Actually, I'm hoping Ron goes bad. He's mad to make money, which leaves him open.

Hmmm. I'm willing to take the point about the previous timeline/inevitability, which may also answer my other questions -- he goes back to 18whatever because he's always gone back to 18whatever -- but it still seems pretty strange to me.

Nutty, thanks for your point about the growing realism as the characters age and the increasing disconnect as the adult characters remain tropes. As I get further into the series, this has been bugging me more and more, although I must admit that it did annoy me a bit from the beginning. I hadn't really figured out what it was that was bothersome, though. You put it perfectly, which is such a relief!

If Snape was a big nerd, wouldn't Hermione be the closest to him now

Snape wasn't the cool kind of nerd like Hermione. He wasn't quite smart enough, plus, although I don't remember from the books, it seems like he must have had bad hair. In fact, I don't see the child Snape so much as a nerd as a geek. But I only read each book once, not really being a Harry Potter fanatic (I save my fanatacism for Firefly) and it's probably six months since I read the most recent one, so I could be all wet on this one.

This is what is stopping me from stepping into the burgeoning HP fandom -- I just can't see doing all the reading it would take to know the canon. I read each of the books once, and I skimmed LARGE sections of the last one. I keep trying to reread and getting bored and wandering off.

Bring back Buffy when it and I were young.

Bring back Buffy when it and I were young

Oh, I dreamed this last night. I was watching an episode I hadn't seen, from S2 or so, with a thin Xander and dorky Willow and perky Buffy and it was so nice to have my friends back.

Which I guess is pathetic, but whatever.

I am having no opinion on any upcoming reveals in the HPverse, as I know that whatever I think would be wonderful (Snape/Lily; Petunia being a Squib; Draco being three-dimensional) won't happen. I'm still a bit bitter (okay, a lot bitter) over the last book and the increasing trend towards nothingness.

This is what is stopping me from stepping into the burgeoning HP fandom -- I just can't see doing all the reading it would take to know the canon.

Oh, but that's the marvelous thing about it--the writers have done the research for you! I like the characters so much more in fanfic than in the books. I think a large part of the reason that OotP was such a disappointment to me was that I'd been reading a lot of fic in the months leading up to its release, and the book just couldn't measure up. I mean, I've read and enjoyed the books, but I certainly don't have the exhaustive knowledge of canon that others do, and I don't think it's necessary for an appreciation of the fic.

Rowling's good at broad strokes, but at this point, I fear her characters have grown beyond her ability to write them well. (She's never been able to believeably write the adults as three-dimensional characters, but when the kids were too young to relate to them as peers, it didn't matter so much.)

I'm curious why everyone seems to think Snape and Lily were/should have been a couple. In the extended flashback in OotP, Snape lashes out at Lily for interfering when James was harassing him, and he calls her a mudblood. Even if he had a secret crush on her, I don't see her going out with him if that's how he acted towards her. I suppose they could have gone out and broken up before that scene, but that's not the vibe I got.

Also, while I think it's possible Petunia's a squib, I don't know how that would fit with her comment about how everyone was so excited to have a witch in the family, as if it were an unusal occurance. (I think she says that in OotP.)

I think the half-blood prince is Hagrid, who had quite a large role (no pun intended) in CoS.

t /just reread the whole series recently

I'm also frighteningly convinced by that Ron is Dumbledore argument.

So you're saying that Ron is subletting from Dumbledore?

I fear her characters have grown beyond her ability to write them well.

Yes, this. But I also think she's got a limited fictional worldview. She's very impatient with fans who want there to be more to Draco than Evil Evil Kid. I can certainly see saying "Don't have a crush on Draco, he's not like the actor." But she's also saying that it's disturbing that people want to be Slytherins; that means that in her mind it's perfectly natural to have one house for Evil People.

It just doesn't make sense, dammit. Why would you tolerate several hundred years of a public school one-quarter of whose population are doomed to dress well and cackle a lot?