Transcript #455 - MuggleCast

Transcript for MuggleCast Episode #455, How To Hogwarts (OOTP 19, The Lion & The Serpent)

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: And I’m Laura.

Andrew: On today’s show we are discussing Chapter 19 of Order of the Phoenix, “The Lion and the Serpent,” and we also have a debate tied to it. I think we might be annoying some of our listeners if we actually believe these stances Micah gave us.

Micah: [laughs] Why would you say that?

Andrew: Because you are making you and I say some terrible things, and I’m worried.

[Eric laughs]

Micah: Why, because we’re arguing on the right side of the law?

Andrew and Eric: Wow.

Andrew: Okay, well, we’ll talk about that later in today’s episode. We also have some great feedback and a little bit of news, so let’s start with that. I didn’t realize this; The Tales of Beedle the Bard has never had an audiobook, but that changes later this month because on March 31, an “all-star,” as Eric wrote, cast of Harry Potter cast members are getting together to record this. It makes a lot of sense that they’re involving a lot of actors and actresses, because The Tales of Beedle the Bard, of course, is made up of multiple stories by J.K. Rowling. This was released in what, 2008, I want to say?

Eric: Something like that, yeah.

Andrew: So get this: Sally Mortemore… well, nobody knows her. Madam Pince, she’s going to intro the book; Noma Dumezweni, who played Hermione in Cursed Child, she’s going to read “The Tale of the Three Brothers”; Evanna Lynch is going to read “The Fountain of Fair Fortune”; Bonnie Wright is going to read “Babbity Rabbity and her Cackling Stump”; Jason Isaacs is going to read “The Warlock’s Hairy Heart”; and Warwick Davis reads “The Wizard and the Hopping Pot.” And then, of course, the book has those introductions from Dumbledore, which are so great, and Jude Law is going to narrate those. So big cast of people getting together to record this. Sounds like a great idea.

Eric: Yeah, yeah. I’m really getting into audiobooks lately, a little bit even more than I have in the past, and audiobooks that have multiple narrators are really a cool thing also. It just feels like a special multimedia production of some sort, or theatrical kind of a thing.

Andrew: Keeps it fresh too, I imagine, while you’re reading.

Eric: Yeah, absolutely. And there is a degree of cleverness as well behind the different people they’ve chosen for each of these things. So for instance, Noma Dumezweni… Hermione in the movie reads “The Tale of the Three Brothers”; Emma Watson does.

Andrew: Oh, yeah.

Eric: And then so to have another Hermione, to have Cursed Child‘s original cast member Hermione read it in this audiobook, is a clever either nod, or it just makes sense that as Dumbledore gifts that book to Hermione, that she would be reading that chapter.

Andrew: Yeah, that’s very clever.

Micah: I love how they got the librarian to intro the book.

[Andrew and Eric laugh]

Micah: Very appropriate.

Eric: And I’m struggling to remember the scene that she was in, that Madam Pince was in. I can’t… I think…

Andrew: It was the scene where she goes, “Shh!”

[Eric and Micah laugh]

Eric: She looks like the witch who was at the high table in the Great Hall in a couple scenes that I always assumed was Professor Sinistra.

Andrew: Oh, I think I did too.

Eric: Yeah, you just always kind of assume because the librarian wouldn’t necessarily get a seat at the high table, right?

Andrew: Right. No offense to any librarians out there.

Eric: No, no, but you don’t see Filch sitting up there either.

Micah: Yeah, because I’m sure there are no librarians who listen to this show.

[Andrew laughs]

Eric: There are… I actually know three librarians who listen to the show.

Micah: That’s my point. Well, isn’t there a moment in the Restricted Section, or am I thinking of Sorcerer’s Stone?

Eric: Sorcerer’s Stone.

Andrew: Yes, that’s kind of what I was referring to. You wrote down, Eric, Chamber of Secrets, but in this article it just says Harry Potter film series, so I don’t know. Maybe she’s not in Chamber of Secrets at all.

Eric: Yeah. Huh.

Micah: I knew I saw her in the Battle for Hogwarts.

[Everyone laughs]

Eric: Maybe they amended the article, because I definitely remember it saying Chamber of Secrets.

Micah: Her and Sean Biggerstaff, right? Flying by in that one very quick moment.

Eric: Oh, God.

Andrew: Totally. And Winky was there too.

[Eric laughs]

Micah: Even though she never appeared in Goblet of Fire, they… yeah.

Andrew: So we haven’t done this in a while, MuggleCast TBT. We post these on social media about every week, and now that we are approaching our 15th anniversary, we want to include more of these on each episode of MuggleCast. I loved this one that we posted earlier this week; thanks to our social media manager Jule for posting this. We were in London, actually for the release of The Tales of Beedle the Bard, so appropriate that this clip was posted this week. And we are discussing if J.K. Rowling could write any other books beyond Harry Potter. Listen to this.

[TBT clip starts]

Andrew: Well, anything she does now is going to be… it’s going to get huge hype around it, because how could it not? And imagine starting another suspense novel or whatever and starting this whole trilogy all over again. It won’t be as fun as Harry Potter, but…

Elysa: Didn’t she say, though, that if she published anything else outside of Harry Potter, she was considering using a pseudonym?

Andrew: Oh, a what?

Elysa: A pseudonym? Like, changing her name?

Andrew: Oh, to like, Joanne Rowling? Wasn’t she just joking, though?

Elysa: I mean, I couldn’t tell.

Jamie: It’ll get leaked as well. We’re going to find out what it is.

Elysa: Yeah, no. I mean, we definitely would.

Andrew: That’d be really hard to keep it a secret.

[TBT clip ends]

Andrew: That’s kind of crazy that I spoke about that, because that’s exactly what happened. She published under a pseudonym, and it got leaked. [laughs]

Eric: And Andrew, you predicted that it would be also in the same genre as Harry Potter, suspense/mystery.

Andrew: Yeah, yeah. Well, she writes what she knows. Also, it sounded like I didn’t know what a pseudonym was.

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Andrew: Elysa had to give me a definition, or maybe I just couldn’t hear her. I don’t know, but that’s a little embarrassing.

Laura: Well, you guys were live, right? So yeah, it happens.

Andrew: It could be hard to hear each other.

Laura: I was going to say, wow, my voice has changed so much since then.

[Eric laughs]

Andrew: No, Laura, that wasn’t you.

Laura: Who’s that British guy?

Andrew: Oh. [laughs] That was Jamie. And the woman was Elysa, who was on the show a while ago. Laura’s BFF.

Eric: But Jamie is saying it would leak and it would be hard to keep under wraps. That’s exactly what happened.

Andrew: Yeah, exactly.

Eric: Very cool.

Andrew: So yeah, we’ll include more of those on the show as we approach our 15th anniversary.

Listener Feedback

Andrew: Moving over to Muggle Mail now; we have this voice memo from Jacob.

