Transcript – Episode 133

[Show music begins]

Caleb Graves: This is Episode 133 of Alohomora! for April 18, 2015.

[Show music continues]

Caleb: Hey guys, welcome to another episode of Alohomora! We’re jumping into discussing the Harry Potter series. I’m Caleb Graves.

Rosie Morris: I’m Rosie Morris.

Michael Harle: I’m Michael Harle. And joining us today is actually somebody who has been a part of the Alohomora! team for a long time, but she’s been kind of behind the scenes. If you’ve been in the forums, you may have spotted her. It’s Alison, or as she is known on the forums, HPAlison. Welcome, Alison, to the show. It’s so good to finally have you.

Alison Stover: Hey, guys!

Michael: So tell us a bit about yourself, about your Harry Potter experience, your house, all the fun Harry Potter-related things.

Alison: Okay. I’m Alison, I live in Montana currently, and I got into Harry Potter… I worked at Barnes & Noble the summer of 2000 when I was 18, and it was right before the fourth book came out, and they actually let us borrow… we could take home the first three books. So I read them and fell in love, and then I worked the midnight release for the fourth book and I’ve just been obsessed ever since. And my house is Gryffindor, although I don’t know of how accurate that is; I think I’m more somewhere between Slytherin and Ravenclaw, but that’s what they sorted me in.

Michael: Ooh. Well, that actually… we don’t usually have a balance of two Gryffindors and two Hufflepuffs; that’s an unusual mix for our show.

[Caleb laughs]

Michael: So that’s nice and different.

Caleb: It is.

Michael: But we’re so glad to finally have you on the show, Alison, so we’re glad you’re here today.

Alison: Yeah, I’ve been meaning to… I’ve been wanting to do it for a long time, and I’ve never thought about it at the right time or it’s never worked out.

Michael: Well, good, because we’ve got you halfway through Half-Blood Prince here.

Caleb: And speaking of Half-Blood Prince, before we get into recapping last week’s episode, we want to remind you to read Chapter 15 of Half-Blood Prince, “The Unbreakable Vow.”

Michael: But before we head to Slughorn’s awesome holiday party, we’re going to recap some of the comments that you the listeners left on Chapter 14 from last week. And we start off, actually, with a discussion about the chapter’s namesake, “Felix Felicis,” with a comment from FizzTheWhizzbie, which says,

“I know wizards in general are very lax when it comes to safety but Felix Felicis is dangerous. Besides the possible cheating repercussions, did anyone think about if Voldemort knew Harry had acquired this potion? Draco and others on his side were in the class. Couldn’t that have gotten out somehow? We know that Voldemort is superstitious. Wouldn’t one of his greatest enemies (and perhaps the luckiest teenager to ever live) having liquid luck be a major problem they would want to solve? I would have stolen that Felix if I was Voldy and drunk it down!”

So of course, FizzTheWhizzbie is asking here if it’s actually dangerous to Harry that he has the Felix Felicis and whether Voldemort would see Felix Felicis as a potential threat in his plans. What do you guys think?

Caleb: I just… I don’t know if Voldemort thinks that hard about wanting Felix Felicis. He probably doesn’t think he needs luck. He needs power; he needs might. I don’t know if he would be dealing in luck.

Michael: Mhm.

Alison: I think that would almost be like admitting that he’s fallible in some way, that he needs help, and that’s what Dumbledore is always emphasizing, that Voldemort trusts nobody and that… I don’t think he would feel like he needs the help, or trust it to help him.

Michael: That’s interesting just, I guess, in terms of thinking about the Deathly Hallows and Voldemort seeking out… not only to have… he has so much power already, but then he feels he requires the aid of the Elder Wand to get what he wants. And as we see at the end of Half-Blood Prince – if I’m correct; remind me if I’m wrong – don’t Harry’s friends use Felix Felicis during that battle?

Caleb: They do.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: Yeah, so it does help them out, if I recall correctly.

Caleb: Mhm.

Rosie: I do think he would see it as a threat as well. So if he knew that Harry was taking Felix Felicis and was about to face him, I think he would be worried in the same way that he is paranoid about the Prophecy. He goes after Harry in the first place because of this prophecy saying that he would have this downfall, so I think he would see it as something that might make Harry succeed, and therefore would be worried about it. But I don’t think he would think of using it himself, perhaps.

Michael: Mhm. What would happen if Voldemort used it and Harry used it at the same time and they went up against each other? Does that just cancel it out? How does that even…?

Rosie: Stalemate.

Michael: Stalemate? A Felix Felicis stalemate? Because of course, as we know, Felix Felicis doesn’t… and we came to this conclusion last week on the show, that Felix Felicis isn’t necessarily… it doesn’t make things work out for you; it leads you on the path that’s already in existence, I guess. So I don’t know if that would actually work that way or not, for Harry or Voldemort, if it’s strong enough for the circumstances that they’re using it in. But I thought it was just an interesting question: Is Felix Felicis actually powerful enough to be dangerous to either side? But then, a lot of the following comments… there were a lot of discussions on the various characters’ actions in the romance subplots of the last chapter. And a lot of people had a lot to say about Ron. [laughs] And the first comment comes here from Hufflepug, who said,

“I want to jump to Ron’s defense. Yes, he has an inferiority complex and can be irrational and jealous at times, but it’s important to remember why he can be this way: 1. He has five older brothers, most of whom have been prefects, Quidditch captains, or at least very popular, and his sister gets a lot of attention from her mom because she’s the only girl. 2. His best friend is the most famous person in the wizarding world. 3. The girl he loves is one of the smartest and most capable people he knows, which can be incredibly intimidating to someone who already has low self-esteem. 4. He was only prefect because Dumbledore thought Harry would be too busy. 5. He has just found out he’s the only one of his close friends to have never kissed anyone – this includes his little sister whom he has written off as young or immature […] up to this point and is suddenly struck with the fact that she’s maturing faster than he is. He doesn’t even know if anyone has ever had a crush on him. 6. He’s a fine Quidditch keeper, but he doesn’t stand out, and he was made fun of for it last year and intimidated into playing worse than he actually could. 7. His family is very poor. Ron’s inferiority complex is not good but it’s understandable. As a Gryffindor, all he really wants to do is prove his worth and he feels like he’s been failing at that. I love Ron because I think he’s one of the most realistic characters in the series. His character is a perfect representation of what it’s like to be a teenager. He blocks out all the wonderful things about his life that others can see and he focuses on the negatives. He dwells upon those things, picks them apart, blames himself, and takes it out on other people who may be ignorant of what he’s going through, whose well-intended attempts at help only serve to make him feel more inferior. Harry has to fight the battle with Voldemort, but I think Ron’s battle with himself, which is so often overshadowed, is important in its own way and is more realistic to what the reader may have gone through in real life. It’s so exciting to see him triumph when he destroys the locket Horcrux because it represents him overpowering all those negative feelings and saying to himself, ‘I’m strong, I’m important, and I should never doubt that. Look at me, I’m fighting to save the world.'”

So that was a very eloquent defense of Ron.

Rosie: Definitely.

Michael: What do you guys think, just from that comment?

Rosie: I agree with everything.

Michael: You agree with everything…? Because Rosie and Caleb, you weren’t on last week, and we had a lot to say about Ron. What are your general views on Ron in this book and with his relationship with Hermione in this book?

Rosie: Pretty much the same as Hufflepug’s. I mean, he is a very realistic teenager, I think, and he is definitely maturing slower than some of the girls around him, and a bit slower than Harry as well, although Harry is slow on the uptake as well. But Harry has so much else that makes him interesting and whatever that Ron definitely feels pressure to try and live up to Harry’s shadow. And I think last chapter and the romantic moments of this book are very much what you would expect of fifteen-year-olds who are venturing into this world for the first time. And I think Ron’s insecurities are very natural and it’s really nice to actually see a character who’s supposedly a hero going through all of these worries and things, especially a male character in these books because you wouldn’t necessarily always come across heroes who have these insecurities in this way.

Michael: That’s true. Ron is a very vulnerable male lead.

Rosie: I like it. Yeah.

Michael: Alison and Caleb, any thoughts on Ron?

Caleb: Yeah, I have quite a lot… I don’t know if it’s fair to say a lot, but I have quite a few problems with Ron throughout the series. But at this point, maybe we’re starting to get to the point where it’s not as forgivable for me. But I do think it is – I agree with Rosie – typical of a fifteen-year-old. It’s good to see a vulnerable male lead. And he’s… [laughs] I just sometimes get so angry, though.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: But I guess I can’t fault him too much. I do remember what it was like to be fifteen, and it’s a troubling time. Yeah.

Alison: Yeah, I think Hufflepug is right in everything she’s saying about Ron. I guess the only thing I can think about it is that even if you understand why he is like that, that doesn’t mean it’s right, or that doesn’t mean that he still shouldn’t be called out in some way for the way he behaves in a lot of the series, really.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: Hmm. Well, and that actually leads perfectly into this last set of comments. There’s two comments here that were made by Casey L. and SlytherinKnight that had a very provocative suggestion about Ron and his behavior. And Casey L. started it off by saying,

“I’ve always found Ron and Harry’s relationship very interesting. If you go back to book one at King’s Cross, you might remember that Ron isn’t the first Weasley to speak to Harry on the train it’s George when he and Fred help Harry stow his trunk. Later, after they’ve realized who he is, they go out and tell their mother, Percy, Ron, and Ginny, and it is only once the train has taken off that Ron comes to Harry’s compartment and asks to share it with him. When I re-read the book several years after I’d first read that chapter (and after watching the movie several times), it kind of painted their friendship in a new light. In the movie, it just seems Ron runs into Harry by accident on the train, but in the book, he sits with Harry knowing exactly who he is, so they’re not exactly entering their friendship on as even of footing.”

And SlytherinKnight followed up the comment by saying,

“It almost lends credence that Ron is ‘latching on’ to Harry, the famous kid, in order to make himself seem more important; he’s the best friend of the Boy-Who-Lived, something that none of his brothers could be. I’ve kind of wondered if Ron is the one in charge of their friendship; he is the one who leads Harry in dealing with anyone else, almost like he is trying to keep Harry all to himself (how Ron treats Hermione before the troll incident for example). Could Harry be letting Ron take the lead because it’s a bit like conditioning from the Dursleys, keeping quiet and not be seen or heard? Or is Harry just so afraid of losing his first friend that he will let Ron do whatever he wants?”

