Transcript for MuggleCast Episode #659, ‘You Available To Be Stolen This Friday?’ (GOF Chapter 26, The Second Task)
Show Intro
[Show music plays]
Laura Tee: Welcome to MuggleCast, your weekly ride into the wizarding world fandom. I’m Laura.
Eric Scull: I’m Eric.
Micah Tannenbaum: And I’m Micah.
Laura: Grab your House-themed pennants and something to do for an hour, because today we’re heading down to the Black Lake and celebrating a Triwizard task that nobody above ground can see or appreciate.
Eric: Yay!
Laura: Of course, this week we’re discussing Goblet of Fire Chapter 26, “The Second Task.” But first, welcome back, Chloé, our beloved Social Media Manager.
Chloé Laverson: Hi, friends. Missed y’all. It’s good to be on an episode with the boys; it’s been a while.
Laura: Right?
Eric: Chloé, not only are you back, but you dressed on theme!
Chloé: Always, always. I think my first episode I ever did, I also dressed up, and I think I’ve at least put an accessory on every single time. I’m committed to the bit.
Eric: You’re committed to the bit, but this is… so for listeners at home on audio, you’re in a Beauxbatons school uniform.
Chloé: Yes, I am honoring my girl Fleur and rocking the… it’s subtle. I told Eric it’s subtle. It’s just the cape.
Eric: This is not subtle, but I do agree, it’s beautiful.
[Chloé and Micah laugh]
Chloé: I left the hat, okay?
Laura: Well, hey, I think it’s particularly on theme because there’s a little bit of character assassination that happens of Fleur in this doc, and I’m so glad that you are here to represent, Chloé.
Chloé: I strongly disagree, babes. I don’t think there’s a character assassination at all. I actually think this chapter shows her off in such a positive light, but we’ll get to it.
Laura: Okay.
Eric: We’ll get to it. That’s an interesting take. I look forward to discussing it.
Laura: [laughs] Eric is like, “I’m primed for the debate.”
[Everyone laughs]
Chloé: He’s like, “I am ready to fight. Square up.” [laughs]
Laura: Well, a little bit of housekeeping before we get into our chapter: We will be off next week for Memorial Day, but we will be releasing a bonus MuggleCast from our MuggleCast archives instead of an episode, and then the following week, we’ll be back as usual. And speaking of bonus MuggleCast, we just released our bonus about the WB games CEO J.B. Perrette. This was about them discussing their video game strategy. And we actually will have a new bonus coming to Patreon and MuggleCast Gold recording this week. What is on tap for us this week, Micah?
Micah: Yeah, so we are going to be discussing some of the top places that didn’t make an appearance in the Harry Potter films, but we would love to see make the Harry Potter TV show.
Eric: Oooh.
Laura: Fascinating.
Micah: So each host chose one or two.
Chloé: I love this topic.
Eric: It’s a good topic.
Micah: We’re going to dive in and have some fun with it.
Chapter by Chapter: Seven-Word Summary
Laura: Let’s go ahead and get into this week’s chapter, again, Goblet of Fire Chapter 26, “The Second Task,” and we will get started as always with our seven-word summary.
Chloé: Oh my God. I didn’t think. I didn’t think. I’m not prepared.
Micah: No, it’s better that way. This way it’s just whatever word pops out.
Chloé: Okay.
[Seven-Word Summary music plays]
Chloé: The… [laughs]
Micah: … merpeople…
Laura: … mock…
Eric: … Harry…
Chloé: … incessantly…
Micah: … under…
Laura: … water!
Eric: Yay!
[Chloé laughs]
Micah: It’s that Ravenclaw connection, Laura.
Chloé: Go crazy.
Laura: I know. I picked up what you were putting down.
Chapter by Chapter: Main Discussion
Eric: That Seven-Word Summary might be the only thing that slays about this chapter. I think that we have found it, you guys, the element of a rushed book that does not work under any scrutiny. It’s the second Triwizard task!
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Eric: So I am excited for you to join me on this journey of discussing the chapter, but before we can talk about the second task, there is a little bit of plot update otherwise. We last left Rubeus Hagrid when Dumbledore refused to accept his resignation, and now, everybody, Hagrid is back teaching classes. He did seem to take some cues from Professor Grubbly-Plank because he’s going on about unicorns. And it’s said that Hagrid actually knows a lot about unicorns, but Harry specifically feels like Hagrid is a little disappointed that unicorns aren’t more dangerous. So he could have been teaching about unicorns all this time, but he just thinks they’re probably boring. Are we sad to see a good teacher in Grubbly-Plank just go?
Laura: Isn’t she back later? Don’t we get her again?
[Micah laughs]
Eric: I know she comes back next year when Hagrid is away.
Micah: Shh. Spoilers.
[Chloé laughs]
Laura: Hey, Kierra finished Order, so we’re good.
Chloé: [laughs] I think it’s cuckoo bananas that Hagrid thinks unicorns are boring. I get that they don’t have fangs or claws, but I would kill to be in this class, in this lesson. I want to meet a unicorn. Like, are you joking?
Micah: Do we think that he got instruction, though, to temper down the lesson a little bit?
Eric: If he did, it came way too late.
Chloé: Real.
Eric: Because there was a free-for-all with the Skrewts; there was a full-on war where the Skrewts just decimated each other over months.
Chloé: I mean, I can imagine that he probably feels maybe a little trepidatious or intimidated, scared, even, to go so far at this point. I don’t know. I feel like Hagrid might be a little nervous. Also, he probably is comparing himself to Grubbly-Plank and how the students feel; we know that Hagrid overthinks and is in his head about his lessons and often doesn’t feel like he is enough, so I wonder if that’s a bit of it, too, wanting to build off what Grubbly-Plank does so that he feels more secure coming back.
Laura: Yeah, and he does this in Prisoner as well, where after an incident occurs in his classroom with a more dangerous animal, he defaults to something a lot safer until the heat wears off, right? He does this with the Flobberworms.
Chloé: Unicorns are so much more interesting than Flobberworms. [laughs]
Laura: Oh, 100%. But Chloé, I wanted to expand on what you said there because I think the reason that Hagrid finds the more dangerous creatures interesting is because he feels misunderstood and he thinks they’re misunderstood, right? He sees himself in them, and just like he does with all of the Hogwarts students who don’t really have a home when they first come to Hogwarts, he’s doing the same thing for these beasts.
Chloé: Wow, yeah.
Laura: So his heart’s in the right place.
Chloé: No, Hagrid is so tender. He’s just so cutie and so precious. I do love what Danielle said in the Discord: “Unicorns aren’t metal enough for Hagrid.”
[Eric laughs]
Laura: Legit.
Chloé: Nothing’s metal enough for Hagrid unless it can kill you on site.
Laura: Dude, what if it was a vampire unicorn?
Eric and Micah: Oooh.
Chloé: Whoa.
Laura: I don’t know if that’s possible, but he would be into that.
Chloé: Interesting. Interesting. [laughs]
Micah: Also, there’s zero room for error, though, here for Hagrid. I think that’s part of it, too. And it goes to your point, Chloé, about him being nervous. He realizes that he needs to play it safe; there’s no opportunity here for him to mess up. And we’re also told that… I think there’s only two of the Blast-Ended Skrewts left at this point…
[Chloé and Micah laugh]
Micah: … so it’s not really like there’s much for him to do with the remaining Skrewts. So I believe that Hagrid should have returned to his job as gamekeeper, going back to the question; Grubbly-Plank should have stayed, because Hagrid is not a good professor.
Chloé: Here we go, Micah.
Micah: He’s not qualified for the job. I’m sure there’s plenty of leftovers from the Beauxbatons carriages that he needs to clean up, given the time that he has spent sulking in his cabin…
Chloé and Laura: Whoa.
Eric: Wow. “Why doesn’t Hagrid find something he’s good at?” Oh my God.
Chloé: Scooping up poop. I see the DMs now.
[Micah laughs]
Chloé: “I am so sad. Micah keeps laying into Hagrid. Micah is too obsessed with…” I can see it now because last time, that also happened. [laughs]
Eric: We’ll pivot slightly. Yes, Hagrid got the idea of unicorns from Grubbly-Plank’s best lesson of the year. However, Hagrid’s class might actually be a little bit more accessible than Grubbly-Plank’s was, because Hagrid has brought baby unicorns, unicorn foals, and unicorn foals are not as nit-picky. They are not as exclusionary as adult unicorns when it comes to letting boys into their enclosure, so I would say props to Hagrid.
Micah: Well…
Laura: It’s because the unicorns are naive at that age.
Chloé: Yes, I was about to say.
Laura: They haven’t…
Eric: Uh, okay.
Chloé: There’s a social commentary there, babes…
Laura: Dude, 100%.
Chloé: … about the fact that as they get older, they become more wary of men, but when they’re babies, they’re like, “Yeah, we’re okay with them.” Like, hello. [laughs]
Eric: Okay.
Laura: Yeah, there’s something to that.
Chloé: For sure.
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Eric: Yeah, I agree. But I mean, this way all the students can participate and get closer.
Chloé: It’s smart. It’s a smart move, for sure.
Micah: The only reason it was written this way was so that Draco could have his fun with Harry and show off the article about Hagrid. It gave them a meaningful conversation where they weren’t going to be interrupted by Grubbly-Plank or any of the other students.
Eric: So you’re saying no joy, no love for Hagrid making the class…
Chloé: This was a plot device. [laughs]
Micah: It’s a total plot device.
Eric: Yeah. Okay, all right.
