Transcript for MuggleCast Episode #454, Drinky Winky (OOTP 18, Dumbledore’s Army)
Show Intro
[Show music plays]
Andrew Sims: Welcome to MuggleCast, your weekly ride into the wizarding world. I’m Andrew.
Eric Scull: I’m Eric.
Micah Tannenbaum: I’m Micah.
Laura Tee: I’m Laura.
Andrew: And we’re joined by one of our Slug Club patrons this week, Grace. Hi, Grace. Welcome to the show.
Grace: Thanks, super excited to be here.
Andrew: Yeah, good to have you. You’re wearing your Voldemort Day shirt…
Grace: That’s right.
Andrew: … which, I don’t know if we should allow that. That’s very dark.
Grace: For Voldemort and Valor.
Andrew: Whoa, whoa! Don’t say it!
Eric: Wow. Whoa.
[Grace laughs]
Andrew: Chills. Thanks for supporting us on Patreon. Let’s get your fandom ID.
Grace: So my favorite book is Goblet of Fire. My favorite movie is probably Deathly Hallows – Part 2, just because I saw it at LeakyCon in 2011 so it’s a great memory. My Hogwarts House is Slytherin, if you couldn’t tell from the Voldemort Day shirt.
[Andrew laughs]
Grace: My Ilvermorny House is Horned Serpent, so snake, snakes. And then ironically, my Patronus is a lioness, so bummer. And then the last question this week about my favorite room or area of Hogwarts kind of threw me, because obviously, after the chapter we’re talking about today, you want to say Room of Requirement. But after I thought about it, I think one of the coolest places in Hogwarts is actually Dumbledore’s office.
Andrew: Ohh.
Grace: I really love the design of that space and also the stuff in it. I feel like you could be in there forever. So yeah, I’m going to go with Dumbledore’s office on that one.
Andrew: It’s so cozy. And of course, you just want to hang out with Dumbledore in there.
Grace: Yeah, yeah.
Andrew: Have some mead. Knit some socks.
Grace: All the old headmasters and everything. Crazy.
Andrew: Yeah, yeah. That’s cool. Well, great. Welcome to the show. And like you mentioned, we are discussing Order of the Phoenix Chapter 18 today, “Dumbledore’s Army,” and we’ll get to that in a little bit, but we’ve got some news to talk about. First of all, Cormoran Strike Book 5 is titled Troubled Blood, and it will be released September 29, 2020. J.K. Rowling recently said that she had finished the book, so we were expecting it this year, and yeah, coming out this fall now. So now I definitely need to finish reading Lethal White. I’m up against the clock, officially.
Eric: It seems like, based on the title, that Strike will be confronting some of his relations, some of his blood relations.
Andrew: Oh, okay.
Eric: That’s kind of what I get from it.
Andrew: Yeah, there used to be a time on the show where we would analyze titles of J.K. Rowling books, so…
[Andrew and Grace laugh]
Micah: Not anymore, though.
Andrew: Yeah. I just think of the Taylor Swift song “Bad Blood” every time I look at that title.
Laura: That’s what I thought of too. [laughs]
Grace: Definitely her inspiration.
Andrew: [singing] “Now we got troubled blood.” Anyway, so yeah, we’re all looking forward to that. We’re all in agreement here that these books are really, really good. Lethal White was dense, so that’s why I had tuned out and not finished it, but I’m looking forward to this, and I’m really glad J.K. Rowling is keeping up this series.
Micah: I think there’s a chance for a double meaning, though, here too, not just related to Strike, but I’m sure if there’s a case that he’s working, that it’s possible that there could be some troubled blood between the family members.
Laura: Oooh.
Andrew: Yeah, or maybe there is trouble with the blood!
Eric: Yeah, yeah. Maybe it’s got a biological agent or something in it.
Andrew: Right.
Micah: Maybe “Blood” is a person.
Andrew: Whoa.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Maybe “Troubled” is a person. Whoa.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Micah: But it’s interesting, though, because we don’t know much about Strike’s family, I don’t think. I mean, we know about his father a little bit, but I guess we’re going to learn a lot more.
Andrew: You know, each of these words ends with the letter D, and Dan Radcliffe starts with D, so I think this confirms Dan Radcliffe is in the plot of Troubled Blood.
Eric: Definitely.
Laura: I didn’t know we brought back crackpot theory.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: That is not a crackpot theory. That is a good theory.
Laura: Okay. [laughs]
Micah: Well…
Andrew: Speaking of… go ahead.
Micah: I was going to say, speaking of crackpot theories, Cursed Child is opening in Japan.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: I was going to say, speaking of expansion, yeah, Cursed Child is opening in Japan. This is going to be the seventh production by the time it opens in summer 2022. This will be the first production in Asia, so pretty cool; nice to see it expanding. I don’t think any of us are ever going to get over to Japan to see it. I mean, we can’t even get Laura to New York to see it.
[Grace laughs]
Laura: Yeah, not going to happen.
Andrew: Have you seen it, Grace?
Grace: Yeah, I actually flew to New York over the summer. It was my graduation from graduate school present to myself.
Andrew: That’s fantastic. Of course you did, because you’re wearing the shirt.
Grace: Yeah, I went and saw it over the summer. I wish I could have seen it with the original cast, but it was interesting. [laughs]
Andrew: Interesting. Oh, did you not love it?
Grace: I did – well, I read the book, of course, the script book, but the illusions in that show were worth every penny to fly up there. The stuff that they do in the theater is incredible.
Andrew: Right, right. Yeah, the illusions are crazy. They make you believe that Voldemort had a child.
[Grace and Laura laugh]
Andrew: One other little piece of news to mention: Fantastic Beasts 3 is going to start filming any day now. Callum Turner, who plays Theseus Scamander in the series, he said while he hasn’t seen the script and he has no idea about the extent of his involvement, they were going to start filming in about six weeks, and he said this back in mid-January, so that would put this timeline at right around now, late February. So we’ll see if Warner Bros. makes an announcement; presumably they will once they’re in production, because people would like to see that, including their investors, that they’re actually filming this finally. So hopefully we’ll get some more information about the film in the weeks ahead. Maybe they’ll even rev the fandom up and give us a title. Who knows?
Micah: No.
Andrew: [laughs] That’s all I want.
Micah: But just to add to that, I know on the last episode, which was a couple weeks ago, we had talked about the new illustrated edition of Sorcerer’s Stone done by MinaLima. And we reached out to them, and we will probably have them on the show closer to when the book is released. But one thing that I did get a piece of information, I guess from their publicist, is that they can’t do it now because they are working on Fantastic Beasts 3.
Eric: There you go.
Micah: So a nice tie-in to your story here, Andrew.
Andrew: Yeah. Aren’t we more important than Fantastic Beasts 3? Can’t they cut some time out for us?
[Grace laughs]
Micah: After the last movie, I don’t know, Andrew. I would think that… not to say… I mean, obviously the work that MinaLima does is exceptional…
Andrew: It’s amazing.
Micah: … but storytelling needs a little work.
Andrew: Yeah, so I’m just excited to see… hopefully we get some information. I mean, we’re still, what, a little under two years away now from Fantastic Beasts 3…
Eric: Sure.
