The Buddies sadly close out their epic pilgrimage into the Harry Potter world with Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Parts 1 & 2. In this episode, they discuss a wide range of topics, including fearing death, goblin-wizard relations, and casting couches. Plus, they tackle the age-old question: Is it okay to slow dance with your best friend’s girlfriend alone in your room? So, grab your popcorn and tissues as we watch the final movies of this epic, life-changing series.

Intro (0:00-1:55)
Stock Up/Down (1:56-46:45)
Favorite Scene/Character (46:46-53:59)
Love/Hate (54:00-1:04:14)
Lingering Questions (1:04:15-1:08:25)
Conclusion (1:08:26-1:10:14)

NEXT BOOK: Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to the book club. I’m Dylan here with the one and only guy I wanna hunt horcruxes with. Keith, what’s up, buddy? Dylan, I’m feeling deathly and hollow after finishing this series.

Yeah. It’s it’s been, like, 4 months that I’ve just been thinking about Harry Potter. It was even last night, I was putting my daughter to bed. She’s 2 months old. So I’m I’m putting her to bed, and she was fast asleep.

But I have to give her this bottle. Otherwise, she’ll be up all night. And so she’s fast asleep, so I’m trying to feed her. I’m trying to get as much possibly inside of her so that she won’t wake up sooner. And the whole time, I was felt like I was Harry and she was Dumbledore in the cave because I’d be like, come on.

One more sip. One I said, one more sip. One more sip. And then just squeezing her mouth open to, like, force some milk down. Mhmm.

And she would do it. I’d be like, that’s so good. You’re doing so good. And then she’d be like, I don’t want anymore. And I’d be like, one more sip.

One more sip. I was just waiting for the inferior to come out and and start attacking me. But, yeah, I I had a Harry Potter. And, basically, that’s been my life the last few months. I’ve just been associating everything with Harry Potter.

It’s it’s a hollow feeling for sure, especially once you start reading other books that you realize are not the same as this masterpiece. Yep. But here we are. Here at The Buddy Book Club, we’re breaking down some box office bangers, and this week, we’re discussing 2010 and 2000 eleven’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows films. That’s part 1 and part 2.

If you’d like to recommend a book or movie for us to read or watch, you can reach out to us about our past episodes. Visit our website at buddybookclub.com, instead of an owl, on Twitter or Instagram, buddybookuppodcast. You can list us, iTunes, Spotify, or your podcasts. Please download. Give us a review.

5 stars would be nice. Follow us on social channels, please, and thanks. Keith, let’s jump into, Deathly Hallows part 1 and 2. So with some stock up, stock down, stock up. What do you got?

Stock up fearing death. Oh. Yeah. As a species, we’re born, you know, to survive and fear death. I mean, all animals are.

And that’s really why that scene where Harry knows he has to die is so powerful is because you’re basically walking into something that from the very first day you’re born, you’re programmed to not want to do. Yeah. But it’s just this really really heart wrenching scene where it’s, like, oh, now I have to sacrifice myself for the the good of everyone else. But after that happens in the movie, not in the book, not canon, Harry gets into a 1 on 1 battle with Voldemort. Mhmm.

And frankly, this scene I thought was pretty stupid. I thought the book was cinematic. It was, like, perfect. This one on 1 match up, everyone to watching the big showdown. And the movie, they’re like, why don’t we just make this like a cartoon?

And they’re, like, jumping around. It’s almost kinda like the Battle of Mustafar, where, Obi wan and Anakin are just like jumping around every single, like, prop and the whole point. Floating floating droid. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. So they’re they’re fighting. And then at one point, Harry just grabs on to Voldemort and is like, you’re coming with me and I’m gonna fall to my death and kill him. Mhmm. So he’s just no longer afraid of dying.

But it, like, kind of ruins the whole scene before that where it’s this whole big thing of, like, I don’t wanna die. I don’t wanna have to do this. I don’t you know, this whole, like, thing you have to go through. 4 4 minutes later, he’s like, fuck it. Grabs onto him.

I’ll jump and just kill myself. It was like Yeah. What? What? Are you kidding me?

That was the best part because it was an homage to point break with Johnny Utah and Bodhi jumping out of the airplane, and he’s like, pull the chute. Pull the chute. And he’s like, no. I’m not gonna pull the chute. It was point break.

That’s what they just recreated in the Harry Potter universe. But but also Voldemort can fly. You can’t. So I don’t really understand. Yeah.

There’s no there’s no risk for Voldemort. He’s like, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Alright.

Whatever. Yeah. He’s like, okay. I I didn’t get it all. Yeah.

Yeah. I I didn’t care for that final showdown either. It was also in the book, and and correct me if I’m wrong because it’s been a couple weeks. But he, like, slips out of Hagrid’s shoulders as Neville’s doing the whole snake thing and puts the invisibility cloak on and kinda slips away. And they’re like, where’s where’s where’s Harry?

Whereas in this one, he just, like, falls out of Hagrid’s arms. He’s like, I’m alive. Here I am. Come catch me. And, like, runs away.

It’s like, Yeah. The whole sequence was was pretty dumb. Neville’s whole thing too is, like, he pulls the the sword out, and it means something at that moment because he then kills the, the snake with it. Mhmm. But we don’t get that for, like, 5 more minutes.

So it’s just like, They made the snake thing elongated when that should have been just Neville’s moment right there in front of everyone. Right. And then no one’s watching at the end. So it just seems like I’m like, where did everyone go? It looks seems like everyone’s gone.

I guess it’s, like, kind of a fizzle. It’s just like, I guess they’re fighting, but that’s where it goes. The nice part about the book, like you said, was it was this final showdown in the great hall, mano a mano, Voldemort versus Harry. Everyone’s there cheering him on, and the the best part about that scene, like we talked about in in the book pod, is Harry just being like, hey, Tom. Your wand’s not gonna work.

I know all this stuff. Don’t aren’t you worried about it? Aren’t you worried about it? You’re not the owner. Haven’t you been noticing weird stuff?

Yeah. And just, like, talking trash right before the spell rebounds and and Dumbledore kills kills himself. Excuse me, Voldemort. They always do that. If they’re gonna change stuff, I think they also especially since they didn’t they put, like, no emphasis on the whole Expelliarmus?

Yeah. That was, like, a huge emphasis where they don’t put any emphasis in the movie. It should have been, like, Protego shield protecting his friends like his parents did for him and then bounce back or something. Like, something that where there’s symbolism, you know, for for that. Oh.

But instead, it’s just by himself, and then I talked about this later, but, like, then he kills him. I don’t even know how. It’s the the spell rebounds. So that’s the same. But he turns into, like, gladiator for a minute.

You know what I’m talking about? His, like, body falls apart and then, like, we fall like a leaf in the the sky, and you have, like, this music playing. I was like, He goes to a he went to Elysium? Yeah. So it happens.

I’m like, wait. What’s going on? Do you know the scene that all the time in Gladiator, it’s all that artsy, like The wheats? When he Yeah. He’s like hands, like, feeling hands to your wheatgrass.

Yeah. That’s what happens for the movie. I was like I was like, what the hell is happening here? Yeah. I don’t know why they did the Marvel movie, when Thanos snaps his fingers and he just, like, disintegrates.

I’m not sure why that would be different than anything else. But I was okay with that part. It was more just the fight, I thought. It didn’t need to be fixed. It was Yeah.

It was really well done in in the in the book, and you had the opportunity to do it. All the set was there. You know, you you really it didn’t add anything to it besides this flying around Voldemort Harry thing. Especially since our criticisms in the past have been they had so much action in the scene, and they didn’t take they took it away. Instead, they just did, like, the dueling lightning bolts.

You know? And then this one, they’re like, alright. We’ll add a ton of actions. Like, no. This is what we don’t need there.

Like, you should’ve done that for the other times, and now you put it in. It’s cartoonish now. Yeah. And I have more on the action in gen in general later. But, but, yeah, I agree.

The the Nagini thing was a little odd too with, like, her Ron and Hermione doing that thing. I don’t know. So I was glad they put Ron and Hermione getting the Basilisk fang in because we didn’t see that in the book. It was just they gave birth to her. Make out, which I thought was better, and then then there was in the book.

So I’ll give them props for that. There was innuendo all throughout that scene. You remember I think there were a lot of percussion. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

I’m picking up what you’re putting down. My first stock up oh, god. I should now I’m following it up with this. Whatever. My first stock up is a casting couch stock up.

So, yeah, hear me out here. The casting couch is really just if we boil the meaning behind it, it’s really just an opportunity to see if there’s chemistry between 2 amateur talents. Right? That’s really the goal. Let’s see if there’s chemistry between these 2 amateur talents.

And maybe, you know, there is, and they’ll go on to bigger and thicker things. Or, you know Which which where are you seeing these guys? What is it? What’s the website? And I’m not suggesting they should have made 11 year old Daniel Radcliffe make out with 9 year old Bonnie Wright, at the beginning of this whole series, but it is a $1,000,000,000 franchise.

So maybe. You know? Oh, to see if their chemistry Yeah. To see if there’s some chemistry. I was like, wait.

What think I was talking about? I was like, what does this have to do with either? Yeah. There’s just there’s just no chemistry with Ginny. I mean Okay.

We actually get. It was funny because in our podcast bring it up like that. I know. I’m gonna forget and forget. In in the podcast about the the shoe tying thing, I was like, oh, you don’t even tie someone’s shoes unless it’s, like, at a formal event or like that.

I don’t even know what I was thinking, but it makes sense to me. But what do you know? There is a formal event, Bill and Fleur’s wedding, and Ginny needs someone to help zip up her dress, a very classic trope. Harry, come zip it up. And then they have a kiss, but me and the wife were sitting on the couch watching this, and we both had the same thought, which is they didn’t even show them kiss.

And the angle at which they filmed it, it’s very clear that they didn’t kiss. Like, the 2 actors didn’t kiss. They filmed it like a passion cove, like a skin a max type sex scene. Yeah. They’re supposedly having sex, but you can tell by the angle.

It’s like, no, that’s just not that’s just not how bodies work. And that was the same with this kiss. Like, if you go back and look at it, it was like, oh, they filmed it in a way that you can’t see them kiss, like, for this reason. Their heads are tilted weird way. They’re obviously not kissing because they have they have no chemistry.

That was my thought, which is true for sure. But then we finally do get a kiss between them towards the end at the Battle of Hogwarts, and the kiss we see is the most dispassionate kiss I’ve ever seen in my whole life. I kiss my sister more passionately than these two people kissed each other. It was like Alright. What what is happening here?

So now I understand why they didn’t have them kiss in the first one because they must have done it. They had a take where they kissed, and they were like, oh my god. This is gonna ruin the entire movie because people won’t stop thinking about this. So let’s fit a kiss in, but let’s do it in the last 10 minutes of the second movie so that people are already past it. But, yeah, it it’s it’s just continues to blow me away throughout the series how the chemistry is, like, 2 opposites.

Can I And they would’ve gotten your hot bodied? Me kissing my sister? No. No. The, the animated version of Harry and and Hermione kissing.

I was like, oh. The an animated version? You know how, like, there he’s seeing it in the, the locket? Like Oh, yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. They showed that, and I’m like, I’m kinda into this. I don’t know what to do. Well, I guess since we’re here, let’s let’s talk about because there is a a big divide, I feel like, about the Harry and Hermione dance scene, the dirty dancing that happens in the tent.

How did you feel about that? Was because there was chemistry there for sure. Yeah. I don’t know. That was that that that felt a little bit off putting.

I felt like that was kinda cheating, honestly. Cheating how? If you’re doing, like, an intimate dance like that, it’s it’s one thing to do, like, a fun dance. Oh, you meant, like, it was cheating on Ron. Like, she was cheating on Ron.

Yeah. Like, if Ron walked in on that, that’d be the same as walking in on its own making out. If it’s in, like, a big group setting alright. Whatever. It’s kinda weird still, but it’s 1 on 1 in a room by yourself in a bedroom.

Yeah. And you’re 2 people listening to music, and they’re they’re not swing dancing and doing, like, fun dancing and doing, like, the chicken dance. They’re doing slow dancing, hands on on, close to to buttocks. You know? Pop fiction kind of dancing.

You know? They’re not at the Yeah. The Bebop, Rocksteady, whatever that dance hall is, or restaurant. Yeah. No.

I agree. It was something more. I mean, it was to the point where they show that one bit at the end when they stop dancing and look at each other, and at least my mind went, are they gonna kiss right now? You know, is this gonna be total notkin in? Is the bring up your sister thing is if you were dancing with your sister at a wedding like that, 100% fine.

Everyone would be like, oh, that’s really nice. If you do that in a room together by yourself, now you’re like Tuesday night. Right. So, like, that that’s the difference. Or you could tell it’s like, oh, that’s a little weird.

Right? A 100%. No. Yeah. I thought I thought the same thing, and it was an it was an interesting ad.

And I looked it up because I was interested to see what the Internet thought about it, and there are Reddit threads about this. With most people being on the side of it’s totally fine. It’s 2 people missing, which is a weird take, but it’s one person that got a lot of upvotes or whatever. So it’s it’s pretty much 2 people missing their loved ones, you know, Ginny and Ron, and they’re platonic friends and kind of having some emotion with each other which I didn’t really follow. And then a lot of stuff was around it’s ridiculous that people can’t think that like a man and a woman can be friends platonically and just enjoy each other’s company.

And it’s like, that’s not that it yeah. It’s like We both been 16 and yeah. 16 and you’re just, like, invite you by yourself for that long. I mean, I I don’t know how you out I’ll still take that. You know what I mean?

If it were 2 if it were 2 60 or, like, 80 year olds dancing like that, 100% completely fine. Well, hold on a second. STDs highest rates are on college campuses and retirement homes. So We’re going really deep on this. Retirement homes.

People are getting I don’t mind. I don’t mind. Throw shade on the on the AARP community. Yeah. I just wanted to talk about that dance because it was something that wasn’t in the book, and they threw in there.

And But they did a good chemistry. I’ll give it to you. Yeah. Good point. Yeah.

What else do you have for stock up? Stock up goblins hating wizards. Okay. Yeah. I think in the book, we kind of had talked about how the goblins’ mindset and kind of who they are as people is a little bit questionable, morals and ethic wise.

In the movie though, we see 1, we get to the we get to Gringotts’ end. The wizards are the policing body there. So it’s not the actual goblins themselves controlling. They don’t have like sovereignty, like when a police force is from a different country and you’re protecting yourselves. That’s gonna be immediately draw hate towards the other group.

Then Harry gets there, casts the imperious curse on that bank teller. He’s just a bank teller. He’s not a nefarious person. He’s not mean in any way. All his job is to is to do his job is to protect the money in there and protect the assets of wizards Uh-huh.

Assets. Peloton and Imperius curse, walks him out in front of the dragon as a laugh, and the dragon blows fire on him and kills him. Well, as we hear of it, they bounce out of there, sucks with the goblin. See you later. But that seems the enemy’s start right there.

They don’t care of you. They don’t value, your life, and they are the ones who control, the policing of your of your civilization. So I understand it now. Stock up. Yeah.

That goblin, he was he was just punching a a time sheet or whatever. Like 9 to 5. Punching 9 to 5. Yeah. It actually two things about this scene reminded me of Austin Powers.

1 being that the guards, like, the wizard guards, came in in uniforms that were very similar to the uniforms of, like, the henchmen from Austin Powers, just the random henchmen guys that are running around the silo at Austin Powers. I I thought it was kinda weird in general that these wizards would have hats and button down shirts. Like, you know, a security guard is basically what they were dressed up as, and it that seemed kind of odd to me. And the other part was that, the one goblin, like, we were talking about who’s, you know, just doing his job. He’s working at 9 to 5.

He’s, you know, he’s hoping he could put enough aside to to to retire at 67 or whatever the case. I don’t know it is for goblins. And then he just gets got. And there was this is why I miss DVDs. I love streaming stuff, obviously, because it’s great, and you could just spend hours streaming.

But when you used to buy a DVD, it would have bonus features on it. And one of the bonus features for the Austin Powers, DVD was a skit that they did. And do you remember in Austin Powers when he uses the steamroller and runs over the guy? He’s like, stop. Stop.

And he’s like, get out of the way. Get out of the way. So he runs over that guy, and the the skit is the guy’s family, like, the next day or something like that. And his son’s like, mom, when’s when’s daddy coming home? And mom’s just like, daddy’s not gonna come home tomorrow, son.

But they go through this whole it’s funny. It’s not sad, which is what it kind of seems like it should be. But, you know, you think because no one ever thinks about in James Bond movies or whatnot the lives of these henchmen. It’s almost like a Rick and Rick and Morty type thing. So I was thinking about what that goblin, is leaving behind.

I did like how in the movie, we we see Griphook get got. You know? We we see him lying dead on the ground, and the sword of Gryffindor disappears as it should to to be passed back to the next, Gryffindor that’s brave enough to take it or whatever the case be. But, yeah, that’s a good one. My next stock up was a Hogwarts drinking water, and this is a quick one.

But I assume outside of the pumpkin juice and the fire whiskey what else they drink in there? Butterbeer. Outside of that You’re a water snob? Feel like you are, aren’t you? Well, I was drinking tap water down here until I got a like, we were buying bottled water for some inane reason, and I was fine with it.

Whatever. I don’t I don’t really care. But then I was like, why am I not gonna drink the tap water? I get all these reports that says the tap water’s fine. I’m drinking the tap water.

And I’ve been doing that for, like, 6 months, and then I get a report, like, your tap water may have lead in it. I was like, goddamn it. So, no, I’m not good. Right? You want to get some iron in your blood.

Right? That’s fine. It’s not iron. It’s not iron. Yeah.

Same difference. No. I’m not a water. What would a water snot be like? Oh, I only drink Perrier kind of thing?

Yeah. Yeah. Well, you only like, oh, that I can’t drink. The big one is, Dasani. Dasani is, like, disgusting.

It’s the most, like, vile thing ever. I’ll never drink that. Well, I think any sort of triple osmosis water that you’re buying Woah. Is just some of the stupidest thing we can do as a like, that’s how I know that as a human race, we’re pretty stupid. It’s just the fact that most of this water is tap water that they’ve put through a triple charcoal filter or whatever the case is, bottled it, and sold it to you.

Mhmm. It’s it’s snake oil. You know? They’re selling the tap. Convenience.

You’re not buying the water, I I think, at least. The only reason I drink water bottled water is just like, oh, nice. I Sure. If if I’m at a gas station and there’s a bunch of waters there, I’m not grabbing a Dasani. I’m grabbing I’m spending an extra dollar on Fiji or something that’s Yeah.

A a spring water. You know? I agree. I I’m just not one of those people that won’t drink water. I don’t drink anything that’s cold.

I don’t really care. No. Yeah. Of course. Are you kidding me?

I drink out of I drink out of colds I drink out of holes in the top of the top of the top is what I’m saying. Yeah. Okay. We’re around the same thing. You get that extra latex feeling in the summer, that that hot rubber taste.

It’s wonderful. Jesus. Yeah. So the hogwash drinking water, back to my point, which was a quick one. Yeah.

You know, they the water tap waters and whatnot, they put fluoride and stuff in it to Mhmm. Keep your teeth a bunch of counties do that, whatever. The Hogwarts drinking water, they gotta be throwing extra testosterone in there because Harry looks 25 or 30 in this movie. It’s they’re trying so hard to make him look like a 17 year old, but his 5 o’clock shadow is showing up at noontime. It’s it’s hard to believe that this odd looking man is is 17 or whatever the case is because he could grow.

It’s like I’m looking at him and was like, he could grow a fuller beard than I can grow now at at 37 years old. So, I didn’t I didn’t love the the Harry look in this one. I think in general, it wasn’t his best look out of all the movies. Well, when they show his older Harry, he’s, like, 35, and they looks like he’s 65. They’re like, he’s he’s pretty much dead.

He’s gonna die pretty soon. Where and then they take Hermione, and they’re like, we’ll put one wrinkle on your forehead. You look exactly what they’re saying. Also, look 18. Yeah.

And then whatever they did to Ginny, they’re like, we’re given putting £2 of hairspray in her hair and making her wear this thing out there. So with Ron. Ron, they’re like, we’ll keep everything the same, add £20. Add £20. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Put a beer belly on him. They put a very tasteful yeah. Very tasteful beer belly on Ron.

I I I appreciated it. Yeah. Yeah. I I was a big fan of the look of the epilogue, but they had to do it with Harry because they could have left just said, hey, Daniel. Just grow your stubble out for a couple of days, and you’ll be fine.

But because it was so close to what he looked like during the rest of the movie, they they couldn’t they couldn’t do that. And it almost felt like the makeup they were giving him was, like, trying to hide his stubble, but it just made him look more like plasticine or something. Yeah. So, yeah, didn’t love it. Hogwarts drinking water stock up if you’re trying to get, jacked out of your mind.

Did you have any other startups? Last one. This one might be a little bit more controversial, Seth. That’s okay, though. Tim Tebow’s Super Bowl ad stock up.

Were there? Tim Tebow’s Super Bowl ads? You might not remember this, but 2010, Tim Tebow did a pro life Super Bowl ad back in the day. No. It was super controversial.

Do you not remember this? Oh my god. No. What? Look it up.

It’s I I was like very very I might have to. But in the commercial, this might ring a bell. His, like, mom’s talking about, like, I don’t know, pro life. I don’t give a shit. He she tackles her.

You know, things it might have been like a pro violence against women, commercial, to be honest with you. I don’t know. Anyways, a huge controversy, but it doesn’t look as bad as the the pro life, version of of this movie. What what happened there? What was going on?

I forgot to ask you about this in the book, but I didn’t know I’ve seen this meme of the little, like, fetus thing. Oh, yeah. Yeah. In the movie, I’m seeing that meme. Moldy, voldy, as I like to call it.

I didn’t know that was I didn’t know that was from this movie. I thought that was just a completely different thing. I didn’t know I didn’t know that. What is that? What is the symbolism?

Can you explain what’s going on there? I was, like, shocked when I came on screen. I was like, wait. What is going is what’s going on? So I thought it was a Tim Tebow commercial.

Well, they did talk about in the book, Harry saw it. He said, oh my god. What is that? The way it was explained in the book or described was actually very similar to to what it looked like in the movie. I thought it was pretty good because he’s just, like, a rat looking Voldemort, basically.

This, like, little rat looking cowering Voldemort, which is accurate. They gave it a lot more fetus slash, like, alien vibes going on. So, yeah, I, I wanted to talk about Multivoldy at some point, because I think it’s a really good job by the by the the graphic people or whatever, the the special effects people or whatever the case is, even though it’s obviously a puppet. But, yeah, it’s definitely fetus y. That’s for sure.

What’s the symbolism? I like, his Oh, I think it’s his soul. Right? So it’s like his a piece of the piece of Voldemort’s soul that’s within Harry. Okay.

Why would he be there in his dream or his thing and why I don’t know. I just didn’t I don’t know. I don’t understand it. I honestly have a lot of questions just around the whole thing in general. It’s one of those things when you’re reading the book, you’re just like, yes, yes, yes.

Okay, okay, okay. And then when you close the book, you’re trying to logically go through it. It’s almost like watching a Christopher Nolan movie or something. Yeah. Yeah.

You know? And then you try to piece it back, and you’re just like, I don’t know if that actually makes any sense. So, yeah, I I think my understanding is that moldy voldy is Voldemort’s yep. The piece of Voldemort’s soul that’s in Harry that is now dying Okay. Slash dead because of the curse that because of the curse that Voldemort did.

No. Anyways. I can’t believe someone would spend, like, $10,000,000 on a on a pro life thing. Who’s who’s watching that and saying, you know what? After these chips and nachos and 12 beers, I’m gonna become abstinent.

It was a big deal. To spend $10,000,000 on anything, honestly, really is, doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, but what are you gonna do? Maybe the Batmobile. Stock up for me. Reaping what you sow.

It’s a phrase. I think it involves something around the farming industry, but I I think we all understand the point. Right? Mhmm. So for 6 movies, the directors, screenwriters, producers, whoever, they’ve decided to trim down the presence of the presence of or really totally omitting some ancillary characters in favor of the big three.

We had issues with that from time to time, but at the same instance, you have to understand it. The problem is that now that we’re at the end of the story, these supporting characters take on an important role in tying up the series with a bow. But as moviegoers, we haven’t seen enough of them in the movies themselves to care. I think it’s something that we can often brush over because a lot of the people that watch the Harry Potter movies that we know are we’re just associating with ourselves, but we’ve read the books. So we know what’s going on and and everything like that.

But there’s gotta be a huge slew. I mean, I have I know a bunch of people who have never read the books and only seen the movies, And what what comes to mind first is as Snape and Dobby, really. Snape has this huge story arc that happens within this movie, but it’s based on so much that has happened between him and Harry in previous books, and and I don’t wanna get into the whole, you know, is Snape a bad guy thing again because we know your feeling on on that. But just the idea that Snape kinda comes in here at the end, and he has this part, but we don’t really know a lot about him from the movies themselves. He had a little bit in Half Blood Prince, but even then, not enough.

And before that, there were some movies where he was really just missing. They just took his lines and gave them to someone else, or he wasn’t there. So having Snape, you know, be this kind of savior and this and this light and someone that Harry names his child after as just a moviegoer, it’s kind of like, wait. What? Okay.

I I guess so, but it doesn’t have the same payoff. And then Dobby I talk about Cotton Onions listening to Dobby die in the audiobook. Dobby’s not even in the movies. They took all of his parts and gave them to other people. Throughout the series, he has been helping pot Harry in, like, different ways and always been around for Harry and showing his love for Harry.

And I know that he has, like, a quick moment here, and he had a moment in, like, book 2. But outside of that, it’s it’s like we don’t really even know no Dobby. It feels like the Fred and Lupin deaths, which we don’t even see on camera, those ones hit hardest because we actually know those characters from the movies. You know, we had an entire movie with Lupin and more on top of that. And Fred, we’ve, you know, interacted with either him or George.

We don’t know which one, but we’ve interacted with them throughout this whole series. So, you know, I think that’s why the filmmakers decided to add the Snape stuff that wasn’t in the book with, like him giving, you know, shushing Harry in the astronomy tower, and then also in this one when like Griphook tells Harry that Snape knowingly put a fake sword in, Bellatrix’s Mhmm. Vault just to bring his name up and show kind of these bread crumbs that that we know that Snape’s a a a good guy. But but, yeah, I just thought a a lot of the the characters that kind of should have had more screen time throughout our earlier ones didn’t get it, and it because of that, it didn’t really pay off. And I feel like it’s harder for us book fans to realize it because we’ve read them both, and they kind of all meld into this one Harry Potter universe.

But, yeah, I just didn’t love it. Yeah. I completely agree. I mean, we talk about it for other movies. I feel like side characters would be featured for 1 movie and then never be seen again.

And, you know, you kinda just didn’t they kind of fade in the distance. Realistically, what they should have done was just remove some characters or made the characters combined. Bringing back Bill, we’ve never seen Bill. I was about to say that. That could’ve just been Fred and George.

It would’ve been better. At the beginning of whatever, maybe it’s the first part part 1 or part 2, I forget. Bill walks in the door and goes, hi. I’m Bill. And then I go, I like, wait.

What? Bill? Harry knows Bill? Harry knows Bill. Harry’s Yeah.

Bill for years. Wait. He knew him from the Triwizard Tournament. Oh, he wasn’t in that. He wasn’t in that.

And now on top of that, he goes, hi. I’m Bill. Also, I’m a werewolf. It’s, like, wait. What?

Because in the astronomy tower, he got werewolfed by Greyback, but they left that out of the movie. So he just walks in. He’s like, I’m Bill. I got bit by a werewolf. I’m gonna marry Fleur, who you know and you should know how I know, but, like, it just it made no sense.

The best is Lupin and Tonks walk in on the the very beginning when they all meet back up at, the Weasley’s house. Yeah. And they’re like, should we tell them? And he says, no. No.

We’ll wait. And then we never hear from them again, and they die. So you don’t know they’re married. You don’t know they’re having a kid. You don’t know any of that stuff.

Oh, I thought he I thought he said we’re having a baby. Oh, okay. Say that? I don’t remember, but it just seems like they just, like, were, like, I thought that was been funny. Just we’ll never hear them again.

Yeah. I I think they might have said we’re having a baby. So then it’s like, okay. So so someone murdered Tonks and and a child? Like, oh, no.

Teddy’s alive. He’s just not not there. You know? Yeah. Yeah.

I wonder if Teddy was in the train with them in the epilogue. Oh, yeah. Probably. Isn’t he, like, at school or something? I don’t know.

Either way. Yeah. So some of that stuff. The the Bill one kinda laughed because there’s so many different pieces to that, where he’s a werewolf. He’s Bill, they’ve met several times, he works at Great Guts.

His face is fairly scratched. I wouldn’t even notice that unless he called it out. Yeah. And then Lupin has a scratch on his face too, which I was like, wait, I thought you either you lose the scratch as you heal or damn. I don’t know.

Alright. I had one last quick one. The Death Eater recruiting office, you know, like the military recruiting offices, I feel like those used to be a thing. I’m not sure if they are anymore. I’m sure they are.

I’m sure they are. But the Death Eater recruiting office, we kinda talked about in previous episodes how I wasn’t sure how many Death Eaters there were, and it seemed like there couldn’t have been that many. You know? I thought there was maybe a couple dozen. You thought there was potentially more, but I can assure you there was not 10,000 Death Eaters.

And that’s how many there are in the scene at the Battle of Hogwarts when they’re running down the mountain towards the castle. It honestly, to me, it looked like, you know, the Uruk hai at at the Battle of Helm’s Deep with the amount of Death Eaters that were coming at them. Oh, yeah. Yep. Good comparison.

I have no idea how all these Death Eaters came out of the woodwork and and are storming Hogwarts. It definitely there wasn’t this many in the book. Yes. I understand there was Deventors and giants and, you know, giant spiders, all all that stuff, which we saw, and I appreciate. But the human element, I know they’re trying to make it epic or something, but come on.

There’s just not that many Death Eaters. No. Yeah. I agree. I think it’s I think I said it was 20 to 1 Death Eaters to Order of the Phoenix, but I think there was only, like, 20 Order of the Phoenix members.

So that’d be 400 total. Right? Yeah. So Yeah. My math’s correct.

I don’t know. Maybe they’re just, like, they opened up their social media, and they’re just recruiting across other countries and stuff. They’re just I mean, we need to know what they’re doing because we’re we’re not growing at this rate. They grew they grew pretty quickly. We gotta figure out what they did because whatever the recruiting whoever the recruiting officer was TikTok early.

That’s what it was. Think we’re just missing out. Maybe there’s some sort of dark magic GI bill that you can get into to get into GI dark magic college or something. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

That’s that makes sense. Alright. Let’s move on to stock down. What do you have for stock down? Stock down camping.

I’ve never understood camping. I’m not a big camper. I mean, the thing is everything about the best things about camping are just things that you don’t need to suffer to do. For me, like, hey. Like, what’s great about camping is you can go outside and create a fire and send and make Yeah.

Some more. You can just build a fire pit in your backyard and do that. They’re like, yeah. You can be by water. It’s like, I live by the water.

You know, it’s like all this stuff. Nature. You can be in nature. You can go on a hike. Yeah.

But you can have a sleepover with nature. I guess. That’s neither here nor there. But So you didn’t do much camping as a kid is what I I did a couple times. Like, with your family, brothers, sister.

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So you’re in tents and stuff like that. Yeah.

It just Tents and sleeping bags? I I was a guy that liked that liked sports and I liked playing computer games. So that it’s just like none of those things really camping didn’t add into any of those things. No. So it didn’t take a lot.

Land party is tough out there. Exactly. So So I just did, like, understand. I’m very literal person. I just didn’t under I’m like, but we can just do all these things easier.

It’s like when people use chopsticks and it just frustrates me because I’m like, but they created a tool that’s better. Like, why would we just not use the they’re like, woah, this area is supposed to eat it. I’m like, but but why? They’re like, yeah. Well, that’s what they do.

You know, like cavemen used to eat with their hands. Is that how I should eat everything now? Well, a lot of cultures do eat with their hands. So, yeah, if you’re gonna be there, you should be like they’re they’d probably say the same thing to you. You’d say, where’s the fork?

When they say, god gave us the fork used to eat spaghetti with their hands, so that’s why I’m eating spaghetti now with hands, you know? Like, that doesn’t make any sense. I’m not sure the Romans ate spaghetti. They’re from Italy, kid. Stick with me one time.

Jesus Christ. I guess Rome was a big place. So Anyways, what was I saying? Oh, but then this it doesn’t really make any sense why they need to suffer camping. You can go anywhere you want.

Go to go on a beach. Go to, like, a a deserted island. Do the exact same thing you’re doing right now. But instead of a Mai Tai by the by the beach sitting getting the creative juices flowing, start thinking about where those hog rugs could be Mhmm. Rather than suffering in, like, Antarctica and North Scotland where it’s, like, 30 degrees, and they’re, like, and there’s people that are running into people.

Oh, like Yeah. Where are you? You can go literally anywhere in the whole world. Just go to somewhere that’s, 1, enjoyable, and 2, you’ll never run into any other people. Like, it’s just it does seems pretty obvious.

You know, the UK is a pretty relatively small place compared to the rest of the world. Right? So just go anywhere else. I don’t know. It’s funny you say this because I was wondering as I was watching it and reading the book kind of, what the rules are with apparating because do you just have to know the place?

Like, you couldn’t obviously have been there. Right? Are you in apparating a place you haven’t been to? It’d be close enough. So there is a proximity.

