Transcript for MuggleCast Episode #425, Half-Blood Prince in Review
Show Intro
[Show music plays]
Andrew Sims: Welcome to MuggleCast Episode 425. I’m Andrew.
Eric Scull: I’m Eric.
Micah Tannenbaum: I’m Micah.
Laura Tee: And I’m Laura.
Andrew: On today’s episode, we are going to wrap up Half-Blood Prince. We’re going to talk about everyone’s favorite moments, the worst moments, the most notable new characters, the top seven moments, compare it to the movie, the MVP of the book, rename the book, and a 14-word summary. [laughs]
Eric: Wow.
Laura: Because seven times two is 14.
Andrew: Yes.
Micah: You like that math that I did? It was really difficult, but somehow I figured it out.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: Why is it 14?
Andrew: Well, I think we were thinking we can’t possibly describe this book in just seven words, so since it’s an entire book we’re summarizing, let’s double the word count.
Eric: I gotcha, I gotcha.
Andrew: And I think it’s going to be a terrible sentence, but we’ll give it our best shot.
[Eric laughs]
Laura: Just based on… yeah, it’s going to be a run-on sentence at the very least.
Andrew: Yes.
Micah: As long as it doesn’t end with “bathroom,” we’re good.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Andrew: And then we’ll also preview what we’re going to do in the weeks ahead. We’ve already started brainstorming a few things, and we’re really excited about what we have for you all.
News
Andrew: But first, couple news items. Did you guys hear there was a fire at Leavesden Studios where the Harry Potter movies were shot?
Eric: [gasps] What? All the stuff! All the stuff! All my childhood, it’s up in flames.
Andrew: Gone. It’s all gone. If you read the media headlines, everything burned down. Harry Potter is over; they can’t film any more Harry Potter movies there. No, so there was a big fire at Leavesden Studios, and we just wanted to mention it, because a lot of the media reports were saying, “Site of Harry Potter, where the Harry Potter movies were filmed, burned down,” and all this stuff. But luckily, the Studio Tour was not affected. And actually, I think they stayed open. [laughs] I don’t think they closed it off.
Eric: Oh, wow. [laughs]
Andrew: Even though there was a fire next door.
Laura: That is dedication. I can just see these very prim and proper British tour guides being like, “Oh, no, don’t mind that fire over there.”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Laura: “This will be fine.”
Andrew: “Everything’s fine. They’re just filming a movie over there.”
[Laura laughs]
Eric: According to this article from the BBC, fire crews were there for 15 hours trying to put this blaze out. “Pip, pip, cheerio. Carry on.”
Andrew: Yeah, so it was pretty big. Have you guys been…? None of you have been to the Studio Tour, right?
Eric: I have.
Laura: I have not.
Andrew: Oh.
Eric: 2015.
Andrew: Oh, okay, so that was when it first opened.
Eric: Yeah, they had just done their first expansion, which was the Hogwarts Express, I think.
Andrew: The Studio Tour is amazing. If you ever take a trip over to England, please go and check it out. It’s definitely one of the best Harry Potter attractions. And I know people in England are a little salty that they don’t still have a Harry Potter theme park, and I feel like that’s their Harry Potter theme park.
Eric: Absolutely.
Laura: Does seem like a missed opportunity not to have a Harry Potter theme park in the home country of Harry Potter.
Andrew: Yeah, I guess. It’s just… I know there are theme parks over there, but they’re not up there with Universal and Disney, you know?
Eric: Well, they have Cursed Child in London.
Andrew: Right.
Eric: There you go.
Andrew: There are attractions, for sure.
Laura: Is that a good trade-off?
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: Well, the House of MinaLima. That’s the one I want in the US of A.
Andrew: Yeah, me too.
Eric: Absolutely.
Andrew: Anyway, I also wanted to check in on Wizards Unite. What level is everybody at now?
Laura: I kind of went on a little hiatus – not intentionally, I just got busy – so I’m still on level 7.
Micah: I’m on level 11.
Andrew: Oh, Micah, you’ve made a lot of progress.
Micah: Yeah. You know what I did, actually, when I was going somewhere Thursday night, I left a little bit early and I went to… what do they call the places where you can battle?
Andrew and Eric: Fortresses?
Micah: Fortresses, yeah. I went to one of those, and I just parked my car outside of it and battled for 10-15 minutes to collect some stuff, build up my level.
Andrew: [laughs] Nice.
Micah: I did that with Pokémon too. That’s, I think, a little bit more dangerous, though, because you’re looking for certain Pokémon as you’re driving around, and I wouldn’t recommend that at all.
Laura: I did go out for dinner the other night somewhere that actually happened to be an Inn, so I’m at the dinner table, and every five minutes I’m reentering the Inn to get more spell energy. [laughs] So by the time I left, I had pretty much maxed out my spell energy, so that kept me going for a while.
Andrew: [laughs] I’m level 14.
Micah: Nice.
Andrew: Yeah. I feel like I don’t play too much, so I guess I’m okay with that. I play maybe a half hour, 45 minutes a day. It’s just really when I’m walking the dog, or when I get a moment… a break with work, I’ll just load up the app and see if something happens to be nearby. What are you, Eric?
Eric: Level 6.
Andrew: Okay, so Laura and Eric are playing the least.
Micah: Let’s go, Eric. Step it up, Eric.
Eric: I’m working on it. I leveled up; I was really, really happy about it, but it wasn’t one of those significant level-ups where you can all of a sudden add a career to your profile, so I didn’t get to do that yet. I’m finding a lot of parks by my… or areas by my house will have two of the three different types of buildings. They’ll have a Fortress and an Inn, but not a Botanist, not a Herbology. Or they’ll have the Herbology and an Inn, but not a Fortress. And so I’m wondering, as far as planning goes, if that’s intentional, because you have to go further to get that one extra place that completes, really, the circle of recharge, reuse.
Micah: Yeah. One thing that I noticed, too, that really bothered me was sometimes you can be in the middle of a battle and they’ll tell you that you don’t have any more spells left to be able to cast…
Laura: Yes.
Micah: … and to me, that kind of cheapens it a little bit. I think they should at least let you finish the battle before goading you into having to pay money to get more spells. I think that’s definitely something that they can improve upon. And then also, capacities. I think as you level up… I know probably at certain levels, your capacities for certain things potions increase, but I think they could do a better job with that too, because I’m just walking around trying to pick stuff up, and I can’t because my bag is full, so I have to go in and delete stuff and… so there’s definitely room for improvement.
Andrew: Considering the duels, Micah, you could also just be a better wizard and not enter these duels until you’re sure you are prepared to fight. You know what I mean?
Micah: Yeah.
Laura: But I feel like your spell energy isn’t made readily apparent to you until you enter a fight.
Eric: Right.
Andrew: You’re right.
Laura: Because I’m looking at the home screen right now, and there’s nothing on here that indicates what my current spell energy is.
Eric: Right.
Micah: Great point.
Andrew: I was just mainly teasing Micah.
Micah: They could do an alert as you get down to maybe five. Let you know, “Hey, only five spells left.”
Andrew: Yeah, that’s a good idea. Like I’ve said previously, I am right next to an Inn, so I have no problem.
Micah: Well, lucky you.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: I have to go to work to get Inns nearby me, because there’s nothing really around where I live.
Andrew: Yeah, if I didn’t have this Inn right next to me, I think I would have a… my level would not be 14.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: Because that has been a game changer for me. But patrons, I want to know, those of you who are listening live, if you are still playing actively. Should we continue talking about this week to week? Lindsay is level 10, she says. JY is level 22. My boyfriend is level 18. I’m honestly kind of embarrassed for him; we were looking at our screen time settings last night in iOS, comparing. He has spent almost 11 hours playing that game over the past week.
Eric: Wow.
Andrew: I’m just like, “Yeah, that’s a lot of time.”
Micah: It’s more time than he spends with you.
Andrew: [laughs] That’s actually, during the week, not incorrect.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Anyway, one other thing we wanted to bring up here at the top of the show: We have a little bit of an announcement. Micah, Eric, and I are going to be down in Orlando in one month for Podcast Movement. It is a podcasting convention of sorts; all these podcasters are going to be gathering and discussing tricks and tips and all that. It’s going to be a lot of fun. But we figured while we’re down there, we should do a meetup with the listeners. So our meetup is going to be Thursday, August 15, sometime in the evening, probably around dinnertime, and we want to meet up at a bar in Universal CityWalk. People of all ages will be welcome. So we put up a survey, and we’ll put a link to it in the show notes. Let us know if you can come, and then we will email you closer to that date with exact details concerning where this meetup will be taking place. We’re also asking if anybody has any suggestions as to where we should do this meetup in CityWalk; any particular place that people like. So yeah, we’re also going to use that trip to all ride Hagrid’s [takes a deep breath] Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure together, and we’ll record something while we’re down there in Orlando, and it’ll be a good time. So let us know if you can make it. August 15; that’s a Thursday. We’re going to be turning up before the weekend.