Andrew: … but if all had gone according to plan, we would have been seeing it this November, and I’m sure we would have heard a lot about it by now, but oh well. I’m calling it Fantastic Beasts: More Hogwarts, Y’all until they announce an official title.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: Since they said we’re going to be getting more Hogwarts. Okay, we have some Muggle Mail to discuss today as well, but first, this week’s episode of MuggleCast is sponsored by Open Fit.
[Ad break]
Eric: And as a reminder to all of our MuggleCast listeners, we have a listener survey going out in the Interwebs right now, and the important thing about this is that it is the best way for you as our listeners to tell us, well, how you found the show, what you like about the show, what you don’t like about the show, and where you’re from, because… well, spoilers. But we have a lot of good questions. We pored over it. They each tell us just a depth of knowledge we didn’t have before. If you would be so kind, please take the time this week to fill out the MuggleCast listeners survey. We are actually capping responses; we’re going to stop gathering responses on this Friday, February 28, because that will have been at least a month since we’ve had this thing out. So we’ve gotten over 1,000 responses; it’s super helpful, but don’t think for a second that somebody else said exactly what you would say if you took it, because it may be your insight that leads us to the next big gift that we give our patrons, or next big event, live event that we do. I mean, really, there’s several opportunities there in the questions to really lay out your specific opinion or ideas, and we are looking at those. We are ravenous for those ideas.
Andrew: If anyone says they don’t like my singing, though, that will be thrown in the trash. Just a warning.
Eric: Andrew, I’ve reviewed a couple of the responses. I don’t know what to tell you. I’m so sorry.
Andrew: Oh no.
Eric: But then for everybody that said they didn’t like it, other people are clamoring for an album, so you’ve got to…
Andrew: Oh. Wait, did people actually say they don’t like it?
[Grace laughs]
Eric: No, no, no.
Andrew: Oh, okay. All right.
Micah: Well, they will now because you basically asked for it.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: So please take it till this Friday to… or no, do it before this Friday to fill out the MuggleCast listener survey. And the link for that will be in the show notes; it’s already on the website and our social.
Listener Feedback
Micah: All right, time now for some Muggle Mail on Twitter. We actually heard from an old college friend of mine, Brian, and yeah, he actually found the show by himself, not through me, and then followed up with me and asked me if it was actually me on the show.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Oh, that’s funny.
Micah: This was years ago at this point, years ago. But he says,
“On the topic of Harry becoming an Auror instead of becoming a professor at Hogwarts, he could be/do both. My best professors were the practicing designers or visiting artists who took ‘time off’ from their professional careers to advise on the current trends and practices outside the walls of the university. I had professors who went directly from study to teaching, and those classes were not as beneficial as the educators who learned what worked/didn’t work out in the real world.”
Laura: So true.
Andrew: I love that.
Micah: So I know we talked on the last episode about whether or not Harry should have just gone back to Hogwarts and taught there, specifically Defense Against the Dark Arts, instead of becoming an Auror, because let’s face it, he defeated Voldemort at 17; he doesn’t really need to become an Auror. Any dark forces that he faces in the future pale in comparison to Voldemort.
Andrew: Just won’t live up to the original.
Eric: But that is a big thing in academia, is having professors who worked in the field or are actively working in the field. I know that was a big thing that DePaul was advertising when I was going to DePaul here in Chicago, is that a certain high percentage of their staff members were actively working in the field that they were teaching.
Andrew: That’s great. It’s reassuring. “This person practices what they preach.”
Eric: Yeah, it just promises they have up-to-date info on what it’s really like.
Andrew and Grace: Yeah.
Grace: I actually teach at a community college, and so that’s one of the really cool things about it, is that we all have day jobs and then we also get to teach part-time, so we get to put that practice into the classroom. It’s pretty cool.
Laura: That’s awesome.
Eric: What do you teach?
Grace: I teach public speaking, so communication.
Eric: Oh, cool.
Grace: Yeah, everyone’s least favorite class behind math.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Andrew: That’s important. No, tell people, “Hey, you want to be a podcaster someday? Take this class.”
Grace: I actually do cover podcasting as forms of modern public speaking.
Andrew: Really? Oh, cool.
Grace: So this is cool; I get to go in and be like, “See? I wasn’t kidding.”
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Well, on a similar note, we also heard from C Bird on Twitter. They say,
“Hey, MuggleCasters. In the latest episode, you ask the question if Harry could even become a teacher since he didn’t graduate, and at this point, I want to reach through my phone and yell, ‘How can you forget Hagrid?!’ He’s a teacher (not a very good one) but left after his third year.”
Yeah, that’s true.
Andrew: Yeah, good point.
Micah: But it was Dumbledore back then who was hiring these lackeys. Who is it now? Is it McGonagall? Is it somebody else?
Laura: Yeah, I feel like McGonagall would probably have more stringent standards. [laughs]
Andrew: Yes.
Eric: It could still be Hagrid; he’d just have to take a couple of those certification courses.
[Grace laughs]
Micah: And he would have to use Open Fit. Maybe if he shed a couple pounds, then he can come in incognito.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Oh, right. And shaved his beard? Nobody would recognize him.
Andrew: Oh, yeah.
Micah: But this makes me think of Neville too. We never know whether or not he finished Hogwarts, and he obviously becomes Herbology professor.
Andrew: Right. Yeah, that’s a great point. And this from Abigail:
“Hey, MuggleCast! Big fan here. I’ve been listening to your podcast for a little while now with my sister. I recently became a patron because I wanted to get in on extra content. My sister Hannah has been a patron for several months, and I haven’t told her I became a patron. I think it would be funny if you read this email on the podcast so I can rub it in my sister’s face that I was on MuggleCast first. Wishing you all the best, Abigail.”
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Andrew: So Hannah, your sister’s a patron now. Isn’t that cool? Thank you both.
Eric: [laughs] Wouldn’t it be funny if they met on this morning’s hangout first?
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Andrew: “You’re here too?!”
Laura: Oh, sisterly shade.
Andrew: Yeah, and thank you, sisters, for getting separate accounts. Other people would share their password, but you two, you pledge separately, so thank you. We appreciate that a lot. Like Micah, for example, always asking me for my Disney+ password, my Netflix password… I’m like, “Dude, pay for it yourself.”
Micah: But somehow you still give it to me, so I don’t know why.
Andrew: Because I love you; that’s why. Okay, so we also have a voice message now from Marie.
[Voicemail plays]
“Hey, MuggleCast. This is Marie. Relatively new listener, but I am obsessed, and I have been listening backwards all the way up to, like, Episode 300. I wanted to share with you a quick theory that I had. I was curious once about what Dumbledore’s boggart might be, so I googled it, and it said that it was the corpse of his sister, Ariana. But I don’t remember that being anywhere in canon; you can correct me if I’m wrong. But my theory is that Dumbledore’s boggart is actually himself. Now, hear me out: He knows that he has a dark past. He knows that he made poor decisions as a young man. He knows that he shouldn’t trust himself with power; I’m pretty sure that he actually said that that’s the reason why he didn’t become Minister of Magic when everyone wanted him to be. He knows that he’s probably partially or fully responsible for the death of his sister, and I’m sure that he realizes all of his flaws. And so that’s my theory, is that when a boggart stands in front of Dumbledore that it becomes himself, and that’s what his greatest fear is. Let me know what you think. Thanks.”
