Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (novel)/Fridge

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Fridge Brilliance

  • Although I've always loved Deathly Hallows, no matter how many times I read it in the months after it came out, I never understood all the convoluted, complicated explanations of Harry's and Voldemort's connection—why Voldemort had to kill him for Dumbledore's plan to work, how Harry survived his "death" in the forest, could only Harry kill Voldemort only because of the prophecy, and was it entirely a Self-Fulfilling Prophecy... after nearly frying my brain trying to understand, I decided to give up, and accept "Harry came Back from the Dead and A Wizard Did It" without letting it detract from my enjoyment of the rest of the series. Upon reading Book 7 for the first time in a few years, I understood it all with no effort! What had changed in the interim? I had watched Gargoyles! I read Dumbledore's explanation of how Voldemort using Harry's blood to resurrect himself linked Harry to him in such a way so that Harry would live because Voldemort lived as if for the first time, only this time, I thought, "Just like Demona and MacBeth!" Furthermore, I could now see that Harry's "death" was just like all the times Demona or MacBeth had been "killed temporarily." Someone only able to die if killed by a certain person? Nothing weird about that anymore. It's enough to make me wonder if J. K. Rowling ever watched that show...
    • Harry couldn't have lost a part of his soul, because only the most destructive and evil of acts (killing another person) splits your soul in half. When did Harry find time to kill someone? He didn't, so therefore his soul was still intact. The blood wasn't a symbol of Harry's soul, it was the power in the blood itself the ol' Voldy was after (Lily's protection).
  • I've realized that Ginny is the most logical person for Harry to marry. A somewhat important subplot in the books is Harry's relationship with the Weasleys, to the point where they might as while be his family. If Harry had married somebody else, he wouldn't be part of the Weasely family anymore, and that connection would be lost. -Redtutel
  • You have to admire Rowling's strategy when it comes to explaining Harry's rebirth - she pulls it off by creating a situation that probably had never, ever happened before in the history of wizardkind. Nobody could possibly know what would happen when one human being first made five Horcruxes (which no one had ever done before) and THEN made another human being a human Horcrux (which had never happened before) and THEN tried and failed to kill that human Horcrux (with a curse that had never failed to be fatal before) and THEN used that human Horcrux's blood in a resurrection spell, and THEN tried to kill that human Horcrux again with that same spell, and failed again, and THEN joined with that human Horcrux through a paired-wand bond, and THEN tried to kill that human Horcrux a third time, with the same spell, while that human Horcrux was in possession (theoretically at least) of all three of the Deathly Hallows. I mean, you couldn't do a spell like that on purpose if you tried. It had to be a wholly unique event.
    • You got your order wrong, and there are more things. The order would be first making 5 Horcruxes, THEN offering a woman to spare her if she allowed him to kill her child (which he had never done before), THEN killing that woman (placing Harry under the blood protection), THEN trying to kill that child with a curse that had never failed before, THEN having his soul spontaneously split when the spell rebounded, THEN the part of the soul that split away taking refuge into the nearest living being (Harry), THEN the still free soul possessing another man and fighting with the living vessel and being defeated, THEN using the human Horcrux's blood in a resurrection ritual, THEN trying to kill the human Horcrux again with the same spell that failed before, THEN joined with that human Horcrux through a paired-wand bond in which he was determined to be the weaker one, THEN trying to kill that human Horcrux a third time, THEN possessing him, THEN using another person's wand to try to avoid the paired-wand bond and failing as the other person's wand breaks, THEN trying to kill that human Horcrux as he attempts to do a Heroic Sacrifice to save his friends, THEN having that human Horcrux survive AGAIN, and finally trying to kill him AGAIN by using a wand that has been said many times to be unable to fight against its owner. All in all, a VERY long chain of events that are very unlikely to be repeated in the same form ever again.
      • To spare everyone another even longer paragraph, I'll add in that Voldy didn't only take the blood of a horcrux and someone destined to be his equal: he took in Lily's protection. Word of God says that Lily's goodness was in Voldy's veins, and that's how he could've repented.
    • Um, Quirrell, anybody? While the whole "Harry kills Quirrell" is far more ambiguous in the book than it is in the movie, it is pretty much evident that Quirrell died pretty much directly because of Harry. Voldemort leaving just sealed the deal. While it is usually claimed that such a split only occurs through murder (which Harry's killing/moral wounding of Quirrell is most assuredly not), who is to say that is true? Turtler.