[Voicemail plays]

“Hi, MuggleCast. This is Jacob from Virginia. I have really enjoyed the last few episodes of your podcast as we’ve been going through these chapters of Order of the Phoenix because I had forgotten how much I love these chapters, but also how much of an influence that they made on my own life. You brought up a few weeks ago if anybody had a teacher in high school that they just really didn’t enjoy or felt like wasn’t very qualified for their job, and that is absolutely how my classmates and I felt about our chorus teacher. We loved singing in choir, and we had a very young, new teacher who was really ineffective and didn’t quite have the skills to do it, and so in that role, I actually started an afterschool group and would often during class take my classmates to the band room, which was empty at the time, and I got to practice teaching for a little bit. And now I am a high school choir director and I love everything about it, but I felt very much like Harry in a role, that if we were going to do what we wanted to do, we would have to have some initiative from the student side. So thank you for doing what you all do, and keep it up.”

[Voicemail ends]

Andrew: That’s awesome, Jacob. Thank you so much for sharing.

Laura: Yeah, that’s really cool.

Eric: I wonder if the original teacher has gotten better. I know some teachers they can hire pretty young, right out of school, and it’s possible that there were some growing pains there. But I wonder if Jacob is now teaching at the same school, either alongside the choir director, or whether they’re fired and no longer there.

[Andrew and Eric laugh]

Andrew: “Let me show you how it’s done.”

Eric: I’d love, yeah, a follow-up. But it’s really lovely to hear this as a real world example of kids taking the effort.

Andrew: Yeah, absolutely. Okay, now we have this email from Heather:

“I wanted to send in a little note in regards to your discussion a few episodes ago about the Hog’s Head. I happened to come across the word ‘hogshead’ in the Official Scrabble Players dictionary, just by chance, because it was at the top of a page. It is defined as a ‘large cask.’ I found this so interesting, and looking a little further into it, Wikipedia defines it as: ‘a large cask of liquid (or, less often, of a food commodity). More specifically, it refers to a specified volume, measured in either imperial or US customary measures, primarily applied to alcoholic beverages, such as wine, ale, or cider.’ So it seems that the name of the pub was very purposely chosen! I thought you might find this interesting, so wanted to share.”

Laura: That’s really cool.

Andrew: I did not realize that was a real word, yeah.

Eric: It’s kind of breaking my brain a little bit.

[Andrew and Eric laugh]

Andrew: That something in the wizarding world is real?

Eric: Yeah, well, that hogshead is a word; hogshead, if you put a space in it, it’s the Hog’s Head. That’s the name of the pub. But there’s also this weird connection: hogshead you store wine in, but there’s all these hog things – Hogwarts, Hogsmeade – and so did J.K. Rowling start with hogshead that she changed into Hog’s Head, and was like, “Let’s keep with this hogs theme. Going to put it in Hogsmeade next to Hogwarts; that’s the name of the school”? Because it’s just so many hogs, I guess, around.

Andrew: So many hogs. I think what this means is that we could call the show Hogshead, and we couldn’t get sued by Warner Bros. because this was a word that existed outside of the wizarding world.

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Laura: HogsheadCast.

Andrew: We found something. HogsheadCast.

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Micah: HoggyCast.

Andrew: HogsCast.

Laura: Love it.

Andrew: HogsCast was cool.

Micah: This, to me, is an example of J.K. Rowling being very intentional about name origins. I know back in the day we used to have the name origins section on MuggleNet, and it was amazing just diving into all the little details of characters and places and spells, and this is another one of those examples where there’s more meaning beneath the surface.

Laura: Agreed. We have another piece of feedback from Rebecca in Reading, UK. Rebecca says,

“I was just listening to Episode 454 where you discuss Chapter 18 of Order of the Phoenix. You mention that Dumbledore’s comment about finding a room full of chamberpots was probably a deliberate clue to point Harry towards the Room of Requirement. However, I don’t think Dumbledore ever knew about the Room of Requirement. In Deathly Hallows, when Harry finally realizes where the diadem is hidden, he thinks: ‘Tom Riddle, who confided in no one and operated alone, might have been arrogant enough to assume that he, and only he, had penetrated the deepest mysteries of Hogwarts Castle. Of course, Dumbledore and Flitwick, those model pupils, had never set foot in that particular place, but he, Harry, had strayed off the path in his time at school – here at last was a secret he and Voldemort knew, that Dumbledore had never discovered.‘ I thought this was a really important moment for Harry, and another illustration of the parallels between him and Riddle. But do you think that Harry was just naive to assume that Dumbledore didn’t know about the Room of Requirement? Or is it specifically the room where everything is hidden that Dumbledore didn’t know about? And if Dumbledore did know, why didn’t he think to check there for Horcruxes?”

Laura: Ooh, so many good questions here.

Andrew: Yeah. And to clarify, I think Rebecca is specifically asking about that room that we see in Deathly Hallows, not the Room of Requirement on a whole, because as we discussed previously, Dumbledore is aware of the room; he says so in Goblet of Fire. He at least accidentally came across it in that book. To answer Rebecca’s question, it sounds like he wasn’t aware of that specific version of the Room of Requirement.

Eric: Right, because to her question, why didn’t he think to check there for Horcruxes?

Andrew: Right, he travels to a faraway cave, but not the Room of Requirement?

[Eric laughs]

Andrew: I mean, if he had any idea that there was a Horcrux in there, he would have just went there. I mean, he would have preferred going there instead of a cave far away.

Micah: Especially given the fact that Dumbledore feels very strongly that Horcruxes would be tied in some way to the founders, and what better place to hide a Horcrux than inside of Hogwarts?

Eric: Oh, yeah.

Micah: Now, does that quote mean that Dumbledore and Flitwick went to school together?

Eric: That’s a weird thing that J.K. Rowling wrote.

Micah: It’s a weird pairing, right? I mean…

Eric: Yeah, it’s an odd thing to read from Harry’s perspective.

Micah: I wonder, is there some sort of book or scroll that gets passed down from one headmaster to the next that details out the secrets of Hogwarts? Or are you kind of on your own as a headmaster to figure it out?

Eric: Huh. It’s a good question.

Andrew: Well, you can consult the portraits, and I guess they would be a little helpful.

Eric: Right.

Andrew: But yeah, I don’t know. You would think there’s a book. “How to Hogwarts.”

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Andrew: By the founders.

Laura: Let’s reach out to J.K. Rowling on Twitter and see if she’ll put this together.

Andrew: No, she won’t. If she’s not doing the encyclopedia, she’s not doing that. Unless she does a founders series. Yeah, interesting perspective. Thank you, Rebecca.

Chapter by Chapter: Seven-Word Summary

Andrew: Okay, it’s time now for Chapter by Chapter, and this week we are discussing Order of the Phoenix Chapter 19, “The Lion and the Serpent.” And as always, we will start with our seven-word summary. Eric, ready when you are.

Eric: All right. I’m feeling frisky. I’m going to start with the word… The…

[Seven-Word Summary music plays]

Micah: … Quidditch…

Andrew: … match…

Laura: … features…

Andrew: … Draco…

Micah: … falling…

Eric: … out.

Andrew: Okay.

Laura: When I chose “features,” I was thinking “bullying from Slytherin.”

Andrew: Oh.

Andrew and Eric: Yeah.

