezed in a tube. His earlobes are left behind in Little Whinging – or not earlobes, his eardrums or something. Very uncomfortable. But whether or not it’s his first time Apparating I think is a fair question, because if you remember way back in Sorcerer’s Stone, in the second chapter, “The Worst Birthday,” J.K. Rowling is talking about these moments where Harry did unexplained things, such as growing his hair back that one time Petunia cut it all off. And one of the things he did was he was being chased by these kids at school, and all of a sudden he found himself on the roof of the kitchens at school. In fact, I went back and read it, and he’s not only on the roof, he’s sitting crosslegged on a chimney, just chilling all of a sudden. He didn’t know how he got there. And that strikes me as being an early precursor to what is clearly Apparition. Maybe when J.K. Rowling wrote the first book, she didn’t expect it to be… she hadn’t yet figured out that it was a uncomfortable experience for everyone involved.
Andrew: Well, what I’m wondering is can you do accidental Apparition?
Eric: Right.
Andrew: How did this occur? Or is this an entirely different type of magic? Which would also be an interesting thing to learn.
Pat: I think because he was underage and didn’t know that, it is totally different. Because Apparition seems to have to be very mindful of where you are going, so these kind of things just seem beyond his control.
Eric: He didn’t have the destination or the deliberation. [laughs]
Andrew: Yeah, to quote that U2 song, “You’ve got no destination.”
Eric: Oh.
Andrew: “Beautiful Day.”
Eric: I mean, so that was just a throwback to Chapter 2 of the first book, when I think Harry had teleported before, if he hasn’t Apparated, at the very least. [laughs]
Andrew: Kind of a parallel.
Eric: Yeah, look at that.
Andrew: 1 and 7, 2 and 6, 3 and 5. Okay, so another thing we learn that’s very interesting is that Voldemort is now on the defensive. Harry’s scar isn’t hurting, and feels like the war is over.
Micah: Yeah, why did we need to have Order of the Phoenix?
Andrew: Yeah, right, all that pain.
[Pat laughs]
Micah: Which is important, though, too. I think Voldemort recognizes the danger of the fact that their minds are connected, and it can work both ways. Voldemort tried to use it to his advantage at the end of Order of the Phoenix, but what’s to say that Harry can’t do the same?
Andrew: Yeah. I find it interesting on a whole – and we’re going to touch on a couple different points here, but related to this – but Dumbledore is an open book right now. Harry’s got questions, and Dumbledore is happy to answer for the most part, as long as he has the time to tell to give him the answer, more or less.
Micah: Unless it’s related to his hand.
Andrew: No, but he says in this chapter that he can’t tell the story of the hand because it’s a long story and he wants to do it justice.
Eric: Yeah, but he never tells the story of the hand. It’s the biggest baiting of all time.
Pat: Well, he does tell it eventually.
Eric: Does he?
Pat: Near the end of the book, yeah.
Eric: I can’t remember when he actually sits down and is like, “This is what I was doing there.”
Pat: Yeah, it’s when he’s talking about the ring when they actually… he actually is like, “Okay, they are Horcruxes. Okay, Harry, this is what the ring was.”
Eric: Oh, okay. Thank you. But does he actually talk about…? I think it’s probably only a Book 7 point that the reason he injured his arm was because he hesitated, thinking that he could use the Resurrection Stone to bring his family back. That’s clearly a Book 7 revelation, right?
Pat: Yeah, they don’t actually say what he did to the ring to make it hurt his hand or anything like that.
Eric: Okay, maybe that’s what I’m misremembering. But I’m glad you corrected me, because I’d rather not be wrong the next 34 episodes.
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Eric: So it does come up. I don’t know. To some extent, Dumbledore is an open book, and then to the other extent, he is still controlling all of the narrative here. He knows what kind of questions Harry is going to ask, or has a general… because Harry is not the world’s smartest kid, and all the questions that Harry is asking are topical. “Oh, sir, I saw in the newspaper that you and Scrimgeour aren’t…” Yep, yep. Okay, great.
Andrew: True, but it is still refreshing to see Dumbledore speaking openly with him. They have some one-on-one time; they’re not distracted by stuff going on at Hogwarts. This is kind of the adventure that I was getting at last week when we were analyzing that line from Dumbledore. Him and Harry are going out together, hitting the world, hitting the road. It’s going to be fun. We’re up for new things.
Eric: I agree. I remember reading this for the first time and being like, “You know what? This is awesome.” Dumbledore and Harry as equals. He’s really repenting over what he did with Sirius last book.
Micah: But at the same time, he is continuing to lay the groundwork, which we saw in the last chapter as well. When they start talking about exactly why they’ve Apparated to this place, and they talk about how Dumbledore is looking to bring an old colleague out of retirement, and Harry is kind of confused as to how he can be helpful in this endeavor, and Dumbledore says, “Oh, I think we’ll find a use for you.” And isn’t that all Dumbledore is really about?
Eric: Yeah, playing chess.
Andrew: Finding use for him and Newt.
Micah: Yeah, well, I was going to say, going back to what we were talking about earlier with with Newt, Dumbledore is… he’s a master manipulator.
Andrew: But he is right, that this is apparently what pushes Slughorn over the edge. Slughorn shrugs it off a couple pages later, like, “Oh, really? This is what you’re doing to try and get me back to school?”