      • Actually, Dumbledore does explain that Snape killing him won't harm Snape's soul because Snape is actually putting Dumbledore out of his misery by mercy-killing him. So, there is at least one instance where simply killing someone is different from "murdering" them. Though, if the intent is the catalyst, what about when Harry uses the Cruciatus Curse on Bellatrix Lestrange? He certainly intended to torture and possibly kill her, though he lacked the purity (admittedly, pure evil) of mind to do so.
      • It is not just murder, but cold-blooded murder, as in killing someone who either can't defend him/herself from you or who is weaker than you. What Harry was doing was attempting to defend himself from Quirrell, and the book makes it clear that what Harry was doing to Quirrell was just burning his skin. The one who killed Quirrell was Voldemort when he left his body. The example about Dumbledore being mercy-killed by Snape is a good one. And what Harry intended to do to Bellatrix Lestrange was to make her suffer like he was suffering, but, as he discovered, righteous anger isn't enough.
  • I just got the rest of the symbolism of the wands. Thinking about the thestral tail hair in the Elder Wand. I got that Voldemort's wand was made of Yew, the whole "death tree symbolism", but his and Harry's wands were connected by the same phoenix, the bird of rebirth - the whole "horcruxes of each other" thing, with the core being the same phoenix and all - connected, and Harry's wand was made of Holly, connected to rebirth in several mythologies, including Christianity, to mirror Voldemort's wand. Because even though they both come back, Harry's the one who ultimately lives. I hadn't realized that it was so intricately connected like that until just now.
    • Going into that a little more, this troper realized the significance between the shared phoenix core: phoenix are famous for their immortality and ability to always be reborn. According to Harry and Rowling herself, Voldemort always had the chance to feel remorse for what he did and be reborn in a manner of speaking. He considered that a stupid idea, though, and never seriously considered it, just like he considered his wand useless and discarded it. Harry's love for his holly wand and rebirth at the end of DH, on the other hand, showed his willingness to change and acceptance that there were things in the world he couldn't control or understand. The fact that both phoenix tails came from Fawkes (Dumbledore's pet) is also symbolic of how Riddle and Harry both saw Hogwarts as their true home!
    • Rowling definitely did her research when it came to wands: Lily Potter's wand was made of willow, which is traditionally associated with healing, protection and love. Her last act on Earth was to give her son the protection of her love. Also Elder (sometimes known as witchwood) is linked magically to protection, often against lightning strike, but bad luck will fall on anyone who uses it without permission. In other words, Voldemort's use of a wand that wasn't strictly his brought about his death via a certain young man with a lightning scar...
  • Sure, it was easy enough to accept that Snape hated Neville because he was a Gryffindor, he was incompetent, and he was available, but it wasn't until some time after reading Deathly Hallows that I figured out that his particular hatred for Neville was due to his belief that if Neville had been the Chosen One named in the prophecy - that if Voldemort had decided to attack the Longbottoms instead of the Potters - Lily would still be alive.
  • After reading the seventh book, I understood Snape's hatred for Harry in a different light. Not only did Harry have his mother's eyes and look like his father (reinforcing the bond they had and the fact that Snape would never see Lily again), but he also might have been Snape's son in a different world. Hard to be friends with a kid like that.
  • If you read "The Prince's Tale" with the mindset of "Snape views Dumbledore as a father figure" (which, considering Snape's real father, is not that far-fetched of an assumption), it adds a whole new dimension to Snape's resentment of Harry: Snape is very much the "Well Done, Son" Guy, constantly putting his life on the line for Dumbledore and doing everything he asks, which condemns him to a life of being hated by the entire Wizarding World when he kills Dumbledore, while Harry (in Snape's mind) will do much of the same and be worshipped by the Wizarding World, because everyone wants to see Voldemort killed. (Unfortunately, this makes Dumbledore seem pretty cold and even more manipulative than he already is, because it reads as though he deliberately took advantage of Snape's desperation for approval by a father-figure and tormented him with it.)
  • Chew on this. After reading Deathly Hallows, I could not understand why, if Snape cared so much about keeping Harry safe, why he tried so hard to get him expelled (he'd be more vulnerable in the regular world), keep his grades low (can't defend himself if he doesn't learn anything), and belittle him constantly. Then I realized that he was trying to minimize or eliminate the threat Harry posed to Voldy, as that would make Voldy more likely to just leave it. -- 72.240.206.0
  • One that occurred to me involving Snape is that given that both are Muggle-borns and teen geniuses, Snape's nasty treatment of Hermione might not be just because he's a jerkass, but also because she reminds him of Lily, and he's probably angered by her friendship with Harry (who, of course, reminds him of James Potter).