Eric: I mentioned… I said falling out because Draco in this chapter falls way out of my favor as a character. And furthermore, I’ve been considering maybe going into some post-canon Harry/Draco fanfic; I was like, “This seems cool. It’s time for me to visit some of those many Harry Potter fans who think that would be a realistic relationship.” But after reading this chapter, I’m thinking that no Harry Draco romance fic can exist if the author of each said fic allows this chapter to be canon and included, because Draco crosses the line in this chapter.

Micah: Draco is 15 years old, though. Let’s also remember that.

Andrew: Yeah, and he does redeem himself in Cursed Child, I feel.

Eric: Wait, when?

Andrew: Well, Harry and Draco have a cordial relationship in the play.

Eric: It’s just the insults, man. It’s like…

Andrew: I know they’re bad, but yeah, I agree with Micah. He is a kid, so you have to forgive him a little bit.

Eric: Okay, I’m looking forward to our debate.

[Laura laughs]

Micah: And highly influenced by his father.

Andrew: And actually, I’ll give this real world example – and I don’t have the answer to this, so you guys can tell me – I was bullied by a kid in elementary school. He choked me at one point in elementary school.

Eric: What?!

Andrew: Yeah, his name was also Andrew. A worse Andrew, obviously.

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Andrew: But now I cracked up years later when he sends me a Facebook friend request. I’m like, “Uh, Dude, do you remember when you choked me at school? Am I supposed to forget that?” [laughs] So it’s like, these people who may have been bullies in their early years, you have to make a choice. Do you forgive these people or not? And do you realize that they are different people now?

Laura: Yeah. I definitely had a bully when I was in middle school, and at the time it was really easy to hate her, but now, as an adult looking back… I met her mother, and I’ve realized now… I’m like, “Oh, that’s why she was the way that she was, because her mom was a bully too.”

[Andrew laughs]

Laura: So actually, in retrospect, it wasn’t her fault.

Andrew and Eric: Yeah.

Andrew: Well, we can talk about this more.

Eric: Yeah, sure. No, I find it interesting… it’s definitely appropriate to start the chapter off mentioning bullying overtones.

Micah: Absolutely.

Eric: I denied my bullies’ Facebook friend requests.

Andrew: Did you? [laughs]

Eric: But there were peripheral bullies that I have accepted.

Micah: Don’t validate the bully, yeah, exactly.

[Andrew laughs]

Chapter by Chapter: Main Discussion

Eric: But yeah, so going off of a successful first Dumbledore’s Army meeting in the last chapter, “Dumbledore’s Army,” we actually see there’s a little passage of time between the chapters, and they’ve now had three successful Dumbledore’s Army meetings, and in fact, the students are getting so good that Neville has now disarmed Hermione. That’s super impressive, right?

Andrew: Yeah, it’s nice to see the progress.

Eric: It really goes to show as well, towards… back to Jacob’s voice memo, too, when kids are running the show, or when you’re taking it upon yourself to learn, you’re going to automatically be more engaged in the material and a little bit more inspired, I think. Dumbledore’s Army is really, we’re finding, a complete antidote to what’s going on at school, and it’s really helping these people learn defense. Other shout-outs to best improved: Colin Creevey has mastered the Impediment Jinx, and Parvati Patil casts a mean Reducto, so that’s pretty cool.

Andrew: Did we discuss this on last week’s episode? The listener that pointed out that Harry being a teacher here, he’s getting in that teacher fill that he may have wanted post-Harry Potter, we speculated that he may have wanted post-Harry Potter? And here are some good examples of Harry being able to successfully teach his fellow students. So yeah, I can see why maybe he didn’t feel the urge to go back to Hogwarts to teach, because he already did it.

Eric: [laughs] But yeah, I think that would have been a natural thing for him as well, a natural evolution. He could have really made it work.

Micah: Yeah, he’s the best Defense Against the Dark Arts professor they’ve had since Lupin.

Andrew: Yeah, and he returns the following year.

[Eric and Micah laugh]

Eric: Once the curse is lifted, yeah. But it’s also an example of the saying that all the best stuff comes out of struggle. It’s an example that… they’ve created Dumbledore’s Army because of the way Umbridge was behaving, and similarly, Hermione develops a way for them all to know when the next meeting of the DA is going to be. And this is actually really super cool; they’re having to, I guess, move around everybody else’s practices, everybody’s Quidditch training schedules, because there are three Houses represented in Dumbledore’s Army – Quidditch, of course, being a huge part of this chapter later. But Hermione comes up with this, as we all know, really neat idea to use a fake Galleon, and a Galleon which around the edges normally has a serial number on it; instead of being just some arbitrary serial number, you will change the Galleon. Harry has the master one; he has the one Galleon to rule them all, and he changes the dates – it doesn’t say how – around the edges, but then everybody else will see those numbers change, and it reflects the date and time of their next appointment. This is one of the coolest bits of magic that we see, I think, definitely in this book. But not only that, but it’s immediately praised by somebody else; Terry Boot, who I believe is a Ravenclaw, says, “That’s NEWT level magic,” and he’s really super impressed.

Andrew: Well, and weirdly, Hermione is immediately insecure about it; she thinks that people don’t actually want this, but they can’t believe that she came up with this at such a young age.

Micah: And not only that, she’s borrowing the idea from Voldemort, which makes it that much better at the end of the day. It’s their version of the Dark Mark. Little bit less permanent, right? A coin versus a tattoo of sorts.

Andrew: And you also feel J.K. Rowling really wanted us to feel bad for Ron in this chapter. Not only is he bullied horribly later in the chapter, but he brings up, I think twice, just how poor he is. He’s like, “Oh, I won’t confuse this with other Galleons, because I don’t have any other Galleons.”

[Eric laughs]

Andrew: “What is a Galleon?” And we’re just like, “Oh, that’s really sad.” Oh, and then the other moment was Ron getting excited that Hermione brought money to the meeting.

[Eric laughs]

Andrew: “Woo, is this for me? Are we betting now who can defeat who?”

Micah: It’s a little odd because you have Ginny there as well; you have Fred and George there, and they don’t seem to be as hung up on the money aspect as Ron is.

Andrew: Is it because he gets bullied by Draco? Not just in this chapter, obviously, but earlier in the series. He’s just more insecure.

Laura: I think it boils down to a lot of Ron’s insecurities as… he’s the youngest Weasley brother. We know from Deathly Hallows that he has that insecurity about being a son of a mother who wanted a daughter. And I think that he really just questions his place in his family, in Hogwarts, in society, as a result of all of those insecurities, and I think that has a tendency to manifest itself in this, I mean, I guess social insecurity when it comes to money, right? He doesn’t… he’s really struggling to find his identity and find out what makes Ron Ron, and we see that in this chapter because he’s like, “Oh, well, I’m crap at Quidditch as well, so what do I have?”

Eric: Yeah, and if you go back to the Mirror of Erised in Book 1, it’s just really clever how well J.K. Rowling set up each of the trio and what their insecurities would be. But he sees himself being the best, and that’s just who he would be: “Oh, I’m Quidditch captain. I’m Head Boy.” This, that, the other thing. Ron desperately wants acclaim and glory, but I think there’s really a deep insecurity there.

Micah: It’s funny that you said the trio, because that made me wonder, have we ever thought about what Hermione would see in the mirror?

