Deathly Hallows (SPOILERS)
This list is by no means complete or comprehensive. It is based on my first reading of the book and notes that I took quickly during a long stretch of no sleep and no food. I will be taking part in a more thorough chapter-by-chapter analysis on deathly_cntdwn starting August 1.
Theories:
The motorbike will reappear. True!
Tonks's parents are still alive. True!
Ollivander is hiding or evil. False. He has been captured by DEs.
Hermione's parents will die. False. She modifies their memories and sends them to Australia. This might also qualify as "WTF?!" How did they get passports?
Dumbledore will leave Harry his silver instruments and Pensieve. False. He leaves Harry the first snitch he caught as well as the sword of Gryffindor, Ron the put-outer and Hermione a book of runic children's stories.
We'll be seeing Norbert again. Mostly false. Norbert is mentioned and is apparently now Norberta.
R.A.B. is Regulus Black. True! However, he didn't turn out to be nearly as awesome as I was hoping.
Slytherin's locket was the one first seen in OotP. True! And the trio are smart enough to figure that out as soon as they figure out R.A.B.
Regulus took Kreacher with him to the cave. True! And so did Voldemort, initially.
Regulus was tracking Horcruxes. False. The locket he knew about by chance, and he didn't know what it was.
The "water" in the lake was Draught of Living Death. Not that we know of.
Snape will be headmaster of Hogwarts. True! Although I thought it would happen at the end of the book, not the beginning.
Mundungus stole the locket and sold it. True! Randomly, he sold it to Umbridge.
Godric Gryffindor was born in Godric's Hollow. True! And Dumbledore's family used to live there too.
There was a witness hiding in Godric's Hollow that night. Unknown. Plenty of room for the possibility, and my guess is still Peter Pettigrew.
Harry will have to speak Parseltongue to open the locket. True!
The Deathly Hallows will be a Founder's bones. False. They are items which make one the master of death.
The fact that Dumbledore's and Sirius's bank accounts were right next to one another will be significant and a Horcrux will be in the latter. False. The Horcrux is in Bellatrix's account.
Auntie Muriel's tiara will be the Key to Everything. False. But we do get shown it a number of times before getting told about the diadem of Ravenclaw.
Nagini is not a Horcrux. False. Dammit.
The tiara Harry saw in the Room of Requirement is Ravenclaw's. True! Also, a Horcrux.
McGonagall is evil. False. Although there's room left for her to be working for herself. We don't even see her until Ch 30. I don't even think she's mentioned before then.
The Grey Lady is the ghost of Ravenclaw herself or one of her students, and will provide key information. Close. She is Ravenclaw's daughter.
Harry's flying ability will be key to his success. True. In the burning Room of Requirement, he collects Malfoy, Goyle and the Ravenclaw diadem on a broom.
One of the Weasley twins will die. True! I called it three years ago!
Snape will die heroically, proving his loyalty to Dumbledore. False. His death was really, really pointless.
Snape is ultimately loyal to Dumbledore: True!
Snape was in love with Lily Potter. True!
Harry is a Horcrux. True! How about that?
Narcissa will sacrifice herself for Draco as a mirror of Lily and Harry. False. But she did betray Voldemort out of love for her son.
The Sorting Hat will be destroyed. False? It got burnt up, but apparently they are still doing sorting later.
Neville will have an awesome heroic moment. True! He gets a few, but slicing off Nagini's head is, of course, the biggest.
We will learn what James and Lily did for a living. False.
The wand in Ollivander's window belonged to Ravenclaw. False.
Tonks is evil, Imperiused or under a love potion. False. She's just lame.
Ginny is evil or in some way still connected to Voldemort. False.
Irma Pince and Argus Filch are Snape's hidden parents. Not that we know of.
Character Development:
The Malfoys get a chance to be a more interesting and less two-dimensional set of characters. Lucius Malfoy has *white peacocks* roaming the grounds of Malfoy Manor. Of course he does. Narcissa gets an awesome pivotal scene in which she betrays Voldemort out of love for her son.
Enormous amounts of Dumbledore family backstory. Bring on the very worrying fanfic! Albus Dumbledore has become highly slashable.
We finally learn about Grindelwald.
Dudley displays positive character traits, and says reasonably nice things to Harry.