  • On this very website, there seems to be a whole lot of people not understanding why Snape is obsessed with Lily, why he didn't just "move on" after she told him she wanted nothing more to do with him. If I may, I shall take this opportunity to present the "Snape moved on" sequence of events: Snape learns that Voldemort is going after the Potters. Snape does nothing. Since he doesn't love Lily anymore, he doesn't beg Voldemort for her life, meaning that Lily doesn't get the opportunity to "stand aside". This, in turn, renders her sacrifice worthless; after all, her fate is sealed. So, RIP Harry Potter: July 31, 1980 - October 31, 1981. Without Snape's creepy obsession with Lily, there is no story. So, Tropers... Still think Snape should have just "moved on"? - tenderlumpling
    • It's true that if Snape hadn't loved Lily, the story wouldn't have happened... but that in no way means that seeing his love as obsessive or non-creepy is a wrong or invalid view.
      • Wait.. Wouldn't Lily still have sacrificed herself to protect Harry, even without Snape's intervention? Harry sacrificed himself to protect everyone, without Voldemort offering to spare him.
      • The idea is that, for that to work, you actually have to be given the chance to step aside. Harry could have easily run away and leave all of his friends to die, but instead chose to sacrifice himself and die. The thing here is about choice: if Snape hadn't begged Voldemort to spare Lily, Voldemort wouldn't have given her the choice to step aside, and thus Lily's death has no chance to choose to sacrifice herself for her son.
  • This one occured to me after re-reading the seventh book. Take a good look at the prophecy lines "marked as his equal" and "has power he knows not". First, consider that Harry was a Horcrux, which meant he couldn't kill Voldemort without dying first, whereas Voldemort clearly had no such restriction... making them not necessarily equals. Secondly, due to Voldemort's obsessive belief that Harry was the chosen one, it meant that he disregarded most everyone else's abilities as irrelevant. Now look at Neville, who 1) would be free to defeat Voldemort without dying, and 2) clearly not deemed as important to Voldemort, would possess abilities which Voldemort did not know what they were. In short, up until the very end, it was still up in the air exactly whom the prophecy applied to.
    • Except Harry's scar, the attack by Voldemort, is what marked Harry as his equal. Also, Harry survived the killing curse because Voldemort was protecting Harry with his mother's blood, just as Harry was protecting Voldemort as a Horcrux. The whole reason Dumbledore wanted Harry to sacrifice himself was because the first one to "die" would retain their protection, while the "survivor" lost theirs.
  • JUST came to this thought after rereading Deathly Hallows. (being put in spoilers just in case.) In the epilogue, Harry's son is worried that he'll be in Slytherin. His name is Albus Severus Potter, making his initials A.S.P. Therefore, it would actually be quite appropriate for him to be in Slytherin. Stealth Pun?
    • As noted by others, an asp is a kind of snake. A.S.P could also stand for A Slytherin Potter.
    • One more thing about Al's name: which one of Harry's kids is named after Severus Snape? The one with Lily's Eyes!
  • Also regarding Albus Severus and his initials... being Harry's kid, he might be a Parseltongue.
    • No, Harry was only a Parseltongue due to the fragment of Voldemort's soul attached to his. I seem to recall something about Harry having lost the ability after that fragment was destroyed.
      • Yes, that was Word of God, although I can't remember where she said it... An interview somewhere.
  • This one only took a chapter or two to hit me (if that), but it's still the same type of hidden bonus justification. Snape's last words are "look at me", directed at Harry. He wants the last thing he sees to be Lily's eyes. *sniffle*
    • That was Fridge Horror for me. Yes, I saw it as moving at first, but then I remembered that Snape is staring lovingly into the teenaged son of his crush. He's staring at Harry as he would stare at Lilly. Ew...
    • My friend helped me realize this one AND took it a step further: Not only is he staring into "her" eyes...in his mind her eyes are all he needs to be with her. He's dying, finally happy, in the arms of the only woman he ever loved. Double *sniffle*...
    • This is even quite explicit in the movie version, wherein Snape's dialogue has been extended by one sentence: "You have the eyes of your mother."
    • There's another way to interpret this: when I read it in the book, the intonation in my head was different to that in the movie. It was more like he was asking Harry to really look at/into "him", as in finally see his true intentions and secrets, by seeing his memories. The movie clears up the ambiguity, but I like that it can be read both ways.