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: But it seems to work, so can you blame Dumbledore?
Eric: Can you blame Dumbledore…
Andrew: The only other solution is just having him pick another professor.
Eric: Yeah. You can blame Dumbledore for a lot, but I think he’s in tune to what’s going to make Slughorn do it. Although I will say there’s a big, big difference between this and the scene in the movie. Actually, just for fun, I watched the… it’s ten minutes of the beginning of Movie 6, prior to recording this episode, and it works out really differently. We all know the movies are rushed, but reading this chapter in the book is such a big, better experience, because Harry actually earns the whole convincing Slughorn to come back thing. Without knowing what he’s doing, Harry asks Slughorn those questions, like, “Oh, but surely you’re not still in touch with them, are you?” All of his prized students? And Slughorn realizes that his life on the run has taken a toll. And when he’s talking about his mother, that scene is elongated and elaborated on, and just it works better in the book to show that Harry has provided an invaluable service to Dumbledore, whereas in the movie, it’s just like Slughorn is just saying, “Oh, shiny Harry Potter,” and then says, “All right, I’ll do it!”
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Eric: It’s much, much more intricate and soft in the books, and I love that about this chapter.
Andrew: Speaking of… we were talking about the hand, and Katie, who’s listening live on Patreon, reminds us it’s actually just in Snape’s memories that we learn the hand story.
Eric: Yeah, so Dumbledore… despite his line here where he says, “‘I have no time to explain now,’ said Dumbledore. ‘It is a thrilling tale, I wish to do it justice,'” we never really get Dumbledore’s perspective of what he was doing.
Andrew: But then, speaking of the hand, we do get… okay, so this “I wish to do it justice,” that’s the second hand reference, and we actually get a third one later on, when they actually walk into Slughorn’s room. But before then, we get an explanation of the Inferi. Dumbledore says, “They are corpses. Dead bodies that have been bewitched to do a Dark wizard’s bidding. Inferi have not been seen for a long time, however, not since Voldemort was last powerful… He killed enough people to make an army of them, of course.”
Eric: Why the “of course” here?
Andrew: Voldemort is just a killing machine.
Eric: [singing] “I’m just a killing machine…”
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: That’s terrifying. Voldemort… even if you could have the power, why would you go for an army of the dead? It’s clearly… that’s a very terrorist action. That’s a very “instill fear in everyone” to have these Inferi. I mean, the first wizarding war is suddenly a little bit more interesting now that there were these zombies or reanimated corpses of everyone’s loved ones coming after them. I don’t care to ever relive that experience. That sounds awful.
Pat: Right, I think it’s a master… just evil person, because he can control all of them without actually losing any numbers to his followers if something happens to them.
Eric: Game of Thrones.
Andrew: Interesting, yeah. Dumbledore also makes a good point here that Harry never checks to make sure Dumbledore is really Dumbledore, and this is where Dumbledore says that funny line, “You would ask what my favorite type of jam is, and it is raspberry.”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: Yeah, silly Harry. Dumbledore was somebody else all along.
Andrew: I would ask Dumbledore how much we’re making on Patreon. That would be my security question.
[Eric and Pat laugh]
Andrew: And then Micah, you bring up a good point. Dumbledore and Harry, they’re walking to Slughorn’s, but…
Micah: How do they even know where he is? Or Dumbledore, how does he know where he is? I have a feeling he’s been tracking him a little bit.
Andrew: Creep.
Eric: Maybe.
Pat: I think it’s because… clearly when we do first see Slughorn, I feel like Dumbledore has been in contact with him at some point, because he knows what Dumbledore wants without Dumbledore asking. So I think – my theory is, at least – that he probably used Fawkes instead of an owl to find him, because Fawkes is way better than an owl, and then he was able to track where Fawkes went to find him.
Andrew: Hmm, interesting. That’s acceptable.
Eric: I think maybe they haven’t spoken in a couple years, and so Slughorn knows that the only reason that Dumbledore would reach out is if he wanted him to teach again. But I think the other thing is, Slughorn has the faculties to know what it is that he would be… he knows he’s being attempted to be recruited by the Death Eaters and packed up of his own volition. He knows what he done, okay? He knows that he knows Voldemort’s secret. He knows that he could be killed for knowing Voldemort’s secret, more or less, or at least a part of the puzzle. And I don’t think Slughorn is stupid, so I think that he’s intuiting what it is that Dumbledore wants. I think that’s just clear. I don’t think he saw anything; I don’t think he saw Fawkes, and I don’t think Dumbledore has been tracking him, because when they actually get there, Slughorn says that he only had two minutes to prepare. He saw them coming somehow before they got there, but it still just wasn’t… he would have seen them coming and moved if he ever spotted Dumbledore the first time, so Dumbledore can’t really know where he is prior to them Apparating there. But it doesn’t make sense why they would Apparate there, though, so I think this whole thing supports Miss Currie’s crackpot theory of last week, which is that Dumbledore is using Felix Felicis right now. The most compelling, I think, evidence of it is just that they seem to be going nowhere in particular, and all of a sudden, when they’re talking about the Ministry, and Dumbledore is answering Harry’s questions, Dumbledore would just be like, “Left here, Harry. Up this steep incline here, Harry.” It’s just sort of impulsive…
Andrew: Just coming to him?