Eric: Dibs on the motorbike.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: Before my birthday.
Andrew: Oh, yeah. When is your birthday, Micah?
Micah: That Saturday.
Andrew: Okay, so this will actually be Micah’s birthday party.
Micah: So now people have to show up.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: And buy you drinks.
Micah: That’s right.
MuggleCasTBT
Andrew: Time now for MuggleCasTBT. Laura, I love this one. [laughs]
Laura: Yeah. [laughs]
Andrew: So we’re going to play a clip now from Episode 61. October 31, 2006. A Halloween episode, how fun.
Laura: Oh my God.
Andrew: And of course, this was before Deathly Hallows came out, and we were talking about where the final battle would take place. Let’s go back in time and listen.
[Audio clip plays]
Andrew: Where do you guys think the final battle will take place?
Ben: Hogwarts.
Laura: Not at Hogwarts! Not at Hogwarts. Oh my God.
Andrew: I think it should.
Laura: No!
Ben: Why not, Laura? Why not?
Laura: Every bad fanfiction I’ve ever read in my whole life, they have the final battle take place at Hogwarts…
Micah: No, no, no.
Laura: … and then first years are out fighting Death Eaters. It’s ridiculous. No.
Micah: I think it should be at Godric’s Hollow.
Andrew: Yeah, oh, that would be good.
[Audio clip ends]
Andrew: Wow. So Laura, you were adamant that there would be no battle… you didn’t want the battle to be at Hogwarts.
Laura: No, I really didn’t. And also, how old was I then? 16? 16-year-old me was very determined…
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: … because I used to be a moderator over at MuggleNet FanFiction, and I wasn’t kidding when I said that every time a final battle fanfiction came through, it always took place at Hogwarts, and it was always terrible and just really poorly constructed. But I have to say, I was wrong, because the way that J.K. Rowling did it was very good, and I ended up really enjoying the finished product.
Andrew: All right.
Laura: So she surprised me.
Andrew: Yeah. Now I’m trying to think back to when you and I were cuddled up in bed together reading the final book if I heard any…
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Eric: I was thinking that too.
Andrew: Did I hear any groans when you started realizing that it was at Hogwarts?
Laura: No, I was probably just crying. I cried intermittently while I read that book.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: I would just like to take a moment to observe all of our going-through-puberty voices.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Laura: I didn’t even recognize myself at first. I was like, “Who is that?”
Andrew: Yeah, it’s pretty funny. And there’s some…
Micah: Was there some Ben in there too?
Andrew: Ben was in there. There’s a little out-of-sync editing; I wonder if that was me. Oops.
Micah: No. Never you, Andrew.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: You were always perfect. But I was definitely wrong on Godric’s Hollow, even though we did end up going there. So bad prediction on my part.
Eric: That would’ve been a good place for a last stand. It is the last stand of Cursed Child, though, so that’s kind of cool.
Andrew: Oh, that’s actually a great point. So Micah, you kind of did predict something accurately.
Micah: Yeah, kind of.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: Not as good as the Dumbledore Fantastic Beasts prediction.
Eric: Well, that’ll always be the high watermark for sure.
Andrew: Were you also thinking that maybe because at the end of Half-Blood Prince we hear that he’s going to go to Godric’s Hollow?
Micah: Possibly.
Andrew: Anyway, so follow us on social media. You will get those MuggleCasTBT clips first. They’re really a lot of fun to look back on.
Half-Blood Prince in Review
Andrew: Now it is time for Half-Blood Prince in review. One more time, we’re going to sit with Half-Blood Prince and analyze it, and we’re going to start with our 14-word summary. This is going to be a mess, but here we go.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Harry…
Eric: … Potter…
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Oh, man, Eric.
Andrew: … and the Half-Blood Prince.
[Laura laughs]
Micah: You get seven words right there. Or six.
Laura: Well, I’m going to make this… and…
Eric: Oh, God.
Micah: … Dumbledore…
Andrew: … discover…
Eric: … the…
Laura: … secret…
Micah: … about…
Andrew: … Lord…
Eric: … Voldemort’s…
Laura: … Horcruxes…
Micah: … from…
Andrew: [laughs] Hmm.
Laura: Writing ourselves into a corner.
Andrew: Yep.
Eric and Laura: Since 2005.
Andrew: I guess I’m just going to say… the…
Micah: [whispers] Go with walrus.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: What? Sorry? Sorry, what?
Micah: [whispers] Walrus, walrus…
Eric: Should I end in “hooray”? Should I end in “bathroom”? Should I…?
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: … memories.
Micah: No, end in “Partygood.”
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: Oh, yeah. Oh, too late, too late, too late.
Andrew: “From the memories.” That’s good. Actually, that works perfectly. That went a lot better than we all thought.
Micah: I’m impressed, actually.
Andrew: Unless we listened to Micah and added “Partygood” to it.
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Eric: That was a classic.
Andrew: So we’re going to do something now that we usually do at the end of Chapter by Chapter. We want to also rename the book, and also award MVP of the book.
Micah: Yeah, one thing I wanted to bring up here… I tried to do a little bit of homework and figure out if there was any other alternate titles that were announced or discovered about Half-Blood Prince prior to. I think there’s some notable ones from other books. “Harry Potter and the Doomspell Tournament” was under consideration for Goblet of Fire, and then “Harry Potter and the Peverell Quest” was one that was I think… wasn’t it a site that Scholastic or Bloomsbury had? They had to go in and register different titles for books.
Andrew: They did.
Micah: But there didn’t seem to be any big news around Half-Blood Prince, so we’re going to do it ourselves.
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah, they would snap up these domain names, I think partly to throw people off, because didn’t they also…? So they would reserve Half-Blood Prince, and then five or six others. And then I think they did that with Deathly Hallows, or maybe it was just Deathly Hallows that they did that with.
Eric: Yeah, there was “The Pillar of Storgé,” I think, unless that was a fake one.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Andrew: Yeah, that was one.
Laura: Oh, yeah! Do you guys remember? We did a whole conversation about that, like what that meant.
Andrew: [in a nasally voice] “You guys, the book might be called ‘Harry Potter the Pillar of Storgé.’ What does it mean?”
[Laura laughs]
Eric: And J.K. Rowling joked…
Andrew: “Well, whatever happens in the book, there can be no battle at Hogwarts.”
Eric: That’s for sure.
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: “The battle better not be at the Pillar of Storgé!”
Laura: You know what? It’s like I said on Instagram; I can’t be right all the time, okay?
Andrew: Laura, I’m playing with you. Just completely… yeah, we all made very wrong predictions. Don’t worry.
Laura: I know, I’m playing back. It’s all right.
Andrew: Oh, okay. Where were you saying, Eric? Sorry.
Eric: J.K. Rowling on her website joked not only that it would be called “The Pillar of Storgé,” but also “The Mystic Kettle of Knackledirk.” Remember that?
Andrew: [laughs] No, I can’t say I do.
Eric: Oh, it’s on her… she says, “Possible title of Book 7 there. Must make a note of it.”
Andrew: Oh, yeah.
Eric: For Book 7.
Andrew: Okay, that rings a bell.
Eric: There’s actually… the first Google result, though… somebody turned that misfortune of her joking into a fortune. The first Google result is now a fanfiction in 30 chapters called “The Mystic Kettle of Knackledirk.”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: So somebody wrote it.
Andrew: All right, well, like you said, Micah, let’s rename them ourselves. Rename the book ourselves.
Micah: All right, I went with “Harry Potter and That All-Important Memory.” I kept the hyphen there, too, just like Half-Blood, but changed it to “All-Important.”
[Laura laughs]
Eric: Oh, that’s clever.
Micah: I didn’t realize that until I just read it…
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Micah: … but I’ll take credit for being clever.
Laura: Yep. I went with “Harry Potter and the #FakeNews Horcrux.”
Andrew: Aww, too soon. I went with “Harry Potter and the Seven.” And I also went with this because think about if this was announced before knowing what would happen in the book. We all would have lost our minds. “And the seven what?” Come on, I was really proud of this. [laughs]
Eric: Yeah, I like this. I like that it’s sort of abrupt, too. I like that because it’s abrupt, versus the other titles can kind of flower on.
Andrew: Though it could be a little awkward that Book 6 is titled “Harry Potter and the Seven.” Little confusing.
Eric: I went with – this is a little tongue-in-cheek – “Harry Potter and Everything Besides His Relationships.”
Andrew: Still hung up on Ginny.
Micah: Yeah, can’t imagine why that would be your choice.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Yeah, should we…? I think we should mention that now, that I’ve actually previewed the first chapter of my Harry/Ginny fanfiction to the patrons that put us over the 1,000 patron mark. We’ve actually… so the first chapter is written. Have you guys…? I shared it with you guys too. Have you guys read it?