    • Best way of all to interpret it could be both: he wanted Harry to see the truth of what he'd been trying to achieve, so he could die while looking into Lily's eyes and seeing forgiveness in them.
  • I realized something about Deathly Hallows and its long stretches of the protagonists camping out while on the run. Rowling likes to borrow from somewhat obscure English popular fiction (such as the school story), and it occurred to me that this kind of setting/plot is a lot like The Thirty-Nine Steps and Rogue Male - same idea of a sinister force threatening England in a Day of the Jackboot way and camping while on the run.-
  • In Deathly Hallows, did anyone else catch the subtlety of the exact moment that Harry reveals himself to be alive in the Great Hall toward the end of the battle? It was right as Molly Weasley killed Bellatrix. Then Voldemort stopped fighting McGonagall, Kingsley, and Slughorn and turned toward Molly. Of all the friends he had fighting in the battle, why stop the battle to help Molly? Consider Order of the Phoenix, where Molly tells Sirius that Harry is "as good as" a son to her. When Harry sees Molly's boggart, it is flashing through images of her dead sons... and Harry is included. And, finally, in the beginning of Deathly Hallows, the gift of the watch. Because he was powerless to do so seventeen years ago, Harry is protecting the only mother he has ever known. - Spitfire71
  • Another one: Ron mentioned in Deathly Hallows that Voldemort had made his own name taboo—that is, if anyone said it, it would automatically dispatch the Snatchers, who would then rough them up (or, if it turned out to be Harry, turn his ass in). I thought it was brilliant from the get-go, but it took me a bit more time to unravel just HOW brilliant it was. He not only finds a way to separate Harry from everyone else (because he knows Harry's one of the few who has the balls to say the name), he also mocks Harry's (and by extension Dumbledore's) bravery. He wants to keep the wizarding world in a constant state of fear, and creating such an intense fear of his name alone is, in my opinion, sheer, terrifying genius. We're often told that Voldemort is super intelligent and super evil, but details like this really show it. -Maiira
    • Also points out some logical failure from the protagonists. If they really wanted to be as brave as Dumbledore, they'd have called him Tom Riddle, the name he was born with, not the trumped up title he gave himself. -Meiriona
      • Funnily enough, your statement just gave me a Fridge Brilliance moment. There's a difference between being brave and being fearless - Harry and company called him Voldemort to display that his fear tactics wouldn't hold them back. However, they were still afraid of his power and brutality, and rightfully so. Dumbledore was the only one who called him Tom, because as a powerful wizard in his own right and someone who nearly became evil due to the Deathly Hallows, he looks past the mass murders and all the power to see, underneath, just a man who he holds in contempt and pity. Plus, Harry actually does call him Tom Riddle - in their very final battle. This is after Harry sacrificed himself and had his talk with Dumbledore in the world between life and death. There, Dumbledore explains that since Harry had ownership of all three items, but more importantly had come to terms with his own mortality, he was the Master of Death. Harry didn't just call Voldemort "Tom Riddle" to mock him or to emulate Dumbledore, it was because he had completely overcome his fear of dying at Voldemort's hand and had completely surpassed the Dark Lord (and more importantly was on an equal level with Dumbledore, one might say). That little change signifies Harry's final step in his journey to become the great heroic wizard Dumbledore knew he could be. -
  • Unmarked Deathly Hallows Spoilers: In the seventh book, there comes a time when Voldemort is calling for Harry to be given up, and then no one will get hurt. Pansy steps up to say Harry should be given to Voldemort, and not one of the Slytherins stands against her. Now, some people see this as a DMoS for Jo, and she could have shown that Slytherin's aren't all evil and had some stand up for Harry, etc. But—how many of the Slytherins knew where their parents were? Their family members? Their loved ones? How many Slytherins had people they cared for with Voldemort, and potentially in danger if they helped the 'good guys'? It's actually really sad for them, because they don't necessarily know if it's safe for their families if they decide to step up for Harry, so they don't, whereas the other houses don't have that same stigma attached! /End Spoilers
    • However, Jo has said that some Slytherins came back, which is a fridge moment in and of itself. The two houses that had the most people stay were Gryffindor (duh, loyalty and bravery) and Hufflepuff (loyalty and hard work). That leaves Slytherin and Ravenclaw—the house of the cunning and the intelligent, respectively. The Slytherins and Ravenclaws were being disloyal, but they were smart enough to realize that there was no way that Hogwarts students and the tiny Order of the Phoenix fighters could defeat Voldemort, who had taken over England at that point. Some, if not all, of those students came back with Slughorn at the end of the battle!