And to put this comment in context of last week’s chapter, we had a discussion about how Harry treats Ron in terms of the Quidditch, and he knows that Ron is behaving very badly and he just allows him to behave that way. He does give him a talking to, but he essentially allows him to behave that way. And we also discussed how we all felt, generally, that Harry would side with Ron in an argument between Ron and Hermione even if he knows that Hermione is actually in the right. So thoughts on that?

Caleb: I’m blown away by this, to be honest.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: I had never really thought about it like that. I don’t know if it’s watching the movie or just making one of those assumptions as a reader and not reading enough between the lines, that I just always assumed it was that spontaneous meeting up. It creates that ideal moment, so now I feel like my life is very different. I need a moment.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: No, I don’t know. I do think that Casey points out a very important thing, that their relationship is very interesting and very complex. It’s easy to look at it at a surface level, but when you really dig, there’s a lot of levels that I think SlytherinKnight pulls out in that second comment. So yeah, it’s not so easy to narrow it down to a simple thing.

Alison: The more I think about it, it’s like finding the most popular kid in school and making friends with them. It’s not that it’s disingenuous, but I guess you would say it’s not even footing. But even if Ron chose to introduce himself or accidentally sit in the compartment with Harry, it doesn’t mean that their friendship, as it developed, wasn’t real.

Michael: Yeah.

Alison: I think that Ron may have chosen because he was curious or because he wanted to be associated with him, but that doesn’t mean that they didn’t develop into a real friendship, which I think the books… for all Ron’s flaws and the flaws in their friendship, it is a real, genuine friendship.

Rosie: And don’t forget that Harry isn’t popular on the train, either. Hardly anyone knows that he’s there. So he may be interesting but he’s not popular.

Michael: Mhm.

Rosie: So sure, Ron might think it would be a good person to be friends with, but not necessarily in order to make more friends. He does that well enough with the other boys in the Gryffindor Tower. And they don’t even know that they’re going to be sorted into the same house or anything, so the train journey is just a train journey at that point.

Michael: Yeah, yeah.

Rosie: And then, I don’t think that Ron makes a point of saying he’s Harry Potter’s friend ever. He will be Harry’s friend and he will be friends with the other Gryffindor boys and he will want to be in the Quidditch team and all that stuff. But he could easily say, “You know, I’m Charlie Weasley’s little brother,” and that kind of thing as well because he’s got these famous – or school famous – connections that he could easily play on. And I don’t think he ever really does that. He’s happy to be connected but not shouting out about it. He doesn’t brag that he’s Harry’s friend.

Michael: Well, yeah, no, because he tends to brag more about things that are about him if he ever gets the opportunity.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: Not about Harry or his time with Harry or friendship with Harry. And Alison, I am inclined to agree with you that the friendship blossomed regardless of Ron’s intentions by sitting next to Harry on the train. The friendship that came from that isn’t disingenuous. But I just thought SlytherinKnight had a really good point with pulling out how it has affected the dynamics of Harry and Ron’s relationship up to now, and how in matters of arguments, Harry will often let Ron take the lead or let Ron get away with things that he knows aren’t right, as we see a lot of in the last chapter.

Rosie: I do think he would side with Hermione, though. We see him go and comfort Hermione rather than stay with Ron when he’s with Lavender. So I do think he does have some moral leanings toward Hermione occasionally.

Michael: Oh, yeah! No, I think it’s true that Harry sees that Hermione is… he tries to… the thing is, Harry always tries to balance between the two of them when there’s an argument.

Rosie: Yeah, yeah.

Michael: But he does tend to… in the past – perhaps not with this particular situation – he does tend to side… I think before we’ve seen him side with Ron over Hermione a lot more. Maybe that’s maturing; maybe that’s changing. And of course, in Deathly Hallows we’ll see that whole dynamic blow up and have consequences.

Rosie: Mhm.

Michael: But yes, an excellent exploration on Ron from these comments as well as on the questions about Felix Felicis. There were so many other discussions this week and I wanted to make sure [to] shout-out to a few of you who contributed: TheAmazingBouncingFerret, Blind Ravenclaw, ccmoundshroud, daveybjones999, AFreeElf, an anonymous guest who was not named on the main site, The Half Blood Princess, HermioneDuh, which is a great username…

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Michael: … HowAmIGoingToTranslateThis, and nightwatch, who were both hanging out on the forums, which is great. Listeners, we saw that you’re trying to take back the forums. Please do; we love that you go there as well as the main site. PuffNProud, thequeerweasleycousin, QuibbleQuaffle, RoonilWazlib, SilverDoe25, and SnapesManyButtons. I also wanted to do a Shout-out Maxima, as I call it…

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: … to Hufflepuffskein for starting quite a few different discussions on the main site including about if Merope had lived, Quidditch captains, and Sassy Ginny; Hufflepug for talking about wizard food, LaurelPhoenix for defending Hermione – always good to defend Hermione – and SpinnersEnd for bringing up a conversation about how wizards test for the use of Felix Felicis in sporting events and competitions. All very great discussion topics. If you, the listeners, would like to check them out, please go to the Alohomora! main site, alohomora.mugglenet.com, and you can still join in the discussion even though that chapter has past.

Rosie: So we now need to go over the Podcast Question of the Week comments from last week, which actually lead quite nicely on from our discussion of our wonderful Ron Weasley, as last week’s chapter was particularly focused on the developing relationship between Ron and Hermione, and also Harry/Ginny to a slight extent. So the question last week was,

“Rowling’s style in Chapter 14 is notably different from other chapters, with a lot of major character developments relegated to narration, rather than in moments of dialogue. In a previous episode, it was suggested that, along with Rowling’s distaste for writing Quidditch, her writing of romance may have suffered a similar fate. Yet, Rowling has both in the past and in this book showed that she is no stranger to writing the humor and heartbreak of romantic relationships, and love itself is the key to the Potter series as a whole. Is this approach in Chapter 14 uncharacteristic of Rowling? Could the romantic relationships have benefited from expanded chapters or a different approach? Or is Rowling’s style for these relationship subplots perfectly in keeping with the rest of Half-Blood Prince‘s tone?”

And you guys had some brilliant comments on this. And our first one comes from Quibble Quaffle and it says,

“In the book, although I didn’t really find the romance that interesting personally, and I still don’t have any feelings at all about Harry and Ginny, to me it felt like it happened just because it was neat, I enjoyed it as a way of having a contrast against the dark Voldemort stuff. The film completely tipped the scale way off balance towards the romance so that there was nothing dark at all then suddenly whoops Dumbledore’s dead. It was little things like swapping Dumbledore confronting with the Dursleys for Harry flirting with some random Muggle girl that just didn’t need to happen.”

And I totally agree with that.

[Michael laughs]

Rosie: The whole thing at the beginning of the movie is just so off-putting and it’s just wrong.

Caleb: Oh, it is.

Rosie: But yeah, never mind.

Michael: See, I must be the only person in the world who likes the scenes that were added in Half-Blood Prince. [laughs]

Rosie: How do you like that scene? It’s so bad.

Michael: The only one that doesn’t work for me – and that’s touched on here – is the addition of the Harry/Ginny scene in the Room of Requirement. That doesn’t work at all. It’s just bad. It’s very badly acted and it’s very badly written.

Rosie: Yeah, I agree. Wooden.

Michael: The beginning scene works for me just because you have the two tones being set very clearly of what the movie is going to be, even if they’re not the best ways of doing it. But you get the Death Eaters flying through London in through Diagon Alley so you have got the threat, and then you’ve got Harry focused on his romantic side. And it’s not to say that he has one because he doesn’t. He is obviously very inept at it. But it works for me in the movie and I think it works as a translation from the book. I had the benefit… before we started Half-Blood Prince I read the whole book and then I immediately watched the movie afterwards, and I know this is a thing that many people will not agree with but it does come from watching the film right after reading the book; it’s actually a pretty solid adaptation compared to most of the Harry Potter adaptations. It’s pretty darn close to the book, especially considering how much Kloves leaves in or leaves out. And I guess there’s elements of the romances in the books that are written to me weakly, so I could see why the movie had a hard time adapting them anyway. It’s that the book didn’t do certain things justice.

Rosie: I think I’m just always going to have issues with adding what seems like useless things to the movies when you’ve got so much of the book that you’re leaving out which would possibly add something more to the movie. And yeah, the random Muggle girl is just unnecessary. [laughs]

Caleb: So out of place.

Rosie: But to go back to the books, Snufflebeast says,

“I’ve always really enjoyed the romantic subplots in this book, but I agree the Harry and Ginny story is somewhat lacking. I don’t think it needed all that much, though. Maybe an extra scene or two in previous books to more firmly establish their pre-romance friendship would have helped, and yes – actually showing more of Harry and Ginny’s interactions in this book. We hear about the pair of them spending time together over the summer (playing Quidditch, et cetera) but unfortunately we never actually witness it. The worst of it is the hint near the end that ‘A long walk in the grounds seemed indicated…’ but again, it’s left entirely to our imaginations! I don’t actually think this style is incongruous with Rowling’s other writing. She very frequently uses this technique to outline day-to-day events and indicate the passage of time, and very effectively too. The difference here is that it is something so important to our main character. I sometimes wonder whether it was a confidence issue on Rowling’s part. Maybe she didn’t feel she could write romantic scenes as good as she would like, and decided it best to let readers imagine it (we all know how terribly Yates and Kloves failed at the romance in the film). It’s the ‘Jaws’ effect, where hinting at the shark is far more effective than showing it could have ever been. JRR Tolkien is another storyteller absolutely brilliant at this. Throughout his Middle-earth stories, he constantly leaves hints and references to people, places, and events you could never possibility know about – but it evokes such a wonderfully mythic atmosphere. Knowing that the ‘devices of Saruman’ helped drive Sauron from Dol Guldur is really intriguing and imagination-stimulating, but actually trying to visualize it could so easily fall flat (as we saw in Peter Jackson’s recent take on that particular event). Another example I suppose is the way the ‘Sherlock’ screenwriters handled the issue of how Sherlock survived his apparent death in the second series. They solved the problem by giving viewers a number of rather humorous explanations, and never really tried to give a solid explanation, knowing that nothing they could come up with would live up to the anticipation.”

Aside: I think they could have come up with something just because it was a bit of a cop-out.