Eric: Oh, you’re right. She doesn’t actually get a look in it, does she? What would she see?

Micah: Lots of books.

[Andrew laughs]

Micah: Herself as Minister, maybe.

Andrew: Oh, yeah.

[Eric laughs]

Micah: But before we jump into the nastiness of this chapter, I thought it was important to just call out how the chapter opens with Harry, because he’s feeling really good about what’s going on, obviously the success of Dumbledore’s Army. But the quote from the book is that he felt “as though he were carrying some kind of talisman inside his chest over the following two weeks,” and I thought that that was an interesting contrast to the actual bit of Voldemort’s soul he’s carrying around inside of him, so pretty intentional on the part of J.K. Rowling to throw this out there.

Eric: Yeah, definitely. And I’ve felt this before, too, when you’re openly defying authority, or not even openly, but when you know that you yourself are solving one of your own problems, there’s…

Micah: I love how you corrected yourself, Eric, because Andrew and I were going to use that in our argument later, the fact that you just said that Harry is in defiance of authority.

[Everyone laughs]

Eric: No, but whenever you… as teenagers, I think a lot of us have challenged authority in the past, and if you succeed, you can’t help but feel like you’ve triumphed over the great snake or something, which reminds me of Greek mythology, which actually brings up… so Hermione – getting back to the coins real quickly – what she uses is called the Protean Charm, and this was last week’s Quizzitch answer as well. But I, because I love audiobooks so much, was just reading The Odyssey, and Proteus, for whom I’m assuming the Protean Charm is named, was the oldest son of Poseidon, who basically could tell the future. And Odysseus actually captures him to find out what his future is, but in order to get his prophecy, you need to capture him, and once you grab him, he changes his shape and changes his form a dozen times into a shark and a bear and all this stuff to basically evade capture and having to tell you your future. So the Protean Charm… Proteus could change his shape a lot, and so these coins will change indefinitely to whatever Harry sets them to. I thought it was a real cool reference to old mythology.

Micah: That is very cool.

Andrew: Yeah, good catch.

Eric: But speaking of change, we’re changing gears a little bit here to the Quidditch game and the Quidditch match that’s coming up. One of the best examples, I think, not only of change and skill at magic, comes from another DA member, Luna, who has designed a giant lion hat. We all remember this from this book as sticking out; it’s one of the top moments, the coolest things I think Luna has ever done. She really shows her support for Harry, Ron, Hermione, the Gryffindors, by breaking House minds as well in creating this.

Andrew: Included in the movie, thank goodness. But I don’t think Evanna Lynch made this one, right?

Eric: Right.

Andrew: She made the earrings for the movie, but I don’t think she made the hat. That’s a little more advanced.

Micah: She probably had some level of input on the hat as well.

Andrew: [laughs] Maybe.

Micah: Just knowing her and her passion for Luna and for the series.

Andrew: It’s only a matter of time before they start mass manufacturing that hat for purchase at Hot Topic or something.

[Eric laughs]

Micah: Yeah, that’s a good… Google that and see if there’s a replica anywhere that you can purchase.

Andrew: I don’t think there is.

Eric: I just remember seeing one… there was a fan who had made one at Lumos. Andrew, do you remember?

Andrew: I do remember that, yes.

Eric: There’s a picture of us, and it’s really, really amazing.

Andrew: Yeah. Imagine bringing that on a plane.

[Eric laughs]

Andrew: “What are you doing?” “Going to a Harry Potter conference.”

Laura: Especially if it roars.

[Andrew laughs]

Micah: But yes, this is the ultimate representation of House unity and different Houses coming together. I think Luna is the one who really gets things going, and Dumbledore’s Army definitely helps in all this, right? I think it’s fair to say that for the most part, the other Houses would be aligned against Slytherin, no matter what. I feel like if Hufflepuff was playing Slytherin, or Ravenclaw was playing Slytherin, then the other Houses would want to see Slytherin defeated. But just Luna in this particular chapter, it is really cool to see her with this hat. The fact that she says that she wanted to put a snake in its mouth, but she didn’t have the time to do so.

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Micah: It just adds to it, in my opinion.

Laura: Yep.

Eric: Yeah, it’s really good support from Luna, and it’s useful because in this chapter, the Slytherins have really upped their game of intimidation, of really just antics that should not be tolerated. But under their Head of House, under Severus Snape – and actually, Harry mentions, too, McGonagall is letting them off homework so that they can do more practice – but really, everyone wants to see this fight happen, but the teachers are becoming lax because there’s all this taunting.

Micah: So this begs the question, though, is it just bad sportsmanship? Is it bullying? Is it just, hey, you have four groups that you are responsible for setting up every single year. You’ve segmented them, you’ve made them like this, and it’s a sporting match; of course there’s going to be different things said to different people, and there’s going to be a little bit of antagonizing the other team. Think about it; I’m sure we’ve all been to a sporting event, right?

Andrew: Right.

Micah: Some more intense than others. Even at school, right? We’ve probably been to something similar to this. You don’t think that the other team – the visiting team, let’s say – is open to being antagonized? Now, there’s obviously a line, but isn’t it all just in good fun?

Andrew: [laughs] No.

Eric: Well, to some extent, different people… [laughs] I think, isn’t it Draco imitating Ron dropping the Quaffle every time he sees him? We know that Ron is particularly susceptible. Harry actually has a wonderful retort about, what is it, Montague? “If Montague tries to throw next to me, I’d be more worried”? Harry, at least, has dealt with this kind of criticism before, the “Potter stinks” badges being the most recent ones that come to mind, but Ron and other members are less equipped to deal with it, and we just see it have such a negative effect on Ron throughout this chapter.

Andrew: And Draco isn’t doing this just for good fun. He’s doing this because he genuinely hates Ron. Yes, I think a line has been crossed, because I think this line in particular from the song, “Weasley was born in a bin”; he’s talking about the Weasley family being poor, and that’s vicious.

Eric: Yeah, yeah. Absolutely. By the time we get to the song, which… it really comes to a head, everything that Draco, I guess, at the forefront has been planning. To answer your question, Micah, it’s less about poor sportsmanship, and it is active bullying. I think it crosses a threshold pretty quickly.

Laura: I agree. I think that one-off instances like, for example, Draco taunting Ron in the corridors, pretending to drop a Quaffle, I think that’s one thing, but when we get into this coordinated effort to throw Ron off in the middle of a match, that’s just straight up a master level of coordinated bullying. And we’ll talk about this in connecting the threads, but I’m actually not shocked that this happens based on some of the things that happen in Prisoner of Azkaban.

Eric: [laughs] It was foretold, Laura.

Laura: Yes, it was.

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Micah: By Trelawney? Or by us?

Eric: We just should have checked the corresponding chapter before getting into this chapter, you guys, because there’s clear reference. [laughs]

Micah: I agree.

Andrew: What bothers me most about this is that the teachers and Madam Hooch are seemingly okay with this. So maybe they do agree with you, Micah; it’s all in good fun, but I think it does cross that line.