  • We find out in the epilogue of Deathly Hallows that Neville became the herbology professor at Hogwarts. However, Word of God stated that he served briefly as an auror. Although he proved in the books to be adept at both herbology and auror-ing, I thought this was a bit of a strange career change to make. Then I realized it would make perfect sense if he ever found out his wife Hannah was pregnant—Neville was probably worried about being in such a high-risk profession, not out of fear for his own safety, but because he didn't want his kids to grow up without a father the way he had to.
  • In Deathly Hallows, Ron is disguised as a ministry worker whose wife is a Muggleborn on trial, and as we all know, Ron later marries Hermione, who is a Muggleborn. No wonder it hits him so hard; he's in love with Hermione, and this parallel just brings it right home, reminding him of how much danger she's in just because of her blood status.
    • It's even stronger in the movie.
  • There was that whole stink about Moral Dissonance regarding Dumbledore training Harry to, essentially, kill him because of his Horcrux. But think about it... when did this training start? Book 5. What happened in book 4? The resurrection ritual, where Voldemort took Harry's blood. And there was a gleam of "something like triumph" in Dumbledore's eyes when Harry told him about it. Dumbledore only began training Harry when it became clear that Voldemort had made it impossible to kill Harry without killing himself, and Harry had a chance to "go back" and survive dying!
  • Harry's ultimate plan for the Elder Wand was to put it back where it was, and die a natural death undefeated in order to break its power. On the surface, and given Word of God that he becomes an Auror, this seems like a bad plan. But then it hit me -- the Elder Wand's ownership passes from one owner to the other upon the first person's defeat or murder. The opponent doesn't even need to know what they'd done, as proven by both Harry and Malfoy doing it by accident. So in the event that Harry is ever defeated, possession would go to that person, and if that person were defeated, it would go to whoever beat him, and so on and so on until the Elder Wand's power is effectively broken by the simple fact that nobody knows who's supposed to be using the thing.
  • When Dumbledore leaves Harry the sword of Gryffindor in his will, I finally realized that Dumbledore knew Harry couldn't get it from his will, and that Harry would remember that the imbibed sword could kill Horcruxes. By putting it in his will and not letting Harry get to it, he was able to make Harry want to get it by making him believe that it was truly his, and then with the thoughts of getting the word filling up his mind, he would remember that one fight in the Chamber of Secrets, and then remember that he can kill Horcruxes now. When the trio was lamenting about how they weren't very close to killing the Horcruxes as they were to finding them, they actually were getting closer by aiming to get the sword! OH, DUMBLEDORE!
  • The deaths of Voldemort, Snape, and Harry mirror that of the brothers in "The Tale of the Three Brothers" perfectly, right down to age order: The eldest, Voldemort, died because of power. The second, Snape, died for lost love. And the youngest, Harry, greeted Death like an old friend, willing and ready.
  • Grindelwald's sign / the symbol of the Deathy Hallows being worn by Xenophilius (in a completely innocent gesture that nonetheless greatly offends) directly parallels the way Swastikas are treated by the public today.
    • It also parallels the way fundie nutjobs have treated the entire Harry Potter series since the beginning - there are webpages out there dedicated to "proving" how everything in the books is really an evil Nazi and/or Satanic symbol. In many ways, Xenophilius Lovegood seems like a Take That to anti-Harry Potter and anti-witchcraft conspiracy nuts out there.
  • Lily's patronus is a doe. What famous deer do we know who died while her son watched?
    • On the same note; Lily's patronus was a female deer, without the antlers. James' patronus was a deer with antlers; therefor a male deer and the natural couterpart to Lily's deer. Snape's patronus was a deer without antlers; he loved her, symbolized by the same deer Lily had, but he could not be her natural counterpart, as James was.
      • No, Snape's patronus was a doe, the same as Lily's, to signify that the unrequited love he had for her was so strong his patronus matched hers.
  • During the sequence where Harry travels through Snape's memories, there's a scene where Snape asks Dumbledore why he destroyed the ring before calling him, and whether he thought destroying it might stop the curse. Dumbledore just sort of halfheartedly agreed to it. But since when has Dumbledore been mistaken about magic? No, the real reason he waited to call Snape was to destroy the Horcrux! The Sword of Gryffindor can only be used when it is needed or when the wielder has proven themselves worthy of the blade, and there's no evidence that Dumbledore ever proved he had the particular type of bravery needed to wield the sword—remember, while he was certainly brave, he was never the same kind of brave as Harry, Ron, or Neville; he was a genius, never put into a situation beyond his ability to handle, and in situations that were beyond his control, he seemed accepting, rather than defiant. So he had to take the blade because he needed to destroy this source of evil before he died. If he had waited for Snape to stop the curse, the condition of "need" would no longer have applied, and he couldn't have destroyed the Horcrux!