Michael: Yes. [laughs]

Rosie: [continues]

“So I suppose I’m happy enough with what we’ve got (despite the awkward monster metaphor). Better to have us wondering just how things happened, mixed in with a number of genuinely brilliant moments, than potentially leaving us disappointed.”

Caleb: Quite a grasp of a lot of fandoms there.

Rosie: Yes.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Rosie: It’s always good to compare things to other things to have that general context.

Michael: Oh, yeah.

Rosie: Yeah, I agree. I quite like that there are… okay, as we always say as fan fiction writers, it leaves a lot of material for us to go and cover ourselves.

Michael: It most certainly does.

Rosie: And it really did inspire quite a lot of fan fiction at the time. And yeah, I think if we had seen more of the summer it would have been interesting but then it’s not really to do with the main plot, and if we had seen this walk in the grounds it would be interesting but then again it’s not really to do with the main plot, and I think that’s where this subplot fails because it’s just… it’s important because it’s showing that Harry does have a life outside of his battle with Voldemort and it’s understandable that it would be Ginny and I think it’s nice to see Ginny grow as a character especially in this last chapter last week. I think she really comes into her own and stands up for herself and that really lends itself to her becoming a character that we could see in this romance. But we needed a bit more natural growth into this relationship, which we do see with Ron and Hermione, but Harry and Ginny just happens, which is probably… it comes true in normal life as well, so it could happen. But it would be nice just to see maybe some of Ginny’s feelings as Harry starts to notice her as well.

Alison: And it also just seems like… there is so much of the book when it is told from Harry’s perspective that he’s just clueless, that to have stuff be developed almost wouldn’t seem true to his character although it would be nice. But I feel like… I’ve always been comfortable with it, with Harry and Ginny, but probably because I didn’t really care and I think it isn’t really until I’ve read it over and over and over again and done critical thinking about it that it actually makes sense why Ginny and Harry are right for each other. Which could indicate that that needed a little bit more development without forcing people to have essentially dissertation level thoughts about it…

[Michael laughs]

Alison: … before you can make up your mind.

Michael: See, and my problem with that is where their relationship is taken in Book 7. Because Harry becomes super obsessive about Ginny and very protective of her in Book 7. He’s watching her on the Marauder’s Map and when he gets to Hogwarts, he spends every interaction with her being like, “Go home, stay out of the battle, go and hide in a closet somewhere.” And he’s very passionate about protecting her and keeping her safe and out of harm’s way. And that element – that version of love, that romantic love – is kind of like the last version of love that we haven’t had from Harry. He has all the other loves – he has friendship love, he has familial love, love through loss – and he finally gets romantic love as his final bit of experience of love. And that one plays a really big part in Deathly Hallows and his behavior in Deathly Hallows. So, it’s kind of disappointing – that’s why it’s disappointing to me – and like you said, Rosie, Hermione and Ron are written so well.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: That relationship is done so well, so why not Harry and Ginny? And I understand part of it is that we’re getting it from Harry’s perspective, so he gets to see Hermione and Ron and both sides of their conflicts.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: He can’t get into Ginny’s head, and I guess therefore we can’t through narration, but…

Rosie: I think part of the problem is that we see Harry discovering this love through his experience of jealousy, not through his experience of actual love.

Michael: Yes. Yeah.

Rosie: We never really see him have the happy feelings of this love. We only ever see him have the awkward monster metaphor. [laughs]

Michael: Yes. That…

Caleb: That’s slightly problematic.

Michael: Yeah.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: No. That’s another problem I have with it, too. Because we do jump from Harry being almost completely clueless of Ginny and not really even noticing her to being like, “I want her. She’s mine.” [laughs]

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: Which is not really a good… I mean, that’s a somewhat logical development for a teenager, but like you said, there’s never really that final proper leap into a good mutual relationship.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: Because it’s still not very mutual in Deathly Hallows, because Ginny’s pretty much rejecting everything Harry tells her to do. Because she’s trying to make it clear that she’s her own woman and she can make her own choices.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: And Harry’s just like, “Nope. No, you’re not. Go away. Don’t die, please.”

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Rosie: I’m fairly sure that Pottermore has told us that they have some hard times to go through after the battle before they get married and whatever it is that they do in the future. So I think we do see that they struggle with the foundation of their relationship before coming out stronger. I’m fairly sure that’s been said.

Michael: Well…

Rosie: Otherwise I’m just making that up in my head. [laughs]

Michael: I think it’s been implied…

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: But I think there were a few implications from Rita Skeeter about that.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: It wasn’t definite.

Rosie: Which would make total sense that they’ve had this intense high school relationship, and then that becomes something stronger which then lasts.

Michael: Mhm.

Rosie: I don’t think they’re at the stage by the end of the books where they would be a lasting couple.

Michael: Mmm… mhm.

Rosie: So, yeah. Here’s hoping for Book 8.

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Rosie: Just to round off quickly, we’ve got a comment from SpinnersEnd, which says,

“Using love as an overarching theme in a book series and writing a romance scene are two very different themes. This chapter almost comes off as an early attempt at a teenage romance scene. It doesn’t feel as well rounded and filled out as the rest of the chapters. At first, this chapter was a little jarring for me to read. It took me out of the flow of what was happening in the rest of the book and threw some teenage antics in my face. The romances were never forefront in my mind while reading any of these books. I like them because they make for well-rounded characters, but throwing them into the headlines like this seemed a little out-of-the-blue.”

And I think that goes into what I was saying before about how the extra details that we really want about the formation of Harry and Ginny’s friendship and romance isn’t to do with the main plot. So therefore, if you’re going to have quite a long book, they would probably be the first things to get cut. So it is out of the blue to include it, but if you’re going to have something, how else would you really tie it in?

Michael: That’s funny, because I never really felt the romance stuff was out of the blue. I can see, Rosie, what you’re saying about how there’s the possibility, especially if you’re looking for a shorter, tighter book, that an editor would see these things and maybe suggest that some of it could go. But… again, I caught on to Ron and Hermione very early on in the series.

Rosie: Yeah. I’m definitely a canon shipper that was like, “Yep. This is going to happen from Book 1.”

Michael: Yeah.

Rosie: As soon as we have the Wingardium Leviosa…

Michael: Yeah!

Rosie: … it’s just like, “Yep, she’s going to fall in love with him.” [laughs]

Michael: Yeah. And to me… the thing is, I found more through being on Alohomora! and discussing things with the fans, I’m actually surprised to have found that a lot of fans didn’t see it…

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: … and that it wasn’t so plain to them. But I guess for a reader who did find it very plain, I think that’s why the romance of Book 6 doesn’t become as a shock to me, or steal the narrative in any way. And to me, it enhances the narrative because this side of love is very important for all of them to learn before Book 7. I think it’s essential… like SpinnersEnd said, using love as an overarching theme in a book series and writing a romance scene are two very different things, but I’m not so sure about that in the case of Harry Potter – especially when you get down to what is perhaps one of the most core relationships in the book, which is Snape and Lily, which is very romanticized [laughs] not just by the fandom but the book itself.

Alison: Well, I wonder if it also has to do with the fact that from an editing perspective someone had said, “Well, we’re marketing these as kids’ books, so tamp down the romance.” I think after Book 5 on, these are no longer children’s books…

Michael: No.

Alison: … but that’s what most people think of them as. You know, as a society we tend to be much more comfortable with throwing things like violence at younger children then throwing things like love and romance, which people just think are either inappropriate or that kids won’t like it.

Michael: Yeah, and I think that’s why Harry Potter was such a unique series, like you said, Alison, to put the romance in the way they did. Harry Potter was why it was so mammothly successful, and what I don’t see in a lot of Young Adult and juvenile books that have followed it, they don’t tend to grow with their audience like Harry Potter did.

Alison: Mhm.

Michael: I’ve read so many series now that remain in stasis with the kind of maturity level that they start at. They may go for seven or even more books, and they stay there where they began. Harry Potter is kind of an unusual case in that respect. So I think in a way, yeah, it probably was something of a gamble for both Rowling and the publishers, but because it was so trusted and by this point the series had, like you said, Alison, already grown, it worked for this particular case. But I think that’s part of what makes Harry Potter so special, compared to other series of its time… and even now, actually.

Rosie: Definitely. That’s a nice way to round off. Good.

Michael: [laughs] Like that’s it. That’s all I had to say.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: All right. Well, we are going to shift right into this week’s chapter discussion.

[Half-Blood Prince Chapter 15 intro begins]

[Folk music plays]

Luna: Chapter 15.

[Sound of drinks being served]

Luna: “The Unbreakable Vow.”

[Half-Blood Prince Chapter 15 intro ends]

Caleb: All right. Well, if last week’s chapter was a building of romance, then this chapter continues that but gives it a really good Mean Girls-esque spin to it…

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: … with a slightly more important thing that lands right at the end out of nowhere. So a quick summary: Christmas is coming, and Harry is the target of mistletoe and love potions; Ron and Lavender are heating up; we also get a little bit of romantic spin on Irma Pince and Argus Filch; Romilda Vane is real thirsty for Harry…

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: … while Ron and Hermione continue to battle it out. Harry takes Luna to Slughorn’s party, Hermione gets a date too, and then we get the really fabulous party where at the end we get a really important conversation between Snape and Malfoy. So first off, hot off of their make-out scene from after the Quidditch match, Ron and Lavender are a real thing now. And pretty much anywhere Ron goes, Lavender is close behind. And this, to say the least – and it amplifies throughout the chapter – Ron and Hermione’s relationship becomes more and more awkward. Even though Ron is now involved with Lavender, more than anything, it’s bringing their suppressed feelings, shall we say, to light in very unusual ways. Does anyone have comments on that?

Michael: Oh! [laughs] I thought that was just a statement. Yes, that is exactly what is happening there. [laughs]

Caleb: Yeah. Some of the funnier lines for me were Ron saying, “It’s a free country,” which is such an American thing to say.

[Everyone laughs]

Rosie: Well, it is also very British. We definitely said that as well. [laughs]

Caleb: Yeah. So, it’s funny to hear Ron say that, and then he points out [that] he’s a “free agent” and can date whoever he wants.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: And Hermione comes right back that “Ron can kiss whoever he likes.” So clearly, both of them are so totally okay with what’s going on with no bitterness or problems whatsoever.

Rosie: Definitely, yeah. Yeah, no problem here. Right.

Michael: [laughs] Yes, this relationship has such a long-lasting future. You can see it now.

