The Order of the Phoenix Re-Read: Chapter 10

[slowfox]

Y'know, I'm surprised that Sirius is depicted as being stir-crazy as he is, since he obviously managed to stick 12 years at Azkaban, and he can't have been at Grimmauld Place that long, really. 'twas certainly a risk, though, going out into the world as Padfoot, since Wormtail would surely have revealed his Animagus form to the Death Eaters.

I'd initially thought that Ginny called Luna by her proper name constantly, but clearly not, since she refers to her as 'Loony' from the outset. I'm a bit disappointed in Ginny for that, although it does tally with her calling Fleur 'Phlegm' later on in the series.

Luna's introduction bothered me on the first read: here was this brand new character being foisted upon us, and there was a very deep fear that she might prove to be a MarySue type character, but this time in fanon. However, I definitely warmed to Luna through books V and VI, to the extent that I now think she's awesome, so I was looking forward to her introduction this time 'round, but again find myself a bit underwhelmed by her.

OTOH, I do like that Cho seeked out Harry on the Hogwarts Express, even if it didn't end up being fantastic timing from Harry's perspective. GoF demonstrated that Cho didn't necessarily follow everyone else's lead when it came to opinions of Harry, and even though I had divined that Harry's true partner was Parvati^* by the time OotP was published, I do like PoA/GoF Cho.


"Well, there are two fifth-year prefects from each house," said Hermione...

Sometimes you really have to wonder about JKR: unless Harry has the observational faculties of a stupefied hamster, he would surely by now have known that prefects were drawn in pairs from each house's fifth-years. This seems to me to be one of the classic cases of using characters to deliver exposition so that she doesn't lose her Harry!PoV in the telling of the tale. But it just seems a little... forced.

And this extends to the other prefects' names. The Slytherin ferret is, of course, just 'Malfoy', and although we could've got away with 'Parkinson' for his counterpart, it seems appropriate that Hermione uses her full-name. I do think some of Ron's rubbing off on Hermione with the "thicker than a concussed troll..." remark, though :-)

Anyway, it seems a little... over formal to refer to Ernie and Hannah by their full names. How many fifth year Ernie's or MacMillans can there be at Hogwarts? Surely Ron'd just say 'Macmillan'? And I highly doubt that there's more than one Padma at Hogwarts, so the 'Patil' does seem superfluous.

However, having picked holes in the dialogue, I have to say that this was brilliant:

SIRIUS - BLACK AS HE'S PAINTED?
Notorius mass murderer or innocent singing sensation?

Like Harry, I too had to read that sentence more than once to make sure I was following the thread. The Quibbler is deliciously loopy.

Malfoy hints that they were aware that Sirius was with Harry on the platform. Quite what they (The Bad Guys) can do with that information we don't know - presumably Sirius is safe enough whilst he remains inside an Unplottable location? But it does hint that Malfoy's privy to some of the Death Eater's deliberations (I do wonder if, deep down, Draco had as miserable a summer as Harry did, not being allowed to attend the Death Eaters' meetings and so on...)

No Hagrid to collect the first years. Quite why Harry was surprised when, again, just about every single fifth year fic out there has Hagrid still away in France on Official Hogwarts Business, I have no idea. I'm a bit surprised that they all seem so taken aback by his absence, though.

And finally, the chapter closes with the Thestrals - at this point, all that we know is that Harry and Luna can both see them, and that Ron can't. We learn later that Neville can see them, but even though he was in the same carriage as Harry, Ginny and Luna, they seem to have become separated between the Hogwarts Express and the 'horseless' carriages.



* and you think I'm joking...

Comments

[slowfox]

I'm probably being unbelievably picky there, of course :-) And they're her characters in the end, so she can fully declare what's 'natural' and what isn't - but it just struck me as being... overly formal speech. But then again, since it was possibly the first time either Ernie or Hannah had been mentioned in this instalment, JKR probably wanted to include the full name for readers either late to the series, or those who aren't so obsessive might not have committed to memory the names of all the students in Harry's year.