Eric: Well, that really raises the question, too: How did Snape downplay this attack on Alicia Spinnet? Because Miles Bletchley… she had to go to the hospital wing with that, and Snape either accompanied her to the hospital wing or he later told teachers in the staffroom that it was an accident, or he really just severely downplayed the part that his own House had to do with these attacks. It’s different if you have a verbal attack; you can say “Sticks and stones can break my bones,” but when you’re actually jinxing each other in the hallways, it’s gone way too far, and that’s how you know you’re part of a toxic culture.

Micah: I agree. I think that the line is crossed by Slytherin in this chapter, and the fact that Snape doesn’t do anything to try and rectify it makes him culpable. But I also think the rest of the staff, to the point Andrew made, are culpable as well, because they have the ability to step in and do something about it – the High Inquisitor has the ability to step in and do something about it – but they refuse to. They let it go on, and they let it get to a level. We know Ron is already nervous despite anything else, right? That’s just who he is, and he’s going to feel really, really nervous about taking on his first Quidditch match. And on top of that, it’s against Slytherin. We know they’re making fun of him; he’s got half the stands chanting things at him. I think there’s a line that the teachers need to step in and do something about it, and they don’t.

Eric: Here’s the question that I have, that I just thought of: Hermione even comes up to Harry and says, “Don’t let him see what’s on the badges,” because we haven’t quite made them out yet, and she knows that Ron’s weakness is his fortitude, is his self-image. Harry knows it. Hermione knows it. How did Slytherin learn it? What told Draco Malfoy, for instance, that if he were to get all the Slytherins together and write lyrics to a song and a chant that insult Weasley, that it would have such the desired effect that they want? Who told the Slytherins that Ron’s self-consciousness gets the better of him at Quidditch?

Andrew: I think they just know. They just know Ron is just that type of person. This hasn’t been a big secret. I mean, sometimes you can just tell by… remember, they’ve been in the same school for five years now, and you get that sense, and there’s been a lot of taunting before by Draco.

Eric: So it’s kind of like blood in the water?

Micah: And I’m sure word spread about his practicing and how bad he was during practice.

Laura: Yeah. Well, especially because Draco and Pansy Parkinson and all of these other Slytherins came to that first Gryffindor practice.

Eric: Oh, that’s right.

Andrew: Which should not have been allowed.

Laura: And they were taunting him there, yeah.

Eric: Okay. So they saw that their taunts had an effect, and then immediately were emboldened to do more of it.

Micah: But here’s my question, though: Draco, right? Draco sucks at Quidditch. He is not good at all. Yet he is piling on Ron, who’s in his first game, by the way, right? This is the first time he’s playing. How many years has Draco been playing? How many Snitches has he caught?

[Everyone laughs]

Micah: He just shadows Harry. He just shadows him! He’s a terrible Quidditch player! Throw some shit back in his face.

Andrew: But he’s got confidence.

Eric: Is that bullying, Micah? Or is that just poor sportsmanship?

Micah: Well, that’s going to be my next question, though, is if this was reversed, if somebody on Slytherin was being treated this way, how would we feel? We’d be okay with it.

Andrew: We probably would be, but that’s okay. We can be biased.

[Eric and Micah laugh]

Eric: Well, it’s not okay to insult someone’s class and blood status, and there are just things you can’t do. But you’ve got to kind of admire the brilliance or the harmony of it all in what Draco has accomplished in this chapter. Now, what happens after the match aside, the actual coordination of an entire, I want to say, Slytherin army… but all the Slytherins coming together, singing the song perfectly, achieving the desired result; it’s so insidious, but it strikes me as being something that would in the real world happen at a sporting event.

Micah: Agreed. Yeah, even high school sports, middle school sports… is it this extreme? Probably not, but I’m sure if you were to go, you would see signs. You would see parents yelling things. I don’t know if there’s a coordinated song against one of the opposing team players, but I’m sure it’s happened.

Eric: [laughs] Well, the pep band is meant to do the opposite, right? It’s meant to pep people up and be excited for sports. This is just…

Andrew: And drown out the taunts, maybe.

Eric: Yeah, what the Slytherins are doing is like an anti-pep band, basically. So moving on just a little bit, here are the actual lyrics of the Slytherin song, which I think it’s clever how J.K. Rowling writes it, because there’ll be two paragraphs of whatever Harry is doing, whatever’s happening at Quidditch, and then there will be two lines of the song in between the thing. It’s real cool. But it’s,

“Weasley cannot save a thing
He cannot block a single ring
That’s why Slytherins all sing
Weasley is our king

Weasley was born in a bin
He always lets the Quaffle in
Weasley will make sure we win
Weasley is our king”

Micah: Now, if you take out the “Weasley was born in a bin,” how bad is that song?

Eric: It’s a lot more innocuous.

Andrew: But still, I just don’t like this idea of students taunting other students together. Maybe if it was just Draco, or maybe him and a couple of others. But the way it’s written, it sounds like half the stadium is singing this thing.

Laura: I mean, have y’all ever seen a football match out of the UK?

Micah: Yeah.

Laura: This kind of thing is super common in those.

Eric: Really?

Andrew: Do you mean soccer? Or football football? American football?

Laura: Soccer.

Andrew: Okay, soccer. Got it.

Laura: Soccer to the Americans; football to everyone else.

Andrew: Got it.

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Laura: It’s not uncommon for the fans of a team to come up with a song and goad the other team with it, so I wouldn’t be surprised if this was also common in Quidditch and if these students were just mirroring the behavior that they see in professional athletics.

Andrew: That’s true, but I still think the teachers should have stepped in. They know this is harmful to Ron.

Laura: Oh, I agree. We could have a whole bonus MuggleCast – probably more than one bonus MuggleCast – about all of the things that happen at Hogwarts that are just very questionable and wrong.

Andrew: Yeah, it’s an emotional nightmare.

[Everyone laughs]

Eric: I like this idea of taking out that one sentence, Micah. I don’t know what you replace it with; like, “Ron has no…”

Andrew: Who is going to take out that sentence and replace it? They’re trying to hurt them.

Eric: But that is the offending sentence, though. That’s the offending line.

Andrew: Yes, but this is what happened.

Eric: Other than that, you just get a cool, twisted… it subverts expectations. When Harry first sees the badge, “Weasley Is Our King,” he’s like, “What is this nonsense?” Like, “Oh no, what are they going to do now?” Because you wouldn’t normally see your enemy pledging, “Hail the king. Hail the king. Weasley is our king.” It’s such an interesting backwards take on… but then when you get into the lyrics and listen to why, you’re like, “Oh, they’re saying it ironically.” So the match ends; Harry, at least, is able to save Gryffindor as a whole, or so he thinks for now, by catching the Snitch basically out of Draco’s fingers. They’re both diving for it. And that’s the other thing about Draco being a bad Quidditch player, like you were saying. He’s always just… it’s always just neck and neck with Harry, and he usually is being reactive where Harry is proactive.

Micah: Right. Harry is looking for the Snitch; Draco is just looking at Harry, yeah. I mean, if you’re still going to write that fanfic, there’s something there, Eric.

[Andrew and Eric laugh]

Micah: But before we go into the fight, just very quickly: Couldn’t they have given Ron something to block out the sound? Ron doesn’t need his ears to be able to play Quidditch; he just needs to see what’s going on.