Micah: I bet if Harry went up to one of those unicorns, would’ve been fine.
Chloé: Well, considering they’re babies, yeah. [laughs]
Micah: No, I’m talking about in the other chapter.
Chloé: Oh, oh, oh. I think it’s wonderful that the women get an animal, if that makes sense. I think that’s pretty cool too.
Eric: Look, I agree. Yeah, Lisa Frank would be thrilled to learn this.
Chloé: Oh, for real. [laughs] The gold unicorns, too, the fact that they’re gold when they’re babies. That goes hard.
Eric: It’s really cool. So can we say that Hagrid learned something from this incident that has occurred, or…? No.
Chloé: No, ain’t no way.
Eric: Can we see him introducing Skrewts or something awful next time? Probably.
Chloé: Yes.
Eric: Well, okay.
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Eric: In the meantime, the heat’s off. We’ll pivot to Harry now, because Harry, of course, has the clue from the egg now that he’s gotten it out of prefects’ bathroom, and he knows that the task takes place in the Black Lake, but he does not have any clue how to survive underwater. So now you know that the task is water, but that’s only part the way, and the fact that he procrastinated so long means there’s next to no time to actually figure out how to do what it is he has to do.
Laura: Yeah, you would have thought he would’ve learned his lesson. How many times has he procrastinated so far? He always ends up in a panic.
Chloé: And depending on others to get him through.
Laura: Yep.
Micah: Right. It shows why it was important for him to figure out the egg as soon as possible, because he wasn’t anticipating having this additional component to the prep for the task. The real challenge here really wasn’t opening the egg and figuring out its clue; it was, “Okay, well, how am I going to learn to swim underwater for an hour?”
Chloé: Well, that’s the other thing: What if Harry couldn’t swim? What if any of these champions couldn’t swim? It’s not necessarily a skill that you automatically learn. That would be insane to have to learn an entire new skill, and then you have to figure out how to breathe underwater? Harry procrastinated so much that in any other situation… he would have never been able to complete this task. Thank God he learned how to swim; I guess the Dursleys gave him lessons or something. I don’t know.
Eric: Yeah, I don’t know why. I don’t know how that would’ve happened.
Chloé: Yeah. I mean, you can also learn how to do that in the prefects’ bath, TBH. [laughs]
Eric: Oh, yeah. Well, even if you figured out the clue the day after the first task, it’s wintertime. You’re not going to take swimming lessons in the lake in the winter.
Chloé: Right, but the prefects’ bath…
Laura: Unless you’re Krum.
Eric: Unless you’re Krum, yeah.
Chloé: True. Krum do love his cold plunge. He be on that cold plunge, guys. [laughs]
Eric: The Polar Plunge? Yeah, yeah. He does love it. But so my question regarding Harry, because… and to Hermione and Ron’s credit, they accompany him to the library. There are many long nights in the library. In fact, the night before the task, Harry is still going to the library after hours, all this stuff, looking for something. So he’s trying; his friends are trying to help him. The beginning of the chapter goes through Harry’s process and how he’s trying to find out the answer, but do we think that he’s utilizing all avenues here? I definitely think there are teachers that won’t help him. He’s asked McGonagall just for access to the Restricted Section, which presumably she gives, but I know that – or I believe – if he were to actually ask her, “Any understanding of how to breathe underwater?” she would say, “No, Potter, you’ve got to figure it out on your own.” But that said, somebody like Remus Lupin, last year’s professor – no longer bound by necessarily the rules that would constitute cheating – surely asking any adult might be better than trying to figure it out with a bunch of people his own age.
Chloé: Another issue with his procrastination, though: If he hadn’t procrastinated, he probably could have gotten a few owls out to whoever he wanted – Sirius, Lupin, someone – but he couldn’t. Or maybe he could, but there’s no guarantee that the owl would fly back in time. Another issue with mail by owl, or communication by owl.
Laura: And honestly, I feel like Fakey has really shown that he’ll help Harry at this point. I mean, he does, right? We find out later that by the transitive property, he is the reason Harry figures out how to do this.
[Chloé and Eric laugh]
Laura: And I think that Harry literally could have just gone to him and been like, “Hey, Professor…”
Chloé: For sure.
Laura: “… I’ve got to figure out how to breathe underwater,” and he would have made it happen. But I did have a question: Do we think Professor Sprout would have helped, given the fact that Cedric Diggory is in her House and she probably wants him to win? Or would she have been like, “You’re on your own, kid”?
Chloé: For sure “You’re on your own, kid.”
Micah: Flitwick, maybe.
Chloé: I don’t think any of the professors would at Hogwarts, except Fakey, if I’m honest. I feel like they all got briefed, like, “You are not supposed to help these champions, period.”
Micah: Yeah, but we see Karkaroff, we see Maxime helping, or we’re presuming that they’re helping their respective champions, and I don’t think it’d be any different for Harry to get assistance from Dumbledore.
Chloé: If everyone’s cheating, then we might as well cheat too. [laughs]
Eric: Right.
Micah: But what I think this all really does a good job of shining a light on is the fact that Harry is younger than these other champions; Hermione even calls it out, right? The lack of educational training that Harry has up until this point really limits him in figuring out an easy solution, things that probably came a little bit more readily to Cedric, Krum, and Fleur.
Eric: Right, they may have, for instance, been shown Bubble-Head Charms in Charms class in a few years’ time, potentially, which is what they end up using. We are going to talk a little bit more about the whole breathing underwater thing in a moment, but first, we’d like to take a break and hear from our sponsors.
[Ad break]
Eric: All right, we’re back, and I have one question for you guys about breathing underwater: Why isn’t it written about more often, or more frequently? Why are there no books about people who are undersea explorer wizards?
Chloé: [laughs] Real. Real.
Eric: And Harry strikes out, but wouldn’t this be…? There would be a wizarding version of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. There would be a version…
Chloé: 1,000%.
Eric: Yeah, something cool. So Harry just completely strikes out?
Chloé: Yeah, this is the first thing I would ask or look up the second I’m going to Hogwarts as a Muggle-born.
Eric: How to breathe underwater? [laughs]
Chloé: How to breathe underwater! I love swimming. I love the ocean; I grew up next to it. The first question I would have is, “Are there mermaids?” The answer is yes. And “How do I go swim with the mermaids?” After learning more about them, I might not be as interested. But those would still be my first questions, especially as an 11-year-old girl, so I’m shocked that they didn’t have this thought yet.
Laura: Yeah. Well, and I’m also shocked that Harry doesn’t think… if we’re thinking about people he could ask for help, I’m surprised he doesn’t ask Madam Pince for help.
Chloé: Doesn’t he?
Laura: Does he for this, specifically?
Chloé: Yes, he asks… yeah, I don’t think they specify how in detail he asks her, but I think that he does ask her where to find books about underwater things in this chapter.
Laura: Okay, okay. Well, never mind. Scratch that, then. Because I’m used to…
Chloé: But he could have maybe been more explicit. She is a librarian.
Laura: Yeah, and I mean, that’s a really big part of the job. [laughs]
Chloé: Also, the fact that that’s not something that other students are looking up is also cuckoo bananas to me. They have their summers off; you’re telling me that none of them want to know what it’s like to breathe underwater or go on a little underwater adventure? These wizards, man.
Micah: It’s true.
Laura: I guess they didn’t grow up playing mermaids in the pool, Chloé. That might just be a you and me thing.
[Micah laughs]
Chloé: Well, that sucks.
Eric: Wait, what is this?
Chloé: [gasps] Should we play mermaids, Laura?
Eric: What is mermaids? Besides an amazing charity.
Micah: Is it like Marco Polo?
Chloé: No, babes, you literally just pretend you’re mermaids.
Laura: You literally in a swimming pool, you just pretend you’re a mermaid.
Eric: That’s cool. Yeah, that’s cool.
Chloé: Yeah, some of us still do it. [laughs]
Eric: Well, nowadays, they have 3D printed fins, right? And stretchy tails that you can wear?
Chloé: So cool. You can actually be a mermaid as a job. That’s a job now.
Eric: Really?
Chloé: I don’t know why I didn’t go into that. Crazy.
[Micah laughs]
Eric: Well, there’s still a future.
Chloé: Still time!
Eric: [laughs] Still time.
Micah: Eric, I do think there is one person that Harry could have gone to now. We saw him be dismissive of him already, but that’s Ludo Bagman.
Chloé: Oooh.
Micah: Ludo would 1,000% have helped Harry in this task.
Chloé: Would he know how to breathe underwater? I’m sorry, but Ludo kind of just seems like a big ol’ himbo.
Eric: Yes but no, because he has at this point offered so many times to help Harry…
Chloé: That’s true. That’s true.
Eric: … and there’s more and more evidence that he’s actively betting on Harry that I bet that he has easily three options worked out for Harry to take even one minute before Harry dives in. He’s got preparation. Bagman is there with probably a pocketful of Gillyweed, another book of…
Chloé: That’s true. His livelihood is depending on this.
Eric: Exactly. That’s why Bagman specifically is so relieved when Harry shows up; everyone else is scoffing at him…
Chloé: Yeah, it’s true.
Eric: … but Bagman is relieved. It’s like… okay, so I do think Bagman is 100% a resource, Micah, just like you said.
Micah: Well, Danielle in the Discord brings up a good point: Ludo knows a guy who knows a guy who can help Harry.
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: Ahh.
Laura: That sounds about right.
Eric: [in a mafioso voice] Ludo Bagman, he knows a guy.
Chloé: Definitely not sketchy at all.