The Weasley twins cease to be identical when George loses an ear. And then he loses his brother.
Kreacher changes to become more Dobby-like practically overnight. Rather poor character development, I thought, but then I suppose Jo didn't want to spend to much time on him with so much else happening.
The trio enter some very murky moral territory. The best example of this is the Gringott's breakin, the deal with the goblin and the use of Unforgivable curses. This went far enough to really surprise me. I can see using the Imperius curse if you're in danger and it's in a good cause, but Harry Cruicioed someone! In front of McGonagall! Dude! Ron always seems especially prepared to do the underhanded thing.
Neville is all kinds of crazy awesome. I love him so much. He is, indeed, the man. As Harry goes to his death, he passes his mantle to Neville, and only speaks to him. I loved the symbolism of it. Long live Harry/Neville! I am grudgingly fond of Gran as well.
Snape's character ambiguity remains ambiguous right to the end, at which point we get more information than we (especially fic writers) ever needed.
Shipping:
Remus/Tonks - I could also put this under "WTF?!" or under "Things Jo did..." but I guess it has a legitimate place here. Remus still seems quite reluctant. They have a child, but the timeline allows for the possibility that it is *not actually Remus's baby*, since Tonks apparently got knocked up right around the time Dumbledore died, and they get married about two weeks into the relationship. Remus is neither a rash nor impulsive man. We've seen how controlled and cautious he is. Would he really rush into a sexual relationship like this? I think that there is still plenty of room left for a queer reading of Remus and a love-potioned Tonks. Their levels of passion and interest in one another do not seem very balanced.
Albus Dumbledore/Elphias Doge - Dumbledore's old school days friend who was planning to tour the continent with him after they left school. Doge wrote Dumbledore's very touching obituary.
Albus Dumbledore/Gellert Grindelwald - Very, very intensely close friends for...two months. Gellert was apparently a very pretty man.
Aberforth/goats - Yup. We get a number of references to this, including his patronus being a goat.
Aberforth/Ariana - Dumbledore family incest 'ship. Troubling, but arguable.
Polyjuiced Harrys - Harry!Fleur casting loving looks at Bill was just ... And Hermione thinks Harryjuice looks tasty. This will be fun in the movie.
Harry/Ginny - Unquestionably canon. When she invited him into her room on his birthday, I thought maybe ... but then Ron interrupted.
Ron/Hermione - Obvious, but not entirely resolved until the final battle. When they disappeared to find a bathroom, I was sure that ... but apparently not.
Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches - Apparently it's not all "wandwork". *giggle*
Krum/Hermione - It's off, but he still seems to make her nervous. Ron does a better job of blocking than in GoF. And then Krum thinks Ginny's good-looking, and Harry blocks.
Kreacher/Regulus - That elf loved the youngest Black, we learn. And Regulus was very kind to him.
Harry/Hermione - One very nightmarish and AU sequence, which involves neither the real Harry nor the real Hermione.
Harry/Ron - They hug! Awww.... And when Ron is polyjuiced for the Gringotts breakin, Harry says "He's not my type, but he'll do."
Harry/Draco - Harry is now the master of Draco's "wand". All the language surrounded this discussion is rather dodgy. And Harry saves Draco's life. Of course.
Harry/Cho - Sounds like she's still somewhat keen on him. Well, he's a big hero now, isn't he? But Ginny blocks her.
The Bloody Baron/The Grey Lady - Apparently she rejected him and he killed her, then himself. How odd. If he didn't fear death, how did he end up a ghost? We can assume the Fat Friar is also medieval, which means Gryffindor got its ghost really late.
Tom Riddle/The Grey Lady - Sounds like he really charmed her.
Snape/Lily - We are pretty much beaten over the head with this 'ship in Ch 34. In fact, that chapter is just designed to kill Snape fic writers, isn't it? It's really over the top, and so much of it could easily be left unsaid and the point still be made.
Harry/Neville - Well, that's where I'm going with this.
Voldemort/Bellatrix - Canon and laid on with a trowel.