[Voicemail ends]
Andrew: That is super cool for sharing. However, we did look this up and J.K. Rowling did confirm that his boggart is his sister, Ariana, which I love. I did not know that before. This is one of those things that J.K. Rowling just mentioned in passing, in a Bloomsbury webchat back in 2007 or something, so who knows if she still remembers that? Hopefully she does, and this may even come into play in the future Fantastic Beasts films.
Laura: I will say, I think Dumbledore is into himself enough, though, that I could see this being some kind of AU theory about his boggart.
Andrew: AU?
Laura: Yeah, alternate universe.
Andrew: Oh, oh.
Laura: Dumbledore is kind of into himself.
Micah: I really like this theory.
Eric: Yeah, I think he fears himself too, though, so I think it makes sense. He fears what he himself is capable of, especially after Ariana’s death.
Micah: It ties him very closely to Leta. It’s almost the exact same boggart, just in different form.
Andrew: Oh, yeah. Cool. Well, thank you for sharing, Marie. Before we get to Chapter by Chapter, this week’s episode is also sponsored by a product that the Granger family would surely be big fans of: Quip.
[Ad break]
Chapter by Chapter: Seven-Word Summary
Andrew: Okay, it’s time now for Chapter by Chapter, and we are discussing Order of the Phoenix Chapter 18, “Dumbledore’s Army.” What an exciting chapter. And we will start, as always, with our seven-word summary, and Grace, you get to kick it off today. So I’m going to start the music after you contribute the first word, okay?
Grace: All right, so first word: Hogwarts…
[Seven-Word Summary music plays]
Laura: … is…
Andrew: … holding…
Micah: … a…
Eric: … group…
Grace: … Defense…
Laura: … meeting!
Andrew: Yay! With seven seconds to spare.
Micah: Well done.
Grace: Go team.
Andrew: I really like that music.
Micah: I love how we arranged the letters so that they say “LAME” in the middle.
Andrew: This segment is trying to tell us something.
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: We pulled through.
Chapter by Chapter: Main Discussion
Andrew: So yeah, as the chapter title suggests, this is the chapter in which we have our first real Dumbledore’s Army meeting. However, this chapter starts off with something I wanted to mention unrelated to the overall discussion. At the beginning they’re discussing Umbridge’s latest infiltration, looking at Harry’s letters, and Harry Accios a bullfrog, and this jumped out to me because I remembered that on her new website last year or a couple years ago, J.K. Rowling said that Newt could not just Accio all his beasts in the first Fantastic Beasts movie because you can only Accio inanimate objects. So little mistake there, and this is why J.K. Rowling needs a team of people to make sure everything she’s saying checks out canon-wise.
Eric: Right.
Grace: I was thinking about it, and so the first time we ever see McGonagall in Transfiguration, she transfigures a table into a pig, which, like, how does that work? So my out was maybe the toads that they use in Flitwick’s classroom are her old socks or something that she’s just turned into toads for them to be able to practice on.
Andrew: Oh, okay.
Grace: So maybe they are inanimate objects at heart. [laughs]
Andrew: Bit of a stretch, but yeah, it can work in the wizarding world.
Micah: It could, yeah. But if you go to Crimes of Grindelwald, Newt does Accio the Niffler at one point during the movie.
Andrew: Right.
Eric: Yeah, except I think the reason that we have been discussing this more recently is because in the first Fantastic Beasts movie, he could have supposedly Accio‘d all of the beasts that fell out of his case.
Andrew: Exactly, and then J.K. Rowling is like, “No, you can’t do that,” and then in the next movie, she’s like, “Accio Niffler!”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: There have been theories about maybe because the Niffler was so close in proximity, or because the Niffler had gold in its pocket.
Eric: Right.
Andrew: But Newt said, “Niffler,” not “Accio gold.”
Micah: It’s also smaller. It’s a Niffler; it’s not an Erumpent or something that is massive in size. I also like what you said about proximity; I don’t think he could just wave his wand in Central Park, and if the beast is by the Empire State Building, it’s automatically going to just fly over to him.
Andrew: No, not in that traffic.
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Well, and also, what was he going to say? “Accio all of my beasts”?
Andrew: Right.
Micah: Movie over.
Eric: Well, he’d be able to name them one by one.
Laura: It’s a lot of beasts.
Eric: A lot of them aren’t indigenous to the region, so they’re probably the only one of its kind in the thing. What I go back to is that Harry Accio‘d his broom from his bedroom on the other side of the grounds during the first Triwizard task. There is a distance allotment; you’re allowed to do it from some kind of a distance.
Andrew: Right, right. How far? That is the question. Hasn’t J.K. Rowling said you couldn’t do it over an ocean, too? I vaguely remember something like that.
Micah: Yes. One other thing I just want to mention at the top of the chapter – because we did discuss this when we were talking about “The Hog’s Head” – but the chapter art for “Dumbledore’s Army” is actually pretty comical; not sure if people got a chance to take a look at it, but it is Dobby with a lot of hats and scarves and socks. And pretty significant, though, that he also plays a role in a chapter titled “Dumbledore’s Army.” We can talk more about him later.
Eric: My big question about McGonagall and her classroom… this is something interesting. So what they’re doing to the toad – or the bullfrogs, sorry – is silencing them using Silencio. Something that struck me was in the absence of a proper Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher, is it possible that the other teachers are picking up some of the slack? The reason is you see what Silencio does to a bullfrog, but immediately, because I know how this chapter is ending, I’m thinking this would be a great spell for people to learn on other people, because so few people, even as of year seven, can do non-verbal magic. So you need to shout a spell in order to do a spell, and if you have Silencio‘d somebody, odds are they can’t shout the spell in the way that they are required to cast a spell. Wouldn’t Silencio be one of the most effective defensive spells?
Andrew: Yeah. Well, especially amongst the kids; maybe not so much the adults, because it seems at least in Fantastic Beasts, all the adults know a lot of non-verbal magic.
Eric: Oh, that’s a good point.
Andrew: But yeah, amongst the kids? I mean, Harry could shut up Draco, and then Draco would be useless in terms of his offense.
Micah: I do like this connection you’re making, though, Eric, because didn’t we talk in a previous discussion about how Umbridge didn’t like the fact that Snape was teaching the Strengthening Solution?
Eric: Oh, yeah.
Micah: So maybe there is something to the professors doing a little bit of Defense Against the Dark Arts in their own classes.
Eric: That’s fascinating.
Laura: You think they’re meeting up away from Umbridge and being like, “Okay, this is what I’m going to do this week”? They’re coming up with lesson plans to supplement the lacking Defense Against the Dark Arts lessons?
Andrew: That all makes a lot of sense. I like this theory a lot.
Eric: But I don’t think they catch on to it necessarily.
Andrew: Who, the kids?
Eric: Harry, while he’s lesson planning, isn’t exactly like, “Ooh, this would actually be perfect, because Snape is the only person I know that doesn’t need to say a spell to cast it.”