Because, remember Voldemort is, like, traveling back really quickly from getting the wand and went to go find out the Elder Wand. They call him back because they have Harry and, Ron and Hermione, like, held hostage before they escape. And eventually, he gets there, but it takes him he he can’t go out and do it instantly. So there is some He’s, like, skipping spots, like, kind of going a 100 miles at a time Yeah. Or whatever the case is.

Okay. I mean, airplanes exist. So, I mean Yeah. We we can go anywhere we want. Even then, you can so but I guess in that sense, they’re limited to the United Kingdom.

Right? But you could still, yeah, you could still just go anywhere. Like, it doesn’t You can get on a broom. Their brooms are are airplanes. It’s the same thing.

Well, they actually pulled up at one part in the movie. They pulled up to this, like, giant rock place with all these holes in the ground. I was like, that’s a terrible place to camp. Who thought about camping there? 1, it’s just gonna be uncomfortable.

2, you could roll an ankle. You step in one of those holes, you roll an ankle, and and you could be screwed. But, yeah, just in terms of general camping, I did some camping on the north rim of the Grand Canyon. That was pretty fucking epic, so I also did a lot of camping as a kid where I camped in the woods of New Hampshire and pooped in a hole and slept in a tent with my dad and my sister and got eaten by mosquitoes to the point that I think I had 12 mosquito bites on my testicles. I remember counting.

So, yeah, yeah, there are bad times, but, I remember it now as being a great time. Yeah. That’s what I think it it is. But, I mean, also the stock time just because the camping scenes in this movie were just it was just too much of the first movie, specifically. Yeah.

There’s too much. Yeah. It they should’ve taken like, cut that in half and then put it into the the heights of the ministry and the last scene where they’re at, the Malfoys. Like, seems like that would’ve been pretty obvious, but Yeah. Well, I’m gonna expand on that with my stock down, but I will say last thought on camping in general.

If you go camping, just get an air mattress. It makes it way better. It’s just a better experience on the ground. You have to be with nature and be on the ground. See, like, that’s the whole and take it one step further.

Why don’t you just get a bed? Why don’t you just get a bed? Why don’t you just get a bed? I’m actually, like honestly, I might I would love to, in this lifetime, get a camper and drive around to cool campgrounds and, you know, sleep on a bed in a comfortable place, but be in a cool spot. That’s like using a fork.

That is doing it right. That’s doing it how you wanna do it. Yep. Exactly. I wanna do it is be in my own house and my own bed.

Yeah. I don’t have to be John I don’t have to be John Muir. I can just be Winnebago again. I don’t know who John Muir is. Just fucking read a book one time.

Alright. Oh, your point about how they use their time, my first talk down, is talk down to movies that favor epic battle scenes because we got none of that here. We got literally none of that. Like you said, the first one, there’s so much camping. You know what there was enough?

The Malfoy Manor thing, like you said, could have been drawn out. More importantly, I felt the way we jumped this movie off with the Harry broom scene, all the Harry’s flying in the brooms, why are we making that a bigger scene? That scene was, like, 2 minutes long. We saw Harry there, Hedwig dies, and Harry’s wand splits. In the book, there’s so much content there between all these different fights that are happening in the sky.

It feels like that’s something that moviemakers would want to show on on the big screen. It’s it’s what they’ve tried to show in other films here with them flying under the, you know, on the Thames, flying under bridges, around Big Ben, all that stuff. You do that, but it’s an epic aerial battle around it’s the battle for Britain, but it’s Harry Potter. Yeah. I just don’t know why they didn’t make that that scene that scene longer.

It just felt like there was also the Battle of Hogwarts, there was no battle. It was the 10,000 Death Eaters running to the school, and then most of the time, you know, we pretty much only get a giant trying to decapitate Harry, Ron, and Hermione, and we get the Bellatrix Molly Weasley duel, which is, like, super quick anyways. And that’s about it. We don’t get a lot of just fighting. This was a great opportunity, I felt like, to see Lupin and Tonks fight to their death.

We talked about that, how that was missing from the books was these these fights. And we know these characters. We wanna see what happened to them. This was a great opportunity to see some actual wizarding duels within Hogwarts. But instead, it’s this other stuff throughout the movie, and then they’re focusing on this Nagini thing, which it’s like, alright.

We don’t need all this. Let’s see some wizards doing wizard stuff in Hogwarts like what actually happened. Yeah. Because, otherwise, it’s just we’re focused on our main characters, and then they come back and they’re like, oh, some people died. It’s like, wait.

What? You know, show me I I know Percy is not really a character in the movie, so this would be hard. But show me Percy coming back and fighting after he sees Fred’s dead body and taking down Death Eaters. You know? I I just wanted I wanted more.

It felt like this final movie deserved more in terms of longer action sequences. Yeah. What what it is is is they just focus so much on Harry Potter. They thought the book the book is called Harry Potter, but really the reason we love it is because all the characters, the world building, like, every single person you feel like you know by the end of the book. Yeah.

It’s like, Dave Matthews Band. I always could bring that up. Dave Matthews is incredible. He’s the lead lead person of that. Right?

I’m not a huge Dave Madison, but Okay. His band is incredible. The band is, like, amazing. They have an incredible, like, saxophone. They have drummer.

They all do solos. So, like, they’re everyone gets gets highlighted even though it’s called Dave Matthews Band. They took the wrong things, I think, or they focused on the wrong stuff. And I think the TV show is going to do, especially since they’re gonna have a lot more length, they’re gonna do a much better job of establishing these characters where you’re you’re bought in and wanting to like know what happens to Neville and what happens to Luna Lovegood and, like, all these different characters that they come on screen for a little bit in this one and and you never see them again. Oh, so the TV show is following the same characters?

It’s like the same I think it’s exactly the same. I think it’s the exact I mean, I haven’t heard anything differently, but they’re casting all the same characters. So it’s not So it’s like the Harry Potter series. Like It’s Harry Potter TV show. What?

Yeah. I mean, they’ve done that with Spider Man. They’ve done it, and they’re not doing, like, anything that we haven’t seen or Batman and all the other things. I guess they did iterations of that. The superheroes are a bit different because there’s so much potential canon to to write about.

You know, there’s so many different story lines that you could that you could do, where this is just one very direct novel. So Yeah. Well, I my assumption is that they’re gonna be, like, alright. In the movie, they did this. Let’s now expand and actually show more and then maybe add a little additional context and maybe have the camera nod on Harry every single scene.

It’s gonna be on other people now Yeah. Which I’m hoping. But Yeah. Interesting that you chose Dave Matthews. I was thinking maybe How do I pull that from?

Bruce Springsteen and the E Street Band or E Street Band is pretty good too. Right? Yeah. The E Street Band is great. What?

You got I just don’t I don’t like it. I I’ve always said I don’t like that Dave Matthews band does that. Because I’m like, he is such a good band. It’s kind of a dickhead mood to be like that. Oh, yeah.

And the whole the whole band. George Clinton and the parliament phone company. Tom Brady and the Patriots. You know. That’s Well, it was.

It was. Oh, it kinda was. Well, Belichick helped. But but I mean, the whole team won. You know what I’m saying.

Anyways I don’t have any other stock downs. So My my last one and, it was, stock down being an athlete. This is my first stock I think I purchased. And I’m gonna finish it out, close it out, go full circle, make the last one I purchased or sell rather. The ending, well, I’ve already talked about it.

But after Wilmer dies, after the gladiator wind blowing what’s it called, Elysium? Elysium. Yeah. They’re easy and spaghetti with its hands like you’re talking about rent in Rome. Anyways, Harry and Ron and Hermione walk away from the castle.

And again, this is just I I appreciate that they kept it consistent. This is the final scene. The scene this is what happens. Harry walks out. He’s like, I’m gonna get rid of this wand because no one deserves to have it.

He can’t break the wand in half. I don’t know what that was. It’s a piece of it’s a little twig. He’s like, yeah. What what the I’m like, lift the weight one time for me, bud.

Put the wand down. Do a couple curls one time for me. Maybe a couple of trap workouts. I don’t know what he needs. But he couldn’t break the stick.

Like, they needed a reek. Let’s cut that again. And then the final scene is them walking away with Hogwarts in the background. What are they looking at? Ali, I actually wrote this up.

What are they looking at? The scene should be backdrop of them looking at Hogwarts. It’s like smoking. All their friends are down and their family down there. Them appreciating Hogwarts.

That’s the that’s the movie is. It’s not them looking into the forest. I don’t know where they’re looking. Yeah. Looking on to the Forbidden Forest.

Like Like, watch it again. It’s so dumb. It doesn’t make any sense what they’re doing. It’s obviously a book diversion here because Harry just buries the elder wand with Dumbledore, which we’ve talked about how that’s kinda dumb too. But it also feels like the elder wand has been around for 100 of years.

If if it was easy to break, someone would have just, like, sat on it and be like, oh, there goes the elder wand. Like, I broke it. So I’d understand why it would be harder for Harry to snap, but at the same time, it feels like it’s something that shouldn’t snap. And if that is something that you can snap, and I know you can snap wands, it just feels like there should be a little more like, they’re making who’s ever making the wands, I’m not gonna blame Ollivander because I don’t think he’s the manufacturer, but who’s ever making these wands is making them like iPhones or something. Like, they’re supposed to be broken, so then you’re forced to buy a new one.

Because if you think about it, the wand industry, not a very profitable industry. You’re selling someone one wand that they’re probably gonna have for their entire life, so in order to maximize your profits, you wanna make those wands easy to break so that people have to keep coming back for more. But at the same time, it seems like that shouldn’t be the case because the wand chooses the wizard, and, like, that wand is yours, and then breaking it seems like breaking a part of your soul. So yeah. But it just seems like the elder one shouldn’t shouldn’t be able to be broken.

Well, yeah. I I also think the they were standing over the waterfall there or waterfront or whatever that was, the on the bridge, and the cliche is for him to throw it in there. And they’re like, no. Let’s play break cliches, and let’s have him break it. But then I’m like, oh, I see why they always have him throw it because watching a person try to break something, especially when they’re weaklings, it does not look good.

So they he should have thrown it into the water. I mean, we’ve also learned from lots of sports movies in the past that watching someone throw something can really change how you view a character. Like, if if he can’t throw a wand or he can’t throw something, I I immediately don’t even believe that’s Harry Potter. Like, Harry Potter is an athlete. He’s the best seeker in a 100 years.

He has pure athleticism. I’m sure if you gave him a ball, he’d know how to throw it. So if instead he’s kinda doing this, like, you know, shot put toss, I’d be concerned. Did you have a favorite scene in this one? Of these 2, I guess.

You, kind of were just mentioning that you didn’t like it. I actually thought that the battle scene, the first one, the second one was terrible, when it’s basically a mix of Lord of the Rings and Independence Day when they fire the rockets at the the alien ship. I like that. And like when we zoom out and you were seeing the the the charging of the The Uruk hai? The yeah.

Like the the giants are charging all the different, death eater charging. And then we have like the the guards or Hogwarts standing, like standing out there. I was like, this is sick. And then to your point, I was like, now we zoom in on the battle and we see Yeah. These 1 on 1 matchups.

So like that we’ve been waiting for all. I also think that, again, we could have like matched up people that we wanted to see. Like, I think Neville should have been actually the one to kill Bellatrix. Like, that’s But that’s not in the book. I did get that, but, like, I wouldn’t find if you change that and then have I don’t know.

Just match people up a little bit more. Yeah. I think it would’ve been fine if you change that. Also, like, the Malfoy’s getting away scot free, I wanted my boy, Ron’s dad to fucking go up against Lucius and just and and get that. Like, you know, that’s another bad one to say.

Yeah. Boy him, like, actually, like, put him in a choke hold and rip his head off. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I I was hoping for the Malfoy’s that it was kind of a Jurassic Park type thing where they think they’re getting away scot free, but there’s actually a dementor that’s just, like, sitting there in the brush, like that that winged neck dinosaur, and instead just, like, jumps on them and sucks all their souls out. Yeah. Yeah. Because, like, they’re obviously getting caught. Like, the you know, at least Lucius is is going to Azkaban.

I mean, they’re probably all going to Azkaban. Malfoy is probably gonna get off early because Harry’s gonna go in and testify on his behalf, you know, a little character witness situation. But, yeah, that’s what I’m saying is is they had that big scene, like, okay. This is cool when they say all the, you know, stand up for Hogwarts and all the, gargoyles or whatever come to life. It’s like, this is gonna be awesome.

And then we flash back to Harry running around her. Yeah. I I mean, not not one like, couple of clips were were awesome. But, yeah, I wish they could did a little bit more. Yeah.

Dig in deeper. Go deeper. My favorite scene was the the way they told the the the Peverell brothers story. I thought the animation for that was phenomenal. I love when they work animation into live action movies.

I just I feel like they usually do it pretty well. And this, I thought, was was super was super good. Whoever they chose to do the animation, big fan. The story was told wonderfully. Love the voice over.

I loved every bit of it. It got me into the fairy tale aspect of it. And I think that, like, whatever Disney studio or whatever or universal I don’t know. Whichever one owns the Harry Potter, Warner Brothers. Right?

Whatever. Whoever owns it at the park, the Harry Potter park, they have, like, these characters, like death and whatever, in puppet form, like the big human puppets, like how people dress up as dinosaurs and stuff. And it seems pretty cool. Like, people can go and watch watch that play or whatever the case is. So, yeah, I just I thought that animation was awesome and really brought that story to life.

Because otherwise, it’s just them sitting there telling a story. I’m just so you saw the 6 pre prior movies where they’re, like, cutting everything they can and I was, like, they actually just told the whole story which was, like, actually refreshing. They didn’t really, which also too with the the breaking the the movies up into 2 was definitely great. It did did feel like you’re seeing a full fledged movie, obviously. You needed it.

You really needed it. I mean, it would be in my love and, you know, I guess, we will just burn that, but it’s okay to do this stuff, cutting all this stuff with the other books because whatever. But we have to end this series. We have to end these 8 movies that we’re gonna watch. I know it’s probably partially a money grab, but at the same time, it needed time to breathe.

And I appreciate that they did that. I know we didn’t like all the hopping around and camping, but we spent time there. We spent time with them, and we needed that time. So I’m really glad they they broke it up into 2 movies. Mhmm.

For sure. It would’ve been like Lawrence of Arabia. It would’ve been like 3 hours and 48 minutes if if you didn’t. You know? I I don’t know how how you how you could tell this story with all the beats you needed to hit without it.

Do you have a favorite character in this film or these films? In in this one, I and I I think it’s more just because I needed to know more backstory, especially since I don’t think the book really comes either, but Lucius Malfoy? I don’t know what movie he was in, but he was unbelievable actor. He was like I thought he just went through the most horrific torturing of all time. Like, his eyes are all droopy, especially because you know the character that he is and, like, the blonde perfectly flowing hair and the arrogance and the cockiness and the just the swagger he has.

And then to this, like, that’s the biggest change I’ve ever seen in a character. It’s it’s incredible. I don’t know what happened to him. I need more on him, but he’s been broken. He’s a broken person.

Yeah. Whoever did the the makeup and whatnot for him was perfectly done. It’s like, what’s the in Game of Thrones when the guy gets his, the guy gets, like, tortured and cut off? What’s it? Theon Greyjoy?

Yeah. Theon Greyjoyed. You got that’s what happened to him. We don’t know how. Yeah.

Yeah. Jason Isaacs who who plays him, obviously good in the Patriot. And I’m gonna now go on my Patriot the Patriot rant because Keith cut it from a previous episode. No. I won’t do that to you, Keith.

But, yeah, he he’s a he’s a phenomenal actor. I love that he got some time in this one because the downfall of Lucius Malfoy and talking about reaping what you sow, this was, you know, what Lucius Malfoy he’s reaping what he sowed right here in terms of he wanted Voldemort to come back. Okay. Here you go. You happy now?

Best supporting actor for sure. Mhmm. Should’ve got a nod. I think my character, it has to be Neville. He didn’t get enough, in my opinion.

I think the one thing they were missing was Harry running into Neville as he’s going to the forest and telling Neville about the snake as opposed to Ron and Hermione. He tells Neville that Neville’s gotta kill the snake, and, you know, obviously, we see Neville do that. I it’s unfortunate how they changed that at the end, but Neville still got the snake, and they give Neville a cub couple other action pieces, including, like, blowing up the bridge with Seamus and whatnot, which I enjoyed. And it just shows how far Neville’s come. You know, it just shows how far Neville’s come from him being brave enough to stand up to them in in the Sorcerer’s Stone, but also being a total coward, Trevor, to now and him being a a total badass and a babe, I may say.

Yeah. I was gonna say, way to commit to the character. That that’s going full becoming tall all of a sudden and good looking. That’s really how you commit to a character. I appreciate that.

They’re like, okay, Neville. You go through this big emotional change throughout this series. He’s like, can I go through a physical change too? They’re like, well, we can’t make that happen. He’s like, I got it.

He’s like, oh, I’ve been stunting my girl. I’ve been smoking cigarettes, drinking coffee every day, and just to get into character. You want me to stop cut back on that? Yeah. Alright.

We’re good. He’s like, I’ll go cold turkey, and I’ll just become hot, Neville. Yeah. It’ll be it’ll be fine. Let’s get in some love hate though because I wanna get here.

Keep it here for love. Love, the the headwave change, real real big fan of that. We talked about in the book. Hedwig is in the book. He’s in the cage.

I didn’t like that. I was like, he should die in his sword and that’s what he does. He and this one also the reason which like the whole Belliaramos being Harry’s signature spell. I won’t let you say that. Yeah.

What is it? Expelliarmus? I don’t remember. What was I saying? Oh, well yeah.

So he goes out in his sword. He dies flying and protecting Harry. And the reason that they know it’s the real Harry is because they’re only Hedwig would come protect the real Harry. So Is Hedwig a boy bird or a girl bird? She yeah.

Yeah. What did I say? Okay. Yeah. He said he.

I was that’s fine. Who knows? How would you know? It seems like you have to be a whatever bird what’s a bird person? Ornithologist?

I don’t know. Love. My love’s Aberforth. He gives Harry the lie to me, don’t lie to yourself line, which is awesome. I love it’s one of my favorite lines.

I use use it all the time. It’s it it works every time. I just can’t believe that it was it was in a movie, honestly. I use the option of that, but alright. I say, hey.

By yourself. Don’t lie to me. That is it doesn’t make any sense. Yeah. It makes perfect sense.

Be honest with me. You can lie to yourself. Like, you could lie to yourself, but don’t don’t be honest with me. That’s that makes more sense. What are you talking about?

If you were, like, wearing trendy jeans don’t. You really think those jeans are good? You do be, like, no. They’re awful. But then to yourself, you’re, like, these are the best.

That’s it makes more sense. No. It’s the other way. No. That’s the only reason you’re wearing them.

Because you think they’re good, but you know when you’re when you’re because you’re lying to yourself. But when you know when you tell me, you’re telling the truth. Okay. Good point, Keith. Good point.

Whatever. What else, Jeffrey love? I thought there was a lot of hat tips. So we we talked about how they didn’t really establish all the characters Uh-huh. In the books.

I thought there was a lot of hat tips that went on this one where, like, they were just, like, quickly reference something that we only book readers would know, which I thought was, like, kind of a special, like, for you. Give an example. No. I don’t know. There no.

There was just a ton of, Like like, names mentioned or stuff like that? Yeah. Like, there’s references to names. There was things that you would only know if you had read the book. Like, the Tonks and Lupin stuff, like I mentioned.

Mhmm. A bunch of the side characters just had stuff added in that you wouldn’t know otherwise. Okay. I loved Snape deflects when they’re they’re, like, when Harry steps out of the crowd, which is so stupid and so cheesy. They’re like, who’s if anyone’s harboring Harry Potter, like Yeah.

You know, let us know, and then Harry just steps out of the crowd. Like, a bunch of people wouldn’t be like, Harry’s right here. Harry, what are you what are you doing here? You know? Like, there wouldn’t be a ruckus beforehand.

There’d be a bunch of silent people, and Harry just steps out. Anyhoo. McGonagall steps up to fight Snape, and she sends a curse at him. He deflects her spell to take down both Carrows. So the Carrows are behind him.

So he deflects her spell, but he’s actually using it to take down the Karos before he escapes. So it was awesome because, as someone that knew already that Snape’s a good guy, it’s like, oh, Snape, you’re not only a good guy, but you’re a phenomenal wizard. I appreciate you. And, yeah, I just thought it was a cool little thing that they threw in there, as opposed to Harry using a unforgettable curse unforgivable curse on them. What about hates then?

Oh, I thought that Snape payoff was gonna be better. And I think I’ve seen the always thing, like a clip of that. And I was like, oh, that does hit home hard. But when they’re showing all the flashbacks, he’s, like, talking without any emotion or anything like that. Uh-huh.

It felt like, Hans Gruber with the American accent pretending to be a guy that’s, you know, in pain. Yeah. That’s what it felt like. It didn’t feel like he really was. Like, when he’s crying and holding her dead body, that that hit.

Yeah. Outside of that. And the always thing hit, but all the other parts didn’t seem to ring true to me. I don’t know. On this reread and rewatch, I’m not sure the always hits with me.

It it’s so he he casts his Patronus, and it’s a doe, which is Lily’s. And so Dumbledore’s asking him, oh, you still love her? And he’s like, always. It’s like, well well, duh. Snape’s an incel.

He doesn’t go outside. You know? He’s not gonna find new love. Yeah. Yeah.

Why is this surprising to you that his Patronus is a doe? Of course, it is. That that’s why he’s here. What are we talking about? There’s probably could’ve been a better way to do it.

I don’t know how, but there definitely could’ve been a better way. Yeah. I agree. But I remember this being like, oh, goosebumps when I first read it, and now maybe I’m just, like, have gotten and my my my heart is is hard or something. But, yeah, it just it didn’t it doesn’t do it for me the same as it it used to.

My hate and this is really the the only big one for me considering they had 2 movies, was there’s no Dumbledore family history, really. It’s touched upon Bethel the Bagshot and then Harry chats with at at at Bill and Fleur’s wedding, which, by the way, Harry’s not in disguise. Harry’s undesirable number 1, him being at a wedding with a bunch of people that are just kind of people. It’s like Don’t worry about it. Wouldn’t be the that’s Harry Potter.

The ministry is looking for you. What? What are we what are we talking about here? But, yeah, he so the the whole point of the the book or, you know, a big part of the book is Harry feeling like Dumbledore didn’t come clean to him about or he didn’t know Dumbledore. Just like he didn’t know Dumbledore as a person like he thought he did.

He thought he and Dumbledore were close. Maybe they weren’t close at all. Is Dumbledore leading him down the right path? Is he second guessing himself because of it? And none of that’s really in the movies, which it felt like was a big, big, big part of the books.

We get a tiny bit about Dumbledore. I don’t think Grindelwald is really talked about. I don’t think anything about Dumbledore’s sister is discussed besides them pointing out the painting and saying, oh, that was your sister, not what happened, not that whole story. And it seemed like the Harry Dumbledore relationship was a big part of the book, and it’s just no part of this these movies, which is unfortunate to me. Yeah.

I think it was supposed to come across in the whole camping scene where he’s like, he didn’t tell me anything. Oh. No. He didn’t tell me anything. Yeah.

So I agree, though. It wasn’t it wasn’t explicit and, yeah, that that turmoil wasn’t necessarily there that you would think there should be. Yeah. It just and I get it. You know, he says, oh, you didn’t tell me anything, whatever.

This and the other thing. But that’s it. We want it to be continuously repeated and being, like, am I on the right path? Am I doing the right thing? Mhmm.

You know, I want him second guessing himself until he is his mind is set on going into the forest to die to Voldemort’s hands. You know? Yeah. No. I agree.

What else do you hate? The Dobby after he dies scene, I felt like in film school they’re like, show don’t tell. I don’t know what that means and now I know what it means after seeing this scene. He’s like, I’m gonna bury him without using my wand. And he, like, carried him away.

All you need to do in that scene is him crying over the body, stoically picks it up, doesn’t say one word, picks up a shovel and just starts digging and starts digging and digging. And everyone’s watching. They’re like, hey, did you, like, wanna use your wall? He’s like, no. I need to do this.

And then his hands are bleeding at the end and he’s placing the body, like, gentle. That’s a heart wrenching scene. Him being, like, I need to I need to bury this person, and I’m not using a wand to do it to show that I mean it. It’s, like, fuck it. I want to bury him, and I’m not going to use my wand.

It’s, like, okay. Cool. What do you want? Extra points? Yeah.

When he was, like, a 4th year, he’s, like, sitting there in his 4 poster bed before he’s going to sleep at night. He’s like, when Dobby dies, I’ll I’ll bury him without a wand. Like, I’m gonna do that. Alright. Respect.

Yeah. Dobby is gonna die before me, so I I don’t respect him. I like him. I’m gonna bury him like a muggle. Yeah.

Yeah. No. I agree. We need a silhouette with him using that shovel on some sand as the as the sun’s coming down or whatever the case is. I like the bloody hands thing, you know.

And then the the last cut is just him, like, the last shovel, and then you see the he lies a free elf. That hits. Then you’re you get you get chills thinking of that. Yeah. Now we’re talking.

Yeah. God, you should you should do this movie. I You should do they need help with the TV show? TV show. Yeah.

They need reburying. Of a TV writer, anyways. You know? So Yeah. I know I know you got some screenplays or, some what do they call them when you specs?

Some spec scripts? Have you ever have I asked you this before? Have you ever read the spec strip out there for the Seinfeld 911 episode? Yeah. I read a blog on it.

Buddybookclub.com. Oh, did you? Yeah. Oh, good. Good.

I love that. I love it. It’s so funny. Holy smokes. We’d go on ski trips.

This ski trip’s kinda like camping, but you you stay in a a house. We’d go on ski trips, and I’d always pull it up if there’s, like, 4 people in the car. And for the last, you know, the last hour, you’re, like, excited to get there. I would be, like, hey, everyone pull it up on your phones who’s not driving, obviously, and let’s do a read through of the script. Like, which character do you wanna be?

And and we we do that we do that a couple times. It was it was super fun. Also, a ski trip is like camping. It’s the most wild thing you’ve ever said. It’s the exact opposite of camping.

I it’s, like, what I would wanna do. I don’t even like skiing. I I would do that as ski trip. I was just trying to bring bring the conversation full circle. You’re arguing for my argument.

Because here you go, you do something very expensive, but you’re outside. You’re enjoying it. It’s like a sport. You’re struggling. And then you get done, and you hit the apres ski.

You get hot chocolate. You get by a fire. Inside, you get a hot tub going, you get drinking games going, you get board games going, you get I mean Yes. Yes. Does that sound a 100 times better than being, like, we just got done hiking.

I’m sweating right now, but now it’s 30 degrees. So I’m absolutely freezing. Oh, now great. I’m gonna go sit in this fucking tent on the ground. Well, I brought a blow up mattress.

Yeah. That’s that’s the worst thing ever. What are you talking about? You just made my argument for me. Oh, man.

Maybe you wanna go skiing. Do you have any lingering questions? No. But I did wanna say that way, I had an epiphany. We should change the lingering questions category to what does it all mean, Basil?

Oh. That’s that’s the name of it. Anyways I’ll fix that in post. So what does it all mean, Basil? Yeah.

Yeah. Okay. I have a few. Hermione’s family is not gonna think it’s weird that they have blank picture frames in their house because in the movie, she obliviates them. They stay at their house, and then she leaves.

In the books, she sends them to, like, Australia, so they don’t even know that they have a daughter. But now they’re just the next day walking around their house, and there’s all these picture frames that have like they’re empty. They’re basically what you would buy at Target. They’re just like a car in the background, and they’re just wondering why do we have all these picture frames, or there’s like the mom on one side, the dad on the other, and just this blank space in between them, and they’re not confused by that? Well, here’s the thing, d man.

When you don’t have kids like myself, you put pictures up of just landscapes. If you look around my room right now, there’s just paintings of landscapes, flowers. I got a tiger up on the wall. So it’s not weird just to have a back You just have a dorm room style? Well, first of all, missus McGonigal painted 3 of these.

So Oh, yeah. Yeah. Then there Send me a miss McGonigal painting. Let’s see anyone. Yeah.

Let me get a commission. Beach a beachside commission for my Cape Cod house would be wonderful. No. I I so I don’t think it’s weird at all. To answer your question.

Alright. Fine. I talked about Harry, no disguise for the wedding. That is weird. Draco Malfoy along with Neville, they took the hot pills in this one.

I think Draco has aged the best besides Neville. He kinda looks like hot Squidward now, if you know the, the Spongebob stuff. You probably have the Spongebob comforter on your on your bed, so you just look at it, and you and you’ll see hot Squidward on it. Who who is it that you said ages like that? Draco Malfoy.

Oh, yeah. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

The escape from the rumor requirements was giving off big Aladdin vibes, like, when they escape from the tunnel where they get the lamp where the big tiger head is. You’ve seen Aladdin in the cartoon. Right? Mhmm. Yeah.

It was it was pretty much exactly that scene, so they kinda just stole it from there, but I’m okay with it. And Volti has Nagini kill Snape. So wouldn’t that make her the master of the Elder Wand based on his logic? Yeah. That’s a good one to find.

I don’t know. He’s like, you killed Dumbledore, so you’re now the master of the Elder Wand. Well, all you gotta do is the person. Right? So He didn’t do anything.

He just said, like, Nagini, go kill him. I thought he sent a spell out of him that, like, paralyzed him or something. But he thinks it’s if you kill them. That’s the whole difference between him and Harry. Harry realizes that it’s not about that.

He was like, alright, go kill Snape. He said, okay, so now Nagini is is the master of the Elder Wand. And then my last lingering question, and we don’t really have to, like, talk about this, but it’s just really a a a thought thing, is I don’t get talking about we were talking about the logic earlier, the the logic that you sit back and you think, does that make any sense? I don’t get how Harry survived Snape’s Snape Voldemort’s initial killing curse. I didn’t understand it.

And even with the books, I I still don’t understand it. Voldemort kills him, he sacrifices himself, and he goes into his thing, and then Dumbledore’s like, he’s am I dead? Dumbledore’s like, maybe you are, maybe you’re not. Yeah. I didn’t understand it most of it either.

I mean, I assume that he that it didn’t kill him. It killed the soul. Right? Or something? Yeah.

But why didn’t it kill him too? Basically, there’s 2 people in him and he killed only one of the people. So Yeah. So, you know, Harry says in the book, he’s like, then I’m dead and Dumbledore says, that is a question. Isn’t it on the whole, dear boy?

I think not. Harry says, not. Dumbledore is not. Harry says, but but I should have died. I didn’t defend myself.

I meant to let him kill me. And Dumbledore says, and that will, I think, have made all the difference. I guess because he has the protection blood still in him. There’s also a bunch of that too. But, also, Voldemort has the protection blood because he the Dumbledore even says Voldemort has some of the protection blood.

Yeah. I don’t know. Yeah. So that whole thing, I’m still not a 100%, even though I’ve read these books, like, 20 times. I’m I’m not exactly sure on how the logic of of of that works.

Keith, we did it. 7 books, 8 movies, we finished Harry Potter. We did it. Fucking a we said way back when. We’re like, oh, we get a 100 episodes.

We’ll do Harry Potter. Never thinking we’d get here. Look at us now. 200 will be born peace. We do need another milestone on there because we’ve done the 2 milestones we said we do.

We did, 69. We did, what’s it called? Fifty Shades of Grey. Fifty Shades of Grey. We didn’t finish the book, unfortunately.

Well, fortunately. No. Unfortunately, that book was terrible. And then for episode 114, we said we’d we’d make sure we followed up Harry Potter with the worst book ever written probably. So we did that.

I was gonna say what a lead in. Yeah. For Fifty Shades being terrible, what do we got next? Mexican Gothic, is next. It was a a TikTok book recommendation.

We may not ever take a TikTok book recommendation effort. So not to bury the lead, but, No. That’s the opposite of burying the lead. That’s putting it right on the headline. Yeah.

Yeah. That’s true. Yeah. So next, next time around, we’ll be doing Mexican Gothic. Probably, I’m assuming we both finished it.

And then what’s the other one, just in case if people are listening and and wanna check-in that we’re reading now? Before the Fall by Noah Hawley. Yeah. Before the Fall. So far, I’m enjoying it.

It’s a it’s a book, much different than Mexican Gothic. But either way, Keith, this has been quite the journey. We did it. Harry did it. Voldemort did not do it, but but we made it through.

So, yeah. I’m glad I’m glad we did it we did it together. That’s important to me. Just like Harry and Ron and Hermione, we did it together. No.

It was, quite the journey and, we survived all 7 Yeah. 7 books. So appreciate it. Mhmm. I’ll split my soul for you.

Alright. I’ll catch you for Mexican Gothic. Indeed. Alright. Alright.

Bye now.

The Buddies close out J.K. Rowling’s Harry Potter series with book 7: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. It was a sad episode for the Buddies as they finished the last chapter in their favorite book series, and got to talking about: Snape the “good guy”, Unforgivable Curses basically being magical jaywalking, and “kids” fairytales. Per usual, the Buddies got into some conspiracy theories that would make Xenophilius Lovegood look like a mainstream journalist. So grab your wands, brooms, and Deathly Hallows, for the last time and join us on our Harry Potter nostalgic farewell tour.