Deaths:
Charity Burbage - Muggle Studies teacher we've never met. (Ch 1)
Percival, Kendra and Ariana Dumbledore (backstory deaths) - Dumbledore's father, mother and younger sister. (Ch 2)
Hedwig - This was such an all-bets-are-off death. If Jo can kill Hedwig, she can kill anyone. Also, this can be seen as part of the process of Harry being stripped of all his important possessions before he makes his stand. (Ch 4)
Mad-Eye Moody - Body never recovered. I was hoping for Inferius!Moody, but he never showed. Lots of room for "Moody's not dead" theories. (Ch 5)
Rufus Scrimgeour - Killed when the DEs took the Ministry. That was a huge shocker, but I did predict some sort of attack during the wedding. (Ch 8)
Regulus Arcturus Black (backstory death) - We already knew he was dead, of course, but we get the most thorough explanation so far from Kreacher. His body remains in the lake in the cave. (Ch 10)
Bathilda Bagshot - I don't even want to think about this one. Can I vote for it to be cut from the film? (Ch 17)
Ted Tonks - We just get to meet him in this book, and he's killed off screen. (Ch 22)
Dirk Cresswell - Not sure we've even met him, but he's mentioned several times in this book before turning up dead. (Ch 22)
Peter Pettigrew - Damn, this was disappointing. I think we were all really hoping that his life-debt to Harry would be really handy at some point, like he might be forced to help/save Harry, but him strangling himself with his own silver hand was really, really lame and will be even worse on the screen. (Ch 23)
Dobby - Stabbed by Bellatrix's thrown knife. This might have actually been the saddest death in the entire book. (Ch 23)
Vincent Crabbe - Killed in a fire spell of his own casting, which would have killed Goyle an Malfoy as well, if the Trio hadn't saved them. (Ch 31)
Fred Weasley - Did I call it or what? She killed one of the Weasley twins. The fallout from this is going to feed fic writers for years. (Ch 31)
Severus Snape - Of all the deaths I pictured for Snape, none were this pointless. There are already "Snape is not dead" theories circulating, and I think I buy it. After all, they got Arthur Weasley to St Mungo's in time, didn't they? Nagini's poison doesn't work that fast. And Snape is so the type to carry around a bezoar with him. (Ch 32)
Remus Lupin - Off screen, entirely expected, and at the end of a whole book wherein he is bafflingly dull. I didn't cry. (Ch 33)
Nymphadora Tonks - It goes without saying that I did not cry for her either. She was mildly interesting in OotP, but as a character, she didn't serve much purpose. Her metamorphmagus powers never really proved key anywhere. She could be lifted out of the story with barely a ripple. (Ch 33)
Colin Creevey - Not only is he underage, but what is he even still doing at Hogwarts? He's Muggle-born, and they weren't allowed in this year. Yes, I know the DA were summoned, but how did he get from his Muggle house to the school that fast without having access to wizard transport? (Ch 34)
Bellatrix Lestrange - Is she dead? I couldn't actually tell from the passage, though when she falls, it's compared to Sirius. I'm not sure I can see Molly using the AK, but "NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!" has got to be one of the best lines ever. (Ch 36)
Voldemort - Killed by his own rebounding curse. I love that it's Harry's signature "Expelliarmus" that finishes him off -- a spell he learned from Snape in second year -- and I love that Harry does not actually kill anyone in this entire book. His moral grey area is not *that* dark.
WTF?!
I have a bone to pick with you, Jo. From my very first reading of PoA, Remus Lupin was one of my favourite characters, and for the past three years, he has been my very favourite character. So why the hell did you go and make him Captain Boring in this book? By the time he dies, the reader has almost stopped caring.
Voldemort can fly?! And apparently so can Snape.
Harry's cloak is extra-extra special and no one seems to have noticed this at all.
Harry is descended from the Peverell family, and apparently so is Voldemort. Both these facts are mentioned, but never that it means some blood relationship between the two, however distant.
Percy's out-of-nowhere reconciliation and Remus waving around baby photos. This seemed really random and OOC.
Ron fakes Parseltongue to get into the Chamber of Secrets. Does this seem remotely likely to anyone?
When Harry's got his beloved dead crowded around him, why are Dumbledore, Tonks and Fred not there? Was he really that much closer to Remus?
Things Jo did just to bugger up my fanfic:
Death Eater Yaxley is a man.
Everything Snape ever said and did is handed to us all at once.
We get exact birthdates for James and Lily, which are a year out of what we thought was canon.