Andrew: I did see the email; I can’t say I’ve read it. I’m sorry. But I will.
Eric: Okay.
Micah: I did read it.
Eric: Oh, what did you think?
Micah: I’m waiting for more. It’s just the beginning.
Eric: Oh, all right.
Micah: Such a tease, Eric.
Laura: Micah is on pins and needles. He wants to know what happens.
Micah: I didn’t realize it was going to start with the Dursleys, so I was very impressed by that.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: A little surprise, little surprise right there. Yes, this will span the three weeks of Chapters 24-25 of Half-Blood Prince where J.K. Rowling just kind of skipped over Harry and Ginny’s relationship. So that’ll be available… I’m going to put the first chapter up for all patrons this week.
Andrew: Awesome.
Micah: Given that it started with the Dursleys, are you writing 30 chapters as well? Is it going to mirror Half-Blood Prince?
Eric: Oh, no, no, no. Probably, if I had to guess, maybe eight or nine chapters total.
Micah: Got it. One quick question I had, though, before we go on to MVP of the book, was didn’t J.K. Rowling say that this title was considered for the title of Book 2? Or am I making that up?
Eric: She did say that, yes.
Andrew: I thought…
Micah: What do we think of that?
Andrew: Well, that’s pretty significant, because didn’t she also have a chapter from Book 2 that she moved to Book 6?
Eric: She said which one it was too, I think, too, in an interview. And it wasn’t the one you’d think, but there was definitely one in there… yeah, Book 2 was originally a lot more about Snape, and if you think about it… I mean, we spent all of Book 6 Chapter by Chapter doing Connecting the Threads, and a vast majority of them connected to Book 2. They really are linked inextricably, and I think in the end, the only reason Book 2 wasn’t called Half-Blood Prince is she needed to push the Snape stuff off and kind of focus a little bit more on Voldemort. But the idea that Book 2 could have been Half-Blood Prince? Crazy, total crazy. But you still get things like blood status, Mudblood being a term that’s introduced in Book 2. So she was definitely thinking ahead.
Andrew: So she actually said this in a Q&A on her website, which unfortunately is no longer online, but AccioQuote.org, which is a great resource for everything that J.K. Rowling has ever said, still has it. She said,
“There is no trace of the Half-Blood Prince storyline left in Chamber of Secrets, rather the link between the two books relates to a discovery Harry made in Chamber of Secrets that foreshadows something he finds out in Half-Blood Prince. Half-Blood Prince was once, in the long distant past, a possibility for Chamber of Secrets, and from that we deduced that it was genuine. Certain crucial pieces of information in Book 6 were originally planned for Chamber of Secrets, but very early on (first draft of Chamber) I realized that this information’s proper home was Book 6. I have said before now that Chamber holds some very important clues to the ultimate end of the series. Not as many as 6, obviously, but there is a link.”
So there you go. That’s what she has said.
Eric: Yep, you’ve got a Horcrux. You’ve got the Vanishing Cabinet. Those are big, big parts in big moments in Book 6.
Andrew: Yeah. And not just that stuff, but also, I mean, Micah and Laura, I know when you planned a chapter, too, you guys did some great jobs looking back at the threads between the two books.
Laura: Yep. This is the fun thing about this series; it’s a frame narrative.
Andrew: All right, so MVP of the book. Micah?
Micah: Yeah, I ended up going with Slughorn as my MVP. He’s really the key to not just this book, but for a lot of the series, just given the information that he holds; his relationship with a young Tom Riddle is really essential to what ends up happening at the end of this book, because without that information, Harry can’t really move forward. So I thought he is a interesting character, definitely flawed. I like the fact that he is the new Head of Slytherin House, and we see him in that role towards the end of this chapter, and then… or sorry, towards the end of the book, and then going into Deathly Hallows. But really like the introduction of him, love the portrayal of him – and we’ll talk a little bit more about this, I think, later on in our discussion – by Jim Broadbent. So I ended up going with Slughorn.
Laura: That’s a good choice. I went with Dumbledore, and I know we’ve had a lot of conversations about how flawed of a character Dumbledore is, but something that really sticks out about him in this book is… later on in Book 7, we learn more about his connection to the Deathly Hallows and his youthful held beliefs about the greater good. And even though he was able to move on from that, I think he kind of used that in order to position himself for Book 6, because ultimately, he knew that he had to die, but he also had to set everything in motion so that things would go according to plan after his death. So he accepted his death knowing that he would not actually see Harry defeat Voldemort, and he stuck to the plan all the way through the year, knowing that his death was looming over him. So gotta give him it for that.
Eric: Pretty MVP-y.
Andrew: I went with Professor Snape. I think his role is obviously super critical to what happens, and I think that the opening chapters highlight just how important he is and why he should be the MVP of this book. Oh, and he’s in the title, so that’s important too.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: I don’t have as long of an answer for this. I just feel like he helped Dumbledore put his plan into motion, he helped him carry it out, and without him, we potentially could have had a very different outcome. Dumbledore needed an ally, and Snape was the best ally he could have gotten, even though Harry currently despises him.
Eric: Yeah, that’s very true. And I gave my MVP… went a little dark, but I gave it to Lord Voldemort. He really did…
Andrew: Whoa.
Eric: I know. Sorry, guys. He really did discover the key to immortality; as close to immortality as is possible to get, he did it. And he kept everyone guessing, except Dumbledore. But he absolutely… no other wizard could even fathom making more than one Horcrux successfully, and he made so many that it’s going to take Harry and friends an entire other year to hunt and destroy them without him being able to know. So definite praise to Lord Voldemort for really doing what he set out to do and achieving his dream.
Andrew: Props to this crazy man for putting so much work into his plan to take over the world. Bravo.
Eric: I mean, if you put your mind to it, you can accomplish anything. That’s the lesson I get.
Andrew: [laughs] Lord Voldemort is a role model.
Eric: [laughs] Oh, God.
Andrew: I feel like that’s what you’re saying.
Eric: No, except all the murder. That’s bad.
Andrew: You’re somebody who would wear a Dark Mark tattoo, which we’re going to talk about later today, I think.
Eric: Oh, no, but I do have that shirt from Cursed Child – I just found it in my drawer the other day – that says “Voldemort Day.”
Andrew: Yeah, Voldemort Day.
Eric: Really cool.
Andrew: Spoiler alert. [laughs]
Eric: Oh. [laughs] Hashtag #KeepTheSecrets.
Andrew: So I wanted to ask, was this anyone’s favorite or least favorite book in the series?
Laura: Neither for me. I would say Half-Blood Prince is probably… my rankings change a little bit over time, but it’s probably in the second or third slot for me, depending.
Micah: It’s in the top seven, right?
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: It’s number two or three for me as well. Number 5 is my favorite, and I don’t think that’ll ever change, though we’ll see what happens after we reread it in the weeks ahead, weeks and months ahead. But yeah, I would put it at number two, but then I’m like, “Oh, but Deathly Hallows is so important, blah, blah, blah.” So just having read it over the past year, I really did love the book, and I just love how dark it gets. I love this whole Horcrux mystery. I love that it is also genuinely funny in parts, and it’s just a good read. So yeah, for me, it’s either two or three.
Eric: Yeah, it’s pretty much been in my number two slot since reading it, and that’s where it will stay, I think, behind Prisoner.
Micah: Agree, same as Eric. My favorite book is Prisoner of Azkaban, and I would say Half-Blood Prince is definitely in that number two/number three slot right behind it.
Eric: Yeah, I really, really enjoy reading and rereading Goblet of Fire, though. I feel like maybe that doesn’t get as much love. So I know we aren’t talking about Goblet, but I’d put that third, because I think a lot of them… especially with Half-Blood, all these people that come to the funeral – we noticed last week – a lot of those were the characters from Goblet, Madame Maxime and some of the others. So I think that really, the wider Harry Potter, the wider wizarding world, the books that deal the most with that, tend to be my favorite.
Laura: Yeah, Goblet of Fire is my number one, always.
Eric: Nice.
Andrew: Oh, interesting. So this is interesting: On Patreon, we asked, “Where does Half-Blood Prince rank for you?” It actually is the favorite book of the most people on Patreon. 49 people said it’s their favorite book.
Eric: Wow.
Andrew: 39 people said it’s their third favorite, 37 people said it’s their second favorite, then fifth, fourth, sixth, and “It’s my least favorite book.” So interesting results; I didn’t actually expect Half-Blood Prince to be the favorite book vote-wise, the most popular vote. [laughs]
Micah: It is a little surprising.
Andrew: It is, yeah.
Micah: Some people gave explanations as to why it was or wasn’t their favorite book.
Andrew: Yeah. What’d they say, Micah?
Micah: So Robbie Stillman says,
“I said favorite, but it’s hard for me to rank one at a time. Half-Blood Prince, Prisoner of Azkaban, and Deathly Hallows are top three of the books. Funny, though, that Prisoner of Azkaban is least favorite movie, and Half-Blood Prince is a huge disappointment to me comparing to the book.”