Intro (0:00-1:19)
Stock Up/Down (1:20-38:33)
Favorite Scene/Character/Magical Elements (38:34-51:40)
Love/Hate (51:41-1:04:05)
Lingering Questions (1:04:06-1:10:17)
Conclusion (1:10:18-1:16:53)

NEXT Episode: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by – MOVIE 

NEXT BOOK: Mexican Gothic by Silvia Moreno-Garcia

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

Alright, welcome to Book Club. I’m Dylan here with the 4th Peverell Brother. He’s asked death for a magical Swedish made penis enlarger pump. Why? You do the math, Keith.

What’s up, buddy? Not something that’s not my bag, baby. One book. Here at the Buddy Book Club, we’re reading out some bestsellers. And this week, we’re entering the hallowed world of Harry Potter and and chatting about Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by JK Rowling.

If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read or reach out to us on any past episodes, you can visit our website, buddybookhub.com. Send us an OWL on Twitter or Instagram, buddybookhubodcast. You can list us iTunes, Spotify, review your podcast, download, give us a 5 star review. Give us, you know, say whatever you want. You can give us 5 stars and say, you suck.

That’d be fine. I’d be okay with it. Yeah. And if you hate it, just, you know, like I said, say so in the comment. Nothing else, give us a follow on social channels, please, and thanks.

Once again, disclaimer for the Harry Potter series. There are spoilers for this book and past books, But at this point, I feel like you should know. Unfortunately, there’s no future books for us to read. There’s The Cursed Child, which I have read. Have you ever read The Cursed Child?

No. I’ve heard negative. Not canon. Not anytime they just start doing time turner stuff, and it’s like, oh, I turned back time, Voldemort’s back. It’s like, woah.

Hold on. Hold on a second. So let’s get into some stock up, stock down. Keith, what do you got stock up for Deathly Hallows? Stock up, Snape is actually evil.

I kept on waiting. I kept on this is like your, Ginny’s a terrible actress Yeah. Thing where I kept on being like I’m waiting for that to happen. I kept on waiting for Snape where I was like I guess I always remember Snape being a good guy at the end. Yeah.

But I’m kept on waiting for it. It never comes. Doesn’t come at all. So let me give you a run through a couple of things here. 1st, Snape stares into Harry’s eyes and he’s like, look at me, right, before he dies.

Yeah. Why? Sure. So you may argue that, you know, he wants to see Lily’s eyes one more time or something romantic or whatever like that. Climax.

Or Jesus. Or maybe he’s putting a memory charm on Harry. You know? He’s doing a little little memory charm. I mean, it seemed like something was going on there.

If his his eyes were so great, then wouldn’t he actually like Harry and, like, looking at him and, you know, all these things in the past? It it seems like why would I don’t know. 2, memories can be altered, d man. Obliviate. We know this.

Right? Mhmm. Well, obliviate and we know from the last book where Slughorn alters memories. Yeah. Who says this guy who is an incredible wizard in terms of, like, memory stuff and the mind can’t change memories and and give them to Harry and put them in a flask and say, oh, yeah.

This is exactly what happened. Nice to just rewrite your story. Right? That’s an interesting point because if in, like, the wizarding court of law, memories shouldn’t be able to count. Right?

Because if you can alter them Yeah. It’s like circumstantial evidence. It’s not actual evidence. Oh, oh, so you’re saying he just altered the memories that he gave Yeah. To Harry about his conversations with Dumbledore.

Right. Yeah. You’re about to die. You’re like, well, people are gonna think I’m shitty. So here we go.

I’m just gonna tell Harry I’m the best guy and the hero of this story. I did I did all the great things. Number 3 is just and then most important thing is I’m not really big on talk. Everyone can talk big. Everyone can say I’m this, I’m that.

What has he actually done? What action? What has he done? What action has he ever done that actually shows that he’s a good person? We’re here talking about a book and, you know, you’re not No.

Well, you know what I’m saying. I I if I if I were telling you I’m the most charitable person ever, I’m super charitable. All I do is charity. Yeah. Okay.

But you don’t donate as anonymous. So no one does. Yeah. Well, obviously no. But you know what I’m saying?

Like, then I had to go and do it. Otherwise, it doesn’t mean it’s just talk. It doesn’t mean anything. Okay. What is he doing that actually is showing that he’s a good person?

I appreciate this hot take, but we know It’s not a hot take. I think it’s a very rational take. It’s a rash it’s a normal take. We know his Patronus is the doe and he let I’ll tell you what what is, his brother’s Patronus, Albus Dumbledore’s brother’s Patronus? A goat because he’s a goat fucker.

They’re they’re similar to to doe’s, but okay. Go on. Sure. So we know that he put the sword of Gryffindor at the bottom of the lake so that Ron could get it. Well, spin zone, Harry has he has the the thing around his neck.

He’d love those? He knows that yeah. He wants that to be hidden from the world. He puts a a desirable object at the bottom of the ocean so that that will go kill him and he’ll hide it. Right?

Like, he could’ve made it easy. What was the point of making it a hard time? Well, it has to be because, for a Gryffindor to take the sword, he has to do it in, like, a brave or courageous manner or something like that. So Ron needed to do it to, like, save Harry or whatever the case is. That’s the only way he could get the sword.

Interesting. Fucking read a book for me one time. I mean, it seems like one action doesn’t really, you know Yeah. There’s a lot of shittiness. It could’ve made it easier.

I mean, that’s all I’m saying. Definitely, like, not enough to name your child after him and then say he was the bravest man. If Ron isn’t there, Harry just dies. He doesn’t save him. Snape didn’t save him.

The story ends. Right? Yeah. So what was the what was the I mean, what’s a good act there? I don’t get it.

It’s not like Snape dove in and pulled him out, and he’s like, I don’t know who pulled me out of the water, you know? Yeah. That would have been the one, really. Yeah. My first stock up is Do you agree with me?

I did you didn’t have an answer to that. You gave me one thing. I just you did. You didn’t even agree with me? You’re just like, yeah.

Alright. You’re right. Alright. Fair enough. It’s a super hot take.

And that’s a It’s not a hot take. I I I think this is resolved. What has he done? That’s a nice gesture. You can just talk about game, but no.

He doesn’t do shit. He also, like, kept the Caros off all the students while Did he? At Hogwarts. Yeah. Neville had a black eye.

That was about it. It’s not like kids were getting murdered. It’s probably safer than normal. He didn’t secretly help students. He’s not doing anything that’s, like, behind the back of people.

He he’s made Hogwarts significantly, significantly worse. He’s made other people’s lives significantly, slightly worse. He killed Dumbledore. He could’ve if the the by the same logic that his hands are already dirty so he’s willing to kill Dumbledore, then just kill Voldemort. The the whole thing’s over.

He’s standing next to him. Just kill him. The whole the horcruxes. But he’s dead. Then they have no one chasing them as they go find the horcruxes.

Why would you want a person to be alive that’s, joint hunting? That was more of a lingering question for me is why do you have to kill Dumbledore or kill Voldemort last? Couldn’t you kill the rest of his horcruxes? It takes 13 years to to find, you know, or 12 years for it to come back or whatever. So But his soul might be, like, a piece of him just floating out there.

Yeah. I don’t know. My first stock up, this one’s for you, Keith, is the Eris tour. Is this something you’re familiar with? I am familiar.

Yeah. I’m good. I’m I’m not familiar, but I’m just guessing here. It’s a Taylor Swift thing, the Eris tour. It’s, like, she goes and she plays all of her music from all of her heiress.

Is that the is that the Mhmm. Yeah. Yeah. So it’s kind of like a a greatest hits tour in a way, which when you’re there, like, if you have the ability to do that, it’s great. And that’s a stock up for me as it relates to this book because in Deathly Hallows, I loved all of the callbacks to things and events from previous books.

It was like a greatest hits tour or like that 100th episode of Seinfeld where they go through all of the greatest hits except that episode sucks, and this was this was good. This was well done. Because why that episode sucks is they just say, here’s all funny jokes that don’t make any sense in the for the context of this episode, whereas Deathly Hallows, they would reference back to things that happened in book 1 or creatures they had run into or blasted its scoots, all different stuff, but it it wove so neatly into the story that was being told that it never felt like they were giving us our greatest hits. It was just like, oh, yeah. I remember that.

I remember that. And, knowing that this is the culmination of the story, it was great to kind of pull back from those memories and realize the journey that we’ve all been on with Harry and company. So it felt like going to the Harry Potter era store, and and I was all for it. I mean, I was so immersed in it. I guess, do you have some examples?

I’m trying to think of, like, what, I guess, ones that you were, like, that they called back to. Because I feel like when you’re in this world, it’s not a callback. It’s just part of your life. Yeah. I guess that that’s a good point.

But it was stuff that happened in other books. I mean, whether it be people or stuff about, you know, the Chamber of Secrets, the basilisk, and then Quirrell got referenced. Albania got referenced. Oh, that time that they tried to kill a hippogriff just like they throw random stuff out there, but we know what they’re talking about because it’s like, oh, yeah. That was from this book.

I remember when that happened. So, yeah. I I enjoyed it. It’s really hard to to close a series, but this did about as good of a job as you possibly can with tying everything, all the loose ends up, closing the series out. Yeah.

It catered to the to the super fans, and and I appreciate that. It didn’t leave us hanging whatsoever. What else do you have for stock up? Pretending to be nice and care about charity, stock up. Oh.

Ron gifts Harry 12 fail safe ways to charm, which is explains that it’s, everything you need to know about girls. Yeah. I get that the book, it really is just basically saying listen and respond to girls, like that’s what the the book is. Uh-huh. And it makes it sound a little bit more nefarious obviously.

But based on Ron’s attitude throughout the first six books, he’s kind of a dick. So and the person that Hermione really liked or fell in love with is that person. So I don’t really understand why he needs to fake this whole nice attitude. But on the counter thing that is that you do see that it works. It turns out that the only time he gets a snogger in the whole book, which you think this has been a long time coming.

And do you think there’d be a little bit of a better payoff here with, like, something that happens that that they snog for the first time? But it’s when he says, oh, we should, like, protect the house elves. Like, he actually cares about house elves. So the first time in, you know, 7 years, he actually says one nice thing about the house sells, and she makes out with him. Mhmm.

So I guess the book works and pretending you care about charities and just fake being nice is something that you should do, and so, stock up to that. One last thing though on this is that Harry, after he gets the book, he goes, like, downstairs and, he’s with missus Weasley and he, like, pays her a compliment just because Harry’s a actually genuine nice guy. Mhmm. And Ron gives him, like, a wink and a nudge being, like, oh, you must be reading the book, which does that just mean that Ron wants Harry to fuck his mom? Like, what’s what’s going on?

I didn’t I I was like, wait. What in that book forgetting with girls? What is this? Yeah. I think it’s it’s levels.

You know? It’s about, schmoozing, and then also the next level would be snogging, and then the next level would be fornication. So Okay. Yeah. I think that the schmoozing.

They’re they’re rules that apply to everything. I mean, I’m sure they apply to this same sex as well. It’s also it’s like those men’s health magazines or whatever that, you know, my dad used to have men’s health, and I’d use it when I went to the restroom. I’d read it and be like, how to get chicks or all this stuff, and and it’s all the same stuff. It’s like look into the house.

Listen. Beautiful. Attractive. Skip to page 36 where we give you the ab workout. Do that.

No. It’s all, you know, it’s all the same stuff. It’s, you know, listen, basically. Listen, respond, be interested, and that’s all it says, which is just stuff that people should be interested. Yeah.

Like George Costanza. I watched that episode recently. Good stuff. My next stock up and because it is this week, I’m gonna have to say it, but it’s Thanksgiving is stock up for me, and it does relate to this book. Because at least for me personally, you can give me your take, but Thanksgiving is the number one holiday day as an adult.

You know, when you’re a kid, obviously, Christmas is super cool because you get an n 64 or something that, like, blows your gourd and Mhmm. You’re happier than you’ve ever been. But, I mean, even this year, you know, I don’t wanna buy any. Now I have to buy the gifts too. You know?

It’s not just like my dad taking me to the store being like, I’ll pick out something, you know, for your stepmom or my mom saying, here, take $20 and buy me something when you’re a kid. It’s like, oh, okay. Cool. So I gotta do all this stuff. So thanksgiving’s the best because it’s just being around the people you love.

It’s good food. There’s football. You know what’s gonna happen every single year. Every single year, I know what’s going to be on the table. I know I’m going to lose a lot of money gambling on football.

I know I’m going to continue to try to drink until I get drunk, but know that it’s impossible because I’ve eaten so much food and then I’m going to fall asleep. Yep. So even though I know what’s happening, I know I’m going to love it every single year. And that is how I looked at not only this Harry Potter book, but just us doing this Harry Potter journey all over again, it was a lot of books. We started this in June.

You know what I mean? It’s November, all these books and all the movies, and it had been a while since I had done that full rewatch and reread. And I know exactly what I was in for. And it paid off over and over and over again. I loved the whole experience.

I forgot a lot about 7, I feel like, because this is the book that I’ve read the least, out of all of them because usually, you’re gonna start from the one and go. It tied like I said before, it tied all those other books back. It tied up all the loose ends with the story. I really loved how much time we get to spend with Harry, Ron, and Hermione just together even though Ron kinda dipped out of there for a bit. But the whole horcrux hunting, hallows hunting situation.

It was almost like like a mission impossible movie or something like that kind of thing going on. You know? There was this this, like, action movie thing that was happening in the Harry Potter world while it was also Plus, like, treasure hunting, which I love. Like, National Treasure. Exactly.

Yeah. Heist movies. I love that too. Because there’s a bank heist in the middle of this. I got that coming up too.

Yeah. So I forgot how much I love this. And even though I knew it was coming, it was one of those surprises. Like, when I actually win one bet on on Thanksgiving, and it was a nice surprise. Or the the turkey just comes out perfecto.

So yeah. How do you feel about Thanksgiving? Top top or top 2? Well, I think there’s an analogy in this is that when you read this book for the first time, you get something different out of it. And when you get older, you get something different out of it.

That’s similar to my favorite holidays too. It’s Christmas, obviously, when you’re younger. College, I think Halloween. And then 4th July post college, I feel like was my favorite. Oh.

Now it’s starting to become Thanksgiving time. I like the comparison. And then you, also, like, after Thanksgiving night, you had an end and you’re very satisfying. You you you you you’re gonna miss it. You wait wait Oh.

You know, until the next time you do it. Oh, yeah. I’m really You know, I’m really gonna miss it. Really gonna miss it. I’m glad we still have the movies even though we’re not a huge fan of the movie series in general, but I’m glad we have them just because I feel like I don’t have to fully close out my Harry Potter stuff.

Because when I finished reading this, in my mind, as I’m getting towards that end of the book, I was like, holy smokes. It’s gonna be, is the next time I read this gonna be when I’m reading it to my daughter in, like, 8 years? Yeah. You know? I didn’t know when I would kinda go back and do it, where Caroline, she legitimately is reading Harry Potter book every day.

Somehow, she’s like, oh, I’m gonna go to bed. I’m gonna put on Harry Potter book 3. I’m like, okay. Cool. Go for you.

It’s like Seinfeld or I appreciate that. They’re both. They’re legitimately, it’s either Seinfeld or Harry Potter in here these days. What is great is I have already forgotten, like, half the even though the 7th one, there was so much that happened. I’m like I was, like, trying to recall what happened, like, after reading it.

So it is great that it’s so much that you can probably go back in a couple years and not remember most of it. I can remember the first time I read this book. I tried to read it as fast as possible so I would miss stuff. Like, my goal was to miss stuff because I wanted to then start to get into it. I just read it so quickly.

I must have missed stuff. I’m such a fast reader. Yeah. What else do you have for stock up? Last one, and it’s a quick one.

Just Unforgivable Curses stock up early or in put forth. Begin to choose to them, and they’re like these frowned upon things. We’re just throwing them out whimsy andimsy in this book. They’re just oh, yeah. Yeah.

Obviously, I’m gonna use Imperio on these 5 5 people in Gringotts. Not a big deal. I mean, also, I thought you had to, like, practice and hone these. I think it’s, like, the hardest spells ever. You You’re talking about, like, casting Patronus is impossible.

I thought, like, you know, the dark spells are impossible, but it’s just no. Easy day. And then he pulls out a Crucio, I think, right in front of McGonagall. Right? I mean, that was deserved as, I appreciated that.

I was pretty pumped about the that. But at the same time, you think McGahn will be like, oh my god. I can’t believe you did that curse. He was just like, well It’s unforgivable. I was it was one of my stock it was one of my stock downs actually was was was branding because it’s brand they’re branded as unforgivable curses.

I don’t know who the person that you’re looking for forgiveness is, but everyone is not forgiven. Because, like you said, Harry pulls out the Curcio on the Caro sister in front of McGonagall, and she’s giving him a slow clap for it. Molly Weasley, presumably Avada or excuse me, abracadabra’s Bellatrix Lestrange because she kills her. So I don’t know how else I mean, obviously, there’s lots of spells that could kill people, but it’s not like she’s, you know, Septum Sempering her. So she did that.

And like you said, they’re piercing everyone left and right. So, yeah, I don’t know whose forgiveness we’re looking for with these being unforgivable because everyone’s using them. It’s Yeah. Maybe they’re they’re serving jail sentences after those, maybe. Yeah.

I I didn’t I didn’t understand that at all. And it’s a great point that you make too with, the amount of chapters that we spend on Harry learning his Patronus charm, and then for just easily just crucios, imperios, abracadabras getting thrown left and right. It’s like, what? It’d be like they they just created a a gun that no safety, you know, hairpin trigger. You just can anyone can fire it, it, and they’re marketing it.

Like, it’s like a Stretch Armstrong, marketing on Saturday morning cartoons to kids or something like that. Anyone can just go around and abracadabra people. So, yeah, I I had I had that as well. I know I noticed that. I like it.

Like that one. Do do you remember the unforgivable video on YouTube? Yeah. Of course. Well, for free That’s that was marketed yeah.

That was marketed well, so maybe that’s why they they did it. Who is forgive who are they looking forgiveness from? I don’t care. I don’t know. Well, I got 2 more stock ups.

One’s pretty quick, but, stock up audiobooks, and this has been a stock up left and right for us on this podcast because we like to listen to these and many of the books we do. The the best part about audiobooks for me, and and this has been, you know, discussed, so I’m not gonna go into it. But, you know, you can listen to them anywhere. It’s as it’s as simple as that. You know, whether you’re folding laundry or taking the dog for a walk, basically, all the raking leaves in the yard, all all the mundane stuff that you, like, kinda sucks.

I mean, some of that stuff’s not not too shabby. But it just gets better when you have a good audiobook in your ears. But especially for this book, I listened a lot while I was making dinner, and it was really important because any time I felt it coming on, go into the cupboard, grab an onion, start cutting it. Easy excuse. Easy excuse.

Caroline comes in. She’s like, are you are you crying? I was like, oh, I sorry. I just started cutting onion. The Weasley twin down, cutting onions.

Percy comes back into the fold, and everyone hugs it out. Oh, cut cutting onions. No big deal. Little little always from from Severus Snape, cutting onions. So Dobby, oh my god.

Don’t even get me started. I I had to go through a whole batch. I was like, French onion soup tonight. It’s French onion soup tonight. I’m cutting £5 of onions.

So so, yeah, audiobooks stock up because they they help you get the cover up. If I was just sitting on the couch reading this book and crying, I’m not a big, male masculinity thing, but at the same time, I don’t wanna be reading a Harry Potter book at the age of 37 crying on a couch right now. You know? It’s not the greatest of looks. So so appreciate the idea.

Nothing wrong with it. Nothing wrong with it. I told you. I was on an airplane the whole time. You know?

Like, it gets you get emotional for some no reason. You know? That’s what I was having to miss. So yeah. We’re all the same page.

Yeah. And then my, my last stock up was conspiracy theories stock up, and this relates to Xenophilius Lovegood and and the hallows story. You know, he’s telling them, you know, he’s got all those pendants on. He’s telling them this hallows story, and Hermione is just all like, Oh my god, you fucking idiot. No way this can be true.

This is absurd. Hermione, you live in a magical world with ghosts, ghouls, giants, a sorcerer’s stone, blasted scoots. Like, why is this so unfounded? Like, you know, why is it so unbelievable? I I do get that Hermione is quite a literal person, and I think they do a good job framing it to make it believable.

But at the same time, you should never say I don’t think so about anything in this world. Mhmm. Agreed. Because all of it is right in front of us. Like, there are the Hogwarts itself is crazy magical stuff going on.

You’ve you’ve been there. You’ve seen this throughout the years. There are these Dementor things that suck souls out of your face. I I think the, you know, the idea that someone could negotiate with death is is a decent potential. This is all conspiracy theory, the whole house thing, and it turns out to be true.

So conspiracy theory stock up just like UFOs. Check their releases. I mean, mine was kids fairy tales stuck down. The first half of it is the same exact reason. Mhmm.

There’s magic. There’s dragons. What’s the make believe part of, you know, how do you tell a fairy tale of, like, you know Good point. I was gonna say, compare it to be, like, telling you, like, a fairy tale to someone being, like, and then there’s metal, you know, cylinders that fly in the sky, and then they land at an airport, and I’m being, like, oh my god. I can’t believe that’s crazy.

And they’re like, no, that actually happens already. So it’s not really that that nuts. But Yeah. It’s a fairy tale and I’m hoping that, when you’re you’re start reading fairy tales to, your your newborn here, that you’re maybe not telling the ones that they tell in the wizarding world. They’re they’re just kinda like talking about the fairy tale and it’s like, oh, yeah.

And so, like, it’s a kid’s tale. Everyone knows it growing up and it’s like, you know, it’s super childish. Like what happens? Like, oh, they talk to death and, they get 3 things and, 2 of the brothers, they both die. One of them is haunted by dead people walking around and basically, it’s so inflicted by that and they they off themselves.

They kill themselves. Kids book. Kids story. Yeah. And then, the other one, gets stabbed in the back at night while they’re trying to sleep.

So good night. Yeah. Dog’s bed bugs night. Oh. Yeah.

Yeah. They’re Like, is it kid’s story? They’re, like, the original Hansel and Gretel type, like, the brothers Grimm fairy tales that are actually, like, much darker. I guess those are dark too. Yeah.

That’s a good point. Even Goldilocks and stuff like that about Where are in Little Red Riding Hood. Burn in your mouth on oatmeal or on what’s called? Yeah. That is bread cradles.

Porridge. Yeah. Porridge. Yeah. Witch’s oatmeal.

Yeah. Sure. And I meant, little red riding hood. But but, yeah, the the original ones are messed up. Like, Hansel and Gretel is really messed up from what I can from what I remember about the actual original story.

So, my first stock down is the idea that Voldemort is one of the most dangerous wizards in history. Stock hard down on that. So I’m not even gonna mention that he’s been blundered by a child legitimately 6 years in a row. Every single time they go up against each other, he loses. He’s like Jim Harbaugh against John Harbaugh.

Nice. Yeah. Thanks. Pertinent. So when the battle for Hogwarts, he’s got Dementors.

He’s got Giants. He’s got werewolves. He’s got Inferry all on his side, and yet he still can’t beat a handful of kids at a school, like a handful of kids and a couple of teachers. He’s like he’s like the cartel goons in the movie toy soldiers. Did you see that movie?

Please help me out. Toy soldiers? Yes. Sean Astin. It’s like the drug cartel goes to take over the school and all the kids get him.

Harry Potter is like Macaulay Culkin in Home Alone in all of this, and he’s this the sticky bandits or the wet bandits, whichever, you know, 1 or 2 you wanna choose. But either way, Voldemort is not the most dangerous wizard in history. And then on top of that, what we learn in this book, you know, we we have to talk about the horcruxes, obviously. You know, as as someone trying not to die, one would assume that these horcruxes are of the utmost importance to Voldemort, and and Dumbledore alludes to much. And we obviously know at the end when Voldemort puts Nagini in his protective little cocoon there, that he agrees.

But outside of The Locket, which was in a very complicated, magical sit situation and, like, extremely hard to obtain, which makes sense. That’s what you would do for Harrokards. Right? You would put it in this faraway place, so it’s in a cave on a on a lake when then there’s all this magical stuff going on for you to get there. That makes a lot of sense.

But outside of that, we got the gauntlet ring. It’s just the gauntlet ring is just lying around in a broken down shack. It’s legitimately just sitting there. Anyone could go by and and pick it up. Voldemort just relying on the idea that no one will know his lineage, so they won’t be able to do that even though people know that he’s the heir of Slytherin, so you could kind of try to trace Salazar.

You know, you could do a double loaded, but just to have the he goes to the gaunt house, goes to the rubble, and just puts the ring down in there, and he’s like, that one’s good. Piece of my soul. Real good. No problem. The Rave and Claw Diadette, just sitting there in the room of requirements, specifically in the place where people go to hide things, Voldemort says himself he thinks he’s the only one to have found the room of requirements.

How is that possible? Yeah. It’s like Christmas. There’s shit everywhere. It’s like walking into a a I get to all of his stuff.

It’s like walking into a hoarder house and being like, oh, no one’s lived here before. It just doesn’t make any sense. Even and so the Hogwarts has been around for 100 of years, so the idea that he would walk into that room, and it would be empty is almost impossible. Right? Yeah.

Yeah. So let’s just say let’s just say that, okay, that is what happened. He walked in, he walked by the room, he said, I need a place to hide something, and an empty room showed up. That’s what you’re going with to hide a piece of your soul? Like no one else would walk around and just say, Oh, I need a place to hide something?

It makes no sense that that would be the smart thing to do. So I’m not gonna talk about the the Hufflepuff cup because hot green gets whatever. Fine. I don’t care. But the rest of it, it seems so strange.

Was pretty rugged. That was a tough one. Yeah. That’s a tough one. That’s a tough one.

But at the same time, all he did was hand it to Bellatrix and say, Put this in your safe because Gregor’s already has all that stuff together, which he didn’t do it himself. He has to just trust that Bellatrix is doing it. They’re still not necessarily the most important. And I mean even the diary, he just gives it to Lucius Malfoy and doesn’t tell Malfoy it’s a whole like, Malfoy could have brought that down to the local library and donated it, which actually would have been the safest move. Now it’s in circulation.

No one’s ever gonna figure that one out. So, yeah. Voldemort, not not a top 10 not a top 10 bad guy in the history of the wizarding world. Oh, yeah. He’s just too arrogant, and then really it comes down to it.

He’s just never about that life. Not not ever. Didn’t wanna then never wants to get his hands dirty. Never kills Harry when he’s a baby with his hands. He doesn’t enter the battlefield, the main war.

He’s only gonna sit back. William Wallace, Alexander the Great. I don’t know if Alexander the Great after the battlefield. No Gibson from the Patriot. Thank you.

No Gibson from the Patriot. I mean, all the people that are actual leaders enter the battlefield first. They’re they’re leading the charge. You can’t just sit back like what? Yeah.

Come on. It’s soft. Be better, Voldy. Alright. What else do you have for stock down?

Yeah. Last one is just Lupin, stock down. Oh, buddy. No. I mean, it’s tough.

I don’t wanna I don’t wanna trash on someone. But when Lupin first comes in, to the Weasleys and he comes in super super hot, I I initially wrote, Stockton getting married. I was like, oh, man. This dude’s really gonna change. He really kinda sucks.

So it was he got married. Because his his disposition previously was super nice and understanding and always, like, very well tempered. Mhmm. And then I was like, oh, it’s because he’s having a kid. And I was like, stuck down having a kid.

But, it turns out it wasn’t that either. I guess that that was of the reason that he was being so harsh. But, I mean, the dude did die after all, so I don’t wanna Talk hell of the dead? Yeah. But he didn’t get really a proper debt.

We don’t know what happened to him. It’s just him and his wife died, which is kinda sad. Yeah. They’re just laying there. Nothing really great for him in this book.

He has a big argument and a blowout with Harry or Roud as they would say in, in Britain. Yeah. But the real reason Roud. Sorry. Yeah.

Good good fix. The real reason that it’s a stock down is because the dude’s a werewolf. It’s been 3 or 4 books here that we’ve known that and he hasn’t really have he has he turned into a werewolf since then? I mean, I’m sure he has, but, not on screen. We’re not really getting anything, but why don’t we just go full Incredible Hulk and just Yeah.

I was saying the same thing. You know, unleash him on on the Death Eaters. What are we doing here? It’s just a huge miss. Actually, I even wrote this note when I saw there there’s a full moon, and I was like, where the hell’s Lupin been recently?

Why isn’t he why isn’t he out there terrorizing people? Like, this is a guy guy you want to hear aside just to unleash on people. You were listening to it and you looked up in the sky and saw a full moon. You’re like, where’s Lupin been? Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. I I mean, I feel like you could have put a couple of pages in there, for it being a full moon during the battle of Hogwarts, and Lupin is able to, like, differentiate his wife from the Death Eaters and goes straight after them. He just has his Wolverine moment and goes, you know, full Berserker mode on, Greyback. Just goes straight after Greyback and somehow gets cursed and then Tonks, who’s Tonks is is an ore.

You know, she’s a badass. So I wanna see how she died because I assume that it’s when you see the a samurai die or something along those lines and around them is just a 100 enemy bodies. You know? Yeah. Yeah.

I would’ve I would’ve liked to see more. I thought you were gonna keep going with your stock up, stock down about marriage, having a kid, and then straight to Teddy and be, like, not having parents, being an orphan. Stock up. Harry is a godfather, and so shouldn’t he be, like, growing up in their house? Yeah.

I was thinking about that too. I was like, wait. So you just abandoned the kid? Figure it’s been a tough it was a tough book for Tonks’ mom who lost her husband, her daughter, and her son-in-law. So I think the only thing she has left is her grandson, so I think it’s gonna be a little bit of a Neville type situation for Teddy where he grows up he grows up with his with his grandmother, especially because he’s named after his grandfather.

Right? So, you know, it just seems like she would, she would raise him. But, yeah, you didn’t even really talk about Lupin’s worst moment, which is when he went to Harry, Ron, and Hermione and asked to join them. He was, like, trying to Peter Pan this whole thing and be, like, let me join you kids on your journey. And they’re, like, get out of here, geezer.

Like, what do you what? No. I didn’t really have a big issue with him there. So you’re telling me you couldn’t use an extra wizard and, like, you don’t trust Lupin? I didn’t really fault him that much for that.

I guess he is was running away from his problems. So Yeah. He wasn’t doing it for the right reasons. That that’s for sure. That’s true.

Yeah. That’s true. He had, yeah, he had a little bit of manic stuff going on. I mean, the the, you know, even the best time we see him, he’s, like, coming in. He’s, like, talks at the kid.

Oh, let’s get drunk. Alright. I gotta go. I was like, what? Nope.

Nope. Yeah. Alright. Like, what color is there? Is he gonna be werewolf?

I don’t know. I gotta get out of here. He’s like, alright. Lupin, you’re you’re having a moment here. Yeah.

So so not a good not a good book for him, unfortunately. He, he dies at the end. And, and, yeah, and Harry didn’t wanna name his kid after Lupin, one of his, best teachers and whatever. He wanted to name it after his one of his worst teachers ever since. Yep.

Makes sense. 2nd best stock down is a prejudice stock down. Lot of Slytherin prejudice here at at the end from McGonagall. We’ve been getting Slytherin prejudice throughout, but Voldemort’s attacking the school and he says bring out Harry Potter and a bunch of the Slytherins step up and they’re like, alright. Let’s get this guy.

And then the rest of the school steps up and they say, no. You know, through over our dead bodies kinda situation where McGonagall has to step in and say, Slughorn, take your whole house. Get them out of here. They’re done. There’s got to be some good eggs in there, right?

Some good eggs that want to stay and fight that are just getting pushed out the door. What about kids whose parents are are death eaters, but they’re rebelling against their parents? You know, I don’t wanna be I don’t wanna be they’re terrible people. I don’t wanna be a terrible person. Well, they probably wouldn’t be in Southern then, I guess, would be the, like, life was named Cyrus.

Is that the case? You have to just be a terrible person if you’re in in Slytherin, or what about maybe this kid is a terrible person, but their parents were death eaters and Voldemort killed their parents, You know? Because Voldemort’s killing death eaters himself left and right in in this book when they’re, you know, not doing right by him. So you wanted to be a death eater, like like, Regulus. You know?

And then all this bad shit happened, and you say, nope. I’m anti Voldemort. You’re ready to fight. You’re ready to fight for the school, and McGonagall’s pushing you out the door. Prejudice.

So, yeah, I I I don’t I don’t stand for prejudice, and I don’t I don’t I don’t I don’t go look for McGonagall in my opinion. I will go back to my my Snape take. Actions speak louder than words. I mean, if you wanna step up and game up and show that you’re you’re part of Hogwarts and you’re actually a good person, then step to the plate and make and do that. Don’t don’t keep saying, well, maybe they could have done No.

No. Just do it. You know what I mean? So Well, I didn’t have the opportunity. You got to drive I’ve had 7 years of opportunity.

I haven’t seen one of them step up to the plate and do anything good. So until then, you know, you keep quiet and you get out of Hogwarts. You seen the movie Half Baked? Yeah. When when Pansy Parkinson or whatever is saying, grab him to Harry Potter, and then everyone steps up.

I pictured the scene where the guy’s like, boo this man. Boom. Every the rest of the people just go boo. Boo. You ever suck dick for marijuana?

Okay. Last one. Quick one. Wizarding negotiating skills, stock down. Once again, they’re just not teaching the right stuff at this school.

Harry has a deal with Griphook. Right? So he saves Griphook’s life. Griphook is being tortured and held prisoner by Voldemort at the Malfoy’s. And Harry saves his life.

