Transcript for MuggleCast Episode #704, Keep Your Friends Close And Your Beetles Closer (OOTP Chapter 25, The Beetle at Bay)
Show Intro
[Show music plays]
Andrew Sims: Welcome to MuggleCast, your weekly ride into the world of Harry Potter. I’m Andrew.
Eric Scull: I’m Eric.
Micah Tannenbaum: I’m Micah.
Laura Tee: And I’m Laura.
Andrew: We’re your Harry Potter friends, talking about the books, the movies, the upcoming TV show, so make sure you follow this show in your favorite podcast app, and that way you will never miss an episode. And this week, we are puckering up and discussing Order of the Phoenix Chapter 25, “The Beetle at Bay.” And to help us with today’s discussion, we’re joined by MuggleCast listener and Slug Club patron, Katie. Welcome to the show, Katie.
Katie: Hi, thanks for having me!
Andrew: Yeah, our pleasure. Let’s get your fandom ID.
Katie: Absolutely. So I am a Ravenclaw; I am a Thunderbird; my favorite book is Prisoner of Azkaban; favorite movie is Sorcerer’s Stone; as far as my Patronus, I am a dolphin. And then the best place to go on a first date for me is going to be Hogsmeade still, and I want to go to Honeydukes and curate bags of sweets for each other, and then go find a spot to sit and exchange and just talk about and enjoy the sweets that we’ve picked.
Eric: Oh, that’s really romantic.
Andrew: That’s so cute!
Laura: Yeah, that’s very sweet.
Andrew: Take turns putting the sweets in each other’s mouths. Maybe that’s a little much for a first date.
[Katie laughs]
Eric: Be like, “Blood pops? Why do you think I’d like this? You have horrible taste! Ugh!”
Micah: Could’ve given Harry some tips there, too.
Eric: That’s true.
Andrew: Yeah. Well, it’s not too late; we have a whole chapter to discuss that. [laughs] Well, welcome again, Katie. And before we go any further, we want to take a moment to acknowledge that J.K. Rowling’s comments and actions regarding the trans community, including the things she continues to say on X, do not reflect the values of this podcast or the spirit in which we celebrate the wizarding world, and while we continue to love the world of Harry Potter, we stand firmly with trans people and believe in fostering a fandom that is inclusive, safe, and affirming for everyone. Trans rights are human rights, and we will always feel this way.
Eric: Yeah, five years ago on our show we discussed in depth the problematic rhetoric and our concern for manipulative tactics being deployed by Rowling in her early social media posts about trans people. Now, in response to April’s UK Supreme Court ruling clarifying the Equality Act does not consider trans women to have the same legal classification as granted to cis women, knowing that Rowling herself donated nearly $100,000 to the group that brought the lawsuit which pushed this issue, with Rowling publicly gloating over the decision afterward with a cigar while on her yacht in the Bahamas, it’s become necessary again for us to acknowledge that the assault on transgender people’s rights across the world is devastating, uninformed, and not okay, plus the types of legal reforms that are being made will actually make all women less safe. And Rowling herself has said and done some really alarming things, even about female athletes, picking fights with several of them recently, and it’s just all been deeply problematic.
Laura: We’re going to be saying more about Rowling and all of this in about a month from now; we have invited a guest on our show to discuss a new element in the discourse, and we’ll be discussing Rowling’s behavior a little more at that time. For now, we definitely encourage you all to check out organizations like Trans Lifeline, the Trevor Project, and GLAAD’s trans resources site for more information on how you can help protect trans people, and we will include links to these resources in the show notes.
Micah: And on a related note, Harry Potter TV’s newest Snape actor Paapa Essiedu is among 400+ signatories on an open letter to the UK film and TV industry on trans rights. The letter expresses solidarity for the trans, nonbinary, and intersex communities impacted by a recent UK Supreme Court ruling. The ruling and subsequent Equalities and Human Rights Commission guidance will see trans people excluded from many single-sex facilities, which have an impact across the industry, from sets to cinemas. The letter calls on industry bodies and cultural institutions to commit to protecting trans people within the industry and their respective organizations. The letter goes on to state:
“The Supreme Court’s ruling that, under the Equality Act, ‘woman’ is defined by biological sex, states that ‘the concept of sex is binary, a person is either a man or a woman.’ We believe the ruling undermines the lived reality and threatens the safety of trans, nonbinary, and intersex people living in the UK.”
Eric: Also signing that petition, Eddie Redmayne and Katie Leung.
Andrew: Well, like we said, we’ll have more to say on that in about a month from now. And changing gears: If you love MuggleCast and want to help us keep this show running smoother than a date with Harry Potter, visit Patreon.com/MuggleCast, and we’d really appreciate your support there. You’ll get instant access to twice monthly bonus MuggleCast episodes, ad-free episodes, a new physical gift every year, the chance to cohost the show one day like Katie is today, and a whole lot more. We cannot do this without you, and we appreciate you like Madam Puddifoot appreciates a good coffee. For more ways to support us and to learn more about the show, you can also visit MuggleCast.com.
Chapter by Chapter: Time-Turner
Andrew: All right, now it’s time for Chapter by Chapter, and we’re discussing Order of the Phoenix Chapter 25, “The Beetle at Bay.”
Eric: Which we last discussed on Episode 462 of MuggleCast, way back on April 21 of 2020. This clip we’re about to play also includes some cool ideas for dates for Harry and Cho.
[Ticking sound]
Dumbledore: Three turns should do it, I think. Good luck.
Ron: What the…?
[Bell dings]
[Whooshing sound]
Robotic voice: Episode 462.
Andrew: … which, yeah, those are big things on a first date.
Micah: Totally.
Andrew: Or a second or third.
Micah: Not just about thinking up some topics of conversation, but what exactly it is that they’re going to do when they go to Hogsmeade, because they seem lost.
Andrew: Yeah. Yeah, you need some plans.
Micah: Yeah, at least say, “Oh, you know what? You want to go to the Three Broomsticks? You want to go to…” any other place but Madam Puddifoot’s, honestly.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: Because that’s where things just go off the rails.
Andrew: “Do you want to go ride Escape from Gringotts? What do you want to do?”
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: “There’s all kinds of things we could do. We can get a butterbeer, some ice cream…”
Laura: You know, I…
Eric: Take a picture by the snowman…
[Ticking sound]
Dumbledore: Mysterious thing, time.
[Bell dings]
Andrew: Oh, we’ll never know what Laura thought. [laughs]
Laura: Yeah. Oh, well.
Eric: Well, you can! Just go back and listen to MuggleCast 462, titled “Kreacher and the Keys.”
Andrew: There you go. That was called a cliffhanger.
Chapter by Chapter: Main Discussion
Laura: Jumping into this week’s discussion, I really wanted to set the tone for our discussion with this thought that Harry has, and I think it’s a thought that actually sets the tone for the rest of this chapter. So Katie, I was wondering if you could actually read this italicized excerpt here.
Katie: “He could not understand why his fellow students were not looking scared or at least discussing the terrible piece of news on the front page, but very few of them took the newspaper every day like Hermione. There they all were, talking about homework and Quidditch and who knew what other rubbish, and outside these walls ten more Death Eaters had swollen Voldemort’s ranks.”