Andrew: I think you do. And let’s pretend that he actually gets to mute everything that’s happening around him; he’s going to want to know what’s happening around him. He’s going to want to hear because he’s going to be worried that it’s going to get worse or something. That would just be a distraction. And who wants to be deaf during a match like this, when you’re playing?

Eric: Yeah. I think the perfect solution was either to mute Ron, or cover Ron’s ears, or we just learned the Silencio charm. [laughs]

Andrew: Well, why didn’t…? Or Hermione could have done what she did in, what, Book 1, and go burn some cloaks and set the place on fire…

[Eric and Laura laugh]

Andrew: … and then that would have stopped them from singing.

Eric: Yeah, just a little…

Andrew: Where was Hermione during all this?

Eric: What’s a little arson between enemies?

Andrew: Yeah, she’s done it before. It works.

[Laura laughs]

Micah: You know what? You’ve got three Houses against one here. Come up with something. Sing something, anything. It doesn’t matter what it is; you would drown out Slytherin easily.

Eric: That’s true. That’s true. But it just speaks to the cleverness, right? How sudden it is that nobody can think of something to do or what to do in the moment. Harry’s only recourse is to catch the Snitch fast, and so he does. But Crabbe shoots a Bludger at him, hits him in the small of the back. Have you guys…? The small of the back is where all the nerves meet, and…

Micah: That hurts like a you-know-what if you ever get hit there.

Eric: Have you ever been injured there, Micah?

Micah: Yeah. I mean, I’ve also gotten kicked during karate, like right in the kidneys…

Laura: Oof.

Micah: … and you have to gasp for air. But yeah, if you ever get hit in the small of the back…

Andrew: You did karate? I didn’t know that.

Micah: Yeah, man. Watch out.

Eric: Watch out. [laughs]

Andrew: I won’t mess with you.

[Micah laughs]

Andrew: You a black belt?

Micah: I made it to blue belt, so you’re fine.

[Eric laughs]

Andrew: Oh, okay.

Eric: Man, Micah knows karate. But it’s actually… I don’t think it’s a diversionary tactic, but it works out perfectly, because while Madam Hooch is over disciplining Crabbe or, I don’t know, slapping him on the wrist, whatever she does, that is when Draco’s verbal attacks on Harry and Ron and the Weasleys as a whole really pick up.

Andrew: Yeah, and it was sickening to watch, because they won. The game is over. Let it go now. But Draco has to make his way over there and continue taunting them while they are celebrating. That’s just disgusting.

Eric: All he has is his words, right? And Alicia or Angelina even says, “Talk about sour grapes.” You’re a poor sport by still going on about this, but it achieves… you almost wonder if somebody put Malfoy up to this, because in addition to being a bad athlete here and a poor sport, he is goading Harry and Fred and George beyond really the level of tolerance, talking about the smell of their house – where he’s never set foot, let’s be clear – but the smell coming from the fact that Harry’s mom was Muggle-born, and the fact that the Weasleys are poor. These are things that no one could reasonably tolerate past a certain point.

Andrew: I don’t think anyone put Draco up to it, but I think he may have been thinking that “If I taunt them enough, they are going to react, and then Umbridge is going to punish them somehow.” Maybe that’s it.

Eric and Laura: Yeah.

Eric: Because we know this fight gives Umbridge exactly what she’s looking for, essentially, and that’s why I wonder if she and Draco just had a conversation, or something like, “Hey…” because we’re just seeing Draco be more organized than I think, frankly, we ever see him in any of the books. He takes a whole year to do the whole Room of Requirement thing next book. But this still strikes me as being much more organized, getting everyone to learn the lines and sing the song and then attack and then basically get attacked, so that Harry can have a lifetime ban. That’s how you one-up your enemy, just with all this illegal, stupid crap.

Micah: Right. It goes past being a sore loser. It’s just unfortunate that there’s nobody there to hear what Draco is saying to Fred and George and Harry. It was interesting to me, though, that with the comments made about Molly and Arthur, Harry is able to keep his composure and he’s able to hold back George, but once something is said about Harry’s mother, that’s the moment when it shifts and he just loses it. And you can’t blame him; I mean, you’re talking about his family. I mean, the Weasleys are his family, but I just found it interesting that was the moment that the switch flipped, and he just goes completely bonkers on Draco.

Laura: Well, it’s really crossing a line there, because he’s taunting Harry about his dead mother.

Andrew and Micah: Yeah.

Eric: It’s just so beyond… it’s so far past the line, I think, that we’re meant to accept. But maybe Hogwarts just needs a meditation course to help people keep their emotions in check, because I don’t know in the end that the penalty that Harry faces is worth it. I think he may… he’s not sad he hit Malfoy, but I think he would have thought twice about it if he had known the end of the… what would happen very shortly after.

Micah: But it was the buildup, though, I think. It’s Molly, it’s Arthur, then it’s the Weasley family as a whole, and then it’s finally about Lily, and that’s just the breaking point. He can only take so much. He’s 15 too.

Eric: That’s a good point. He’s also 15. It’s just you can’t imagine there’s somebody as profane as Draco is who can exist and be allowed to taunt for this large extent. And it’s so maddening that Hooch is distracted by what Crabbe did; this whole time, she only looks over when they’ve physically fought and Harry punches Draco. We can’t really advocate for physical violence here on this show. He does do it, and Hooch comes over and sends them to their Heads of House.

Micah: Why are there not more officials? Why is it just Madam Hooch officiating the…? You think about other sporting events; there’s more than just one umpire or referee. Here it’s just Madam Hooch, and she’s not paying attention to what’s going on. And what happens after Quidditch matches, normally? Do you shake the other team’s hand? Is there some sort of cordial interaction, normally, between the Houses that actually respect each other?

Andrew: You would hope so, but this school sets them up to hate each other, so they don’t do that.

Eric: Yeah, and apparently all the teachers are watching. McGonagall did see what they did. Snape probably did, too, and Umbridge definitely did.

Andrew: And Umbridge’s punishment aside – which we’ll talk about in a second – I just don’t understand how Hooch and McGonagall can get so mad at Harry when there is this taunting happening across the Quidditch pitch. There should have been some acceptance of Harry’s attack in light of what was happening during that game. It’s as if the taunting wasn’t happening at all. They just don’t care.

Eric: Well, that’s it. Yeah, that’s just it. You’re getting… Draco’s taunts would be erased. If you were to take it to Snape, Snape would be like, “I was right there; Draco didn’t say anything.” You’re just covering up for and minimizing the heinous nature and extent of Draco’s comments, and saying… I think Umbridge even uses the Gryffindors’ short tempers against them, completely ignoring the fact that they were provoked, and it’s just… when you have a bold group of people who are unwilling to see truth and have authority, you’re in for a world of shit from what they’re able to do. So let’s get to the meeting. I think, to be fair – Andrew, to your question – why McGonagall is so angry at Harry; I think that’s to do with what this attack opens the door of, right? Because right when Umbridge comes in, she’s saying, “Do you have any idea what you’ve -?”, and then she gets interrupted. And I think what makes McGonagall upset is she knows that this fight will be the linchpin, will be the breaking point to allow Umbridge to do exactly what she does, which is to ban half the Quidditch team.

