Lupin and the Full Moon

[Amy Z]

No: HPFGUIDX 17705

Gwen wrote:

>In these paragons of horror films (note my tongue firmly wedged in 
my cheek,
>here), it is a constant plot point that Joe Wolf goes from mild-
mannered,
>clean-shaven guy-next-door to Fuzzface el Supremo every time the 
moon peeks
>out from a cloud. Invariably, this is when Scooby and Shaggy will 
see him,
>but by the time they get Daphne and Velma and Fred, the clouds cover 
the
>moon again, and Wolfie-boy is no longer hairy, so no one believes 
them.

Wow, I'd forgotten those!  I did watch I Was a Teenage Werewolf the 
other day (on Mystery Science Theater 3000--I could never get through 
an un-MSTed version) and I realized an odd thing about this and other 
movie werewolves:  they don't look like wolves, with a long snout and 
all.  They just look like very hairy people with fangs, in this case 
Michael Landon.  He also wears a track suit throughout his 
transformation, oddly enough.  May I say that our Lupin would never 
be so tacky.

But I digress.

I really do think JKR is committing a flint here, or at least is 
mangling her own rules of lycanthropy in order to make her plot 
work.  It just doesn't work that Lupin only transforms when actually 
exposed to the moon.  Otherwise he could just hole up in his office 
one night a month and never suffer again--heck, he could spend the 
time playing pinochle and have a grand old time.  Then all of us 
Lupinlovers who just can't resist a soulful, suffering man would pine 
away.

Or are you proposing that even if he's indoors, if the moon is out, 
he's a wolf, and if the moon is behind a cloud, he goes back to being 
a man?  That also doesn't seem to be what JKR is suggesting; once he 
transforms, he's a wolf until the moon goes down.  I wonder if she 
noticed that she'd backed herself into a corner, or did she just 
wander into DaphneFredVelmaLand and not notice the inconsistency with 
the rest of her system?

Amy Z

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