Just to add to the whole “plan” thing, I do believe it was said before, but I remain convinced that TSM has a very clear outline and a very clear end goal for this story. However, that is where we get back to them not being able to let go of certain ideas, or dragging them out ad nauseam.

That being said, there was a lot of good stuff in this chapter, and with each passing scene I believe more and more that, separate of each other yet so deeply intertwined, we are seeing some of the best takes on Snape and Dumbledore in the fandom.

Meanwhile, next to Lily, Pettigrew remains my favourite character in Year 3. He’s delightfully devilish, and I am intrigued as to his ultimate fate. The prologue is iffy on that particular point, but given that he’s not in Dumbledore’s office, the way the timeline closes in on the prologue, the reference to “trusting the wrong people” and the general animosity between the Potters and the Blacks, it seems that he’s being set up to, at least temporarily, fail at the end of the Death Eater Menace and be the key to Sirius’s redemption.

All of that being said, with all of my musing about the prologue and the timeline, I have just stumbled upon an idea of which I cannot really believe it has not occurred to anyone else, so I’m extremely wary of it.

Spoiler

Do we think the first Potter prophecy will ultimately end up unfulfilled?

By the end of Year 4, Harry appears to no longer be a Potter, nor is he then, obviously, the “last one.” However, the prophecy specifies just that. Now, a lot can happen between now, Year 4 and the resolution of the story, but it would be a rather brilliant thing to do to just pull the rug out from under the reader like that. Of course, that would also imply a survival of the line beyond the current generation – which means Jim’s survival or James fathering another spawn. The latter in particular seems unlikely, at least with the current Lady Potter.

Then again, I would be the first to admit that such a twist being telegraphed at the end of the first year would be weird, to say the least, so I don’t actually think it will come to that, going purely by genre conventions and by how much TSM likes their big reveals.

 

I'm pretty certain that if TSM released each book in one chunk (vs. months between each chapter), then a lot of issues people have with PoS would be solved. The story's expansive plot and huge set of characters works much better if it's all fresh in your mind. When I go back and reread Book 3 in one go, it fits together really well. It's just waiting between each chapter makes it feel a lot more disjointed.

Someone earlier asked for the overall plot of Book 3.

Spoiler: Spoilers

The main plot centers on two storylines (1) freeing Sirius and (2) revisiting the Marauder's past. These plot points move up and down, and there's a bunch of sub plots (Hermione's sketchiness, the Wilkes vault, etc.) but they're all really in service of the two big storylines.

TSM mentioned that he significantly reworked his plans for Book 3 because his initial drafts were more "Marauders reminisce about the past for 10 chapters" instead of an actual story. I think having freeing Sirius provides a nice through-line for the year and at least grounds the plot in the present day. Many seemingly disparate plot threads (Remus in Shamballa, Justin being the Prince heir, the Fidelius) have already merged back into the main storylines, so I'm confident that by the end of the year the plot will be largely cohesive.

Maybe the only exception being the Student Clubs, but TSM has said "ask me again at the end of Book 3" so maybe even that.

 

Just binged the whole thing from scratch. Antology sounds about right. Perhaps more precisely, a meta, parodic, loving tribute to 20 years of HP FF tropes. Not really a story, per se.

Latest chapter is the inauguration of the indy!Peter genre: implausible reveal of a lofty heritage after an abused childhood, Gringotts' vault, mentor ancestor portrait, galleons galore, revenge on abuser, school buddy bashing, animagus, occlumens, alpha BAMF, veela!Narcissa banger...

It definitely has its moments, if you have a few hundred fics under your belt and are able to trudge across all the bumps to enjoy the spot-the-parody game. As a story it doesn't flow: too many infodumps, asspullings, inconsistent characterizations, etc.

 

I'm still going through the story. Just thought

Spoiler

it was a bit surprising he didn't subvert nukes and moon landing cliche (the author is American though, so ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ). Plot is all over the place, but character development is excellent. Pettigrew makes a surprisingly engaging villain. I haven't read any fic treating his character the way this fic does. His cliched origins could have been rewritten for something better. Really want it to be just a AU fic instead of WBWL fic.

Cultural blindness was brought out well. Story merits a 4.5/5 for the character building. World building was pretty average though.
I'd give a 3/5 or 2/5.

 

Two updates within two weeks, all I can say is that escalated quickly

 

I'm reading a few chapters of this story every time I can't find something I like. It is good once you get through majority of first book and there are few intriguing and new ideas introduced every while or so. However, I just have a feeling that this is too similar to Sarcasm and Slytherin by sunmoonandstars and that one is more enjoyable for me so I'll just rate it with 3, and recommend it in case you have nothing else to read.

 

Just recently finished reading this. I'd say the quality of the writing and the planning has improved substantially over the course of the fic. It definitely started out a 2 or 3/5, but I'd say its substantially improved from there up to high 4 or low 5/5.

The author could do with a bit more thorough editing, to pair down his work slightly, but its not too bad. Its one of the rare fics these days that really kept me absorbed, all the way through 900k words.

 

I thought something big might be heading our way (particularly considering Harry’s smugness in the prologue), but these last two chapters have really managed to renew my interest in the story.