Andrew: So despite the bad news that Umbridge is probably reading Harry’s mail, the Gryffindor Quidditch team does get approval to practice, and Angelina says she went to McGonagall and she thinks that McGonagall went to Dumbledore, and then Umbridge had to give in. So assuming this is true, how did Dumbledore argue this to Umbridge, I wonder? And where are the limits in terms of when Umbridge would give in? Because it doesn’t… I can’t picture Dumbledore going to Umbridge and Umbridge being like, “You know what? You’re right. I’m going to let them practice.”
Laura: I can see Dumbledore arguing this in a manner very similar to how he argued Harry’s innocence over the summer during his trial. Very calmly and then just asking very pointed questions, and then ultimately, when it was clear that Umbridge didn’t have a leg to stand on, being like, “Well, great. Glad to hear that Gryffindor has been reinstated. Have a great day, Dolores.”
Andrew: [imitating Dumbledore] “I look forward to their reinstatement immediately, without delay.”
Laura: Yep.
Andrew: “Thank you, toad.”
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: I think, though, that given Slytherin – we already know that they’ve been given permission to practice – it wouldn’t be that hard for Dumbledore to argue that… I’m guessing it’s the other three Houses at this point, but I think it would be near impossible for her not to reinstate all four House Quidditch teams. Now, whether or not she found a way to remove Harry from Gryffindor is a completely different story, because really, at the end of the day, I think all she cares about is making Harry’s life miserable, and if he wasn’t on the Quidditch team, I think Gryffindor would have already gotten approval not long after she put out that decree.
Andrew: Yeah, that’s a good point.
Grace: Yeah. I know we hear about the Board of Governors really early on in the series; maybe that’s just one of the things that got dropped as we went through because I know Lucius was on the Board of Governors, so I didn’t know maybe if they had a role to play in things like this. Or if there’s powerful Gryffindor people on the Board of Governors, they might have some sway.
Andrew: Yeah, you would think so. The Gryffindor Quidditch team never did anything wrong, so there was no excuse Umbridge could come up with. Her best excuse was “I hate Harry, and Harry did something bad,” but that’s not enough to cancel an entire team.
Eric: Right.
Andrew: So the conversation turns back to Dumbledore’s Army, but Hermione is having second thoughts about it now that Sirius is a big fan of this plan. She thinks that he’s been “reckless” and “living through” the trio since he’s been stuck at Grimmauld Place, so she just doesn’t trust his judgment anymore.
Eric: Ouch, right? That hurts.
Andrew: Yeah. I get it, though. I get it, though.
Laura: She’s kind of right.
Eric: Just what I love about it is that as soon as she starts second guessing, Ron and Harry are at a loss for words. They can’t figure it… they’re like, “You suggested… this was your idea in the first place!” They don’t know where to go with her to convince her that what they’re doing is right.
Andrew: Right.
Eric: But I don’t know. It’s just funny how, I mean, she’s really leading the way here.
Micah: Yeah. I think unlike Ron and Harry, though, Hermione is processing the actual risk of what they’re doing and what the potential consequences are, and she’s only nervous now, and this is with good reason, because Umbridge almost caught Sirius. But there was an inherent risk of getting caught with something like Dumbledore’s Army to start, so she knew this. I just think this is her analytical mind at work, and she’s speaking out loud, and that Ron and Harry, they’re just shocked that she’s now thinking about not doing this. But I actually think it’s smart that she’s considering her options, because look at what almost just happened at the end of the last chapter.
Andrew: And the big question is still where? Where can they do this without getting caught?
Eric: Right.
Andrew: And there are no options that seem to stand out, because Umbridge will be able to get wherever they are. But yeah, the Room of Requirement will solve all of their problems. I was wondering, has anyone ever been guilty of encouraging someone to do something so you could live vicariously through them? I always think of gambling.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: It’s a lot of fun to watch people gamble, because it’s not your money.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: And then once you start playing, you’re like, “Oh, never mind.”
Eric: I have provided that service for others, where I gamble and lose money for their entertainment. Yes, I have done it. Not willingly, but I’ve done that, yeah. [laughs]
Micah: I’m not going to Vegas with you, Andrew.
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: This is a red flag right away. You’re going to be on the roulette table.
Andrew: Yep. Let me watch you play.
Micah: You’re just going to want to put the little chips on the board for me and then hope for the best.
Grace: I really like this chapter – actually, this is my favorite chapter of Order of the Phoenix, so I’m really excited we’re talking about it.
Eric: Oh, wow.
Grace: But I love it mostly because of what it does for both Hermione and Harry, but specifically that part of Hermione, and it’ll come up later when we do the connections between the books. But I love that she wants to do what is right, and then it usually catches up to her, “Uh-oh,” but she continues on, and I think that really captures why she’s in Gryffindor. And I do point out later in the chapter, Harry does refrain from being reckless, so she can count that as a win. She got into his brain.
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah, so Harry starts feeling the burn, and not the type of burn that Iowa, New Hampshire, and Nevada have been feeling.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: He realizes that Voldemort is angry, and it says, “Harry had not meant to say that at all… yet he knew at once it was true… Voldemort was in a towering temper,” and then Harry says to Ron, “He wants something done, and it’s not happening fast enough.” Dumbledore, in the last book, had warned Harry that he’ll be able to feel Voldemort’s angry mood, but this was the first time he realized he could feel when Voldemort was in a happy mood, too. And Harry also seems very confident in relaying Voldemort’s feelings for the first time. I mean, just the way that J.K. Rowling writes this, Harry had no doubt in his mind that Voldemort was feeling this way. So Harry is now experiencing the highs and lows of Voldemort’s life and mission, and I’m wondering if there’s other feelings he could be experiencing as well, because when else do you have certain highs? Getting back to gambling, not that I think Voldemort is gambling, or maybe when he’s having some fun with Bellatrix. I wonder if he can feel that too.
Laura: I think if that were the case, we would have seen evidence in Deathly Hallows. [laughs] Just based on Cursed Child and what we know apparently happened during that particular point in the series.
Andrew: Yeah, yeah. Makes you wonder.
Micah: I can’t recall, but wasn’t it strictly a movie-ism that Harry and Voldemort were feeling these emotions when the Horcruxes were being destroyed? Particularly Voldemort?
Eric: Yeah, but they are related. It’s kind of a related incident. In the books, Voldemort has been so distant from his Horcruxes for such a long time that he doesn’t feel when they’ve been destroyed. It’s in fact only after he goes and searches them all up and realizes they’ve been taken that he knows he’s in trouble.
Micah: Right.
Eric: But in the movie, as soon as one is destroyed, he screams.
Micah: Right, well, I mean, for the movie, it obviously makes sense to do that because it gives the person watching a little bit more insight into what’s going on, but… so yeah, I mean, I think maybe he’s just upset he had to practice for those couple of hours in the rain; that piece of him that’s inside of Harry is just pissed off that he’s soaking wet and exhausted.
[Eric laughs]
Micah: But I do think it’s important here to talk about Horcruxes, because this is one of the times in Order of the Phoenix that we could say that perhaps this connection is so strong because part of Voldemort is within Harry and that’s what is allowing them to connect with each other.
