Disappointment Was: Deaths in DH LONG

[sistermagpie]

No: HPFGUIDX 177496

Magpie:
> I mean, when I'm criticizing the book I feel like I ought to talk 
> about what's in the, not what's not in the book. Therefore not 
having 
> House Unity actually isn't a criticism I have of the book at all. 
> There was no storyline about it, so there's nothing to criticize--
> Slytherin is a very different house there. My criticisms of Draco's 
> storyline aren't just that he didn't do X that I imagined him 
doing, 
> but that I thought he was all over the place with no purpose, he 
> confused me and seemed pointless whenever he showed up and just 
> petered out after a really good beginning in the first chapter. And 
> that it was a waste of the set up in HBP, yes. That did raise my 
> expectations for him to make an important choice. JKR seemed to 
> instead want the point to be that he was frozen, which is her 
choice 
> but led for me to the Malfoys being pretty boring and left me 
feeling 
> like this coming of age series regressed.

Magpie:
Adding on to myself to try to head off confusion. I *do* think it's 
perfectly reasonable to criticize they're not being House Unity in 
the book in terms of what that "says." I think the whole set up of 
Slytherin just being the house that houses all the less noble aspects 
of ourselves is a really unhealthy and uninspiring idea, and I think 
it's perfectly valid as a criticism, or especially to explain a 
personal reaction of why somebody thought the series wasn't 
enjoyable. I do think that a series that dealt with this question 
might have been better for me because I don't like the whole 
underlying philosophy.

But that's a bit different than discussing DH as a single book or the 
second half of HBP and how it's written. On that score I'd go for a 
lot of other things before I got to what storyline she should have 
written instead. I would at least try to judge what she actually did 
first.

-m