[Rosie laughs]

Alison: But it seems like it’s such an important thing. I don’t think Ron could really be ready for such a mature relationship where it’s not just all about being a teenage boy if he hadn’t had that experience.

Michael: Mhm. No, I think that’s what truly makes Ron realize how upset he would be without Hermione. He already seems to know it, but he’s basically… from the very little information we get from her, he is essentially dating the antithesis of Hermione.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: Lavender is not Hermione in any way, shape or form. Not only is it interesting that he picked Lavender just because she kind of went for him, but also because if you think about it, Lavender and Hermione have butted heads before…

Caleb: Yep.

Michael: … over – not Transfiguration – over Divination. Lavender fully embraces Divination, which is something Hermione is very much against. So we’ve already seen that these two characters don’t gel well…

Rosie: I think that’s an example of Ron not really thinking about the larger picture then. I don’t think he would deliberately pick Lavender to scorn Hermione; I think he’s almost seeing Lavender as practice.

Michael: Mmm…

Rosie: And it just so happens that Lavender was the one that actually did kind of throw herself at him, so he just went with whatever was easy. And it just so happened that that would then hurt Hermione even more, which Ron kind of realizes too late…

Michael: Mhm.

Rosie: … in a very Ron way. [laughs]

Michael: Can I just say storytime just a little bit here? I had quite a few years ago this friend who was very antisocial, very bad with people in general, and he basically got a girlfriend from the first girl who said yes – kind of like here. And not a week after being with her, he was basically telling me – this was before I had come out – he was telling me, “Michael, great way to get girls – read Twilight. That is a good way to get girls.”

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: And I was like, “Oh God!”

Rosie: Oh, dear.

Michael: And I feel like Ron is kind of doing the same thing here: “I know what I’m doing, I have a girlfriend now.”

[Caleb and Rosie laugh]

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: “I am an expert.”

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: Clearly. And then while they’re battling subtly about their love for one another, Harry meanwhile is the target of love potions. Hermione tells him that quite a few girls are coming after him wanting to be his date for Slughorn’s party, which has suddenly become the epic winter gala of the year.

[Rosie laughs]

Caleb: Everyone wants to be at Slughorn’s party, which is kind of funny because the Slug Club is a very small group of people, but for some reason everyone… I mean, it is exclusive, but it seems like it’s too small to make it popular for everyone at school. Does that make sense?

Michael: Well, isn’t that like… this brings up a conversation we had back in Goblet of Fire because clearly Slughorn’s Christmas party is like the new Yule Ball. Right?

Caleb: Right.

Rosie: Yeah.

Michael: And it reminds me of that discussion that Laura had brought up all those episodes ago about don’t they have any extracurricular things at Hogwarts where they gather together and just… shoot the breeze? Do regular old things?

Rosie: These kids are just so bored.

Michael: Yeah. [laughs] They have magic wands…

Caleb: Really.

Michael: … but they’re just so bored. Yeah.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: No, I think that’s it. They’re aren’t a lot of these social gathering events at Hogwarts.

Caleb: Yeah.

Michael: So, they’re like, “Oh my God. I could get invited to the big kids’ party.”

[Caleb laughs]

Michael: The exclusive… and it’s even more exclusive than the Yule Ball. So like you said, Caleb…

Caleb: Yeah.

Michael: … there’s very few people in the Slug Club. So yeah, I could see the competition being even more heated to get a date to this party.

Caleb: It’s so funny.

Rosie: And Slughorn’s inviting celebrities as well.

Michael: Yes.

Caleb: That’s true.

Rosie: The Holyhead Harpies people are going to be there and all that kind of stuff.

Caleb: Yeah, there’s a lot of people there.

Rosie: Yeah.

Caleb: We also find out that the way that these girls are getting these love potions in is they’re getting them from Fred and George’s shop, and Harry asks, “How can this be possible if Filch is regularly and rigorously checking everything that comes in?” Hermione tells him that the love potions are being snuck in as perfumes and cough potions, which is amusing, but then that leads Harry to think that, “Oh, other things could be smuggled in past Filch.” He’s obviously referencing his constant belief that Malfoy is up to something. Hermione shrugs it off. She’s over it. Harry, we know, has some good inklings, but it’s the wrong route as we find out later in the book. But just a little reference there.

Alison: What struck me as surprising was that Hermione was saying that the love potions didn’t get picked up because they’re not dark or dangerous. And Harry, he says, “Easy for you to say,” darkly but sarcastically. But really if you think about it, I’m surprised that Hermione doesn’t think of love potions as dark and dangerous because especially for her, who logic is such an important thing, really there’s few things that would be more scary and a really horrible thing to do to mess with somebody’s emotions. And it’s interesting that she doesn’t realize… it doesn’t occur to her that that might be something that would be considered dark.

Michael: Yeah, I think that there’s some… this is the point of the book where… and it still works successfully and way more successfully than I think a lot of authors could have done it. But at the same time, I do think Rowling is considering who our characters are, and what we’ve seen them do and the actions and decisions they’ve made in the past. She’s stretching believability with how they would behave to make sure that this Malfoy mystery is completely disregarded.

Rosie: Mhm.

Michael: I do think Hermione would recognize the danger of love potions, especially considering as far as we know, Harry is giving both Ron and Hermione full documentation of what he’s seeing in the memories, so they know about what Merope did to Tom Riddle Sr. with a very strong love potion. So… yeah, Hermione has examples of love potions being dangerous things.

Alison: And maybe it’s just that she knows where Harry is going with this. You could argue that she’s just trying to head him off and make him doubt what he’s thinking so quickly to avoid another Malfoy discussion.

Michael: Mhm.

Rosie: Maybe it’s also that she’s underestimating Fred and George. The love potions that they’re making, maybe she thinks that they’re just silly little trifles that are just jokes and will wear off quickly. She’s not really thinking of them as dangerous, long-lasting effect type things.

Michael: Mmm. Mhm.

Rosie: I don’t know. I think Hermione’s actions in this chapter are very much… they’re the closest to spite we ever really see.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: Oh yeah. We’re going to get some good ones in a few moments.

Rosie: Yeah. So I think she’s really just focusing on her own emotions and her own anger at this point and not really listening to what else is actually going on.

Michael: Which is probably a good thing. She never does that. [laughs]

Rosie: Yeah, it’s nice to see her be a bit self-absorbed for a change.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: Yeah, absolutely. Hermione and Harry are having this conversation in the library, and all a sudden the librarian Irma Pince walks by, not too happy that they’re there, tells them the library is closed, and she notices that Harry’s copy of Advanced Potion Making is all written over of course by the Half-Blood Prince. She is shocked and horrified that a book could be written all over in such a way.

Rosie: “Despoiled! Desecrated! Befouled!”

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: Exactly. Those are the words she uses, which is funny because text books for school, people write over those all the time.

Rosie: Mhm.

Caleb: Right? That’s what text books are for, but she, representing this holiness of books that librarians just want to guard over… just very funny. She’s very upset about it, which leads to…

Rosie: It’s not even a library book.

Caleb: Yeah, that’s true.

Rosie: Harry’s like, “Calm down!”

Caleb: She’s just upset that the book in general is desecrated.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: Oh, trust me. As a librarian, whether it’s your book or not, if you see one being written in…

Caleb: It’s one of your children.

Michael: It makes your heart drop a little bit.

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Michael: It was even hard for me to write in books in college. I knew I had to do it, and they even were like, “Here’s some giant margins on the side for you to write in.”

[Caleb and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: Yeah.

Michael: And I was still just like, “Ugh, this is awful. Why am I doing this?”

Rosie: Yeah, I have bought two copies of some books so I could write in one and keep one nice.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: Oh, dear. But Harry suggests to Hermione that Pince is actually upset after hearing Hermione speak rudely about Filch just a few moments earlier, and he mentions how he always thought there was something between the two. Which that couple is certainly one of my favorites to play up in the series.

[Everyone laughs]

Michael: Yeah. That’s a fun one. Rosie, I’m sure there’s a lot of fanfiction about those two, right?

Rosie: Umm… nothing that jumps to mind, but I’m sure it’s out there.

Michael: It exists. [laughs]

Rosie: Yeah.

Caleb: Yeah, it has to. So they’re on the way back to the Gryffindor common room and just as they’re entering, sure enough, as Hermione mentioned just a few moments earlier, Romilda Vane is right there, so kindly offering Harry a Gillywater. And then when he passes that up, she offers him some Chocolate Cauldrons, just a very generous gift.

[Rosie laughs]

Caleb: Harry very rudely declines; I can’t imagine why. But it’s just funny because we get this new character who is just so eager, so infatuated with Harry, and she has no reason to other than he is the Chosen One. He’s so famous.

Rosie: She’s just the female Colin Creevey.

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Rosie: It’s a very similar thing, but just a very different outcome. [laughs]

Alison: You kind of wonder how they didn’t know each other beforehand. I mean, obviously, it’s a book construction, but just a girl a year behind him in the same house that they wouldn’t already have some familiarity with each other…

Caleb: She’s one of those 1,000 students we don’t know about.

[Michael laughs]

Rosie: It almost seems like she’s a transfer student this year or something.

Caleb: Yeah.

Rosie: She’s just suddenly cropped up. Yeah, it’s a bit odd.

Caleb: But what is initially a funny, amusing moment for Hermione to be like, “Told you so, Harry,” turns foul very quickly when they spot Ron and Lavender in their new favorite state, intertwined with one another, snogging, because they have nothing better to do at this point.

Rosie: Yes.

Caleb: How long have they been even going out at this point? A week? Something like that? I don’t know, I can’t remember how much time has passed.

Michael: Word to all those new couples out there…

[Caleb laughs]

Michael: … if you’re making out in public, nobody likes you. Stop it.

Caleb: Yeah.

[Everyone laughs]

Caleb: No one wants to see that.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: I mean, I guess they don’t have many escape spots at Hogwarts, something like an empty classroom…

Michael: They have tons of escape spots! There’s the Room of Requirement…

Caleb: Yeah!

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: This also pulls out another point that’s slightly problematic, how easy it is to sneak off at Hogwarts…

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: We probably don’t want to get into that. I’m just thinking about this.

Michael: There are people doing it in the bushes at the Yule Ball, so…

Caleb: Yeah… that’s slightly scandalous.

Rosie: But the girls’ dormitory stairs will become a slide if Ron tries to get up there.

