You kidding? Star Wars didn't even start using that phrase until after the Prequels. I remember Ludo Bagman referring to "our side" at one point, and that's it.

Anyways, I've just started Year 4, and I'll post my review once I'm done with that.

 

I spent the last few days blowing through the series and was surprised to find that I had a good time. Despite the obvious WBWL tropes, I really enjoyed the group dynamic between the main characters. The plot did remain quite similar to cannon, but the alternate Slytherin perspective and subplots carried me through each book. My only complaint is the obvious “right-ness” of the main characters. Nearly every Slytherin is portrayed as cunning and intelligent, able to outwit a majority of the adults around them. Harry is able to success manipulate the likes of the Wizengamot, and rarely runs into actual trouble while doing so. Overall, I give the series a 4/5. I have a bias towards Slytherin Harry and good characterization.

 

If Harry Potter fanfiction existed in academia this would be the PhD thesis of the wrong!BWL genre.

This story has so many instances where I’d usually click the x, but the author has actually presented all the terrible cliches in enjoyable ways. The main saving grace are the character surrounding Harry being fleshed out.

If I can get passed “Hadrian” Potter, magical cores, and cartoonishly bad James/Dumbledore then the story is engaging. 3/5 would be 4 if some of the overdone cliches weren’t in there or at least Dumbledore be portrayed close to his canon self.

 

I've finished reading what's available over the last little bit and it's definitely fit for Almost Recommended. It's a solid fit if you can turn your brain off for a bit and just enjoy the ride. There are moments where you need to really suspend disbelief when dealing with the idiot ball that has been handed to James and Jules. On the other hand though, that same idiot ball is the foundation of the story.

A nice diversion.

 

I’m shocked at how much I’ve enjoyed this up to this point with the Hadrians and what not.

A well biased 3.5 from me - it’s pedantic and unfriendly to read at times and the caricature of Dumbledore grates on me, but somehow in all that it’s found time for a very charming Slytherin cast.

 

This story - I both enjoy it and get annoyed by it.

It keeps piling choices that irk me one by one, and at the same time, it manages to present majority of them in a competent way. But for the constant see-saw of James and Dumbledore from semi-reasonable to stupid, it's actually competently written and entertaining. An easy 3/5.


I am glad that I read some of the reviews on this thread before jumping in, because I needed to be prepared for James' characterization. Which is... super bad and entirely different from what it could be. Sirius, Remus and James are changed in a bunch of ways, and Harry is in some ways a little shit when talking with both Remus and James, admittedly, with reasons - which would be impossible with canon characterizations.

Wrong Boy Who Lived premise and having Harry live with Dursleys. Oh boy:

Spoiler

There are two reasons given for Harry to live at Dursleys:
1. James thought Harry was a squib.
2. Harry living at Petunia's 'recharges' the protections on both him and Jules.

If only those two reasons were given depth. Maybe, just maybe, there exists a version of James that would decide to put his work and his magical child above taking care of a squib* - given some trauma due to Lilly's death, increased responsibilities as a Head Auror, and the need to protect his supposed chosen-one son to consider giving Harry away. It could be a dramatic choice that James isn't happy about, and there are hints to this as James picks Harry up for the first time, and tries to make amends, including quickly confirming him as an older son, a heir. (Even in such circumstances I'd expect James to constantly check-in on Harry and pick him up on first show of accidental magic, unless the second reason is vital) (At the same time, I think there's canon mentions of little Harry showing drops of magical potential before James and Lilly got killed)

At first, I though that supposed squibness would serve as an explanation, and the whole point would be "Harry can stay at Jame's now, but he'll always know that James gave in to prejudices." and that early decision and James potencial stubbornes of how things are usually done would be a driving conflict.
... And Harry gets sorted into Slytherin and James stops talking to him. What?

The second reason could also be explored, provided all parties of the arrangement are unhappy. If there were a credible treat to Jules, a series of attempts on his life, etc, I could see justification for saying "well, we have to stick one you at Dursleys", but they would SURELY be ensuring at least the minimal safety, etc.

All in all, I believe there could be a reasonably deconstructed reason of why one twin has to live at Dursleys, but I'd rather wish it would be a sane reason, and at least somewhat believable.

*See also the Weasley accountaint squib no one talks about - there would be some precedent for exclusion of squibs from the wizarding world.

p.s. Being a potencial Squib as a reason to foister Harry to Dursleys could maaaaybe lead to Harry getting treated differently by Petunia.