Laura: So yeah, the trio and really the rest of the wizarding world are greeted with this horrifying news of a mass breakout from Azkaban, including people like Bellatrix Lestrange, including Antonin Dolohov, and we’ll talk about him maybe a little bit more later. But I felt like I resonated so much with this quote because I think at various points in life, depending on what was going on in the world and how much it personally affected us, it can feel weird to look around and see life continuing on as normal, as though this horrible thing isn’t going on. Maybe that’s a little too real for the time period that we live in right now, but…
[Eric laughs]
Micah: I was going to say, Laura, oh, the times in which we live.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Micah: Because the Ministry’s reaction to this mass breakout from Azkaban is reflective of real world examples of governments denying inconvenient truths, and we see this in the way that not only are they denying it, but they’re not allowing the Daily Prophet to do their due diligence in terms of reporting on what happened. It’s clear that the story that’s being put out there, especially as this chapter goes on, is not being believed by the general public.
Eric: Right.
Micah: They’re itching for more.
Katie: It’s something we’re seeing today, to your point. So we see the current press secretary blaming previous administrations and just trying to avoid accountability wherever possible.
Eric: It’s surprising how well that sort of thing works because I think people let it or want it to work. People still want to have a belief in government institutions being good; people want to believe that those in power are magnanimous, and sometimes that’s not the case, as we’ll see in these books and in real life.
Andrew and Laura: Yeah.
Andrew: The business as usual point is interesting to me, too, because it kind of feels like something should be said to the student body at Hogwarts, like, “Hey, you might have heard this news.” Why isn’t there a bigger announcement being made? Is it because they are protected in Hogwarts? Is it just that simple?
Laura: I think it might have something to do with that new Educational Decree…
Andrew: Well, okay, yep.
Laura: … that we learn about a little bit here soon, basically saying professors cannot talk to students about things that are not directly related to their subject of expertise, which is why we see the professors all huddled around whispering to each other over breakfast, because they’re not allowed to.
Micah: I think it has a lot to do not just with the Educational Decree, but with the person who’s responsible for that Educational Decree. The fact that she is at Hogwarts, in and of itself, is a barrier to anybody saying anything, especially Dumbledore. Look at what Dumbledore shared at the end of last term; he had no problem telling all of the students that Voldemort was back. Now flash forward a little bit less than a year later, nobody is addressing the students on the fact that ten Death Eaters just broke out of Azkaban. I think that has everything to do with Umbridge.
Eric: Yeah, it does. And she was appointed to do educational reform; that was what it said in the Prophet, and on the surface, educational reform, wow, that sounds great. We’re going to make the tax dollars go further; we’re going to shape up the teachers. But this restriction, the latest restriction on “Teachers can’t say anything outside of strictly their subject matter,” is a perfect example of how that reform is actually a horrible thing. I mean, how many times have you learned something from one of your teachers that wasn’t their subject matter, but you learn through interaction or extracurricular activities or after class? Or if something comes up in class, they’re going to answer the question whether it pertains or not, and that’s just good teaching. That’s just being an educated person helping the uneducated people. And that’s all gone now. And so this control, this need for control that Umbridge is exercising over Hogwarts – which we’ll continue to see in this and the next chapter – is really just… it’s harmful in every way, and it’s not as… I already used the word magnanimous, but it’s not as healthy and helpful as it initially stated when she was given the role of High Inquisitor.
Katie: Well, the decree came out…
Laura: Yeah, well, that was never the intent. Go ahead, Katie.
Katie: The decree came out after the headline. So to me, when the headline first came out, there should have been a “You are safe, children. It is okay here.” It was clearly after the teachers had been doing that whispering at the breakfast table that she’s like, “People need to stop talking,” and she panicked and knee-jerk reaction put something out.
Andrew: And maybe she was afraid that Dumbledore was going to make a school-wide announcement, and she wanted to nip it in the bud.
Micah: But he wouldn’t look at Harry when he said it, though.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: No, no.
Katie: Anywhere but him.
Andrew: But luckily there’s a lot of kids to look at in the Great Hall, so it’s easy to avoid his beautiful eyes.
Micah: That’s true.
Laura: Right. Harry is definitely the one that is the most in danger, but don’t look at him; he might attack you.
Micah: The other thing about this is not only is there a lack of information, but the information that is being shared is actually being spun. Fudge is laying blame at the feet of Sirius for what’s happened, but in typical Fudge fashion – and we can look back over many books now, at this point – Fudge doesn’t have any evidence that Sirius is responsible.
Eric: And he’s deliberately buried evidence, too. The reason this Sirius Black scapegoat works is because Sirius is the only person known to have escaped from Azkaban. Wrong! Barty Crouch, Jr. also escaped from Azkaban – totally different way – and he was a Death Eater, but he can’t exactly testify as to that, because Fudge found a way to silence him permanently. And so this is all a game of selective facts, and the narrative that’s being pushed is just really skewed from what we know the truth to be.
Laura: Yeah. And later on when we are in the conversation, in the interview with Rita, I mean, she effectively says as much. She’s like, “Yeah, Fudge is putting his thumb on the scale over at the Prophet,” because it’s all based on the public temperament and the public’s tolerance for news about Voldemort, because nobody wants to believe that he’s back. So people would much rather their official sources of information pat them on the head and tell them, “It’s going to be okay; you don’t need to worry about that crazy stuff Dumbledore was saying.” So we’re clearly at kind of a breaking point, because as Micah called out earlier, we do start seeing the cracks in the facade of this approach, in terms of people starting to ask more questions and find the Prophet‘s account not fully satisfactory, not providing full, complete answers as to what happened.
Micah: Yeah, and this tactic in particular doesn’t seem like it’s very enforceable, this decree. How is she going to know? She cannot monitor every single conversation that’s happening throughout Hogwarts. So it is that fear tactic that you’re talking about, Laura, right? It’s the chance that Umbridge would find out about it that is scaring not only the students, but also the professors, because they likely, as we see in this chapter with Hagrid and Trelawney, have to be concerned for their jobs, and there’s no easier way to get fired than getting caught doing something against an Educational Decree.
Eric: Right. It’s essentially meant to dissuade and create this culture of information suppression and total control, because to actually legislate out what it is that’s going to… they’re having to do these blanket Educational Decrees, and it effectively renders the information at Hogwarts one-sided and completely arbitrary, but at the same time, they’d have to do a million Educational Decrees, which is ridiculous at this point; there’s probably already been, like, ten, and we know we got a lot more. But it’s because of this blatant power grab from the Ministry.
Katie: And every decree so far has clearly been rushed.
[Eric laughs]
Katie: They’re panicked responses. They are not well thought out. They are not looking ahead. They are just, “What’s my problem right now, and how can I regain control of this situation?” And there’s no afterthought.
Eric: And they’re a matter of public record too, we know, because this is the UK government. This is the Ministry of Magic government that’s passing these decrees. Because I think we said when this first started, the first such decree was establishing something in Hogwarts, so it’s essentially going back to the beginning of the government looking over Hogwarts. The people, the public that are reading this, if they’re not distracted by the huge mass breakout from Azkaban and people being killed in hospitals and all this other stuff, I think they’d be able to see a pretty clear picture of how the Ministry is trying, and kind of honestly losing, at suppressing the truth.
