Ginny VS Harry

[delwynmarch]

No: HPFGUIDX 135183

First off, let me say that I was never for H/Hr. I was always a R/H
shipper, I guess I just like their bickering ;-)

Secondly, I have to say that I took JKR's comment about "anvil-sized
clues" as referring *only* to R/H, and not at all to H/G. My
understanding is that she was only talking about H/Hr and R/Hr, and
saying that she always led us to believe in the second one.

As for H/G, I had absolutely *nothing* against it. The idea of One Big
Happy Weasley Family always appealed to my overly-sentimental side, so
I had no problem envisioning Harry and Ginny together.

But...

Hickengruendler wrote:
"I will not again repeat why I think Ginny's development in OotP and
HBP was overdone. My arguments didn't change, and I think neither did
anyone's counter-arguments."

Del replies:
Ginny's development was way overdone for me too. I forced myself to
accept OoP-Ginny, under the excuse that she was finally coming into
herself, that the circumstances had changed dramatically, that many
other secondary characters (Neville, Luna) were also being given a lot
of exposition, etc...

But then we get into HBP, and things still don't make any sense. JKR
seems to always be hesitating between exposing more of Ginny and
keeping her under the radar. Almost every single time Harry has a
chance to be with Ginny alone, she runs away to be with Dean!

And where EVER did his sudden jealousy come from?? It's not like Harry
didn't know that Ginny was dating boys, and Dean in particular. So why
does it suddenly bother him? Am I *really* supposed to believe that
it's just because he SAW Ginny kissing Dean?? If that's the case, then
his reason to like Ginny is no better than his reason to like Cho was. 

Honestly, all that telling about how Harry couldn't stop thinking
about Ginny suddenly, how he dreamed of her, this reeked of
infatuation, not love! It's EXACTLY the same kind of thing he did with
Cho: being irrationally jealous of her boyfriend, spending hours
dreaming or day-dreaming about her while *at the same time* spending
very little time actually interacting with her, and so on. So I never
saw any reason to believe that Harry's interest in Ginny was anything
more than a crush, like he had on Cho.

As an aside: am I the only one who was profoundly annoyed by Harry
wondering whether Ron would approve of Harry dating Ginny, when we
KNOW that Ron *always* wanted his best friend and his sister to get
together? At the end of OoP, he couldn't have been more clear about
it, when he looked at Harry while telling Ginny to choose her next
boyfriend a bit better. So I found Harry asking himself the same
question over and over again to be extremely irritating.

Hickengruendler wrote:
"I will focus instead of the H/G couple and particularly the scene
after Dumbledore's funeral.

Does this scene feel in any way earned? First of all, it doesn't make
any sense. I don't see why Ginny is in any less danger now."

Del replies:
Agreed. The only Hogwarts student who died so far was not someone
Harry particularly liked. And when Harry came back from his little
trip to the cave with DD and saw the Dark Mark, it was painfully
obvious that there was nothing he could have done if it was Ginny who
had died. So Ginny is in no way in more or less danger whether she is
with Harry or not. Not to mention Harry's "saving-people-thing": does
Harry really think that LV wouldn't attack or capture Ginny if he
didn't think Harry loves her? Come ON! LV knows that Harry would take
risks for *anyone*, AND he knows that Harry *already* took risks once
to save *Ginny*. So that whole "we have to split blah blah blah" is
just silly IMO.

But the very worst part of it IMO was one of Harry's lines, when he says:

"It's been like... like something out of someone else's life, those
last few weeks with you."

When I read that, my mind went HUH?! And now my reaction to it is an
emphatic SHOW, DON'T TELL! As much as I love JKR, she spectacularly
failed to show *anything* about how being with Ginny changed Harry's
life. It feels like this isn't at all the same writer who wrote so
superbly about Harry's fear in GoF, about how it made him feel, about
how it changed his view on everything. It's not the same writer who
wrote about Harry's short temper in OoP, how he was always about to
explode at the slighest excuse. And it's definitely not the same
writer who wrote about Harry's crush on Cho, how it gave him
butterflies in the stomach and so on. This is a MAJOR let-down for me,
especially since I so love a good love story. We do not see or feel
ANY difference in Harry, his life, his feelings, when he is finally
going out with Ginny. In fact, it seems to me that being with Cho had
more influence on him than being with his supposedly great love. Not
good writing, definitely.

Hickengruendler wrote:
"But also: Harry and Ginny spoke in it, as if they were deeply in
love, soul-mates and whatever. But is there really anything in any of
 the books that hints to this? Did Harry and Ginny ever have a
meaningful conversation on-page?"

Del replies:
Nope, especially not as boyfriend/girlfriend. As I said, we had more
exposition of the Harry/Cho relationship than the H/G one! We went
through every step of the evolution of Harry's relationship with Cho,
but we don't see ANYTHING of Harry's relationship with Ginny. This is
crazy.

Hickengruendler wrote:
"Hickengruendler, who does not think that people have found their
soulmates at the age of 16, but for the sake of storyline would 
accept this, if were presented believably"

Del replies:
I personally don't even believe in the concept of soulmates. I do
beleive that some people are extraordinarily fitted for each other
(like my husband and I, it keeps amazing us), but soulmates? Nah. My
husband and I have had to *work* to make our relationship work, but
Harry and Ginny seem to just blissfully be happy together. Blah! Two
strong characters like them, just get along without hitches? I don't
think so! But then why oh WHY aren't we allowed to see them
interacting as bf/gf, see them making conscious efforts to make the
other happy, see them dealing with the little hitches that must happen
every now and then? WHY??? *THAT* would have convinced me that they
belong together indeed! It might even have made me cry when Harry
decides to ditch Ginny to protect her. Instead, I'm left with this
feeling that I've been watching a bad TV movie, where the characters
get together for no better reason than the script says so, and where
only the music has a chance of making me cry when the hero sacrifices
his love relationship for the greater good. Hey, even in those bad TV
movies, you actually get to SEE the happy couple spending time
together, eating ice-cream, playing in the park, watching a movie
together, or kissing under the stars. If there is no time, all we get
is an accelerated view of all those snippets linked together with a
sweet happy romantic music, but at least we get to SEE it. Not so for
Harry and Ginny. How disappointing.

Del