Deconstructing Harry Part 7: A Review in Seven Parts

Click for Part 1. Click for Part 2. Click for Part 3. Click for Part 4. Click for Part 5. Click for Part 6.

Author's note: The "thoughts-per-page" posted are the exact thoughts I had while reading that very page. They have not nor will not be edited in retrospect or changed in hindsight. Here are my thoughts on the final 118 pages of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows:

Page 642 - "I do not need to seek Potter. Before the night is out, Potter will have come to find me." Like Luke Skywalker coming to find his father in Return of the Jedi. Why do bad guys always go out of their way to hunt down the good guys until the ending of the final episode, where suddenly they sit around patiently waiting for the hero to come to them? Why not wait in the first place? Maybe take up knitting?

Page 656 - Voldemort has his pet snake dispose of Severus Snape. Blood gushes from Snape's wounds and such. Blah blah blah.

Page 658 - Right before dying Snape gives Harry his silvery brain semen because J.K. Rowling is too poor a writer to properly tell a story without a ton of exposition -- hence the Pensieve.

Pages 662 - 690 - We find out what we knew all along. Snape was a good guy. He loved Lily. Dumbledore had asked to be killed by Snape. Why tell us this now, during the book's electrifying climax? Because there's nothing like 28 pages of convoluted and predictable back story to truly bring the thrills and chills out of the final pages of the final novel in the Harry Potter series. I mean -- there's only a war going on out there. People dying. But why worry about that? Let's look at Snape's childhood and examine the relationship he had with Dumbledore, instead.

Pages 690 - 710 - Harry thinks back through every Quidditch match he's ever played and decides to free every Golden Snitch, as he feels that they are being abused in a way similar to House Elves.

Pages 711 - 759 - Harry sets hundreds of Snitches free. To his surprise, they gang up on Voldemort and kill him with their flapping wings. Voldemort screams, "And I woulda gotten away with it too, if it weren't for you meddling orbs!" and dies a violent death. Ron remarks, "One thing you can say for old Voldy -- the guy sure had balls!" Tired of Ron's bad puns, Hermione dumps the dude and marries a House Elf. Ron begins dating a Snitch and Harry hides the secret feelings he has for Ron and finds his new Patronus is a closet. A closet he doesn't come out of for the rest of his life.

Okay, I made pages 690 - 759 up. Here's the real ending. Brace yourselves.

Page 691 - "Harry understood at last that he was not supposed to survive." This could be good.

Page 693 - "I must die. It must end." - Harry Potter. J.K. Rowling must not be playing with our emotions or this series will be destroyed. She's on the right path. Harry Potter needs to die to make the story complete. It's obvious J.K. knows this, but will she have the nerve to go through with killing Harry Potter? Only if she's an honest storyteller, not a cash-whore.

Page 694 - Poor Colin Creevey. "He was tiny in death." So many giving their lives for Harry. Will Harry do the same for them?

Page 696 - This is looking like it's for real. Harry's now telling Neville to kill the snake if Ron and Hermione fail. Harry has no plans on surviving. But what are J.K.'s plans for him?

Page 697 - "Hogwarts was the first and best home he had known. He and Voldemort and Snape, the abandoned boys, had all found home here." Beautiful description of a beautiful school. If Harry really dies, this could get emotional.

Page 699 - Sirius Black, James Weasley, Remus Lupin -- the dead have all come to see Harry off and welcome him to the afterlife, or something. The most sentimental moment is with Harry's mom. "You've been so brave," she tells him. James follows her up by saying, "We are ... so proud of you." And, if Harry really does die, this will be the most powerful moment in the entire 7 book Harry Potter series. If he lives, this moment will be cheap and tacky and I just may join the Christian nutters in burning the book. Not because it's sinful, but because it would be a sin for J.K. Rowling to play with our emotions like this and not be true to her own story. And the truth is: Harry Potter must die.