Andrew: This talk about it being a rushed and panicked response actually reminds me of executive orders by a US President. It’s like, “Oh, let’s just throw everything at the wall and see what sticks,” and a lot of this actually isn’t going to hold up in court. Similarly, Umbridge can put together an Educational Decree that says the professors can’t talk to the students about anything outside of their expertise, but how is that going to be enforced? Like we were just talking about. My only guess with enforcement concerning this decree is she might be working with other Slytherins to help her out. I think some kids, including Draco, would get a kick out of that.
Micah: Snitches.
Katie: We see it eventually.
Laura: Right. That’s right, Katie, we get the Inquisitorial Squad, and it’s very clear that Umbridge is using them as her minions, her little birds, if you will. [laughs] And yeah, I think they would delight in eavesdropping on people and ratting them out for doing things that are wrong.
Katie: Well, and Lee Jordan even calls out how ridiculous it is when he challenges her in her class about, “Well, you can’t punish us for playing Exploding Snap. That’s not part of this class.”
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Laura: Right!
Katie: And he gets detention for it. [laughs]
Laura: Yeah, and then he’s the one who needs the Murtlap essence at that point.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Augh. You know what, though? I think that people oftentimes criticize the Order of the Phoenix movie for having so many students being sent to Umbridge and all rubbing their hands, but here’s an example of her using Harry’s punishment on other students, so it is in the book.
Laura: She definitely does, yeah. But I will say that all of this does spur the DA to work even harder, to the point where Neville is kind of the new top student in the DA. As a matter of fact, Harry notes that only Hermione exceeds his prowess at this point with learning various jinxes and stuns, and I think that we have a Neville Gets Swole Spotify playlist that we made a few years ago?
Eric: Yes! Yes.
Laura: Is that true, Eric? [laughs]
Eric: It’s true, and it’s still up there; I checked the MuggleCast account. We’ll link to it in the show notes for sure, but we had a Neville, essentially, like, gym playlist when he’s putting his head down. We all collaborated on it, so you can kind of tell which host contributed what artist.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: But yeah, it’s a lot of fun, and I was reminded listening back to 462 that we had some fun there, so definitely check out that Neville Gets Swole playlist.
Andrew: There’s 148 songs on it, so you will be entertained for a while. For nine hours and three minutes, to be exact.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Katie: That’s a hell of a workout.
Laura: Look at us. Yeah, we’re just pumping out content with this.
Andrew: Oh, pump. Swole.
Micah: I was going to say, I’m going to listen to it on my flight to LA next week.
Andrew: I think a lot of Neville’s motivation here is coming from what the trio just saw, that his parents are going through. And also knowing that these people who seriously, seriously harmed his parents are now out in the open again, broke out of Azkaban, that’s motivating him to become a better wizard and to finally exact revenge on them.
Laura: Totally. But it is an interesting dynamic shift that we see because of this article. It does specifically call out the crimes of each of these ten Death Eaters, and for Bellatrix, it specifically calls out the torture and incapacitation of Frank and Alice Longbottom, and it’s very clear that Harry is the only one of their friend group who knew about it, and he was a good friend so he didn’t share the news, but Ron and Hermione are shocked by this because they had no idea. And there are other Hogwarts students who are getting a lot more attention right now because their families were also affected by these particular Death Eaters, right, Katie?
Katie: Yeah, Susan Bones even comes up to him in Herbology; it’s like, “I can’t imagine this is what you’re going through. This is terrible.” And she’s just one person whose relative family was affected by this, but it also makes me wonder… we see Neville glow up in the DA, but has anyone checked in on him and the attention that he’s getting out of this?
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric and Laura: Yeah.
Andrew: It’s a good question. It is nice to see, though, that Susan is acknowledging and understanding what Harry is currently going through, though, because through much of this book so far, not many people have been on Harry’s side. So between the Prophet reporting and comments like this from Susan, it’s like, “All right, the wind is changing.”
Katie: I agree. It’s nice to see somebody come in quietly and show some sort of support or just acknowledgement of what Harry is going through, versus… was it Ernie who was like, “I stand by you, me and my…”? Like it was a show. And now it’s a more subtle, like, “I feel you on this now.”
Andrew: More meaningful, yeah.
Laura: Right. More authentic, less performative. Well, Hermione has one of her patented eureka moments.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: She is very frustrated reading this article from the Daily Prophet, because she’s like, “If only we could get word out somewhere where people could read a different point of view than this,” and she’s like, “Aha! I have a great idea that I can’t tell you about, but I’ll be back later.” And so she dips out here, saying that she’s “the only one who can,” right? So Hermione has something up her sleeve, and she believes that she is the only one who can. She is, because she’s blackmailing Rita Skeeter. So this next part of the conversation is going to be pretty fun.
Eric: She’s singlehandedly changing the course of wizarding history. It’s easy to overlook; this is just a chapter in a book, and a thing that happens. So much is happening in this book. But if you really think about it, this really turns the tide by presenting the real story, but the alternative to all the fictitious stuff that’s being put out by the news. Hermione’s inkling here that what people need is to be able to be told this account, and then they’ll be on even enough footing to make the decision for themselves, is really brilliant, and I don’t think she gets enough credit for it. She is the only one that could do this, and through doing it, she shapes the future. I think that this in no small way leads to so much of the resistance and the people being actually aware and starting to be able to prepare for a world in which Voldemort is back.
Micah: And it also shows her ability to exploit certain things and certain people. We see her do it with Rita in this chapter, but also I’m thinking about The Quibbler, the publication that she was so apt to dismiss earlier on in this book. She’s using it basically as a tool to her own end.
Eric: Is exploit the right term?
Micah: She takes advantage of it.
Eric and Laura: Yeah.
Eric: I mean, they have the highest sales month. [laughs]
Laura: Yeah, so it works out for them.
Micah: Well, I don’t know how many alternatives there are.
Laura: Right.
Micah: But Luna probably doesn’t really care all that much at the end of the day what Hermione thought earlier on in this book, but I do think she’s making the most of the situation.
Eric: I do think it’s important to point out, as you did, that Hermione really doesn’t care a lot about The Quibbler. And she’s got leverage on Rita; this is how she’s using it.
Andrew and Laura: Yeah.
Andrew: It’s a place where she can get this interview out to a mass audience, and that type of opportunity isn’t all that common, I guess, and she sees it as the best solution.
Micah: Yeah. I mean, I guess “exploit” has a negative connotation to it, but so does blackmail, and we seem to be okay with that.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Andrew: We’ve discussed before; Hermione has got a bit of a bad side…
Laura and Micah: She does.
Andrew: … so if you want to call it exploitation, that’s okay.
Laura: Yeah, I mean, she’s straight up blackmailing Rita. She’s like, “If you don’t do this for free, I’m going to rat you out for being an unregistered Animagus.” [laughs]
Andrew: She deserves it.
Eric: Well, she broke the law. And the other thing is that the byline – Rita Skeeter, by Rita Skeeter – it shouldn’t, but it does lend credibility to whatever story comes after it, because people are familiar. People love a celebrity. People have read that name in the paper, and if it’s in the paper, it’s got to be real, so Rita Skeeter inadvertently being forced to write this does go a ways to people believing it.