Eric: Yeah, yeah, exactly.
Andrew: That’s interesting.
Pat: Well, because yeah, he’s living in a Muggle neighborhood, so maybe Dumbledore is able just to feel the magic, and that’s how he’s finding him once they get to that area.
Eric: Yeah, maybe.
Andrew: Possibly.
Micah: But I agree with Patrick, there has to be some sort of intel. It can’t just be that he happens to Apparate to this town and Slughorn is there.
Andrew: Because also remember, he’s on the move so often. What is it, weekly?
Eric: Something like that.
Pat: Yeah, he says weekly.
Andrew: Yeah, so I just feel like he would have had to have some advanced information. It just seems way too lucky given how on the move this guy constantly is. Okay, so moving on. When they first see Slughorn’s house, Dumbledore says, “Oh dear. Oh dear, dear, dear” about the condition of the house, and that “something horrible has happened here.” But later, he says he knew a Death Eater didn’t attack it because there was no Dark Mark over the house. So what did he think happened here? Or were the “Oh dear”s just Dumbledore shaking his head at Slughorn faking the situation?
[Pat laughs]
Andrew: I feel like this “Oh dear” is a total double meaning, purposefully.
Pat: Yeah, because Dumbledore has a flare for the dramatics, so maybe he’s just like, “Oh, this is just a poor job of faking it. I would have done way better.”
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Right. “Oh dear, Slughorn can’t fake it like he used to.”
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Andrew: And yet he still wants to hire him as a teacher.
Eric: Well, yeah, I think that has less to do with his teaching abilities and more to do with the strategic use that Slughorn provides, right? He’s keeping Slughorn safe so that he can extract the memory, which we all know confirms to Dumbledore that it is, in fact, Horcruxes that he’s looking for. Although Dumbledore already knew that, because he destroyed a Horcrux, so yeah. But yeah, I think it is for show. I think you never know… he doesn’t know exactly where Slughorn is at that moment, so he’s saying those things and concerning Harry just because… just to get them in the door without Slughorn fleeing. So I think it’s all an act; I think it’s all a show until Dumbledore is able to really locate where Horace is hiding.
Pat: Well, the one thing that’s always bothered me about this, for how many years this book has been out now, is that when he’s like, “Oh, the Dark Mark. How could I have forgotten?” But they’re in… to me, at least in my mind, I’m picturing just a subdivision type of place, like a cul de sac. So no matter when he saw them, Dumbledore and Harry would have seen the Dark Mark go up, even if he only had a three minute warning or two minute warning. They would have seen it no matter what, so they would have gone in wands a-blazin’ if they would have seen a Dark Mark go up, I feel like.
Andrew: We get another reference to Dumbledore’s hand; Slughorn notices it. The line goes, “‘Well, maybe you ought to think about retirement yourself,’ said Slughorn bluntly. His pale gooseberry eyes had found Dumbledore’s injured hand. ‘Reactions not what they were, I see.'”
Eric: Yeah. It’s kind of funny…
Andrew: But he’s not actually slower, you don’t think, Eric?
Eric: Yeah, well, I mean, it’s possible that Dumbledore’s reactions are actually slower, but I think most of it is he hesitated because he was thinking of his family, so in the last few moments before… or actually, now I’m confused, because doesn’t he…? He injures his hand when he puts the ring on. He actually tried to wear it before destroying it; I think that’s what… so that doesn’t really strike me as being reactions. That’s just a… he’s playing it off. I’m saying there’s some misdirection here, where it’s not actually Dumbledore being slower that is causing him to have his injured hand.
Andrew: Right, because Slughorn doesn’t know what this ring is or what it does, presumably.
Eric: Right, yeah.
Andrew: So yeah, it’s not… Dumbledore wasn’t slow on a spell or something. He knew what he was getting himself into. And Dumbledore just shrugs it off, because he’s not about to go and explain everything to Slughorn, of all people. [laughs]
Eric: Yeah, but Snape, even in Chapter 2 of this book, is telling everybody that Dumbledore’s reactions suck and that he’s getting older, but in reality, I mean, if you think about it this way, Dumbledore could still very much in this book be peak Dumbledore. I mean, not long ago he had the battle at the Ministry with Voldemort, where he faced off – and that’s actually one of the scenes I love in the movie, too, this massive, massive battle – and Dumbledore held his own. And this characterization of him being slower in Book 6 works because he eventually gets killed, and you’re like, “Oh, okay, he was old; he was slower,” but I think Dumbledore is still very much peak Dumbledore.
Pat: I think a part of this, too, is just clearly Dumbledore and Slughorn are old friends, so there is a little subtle shade and banter going on between the two of them as well, where Dumbledore is like, “Oh, you’re a little slow here. Only had two minutes?” And then Slughorn is like, “Oh, look at you, getting old yourself.”
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Yeah, that two minutes thing is funny because he does a lot in two minutes to his house. If he had that third minute, maybe he would have thought about putting the Dark Mark up.
Pat: He just loves baths too much; he didn’t hear his alarm.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Yeah, he was too relaxed.