Andrew: Yeah. So Harry is sharing this information with Ron, and Ron is like, “Well, it’s time to go to Dumbledore to tell him about what you’re feeling right now.” But Harry shrugs it off, and I find this surprising, because surely Dumbledore would like to know that Voldemort isn’t happy that something’s not happening faster. This seems like very valuable information, especially when Dumbledore has a sense of what Voldemort is after already, or he knows what Voldemort is after already. So what’s going on here? Why is Harry so stubborn about this?
Eric: I think it’s just the treatment that he’s been receiving from Dumbledore, right? He’s like, “I’m not going to do him any favors. He can figure it out.” I mean, if Harry can walk into a pub and all of a sudden four different people are able to report to Dumbledore what he’s doing, Harry probably figures he’s not the only source of information for that Voldemort is frustrated, and he just… I don’t know, he just dissociates himself from being on Dumbledore’s side, which is ironic, given what he’s doing later in this chapter.
Laura: Agreed.
Grace: Yeah, I mean, Harry is conditioned to not trust adults. I mean, we see it from the first book all the way through up to here. But I specifically remember when his scar starts hurting in Goblet of Fire, he literally goes through a list in his mind of who he can talk to, and then also what they’ll say back, and he settles on Sirius instead of Dumbledore. I think that’s very telling about whether or not Harry trusts or doesn’t want to bother Dumbledore with these kinds of things.
Eric: Right.
Andrew: You would think Dumbledore might want to resolve this so that Harry does trust him more…
Eric: You would think.
Andrew: … because the information is valuable.
Eric: Yeah, you really would think, but Dumbledore has not created that environment of “Come and tell me.” Even the idea that he’d be bothering Dumbledore if he were to tell him; that’s on Dumbledore, I think, to a certain extent.
Micah: I agree with Eric.
Grace: Yeah, because I mean, he even tells Sirius later in this book about what’s going on instead of… now, if Sirius relays that to Dumbledore, it’s a different matter altogether.
Andrew and Laura: Yeah.
Micah: This is Dumbledore’s fault. He’s isolated Harry for the entire year thus far, even going back into the summer, and so I can’t blame Harry for not thinking that he can go and trust Dumbledore with this information, but I do think he should have spoken with somebody. Sirius is obviously not an option, but McGonagall could have been, and I think his decision not to tell any adult makes him more vulnerable to manipulation in the future.
Andrew and Eric: Yeah.
Andrew: So in some lighter news, Dobby shows up, and he stops by to deliver Hedwig, who’s now mended thanks to Grubbly-Plank. And Dobby reveals that, as we saw in the chapter art, he’s been taking all the hats and socks that Hermione has been knitting, and it’s super adorable.
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Andrew: And Winky, unfortunately, we learn, has been drinking a lot over all these clothing drops. [laughs] Hermione’s work is causing Winky to drink; it’s just so sad. And just to hear Dobby tell the story is really entertaining as well.
Laura: It’s also interesting because Dobby points out that none of the other elves will clean the Gryffindor common room anymore because they’re offended at the clothes being left, and so it’s interesting because… we’ve talked about this before; Hermione is trying to do the right thing here, but we were questioning, is she going about it the right way?
Andrew: Yeah, and it’s backfiring badly.
Micah: With Hedwig’s arrival, I wanted to go back to something that was really at the very start of the chapter, and that is Hermione saying that she believes Umbridge is responsible for the attack on Hedwig. Now, we don’t know specifics, but if that is the case, let’s add animal cruelty to the list for Umbridge, and we can plus up her suck count at the end of this discussion.
Eric: Oh, thank gosh. I was worried we wouldn’t be able to do that this chapter.
[Andrew and Grace laugh]
Eric: But you’re right. You’re right. What a horrible way to start the chapter. You know Hermione is 100% correct on this, because she lays out… it’s pretty much an open-shut case. This is clearly where she connects the Dungbomb thing. She really is just the top witch of her age.
Grace: Yeah, I don’t know. When I read Order of the Phoenix I always do end up wondering what happened to Winky, and so I went and looked it up and saw that apparently, according to JKR, that she did participate in the Battle of Hogwarts, and that she got off the sauce, I think is how J.K. Rowling put it.
[Andrew laughs]
Grace: But I find that really interesting. I wish we had seen more of Winky later on, because she kind of gets dropped off after this book.
Andrew: And of course, I don’t think makes any appearance at all in the movies, which was a bit of a bummer.
Micah: No, and I think that was a miss, particularly with Barty Crouch, Jr. in Goblet of Fire. And then of course, we didn’t get, I don’t think, any house-elves, with the exception of Kreacher in Order of the Phoenix. I think it’s actually Neville, right, who tips off Harry about the Room of Requirement in the movie?
Andrew: Oh, yeah. But yeah, so speaking of the Room of Requirement, so Dobby is just absolutely in love with Harry. “Anything for Harry Potter. Whatever I can do to help, I’m there for you, buddy.”
[Micah laughs]
Andrew: And so Harry asks him for a place for Dumbledore’s Army to meet and Dobby immediately thinks of the Room of Requirement, or the Come and Go Room, and I think we’ve referenced that alternate title from time to time on the show. And Dobby says that he uses this room for Winky when Winky has drunk too much, [laughs] and so they go in there and they find a little elf bed, which is just so cute to visualize, and butterbeer antidotes. They actually have places like this in Vegas – I’m bringing up gambling a lot this episode – but Vegas has hangover doctor offices where you can go and they’ll shoot you up with, I don’t know, water and some vitamins to help you recover from your hangover. I have an annual pass to one of those places…
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Andrew: But anyway, that just made me think of that. These are real things.
Eric: Yeah. I mean, reading about the “antidote” to butterbeer… like, wow, I didn’t realize butterbeer needed… I mean, I don’t know that it’s a specific… it might just be a betterment potion or a hydration potion, or treating the causes of drunkenness rather than being a specific anti-butterbeer.
Micah: Yeah, I didn’t know you could get wasted off of butterbeer.
Andrew: Yeah, that’s what I was going to say. I didn’t think it was so strong.
Eric: Well, normally you can’t, but because Winky is smaller, it affects her more.
Andrew: Ahh. Okay, that makes sense.
Laura: Yeah, I think Harry brought this up – was it in Goblet of Fire? – and Dobby says, “‘Tis strong for a house-elf.”
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Grace: Yeah. I love that the Dumbledore chamberpots line from Goblet of Fire really was so important in this book; I think that’s a really funny connection to Goblet of Fire. Also, I still wonder why was Dumbledore wandering around the castle at 5:00 a.m. and didn’t know where a bathroom was?
[Andrew laughs]
Grace: But it worked out here.
Eric: Well, one thing at a time here. We’re trying to figure a lot out.
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: Yeah, you would think he has his own bathroom.
Grace: Right [laughs]
Eric: Exactly. Well, but that’s what makes it a little bit more obviously a clue for Harry, and seeing Harry internalize this when Dobby is telling him about the room, he’s like, “Oh, man, now I remember Dumbledore saying something about a room with chamberpots,” and so it’s almost that revelation that he has, that Dumbledore has said about this room in close proximity, kind of with a code, right? Codedly convinces Harry that this is the way beyond all other ways to go.
Grace: And it convinces Hermione, which is even more important.
Eric: Yeah, yeah.
Grace: This is a good, safe place.
Andrew: “Oh, Dumbledore’s idea? I’m in.”
Grace: Right.