We’re actually going to talk a little bit about that later on. Samantha Tillman said,
“I really like that we are given so much info about Voldemort’s past in this book. And I like that we’re reminded that these characters are kids who still deal with kid stuff, like falling in love and feeling afraid.”
Sharon Whale,
“I really enjoyed reading about Voldy’s origins in this one. I wish they had made more of it in the movies.”
Yeah, both Sam and Sharon touched on this point. They really didn’t do, in my opinion, a great job of delving into Voldemort’s past the level of which they could have done in the films. I thought it could’ve been a much more integral part of that particular movie.
Andrew: I wonder… I imagine, as always, it’s a time thing, but I wonder if it’s also a keeping-it-a-children’s-movie type of thing, because that’s some really dark stuff that you get into.
Eric: Yeah, with the Gaunts.
Andrew: Right.
Laura: But also, something that overall they didn’t do a great job with in the movies is addressing backstories.
Micah: Very true.
Eric: Right, think of the “Snape’s Worst Memory” thing. I mean, they filmed for weeks, and it came down to 15 seconds or something.
Micah: Right.
Laura: Well, and also the Marauders. Nonexistent in the movies.
Micah: Exactly.
Andrew: Don’t worry, the Harry Potter TV show will add all this back.
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Yep.
Micah: Well, the biggest thing for me, too, is Lupin knows how the Marauder’s Map works, but how?
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: He’s good at his job!
Micah: Yeah, that must be it. He’s just so good at being a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher that he just knows how to open up the map, but Snape, who’s also a very accomplished wizard, gets insults thrown back at him. So I have a little bit of an issue with that.
Andrew: MacKenzie says,
“Goblet of Fire is number one for me, always has been since my first read-through. I mean, the Quidditch World Cup, Triwizard Tourney, AND Voldemort is back! Absolutely mind-blowing.”
Amber said,
“Half-Blood Prince is my favorite of the series. As an adolescent/teen/young adult, POA was my #1, but while rereading as an adult with children, and after listening to Hannah and Marcel of the ‘Witch, Please’ podcast discuss HBP, it changed my perspective drastically! This is a book all about mothers, and that seemingly small insight put the whole of HBP in a bright new light for me.”
Laura: Interesting.
Eric: This is the first shout-out for “Witch, Please” podcast. I have not heard of this podcast. Seems pretty cool.
Andrew: Eleanor says,
“My favorite because of the character background and plot development. I also love the fact that Harry spends a lot of time unknowingly defending Snape, and I find the dynamic between the trio very realistic and quite amusing (from the perspective of my late 30s). I also like the fact that Harry gets slapped down a lot by Dumbledore, as I am finding Harry quite trying by this point (sacrilege!) But I also like the fact that he actually turns out to be right, even though his obsession is misplaced.”
And finally, Jeff says,
“Half-Blood Prince is my favorite. I love the way Jo balanced the drama and humor; she managed to bring levity to an otherwise dark storyline. Also, the book’s climax had by far the biggest death in the series up to that point; it was such a stunning moment.”
Yes, Jeff, it was, and this is why that needs to become an attraction at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter Universal Orlando.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Laura: Dumbledore’s Death Terror Fall Tower of Fear.
Andrew: Hold on, Laura, let me draw a big breath, and then I’ll give you a title.
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: [takes a deep breath] Dumbledore’s Magical Astronomy Tower of Terror Free Fall. The first free fall in the United States.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Andrew: All right, favorite Half-Blood Prince moment now. Eric?
Eric: It’s got to be, for me… we talked about the memories and how much you learn. Bob Ogden, good old Ministry official Bob Ogden, interacting with the Gaunts when he encounters Morfin and is ushered inside to meet Marvolo, and Merope is there. You meet Voldemort’s mom and his uncle and his grandfather, and they’re all just as despicable as you would choose to believe, and it’s all through the eyes of poor, unsuspecting Bob Ogden. I don’t think it gets better than that. Even though Book 3 is my favorite, I don’t think it gets better than the Gaunt house chapter.
Laura: Yeah, it’s a good one.
Andrew: How about you, Laura?
Laura: I had to say the cave. And the reason for this… of course, we learn a lot about Voldemort through this, of course, but I think what I loved about this was seeing a lot of magic traces. I feel like this was one of the first times in the series where we saw this, that you could… if you were a very learned wizard, that you could feel or sense magic without having to actually do anything. And it’s something that I wish we had learned more about, but I really enjoyed the glimpse of it that we got in this chapter.
Andrew: Yeah, and we’ve been poo-pooing the movie a bit, but that is my favorite scene in the movie for similar reasons as you describe here. My favorite moment, I think, was Aragog’s funeral, because the way that Slughorn worked on his feet as poor Hagrid is suffering was just so funny to me. It’s funny in the movie; I think it’s funnier in the book. [laughs] It’s just so smart and so Slughorn, and I just loved it. It’s so clever. That was one of the moments in the book where I was actually laughing out loud reading.
Micah: Because you could picture the movie, or just because it was well-written?
Andrew: Just what was going on. It was so ridiculous. It was so mean, but also clever. I mean, I think we discussed, “Would we do this? And are we above what Slughorn did?” [laughs] And I don’t know if I am above it.
Micah: He definitely shows some of his Slytherin traits in this book, for sure. I originally had down the Christmas party, but then as Eric, you were talking about the memories, I really enjoyed all of the memories throughout the course of the book, but the Mrs. Cole one was really good…
[Eric laughs]
Micah: … the way that J.K. Rowling wrote Dumbledore and how manipulative he was in this moment, the fact that he’s willing to get her a little tipsy in order to get the information that he needs and ultimately be able to go see Tom Riddle, was another side to Dumbledore’s character I don’t think that we get much of in the series. And then I just really enjoy the Christmas party. I really like the fact that Harry ends up taking Luna, and he values that friendship so much. And the nature of the party, I think, is a lot like what was being touched on earlier with Goblet of Fire; you have so many different types of people in the same room with each other that maybe normally wouldn’t be together. You have a vampire just hanging out amongst children; that’s not very safe. But just the fact that this was a very happy moment that kind of balanced out some of the other dark moments that were in Half-Blood Prince.
Eric: For sure.
Andrew: Yeah. All right, now worst Half-Blood Prince moment. And Micah, as you wrote, this could be an event in the book or something you just considered poorly written. Eric, what was yours?
Eric: Mine isn’t a poorly written thing, although I was going to say something and I see Laura’s got it for me. Thanks, Laura.
[Laura laughs]
Eric: But the biggest thing for me, honestly, is the fake Horcrux discovery. What a gut punch to have Dumbledore die and have it be all for naught. Even the remarkable cave scene, all its wonderful buildup, and they didn’t even need to go to begin with, because the Horcrux was already found? It’s just such a pitfall, really, and so I hate it. I think it’s greatly written. It had to happen; they had to know that the locket was still out there somewhere. But you just feel so robbed of catharsis there in that moment, I think.
Andrew: And then also one of the biggest moments that we discussed, and that all fans discuss, leading up to Deathly Hallows: Who is RAB?
Eric: That’s right. Yeah, a big, big mystery was formed with that plot point.
Laura: I think as a fandom, we had that one figured out, though, right?
Eric: Yeah, immediately.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Andrew: Did we? I feel like we were speculating for a while. Maybe not.
Eric: It was in Order of the Phoenix, I think, if I’m not mistaken.
Laura: Yeah, with the Black family tree.
Andrew: Right.
Laura: Yeah, that’s where we got it from.
Andrew: See, I’m looking at a classic site, BeyondHogwarts.com, and they had a whole article, “Who is RAB?” And there’s speculation about it being a Burke or a Borgin. I don’t think it was abundantly clear.
Micah: Oh. I always thought, at least from working on… maybe it was just the fact that we were so close to it working for MuggleNet, but Regulus was always what I saw in articles. And even when we were talking on the podcast, I’m sure we threw out other options, but Regulus was definitely the top theory.
Andrew: Yeah. And this is mentioned in that article, too, the RAB theory. But yeah, there were a bunch of theories going around.
Micah: Yeah. I think the big piece, though, that nobody really threw in there was that Kreacher was involved as well.
Eric: Yes. Yeah, Kreacher’s involvement, the fact that that made him a little bit messed up, a little bit… that he never quite recovered from his involvement, that is – you’re right, Micah – a super surprise, and devastating.
Micah: Yeah, and also the fact that, without all of this happening, Harry and Kreacher’s relationship may have never improved, and he wouldn’t have run into the final battle with… he had a frying pan in his hand or something like that?
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: It was great, great.
Laura: For me, I said Ginny’s rushed character development, and Eric, I wasn’t sure if I was going to earn your ire by saying that.
Eric: No, I can’t help but agree with you, Laura.