Micah: On the ring front, though, Andrew, is it possible, though, that he does have an idea of what it represents? Because it says that his eyes lingered for a moment, and there was this tiny frown, this crease on his forehead. Having the foresight, knowing what’s coming later on in the book, is there any chance that he might recognize this?
Andrew: So I think that’s possible, but my gut reaction when I read this was he just had a temporary mood change from being near a Horcrux.
Eric: Oh, like it’s still affecting him?
Andrew: Well, just being close to it, because we know being close to one can affect your mood.
Eric: But this is destroyed. This is totally, totally broken.
Pat: I was thinking later in the book, when we’re looking at the memories and everything and they find the ring, when they go back in the memories of who owned it and everything, and at some point young Tom wears the ring back at Hogwarts, and I’m pretty sure Slughorn notices the ring on Tom’s hand back then.
Eric: Ohh.
Pat: So I’m thinking he just recognizes it from seeing it however many years ago.
Eric: That’s tantalizing. I didn’t know if he recognized the crest on it, the Peverell crest, as being a magical historical kind of thing. Although I will say, with a crack down the middle of the stone, I don’t know how you’d recognize the crest if the crest was on it, so I’m not 100% sure on that. I like Pat’s answer.
Andrew: Yeah, I’ve liked a lot of Pat’s answers this episode.
Eric: Yeah, Pat is a pretty good… yeah, you’re doing great, buddy.
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Pat: Thanks.
Andrew: We’re going to get his fandom ID at the end, Pat. Some of our listeners have been demanding that we get his fandom ID, so we’ll do that later.
Eric: Okay.
Micah: So the conversation continues between the three of them, and there’s a lot of back and forth. And Slughorn brings up the point that, “Why would I want to go back to Hogwarts? There’s all these kinds of things that are happening there.” He references Umbridge’s story of being taken into the forest by centaurs, and Dumbledore clears up everything that happened, though. But I think he kind of has a point, though, right? Because up until now, there’s no reason for us to think that he won’t be taking over the Defense Against the Dark Arts post, and we know that that position is cursed; something’s wrong there. And Harry is there, so there’s bound to be something that’s going to go wrong.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Micah: So Hogwarts doesn’t exactly seem the safest place to be, even though Dumbledore is there.
Eric: Right.
Andrew: Eh, it’s still the safest place. I don’t see what the downsides are. Yes, Harry is there, and Harry runs into bad luck all the time. But like you said, Dumbledore is still there. The school is very well protected with charms around it. And I think Slughorn comes to realize that in this chapter, and Harry makes some good arguments there as well, as to why he should be coming back to the school for his own safety.
Micah: And that he doesn’t have to join the Order of the Phoenix.
Andrew and Eric: Yeah.
Eric: Thank you, Harry, for clearing that up for book readers everywhere. Not every teacher…
Andrew: But it was kind of weird that Slughorn thought that all teachers had to be in the Order of the Phoenix.
Eric: Yeah, he’s out of touch. I think he’s just out of touch with people.
Andrew: Too much time in the bath.
[Eric and Pat laugh]
Micah: Even if they’re not, though…
Eric: He’s pruny.
Micah: With a rubber ducky?
Eric: Yeah. [singing] “Rubber ducky, you’re the one…”
Micah: Even if he’s not, though, I would still seem to think that there would need to be some kind of allegiance to Dumbledore, right? Even if all the teachers aren’t officially a part of the Order, it does seem that they band together, especially once we get to Deathly Hallows.
Andrew and Eric: Yeah.
Eric: I think there’s an unwritten kind of thing where this can’t be like the Hogwarts founders, right? Where three of them put up with the fourth. I think that – although there’s a little bit of that with Lockhart in Book 2 – Dumbledore wants to run a much more cohesive sort of ship than that. Although, Book 5 was the complete antithesis of that as well with Umbridge. I just think the first couple chapters of this book have been about security. I mean, if you think about “The Other Minister,” about how the magical world is adding extra security to the Muggle Prime Minister, and Dumbledore, in the last chapter, talked about the protections around Privet Drive and what he’s done to protect Harry all these years, you just get the idea that the wide open world that we are now in, in Slughorn’s makeshift home here, is the most dangerous place that you could possibly be in a time of war. So Hogwarts with all the professors is, in comparison, much safer.
Micah: It is, but I feel like Dumbledore wants Slughorn at Hogwarts not necessarily to protect Slughorn; it’s to protect the information that he holds with the hope of extracting it from him at some point. For as good of old pals as they may be, it just seems that he’s more concerned about what information Slughorn holds and the possibility of that being lost should anything happen to him.
Eric: Yeah, yeah. He’s a crucial get.
Pat: Yeah, and Dumbledore’s protections are going to be way stronger than anything Slughorn could ever do. So it’s true… he probably only has faith in his own protection to keep that information safe.
Andrew: Yeah, I mean, and maybe Slughorn realized in this chapter that he’s not as safe on his own as he thought he was, that there’s some clear red flags that people like Dumbledore can spot. So we originally had a question in this doc about what are our impressions of Slughorn? But I said maybe we shouldn’t even discuss that, because our impressions are quickly made for us. Slughorn, we learn, is a collector of people. He likes to have the brightest people around him. He holds these meetings at Hogwarts to keep everybody connected and to do each other favors. I thought it was interesting because I was trying to think if I know anybody in real life who loves collecting people, but I think the only parallel is when somebody wants to take advantage of talented people, so they just stay close to them, not to be a good friend, but just to have them around for when they need them. It’s not exactly what Slughorn is doing, but it’s probably the Muggle world equivalent.