[Grace and Micah laugh]
Eric: Yeah, so even though Dumbledore is not speaking to Harry, Harry is not speaking to Dumbledore, there has managed to be this transmission of information between the two of them, which is really cool.
Micah: And I think it’s important that it’s laid out in this chapter that the Room of Requirement is a room for all, right? They talk about Dumbledore. They talk about Filch, right? I think. Isn’t it Fred and George who mentioned Filch? And there’s a couple of other references. Not only that, the complete contrast in what this room is used for in Order of the Phoenix versus what it’s used for in Half-Blood Prince and the fact that it’s a room right now which is for the formation of Dumbledore’s Army to fight back, yet in Half-Blood Prince, it is a way for Death Eaters to infiltrate the school. So completely different ends of the spectrum.
Laura: Yeah, and I mean, it’s even more disturbing when you consider the fact that Draco Malfoy takes his cues on how to organize that based on how Dumbledore’s Army communicates with each other later on in this book.
Micah: Yep.
Andrew: Right. One wonders if this room survives the post-Harry Potter 7 world, because it does seem like a security nightmare!
[“It’s starting to sound like a security nightmare!” sound effect plays with sirens]
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Andrew: But really, for anyone to be able to use this? That’s a problem. Especially to break into the school.
Grace: Yeah, we don’t ever find out, do we, after Book 7, whether the Fiendfyre destroyed that room completely? Or if they managed to get it back up and running.
Eric: Oh, man.
Andrew: I would guess they get it back up and running, because that room basically purges itself. So Dumbledore’s Army unites in the Room of Requirement; everybody gets in. The room has a lot of books and other magical objects to help them in their training, right, Eric?
Eric: Yeah, it’s got some really cool… I mean, I wonder where all these books came from physically, but this seems to have pretty much everything you’d ever need. I just get giddy reading this segment of the chapter. A room that can be absolutely anything ever that you want? And the books are clearly real books; it’s not like the room is manifesting books that didn’t previously exist, but it’s pulling relevant source material. It really speaks to a sentience of Hogwarts. And I just had to laugh, because Hermione, before they get the group together, is seen reading a book called Jinxes for the Jinxed, and if you’ll recall, she earlier in this book had a huge argument with Umbridge over jinxes and counter-jinxes, and so I’m wondering if the reason she waltzed over to this particular book and started reading it, while there was still disorder and people were still arriving, was to see if she could prove her point or just pick up another book on jinxes. It’s a very clever, in my mind, very small throwback to a couple chapters ago.
Andrew: Yeah. And I was just looking it up, and we don’t know for sure if the Room of Requirement survived Book 7. Ron does wonder if it’s still there, but we don’t get an answer for sure. Time to tweet J.K. Rowling.
[Eric laughs]
Grace: Yeah, because I mean, I would assume, maybe like the Chamber of Secrets, that’s a place that was built by the founders, so I don’t know what kind of magic would go into building that space.
Andrew: Yeah. Well, and I just feel like, because it’s able to transform into so many things, it should be able to survive something like what occurs in Deathly Hallows. But when they’re trying to come up with a name for Dumbledore’s Army, the group tosses around a bunch of different names, and Eric thought that we could rate these alternative names. I think that’s a fun idea. Angelina Johnson said “The Anti-Umbridge League.” I feel like that’s pushing your luck.
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Eric: A little on the nose?
Andrew: Yeah, and she’s going to get extra mad if she hears about it.
Micah: You need the acronym to go along with it as well. You need that DA, right? TAUL doesn’t work.
Laura: I mean, they could be the AUL.
Eric: AUL? The awl?
Andrew: Awl. We’re awl going to bring down Voldemort. Fred Weasley said “The Ministry of Magic Are Morons Group.”
[Micah laughs]
Eric: Or MMAMG.
Laura: I have to give him points for the alliteration that’s going on here.
Andrew: Okay. But also would deeply anger Umbridge, so best that they did not pick that one. Cho Chang said “The Defense Association,” which is just so boring. That sounds like an office.
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Grace: Well, it’s definitely less Gryffindor than the first two.
[Andrew and Grace laugh]
Eric: It does speak for itself, though, kind of.
Grace: That’s true.
Micah: It is very Ravenclaw.
Grace: Yeah, practical.
Andrew: When I think of other names it could have been, I think of Harry Potter trivia names, like “The Group Who Shall Not Be Named.”
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: That’s a good point. But it is, of course, Ginny Weasley who comes up with, “Uh, we’ll keep your DA idea, Cho, but let’s call it ‘Dumbledore’s Army.'”
Grace: Harry’s girlfriend’s got brains.
Eric: So I think we’re in agreement that the names get better as they go along. They properly narrow it down.
Andrew: Defense Association wasn’t, in my opinion.
[Grace laughs]
Eric: But do you think that that’s the second best of the proposed? Or would you rather have Ministry of Magic Are Morons Group or Anti-Umbridge League over Defense Association? If it can’t be Dumbledore’s Army.
Andrew: If there were no consequences to calling it the Anti-Umbridge League, I would definitely call it the Anti-Umbridge League.
Eric: Okay, all right.
Grace: Yeah, I really enjoy the first part of this with Hermione sticking to the rules, like “We’ve got to vote on a name; we’ve got to vote on a leader.” I think that that’s one of my favorite little Hermione pieces in this chapter.
Andrew: Yeah. And it is a great idea, because there are some members of this group who have shown signs of defection or rebellion, and by voting for the leader, there’s going to be no doubt about that, about who’s in charge.
Laura: Yeah, it is kind of a funny moment where Hermione keeps putting her hand in the air, and Harry is getting a taste of what it’s like to be Umbridge in this case.
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Laura: Like, “Okay, yes, what do you need now?”
Grace: And I think that’s such a cool little… I wrote in the doc #JusticeForProfessorHarry, but I love that little moment of Harry knowing what it feels like to be a Hogwarts professor that has Hermione in their classroom.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: And that’s why he didn’t need to come back to be a teacher, because he already was a teacher at Hogwarts.
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Micah: There you go. Yeah, I thought this was great. And as you would expect, students, they don’t like the fact that they have to start with the basics, but in going through this exercise, you see that not everyone is as good at the basics as you would be led to believe, and it’s really important that they start here and they go with Expelliarmus. I thought the moment between Harry and Neville – despite the fact that it’s because Harry is distracted by Cho that Neville is able to disarm him…
[Eric laughs]
Micah: … but still for the confidence boost that it gives Neville, it’s so important. And I think Harry really shines through, even in this first lesson, as being a really good teacher.
Eric: Yeah, yeah. And nobody likes Zacharias Smith. I bet Zacharias Smith’s own mother doesn’t even like him.
[Grace laughs]
Eric: But Fred and George jinxing him is not allowed, and Harry gives them an eye. I take back what I said about… that was very mean about saying his mother didn’t even like him.
Grace: Probably true.
Andrew: I’m with you. I don’t like his name.
Eric: [laughs] The Fred and George taking turns jinxing him and Harry just giving them an eye, and Fred being like, “Sorry, Harry, couldn’t help it,” is a very teacherly thing to do. Harry allows it. He doesn’t out them and say, “This is what was happening,” but he puts a stop to it. They understand. And Fred and George, who are older than Harry, respect him enough to knock it off then.