Laura: Unfortunately, Harry is about to receive some more bad news after Hermione leaves he and Ron in the Great Hall, and it’s that Hagrid has been put on probation. So not a surprise, but still a bummer. And to be honest, it really seems like the trio are the only three to be upset about this at all, little bit. Yeah, Katie?
Katie: It surprised me because earlier they were all defending him. When he returned, Fred and George were running up to him, even; people were excited to see him and excited for him to be back. And now it’s just silence, so it’s just… why silence now? I mean, it’s not shocking, like you said, but it’s like, you loved this teacher, allegedly, but were silent now.
Micah: How public is it, though? I mean, Harry knows because Hagrid shared it, but who else knows? Is that something that is outwardly communicated by Umbridge to let students know that a teacher is on probation?
Katie: I think it’s said that the news had spread. The news was slowly spreading.
Laura: Yeah. I think it’s one of those things, like in a school environment…
Micah: Gossip.
Laura: … or a work environment, [censored] like this gets out.
Katie: Well, and Umbridge starts joining all the classes.
Andrew: Right.
Katie: She’s showing up. It was mentioned that she’s in every single one…
Laura: That’s right.
Katie: … of the Care of Magical Creatures and Divination classes, which, how does she have time for that?
Eric: She works in the Ministry where the Time-Turners are.
[Katie and Micah laugh]
Andrew: But I think that’s part of the reason why maybe students don’t see it as big of a deal as the trio might, because he’s still teaching. Yeah, Humbridge… [laughs] Humbridge. Umbridge is breathing down his back, but he’s still there. And I also think that the student body is slowly but surely just growing used to Umbridge’s presence and what she’s doing at the school. There’s no stopping it. She clearly is in control.
Eric: It’s crazy, yeah. It’s been normalized, her presence there, and everything that she’s doing to bully and subjugate the students. People are used to it. It’s not as shocking as it would have been on day one.
Katie: Silence supports the oppressor.
Micah: My question about this, though, is: Is she in every Care of Magical Creatures and Divination class, or is she in every one of Harry’s Care of Magical Creature and Divination class?
Eric: Ahh.
Katie: I was wondering that, too, because I was thinking about the math on that. We can think there’s six grade levels that are in all those classes, plus NEWTs, and we can assume that there’s two per year, because we talk about Potions with the Slytherins; Hufflepuffs are in Herbology. So are there two classes per year? Times six years; that’s 24 classes for just those two. How is she doing that plus her DADA teaching? Doesn’t add up.
Micah: Well, she doesn’t teach.
[Katie laughs]
Eric: Yeah. Well, right. I like the idea that it’s just Harry’s classes.
Micah: Right, because then she’s also able to watch… that would make sense; it serves a double purpose.
Eric: Yeah, I never thought about that. I always thought it was just absolutely nuts… 20 something classes and that. But yeah, it’s probably just Harry’s.
Laura: Yeah. I like the idea of her trying to kill two birds with one stone by doing that. Moving on, we talked a little bit about Neville and his glow-up in the DA; unfortunately, Harry is not having the same experience with Occlumency. He’s continuing to really struggle in that space; it seems like his lessons with Snape are making things worse, not better. Harry is noticing more occasions where he’s feeling an emotion that is not his own, and more dreams about the Department of Mysteries. His scar almost always hurts, too. And Hermione opines at one point that maybe this is like a fever and it just needs to get worse before it gets better. Ron, of course, is immediately like, “Nope, Snape is trying to kill you. You should stop doing these lessons.” But I found myself thinking about the fever breaking excuse, and that could make a certain amount of sense, but if that’s the expectation, that would be a good thing for Harry to know, right? Why couldn’t anyone have told him that?
Katie: This is a solid question.
Micah: It all goes back to what we were talking about last week with Snape’s inability to handle this whole situation with any sort of care at all. And to your point, Laura, I do think that if it’s one of those things where it’s got to get worse before it gets better, Harry should know that, and it doesn’t seem like there’s any kind of soft touch that’s coming from Snape. But I do think that there is something to what Ron is saying, and I don’t think that he should be – at least at this point in the story – so easily dismissed by Hermione. What better way for Snape as this double agent to show loyalty to Voldemort than by keeping Harry in such a state where he would be easily manipulated? We don’t know what information he’s sharing with Voldemort at this point, but clearly Harry is in a extremely weakened state by this whole process. And Snape is a double agent; he’s got to play both sides. He’s got to be giving Dumbledore some, giving Voldemort some.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: Otherwise Voldemort wouldn’t be willing to trust him as much as he does.
Eric: The first book, the tasks leading to the Sorcerer’s Stone retrieval, really painted Ron as the strategizer, but this is Hermione’s chapter for strategizing, getting Rita Skeeter to the table, etc., etc. Ron – bless him – he is thinking strategically still. This is something that you would think, that Snape would have now a huge… a weapon of his own in a weakened Harry, so I appreciate that Ron is still thinking about this. I just don’t think he’s ever been shut down faster by Hermione.
Katie: Hermione was straight-up mean. She was mean.
Andrew and Eric: Yeah.
Katie: “Shut up, Ron.” That’s just mean.
Eric: Aww.
Laura: Yeah, it’s unnecessary.
Andrew: Well, but it’s interesting hearing Hermione say “We need to trust Dumbledore,” but then none of them are like, “Yeah, you know what? That’s a good point, me,” or “That’s a good point, Hermione.”
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: And I think there’s a lot left unsaid here, because the scene actually ends on this moment, and no one’s like, “Yeah, we do need to trust Dumbledore.” I think they’re kind of questioning whether they can trust Dumbledore or not, because nobody’s willing to speak that out into the air other than Hermione saying, “We got it. We should.”
Katie: If only he was around to answer questions.
[Micah laughs]
Andrew: Yep.
Micah: Yeah, I mean, the line we always get is “Dumbledore trusts Snape. We trust Dumbledore.” And that’s by association, right? That’s where the trust is coming from. But when has Dumbledore proven himself to be trustworthy up until this point, with everything that Harry has been through, and with everything that Harry is going through in this book? Besides him showing up for the trial.
Eric: You know that only trustworthy people are on Chocolate Frog Cards, right?
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: There’s some paperwork, and you have to prove you’re trustworthy before you get printed on that card.
Eric: You’re honored, yeah.
Katie: Well, and the response is always, “Well, has he ever led you wrong?” It’s like, “Well, he’s not led me straight either. It’s always a little curvy.”
[Andrew laugh]
Eric: It’s very curvy. And what Hermione says about shutting Ron down is, “How many times have you suspected Snape, and how many times has that proven to be a waste of time? Stop wasting time, Ronald.” And it’s like, well, we still don’t have many answers to him, and we know from having just read the Occlumency chapter that Snape is hiding a very longing passion for Harry’s mom, so there could be so much more to Snape. There is so much more to Snape that is being hidden and it’s being pulled over your eyes, and so it’s very reasonable, I think, at this stage, that Snape could still be one of the bad ones.
Laura: Yeah. You know what I was also thinking about during this moment? I was thinking about how surprised I am that in the next book, when the big “Snape kills Dumbledore” reveal happens…
Katie: What?!
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Oh no! [laughs] But I’m kind of surprised Ron doesn’t throw this in Hermione’s face at that point to be like, “Yeah, remember last year when I told you that he was weakening Harry? Looks like I was right.” And he wasn’t, but still.
