Who needs Harry? (was: GoF CH 27-29 Post DH look/ Snape and Harry redux)

[horridporrid03]

No: HPFGUIDX 182310

> >>Betsy Hp:
> > <snip>
> > Or, they could capture Voldemort and find out from the man       
> > himself.  

> >>Carol responds:
> You can't just capture Voldemort or they would have done so after he
> reappeared at the end of OoP.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
That it didn't happen isn't enough to convince me that it *couldn't* 
happen.  The only special power Voldemort seems to have is his broken 
off soul bits.  All those do is make him hard to kill (but not 
impossible to kill as he does, in fact, die in the end).  I recall 
nothing said about Voldemort being impossible to capture or hold.

Could JKR have created Voldemort as indeed that formidable?  Sure.  
She could have made up any kind of magical powers she wanted to.  But 
she doesn't.  So instead of showing Voldemort impossible to capture, 
she shows a world too stupid to do so.  (Heck, she doesn't even give 
him crack guards, human or otherwise, for an assult force to get 
through.  Voldemort surrounds himself with idiots and then encourages 
their idiocy.)

> >>Carol:
> And the people whose memories Dumbledore collected back when he was
> only exploring Tom's past and his murders <snip> were long dead.
> <snip>
> The only person who contributed a memory used in the training      
> sessions in HBP besides DD who was still alive was Slughorn.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
At what point during Voldemort's rise to power did Dumbledore start 
researching his past?  I'm remembering it as having happened *after* 
Tom Riddle became Voldemort, but I could well be wrong.  So, if 
Dumbledore did start his research before there were any indications 
Tom was up to no good yeah, those trails would have gone cold.

However, the trails Dumbledore followed were not the only trails 
available.  Unless Tom's fellow classmates all died in strange and 
troubling accidents (except for the ones who went evil) everything 
Dumbledore found out could have been found out by some basic 
detective work.  We're not given any indication that there was a 
sudden rash of deaths amongst those of a certain age just before 
Voldemort appeared as a threat.

What we're supposed to believe is that the moment Voldemort appeared 
on the scene, not only did none of his fellow classmates (or 
teachers, I suppose) recognize him as Tom Riddle, no one tried to 
figure out just who this guy was and what his motivations where.  
Except for Dumbledore.  Who told nothing to no one.  (Loyal as 
Voldemort's most ardent followers is our Dumbledore, keeper of 
Voldemort's secrets.)

> >>Carol:
> No one who knew him at school (and wasn't a Death Eater or aready   
> dead) was willing to talk. They were all too afraid even to speak   
> his name.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
But why?  Why was *everyone* so terrified to speak Voldemort's name?  
Not just random house-wizards, but Unspeakables and Aurors and 
members of the Order?  Voldemort wasn't *that* old, for a wizard.  
His fellow classmates (including those a few years above and below) 
should have had representatives within those various institutions.  
We get no explanation as to why the *only* person willing to remember 
Voldemort as Tom Riddle was Dumbledore.

It's like Voldemort appeared on the scene, said "fear me!" and not 
only did the WW oblige, Dumbledore aided and abetted him by refusing 
to share what he knew. 

> >>Carol:
> I don't think that anyone but DD was aware of LV's tendency to      
> collect "trophies."
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
I suspect that as per canon, you're right. Little Tom Riddle magpied 
in his orphanage but managed to stop upon reaching Hogwarts.  Until 
that Founder fetish hit of course.  The problem is, that's not how 
human beings behave.  So we have some unnatural behavior for the sake 
of the script.  It's JKR forcing a round peg into a square hole in 
order to keep all of the information under Dumbledore's hat.

In a more realistic or organic telling, his dormmates (and the 
various prefects) should have seen similar behavior.  Seven years 
living in such close quarters, Tom Riddle's box of goodies should 
have been noticed.  Not remarked on, necessarily (unless he stole 
stuff like he did in the orphange) but something for a canny 
detective to learn about. 

> >>Carol:
> Think about it, Betsy. Did we Muggles anticipate anything of the    
> sort before HBP? I didn't.
> <snip>

Betsy Hp:
Oh, don't bring Muggles into this, Carol! (You know how I get when we 
play wizards vs. muggles... <bg>) MI-5 or the FBI would have had 
Riddle down and gone before the second Death Eater's mark wafted 
above some poor victim's house. (Yay Muggles! <rbg>)

As to us readers... of course we couldn't anticipate any of the crap 
JKR dumped on us (via Dumbledore) in HBP.  We were looking at things 
through a very controlled set of eyes.  Which, fine, JKR wasn't 
writing a mystery that she needed to fairly set forth clues for or 
anything.  But when the big reveal finally *did* come, I was left 
wondering how the hell Voldemort managed to get as powerful as he did 
in the first place.  And why the hell Harry was put forth as the only 
person able to take him down.

Only in an Idiot World does Harry Potter become a hero.  Only in an 
Idiot World does Voldemort become a super-villain.

> >>Carol, not sure that Betsy is even serious in her suggestions and
> sensing some disillusionment with Dumbledore :-)

Betsy Hp:
I am serious that Harry's part in Voldemort's destruction seemed 
unnecessary and forced.  Nothing in DH showed me (or even told me, 
for that matter) why *Harry* was the only one for the job.  Voldemort 
just wasn't that indestructable or untouchable.  So it's more 
disillusionment with JKR's plot premise than anything else.  

Though yeah, the only way Dumbledore makes sense to me is if we're 
allowed to see him as a broken, almost evil, egotistical old man.  
But going down that path also asks us (IMO, anyway) to see the WW as 
a broken world heading towards its own destruction.  The final 
showdown and the epilogue squelches those readings though.  In my 
opinion anyway.

> >>Bruce Alan Wilson:
> I got the impression that Crabbe's conjuration was sheer dumb
> luck on his part.

Betsy Hp:
Right.  So if a barely literate boob (stunning comment on the state 
of education at Hogwarts is our Crabbe) could stumble across a means 
to destroy a horcrux, imagine what an Unspeakable or an Auror or a 
Dark Arts expert could have thought up.  Harry had nothing to do with 
it.

Betsy Hp