OOP: Re: [HPforGrownups] As for me... things I liked and didn't like in OotP

[the firey chasm from whence it came]

No: HPFGUIDX 64699

At 01:31 AM 6/27/2003 +0000, you wrote:
>Hello all,
>
>Just had to post this somewhere and here works respond away -flames
>are fine if that really floats your boat.Before you go on, as this is
>a list of what I liked, loved, hated and didn't like, there will
>obviously be some spoilers. Don't read if you don't know, or want to
>know what kinds of things might be included in such lists. :)
>J
>K
>R
>*
>R
>o
>c
>k
>s
>*
>*
>
><snip>


>2)Harry even *trying* the Cruciatus!!! Where the hell did *that* come
>from?!

Really? I kind of liked that, it showed how angry he was. Remember, he was 
trying it against Bellatrix who had just killed the only father he ever 
really had. Certainly not justified, but definitely understandable. I was 
surprised, but I understood it.

>3)Why couldn't Harry see the Thestrals before? We know from what he
>hears around dementors that he witnessed his mother's death at least -
>  the memory of a flash of green that he had even before that suggests
>he might even have *seen* it... if this is deliberate and not
>a 'flint', I would have liked to have had this explained.

<snip>

I just listened to an interview with JKR today where she explains about the 
Thestrals. Apparently you have to process the death in your mind first and 
understand it before you'll see the Thestrals. When his parents died he was 
too young to understand what he was seeing, and he hadn't totally come to 
terms with Cedric's death yet at the end of GoF. She said that to introduce 
the Thestrals right at the end of GoF would have been wierd and I can see 
that, though I think she should have explained the need to not only see 
death, but to understand it a little bit better in OoP, seeing as how 
leaving it the way she did does make it look like an oversight.

Oh and here's the interview where she talks about it: 
http://www.msn.co.uk/liveevents/harrypotter/event/Default.asp
~dream