  • The deaths of Lupin and Tonks directly paralleled those of James and Lily - both couples died because of Voldemort; both left a young son that was raised by a maternal relative; both women initially weren't supposed to die (Snape begged Voldemort to let Lily live; Tonks was initially at home with Teddy before she left to fight in the war); both fathers were Marauders. However, Harry was raised by people that did not act as his family, whereas Teddy was raised by people who loved him as one of their own, leaving him happier and safer through his childhood, showing that the loss of his parents did not mean the loss of a family, as it initially did with Harry.
  • When Ron is given the Deluminator by Dumbledore in his will, one could think at first it is a sort of condescending gesture towards the supposedly least successful member of the Trio. Soon, he finds the Mundane Utility of the artifact, because turning off the lights can be useful in many situations. But then Ron discovers that it can be used to find his friends. Ron supposes that it is because Dumbledore thought he would leave his friends, but Harry sets him right: it's because he knew that he would come back. Then, when you realize that Dumbledore knows very well what can happen when you make a bad choice in anger and are unable to go back on it, and gave Ron the Deluminator to make sure that he didn't find himself in the same situation Dumbledore was so many years ago. - Milarqui
  • This occurred to me when rereading the scene where Harry enters Voldemort's camp in the woods to allow himself to be killed. Before Harry reveals himself, Voldemort seems extremely solemn, almost disappointed, that Harry hasn't shown up, whispering "I thought he would come ... I expected him to come". The odd thing is that Voldemort has spent the last three books basically calling Harry a Dirty Coward who lets everyone sacrifice themselves for him, so why would he expect Harry to willingly walk to the slaughter, and why such disappointment? But consider how Voldemort "sees death as a shameful human weakness", something all mere humans must inevitably submit to—exactly the idea that terrifies Voldemort, which he tries to rebel against. Proving himself mightier than death is how Voldemort (described plenty of times as a classic malignant narcissist) makes himself greater than any mere human, proving that he alone stands above human weakness. So if the cowardly little boy also has the strength to resist the call of death and not go humbly to the slaughter, it means Voldemort isn't standing above anyone. His narcissism is deflated and leaves him only as human as anyone else ... Voldemort's worst fear.
  • OK, so Voldemort planned to make his sixth and final horcrux by killing Harry as a baby. But, what object did he bring with him to use? Nagini, who eventually did become the last horcrux, is never indicated to be with him. My personal theory? He was going to make his wand a horcrux, thinking to link its power with him even closer.
  • This came to me while reading through the TV Tropes pages on Harry Potter, on 10/19/2011. Somehow, in the years since I read the first one (what is it, 7, 8 years now?) I forgot that the murder of the Potters and Voldemort's first downfall happened on Halloween, also known as All Hallows Eve. Deathly Hallows?
    • "Hallows" just means something sacred or "hallowed". Having said that, you have a point about the date they died; All Hallows' Eve is said to be the night when the veil between our world and the other is thinnest, so spirits can travel more freely - perhaps foreshadowing that the four people who had the Killing Curse turned or rebounded on them that night would all come back in their own ways ( James and Lily return in spirit form in Books Four and Seven, Harry literally comes back, and Christ knows Voldemort can't seem to stay dead).
  • Saving Malfoy from The Fiendfyre in Room of Requirement. Knowing that Malfoy was a total jerk in the series, Harry's decision to save him was not convincing for Harry's goodness was not a satisfying enough reason. Then, looking past, during the Malfoy Manor, Malfoy's failure to confirm Harry Potter was technically saving Harry's life so it becomes more like I.O.U for saving Harry's life. Malfoy's incompetence as a death eater saved a crucial plot point.
  • I didn't realize this until just about my fourth reread of book seven. It may or may not be deliberate, but at the beginning of the book George loses one ear. One part of an identical set. Then, near the end, Fred dies in battle. Again, one part of an identical set. The idea that JK was foreshadowing the latter in such a subtle fashion blew my mind a little. I hope that was deliberate, because it's an amazing touch if it was.