The epilogue. Can we just ignore it, please? *gag* At least we only find out about the trio, Ginny, Draco and Neville. And we still don't know what anyone but Neville ended up doing for a living.
Theories:
The motorbike will reappear. True!
Tonks's parents are still alive. True!
Ollivander is hiding or evil. False. He has been captured by DEs.
Hermione's parents will die. False. She modifies their memories and sends them to Australia. This might also qualify as "WTF?!" How did they get passports?
Dumbledore will leave Harry his silver instruments and Pensieve. False. He leaves Harry the first snitch he caught as well as the sword of Gryffindor, Ron the put-outer and Hermione a book of runic children's stories.
We'll be seeing Norbert again. Mostly false. Norbert is mentioned and is apparently now Norberta.
R.A.B. is Regulus Black. True! However, he didn't turn out to be nearly as awesome as I was hoping.
Slytherin's locket was the one first seen in OotP. True! And the trio are smart enough to figure that out as soon as they figure out R.A.B.
Regulus took Kreacher with him to the cave. True! And so did Voldemort, initially.
Regulus was tracking Horcruxes. False. The locket he knew about by chance, and he didn't know what it was.
The "water" in the lake was Draught of Living Death. Not that we know of.
Snape will be headmaster of Hogwarts. True! Although I thought it would happen at the end of the book, not the beginning.
Mundungus stole the locket and sold it. True! Randomly, he sold it to Umbridge.
Godric Gryffindor was born in Godric's Hollow. True! And Dumbledore's family used to live there too.
There was a witness hiding in Godric's Hollow that night. Unknown. Plenty of room for the possibility, and my guess is still Peter Pettigrew.
Harry will have to speak Parseltongue to open the locket. True!
The Deathly Hallows will be a Founder's bones. False. They are items which make one the master of death.
The fact that Dumbledore's and Sirius's bank accounts were right next to one another will be significant and a Horcrux will be in the latter. False. The Horcrux is in Bellatrix's account.
Auntie Muriel's tiara will be the Key to Everything. False. But we do get shown it a number of times before getting told about the diadem of Ravenclaw.
Nagini is not a Horcrux. False. Dammit.
The tiara Harry saw in the Room of Requirement is Ravenclaw's. True! Also, a Horcrux.
McGonagall is evil. False. Although there's room left for her to be working for herself. We don't even see her until Ch 30. I don't even think she's mentioned before then.
The Grey Lady is the ghost of Ravenclaw herself or one of her students, and will provide key information. Close. She is Ravenclaw's daughter.
Harry's flying ability will be key to his success. True. In the burning Room of Requirement, he collects Malfoy, Goyle and the Ravenclaw diadem on a broom.
One of the Weasley twins will die. True! I called it three years ago!
Snape will die heroically, proving his loyalty to Dumbledore. False. His death was really, really pointless.
Snape is ultimately loyal to Dumbledore: True!
Snape was in love with Lily Potter. True!
Harry is a Horcrux. True! How about that?
Narcissa will sacrifice herself for Draco as a mirror of Lily and Harry. False. But she did betray Voldemort out of love for her son.
The Sorting Hat will be destroyed. False? It got burnt up, but apparently they are still doing sorting later.
Neville will have an awesome heroic moment. True! He gets a few, but slicing off Nagini's head is, of course, the biggest.
We will learn what James and Lily did for a living. False.
The wand in Ollivander's window belonged to Ravenclaw. False.
Tonks is evil, Imperiused or under a love potion. False. She's just lame.
Ginny is evil or in some way still connected to Voldemort. False.
Irma Pince and Argus Filch are Snape's hidden parents. Not that we know of.
Character Development:
The Malfoys get a chance to be a more interesting and less two-dimensional set of characters. Lucius Malfoy has *white peacocks* roaming the grounds of Malfoy Manor. Of course he does. Narcissa gets an awesome pivotal scene in which she betrays Voldemort out of love for her son.
Enormous amounts of Dumbledore family backstory. Bring on the very worrying fanfic! Albus Dumbledore has become highly slashable.
We finally learn about Grindelwald.
Dudley displays positive character traits, and says reasonably nice things to Harry.
The Weasley twins cease to be identical when George loses an ear. And then he loses his brother.