Not only that, Griphook witnesses him burying Dobby, a house elf, a presumed lower being to most wizards, which Griphook is taken by. So Griphook should know that Harry’s a good guy and also that Harry saved him. So Harry should know this as well. And then, when they start negotiating on how to get into Bellatrix’s vault, Harry just gives him the sword. And I know Harry has this loophole that he said, Okay, I’ll give it to him, but it’ll be after we have all the horcruxes.

But still, it seemed like he should when Griphook said give me the sword, Harry’s rebuttal to that classic negotiation is he goes, No. And then, you start negotiating. Not, let me think about it. Okay. I thought about it.

Yeah. Sure. I’ll give you the sword. So yeah. Not what are you doing, Harry?

Not great. Yeah. And, if this book teaches you anything, the prejudice part. You almost can use prejudice. Oh, yeah.

All this all this are terrible. All of, what what kind of creatures? Goblins are bad too. Yeah. It’s like, like, what else could you do to to make them turn to your side?

So apparently not. Yeah. Bill has to give him the the big speech about how terrible goblins are. They also, the way goblins look at stuff, I understand perspective matters. That’s a cool logic Did you?

For me to have. I thought well, it’s just the original idea that you you would it’s so backwards that you would never think of it, but it’s a creative thing to come up with as a bad like a bad guy. It it’s an ultimate business idea for for goblins because everything is a rental. You know, they own everything. It’s a lease.

Everything is a lease. It’s a lease. It’s a smart. Yeah. It’d be it’d be like everything that we owned that we bought.

If if Jeff Bezos did this, you’d have to return all the stuff to Amazon afterwards. You’d be like, oh, well, now you owe me money. It’s like, I I broke the cheese grater. It’s like, oh, you it’s like the rent a center situation. You know?

People get poor using rent a center. It’s like exactly like that. I’m not supposed to be renting my bed right now? That’s weird. Okay.

Let’s get into the Burning A Bot’s every flavor bean potpourri section here. Interesting for this book in particular, not a lot of magical elements that were talked about, not a lot of spells, and not a lot of magical creatures. So I didn’t know if you had any of those. Maybe magical element perhaps. I fit, I fit the the round peg into the square hole for these, you know, to make it work.

Well, well, let’s start with what we like to start off with, favorite chapter or part of the book in, Death of the Hallows. What do you got? Mine was and this one I literally didn’t remember one part of this at all was the you already mentioned it. The Mission Impossible infiltration into the, ministry. Mhmm.

They’re in different disguises. They’re basically, like, kinda going off the cuff. They’re just kinda trying to figure out as they go. I don’t remember the scene at all. I I told you I forgot Umbridge was even in this book.

And I was like, wait, she’s here? Like, everything about it and then him just like coming up being like, I can’t stand this shit. And then kinda leading the whole pack of people that are about to be tried away and and and getting saving them as well. Great. Everything about it was awesome.

So that was my favorite. There’s so much good parts of this book, but this is one scene I completely forgot about. I thought it was a completely underrated scene. Yeah. That’s a good mention because it it almost happened so early on in the book that I I forgot about it by the time I finished the book, You know?

And it is so good because it’s like a the Mission Impossible, but where, usually, they get, like, 4 steps into the Mission Impossible and then shit goes haywire. This is they plan for a month, and then the first second they get through the elevator, it starts to go awry, which is which is great. And they all get split up and, you know, read the book. But it was, I I really like that as well. I hope that was a that was a really fun chapter that that I, that I didn’t recall.

But for me and maybe just because I’m more into, like, the the, like, lore type stuff or whatever, but I love the story of the hallows. And then that really that ties right into pretty much every the whole time at, like, Shell Cottage because it ties right into that Shell Cottage situation where Harry has his moment realizing that not only the Hallows are real, but Voldemort has been trying to get the wand. And now Harry has to make a decision howls are horcruxes. And I like this not only because it’s awesome, but because we’ve been getting these teasing moments about this stuff, not only throughout this book, but throughout the whole series. And then you can start tying the pieces together in your head where it’s like, holy smokes.

Harry has this cloak that is one of 3. Like, that’s pretty crazy. And Dumbledore had this wand. What? He had the most powerful wand.

And hearing that hearing that lore and then the conversations that he has with Ollivander and then Griphook about deciding what to do next, I loved it a lot. And it was a big come up instead of Hermione who didn’t think that that it was real. So, yeah, I thought I thought that moment. And that I feel like that is kind of well, I was gonna say it’s the halfway point of the book, and it really turns the tone right there, and we go into a different kind of section. But as you’ll see when we watch the movies, that is where they stop.

A lot of the movies. So I was wondering where they stop. Yeah. They stop it at Dobby’s death. Yeah.

What about, favorite character for this one? You know what? For this one, I’m I’m going Harry. Harry went through a lot in this one. It’s just a great around around book.

It taught us a lot about leadership, perseverance, sacrifice, all the things a great leader, a great main character has to to embody and he he did all those things in this book and, and that they had a lot of struggles. He had a lot of doubters. He had a lot of, doubt of of himself. Yeah. I think that was the biggest thing is is the self doubt.

Throughout all the other books, he it’s been him versus the doubters. And then in this book, it’s really about he’s the doubter, You know? He’s saying what’s going to happen when I eventually have to face him? Was Dumbledore lying to me? And then, you know, vis a vis, am I an idiot for listening to Dumbledore?

Am I an idiot for going on this whole thing? So, you know, I feel like a lot of the doubt for this one was was internal, and he was able able to overcome that. Yeah. I think that that’s a that’s a fair choice. That’s the minus, you know, in the betting terms, that’s the minus 110 right there.

But, I’m gonna say who’s not my favorite, and, you know, might might get me some some hate mail, but gotta say Ron. You know? Ron, it’s it just wasn’t a good look for him in this book, honestly. You know? He’s stepping out on his best friends because he’s not getting 3 square meals a day, and he wants to see his mom.

Buddy, this is war. This is a legit war. You should know what you signed up for here. So stepping out on your best friend and your girlfriend, who’s also your best friend. Also, they don’t have grocery stores in Britain.

Just throw an invisibility cloak on, throw a fucking, peanut butter and jelly sandwich, a couple of peanut things of peanut butter, a couple of things of jelly, get a loaf of bread. I mean, what are we talking about? What’s how is food the issue? I don’t understand that. Yeah.

I I also thought thought the same thing too. They’re they’re in the woods, which I understand. But you know what the best part was? When they are camping in the woods because I I thought the same thing. You can apparate, disaparate at will.

So apparate into a grocery store with the invisibility cloak on, pick up a bunch of stuff and apparate it or disapparate it. Whatever the case is. Easy peasy. But I was like, hey, I understand that’s a little hard. So I mean, it’s a it’s a little too easy.

You know, too easy for JK. So but then they’re in the woods and they stumble upon those other people that are in the woods and the guy’s like, oh, here’s a pond. Assio salmon. And, like, 20 salmon fly out to him. He’s like, alright.

We’re eating salmon tonight. He’s like, why aren’t why aren’t Harry and Hermione figuring this one out? Point. Why didn’t they use Assio the salmon? Maybe they sound like fish.

They’re not big fish people. So I respect it. Yeah. Any port in a storm. So, yeah, he was probably my least favorite.

And and and for low screen time, but it’s gotta be Neville. Right? And doesn’t get a lot of doesn’t get a lot of pages in this one. When he comes out of the portrait one, he’s so jacked up to see them, and he’s he’s got the shit beat out of him, but he’s never been happier in his whole life. I was picturing, honestly, like, Brad Pitt from Fight Club when he comes out of there.

That that’s what he is now. He’s like he has the he’s the swagger and the confidence, and somehow, he’s also looks like Brad Pitt. So, you know, everyone’s dream. I mean, what? Anyway, do you know what I’m saying?

Yeah. He’s just like a weird kid who a war broke out and found out that he’s a complete badass, you know, in a wartime situation, which is which is awesome. He’s like a straight out of Band of Brothers HBO miniseries. So not only does he have that moment coming out of the portrait, but then, obviously, Harry has a quick moment. And out of all the people that he could run into, and I trust he tells Neville that he’s gotta kill Nagini.

And Neville just not only steps up to Voldemort alone at the end when it seems like Voldemort’s already won. He’s like, uh-uh. Not gonna fly. And then he goes and kills Nagini. So, yeah, Neville.

You get it for me. Yeah. Love that. What about magical element? Rising from the dead?

So, when I first read this book, I remember thinking, is this a religious book? Did Harry is Harry just Jesus in this? Yeah. Because he gets killed, talks to God, aka Dumbledore, and then they’re like, is this all in your head? He’s like, you tell me.

And then he rises from the dead. I was like, wait. What? So, yeah, that’s that’s kind of a cool element, him being Jesus, but, yeah, 3 days. What about you?

It didn’t take or do, like, less than 3 hours. Yeah. Whatever. 3 minutes. Yes.

Yeah. I was thinking about this one, and nothing from this particular book jumped out to me, but I just wanna pull an in general is gonna be portraits. Just the fact that portraits can talk and move in their frames and seem to it’s not just playback of memories. Like they have their own personalities. It seems like everyone’s immortal, Right?

Because Harry even has a conversation with Dumbledore’s portrait at the end and Dumbledore’s crying. And he’s like, oh, my dear boy, you did it. You know? All you need in the wizarding world is to have a kid with a crayon draw a couple of pictures of you, and you can put them all over the place. And and you could just continue to live on.

I feel like portraits should be like AI. They should be like, this is how that person would respond. Yeah. Exactly. But not have a person out like, not be able to, like, be like, oh, this is what’s happening in the future, and I cannot make decisions that I would make if I were alive.

Yeah. They they they are that person as if they were alive pretty much. Yeah. So and I agree with you. It should be they can’t maybe get new information, but they can relay things that they I don’t know.

But, yeah, I thought the portrait thing just seems like an easy hack because whenever someone dies, it’s like, oh, this is terrible. They die. But it’s like, oh, just go and chat with their portrait. Like, when you just go over there, chat with their portrait, it’s the exact same thing. You just can’t hug them.

So, yeah, I’m gonna say the portrait. Although, I will say that both Harry’s little thing that Hagrid gave him, the taseraznack that he stores stuff in, and Hermione’s bag are pretty sweet. I mean, just if you travel ever, just use Hermione’s bag, especially with an Assio spell. You know, it just everything. You could you could put your whole house in there.

Doesn’t matter. You’d have everything with you all times. The tent. The same thing. Yeah.

Well, the tent goes in there. There’s some food in there. Yeah. Why also didn’t they just throw endless amounts of food in there? You know?

Canned canned goods. Wizarding canned goods. Astronaut food. Whatever. What about spell?

Abracadabra for you? The fire spell that was used in the room of requirement that burned everything? Yeah. Seems like they should’ve just learned that spell, and they wouldn’t need the sword or anything. Right?

Yeah. Hermione is like, it’s it’s uncontrollable. I would never wanna use that even though it can kill all of us. Control that. Or who cares?

It’s we’re we’re talking about killing the most dange quote unquote, the most dangerous wizard, dark wizard. So go to a body of water and light that thing up. And worst case, you can also augment it. Just shoot water out of your wand. Oh, it doesn’t kill that fire.

Whatever. You know, the fire is uncontrollable. Who cares? You’re not gonna burn down half of Britain. You know, it might be a Just learn that spell.

Learn how to control it. Yeah. Figure it out. It’s like and also, why is there a spell that Crabbe or whatever can can do that kills horcruxes? It seems way too easy.

What’s the point of a horcrux? And you have to use basilisk venom to do it, but it’s like, oh, this spell that Crabbe could do. That stuck down Hermione for not really remedial charms and and yet he can do this spell? Nah. No.

No. No. No. No. No.

No. No. Yeah. Hermione definitely forgot about that, and she was like, oh, shit. Yeah.

Like, Hermione, why don’t we use this? She’s like, oh, no. I would never use that. It’s too dangerous. No one could ever use it.

And so she that was definitely her covering for herself. Yeah. Yeah. She’s like, oh, shit. I totally forgot a 100%.

I’m gonna have to go with Expelliarmus. We just have to it has to be said on this podcast because it is the Harry Potter spell. It’s what gets him the elder wand. It’s what he uses against Dumbledore. I’m not sure Dumbledore, but he uses against Voldemort time and time again.

You know, it is it is Harry. It’s his signature move, like they say at the beginning, which we didn’t even talk about the whole beginning with all the polyjuice potion. Everyone’s transforming into Harry and looking at his penis, and it’s just so uncomfortable. But even, you know, even then, he’s expelliarmus ing left to right, and they say they knew it was him because he used expelliarmus. So, yeah, it’s you just gotta give a shout out to it in the wizarding world.

It’s great. It’s like Harry’s shooting rubber bullets and everyone shooting regular bullets. So respect or much respect. Do you have a magical creature? I feel like we didn’t have any new ones, did we?

I said Luna’s dad. He’s got a good creature. Xenophilius Lovegood? He kinda sucked, honestly. I understand that he wants to protect his daughter, but at the same time, practice like you play.

Yeah. And also, if you’re gonna be writing a revolt against the government thing and you know the government’s getting overthrown, maybe try to be a little bit more secretive or, you know, prepare for potentially someone coming and and trying to snatch you up at night or snatch your daughter or just you know what I mean? Yeah. On like Harry Potter radio or whatever that radio thing is, they’re traveling all over the place because they can’t they have to move because they can’t keep broadcasting from the same location. Makes perfect sense.

Yet, Xenophilius Lovegood is just printing the Quibbler from his house and thinks it’s gonna be chill with Voldemort. Yeah. It’s probably not not super duper smart. I guess for a magical creature then would be that thingy out on the wall Yeah. Which he thought was one thing and it just explodes.

But, it feels like Hermione should’ve got a couple of those. You can start throwing them around like they’re bombs or something like that. Maybe that could destroy a horcrux. I don’t know. Let’s show you some love hate, Keith.

What did you love about Deathly Hallows? Ronald Bilious Weasley. Oh, no. He’s my at least favorite character. Great name.

No. I meant the name. Oh, the name. Yeah. I also heard Bany does call her Ronald.

So we had debated why the movie that she was calling him Ronald. She does when she’s upset with him. So, we did solve that. So that’s that’s okay. Damn.

I hope she she pulls the full name out of it. Hand up. Hand up. My bad. Yeah.

Hand up. Speaking of things that we can relate to, Harry, anytime the scar hurts, just keeps running to the bathroom. You think what are they saying to him? Behind the back, they’re like, Harry’s really got the shit, son. Yeah.

Alright. Harry’s got an eating disorder. Right? Right? Yeah.

Oh, wow. I didn’t go there. I was thinking that he was like, oh my god. My stomach. And he’s just like, or my scar, I mean.

Whoops. And I was like, I got I feel you. I feel you. I gotcha. Yeah.

Hermione is like, good thing I can just keep using the same I have that magical toilet paper. You just keep wiping with it, and, you know, it’s always clean. Anyways Yeah. That was, that was an interesting take. Like, obviously, people are gonna know.

What what are you doing? What I loved about this well, we kinda we kinda talked about it anyway, so I’m just gonna go through it quickly. But it’s like a few different books all tied into one here. Not only do we get the Harry Potter story that we’re looking for that, you know, ends the entire series and his, you know, inevitable full frontal assault against Voldemort, we get the bank heist. We get the children’s story, which is great by the way.

I love that story. We get wandlore. We get horcrux lore. We get general wizarding lore. There’s so much in there.

Not only do you get the bank heist, we also get the ministry heist like you talked about. We get the escape with all, you know, the like car chase scene with all of them on the brooms at the beginning. So oh my god. I didn’t even talk about cutting onions for Hedwig. My god talk about onions needed.

And then another thing I love because it’s it’s talking about cutting onions is for me, for some reason, Percy coming back into the family fold got me more in the feels than Fred dying. Maybe it was because it was just like so quick with Fred dying. And Oh, you’re much more emotional, like, and how does he react? Yeah. Like, I got Oh, you’re Not angry.

Oh, I was angry. Oh. Percy should be the one dying, not not Fred. He should’ve sacrificed himself somehow. He does go on to, like, you know, immediately start attacking people once once Fred gets caught.

And he’s gonna have to live with that guilt. I mean, Percy’s Percy’s gonna gonna have a lot of wizarding therapy ahead of him. But just the way that his mom and dad embraced him coming back, it it first, I don’t know why. People. He’s a shitty person.

But it it just it got me right in the feels. I got the goose pimples and and started to well up a little bit. So, yeah, I I I I love that moment for the Weasley family even though, you know, the Fred stuff kinda sucks. What else you love? Just how sick would a post Voldy death party be?

Like, is that just how how sick would that? I’m just thinking about how awesome that would be. Well, like, there’s, like, 50 plus people that that died, so that’s unfortunate. We gotta celebrate their death. I did I did appreciate how even Harry in there was like, oh, it’s awesome, but then, like, it sucks because all these people died.

So there is this weird duality going on. But, yeah, I figured just, like, after a battle, like, you know, if you’re a soldier or something like that when, yeah, it’s shitty that all these people died, obviously, but the the fact that you survived, there’s this euphoria that comes for that. Mhmm. So, yeah, I think, Hogwarts probably, the house elves probably broke out all the butter beer and the fire whiskey, and and people really got after it, cheers into cheers into the dead and and to each other. And I bet you a few wizards were made that night, if you know what I’m saying.

I do know what you’re saying. My my last love is and this is just maybe a pat on my own back, but Harry at the end, when he’s having his showdown with Voldemort, he’s calling him Tom Riddle the whole time, and Voldemort’s getting pissed. I have been saying for months, legitimately months, that we shouldn’t call him he who must not be named. We shouldn’t call him Voldemort, this name that he picked out for himself. We should be calling him Tom Riddle, humanizing this evil, evil man who has turned himself into Voldemort, this, you know, mythical being that can’t be beaten.

No. He’s Tom Riddle. He’s a guy. I’m gonna go over there. I’m gonna kick him in the nuts.

So, yeah. I’m just glad that Harry finally just called him Tom and pissed him off before he ended up obliterating him. That’s a great point. Yeah. I I’ve gotta leave it to Tommy, Tommy r or something.

You know? Just just keep on messing around with his name. Yeah. Yeah. Or just Riddle because that’s the name he doesn’t like.

Right? So just call it Riddle. Hey, Riddle. Woodwood hates. You already mentioned it, but why did Harry need to take Hedwig with him?

It’s a bird of flight. Let let her off the cage and tell her to meet you at the Weasley slice. Yeah. Just take a different route. I just yeah.

I just didn’t get it. She doesn’t need to be in the line of fire. Yeah. Also, I’d just be pissed if, Hedwig dies, you know, flying, doing what she loves, so be it. You know, the best thing that can happen is you die doing what you love.

You know what I mean? But in a cage Yeah. She literally died. That didn’t sit well with me. Die do what you love, When I die on the Thanksgiving table, kid, just know.

I have a huge parlay on the line. I’m 8 beers deep. Yeah. Watching football, eating mac and cheese. Beers on Thanksgiving.

I feel like beers are hard because there’s so much food there. I’m I’m probably not gonna do beers. I’m probably gonna do probably do a little, little bourbon. You know? You gotta have a cocktail or a hard liquor or something like that.

I like the Aperol Spritz for me. Oh, okay. Yeah. I like it for a few reasons. One, it’s citrusy and refreshing, and there’s ice in it, so it hydrates you as well.

And, you know, it’s also got orange in it, even though it’s orange liqueur, and there’s but there’s an orange garnish on it, so it’s pretty much breakfast, so that means you can start early. And then additionally, you just kind of continuously fill it throughout the day. It’s never empty. It’s like we’re doing the refill charm spell on it that Harry does to Slughorn. So no one can ever count how many I’ve had because I’m just constantly adding more to it.

Oh, a little Prosecco here, a little Aperol there, a little seltzer here. You never know. You know, if you had cans, like, 10 beer cans, I’ll be like, you just drink 10 beer cans, are you a psychopath? But here, it’s like, hey. What a not like I’m gonna finish a bottle.

Oh, maybe I will finish a bottle of Aperol in a second. Who knows? Yeah. But there’s multiple. So so, yeah, that’s why that’s why I let you go.

I like that. That’s that’s very rational and and well thought out. Yeah. Thank you. My hate is so the locket is pretty much Sauron’s one ring from Lord of the Rings.

It’s like JK really went too far on this one where she’s taken some other things from Tolkien, Dementors, or or basically the Nazgul, and and others. But this is is like exactly what the one ring is, where if you’re wearing it, it, you know, puts all these bad thoughts in your head and it, like, makes you really hard to continue wearing. It tries to kill you, which it tried to kill Frodo, tried to drag Frodo down at one point. So and especially, like, Frodo in wears the ring around his neck, like the locket. So it was a little bit too on the nose for some of the stuff that she’s pretty much just straight up stolen from from Tolkien.

And and I I respect j I respect j r r Tolkien. I respect j k Rowling. I just think that the locket was a little too close to the one ring. There seems like there are a lot of things they could have done instead of just having it around their neck when they know it was fucking with them. You can just have it in the tent.

Yeah. You’re putting Hermione’s bag. She shoved the bag in her sock like the the bag’s not going anywhere. You know? Right.

Plus, there’s a 1,000,000 things in that bag. If they look at his neck, they’re like, oh, here’s this locket, whereas you’re there to go through every single one, the the bag. Yeah. It’s yeah. Don’t don’t wear it.

You’re just sitting in a tent at night. Just put it in the bag. Car keys. You’d put your car keys in a bowl. You’re not gonna lose them.

What else, Jay? The I might have missed it, but Umbridge didn’t really get her comeuppance. She doesn’t really there’s no so I found, JK wrote, like, a follow-up piece on her website being, like, oh, yeah. She was sentenced to prison at Ask Man, life in prison, which good. It wasn’t enough for me, honestly.

I’ll be I’ll be honest with you. I just watched the The Gentleman. Have you seen that movie? Yeah. I love that movie.

Great movie. Yeah. I really like the the guy. He did the snatch too. That guy.

He all those movies are pretty, yeah. He’s a they’re all they’re all solid. Sherlock Holmes movies too. I like the ending, the pound of flesh. Mhmm.

The metaphor where he takes it literally. That’s what I needed from her. I needed £2. £2 of flesh for the for those who didn’t watch it, you should watch it but he basically is like, in order to get my good graces, you have to go cut off a pound of your own flesh literally. If it’s not a a full pound then I’ll kill you.

It’s also a good like brain stimulator. It’s a good interview question. Honestly, you should probably think about doing that for your interview. Would you cut off? Yeah, exactly.

What what what part of your body would you cut off? Can you just be 1 pound? Yeah. If you go under then they kill you. If they go you go over, you’re fine.

Oh, I know one thing that I’d definitely be fine with if I well, like, I’d be fine in the sense it’s over a pound. I wouldn’t be fine in the sense that I have to cut it off. But, yeah. I don’t I don’t know. I guess, you know, you’d want to say your butt or something like that, but you probably need, you know, if you want to do any sort of sports, it’s going to be tough.

So you wouldn’t want to do a hand. That seems really bad. It’s a good I guess. I guess can you just take little pieces all over the place, which would also suck, but at least eventually would heal. I bet you in like Gattaca, you know when he goes in the shower and has to scrub off all of his skin flakes and stuff like that?

I would start with that and see how much I could get. I could probably get a quarter quarter pound, I think, out of all out of all that. I mean, your skin weighs a good amount. You could probably, like and it would suck to fillet it, but at least you would still have some structural integrity in your body. Yeah.

I think the person that has the gun deer head is not it’s not gonna be like, oh, the dry skin you have? That’s a you’re right. That’s fair. Well, first, you shave your head. That’s that’s for sure.

Yeah. You’re like, that counts. It’s like, no. I hope you have long hair. Yeah.

Yeah. So my next hate is it’s a bit naive of Harry to put the elder wand back with the idea of if I die a natural death, the wand will lose its power. Harry, the entire wizarding world will know that you are the rightful owner of the elder wand. So any snotnosed kid can walk up to you in the street, give you the old expelliarmus, and it’s theirs now. All they have to do is go to Dumbledore’s tomb and get it.

That’s the best case scenario. Worst case scenario, people are coming up just abracadabra. Okay. I’m going to go get the elder wand. It’s not like the entire wizard world knows this.

Some Death Eaters are still out there. They’ll come to you and just kill you or expel any spell against you, and then all of a sudden, it’s theirs. So I thought it was it was pretty naive of him to, to just be like, I’m gonna put it back where it belongs. Yeah. Didn’t didn’t didn’t care for it.

Yeah. No. I I agree. I didn’t really that that kinda went over my head a little bit, some of that stuff. So, I just was like, alright.

I’ll move along. Did you have any other hates? Last ones were just more of the hate of movie 5, how the room requirement is so important this movie and they no one can get in even though they know they’re in there. The movie 5 just completely destroys that whole logic because you can just blow the door down. So it’s just Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. Not canon. Not canon. Okay.

Oh the last thing was just that once the Voldemort knows that they’re going after the Hulk races, I don’t know why they can’t tell everyone that. Alright? Like, I understand you don’t want it to get out. You need to keep the secret tight within the group because you don’t want him ever finding out. But once he knows, now tell everyone.

Who cares? Like, let’s get this shit. Yeah. Once Voldemort knows that you’re going for horcruxes, yeah. The only concern would be, once again, if they stole something from Lord of the Rings or something, and a kid grabbed the diadem and was like, now I get the power of this and or diadem, whatever it is.

And he’s like, you know, now I have the power, and they don’t wanna give it to him. But, yeah, I I I agree. Lingering questions and some potpourri. Did you have any lingering questions after this one? No.

I think we answered a lot of the ones that I Oh, really? Oh, I had a bunch. Well, here we go. Oh, I will, because talk about hitting you with them. You had mentioned the wand Gatling gun in a previous podcast where the idea is you just have a Gatling gun of wands and it just spell left and right.

And it was an interesting thought experiment, but not something that was based in anything that J. K. Had put pen to paper. But we do see some potential use here as Harry does a 3 wand curse at Malfoy in in Malfoy Manor, or it might have been at Bellatrix. I don’t know.

Either way, he has the 3 wands, and he shoots a curse, and it’s like triple power. So it leads you to wonder why not have multiple wands, you know? Well, we’ve already got over this because, obviously, you should just if it’s the only thing you can conduct magic through, then you should have it should be like a flashlight. You should have, like, 50 of them if you’re in the dark all the time. You know?

You can’t just be like I don’t know. I don’t know if a flashlight is such an example. I’m trying to get it. No. No.

It is because, like, you use Lumos as an example. When they use Lumos, it’s like this little wand tip light. So if you had 10 wands, it’d be one of those things one of those flashlights that you see on TV for, like, you know, buy now for $20 and it shoots to outer space. I I guess the counterargument is, like, why don’t you have 4 phones? Because we should have that.

Because the phone is, like, the most important asset we have pretty much. Yeah. But why would I need 4 of them? 1 I can only do I can only use 1 at a time. Yeah.

That’s true. Well, I’m thinking of like if you break a wand, you need a backup right away. Yeah. But more, I’m saying just use some Spello tape. Start expelliarmicing everyone and take that and just keep taping wands to your boss.

Oh my mega wand. Yeah. And because you’ve expelliarmiced these people, now it’s yours and it recognizes you as the owner and then you can just have this mega wand. You’re walking around with a bundle of sticks that’s actually just this bazooka wand that you have. You say Lumos, and it’s just a fucking spotlight.

It’s like popping. Exactly. It’s like when a movie opens or whatever. Yeah. Yeah.

Just blinding people. That’s you’re you’re doing, like, next door to the house. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

So professor Bins is always talking about the goblin rebellion, and and they’ve referenced it a bunch, and they reference it in this as as well. I I wanna know how that played out. If they were to make you know how Star Wars, they’re making all these Star Wars shows on Disney Plus that are in the Star Wars universe? I think that this would be an interesting one because they’re talking about or Grippleks talking about how, oh, wizards refuse to give goblins wands. They kept wand lore to themselves.

But then there’s the story of this one goblin who potentially was able to wield a wand. And how goblins have their own magical power. And then you tie in this goblin rebellion. So, like, was there a wizard that went bad and and or maybe not even bad, went good and and taught goblins some wand lore? Because they felt like every creature should understand it and that led to the goblin rebellion.

I feel like that would be an interesting side story for something that happened in the past. Yeah. I was also a bit shocked that, Imperial worked on them. I I just was assuming that they were gonna be, like, from, episode 1 star wars where he’s like, your mind tricks don’t work on me. You know?

Yeah. They should they should’ve been like, no. Shake that one right off. Yeah. Why did they include Mundungus in the Harry escape plan?

Like, just just don’t have him there. You know you know he’s he’s not gonna be able to do anything and it leads to Moody’s death. Yeah. No idea why he was there. Yeah.

You don’t need Mundungus. Also, you know, Stan Shunt that that same kind of thing. Stan Shunpike being a death eater, not a good look for Harry after he realizes during the escape that it’s Stan Schenpike. He’s like, oh, he must be imperious. Yeah.

Okay. Yeah. That is the nicest excuse you could put. Everything is like, everyone’s imperious if you don’t do what you want. It’s like just saying fake news.

That’s what that is. A 100%. Everything. Harry, as a leader of people, needs to put his hand up for this one. Yeah.

He needs to say, hey, I’m the chosen one, but even I can make mistakes. Stan Shonpike’s a death eater. He’s a piece of shit. My bad. I shouldn’t have made an entire book about me hating the minister because he had Stan Shunpike behind bars, and I should have moved on from it.

So so, yeah, not a good look by Harry. Question. How did Dumbledore get Fawkes? Is that also another fun backstory that we should hear? It’s, like, very tied to him.

Isn’t that his, what’s called as well, Patronus? Yeah. Patronus. There is a, a theory that Fox is Dumbledore’s horcrux, and so Dumbledore is actually dead, and Fox is his horcrux. Oh, I like that.

Yeah. It’s interesting, especially if you did something like you killed Grindelwald in a duel, so you murdered someone, but it’s not like you’re obviously you are a murderer because you murdered someone, but it wasn’t in cold blood or something. So why not use that option? I think I don’t know that, so You will. We don’t know that, but yeah.

But why not use that opportunity to create a horcrux? It was, like, whatever. So I haven’t seen any other ones, so maybe this gets addressed. But I would just like to see some more early Dumbledore or read about it, really. So Voldemort can fly.

We learned that in the escape, from from the, Dursleys. We learned that Voldemort can’t fly. He can do the smoke thingy from the movies. So it makes sense now why they include that in the movies. Unfortunately, it should only be for Voldemort because when Voldemort does it, people are legitimately like, holy shit.

Voldemort can fly. What the fuck? So it’s super cool if it’s just Voldemort. It’s not that cool if everyone else can do it. So Yeah.

But, I see where I now I know where they got it from because I was wondering in the movies why they just created that whole thing. Well, that takes us to the end here. So who gets awarded the House Cup for you, Keith? For me, it’s really gonna be the the lasting impact of this book, namely, Voldemort’s lasting impact. Getting rid of the Sorting Hat.

That’s what I think this book is really all about. And Voldemort tried to do that and everyone rallied against him as Yeah. There are 4 houses still at the end which I didn’t think made a lot of sense. The whole idea and even when Harry’s kids he sees, Malfoy’s kids, there’s already, like, this enemy or there’s already There’s a division. Yeah.

I’m like, did we not learn from a a civil war we just had? Like Yeah. Do we not start, like, crossing the lines and stop separating people by groups like this? The whole whole concept of putting like minded people together and putting people that don’t think the same way as you separate from you and having them battling at each other in houses sets precedent for future issues. Yeah.

Instead of just randomizing, like, I think you keep the 4 houses but it’s randomized where people go. There’s no starting hat. You just say you open up up a card and it says you’re in this house. That doesn’t mean anything. And now you start mixing with other people and this this solves 2 problems.

1 is that, you know, again, that’s this how like societies grow and get better is that everyone mixes and everyone, you know, ideas get clash and they you come up with the best things. Secondly, the the withers and witches are the most important people. Right? So we don’t we don’t care about the humans. Thirdly, let’s stop, inbreeding, you know?

So get out of these all these houses. That’s gonna help make more witches and wizards that aren’t messed up like Umbridge and, Voldemort. So yeah. Yeah. That’s my that’s my, my speech there at the end of things, but, House Cup goes to Voldemort’s last night.

It was funny. After they beat Voldemort, Harry, you know, pointed out that the house division, the house tables, and everything was gone. It was everyone just celebrating together. And then 5 pages later, it’s his kids being, I don’t know if I want to be in Slytherin. I don’t want to and he’s like, oh, you know, you were named after Severus Snape, who’s one of the, who’s one of the most courageous wizards ever.

The rest of the Slytherins suck, but there’s one. So yeah. Why was he courageous, d man? I don’t care. Remember all the things he did that were so nice and so no.

I don’t remember any of them. No. No. He read Petunia’s letters. For me, and it’s low hanging fruit, but we just I think we gotta give a thank you and a house cup to to JK Rowling, you know, just for for the world that she created, you know, with an assist from J.

R. R. Tolkien. But, it’s crazy how quickly these books came out, and the amount of Harry Potter hype was incredible when we were younger and all this stuff was coming out. And you think about George RR Martin, who did his A Song of Ice and Fire, and he’s still not and granted those are super duper long books, but he’s still not even close to done with the series, and it’s been years years years years years.

And, J. K. Rowling had this wonderful outline that she was able to make sure everything tied together. She didn’t pull lost on us, and it still hits. I’m 37.

I started reading this book series when I was probably 12, and the magic still persists. Oh, great. Yeah. Just just House Cup, JK. Obviously, poke holes in a lot of this stuff in jest, although some of it is serious.