 

I think you've captured the biggest issue with this story, and that's the fact that you can arrive at the same place with more reasonable characters. Your point in your spoiler about the Dursleys potentially treating Harry differently because he was supposedly a squib, which as you mentioned is counter to canon (I think I remember something regarding scaring the Potters' cat with accidental magic, but that also may be fanon), is one I think would have had more interesting implications than the whole over the top fanon!Dursleys that we get in story. ANd also added an interesting bit of conflict.

Honestly, AU Dursleys is one of the things that's rarely done well (or even at all), and it's something I wish there was more of, if only for novelty's sake.

It's been mentioned by several people in this thread but it bears repeating as probably the major sticking point for this series: James and Dumbledore would be far more engaging if they weren't continuously flanderised. Dumbledore doesn't need to be non-manipulative, and James can still have made some of the same calls, but there's massive room for subtleties and flawed but well meaning reasons that are completely absent, and that cheapens everything else.

I've spent way more time than I should thinking about this, and it kind of makes me wish I could write passably decent prose. Alas, I suck, and have the attention span of a hummingbird.

 

I think thats the thing I can't get over. Like, Dumbledore making Machiavellien choices is one thing, but James doing it (without those Machiavellien reasons) is all kinds of wtf. And then he just keeps doubling down on the douchebaggery.

You make a very good points, though. And I agree, the entirely subjective nature of each PoV is really clever but super confusing at times, and there's a lot of stuff that would make more sense (like character motivations) if some things were actually explained. As it's, the only people with an agenda that we're (mostly) fully aware of is Harry and and his crew. The rest are largely opaque, even in their own PoV, and that makes things a bit confusing.

And I'll reiterate that my biggest gripe is that I think all of the conflicts would be much more fascinating if the 'Light' was even a little sympathetic. I mean, they're as complex and nuanced as canon Voldemort.

Anyway, I'll stop flogging that dead horse. I guess I just see a fair amount of potential in the story (and the author's writing) that it just doesn't meet and that bugs me. Which ironically says good things about the story

 

Pansy, for possibly the first time in my life. The Slytherin cast really is well written.

 

I don't quite have the energy to write a full-on critique of this, so this is mostly going to be random musings / bullet points.

I did read all of this, over a fairly short amount of time. It didn't quite get to that "everything else I'm doing in my life is just a distraction and/or obstacle to getting me back in a chair and reading more" level, but I was certainly hooked. That in and of itself is a pretty big plus - no matter what faults this has, I wanted to keep reading, and I was disappointed there wasn't more, even after nearly 700K.

The writing in this is actually pretty good. It's got a conciseness and clarity to it that you don't often find in fanfiction. It loses some points on voice - it's good writing, but it's not uniquely good, if that makes sense.

The characters are for the most part engaging and easy to differentiate. They do tend to kind of fall into some familiar patterns - if I never read the phrase "well met" again, I'll be happy - and some of the sarcasm / quip-y scenes are better than others.

Some of the more trope-y stuff, like Harry's snake familiar, seem tacked on in a way that doesn't really work for me. The Harry/Eriss relationship just kinda felt like it was accomplished via fiat, and set up to be exploited later in a "vulnerable element that Harry really really cares about" way.

The over-focus on books as a source of magical development / knowledge is... eh, I've seen worse. Bit pedestrian. And the way the author kind of leans into it, at least they're committed. It makes scenes like Harry and Theo and their copybook scheme have a bit of weight / secondhand glee to them, in the way that fics that just hand Harry a bunch of handwaved generic Shit He Got From The Potter Vault tend to feel empty / pointless.

Some of the ritual / pagan magic stuff is fairly interesting. Again, not a new concept exactly, but not overdone and it was written well.

One of my main gripes is how the author just bends over backwards to graft the story along to the stations of the canon. There are several times the author pivots to this that just really, really feel like a crutch.

Another thing I'm not jazzed about is the Death Eater apologist stuff. I get making things morally ambiguous, that's fine. I even think the way Harry slowly starts adopting different aspects of the whole Improved Pureblood Philosophy is pretty well done. No, my gripe is more that in the narrative sense, the author's gone and made the "Light" side ridiculous. Continually pivoting towards "the government outlaws things not because they're dangerous but because they want to consolidate power," while simultaneously showing a Ministry / government in the present day that's incompetent and bumbling, and ALSO showing all these ancient Houses with vast mansions and ridiculous wealth and clever, imposing Lords, and then turning around and having those same Lords go "well we couldn't like, actually repeal the ban on blood magic, the MInistry's clamped down too hard. We needed Voldemort to start dropping bodies. But like, not in a terrible way." It just... strains the WSOD quite a bit.