Andrew: He probably forgot.
[Laura laughs]
Katie: Poor Ron. No, I bet he brings it up in their marital spats later. “Hey, remember that time in school?”
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Oh, that’s hilarious.
Katie: “I was right.”
Andrew: During the vows.
Laura: That actually sounds right.
[Katie laughs]
Eric: Well, and not only that, but eventually when we learn that Snape is the one who told Voldemort about Lily and James and the prophecy – which we can’t know that now, because we don’t know about the prophecy yet – but there are many reasons yet to be found out why you can and should still suspect Snape of some wrongdoing.
Laura: I don’t think Harry envisioned that he would be partially spending Valentine’s Day with Rita Skeeter, but here we have it in this next part of the chapter. [laughs] So while Harry has all of this mess going on in his personal life and in the world politically, with Voldemort, at school, Valentine’s Day also sneaks up on him, and of course, he had previously asked Cho to go with him to Hogsmeade on Valentine’s Day, after she laid some very not-so-subtle hints, and he finally picked up on it and asked her. But I’ve got to say, for his big first date with Cho, I don’t think Harry or Cho were really set up for success here, and maybe we can start that conversation with Madam Puddifoot’s, the date location that Cho picks. It’s funny because when you read back over this, it’s clear that she’s trying to make it seem like a spontaneous recommendation and like that wasn’t where she always was trying to lead Harry the whole time.
Andrew: Aww.
Laura: But actually, that was directly where she was trying to get him for a romantic Valentine’s Day date, and we know this because she mentions that she used to come here with Cedric. So this is… it’s very rough. And on top of it all, Madam Puddifoot’s is the most un-Harry place for a date.
Andrew: Yeah, but that’s life, man. It’s time to level up and go to a nice place for your first date. And this is on Valentine’s Day; I think it’s a great idea for their first date spot. Cho is also very excited by the fact that Madam Puddifoot has decorated for Valentine’s Day; she makes a note of how charming that is. I really don’t see anything wrong with this. No matter where they went on Valentine’s Day, there’s probably going to be couples holding hands, because it’s Valentine’s Day. Maybe don’t do your first date on Valentine’s Day if you don’t want to be surrounded by love in the air.
Laura: Yeah. That’s a lot of pressure.
Eric: I’ve been to restaurants on Valentine’s Day where everyone in there is couples celebrating Valentine’s Day, and it’s not as oppressive, everyone crunched in, sitting on top of each other as Madam Puddifoot’s is. And so there’s really no privacy. It’s okay to be somewhere in a group on Valentine’s Day with your significant other, but in order for that to be appealing, you should already be a thing together. You know what I’m saying? If Harry and Cho had already been dating for a while, then this place is kind of okay. As a first date, though, not today. It’s clearly for people who are already at the snogging stage, and people who are real nosy, and it’s just not great.
Andrew: But what would be the equivalent of that in the Muggle world, where it’s normal for people to be kissing each other in a coffee shop? I don’t think there is anything. And so my point is just that I don’t think these people are there to kiss; I think it’s just Valentine’s Day.
Laura: Well…
Micah: But this is… oh, go ahead, Laura.
Laura: I was just going to say we have to remember, I think, a lot of people in Madam Puddifoot’s are teenagers, right? They’re all Hogwarts students. And I definitely remember being a teenager; it was way more common for people in that age bracket to do stuff like that, to make out at the movie theater, or to make out at the coffee shop or whatever. It’s obviously tacky, and I think we all know that now as adults, but when you’re 15 and your hormones are flying, I think it’s pretty natural. But the thing is, Harry, he’s clearly not in a place where he’s ready for this with Cho, but he feels a lot of pressure because of the environment that they’re in.
Katie: I think the environment was kind of funny. And it was such a quick moment, but one of the things that made me laugh the most is when he’s looking around and he looks up and one of the cherubs just drops glitter in his face.
[Everyone laughs]
Katie: I want to see that on the show. Just like, “Glitter! Glitter bomb!”
[Eric laughs]
Laura: Honestly, that would be a great “Max that” moment for sure. It definitely adds some levity to it, even though Harry is really uncomfortable.
Katie: The whole time he’s uncomfortable, being like, “Cho, what’s going on? Why are you crying? Why are you crying?”
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Katie: Just, “Get it off of me.” [laughs]
Andrew: Yeah. I maybe should take back what I said, because I had no experience dating when I was Harry’s age. The only romance I was having was romance in The Sims video game. I did not have any experiences like this. I defer to…
Micah: That’s legit.
Laura: Oh, so your Sims didn’t make out at the coffee shop?
Andrew: Oh, I made my Sims make out, but that’s not reflective of the real world. I’ve got to keep that in mind.
Laura: [laughs] Ah, okay.
Micah: But Laura, what I was going to say earlier is pretty similar. I feel like Madam Puddifoot’s, at least in this particular instance, is an extension of Hogwarts, and so yeah, you’re going to see – especially on a day like this – couples holding hands, snogging, doing all of those things, because that’s what you see in middle schools and high schools around at least the US; I’m sure that’s true in other places of the world as well. But I do think in classic teenage boy fashion, Harry didn’t do any prep for this date, and I understand he had a lot of time, but I’m just going to say he’s had a lot on his plate. He’s got this greasy-haired Potions professor screwing with his head, messing up his mind every single week, multiple times a week. So I give him a little bit of a pass here.
Eric and Laura: Yeah.
Katie: I don’t.
Laura: [laughs] Go off, Katie.
Katie: You have a month and a half. You’re in DA meetings with Cho. Ask her. “Hey, what do you want to do on our date? What do you want to do when we’re in town?” I also think he forgets he has other friends other than Hermione and Ron. Ask Fred and George; they know the town. “Is there a cool spot that I could take her? Do you know anywhere neat?” Any of the Chasers on the Quidditch team. He has other friends. Ask people.
Eric: Yeah, that’s actually a good point. If he were an active participant in this budding relationship, he would have taken the time, or found the time to ask those types of questions.
Micah: I don’t think he’s ready for a girlfriend at this point in his life.
Eric: Apparently not.
Katie: Clearly. [laughs]
Laura: No.
Micah: I’m serious. [laughs] I think this would have worked out maybe a little bit better in Goblet of Fire if Cedric wasn’t there, but where he’s at currently in Order of the Phoenix, there’s too much other stuff going on, and she’s not a priority, clearly.
Eric: Well, I also think she’s not ready for the relationship, because this comes off as very… it’s trying to do two things at once. She brings Harry to this very obviously intimate romantic place on Valentine’s Day, which is meant to be a good first date spot where they can get to know each other better, but her stated intention at some point is to talk about Cedric, and that is not just a buzzkill, but that’s not the kind of thing you would talk about when you want to be romantic with somebody; it’s when you want to talk about your trauma. And there needs to be that conversation before you can start dating, so that should have been somewhere else. That should have happened somewhere else.
Katie: Agreed.
Laura: Yeah, I agree. But also, I mean, they’re both traumatized and both really young, and we know Harry sure as hell has not had any real support for his grief and the hit that his mental health has taken in the last year. And it’s probably safe to assume that Cho feels pretty alone in that, too, and I think that’s probably the reason she fixates on Harry so much, because he’s the only one who can share the experience of losing Cedric with her. So maybe she doesn’t even know… maybe she thinks that she has a romantic interest in him, but maybe it has more to do with Cedric than she’s fully realized.