Micah: My mind is going back to the beginning of the chapter, though; I know I threw out Flitwick’s name earlier, too, but it’s almost ironic that Harry is sitting there in Charms class and is talking to Ron and Hermione about how to figure this whole thing out – I mean, they’re also talking about Snape and Moody’s interaction – but why not go up to the Charms professor and at least try? [laughs]
Chloé: Can we just talk about for a second the fact that Flitwick is zooming across the room because they’re doing Summoning and Banishing Charms and Neville accidentally Banishes and Summons Flitwick? That is so funny to me, and I forgot about it completely until I reread the chapter. [laughs]
Eric: I guess you can Accio living things in the books.
Chloé: I guess. [laughs]
Eric: Ah, it’s so funny.
Laura: Does he Accio him or does he Banish him?
Eric: Well…
Chloé: I don’t know, but there’s literally… they talk about the fact that Flitwick zooms across the room.
Eric: Why should you be allowed to do one and not the other, is what I wonder.
Chloé: True.
Eric: I don’t want to be pulled anywhere any more than I want to be pushed somewhere by magic unexpected.
Chloé: I wonder, Micah, though… I feel like Harry is just not close to Flitwick at all.
Eric: You would get that sense.
Chloé: I feel like he might just not even have the comfortability level to ask him.
Eric: Flitwick is such a good teacher…
Micah: Desperate times.
Chloé: True. [laughs]
Eric: Flitwick would absolutely… more than McGongall, more than the other Heads of House, more than Sprout, Flitwick would point Harry in the right direction, because the end result of giving a tip to Harry would mean that Harry researches more Charms, which is totally in Flitwick’s best interest to have a student inspired.
Chloé: Teaching moment.
Eric: Yeah, absolutely. So let’s start talking about the task itself, because Harry wakes up, he’s still in the library, he’s got ten minutes before the task starts, and he still doesn’t know what he’s doing for the task. Have any of us been in a similar situation where either you’re up late studying or you’re just completely woefully unprepared? And it’s time; it’s do or die. You have to just… you find yourself having to wing it?
Laura: Oh, yeah. I mean, I’ve been in the situation of having overslept and woken up just a few minutes before I’m supposed to be taking a test, and not only is there no way that I’ll get there in time, but I’m in no condition to be taking a test right now. So if I had been Harry, I wouldn’t have gone. I would have been like, “I’m going to bed.” I would’ve skipped it.
Eric: [laughs] Come what may.
Chloé: 100%. I would’ve said, “Absolutely not.” What’s the Goblet going to do? Like, what is the Goblet going to do?
Eric: I don’t what to find out.
Chloé: Okay, so he misses a task. I feel like Harry is starting to care about winning just a little bit at this point. But if we’re so honest, if I was in Harry’s situation and I was thrown into a death tournament against my will against students that are so much older than me and so much more prepared, I’m not going to the second task if I oversleep. Like, hello. I’m saying, “Nah, thanks so much. I’mma sleep in. Everyone else can sit by the lake unamused for an hour; I’ll stay here.”
Eric: Yeah, I mean, there’s that. We’ll talk about that in a minute. But it’s not even about learning how to breathe underwater or learning how to swim, because the mermaids aren’t just in the water; they’re at the bottom of the lake. They’re all the way across through this obstacle course of underwater demons and horrible things. This is hard. This is really, really hard.
Chloé: The only reason Harry is going is because low-key the embarrassment of not, in my opinion. He would probably feel ashamed or embarrassed that he wasn’t able to do the next task or complete it.
Micah: And he does when he first goes into the water because he doesn’t think it’s going to work.
Eric: That said, Dobby tells him that they have his Wheezy.
[Micah laughs]
Chloé: That’s true.
Eric: This is actually… at that point, this has become a rescue mission for Harry. Everything that Harry has come to believe about this task is to take it at its word and that something is gone; it won’t come back. And the thing that he loves the most, it turns out, is Ron Weasley, underwater being held hostage.
Micah: So one thing I wanted to bring up, though, that I think is important here, though – it’s with Dobby, and it’s also with Moaning Myrtle a little bit later on in this chapter – is that Harry actually has a pretty vast network of support.
Chloé: True.
Micah: He just doesn’t look to tap into the right people at the right time.
Chloé: I think that’s because he’s never really… he’s not used to the support. He was so alone in his childhood; he had no one to go to; he had to be hyper independent, and he just still at this point does not realize that he has people in his corner that he can trust and people that will help him, and it’s heartbreaking, but that’s a part of it. He’s gotten so comfortable with Ron and Hermione; they’re the only people that he really feels like, “Oh, I can go to them with anything,” but he does not realize that he has a much more vast network; you’re so right about that. And I think it’s a product of his childhood.
Eric: I love that idea, because it’s just not a reflex for him. Even though he has all of these friends that are willing to help, it’s not a reflex. Voldemort, by contrast – or Dumbledore, even – use people, and that is almost to a detriment of being friends with somebody. Harry doesn’t know that there’s a middle ground; you don’t need to… if you ask somebody for help, it doesn’t mean that you’re using them, or it doesn’t mean that you’re not a good friend to them. But I think that Harry is erring on the side of… like you said, Chloé, I think you hit it on the head, abused child and he’s on his own.
Chloé: Also, I mean, we’re all adults here. We know how hard it is for us to ask for help when we need it from our support system. And I’ve been in moments where I’ve been struggling with my mental health or having a difficult moment in life, and I’ve even found it hard to reach out to my inner circle, let alone maybe my bigger one. So I think that Harry has that feeling of anxiety and not wanting to take advantage of people, and also even more just doesn’t even know that it’s there.
Eric: It’s definitely the “doesn’t even know,” too, because at the point of him getting so stressed out, you would think that something would dawn on him of “somebody I can ask,” but it doesn’t even occur to him.
Micah: Right.
Laura: He also feels like an imposter, too, right? He’s not supposed to be there, and he’s so much younger.
Eric: He’s got to get out of his own way, almost.
Chloé: Oh, that is so this chapter. [laughs]
Micah: I was going to bring up the movie because I do think for as much as we criticize the films, the movie did a great job of changing this from Dobby to Neville.
Chloé: 100.
Micah: And really giving Neville a powerful moment, another moment of connection with Harry. We talk about how it could have been Neville a lot on this podcast, but the fact that it is him who steps up and helps Harry in this moment is well done by the movie.
Laura: I agree.
Eric: That’s a great point that leads directly into… this is Harry’s network. These are his people that could have always been there to help him and tell him through this stuff.
Chloé: Also, it low-key does feel like the obvious choice for the author. I’m kind of surprised that she didn’t go that way. Neville is known for his Herbology skill, and it’s talked about before.
Eric: Yeah, but Neville would never be able to break into Snape’s office, though, and get his ingredients, so there is that.
Chloé: That’s true. I do love a win for my boy, though.
Eric: Yeah, yeah. So Dobby helps out, which is great. And actually, it turns out that in the books, Dobby actually overheard Fakey and McGonagall talking about the task one day in the staff room. I will bet that Mad-Eye knew that he was there, knew that Harry’s friend Dobby, who he knows is friends with Harry, was there.
Micah: He’s seen his socks.
Eric: He’s seen his socks, exactly. Anyway, so Harry runs down to the lake. There’s no time; he gets in the water right when it starts, puts the Gillyweed in his mouth, starts to wade out. Also, everyone is giving him the stink eye, and this would be expected from the Slytherins who thought for a moment there’d be this really embarrassing opportunity to get Potter for being too scared to show up or whatever, but these are the headmasters of the other schools. What do they have to be glaring at Harry for? Where is professionalism in sports?
Chloé: Ooh, I think they’re glaring because he did show up. I bet they didn’t want him to and they had already decided that he wasn’t going to because he’s so late, so him showing up makes them pretty upset.
Laura: Yeah, and I think that’s what Harry thinks, too. That’s his perception. I always try to remember that in these books we are always getting Harry’s perception, and it’s not to say that his perception isn’t correct, because I think a lot of the time it is, but I think it’s also possible that they were giving him stink eye for being late and creating a commotion, when again, they’re also thinking, “You’re not supposed to be here anyway.”
Chloé: That reminds me of the moment earlier in this book when Harry feels sort of jilted by Professor Sprout. He is probably in his own head at least a little; he’s definitely not an unreliable narrator, but there are definitely some moments that he’s overthinking that it might not appear that way or seem that way to others.
Eric: That’s good enough for me, for sure. So we talked about this briefly before, [laughs] but the task itself is kind of a poor spectacle.
Chloé: Bring your knitting. [laughs]
Eric: This is joked I think most successfully… this is joked in Puffs because it’s right at the break between acts, and everyone jumps in and then there’s just this dead silence and it’s like, “Okay, what next?”
Chloé: “What do we do now?”
Eric: Yeah, well, so the book confirms that nobody above ground is watching or able to watch what is going on in the water. I’m going to ask for the first time, but not the last in this chapter: Who planned this? Who planned this this way? They can’t even have one of those Fantastic Beasts-style security magic spells that has footage of the champions performing? Maybe in a quarter screen like you’re doing Mario Kart, nothing like that. Also, the lake itself is so dirty, is so dark that Harry can’t even see with his special Gillyweed body, can’t even see more than ten feet in front of his face, so this is just a disaster from a public perspective, from a sport fun activity perspective. Who’s going to cheer about this?
Laura: Hey, maybe in the show, they’ll include those magical Jumbotrons to…
Chloé: [laughs] Ret-con.