Eric: The Peter Pettigrew equivalent of why he was with the Marauders, is they were better than him and stronger and could give him prestige?
Andrew: Yeah, right. Yeah, or if you need services from them, it’s generally not a good person. [laughs]
Eric: I think it is… forgive me for saying this; I’m pretty sure it’s canon that it can be a Slytherin quality to be ambitious, but to surround yourself with those that have high status. Is that a misreading, do you think, of Slytherins? I think we’re seeing in Slughorn a different… a really needed component of Slytherin House. He’s the Head of Slytherin House, or has been, and it’s very much about who you know with him. And I think that there is something to be said… I mean, that is success. I think J.K. Rowling has a quote where she said most politicians in the world would be Slytherins, and it’s because they have that drive and they want to be connected. But Slughorn’s side of that is just… it’s connected, and then in this chapter, we’re seeing how that’s a problem. But the book is showing us how Harry feels about it, which is not positively.
Andrew: I just feel like people like him aren’t people who should be respected or should be given attention, because they just want to take advantage of people, they don’t want to genuinely be their friend, and that’s not right.
Eric: Yeah, and it’s really ridiculous that Slughorn has been avoiding coming to Dumbledore’s side all this time, if you really think about it. And there’s enough ingredients in this chapter to just absolutely hate Slughorn. The way that he… there’s a quote I found; it’s not the one I was looking for, but there’s a quote that says, “If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor. If an elephant has its foot on the tail of a mouse, and you say that you are neutral, the mouse will not appreciate your neutrality.” Slughorn is not choosing sides in a war, and it’s really a mark against his character. He’s cowardly, or he’s not a good dude or good person, because he hasn’t… not choosing a side is almost worse than choosing a side, because if you chose a side, you’d at least say, “Oh, that’s my side. This is how I feel, and it’s informed by thoughts and feelings.” But to not feel… to just get up and pack up and run the way Slughorn is, is almost worse and almost like the lowest form of low. So you almost… in this chapter you get a lot of fun moments, but I think objectively, you can hate Slughorn from the get-go. Agree?
Micah: Yeah, I think that’s fair. I do, yeah. I think you can dislike him, but I feel like there’s a much more sympathetic version of him that’s played by Jim Broadbent. I think people generally like Slughorn in the films, so it’s kind of that same thing; a lot of people don’t like Snape in the books, but like Alan Rickman’s portrayal of him in the film. So I don’t know. It’s hard, but hopefully he proves himself throughout the course of this book.
Andrew: I mean, we have our own Slug Club on Patreon, so what does it say about us? We collect people.
Eric: We’re collecting you all.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: I think we have to look in the mirror if we’re criticizing Slughorn so much.
Eric: We have to change our show tagline from “No theory of safe” to “We want to collect you.”
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: Yeah. But I actually had a question about this, because Dumbledore really is the first to reference the Slug Club once they leave the house. Harry says that he has “a sudden and vivid mental image of a great swollen spider, spinning a web around it, twitching a thread here and there to bring its large and juicy flies a little closer.” And it seems like to me, in this moment, it’s not just Slughorn that this applies to; I think this very much could refer to Dumbledore too. It seems like he’s doing a lot of that. He’s doing a lot of laying the groundwork, bringing people close to him.
Andrew: But Dumbledore is doing it for the greater good.
Micah: Is he?
Andrew: Yeah, Slughorn is doing it for himself. [laughs]
Eric: Yeah, I think the comparison between the two of them is fair.
Andrew: Yeah, it is, but they have different motives. So there’s another great line, and this is also in the movie where Dumbledore says he’s reading a magazine in the bathroom, and he’s like, “I do love knitting patterns.” Between this and his admission that he loves a raspberry jam, we should have known after reading this chapter that he was gay, no question. I can’t believe we were all so shocked.
Eric: I don’t know what you mean, Andrew.
Andrew: Well, it’s just a little gay to love knitting and raspberry jam. Pat, you actually knit. Did you know he was gay once you read that line?
[Andrew and Pat laugh]
Pat: I always thought he was well before this, because it always talked of him wearing high-heeled boots.
[Eric laughs]
Pat: And always a lot of… not that purple’s a gay color, but…
Andrew: [laughs] Okay.
Pat: … more voluptuously purple robes and stuff.
Andrew: Vibrant, yeah. Gay in the classic sense. Happy and colorful.
Eric: But why raspberry jam? Why is raspberry jam gay? Because it’s fruity?
Andrew: That just seems… it’s just very fruity.
[Pat laughs]
Andrew: I don’t… it’s just… it’s beyond strawberry. It’s just extra. [laughs]
Micah: You’re saying that he could have come up with another security question.
Andrew: Yes, yes, yes.
Pat: I’m also the person, though, that is thoroughly convinced that both Charlie Weasley is gay and Sirius Black is gay, so…
Andrew: That’s why you…
Eric: I believe in Sirius and Remus as a close to canonical relationship, but Charlie Weasley is asexual, and if you want more info on that, the Tonks and the Aurors wizard rock song “Charlie Weasley 1991” shows that he just loves dragons, dude. He might be a little too much into his dragons.