Laura: I guess my feeling of it is that Ginny pretty much is just perfect throughout this whole book, in the way that she reacts to things, in the way that she deals with Harry breaking up with her to go chase Voldemort, in the fact that she accepts that she’s not in a place to be Harry’s number one at the moment… these are all great things, and I’m not saying that she shouldn’t have them, but I don’t feel like it was earned. I don’t feel like I got the character development, the necessary development in order to make me believe that a 16-year-old would be okay with that.
Eric: Yeah. I mean, our rereading even the last couple chapters of the book being so rushed, the end of the book happening at the funeral, how he’s breaking up with Ginny, he’s breaking up with Hermione and Ron, and they’re talking about the wedding, and they’re all at the funeral? It just seems so rushed, and so I think there probably was something that had to go when J.K. Rowling was either rushing to meet a deadline or something, but it was definitely the development of between Harry and Ginny, and of Ginny as a character. Like you said, give her some faults. Give her some sticking points to make her a real character. And for heaven’s sake, don’t omit the three weeks that they’re dating!
Laura: Well, and I also just feel like… I don’t know. Sometimes when I think… because I actually really quite like Book 6, but when I think about the Harry and Ginny relationship, I just… it kind of felt to me like, “Oh, we’re in Book 6 now. This is where Harry and Ginny are supposed to get together, so here’s where it happens,” and it just didn’t feel like there was any buildup to it. There was more buildup to Harry’s relationship with Cho Chang than there was to this.
Micah: True. She’s also a bit off-character – well, it’s hard to know if it’s in-character or not – when she goes after Hermione about Quidditch, and then also the fact that Harry is doing so well in Potions. It’s a double sucker punch from Ginny to Hermione, and it’s really intense. And for her character, for somebody who we don’t know a whole lot about… and who knows what’s going through her mind at that point? Is it just because of her feelings for Harry? Is it because of what’s going on between Ron and Hermione? Don’t know, but it just seemed a little bit out of left field to have her come in and really just throw these two punches right at Hermione.
Andrew: So my worst moment… I was trying to remember the moments that annoyed me from a plot perspective, and I know there were a couple, and I tried to look at the old docs to kind of jog my memories, but I couldn’t find anything. But just the worst moment was Tom being a murderer. I mean, those were really heavy, really awful. Probably some of the worst things that we see in this entire book series, and it just leaves… Eric mentioned the pitfall earlier with the fake Horcrux; this was a pitfall moment when you just see what Tom was up to.
Eric: Yeah. It’s true; the peek behind the curtain is grotesque and disturbing.
Micah: For me, there were two relationships that I didn’t really like in this book. The first… and it’s more towards the end, for Harry and McGonagall. I don’t like the way that they interacted at the end of Half-Blood Prince. I thought Harry could have leaned on her a little bit more. And I think, Eric, you talked about it in a previous episode; there’s nothing that is really causing Harry to have to follow exactly what Dumbledore has told him at this point, and I think McGonagall, just given what she’s meant to him over the years, could have been an extremely powerful ally to have and could have been helpful to him moving into Deathly Hallows. And just given what she’s represented to him over the years, almost like a mother or grandmotherly type of figure, the way that he behaves towards her, I thought… I just… it kind of rubbed me the wrong way. And then I thought Scrimgeour as a character… I was really disappointed. Given that he’s taking over for Fudge, who we know is just completely inept at his job, I really didn’t like the way that he came across, and I’m interested to get your thoughts as well about him. I thought that there was an opportunity here to also kind of bring Harry together with somebody who’s an Auror, who’s extremely talented, but maybe not able to really lead in any way. So I don’t know. I was just left wanting more from Scrimgeour, because he bites the dust pretty early in the next book, and he just didn’t come across very strong to me.
Eric: Yeah, I agree completely.
Andrew: Well, and we’re meant not to like him. I mean, the way he tries to manipulate…
Micah: Yeah, no, but we just came from not liking Fudge because he was just not good at his job…
Eric: A bureaucrat, yeah, and a politician.
Micah: … and I thought we could have replaced him with somebody who was a little bit better, who could connect with Harry a little bit more, and that’s clearly not the case.
Eric: But those two points – McGonagall, Scrimgeour – we see both of those characters interact with Harry in the last chapter, and so that kind of goes back to maybe what I was saying, which is the end of the book is rushed. Maybe some of these things would land a little bit better if there had been more time, or maybe if J.K. Rowling’s heart was in developing those characters. Remember, Scrimgeour was the lion-maned guy, the guy that was previewed before Book 6. We were like, “This guy is going to be a badass,” and in the end, he’s just a politician who can’t get Harry to do what he wants. Big news.
Andrew: [laughs] I don’t know. I mean, I still remember while reading these books – and I still feel this way – it is a bummer that Harry did not have a better relationship with the Ministry, but I guess J.K. Rowling just wanted it that way, and I think maybe she’s trying to tell us something about our relationship with the government.
[Eric laughs]
Laura: Yeah. Well, also, I mean, I think the Ministry, even at this point in the series, is too corrupted. You may have some good actors there who are trying to do the right thing, but there are also enough bad actors who were already working there, and slowly encroaching on its control from the inside. So I don’t think there is a way Harry can have a relationship with the Ministry at this point.
Andrew: Yeah, totally. Okay, so now we’re going to do most notable new characters. As always with every book, J.K. Rowling introduces a bunch of interesting new characters. Micah, who do you think…? You created this list.
Micah: I did.
Andrew: So tell us why these people were so great.
Micah: All of them? I don’t know that they’re all great…
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Micah: … but certainly they made an impact in one way or the other on the story. And we can kind of jump around here; we just talked a lot about Scrimgeour, who pops up in the very first chapter. Slughorn plays a key role in this book. Bill Weasley… I’m not sure it’s the first… is this the first time we meet him? Obviously, he’s been mentioned before, but I’m pretty sure this is the first time we actually get scenes with him.
Eric: Goblet of Fire, he has breakfast with the Weasleys…
Micah: Ah.
Laura: Ohh.
Eric: … and he’s listed as… yeah, it’s Charlie who we don’t really see, I think, ever. But Bill is cool. He’s got long hair, and Harry really likes him in Goblet of Fire.
Micah: Got it. Okay, so we can throw Bill aside then.
[Eric laughs]
Micah: But we certainly get more…
Laura: Just like Fenrir did.
Andrew and Micah: Ooohh.
Eric: Oh, snap.
Micah: Well, and speaking of Fenrir, it’s our first introduction in person to him and his nasty ways. But a lot of new characters come up in the memory scenes: Hepzibah Smith and her house-elf Hokey; all of the Gaunt family; Bob Ogden, who Eric, you talked about before; Mrs. Cole; and then we get the Carrow brother and sister pair, Amycus and Alecto, show up towards the end of the book. But to me, I would say probably it’s Slughorn and Scrimgeour who are the standout new characters, but certainly open for debate.
Andrew: No, definitely.
Laura: Yeah, I agree with you. I will say, I really did enjoy the memory scenes with Hepzibah.
Micah: Oh, yeah.
Laura: She was just such an eccentric character who was so interesting to read about, and it was a bit heartbreaking to watch her be taken advantage of by Tom Riddle.
Andrew: Hepzibah… a good way to put it; she is eccentric. J.K. Rowling does a really great job of writing those types of characters, and that is also very evident in her Cormoran Strike series.
Eric: Yes.
Andrew: You see a lot of interesting characters, very well-written, in very unique ways.
Eric: But I mean, between Cedric Diggory and Hepzibah Smith, she’s just setting these Hufflepuffs up to knock them down.
Andrew: And that’s why we have Puffs the play, coming to Chicago.
Micah: Yes, there you go. Eric, please go see it.
Eric: I was going to say, I think Newt might die now. I think Newt is probably going to get killed, because J.K. Rowling…
Micah: How? He’s alive in the Potter series.
Eric: Oh! Oh, wait, he’s safe! Oh my God, thank God.
Micah: There you go. Eric, trust me, I’m saving you a lot of grief here.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: I’m just saying, she killed all the other Hufflepuffs that we met.
Micah: Yeah. The one thing I would just say about Slughorn that I really enjoyed is the fact that we’re getting to see a Slytherin, really, in a different light. Obviously, he has Slytherin traits that we see throughout the course of Half-Blood Prince, but I think this is finally a Slytherin character that we can get behind a little bit, and I thought it’s really crucial that he is brought back. Obviously… and I think when we were first reading the book, a lot of us thought that he was going to be brought back to teach Defense Against the Dark Arts. We didn’t really know that he was a Potions Master, and this allows Snape to move into Defense Against the Dark Arts, to allow the curse to take hold for him. He obviously is no longer in that role after this book. So there’s a lot of things, I think, with Slughorn that were certainly enjoyable to read. Andrew, you brought it up before, just the way he behaves at times, and certainly shown through a lot at Aragog’s funeral. But I enjoyed Slughorn. I also enjoyed Jim Broadbent playing Slughorn.