I I know you’re serious with the Snape thing, and you won’t let you won’t let it down. I get it. But, on the whole, just a freaking amazing series. It bothers me because I don’t know what the fuck we’re gonna do. I’ve when I started listening to our next book, 1, it wasn’t Jim Dale, so I was so pissed.

I was like, what the fuck am I listening to? And 2, I just kinda forgot that other books existed, really. It was just I’ve been in this Harry Potter situation for so long that just reading another book for me. This new book we’re reading. It was tough.

It was tough. I feel really I’m like the I’m like, the narrator is fucking terrible. It’s just a normal narrator. Yeah. Exactly.

Exactly. Everything pales in comparison. So, what is your final ranking on on the books? Yeah. I think I’m gonna go 4 stills number 1, 47.

I thought that was really good. 61325. I’ve decided to move 3 back. It didn’t have the same memory wise lasting impact as, as these other ones. Yeah.

I am I’m having a tough time with it with a 2, but I’m gonna go 437-1652. That’s what I said. That’s what I wrote down. I’m it it’s I I don’t know. It’s fluid, but that’s what I wrote down.

You know? That’s what I wrote down. It just feels hard dropping 1 and dropping 6 because they’re both so good, but I think as long as any I’m not gonna judge anyone on their ranking as long as they have 52 as as the 2. Then after that, you know, whatever. Let them fall let them fall as you will.

Keith, we did it. We did it. Well, that was the entire Harry Potter series. We still have, the the movies, which we’re gonna we’re gonna do. But if you wanna get a a head start on our next book, Keith, what do we got coming up?

We have Mexican Gothic by I’m gonna butcher the name. When we when we do the pop, we’re gonna butcher out the names, so don’t worry about it. Yeah. Silvia Moreno Garcia. Oh, nice.

Very well. Very well done. Yeah. So, we’re gonna and then when I told Caroline I was reading this, she was like, oh, yeah. That’s a hit that’s like a hit book.

Like, a couple years ago, it was, like, really big. So I was like, oh, cool. Well, I guess that’s why I guess that’s why we’re doing it. So I I hope people have read the book. Kind of a backwards compliment or a backhanded compliment.

They’re like, oh, that’s super hip. That was cool 2 years ago. But who knows, like, what books are hip, like, right now that are coming in? That seems We gotta be on that book talk. Talk.

That’s on you. Yeah. I guess so. I guess so. It seems like that’s just too quick.

I’ve never read a book besides, like, a Harry Potter book or A Song of Ice and Fire. We gotta be the people making the the new books. We gotta make the the cool yeah. That’s on us. Oh, we gotta make them cool.

Alright, Keith. Well, this has been an incredible journey. We it started with our 1 hundredth episode, and now we’re at, like, 115 after doing these. So I I I can’t wait to see what’s in store for the 2 hundredth hundredth episode. Can’t wait.

We’re almost there. Yeah. Alright. Well, I’ll catch you for for the movies and the Mexican Gothic. Indeed.

Alright. Love it. Bye. Bye now.

The Buddies watch movie # 6 – Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince on this week’s episode. The Buddies get to chatting about: Hogwarts “three strikes policy” for attempted murder, how Ginny and Harry’s on-screen chemistry makes a flobberworm look charismatic, and whether Dumbledore the worst wingman in wizarding history. So, grab yourself some Felix Felicis, don’t tie your shoes, because we’re all getting real lucky on this episode.

Intro (0:00-1:17)
Stock Up/Down (1:18-26:33)
Favorite Scene/Character/Studio Notes (26:34-39:05)
Love/Hate (39:06-48:03)
Conclusion (48:04-50:33)

NEXT Episode: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by – MOVIE
NEXT BOOK: TBD

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to the book club. I’m Dylan here with the king tosser himself, Keith. Pardon me? King tossler what?

Now, close your eyes. Close your eyes. They’re closed. That’s it. That’s when I come over and and sexually assault you by not asking for consent.

Here at the buddy book club, we’re breaking down some box office bangers. And this week, we’ll be discussing 2000 nine’s Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince film. If you’d like to recommend a book or movie for us to read or watch, reach out to us by any past episodes. You can visit our website, buyoutbook.com, send us an owl on Twitter or Instagram, buyoutbookpodcast. You listen to us, IG and Spotify.

If I review your podcast, please download and subscribe. And just so you we’re both aware, like, you know that’s a direct reference from this movie. Right? I’m thinking about, the one scene where Dumbledore is, like, he collects people, and then Harry looks at him and he’s, like, do you want to collect me? Yeah.

I don’t know what that was. It was way too sexual, though, the way he said it. Actually, there’s no really nonsexual way to say, do you want him to collect me? I don’t understand. Yeah.

I agree. That’s a weird weird choice of words. Yeah. And we’ll talk more about more about the Ginny thing, but it’s just a good thing Harry was into her because if you did that to somebody, like, holy smokes. I, you can’t be doing that.

That’s assault. Alright. Let’s get into some stock up stock down. Keith, what do you have for stock up? Awkward social interaction?

Stock up. My life. You ever right before you go to sleep, you just think of all the terrible things you’ve done in your life? You go in for for the hug and they wanted a handshake or you’re at the TSA airport and they say, hey, I have a good flight. You say, you too.

Mhmm. Or, like, I have this one time, and there’s people visiting in town. I didn’t really know very well. They’re, like, friends of our friends. We were driving around, and I was, like, oh, and this is obviously, Central Park.

We’re in Boston. And they all laughed. And I think about that all the time because I thought it was Central Park. It’s called Boston Common in the Central Parks of New York City. But, yeah, those are the type of things that keep me up at night when you just, like, think back and you’re like Yeah.

Can’t believe I did that. It’s funny you say that because, legitimately, yesterday, I was walking my halls of my house. I thought about something I had said to someone that day that made no sense. Like, I was trying to be funny, but it came off as, like, probably dickish and rude. And I was like, oh my god.

This person hates me. I’m just never gonna talk to them again. Like, that’s it. It it’s over. Yeah.

Yep. So we all have those, but I realized after this movie, none of that stuff is really that big of a deal when you compare it to the interactions of Perry and Ginny. Oh my god. Because You wanted to get right into it, didn’t you? Comparison wise, no conversation you’ve had or no relationship you’ve had is as awkward as the relationship they have.

I’ve been waiting for it for 6 movies. Mhmm. You keep on talking about it, and then we watched this, and I was, like, oh my god. I know exactly what demon’s been saying this whole time now. Because to say it was tough to watch and under and it’s not Harry.

It’s a 100% not Harry because Harry and Cho had good chemistry. I even thought, like, Harry and Fleur. I think I almost should’ve just took Fleur as actor and given her red hair and just pretended she was Jimmy because I think that would’ve been good. Yeah. This was just wasn’t there.

It was the opposite of sparks flying. No chemistry at all. Whatever the, like, neutron bomb or the one that, like, just keeps blowing up and blowing up and blowing up, it it was one of those because, yes, the spark of this whole issue is that the actress who plays Ginny is terrible. We had seen inklings of this in the past that now have carried to this her opus, really, which is this movie of of how terrible she is, and it’s just it’s also cringey. But we have to also put some blame on Daniel Radcliffe because their chemistry is just terrible.

The chemistry they have together is so uncomfortable. It’s it just doesn’t make any sense that it would be believable that he and Ginny could possibly like each other. But we also have to blame, like, the directors and the screenwriters because we know Ginny from the books, and she’s awesome, and she’s more outgoing and d g a f like, doesn’t give a fuck than anyone else. And in the movie, she just seems so robotic and zombie like. But but if someone’s gonna give her lines when they go to, the rumor requirement, and she does the close your eyes things that I referenced at the top, which is whatever.

Close your eyes, then she gives them a kiss. Fine. Whatever. But then after that, she looks deep into his eyes and says, I can stay hidden up here too if you like. What does that even mean?

What? Why would he want you to stay hidden up here? What? What? They already did the shy, innocent thing with Cho.

So, like, that’s already been done, and she did that well. Yeah. So, like, we don’t need another we need someone that’s, like, gregarious and We need Ginny. We need Ginny. We need Ginny.

Yeah. Ginny character. Yeah. And instead and it’s and I get in the first two books how she’s, oh my god. This is Harry Potter.

I saw him for the first time. I have a crush on him. Fine. But we know by now that Ginny’s been around the block. She’s had a bunch of dates.

Like, she’s very comfortable in her own skin. Mhmm. Yes. She likes Harry and she wants to be with him, but she’s not, like, scared of him or nervous around him. She’s more just chill.

So yeah. And they put her in this movie so much, and every single time, it’s why are we here? This is so uncomfortable. Like, I was trying to think of what good chemistry looks like. It’s one of those things where, you know, you see it and you’re like, I don’t know how to make it better.

I don’t even know there’s no direction I could give them. I don’t even know what you’d do. Yeah. You can’t explain it, but when you see it, whatever that phrase is Pornography. Yeah.

That that’s what I was thinking of. That’s what you’re thinking about? Yeah. I can explain it, but I know it when I see it. Yeah.

And that’s what good chemistry is. Even movies, like, with like Adam Sandler and Jennifer Aniston, They’re in movies together, and they have good chemistry. And you’re like you wouldn’t think about it. You know? You wouldn’t be like, oh, they have good on screen chemistry, but they do.

And I feel like the director or someone had to step in front of this and be like, hey. You guys are gonna we’re gonna get you a yurt in Mongolia, and you’re gonna take ecstasy together for 3 days straight. And when you get out of there, we’re gonna have a Ginny Harry relationship that we need because she just I don’t think she blinks. She doesn’t blink in the movie. It’s creepy.

I I don’t know. I’m over it, Paul. Well, we had to get that out of the way. Anyways Thanks for thanks for getting that out of the way. I was like, I gotta we gotta go off the top.

Otherwise, it will it’ll derail us the rest of the episode. Yeah. My first stock up is attempted murder stock up. So Harry gets zero punishment, and not even a stern talking to after gutting Malfoy like a fish with his sectum sempraing. I found that to be quite interesting.

In the book, it’s obviously Snape comes in and he’s like, you wait here, and Snape gives him detention and this, that, and the other thing. But in the book, it’s like Harry does the sextum sempa in a little well, it did have the American History X vibes to it, the, you know, black and white bathroom scene. But, yeah, he gives him the sextum sempa. Snape goes in there, gives him, like, a look, and Harry runs off. And it was like, alright.

Move on to the next thing. So, yeah, I guess if you wanna murder a fellow student in Hogwarts I mean, we’ve kinda been over this before about Hogwarts. You know? I don’t know what you’re talking about. This is this is, like, completely fine.

We’ve already had multiple instances of this. Yeah. Remember Draco’s dad and and, like No. In the movie. Yeah.

In terms of all the camera. Yeah. Yeah. That’s fine. Malfoy tries to kill 2 people.

It doesn’t get any punishment for that. So, yeah, there’s there’s no attempted murder is fine in the wizarding world. I don’t know what you’re not understanding here. Yeah. He tried to abracadabra him, as you said.

That’s that’s what it is. Don’t worry about that. Yeah. I I just I just found that interesting. It feels like you could just do a quick follow-up with, like, the next scene Harry is says I can’t I can’t go to the Quidditch match because I have detention with Snape for the rest of my life after I attempted murder on my own.

I do think there’s a lot of cuts that are happen that occur that, like, they probably would have had something and they just really, we gotta tighten this the ship up here. Yeah. I was thinking about that earlier when I was thinking about this movie was when Harry tells Slughorn during the Felix Felicis stuff, which I’m sure we’ll get into shortly. But he tells Slughorn, he says, I am the chosen one. And because of that, Slughorn I mean, because of that and other things, Slughorn gives him the memory.

But in the book, it’s the exact same thing, but we also get inside Harry’s head where Harry’s like, oh, he’s so drunk. He’s not gonna remember this, so I’m just gonna tell him I’m the chosen one. But we don’t get that in the movie. So in the movie, Harry just tells him he’s the chosen one. And if you were watching this and didn’t read the books, you’d be like, oh, so Harry is the chosen one.

And then you move on. And I know it’s a small thing, but still I think a lot of it luckily with the context of the book. Yeah. Yeah. The more and because these books are so long, the deeper and deeper you go into the movies, I feel like they’re really directed for book readers.

Because I I would be interested for someone that had only seen the movies to to to see if they thought they were comprehensible in terms of the deeper plot plot lines or whatever is going on. Yeah. Do you have any other stock ups? Yeah. Speaking of needing book context because if I just watched the movies, this would be the stock up.

How Harry’s a coward stock up. Ending scene, he kinda just sits on the sideline instead of just disarming Malfoy or doing anything. I know Dumbledore tells him not to do anything, but at the same time, you know, game up one time for me. Right? Like, we’re we’re just gonna let him sit there and get attacked.

I didn’t really understand. In the book, obviously, Harry’s under the invisibility cloak, and he’s stunned. So, like, he can’t he can’t move. So Yeah. Dumbledore is forcing him to stay there.

But he just sits there and just watches. And then even, Snape walks up and says, like, what’s going on? And he’s like and he just keeps on goes in there. Yeah. Which it was it was a little bit more understandable because he’s like, oh, Snape’s on our side, which makes sense.

But at the same time, like, game up one time for me. And then also, he never tells Ron about him and Ginny. So another cowardly cowardly act there. Yeah. In the book, he fesses up immediately.

Well, not immediately. Well, in the book, he gives him the the look of, and then Ron gives him, like, the the head shake. He makes out with her directly. Remember? Yeah.

That’s true. But he does give a That’s after the make out. They make out and then he connects sides with Ron and Ron’s, like, drooling. Wow. And he’s like Well, in the book, he’s, like, also just goes up completely makes out with her immediately.

And I’m like, you don’t know that she likes you. I’m like, I’m that’s that’s assault, brother. It’s the reverse. Yeah. It’s the reverse of what Ginny did to him except Ginny told him to close his eyes.

Well, the chemistry was explosive on the screen. So he he had to go over the kiss. Because someone had to make a move. It was so obvious. Someone had to make a move.

Oh my god. It was so cringey. So cringey. I never even thought about that, honestly, because I just came from reading the book. But the point about the Astronomy Tower and Harry, it makes me like this movie less because of that.

Because Harry is the most courageous and brave person. Yeah. He will throw himself at the fire. The idea that he would sit back even though and I now understand why they had Snape him see Snape because that was also a, difference from the book because that does make sense that he saw Snape. He said, okay.

Snape’s on our side. He’s gonna take care of it. But at the same time, Harry would be up there, wand out him and Dumbledore versus the Death Eaters. Let’s go get them. Yeah.

Dumbledore says, go and hide. And he’s like, okay. Cool. Deal. Yeah.

And that that’s it. Yeah. My second stock up is 2nd Chances. So David Yates, who directed this movie, directed the previous movie, Order of the Phoenix. And if you listened to our episode on that, if, you didn’t, shame on you.

But if you did, we hated that movie. Terrible, terrible movie. I feel like he was a lot to blame for that, personally. I am not gonna bear the lead here. I liked this movie.

I thought this was one of the better movies. And they they I agree. They gave him a second chance with this one, granted, you know, the story is kind of unclear of how of how that worked. But he was still in post production for Order of the Phoenix when they started preproduction for this, and they needed a director. And they approached him to direct it, and he he said yes.

And it’s a it’s a really good second chance. The movie, 2 and a half hours long. It’s like pornography here where I couldn’t tell you exactly what it is, but I didn’t know when I saw it. It just felt fluid. Like, the last movie did and and some of the other ones in in the past too, it was, I think, 4 as well, felt like a bunch of different scenes that were from the book that were just kinda, like, chopped together and put into this.

This one felt like it was actually telling a story. And although there’s a lot of stuff that, you know, we’ve already discussed and we may discuss more, that that’s obviously either on the cutting room floor or just never got put into it from the book itself, I was okay with it. At no point was I upset they didn’t put something in because it felt like they were telling the story well enough that it was clear, concise. We were moving from scene to scene with these characters. It wasn’t just kinda jumping all over the place.

I was glad they gave him a second chance for this one, And and granted, if you look at Rotten Tomatoes or any of the reviews, it’s kinda funny because Order of the Phoenix is higher and people like that movie more seemingly than they do this movie, and I That’s crazy. Couldn’t feel different. So you you thought this one was good? It didn’t feel rushed. It felt like it was they added a few things, but I wasn’t upset about the matting stuff.

Nothing really distracted you or took you away from the movie. There’s no point where I was, like, just rolling my eyes because that happened the last movie that happened numerous times. And a lot the last movie I was like, wait, what? Why are they doing like, what’s going there’s a lot of whys in what’s going on. This one, it just felt very, like, a normal movie Yes.

Which is which is rare for these ones which have all seemed to be that’s, like, the first and second one. I think those were pretty or similar to this. But since then, it’s been a lot of, like, cut up scenes, quick montages, things like that where this one didn’t didn’t have that. Although, I will say at the beginning when they turn into smoke monsters, I was, like, here we go. And they never did that again for the rest of the movie.

I was like, oh, thank god. In reading Deathly Hallows, I’m at, where they’re at the Lovegood’s house. And Harry peeks outside, and he sees all these death eaters flying around the house on brooms. And I was just like, god. This is what it’s supposed to be.

Not smoke monsters flying around, destroying bridges somehow. So, yeah, I I agree. When they first opened with that, I was a little hesitant. I was like, oh, here we go. There’s just breaking muggles.

Like, you know, how many muggles are gonna see wizards, and we’re just gonna move on with this thing. But from there on out, it was it was a very you understood what was going on. Like, you knew the whole Malfoy backstory. They touched on it frequently throughout that you were remembering that, and they planted the seed with Snape and Narcissa, you know, at the beginning. So, you got that as well.

And, it really just stuck with Harry and his story, and then they interwove the Dumbledore and pensive stuff pretty well, I thought. The only one that they really missed out on was the gauntlet stuff, and I can understand why that wouldn’t make it in there. Although, you know, I wish it had, but I get it. The movie’s 2 hours and 30 minutes long. What do you have for stock down?

Dumbledore’s wingman abilities, stock down. Not to beat a dead hippogriff here, but, I’m gonna beat a dead hippogriff. I mean, I’m not sure why that scene in the beginning was, added into the movie where Harry’s at the coffee shop and he talks to the coffee waitress or coffee barista for Who’s Harry Potter? Is he a big tosser? He’s a tosser.

I mean, the chemistry between them 2 Yeah. Because the whole movie movie. That was a rom com. I was ready for I was locked in. I really wanted to go on that date.

I was like, alright. I don’t mind where we’re going here. And then Dumbledore, let me just give you his resume. Comes in. He hasn’t talked to Harry for 5 movies.

He literally has not done anything. The one time my guy is finally starting to talk chatting up with a a female. Dumbledore comes in right away cock blocks him. He’s like, I need your help. What does he need his help for?

Just like a sales pitch. It’s not like I’m gonna help you out. It’s just like help me out. Haven’t talked to you 5 years. Show up.

Cock block you. Do that. So I’m like, alright, Dumbledore. That kinda sucks. And then later in the movie, this kinda really just threw me off too.

This might have been like ad libbed because that’s how dumb I think this is. Dumbledore is he’s supposed to be perceptive. That’s like his biggest thing is he knows kind of everything about people. In in book 7, we we see that, like, oh, he gives things to Ron and Hermione and he’s, like, I know you so well that these things are gonna come in handy for you down the road. And so, like, that’s kind of, like, where he is.

He knows Harry really well. He asks Harry in the middle of the movie What’s up with you, Hermione? Dating? Yeah. Yeah.

Hermione. Uh-huh. I was like, what? Do so you’re just you don’t know anything? And the only thing I can think of is that he just is a giant cock bug, and he saw her him talking to Hermione.

He’s, like, you gotta come meet me and talk now. That’s the only reason. Right? That’s so he’s just cockpawking him again. He’s he thinks he’s he’s getting with Hermione.

He’s collecting him. Rita Skeeter wrote about this, like, 3 books ago. Is he just, like, catching up on Rita Skeeter articles? Like, wait. They’re dating?

Oh, wow. I didn’t realize that. Like, is he just an idiot in these movies? I don’t get it. So one of my stock downs was was consent, which we’ve already discussed because, you know, Ginny goes she goes right in.

That’s a stock down. Alright. There you go. Ginny goes right in. I’ll take it.

But I wanted to just talk I wanted to use that as a vehicle to talk more about the relationship stuff in this movie because it’s really getting hammered. And my note was that, you know, even Dumbledore is asking about it, which, you know, your point is is better in just that, how is he not this perceptive? He should blatantly know that Harry and Hermione are are not a thing. So it’s concerning, but also we have to talk about Ginny being there with the whole after the sectum sempa when Ron and Hermione are telling Harry that he has to get rid of the book. And Ginny’s like, yep.

Yep. You gotta get rid of it. You gotta get rid of it. And then she’s the one that, like, takes him to the room of requirements to to force him to get rid of it. It’s like, where did you come from?

You don’t even know what this book is. Ron, Hermione, and I have been talking about the half blood prince. Who are you? They really shoehorned her into that scene Yeah. Which I didn’t understand why.

Because this girl is not even your girlfriend who you, like, kinda like and she kinda likes you, tells you you have to get rid of the most important textbook you’ve ever had that’s actually changed your year for the better? And she’s coming out of the woodwork. I don’t know. Also, did they, patch up the room of requirement after blowing out through the door the last movie or what? I guess I guess it just required itself to be fixed.

Yeah. Just fixed it. Okay. I think my biggest qualm is just they really hit the relationship stuff over and over and over again throughout, and I feel like if there was any space to cut a little bit of that and add something like the Gaunts, which I would have really enjoyed, that backstory, that’s probably where I would have cut it. There’s just so much lavender brown in this, and I do understand that it’s to, you know, you can’t have the Ron Hermione situation without putting lavender brown in there.

But over and over again, it’s just that lavender brown thing and then the Harry and Ginny thing, which is it’s just so bad that when you’re editing it, you just say, hey. Can we just cut some of this Harry and Ginny stuff? It it’s not working. So, yeah, I just thought the relationship stuff was kinda was kinda funny. And I know it makes sense.

Like, they’re 15, 16 year old kids. Yeah. They’re probably, like, round and 3rd in the prefix bathroom. So, yeah, I don’t know. How do you how do you feel about the relationship stuff?

And or was it whatever to you? I think when you look back at it, you’re like, yeah, I guess there was a lot of scenes with them focusing on relationships, but it did ground it. I also think like in the past when there’s just too much going on and then there’s no you need like some slowdown for the movie for the, the uptick of the movies to to pay off. So, that’s like the problem with a lot of like the Marvel movies and new Star Wars movies and like their whole thing is like we have to have constant constant action. Otherwise, we’ll lose people.

It’s like no, the action is not good when when it’s 90 minutes of action. It’s good when it’s 30 minutes of action with 60 minutes of stuff in between that, like, makes the action better. I don’t know. That’s what I just thought. No.

That’s that’s a great point. That’s what I was trying to say earlier when I couldn’t put my finger on it, and and that’s exactly what it is, I think. The other movies, or at least definitely the last one, is they were just trying to force all of this, like, action and content and content on top of each other and but there was they were conflicting. They never made sense together, and this one has a that slower underlying pace with just the guys and gals, you know, going to school, falling in love, and then stuff goes down. So, yeah, I think that’s it.

I think that’s that’s what makes this a better movie in my opinion. So, yeah, okay. You talked about the cliff. I’m I’m down. I’m down.

Close your eyes, Keith. My first well, I already did the consent one, I guess, but my my other stock down was was color. Who needs it? You know, people don’t like to watch black and white movies, but this is pretty much a black and white movie. There there’s a real lack of color going on.

Most most of the scenes are totally muted. You know, there’s no bright colors whatsoever. It’s all in this, like, sepia tone situation. The flashbacks are very green. When we see Voldemort as a as a kid, it’s, like, all green, the Oh.

Flashback. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. That’s because he’s, like, the Slytherin.

That’s the reason that’s supposed to be. Interesting. Which is funny because I thought a lot of those pensive scenes when they go into them, the color scheme there was very similar to the precog premonitions for minority report. Oh, yeah. Good point.

Yeah. But, yeah. And so, you know, the the whole sectumsempra scene was totally black and white. It was American history acts happening all over again. Harry and Dumbledore in the cave was primarily black and white with then some, like, fire going on.

Yeah. It was interesting. Just the entire movie was and it was this was obviously done on purpose. And supposedly, they they did it in the studio. They wanted to do it to make it kind of, like, a darker, you know, more moody type film, which cutting back to my previous stuff, even, like, Snape’s house, when they go to Snape’s house to do the unbreakable, the unbreakable vile, I love that.

The colors worked great, which was, like, no colors. Great scene. Yeah. They gave it to the studio. The studio said, we need more color.

And, supposedly, they edited it, sent it back to the studio, and the director was like, you’re still not gonna like it. And they were said, nope. We’re fine. So yeah. But it it works out.

It doesn’t feel like you’re watching a movie that has muted color. It’s just tonal. You know? It just feels like the tone is different. So I think it was a good good choice.

Yeah. I liked it. Other stock downs for you? Problem solving skills stock down. Okay.

In the book, we talked about Harry being obsessed with Malfoy and, like, everyone else around him being, like, alright. Like and you mentioned like, I think you said gaslapping was a a term you threw out there that like everyone’s kinda like, nah, you’re not seeing that. That’s not happening. I mean, Harry had Harry had to make a like a bunch of logical jumps in order to prove out that Malfoy was a death eater. He kept on being like, well, his like his wrist wasn’t showing as we showed him.

He must have done that. He was like kind of just making all these guesses. Mhmm. And then everyone’s like, I don’t know. Maybe.

And this, he sees Malfoy going into the what what’s it called? What’s it called? What’s it called? Birkin. Dark Bergen and Botts?

Bergen? No. No. Those are Bergen and Botts every they were being whatever. He he sneaks away there.

And who is he with? Like, 5 death eaters. And he they’re, like, hearing another conversation, talking about, like, this is what we need to do. Fenrir Greyback is with them. Yeah.

He’s really on the lookout. And then on the next scene on the train, he’s like, I think Malfoy might be a death eater. And they’re like, what are you, an idiot, Harry? Like, why would you ever come to that conclusion? That makes no sense.

I’m like, what? What do you mean? Yeah. That’s it’s, like, the only rational conclusion is that he’s working with or is a death eater. That’s the only two things you can take away from that.

Mhmm. There’s no other conclusion, and every and even, like, the the order of the Phoenix are like, yeah. We looked into it. I don’t think so. And it’s like, What?

What? And then, like, at the same scene, Ron’s dad’s like, yeah. They’re trying to fix something, like, that, helps people transport. But, yeah, he’s definitely and nothing’s happening. Don’t worry about that.

When they give him the we looked into it, but, yeah, definitely not, is basically what happens at work when someone asks me, oh, like, hey. Are you able to pull this kind of report? And I’m like, click click click. Oh, I I looked into it, but, no, I actually can’t do that. You’re gonna have to ask somebody else.

Done. Yeah. That’s like the you forgot the email, and then 3 days later, you’re like, like, shit. You follow-up with someone, and you’re like, yeah. I’ve been waiting for them this whole time.

I’ve been looking into it. They just haven’t gotten back to me even though you just read it and sent over something. Yeah. That that works. Just throw someone else under the bus.

I’m waiting on this person to get back to me and just pray they never go directly to that person. Yeah. Yeah. It didn’t it didn’t make a lot of sense. Also, the vanishing cabinet in the room of requirements when Harry’s standing next to it, but it’s just covered in a in a tapestry, He has no no acknowledgment of that thing.

It’s like there’s a bird in there. They open it up. Bird comes out. No. No.

No. No. It’s like, you saw this. It you know? That you you saw this, not Mario.

There’s a little too many breadcrumbs. And I understand it’s it’s for the viewer. You know, you’re supposed to be able to put put it together yourself, what’s happening. And I under I understand that. I I’m not I’m not actually upset about it.

It’s just if you think about it, it starts to kind of unravel. Yeah. Just don’t think. Alright. Okay.

Just don’t think. What about a favorite scene? I just really liked the whole ending. Oh, okay. Where does the ending start for you?

Them going to the cave. That’s where it starts for me. We talked about, like, the whole lead up really meant something because there wasn’t a ton of action. They did throw in, like, the whole burning down the laziness. It’s just Yeah.

I wasn’t I didn’t really understand the motive for that other than so that we didn’t have to see Ginny and, Harry on screen for any longer. They’re about to, like, kiss or she’s about to, like, tie his shoes and do something else a little awkward. I don’t know what’s going on. This movie with with, you know, the wife and and actually my my mother-in-law was in town. And so we were watching it, and I was like she bent down on her knees.

I was like, close your eyes, everybody. Geez. You said your mother-in-law. She’s a good egg. Wow.

You are that’s a savage move. Holy shit. Maybe it was the camerawork, but the camerawork, I was like, what is happening here? Or or I’m just maybe I’m sick. I’m just sick in the head.

That’s definitely it. No. That was too that was too much. There’s nothing, like, romantic about someone bending down and tying your shoes. That’s not romantic at all unless there’s some other inclination that you’re getting when they do that.

I would never understand why someone would tie someone else’s shoes. I don’t know why someone would want to tie someone else’s shoes. I’m, like, a mix between Jerry Seinfeld and Pauley from The Sopranos, which is, like, and then tie their shoes. Yeah. Yeah.

Definitely not. The only time I can think about when someone else would tie my shoes would be a wedding situation where we’re getting ready, and those pants can be kinda tight because you don’t wear them that often. Yeah. And the thought is I’m gonna split these pants in half, and these dress shoes are very complicated to to tie because they’re all waxed laces. Mhmm.

Can someone else tie? Adult, if you’re having someone tie your shoes, you put the your foot onto a ledge. Yeah. Or you’re, like, on a bed and you’re like, yo. Do you mind tying these real quick?

Something like that. That’s the only time you’d ever you wouldn’t be like, bend down. No one’s on a stairwell and says, don’t take one more step. I’m gonna get down on my knees and tie your shoes. Okay.

Why are you spitting on your hands? That’s a weird thing to do to tie the shoes. Oh my god. Yeah. The the the burning of the burrow was, interesting decision.

But according to the director or whatever the case was, there wasn’t enough, or there wasn’t a lot of action, and so they wanted to introduce an action scene in there to kind of bring it all together, which I’m fine with. And I appreciate that they weren’t forcing all of the action and just threw something in there. It it didn’t obviously make make a ton of sense, but they also weren’t gonna put Skrimjor or Percy Weasley into this film. So if you’re not gonna have that Christmas situation, you know, put an action scene with people trying to burn down the borough. Why why not?

Yeah. Although, for for if Harry’s the the head of the DA, him and Ginny standing on, like, a piece of mud in the open while a bunch of death eaters are shooting curses at them from cover. It’s just tactically, it’s a terrible move, so he he should know better than that. Yeah. So for my favorite scene, I’m thinking the cape was pretty cool, for one.

It’s very my mine of Moria, mines of Moria situation. It it was good to see Dumbledore do some real magic. It was the only time we get to see Dumbledore do real magic. And even though it was a little bit of Moses parting the Red Seas there, I enjoyed it. I I thought that was that was pretty fun to see.

The Infuri themselves were were scary. The the the scene when he Harry’s getting dragged down, and you see all of them attached to the walls or the walls of the inside of the cave, like, on the different, I don’t know, giant stalagmites or whatever they are, was super cool. Although it was just visually, it was like, this is this is messed up. So I I like that. You know, the only issue I really had with that scene was that Dumbledore didn’t seem to need water that bad.

You know, in the book, he’s legitimately dying for water. And this one, he’s like, Harry, pass me some water. And Harry just goes over to the water and then You’re telling me that he underacted a scene where every other scene he’s complaining about, he’s overacting? Yeah. Michael Gambon in this one is just like, yo, is there any water?

Does anyone have a little sip of water? I mean, I’m fine, but I’d like an itch in my throat. Do you wanna have anything? I’m totally fine. I could go without, but if there was water, I’d take it.

Yeah. So that’s up there for me. The scene I liked more was Harry’s Felix Felice’s scene. I thought that in every part of it, I enjoyed. From Daniel Radcliffe’s acting, which I thought was impeccable.

I don’t know if they actually had him drink, like, 3, 4 beers and have him do that. I did read a note that he was, he said this is his least favorite movie because he was struggling with alcohol. So Oh. Yeah. Oh, yeah.

I don’t know if that’s true. No. Perfect. Yeah. Yeah.

The pinchers. I mean, this value, he’s he’s what’s it called then? Method acting. Yes. Method acting.

When you talk about the 2 to 3, twitties on the last episode, he was just he was taking that to heart. Yeah. So I just thought that was the whole way that story was told. They added in this fish story for for slughorn. This the the fish story about Lily Potter giving him this fish.

It was touching. It was a touching story. I thought it perfectly fit the idea of what was going on at the time. I I thought it was really good. You know, for for things that they’re just making up for the movie, this was one of the better ones in the entire series, that that that conversation.

So, yeah, I I just I I like I like that a lot. We’re we’re gonna get into some other stuff because I wanna talk talk later about some of some of the jokes. And for the ending too, just the ending in in general, they ended the movie pretty well, I thought. Did you agree? Because we’ve had issues with this in the past.

Overall, good ending. It was similar to the book. I thought it was it was a great, in terms of, like Well, they didn’t have the funeral. They didn’t have Dumbledore’s funeral. The whole everyone coming together type thing at the end on the lawn.