[Andrew laughs]
Pat: So he’s the Aberforth but with dragons?
Eric: Yeah, I think so. I really think so, and you will too after hearing that song.
Micah: That’s dangerous.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: It’s very dangerous! But there’s a little bit of risk, a little bit of reward.
Andrew: I think Pat plays Hogwarts Mystery to get clues about the sexuality of Bill and Charlie.
Pat: I’m telling you, that’s why I want to be best friends with Charlie.
Andrew: [laughs] To find out?
Pat: Yes.
Andrew: So we’re getting close to the end of this chapter here. So Slughorn agrees that he will come to Hogwarts; Harry and Dumbledore have just tempted him too much. And so I found this interesting: So Dumbledore says to Slughorn, “Wonderful. Then, Horace, we shall see you on the first of September.” This surprised me. The impression I’m getting is that Slughorn is going to show up on September 1 and start teaching right away. Shouldn’t there be some preparation? Shouldn’t there be some meetings with Dumbledore about what to do? Dumbledore just grabs somebody and throws them right into the deep end. I feel like this speaks to Dumbledore’s loosey-goosey teaching policies at Hogwarts. You get weirdos like Trelawney. You get egotistical people like Lockhart. There’s no vetting or preparation. It’s just like, “Come on in, okay.”
Eric: [laughs] Well, again, Trelawney is at Hogwarts not for her teaching ability; she’s there because she’s strategically important.
Pat: Right.
Micah: Same with Slughorn now.
Andrew: [sighs] I don’t know.
Eric: At least Slughorn has been a teacher before, so you vaguely know how to do it. I mean, I think if the best teacher that Harry has ever had is Lupin, and he shows up… he rides the train with them to school, so he’s also not at Hogwarts in advance, prepping his coursework. Presumably, Lupin did some prep, right? Some curriculum. He probably worked it out with Dumbledore over owl.
Andrew: So even if a lot of these teachers are there for the sake of Harry’s story, how about all the other students at the school? They deserve good teachers. And Slughorn is being thrown in after not teaching for 15 years. That’s a long time. You’ve got to get ready again.
Eric: He’s out of touch.
Andrew: Especially somebody like Slughorn, who ten minutes ago didn’t want the job.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Pat: But I don’t think a lot changes in potion-making. An ingredient list is an ingredient list; you’re going to be able to do it no matter what.
Eric: That’s a fair point.
Andrew: I just have lots of concerns. I would not send my son or daughter to Hogwarts, knowing all these issues.
Micah: Well, hold on a second, though, because I think we’re talking… there’s a whole other side of this too. McGonagall is a good teacher. Sprout is a good teacher. Flitwick is a good teacher. Snape is a good teacher, despite the fact that he’s… who he is.
Eric: His methods suck.
Micah: I think there are good teachers at the school; we just are tending to focus in on a handful of them that are not. Hagrid is probably not a good choice either.
Andrew: [laughs] Right.
Eric: Yeah, is Hagrid really strategic? I think Hagrid is the one pity case, or Dumbledore… well, Dumbledore values his integrity. He says, “I would trust Hagrid with my life.” I think that’s why; it’s like, “Keep your friends close.” But it’s very much a “Who’s Dumbledore’s best friend?” kind of game, or “Who’s strategically important to the war against Voldemort?” that influences Dumbledore’s hiring.
Micah: Yeah. Well, look, there are definitely questionable choices, and we could run through probably quite a few of them.
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah, remember when we did the…? Dumbledore called in with his resolutions for the school to make it safer?
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: “The staircases, they shouldn’t be moving. That’s dangerous.” I just needed to vent about the issues at Hogwarts for a moment.
Eric: Perfect.
Andrew: Thank you for giving me the floor. And then finally, Dumbledore says that he wants to give Harry private lessons this year, which is cool. And I just love this little line; Harry says, “What are you going to teach me?” And Dumbledore says, “Oh, a little of this, a little of that.”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: I just found that really adorable.
Eric: “I’m going to teach you the top five hits from Barbra Streisand and Bette Midler.”
Andrew: Yeah, yeah. “Going to teach you some knitting patterns, and how to conjure a Dark Mark if you’ve got to fake one.”
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: “And I’m going to teach you all the types of jam and why I go with raspberry.”
Micah: Do you think, though, that the mention of the Potions OWL was a little bit of a giveaway that perhaps, I don’t know, Snape would be teaching something else?
Eric: It’s so clever. Dumbledore says to Harry, “Don’t count your owls before they arrive.” Ah, I love it.
Pat: Yeah, I love the double meaning with that. Legitimately, everything is delivered by owl, but then they took their OWLs. I thought it was clever.
Eric: And Harry is lamenting that he’ll be seeing so much less of Snape. Little does he know… perfect. Perfect, perfect, perfect. I love it. Chef’s kiss.