Page 704 - "[Harry] saw the mouth move and a flash of green light, and everything was gone." I paused here. I stopped reading for at least 5 minutes and paced my living room floor. I even debated vacuuming. Did J.K. really just kill Harry Potter? The drawing at the start of the next chapter of a corpse-like Potter certainly indicates that she did. If she killed him, this will be amazing. A miracle. A moment never forgotten by fans the world over. If not, this will mean nothing. It will be a trick, a double-cross, a disappointment unparalleled in literary history. I had to stop pacing. I had to get back to reading. I had to know the truth. I had to have an excuse not to vacuum.

Page 707 - Harry sees Dumbledore. "You wonderful boy." says Dumbledore. "You brave, brave man." My eyes well up, but I won't let a tear escape. Not yet. I have to know -- is Potter really dead? Is J.K. Rowling as brave as the hero of her novels?

Page 707 - Dumbledore lets Harry know that he's (Harry) still alive. From this point on I read only to get to the end. There is no enjoyment for me in this series anymore. It has been compromised in a way that I will never forgive. J.K. Rowling has never been an exceptional writer, but she can spin a good tale. But this isn't one of them. Sure, Ron and/or Hermione could still die -- but what does it matter anymore? J.K. just spent the last how many pages playing with our emotions? Messing with our heads to make her book seem like something other than a 700 page tease. We waited a decade for this? Are you fucking kidding me?

Page 709 - "You were the seventh Horcrux, Harry" says Dumbledore. No shit. I called it way back on page 601. "'What, then, was the Horcrux?' How about Harry himself? Isn't this obvious? Now, if I'm wrong, this will be embarrassing." I wrote in the last update.

I wasn't wrong, but it's still embarrassing. Just not for me. It's embarrassing for J.K. Rowling to write such a predictable story full-up of shit. Sorry guys, but this whole thing is really pissing me off. A decade's a long time to wait to be crapped on by some pussy too scared to give us a decent ending to a blockbuster series.

Pages 713 - 714 - Dumbledore rambles on about the Hallows being real. And we'd expect anything else? Like J.K. would title the final fucking novel after some made-up shit. That'd be like finding out in Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets that there really wasn't a Chamber of Secrets but rather an Outhouse of Doodling.

Page 717 - Dumbledore confesses to being a bit of an egotist and failing his sister. This is about as shocking a revelation as we're going to get in The Deathly Hallows. And it isn't all that shocking, as Dumbledore essentially excuses away his actions in the same way that Bush excuses away his years of drinking, driving and cocaine sniffing.

Page 720 - Harry's the true master of death because only the true master of death doesn't run away from death, or something. Gotta love the irony found in nearly every single fantasy book or screenplay ever written.

Page 727 - Hagrid carries Harry's "corpse." I guess this "'corpse-carrying'" is Hagrid's only reason for being in this book. What happened to the big war with the giants that J.K. promised? Is this it? Some big oaf carrying a kid who's playing dead?

Page 733 - Neville slices off the snake's head. Maybe I would have cared 100 pages ago.

Page 736 - "NOT MY DAUGHTER, YOU BITCH!" - Mrs. Weasley. Okay, how could you not like that line?

Page 737 - Harry and Voldemort begin circling each other. Like in a Western. Sorta generic. Somebody just kill somebody else and be done with it, already.

Pages 738 - 743 - Unbelievably, we have to sit through more exposition. And not just exposition, but exposition we've already sat through. It's like J.K. Rowling forgot that we could read Harry's visions, so we also have to hear Harry explain his visions to Voldemort. Seriously, this has to be the first time in literary history where the reader is forced to sit through the exact same exposition twice in one novel. And I never thought Rowling could top the Scooby-Doo ending she wrote up in Chamber of Secrets, but somehow she manages.

Page 744 - Voldemort dies. It's a genuine "meh" moment. And I don't even use the word "meh."

Page 745 - Luna has one final moment to shine and remind everyone how shiny she can be. I can't help but smile through my vile dissatisfaction with The Deathly Hallows. That Luna. She's got me whipped.