Micah: Maybe there’s performances. Maybe the giant squid is… that’s why you can’t see him, is because he’s doing magic tricks up on the surface.
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Eric: They’re keeping them entertained; the school mascots are coming out to walk on and keep people busy.
Chloé: Yo, or there’s cheering; there’s cheerleaders leading cheers. I feel like it would be so miserable, actually, to watch this; “watch” in air quotes, because what the hell are you watching? It’s cold. It is so cold. Obviously, the champions… that’s awful. I looked up the temperature in Scotland in February because I was so curious; it’s really cold. It’s 42 degrees Fahrenheit at a high.
Eric: That’s five degrees Celsius. That’s five Celsius.
Chloé: Yeah, I’m not… you know what I would do? I would leave, go get a hot cocoa in the Great Hall…
[Micah laughs]
Chloé: … then come back for the scores. I don’t want to sit there miserable, not doing anything. Like… [gags] Also, Harry is in a robe. Can we talk about that for a second? He jumps in in his full wizarding robe. That is what he’s swimming in. That sounds awful.
Micah: Well, it’s his lack of attention to what’s going on.
Chloé and Eric: Yeah.
Eric: The thing is, this is a task with mermaids, but you can’t even see mermaids if you’re above ground. Chloé, you’d start a riot.
Chloé: Yeah! Well, you can see the mermaids… that’s what I’m saying, though; you see the mermaids at the scoring. So you leave, get hot cocoa, come back, you see the mermaids, you see the scores…
Eric: Right.
Chloé: You don’t need to do anything else. I mean, that’s what I’m doing.
Eric: Well, to really put a cap on this fact that nobody can see what’s going on, Dumbledore needs to go and talk to the Merchieftainess at the end of the task to figure out what happened. So not even Dumbledore… it’s bad enough the audience is getting an absolute wet blanket of a show here, but none of the judges at all either can here. And actually, if you want to point out a little security issue here with the judging, all the other judges have to take Dumbledore’s word for it about what the Merchieftainess is saying because none of them speak Mermish, so they also can’t…
Chloé: I think that’s so cool. I think it’s so cool that Dumbledore speaks Mermish.
[Micah laughs]
Eric: Oh, yeah. It’s really badass.
Chloé: I love that it’s just an offhanded comment. And it made me think about language electives at Hogwarts and whether or not they also… if you could potentially take Mermish or gobbledygook, or…
Eric: Right, as an elective.
Chloé: I don’t know. That’s so cool. I want to learn wizarding languages.
Eric: There needs to be Duolingo for Mermish, Duolingo for gobbledygook… we’ve got to make it happen.
Micah: One thing that just came to mind: Given that the all powerful Mad-Eye Moody can see through Deathly Hallows, can he see to the bottom of the lake?
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Eric: Oh, he could give…
Micah: And is Dumbledore just leaning on his shoulder saying, “Alastor. How are we doing?”
Chloé: How powerful is that eye?
Eric: It’s too powerful, in answer to your question, Chloé, but it’s…
Chloé: That’s true, but seeing to the bottom of the Black Lake; I imagine there’s some limit to its magic.
Eric: We’re going to continue this discussion about the second task in just a moment, but first, let’s swim on over to our other sponsor for this week.
[Ad break]
Eric: Our ads on this show are like buoys; we swim to them in safety, and they keep us afloat.
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: They don’t have any of those in the Black Lake. [laughs]
Chloé: Low-key, I wish the Black Lake had a pier.
Eric: Oooh.
Chloé: Can you imagine sitting on the pier and talking to the giant squid, saying, “What’s up?”
Micah: It does in Hogwarts Legacy.
Chloé: Does it really? See, I need to play this freaking game. Geez.
Eric: You do.
Chloé: I don’t know. I’ll find a man to use and play it.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Okay!
Laura: Gonna use a man for his PS5.
Chloé: No, I can… we can talk about it later. [laughs]
Micah: You had mentioned earlier, Eric, about the entrustment of what Dumbledore was saying, right? That basically Karkaroff and Maxime need to believe what it is that he’s hearing from the merpeople.
Eric: To judge.
Micah: I’m also wondering, from a trust standpoint, did we assume that Dumbledore and the other headmasters entrusted the safety of the contestants to the merpeople? Otherwise, to me, this is beyond security/safety nightmare territory, because not only are we talking about the contestants; we’re talking about four other people who are down there, presumably with their consent…
Eric: Dubious.
Micah: … that are basically unconscious.
Chloé: Oof.
Eric: Yeah. Let’s… okay. I’m glad you brought up this issue of safety surrounding the so-called hostages; we’ll talk about that in a moment. I first just want to mention, because we are going through the chapter, who each of the hostages is that they’ve chosen for this champion. So we have a situation where Ron Weasley is Harry’s – or his Wheezy – is his hostage. Hermione has been chosen for Krum, and Cho Chang has been chosen for Cedric Diggory, so with Cho and with Hermione, you have the champions’ Yule Ball partners, which kind of makes sense in a way. There’s at least a narrative to it.
Chloé: Mmm, does it? [laughs]
Eric: Well, we’ll get into that.
Chloé: There’s a narrative.
Micah: Well, I would say three of four Yule Ball partners, because Harry and Ron kind of went together.
[Chloé and Micah laugh]
Chloé: Real. Real, Micah.
Laura: Yeah, true.
Chloé: They didn’t talk to anyone else.
Eric: That’s a good point. Harry ended up going to the ball with Ron more than he went with Parvati or Padma. Okay, that’s a fair point. But for Fleur Delacour…
Chloé: He went with Parvati.
Eric: For Fleur, we do not have Roger Davies as a hostage, who was her Yule Ball champion. We have her 8-year-old sister Gabrielle, who I don’t even know what she’s doing here. What is she…?
[Chloé laughs]
Micah: What do you mean, what is she doing here?
Eric: Who brings an 8-year-old, subdues them, puts them at the bottom of the lake, and makes their older sister go and get them?
Micah: Dumbledore.
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Chloé: Dumbledore. Okay, I actually think it is valid that Gabrielle is with Fleur because Gabrielle is her younger sister, and this is probably one of the biggest moments in Fleur’s life; she’s going to want her little sister… her sister is going to want to support her sister, period. I also think that Fleur, it makes so much more sense that she is the most hysterical out of all the champions. That’s her little sister. Fleur has been protecting this girl probably her whole life; Gabrielle probably looks up to her. They’re so attached to one another. I can’t imagine what it feels like for her to think, “Oh my God. I didn’t save her, as her older sister. I couldn’t be there for her.” To me, this is so much more real for Fleur than any of the other champions.
Micah: I agree.
Chloé: The stakes are so much higher; it’s insane.
Eric: I think it’s a little extreme. I think it’s too far. I think that there’s no… we talked about the security or whether it’s right for Harry to have to compete because he’s three years younger than the 17-year-olds who are of age and therefore can consent. Now we have Ron and Hermione, who are also 14, who are a part of this Triwizard Tournament whether they put their name in the Goblet or not, and they didn’t. But then now you have Gabrielle who’s 8 years old. She’s French; they had to import her specially for this task. Seriously, Fleur doesn’t care about anybody else that’s with her?
Chloé: Well, I think she probably… I actually think Gabrielle is probably already there.
Eric: She is in the movie.
Chloé: Like I said, I think she’s probably there to… well, yeah, she is in the movies. And she’s definitely not 8 in the movies; they aged her up. But I do think that she’s probably…
Eric: That’s because it would be insane for an actual 8-year-old to be somebody’s hostage! I’m sorry. I’m sorry. Go ahead.
Chloé: I agree that it’d be weird. It’s crazy that she’s the hostage. I think she might have already been there, though, to support her sister through this, because she’s a part of Beauxbatons; she’s part of the school. It wouldn’t have been crazy for her to come along for her sister.
Micah: I agree, and I’m going to assume that there were permissions given here by her parents by Madame Maxime for this to take place.
Eric: Let’s hope she wasn’t abducted in the middle of the night.
Chloé: Definitely translation happening. No, no, no; I’m sure Madame Maxime explained what was happening.
Micah: And I agree, Eric; I’m not trying to take away from the extreme point of it, but I think Chloé really got it right when Fleur is the one who suffers the most here, who has the strongest connection to the person that’s been taken. That goes exactly to what – and I’m not going to sing like Geoff did last week – the song says, “We’ve taken what you’re sorely miss.” There’s nothing that showcases that better than Gabby being a… I call her Gabby, I guess.
[Everyone laughs]
Chloé: Hey, Gabby.
Eric: Gabby to her friends. Micah is a personal friend.
Micah: Yeah, but you know what I mean. I mean, Roger Davies… Fleur is not going to miss Roger. I mean, come on.
Laura: No, of course.
Chloé: She didn’t care about him at all. Not even a little.
Eric: Where is this Roger Davies hate coming from? Perfectly fine bloke.
Chloé: No, okay, but do you remember…? No, he’s fabulous. Nothing against Roger Davies. He’s a prefect; I’m sure he’s great. The issue is that Fleur didn’t care that he was her date. She talked over him the whole time and she really wanted to be there with Cedric; let’s be honest.
Micah: Remember, “We’ve taken what you’ll sorely miss.” Roger does not fit that category. I’m sorry.
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: Okay, okay.
Micah: And… can I say, though…
Eric: But Micah, I see that you have a hot take.
Micah: I do, because I actually don’t think Hermione is meaningful enough to Krum for her to be what he has to rescue.
Chloé: Yes, Micah!
Micah: And you could probably make the same argument for Cho with Cedric. I’m not going to go there; I don’t know how intense their relationship is.
