PoA Re-Read: Chapters Nineteen and Twenty

[author_by_night]

Last segment: Sirius told his story to a (very) recently convinced Remus and a slightly less convinced Harry, Ron and Hermione. And then Snape turned up.

LJ is being weird, so you may get this in your feed twice.

Comments

[chocolatepot]

A bit less "aww"-inspiring is Sirius's suggestion that they kill him together; Remus thinks this sounds like a splendid idea.

I've always wondered about that. I wouldn't go so far as to call it OOC, but it did seem very sudden and weird to me. Like she just decided she needed to wrap up the scene because it was stretching credulity enough to have the moon rising so late at night, no need to make it go any longer.

[author_by_night]

Yeah, the more I think about it, the stranger her timeline was. It would've made much more sense had Buckbeak's execution taken place earlier.

I don't think it's OOC either, but I do think it's a part of Remus's character that was never fully explored - it comes up again in DH, when he does some pretty questionable things, and it does seem "off" there too because there's no balance or apparent set up for it. Of course, in this scene there's also a Full Moon coming, so maybe some of it was the inner wolf coming out? He might be so caught up in the moment he doesn't even realize it. With Sirius, he was acting like the mad man he'd purported to be until Remus showed up to calm him down and get answers, so I think he's still unhinged at this point.

[snorkackcatcher]

Dunno. I think this scene was always a key pointer to a part of Remus's character -- he has the ability to be ruthless when he needs to be, and doesn't take betrayal well -- but FFP and Remus!fandom in general (including me, to be fair) tended to downplay or gloss over it, and so his actions in DH came as a bit of a shock when they really shouldn't have.

[author_by_night]

Oh, for sure. I was totally Remus!Fandom (to a slightly humiliating extent in hindsight), so he surprised and startled me in DH ("My Remus would never be such an asshole!"), whereas this scene shows that no, he's not always a kind and gentle person. I still think DH could have built it up a bit better, but I don't think it was... as out of nowhere as we all thought. It makes a lot more sense if you consider everything we see in this book.

[ragnarok_08]

A bit less "aww"-inspiring is Sirius's suggestion that they kill him together; Remus thinks this sounds like a splendid idea.

Yeah, that was weird for me too.

[linda_lupos]

I do wish we knew, however, what made Sirius suspect Remus. Was it war-driven paranoia? Was Remus doing the platonic equivalent of what he does to Tonks, pushing them away? If it was the latter, I can understand Sirius misinterpreting it as something else. And did James and Lily suspect him, or just Sirius?Perhaps Sirius and Remus were never the biggest buddies everrrr. I can see them having a sort of triangle, with James as the connecting middle. From what I can remember from Snape's Worst Memory (euggghhh) and from what McGonagall had said, James was always the ringleader, ánd he was Head Boy and everything. I can see James being a little more sensible and mature IF NEED BE, while Sirius was just all fun all the time. Remus would connect better with James, if that were the case, because they'd have something in common

twele

[author_by_night]

That's a very good point, and I think there's truth to that. Sirius pranking Snape into finding Remus definitely seems... less than understanding. My guess is they're more like... typical guy buds, you know? Whereas James and Sirius were more than regular close friends. Kind of like Harry and Hermione versus Harry and Ron, although I have a hard time believing Harry and Hermione would ever think the other was capable of killing, say, Ron and Neville. On the other hand, look at the mess they were at times OoTP through DH - MWPP were fighting the war way longer than that. :/

I'm sure I have entire theories as to why Sirius suspected Remus saved somewhere. :P

[sea_thoughts]

At the time, Harry's decision definitely seemed merciful, but over the years I've changed my mind, and now I think that Remus and Sirius (while they weren't exactly being responsible adults by executing Peter in front of the Trio) were actually being kinder to Peter. If they were going to use Avada Kedavra, then that's it, boom, Peter is dead. By putting him in Azkaban, Harry's condemning Peter to mental torture, where he has all his positive memories sucked away and slowly loses his mind. (And in the end, his actual death isn't that nice, either, so this really would have been the best ending for him!)

I think Peter actually loved his life as Scabbers. It was simple, peaceful. He had a family. I mean, he even bit Goyle's finger for Ron. And I honestly don't believe he would have done anything to Harry but I take Sirius's point. Still, if Sirius hadn't escaped, Peter wouldn't have escaped and gone to Voldemort...

[author_by_night]

Huh, that's actually a very good point. I think we're definitely supposed to read it as merciful, but it would have almost been better to just let him die. Perhaps not the way they were going to do it, though.