MVP of the Week
Andrew: All right, so let’s name our MVPs of the week. My MVP of the Week is Slughorn’s bath.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Because if he had had an extra minute to prepare – three minutes instead of two – he may have actually thought to put up the Dark Mark, and then maybe Dumbledore would have been fooled, and then they wouldn’t have gone in, and then Slughorn wouldn’t be teaching at Hogwarts. It’s a domino effect. So thank you to that bath for being so comfortable that Slughorn just kind of slipped away. He let loose for a minute.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: I love it. That’s a good one. My MVP of the Week is Lily Potter. She’s still Slughorn’s favorite after all these years. He says “one of my favorites,” but he’s got her picture first and foremost, so I think that he really just has such fond memories of this Muggle-born.
Micah: I’m going to give it to Dumbledore. The second consecutive chapter that he walks into somebody’s house and just lays the law down, he gets what he wants, and moves on.
Eric: Boom.
Andrew: Okay.
Eric: Sheriff Dumbledore.
Andrew: Pat?
Pat: I’m going to say Molly Weasley, because the very end, she’s probably like, “Okay, I heard them come here. Why aren’t they walking in my house yet?” When in all reality, Dumbledore has pulled Harry into a shed, and she’s probably just looking out the window like, “Why are they in the shed?”
[Everyone laughs]
Pat: “Just come in here so I can feed Harry.”
Eric: “I didn’t clean in there. I wasn’t expecting them to go in there.”
Pat: Right. [laughs]
Rename the Chapter
Andrew: And now let’s rename the chapter. Mine is Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Chapter 4, “Poke Me, Baby.”
Eric: Oh my God.
[Eric and Pat laugh]
Eric: That’s a good one. Mine is Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Chapter 4, “The Crooked Door.”
Micah: Harry Potter the Half-Blood Prince Chapter 4, “Intruder Alert.”
Pat: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Chapter 4, “Horace Slughorn: The Original Gone Girl.”
Andrew: [laughs] Half-Blood Prince, “Time to get ADT home security.”
[Eric and Pat laugh]
Andrew: So Pat, before we get to an email here, let’s get your fandom ID. I didn’t do this at the beginning because I thought we were reserving it for Patreon guests, but some people in the chat asked, and I’m sure people are curious. So what is your favorite book and your favorite movie?
Pat: Favorite book is Prisoner of Azkaban; I’ve read it probably 17 times. And movie, it used to be Deathly Hallows – Part 1 for a long time, but recently it’s changed to Half-Blood Prince.
Andrew: Ooh. And then what are your Hogwarts and Ilvermorny Houses?
Pat: Hogwarts is Gryffindor, and I’m slowly coming around to the fact that my secondary one would be Hufflepuff.
Eric: Love it.
Pat: But for Ilvermorny, it was the Pukwudgie.
Andrew: I told him he should buy some of that crossover House merchandise. Remember when we spoke about that a while ago? Your hybrid Hogwarts House?
Pat: Yes, because I would be a Gryffinpuff.
Andrew: Yeah, you can buy some… I’ll get it for you for Christmas, some Gryffinpuff stuff.
[Pat laughs]
Eric: Get one for me too.
Andrew: Okay.
Eric: [laughs] Just jumping in there.
Andrew: Your favorite character?
Pat: Sirius Black.
Eric: Oh, yeah.
Andrew: And you bought the wand at the Wizarding World, didn’t you?
Pat: I did.
Andrew: It was very exciting. We went into Ollivanders hoping Patrick would get picked, but instead it was a little girl, because of course.
Pat: And she was way too eager.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Oh my God.
Andrew: But you were eager to get picked!
Pat: Yeah, but I wasn’t jumping up and down and squealing when she got picked.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Excuse me, how old are you? How old is she? Let the kid have the fun, man.
Pat: I mean, she was 11, but still.
Eric: Oh, she’s even 11 and she’s…? Wow. You would deprive an 11-year-old of her wand-choosing experience?
Pat: Oh, for sure. Harry has been in my life for 20 years, this little girl can wait.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: “I deserve this moment.”
Eric: She wasn’t even born when Harry Potter was out.
Pat: Exactly.
Andrew: And what is your Patronus?
Pat: Well, according to Pottermore, it was a ragdoll cat.
Andrew: Okay.
Pat: Which, when I looked up more, it is kind of true, so that’s good.
Andrew: Okay. Pat also texted me, “I didn’t get my fandom ID!! :(”
[Pat laughs]
Andrew: So there you go.
Pat: I’m a fan. What can I say?
[Andrew laughs]
Listener Feedback
Andrew: All right, so we have an email here. This was a great point. This was submitted by James; he said,
“Hello again! I’m watching the trailer yet again.”
Referring to the latest Crimes of Grindelwald trailer.
“I’m not sure if this is new information or not, and even so, it is purely speculation. Have we been informed of Leta’s House yet? If not, I have reason to believe she’s in Slytherin. In the boggart scene there is a girl standing behind Newt who I believe to be young Leta, and she is in Slytherin robes. I don’t think we know who has been cast as young Leta yet (please correct me if that isn’t true), so I can’t be sure that is her. I strongly believe it is, though. Sorry for the back-to-back emails; I’m just getting really into this trailer right now. Happy podcasting!”
So yeah, there is a girl standing behind Newt, and it would make sense that this is Leta. Also, you could argue this looks like Leta. And what I also find interesting is that she’s the only one of the students in the background who’s not happy. Everybody else is smiling and applauding, but this girl, who is allegedly Leta, is just standing there with her mouth kind of agape.