Chloé: It’s a little more valid.
Micah: But I think if you’re ranking them in order, I would put Krum/Hermione at the bottom; then I would go Cho/Cedric; then Harry/Ron; then Fleur and Gabrielle. I mean, Krum’s broom is probably more meaningful to him than Hermione.
Chloé: Yo. Real.
Laura: I don’t know. To a certain extent, I feel like this was related to availability of someone to be a hostage. Cedric is an only child, right?
Eric: Wait a minute, but they just got Gabrielle from France. What do you mean, availability?
Chloé: I’m telling you, Gabrielle was already there, Eric.
Laura: She was already there.
Eric: That is not book canon, though. It’s just not.
Chloé: I know; it’s not book canon…
Eric: They imported her specially. They flew her first class so that she could be a hostage.
Micah: She’s like the fourth dragon. She came with the fourth dragon.
Chloé: Okay, but low-key that’s not book canon either.
Eric: Okay, all right.
Chloé: We don’t know if she was there. We don’t know if she was imported.
Eric: I’m just saying, if they went to France, they can’t go to Bulgaria? There is none of Viktor’s family members that he would go…? I’m trying to support Micah here.
Micah: And they have magic, too.
Eric: He only just met Hermione at the beginning of this school year at the earliest.
Chloé: I’m not trying to start any fights, but I low-key think this is more confirmation that Gabrielle is already there, because you’re right; if she wasn’t, it makes no sense for them to import her and not someone else for the other champions that definitely have someone closer to them. Like Cedric, for example, his dad; we know that they’re super close. What about Krum’s family? I don’t know. We don’t know anything about Krum.
Laura: And see, here’s what I feel about Krum: I feel like Krum, he’s an outsider who’s kind of foisted into the spotlight because he is a sports star, so he doesn’t like all the attention. We also hear him tell Hermione that he likes Hogwarts better than Durmstrang.
Chloé: True.
Laura: He’s a lot more ideologically aligned with the world that he finds himself in at Hogwarts and with Hermione, and I think it’s possible that he doesn’t really have anyone else he’s super close with. And yeah, he hasn’t known Hermione that long, but he may have a better connection with her than he’s had with anyone else.
Chloé: Laura’s got a little soft spot for Krum.
Laura: I do!
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: That was incredibly touching. Laura, that’s incredibly touching, and to support what you said, in the next chapter Hermione reveals that Viktor has invited her… well, Rita Skeeter reveals that he’s invited her to Bulgaria, but Hermione tells Ron and Harry that he says that he feels strongly about Hermione in a way that he hasn’t about other girls.
Chloé: Okay, can I just say that feels like a little love bomb-y? Just a little.
Eric: Well…
Chloé: How? They haven’t known each other for that long. Hermione is 14; Krum is 18.
Eric: So this is what Micah is saying; why is she his hostage?
Chloé: Well, that’s… you’re telling me that Krum, after spending seven years at a school, has no closer relation than a girl that he just met a few months ago? That makes me really sad for Krum, if I’m so honest.
Eric: I don’t need to be telling you that, because the people who run the Triwizard Tournament have said it for us. Hermione is…
Chloé: Yeah, it’s just…
Micah: Well, that’s a great question, though, Eric. Who made these decisions? Who did the research to determine…?
Chloé: Because no one talked to Harry.
Eric: Yeah, no one asked him who would he like to sacrifice.
Micah: Right, exactly.
Eric: My question is why do they need a hostage at all? Because if you think about it, think about the first task where they have to retrieve the golden egg. They have no emotional attachment to the golden egg. There’s no reason. They also don’t need an emotional attachment. Nobody fails the first task because, “Oh, it’s not my thing that I most love.” So why is there a living human person, who also is bewitched in a way we don’t understand, left to drown or exist at the bottom of the lake? That’s so extra.
Chloé: Well, I mean, this competition… [laughs]
Laura: Yeah, I mean, it’s to make them operate within the time limit. It’s to give it stakes.
Chloé and Eric: Yeah.
Chloé: I mean, this competition do be extra. If I could give it one word, it’d be extra.
Eric: I’m just saying, these champions want to win. They don’t need that little extra incentive that… it could have been another golden egg at the bottom and they still would have to retrieve it; they still would have to learn to breathe underwater and swim to get it.
Chloé: It is traumatizing.
Eric: All I wish to say is that including these humans as hostages brings up a lot more questions, I think, that are sticky and that don’t have easy answers and are never answered in the book than it would otherwise. But it’s fun!
Chloé: It also makes the task more traumatizing. I think all these tasks are supposed to be a little low-key traumatizing, but adding the aspect of someone you care about and potentially not knowing if they’re going to be safe or not, and that has to do with you… like, Harry is actually probably one of the only people that has already been in that situation.
Eric: All right, so moving on, we’re getting to Micah’s question: Are they actually in danger? Are the hostages actually in danger here? I’ve tried to find some book evidence that states either way; all I can find that says that they’re not in real danger is that after coming to, Ron asks Harry why Gabrielle was with them, and Harry tells Ron, “Oh, it said that they were going to take her,” and Ron laughs, saying, “Harry, you prat, you didn’t take that song thing seriously, did you? Dumbledore wouldn’t have let any of us drown! It was only to make sure you got back inside the time limit!” That’s the only evidence. He didn’t say, “Dumbledore says you won’t get hurt.” He didn’t say, “McGonagall made sure we didn’t get hurt.” Afterwards, Pomfrey is circling everyone that’s been underwater like a vulture because they were in real danger. It’s bad if the only person that says you were safe the whole time is Ron, and he’s joking. He’s always wrong.
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: That’s not very convincing for me.
Micah: He’s not always wrong.
Eric: He’s mostly wrong.
Micah: He’s only right when he jokes about things. But I think that’s why the merpeople were there; they were there to ensure that none of these individuals came to harm at all. They run the lake, right? They’re in charge, plus the giant squid sometimes.
Chloé: I was about to say, do they run the lake? Or does the giant squid run the lake?
Eric: [to the tune of Beyoncé’s “Run the World”] Who run the lake? Squids.
[Chloé laughs]
Laura: And it makes sense because Harry is the last to surface, and as he’s surfacing, the merpeople are all swimming up with him. So especially when we see how things end up with the task, it’s very clear that they were kind of escorting the final champion to the surface.
Eric: Like it was all an act?
Laura: Yeah, I think so.
Chloé: Yeah, I was about to say, they also change their attitude completely. They’re scary in the lake; Harry is like, “Whoa, these merpeople are attacking me.” But then they come out and they’re smiling, and the chieftainess talks to Dumbledore like it’s all good.
Eric: She has to because nobody could see anything in the lake, so they were all going to escort the winners anyway because they have to tell them what just happened because nobody can see.
Chloé: They don’t have to be cheery, though.
Eric: Yeah, it’s the unknown, I think, of another creature. Harry can only guess at how the merpeople truly think. But Harry tries to grab one of the merperson’s tridents so that he can cut the rope, and it tugs back and is like, “No, no, no,” and it’s laughing and smiling but in a mocking way. I’m just saying, that’s pretty intense. If the merpeople are acting, they’re doing a good act. And not only this, there’s more to their song, by the way. It’s bad enough that the original clue says, “Past an hour, the prospect’s black. Too late, it’s gone, it won’t come back,” when in the lake half an hour into the challenge, they say, “Your time’s half gone, so tarry not, lest what you seek stays here to rot.” They’re so extra. Your friends – who you know at this point are your friends – are going to rot down here if you don’t come get them.
Chloé: Do you think that it’s the merpeople, though, dictating what they’re saying? Dictating the clues? Isn’t that the judges and the Ministry of Magic?
Eric: Eh, I think they’re probably helping. Yeah, it was probably scripted by somebody else for sure.
Chloé: Yeah, I was about to say, I think that you’re right; the mocking is pretty icky. And I wonder if there is some animosity between merpeople and wizarding kind, especially since they’re scared of wands, which we see in the chapter. But I do think it’s interesting that their attitude changes after the task is done; that seems really weird to me. I do wonder if they had clear instructions and then some of them that do have biases towards wizarding kind took it further than they should’ve.
Eric: That’s a great question. We just don’t have enough info to the contrary. Harry, while swimming, sees this stone with depicted on it where the mermaids are a warrior race that fight off the giant squid; he sees them as warriors. One of them keeps an awful grindylow as a pet in its front yard, little front garden. So these are people not to be trifled with.
Chloé: I kind of love that they have pet grindylows.
[Chloé and Micah laugh]
Eric: Yeah, okay, it’s really cool. I’m just saying… this is all in a pre-defense of Harry, because Harry feels like a fool. Harry feels like he done been played. He feels so foolish for ever thinking that the kids were in danger, but there’s not evidence. If literally only evidence is Ron going, “Ah, Dumbledore would never let it…” I’m sorry, that’s not good enough. Did at any point Dumbledore promise? Did at any point somebody tell anybody that these people wouldn’t be harmed? I don’t know. It seems strange to me.
Micah: When you brought up, though, this whole confrontation between Harry and the merpeople, and the history aspect of it, it reminded me a lot of when Harry first entered the forest and he encountered the centaurs, and really he got similar treatment from them, much like he sees here in this chapter, right? It’s really only Firenze that is kind to him. And I think it’s a demonstration of the fact, “Look, you’re on our territory now. This is our land. This is where we live. You don’t just get to come in here and take my trident away to use it for your own purposes.” And yeah, they’re fearful of wands; somebody mentioned that earlier. But I think it’s the fact that you’re in their world, and you need to obey their rules if you want to get out of this particular situation.