Eric: I think that’s probably right. It’s just that because this is such a miss – the very last person Harry wants to think about or talk about right now is Cedric – he comes away from this experience resenting Cho, and that’s not great, right? That’s not something you want to see. He very comically leaves the shop and is like, “Women!”
[Andrew and Katie laugh]
Laura: Yes, because he knows so much about women, and he has so many experiences to compare this to. I was like, “Okay, Harry. Calm down. You’re fine.” Harry’s awkward date with Cho does come to an end when he reveals to her, very stupidly, that he wants to go meet up with Hermione before he and Cho have really had a chance to settle into their date, and Cho very clearly makes some assumptions about what that means and what Hermione must be to Harry and vice versa. So Harry storms out, curses all women everywhere because he’s frustrated at Cho, and finds himself at the Three Broomsticks, meeting up with Hermione as well as Rita Skeeter and Luna Lovegood. What a trio. Who would have imagined these three coming together? And Hermione introduces the idea that Rita’s interview of Harry that she’s about to do is going to be published in The Quibbler, hence Luna’s presence. And as we said before, Rita doesn’t really have any choice in the matter, because Hermione is blackmailing her. Again, I love when Hermione goes on these justice streaks. I think they’re very, very entertaining.
Micah: Well, I mean, she did keep a woman trapped in a jar for several months.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Micah: Like, that’s borderline psychotic.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Yeah!
Micah: We were just doing an episode on What the Hype?! about You. I mean, it’s no different than keeping somebody in a cage in the bottom of a bookstore, right?
Laura: True.
Andrew: Keep your friends close, keep your enemies…
Micah: In a jar.
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: Very close, in a jar. Next to your bed.
Laura: To be fair, Rita was bullying Hermione and her friends.
Micah: Okay? [laughs] So does Draco.
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: Don’t get on Laura’s bad side.
Eric: Well, it’s an insane overreach.
Katie: That’s how you survive school, is blackmail your bullies.
Andrew: Hey, we were talking earlier about Hermione being a little batty.
Laura: She is!
Andrew: I like it. I like that she’s trapped in the jar; I like she’s kind of disheveled in this scene and having to bend to Hermione’s wills. I’m surprised Rita was able to show up to this, because I would have thought she had a date for Valentine’s Day.
Laura: Really?
Katie: Not looking the way she looks.
Andrew: [laughs] Not Fudge? She loves Fudge.
Micah: Who did we pair her with? Ludo Bagman?
Andrew: Oh, I can see that. Yeah.
Micah: We talked about that, I think, when we did Goblet of Fire.
Eric: I think you’re right.
Laura: But yeah, to your point, Katie, I don’t think that Rita would consider herself to be Valentine’s Day ready, because she’s clearly not doing so well. And typically, we’re used to seeing her a lot more put together in her way, whereas here we have chipped nail polish and missing jewels on her long talon-like nails, and her hair is hanging limp around her face. So yeah, I think that’s why there were no Valentine’s Day plans, Andrew.
Andrew: I think also because Lockhart had his memory erased, and if he was still with it, those two definitely would have become a couple. They’re both very full on themselves. PR power couple.
Katie: She could totally be his ghost writer.
Andrew: Yeah! Maybe she was.
Micah: Oooh. Declare that canon.
[Andrew and Katie laugh]
[“I declare canon!” sound effect plays with thunder]
Laura: But Katie, you asked an interesting question here about Hermione’s plan.
Katie: Yeah, I wondered why she didn’t share it sooner. She waits till she gets a response and then just spurs it on Harry in the last minute in a very public place. And maybe it’s a lesson of learning not to use the Hog’s Head and to go somewhere more public this time, but I also wondered about… you’re asking this person to relive their trauma in this very public place. It’s not just a secret meeting to plan something, but “Please deep dive into this very terrible experience so we can document it.”
Eric: Well, he’s got nothing better to do on Valentine’s Day. [laughs]
Micah: I was going to say, that’s part of it.
Katie: And in this conversation… Cho just asked him to do the same thing, almost!
Eric: Oh, yeah.
Micah: That’s a great point.
Katie: He told Cho no, but Rita? Sure. For the greater good.
Micah: Do we blame Hermione at all, though, for what happens with Harry and Cho, maybe indirectly?
Katie and Laura: No.
Eric: She’s looking for something to be genuinely mad at Harry about, and this jealousy came out of nowhere. I don’t think Harry could rightly have guessed that Cho would be jealous of Hermione, because when he realizes that that’s what’s going on, he’s highly amused and is like, “I don’t think about Hermione like that!”
Micah: Well, that was the wrong reaction.
Andrew: When the date is going bad, though, Cho is going to look for reasons to get mad at Hermione for this invite, and I think Harry could have anticipated that.
Katie: I think it’s another character avoiding accountability. It can’t possibly be Cho’s fault that the date went south; it’s Hermione’s.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: The thing is…
Micah: If Hermione knows Harry is going on a date, though, and she knows it’s his first date with Cho, why is she asking him to meet at all?
Andrew: Right. Give him space.
Laura: Well, because this is when Rita is available.
Katie: What else is she doing? [laughs]
Eric: The only way this happens is if Umbridge is not around, so it needs to be during a Hogsmeade weekend.
Micah: That’s true.
Eric: Could have been tomorrow. I think that the key moment here, whether Hermione did anything wrong, is when she sees Harry, she says, “Harry, I wasn’t expecting you for another hour,” and so she really was going to give Harry all the time he needed to wrap up his date with Cho. I mean, I think as a first date, I don’t think it’s likely to last eight or ten hours unless they really hit it off.
Andrew: No.
Micah: Well, they walked down together. You’d expect them to walk back to the castle together, no?
Andrew: Snog… snog some more…
Eric: Well, Cho could come along. I think maybe Hermione even intimated that…
Andrew: Yeah, yeah. She does offer that.
Katie: Cho would have loved to have heard it. She was trying to hear it at Puddifoot’s.
Eric: Well, that’s the thing, yeah; Cho has maybe isolated herself from the riches here. But the other thing I’m thinking about regarding Rita is that she’s looking a bit off, as we said; she’s also, I think, awaiting redemption. It can’t be good for Hermione to have this leverage on her. I would say that that’s probably contributed to a worsening mental state. Also, Hermione is the reason she quit her job at the Daily Prophet; I think Hermione forced that to happen at the end of the last… so Rita is not relevant anymore. And I think that’s probably one of the main reasons why she was doing what she did so maliciously, is she got high off of being relevant and Miss Thing. Now making Rita do this, she inevitably is giving Rita the chance to be relevant again, also, and to do something I think even Rita would understand matters. Even though Rita’s politics are kind of with the side that she was mostly on, and she’s been fine with Fudge leaning on the paper, I’d like to believe that after she finishes with this story and writes it, she will realize that she’s actually done an important thing.
Micah: But it’s okay that Hermione tears her down, as long as she’s going to build her back up through this opportunity? Because through her physical appearance… I just wanted to bring that up for a second, because yes, we know that she was in the jar, but she was released from the jar at the end of Goblet of Fire once they got back to London.