Kreacher changes to become more Dobby-like practically overnight. Rather poor character development, I thought, but then I suppose Jo didn't want to spend to much time on him with so much else happening.
The trio enter some very murky moral territory. The best example of this is the Gringott's breakin, the deal with the goblin and the use of Unforgivable curses. This went far enough to really surprise me. I can see using the Imperius curse if you're in danger and it's in a good cause, but Harry Cruicioed someone! In front of McGonagall! Dude! Ron always seems especially prepared to do the underhanded thing.
Neville is all kinds of crazy awesome. I love him so much. He is, indeed, the man. As Harry goes to his death, he passes his mantle to Neville, and only speaks to him. I loved the symbolism of it. Long live Harry/Neville! I am grudgingly fond of Gran as well.
Snape's character ambiguity remains ambiguous right to the end, at which point we get more information than we (especially fic writers) ever needed.
Shipping:
Remus/Tonks - I could also put this under "WTF?!" or under "Things Jo did..." but I guess it has a legitimate place here. Remus still seems quite reluctant. They have a child, but the timeline allows for the possibility that it is *not actually Remus's baby*, since Tonks apparently got knocked up right around the time Dumbledore died, and they get married about two weeks into the relationship. Remus is neither a rash nor impulsive man. We've seen how controlled and cautious he is. Would he really rush into a sexual relationship like this? I think that there is still plenty of room left for a queer reading of Remus and a love-potioned Tonks. Their levels of passion and interest in one another do not seem very balanced.
Albus Dumbledore/Elphias Doge - Dumbledore's old school days friend who was planning to tour the continent with him after they left school. Doge wrote Dumbledore's very touching obituary.
Albus Dumbledore/Gellert Grindelwald - Very, very intensely close friends for...two months. Gellert was apparently a very pretty man.
Aberforth/goats - Yup. We get a number of references to this, including his patronus being a goat.
Aberforth/Ariana - Dumbledore family incest 'ship. Troubling, but arguable.
Polyjuiced Harrys - Harry!Fleur casting loving looks at Bill was just ... And Hermione thinks Harryjuice looks tasty. This will be fun in the movie.
Harry/Ginny - Unquestionably canon. When she invited him into her room on his birthday, I thought maybe ... but then Ron interrupted.
Ron/Hermione - Obvious, but not entirely resolved until the final battle. When they disappeared to find a bathroom, I was sure that ... but apparently not.
Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches - Apparently it's not all "wandwork". *giggle*
Krum/Hermione - It's off, but he still seems to make her nervous. Ron does a better job of blocking than in GoF. And then Krum thinks Ginny's good-looking, and Harry blocks.
Kreacher/Regulus - That elf loved the youngest Black, we learn. And Regulus was very kind to him.
Harry/Hermione - One very nightmarish and AU sequence, which involves neither the real Harry nor the real Hermione.
Harry/Ron - They hug! Awww.... And when Ron is polyjuiced for the Gringotts breakin, Harry says "He's not my type, but he'll do."
Harry/Draco - Harry is now the master of Draco's "wand". All the language surrounded this discussion is rather dodgy. And Harry saves Draco's life. Of course.
Harry/Cho - Sounds like she's still somewhat keen on him. Well, he's a big hero now, isn't he? But Ginny blocks her.
The Bloody Baron/The Grey Lady - Apparently she rejected him and he killed her, then himself. How odd. If he didn't fear death, how did he end up a ghost? We can assume the Fat Friar is also medieval, which means Gryffindor got its ghost really late.
Tom Riddle/The Grey Lady - Sounds like he really charmed her.
Snape/Lily - We are pretty much beaten over the head with this 'ship in Ch 34. In fact, that chapter is just designed to kill Snape fic writers, isn't it? It's really over the top, and so much of it could easily be left unsaid and the point still be made.
Harry/Neville - Well, that's where I'm going with this.
Voldemort/Bellatrix - Canon and laid on with a trowel.
