Countdown to Harry Potter 7: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix continues the trend of Goblet of Fire - the series continues to grow darker, and far more intriguing. After being attacked by Dementors while still in the Muggle world, Harry finds himself facing an expulsion hearing for use of underage magic. He’s spirited away in the middle of the night by the Order of the Phoenix - an assembly of wizards united against Voldemort and led, naturally, by Albus Dumbledore. The trouble is, for some reason, Dumbledore doesn’t seem to want to have anything to do with Harry himself, avoiding him, not speaking to him... not even meeting him eye-to-eye. Things get even worse upon the return to Hogwarts when the Ministry of Magic forces a new Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher upon the school - a nasty woman named Dolores Umbridge, who has a vile temperament and far too much power. Umbridge’s teaching style is useless for the students, and as some of them realize they need to know how to defend themselves, Hermione comes up with the one person who could adequately train them in Defense Against the Dark Arts: Harry himself.
Perhaps even more than Goblet of Fire, this book entails a complete shift for Harry’s universe, and for a great many of the characters. Most clear, of course, is the change in Harry’s relationship with his godfather, Sirius Black. Sirius’s home is used as headquarters for the Order of the Phoenix, but Sirius himself is unable to leave, as he is still a wanted fugitive. He and Harry begin to regard each other more like friends or brothers than a parental figure and a child, with Sirius encouraging Harry to take big risks and other character pointing that out. Of course, at the end of the novel, it is Sirius’s death that compounds Harry’s guilt - he blames himself for leading a group of Death Eaters to the Ministry of Magic, where Sirius and the order came to his rescue... and Sirius perished.
Harry himself undergoes a major transformation in this book as well. Many fans criticize this volume in the series, saying that Harry is too emotional, even annoying. I’ve read the novel several times now and, while I understand their position, I don’t think it’s a valid one. Harry is 15 years old, an emotional time for anyone. But Harry is under far more stress than any normal teenager. Just weeks before the novel begins, he watched the murder of a fellow student, had his own blood taken from him and used to resurrect the man who murdered his parents, and then encountered their very spirits just before a desperate escape. Since then, he’s been isolated from his friends, his mentor figure (Dumbledore) is obviously avoiding him, and half the people in the Wizarding World refuse to believe him when he says Voldemort has returned. They view him as, at best, a liar, and at worst, barking mad. In fact, one of the few people who does believe him is Luna “Looney” Lovegood, a girl with the reputation of being off in outer space and whose father publishes the Wizarding equivalent to the National Enquirer. What’s worse, Umbridge is using her position as “High Inquisitor” at Hogwarts to further ostracize Harry, giving him frequent and torturous detentions (writing lines with a quill that actually cuts into his flesh), and ultimately banning him from the one joy remaining to him, playing Quidditch. And as the icing on the cake, the girl he’s had a crush on for a year - Cho Chang - is finally returning his affections... but she can’t seem to stop crying over her dead boyfriend, Cedric.
Honestly, I think Harry handles it a lot better than I would have at that age.
But this is part of being a teenager, this is a stage he really has to go through to become an adult, a transformation which is much clearer in book six. Even here, though, we see that transformation begin when Harry agrees to teach his fellow students - not just from Griffindor, but Ravenclaw and Hufflepuff as well. The students who believe him, who fear Voldemort’s return, agree to join the group that becomes “Dumbledore’s Army.” Harry becomes a teacher, and we see that all the spells he learned last year come in handy after all. He’s clearly the best, but he’s mature enough to know that things like inter-house rivalry simply don’t matter in the grand scheme of things: he has to make everyone the best they can be.
And in no one is that transformation more profound than in Neville Longbottom.
We learn in this book the truth about the prophecy that has bound Harry to Voldemort - it was foreseen that Voldemort’s downfall could only be caused by one born at the end of July to parents who had thrice defied the dark lord. There were two young men that prophecy could have applied to - Harry and Neville. Because Voldemort attacked Harry, he marked him as the boy of prophecy. But Neville - poor, clumsy, good-hearted Neville - remains loyal to Harry, joins the DA and joins the trio, along with Luna and Ginny, for the final battle in the ministry of magic.
In short, Neville steps up.
He may never be a warrior, he may never be of Harry’s caliber, but in this book we see the raw courage that marks Neville as a true Griffindor. He does so again in book six, and I have no doubt that in the final volume, should the need arise, Neville Longbottom will proudly fight alongside Harry, to the death if need be.
Goblet of Fire began changing things for Harry and his friends. This is the book that really shows us the shape of those changes. The book is exciting, intriguing and revealing. And it continued to be my favorite in the series... until the release of Half-Blood Prince.