Michael: Yeah. [laughs]

Alison: But I wonder if Ron, whether consciously or unconsciously, wants people to see him.

Caleb: Oh, he totally does.

Michael: Oh, yeah.

Alison: You know, as a status symbol.

Caleb: And so does Lavender. She wants everyone to see… because Ron is exalted now for some reason. She wants everyone to see that she’s got him.

Michael: Yeah, can you imagine if wizards had social media?

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Michael: That would be bad.

Rosie: Lavender’s would be horrendous.

Michael: Oh God, yeah. Unfriend that. No.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: So this moment only perpetuates the strife between Ron and Hermione, and it escalates the next day when they’re in Transfiguration where Ron and Hermione are making fun of one another. Hermione makes a jab about Ron not being able to do well… what is it, they’re doing something with eyebrows? No, he messes up his eyebrows… no, they’re doing something with eyebrows, but he grows a mustache, right? That’s what it is.

Rosie: Yes.

Michael: Yes.

Caleb: But then Ron makes fun of her by mimicking her eagerly volunteering in class…

Michael: Yeah.

Caleb: … and then that’s supported by Lavender and Parvati also making fun of Hermione. They’re all ganging up on her, which this is sounding more and more like a Mean Girls spinoff at Hogwarts. It’s like for some reason Lavender and Parvati are the Plastics now…

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: … which is a very strange turn of events.

Rosie: They always have been.

Michael: Yeah.

Caleb: I guess that’s true.

Rosie: They’ve always been those kind of girls.

Caleb: Yeah.

Rosie: And Hermione has always been different from them.

Caleb: That’s true.

Alison: I was trying to decide which one is more mean because Hermione… on the surface, what Ron was doing with his impression was really pretty cruel because it’s such a common thing of Hermione to do, but then I think she got back at him with the commenting that he’s not that great at Quidditch, as that goes along. But I don’t know, overall I just felt like Ron was going from just being really over the line, beyond what you would normally do when you’re angry at someone, something that just goes too far and is hard to forgive later once they get over it.

Rosie: Yeah, they’re both feeding into the other’s insecurities at this point, and Ron is… considering that the last five years have been about correcting that initial kind of troll mistake…

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Rosie: … this is Ron going right back to that initial moment of bullying before they were even friends. So it’s really kind of pulling apart that friendship in a horrible way.

Alison: And it also goes to show just how Hermione puts up such a strong front…

Rosie: Yeah.

Alison: … but she has so many insecurities of her own, and I feel like she was much more upset by what Ron said than Ron was or at least let on by what she said.

Rosie: Mhm.

Alison: It’s a side of Hermione we don’t see very often, when she just ran into the bathroom and cried. And you also see later on at dinner, she’s sitting there by herself and it doesn’t seem like she has any other friends except for Ginny, whereas Ron has more of a support system with the other boys in Gryffindor.

Rosie: Mhm.

Michael: Well, and I think even Harry might have mentioned it at one point, but Hermione is laughing because Ron grew a mustache. [laughs] And he looks ridiculous. Anybody would laugh at that. Ron is making fun of Hermione at a very personal level. There’s a difference in what’s the dynamic there, too. Like you said, Alison, Ron not only has that, but he also has friends to back him up. He’s got a support system that Hermione doesn’t really have right now. So it’s unbalanced in how this is going. Hermione is on the losing end right here.

Caleb: Yeah, and I think we get a couple of sources to really point out how Ron is – I think he is – more in the wrong here. Because right after this happens, Harry goes after Hermione because he thinks Ron is just fine with the two other girls in class, and he finds her coming out of the bathroom, and Luna Lovegood is with her.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: And Luna does the thing that she often does – makes very insightful comments about people or things around her. She says about Ron, “He says very funny things sometimes. But he can be a bit unkind.” And just really well timed. I don’t know, it’s a very deep criticism of Ron in a moment where he really looks one of his worst levels, I think. I know it’s harmless, and it gets passed over later, but like we’ve been saying, that was a really mean thing to do to Hermione, and Luna is very insightful about it in her very Luna way.

Michael: I think the neat thing about that is that… and the narration says that, and this is through Harry that we’re getting this, but it says, “Luna was demonstrating her usual knack of speaking uncomfortable truths; he had never met anyone quite like her.” Which, in addition, it acknowledges that Harry knows that Luna is correct. And Harry has had one major confrontation with Ron in this book, and it was in the last chapter after the Quidditch match where he pretty much yelled at him, and then Ron deflated. Which is why I think… another reason why Harry is so hesitant to get angry with Ron is because Ron will either out-do his own anger, or he will completely shrink and start beating himself up. So there’s just no happy medium with Ron. He’s one extreme or the other.

Rosie: I think the relationship between Luna and Ron is quite interesting as well. We see the very first introduction of Luna. We see Hermione being a bit awkward, but then they become friends because they’re both slightly outcast girls together. And then Ron is never really quite certain of how to act around Luna and always finds her a bit too weird until a few chapters’ time when she does the Quidditch commentary, and when he compliments her on that, she goes, “You’re making fun of me, aren’t you?” and he goes, “No, I actually mean it.” And that’s when Luna really solidifies her role in the group, when Ron finally accepts her. So it’s when she realizes that he can be unkind, but he can also choose to be kind and become the better person for it. So there’s hope for him yet, basically.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Michael: Side note, that was a moderately popular shipping pair, Ron and Luna.

Caleb: It was.

Rosie: Luna and Ron, yeah.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: Yeah. Then the scene shifts quite dramatically when Harry all of a sudden asks Luna to be his date for Slughorn’s party.

Rosie: Which is so sweet.

Michael: It’s adorable. [laughs]

Caleb: Yeah, I love this moment. And it’s an interesting juxtaposition. Well, okay, actually, before I jump to that, I want to thank… Harry has a thing for asking people last-minute to things like this. He asked Parvati very last-minute to the Yule Ball. That one was a little more… no, actually, it wasn’t really planned out any more than that. I mean, he just saw Parvati walk across and was like, “Hey, you got a date? Let’s go.” This also just spills out. It is interesting because now we’re at a time where he’s developing these feelings for Ginny, but he still is doing this practice of asking people last-minute to these functions.

Michael: Yeah, I guess that speaks to why, perhaps, the romance is so badly developed for Harry and Ginny, and why it pans out the way it does narratively is because I mean, this just shows that Harry is absolutely clueless. I was just rereading last night because Charlie and I are rereading Order of the Phoenix, and we just read the part where they get back to school, and Cho is like, “So Valentine’s Day Hogsmeade weekend,” and he’s like, “Uh-huh, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

[Caleb, Michael, and Rosie laugh]

Michael: And she actually has to walk away, about to cry, before he figures it out. The narration actually says that something clunked into place in his head.

[Caleb, Michael, and Rosie laugh]

Michael: And I think Harry is still very much in that stage of development where he just… and I guess it makes sense. Harry doesn’t really have time to focus on romantic relationships.

Rosie: He’s too focused on Malfoy.

Michael: Yeah. [laughs]

Rosie: Because that’s not a shipping pair at all. [laughs]

Michael: Yeah. Yeah, depending on how you want to…

Alison: This is an example of where Harry did something right in the sense of with Parvati, he asked out of desperation because he really needed to have someone. With Cho, well, he was essentially hit over the head with it, and it finally came to him. Here, part of it, I think, was out of kindness and then also just… but I guess that sounds like he’s feeling sorry for Luna, which I don’t think that’s the case, but I guess it’s a reminder for him of for all how crazy Luna is, what a good person she is, and there’s just an opportunity. Unlike the Ball, he didn’t really need to have somebody except for to avoid other girls getting in the way. But it’s just a really good thing for him to do and then finally something he thought he would actually probably enjoy, at least instinctually he did.

Rosie: Yeah. He does consider Luna to be his friend, and I think that’s a very important realization that he’s got here that, “Oh, yeah, he does know more girls than just Ginny and Hermione, and he could actually have an interesting conversation with someone who would not really matter to the rest of the school.” He doesn’t care what anyone else thinks. He’s just going to go because it’s something that might interest him.

Michael: Well, yeah, and I like, too, that he basically clarifies, “We’re going as friends.”

Rosie: Just as friends. [laughs]

Michael: Yeah, she’s like, “Yes, friends. I love going as friends.”

Rosie: Friends is even better for her.

Caleb: That’s a good point to bring up, because Peeves comes along with impeccable timing to make fun of them about them going to the party together. Do we think that Luna ever considered that he thought of her as more than a friend? I mean, for me, it reads pretty clear that Luna also is on the same page as Harry that they’re just friends, but I had to wonder if she ever considered it.

Michael: Hmm… it’s funny. Maybe this is one of those things that I just read, and I was like, “Is Luna doing a passive-aggressive girl thing?” And because it’s Luna, it’s a little different, but she keeps rubbing in the point where she’s like, “Oh, yes, I’d love to go as friends. Nobody’s asked me to anything yet.”

Michael and Rosie: As a friend. [laughs]

Michael: Friend, friend, friend. And I’m just like, “Hmm… does she…?” And the thing is, I could see Luna just not really… even if she did have feelings for Harry or wondered if that was why he was asking, the clarification doesn’t bother her. She’s not upset or disappointed. She’s just like, “Oh, okay.”

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Michael: She just rolls with it.

Rosie: If anything, I think she’s making fun of him. I think Luna doesn’t have enough actual friends to consider him as anything other than a friend. She’s very grateful to have friends – to be friends with Harry and with Ginny – and to have actual friendship experiences that she doesn’t really worry too much about the rest of that stuff yet, as far as we know.

Alison: And that’s what I was thinking, too, Rosie. I think she was completely sincere, actually. I think just having genuine friends is still a new concept for her, and she’s just so excited to have anyone who would think of her as a friend, and in Book 7, we see that reflected in that mural that she has where just the concept of friendship is probably better than romance because it’s something she’s probably longed for her entire life.