Deaths:
Charity Burbage - Muggle Studies teacher we've never met. (Ch 1)
Percival, Kendra and Ariana Dumbledore (backstory deaths) - Dumbledore's father, mother and younger sister. (Ch 2)
Hedwig - This was such an all-bets-are-off death. If Jo can kill Hedwig, she can kill anyone. Also, this can be seen as part of the process of Harry being stripped of all his important possessions before he makes his stand. (Ch 4)
Mad-Eye Moody - Body never recovered. I was hoping for Inferius!Moody, but he never showed. Lots of room for "Moody's not dead" theories. (Ch 5)
Rufus Scrimgeour - Killed when the DEs took the Ministry. That was a huge shocker, but I did predict some sort of attack during the wedding. (Ch 8)
Regulus Arcturus Black (backstory death) - We already knew he was dead, of course, but we get the most thorough explanation so far from Kreacher. His body remains in the lake in the cave. (Ch 10)
Bathilda Bagshot - I don't even want to think about this one. Can I vote for it to be cut from the film? (Ch 17)
Ted Tonks - We just get to meet him in this book, and he's killed off screen. (Ch 22)
Dirk Cresswell - Not sure we've even met him, but he's mentioned several times in this book before turning up dead. (Ch 22)
Peter Pettigrew - Damn, this was disappointing. I think we were all really hoping that his life-debt to Harry would be really handy at some point, like he might be forced to help/save Harry, but him strangling himself with his own silver hand was really, really lame and will be even worse on the screen. (Ch 23)
Dobby - Stabbed by Bellatrix's thrown knife. This might have actually been the saddest death in the entire book. (Ch 23)
Vincent Crabbe - Killed in a fire spell of his own casting, which would have killed Goyle an Malfoy as well, if the Trio hadn't saved them. (Ch 31)
Fred Weasley - Did I call it or what? She killed one of the Weasley twins. The fallout from this is going to feed fic writers for years. (Ch 31)
Severus Snape - Of all the deaths I pictured for Snape, none were this pointless. There are already "Snape is not dead" theories circulating, and I think I buy it. After all, they got Arthur Weasley to St Mungo's in time, didn't they? Nagini's poison doesn't work that fast. And Snape is so the type to carry around a bezoar with him. (Ch 32)
Remus Lupin - Off screen, entirely expected, and at the end of a whole book wherein he is bafflingly dull. I didn't cry. (Ch 33)
Nymphadora Tonks - It goes without saying that I did not cry for her either. She was mildly interesting in OotP, but as a character, she didn't serve much purpose. Her metamorphmagus powers never really proved key anywhere. She could be lifted out of the story with barely a ripple. (Ch 33)
Colin Creevey - Not only is he underage, but what is he even still doing at Hogwarts? He's Muggle-born, and they weren't allowed in this year. Yes, I know the DA were summoned, but how did he get from his Muggle house to the school that fast without having access to wizard transport? (Ch 34)
Bellatrix Lestrange - Is she dead? I couldn't actually tell from the passage, though when she falls, it's compared to Sirius. I'm not sure I can see Molly using the AK, but "NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!" has got to be one of the best lines ever. (Ch 36)
Voldemort - Killed by his own rebounding curse. I love that it's Harry's signature "Expelliarmus" that finishes him off -- a spell he learned from Snape in second year -- and I love that Harry does not actually kill anyone in this entire book. His moral grey area is not *that* dark.
WTF?!
I have a bone to pick with you, Jo. From my very first reading of PoA, Remus Lupin was one of my favourite characters, and for the past three years, he has been my very favourite character. So why the hell did you go and make him Captain Boring in this book? By the time he dies, the reader has almost stopped caring.
Voldemort can fly?! And apparently so can Snape.
Harry's cloak is extra-extra special and no one seems to have noticed this at all.
Harry is descended from the Peverell family, and apparently so is Voldemort. Both these facts are mentioned, but never that it means some blood relationship between the two, however distant.
Percy's out-of-nowhere reconciliation and Remus waving around baby photos. This seemed really random and OOC.
Ron fakes Parseltongue to get into the Chamber of Secrets. Does this seem remotely likely to anyone?
When Harry's got his beloved dead crowded around him, why are Dumbledore, Tonks and Fred not there? Was he really that much closer to Remus?
Things Jo did just to bugger up my fanfic:
Death Eater Yaxley is a man.
Everything Snape ever said and did is handed to us all at once.
We get exact birthdates for James and Lily, which are a year out of what we thought was canon.
The epilogue. Can we just ignore it, please? *gag* At least we only find out about the trio, Ginny, Draco and Neville. And we still don't know what anyone but Neville ended up doing for a living.