Page 747 - Dumbledore in the portrait breaking down was moving. I'll admit it. Not moving enough to make me reconsider the sheer suckiness of this book, but moving nonetheless.

Page 753 - "Nineteen Years Later." Just when you think it can't get any worse, it gets worser (is "worser" really a word? Spell check isn't calling it out). If you care at all about this series, you will stop reading prior to page 753. This is where J.K. reveals her backup plan. She knows she isn't a writer proper and all she has going is Harry Potter, so she sets up a sequel with the children of the children made famous in the first 7 novels. And, in the process, she expects us to believe that Harry stuck with Ginny, Hermione stuck with Ron and everyone named everyone after anyone that mattered in the first seven books. That makes it easier for J.K. when she writes the shitty follow-up series. Why waste time with new names when you can conveniently rewrite the same story with the same names and still bring in the billions? What a joke Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows turned out to be. But the joke's on J.K. Rowling, as even her most devoted fans will find the "epilogue" to this novel desperate at best and pathetic at worst.

Well, Harry Potter is over and has ended in a raging torrent of disillusionment. I think I'm going to get obscenely drunk and eat an ungodly number of KitKat candy bars. As far as I can recall, no novel has ever caused me to do that before ... and I've read a lot of novels. Thanks for setting me down the path of obesity and alcoholism, J.K. Your little wizard fable has destroyed my life. Hope you're happy, bitch.
--Alex Sandell

Deconstructing Harry Part 2: A Review in Seven Parts

Click to read Part 1, if you haven't already

Author's note: I haven't read ahead in the book. The "thoughts-per-page" posted are the exact thoughts I had while reading that very page. They have not been edited in retrospect or changed in hindsight. Many thoughts will be wrong. Many will be right. I will hold off on giving my opinion of the book until I'm finished reading it. Here are my thoughts on pages 101-200 of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows:

Page 104 - Hermione reveals that a Horcrux is the opposite of a human-being. If you run a human through with a sword, their soul will survive, untouched. If you destroy a Horcrux the very soul contained within will perish.

Page 105 - Harry's doubting his relationship with Dumbledore again. Who was this hippy-dippy wizard, anyway?

Page 114 - "It's traditional to give a wizard a watch when he comes of age." I guess it beats a sweater. Of course Harry's watch is used, because Harry is repressed and everything. The Wizarding community sure doesn't come through much for their savior.

Page 116 - Ginny gives Harry a superior present. She sneaks him off into a room and begins "kissing him as she had never kissed him before." Harry considers it "blissful oblivion" and enjoys it so much that even "firewhisky" cannot compare. Tweens have just been given masturbation fantasies that will last them throughout adolescence -- or at least until they find their dad's stash of Playboy Magazines.

Page 120 - Hagrid gives Harry a birthday gift that will come in handier than the hard-on Ginny delivered. It's a "Mokeskin." You can hide anything inside it and only the owner can get it back out.

Page 125 - Rufus Scrimgeour -- a sort of George W. Bush doppelganger -- crashes Harry's party to give Harry, Ron and Hermione what was left for them by Dumbledore in his will. Ron gets a Deluminator (it's a lighter shaped object that can turn lights in rooms on and off at will), Hermione receives a copy of The Tales of Beedle the Bard (a collection of children's stories) and a disappointed Harry is willed the snitch he caught in his first Quidditch match.

Page 128 - Harry discovers Dumbledore also left him "The sword of Godric Gryffindor." But Scrimgeour isn't willing to give up the sword, claiming it wasn't Dumbledore's to grant in the first place. Harry all freaks out (as Harry's prone to do), thinking the sword was mean to be bestowed upon him to kill Voldemort.

Page 134 - There's more to the Snitch than Harry had suspected. In Dumbledore's handwriting appears the words, "I open at the close." The close of Harry's life? The close of Macy's Day 24 Hour Sale? Did Dumbledore suddenly turn into the Riddler? Mysterious ...