Grace: Yeah, I think this is one of my favorite chapters in this book because it’s one of the few times where we get to see Harry be really happy and feel like he’s got control of something. I mean, he starts off this lesson super nervous, and then by the end he feels really comfortable, and I think that’s a really cool thing to see in his character growth.
Eric: It’s kind of… you know how in the movie when Harry and Cho are under the mistletoe – I know that we’re not there yet in this part in the book – but how it just magically appears over them right away? So too in the book, Harry is trying to get some order, and he thinks, “I should have a whistle,” and he looks over on a chair, and all of a sudden there’s a whistle there, which I think is pretty much the same way. I completely envision a whistle not having been there a second before when the room first came up, but as soon as he thinks it, because he’s the one who called the room into existence, that it’ll show up that same way, which just speaks to how cool the room is.
Andrew: Yeah. And final point I’ll make on it is even though these spells are basic, and yeah, we’re getting started with simple spells because not everybody is that great at them, they’re also just building a team here. They’re getting to know each other. So I think it’s great to start at this level so they don’t have to dive in knee-deep first; they just get their toes wet.
Micah: Right. And unity is important. Obviously, we’re leaving Slytherin out of the equation here – sorry, Grace…
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Micah: … but it’s the way J.K. Rowling wrote the story. But I think it’s so important that we’re seeing all three of these Houses come together to fight for a common cause, and this is the very foundation of that.
Andrew: No House points to deal with either. This is a cool example…
Micah: Could Harry…? You made me think of that, though, earlier. Could Harry give out House points during this lesson?
Grace: Interesting.
Andrew: I don’t think he should. I brought that up because I think the beauty of Dumbledore’s Army is that they’re not against each other; they’re all in this together, so don’t throw House points in the mix because it’s just going to start dividing people up again.
Laura: Yeah, this is also… I mean, it’s a really nice parallel to the Order of the Phoenix. I mean, they are effectively mirroring what the adults are doing outside of the castle, so this is real world experience for them that’s not being hampered by these house rules that will have no practical application once they leave school.
Eric: I feel like Umbridge would want to know the source of any and all points given to Houses too.
Laura: True.
Andrew: Oh, yeah.
[Micah laughs]
Eric: So I mean, Harry can’t because he’s not a prefect, but if he did a House thing, it’d be like, “Wow. Weirdly, Ravenclaw is up 17 between 5:00 p.m. when classes ended yesterday and 10:00 a.m. this morning,” [laughs] so it’d be a dead giveaway what they were doing.
Micah: True.
Andrew: All right, and I think that’s the chapter.
Eric: Wow! Kind of a quick discussion.
Andrew: Streamlined. Yeah, it was a simpler chapter, I would say.
Eric: It’s just one of the best ones, where everything’s going according to… Harry is able to learn and grow and have a good time. It’s a feel-good chapter.
Grace: Yeah, it’s a small chapter, but it has mighty implications for the series, which is neat to me.
Laura: Definitely does.
Eric: Well put. Well put.
Laura: Speaking of, we still have the Umbridge Suck count ahead, as well as some connecting the threads to discuss, but before that, we need to talk about a different kind of thread.
[Eric laughs]
Laura: We’re going to hear from one of our sponsors, Third Love.
[Ad break]
Andrew: All right, so the Umbridge Suck count, I believe, only grows by one today because of potentially attacking Hedwig.
Eric: Right.
Laura: Ugh, I feel like animal abuse deserves extra points.
Andrew: Oooh. How many points?
Laura: Okay, can we say two? Because she attacked Hedwig, but also Grubbly-Plank had to take important time away from her lesson planning to heal Hedwig.
Andrew: Right. Yeah.
Eric: There you go.
Andrew: Sure.
Laura: Yeah, screw Umbridge.
Andrew: Okay.
Micah: And she’s probably going to dock Grubbly-Plank because she didn’t have time to prepare for her lesson, so you could add another one on for that.
Eric: Right.
Andrew: Oh, but that’s just guessing now.
Micah: Here, if we want to extrapolate it all the way out, who knows what this damage could have done to Hedwig, so that in Deathly Hallows, if she could have flown better, maybe she would have avoided…
Andrew and Eric: Ohhh.
Grace: See? Yes.
Laura: Oh my God.
Eric: So you’re saying if she’s flying with a limp?
Micah: I’m saying Umbridge is directly responsible for Hedwig’s death in Deathly Hallows.
Andrew: Oh my goodness. All right. Well, yeah, I can add an extra point for that. Definitely.
[“Hem-hem!” Umbridge Suck count sound effect plays]
Andrew: All right, so that brings it up to 35.
[Everyone laughs]
Connecting the Threads
Laura: All right, well, we’ve got several threads to connect today. What I love about this chapter is, like we said, the discussion about it can be pretty streamlined, but there’s a lot of little things going on here that are pretty cool callbacks to Prisoner of Azkaban. So we can start with Quidditch. We are introduced to the Impervius Charm in Chapter 9 of Prisoner of Azkaban, when Hermione charms Harry’s glasses so that he can actually see while he’s flying in a blinding rainstorm when they play against Hufflepuff, and here, when the Gryffindor Quidditch team is practicing, they all use the same charm so that the rain doesn’t get in their faces and block them while they’re trying to practice, because Angelina says they’re probably going to play against Slytherin in pretty similar conditions. So I thought that was a nice little callback. Then there’s this really cool thing about Sirius in Hogwarts. So in Chapter 9 of Prisoner of Azkaban, we learn that Sirius has successfully escaped Hogwarts and evaded any kind of capture. This is after he breaks into the Gryffindor boys’ dormitory and Ron believes that Sirius is trying to stab him; really he’s trying to kill Peter Pettigrew, but everybody’s flummoxed by the fact that Sirius was able to get in undetected and get out without being captured. And here we see the trio sort of uncertain about how much Umbridge knows about how close she came to capturing Sirius, so it’s a really nice contrast here, where Sirius gets away and is pretty certainly safe in Prisoner of Azkaban, but in this book, we’re feeling a little bit unsettled thinking Umbridge may know more than what we’re hoping. Also, it’s really interesting looking back at Prisoner of Azkaban; in Chapter 21, Dumbledore tells two 13-year-olds, “Yeah, use this Time-Turner.”
[Eric laughs]
Laura: “Go back in time, save Sirius, save Buckbeak.” So Dumbledore is really giving Harry and Hermione his stamp of approval to act in his stead. And then in Chapter 18 of Order of the Phoenix, the students actively take Dumbledore’s name on when they decide that they’re going to fight the power, so I thought that was a pretty good one. Then also looking at Hermione taking matters into her own hands: In Prisoner of Azkaban throughout the book, she devotes a significant amount of time to helping Hagrid prep for Buckbeak’s trial, actively trying to undermine the Ministry, effectively, and in Order of the Phoenix Chapter 18, we see the birth of a movement that Hermione originally inspired, again, looking to undermine the Ministry. And then, Eric, I know you’ll like this one.
Eric: Ooh!