Eric and Pat: Yeah.
Pat: I think the other students are like, “Haha, look at Newt. He doesn’t want to be a desk boy.” And she’s like, “Okay, I know him. Yeah, he doesn’t want this.”
Andrew: [laughs] “So embarrassing, dude.”
Eric: I think that’s the right take.
Andrew: So there we go. Leta might be a Slytherin. Interesting, a Slytherin and Hufflepuff dating one another. Scandal.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Okay, so we have received a lot of voicemails recently; we’re going to catch up on them next week. Instead of doing Chapter 5 next week, we’re going to do voicemails, and we are also going to talk about the information we learned in these brand new Fantastic Beasts: Crimes of Grindelwald set reports.
Quizzitch
Andrew: Before we wrap up the show, though, it’s time, as always, for Quizzitch.
Eric: Yes, last week’s question was who gave Ambrosius Flume his first job thanks to Slughorn? And the correct answer was Ciceron Harkiss. So Slughorn arranged a meeting between Ciceron Harkiss and Ambrosius Flume, who is now the proprietor of Honeydukes, and it got Flume started, and as a result, Slughorn gets baskets and baskets of candy whenever he wants them. So super cool. I think it’s just birthdays and holidays, actually, but super cool. Good for that. The winners who got the correct answer over to us on Twitter are Haley, Karen, Liam, Jenna, Homechikki, Sean, Jessica, Charlie, Vanessa, Count Ravioli, and Robyn.
Andrew: Great. Speaking of trivia, I spoke a few weeks ago about how Pat and I, our Harry Potter trivia team won, and we won a private open bar party for 25 people for two hours. We now have the date set. Eric has been invited along with his trivia team.
Eric: Thank you.
Andrew: Even though one of them accused me of cheating, but that’s okay; they’re still invited.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Micah, you are invited too. It’s in late September. Do you want to come out?
Micah: Yeah, sure. Let’s go.
Andrew: Open bar, baby. Two hours, all you can drink.
Eric: That’s worth the price of airfare alone.
Andrew: We should also invite J.K. Rowling and maybe let her bring one guest? Two?
Eric: Uh… yeah, yes.
Andrew: After all, it is because of her that we’re getting to drink for free for two hours.
Eric: Okay, two.
Andrew: [laughs] So that’ll be fun, and maybe we’ll record something for Patreon while we’re there, and we’ll recap it here on the show. But still a month away.
Eric: Yeah. So next week’s Quizzitch question is, of course, based on the next chapter of the Harry Potter books. This is actually really a harder one; I love a good challenge, so hopefully you find it thrilling. The question is: The night Harry arrives at the Burrow, which characters does he spot who are not in the film adaptation, and which characters does he not interact with that he does in the movie? So basically, from a character standpoint, who’s in this scene and who’s not, in the books and the movie? So I’ll give a hint: There’s three of each. There’s three that are in the book that aren’t in the movie, and three there that he interacts with in the movie that are just not in the book at this time, on the night when he first arrives at the Burrow. Good stuff.
Andrew: Okay. All right, so tweet that to us.
Micah: The title of the chapter may help with that.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Maybe, maybe not.
Andrew: Hmm, sounds like a hint. All right, well, thank you, everybody, as always for listening. We love that you tune in every week to our humble Harry Potter podcast. If you don’t already, we’d love if you liked us on Facebook, Facebook.com/MuggleCast, and we’ll keep you up to date there with the latest episode releases and news, including Harry Potter news, not just about the show. Also, we’ve got our Twitter account, Twitter.com/MuggleCast, and just hit up MuggleCast.com; that’s where you can get all the information you need, including how to support us on Patreon, where you will get instant access to lots of benefits, including bonus MuggleCasts. We have an exclusive Facebook group. While Pat and I were in Florida, we ran into an already constructed Hogwarts Castle Lego set, that new one. We saw it at a Lego Store; I posted a couple pictures from that Lego Store. It looks pretty cool.
Pat: Yeah, it’s big.
Andrew: We also have monthly hangouts before recording. We get on video and chat with fellow patrons. We did it this morning; it was a lot of fun, so thanks to everybody who joined us this morning. And we also do giveaways, and we’ve got a Voldemort Day-themed giveaway going on right now. And next month, I’m going to give away a variety of stuff that I’ve had sitting in my house for a while that I just don’t need, so I want to give it to listeners. It’s all Harry Potter stuff. [laughs] Important thing to clarify. I’m getting rid of my junk!
Pat: Yeah, just giving away a wooden spoon.
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah. Pat, thanks for joining us. Sounds like you had a good time. Thanks for your points.
Pat: Oh, I did. This was great.
Andrew: Awesome! Well, Pat tends to sit behind me when we’re recording, so if you ever have something extra to add, just shout it while I’m recording.
[Pat laughs]
Eric: Yeah, you’re welcome back anytime.
Andrew: Yeah, yeah. Be nice to have you on again.
Pat: It would be an honor.
Andrew: Aww. Isn’t he sweet? Thanks, everybody, for listening. I’m Andrew.
Eric: I’m Eric.
Micah: I’m Micah.
Pat: And I’m Pat.
Andrew: Bye, everybody.
Eric: Bye!