Andrew: And also, remember, McGonagall has been asking Harry to keep his temper in this book, and here he goes again, losing his temper.

Eric: Yeah, it’s kind of a thing with Harry.

Andrew: It’s justified, but it goes against what McGonagall has been asking him to do multiple times now.

Eric: Exactly. So first of all, when Umbridge comes in and is introducing the… I mean, there’s that little tension between her and McGonagall, and McGonagall is like, “Thankfully, my opinion matters more than yours,” and Umbridge is like, “Um, actually, no, it doesn’t,” and brings out this Educational Degree. Umbridge cites the incident whereby she did not want Gryffindor to be reinstated period. After banning all teams, groups, societies, and clubs, Umbridge was not willing to reinstate the Gryffindor Quidditch team as a whole, and although this was speculated about in the last chapter, this is confirmation that what happened was Umbridge said, “No,” McGonagall didn’t like that, went to Dumbledore, who then insisted that Gryffindor be reinstated. Now, recall our conversation on previous episodes where we all agreed, or seem to agree, that she has no standing to ban Gryffindors just for no reason.

Andrew: Not anymore.

Micah: Right, this gives her the reason, and unfortunately, it justifies what she wanted to do initially. It just proves her point.

Eric: [sighs] Yeah.

Micah: Regardless of what we know, right? Perception is reality, and for anybody watching in the stands, it looked like Harry beat the crap out of Draco. [laughs]

Eric: But it’s fake news, though.

Micah: It is, but that’s where you need more oversight, I think. And this is what’s frustrating as a reader, because you see McGonagall stripped of her power, essentially, but what about Dumbledore? Where is he? He could step in here and make everything good, I think, even with the decrees, because it’s his school at the end of the day. But he’s not there. He’s not doing anything.

Eric: Yeah, and even if he were there, I don’t know that he could do much about this new law that she’s passed. So Umbridge complained to Fudge, she went crying, she was like, “I have no more authority than a common teacher,” which… she’s speaking to the Deputy Headmistress of Hogwarts. Like, biz-natch, sit down.

[Everyone laughs]

Eric: She’s like, “I would have no more authority than just a common teacher.” So Fudge gives her complete impunity oversight to not only impose sanctions, but to adjust other teachers’ punishments for students. It’s the lowest of the low. Educational Decree 25 is the worst one yet.

Micah: Now, if Umbridge was a rational professor, she would probably pose the question, “Why is it that three people who just won a Quidditch match would attack a member of the opposing team?” Doesn’t make any sense. They won. It’s not like they lost. They won.

Andrew: Right.

Micah: Why? Why do that? Oh, maybe because they were being antagonized.

Eric: Yes, exactly.

Micah: But Draco didn’t lift a finger; that’s the difference. If we want to talk about Crabbe, that’s a whole ‘nother ball game, but Draco didn’t lift a finger.

Eric: Yeah, and we know Crabbe gets lines or something, it’s later said.

Micah: Which is very hard for him, let’s be real.

[Eric laughs]

Micah: That’s just as bad as being banned from a Quidditch game.

Andrew: And interestingly, she calls this a lifetime ban, and I’m a little confused by this, because if you read the decree, it says, “The High Inquisitor will henceforth have supreme authority over all punishments, sanctions, and removal of privileges pertaining to the students of Hogwarts.” So why does she say this is a lifetime ban? Does anyone here believe this could genuinely be a lifetime ban? Assuming this all stayed in place. But what’s going on here? Because I don’t think it is a lifetime ban, based on the way this is written.

Micah: It’s a lifetime ban at Hogwarts, I think.

Laura: Yeah, that’s what I interpreted.

Andrew: What do you mean, though? There’s seven years at Hogwarts. That’s not a lifetime.

Eric: Harry’s got two years left. [laughs]

Andrew: Yeah, I don’t get why it’s called a lifetime ban.

Micah: For effect.

Andrew: And Harry is sweating over this, so that’s why I bring it up.

Micah: Yeah, it’s word choice. It’s saying, “For the duration that you’re at this school, you will not play Quidditch.”

Eric: But also, you could see that running up against Harry in the future if he ever wanted to be a pro at Quidditch. The Ministry… because Dolores has so much authority, there could be a barrier for Harry ever doing professional Quidditch as well.

Laura: Not to mention, she’s confiscated his broomstick.

Eric: Oh.

Laura: So he can’t even practice on his own if he wanted to.

Eric: God, I hate that.

Andrew: Right. Well, he’s got money. He can go buy a new broom, maybe.

[Eric laughs]

Micah: This just means more time for Dumbledore’s Army. This is actually a gift from Umbridge.

Andrew: Thank you, toad.

Eric: Wow, I can see you already prepping your debate stance.

[Andrew and Micah laugh]

Laura: Yeah, seriously.

Eric: Wow.

Micah: But… all right, I’ll take a step back. I do think there is a bit of a racist moment on the part of Umbridge, though, with Fred, because she’s looking to punish the counterpart to George basically just because he looks like him, and guilt by association? I mean, what is that?

Eric: Yeah, none of this would hold up under actual law in an actual court, not if anybody competent or morally correct would be there to represent it. The fact… because George actually attacked Draco, gave him a bloody nose or something, but Fred, who was being held back, didn’t actually do anything. You can’t punish somebody for a crime they didn’t do. And you’re right, Micah, I think the way she says…

Micah: Well, you can. I mean, it generally happens a lot, and I don’t know if that’s a bit of the point that J.K. Rowling is trying to make.

Eric: Yeah. Fred just looked at him wrong. Looked like he would have done something.

Micah: Looked like George.

Laura: Well, I mean, to be fair, the only reason Fred didn’t participate was because he was being held back by the three Chasers.

Eric: Yeah, but what does that say about the Gryffindor Quidditch team as a whole? That other Gryffindors…

Micah: They’re strong.

[Everyone laughs]

Eric: But I’m saying the other Gryffindors knew the seriousness of it all and held him back, which means they’re not all bad. So for Umbridge to have been, I guess, after the fact justified in trying to ban Gryffindor Quidditch to begin with, that’s false because at least half the Gryffindor team is really just able to ignore Draco and try and prevent this conflict.

Laura: See, now I feel like you’re prepping for the debate. [laughs]

Micah: Yeah, but it’s not their family, though, Eric. It’s not Alicia’s family or Katie’s family. It’s the Weasleys. And so even if they keep their cool, that’s one thing, but if it was about your family, how would you feel? You would want to get at Draco.

Eric: Well, to that point, I have sort of a wish fulfillment alternate reality here, which we just did for bonus MuggleCast over on Patreon, the Umbridge backstory on Potter-No-More, wherein it is revealed that her father was a janitor for the Ministry of Magic, and Umbridge, her mother was a Muggle. Her brother’s a squib. Her father was this janitor who she persuaded to retire early and later covered up her own father’s existence. If Harry had… in my heart of hearts, I hope that Harry could know this information somehow. All he would need to have said is, “Professor, I know we’ve had our disagreements, but Draco was saying that my mother’s house smelled because she was Muggle-born, that Ron’s family smells because they’re poor. Wasn’t your father a lowly janitor at the Ministry of Magic? How would you feel? Just a little bit of empathy. How would you feel, Umbridge, if what Draco had said, he was saying it about your father?”