Spoiler

The portrayal of time travel is something I cannot recall having seen before, and I really like the whole set-up with the hints dropped along the way about the DoM involvement. I’m a bit wary about what “fate” will demand of Harry, though – my suspicion is that the events to follow are the actual reason why he severs ties his with the (male) Potters for good.

 

Spoiler

It looks rather similar to "Backwards With Purpose II: The Book Of Albus." The mechanics are superficially different, but the main idea is the same: fate (i.e., a lazy author) takes the driver's seat and pisses all over their characters' agency. The author can make anything happen and, if it is out of character, they can just wiggle their fingers and whisper "faaaaaaate." Not terribly exciting, or good writing, for that matter. Then again, it is difficult to introduce foresight, fate, etc. in a story and make it work without falling in the cheap plot device pitfall.

Add random criticism to JKR's poor handling of time travel (oh, the irony) and the justification of finding something to do for Hermione and, well, ok, whatever. Another trope crossed from the list, I guess.

 

Definitely a letdown. I wondered at first

Spoiler

why the death scenes were handled in such a lacking weight manner when author seemed to be able to do that better. And then the appearance of Time-Turner explained everything.

 

This chapter frustrated me a lot. Maybe the author will manage to make this work but undoing the first actual consequences of Harry's actions, as seems likely to be the case here, is going to be a negative for me. Harry hasn't suffered any major consequences to any of his actions in the story so far, everything has gone pretty much exactly his way. Now the author grew some balls and made it so that that wasnt the case, only to do the equivalent of "Lol JK!" with those very consequences removes a lot of the dramatic tension, seemingly for the purpose of adding time travel to the list of things the fic has.

That's the vague stuff, here's the spoiler to go into greater detail:

Spoiler

Where to start... Killing Remus, in self defence, is something that Harry should have to struggle with and is a good reason to explain his separation from the Potter's at the prologue. Undoing that, presumably by not giving Remus the map in the first place, thus not letting Sirius be tracked by it, removes this good avenue to progress the story along. If, however, Remus still dies and it's still Harry's fault, Harry now can deal with it internally with the logic of 'oh well, it was fated to happen or me using the time turner would have prevented it, there was nothing I could have done', completely eliminating Harry's potential for self-reflection and growth from making a difficult decision where there were no good ones available.

Regulus dying closed the door on Harry's potential to become a Metamophmagus, which in turn makes Harry have one less tool in his arsenal. I guarantee that Harry becomes a metamorphmagus because Regulus stays alive after this, and yet having been told he could have this very unique and useful gift, only to prevent him from ever being able to use it, is much more interesting for Harry to have to go through, especially with the knowledge that it was his own actions that caused this to happen.

Harry coming into the effect of the Ultimate Sanction wasnt exactly coming out of left field, and will almost certainly happen again in this new timeline, given that it is the easiest of the consequences to redo while pretending its a big consequence. And yet, going back after it, more specifically after James tell's Harry about this new prophecy the author invented, gives Harry significant knowledge and power when it comes to his interactions with James in the past, plus we know that Sirius gets around the Ultimate Sanction by the end of Harry's 4th year anyway. Most likely, Harry saves Sirius's life in the new timeline, knowingly doing so to get out of the eventual Sanction and gets out of the Ultimate Sanction after a very short period of time suffering under it. As an aside, I really dont like the Sanction functioning the way it does in this fic. I've put up with it, but it's just forced false conflict that I can never get into.

Neville's character development, and his rejection of being a Longbottom, was an important character moment that felt meaningful, given Neville's portrayal throughout this year, but instead of seeing how that plot point develops, we will get Harry remembering that Neville would do that for them if it came down to it. This is a problem because 1) If Harry is under the sanction for longer, we know for sure what way Neville will side in the end, there is no tension to any scene where he is magically angry at Harry because we know that if it's serious he wont act on it, and 2) we know that Theo is still under the sanction at the end of year 4, so this will continue the animosity needlessly between Neville and Theo, and by extension Harry, and magically enforced animosity is the least interesting type of animosity.

Marcus Flint dying ignobly was a turn for the serious for the fic. Showing that even Harry's circle of trust will not just have impeccable plot armour for the remainder of the fic. But, surprise, surprise, plot armour gets reintroduced and he'll get un-murdered.

Pettigrew knowing the Wolfsbane Potion becomes a major threat, that has to galvanise the major forces into action, under threat of a werewolf army. Removing this, relowering the stakes to 'just' Voldemort, will make the future confrontations less threatening and interesting for the protagonists, especially because the possibility was introduced only for it to be removed.

Finally, the 'method' of the time turner seems to be complete bullshit to me. Using it will lead to good for society... That seems completely arbitrary, and introduces a binary nature of 'good vs bad' that the story was previously attempting to avoid. What's more, Hermione is just able to figure out how to key Harry in to using it. If she can do it, how come the Unspeakables, or previous users of the time turner, couldnt do it as well. And, if it can be used once, why not again in the future. Introducing time travel as a possible option that will not result in any paradox's but actually allows for the user to make any and all changes that dont infringe upon the greater good is not a good thing for the story.

tl;dr I dont like this mechanic, and feel it has made the last several chapters pointless if not outright harmful to the future of the story.

 

@PomMan, please tell me you posted this as a review to his fic. It's a great review and might make his story better in the future.