Laura: [laughs] Third year Harry is way more prepared for Defense Against the Dark Arts than his peers two years later. This is evidenced by the fact that at the end of Prisoner of Azkaban, Harry produces a fully-formed Patronus to save himself, Sirius, and Hermione from a horde of Dementors. Meanwhile, fifth year and older students in Dumbledore’s Army can barely produce Expelliarmus.
Eric: Yep.
Laura: And that just goes to show how woefully underprepared these students are.
Micah: Yeah, that’s fair.
Laura: And then, Micah, I think you had a couple of threads to connect.
Micah: Yeah, I did. The first one is actually with the Marauder’s Map. Chapter 18 of Prisoner of Azkaban is entitled “Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs,” and in Chapter 18 of Order of the Phoenix, the Marauder’s Map plays a significant role in the safety of the Dumbledore’s Army students.
Laura: Love it.
Micah: And then Hermione in Chapter 18 of Prisoner of Azkaban – this is when they’re inside the Shrieking Shack – she has this insistence that there aren’t unregistered Animagi, and she reiterates this point during the conversation with Lupin and Sirius and others, and she still believes that the Ministry holds the absolute truth about everything. And I wanted to… I just thought that that’s a far cry from Chapter 18 of Order of the Phoenix, where she believes the Ministry is full of [censored].
[Eric and Grace laugh]
Andrew: Yeah, that’s great.
Laura: Yeah. It’s so funny, too, because we still see evidence in this book of Hermione wanting to discount rumors. Luna says something a little bit earlier in the book about Cornelius Fudge having an army of Heliopaths, and Hermione is like, “Oh goodness, that’s just nonsense. Those aren’t real.”
[Micah laughs]
Laura: So definitely… I mean, we know that Hermione could have ended up being Sorted into Ravenclaw, and I think that this chapter evidences that. We see Hermione’s overwhelming tendencies, very Gryffindor-esque tendencies of doing what’s right and fighting the injustice that’s happening in the Ministry, but then also, sometimes she’s kind of roped in by her intellect a bit. I think sometimes her tendency to follow rules can hinder her a little bit.
MVP of the Week
Andrew: All right, great stuff. And now it’s time for our MVP of the Week.
[MVP of the Week music plays]
Andrew: Oh boy, look out. Here it comes. Get ready for the beat drop.
[Micah laughs]
Laura: It’s about to drop.
Andrew: All right, so I’m going to give mine to Dobby for being friend to the ill, specifically Hedwig and Winky.
Laura: Aww.
Eric: I’m giving mine to Hogwarts for having just the thing to help our students practice.
Andrew: [laughs] Eric is so animated now with the music.
[Laura laughs]
Eric: The music really wakes me up.
Grace: As a person who works in marketing, I have to give mine to Ginny for creating a very lucrative brand with the name Dumbledore’s Army.
Laura: Yep. I’m going to have to give mine to Harry for teaching his signature life-saving move.
Eric: Nice.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Time and time again, disarming is what saves him.
Micah: And I’ll give mine to Neville for finally being able to cast Expelliarmus and getting that huge boost of confidence that he truly needed.
Rename the Chapter
Andrew: All right, and now it is time for us to rename the chapter. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Chapter 18…
[“Hooked on a Feeling” plays]
[Micah laughs]
Andrew: Okay, so obviously Voldemort is not in love with Harry, but I just thought, like, “feeling”?
[Eric laughs]
Micah: I was going to say, is this the end of the chapter where Harry is just totally all about Cho?
Andrew: Oh, no. I was going for the Harry/Voldemort connection.
Micah: Oh, okay.
Eric: Yeah, makes sense. I went with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Chapter 18, “The Tower of Hats.”
[Grace and Micah laugh]
Eric: Seems like it would be…
Grace: Goes with the art for the chapter.
Andrew and Eric: Yeah.
Grace: I had two choices, one obvious, which is “The Room of Requirement,” or the one that I relate more to: “Teaching at Hogwarts: Fake It Till You Make It.”
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: I went with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Chapter 18, “Defense Against the Dull Arts.”
Micah: I see what you did there.
Eric: Nice.
Laura: Yep.
Micah: And finally, I went with Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix Chapter 18, “House-Elf Hangovers.”
Andrew: If you have any feedback about today’s discussion, email it on in to MuggleCast@gmail.com, or you can record a voice memo on your phone and send it to the same address. Just try to record in a quiet place and keep your message to no longer than 60 seconds.
Quizzitch
Andrew: Okay, it’s time now for Quizzitch, and as I understand it, we have some music now for this as well.
Eric: That is right.
[Quizzitch music plays]
Andrew: Whoa!
Eric: Right? Last week’s Quizzitch question: What spell does Gryffindor use to help them practice at Quidditch? The answer, of course, is the Impervius Charm. Congratulations to everyone who submitted the correct answer, including Ryan Nolan, Jim Bob Who, Pravi Singh, Julian S., Rich T. Chicken, Marie Lipocky, The Cat’s Pajamas, Real Slim Brady, Jason King, Michael Not Eric, Hannah E., and Robbie S. And next week’s Quizzitch question: What does Hermione use to bewitch the golden coins for Dumbledore’s Army members? Please submit your correct answer to us on Twitter over at @MuggleCast, hashtag Quizzitch. Thanks for playing.
Andrew: And be sure to also follow us on Facebook and Instagram; we are also MuggleCast there. You will stay abreast of the latest Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts news. Hopefully we’ll be getting some Fantastic Beasts news soon as well. But Grace, thanks for coming on the show today. It was great having you on.
Grace: Thanks. This has been 12-year-old me’s dream.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: Awesome, and hopefully current Grace’s dream as well.
Grace: Oh, yeah, for sure.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: “Well, that was boring, but at least I played off my 12-year-old self’s wildest fantasies.”
Andrew: Sometimes people are like, “Oh yeah, I used to listen to the show,” and I’m like, “Used to? We’re still doing it!”
Grace: Oh, yeah. 15 years, almost.
Andrew: Yeah, yeah, 15 years this August. Thank you to everybody who supports us on Patreon. If you aren’t a patron yet, we would love if you’d consider doing so. By pledging at the $5 level or higher, you will be eligible for our physical gift, which we should be announcing in the next month or two; we’re just finalizing the details there. It’s going to be really good. Even though you won’t be getting our physical gift right away, you will have access to lots of bonus material, including bonus MuggleCast. You’ll be able to hop into our livestream so you can hear us recording and unintentionally revealing the physical gift. [laughs] That’s the beauty of the livestream; it’s just this unfiltered look at the show. And then, of course, if you pledge at the Slug Club level, you will have the opportunity to co-host MuggleCast one day, just like Grace did today. So thank you to everybody who supports us; we truly could not do this without you, so we really appreciate your support. And even if you don’t support us on Patreon, you are a listener, obviously. Make sure you are subscribed to the show. Sometimes people hear this word “subscribe” and they think it means you have to pay. You can subscribe for free through your favorite podcasting app, so make sure you do that, and you will stay up to date on the latest episodes of MuggleCast. And also follow us on social media; we are MuggleCast on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram. All right, I think that’s it. Thanks, everybody, for listening. I’m Andrew.
Eric: I’m Eric.
Micah: I’m Micah.
Laura: I’m Laura.
Grace: And I’m Grace.
Andrew: Bye, everybody.
Laura: See ya.
Grace and Micah: Bye.