semi-necro and this has sort of been discussed before, but never really resolved:


Remus being in the shrieking shack should have been impossible.

I re-read the chapters and when they (Harry/Ron/Sirius et al) enter the shack the last bits of sunlight are waning. Remus sees them going into the shack through the map and then leaves for it, so he probably gets there a good 10 minutes after its gotten dark (not to mention that the full moon should be visible even while the sun is still up).

So, if throughout all this the full moon is up in the sky, why isn't Remus affected? If it where something as simple as coming into direct contact with moonlight for the transformation to work why not just lock him in a room with no windows for the night?

 

I'm not sure if this has been covered before, but with the entire thing about the Elder Wand and it belonging to Harry because he disarmed Draco. Well, why did the ownership not transfer to Voldemort when he AK's Harry?

 

God I hate the fucking Elder Wand.

Fuck you Rowling, fuck you.

 

That's because Harry never died, the AK from Voldemort and the Elder Wand didn't work properly on Harry since Harry himself was its true master.

From the mouth of JKR herself:

 

some things have been bothering me for a while:
1. how in the hell did Mrs. Crouch get Polyjuice in Azkaban
2. in CoS, the Hufflepuffs state that they know Harry hates his muggle relatives. how the fuck did they know?
3. the Order of the Phoenix, didnt they have any truth potion to know who was the rat?
4. why in the hell did harry not start training after third year, when he knew the Dark Lord was coming back?

 

Answers, in order:

1. Mrs. Crouch was accompanied by her husband, Mr. Crouch, who was the former head of the DMLE. I'm pretty sure a wizard who used to be the head of the Auror department knows a few tricks about smuggling contraband through searches. Also, even if he didn't bother to hide the potion, we have no canon confirmation that the guards actually check anything, and even if they did, I'm sure none of the Aurors actually believed that Crouch, who was one of the most ruthless anti-Death Eater officials ever, would try and free the people he hated. After all, the man despised Death Eaters so much that he put his own son in Azkaban (irony, I know).

2. How the fuck could they not know? I would have been more surprised if everyone had thought Harry loved his relatives, THAT would have been a huge plot hole. The number of opportunities for that information to spread is literally countless, even as an unsubstantiated rumor. Besides, there are many instances in the book where Harry publicly declares his dislike of his relatives, all it takes is for someone to overhear. The information could have even been accidentally spread by a Weasley or Hermione. I mean, wow, a young teenager hating his relatives? What unusual and atypical behavior!!111!!! We gotz to callz the AURORZ!!11! We can tell from the context that although the Hufflepuffs knew Harry hated his relatives, they had no idea why. The outburst was most likely just an ill thought out accusation by an immature 12 or 13 year old.

3. Which rat are you referring to? If you mean Marietta, that's kind of pointless, considering she was with Fudge in Dumbledore's office when Harry was caught. Oh, and the whole "SNEAK" thing. I'm unaware of any other rats in OotP.

4. Why should he bother to train? He was just a kid who had a string of really bad luck at his ends of terms. It's not like he alone had the responsibility of saving the Wizarding World or anything........Oh, wait. That aside, at that moment in time, Harry had no idea of the prophecy. Why should he bother to train like a maniac, he was just a kid trying to enjoy his childhood. If Voldemort came back, Dumbledore would take care of it, it's not like only Harry could kill Voldemort or anything.......Oh....damn. But again, at that point, Harry had no idea of his responsibilities, he was just a kid, and Dumbledore was supposed to take care of Voldemort.

 

Thanks for answering the first two, but in the third I meant the original order of the phoenix in the first war against Voldemort.

as for 4, He has faced down Voldemort 4 times now, not to mention fighting off a Basilisk, a Cerberus, who knows how many Dementors, Giant Spiders and a werewolf. After going through all that shit and getting by with a whole lot of luck, i think you would want to make sure the next time it happened it wasn't your last.

 

3. The problem with veritaserum is that everybody thinks it's some infallible truth potion, and that as long as you manage to get it into the person's mouth, you're set. Veritaserum is not even close to being that reliable, in fact, compared to hard physical evidence, veritaserum is actually one of the least reliable and most easily fooled method of interrogation.

Again, from the mouth of JKR herself:

Not a completely satisfying explanation, but good enough. As you can see, Occlumency can be used against veritaserum, that alone makes it highly unreliable. Also, consider the fact that aside from its magical properties, veritaserum is identical to water in appearance, texture, taste, and scent. Therefore, if you just happened to have two traitors, or the person being interrogated was able to perform some sort of transfiguration of the potion into water, you'd never be able to tell the difference. Finally, we have to consider just how difficult it may be to even procure veritaserum. I think the fact that not even Voldemort has been shown to use it is a direct reflection of just how hard it is to get the potion. I find it incredibly likely that the Ministry hoards all knowledge of how to brew veritaserum, and monitors apothecaries for people buying ingredients which could conceivably be used to brew it.