Katie: Allegedly. [laughs]
Micah: Okay, allegedly. Eric, though, going off of what you said, she was given the direction by Hermione not to continue to write the stories that she had been writing the year prior and presumably throughout her entire career, so it’s almost like Hermione has taken the life out of her, and I think that’s why we see her appear the way she does. She’s not presumably working. She’s fallen on hard times because of the situation that she’s put her in.
Eric: Oh my God, Hermione crippled her financially.
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah.
Laura: Right.
Micah: Presumably.
Eric: I mean, Rita abused her power. She abused the role that she had in the last book pretty egregiously. I’m not saying Hermione was right to do…
Micah: Two wrongs don’t make a right.
Eric: Yeah, it’s true. It’s true.
Laura: No, not at all. But I think Hermione had told her she had to put her pen down for one year; that’s resonating with me. And the other thing, too, is Rita’s appearance to me really just reads of economic woes. No one’s going to be able to afford to keep up with their nail habit or getting their hair perfectly set as frequently as she probably was before. Rita messed around and she found out. I’m not saying it’s totally okay what happened to her, but actions have consequences. That’s all I’m saying.
Eric: At any point Rita could go back to work, and it’s just that Hermione would tell everyone that she broke the law by becoming an Animagus. Who knows? Rita in her position…
Laura: And would people care?
Eric: I think people that were scooped and they didn’t know how Rita did it would be pretty pissed.
Laura: Yeah, that’s true.
Katie: If there weren’t other headlines competing? Then yeah, I think people might care. But there’s some pretty big headlines that that would go up against.
Andrew: Getting back to a point from a couple of minutes ago, I do think Rita might be willing to turn a new leaf here and actually do some good in the world. She says to Harry – and I think this is the end of the chapter – she says, “Are you ready to tell the world the truth?” That’s a lot for somebody like Rita to say. And I know her back’s against the wall when it comes to Hermione, but I feel like that’s a big moment for her, and maybe when she has this experience, she’ll be like, “Oh, wow, it actually feels good to tell the truth and make a difference in the world? Even if it’s through the damn Quibbler?” I’m optimistic that she turns a new leaf. Also, I was wondering, okay, so Hermione wasn’t expecting Harry to show up for another hour at least, so Hermione, Rita, and Luna are all sitting there? What are they talking about for an hour? And then what came to mind to me was this TikTok sound. Have you all heard this?
TikTok clip: Hey, hey… how y’all doin’?
Andrew: Just this for an hour.
[Katie and Laura laugh]
Andrew: Awkward. Awkward.
Eric: Well, they can’t have been there long or whatever so far. But if you notice how they each have a cocktail… and you know there’s alcohol in this, based on the description.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: One of them’s got a little umbrella.
Andrew: If I’m Rita, I’m having a drink for sure.
Eric: Rita is swigging from hers, yeah.
Andrew: “It’s Valentine’s Day and I’m single again? Ugh.”
Eric: Everyone’s drinking here.
Laura: [laughs] “It’s Valentine’s Day and I’m being extorted by a teenager.”
[Andrew laughs]
Katie: Did Hermione at least buy her drink?
Eric: Oh, maybe.
Laura: Probably not.
Micah: I would hope so.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Andrew: Yeah, Rita probably can’t afford it.
Katie: It also just shows how important Hermione knows this is, to be sitting with two people that she doesn’t think very highly of – at least lately we haven’t heard her opinion of Luna and if it’s changed, but from previous interactions, she hasn’t thought much of her – and to be sitting there willingly just shows how important Hermione recognizes this is.
Eric: This is why Luna is great. She’s just vibing.
Katie: [laughs] “I have nowhere else to be.”
Eric: She’s absolutely… yeah, she’s just having a good time, seeing where the wind blows.
Laura: Yeah. Well, again, this was a whole scene that actually happens offscreen. We don’t see the Rita interview of Harry. We end up hearing about it after the fact via The Quibbler, but this is something that we recently talked about on bonus MuggleCast as wanting to see actually portrayed in the show. Show us the interview. I think that’s a lot more visually interesting from a TV standpoint than yet another newspaper montage.
Katie: I think it would also…
Andrew: “A 2020 exclusive: Harry Potter. Rita Skeeter. The truth. Tonight at 9:00 p.m. eastern on ABC.”
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: Sorry. Go ahead, Katie.
Katie: Showing that interview would actually be a really great storytelling method to remind to the viewers what happened, because it’s been half of a season, potentially, at that point, since we saw what happened in the graveyard. So to remind the viewers, hear the names that you might have forgotten about; here’s those details you might have forgotten about that are really important. I think it could be a great way for them to rehash that without doing flashbacks or montages.
Laura: I agree.
Andrew: And seeing Harry kind of relive some of this would be interesting, and watch him get this truth out on a large platform, I think, would be a wonderful character moment, an acting moment.
Laura: Yeah. Well, that is Chapter 25.
Odds & Ends
Laura: We are going to move into some odds and ends here quickly before we get into our last couple of segments. So first of all, just something I wanted to mention: The Daily Prophet reminds us that Antonin Dolohov killed Gideon and Fabian Prewett, Molly Weasley’s brothers and Ron’s uncles. Why didn’t Ron mention anything?
Katie: Or Fred or George. They’re all in the school together; they all read the newspaper.
Laura: Right.
Katie: Why didn’t anybody say, “Those are our uncles”?
Laura: Yeah. Do they know? I’m just confused, because it seems like we totally glossed over that while the chapter was focusing on other students whose families were mentioned in the article. It just struck me as odd.
Eric: Yeah, the connection isn’t made, and don’t we see Dolohov in one of the future books too? Like, pretty big? And I still don’t think it’s mentioned.
Micah: He kills Lupin.
Katie: Fred and George might have known them. They might have been one or two years old by the time they died, so not old enough to remember them, but they would have at least heard the names in their very early lives.
Eric: They know their uncle’s names, yeah, for sure too.
Connecting the Threads
Laura: Also wanted to connect some threads quickly between Prisoner of Azkaban and Order of the Phoenix. First of all, Cho reminisces about the first time she and Harry played Quidditch against each other in Prisoner of Azkaban, and she also notes – this was an interesting point – that in Prisoner of Azkaban, when Sirius was at large, Dementors were posted everywhere, but there are none now that ten Death Eaters have escaped from Azkaban.
Micah: You’ve got to have control of them to post them.
Laura: That’s true, right? And that really confirms that the Ministry no longer controls them.
Superlative of the Week
Laura: All right, and now we are going to talk about our best moment of the chapter segment of the week. This week’s theme is #RealTalk quote of the week.
Andrew: I’m going to give my MVP award to a quote we hit on earlier, when Rita says, “All right, Fudge is leaning on the Prophet.” That’s a surprising comment to hear from Rita Skeeter, and very validating.
Eric: I am shook.
Andrew: [laughs] Not a shock, but to hear it from her? I was impressed.
Eric: I think she likes it, but yeah.
Laura: On a related note, when Hermione fires back at Rita and says, “So the Prophet exists to tell people what they want to hear, does it?” And Rita very quickly shoots back, “The Prophet exists to sell itself, you silly girl.” And I was like, man, the brutal honesty. I mean, she’s being real.
Micah: I felt it was only appropriate, after defending Ron earlier, to go with, “Shut up, Ron.”