It's a fun setup, but for it to really play, IMO, the Ministry needs to be shown to actually have some teeth. And to have actual, legit, complex reasons for doing what it's been doing. If you're gonna give the Pureblood side all this smoothing, all this extra explanation and nuance and reasoning why it's The Right Thing, then the treatment of Ron, Dumbledore, James, etc comes off as heavy-handed at best, and full-on "author has an axe to grind and this isn't a story so much as a manifesto" territory.

All that being said... I wouldn't have had those problems with it if I'd dropped it 30K words in like 99% of the fics that tell a version of this story. I had those problems with it because the quality of the writing and characterization were such that there was room for me to have those problems at all.

4/5

 

After a rough start the story becomes very engaging. Almost all the characters are neatly done.

James could have been written better. It would have been better if he had tried harder to get on with Harry. He is a mirror image of Walburga Black with all her prejudices inversed.

Dumbledore is characterised well but the execution leaves a lot to be desired from. He has been too easily frustrated on all accounts to do justice to his character. He is utilitarian and machiavellian, but seems to be over all ineffective.

Voldemort and his cause are made more reasonable and attractive in the story. But Harry gets his information from propaganda, whether its Dumbledore 's, Ministry's, or Voldemort's (Crouch and free Death Eaters). Therefore, readers get a biased account and have to wait for Harry's final determination on where he stands and his reasons. Harry still sees Voldemort as the root cause of his suffering and hasn't displayed any inclination to change that view. Furthermore unsuccessful armed rebellions might have admirers and silent supporters, but tend to lose active support once the romanticism wears off and ugliness of conflict becomes apparent. Voldemort has already caused enough strife and suffering, and suffered a defeat to inspire confidence. Harry has the option of involving himself in the legitimate politics of the Wizarding world and even if he sees things Voldemort's way he has no need to jeopardize his own interests by joining the terrorists.

The Ministry is the constant bad guy of the story and if the series continues post-hogwarts period it will be interesting to read Harry play politics in the big leagues.

The story is not big on romance which works in its favour. But if asked, I will say Harry and Daphne work. The usual Harry melting Daphne's ice or Daphne healing Harry's wounded heart thankfully won't work in this setting. If the Downward Spiral Saga took the pairing and the story to a nightmare, this one has the potential to take it to a better place.

 

I enjoyed it thoroughly, despite the many flaws.

Is it even possible to make James and Dumbledore evil idiots and have them still be well loved and popular in a believable way? I guess the author couldn't figure out a way to sell it so they just didn't even try.

However, I assume this is an intentional attempt to prove that skill at writing can still produce an enjoyable story using lots of tropes. And it is, I would say. The author seems to not have planned far into the future at any point, so we get a very inconsistent Harry from a magical skill perspective (Taure explained this brilliantly I thought, so I will not repeat it)

I also agree to some extent regarding the author cheating a little bit around describing characters by having Harry figure them out in excruciating depth within half a second based on the positioning of an eye brow or a lip. I have taken it throughout to mean this is simply Harry's opinion and we are invited to disagree, but it can be a bit painful.

I am not sure what to review it as. Deeply flawed yet truly enjoyable. Fuck it. 4/5.

 

I was unsure whether or not to like this. Mainly because all said and done up until book two so far, and reading the summaries for the last few books in the series this is nothing but another canon rehash with bashing and the most original thought in this fic is the twin potters name is Jules. Haven't seen that name before.

The best part of the story is the character interactions, but even that can get grating at times. It wouldn't be a Slytherin Harry fic if he didn't go on sermons about how others view Slytherin etc. Annoying tropes like manipulative Dumbledore and a bigoted/absentee James. None of these things are as badly done as other fics, but they are still there nonetheless. That's a good overall summary for the rest of the fic, none of the tropes is as bad as other slytherin/twin fics, but it's still there regardless.

So let's start. Every other child that isn't part of Harrys cliche is obviously an idiot and no where near as mature as the future master politicians 11-12 year olds of Harrys group. Now this is by no means the worse iteration I have seen of it, and there are moments where Ron and Jules and co are given some love, but that is rare and in between and quickly forgotten because it wouldn't fit the next scene of the authors vision.