Laura: Same.
Micah: I thought he did a really great job. And Broadbent is great in a lot of different roles, but certainly that came through in his role as Slughorn.
Andrew: Absolutely.
Laura: Yeah, I thought even though Broadbent doesn’t really look like Slughorn just based on how the character is described, he really did embody the essence of that character really, really well.
Andrew: All right, and now the top seven moments of Half-Blood Prince.
Micah: Not 14?
Andrew: Why the number seven?
[Eric laughs]
Micah: I cut the 14 in half from earlier.
[Laura laughs]
Eric: I was going to say, isn’t 14 the most magically powerful number, Micah? What are you doing?
Micah: Yeah, sorry about that.
Andrew: He tried to do 14, and then he was like, “Ah, screw it. I’ll just do seven.”
Micah: Yeah, too much work.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Micah: But these are not necessarily in any particular order; they may be more so in timeline order than anything. But I thought Slughorn returning to Hogwarts really is essential for the rest of the book. Harry deciding to take NEWT-level Potions; can blame McGonagall for everything that happens after this.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Micah: The Sectumsempra scene. The Horcrux memory in particular, and Harry obtaining it; I think, though, we can make the argument that all of the memories that preceded it were essential to Harry learning the truth about Voldemort and the Horcruxes. The cave, Laura’s favorite moment; Dumbledore’s death; and then, of course, Snape’s big reveal. I’m sure there’s a lot of other things in between all of that that we could probably call out, but I thought those were the key moments of the series.
Laura: I agree.
Eric: Absolutely.
Andrew: I guess Snape’s big reveal… you’re talking about being the Half-Blood Prince? I don’t… did anyone care by that point? [laughs]
Eric: Well, that’s funny, because even though the reveal happens at the end, it’s kind of one of those things where when you reread, then you’re like, “Oh, this is Snape guiding Harry the whole book.”
Andrew: Right.
Eric: Because why should the book even be called this if it’s just a backhanded laugh and compliment at the last chapter of the book? It is supposed to be a book all about Snape.
Andrew: Yeah. I would swap out Snape’s big reveal with the Unbreakable Vow maybe, because that was a pretty critical moment.
Eric: Oh, yeah.
Micah: True. I thought about adding that in, too, but we could always add an eighth or ninth.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: No, we have to stick with seven. A nice Harry Potter number.
Micah: Oh. All right, then get rid of Snape’s big reveal. Nobody cares he’s the Half-Blood Prince except Harry.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: This is Micah’s top seven moments, and that’s fine. Micah planned it. I respect your choices. All right, so that’s about it on Half-Blood Prince. We have a couple of emails we’re about to read, but in a moment, we’re going to discuss what we’re doing in the weeks ahead. But first…
Laura: Yeah, we wanted to hear a word from one of our sponsors, ThirdLove.
[Ad break]
Next of MuggleCast
Andrew: Okay, so what lies ahead now that we are finished with Half-Blood Prince? Like we said last week, we are going to finish up the holes in our Chapter by Chapter series. We haven’t finished Sorcerer’s Stone; we did all but the final chapter. We’re also going to do Order of the Phoenix, and we did start Order of the Phoenix, but since we didn’t get through a lot of it, we are going to restart Order of the Phoenix, which I’m really excited about because, like I keep saying, it is my favorite book. Before we jump into the final chapter of Sorcerer’s Stone – because that would be a little awkward – we are going to have a couple of general discussions on Sorcerer’s Stone, and Micah, what’s going to be the first one?
Micah: The first one is going to focus really on how Sorcerer’s Stone kind of galvanized a generation of readers. I think it’d be really cool to talk about how not just the Harry Potter series – obviously people continue to read the entire thing – but I think this first book in particular really impacted an entire generation, and I would say beyond that, too, because so many people picked up these books. And I know for many of us, even the hosts of this show, it really got us to be readers. It caused us to pick up other books and to read other series, and I think that that’s really cool and really important to talk about, and would definitely be interested to hear from our listeners on this as well. Also talking a little bit about how J.K. Rowling was able to finally get this book published; it wasn’t an easy process. And then David Heyman, the producer of the Harry Potter series, the dumb luck he had in securing the movie rights. And we talked to him a bit about this all the way back in Episode 200, so we’ll have some clips that we roll in, but it’s really an interesting story behind how J.K. Rowling was able to get Sorcerer’s Stone published, and then how Heyman was able to secure the rights for the film.
Andrew: And then we have a couple of other ideas. For example, I started rereading Sorcerer’s Stone the other day in preparation for these segments. I’m using the illustrated edition, which is a little difficult because that’s a big book to hold.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: But reading Chapter 1 of Sorcerer’s Stone, there’s so much to talk about. There are so many hints about the future of the series. There’s all these references to Sirius’s motorbike, which is funny now with this new ride.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: There’s a bunch of stuff in there I’m really excited to talk about, so I almost want to do a Chapter by Chapter of sorts for Chapter 1 specifically. But I think we’re going to do a bit of just some general Sorcerer’s Stone odds and ends, because Laura also came up with a slew of interesting questions, including how we got into Harry Potter initially, and how quickly our obsession set in and whatnot, so we’ll talk about those as well. And I know, Eric, you have a few ideas, too. So the point… in a nutshell, we have a lot of ideas, and I think we were thinking of just spending maybe two episodes before getting into this final chapter, but it sounds like we might actually need more, which is great, because we have plenty of time.
[Eric laughs]
Listener Feedback
Andrew: So before we wrap up today’s episode, couple of emails and voicemails. First of all, a couple of people suggested last episode that it was Elphias Doge who gave the speech at Dumbledore’s funeral, and I did look it up, and that doesn’t appear to be the case. That said, this mystery man also officiated at Bill and Fleur’s wedding. So I’m still confused as to why this particular guy got to be the one who speaks at Dumbledore’s funeral. Why did he deserve to have the spotlight like that?
Eric: Maybe that’s his profession in the wizarding world, and no one can take it from him. Maybe it’s a lifetime appointment.
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Micah: I was going to say, maybe he’s the equivalent of a priest or a rabbi.
Andrew: Yeah, it does sound like that. But again, when you go to funerals, you have important people speak! And nobody spoke!
Laura: I really wonder if this is somebody that we’re going to find out more about through Fantastic Beasts.
Andrew: Well, I would tweet her and ask, but she left Twitter six months ago.
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: Also got this email from Marie:
“I just listened to your latest episode, and while I’m a huge fan of Ginny, I think she couldn’t have accompanied the trio on their camping adventure as she is still underaged. She should be 16 by that time, so her magic would still be detectable by the Ministry, which would of course not be helpful at all. Even though Harry does not even consider this, but I think she did, and that’s why she didn’t object him leaving without her.”
Eric: Ahh.
Andrew: We got a couple emails like that.
Laura: That’s a good point.
Eric: Great point.
Andrew: And this one from Erica:
“I’ve just finished listening to your latest episode finishing the last Chapter by Chapter for Book 6, in which you discussed the attendees of Dumbledore’s funeral. This made me wonder — what about Grindelwald? Obviously he is locked in Nurmengard, but do you think anyone told Grindelwald that Dumbledore died? Would he have mourned this loss? Considering their past, I feel like he should have been told. What do you think?”
Eric: Hmm.
Andrew: I’m imagining a blank stare from Grindelwald, just like, “Hmm, well…”
Laura: I’m trying to remember if this was a movie-ism or not, but doesn’t Voldemort visit Grindelwald at Nurmengard and ask where the Elder Wand is? And Grindelwald tells him it’s with Dumbledore?
Eric: Yes.
Laura: So he knows. He knows he died.
Eric: And he knows he was buried with it.
Laura: And at least based on the movie, it didn’t seem like he was too upset about it. [laughs]
Andrew: What movie was this? Deathly Hallows?
Laura: I think it was Deathly Hallows, yeah.
Andrew: Okay. I do remember a flash to Grindelwald.
Micah: Yeah, it’s the first part, because the first movie ends with Voldemort securing the Elder Wand from Dumbledore. But not… doesn’t Voldemort kill Grindelwald in the book, but not the movie?
Eric: Yeah, so it’s like… I think Grindelwald knows that he’s going to be done now. So maybe there is a romantic component there, where he’s like, “Okay, I’ll be with Dumbledore now. I’m going to tell you it’s with him, and then you kill me.”
Andrew: Yeah, I just don’t think Grindelwald would feel too bad about Dumbledore dying, because it was so far in his past.
Micah: Eh…
Andrew: But maybe my opinion on that will change based on what happens in the next couple movies.
Eric: Well, Dumbledore was an older boy, too. Or sorry, Grindelwald is the older boy, right?
Andrew: I don’t know. Why? What do you…? What’s your…?