Rosie: And the fact that he’s actually saying, “We are friends” at this point is almost like a trophy to her, so him awkwardly saying, “We’re only friends” to her is saying, “We are friends.” It’s brilliant, isn’t it? It’s good. So I think that’s why she would then go talk about it to Ginny as well. Even if she then actually goes and repeats that same phrase: Harry asked me to the party as a friend. It’s still important to her. And it’s really sweet, and I think it definitely earns Harry some brownie points with Ginny later on. [laughs]

Michael: Oh, yeah, and in the end, Luna is going to pair up with Rolf Scamander, so it’s fine. She marries into the Scamander family. That’s a good family to marry into. They’ve got their own movie, so…

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: So later at dinner, there’s an interesting interaction with Parvati that I just wanted to point out. So Parvati and Lavender join Harry and Ron at dinner, and it’s interesting to note that Parvati also seems annoyed with the Ron-Lavender situation. She and Harry share a moment, and she sees Hermione, who’s sitting off by herself, and she greets Hermione and seems to feel really bad about laughing at her earlier in Transfiguration. It’s just this amusing thing with that. She was fine with making fun of her earlier in the moment and now, for some reason, wants to mend the fence with Hermione even though the two of them aren’t really close, so I always wondered why she felt the need to reach out to Hermione in this moment, especially when Lavender is right there.

Michael: I think it’s to spite Lavender because…

Caleb: She’s annoyed with her. Yeah, it’s fair.

Michael: Yeah, because Parvati and Harry are sitting there being like, “Hey, fellow third wheel. This sucks, doesn’t it?” So I think, yeah, Parvati is looking to try [to] get Lavender’s attention.

Caleb: That’s fair.

Rosie: I think she genuinely feels bad for Hermione as well. She saw that her… and I mean, these girls have to share a bedroom. They have to have some friendship and tolerance for each other, and I think Hermione and Parvati would get on better than Hermione and Lavender would. They’re not going to be best friends, but they are going to friends enough that they would talk to each other from time to time. And Parvati has a twin in Ravenclaw, and Hermione is the closest to Ravenclaw this Gryffindor group has gotten, so I think there would be some friendship and respect for each other that Parvati possibly feels that she crossed a line and is trying to repair some of that boundary.

Michael: As you say that, Rosie, a Hermione-Parvati fan fic just pops onto the Internet.

[Caleb, Michael, and Rosie laugh]

Rosie: This episode has got to be called “The Shipping Podcast” or something. It’s ridiculous.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: But Parvati bringing Hermione into the conversation isn’t pointless because it’s a means for us to find out that she has in fact asked Cormac McLaggen to Slughorn’s party.

Michael: Ugh.

Caleb: Like I have said, it is such a Mean Girls moment because of… it’s an awful but an awesome moment with Hermione because this breaks Ron from snogging or whatever he’s doing with Lavender.

Rosie: The plunger noise.

Michael: [laughs] That’s so gross.

Caleb: He surfaces to figure out what’s going on, and Hermione notes that he was almost the Keeper of the Gryffindor team. And I think it’s Parvati [who] asks and says, “Oh, you really like Quidditch players.” “I like really good Quidditch players.”

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Caleb: Just so wonderful.

Michael: And it’s funny because I didn’t realize this until I read the book and then watched the movie again, but something that the movie hit that I thought the book missed the potential of – and I love that bit of dialogue – is when Harry and Hermione are in the library in the movie, and Harry is like, [as Harry] “I thought you and I can go together,” and Hermione is like, [as Hermione] “Why didn’t I think of that?” And it seems like such an obvious thing because… I mean, really… and in a way, because Hermione and Harry are so aloof about this feeling of Ron’s… it wouldn’t have been out of spite. But wouldn’t it have been something if Harry and Hermione had gone together? Ron’s reaction would have been, I think, times 20 of what we see here. I think that would have been even worse for him than the Cormac thing, so…

Caleb: Harry says, “He was left to ponder in silence the depths to which girls to sink to get revenge.”

Michael: It’s pretty amazing.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Rosie: It’s just so true. It would happen, and it’s just so bad.

Michael: Yep. This is a thing that happens in life.

[Rosie laughs]

Caleb: Poor girls. They’re subject to such awful things in school, gosh.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: Well, yeah, that’s something I’ve actually asked female friends of mine. Because I even have one friend who was just… we have this group of friends, and there was one friend who didn’t like another girl in the group, and I said, “Why don’t you like her?” And she was like, “I don’t know.” [laughs] It’s like, “So you don’t have a reason?” And she’s like, “No, I just don’t like her.” And I said, “But you’re so nice to her all the time,” and she’s like, “Yeah, but I don’t like her.” [laughs] I was like, “Okay.” And that was something I saw frequently in that group dynamic. And I’m not saying this is a blanket statement for all boys and girls, because it is different, definitely from person to person, but what I’ve generally seen is that certain groups of boys don’t tend to confront each other on an emotional level; they tend to just be very plain if they even bother to talk about it at all, like Harry and Ron, who have just avoided this discussion entirely vs. girls, who have plans in mind; they have a foresight for what they want. They looks ahead a little more, so if there'[re] other girls in their way, it can get scary.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Michael: And that’s definitely what’s happening here. There’s just a more elaborate tangled web that’s being weaved here on the girls’ end, so…

Rosie: Yeah. I think it’s really interested to see Hermione’s progression to this point as well. If you think back to how she acted around the Yule Ball and her relationship with Viktor and how she didn’t really think about Ron’s reactions too much other than “You should have asked me first” and all that kind of stuff, whereas here, it’s proving that she can play the games that she’s seen others play, so Ron is practicing at relationships, and Hermione is practicing at being the kind of girl that she now thinks Ron might be interested in. If Ron is so interested in Lavender, then this is Hermione becoming closer to Lavender than we’ve ever seen her before.

Caleb: That’s true.

Rosie: And it’s something that we wouldn’t really think that Hermione would do, this very much Mean Girls-esque playing with people’s emotions and deliberating picking the person that she knows would hurt him the most, the person who’s most like Krum, in fact, [whom] we could get in this book, and yeah, it’s just…

Alison: I like it, in a way. It just shows that Hermione is more of a three-dimensional person, even if we’re seeing a side of Hermione that isn’t very good.

Rosie: She’s suddenly a human, not a bookworm.

Alison: And Harry just always thinks she’s one of the guys, and it’s one of the examples where it’s obvious, even to Harry, that she really is a girl and reacts a little differently, maybe, than he would.

Rosie: This emotional range is much more than a teaspoon.

[Alison and Rosie laugh]

Michael: Quite a bit.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: So we finally get to this highly anticipated party, and Harry is a little worried about what Luna might show up in, but she does a really great job. It describes it as “spangled silver robes,” and Harry says she looks quite nice, and he mentions to her that there'[re] rumors of a vampire coming, and Luna points out that “Oh, it’s probably Rufus Scrimgeour because he’s a known vampire who’s trying to hide it.” That would be an interesting shift in plot if that had been true.

Michael: I always thought it would be fun, because it doesn’t work quite the same way. I’ve tried it. And maybe, listeners, you can pull something out of this, but I’ve always thought whenever I’ve come upon Luna’s crazy pronouncements about the wizarding world, I always try to link them in the same way that we do with Trelawney’s stuff, where she makes predictions by accident or she doesn’t even realize she’s actually predicting something that’s correct. I always thought, “Is there credence to anything Luna says?” Because of course, the twist in Deathly Hallows is, for all these crazy things they believe, one of the most core things of Deathly Hallows, so that idea that maybe there’s some nugget of truth to what Luna says but if there’s a different way to translate what she says to make it correct. But I haven’t found one yet.

Alison: Yeah, I thought of the same thing, although what I think is that the Lovegoods [are] more of a statement on the tabloid media that for all the craziness, occasionally, they get something right.

Michael: [laughs] That’s true.

Caleb: Well, for all of the build-up for the party, we don’t get too much from the event itself. We get a quick description of it. It seems like it’s a pretty rad place. Despite there being only a few people in the Slug Club, it seems like there'[re] quite a few people there, special guests of Slughorn’s. There’s a lot of decor. Harry notices there are some real fairies lighting the place up, there’s some loud singing, you typical pipe smoke at this kind of party, and then Harry runs into the vampire, Sanguini, who looks bored, which I think is just really funny because it’s not at all what you… well, I take that back. Maybe it is sort of typical for a vampire when they’re forced to be around a lot of humans [whom they] maybe would rather be eating…

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: … but for me, when I read this, it was like, “Oh, a vampire!” We’ve never really had this in Harry Potter. I can’t wait to see what’s going to happen, and it’s just so anticlimactic.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: Vampires and zombies go hand in hand in the Harry Potter universe. We don’t see that much of them. Because Inferi, as Rowling has declared, are not zombies. Zombies are something else, and they do exist in her world, just not in the way that’s traditional. And it’s funny because Sanguini is definitely also not, perhaps, the traditional vampire. Listeners, if you can look them up either on the Harry Potter Wiki or they’re included in the Harry Potter [and the] Prisoner of Azkaban video game, there are five vampires who are detailed on wizard cards. And they’re fantastic. There’s a lot of great vampire history. There’s a vampiress who bathed in blood, and there was one who sang his victims into a stupor before he bit them.

Caleb: Oh, God.

Michael: It’s very creative. She does get very creative with her vampire mythology, so…

Caleb: More of this scene is taken up by the guy [who]’s with him, Eldred Worple, who is writing a biography about the vampire but now, of course, wants to write a biography about Harry.

Michael: Got to jump on that before Rita Skeeter gets to it, right?

Caleb: Right, yeah.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: Ooh, I wonder if they’re bitter rivals, in a way.

Michael: Rivals? [laughs]

Caleb: Ooh. That’s interesting. But Harry finally finds Hermione, who has escaped Cormac. She admits that she asked him just to annoy Ron. Seems like she’s probably dreading that decision right now. But funnily enough, she says that she debated between asking him and Zacharias Smith. That would just have been a bad choice all around. That gets no one upset for the right reasons.

[Michael laughs]

Rosie: And I don’t think Zacharias would ever accept either.

Caleb: That’s probably true.

Rosie: Cormac is trying to get closer to Harry, so he’s probably using Hermione for that or is just thinking he’s Cormac McLaggen; of course Hermione Granger is going to ask him. But Zacharias would go, “What? No.” But I think it’s interesting that Hermione literally never considered Harry. For all of those Harry and Hermione shippers out there, they think of each other as brother and sister. They would go as friends possibly, but she would never consider Harry for her date for this party.

Michael: I would ask Harry to go to the party.

[Caleb, Michael, and Rosie laugh]

Michael: I’m just saying.

Caleb: Then Trelawney rolls in, probably has had a few things to drink…

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: She brings up Divination class and how Firenze is teaching Divination now. But she calls him Dobbin [laughs], which is such a random name.