Raising their lawns up? Yeah. That was that was a I think that was a a good tribute. I don’t think the funeral would have done anything. But they end the end to end is pretty much a a throwback to the end of Goblet where they all go out on that same ledge and look over the lake, this time instead of thestrals or whatever, it’s Fox.

And the 3 of them kinda say, oh, well, it’s gonna be on us, this, that, and the other thing. I was almost waiting for Hermione to be like, are you guys gonna write me? Are you guys gonna write me? Come on. You’re gonna write me this summer.

Right? So, yeah, I thought it was ended. I thought the ending was was much better than some some of the other ones. So No. Yeah.

I agree. What about characters for this one? Did you did you like any of the on screen characters? I think we had you know, we obviously like we talked about before, we had Slughorn played by Jim Broadbent. We also Ernie McLaggon is in a lot of this movie.

Freddie Stroma plays Ernie Mc Ernie McLaggon. He’s in a lot of it. And then, naturally, Jessie Cave as as Lavender Brown. I feel like those are kind of the 3 characters incredible. I think he was a really, really good actor in this.

I thought he was shown way more, and instead of just saying putter and, like being a bully, he, like, kinda had some depth in this one where you almost feel bad for him at times. Yeah. Interesting. I didn’t even think about that, but but, yeah, I would I would agree with you that Malfoy is really good. He almost is in his own movie here.

His scenes, he’s not really in scenes with anybody. It’s kind of him just toiling and trying to deal with the task at hand. So yeah. I I agree. Before, he was kinda like this ratty little kid that was, like, just a snob.

Mhmm. And now he’s kind of like this tall menacing like oh he’s grown up and he’s like actually a real person now. Yeah. He was a caricature before I felt like now he’s actually it felt like he was a real person. I agree.

Yeah. I agree. I I I think that that’s probably the best call. I do think that Jim Broadband, who played Slughorn, was great. I think that was very well cast.

Ernie McClagan, for some reason, has a has a little place in my heart. That guy is just such a perfect dick. He’s so he plays that hot dick character so well. You do love a hot dick. I love her.

Just creepily staring at Hermione, but he’s not understanding how it’s so creepy just to be staring at her. And his one lines are are great. What? You wanted him to go up and kiss her without saying anything? That Yeah.

I wanted him to just walk up to her in the hallway and say close your eyes and then start making out with her because that’s totally cool. Isn’t this the Disney song? I can show you the world. And then it’s like close your eyes or something. Right?

That’s from that. Yeah. Yeah. Alright. That’s where he’s getting it.

Alright. No. No. It’s don’t you dare close your eyes is what he says. Oh.

Yeah. Oh, okay. Alright. Yeah. Okay.

Never mind. Don’t you dare tie your shoes. Don’t you dare. Yeah. But that’s because they’re, you know, they’re flying on a magic carpet, you know, over That’s true.

Different places. So don’t you dare close your eyes. Studio notes, 8378 on Rotten Tomatoes. Order was 7881. So a little flip floppity doodah.

This one cost 250,000,000. It was the most expensive movie of the series. And like I said, another long one, 2:30 run time. I talked about some of the other studio stuff as we’re going through it. And then some some casting notes.

Supposedly, Danny Radcliffe here and Rupert Grint were hesitant to return for this movie, and Emma Watson also considered not returning. I don’t necessarily believe that. I didn’t dig too much into it. That’s agent talk for we want more money. Yeah.

That’s how I felt. That’s how I felt as well. Well. Because it’s just there’s no way. Right?

It’s the 6th movie. I don’t think they knew at this point that the 7th movie was gonna be 2 movies. So in their mind it’s like, but, you know, they’re saying the reasoning behind this was that they didn’t wanna be typecast, But who’s gonna turn down a bunch of greenbacks to re reprise a role in which no one the studio would go crazy. You couldn’t imagine in the 6th movie changing out. So, yeah, I agree.

It has to be this trying to give more money. Have you ever seen the, the George? What’s the actor that plays George in Seinfeld? Oh, yeah. I did.

Jason. And what’s his name? On why they’re, like, asking him, like, oh, why why did you deserve a $1,000,000 an episode? And he’s like, well Yeah. It’s like there’s 5 different aspects to the show that need to be covered and they’re one of the 5 and so they should have the Yeah.

20%. But the biggest thing you said is that I’ve done everything I can with the character. So now you have to pay me so that I don’t because because now I’m not gonna get jobs for other things. So you’re basically you’re paying me for all the other work I’m not gonna get because the more I play this character, the the more likely it is I’ll never able to get out of the shadow of this character. So he’s like, that’s you’re paying me for.

Yeah. He’s paying me for his type of things. Yeah. Yeah. I didn’t I didn’t know if it was the same interview or a different one, but he talks about how because of that, it ruined TV.

He’s like, oh, we ruined TV for the next, like, 20 years because, yeah, because they were able to get $1,000,000 an episode. Oh, I understand. Yeah. Yeah. The friends people were able to do that as well.

That then they started giving it, you know, the same deals. It’s kinda like the NFL how if someone gets a bigger contract then, okay, you have to match that or get it in a higher. Gotcha. So then it’d be like Spin City, and they’d be giving that to some people. It just can’t float.

Like, that that show’s not getting enough eyeballs to to do to make sure that it’s worth it. I like Spin City. I just use that as a random example. It it’s probably something way worse than that, but, you know, that we’re commanding these these big dollars. That makes sense.

So yeah. It’s it’s crazy how much money they made from that show. It’s crazy how much they made Larry David. Yeah. Larry David made for that show.

Holy smokes. And then he has curve on top of it. Crazy. Crazy. Crazy.

Crazy. Let’s get some love hates. Keith, what did you love about, Half Blood Prince film? You already mentioned the Unbreakable Vow scene. I thought that, like, got the movie off on the right foot.

I think I mentioned in the book, I almost wish they didn’t have it, but I thought the scene was was great. I thought Snape, in the books, like, again, even I I know it’s gonna happen, but I still am never gonna be on Snape’s side based off of this reread. In the in the movies, he just comes off as someone that’s in turmoil and not someone that’s, like, cold blooded and hates everyone and hate deep down, he’s not really that upset about things. You can tell, like, he doesn’t wanna do what he has to do, where in the books, you don’t get that. You don’t get his interlock monologue.

Yeah. If he was actually a death eater, he would’ve in this when in the astronomy tower and he saw Harry, he wouldn’t have shushed him. He would’ve just grabbed him and be like, alright. Let’s kill them both or kill Dumbledore and take him to the dark lord. Yeah.

I I agree with you. The the characters are very different in in the movies than he is in in the books. What I loved about this, and I feel like this is the first movie to do it, but this movie had some actual funny parts where I laughed out loud, I will say. I LOL ed. Oh.

It started when Slughorn was at the 3 broomsticks and ran into Harry, Ron, and Hermione. And he’s standing over Hermione, and he spills his drink on her. And she’s like, oh, and he doesn’t even miss a beat. He goes, all hands on deck. Granger is just like, what?

Just spells your drink at someone. You go, all hands on deck. And at one of Slaghorn’s parties, he’s asking some kid about potions or his great grandfather. He’s like, oh, yeah. My dad doesn’t talk to you anymore.

My dad says the only potion worth having is a stiff one at the end of the day. Love that. Slughorn, basically calling Ron the wrong name the whole time. I thought that was funny too. He delivered those lines as well.

Yeah. He delivered them really well. I was like, rookie of the year. You know, ro ro Rosenhauser. Ron, under the influence of the love potion, Rupert Grint acting his face off in that one, I thought it was great when he does the whole, can you introduce me to her or whatever the case is?

And there’s like, what do you mean? You’ve you’ve been snogging her. He’s like, I haven’t been snogging her. You know? And so I thought that was awesome.

And then Harry high on the Felix Felicis. It’s I I was just laughing with Harry the whole time. I mean, I talked about the pincers thing. So he’s, like, talking about the spider, and he goes, not to mention the pincers. Like, that was funny.

Even when Slughorn at the beginning, Harry, like, sees him in Sprouts’ tent or whatever, and then he’s like, alright. Peace out peace out. I’m going to Hagrid’s, and Slughorn jumps out. He’s like, Harry. And Harry turns around, and he goes, sir.

I don’t know. I don’t know. It was the I don’t remember that, but alright. Okay. You just you gotta you gotta go.

You gotta go rewatch it. It was, I thought it was it was good. The all hands on deck actually slayed me when he said it. I was like, that if you spill now if I spill a beer on someone, I never would consider a Harry Potter movie to be quotable. But if I ever spilled a beer on someone, instead of saying sorry, I’m just gonna say all hands on deck.

What else do you love? I thought the young Dumbledore or young Voldemort rather was great. I thought he was really good. I looked at him up. He’s actually his name’s Hero Fiends Tiffin.

Oh. The nephew of Ralph Fiends. Ralph. Okay. Yeah.

Oh. Is it Fiends? I don’t know his name. Fiends? I don’t I honestly don’t know.

F I e n n n I’ve always heard of it as Fiends, but I don’t know. That kid could have been in The Good Son. Have you seen that movie, The Cawley Culkin? Yeah. I don’t think so.

But it’s just like his it’s really, like, dark messed up movie. But he was like that, like, just a super creepy kid, but acted very well. He can put on the charm, but also he’s, like, a psychopath? Yeah. Exactly.

Yeah. And it’s funny you said that thing about, oh, young whatever, because we’re watching it and young Dumbledore comes out and hair Caroline’s like, oh, so to be younger in the wizarding world, you just need shorter hair and a shorter beard? Because he looks pretty much exactly the same except his beard hair and hair hair’s a cut different color. So give it. Yeah.

I guess so. There’s also references to Dumbledore being, like, off his rocker at some points in this movie, which is interesting. Yeah. It’s not really talked about, I feel like, but No. Yeah.

They just kinda say, you know, that’s that’s why, but I think there’s also some pretty scary stuff in in this in this movie as well. Like, I love that part. I talked about the Infuri. Katie Bell’s being possessed was straight out of The Conjuring. There’s X Resist type that I use.

Yeah. It’s like they pull her up in the air. It’s like all this crazy stuff. And then they slam her. Like slam her into the ground.

If you were a child that took your 10 year old kid to see this, that’s one of those scenes that would, like, stick with me, I feel like. It’s like, I think the 6th sense people will say the 6th sense is a scary movie. I think it’s pretty scary, but the part of the thing that stuck with me was when the kid just says, do you wanna go see my dad’s guns? And then turns around, and there’s a hole in the back of his head. That scared the shit out of me, and I couldn’t sleep for, like, a week because I was just seeing that scene.

So this the Katie Bell scene would be like that for me if I was a kid because Yeah. They really squish her into the ground. On top of that, the sets, you the astronomy tower, that was really good. Whatever they did with the potions classroom with Slughorn, it’s, like, bigger. There’s, like, urns everywhere.

I thought that was super cool. The cave, the landscape shots. I mean, even Snape’s house, we talked about that, but even that house is just in this, you know, those very unique neighborhoods they have in England where they’re all the houses are just kinda stacked on top of each other, townhouse style. I thought it was just it was it was great. It looked great.

It looked great. Mhmm. Yeah. Agreed. Well, let’s jump to hates.

What do you feel about that? I already mentioned it. The collect do you want him to collect me thing? Mhmm. There had to be some other way to say that.

There’s just had to be. You can just whisper Confunded under your breath without using your wand or sending any sort of spell from your wand, which every other spell in the movie has, like, a laser beam come out, but you can just do that, I guess. Good one. Yeah. And they’re they’re also learning at this point in the book.

They’re learning how to do spells without saying anything. Obviously, you can’t do that for a movie. It’d be very confusing. But she could have just poked her spell, her her wand, you know, just give it a little shimmy. So, yeah, I agree with you.

Yeah. And also, is that how Confundus works? It just it moved him. It didn’t Yeah. Like, it physically moved his body.

It didn’t make him go like, Yeah. It seems like that would be a little bit more obvious too that someone casted a spell on someone after the force push. Yeah. Exactly. I got, Fred and George.

This is more of a movie series in general, but it really came to head for me in this one because Fred and George give very little screen time. But Fred and George saying the same thing at the same time in all the movies, I didn’t I never understood that. It just seems like such a boring, low brow, bottom branch kind of Twins are all the same. Extreme humor. Exactly.

Yeah. It’s just like basic twin humor where they say the same thing all the time, and I I don’t understand it. It just bothers me. I don’t know why. It just seems so stupid.

Yeah. It doesn’t happen at all in the book. All the the whole time in the book, they’re just playing off each other. So Yeah. Making jokes for each other, not, like, which is funny.

They’re avid in Costello. They’re, like, setting each other up. They’re not just saying the same thing at the same time. The shop itself was cool, though. The shop was awesome.

That’s, like, right before peak school season. Mhmm. Is it just no one in there after that? Like, because all the kids are gone. Like, so how are they staying in business after?

Like, I get that at one weekend, it’s gonna be bumping. But after that, how are they staying in business? So it’s a good question. My counter would be that there are still kids. You know, there’s kids under 11 that aren’t at Hogwarts, and there’s people over 18 who are buying gifts and buying stuff, whatever.

There’s also, we assume, people that don’t go to Hogwarts. Like, Hogwarts only has we’ve talked tried to break this down in of the episodes, but it only has a few 100 kids. So there’s lots and lots of wizarding families, presumably, that their kids go to a different school, and I’m sure there’s other schools, like, within London proper that maybe aren’t boarding schools. You know? They just have day wizarding schools.

It’s it’s a business. People liquor stores are open, and people work during the day. Well, there’s a thing called alcoholics. Yeah. Well, you don’t think there’s joke shopaholics?

Yeah. Well, I do think the joke shop would be pretty awesome if you’re a squib because you’re basically you’re basically like Batman now. Oh, yeah. Just get that Peruvian darkness powder and Yeah. You have, like, stuff you can actually now be part of the group.

You’re like, oh, I got stuff I can throw out of here and and then actually, like, be magical and everyone else is actually superpowers. That would be an interesting kind of spin off is some sort of group of Aurors, but one of the Aurors is a squib. Yeah. But he just uses all the magical elements properly, and then has a gat, and he’s just blasting dark wizards in the face. Some other ones I had, Dumbledore’s hand should look worse.

It doesn’t look that bad in the movie. It’s supposed to be withered and, like, almost falling off. Disgusting. He looked like a raptor. So his hand looked like, you know, from, like, Jurassic Park?

Yeah. Like a raptor hand. I don’t know. That was weird. Yeah.

I just thought it should’ve been should’ve been more. No gaunts, like I said. I don’t wanna talk about talk about Ginny anymore, but I have, like, 30 on Ginny. Oh, I’m sorry, Ginny. I’m sorry.

Didn’t make positive. She, worked behind the scenes in the art department and helped decorate the Weasley house, creating and placing different objects around the home where she, should be acting. She said, okay. Carrie should be right here. Martha.

And I’m gonna squirt a bottle of Jergens on this wall here. That’s good. You’ll know why later. Alright. So would you recommend Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince and how many buddies out of 4 buddies do you give it?

Yeah. I would. I think this is a good one. I’d probably give it a solid 3 out of 4. Oh.

To to rank it right now, I’d go 4, 6 Wow. 1, 2, 3, 5. You hate threes so much. 5 is a 100 times worse than threes. Okay.

I gave it, I think, 2.75, which is Alright. So pretty much. Pretty pretty good for Yeah. These movies in general. I have I’m gonna say 431625.

Okay. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So that was that was the movie.

I’m really glad we we watched that movie. I liked it. What do we got coming on next? We have the final installment. I mean, I’m almost already done with the book and I’m already getting getting, like, upset thinking about it being over.

Yeah. Just like I’m already it’s so the it’s such a good book. It’s it’s such a good book. Oh, man. It’s so good.

Oh, I can’t believe it’s been a multi month journey. You know what I mean? I think we started this in May or something like that. Mhmm. May or June.

And look look look where we are now. So, yeah, we’ll, we’ll get the Deathly Hallows book next up. You know, we’ll probably we’ll definitely talk about that book itself and probably some higher level just Harry Potter stuff in general. But I don’t even wanna think about where we’re gonna go after that because I honestly have no idea, but we’re gonna have to discuss it. I’ll catch you for, for Deathly Hallows.

Alrighty. I like it. K. Alright. Bye now.

The Buddies are now onto the sixth chapter of their magical journey with “Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince” by J.K. Rowling. The Buddies explored vital wizarding matters including: the questionable ethics of love potions at a high school, the surprising benefits of writing in used textbooks, and whether Dumbledore needed better threat assessment training. The Buddies also tackled life’s deeper questions, like whether Harry’s romantic strategy aligns with the D.E.N.N.I.S. system, and if Ginny Weasley is actually the only person at Hogwarts having a normal teenage experience. So grab your bottle of liquid luck, cause we’re snogging it up this episode (did we use that right)?

Intro (0:00-0:46)
Stock Up/Down (0:47-30:28)
Favorite Scene/Character/Magical Elements (30:29-42:03)
Love/Hate (42:04-55:01)
Conclusion (55:02-1:00:50)

NEXT Episode: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince – MOVIE

NEXT BOOK: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows by J. K. Rowling

Transcript for SEO Purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to Book Club. I’m Dylan here with the Full Blood McGonagall. Keith, what’s up, buddy? You never go full blood, Dylan.

You never go full blood. Little tropic thunder reference. Nice. Here at the Buddy Book Club, we’re breaking down some bestsellers. This week, we’re entering the Vanishing Cabinet, sneaking into Hogwarts, and chatting about Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince by JK Rowling.

If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read or reach out to us on any past episodes, you can visit our website, go to bookhub.com. Send us now all on Twitter or Instagram, go to bookhub podcast. You list those as action on Spotify or review podcast. Please download. Give us a 5 star review.

If nothing else, give us a follow on some social channels, please, and thank you. Once again, disclaimer for the Harry Potter series. There are gonna be spoilers. Keith, let’s jump into stock up, stock down. What do you have for stock up on the half lip prints?

Yeah. Stock up. Airplanes making you emotional. Have you have you had experienced this where you’re, like, on an airplane and you’re reading or you’re listening to music or watching a movie and you’re you’re just much more likely to, like, tear up or feel things? Yeah.

It’s it’s an interesting phenomena because I feel like it is. I I was watching porn on an airplane one time, and I got the absolutely raging boner. And and then I started crying. No. I I I have I have noticed it, though.

There’s a few experiences. One, I started to, like, cry. Another time, I was watching Her. Have you seen that movie? And that was when the airplane had only, like, a few movies you could watch.

It wasn’t, like, you know, pick your own adventure situation. And that movie is so bad. I hated it so much, and I was looking around at other people watching it and being so angry. So talk about another emotion I was feeling. I was so angry.

It’s like, this movie’s terrible. I didn’t I didn’t think it was that bad. I don’t know. Just get a fleshlight like the rest of us. And Right.

And the third I follow that. Third experience was I was on a trip to Vegas, and I was watching on my iPad, I was watching some Anthony Bourdain no reservations, and they were slaughtering a pig, which was extreme. It was showing everything, and I was like, I looked to the person next to me, and I was like, I’m so sorry. I did not realize this was gonna be happening. And she was like, it Then you turned your hardcore porn back on.

Right? You said she was like No. She she was like, it’s alright. This is why I’m a vegetarian. And I was like, oh, cool.

Cemented her values. So, yeah, emotions do fly high in the airplane. Let me get to your point. Yeah. I was for some reason, I was experiencing those same emotions when I read this book with with, Dumbledore.

The the obviously, the last the the last ending part of the book. There was this weird discharge coming from my eyes. I don’t know what was happening. I wasn’t even on an airplane and all this stuff was happening. So I guess these are what normal people have the emotions, but I was I was tearing up.

I didn’t know Dumbledore died in this. Oh. I wasn’t ready for it. What? I thought it was book 7.

Right. Yeah. I thought it was a bit I thought it was early in book 7 that it happened. Definitely hit me much harder than knowing it was coming. I wasn’t prepared for it.

So, yeah, that was that was a bit shocking. The one thing I will say too is you’re talking about the anger and, the about the movie Her and, the emotions you’d feel there. When Umbra showed up to the funeral at the end, which, again, I don’t remember any of the funeral stuff, I think you just murder her. Right? Like, I’d go to Azkaban for that.

I’m I’m fine with that. Like, my darkest, like, biggest enemy showed up to my funeral. I think you can just kill that person. I think that’s fair game. I think that, like, any judge would be, like, well, they kinda had that coming.

They gotta throw that out. Yeah. Who also was so horrible to Dumbledore in the previous, you know, the previous times we’ve seen her. It’s like, what are you doing here? You don’t I would at least make a scene.

Like, you do not disagree. I didn’t know she was in the books. I honestly thought after book 5, she went to a sane asylum and, like, we never heard from her again. And then she’s in book 7. And I was like, what the hell?

She’s terrible in books. Ugh. Yeah. I’m I’m pissed that she’s still alive. Which double blur, I’m I’m gonna get to later.

This is a this is more of, like, a a u a positive eulogy, but I have some negative stuff to talk about now. We can’t buy this. Don’t you worry. Don’t you worry. Yeah.

My first stock up and I couldn’t agree with you more, by the way, and we will have more to discuss about Dumbledore. I am sure of that. But my first stock up is used textbooks stock up. Normally, you buy a used textbook and all you get is, like, some pages ripped out and, you know, penises drawn on every other page. They’re never more helpful.

It was never a thing that you buy a used textbook and and they become more helpful. I feel like college was a big place for used textbooks. Like, in high school, they just give them to you, and then in college, like, somehow, they don’t tell you there’s, like, an extra $5,000 you have to spend on textbooks. Half the classes, you don’t even need the textbook, and they’re like, yeah. This will be a $125.

Like, what? Oh, yeah. It was absurd. At least where I went to school, they had, like, their version of the textbook, so you couldn’t even buy a used one. And then it would change every year.

It’d be like a new volume, but it had no it was no difference. All they did was, like, mix up all the chapters so you couldn’t follow along. You know, it’s it’s it was so messed up. It’d be like a history class on the civil war, and it’s like, and what now you have to buy the new versions. Like, what what changed within the last 1 year that you didn’t the civil war?

Exactly. But, you know and then you buy those used textbooks, and either you’d go to the class and the professor would say, oh, I’m sorry. That’s not gonna work for this class. And then you’re out, however much you spent on that. And then you get that used textbook, and it would be gross.

Like, it’d be like someone had dropped it into it would look like Tom Riddle’s diary after Ginny, like, dropped it in the toilet and Moaning Myrtle, like, blew her snot boogies on it. So the half blood prince, we just gotta give a shout out to him because he actually paid attention to his potions, you know, advanced potions book. And on top of that, not only provided advanced potions, but then it provided lots of other spells and charms that could be performed by whoever found that later on. I almost don’t know why Snape got rid of that book or how that book maybe I guess it ended up in the potions cabinet because maybe Snape was keeping it there and then he became Defense Against the Dark Arts professor and he was like totally forgot about everything potions related because he was just like, oh my god. I finally got the job.

This is amazing. Yeah. The the only thing that makes sense to me would be that that was the book he used as a teacher, not as a Oh. I don’t understand how, as a student, you’d be able to do all of these experiments and do all this learning and all this stuff. So how would you ever be able to test this unless you became professor and then you start going through the textbook and be like, no.

This is what I I would do it. Yeah. That makes a lot more sense, actually. I was also wondering. It’s like, okay.

His advanced potions book, he’s not even getting until, like, his 5th or 6th year. How much time is he actually gonna spend doing potions and stuff? So, yeah, that makes a lot more sense that he just continuously improved on that over time. So it was really like you remember how they used to sell the teacher’s manual for the textbook? You’d buy the textbook, but the teacher would also have a textbook, but it had like, more information and stuff like that.

That was what his was, basically, is what he turned the picture. Oh, I like that. I like that. Yeah. So use textbook.

Stock up. What else, what else do you have for stock up? Michael Jordan’s Secret Stuff Water Shop. Me? Have you ever seen Space Jam?

Yeah. Of course. I feel like I’ve stocked up this, but this might have been, like, stock up for, like, an episode 5 or 10 or something like that. Our 10th episode? Yeah.

It’s a very specific stock. But you’re still buying. But for those that are are in the know yeah. I’m still buying. In Space Jam, great, great movie, not the new one.

We’re gonna even count that that’s not, as d man would say, canon. The Tune Squad is getting absolutely demolished at halftime, and everyone’s like, why can’t we play, like, Michael? Why can’t we play, like, Michael? And Bugs Bunny, being the the smart rabbit that he is takes a, just a water bottle and slaps on a tag that says Michael’s secret stuff on it. So like, like Michael Jordan’s been drinking some, some basically HGH or steroids or well, I don’t know what.

But that’s what’s giving him all these powers. Right? It’s all mental is basically what it comes down to. Right? And the same thing happens in this.

Ron thinks he gets Felix, Felicis, and he’s like, now everything is gonna be easy for me. Everything’s gonna be lucky. I’m gonna be a complete stud. And he is because it’s all mental. Well, you have that mindset, the that attitude with at life, then that happens.

So sock up to that. I wish I could do the same thing as well as that Ron does. We all just need, like, our morning coffee. We need the significant others to be coming in and being like, oh, I slipped some genius potion in there and just like, oh, I guess I’m a genius today. Amazing.

I also had stock up for associated with that, which was the placebo effect. So I liked yours much better, by the way. Okay. Yeah. I just I thought it was I thought it was a nice little touch there.

And he fooled the reader. Harry did a good job of it because he does, like, the whole I’m trying to hide it, but shows his hand. You know? He did a real it’s almost like an Ocean’s 11 type move kind of thing that he did there. You know?

And then in general, though, like, I kinda wanted to talk about Felix Felicis because it’s a it’s a fascinating potion. And to me, like, the description of Harry after he took it, you know, like his experience, it kinda seemed like like that 2 to 3 drink summer high you get. You know, if you have, like, your second or third drink where you’re fully you’re still fully hydrated and fully cognitive. There’s no there’s none of the negative effects of alcohol. It just puts this kinda glow on this summer day.

You’re about to go to the beach or something like that. It’s just like Yep. You’re just walking around feeling like the entire world is on your side. 2, 3 twisted teas and you’re about to do do something. Yeah.

That’s that’s kind of what the Felix Felicis was, you know. I picture it just like a giant vat of some vodka iced tea with big old icebergs of magic ice in there. That’s a great comment because I that was gonna be my favorite magical element. I was gonna ask you, is there anything in the world that’s like that? And you kinda nailed it.

The only thing that you didn’t nail is that literally I could do that every single day. Yeah. That’s the problem. You can’t do Felix releases every single day. I could do 2 to 3 toities and go to the beach every single day for the rest of my life.

That would be no issue with me. That’s why I was like, oh, is it like meth? Yeah. When they first started talking about it, I was like, oh, this is kind of like what people that are, like, microdosing acid must feel like. You know?

Yeah. But Well, yeah, you can’t do it off of that either. Is that not that much of a problem? You, like, think you can fly or something like that. I I don’t think there’s a problem with microdosing acid.

I think the problem is people that just, like, take lots and lots of acid and then get get psychosis. And then also the love potion, that was just roofies. Right? So I I don’t know what that that was weird. That was a weird part of the book.

Part of the book, especially because they were so prominent, these love potions. And it seems like a serious violation. You should be getting sent to Azkaban if you’re giving someone love potions all the time. And this Especially because you’re slipping into this Oh, yeah. A 100%.

And Yeah. You know, it’s not like, couples in couple therapy, you know, taking some ecstasy and then having a a nice night with each other. You know, this is like your who’s the Jell O guy? Bill Cosby. Yeah.

You’re Bill Cosby slipping someone to Mickey. Like, this is not appropriate. And these teenagers are just slipping people love potions all willy nilly, and it seems like the school is kinda turning a blind eye on it. I I, you know, I don’t know if Dumbledore’s slipping. Actually, I know Dumbledore’s slipping.

But, yeah, the the love potion thing seemed a bit confusing. And it seemed like anyone could brew it. Or or wait. Were the Weasleys selling it? Is that what it was?

Yeah. The Weasleys were selling it. That was a little bit Yeah. Yeah. Questionable.

Like, what? So people can just go into a store? Seems like a lot of liability there. Yeah. I think that’s you’re gonna sue it for a while.

The ministry is just not, you know, doing their job of regulating these dangerous potions. I mean, we already know the effect when we hear back to, Voldemort’s mom’s story. You know, we know the effect of these love potions. JK puts out someone who had actually done it and given it to someone. She’s somewhat of a creature based on the inbreeding, which I’m sure we’ll get to as well.

But and she the the the local town, Gaston, she gets on her side because she given these love potions for, like, a significant amount of time that he sires a child with her, and the only reason why she can’t keep him is because she loves him so much that she has to stop giving him the love potion. Seems like it’s it’s it’s a schedule a drug or schedule 1 or whatever the schedules are. My next stock up is the dentist system. Is anyone familiar with the dentist system? Any Always Sunny fans out there?

Well, I have to say that Harry executes the system very well in his relationship with Ginny. He, d, demonstrates value when he saves her from diary Tom Riddle. E, engages physically. You know, they snog after the Quidditch victory. Nurture dependence.

He starts the DA, acts as her protector. He brings all these people into the DA. You know, he’s like, oh, Ginny, don’t worry. As long as I’m on your side, dark wizards, the ministry, no one’s gonna get to you. That’s nurturing dependence.

Neglect emotionally, the last 6 years, he’s pretty much not paid a ton of attention to her even though he knows that she’s into him. And he when he finally does get her, he doesn’t take her on dates, you know, have any real heart to heart say, oh, no. Sorry. I’m too busy with Dumbledore saving the world. Like, we’ll go back and snog later.

So neglects emotionally for sure. Inspires hope. Absolutely. He he gets her to believe that after all these years, we’re together. We’re gonna be going steady, but s separate entirely.

He uses Voldemort as an excuse to break up with her without having her feelings hurt and with also being able to keep her on the line. So going forward, if he ever needs to pull her back in, like in book 7, when they start snogging again, he just executes it perfectly, where although he separates entirely, he still leaves that little breadcrumb trail in case he needs to go back there, and she can’t be mad at him about it. So I would say that he, he executes the dentist system better than has ever been executed, honestly. That’s an incredible pull. I have no notes, and that’s that’s gonna be the clip right there.

It’s it’s easy. That’s a genius right there. You must have got slipped some genius out of potions. I got a little Felix Felicis in my corona that I’m having right now. Damn it.

Last one real quick. Slughorn pulls a move where he ruins his entire house because he doesn’t want visitors. I had to stock that up. You know, stocking up. If you don’t want people to come over your house, just start messing everything up.

And if for us in the non wizarding world, it’s a little more difficult because then you have to, like, put it all together yourself. But you could just, like, mess up kind of, like, one area and then take a picture of it, send to whoever’s coming over and be like, sorry. We got robbed. Can’t come. They’re never gonna follow-up.

They’re gonna be like, oh my god. That’s terrible. You’ll be like, yeah. Yeah. Did they take anything?

No. Actually, nothing got stolen, you know? Oh, okay. Cool. That’s it.

No one’s gonna wanna bring that up to you because they’re gonna be like, that was a horrible memory for them. Why would I go back and ask them if anything ever came of that? So easy peasy. Just just drive around. No visitors.

Smart. Alright. Alright. Fair enough. Stuck down.

What do you got? Dumbledore, stuck down. Weirdest. I mean, this this give me a long rant. I I we had to someone had to do it.

He’s in one of mine too. He he’s stuck down as Dumbledore as my last one. I mean, Dumbledore had a rough book. He finally starts meeting with Harry and giving him the backstory, which I appreciated. That was nice.

But, I mean, the first thing is, Dumbledore’s, like, disposition is kind of this whimsical talks and riddles. You know, it never really gives us full straight answer, which fine. That’s your character. That’s what you do. But then Harry starts, like, asking follow-up questions, and he starts kinda, like, getting upset with him, which pissed me off.

I was like, yo. But start answering the question, and then Harry won’t have to, you know, give a follow-up. And, like, also, if you’re trying to give him this huge big project, maybe stop leaving out all the gaps. Like, we saw this happen last year. Talked about this the previous year when you’re like, sorry.

I should never have done that, and you’re still doing it. It’s almost like he likes having power with people, so he doesn’t fill everyone in on everything. You can be whimsical, but you then you can’t get angry when someone asks a follow-up. Now we actually have a little bit of this, like, angry Dumbledore. Not, like, angry, but, you know, he’s coming out of his shell a little bit in this book.

Mhmm. Imagine Michael Gambon doing this version of Dumbledore. Because when Dumbledore is as chill as possible, that 2 to 3 twisted t jumbledore, and Michael Gambon’s yelling, did you put your name in the hot the Goblet of Fire? Imagine what he’s gonna do with this one. But, he’s gonna be, like, doing the torture curses on him.

Harry. Nextly, the biggest thing Harry keeps telling him and what Dumbledore keeps waving off is, like, yo, Malfoy, there’s an issue with him. There’s something going on with Malfoy. And he’s like, yeah. Yeah.

Don’t worry about it. Do you think I wouldn’t know everything that’s going on? Turns out he didn’t know everything that’s going on. He turns out he didn’t know shit. Like, he lets death eaters into the castle with tons of innocent students and a werewolf running around the castle with tons of innocent students.

This is the same people that were shitting all over Neville for leaning out, like, leaving out a piece of paper. Let that one down. This no. I’m not. No one says anything about this.

Dumbledore, like, that’s your one job is to protect the students, and you didn’t even, like, look into it when Harry’s literally given it to me, like, 6 or 7, like, hints about it. Okay. So he comes clean at the end that he knew about the Malfoy thing from the beginning. That’s my next point. Gone.

