I like twin sisters.

Makes for much fun and strange pairings.

On the topic of cliches, I'm actually itching to read a good phoenix animagus Harry in which the whole plot doesn't revolve around it. I've shunned it so much it's no longer a cliche in my eyes - I haven't read one in years.

 

that would be because they became so cliche' at one point that even mentioning it as an animagus form was a good way to lose more than half your reader base. Giving harry that particular form also tended to produce 'super' harry as the authors would suddenly lose their common sense to the 'Uber Cool' animagus form that Let him do anything.

As far as I can tell most got deleted when the authors found themselves pulling DBZ's, and the few that I have marked haven't updated in several months...

... Actually, now that you mention it, I believe I'd like to see a well written one. Most are just passive as he either forgets he has the form when he needs it the most (Eg: he gets captured) or else they put some kind of mental block on his ability to transform. Dunno, It's really a take it or leave it thing for me.

Edit: I was talking about the Phoenix Animagus form throughout.

 

Manatheron is right. I am yet to see a completed phoenix animagus Harry story. Most of them are abandoned and those select few which are completed are not even worth mentioning again.......

As for sibling cliche I generally tend to avoid reading those as it takes the focus off Harry. Only one I actually read fully was Vash's story...... That kind of interaction is ok. But all the rest His-is-Brother-Boy-Who-Lived stories sucks......
Same for sister who loves him dearly and wants to date a Weasley.....

Can't even read their first chapters............ Ughhhhhhhhhh.....

 

Ah! yes, how could we forget Vash's and Amer's take on the sibling relationship. Deviancy rules! And is so much more interesting. I have read two memorable sister characters besides the ones mentioned. But Amer's is the only twin, possibly girl-who-lived that is engaging as a character in of herself.

Phoenix animagus did become kryptonite for a lot of fics for me. In fact, I rewrote one of mine because things I was hinting at were being misinterpreted as Harry having a phoenix form. There was no way I wanted that associated with what I was writing.

But now I am flirting with both of these clichés again...maybe enough time has passed.

Syao~ I know the fic you're talking about. The one with the plaster falling and nicking the twin's head. Seriously, what an awful plot device.

 

-edit- sorry double - duplicate posted by accident. Clicked back and forward, and it messed up.

 

I persist that a phoenix animagus never can be done well, just because of the attributes and abilities of a phoenix. With this form you automatically overpower Harry.

One element of a good fic is that the author is able to balance the abilities of the characters. Of course quite often Harry outclasses most of the rest, but not in a way that it becomes unbelievable.

The phoenix animagus is one of the plotdevices which usually overturn the balance. Nobody can catch up with him anymore and ridiculous explanations have to justify why the author needs an entire novel-length fic to describe Voldemort's downfall. How do you want to explain that Voldemort is (almost) a match for Harry? Make him a basilisk-animagus?

 

To be facetious, yes.

I actually saw a fic where Voldemort, yes, Voldemort was a Phoenix animagus; and so immortal because of it, and had 'red' eyes because he would 'internally' become a phoenix while maintaining human skin so as to be invulnerable.

That take was...interesting.

I do agree with the phoenix = overpowering bit. I think, like you juxtaposed, Voldemort needs to balance it out somehow. Or any other counterpoint to Harry.
But, honestly, most of the times, it is just not worth it to deal with all the issues this particular plot device brings up.

 

In theory it could be done well if you managed to find an author prepared to put some limits on Harry's power. So a phoenix can survive the killing curse? Render them small and helpless afterwards, when another AK would finish them off. Harry only gets a 'Escape Death Free' card once. He can fire-travel? Make it drain his power majorly. Canon only shows Fawkes fire-travelling in times of dire need.

And the emotional birdsong thing - presumably a phoenix would have to actually feel those emotions rather than just being able to sing the happy song and fill allies with good cheer. Make it so that the song isn't selective either - Harry's circling around the battlefield singing something to give people courage? Make it fill the Death Eater's with courage too. It'd be a nice way to give Harry a wake up call when he just manages to escalate the bloodshed instead of stopping it.

But yeah, I tend to avoid phoenix!Harry fics like the plague. They're usually a cue for a disgustingly Light Harry

 

Actually I think cannon states somewhere that phoenix song uplifts the spirits of the righteous and brings terror to the unrighteous... something like that. Until Half Baked Plot it was only in Fannon that Phoenix song could do anything else, and even in HBP all we know is that it saddened Everyone who heard it.

The Eternal rebirth thing, I'd think that it'd be perpetual, no matter how many times your struck down you can come back. My Question is how long it takes to regenerate into what you were before burning? We know that it's not instantaneous, but if I remember right then for a true phoenix it's something less than a week. Of course if it's only your animagus form it may take longer, or have different effect, such as the ones DreamRed mentions, and I'd counter the fire travel bit by making it instinct to stop any and all curses you see that would hit an 'Innocent' making you easy to pick off. The ability to carry immense loads is the one I'd make magically draining, with the drain being proportional to the load.

I concur about Needing to feel the emotions for the song to work though.