[HPforGrownups] [OOP] - OOP = Empire Strikes Back

[Kirsten Gilson]

No: HPFGUIDX 62199

I agree in some ways, but I feel that GoF was the
'Empire Strikes Back' of this series.  The emotion
that Cedric's death caused, the feeling of 'what
next?'  

Kirsten
--- Dennis Grant <trog at wincom.net> wrote:
> 
> During my reading of OOP on Saturday, and doubly so
> after reading a bunch of
> the posts here, I was struck by the simularity
> between OOP and another famous
> story.
> 
> But let me set some background first:
> 
> There is a tradition in Western literature (and I
> include movies in the same
> category - a movie is just another way to tell a
> story) of the "episodic heroic
> character". Think "Indiana Jones" or (even better)
> "James Bond".
> 
> The character is featured in a series of stories,
> where in each one, the Hero
> Is Placed In Mortal Peril And Must Overcome It To
> Save The Day.
> 
> But one of the characteristics of the "episodic
> hero" is that there's really
> very little carryover from one episode to the next.
> There may be references
> to other episodes, and characters may be introduced
> (or removed!) from the canon,
> but each episode is more-or-less self-contained.
> Hero discovers problem, hero
> struggles against problem, hero ultimately triumphs.
> Next!
> 
> As a reader/viewer, it really doesn't matter all
> that much which episode you
> read/watch first. If you get the episodes out of
> order, you may miss out on
> some backstory and some inside jokes, but you're not
> really punished for it.
> Who here saw all the Bond movies in chronological
> order?
> 
> The first "Star Wars" movie was cast in this mold
> too. Hero discovers past,
> gets mission, rescues princess, blows up Death Star,
> gets medal. Done.
> 
> So too - although with decreasing degree - with the
> first 4 HP books. I actually
> started with GoF, then went back through the rest of
> the series in order. And
> while I picked up on a few things here and there
> from GoF that had been introduced
> earlier on, there were no real startling suprises.
> It is entirely possible to
> read the first 4 HP books stand-alone.
> 
> Back to Star Wars: First movie is a stand-alone
> episodic adventure. But the
> second movie, "The Empire Strikes Back", was very
> different. Instead of Heroes
> Going On Another Quest, this time the heroes spend
> the entire story getting
> their butts kicked. There's no quest; the challenge
> is just to stay alive/effective.
> And all the while, we keep getting hit with Dramatic
> Revelations.
> 
> "Empire" changed Star Wars from "episodic" to
> "epic". Instead of each chapter
> in the story being mostly stand-alone, now each
> chapter is a distinct part of
> the greater arc. It's a SINGLE story in many
> chapters, not many stories with
> the same characters.
> 
> (No, I'm not a George Lucas fanboy. I think the Star
> Wars story had enormous
> potential and George screwed it up. Star Wars doesm
> however, make for a handy
> example as I think more of us have seen it than have
> read "Beowulf" :)
> 
> "Empire" was a filmmaking revolution of sorts. It
> was this enormous-budget,
> super-high-profile blockbuster event, and yet it was
> 100% devoted to moving
> the arc along; setting up the third act. And the
> good guys don't triumph in
> the end - in fact, they're a darn sight worse off by
> the time the credits roll.
> 
> 
> So too, is OOP.
> 
> Unlike the other HP books, there's no specific goal
> or mission to be accomplished.
> This book is more about just getting through the
> year than it is about saving
> the Philosopher's Stone, or winning the TriWizard
> Cup, or what have you.
> 
> But more importantly, pretty much every single major
> character on the Good side
> makes at least one major blunder. Dumbledore keeps
> Harry at arms' length without
> considering the psychic cost to Harry. Sirius
> mistreats a house elf wihout regards
> to the consequences. Snape stops teaching Harry the
> Occul-whatzis lessons. Harry
> never really stops tap-dancing on his own anatomy.
> Even Ms Perfect Hermonie
> makes a blunder with the Centaurs. And in the end,
> there's consequences to all
> these mistakes.
> 
> Meanwhile, over on the Evil side, they seem to have
> their act together. They
> manage to come up with a workable plan to obtain the
> Prophesy Sphere, and it
> comes within a whisker of success. In action, the
> Evil side is much better organized
> and co-ordinated than the Good, and although their
> plans ultimately fail, they
> manage to give as good as they got.
> 
> (Yes, the text of the actual prophesy wouldn't have
> helped them all that much
> had they succeeded - but THEY DIDN'T KNOW THAT - and
> given the lack of knowledge,
> attempting to gain it was a pretty smart thing to
> do)
> 
> See the parallels?
> 
> Now we've known for a while that the HP books are
> greater than the sum of their
> parts, and that they are intended to tell a single
> arc - but OOP is the book
> that really sets this in motion. OOP is the first
> book totally dedicated to
> moving the grand arc along, while sacrificing its
> own interior arc. It's the
> book that moves us from "episodic with some
> additional continuity" to "epic".
> 
> 
> And based on this, I'm starting to think that there
> will be some pretty heavy
> consequences for Harry.
> 
> When you're doing episodic stories, you can't really
> hurt the core characters
> too badly, because you need them around for the next
> episode. You can develop
> characters, move them in different directions, play
> with them a bit, but ultimately
> you need them hale and whole again by the time the
> next episode rolls around.
> 
> 
> But when you're doing epics... you can do real
> damage, because when the arc
> closes, it's CLOSED. An epic doesn't need the hero
> to survive (relatively) unscathed
> - or even to survive. He only has to triumph.
> 
> I beginning to think that Harry isn't going to get
> to lead a normal life, EVER.
> I think we're being set up for a Harry sacrifice of
> some kind. He's not going
> to get the girl, he's not going to live happily ever
> after. Instead, his fate
> will be to face down and destroy Voldy - at which
> point his arc will end.
> 
> My crystal ball gets rather cloudy at this point.
> Rowling is very good at both
> working within her genres, but also giving them her
> own twists. I rather doubt
> that Voldy will turn out to be Harry's father,
> Hermonie his sister, and that
> Sirius will pop out of that veil "unfrozen" at some
> point. (Although it IS clear
> to me that Rowling is now writing as much for the
> screen as she is for the page...)
> 
> 
> I DO forsee a visit to the Land of the Dead at some
> point (that's a common Heroic
> task) and I DO forsee some sort of large-scale
> sacrifice on Harry's part. But
> that's as far as I'll go at this point.
> 
> Although when Dumbledore mentioned that Neville was
> the other child who COULD
> have been the subject of the prophesy, I'll admit
> that Yoda popped out of thin
> air like the Great Gazoo, said "There is another..."
> and then vanished....
> 
> Thoughts? 
> 
> It'll be VERY interesting to see where Rowling goes
> with the next book. If I
> were writing it, Book 6 would be "Harry trains an
> Army" and Book 7 would be
> "Harry Kicks Some Ass" - but then I'm a guy, and
> raised in the heroic military
> tradition (al la Ender's Game). My guess is that JKR
> will have a slightly different
> take on it. :)
> 
> DG
> 


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