Eric: Right.
Chloé: Well, guarantee the merpeople were there before Hogwarts.
Laura: For sure.
Chloé: It’s a classic case of humans, or in this case, wizarding kind, encroaching on a habitat that wasn’t theirs in the first place – same with the centaurs – so of course they’re going to have feelings.
Eric: The merpeople have reason to be cross with wizards, but why are the wizards putting their task in their lake? That’s the other thing, is like, if it can go either way…
Chloé: Well, Dumbledore probably has good relations.
Eric: Well, Dumbledore has the in, but I’m saying… look, here’s the thing: If they are cross with wizards, and have good reason to be, at what point was it ever this idea to let them have a task in…? The centaurs is a perfect example. The centaurs were perfectly willing to let Harry die. If somebody had died during the second task, it would have been maybe an international incident, but what’s wizarding kind going to do? They’re going to arrest a merperson? They can’t; the merpeople have rights.
Chloé: There is this sense of…
Laura: Uh, that never stopped anyone from trying to hurt a disadvantaged group of people, a disenfranchised group of people.
Chloé: Oooh, talk your ish, Laura. Talk your ish, Laura.
Eric: The other thing that speaks to me about how the hostages may have been really in danger – and then we’re going to read poll results, because we asked our patrons, and both on Patreon and in the Discord I see there’s another poll going. Is that you, Laura? Thanks for doing that.
Laura: Yep, get that live feedback.
Eric: But the way in which the hostages are frozen shows bubbles coming from their mouth. There’s a very obvious way of seeing that they’re breathing out, but we don’t see them breathing in. It’s not like they were all given Gillyweed, that they have gills the same way Harry does. Harry would recognize and be like, “Oh, they’re fine.” It’s a creepy sight. The merpeople are creepy, the lake is creepy, everything in the lake is creepy, and your friends are breathing out but not breathing in.
Chloé: In regards to dangerous or not dangerous, I think a big part of the glamour and the glitz of this competition and why you achieve eternal glory at the end is because it’s so dangerous. If it wasn’t dangerous, it wouldn’t be interesting to people, and that’s why people watch football. That’s why people watch wrestling. That’s why… sorry, Micah. [laughs] But that’s why people are interested in those sort of things, jousting, when there was… what happened in Greece? What is that called, when people used to fight lions and tigers?
Eric: Gladiator arena?
Laura: Gladiator arena, yeah.
Chloé: Gladiators! We have done this throughout history. It’s just another example of putting ourselves in danger for entertainment.
Eric: But nobody’s watching this, because nobody can see it. [laughs]
Chloé: Right, but then when we get it through the merpeople and it’s reported in the Daily Prophet.
Eric: But in the idea, yeah. No, it’s a great point. It’s honestly a very great point. So yeah, what are our final thoughts? Are they in danger or not? Our final thoughts before we read the poll results.
Laura: So I feel like Dumbledore has to have… he either has a good relationship with the merpeople, or he has some kind of leverage to ensure the hostages’ safety from them. I think what he couldn’t control in terms of safety would be the obstacles that the champions would come across on their way to and from the merpeople. So the champions also can’t use their wands to send up sparks if they’re in trouble like they can when they’re in the maze in the next task, so I’m wondering what would have happened if, say, Fleur or Harry hadn’t been able to escape the grindylows when they got caught by them? So I feel like those are the bigger risks in this task than the merpeople.
Micah: I agree, Laura, I think all of the risk lies with the champions. I don’t think any risk lay with those that they were trying to rescue; I think the merpeople would have taken them up to the surface. They knew how long those charms that were placed on them were going to last and it probably extended a little bit beyond the hour time limit, and then if needed, they were going to escort anybody leftover up to the surface. So in terms of danger, yeah, I think Harry, Krum, Cedric, Fleur were all in real danger, but I don’t think the other four were. I do think, though – and this can come up again a little bit later – that once Fleur was attacked and out, Gabrielle should have been released to the surface.
Eric: To totally have prevented the misunderstanding that Harry has.
Chloé: Well, and can you imagine how Fleur was feeling the entire time that she was above the lake waiting? She was so, so, so grateful when Harry and Ron brought Gabrielle back. She didn’t know that Gabrielle was going to be fine. Same with Harry; they’d had no idea because of the clue, which you made that point earlier, Eric. So Fleur was probably so terrified and so anxious. I can’t even imagine what was going through her head until Gabrielle resurfaced. That is awful.
Eric: Absolutely! It’s the worst 30 minutes of her life, or whatever it would be.
Chloé: Right, so why traumatize her even more?
Eric: No, yeah, because the Triwizard Tournament can make you compete with your body in sport; they don’t have a right to emotionally traumatize you.
Chloé: Also, why did no one go over and tell her that Gabrielle would be fine? Because she was out of the lake, but clearly, she was still so anxious and stressing until the very end. There’s all the judges there. Dumbledore is there. They’re doing nothing; they’re sitting around waiting. Why didn’t anyone tell her?
Eric: That’s why this is such a big part of this discussion for this chapter, is because I’m convinced that there should have been at least somebody in charge who said, “Actually, Harry, we made it so they weren’t really in danger,” and then Harry can feel embarrassed, but he can at least feel comfort knowing that it’s going to be okay. So we polled our listeners, and with over 175 votes on our Patreon, 89% of patrons say that the hostages were never in any danger in any way, and only 11% are with me saying yes, they were in danger. Here are some comments that they left: “They’re as safe as they are at Hogwarts normally,” okay, “debatably more.”
[Everyone laughs]
Chloé: Yo.
Eric: Not the defense I thought it would be. Sean B. says, “I think they are safer than any other student in the security nightmare that is Hogwarts in that moment. They’re guarded by merpeople the whole time,” which makes them safer. Okay.
Laura: Fair.
Eric: Rachel has a point kind of like Micah’s: “I think they were completely safe when they were with the merpeople, but all bets are off once the champion takes them. Krum nearly bit Hermione’s head off, they could have been grabbed by grindylows, the champion could have dropped them or gotten lost, etc. So yes and no, I’d say. I’d also love to know what kind of explanation Dumbledore gave them beforehand.”
Chloé and Eric: Yeah.
Eric: Two more comments here, one from Ashley: “Dumbledore is cool with the merpeople, as seen at his funeral. I imagine while explaining the scenario to them in mermish, he was like, ‘Keep the hostages safe, but put on a show; give the contestants a good scare, wink wink.'” Okay.
Laura: Yeah, that tracks.
Eric: Yeah. And then Jared C.: “I know we’re told entering the tournament is a magical binding contract with severe penalties for not going through, but I can’t imagine the tournament would sanction the killing of random wizards as part of a task. I think it was just to heighten the drama, both for us as readers and for spectators.” Yeah, but can Gabrielle, who’s only 8, consent to any of that?
Chloé: I also think it’s so interesting how we talk about “the Goblet” and “the tournament.” Who is making those decisions? Does the Goblet have a brain like the Sorting Hat? When you really start to think about it, it’s like, who is deciding the consequences of breaking this binding magical contract? Those are the answers that I want to know because it’s relevant when you have an underage wizard. Dumbledore and McGonagall and all the Ministry people debate whether or not Harry should continue, and they come to the decision because it’s a binding magical contract. With who? Why can’t we break it? What is this entity that is all powerful, dictating the fact that these kids should continue to be put in danger like this?
Eric: I’ll tell you what, so we might have swayed people during our discussion, because there was a poll in Discord that was given, and it was four people say they were actually in danger, and seven say they weren’t. So we’ve gone from 89% to 57% sure that they weren’t in danger, so I’ll take those odds.
Laura: It’s a much smaller sample size, but I’m going to let you have it.
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Eric: Thank you!
Micah: I mean, generally speaking, Eric, they were in danger, because they’re at the bottom of a frickin’ lake in the middle of winter.
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: There’s variables. You can’t possibly predict… yeah.
Chloé: I don’t think they were in direct danger during the task. That being said, that doesn’t mean they’re not traumatized by this whole experience and in danger later on because of it.
Eric: That’s well said; point taken. Let’s talk about the results. So both Fleur and Cedric used the Bubble-Head Charm to survive underwater; Fleur, however, did not rescue her hostage. She was attacked by grindylows and failed to finish, so out of a possible 50 points, she is given 25. We talked about this: Is this character assassination that the only girl in this tournament did so poorly at this task? Is it offensive? Does it offend you?
Laura: Personally, no. I think what this tells me is that the odds weren’t even. I mean, the stakes were a lot higher for the person who was rescuing their younger sibling than they were for anyone else, and I’m not saying that Ron is not super important to Harry, but it’s a different vibe when it’s your younger sibling whose life presumably is in your hands.
Eric: Wouldn’t that give you adrenaline? Wouldn’t that give you superpowers? We hear about people with the maternal instinct lifting buses.
Laura: Maybe.
Chloé: But people respond to that sort of stuff in very different ways. It probably made her freeze and made her more anxious, and she wasn’t able to perform as well as she maybe typically would have because of the much, much higher stakes. Some people thrive on that; some people don’t.
Eric: I’m saying we already have reason to dislike Fleur; she won’t stop talking about how awful Hogwarts is. And so the fact that she does so poorly in this – doesn’t even get to her champion – obviously, it serves Harry’s rescue mission whole plot, but I’m saying it doesn’t look good. That’s why I do think this is character assassination. I always kind of read… I remember being younger and thinking that the reason that Fleur didn’t escape the grindylows is because grindylows are so ugly and offensive that it offends her delicate girl sensibilities. Literally, that’s what I’m reading. And I’m trying to ask if all of that is just me taking that in, or if the author, who is not the world’s greatest supporter of women, in practice, is really writing this character to be a failure at some of these things.
