Would JKR make Lupin evil?

[catja3000]

No: HPFGUIDX 39788

--- In HPforGrownups at y..., "alhewison" <Ali at z...> wrote:
> But Lupin doesn't have a secret: he has a serious "illness". He has 
a 
> serious character defect, he's a werewolf. The fact that he *seems* 
> to be a decent person despite this shouldn't mean that the heroes 
> can't love him and doesn't mean he is boring.

Good point.  But his werewolfness isn't a character defect -- it's an 
*illness*.  The fact that the WW treats it like a character defect is 
part of the point, and is part and parcel to JKR's condemnation of 
the bigoted sectors of the WW, which treat all differences as if they 
were defects.

However, being a werewolf does make Lupin dangerous while in wolf 
form.  And this causes him a great deal of anxiety; he is 
still "haunted" by the thought of what could have happened while out 
marauding, that his irresponsibility (youthful or no) could have hurt 
someone.  Also, the fact that he's been keeping information from 
Dumbledore has been a terrible burden.  Lupin is carrying around an 
enormous amount of guilt and pain and worry; but he still manages to 
soldier on, to be a good teacher, and to show kindness and 
generosity.  He's hardly a faultless "Gary Stu"; but he is 
intelligent and mature enough to admit his wrongdoing, and to suffer 
the consequences.  Neville, interestingly enough, displays some of 
these same qualities, although he is much more timid and tremulous 
about it.  

Another factor in Lupin's defense the structure of the narrative.  
She's already hit the supposed-good-guy-turns-out-bad note twice, 
though within different chords, so it's not repetitive.  Pettigrew, 
obviously, is the first -- the supposed innocent murder victim who 
was not only guilty, but not a murder victim at all.  And now Crouch-
Moody, as the teacher who is absolutely trustworthy -- whoops, guess 
not.  JKR laid the groundwork for the question of a kind, sympathetic 
teacher with a dirty secret in PoA.  Lupin, when he confesses his 
werewolfism and his acceptance of Sirius' innocence, is reviled by 
the Trio, who feel betrayed.  But once everything is explained, they 
realize that he is telling the truth, and he's on their side, and 
that his dark secret (werewolfism)is one that can be lived with 
(especially with wolfsbane pootion).  Okay, fine.  He's been 
established as a good guy.  However, there's nothing ruling out JKR 
reversing that in a later book.  Well, nothing besides the events of 
Book 4.

Psedo-Moody is set up to fill exactly the same role as Lupin did in 
Book 3 -- that of the benevolent teacher-mentor-friend.  Although 
their personalities and temperaments differ, the parallels between 
the two are manifold:  unprepossessing appearance, extensive 
knowledge of the Dark Arts, a hands-on Dewey-esque teaching style, a 
defense of Harry early in the year (Lupin on the train with the 
dementors, Moody zapping Malfoy), revealed to have shapechanging 
ability, a willingness to say Voldemort's name, leave Hogwarts at the 
end, confiscation of the Marauder's Map, embarassment of Snape that 
works to Harry's benefit, a particular show of kindness to Neville... 
I could go on.  In the last, in fact, JKR explicitly invokes Lupin 
when referring to Moody's comforting of Neville -- passing along 
Sprout's compliment "is something Professor Lupin would have done," 
and that act is what inspires Harry's trust (not just his 
admiration).  It's Moody's seeming similarity to Lupin, in his 
kindness and intelligence, that makes it easy for us, and Harry, to 
trust him.  And then JKR twists the knife.

What I mean to say, very long-windedly, is that JKR has already used 
that particular knife-twist once.   The explicit parallel of the 
characters won't mean much, in a narrative sense, unless there is a 
basic, fundamental difference between the two; otherwise, it's just 
more of the same.  Lupin turning out evil would be ridiculously 
repetitive, not only of his own "not-what-he-seems" moment, but also 
an almost exact duplicate of Crouch's.  JKR's got more imagination 
than that, and the tricks up her sleeve are likely going to be spread 
more evenly among the other characters, particularly the ones who 
haven't had anything really significant revealed about them yet, and 
I don't think she'll be hitting the same good-guy-turns-out-to-be-on 
Voldemort's-side note.  After all, that's been the twist of the last 
two books, with a side helping of Voldie's-henchman-turns-out-to-be-
good (a bit up in the air, in Snape's case).  The next good-or-bad 
revelations/concerns will be more subtle, in keeping with the 
maturing of both Harry and the tone of the books -- a good guy's 
(Hagrid, Percy, Ron) unintentional betrayal or a bad guy's (Draco, 
Pettigrew) isolated kindness or warning spring to mind.  

Pippin?  I bow before your ingenuity (conspiracy theories are such 
fun, aren't they?  ;) ), but I don't think that JKR is going to give 
us again anything as simple as "He SEEMS like a good guy, but he's 
REALLY a servant of Voldemort!" again.  It's going to get much more 
layered and complicated, and characters' motives aren't going to boil 
down that neatly anymore.  It's already starting with Fudge -- he 
isn't actively working for Voldie, but his prejudices and laziness 
are helping evil while hindering good.

Okay, I *really* need to shut up now.           

Catja