Questions Answered

I am going to try and answer some of the proposed questions I brought up from the last review after thinking about them. As always, feel free to write your own answers and thoughts to these questions.

1. How did the rat tonic go missing?

Maybe when no one was looking, Scabbers tried to hide it from everyone else. I wonder if there are times when he transfigures back into Pettigrew. I couldn’t imagine living as a rat for 12 years.

2. Why did Hermione get Crookshanks?

I do wonder that, she went in looking for an owl. I think this shows she is a cat person, but at the same time, maybe she wanted a cat (Kneazle in this case) because she doesn’t get along all that well with her dorm mates, and wanted that companion.

3. Why is everyone always after Harry?

In this case, it is a good reason why Sirius is after Harry. Unfortunately, it will take us 14 more chapters essentially to find out why. But, I think Harry deserves a break from this. Let him have a normal year or something 🙂

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Chapter Review

The next day arrives and they are all ready to leave for the Hogwarts Express. Harry tries to find a way to tell Hermione and Ron what he overheard about Sirius Black. The ministry officials picked them up, and were able to fly through traffic with twenty minutes to spare for the train. As they get through the barrier, Mr. Weasley pulls Harry aside and tells him not to go looking for Black. Before Harry could confirm the promise, the train starts to pull away and Harry dashes to the train and finds an compartment with Hermione and Ron, but the only remaining compartment has a sleeping inhabitant in it. I like the fact that when we are first introduced to Lupin, he is immediately judged based off of his appearances. It is actually Ron who is the prejudice one in this scenario. Lupin is wearing shabby clothes, and has brown hair flecked with grey. Ron comments that he thinks Lupin looks like he can easily be beaten with one good hex. As we later find out, Lupin is more than capable of the job and handling himself. Hermione points out that Lupin is the new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher. At one point in the trip, the sneakoscope Ron got Harry goes off in the compartment. What was going in there what was considered “untrustworthy”? About midway through the trip to Hogwarts, it began raining, and the train made a stop. All of the lights went out momentarily in the train, as the dementors boarded the train. Neville and Ginny find their way into their compartment and people kept running into each other. Ginny lamely makes the exuse that she is “looking for Ron.” At this point, Lupin is finally awake. Then, a dementor made it’s way to their compartmant, and locked onto Harry. Harry felt his world around him getting cold and dark. He heard a loud ringing in his ears, and passed out as the dementor tried to suck out his soul. Once Harry regained consciousness, Lupin gave him and everyone else a slab of chocolate. He found out that no one else had the same experience as he did at passing out, and felt weak. As they got to the school. Malfoy makes fun of him for fainting after hearing it from Neville (Why is he spreading stories?) and then McGonagall asks for Harry and Hermione to follow her into her office. Already, we are kind of seeing them being separated from Ron, as he could have been there for Harry’s portion, but I think McGonagall has a softer spot for Harry and Hermione. After making sure Harry was ok, and talking to Hermione, all three headed down to the feast, where Dumbledore announced that Lupin is the new Defense against the Dark Arts teacher and Hagrid is the new Care of Magical Creatures professor.

Conspiracy Theory
Ok, so, I am going to admit that I was not a fan of Harry ending up with Ginny, even though I understand why JK Rowling did it. The reaction and “love” seemed so sudden that it was almost like it came out of nowhere, and we are not really seeing it until the Half-blood Prince. I would have preferred Harry and Hermione to have ended up together based on there personalities, their experiences, and ties to the Muggle world. Despite the appearance, and I don’t like comparing it to an Oedipus thing, but Hermione is also more like Harry’s mom. The point of this post is to point out the “Love Potion” theory. I know that there is no such thing as a real love potion, but there are potions that cause some of the symptoms and reactions as if someone was in love. In this chapter, Mrs. Weasley is talking to Ginny and Hermione about making love potions when she was young, and they giggled about it. (No surprise there, I am sure it is a cute story) But then when we get to the Half-Blood Prince, on Slughorns first class, he has the love potion readily available for people to smell (Not taste, because, you know, all the hormones!). But I don’t think it is as crazy to think Ginny may have either brewed her own, or used some of this at one point in the series. Again, I am well aware this is a conspiracy, and they ended up together because the writer wanted it that way. The issues I have is that for a character whose main theme and attribute is love, his love story kind of…sucks. I try to take the writer out of it when reading the books because they feel like they could live on their own, the characters are rich and deep enough. Anyway, I digress, but points where I think this conspiracy could be a factor, I will point out.

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Questions to Ponder

1. Why is Harry the only one effected drastically by the dementors?

2. Why does Mr. Weasley warn Harry not to go looking for Sirius Black?

3. Why does Lupin ride the train?