Andrew: Well, A, she doesn’t have empathy, and B, I think she would just continue to push back on the fact that Harry punched him. That’s a whole different level to Umbridge.

Micah: Right.

Andrew: And the other teachers at Hogwarts. I mean, in fairness, McGonagall…

Micah: Also, Umbridge doesn’t like her father. [laughs]

Andrew: Yeah, McGonagall was pissed, too, at the punch. So I don’t think there’s any remedying the situation.

Micah: And I don’t think it was just one… it mentions that he went and gave him a… socked him right in the stomach, but after the fact, I think it was very clear that he basically beat the living crap out of him outside of just that one… I don’t think there was just one punch.

Andrew: Rowling says something along the lines of “Harry just didn’t even know what happened next.” I think he just… his head was on fire, so to speak, and he just started attacking without thinking.

Eric: It’s magic. They’ll heal it.

Micah: Maybe that was the Horcrux in him.

Andrew and Laura: Ooh.

Eric: I love that.

Laura: I really enjoy how McGonagall calls this “Muggle dueling.”

[Eric and Micah laugh]

Eric: Because it’s so savage-looking, but you’re just like, “Wizards are above that.”

Micah: She’s probably lucky, though, that it was Muggle dueling, because if Harry pulled out his wand, imagine what would have happened. It would have been nasty.

Eric: The real victim here, the real innocent victim here, is the Snitch because Harry caught it and he didn’t let it go the entire time he was punching Draco.

Micah: [laughs] Brass knuckles is what he used, basically. The Snitch clutched in his hand.

Eric: Man.

Andrew: Should have shoved that down Draco’s throat.

[Everyone laughs]

Andrew: Let the Snitch attack from the inside, fly around in Draco’s stomach.

Micah: But speaking of McGonagall, I just wanted to throw in a bit of her backstory here. It got mentioned earlier in the discussion how she was all about not giving the Gryffindors homework, and there’s a reason for that, because McGonagall loves her some Quidditch. She was, “like her mother, a gifted Quidditch player, although a nasty fall in her final year (a foul during the Gryffindor versus Slytherin game) left her with a concussion, several broken ribs, and a lifelong desire to see Slytherin crushed on the Quidditch pitch. Though she gave up Quidditch upon leaving Hogwarts, the innately competitive McGonagall later took on a keen interest in the fortunes of her House team, and retained a keen eye for Quidditch talent.” So that’s a cool little bit on McGonagall.

Andrew: Yeah, and I think McGonagall is also just very proud of her students winning the cup before, and she wants to continue feeling that pride with that trophy in her office. I think that’s what she says to the team. So yeah, I think this is a great point that you bring up, Micah, and I also think that she’s just really proud.

Eric: But given her injuries, should she not have doubled down on that whole Crabbe thing? Because…

Micah: Oh, look, Crabbe should be banned. This is the injustice part of it, where there’s clearly not equal… I mean, Crabbe could have broken Harry’s back with that shot. The fact that he gets up and he’s okay is…

Eric: A miracle.

Micah: Lucky.

Eric: So as a final point to this chapter, I’ve kind of been, I don’t know, just feeling this way. I’ve read this chapter twice to prepare our discussion, but I couldn’t help but really feel some strong comparisons to the current American political situation. We have a US president that has been impeached by the House, acquitted in the Senate, and really just an ignorance of the whole fact of the matter, right? The arguments being made to defend Draco… or I’ll just say it, the GOP are sticking to their man in a way that is not wholly logical, just as what Draco did is being unpunished, and really Umbridge – or the GOP – is getting what she wanted to begin with. I drew a better comparison when I wrote it down, but the fact is I see a lot of comparison to just those in power being loyalist and not necessarily doing the whole justice thing.

Laura: Yeah, you know, I think that largely we can apply this to any situation in which there is a lack of justice perpetrated by whatever the ruling faction or ruling power is, and I think that this is something that we can see historical instances of, that we can compare to. And I think we’ve all had personal cases like this where maybe there was a little bit of extra context, like thinking about what Draco said to goad everybody on and how that was missing from the equation, right? So I think that it’s something that we’ve all definitely at least had secondhand experience with witnessing. I think that you could even draw parallels to our criminal justice system, where there is a supreme lack of justice when you look at the way that different groups of people tend to be punished differently based on committing the same crimes as perhaps another group of people that is more socially elevated, if you will.

Eric: It just seems like Draco is untouchable, that nothing he does, no matter how low he stoops, can possibly be punished by Umbridge, who has the real authority over everyone at Hogwarts now as of this decree.

Micah: Well, but he could be; it’s just that they’re not actually taking the steps to investigate and to appropriately punish him for antagonizing Harry and creating that whole situation in the first place. And if you want to take Draco out of it completely, though, what about Crabbe? I mean, he should have been given the same punishment as Harry and George. There’s no reason for it, and that’s where, like what Laura was mentioning, the discrepancy, right? It’s very, very clear that there should be equal punishment here for the actions that were taken, but there isn’t. Harry gets it worse.

Eric: Not only does Umbridge not prosecute Draco or Crabbe, but we find out she actually promotes them to the Inquisitorial Squad later, so she’s actively rewarding their completely unconscionable behavior.

Micah: Totally.

Eric: And that speaks to her sinister nature.

Micah: But Harry is giving her every opportunity to do it.

Eric: By being naive?

Micah: No, he attacked Draco. Say what you want; at the end of the day, he still physically assaulted another student. It’s got to be punished in some capacity. Now, whether or not there’s appropriate oversight by somebody like Dumbledore… again, where is Dumbledore? He’s still in charge of the school. Don’t leave it up to Umbridge to make the call. You make the call. You’re the boss man.

Eric: He’s on an ignoring Harry kick.

Micah: Where is he? In the Room of Requirement?

Eric: [laughs] Does he know about that? Let’s move on to our Umbridge Suck count then.

Andrew: Well, and to wrap up the chapter, Hagrid’s back. That’s the little bright spot at the end of the chapter.

Eric: Oh yeah, by the way, Hagrid’s back. Yay! [laughs]

Micah: Well, and Ron is completely distraught, by the way, at the end of the chapter. I mean, the dude was walking outside in the rain while everything else was going on. I mean, he looks terrible.

Andrew: Yeah, and “I’m leaving the Quidditch team. It’s all over. I can’t take this anymore. Goodbye.” But Hagrid’s back, and next chapter it’s a big ol’ story from a big ol’ half-giant.

[Eric laughs]

Andrew: I actually read ahead, and wow, he shares a lot, for sure. I actually listened to “Hagrid’s Tale” and this past chapter, Chapter 19, Jim Dale’s version of the story, and it’s a good one actually to listen to, because he sings the song “Weasley Is Our King,” so that’s entertaining. Yeah, so the Umbridge Suck count previously stood at 35. We have a few here this chapter; obviously, she’s pretty prominent in this chapter. One for not taking no for an answer about teachers overruling her, so she has to come in with this Educational Decree.