Micah: I’ll add my two cents, for what it’s worth, and then I’ll let Chloé and Laura jump in here. What this reminded me of very much was the first task, right? Where she does achieve the end goal, but there’s commentary about her cloak or her dress getting slightly burned, so they took away points for that. Which, like, who cares about that at the end of the day, really? And there’s also historical context here as well, right? We’ve talked a little bit about it.
Chloé: Let’s go. Let’s go, Micah. [laughs]
Micah: The English don’t like the French, and that’s part of what’s coming through here. I don’t think there’s… that’s part of this character assassination a little bit.
Laura: Well, and being harsher on the one female contestant, too. You have to ask yourself, if one of the boys had performed in the same way that Fleur did, would he also have gotten 25 points?
Micah: That’s a really good point.
Eric: And we’re unsure of the scoring model. It seems like if you’ve successfully done a charm that lets you breathe underwater, you get at least 25 points, because that’s pretty much all Fleur has done. And they give more points to Viktor; all the champions did at least that.
Micah: And to bring up the movie again, I think the movie did a better job because isn’t there a moment where – and I don’t think this is in the book – where Mad-Eye Moody says, “Fleur Delacour is no more a fairy princess than I am”?
Chloé: Yep, that’s the movies, but he does say something in her defense along those lines. I don’t remember the exact line in the books. Fleur is not a fairy princess, and we know this after finishing the entire series. She is strong, she is fierce, she is not delicate in any sense of the word. She might look like it, and to other people that means that if someone is more attractive and looks a certain way, they make assumptions, right? But we know that she’s incredibly intelligent, that she’s the strongest person at Beauxbatons, because she gets in this competition, boys and girls. I don’t think it’s a character assassination because of the context that we have, especially later in the books, but I also don’t think it’s a character assassination because I think actually, I empathize with Fleur in this chapter more than I empathize with her in the rest of this book. I’m not sitting here and saying that she isn’t vain or vapid or pretentious, because she has plenty of those moments, but she is terrified in this moment because it is her younger sister. And after the task, I think it’s Dumbledore that says she gets 25 points, and she says that she deserves none. She says, “I deserve none. I have failed to retrieve my sister.” She’s so terrified, and she’s hard on herself because she wasn’t able to do it, and to me, that speaks a lot to her character and who she is. She doesn’t think she deserves the 25 points, even though she did a very successful Bubble-Head Charm. She did just like Cedric, and we know that that’s hard. I also think that Fleur is so incredibly grateful to Ron and Harry, who she knows a little bit already, and she hasn’t treated them especially kindly in the past, but she’s so grateful in that moment, and there’s no snide commentary. She’s just like, “Thank you so much, because that’s my sister and she means the world to me.” So in my opinion, this chapter shows Fleur in a very positive light in terms of her character. It does make me sad that as the only female contestant/champion, that she didn’t do as well as the men. I think there’s a lot to unpack there, and we have done it a little bit in our girls takeover episodes. She is just as capable as the men; that’s why she is there. Laura, I love your point in the doc, if you want to bring it up, because to me… yeah, if you want to bring it up?
Laura: Yeah, no, I can bring this up quickly. I just also interpreted here that maybe Fleur’s performance is meant to be a commentary on theoretical versus applied knowledge. So it’s clear that she’s incredibly intelligent, but based on her performance in the tasks thus far, it makes me think maybe she doesn’t have a ton of practical experience for those book smarts to really serve her at this point.
Micah: Sounds familiar.
[Chloé laughs]
Laura: Yeah, and it’s funny because Hermione is so freakin’ hard on her. [laughs]
Chloé: For real; the women on women bashing in this book makes me sad. But I do think that that’s why Harry is so good at this competition, despite being so much younger than any of the other champions. He’s got practical application for days. This man…
Eric: Out the wazoo.
Chloé: Yeah, out the wazoo. And honestly, if we’re being so real, so does Krum. He’s experiencing that adrenaline playing Quidditch on a professional scale all the time; he knows what pressure is like. This is likely the first time Fleur has ever been in any sort of situation like this. Cedric plays Quidditch for Hogwarts. We don’t really know what type of experiences Fleur has been a part of. My inkling is that Beauxbatons is way more like studies, learn the theoretical, so for the first time ever, she’s probably doing this and actually having to do it, not in a controlled setting. So I don’t know; I obviously have a lot of feelings about Fleur, and I’m biased in a lot of ways, but I think that this chapter is not a character assassination, but rather a platform to build her into what she becomes later on, which is a war hero, a Weasley, and an incredibly strong and powerful woman in this series.
Eric: Well, I am glad that we asked your opinion.
Laura: Love that.
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: You came on to share it. No, it’s good. It definitely gives me a more positive thing to think about her role in this chapter than what I ordinarily would have intuited, so very appreciative.
Micah: In terms of the actual competition itself, though, one thing I… we did talk about this or try to get an idea about this on an earlier episode, and I think this validates that there’s some kind of grading system for the different tasks, because Fleur does get points despite failing the task, right? Chloé brought up she said, “No, I should get zero because I didn’t achieve what was meant to be achieved in this task,” but clearly she got points for the charm that she used, so there are varying levels of grading going on here.
Eric: You’d never know, but yeah, until you do.
Laura: For sure.
Eric: Yeah, yeah. I’m glad you brought up points; let’s talk about everyone else’s. So Cedric and Fleur, it’s mentioned both did a Bubble-Head Charm. Cedric returned first, but he was one minute outside the hour time limit. He does get 47 out of a possible 50 points; that’s pretty darn good. Viktor used partial transfiguration; he didn’t use a special thing other than try and turn into a shark, and so he did at least half of it. It succeeded in getting him to his champion, who he nearly bit in half. He did bring her back second, and ViKtor is awarded 40 points. I love how Harry at the bottom of the lake is like, “No, no, use this rock. Seriously, use this rock.”
Chloé: [laughs] For real. I’m sorry; it’s so funny. Every time I think about it I laugh so hard, because first of all, the image of a shark head on a man, hilarious. Krum was like, “Ah, yes, I be shark.” I just… it’s so funny to me.
Eric: And didn’t think it through, like he’d need to cut ropes.
Chloé: And can you imagine…? This is super morbid and dark humor, but imagine if in the Daily Prophet the next day, it’s like, “Unfortunate turn of events, but one of the hostages has died because of a shark bite,” or “was injured via shark bite.” [laughs]
Eric: Yeah, Dumbledore wouldn’t even know what happened until 30 minutes later. Are the mermaids going to then do something about it? It just doesn’t… they were in so much danger, y’all. So Viktor gets 40 points; Cedric has 47; Fleur has 25. Harry… okay, he returns last, but he does have the remaining two hostages. Bagman straight up says to everyone that three of the four judges would have given Harry full marks, so all 50 points, and Harry knows that Karkaroff ruined this for him. So instead…
Chloé: That’s crazy, bro.
Harry: Yeah. Harry gets 45 points. How do we feel about this? Are we happy with this?
Chloé: Doesn’t deserve it.
Eric: He doesn’t deserve 45?
Chloé: Nah.
Micah: Absolutely not.
Laura: No.
Micah: He didn’t follow the rules of the challenge.
Chloé: Wow, that’s the Hufflepuff versus Slytherins and Ravenclaw mindset right now for sure.
Laura: Yup.
Micah: And as a result, he came back late. And I don’t think there’s a good Samaritan category as part of this competition.
Eric: Wow.
[Laura laughs]
Chloé: Yup. So real. No, he deserves less than Krum.
Micah: You want to give him 25 points like Fleur for the Gillyweed? Do it. But he didn’t come back on time. There’s no extra points for rescuing other hostages. It was clear when he was down there that Ron was his to take; if he would’ve taken Ron and left, he would’ve probably gotten 50 points because he would’ve been back in plenty of time. Harry’s saving people thing… I’m sorry. Moral fiber? Enough.
Chloé: Those are Harry Potter points. He got those points because he’s Harry Freaking Potter.
Laura: Yep.
Eric: Oh my goodness. But he had no reason to believe that they weren’t in actual danger, as I’ve established. Now, 89% of people don’t agree with me on that…
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: … but I think that Harry is not at fault here for just believing it.
Chloé: No, he’s such a precious little boy, but he doesn’t deserve full marks. That’s cuckoo bananas.
Laura: Yeah, I mean, he deserved to have praise heaped upon him for what he did, but he did not deserve to come in second place in this competition.
Eric: Okay.
Chloé: Danielle said, “Save the heroics for the end of the school year, Harry.”
Laura: Yeah, you’re going to need ’em. [laughs]
Eric: If only.
Chloé: For real.
Eric: All right, well, thank you all for joining me…
Micah: I’m with Karkaroff.
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Chloé: Me too.
Eric: … for that discussion of the bottom of the lake.
Odds & Ends
Eric: Let’s wrap up the chapter with some odds and ends. Okay, so Viktor, immediately after Hermione is reunited or above the water with Viktor, he pulls a water beetle out of Hermione’s hair. We know that that beetle is Rita Skeeter. In fact, there’s big proof of that in the very next chapter.
Laura: So we have to up the Rita Spy Count.
Micah: Aw, too bad no shark bite.
