Several things I've noticed...

[Eric Oppen]

No: HPFGUIDX 26836

First off, has anybody else on here noticed that Victor Krum has the same
name as the great Khagan Krum who led the original Bulgars?  As far as I
know it is not a surname used in contemporary Bulgaria, but anybody with
better knowledge than I of Slavic languages and Balkan countries is invited
to correct me, and I'll go slam my ears in the car door for a while.  I'd
bet that Herself used that name _because_ it isn't used by contemporary
Bulgarians (the original Bulgars were not Slavic-speakers, but adopted the
language of the people they had conquered while retaining their name---I
_think_ the original Bulgars, including Khagan Krum, were Turkic-language
speakers.  Where IS Harry Turtledove when I need to ask him something?) and
she didn't want to have some real Bulgarians complaining that she had used
their name.  Kind of the same way that she picked Hermione's name _because_
it isn't in use much now.

Second, on the Harry Potter Galleries site, I notice they've changed the
page with the stills from the trailer---there's one or two shots I remember
that aren't there any more.  Can somebody with greater knowledge than I tell
me why?

Lastly, I agree completely that there _have_ to be good Slytherins, _as well
as_ bad guys from other Houses---it would be too easy for the Aurors to just
roll up Voldemort's network otherwise.  J.L. Mathews' excellent _Slytherin
Rising_ series of fics goes into the lives and adventures of four girls in
Hogwarts, in Slytherin House itself.  It's kind of an alternate-universe
version of the Potterverse, with more action for the female main characters
(Mathews is one of those who wants more strong female characters) and a
slightly different view of magic and the actions and background of one
Severus Snape.  (At one point, it's mentioned that Snapey got tagged "Most
Fanciable Male" by his female classmates one year---my response would be
"And what was the competition like---an unusually ugly gorilla?  Baldrick,
from the _Blackadder_ shows?")   Since I subscribe to the theory that each
Hogwarts house has something like 200 or so students, and that we just see
the ones Harry Potter himself has classes with, there could be quite a few
very nice Slytherins.  In one of my _own_ fanfics, "Requiem," I had a
Slytherin spokesman explain that the wizard world works the same as Muggle
Britain---Voldemort recruited as he did partly because of "the old school
tie" and "the old boys'/girls' network."