Eric: Because they’re both… once you get to 150, you’re like, “Ah, well, I better either get the Elixir of Life or set my affairs in order,” right?
Micah: Grindelwald actually looked good if he was 150 in that movie, versus what Dumbledore looked like.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Eric: I mean, if you think about it, though…
Laura: I mean, I think he looked better in that movie than he did in the Fantastic Beasts movies. [laughs]
Andrew: Ouch!
Micah: Oof.
Andrew: Ouch. Johnny Depp…
Laura: Hey, he looks a little rough. I think they intend him to, but…
Andrew: All right, time now for a couple of voicemails. We’re going to jump to the Half-Blood Prince ones, and then we have this voicemail about people who have Death Eater tattoos.
[Voicemail plays]
“Hey, MuggleCast. My name is Rachel, and I’ve only been a listener for a few years, but I wanted to call in with the perspective that I have coming from someone who watched the movies and fell in love with the movies way before they ever opened the books. But in the past several episodes, you guys have been talking about the last chapters of Half-Blood Prince, and Dumbledore’s death and the funeral and the battle sequence, and your perspective on how the movie didn’t do justice. And I just wanted to bring a bit of my perspective, watching the movies before reading the books. I really felt like the movie did a really good job of doing a tribute to Dumbledore. It wasn’t anything like the books; it was very different, but it did put a lot of focus on his death and just the somberness of it all. I feel like even after the movies ended, you still got Dumbledore’s death with you, and the whole movie isn’t about the glowing wands and how it kind of broke apart the… shoot. The Dark Mark. Wow, I totally lost that. How it broke apart the Dark Mark. It was very powerful to me as a movie-watcher, and reading the books back, it didn’t seem as powerful simply because there was a lot of distraction going on. If they had in the movie brought in all the people for Dumbledore’s funeral, I just felt like it would have been too distracting. And you have to remember that movies are a different medium of storytelling than books, and you can’t include everything that you can in a book. I know as readers, it’s something that we want and something that we long for, and I agree with Andrew’s idea that a TV show would do better, but that is my perspective. Thanks for listening, and it’s my first time leaving a voicemail, so don’t judge me too far. Thanks, guys. Bye.”
[Voicemail ends]
Andrew: You did great, Rachel. Don’t worry.
Laura: Yeah, great points.
Andrew: Yeah. And I thought that was interesting because she watched the movie first. I think we, too, might have had different perspectives if we watched the movie first. Dumbledore’s funeral, if it were brought to screen in full… I mean, that could have been a half hour, and I bet they would have given Harry a speech. It wouldn’t have been some random, I’ll tell you that much.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Micah: But Harry would have worn a top hat, right?
Laura: This is why Andrew is pushing for the TV show. [laughs]
Andrew: This is my hill to die on. Dumbledore’s funeral.
Laura: “Give Harry a speech.”
Micah: Yeah, but he has to wear the top hat. That’s the key.
Andrew: Yes, yes. Here’s how it would work in the TV show, or if they did it in the movie: This guy would start talking, and then Harry would be sitting in the crowd, and he’d be like, “What the F?” And he would stand up, and he’d be like, “Oh, no, no, no,” and he would go up on that stage, he would grab that hat, he would put on the hat, and then he would give the speech.
[Laura laughs]
Micah: Beautiful.
Laura: I don’t really think giving the speech is in Harry’s character, though.
Andrew: But wouldn’t that have been moving in the movie? And he’s tearing up, and Hermione and Ron are all crying. Oh, it would have been so good.
Micah: Here’s just one thing for everybody to think about, and then we can move on to the next voicemail: They decided to give a funeral for a spider instead of a funeral for Dumbledore.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Andrew: That says all you need to know.
Eric: “His spirit lives on…”
Andrew: Well, in defense of including that scene, that was a light moment in the movie. They needed that, I think.
Laura: And they also… I mean, for the story they had to do it because that was how Harry got the memory from Slughorn.
Andrew: Right, right. All right, one more voicemail about Half-Blood Prince.
[Voicemail plays]
“Hey, MuggleCast, this is Katie. I’m calling because you were talking about Snape being upset at Harry for calling him a coward. And I do understand that Snape is going through a tough situation, and he did not want to kill Dumbledore, and he’s hurting, and that he is the exact opposite of a coward, and I feel bad for him for having to go through that, but I just don’t feel sorry for him for being called a coward because he spent the entirety of Book 5 calling Sirius a coward, and maybe now he knows how it feels and understands why Sirius was so miserable. And yeah, thanks for the show. Love listening to you guys. Bye!”
[Voicemail ends]
Laura: Yeah, I think that’s fair.
Andrew: Great point.
Micah: Snape still… he’s a douchebag, though. At the end of the day… do you understand…? You know what I’m saying? He’s not nice towards Harry no matter what, so I’m still surprised that Harry named one of his kids after him.
Eric: Yeah, that was a very questionable decision, I think.
Laura: Yeah, I mean, I feel like we… I’m sure we did an episode on the epilogue at some point…
Andrew: [laughs] “How ’bout those names?”
Laura: … but I was not a fan of the epilogue, personally.
Andrew: Those names, I think, were a bit outrageous at the time, but they definitely grew on me. And maybe Cursed Child has to do with that at this point.
Micah: It probably has to do with it.
Laura: Because you got to write your “Never Sever Us” fanfiction? [laughs]
Andrew: Not necessarily, because hashtag #Scorbus, but… I don’t know. I just like the names. “Albus Severus.” I think that’s a beautiful name. I would name my child that. [laughs]
Eric: It is sort of… aww. Okay, heat is on. I think it is a bit of a revisionist storytelling to say that Snape was the bravest man you ever knew, because while I guess that’s true, you’re choosing to honor a guy who spent his life making yours miserable, to your face, at least.
Laura: And somebody who was close with your mother, but then threw her under the bus socially by calling her a Mudblood, and was clearly on the wrong side of history for a very long time.
Eric: As the caller pointed out, goading Sirius to pretty much sticking his neck out and getting himself in danger caused Sirius’s death. So you have one kid who’s named James Sirius, and the other one, Albus Severus, and it’s like, “Everybody’s happy. They all get along.”
Micah: Well, and let’s not forget that Snape is more or less responsible for the Potters being killed.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric and Laura: Yeah.
Micah: And Harry turns around and names one of his kids after Snape despite everything.
Laura: Yeah. I mean, to be fair as well, though, Sirius really bullied Snape very badly when they were in school together, which also makes the naming questionable. I think that’s the thing; I think it’s something that people who name their children after people in their lives have to contend with, is that you have to be able to accept multiple truths about people, and people can do simultaneously great and terrible things, just like Ollivander says about Voldemort in Book 1.
Andrew: All right, one more voicemail today, and this concerns Death Eater tattoos. It’s a bit of a long voicemail, but they explain themself, so we’ll stick with it.
[Voicemail plays]
“Hey, y’all. I just discovered your podcast after so many years, so I’m super grateful, and I’ve been listening to back episodes, and it’s been really awesome. I wanted to call in after listening to this week’s episode, because you guys mentioned the Vans line that just came out, and one of the things that you said sparked a thought of mine, which is that there’s a Death Eater design. So I am appalled at this, I’ll just start out by saying, and have totally taken issue with this in the past, and I kind of can’t believe that this is something that is marketable and that people want to wear. So I’ll tell you my thought process. One time I was in a bar, and I saw somebody from far out of the corner of my eye with a tattoo of the Dark Mark on their arm, right where it’s supposed to go. And I’m thinking, ‘What is going on here? That is…’ I mean, let’s talk. It’s not actually as bad as this, because it’s fantasy versus reality, but it’s a little bit like having a tattoo of the swastika. That’s saying that you’re of the mindset that pure-bloods are above everyone else, and that you’re willing to torture and kill people, and that you follow, however blindly, the thoughts and teachings of Voldemort, who’s this symbol of tyranny and murder. So kind of not the best tattoo to have in the world. And I actually went up to the person and said, ‘How is it possible that you have this tattoo?’ And I hate it when people talk about tattoos to me. I have tattoos myself, so it’s not like I was trying to be that person. But yeah, I just asked him, and he was like, ‘Well, no, I just thought it looked cool. It doesn’t really mean anything.’ I’m like, ‘Actually, it’s super meaningful, and you can’t just get that tattoo and say, ‘I just thought it looked cool.” So now in the present day, Vans put out this backpack – and I’m not sure what else they have – with the Death Eater Dark Mark insignia on it, and it’s just really surprising to me that they would even try to market it, never mind that there would be an audience for sporting that logo. So I just wondered what your thoughts were on it, and excited to call on the show for the first time. Thanks, all. Bye.”
[Voicemail ends]
Laura: Well, that’s a really good voicemail for your first call-in. Thank you for that.