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: Yeah, and we have to help the Rita Spy Count. We’ll do that at the top of the doc.
Micah: Oh, yeah.
Eric: And then Chloé, you have an absolutely amazing odd and end that I am so grateful to you for.
Chloé: I freaked out for you and for me while I was reading it…
Eric: Ah! I was freaking out!
Chloé: … because there’s a mention of a wizard’s hat, okay? And I have evidence. Okay, so Ron says, “Ron whispered, his eyes alight with interest as he Banished a cushion with a sweep of his wand (it soared into the air and knocked Parvati’s hat off.)”
Laura: [gasps] I love that.
Chloé: Her hat. When Parvati is wearing something different in her hair, JKR denotes it specifically; she wears butterfly clips in another section, and she wears a flower in another section. She is wearing a frickin’ wizard’s hat, which means they all are, or at least most of them. Let’s go.
Eric: Unbelievable.
Laura: Lame.
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: There it is! The third ever mention, and second post-Book 1, of wizards’ hats.
Chloé: I just think that JKR probably remembered this book. [laughs] She’s like, “Oh, yeah, they have hats.”
Micah: But not in the movies.
Chloé and Eric: Yeah.
Micah: And one final odd and end, it’s always important to call out the numbers, right? And unicorns come of age at seven. Seven making another appearance yet again in the series.
Eric: Man. Why didn’t they put a unicorn at the bottom of the lake? It’s old enough.
Chloé: Whoa.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: No. Anyway. I don’t know what I’m saying. I don’t know what I’m even saying at this point.
Chloé: No, that was funny. Keep it in.
Micah: One of the merpeople have a pet unicorn; you just didn’t see it.
[Laura laughs]
MVP of the Week
Eric: It’s time for MVP of the Week.
[MVP of the Week music plays]
Eric: I’m going to give my MVP of the Week to the giant squid because if it is at war with the merpeople, it’s doing a pretty good job of staying alive.
Micah: [laughs] I’m going to give it to Dobby the alarm clock…
[Eric laughs]
Chloé: Real.
Micah: … because without Dobby, who knows what would have happened? But I will say, Harry made a promise at the end of this chapter to buy Dobby socks next trip to Hogsmeade. He’d better deliver, and I’m talking a whole effing 12-pack. Dobby deserves…
Chloé: You know what Harry should get Dobby? One are those sock subscriptions. Have y’all seen that? They send you a new sock every month…
Laura: Oh, yeah!
Micah: Like from Bombas?
Chloé: Yeah! Like, love.
Eric: Harry gets Dobby a sock that screams when it’s dirty. That’s actually what he buys him next chapter.
Chloé: Oof.
Laura: All right, I’m going to give mine to Cedric. Even at the height of competition, he’s still helping Harry. When he arrives at the hostages in the Mermish community, he sees Harry there trying to free Gabrielle, and he mouths to him, “Get outta here; Krum is on the way.”
[Chloé laughs]
Laura: So even though he’s like, “I’m still in first place; I’m still going” – he doesn’t even stop; I mean, he just he passes straight on through, grabs Cho, and is off – but he’s still like, “Hey, life pro tip, man. Move.”
[Chloé and Laura laugh]
Chloé: He does have Hogwarts loyalty for sure. I’m going to give it to the chieftainess of the merpeople; boss ass B, first of all. Love that it’s a female in charge of everyone. She vouches for Harry, we presume, because Harry gets all his moral fiber points, and she speaks to Dumbledore and tells him the whole story. Without her we would simply not know anything about what happened at the bottom of the lake.
Micah: I want to throw in one honorable mention, though, and it’s to Percy, because his reaction when Ron comes out of the water was something I don’t think we’ve ever seen from him, and it shows – and I think he deviates a little bit over the next couple books but comes home in Deathly Hallows – that he cares about his family.
Eric: Yeah, that’s a great call-out.
Laura: For sure.
Eric: He’s rushing and out of breath and just has to see that Ron is okay. But if Percy Weasley thinks that there was something… that Ron was in danger, that means nobody told Percy that they weren’t actually in danger, which means they probably were in… okay.
Chloé: Oh my God. [laughs]
Laura: All right, if you have feedback about today’s discussion, you can contact us by emailing or sending a voice memo recorded on your phone to MuggleCast@gmail.com, or by using our phone number, 1-923-MUGGLE; that’s 1-923-688-4453. Although, to be honest, we really prefer the voice memos you can record on your smartphone, so please send those; they have better audio quality. And if you can keep them under a minute, that would be fabulous. And as a reminder, we are off next week for Memorial Day here in the United States. A bonus MuggleCast installment will be released in its stead, then we’ll be back with more Chapter by Chapter for Goblet of Fire, Chapter 27.
Eric: Yay.
Quizzitch
Laura: And now it’s time for Quizzitch. Take it away, Eric.
Eric: Okay, I was asking Chloé, do you want to maybe read Quizzitch?
Laura: Oh, okay.
Chloé: Sure.
[Quizzitch music plays]
Chloé: Last week’s Quizzitch question: According to Hagrid, at what age do unicorns become pure white? Last week’s answer, also mentioned by Micah, seven years old. Last week’s winners are It’s an owl, it’s a hippogriff, nope, it’s Myrtle swooping down on you in the bathtub…
[Laura and Micah laugh]
Chloé: … Bjorn the silver-horned teenage unicorn; Boogie down like a unicorn, no stopping till the break of dawn – The Weird Sisters, who are still learning how to rhyme words; Dusty Bottoms; Elizabeth K.; Gurl, you’d be stiff if yuda been sittin’ out here all nyte; Jiggly Jane; Ludo Bagman’s crippling gambling addiction (If you have a problem gambling, please seek help)… very nice. Merlin’s saggy left earlobe… naturally. Peter Pettigrew picked a peck of dead Cedric…
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Laura: Oh my God.
Chloé: … Sir King…?
Eric and Micah: King of Kings.
Chloé: Oh, Sir King of Kings. Thank you. [laughs] I thought we were going on Sir Cadogan. The answer is always seven or twelve; Where’s the underwater Care of Magical Creatures lesson… real. You don’t know who manufactures Tootsie Rolls.
Eric: Oh, wow.
Chloé: Amazing.
Laura: I don’t.
Eric: That last one is a deep cut. That last one goes way back to 2005 and another thing another life ago.
Chloé: Next week’s question: Who authorized Aurors to use the Unforgivable Curses during the first wizarding war? Oooh. Wow, that one is pretty hard. Good for you, Eric. [laughs]
Eric: And thank you, Chloé, for taking that… yeah, no, I love that every time somebody else does it they’re like, “Oh, this is not easy.” Of course, listeners can submit your answers for Quizzitch on the MuggleCast website, MuggleCast.com/Quizzitch, or go to the main website and click on “Quizzitch” from the main nav.
Laura: Well, this show is brought to you by Muggles like you. We thankfully don’t have corporate overlords who control the show and could cancel us at any moment for the crazy stuff that we say here.
[Chloé laughs]
Laura: We are proudly an independent podcast, but that means we need support from listeners like you. So how can you help us out? If you’re an Apple Podcasts user, you can subscribe to MuggleCast Gold, which gets you ad-free, early access to MuggleCast, plus two bonus MuggleCast installments every month. There’s also Patreon.com/MuggleCast; you’ll get all the benefits of MuggleCast Gold, plus livestreams, planning docs, the chance to co-host the show one day, a new physical gift every year, and a video message from one of the four of us. You can also visit our Etsy store where you can buy many cool MuggleCast items, like the Cozy Comfy Combo Pack, which is our beanie and socks combined together at one reduced price, along with signed album art signed by the four of the hosts, our wooden cars from our sweet 16, T-shirts, and so much more. You can visit that shop by going to MuggleMillennial.etsy.com.
Eric: All right, and as a reminder, Micah, myself, and Chloé will be with us…
Chloé: Let’s go, boys.
Eric: … at Portland, Oregon! I am so excited to do another LeakyCon…
[Laura makes celebratory air horn sounds]
[Chloé laughs]
Eric: Who’s…? What?
Laura: Sorry.
Chloé: Laura was going [makes celebratory air horn sounds]
Eric: Laura, you are the perfect hype girl.
Chloé: It’s going to be lit.
[Laura laughs]
Eric: Yes, it is going to be lit. Please visit the LeakyCon website and use code “Muggle” to get a discount if you’re thinking of attending. It’s July 5-7 at Oregon Convention Center, and we’re very psyched, very excited. Stay tuned to our socials for updates, and yeah, we will see… Chloé, will you bring the Fleur hat to Oregon?
Chloé: I’m going to cosplay every single day this year, I’ve decided. I’m doing a different cosplay. Last year I did light; this year we’re going all out, baby.
Eric: Oh, man. Who do you know that did full cosplays at LeakyCon last year?
Chloé: Some weird guy, man.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Chloé: He showed up as Elvis Dumbledore? That was cuckoo bananas. [laughs]
Eric: Total cuckoo bananas. I don’t know what I’m doing yet; we’ll figure it out. But we’ll chat.
Laura: Well, if you’re enjoying MuggleCast and think other Muggles would too, you can tell a friend about the show. You can also help us spread the word by leaving a review in your favorite podcast app. Visit MuggleCast.com for transcripts, social media links, our full episode archive, our favorite episodes, and much more. That wraps up this week’s episode of MuggleCast. I’m Laura.
Eric: I’m Eric.
Micah: I’m Micah.
Chloé: And I’m Chloé.
Eric and Laura: Bye.
Chloé: Don’t forget to follow us on socials.