Michael: What does that..?.

Alison: Is that explained anywhere else? I was wondering about that.

Michael: Yeah, what does that mean?

Rosie: You guys don’t have Dobbin?

Michael: What’s “dobbin”?

Rosie: So Dobbin is a traditional pantomime horse name.

Alison and Caleb: Oh.

Caleb: I didn’t know the reference.

Rosie: It’s a derogatory name for a pack horse, basically. Yeah, it’s quite funny in English. [laughs]

Caleb: Ohh.

Michael: Oh, that’s funny…

Alison: A derogatory name for what? Sorry.

Rosie: So it’s a traditional pantomime horse or… I think there was a character that was like Dobbin the mule? So it’s very much just making fun of him and saying that he’s nothing more than a donkey. He’s not a centaur.

Michael: Oh.

Caleb: That’s funny.

Michael: I bet… I think in the US, probably, the only crowd that would go down with well are horse enthusiasts.

[Caleb and Michael laugh]

Rosie: I’m surprised, actually, that that wasn’t translated for you guys into something similar.

Caleb: I don’t know what it would be translated to.

Michael: I think that would make sense because by – and Eric talked about this a few episodes back – Order of the Phoenix, they stopped doing heavy alterations to the books when they brought them over to the US, so they were just like, “Well, if they don’t get it, they don’t get it. These books are very British, and they have to stay that way.” So there were a lot of jokes and words that ended up not being switched, so I think this is…

Rosie: I’m going to do a quick Google of dobbin to make sure I’ve got the reference correctly.

[Caleb laughs]

Michael: Oh, you do. I googled it, and it’s another name for a horse and things like… yeah.

Alison: I guess it’s one of those things that maybe they thought it sounds weird and funny, [so] they didn’t need to translate it anyway, even though British people obviously would get the joke much more than we would.

Michael: Yeah. It’s basically… yeah. Let’s see, a farm horse or a quiet, plodding horse. Yeah, she’s insulting him, is what she’s doing.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: We finally get to the moment of the chapter where something substantively happens because Snape shows up at the party, the party animal that he is…

[Alison and Michael laugh]

Caleb: … and there’s a brief conversation. Because Slughorn is with Harry at this point, and they’re talking about Harry. Slughorn compliments Harry and his wonderful skills in Potions, and it’s an interesting conversation because while Snape is skeptical of Harry’s potion making skills – having been his professor – the skills he’s getting are from the Half-Blood Prince’s book, which of course we know is Snape. So there'[re] a lot of interesting levels going on here.

Michael: Yeah, it’s interesting that – I don’t think Snape knows/has the whole puzzle together but – this is the first time where, I think, Snape is suspicious that something’s wrong. Because Slughorn is like, “Oh, he’s a dab hand at Potions!”

[Caleb laughs]

Michael: “He’s amazing at this!” And Snape is like, “Really, that’s interesting. I’ve never seen that.” And yeah, he doesn’t figure it out. I don’t think he figures out the book until the Sectumsempra bit with Malfoy, [but] then he puts it all together. But I think he’s realizing like, “Oh…”

Caleb: He’s put on notice: There’s something is up.

Michael: Yeah, he’s noticed.

Caleb: So this conversation leads to Harry talking about wanting to be an Auror. Because Slughorn asks him what classes he’s taking. And just a quick funny moment from Luna, who says he should not become an Auror because they are part of the Rotfang Conspiracy, and that conspiracy is working to bring down the Ministry using Dark Magic and of course, gum disease. Of all things.

Michael: Details, Luna. Details. I want details. This sounds absolutely fascinating. [laughs]

Caleb: Well, what’s really important is that all of a sudden, Malfoy is seen trying to get into the party. Filch has caught him, though, and Harry notices that Malfoy looks very off. He realizes he hasn’t seen Malfoy up close for a while, but he noticed that Malfoy looks ill, there are shadows under his eyes, and he has a grayish tinge to his skin.

Michael: Ugh.

Caleb: And even though Slughorn is willing to let Malfoy stay at the party, Snape escorts him away, saying they need to talk. And Harry immediately takes this opportunity to pull out his Invisibility Cloak that is always available and follow Snape and Malfoy. It takes him a while to [find] out where they are, but he reaches the classroom in which they are talking. And it starts off pretty vague. Snape is talking about Malfoy making mistakes and how he shouldn’t be so clumsy and how Draco is suspected of being involved, and it pretty quickly becomes clear they’re talking about the necklace and Katie Bell. So Harry, of course, assumed it was Malfoy [who] did it, and now maybe it seems like Malfoy wasn’t the one involved. We also find out that Draco is learning Occlumency from Bellatrix, as Snape tries to use Legilimen[cy] on him, probably, and then things get pretty heated between the two. Draco is really defiant of Snape, says that he doesn’t want Snape butting into his business. And Harry, on the outside, can’t believe that Malfoy would talk to Snape like this. Snape, who[m] Malfoy has always loved and has been his idol at Hogwarts, the one he always sucks up to. And then we find out that Draco has been avoiding Snape, and then Snape drops the Unbreakable Vow bomb, which of course we the readers already know because we got to see it at the beginning of the book, but Harry does not know about this, and Malfoy alludes to “It’s my job; he gave it to me, and I’m doing it.” But he won’t tell Snape the plan. So Harry, listening, is probably getting a lot of affirmation right now because all along he has thought that Malfoy was up to something, and this is very suggestive that the “he” that gave Malfoy something to do was obviously Lord Voldemort. And another interesting point is that Snape seems to show some real care for Malfoy. Malfoy points out that he doesn’t really care about Defense Against the Dark Arts class because it doesn’t matter about defending against the Dark Arts, just using them. But now Snape is telling him that he needs it to protect himself, talking about his own experience. And just… It’s not superficial, right? It seems like Snape is really caring for Malfoy. I mean, he obviously made the Unbreakable Vow with Narcissa, but…

Rosie: Am I right in thinking that Snape is Draco’s godfather?

Michael: Ooh, is that…?

Alison: I’ve never heard that.

Caleb: I can’t remember.

Rosie: Is that a detail that’s true or is it something fan fiction again? [laughs] I think that he is his godfather.

Michael: Let’s see. [types] “Severus Snape, godfather.” “Is Severus Snape the godfather to Draco Malfoy?”

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: I can’t remember if it was explicitly said or not.

Michael: Doodly doodly doo. Hello, Wikia Answers. Hmm, it doesn’t look like it’s…

Rosie: Is it in the Pottermore information about Draco?

Michael: Yeah, I don’t know. [reads] “Lily wanted Snape to be Harry’s…” No, no, doesn’t look like anybody’s coming up with any proper citation for it, so…

Rosie: Ahh, never mind.

Alison: Well, it could be that he still may have known Draco for a lot of his life. I can see especially Lucius wanting to ingratiate himself with Snape because he knew that Draco would be going to Hogwarts and that Snape was… Well, I don’t know if Snape was always […] Head of […] Slytherin House but that he would be a good person for Draco to know well.

Rosie: But yeah, I think he does genuinely care for Draco. I mean, he is a teacher for a reason and not just because it would leave him close to Dumbledore and give him a secure life. I think you can’t be a teacher that long and not actually care about your students. So there have to be some redeeming qualities to Snape that would see him care about people, even if that person is just the sons of your former comrades. I think this is an interesting thing because it’s the first time we’ve come back to the Unbreakable Vow. And as readers, we’ve been thinking all along, “When are we going to find out more about this?”

Caleb: Maybe even forgot about it a little.

Rosie: Yeah. You might have forgotten and gone, “Oh yeah, that was the beginning of the book!” You might go back and read it again just to remind yourself of what it was. I think I did that the first time. But it’s interesting to see how Snape has developed from the beginning of the book to this point as well. And obviously later on we see the little memory of Snape’s conversations going on through this year with Dumbledore that we had no idea about, but this is really giving us a little bit of a clue that he really does care, and he wants the plans to go well, and he wants to look after the students, and he wants Malfoy to stop almost killing people by accident.

Michael: [laughs] I think that’s why this portion is written this way and why it’s so well done, is because, like you guys said, the Unbreakable Vow stuff and the actual core mystery of Half-Blood Prince hasn’t really been focused on for quite a few chapters, and as we’ve said…

Rosie: Especially after this one, which just is so shipping focused.

Michael: Yes! Well, and as we’ve said before in previous episodes, I think that’s because this mystery is not written the same as any of the other books. Because even though we don’t know it’s correct the first time we read it through, it’s correct. There’s no hidden part of this mystery for us. It’s pretty much as laid out as it could possibly be. So I think the true shocker of this section of the chapter is Snape’s tone and that he’s actually speaking in a compassionate, caring way. He’s not being clipped with his sentences; he’s being very… and he’s speaking with words that he never uses. He’s inviting confidence; he’s saying, “I can help you.” He never says that phrase.

[Caleb, Michael, and Rosie laugh]

Michael: This is a shocking side of Snape that we haven’t seen. This is the start of the Snape revelations, and I think, Rosie, like you said, tying it in [with] the memories that we’ll see in Deathly Hallows, I think that’s perfect because I think this is the start of that. Because Snape’s tone in this section is the same exact tone he takes in those memories in Deathly Hallows, so it’s…

Alison: I think I’ve always read it more that he was saying what he needed using the tone that he thought would work more than that he’s panicking in his own way that Malfoy is, that things need to get done and… I mean, I do believe he generally doesn’t want people to get hurt, but it felt more calculating. I guess I think of so many people, like Dumbledore and Snape, just doing what needs to be done and presenting things in the way they think will come off best.

Michael: Well, I think, like Dumbledore too, there’s a mixture of genuine compassion with that calculating.

Alison: Yeah. I like that because I’d never thought of it as genuine compassion. I like the idea that there’s a little bit of both, and it really helps me read this in a different way.

Rosie: I think it really does rely on your interpretation of Snape. We know that so many people have such polarizing opinions on Snape, and this is a real nugget of information that you could read either way. Same as [laughs] every other interaction we see with him throughout the books.

