Villain!Dumbledore (was: re:HatingDH/Dementors/...Draco/.../KeepSlytherin Ho

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 177706

> Prep0strus:
> <snip>
> And I suppose it's part of the attraction to Snape and Draco.       
> Though, for me, both of them wind up being more pathetic the more I 
> see of them, not more interesting.  So in the end, their            
> being 'good' intrigues me no more than their being 'evil'.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Interestingly enough, I agree. <g>  What I loved about, what 
intrigued me about, both Snape and Draco was their promise.  And as 
of DH, IMO, neither promise was realized.  Snape was reduced to (or 
turned out to be, since the Snape I imagined wasn't the canon Snape 
at all, unfortunately) a rather pathetic little man, blindly 
following the instructions of a portait, while obsessing over a dead 
woman.  (OMG!  Snape is Kreature!!)

And Draco never got off the tower, IMO.  He remained in that uneasy 
grey area between boyhood and manhood and never took a step towards 
change.  Forever trapped in "bad faith".
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bad_faith_(existentialism)

So there went two of JKR's more interesting characters, IMO.  (And it 
was interest created from my own imagination, I do recognize that.)

> >>Prep0strus:
> Having said all that, in this story, Dumbledore isn't a villain, and
> it's strange to me that he appears more villainous to some than our
> Slytherin friends.

Betsy Hp:
Hmm... I wouldn't say Dumbledore is *more* villainous than the 
Slytherins.  They're equated with Nazis after all and it's kind of 
hard to sink lower than that kind of bad. <g>  It's just, IMO, 
Dumbledore is a really crappy good guy.  As has been pointed out, 
he's very careless with other people's lives.  And if it serves him 
to let you twist in the wind, in the wind you will twist.

And I agree with what Magpie said upthread.  If Dumbledore is called 
on his behaviour, he turns it around so that he's suddenly the 
victim, as Magpie illustrated.

Hermione is of the same ilk, IMO.  She can be incredibly callous with 
other people's lives, if it serves her purpose.  And she will also 
play victim if it suites her, IMO.  One example would be her tears 
for herself because her parents won't remember her if she dies, but 
no acknowledgement that she's messed around with their minds.  
Another example is her tears when Ron responds to her mocking him by 
mocking her right back in HBP.

I think, for me, because there's no self-examination on the part of 
the good guys, they kind of fail to interest me as characters.  Or go 
right over into creeping me out.  Not because their behavior is 
*worse* than the bad guys, but because I'm supposed to be rooting for 
these people.

And I think the interest in seeing Dumbledore or Hermione as villains 
is because it'd be wonderful to see them actually *challenged*.  
Forced to walk the talk they've been spouting for so long.  Which 
would, in turn, make them more interesting as they actually struggled 
with things, rather than sort of sailed through comfortable in their 
white hats.  Heh.  In other words, I'd kind of like an entirely 
different book. <bg>

Betsy Hp