Alot of unnecessary stuff is introduced just for the sake of it. Harry can do wandless magic? No worries lets mention this rarely after we spent a whole chapter introducing it at the start of the fic. He has a second wand? No worries so far this has had absolutely zero relevance at all beyond a passing mention now and than. Lets not get on about his exhaustion levels when performing magic, also inconsistent and fitting to the scene. Magic and everything else very much takes a back foot to the character interactions in this story, and that's fine.

The overall problem with this fic is it's inconsistency. I feel like characters act in a certain way to suit the scene that is being written without regard to their previous characterisation in this fic and the overall direction of the fic. A prime example is Hermione in book two. All of the sudden she grows into a bitchier version of her canon self and suspicious of Harry/Malfoy, teams up with Ron and Jules and the canon rehash of year 2 begins. Polyjuice potion, every same student/ghost/cat gets petrified. etc etc. But at the end of the story no matter how much she betrayed her friends in Harrys group? No worries that plot point is over let love and make up and move on to book three. This happens to a lesser but more consistent extent with Jules. One minute he is alright the next minute he is the Slytherin hating Gryffindor the author requires.

So yeah I've only finished book two, was going to start book three tonight. But I am pretty confident Sirius is innocent, James is a dick, convoluted reasons for why he thought Sirius was guilty etc. Most likely Hermione has a time turner again and probably will be a very similar scene to end the book as there was in Prisoner of Azkaban. Jules and Ron will continue to be the authors punching bag for Harrys group as required. Who knows hopefully I'm wrong.

3/5 overall because the writing quality isn't half bad and there definitely are some worthwhile character scenes worth checking out. A decent read if you like slytherin/twin fics but nothing new. If you couldn't stomach this genre in the past this fic won't change your opinion. Reading others peoples comments I am hoping this fic does improve remarkably down the road, but having read the first two books which total 180k words combined I am comfortable giving this series this rating so far. Here is to hoping I get blown away with the next few books in this series, as it is I'm enjoying myself/getting annoyed at times but a decent rec, not library worth though.

 

It uses a fair amount of tropes and cliches, that is undeniable but it manages to be good in spite of them. Sure the characterizations, specifically that of James and dumbledore can get a bit irritating at times on the whole they make sense.

By far the strongest point of this is Slytherin cast and their interactions. Unlike other fics which get on my nerves and are annoying with how mature and political the students are, this doesn't feel like that. The children are show to be smart and cunning and that is about it. The Slytherin house on the whole is also extremely well depicted. Even the minor characters and interesting though a negative is that Gryffindor and specifically Jules group can be rather cartoonish at times. Almost every character is given a bit of development specially those in Harry's clique.

Aside from this the first few books are almost a canon rehash though after that it does somewhat pickup. The word count could have been less, and it does feel a bit bloated at times, But the overall technical writing is excellent.

So for me a 3.5/5 rounded up to 4.

 

So I just binged this ove the last week.

I think this is an excellent attempt at trying to do a Slytherin Harry without going full AU on the world. I find the whole James/dumbledore are idiots thing a bit tiresome.

Harry is definitely a Gary stu there is no real explanation for his extreme precociousness (apart from wandless magic being necessary to survive) which, as taure said, is promptly undermined by a throwaway weakness in charms.

The character development seems a bit rushed sometimes. It's clear the author has a great sense of where they want the characters to be and kind of glossed over how they got there (Hermione and Justin stick out).

I'm excited to see where the same Voldemort who isnt just a genocidal racist plays out. I think the author has done a good job of channeling some of the earlier good Slytherin harry/Twins stories. I especially like the lack of pairings being forced down your throat but it's combined with a very liberal and diverse background which is acknowledged when relevant.

All In a solid read that didn't leave me feeling I had wasted my time. Some nice ideas and scenes. Some sloppiness where the author clearly wanted to rush through to the scenes they had in mind but nothing truly awful.

4/5

 

I am absolutely unsure how to rate this.

On one hand, the pros — strong cast, mostly enjoyable characterisation, and very good dialogue (quite a few chuckle moments).

On the other hand, the cons:
- inconsistent magic, magical development
- slavish adherence to canon stations
- random moments of weakness in Harry, which as far as I can tell only serve the purpose of artifical angst: they crop up randomly, only show up later, and are never really dealt with)

It's easy 4/5, if canon stations and/or tiny pieces of angst don't bother you, but it's personal 3/5.