And that’s my that’s the biggest thing is that it’s revealed that Dumbledore knew the whole time about Malfoy. We need a a Mark what’s his name? Mark Ruffalo. He knew, and he let him get away with it. That was about raping children.

This is just about werewolves. Spotlight. That’s the movie. Yeah. Yeah.

I gotcha. I gotcha. Yeah. He’s always he’s like, yeah. I knew this whole time.

However, what is the solution now that they’ve finally confronted it? He’s like, well, I’ll protect you and your family. Then why didn’t you just say that at the very beginning? What was the reason? There is no reason if the whole thing is, like, I can confront them and then I’ll go protect them, if that’s all you’re gonna do.

He wasn’t like he was gaining more information or doing anything different or do there was no reason not to do that right off the bat. Why wait until things reach that head or basically a point of no return for Malfoy? Whereas, you could, after the slug horn he he gets Ron or even after the Katie Bell situation, you could have just called him to your office, sat him down when it’s just you 2, and you kind of have a little pressure on him because it’s now just you 2 and you’re like, hey, Draco, I know what’s going on here. I know you’re trying to poison me. I understand it.

I can help your family. You don’t have to go through all of this. You know, he’s crying. Draco’s crying to Moaning Myrtle about having to do this. You know, it’s like he was ready to crack.

Like, he’s ready to turn and and and say, I don’t wanna do this. Malfoy now realizes what being a death eater is all about, and he really doesn’t have the stomach for it. So Dumbledore could’ve swooped in way earlier. But now after Malfoy’s already let these Death Eaters into the castle, which, you know, Dumbledore is like, oh, I never never realized that. It’s like, are you kidding me, Dumpy?

What are you doing here? Well yeah. And he’s also he’s he’s waived off 2 attempted murders. He’s almost she’s he’s almost killed 2 students, and he’s like, whatever. And this is my biggest problem is, like, why are we protecting someone that’s not exact exactly innocent at the expense of everyone that’s innocent?

Malfoy and his parents are not innocent people. They’ve opted into doing these things. Why are we protecting them? It doesn’t make sense. It’s like that you know that diagram where it’s like a train coming down the tracks and it’s about to hit a bunch of people and you can pull a lot of stuff.

Argument or whatever. Prisoner’s dilemma, I think it is. Or is it the other one? I don’t know. It’s one of those things.

But the difference here is the train’s coming on the track. It’s only gonna hit the Malfoys, and Dumbledore’s pulling the lever that so that it go goes and hits, like, 30 other people instead. Yeah. The other lever is, like, killing all these innocent children, turning them into werewolves, releasing Voldemort onto the world, and potentially killing yourself. And he’s like, alright.

Let’s do that one. Why is Bill why are the DA students? Why is, all the people in the order of Phoenix paying the price so that we can save these 3 fuck boys? Yeah. It’s like Lucius Malfoy already reopened the Chamber of Secrets pretty much.

You know all the stuff that Draco has done. You’re allowing students. I couldn’t agree with you more. But I just think in general throughout this book, we get a lot of slip ups from Dumbledore in general, which is why we have the stock down here. Why did he put the gauntlet ring on in the 1st place?

Oh, I assumed he had to get it out. He had to put it on or something. I don’t know. Well, yeah, they didn’t really explain that, right? But we learned more about Dumbledore in the 7th book, and I like we’ll talk about that then, But I think it was more of, like, he wanted to learn something or it was a slip up.

Either way, it’s a slip up. Putting that gauntlet ring on and then withering out his hand, not not a good look for 1. Not having Harry drink the potion, in general, the whole cave scene is just bad coaching. It’s just a bad coaching moment. He underestimates his opponent.

He’s like, oh, this is so classic Voldemort. He thinks that physical power is the only thing that matters or whatever the case is. Next thing you know, there’s a fury coming out of the water, and he’s gotta drink this potion to weaken you. It’s like, oh, actually, looking back that you know, he Dumbledore even says, like, looking back, that was a pretty good for the spells and charms. Like, that was pretty good by Dumbledore.

He’s, like, don’t underestimate your opponent. You’re going up against Voldemort. What are you doing? And then not having Harry drink the potion because I don’t know exactly why. Dumbledore, you are the better wizard here.

If this potion is going to affect someone, then wouldn’t you rather it be Harry so then you can help Harry? And if you guys need to get out of there, then you’re going to do a better job of getting you guys out of there than he would. And I do understand the counterargument that he’s put so much suffering upon Harry that he doesn’t want Harry to continue to suffer, and, like, he knows that this is probably gonna fuck him up. And also, like, Harry is the most important. But he said he says, like, it’s not gonna kill you.

Like, that wouldn’t make any sense. That’s not what Voldemort wants to do. So he knows it’s not gonna kill Harry. It it was just bad coaching. Simple as that.

He’s the head coach here, and it’s bad coaching. And it’s moral saving one innocent person. In this case, Harry’s actually innocent to but hurting 1,000 others because everyone knows the only person he’s scared of is Dumbledore. So why would you weaken the one person that could save 1,000 of 1,000 of others? Queen off the chessboard in a chess game.

Yeah. So once Dumbledore is injured or or dies, that really just opens up the floodgates. He’s the one the only person that’s holding up the waters back, and he’s like, well, it’s not that big of a deal. I’ll just, you know, I’ll just take all these sacrifices. Like, no.

It is a big deal. Like, that’s Yeah. Which is his which is his last slip up that I had written down with just dying. You know, don’t die, Dumbledore. I know Harry is super important, but all of the stuff that Harry has to do going forward, it would be a lot easier if you were around.

So Yeah. For sure. Just don’t die. It’s probably that simple. Just for the sake of Malfoy or whatever the case is.

It’s so dumb. Yeah. Dumbledore, stock stock down as well. Well, I mean, because we’re on the same train of thought, I’m gonna continue with my stock down, which is which is gaslighting. And I know that we’ve talked about gaslighting here and there on this on this podcast, and people kinda throw it around these days.

But just so we’re aware, gaslighting is a manipulative tactic that involves causing a person to question their own reality, memories, and perceptions. It’s a form of emotional abuse that can happen in any relationship. Everyone is gaslighting Harry in this book. Every single person that he talks to that matters to him is gaslighting him. He’s like, hey.

I think Malfoy is, fucking some shit up. I have some, like, pretty not great evidence, but, you know, I I think we should look into this. And everyone’s like, oh, you’re always out for Malfoy, Harry. You’re always out for Malfoy. He’s like, I think I think Snape’s trying to fuck with us down below.

He’s like, I trust Severus. I trust Severus. Every single thing, and then they turn it back on him too where they’re like, oh, you’ve always had you’ve always had this thing. You’ve always had this prejudice. You’re you’re always trying to get Draco.

You and him are enemies. Like, no. There’s a lot of sketchy, circumstantial things that are going on that I need people behind me to to support in some degree. And I’m kind of upset that at the end, Harry never does, like, a big I told you so. There’s a little I told you so, but there should be a way bigger I told you so.

And, obviously, we don’t know about the future of Snape at this point. But if this is your first time going in, you’re pissed because it’s like Harry has been warning everyone for years. Harry’s been warning everyone about Malfoy, and everyone just pushes his ideas aside and says he’s obsessing. And next thing you know, they killed Dumbledore. What?

Yeah. And if he didn’t give the Felix Felicis to all of Dumbledore’s army, then that I mean, what would happen to them? You know, more blood would be on Dumbledore’s hands. Yeah. I mean, talk about, inspiring hope.

You slip Ginny some Felix Felicis, and we’re back to the dentist system. I, inspiring hope. I mean, the problem is Harry’s batting batting 800. He’s he’s fucking absolutely raking at the plate, but the last of bat, he struck out. And so everyone’s just like, well, I don’t know about this, dude.

I’m just like, bro, he’s batting 800. Like, you gotta you gotta go with the hot hand here. You gotta trust the guy that’s that’s been right 4 out of 5 times. Great intuition with not only Malfoy, but also with Tonks, the whole, like, Tonks relationship. He was like, oh, do you think that she’s upset?

He misjudged a bit. He thought it was because of Sirius. She was like, do you think he was she was in love with Sirius and, like, that’s why this and this happening? And everyone’s like, oh, get out of here, Harry. But he was close.

Wait. Wasn’t Sirius and her cousins or something? Yeah. It doesn’t matter in the wizarding world. Doesn’t matter.

Alright. Don’t worry. Don’t worry about that. That’s the that’s gonna be my next knockdown, so you you just wait. But, yeah, it’s not a big deal in the listening world.

People just people just do that. It was looping. It wasn’t serious, but he was on the right you know, he Harry’s got good intuition, and that’s been proven over the past 5 years, so maybe people should start listening to him. I don’t know. Did you have another stock down?

Stock Town, Mariah Carey’s success song. Oh. I love that song. And by Eminem. Right?

Jam. Right? Yeah. I love that song. Why?

So so Great song. Yeah. Very catchy. So the backstory on that is she wrote that about Eminem, and then Eminem turned around and wrote the song called The Warning. If you remember I don’t know if I have.

It’s not like a publicly released song. It’s like a YouTube song. It’s him just freestyling, like, for, like, 3 minutes straight. Just absolutely eviscerating her. Yeah.

But that’s what exactly what happened in this situation. In this case, Mariah Carey is Harry Potter, where for the first five books, I’m like, why is Malfoy just showing up all the time being like, Harry, Harry, Harry, like, obsessed with him. And then the little blonde haired kid finally po poked back. In this case, Malfoy. Now Harry is obsessed with Malfoy.

I my whole perspective changed. I’m like, maybe we’ve just been seeing it through the eyes of Harry this whole time where, like, Malfoy will show up and and say something to him. But in reality, like, the first five years has just been seeking him out and, like, ribbing him and doing this stuff and just, like, not including it in the text, you know. He’s not really giving us that perspective. So I really think that my whole my whole mindset of Malfoy and his obsession with Harry has been wrong.

And this book 6 kinda changed that. All he’s doing is thinking and talking about Malfoy. That’s, like, the whole book. It it is definitely It’s kinda weird. The flip situation.

He’s like, Ginny, Malfoy. Ginny and Malfoy. He’s like, wait. What? Which which one are you which one are you looking for?

Her fell falls so hard for Ginny. It’s so she’s been there the whole time, and then all of a sudden, he just can’t do anything if she’s around. I did, like, the little thing at the beginning when they’re in potions class, and whatever that love potion or whatever the smell is of the potion they’re making as opposed to Oh, it’s her smell. And it’s her smell. But it’s like very loosely related.

You know, at that point, you’re not as we’ve read it, so we know. I don’t know if the first time you really pick up on that. That is like, Oh, Harry loves Ginny. That’s why he smells that. If I was Eminem and she released that song about how I’m obsessed with her, I’d be like my my YouTube song would be like, yeah.

I mean, have you seen the Honey music video? Of course I’m obsessed with you. You’re fucking gorgeous. What are we talking about? What are we talking about here?

Sorry. I’m not sorry. My last duck down is Charles Darwin, you know, the theory of evolution guy. Okay. Yeah.

You know, we just talk about a guy who’s batting 800. He crushed the whole theory of evolution thing and understood the implications of inbreeding, yet he himself married his first cousin and went on to have 10 children, 3 of whom didn’t survive past the age of 10. And then I think 3 more of the ones that did survive, like, were were infertile and had a bunch of other health conditions and whatnot. People have to look into that. I’m just kind of going from what I know, so I could be talking a bunch of shit.

But either way, he definitely married his first cousin and there was some effects of inbreeding. And he knew better. He knew. He knew better. So, you know, we know that inbreeding is bad, yet the gaunts and we assume the Malfoys and potentially the Weasleys are, you know, participating in this in this inbreeding.

I mean, look at the gaunts themselves. They’re very serious about their family and their heritage and whatnot. I feel like there’s a a weird, like, rednecky situation going on with them. Is is that bad to say? No.

Although, I don’t know if rednecks are a thing and No. I know. But it’s like, it’s like the family from Deliverance or something like that. Yeah. That’s what I was like.

Yeah. For sure. But, yeah, they have a very strong Deliverance vibe. And, I mean, they’re talking about the the sun whose one eye is looking north and the other eye is looking east. It’s like, you know, not I can understand why Tom Riddle went back and was like, I do not wanna associate with these people.

I’m gonna become the worst wizard in the world. So, yeah, just in general, inbreeding, don’t do it. It’s it’s, it’s it’s confirmed that it can it can fuck your shit up. So Well, I will defend my boy Charles Darwin here a little bit. I mean, this also may be because everyone was inbreeding, but I looked at the statistics because I was like, I don’t know.

That seems not that bad in the 1800 since when he was born. 30% of children died before their first birthday. 43 did not survive past their 5th birthday, and only 60% who live to age 10 survived to adulthood. So He’s got a right around a little statistic. He he’s over bumpy Mendoza lying there.

You’re fine, you know. Yeah. So it’s maybe just maybe his, history is too hard on him. It’s like statistics, man. When you throw it in just a small sample size of this thing, you don’t know.

But if you look at the bigger picture, he’s just everything was normal for him. Favorite chapter. What do you got? Me? We already talked about it.

I I I really think the the ending, yeah, it was great. I I also I I remembered 0 part of the post Dumbledore stuff. I think it’s because when the when you first read it, you’re in shock. I think she did a great job of covering the in shockness after the fact for everyone’s like, everyone’s emotions and everything like that. So I thought that was great.

Yeah. It it kinda ruined me a lot of Lord of the Rings in the sense of I’ve seen those movies so many times. And then if you go back and read the books, you read return of the king, and whatever happens in the movies ends, and there’s still, like, 50, 75 pages left. And you’re like, wait. What?

And there’s all this other stuff, and I feel like that’s what the movie is gonna be like in the sense of because I can’t remember this movie. I kinda remember this thing ending when Dumbledore fell out of the window, you know, or the fell off the tower. And I knew there was some stuff after that, but there was a good amount of, like, Dumbledore’s funeral and people dealing with their grief kinda situation Yeah. That we didn’t really get. It’s hard.

This was a really good it’s a really good book. There’s lots of fun moments throughout. I think probably Harry’s Felix Felicis was one of my favorite moments of it because you get so much stuff going on in there between that time with Hagrid and, like, him getting drunk or, like, not drunk because, like, he’s not he’s fake drinking, which I appreciate. He’s, like, fake drinking and then forcing the other 2 to get drunk, and they’re just, you know, toasting back and forth to everything and Aragog’s funeral to then his conversation with Slughorn, I thought all that all that was great too. But, yeah, the ending I mean, seeing the whole Infuri stuff, it just seems really cool.

Like, it was like, oh, this is a big magic moment kind of thing. Favorite character. I feel like in this, we get Lavender Brown has a bigger role in this book with, you know, with all the snogging and all. Obviously, Slughorn’s a new character. Mclaggon gets a bunch of screen time or page time, whatever the case is.

I’m sure he won’t even be in the movie. And then I guess we have, like, Fenrir Greyback, who is somewhat of a character. Did you have a I mean, obviously, it could be anybody else, but I was just saying the new ones. Did you have a favorite in this one? Mine was, Oh, yeah.

Of course. Mine too. Mine too. Oh, nice. Wow.

Alright. I mean, I just thought it was hilarious when Ron catches her making out with, Dean. I think Ron had a pretty appropriate response of, like, come on, man. Like, I don’t wanna see this shit. Like, this is my sister.

Like, and, like, you know, then, like, my buddy, Dean, I know that you’re doing it right in front of everyone so they can see it. And she’s, like, that’s because you’re a piece of shit that’s a prude that hasn’t done shit. You’re, like, making out with your pillow upstairs, you fucking loser. I was, like, oh my. She went 0 to 100 so quick.

Ron was, like, crying after it pretty much. I know he wasn’t crying, but he was crying. That was that was that was a tough look for him. And, she yeah. And then she’s, like, breaking up with people on whims.

She’s crushing it in Quidditch, then hooks up with her her brother’s best friend right in front of him and dares him to say shit. She’s like, what are you gonna do, bitch? I was, like, holy shit. Ginny is fucking flexing on everyone in this, book, and I I appreciate that. And you realize Ron’s just jealous because of all the inbreeding stuff.

Right? Good point. No. I mean, I thought Ginny is the only person in this entire book series who is living her Hogwarts experience. Like, maybe Hermione, but Hermione is doing it in her own way, which is, like, very bookish, which I appreciate as well.

But Ginny is, like, I’m in high school. I’m gonna have all these awesome experiences. And, like, yeah. I’m gonna date this one person, and I’m gonna date this other person. And I don’t care.

I’m enjoying myself. I’m enjoying my sexuality. I’m being a studded quidditch. I’m doing it all. And then snaps, like, she’s, like, quick witted and is, like, snapping back at people and whatnot.

Like, she gives no fucks. She had quite the glow up because she went from, like, not talking and being shy to, like, yo, I’m the biggest fucking cock in the walk in this whole school. She definitely found her confidence at a little she’s all that moment for sure. But and and that’s why I love Ginny so much in this book, and I think because of that is why I hate Ginny so much in Oh, in the movie. I see.

Yeah. I feel like you haven’t said anything about that. That’s weird. Do you hate it? Yeah.

I just because she has this moment. You know? I agree she was, like, shy and obviously was, like, scared of Harry and stuff at the beginning. And then like Hermione says, she’s like, oh, Ginny just, like, moved on at one point. And she was like, fuck it.

Like, I’m not gonna sit around obsessing with Harry. I’m gonna go and enjoy my Hogwarts experience. Like, we only go to get to go to Hogwarts once, so, like, let me go and enjoy this. So, yeah, Jenny Jenny was awesome. And she’s in the she’s in the DA.

She knows her spells. She’s, like, better at Quidditch than any of her brothers because she was out there on her own time practicing with their brooms when they wouldn’t even play with her. Excuse me. No euphemism. Easy.

No euphemism. Easy. But, yeah, it just it was awesome. It was awesome. I love Jenny.

Love Jenny. Magical element. Did you have anything here? I figured this is not spell, but magical element. So, obviously, I feel like Felix Felicis would would fit in would fit in here.

Yeah. I feel like that’s hard to not have. That was the best part of the book, I I think, or one of the best elements of the book. Definitely. Cool idea.

I I do wonder, and it was in my lingering questions, why doesn’t the ministry just have, like, 2 giant vats of Felix Felicis in case Voldemort comes back or, like, in case they have a wizard war? Or, like, why doesn’t Dumbledore have a bunch of this? Like, why isn’t there more of this around? Like, if Slughorn’s able to brew some up, shouldn’t they have their chemist, like, their wizard chemist, just brewing up Felix Felicis for moments that are needed? I think it’s because, one, it’s incredibly hard to make.

So it’d be like I guess gold isn’t that hard to come by. But, like, it’d be something that’s, like, extraordinarily rare commodity. But it’s hard to make it because it takes time, they said. It was like, oh, it takes 6 months. It’s like so people drink whiskey that’s been barreled for, like, to 30 years or whatever the case is.

Right. Right. But my assumption was, like, you couldn’t make that much quantity because there is some ingredient that’s impossible, you know, to get for it. So if it’s if it’s not a supply issue, then, yeah, you should have it on hand at all times and be ready to use it when needed. Yeah.

I think just in general, I like Felix Felicis for sure. I think in general, like, just always have a basil around. Imagine if you’re, you know, you’re going to a bachelor party, and it’s like, oh, the day we’re supposed to, like you know, you’re in Vegas. It’s like, we’re taking a trip to the Hoover Dam or going 4 wheeling. It’s like, oh, I I do.

I’ve been at the crap stables since till 4 AM just drinking. Swallow a bazor, and you’re like, I’m ready to go. So so I I love I love myself a bazor as well. For your spell, we get a couple I mean, obviously, they’re Snape related. We get Levio corpus.

Sectumsempra is obviously a huge thing in this book when Harry’s sectumsempra’s Malfoy’s blood all over the bathroom. Pretty pretty fortunate that Snape was right there because I feel like sectumsempra, like, you would just bleed out real, real quick. Mhmm. Yeah. They must have every kid’s blood type on file at Hogwarts.

You just have to. Right? I think blood types are made up, honestly. I’ve I’ve said it was. I’ve said it a thousand times.

I don’t get that What’s your blood type? Does that make any sense to you? I don’t know. I don’t know. I have no idea either.

Yeah. Is it isn’t that so weird that they there’s, like, a below? Like, how does that even work? I saw a good GIF. I think it was probably on Reddit or something like that That explained it was like a moving GIF of all the different blood types as, like, which blood type matches with the other ones.

You know, most of them match themselves, but then there’s the whole o situation which really throws everything off. And it was, like, a really well explained one, and I was like, oh, this is good. Now I understand it. And then I closed that window, and I forgot it immediately. I just I’m just trying to think of, like, the first person that’s like, we can use someone else’s blood and put it into someone, and it, like, saves their lives.

Like, oh my god. That’s incredible. And then someone did it and, like, killed them, and they’re like, well, I don’t know why that was. Yeah. I think there was a lot of that.

It was like, oh, this works sometimes. Like, okay. Let’s do it. Oh, okay. Just, like, didn’t.

So that’s how they found out. Okay. That makes sense. Watched at some point in my past, probably, like, you know, at work when you’re, like, in your twenties and you’re trying to sneak watching a YouTube video, like, during the day because you’re just doing boring stuff. And I watch, like, a 10 minute Discovery Channel thing about the figuring out of blood types.

Pretty interesting story. Oh, so there is something about it. Like, people, you know, obviously, people figured it out. I don’t know. I can’t remember when it was.

I wanna say, like like, early 19 100 or something like that, but but yeah. Crazy. Oh, did so did you have a spell? Mine was a charm. Oh.

The refill charm. Oh, yeah. I didn’t know this was a thing you could just do. Why are people buying new bottles of butterbeer? Just fucking keep refilling that bad boy.

Do you think they have, like, the bars have, like, they basically prevent you from doing charms or something? Like, what’s the you know what I mean? Like, what’s the reason not reflecting everything all the time? Yeah. Like, people that try to sneak in their own booze to a bar.

You know, when you’re younger and you’re, like, bringing nips into the bar to save some money Yeah. It’s like, nope. Sorry. You’re kicked out. And, yeah, it was a very interesting charm.

Between that and the ability to vanish stuff, it really makes me feel like Trelawny might be a squib because she’s using the room of requirements to hide her empty sherry bottles. And between this spell and the spell that just vanishes stuff, it seems like you could just she could just be refilling her sherry bottle. Like, you would never need to not do that. I wonder how that works because you could just why make any more? If it had a drop, you could turn that drop into 2 drops and turn that drop into 4 drops, and then this all of a sudden, you got a full glass.

So I like how also they’re like, not only is Trelawny a terrible, terrible teacher She’s a drunk. Yeah. She’s yeah. She’s she’s an alcoholic. Umbridge, though, she’s stuck for firing her.

Yeah. What? Yeah. Yeah. It’s also just hilarious that Trelawney specifically uses the room of requirements to hide her sherry violence.

Seems like the one of the worst reasons for it to use it. We do get a glimpse of, the Ravenclaw Diadem in in this one when they go into the the room requirements when Harry does. My favorite spell was Muffliato, which is, like, the silencing spell. I have a baby, so it really should explain itself. I have a baby and a dog that barks at everything, so I would love to just Muffliato all sorts of stuff and mainly those two things.

Favorite magical creature? We really only have Nfuri. Right? Are the only new ones? I went with Fenrir Greybuck Where are we at?

And him just being an absolute savage and not transforming and still eating people. So, I mean, that could be a great, great character. I’m guessing he’s not even in the movie. But oh, is he? Oh, okay.

I don’t know if he’s, like, tall enough who he is though. Okay. But that’s like a rugged that’s a rugged bad guy. I was, like, thinking, like, oh, if they if she ever wanna do, like, a a side quest book, that’d be a cool one to have where, like, his origin story or, like, how they I don’t know how his story ends in this. I forget.

But, like, that’d be a a villain that would be a good arc to to follow. Yeah. It kinda reminds me of, like, Sabertooth in X Men. I don’t know if you’re a big X Men guy, but, he kind of has that that Sabertooth vibe. But, yeah, it’s it’s pretty crazy that he just decides, like, I’m gonna go all in and just be a werewolf even when I’m not a werewolf.

And then Bill is, like, bit by him, and his only thing is he, like, likes red meat more. Like, he likes meat rare. But, yeah, they say Bill’s face is all messed up and stuff, so it must have been like a Hannibal Lecter type situation where his face just literally got eaten off. I I just had to go with the Infuri. I mean, we’re talking about the the living dead.

You know? I love zombie movies. I’m playing last of us, which is pretty much a zombie thing. But in general, I just love zombie movies, and that’s pretty much what what Inferry are. So Mhmm.

I had to go with them. Simple as that. Keith, what do we love about The Half Blood Prince? Great, great quote from Dumbledore. It’s the unknown we fear when we look upon death and darkness, nothing more.

That gave me chills. I fucking love that. Yeah. It’s funny you say that because a lot of people love dumby quotes and, like, know them from Harry Potter, and I couldn’t Oh, is that right? Yeah.

Yeah. It’s like a big thing. And I couldn’t think of 1 off the top of my head, but then when when I heard this line, I was, like, that’s a great quote. Like and so we were on the same page there because I heard it. I was, like, oh.

And it’s so true as well. I guess that’s why it’s such a great quote is because it is true as well. So, yeah, definitely gave me a little goose pimples myself. For love, I feel like this one just starts out with a bang. We usually kinda get a slow burn into it and although Goblet of Fire kinda starts with a bang too, but it’s almost like a greatest hits album in the first fifty pages of this one.

We get Dumbledore early, which we love. We usually don’t see Dumbledore or, like, get any real Dumbledore interaction till the end of a interaction till the end of a book. We get the burrow early. We both love the burrow. Everything that happens to the burrow is great except for the incest.

And, lessons with Dumbledore, it’s like, oh, Dumbledore’s gonna do lessons with me this year. So you’re like, okay. This year’s gonna be awesome because we get lessons with Dumbledore. We get even more Dumbledore. Harry becomes the Quidditch captain, which tells us there’s gonna be Quidditch.

We’re gonna get more Quidditch in this one, although his captainship is kinda slid in there, here and there, mostly with the tryout scene. But in general, it was like, wow. This is going to be awesome. And then it starts pretty much with, like, Dumbledore talking to Harry’s aunt and uncle, which was fun, and then them going to Slughorn. It was just such a great start that I was all in from the jump.

Great point. The the whole book, I mean, I think was was great because especially because I said the last book, book 5, I was a little bit disappointed because I had never remember thinking 5 was bad, and I placed it as my last place book. Yeah. This one, I think, really revitalized things, especially the second half, like I already mentioned in the ending. It was the first book too where, I guess, Goblet of Fire kinda ends negatively.

But we we catch the bad guy. We get the ultimate goal. Right? On most of the books, we have that same Yeah. It’s the same kind of thing.

Yeah. We the end is, like, we get a big reveal. Harry comes triumphantly, and we do it. Like we said earlier, he went 4 for 4. But this one, there was definitely really, like, a super, super solemn ending where nothing good happened.

The last one at least, like, Harry’s right. Voldemort’s back, and everyone believes him. This one, there’s no positive related at the end of the book here. It’s just, like, not only was he right about Snape, but Dumbledore is dead. And now he’s his big quest ahead, and, like, nothing good happened.

Yeah. So I like that. Guess we forgot about magic a little bit, but, like, horcruxes in general, which we really haven’t even talked about. On top of that, it’s like, now there’s 4 horcruxes out there that I don’t really even know what a few of them are, and how am I gonna find these? I don’t even have Dumbledore anymore.

It’s a low low. It’s Luke getting his arm cut off after fighting Vader and then the Empire taking out the entire resistance, and and we don’t know what’s gonna happen. You know, it’s that kind of a situation. So, yeah, I I love how it it’s so down at the end after being awesome, and you feel like the stakes are at as high as possible right now for Harry and team. So, yeah, big big fan of that.

And I kinda talked about it in my other love, but, you know, we just get so much Dumbledore in this. Like, we normally we see Dumbledore at the end of the book, and this, we’re seeing him throughout the entire book. He’s a main character in this story for the first time ever, and with him comes all of these trips into the pensive, which I I just loved. Hearing about Voldemort’s past was so interesting, and you don’t know why necessarily Dumbledore’s showing to him. I mean, as Sun Tzu says, know thy enemy.

So you think that’s probably the idea is, like, okay. You wanna know who Voldemort is. But then at the end, it’s revealed, like, oh, it was all because of this horcrux thing. And now we’re showing you, 1, you know, all that how Dumbledore found this cave situation and then also the other potentials for horcruxes. And you also see a lot of not only early Tom Riddle, but Tom Riddle’s family.

I love all origin stories, whether they’re good guys or bad guys. We’ve talked about this, but but bad guy origin stories are super fun. I did very much enjoy that as well. And then just for the ending in general, because this is obviously very big. Harry’s been talking about Snape this whole time.

Everyone’s defending Snape, and then Snape ends up killing Dumbledore. Like, do you basically, do you remember your first time reading this book and how that affected you? I think I remember someone spoiling it for me, but I almost, like, didn’t believe them. You know, one of those things where because I remember I read it probably, like, 5 days into the release. It wasn’t, like, one of those things where I you know, oh, I’ll, you know, I’ll save it for a month.

It was pretty quick. You remember when this came out, people were reading it that night. Like, it was a 24 hour turnaround. And so People were outside Barnes and Noble, like, I mean, for all of other books too, but, like, this one for sure, I remember I mean, and I’ve also seen a video, which is hilarious and terrible, by the way. I mean, you probably still find it on YouTube, of people at that time, like, lined out of Barnes and Noble for the midnight release and some guy driving by being, like, Dumbledore dies on page 726.

That’s so weird. Chasing the car down. Yeah. That guy should all similar to Umbridge, that guy should be murdered and, you know, no no issues with that. So yeah.

One of my friends did ruin it. It was a big thing, like, ruining the ending for someone. If you’d read this and someone hadn’t read it, that was the other reason why you had to do it. You had to read it quickly because you were gonna be screwed if someone ruined it for you. And and I had a friend at a party who was like she was like, oh, yeah.

Books are but someone said, like, you know, half blood. And he was like, oh my god. When Dumbledore died, it was crazy. She was like, I’m halfway through. What the fuck, dude?

I would be so mad. I would be so mad. I also remember thinking, and this could be revision of his story. Like, I probably maybe didn’t think this when I was the at the time, but I remember thinking, like, there’s no way Snape is actually bad because if that’s the case, then Dumbledore is one of the worst wizards of all time. It’s fair.

You know what I mean? Because he has such a bad book, I remember thinking. And I’m like, there’s no possible way that he could also be wrong about Snape because then, what the fuck? Why are we looking up to this guy? The guy sucked.

Like, you know, at that point, like, I was like, there must be he must be coming back from the dead or, you know, like, the white wizard situation in, in Lord of the Rings or something. I didn’t know. Something that was gonna happen, I thought. So I mean, so much is stolen from from LOTR that I wouldn’t be surprised if, you know, it’d be it would be terrible if if Dumbledore came back as, like, you know, Dumbledore the White because it’d be, like, so on the nose. But, yeah.

It’s possible. Yeah. Alright. I honestly didn’t have any hate. So if you did, feel free to fire away.

One is not taking Hagrid’s class. That that kinda got my code a little bit. It’s a gym class. You know what I mean? That’s what it is.

It’s gym. Yeah. And I also hate like, you mentioned earlier, Ginny living her best life and, like, living the shit to the full. She I don’t hear Ginny 1 one fucking time about her OWWLs. Right?

She doesn’t say shit. She’s just like, yeah. I’ll fucking crush studying, but, like, I’m still gonna fucking get it in. It’s fine. You know?

We’re good. But these guys are like, well, we are really busy. It’s a fucking gym class. You’re hanging out with your best friends, and you’re going hang out with your best friend teacher. Just take the class.

You know what I mean? Like, it’s not really me that much hard studying or anything like that. That pissed me off. I would have loved for some background on this one where it’s like, oh, what’s going on in Care of Magical Creatures? And they’re doing, like, the best possible creatures this year.

Like, Haggard just found his stride. You know, he was still learning. So he found his stride, and he’s doing awesome stuff. Because he even says and it’s in book 7. But he says, like, oh, we got some unicorn babies in this year.

Like, you could have been playing with unicorn babies, but instead, you babies in this year. Like, you could have been playing with unicorn babies, but instead, you decided not to take the class because it’s too much for you. Like, get out of here. Yeah. That annoyed me.

I also thought the the girl’s hating Floor, I kinda was on her side. She she was kinda being sassy and, like, dickish about everything the Weezies were doing. Mhmm. She’s like, this music sucks. Like, oh, that’s not how it cooks things.

It’s like, you’re being a huge bitch. Yeah. You’re a huge bitch. Kind of the yeah. You’ve gotta deserve all this shit talk you’re getting behind your back.

So I didn’t have any issue with that. But she’s gotta figure it out. I did like the moment that her and missus Weasley had with Bill, though. I think Yeah. That was nice.

That was nice. That was the one thing you’re like, oh, that’s the one redeeming quality issue. But in book 4, she was not this conceited. Or We didn’t really know, though. We didn’t we didn’t hang out there that much.

Yeah. And then the last one, Percy just coming in and opening the door. Oh my god. That may be the most anger I got. I was like, you can knock, you piece of shit.

