Remote Control

[mike_smith]

My job's gotten a little more hectic since I got back from Vegas, which kind of throws off my plans. Nevertheless, I'm too masochistic to stop myself from reviewing this book, so no worries there. It'll just take me till Christmas to finish

Comments

[tekalynn]

The issues with Harry and his "ethics" have been bugging a lot of us for years. Thank you for summing them up so effectively. JKR really seems to want to eat her cake and have it too when it comes to Gryffindor characters in general and Harry in particular. The scary thing is, she really doesn't seem to see this as either contradictory or problematic, judging by her interviews. Harry Is Good, even when he does seriously wrong things.

[mike_smith]

That's my beef in a nutshell. If Harry's supposed to be a flawed character, in that he's spiteful and bitter when it comes to things he doesn't like, then fine. He wouldn't be the first character with that sort of hang up.

But I find it incredible that there's a writer out there who'd create such a character and have no interest in exploiting those foibles. You take, for instance, Rodimus Prime. From the start, it's made clear that he's the new Autobot Commander, and while he's exceptionally qualified for the job, it wasn't his idea, and he never had any interest in doing it, and he's constantly second-guessing himself because he doesn't think he's up to the responsibility. Every episode of Transformers Roddy was in, they used that reluctance to create internal conflict. To deny Rodimus' self-doubt, or to ignore it as if it weren't worth exploring, well, you could do that, but it'd make the character less interesting.

[merenwen_81]

I actually think the Gryffindors and Harry are always right according to the narrator, because Harry thinks so. After all, not many people see themselves as evil. That is also why people he likes tend to be attractive and people he doesn't like...don't. Books one and two are really black and white and in the later ones Harry is beginning to realise most people are not completely good or evil. I have trouble believing you're always supposed to be on Harry's side, even when he's obviously acting like an ass, like when he uses Sectumsempra on Draco.

[lisatrix]

"JKR really seems to want to eat her cake and have it too"
Thank you so much for using that phrase in the order that actually makes sense.

Anyway, yeah- it sort of boggles my mind how black and white the Gryffindor v. Slytherin relationship is depicted in the books. The Gryffindor's recklessness is rarely depicted as bad, and the Slytherin's ambition is never depicted as good, and that just doesn't make any sense to me. Of course the hero's goodness will be played up and his enemy's played down, but it's taken to an extreme here. I think a lot of Harry Potter fanfic is actually an attempt to inject some grey into that black-and-white framework.

[merenwen_81]

Two words: unreliable narrator. Of course, lots of readers seem to believe Harry is always right, but I'm not sure it's intended to be taken that way.

[lisatrix]

I guess what I think is that JKR is doing the unreliable narrator thing, but doing it badly. I haven't really gotten any hints from the text that the author thinks Harry is wrong.

[grapefruitzzz]

There was an awful lot of clinging to Theodore Nott (?), the possible "good Slytherin" who went on the OOTP mission because there is *no-one else*. People have waited years to see any indication that a quarter of all magical eleven-year-olds are anything but possibly evil. From what's been shown so far, it would be better for the world for all the kids sorted into Slytherin to be taken out the back and shot.