Andrew: [laughs] Right? She didn’t leave her name, unfortunately, I don’t think, but thank you, mystery person. First of all, I loved that she went up to the person and was like, “Hey, do you realize that’s kind of problematic that you have that tattoo?”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: So what do you guys think? I mean, I think this person who was challenged, they said that, “Oh, I just thought it looked cool.” I bet that’s why most people buy stuff with this symbol on it.
Laura: I think so too. And also, not defending it, but from a marketing standpoint, there’s always a segment of a fan population that’s going to be down to be on the “bad side” of things…
Andrew: Exactly.
Laura: … and that’s why they have that material out there for them. I mean, objectively speaking, the Dark Mark does look pretty sick.
Andrew: Whoa, Laura.
[Micah laughs]
Laura: It does! But when you understand the meaning behind it, it’s not something I would ever wear or, God forbid, get tattooed on my body. But I do really feel strongly about people getting it permanently inked on themselves. I think that this caller made a really good point about the connection to the swastika, for example, especially given the fact that there are so many parallels in the books between World War II and the wizarding world.
Andrew: Right.
Laura: So yeah, I don’t think that anybody gets this put on their body with the intention of being like, “Yeah, I want to be a supremacist for blood types.”
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: But at the same… I think it’s misplaced admiration for how cool the design looks, unfortunately. But what’s scary about that is that that’s how people get easily radicalized in the real world. They’re attracted to symbols and movements that seem really cool, but they don’t actually know what they mean. So yeah, think about that before you get your Dark Mark tattoo. Kind of messed up.
Eric: I think about a year or two ago, we were going regular again, and I said something very similar about the Deathly Hallows tattoo. People feel a little differently, and I got a lot of backlash for that. It remains to be seen exactly how Grindelwald is going to use his symbol, but the way that the Harry Potter books described the Deathly Hallows symbol was that it was a sign of oppression. Krum freaks out when he sees that symbol in Deathly Hallows because that was what Grindelwald vandalized Durmstrang with, so that, too, is a symbol of oppression, and people are getting it tattooed on themselves. But it’s really just… it’s a recognizable thing from everybody’s favorite book series. It’s the most immediately recognizable, iconic logo. And I always had these friends that were a little on the goth side, a little into the Death Eater/Slytherin type stuff, and would cosplay Death Eaters and all that at cons, and that was just par for the course. There’s a whole section of the theme park, Knockturn Alley. I don’t buy anything in there, but you absolutely can.
Andrew: It’s cool as hell. It’s like the wizarding world’s Hot Topic.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: You walk in there, it’s super dark, all the Dark Arts stuff you can buy…
Micah: It’s air conditioned.
Andrew: Air conditioned, yeah. It’s the most comfortable area of Diagon Alley.
Laura: [laughs] Yeah, and I will say, I have a Deathly Hallows necklace that I wear quite frequently. And I love that you brought that up, Eric, because I think you’re right; I think that it can be construed as a sign of oppression, because there are certainly people in the books that see it that way. But I think it’s also intended to be a throwback to the story of the Three Brothers, which is really sort of integral to the whole Harry Potter narrative, which is what I think of it. But again, it’s a really interesting conversation, and we could probably spend a whole episode talking about how symbols can mean different things to different people depending on what context they have for them. I don’t think there’s any nuance for that when it comes to the Dark Mark, but I think there definitely is when it comes to the Deathly Hallows sigil, for sure.
Micah: The question for me would be, where do you draw the line? Because tattoos are one thing, but then what about people who cosplay or dress up as Voldemort or dress up as Death Eaters? Because they just as much represent what Voldemort stood for as a Dark Mark tattoo does. So the line is very blurry, right? Again, it is a fictional story, so then you’d have to get into every fictional story that has a bad person who represented oppression and doing terrible things to certain groups of people, and we know at the end of the day that there’s plenty of stories out there where people are dressing up and part of communities. So it’s hard for me to say, “No, you shouldn’t go out there and do this,” but I think that there are a lot of different categories that we could come up with, not just tattoos that are reflective of that.
Laura: Yeah. I think for me, the line comes down to permanence. So when I look at cosplaying, for example, cosplaying is an art form. There’s a great deal of creative innovation and artistry that comes with creating your cosplay, and so to me, if I see a really good Bellatrix Lestrange cosplay or a really good Voldemort cosplay, I’m not going to attribute the values of those characters to the person who’s doing the costuming; I just look at it and I’m like, “Wow, they did a really good job with that. That’s amazing.” And also, it’s not permanent, because they take the costume off at the end of the day or the conference, or whatever it is they’re going to. A Dark Mark tattoo, that is permanent. And so to me, I think anytime you put something on your body permanently, you should carefully consider what that says about you to the rest of the world.
Andrew: We’re sure many of you listening have some thoughts on this as well, so please email us if you have any agreements here or disagreements. But to get back to one of the earlier points, I became a Slytherin because I want to be a baddie.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: It feels cool, so that’s why I converted. Remember when I posted that image on Instagram of my new sweater? “New year, new me.” Slytherin. I’m a badass.
Eric: Have you used the apron yet? The Slytherin apron?
Andrew: Oh, of course.
Eric: Yeah?
Andrew: Yeah, I love the green apron. GreenApron.com/MuggleCast.
[Eric laughs]
Laura: My boyfriend is a Slytherin.
Andrew: Ah, no wonder I like him so much.
Laura: Proud Slytherin. But the thing is…
Micah: I was going to ask Andrew if he was going to get a Slytherin tramp stamp or something along those lines.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Andrew: No, no, because what if I convert again in the future? [laughs]
Micah: You know what you should do? Just get all four House crests tramp stamped, and then you’re set.
Andrew: Just get the Hogwarts crest. That’s a safe one.
Micah: There you go.
Andrew: You won’t regret that later.
[Eric laughs]
Quizzitch
Andrew: Anyway, let’s wrap up today’s episode. Time now for Quizzitch.
Eric: Last week’s question was: Which Harry Potter book ends with the sentence, “And together they walked back through the gateway to the Muggle world”? Okay, so correct answers… well, the correct answer was Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets ends with that sentence. And it’s actually kind of a fun exercise – you guys should try it – to go back through each of the Harry Potter books and just read the last sentence and see, if it were all seven, if you could place them in order. Some of them are a little different than what you might think. Closing lines of books is kind of… I don’t know, it just struck me as being ripe for the picking. So it was Chamber of Secrets. The correct answer was submitted by Kate, Ulysses (Batman), Issy Marcantonio, Michelle, Casper, Sarah Davis, Hayley Hansen, Ali Frega, Retta Gamboe, Count Ravioli, MandrakePatronus, Robbie Stillman, and Marlena. Congratulations to those. And a lot of you said that you knew that by heart, the ending sentence of Chamber of Secrets.
Andrew: I feel like that’d be a cool thing to put on a poster, the final sentence of each book.
Eric: We’re jumping around with a couple of Harry Potter books here, so I have another book general question for you for next week’s Quizzitch: Which Harry Potter books – and this does not include the so-called eighth Harry Potter book, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child script – which Harry Potter books do not have a chapter with the same name as the title of the book? Many of them do. I’m going to go so far as to say the majority of Harry Potter books have a chapter in them that are named after the title, but which books – there’s more than one – do not? Submit your answer to us over on Twitter at MuggleCast with hashtag #Quizzitch.
Andrew: Username MuggleCast is where you can find us on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. We want to remind everybody about our Patreon, Patreon.com/MuggleCast. We just announced our 2019 physical gift; it’s the MuggleCast tote bag! This is a spacious bag with a zipper and a little pocket inside. In our scientific tests, it held multiple Harry Potter books and a big jar of pickles simultaneously. In other words, this bag is a perfect companion. It has our iconic mic bolt logo, and a new tagline, “Carrying magic since 2005.” One of the benefits of becoming a patron at the Dumbledore’s Army level or above is that you get a new physical gift every year. We’re really proud to offer this because we want to give back to you! We want you to feel like you’re getting your money’s worth. And this Patreon not only gives you great digital benefits, but awesome physical benefits too. Become a patron before July 31 to be eligible for the signed album art and the bag. This is a really good year to become a patron. Signed album art and the bag. Patreon.com/MuggleCast, and your support goes towards funding and running this show. If you want to get in touch with us, 1-920-3-MUGGLE, MuggleCast@gmail.com, or use the contact form on MuggleCast.com. We also have the P.O. Box, if you’d like to send us something. 4044 North Lincoln Avenue, Box #144, Chicago, IL, 60618. Like we said, next week we’ll be discussing Sorcerer’s Stone. If you have any odds and ends, things that have been on your mind concerning this first book, send them in using voicemail, using email, using the contact form on the website. We might include them within one of our Sorcerer’s Stone episodes. Thanks, everybody, for listening. I’m Andrew.
Eric: I’m Eric.
Micah: I’m Micah.
Laura: And I’m Laura.
Andrew: See everybody next time. Bye!
Laura: Goodbye.
Eric and Micah: Bye.