  • Voldemort's closeness with Nagini seems a little unusual, given that he's a narcisstic, sociopathic megalomaniac. But then you realize: As a Horcrux, Nagini is an extension of Voldemort. Nagini is Voldemort. Thus, when showing closeness with Nagini, Voldemort is showing closeness with... himself. -

Fridge Horror

  • If Voldemort actually won, the wizarding world wouldn't be the only place in danger, considering his hatred of Muggles and half-blood types. If left unchecked he honestly may have attempted to take out everyone on the planet that wasn't in tune with what he wanted. Genocide on a mass scale. Also, if you remember Ron telling Harry, Hermione and Hagrid that if wizards didn't marry Muggles, that they would die out, well...let's just say Voldemort would have probably doomed the human race to near-extinction.
    • Rowlings word remains. Gun beats wand. If he attempted open warfare, he would have to face the British army, followed by every other army that felt threatened by him. Openly declaring war on Muggles would have been a very bad idea, and there is no way he couldn't have known that. He would have been subtle about it, but a genocide wouldn't have been possible at all.
      • Gun beats wand, yes, but wizards have the upper hand in stealth and can teleport with ease. They don't even need to fight a war. Kill off farmers, blight crops, poison drinking water - all incredibly easy to do if you have magic at your disposal.
      • Oh, geez. And never mind what would happen if wizards got a hold of modern weapons and found a way to harness them with magic. Note that most small arms still aren't computerized - hence, they wouldn't be incompatible with magic. Picture the British (or any other) Army marching down the street, when they're suddenly faced with a full squadron's worth of machine guns that are firing, but don't have anyone there physically pulling the trigger. Levitating a gun in place and using some sort of telekinesis spell to fire the gun without presenting a clear target for the enemy to shoot would probably be no object for a decently powerful wizard. Hell, they learn the levitation spell about a month or two into their education.
  • When rewatching Deathly Hallows Part 1, I braced myself for the scene at Bagshot's house. I was prepared for the bloody room Hermione finds and Nagini inside of Bathilda but it took me a while to realize why what Hermione finds is so horrifying. Killing with Avada Kedavra doesn't leave any blood, so what Hermione saw was likely the aftermath of Voldemort flaying Bathilda so Nagini could hide in the skin. And since nobody knew precisely when Harry was going to head to Godric's Hollow, that body could have been decomposing for months. Perhaps a bit obvious to most viewers, but it took me a while to realize all the ramifications.
  • Harry nearly had his soul sucked out by a dementor at the end oc Prisoner of Azkaban (when he and Sirius are at the lake and a bunch of dementors are around, one dementor lowers his hood and is about to give Harry the kiss when the time-turnter Harry comes with the patronus. If Time-Harry hadn't come he would of lost his soul. This thought only gave me shivers until I got to the end of Deathly Hallows and found out that part of Voldemort's soul was in Harry the entire time. If the dementor had taken Harry's soul in PoA Voldemort's would probably still be in there. Harry would then become a second Voldemort. -bookaddict
    • Doubtful. The dementor would probably have eaten the extra soul fragment as well.
  • In The Deathly Hallows, Luna is kidnapped and kept at Malfoy Manor for months! Considering that Bellatrix and Greyback (a sadistic Complete Monster and a child rapist + cannibal) had took residence there, imagine what she must have been through.
    • Hmmm, they couldn't have really done much to her because they promised Xeno she would be safe as long as he published journalism against Harry. But if Xenophilius refused to obey...
      • Also, Luna is pure-blood so Bellatrix wouldn't really have much to say about her. The things Greyback would have done to her, however, are too horrible for words, especially since she's so innocent.
        • Luna may have been a pure-blood, but so was Neville. So were Frank and Alice Longbottom. So was Sirius. They would have been seen as blood traitors in Bellatrix's eyes, just like Luna.
      • And Greyback was traveling with the other Snatchers hunting Muggle-borns down, so he couldn't have been at the Manor there for long periods of time.
  • When Dolores Umbridge resurfaces in Book 7, she is seen with several fully corporeal Patronuses. Now, as Book 3 stated over and over again, the basis for creating a corporeal Patronus is a fair bit of magical power combined with thinking happy thoughts. So Umbridge, being the evil Witch with a Capital B that she was (pun completely intended), got her Patronus-jollies from sentencing people to A Fate Worse Than Death. Voldemort might have been the most powerful dark wizard, but Umbridge just on the strength of her pure sadism was a villainous Badass Normal.
  • In Deathly Hallows, Harry successfully casts Crucio on a Death Eater. Think about what this means. The spell causes pain of a magnitude so great that enough time under it can drive the victim into permanent insanity. According to the text, you have to sincerely want to cause another person this amount of pain in order for the spell to work. And you have to go on wanting it while you watch your victim writhing on the floor and shrieking in mind-shattering agony. Harry's only response after casting it successfully is to murmur, "Bellatrix was right. You have to really mean it." Brrrrr.