Michael: It would make sense to me that Snape does feel bad for Malfoy because not only does Snape know the length to which Voldemort will go to get revenge and exactly how he’s doing it to Malfoy, which is grossly unfair, but he also has the information from Dumbledore of what Malfoy is doing concisely, and he’s also, I think, taking Dumbledore’s tactic that, however this ends, we don’t want Malfoy to kill anybody. We’re letting it go to extremes that it really shouldn’t be going to, yeah. Katie Bell probably shouldn’t have gone so far as to touch that necklace and almost die.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Michael: But at the same time, we really don’t want Malfoy to kill somebody because that would be a problem, and it also would be a horrible thing for everybody to experience, including Malfoy. So I think there is that element there too. Because we know by Deathly Hallows, of course, that Snape does have feelings. So no matter how we feel about him, he does have the human capacity to feel.

Rosie: From a narrative standpoint, it’s actually really interesting to get this information now as well. We were saying earlier about how Harry Potter is fairly unusual in the fact that you grow up with the narrator or the main character, at least, depending on how you read the narrator, and this is… As kids, you are very insular. Your world is made up of things that are connected most intimately with you, and you don’t really start to look out at the world and consider other people complexly until you hit your late teens, and really, your world expands, and you really do start paying attention to things that are happening around you a bit more. And as a book, this book is doing that. We get those three chapters at the beginning where we explore other narrative points that we’ve never had before. So we get “The Other Minister,” we get “Spinner’s End,” and in this scene, we’re really seeing both Harry starting to think about other people a bit more, starting to get a clue that perhaps there’s a bit more going on than he ever really imagined with Draco and with Snape, but we’re also seeing from a narrative standpoint that we can distance ourself slightly more from Harry’s world view now, and we can get some more information and learn some more about the world around us that is not completely clouded from Harry’s point of view. So just as a growing-up standpoint, it’s interesting that this would happen in this book so that the teenagers can also start to think about the world a bit more.

Michael: Which is another reason, I think, why this book is so different in terms of its mystery, because like you said, Rosie, it requires us to actually step out of Harry’s viewpoint a lot more than we have before, and therefore, the solution to the mystery is given to us way more clearly than any of the other books. So to hold off on the revelation of the mystery until this chapter makes sense, actually, because you wouldn’t have much of a book otherwise. I think that is why I perhaps find Half-Blood Prince so impressive. It really doesn’t fit with the tone of the other books. It’s a very unique book, which I know a lot of our listeners and a lot of fans have a problem with because they feel it’s unbalanced and that it maybe isn’t appropriate how Harry’s friends are acting after what they’ve been through in Book 5. But the way it’s written, I actually think it makes sense, and to give the book credit over the movie, I think the book transitions between that ebb and flow of dark and light better than the movie. So I think it works very… And the one thing I was thinking of, actually, though, that this conversation reminded me of that I had to throw out for the listeners, because I know a lot of you in the comments have been trying to rip apart ring theory and just to…

Caleb: I would agree.

Michael: I’ll throw you a bone. This conversation reminds me of Snape and Quirrell’s conversation in Book 1. Because it’s the same…

Rosie: Yeah, definitely. Trying to get information.

Michael: Yeah, it’s the same thing where there’s a lot given but just enough so that you could mistake what’s going on.

Caleb: That wouldn’t be ring theory, though, right? Because isn’t this book supposed to be…?

Michael: Yeah. Well, that’s it. That’s just it. I’m ruining ring theory for… [laughs]

Caleb: Oh, good. I support that because I am not a fan of ring theory.

Rosie: Just a connection.

Michael: I’m breaking ring theory a little bit there…

Caleb: Good.

Michael: … because I think there is a strong connection in that particular bit. Harry has done this before, where he’s only caught snatches of a conversation, and he makes assumptions, but unlike with Quirrell and Snape, he’s actually on the right track this time.

[Rosie laughs]

Alison: Wasn’t there another conversation he…? Yeah, in Book 4, though, there is a conversation he overheard with Snape and Karkaroff.

Rosie: Which is interesting because the first time, it’s Snape and Quirrell, who is actually Voldemort, and Snape threatens him, and the second time, it’s Snape and Karkaroff, who is a Death Eater, who’s scared, and they’re trying to reassure him and say, “Don’t panic; it’ll be okay,” and this time it’s Snape and Malfoy, who is pretty much on the verge of death if he doesn’t do what Voldemort says, and Snape is trying to protect him. So it’s interesting that all of these conversations [have] been Snape on the side of good, trying to make the bad stuff not happen, but Harry always interprets it as the other way around. Snape is good, people!

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: Oh, I take issue with that but…

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

Caleb: … there’s ample time to keep on discussing that. [I] just want to wrap up with the last bit of information we find out. We already knew about the Unbreakable Vow, but we do get some new information. Malfoy reveals to Snape that he’s got people other than Crabbe and Goyle helping him out; he will not include Snape, who[m] he thinks is just looking for glory, and then Malfoy ends the conversation by storming away. So we’re left with knowing that the two of them have a very different relationship now and that there are other people helping Malfoy. We have no idea who or how, and that, of course, is a very important question. And the chapter ends.

Michael: That’s a nice tantalizing thing to leave with. We haven’t left with anything quite that tantalizing at the end of a chapter in Half-Blood Prince yet. That’s…

Rosie: Yeah, a nice little cliffhanger.

Michael: Yeah, that’s nice. Are we halfway yet? Yeah, we are. That was the halfway [point], right? Chapter 15? Let’s see.

Rosie: I think so, yeah.

Alison: Yeah, I’m holding the book up, and it is right about halfway.

Michael: Yeah, there'[re] 30 chapters, yes.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: Yeah, so nice cliffhanger halfway through. Well done, Rowling.

Rosie: It’s the turning point.

[Caleb laughs]

Michael: Good job, Rowling.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: You might… You’re going to be big.

Michael and Rosie: [laugh] You’re going somewhere.

Michael: You’re going places, kid.

Rosie: [laughs] Well, all that remains is for us to give you guys the Question of the Week for this week, and it’s been such a shippy chapter with all of the romance going on, and none of it has been Harry and Hermione, and I know loads of you out there are just complaining and saying, “No, it should have been them!”

[Caleb laughs]

Michael: Yes, there’s so many… The ocean is full of ships…

Rosie: It really is.

Michael: … and there'[re] just cannonballs just flying …

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: … and ships are… Yes, it’s exciting. [laughs] Just like the old days.

Rosie: Yeah. So today’s Question of the Week is a what-would-happen-if, especially for you guys. So what would have happened if Harry and Hermione had gone to the party together? How would Ron have reacted to the news and would the events of the chapter and the party have gone any differently than how it actually ended up in the book? Write all of your cracky-shippy comments…

[Michael laughs]

Rosie: … in the Podcast Question of the Week thread on the main site.

Michael: I think that’s a really good question because I think… Listeners, make sure to take into account the events of Deathly Hallows because I think that really could inform this Podcast Question [of the Week] really well. So there'[re] a lot of possibilities there. But for now, we wrap the show by also, of course, thanking Alison. Alison, not only thank you for being on the show, but thank you for all the work you do for us by moderating the forums over at Alohomora! [too].

Alison: Oh, thanks.

Michael: We appreciate all the work, and we were so glad that you were finally able to come on and talk with us about Harry Potter instead of just typing.

Alison: Yeah, it’s been lots of fun. I should have done it sooner.

Michael: Oh well, we’re glad you made it on, at least before the end, because we are getting close to the end.

Caleb: We are indeed.

Michael: Glad you made it on.

Caleb: Yep, thanks, indeed, for joining us. And if you would like to be on the show, like Alison, head over to alohomora.mugglenet.com and check out the “Be on the Show!” page. If you have just a simple set of Apple or similar headphones, you’re all set.

[Michael laughs]

Caleb: No fancy equipment is needed. And while you’re there, you can download one of our free ringtones that are also on the main site.

Rosie: And if you’d like to contact us in any other way, feel free. You can find us on Twitter at @AlohomoraMN, on Facebook at facebook.com/openthedumbledore, [and] on Tumblr at mnalohomorapodcast. You can phone us on Skype a[t] 206-GO-ALBUS – that’s 206-462-5287 – and you can leave us an audioBoom on alohomora.mugglenet.com. There’s a little button on the sidebar; it’s free, and all you need is a microphone. Just please keep it under 60 seconds so we can include it on the show.

Michael: And to reiterate, listeners, if you even have an inkling that you would like to be on the show but you’re holding back because of nerves, don’t. Because there are only so many chapters left.

Caleb: The end is near.

Michael: We’re halfway through Half-Blood Prince!

Rosie: We’re running out.

Michael: So it’s time to get on the show if you want to give your opinions. And do remember too that we still have three movies left to watch, so there’s also a chance to join the discussion during the movie discussion as well. But in the meantime, while you’re waiting for all of that to come up, we do have our Alohomora! store, where you can purchase many fabulous products, including House shirts as well as products themed after all of our hilarious inside jokes because we are so funny here at Alohomora!. We’ve said things like “Desk!Pig,” “Mandrake Liberation Front,” [and] “Minerva is my homegirl,” and all of those have ended up on various products in our store. We have so many more products and jokes to chose from, so check out the main Alohomora! store on our website.

Rosie: I will be wearing my “Hug me. I’m a Hufflepuff” T-shirt at Expo Patronum this Saturday.

Caleb: [laughs] Nice.

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: Nice.

Caleb: Also make sure to check out our smartphone app, which is available all throughout the Muggle world. Prices may vary depending on your location. It has really great things like transcripts, bloopers, alternate endings, host vlogs, and much more.

Michael: I like that we’ve squeezed everybody’s different way to say the smartphone app thing…

[Rosie laughs]

Michael: We jammed it into this group. [laughs]

Rosie: They’re all there now.

[Michael and Rosie laugh]

[Show music begins]

Caleb: All right, well, that’s going to do it for this week’s episode of Alohomora!. I’m Caleb Graves.

Michael: I’m Michael Harle.

Rosie: And I’m Rosie Morris. Thank you for listening to Episode 133 of Alohomora!

Michael: Open the Dumbledore.

[Show music continues]

[Audio]: Hi, this is Hufflepuffskein. I was just listening to some of the other Audioboos because I’m a teacher and my students made me really angry with some of the things that they posted, so I just decided to do something totally different. And I was listening to some of the previous Audioboos and suprememugwump had posted something about where she was listening to your podcast, and I love the idea, so I wanted to let you know that I almost always listen to your podcasts when I’m walking my dogs and the length of the walk is dictated by the length of the episode. And they love it, by the way, when you guys have really, really long [laughs] episodes. I do too, but they especially appreciate it. So on their behalf and mine, thank you.