4. Again, I'm just going to go with what I said before. At that moment in time, Harry was just a teenager with no idea of his duties. He may have faced many life and death challenges, but he had no real evidence at that time that this was going to keep happening to him. He was a child then, and probably held some hope that "hey, next year's gonna be better." Also, despite everything, he was a teenager, and teenagers procrastinate like it's going out of style. Until the prophecy moment in OotP, Harry still relied on the hope that Dumbledore would be the one to take care of Voldemort, and all he had to do was make sure he stayed out of trouble and at the Dursley's long enough for the blood wards. It's not really a foolproof answer, but really, we're dealing with a teenage mind here, hopped up on hormones and angst, there's no awesome great answer when faced with that.

 

This thread is basically dedicated to nitpicking.

And that moon at the highest point thing doesn't work as Remus only transformed when a cloud moved.

 

Can someone explain to me what the blood wards around Privet Drive were supposed to have done?

Did they protect Harry - regardless of where he was - from Voldemort but nothing else?

Did they only protect Harry while he was at Privet Drive?

If so, then why the hell did Dumbledore insist he return to charge wards that only functioned while he was there and then immediately turn around and allow him to go stay with friends for the rest of the summer?

Did the wards do anything after Voldemort's resurrection?

I'm completely at a loss as to what possible purpose they could have served - especially in the later books.


One other thing that I wouldn't consider a plot hole but made me laugh, and this is paraphrased:

Harry: Why do wizards have to hide from muggles?

Hagrid: Because then muggles would ask wizards to fix all of their problems for them.

It's rather ironic that he says this considering how fucked up the wizarding world is. Wizards can barely help themselves let alone anyone else.

Amusing.

 

There's nit picking, then there's anal retentive?

I think the wards were mostly to protect Harry's family, actually. From what I remember from Cannon, wards protect the house and everyone in it. Dumbledore, believing Harry's power was love (and that, in turn, Harry's relatively would love him) felt it was important that Harry's relatives were protected, since they would be his 'source' of love. They also may have had something to do with the ridiculous amount of luck Harry had in the series.

It wouldn't take a lot of wizards to fix muggles' problems, cancer? Vanish it. Not enough food? Growth charm/potion. A competent wizard could fix the majority of anyone's problems with some ingenuity and a magic wand. Even a mediocre wizard could fix the big problems...

 

When did Pettigrew get his dark mark?

 

The timing is pretty tight for Pettigrew's Mark. He certainly had it at the graveyard, but it seems unlikely that he was Marked while the Fidelius was being cast. I figure that there is some sort of loyalty test as a part of the spell.

 

I suppose it might have been the day he handed the Potters to Voldemort. Probably didn't do it while Voldemort was in freak form...

 

One thing I noticed is that it seems that all the wizards started celebrating Voldemorts defeat before he even died.

The book starts off with Vernon waking up and going to work noticing weird things that signify that everyone is celebrating. And later that night Hagrid comes to Privot Drive with baby Harry on a motercycle and says "He fell asleep as we was flyin' over Bristol."

That implies it's been at most a few hours since Voldemorts defeat.

Also since Hagrid was the only one to find Harry(not including Sirius), no one should know that Harry killed the Dark Lord or that he's even dead yet. All the while everyone seems to be celebrating Harry's defeat and even McGonagal is talking about "Harry Potter day".

 

Harry kills Voldemort on Hallowe'en 1981. Vernon goes to work November 1st and sees everybody celebrating. Harry is dropped off that night.

That's a whole day. Dumbledore undoubtedly took him to St. Mungo's for treatment and testing, as well as went before the Wizengamot to tel the world about the fall of LV. When DD did this, every reporter in Britain would have been shitting themselves writitng headlines like 'YOU-KNOW-WHO DEAD!!! PWNED BY 15 MONTH OLD HARRY POTTER!!!'

 

But Dumbledore asks where Hagrid got 'that motorcycle'. He would only ask that if thats the first time he saw it. If Hagrid went to St. Mungos or more likely Hogwarts Medical Ward after picking up Harry from Godric's Hollow, then he would have seen the motorcycle there and not mentioned it at Privet Drive.

 

Plot device conundrums:

1. What happens if you open a magical tent within a magical tent ? Or trunk ?

2. You walk past the wall that houses the room of requirement while thinking "I need a room that opens after only one pass instead of three". What happens?

3. Or you need a room that appears, say, next to the 2nd floor girls' bathroom. Does the door appear in its usual spot and exit near the specified place when you're done, or does it both appear and let you exit at the specified place ?

 

She stuck it up her bum bum of course. Haven't you ever snuck anything into Azkaban? Ohwai--

That has amazing bypassing those annoying-staircases-to-the-girls'-dorm-rooms ability...