    • To be fair, he had recently learned that Hogwarts had basically been turned into a concentration camp, and that the Death Eater he was Crucying and his sister had been using that same curse to torture the children they were supposed to be teaching; when Carrow said he was going to blame some kids and put them at Voldemort's (nonexistent) mercy to save their own asses, Harry snapped. And he didn't keep the curse on Carrow for any length of time; he just threw him across the room.
    • Actually, this could be a case of misunderstood Fridge Brilliance in disguise. Harry knocks Carrow through the air, whereupon the death eater falls unconscious. Crucio very clearly doesn't knock people unconscious, or even send them flying—just the pain. So in saying that you "really have to mean it," Harry might be acknowledging the fact that he didn't actually cast the curse successfully, and doesn't have it in him to do so, even when presented with such an obvious and available symbol of everything he hates.
  • The Fate of Umbridge. Harry knocks her out, extinguishing her Patronus, and leaves her, unconscious, in a room full of Dementors.
    • Word of God said that she ended up convicted for crimes against muggle-borns and locked in Azkaban, so it should be assumed that she survived that, soul intact.
      • Of course, as a candidate for most despicable fictional character of all time, falling prey to the Dementors' Kiss would have been a well-deserved fate for her. Assuming she had a soul to be sucked out by the dementors in the first place.
  • This is more of a Fridge Tear Jerker, but by the end of Deathly Hallows Andromeda Tonks has lost both her husband and her daughter in the space of a few months. Poor thing.
    • Word of God says it was her own sister, Bellatrix, that murdered her daughter.
  • What happened to Dumbledore's sister decades before the time the story is set? We are just told that when she was a small child, too young to have any control over her magic, some muggle boys saw her doing magic and were very frightened. So they "wanted to make her feel powerless" in retaliation -- Details of what they did are not given, but it left her permanently and severely psychologically damaged. Implication made even worse by how young she was.
    • And to add to that, Dumbledore's father was sent to Azkaban for going after those boys after they attacked her.
  • When you are a kid the fact that Slytherins are bad people is easy to accept. But when you grow up you realize that 25% of the school population are seen as evil by everyone else from their 11th birthday. No surprise that Voldemort had so many followers there : they probably don't have anyone else.
    • Even Dumbledore is horrible to them, pretending they won the cup in the first book before giving it to Gryffindor, and explaining to Harry not that "being Slytherin would have been alright" but that "what matters is that he choose not to become one". And let's not forget that in the 7th book McGonagall sent them all to the dungeons because of one of them (Pansy Parkinson).
      • No she didn't. She told them to leave the School because she couldn't trust them, which isn't too out there really. A lot of them must have had parents or relatives among the Death Eaters, and the entire school was united against them because of years of institutional bias, and one of them had just said that they should hand over the almost-literal Messiah.
  • In Deathly Hallows part 2, during The Prince's Tale, you see Snape go to the Potter's house and cry over Lily's dead body. You see baby Harry crying in his crib in the background. in the movies, Hagrid is still the one that brings Harry to the Dursleys. That means that Snape had come and gone before Hagrid got there, and he made no effort to take Harry to safety or anything. It really makes you question if Snape actually cares about Harry.
    • He didn't. If Voldemort had killed Harry and James and left Lily alone, Snape wouldn't have had the Heel Face Turn in the first place.
      • Wouldn't having a (as far as anyone except Dumbledore knew) Death Eater bring Harry to the Dursley's be rather suspicious to everyone else?
        • That isn't even getting into the strong possibility that Snape hit the Despair Event Horizon and never recovered. He had heel realization but does he ever seem happy? Its possible he simply wanted to distance himself from the son of the person he loved who he helped kill.
        • Indeed, he may have felt at the time that he didn't have the right to have anything to do with the child he'd just helped to orphan: not after he'd failed Harry's mother so terribly. How he justify staying near the only thing that was left of the woman he'd loved?
  • Moody's body must have been discovered by agents of the Ministry, as his eye turns up on Umbridge's door. He never has a funeral, however, as the Ministry doesn't want the public to know it's lost one of its most formidable Aurors. Just days later, the Ministry falls under Voldemort's control, when Mad-Eye's corpse is probably still being held in a Ministry-run morgue. We know the bad guys make use of Inferi...

Fridge Logic

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