Page 137 - At Bill and Fleur's wedding, Harry drinks some Polyjuice and disguises himself as "Cousin Barny." Oh, so now they figure it out. I'm surprised J.K. Rowling didn't have everyone at the wedding drink the potion and turn themselves into 100 Harry Potters.

Page 140 - Luna Lovegood makes her first appearance. She's my favorite character in the entire series and a I have a feeling she'll be nothing more than a bit-player in The Deathly Hallows. I hope I'm wrong. But I know I won't be.

Page 143 - Viktor Crum makes an appearance. Nobody cares.

Page 145 - Harry feels sorry for himself.

Page 148 - If Viktor is to be believed, Luna's dad is wearing Grindelwald's sign. Grindelwald was a dark wizard that Dumbledore went down in infamy for defeating in a battle. But who the fuck believes Viktor?

Page 152 - Elphias Doge reveals that, after becoming "rather rude" with Rita Skeeter, aspersions were cast upon his sanity. Pretty much par for the course with the Bush Administration. How much of this is coincidence and how much is Rowling working politics into her books?

Page 154 - A drunken and gossipy Auntie Muriel spits all over the image of Albus Dumbledore. She claims Kendra Dumbledore locked her daughter Ariana in the cellar for being a "squib." Locked in a cellar for being different? This is something Harry can relate to. His faith is being shaken in Dumbledore, who, according to a tipsy Muriel, sat by passively doing nothing to help his sister.

Page 155 - Sure enough, Harry identifies with Kendra Dumbledore. Was she locked up like Harry, only for knowing too little magic, while Harry was locked away for knowing too much?

Page 158 - Harry finds that Dumbledore's mother and sister were buried close to his mother and father in Godric's Hollow. Harry feels that Dumbledore lied by omission.

Page 159 - Harry doesn't have much time for self-pity prior to a Patronus arriving at the wedding uninvited and declaring, "the ministry has fallen. Scrimgeour is dead. They are coming."

Page 160 - Death Eaters arrive at the place of celebration. Harry, Ron and Hermione narrowly escape with their lives, as they narrowly always do.

Page 162 - Hermione says "damn." Conservative Christians everywhere debate burning the book. Because, of course, they've never cursed before in their lives.

Page 163 - In the Muggle world, Hermione is perfect jail bait. Men begin "wolf-whistling" and hitting on her. Conservative Christians decide that the book does, indeed, need to be burned.

Page 168 - Although he's now 17, could Harry still have a trace on him? Who could have put it there? I'm guessing Mad-Eye Moody, even though he's "dead."

Page 173 - Hermione moves to the political right. "You've got to close your mind!" she tells Harry. Next, she'll join in the closest scheduled book-burning of the latest Harry Potter novel.

Page 174 - Draco makes his grand entrance. He seems unwillingly resigned to torturing those who fail Voldemort.

Page 177 - Harry's starting to have mega-doubts about Dumbledore. Going so far as to compare the great wizard to Dudley. Dudley?!? Now that just stings.

Page 178 - What I wouldn't have given for "Permanent Sticking Charm" when I was a young teenager. "Don't like my Freddy Krueger poster, mom? Tough fucking shit. Try to remove it ... I dare you."

Page 181 - "It seems incredible that Dumbledore" Way to leave us hanging, J.K.. You do know I want your head on a stake for this, don't you? Esp. when it's going to turn out that Albus Dumbledore had reasons for his every action and was never cruel to anyone ... esp. his own blood.

Page 182 - Baby Harry and his mini-broom was a moving scene. Made me get all lumpy in the throat.

Page 186 - Sirius Black's brother, Regulus, was a Death Eater. Regulus? Where does J.K. come up with these ridiculous names? I guess I shouldn't be shocked, as this is the woman who named an entire series after a character named "Harry."

Page 196 - Yikes. Kreacher went through hell and back. He's still an asshole, as far as I'm concerned.

Page 198 - Hermione gets the biggest "I-told-you-so" thus far. It's not hard to see her gloating in that, "I'm really not gloating" sort of way that she's perfected over the course of 7 novels.
--Alex Sandell