Other fandoms in comparison - What Harry Potter got Wrong, they're getting right?

[mistress_kizuna]

Okay, HP can't be the only fandom we occupy, and it's been a while since anything's been posted, so I decided to revv up a new discussion.

Now I'll admit, there are still things I love about HP and the fandom (those genuinely good parts of the books I can't let go of, really good people to chat up with, non-canon fanfiction, and a few other things

Comments

[skull_bearer]

When it comes to fandom, I desperately need good characters. I need characters who's head I can crawl into and walk around in. I was never able to do that with LotR, which is why I don't like it much, though I admire Tolkein very much for writing it. And why I can love a series like Dragonlance, despite (although not being as bad or as draconian as HP) it being pretty bad.
But after HBP, Harry became a bastard, along with just about everyone else, and Voldemort (my favourite character) officially became a 2D charicature. After about a year, I threw in the towel and went looking for something else.

I found X-men, met Magneto, and fell utterly in love. The comics are erratic at best, but grief, at least when shit is written you can bash it as shit (Morrison, I'm looking at you) and not worry about being flamed. HP must be the only fandom with its own gestapo.

Anyway, that got long. I agree with what you say there, and it's much easier to leave the rotting ship of HP when you have somewhere to go to.

[les_lenne]

For the baby thing: Look at "Wicked". Elphaba is a strange baby, too. And later the other people say she is wicked, but is she? The reader knows it's not so easy.
Elphie is everything Voldemort is so not. She's interesting and actually has a personality. Which is very important for a villain (although she isn't the real villain in "Wicked"). Also, she did do some pretty bad things but it's not like with Harry who is praised for doin' it wrong. :|
Most of the characters in Harry Potter couldn't be scared. I think that's why you can't love them. If I would have been sent to death by my own parents' ghosts? Jesus! Harry's reaction is so far from anything a human would have done. Yeah, so that teacher you've always hated tells you to go dying for the greater good. Then some ghosts pop up (one of them that just died, how amusing as well) and tell you the same. Of course you'll be immediately okay with dying

[t0ra_chan]

I think Avatar: The Last Airbender does many things you mentioned a lot better than HP.

Female characters

It has badass female characters on both sites, some can use the elements to fight (benders), others cannot. Even non-benders can be awesome fighters, be their male or female, whereas in HP non-magic users are to be pitied and ridiculed. And even the non-fighting females aren't weak wimps for the most part, but can be useful and stand up for themselves.

In episode 3 Sokka (one of the main characters) makes fun of a group of female warriors, saying the couldn't possible be real fighters. So the leader soundly kicks his ass. So what does Sokka do? He goes back, apologizes and asks to be thought by them. Shocking, I know. Admitting to be wrong? Character development? What is the world coming too?

One-dimensional villainsApart from from Firelord Ozai, all the villains in Avatar are more than one-dimensional bad guys. Prime example is Azula, who is a psycho bitch, but still so awesome and an actual threat to the good guys that you

[reddi_whipped]

I love Sokka! He gets some of the best moments; from the pure comedy: cactus juice, the haikus, feverish attempt at bending (take that, you rock!) to the serious: his wanting to prove himself a true warrior, the doomed romance with Princess Yue. The writers should get praised from making him so versatile instead of the one-note sidekick he could have been.
Other fandoms I like: Still enjoy X-Men Evolution. I might cover some of the other points later for now I'll just talk a bit about morals.

Black-and-white moralityThe Brotherhood gets some nice development, Lance in particular grows from an angry theiving punk to a responsible leader and more anti-hero than villain. Episodes like "Survival Of The Fittest", "Joyride", "Mainstream", "No Good Deed" and the two-part finale really spotlight his moral conflicts. While he usually WANTS to do the right thing, he doesn't always succeed in doing so and his morals are quite a bit looser than the X-Men. Ex: In one ep Kelly has sent the government after the mutants whose identities have just

[ether_bunny]

I think that most of the characters in HP fandom kind of fell through in the end, to the point that a lot of them are incredibly hard to relate to.

I have to agree on most of these points: here are my thoughts.

Female characters - Even Hermione, Narcissa, and Fleur are primarily about their relationships in the end. Look at Hermione in the nineteen years later, what does she become

[ether_bunny]

But then that brings in the natural reactions that characters like Snape and Peter would have to the bullying and mistreatment they received from the good characters. Why in God's name would Severus join the Light side? Not only did those characters most loudly and self-righteously supporting it treat him like shit, but apparently they were sort of patted on the back for it by DUMBLEDORE and rewarded with things like being Head Boy (even while the bullying continued after the Shack incident and through the remainder of their schooling, according to Sirius and Remus). And Dumbledore has the gall to tell Severus he disgusts him. There is no evidence to support that Dumbledore ever even made an effort to dissuade Severus, Regulus, or Draco from joining the Death Eaters. All he did was 'damage control' by sacrificing other unworthy "evil" characters like Snape for the Greater Good

wtf am i really this wordy. lame.

[ether_bunny]

Uninteresting/Badly done romantic subplots - I'm going to have to disagree on James/Lily being an exception. It's not that I think that Severus/Lily was well done either (because it absolutely wasn't, it was terrible imho), but in the final book JKR removed all ability of context for the reader to see how Lily could go on to fall in love with James at all. Where, in the past, since there was so little information about him or Lily at all, we were able to imagine that they became more mature and compatible as they grew, she shattered that notion by presenting James more and more in a Draco-esque light, self centered, rich, spoiled, and a bully. I just can't find any real support in the text of the idea that he matured, and I find him and Lily both really difficult to like given what she's written about them.

Another thing is what someone else commented on - not allowed to feel fear, and I'd like to extend that to not allowed to express emotion for virtually all of the "acceptable" male characters. Look at the individuals in

[ether_bunny]

Oh. And there was another one I wanted to say!

Inconsistent Characterization - Pretty self-explanatory, really. Just look at REMUS LUPIN. The Remus we met in book three would have never blown up and magically assaulted Harry the way book 7 Remus did