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Micah: I feel like that’s real talk throughout the Harry Potter series, not just Order of the Phoenix.
Eric: What’s the least characteristic quote said by Harry Potter, actually said by Harry Potter in the books? “Women!”
[Andrew and Katie laugh]
Eric: Which is immediately followed by something about a human hosepipe. I’m not even going to say it again. It’s just weird.
Katie: I love sassy Harry, but I also love sassy Hermione, and her line “The Prophet might give you rather a lot for an insider’s account of life in Azkaban…”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Laura: Oh, that’s wonderful. I love that.
Lynx Line
Laura: And now we’re going to move into our Lynx Line. This is where MuggleCast listeners who are members of our community over at Patreon.com/MuggleCast get to answer a weekly question, and this week’s question was: If you could scoop one outrageous piece of gossip from Hogwarts, what would your one-sentence headline be?
Andrew: So Cassandra said, “Statute of Secrecy violated! Rich librarian arrested! Irma Pince accused of selling Hogwarts spellbooks to MUGGLES!”
Eric: [gasps] Oh my God.
Laura: Oh my gosh!
Andrew: Yeah, that would be scandalous.
Laura: It really would.
Eric: Danielle says, “What’s next, a vampire? Why your Hogwarts students aren’t safe from the likes of werewolves and giants on campus.”
Laura: Yep, very relevant. [laughs]
Eric: Fear-mongering.
Micah: Katie, who is here, says, “(Not) Picking Pansies: Hogwarts’s least favorite pick-me girl once again overlooked and ignored.”
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: Well done, Katie.
Laura: That’s really good. Well done.
Katie: She really irked me at the beginning of this chapter, making fun of Cho.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Right?! Like, mind your business. Zachary says,
“Fifty Shades of Green! With a looming threat seeming ever so near, Fudge still assures our community we have nothing to fear, all while appearing to turn a new shade of green every interview. Is he telling the truth, or is he playing some sort of sadistic game with us? Find out on my extra juicy edition of my ‘Fly on the Wall’ column.”
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: That’s funny.
Katie: Rachel said, “Oh, Rats! Grown man shares bed with teenage boy.”
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: Oof!
Laura: Whoops.
Andrew: On a similarly creepy note, Shannon said, “Harry Potter and Severus Snape seen alone together! Secret lessons or secret lovers? Hear from the professor himself and our first hand source.”
[Laura and Micah laugh]
Andrew: [imitating Snape] “No freaking way. What are you talking about, you weirdos?”
Eric: Jennifer has perhaps the least likely one: “Hogwarts, a security safety nightmare! Hundreds of Dementors flood campus as high profile mass murderer easily breaks into the school and holds a student at knife point. Who is to blame?” Gee, I wonder.
Laura: Dumbledore.
[Katie laughs]
Micah: Always. Shannon says, “Hogwarts School of Witchcraft and Wizardry: Safer than Gringotts, or security nightmare? Three first year students get past seven obstacles created by top professors to safeguard the (alleged) legendary Philosopher’s Stone.”
Laura: And to wrap us up, Kyle says,
“Dumbledore’s Beast in the Castle? Children in peril: Gamekeeper with dark past hauled off as students allegedly Petrified. Dumbledore resigns in disgrace, refuses to comment on his role in injured students. Bombshell new interview with Hogwarts Governors chairman.”
Ahh, of course Lucius would worm his way into this.
Eric: Yep.
Laura: Those are great. Thanks, y’all.
Andrew: Yeah, lots of creativity as always, including from Katie! Well, don’t forget, everybody, you can participate in the Lynx Line every week by becoming a patron at Patreon.com/MuggleCast. And if you have feedback about today’s talk, you can contact us by emailing or sending a voice memo that you record on your phone to MuggleCast@gmail.com. Next week, Chapter by Chapter continues with Order of the Phoenix Chapter 26, “Seen and Unforeseen.” Be sure to check out our other weekly podcasts, What the Hype?! and Millennial, for more pop culture and real world talk from the four of us. On What the Hype?! recently, we’ve been talking about The Last of Us and Netflix’s You, and over on Millennial, we’re discussing personal fitness and busting myths on the topic with one of our listeners, who is a personal trainer.
Micah: Hey, Andrew, I didn’t know you kiss your biceps in the mirror.
Andrew: Eh, he was trolling. [laughs] Thank you for listening, Micah.
Micah: You’re welcome.
Andrew: [laughs] His words, not mine.
Quizzitch
Andrew: Now it’s time for Quizzitch!
[Quizzitch music plays]
Eric: This week’s question was: What part of the human brain, in addition to aiding cognitive functions like attention and planning, also is involved with the storing of long-term memories? Any Crash Bandicoot fans in the audience? The answer is neocortex, and we’re also looking… we accepted hippocampus, too, because all the parts of the brain work together. 30% of people with a correct answer said they did not look it up, and this week’s winners were Bort Voldemort; Buff Daddy; Cherry Fishing; Hagrid’s Missing Secret Filter; Hogwarts Hippocampus, where Buckbeak majors in Memory Charms; I’ll huffle and I’ll puffle and I’ll look this answer up; Nerdy Gryffindor; Oceanic 815; The Elf Head is Alive; and Tofu Tom. Here’s next week’s Quizzitch question: What prison was the site of the largest jailbreak in British history, when 38 inmates, members of the IRA – that’s the Irish Republican Army – overpowered guards with smuggled weapons and hijacked a food truck in the year 1983? Again, what was the name of that prison? Submit your answer to us on the Quizzitch form located on the MuggleCast website, MuggleCast.com/Quizzitch. If you’re already on the website – maybe you’re looking up transcripts or seeing the must listens page or checking out the about page – anyway, click on “Quizzitch” for the main nav.
Andrew: Katie, thanks so much for joining us today. It was great having you on.
Katie: Thanks for having me. It was so fun.
Andrew: Yeah, we appreciate your support. And I mean, you went the extra mile with the Lynx Line question, too, so thanks for almost kind of pulling double duty in a way. [laughs]
Laura: Well, and also joining us on your birthday.
Eric: Yeah!
Andrew: Oh my God, yeah! Happy birthday. I’m so sorry; we should have said that at the top. Happy birthday. [laughs]
Katie: Thanks so much.
Andrew: Yeah, do you have any plans after tonight’s recording?
Katie: Not tonight, but tomorrow the USA women’s rugby team is playing Canada here in Kansas City, so that’s what we’re doing. We’re going to go check it out.
Eric: Oh my gosh!
Micah: Nice.
Laura: That’ll be great.
Andrew: Fantastic. Well, and sorry for spoiling Half-Blood Prince earlier, too.
[Katie laughs]
Andrew: On your birthday? That’s rough.
Laura: Can you forgive us?
Katie: I guess. It’ll be hard.
Andrew: Thanks again, and thanks, everyone, for listening. Don’t forget to visit Patreon.com/MuggleCast to support us. Please also leave us a review in your favorite podcast app, and send an owl about us to your Harry Potter-loving friends. I’m Andrew.
Eric: I’m Eric.
Micah: I’m Micah.
Laura: I’m Laura.
Katie: And I’m Katie.
Andrew: Bye, everyone, and birthday girl Katie!
Laura: Bye, y’all.
Eric, Katie, and Micah: Bye.