Don’t let you ever walk into this house again. This is the Weezies house here. You’re not a Weezie anymore, you little bitch. And then how does he not understand that how that’s so messed up for how that would affect his family? Like, they love you, and they wanna see you, and you come into Christmas dinner just so that you can bring the minister magic, and then you get out.

Like, oh, like, I would never, even no matter what, I would never forgive him. This is bottom line. Like, the thing too is, like, you can understand where Voldemort’s coming from. He’s not that bad of it. You know what I mean?

Like, you’re like, I get it. He has got some motives. Percy is is a worse person in my mind. You know what I mean? I just think he’s a worse person.

Because what’s he doing this for? Like, so he can become a person like, a a political figure? Like, okay. So you’re turning you’re turning letting your family loose because of this. And this is after you know that Harry was right.

So you can just say, I’m my bad. You know, you can hand up this. It’s not a big deal. Yeah. That I hated that scene.

I got so angry. So I mine was just basically lingering questions. How many death eaters are there? You know, it’s not really clear. It seems like there’s this, like, small group of death eaters.

So, like, why are we super scared of them? Because every time we run into death eaters, it’s, like, the same group of people. So it seems like they should just be able to take care of that, and, like, Voldemort is the only one that they should really be worried about. Like, maybe Bellatrix. But yeah.

Well, they said it was, like, 30 to 1 at the at their height. So I think they’re, like, recruiting and getting people back in. Okay. 30 to 1 what? 30 death years for every 1 order of the phoenix.

Yeah. It’s also, like, why is the order of the phoenix the only one? Like, isn’t there an army? Like, isn’t there a wizard Isn’t there a wizard, special forces or something like that that can be involved in this? How do they identify wizards from muggle families?

You know, is this like a cerebral kind of thing, x men? Like, how do they know Riddle was a wizard? How do they know Hermione is a wizard? You know, how do they know these things? Yeah.

It’s a good. I thought it was similar to, like, the you’re using magic under 18. It’s kinda like saying and a half, which which brings me to the other thing. They said if you’re using magic when you’re under 18, it’s up to the pair under 17. It’s up to the parents to disclose that it was a child.

It that whole thing doesn’t make any sense to me. There’s a big thing in there about how they only knew Harry did it because he was in a muggle house that obviously had no other wizard people. Seems like some, antinonpureblood laws are just nice. Because then it’s like, oh, so Ron could do it under his house, and they wouldn’t know. So it’s up to the parents.

And if I was a parent, I would encourage my kid to use, like, simple magic at home so that when he was able to use magic, that he knew what he was doing. Just like Oh, yeah. Of course. I’d be like, yes. You can have a beer at home so that you understand when you go out that having 6 is probably not a good idea.

What? You think of, like, 8 or 9 is probably better? Like, there’s no point there’s no point in taking the calories. You’re only getting 6 beers. Like, let’s see.

Is that what you’re saying? Exactly. Yeah. If if Harry was so keen on what the Malfoy’s if, if, like, Draco was up to or he thought he did, why didn’t he use the map earlier? It seemed like he waited a while before pulling the map out.

He he was using it, but he couldn’t see where he was because he was in the room of acquiring. I know. But he kinda started that later on. Got it. The whole Horcruxes thing with Slughorn, like, not wanting to give the memory, the memory wasn’t that bad.

What what is he so ashamed of? You know? A student asked him some questions, and he answered them. And he in the memory, he was like, this is terrible stuff. You don’t wanna do this.

Also, Dumbledore being like, alright, Harry. You have all this shit you have to do, but why don’t you go get this memory out of him? And that’s your one job. And if you don’t do it, I’m not gonna give you I’m not gonna be like, it’s alright. Keep working on it.

I’m gonna give you the the stern. I’m not upset. I’m disappointed to talk. Yeah. We can’t talk again until you get it.

I I didn’t major in sales. Like, that’s not my job. Like, you know? Let me know what you think about this, but I thought it would have been almost better if we didn’t see that first scene with Snape talking with, Malfoy’s mom. Yeah.

That would have been a much bigger draw. I mean, it was still a big shock, but, like, that would have been even better, I thought. They’re setting you up to think Snape is which he does kill Dumbledore, but, like, is already a bad guy. So you’re then you’re like, oh, so he’s already a bad guy. We know that.

Yeah. I I liked it. I think it was good because, for one, I didn’t think Snape was gonna kill Dumbledore because I didn’t think about the unbreakable vow. I didn’t think about that at the end. Everything was happening so fast that I wouldn’t wouldn’t be able to recall back to that.

But then after reading the book and you’re thinking back on it, you’d be like, holy smokes. There’s a whole first chapter or whatever with Snape doing the unbreakable vow. Like, oh, interesting. And that also kinda ties back to, like, what Snape does in the future. In general, I liked it because of those things.

I I wouldn’t necessarily get rid of it, but I do understand what you’re saying. Alright. It’s time to award the house cup, Keith. Who gets the house cup for you for half footprints? Yeah.

House cup goes to, Harry and his big old nuts in this one. I mean, Harry was, like, shit talking and and bringing that that hate all all book. First, he runs into Draco’s mom, and he, like, point Blake right to her face. He starts shit talking. I was like, oh, the the respect your elders thing was thrown out the window real, real quick.

He’s shit talking Dumbledore, him and the, minister of magic guy. Magic. He’s grimjour. He just, like, goes out on nonstop. Yeah.

I was Imagine if the president of the United States walks into your house and you’re like, sit down, bitch. I got some words for it. Yeah. Oh, you want me to help you? I mean, kick rocks.

Stand, she’s I mean, I already mentioned on the Jenny, you know, positives, but he just went up to Jenny. Jenny, there’s no been no, like, romantic inclinations for the last, like, 5 years, and he just goes up to Jenny. He’s like, this is my girl now. And starts making out with her, like, no pretext. Nothing.

I’m like, Yeah. What? She just broke up with someone. I was like, goddamn. Harry’s got that fucking game, apparently.

Yeah. He’s like, JK Simmons in Oz or something like that. He’s just, like, the the cock of the walk and and walks up. He’s like, this is my prison bitch now. It’s like, oh, alright.

Sure. Whatever. That is a deep drop. I don’t know it. I but I’m I know Oz in a prison, so I was like, wait.

What? So Yeah. JK Simmons plays the most ridiculous character. But yeah. Yeah.

I couldn’t agree with Mohairi. Absolutely crushes it. I mean, I I understand that he hates the ministry so much, but, you know, the president of the United States walks into, you know, your house. You I feel like it’d be hard to be like, alright. Shut your mouth and let me talk.

I also don’t think that the I mean, as much that I hate the ministry, but I don’t think he was like, hey. We need some, like, moral support. Is he can you help us out? And he’s like, go fuck yourself. I was like, alright.

I guess that’s one way to I feel like you you’ll do a little scratch your back when you scratch my back thing there, and I’m I’m okay with that. A 100%. Or you’re like, hey. You have a negotiation. Like, his negotiation tactics aren’t there.

It’s like, okay. Hey. You guys have fucked me over a bunch of times. So I’m happy to show support for our government because they are the ones that are against Voldemort, but, like, we need some I need some other things. I need Stan Shunpike released so that in the next book he can start killing people because, he is a death eater, it turns out.

Spoiler alert for book 7. But, yeah, I I I agree Harry had some big old nuts in this one. And then he turns on the waterworks for Slughorn. Like, oh, my mom. I thought you thought she was your favorite student.

You know, he’s a little manipulative. Could have been in could have been in Slytherin, this kid. Could have been in Slytherin. Yeah. For my house cup, you know, I would love to give it to Dumbledore as an honor after his death and because we get so much of him in this book, but we’ve already discussed how he blew it.

And so I’m gonna give the house cup to Hogwarts itself. I think this book, we get a perfect little Hogwarts situation. I mean, early on, I loved all the Hogwarts stuff because we were learning about it. I’m really sad after reading this book because we know in book 7 that they don’t return to Hogwarts. And I know they do come back, obviously, for the battle of Hogwarts, which is awesome, and I’m excited to read that again.

But losing Dumbledore is one thing, but it’s even sadder to leave, like, the mundane Hogwarts life forever, which is what we’ve experienced. Like, all the little stuff that happened in the last 6 books about, you know, them just silly things that happen in class or on the Quidditch pitch or going down to Hagrid’s hut or just in the hallways or with peeves. All those little things that really didn’t have anything to do with the plot line, but had so much to do with building this story up. I loved all of that and knowing that it’s over and, really, Hogwarts is only back for this, like, epic battle scene is just really sad, you know, because Hogwarts has so much majesty and beauty and so much amazing things that happened in that place that losing that is really sad. And I know that, you know, we’ve read these books a bunch of times, and I can always go back and revisit them, but I’m not gonna be doing that anytime soon.

So it almost feels like I’m losing something all over again, and I just love Hogwarts so much. So, you know, I had to give the house cup to Hogwarts. It’s got so many fun mysteries and all the little things. You know? If those walls could talk, I’m I’m sad sad we’re leaving Hogwarts.

I’m honestly more sad about that than than losing Dumbledore on this reread. I used to think it was like, oh, this is terrible. We lost Dumbledore. But after this reread, it’s like he’s in the other books, like, a little bit. He’s in this book a lot.

I I loved what we got, but I didn’t care as much this time around that he wasn’t gonna be in it anymore. But you said mundane. That word is a negative connotation, but it’s the the mundane part is the best. Yeah. Exactly.

I wanna be in the mundane, if that’s the case. Exactly. Like, whatever they say. Like, life’s the things that happen is you’re waiting around for other stuff to happen or some bullshit like that. I don’t know what the quote is, but that’s what Hogwarts is.

Dumble coaties. Dumpy quotes. There we go. Dumpy quotes. Alright, Keith.

What do we got coming up next? Finishing this thing out. We got the movie up next, and then we’re gonna do close it out, book 7. I don’t even know what we’ll do after this. Yeah.

We have to go on vacation or something. We should have saved Red Rising for after this. I know. That’s a big mistake. We’ll figure something out.

But Someone’s gotta give us the best series of all time. Someone’s gotta pass it along. Well, the journey is almost over, but I’m I’m excited to watch this movie because I feel like I don’t remember it whatsoever. So I’m excited for that. And then, obviously, I’m already into book 7.

I I’m pretty much have not listened to any, like, sports stuff, and I’m just listening to this book because I love it so much. So so I’m excited for that too. Alright, Keith. I’ll, I’ll catch you for the the movie next time, and you guys can come back and finish the journey with us. Indeed.

Bye now. Bye now.

The Buddies weren’t too happy about the 5th Harry Potter movie, “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix”, where apparently the longest book in the series got hit with a shrinking charm. The Buddies discussed many important topics including: Death Eaters’ and the Lost tv show crossover, Filch’s unexpected workout routine, and whether the movie’s pacing deserves to be thrown through the mysterious veil. So, grab your truth serum (which may or mayn’t be fake), avoid any suspicious-looking smoke clouds, and join us as dissect (attack) this movie for 45 minutes.

Intro (0:00-1:35)
Stock Up/Down (1:36-26:10)
Favorite Scene/Character (26:11-28:38)
Love/Hate (29:39-42:15)
Studio Notes (42:16-43:44)
Listener Email (43:45-45:02)
Conclusion (45:03-47:35)

NEXT BOOK: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J. K. Rowling

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to the book club. I’m Dylan here with which is the abbreviated and unintelligible version of Keith just like the movie is to the book. Keith, what’s up buddy? I thought you were speaking in partial mouth there.

Okay. I am not a partial mouth. No. We’re working out some box office bangers here at the Buddy Book Club, and this week, we’ll be discussing 2000 and seven’s Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix, the film. If you’d like to recommend a book or movie for us to read or watch, you can reach out to us about past episodes on, buddybookclub.com or send us an OWL on Twitter or Instagram, Buddy Book Club Podcast.

You can listen to us on iTunes, Spotify, or every gear podcast. So give us a review. 5 stars, if you will. And, you know, give us a follow on social channels, please, and thank you. Keith, so we had done the Order of the Phoenix book, which you finished way before I did.

Sorry. Having a baby kinda threw me off there. And then I was excited to sit down and watch a movie because it took me so long to read the book. I feel like I hadn’t watched a Harry Potter movie in a while. With having the baby and sleeping schedules and with your significant other, you see each other, but you you don’t see each other because you’re kind of one person’s trying to get some sleep while the other person’s taking care of the baby and you’re you’re just kinda like 2 ships passing in the night.

So I felt like this was gonna be a great opportunity for us to sit down and, together, just enjoy a Harry Potter movie. You thought wrongly. We definitely got to sit down together, which was nice, but enjoy the Harry Potter movie. We did not. That being said, let’s get into some stock up stock down.

Keith, what do you have for stock up for this film? Yes. Stock up, the TV show Lost. Oh. Yeah.

Well, it’s just, for those who haven’t watched. That’s probably the most enthralling TV show I ever watched, at least the first three seasons. Binge watching was not a thing Yeah. Back in the day. That became a thing.

Well, for me, at least with Waz, that was the first show I ever binged. How did you binge it? It was on ABC. They used to do it on their own site. So it was abc.com.

Right. Right. And you go and just stream it. So I would just I’d get back. It was a college.

I’d get back and I’d just be like I gotta get like 3 episodes of Lost in right now. Like, you know, every between every class I was watching it. The problem was, as I pointed out and many I’m sure, is that a lot of stuff was never answered so it became pretty disappointing at the end. Yeah. One of the biggest things that wasn’t answered was what was the black smoke monster?

Mhmm. Well, it turns out they were just death eaters. Yeah. If they just said that, I would have understood and, honestly, that’s why it’s a stock up for Lost. But turning to the page to the Harry Potter side, what the hell did I just watch?

What was that fight scene, d man? That was the dumbest thing I’ve ever seen. And then the one thing I told talked about the book episode is I didn’t understand what the veil was. I was like, well, it’s gonna be great as the the movie’s gonna explain. Yeah.

You’ll see. Very visual appealing. The veil didn’t mean anything. In the the book, correct me if I’m wrong, he, like, gets knocked into the veil, and he and he’s dead. Well, he evaded cadavers or I think as you call it, like, abracadabras or something.

In the clip, you’re laughing at me saying that. I didn’t know that. I thought you’re laughing because that was funny that I said that. I’m mispronouncing it. Is that what you’re laughing there?

Yeah. Well, which is also funny because when we were watching the movie, I think Helen Bonham Carter, who plays Bellatrix Lestrange, the wife pointed this out. I’m pretty sure she says abracadabra. Like, I don’t think she actually says Avada Kedavra. She was like a Juilliard trained actor.

I’m pretty sure. So we’re on the same page. Yeah. But in the book, he he gets, abracadabra ed and then and then falls into the veil. Yeah.

Oh, I mean, he’s dead because he had abracadabra then. That was my whole point. It’s like there’s no mystery. If you get hit by a spell, a death spell, you’re you’re dead. It doesn’t matter that you went into the veil.

And I thought he got like, a stun spell and then, like, fell into it, and then he was, like, where did he go? And then they’re, like, yeah. He’s done. Yeah. I That’s what I thought.

Yeah. I mean, I I think I’d have to revisit it. I’m, like, almost certain, but maybe I’m just tainted from seeing the movie a few times that but, no, because Bellatrix kills him. You’re assuming if she just, like, stunned him and he went into that. But, yeah.

Yeah. I mean, there’s no really, like, mystery then if you shoot a killing spell at someone. They it’ll be like, the guy got shot in the head, but, like, then I didn’t see his body after it. It’s like, yeah. The but you saw the bullet go through his brain.

Right? It’s like, yeah. But what happened to him after that? It’s like, oh, he’s dead. What do you mean?

So So you didn’t like that fight scene? Oh, I hated it. What is the point of the, like, the the clouds of smoke coming and then the white clouds being the good guys, the black clouds coming and being the bad guys and, like, it’s like this is the dumbest thing. I don’t know. They’re just like, oh, this is what magic looks like.

Why don’t we just take the the source material and actually use spells? Mhmm. And, like, the worst part too is, like, the Dumbledore Voldemort fight. Yeah. It was just Star Wars where they’re doing, like, electricity and, like, blocking it instead of the book was perfect.

Like, why did you not just they spent all their budget on the the the special effects of the smoke, and they’re, like, we can’t spend any of it on in this fight. We’ll just do it to lightning bolts. They definitely couldn’t spend it on the centaurs. The centaurs looked like something from, I don’t know, 1995 or, like, or, like, David versus the Argonauts or whatever that, like, 19 sixties movie is with claymation. I was like, wait.

Good thing they’re not having any close ups of these centaurs because they’re terribly done. But I want to just quickly on the smoke thing because that’s obviously sticking in your craw. I had the death eaters as, like, I wasn’t sure if I loved or hated it because the costumes, like, the Death Eaters costumes, I think are phenomenal. The Death Eaters show up straight up in their costumes. Lucius Malfoy does little things, so, like, his mask kind of smokes away.

I was like, that’s cool. That’s super cool. Yeah, I was fine with that. And then when they all start doing the smoke monster stuff, I thought it was the dumbest shit I’d ever seen. I was like, wait, I’m confused.

So everyone just flies around as smoke, and then like they’re apparating, but they’re just flying around as smoke around the kids and whatnot. Why would you ever And it seems like they can cast spells from their smokes state, so it’s like why would you ever land? Like why would you ever assume this human shape? It seems like you’re impossible to hit when you’re a smoke monster. And I agree like the I understand obviously the contrasting versus like light and dark, but like where does that come from?

Why not just like you said, use the source material, have an actual battle where people are just standing and fighting, not this like pseudo apparition thing going on? Because I assume that’s what they’re doing. They’re like apparating but in slow motion. Yeah. It became a sci fi movie instead of a movie in the real world that has meant there was also some sort of logic base of like, hey, you need to learn these spells and everyone can cast different spells and some people are better at certain things and it’s a training.

And this is just like, oh, I’ll just turn into a magic smoke monster. We’ll just fly around. There’s like no particular strategy or anything going on. It’s just Yeah. It it went from like Harry Potter to Tron all of a sudden for I don’t even get it.

And I It’s a lost. Yeah. And I couldn’t agree with you more on the on the Dumbledore Voldemort thing because I had forgot a bunch about this movie because I hadn’t seen it in so long. And after reading the book, how we were pretty jazzed about that that Voldemort, Dumbledore fight because it was the one of the first ones that we felt like it wasn’t just people casting expelliarmus against each other, and it was like an actual, oh, this is real magic situation. And then they first connect with their wands, and I was like, oh, this is Star Wars.

I thought the exact same thing. I was like, oh, this is just emperor versus Yoda situation. They did mix in a couple of things, you know, Dumbledore with the fire snake and and, excuse me, Voldemort with the fire snake and Dumbledore with like the water stuff in the glass which I thought that part was pretty cool but just make the statues come to life and defend you or whatever the the things that were going on in the book. It just yeah. Unfortunately, they went for the spectacle which I feel like isn’t needed for diehard Harry Potter fans.

You know, a bunch of people that are going to go see this movie obviously aren’t diehard Harry Potter fans but they’re Harry Potter fans presumably or the parents of kids that are Harry Potter fans. So who cares about those people? They’re paying for their ticket anyways. So just just make it Harry Potter and don’t make it this new I don’t know. Like you said, this, like, new sci fi thing.

Yeah. I I couldn’t agree with you more. My first and I think my only stock up unfortunately here for this one, but we’re trying to abbreviate just like this movie did, whereas casting directors, so I have to stock up to casting directors. It’s not something we talk about ever in any of our few movie pods that we’ve done and not something I really think about, but I wanted to give a shout out to, Fiona Weir, who’s the casting director for this one. We do have a couple new characters like we talked about when we did the book version, but we have Luna, Umbridge, and Bellatrix.

And talk about going 3 for 3 at the plate. I mean, we got Evanna Lynch as Luna, which I think was like an open casting call. They they picked her out of, like, 15,000 applicants or something like that. So I feel like that’s equally easy and hard to pick out someone that’s that good. You probably just have a couple of minutes with people, and I thought she was the perfect Luna Lovegood.

What do you think? Yeah. I went 3 for 3, I thought. Yeah. Imelda Staunton as Umbridge did that character perfectly.

Her uhmes were were great. She was so hateable, which is exactly what we need. Wasn’t as toadish as she is in the book, which, I appreciate because Imelda seems like a a a nice person, and we didn’t wanna return her into a toad. And Helen Bonham Carter as Bellatrix, not necessarily her you thought it was more of a fight club situation, but crazier than that for sure. Yeah.

No. I thought it was on par hair wise and, like, I think her teeth were a little bit fucked up. But, yeah, otherwise, I mean, she just can play that role perfectly. Yeah. I guess they wanted the woman.

I can’t remember the the actress’s name is from Peaky Blinders who eventually plays Narcissa. So she was supposed to be the, the Bellatrix, but then she got pregnant. She was like, oh, I’m not gonna be able to do the fight scenes. I can’t become a smoke person if I have a baby in me. It’s like, you know, you can’t do that in your 1st trimester.

So re recasting her. You know, before we continue to go on this dark hole of of hating on this film, I think, those three characters, the the acting and just the way that they took that character on, I thought was perfect. I thought that was the truest love to the book itself was how these actors portrayed these characters. Did you have any of the stock ups? Yeah.

Last one was just, Cho Chang stock up. Oh, interesting. Came up pretty pretty good in the movie compared to the book, I thought. In the book, it’s obviously her friend who who gives them up and but then she defends them which we both didn’t care for. Mhmm.

But in this, she gives them up and it’s only because she’s influenced by the truth serum which in the book was fake. So that opens up another whole can of worms there, but I don’t think the truth serum was fake. You keep saying that, but I’m not sure it was in the book. Snape basically said that the the truth serum was fake. We need we need someone to check us out.

Yes. In Harry Potter the Lord of Phoenix, Snape does indeed give Dolores Umbridge a fake baricitarium, potion when Umbridge interrogates Harry Potter. She demands that he drinks. During interrogation, Harry drinks blood. Yeah.

Oh, okay. Good to know. Yeah. So, you yeah. You’re understood right.

Hand up. I’m a close reader. Yeah. Alright. I’m a close Anyways, where was it?

Yeah. With Cho. So this is really a hate in disguise. Honestly, I don’t know if it’s a stock up, but it’s really a hate disguise. 1, I I the middle of the night, I woke up and I was just thinking about this.

I was like, goddamn it. This pisses me off. Filch and Malfoy in the movie Mhmm. Know what the real requirement is. They see it.

Right? Yeah. Like that that’s a big change. Big montage. The the mystery is just like how they get in.

How do they get in there? So what does giving a truth serum to Cho do? It doesn’t make any sense. They give her a truth serum. So in essence would be to tell them where the room is, but they already know where it is.

And then okay. Fine. They give her the truth serum so they can get in. How do they get in there? They just blow the door down.

Yeah. So they didn’t need the truth serum at all. Cho didn’t need to tell them where it was. What is she in trouble for? Why do they use the it didn’t make any sense.

JK would never let this fly. And So whoever the screenwriters were, the directors were, what are we doing? It doesn’t make it’s just like a biggest plot hole. Makes the most sense at all. Yeah.

David Yates was the director. This was his first And he does all the rest of the movie. This is his first Harry Potter movie and really kinda like his first real movie. He was like a TV, director, and supposedly the producers hired him after a bunch of other people said no, which is always a a tough one. They hired him because I guess in the TV shows he had done some, like, British TV shows, it was kind of political, but not really hammering down on the politics.

It was more like using the rest of the story to kind of show this political ideology in rid of the cases. I don’t know. I’m saying that terribly, but I understand the idea because that’s kind of what this what this movie and this book is is it’s, you know, there’s a lot of politics going around in the wizarding world that Mhmm. Are touching Hogwarts all of a sudden, and Harry’s at the center of it with Dumbledore. So so I understand that why you’re trying to trying to tell a story, but also get this political stuff that’s going on in the society into it.

I don’t know if that’s the the number one reason to hire someone for for a story. I’m not gonna say it’s necessarily all his fault. I agree that the script was not good. It was the longest Harry Potter book, 870 pages in the US edition, so the longest Harry Potter book at the time. And it’s comes out to be the 2nd shortest film.

So I’m sure there was some studio pressure to shorten the film because the last goblet of fire was, like, almost 3 hours. Right? It was, like, 2 hours and 45 minutes. So they probably didn’t want another one of those. It it missed the mark, unfortunately.

And Mhmm. To your Cho point, the only problem I had with with that is it kinda makes it seem like Harry dumped Cho because she turned them in and then finds out later, oh, she didn’t turn him them in. Like it was, you know Right. Ferritos serum or whatever the case is. Because Harry gives this look when he finds out like, oh, shit.

Which I feel like would be you’d be able to fix that with Cho, you know. Right. Or she would just say They drugged me. Which they were doing to all the kids in the school. Mhmm.

Like I don’t know why that was added in. They already knew where the the room was. I mean, I don’t know. It just didn’t make any sense. Yeah.

And they also had that weird scene with the the Weasley twins when they’re, like, rubbing that little boy’s shoulder being, like, it hurts at first, but then it goes away. And I was like, what? And then I was like, oh, they’re Umbridge’s office. Got it. Turrets.

Well, I’m just saying. It’s like the what the line was. It was very confusing. Yeah. I used to like that too.

It really wasn’t. Yeah. They wasn’t also very implied. They should’ve just showed his hand. Yeah.

They didn’t. So you don’t you’re like, what are you doing? What’s going on? Yeah. They’re just, like, all up in this kid’s business, like, in his personal space telling him it hurts at first.

I was like, woah. Also to close it out, the river requirement, another stock down. You like it, but we got the mistletoe coming out when Harry gets his first kiss. Mhmm. And then he keeps kissing and he gets it keeps growing.

Mhmm. How about giving me a nice little bed there? You know, it’ll help my boy out a little bit. Yeah. That’s on you.

You know that. Indeed. Hopefully, you know, they’re they’re practicing, important stuff at at Hogwarts, and there’s some Trojans going on in the room of requirement for for him right there. Yeah. They also, they also show in that montage a few times, like, them sneaking out of a side door in the room of requirements, which one doesn’t exist.

But if it did, why wouldn’t they just do that when Umbridge came and blew the door down? Nice stock up, Keith. Really good. Really well done. My first stock down, because we’ll go there, is, CliffNotes stock down.

We’d have them lying around either like my sister had them or I’d buy them, whatever they can. Super useful. I feel like they’ve probably gone the way of the dough. Oh, you’re the physical one there? I went online once.

Oh, no. No. Yeah. I mean, we were, like, at that point. We both graduated high school in the early 2000.

So we were at that point when the Internet still hadn’t necessarily caught on and, like, the stuff you could find on there, I found wasn’t perfect. And go to the bookstore and they have these cliff notes you could buy for, like, $5 or whatever the case is. Yeah. We used to use it a lot. It’s funny.

I feel like now it just that just doesn’t exist anymore. But I just wanted to get some stock down to cliff notes because the the actual books themselves were quite useful. Like, they told exactly what the story was, you know, then they’d have some things in the back with, like, themes and whatever. You know, the stuff you’d normally find at the desk, very useful. It seems like they were trying to cliff note this book into a movie and unfortunately, they ruined the whole idea of cliff notes because they didn’t do a very good job of it.

And you know, I just wanted to call it a couple of things. Ron and Hermione being prefects, not included. I think that is somewhat important because it seems like what they wanted to do here was really focus on Harry and his, like, emotional journey through the book. I was gonna say, you could have just stopped at Ron and Hermione, not including getting into that at the prefect. They were, like, barely in the movie.

Yeah. And the prefect thing is a big early situation for Harry’s emotional journey is what the heck, Ron and Hermione are prefects and I’m not. I didn’t understand why that wasn’t included. Another thing is the Quidditch scenes, the entire Quidditch everything was taken out of this movie. How do you feel about that?

Because I personally think, yeah, it sucks, but I can understand if you’re trying to cut out a half hour, take out the Quidditch stuff. It’s not the most important. Yeah. No. I I was fine with it.

I don’t think it was crucial to this one. Yeah. It’s it’s unfortunate in the sense that I feel like the Quidditch is more of a Ron story in order of the Phoenix, the book. You know? And for Ron’s entire story arc throughout the series, it’s unfortunate because it show it’s like a big thing for him in terms of wanting to do something, failing at it miserably, and, you know, but then making his big save at the end or whatever the case is.

I think I think that’s that’s big for him. Unfortunately, we don’t get that in this. And, you know, for me, the biggest part of the cliff notes that was a stock down was that it seems like the middle portion of the book was just compressed and condensed into an in understandable or whatever the case is story that was mostly just like a series of montages, like Umbridge. Yeah. The entire Umbridge taking over Hogwarts, creating her special orders, sitting in on lessons to the creation of the inquisitorial squad and the sacking of Trelawney, which is several chapters in the book, was compressed down to one montage.

Up until the sacking of Trelawney, it was one montage. That’s my stock down. It’s montages. I’m a huge montage guy. Give me the give me Rocky training in the mountains.

Give me Rocky running through Philadelphia. Yeah. All montages, I’m a big fan of. I feel like oceans all the oceans movies have wonderful montages. Oh, yeah.

You’ve got a nice little, music track behind it. Oh, I’m all I’m all in. This movie just terrible. The montages they did to the worst one what by far was the the filter is now just the comic relief trying to get in. Yeah.

It was like, it was like Tom and Jerry like, It was very Looney Tunesy kinda situation. Exactly. Looney Tunesy. Do you remember, V for Vendetta, Stephen Fry Yeah. Who was the narrator?

Yeah. Exactly. Remember when he does the scene where he’s making fun of the chancellor and the terrorist guy with mask is running around the world? That music, you know, playing in the background. Benny Hill music on.

That was the whole scene with Filch. It was like this wacky music. We went from this, like, dark Harry’s disturbed and he’s possessed intro which I thought was great, actually. I thought the first, like, 15, 20 minutes was really good. And then we went to the from that to Umbridge which is great.

And then we hit a point where then montage just started and, like, newspaper clubbing started. Mhmm. And from there, it became Looney Tunes and silliness and, like, skipping, like, 90% of the story. It’s like, what’s going on? It didn’t it, like, it was a completely different movie all of a sudden.

Yeah. And that happened for the next, like, 70 minutes. So Yeah. I’m glad you brought up the the newspaper stuff too because it seemed like they were, like, doing exposition. I mean, they definitely were and, like, trying to say parts of the story through these, like, newspaper stuff, which I didn’t necessarily hate because I get the idea that, you know, that’s the political aspect is, you know, there’s a media portion to this and there is a media portion to the story itself too.

But then once again with the cliff notes, like, getting rid of the whole Rita Skeeter thing telling Harry’s side of the story and him getting shit on for that and then also that being the reason why Seamus comes back to him and says he believes him. I feel like that. You know, you could’ve just said that in a quick scene too. It didn’t have to be a big deal. It seems like Yeah.

They kinda just were pushing everything together as one and trying to tell the story. A lot of the stuff, I didn’t necessarily hate. I’m like, the some of the shifts that, like, who did what and when. The Weasley twins doing their fire thing, not like, their firecracker thing, not to help Harry get to the fireplace or whatever. You know, they just kinda take these out.

Like, Neville does the shows them the room of requirements instead of Dobby. Although, like, you know, we love Dobby, and Dobby’s a big character. The the later books and movie, you know, you have to have that emotional support. But at the same time, I’m alright with them. Not seeing Neville at Saint Mungo’s and instead Neville telling Harry, you know, the room requirements, those stuff is fine.

Like, I understand when you wanna, like, cut bigger scenes out to kinda compress them and change who did what and when as long as it still continues to tell the story. But just pushing everything together and then making it silly and not really in line with the theme of the book in my mind kinda pissed me off. I think they could also just not had Trelawney and made that scene Hagrid. That would have made way more sense. Okay.

Well, Trelawney is I don’t know anything about her in the story. She just comes in for one scene and then she’s getting fired and you’re like, alright, I guess. You’re not really pulling for her at all. Whereas if Hagrid gets fired in front of everyone, you’re like, what the fuck? It seems like a lot of interesting choices that didn’t add or help this the story at all.

I agree. What else, Chip? Having Harry’s back stuck down. Harry comes into the Gryffindor common room, like, early in the the movie and everyone’s murmuring and looking at him funny. And I know it’s there’s, like, division between even in Gryffindor.

But right there is Fred and George. And even they are looking at him, like, what do you like, what’s what’s Harry doing here? And then then Seamus this is, like, the most illogical thing I’ve ever heard in my entire life. Like, honestly, I almost, like, stopped the movie to rewind it because they walk in. It says, like, Harry on the front cover being, like, Harry is a complete piece of shit fraud.

He just saw someone get murdered right in front of his eyes 2 months ago. And they’re like Harry walks in. It’s like, what’s going on, guys? And he’s like, well, Seamus is having a really, really tough time. They’re like, why is that?

He’s like, well, his mom almost didn’t let him come to school. What? That’s your argument? Logic makes no you literally are talking to a guy that has his face on the cover of a newspaper saying this guy’s a piece of shit, and he just saw someone murdered. Everyone helping Seamus out.

What where is the logic in this? So it doesn’t make any sense. And then Fred and George don’t say shit. Like, in Fred and George are are regardless of what Harry has done for them or know about the orthopedics, they obviously know that. Mhmm.

They obviously are not just want wants to keep their mouth shut, would a 100% step up and and talk shit back to Seamus. They would defend his honor a 100% of the time. Plus, Harry just gave him a 1,000 galleons 2 months ago. They had the double motivation to do that. And they just sit back, and they’re like, yeah, Harry.

It’s like, it doesn’t make any sense, d man. Or they’d lean into it heavy and be like, Harry sucks. You know? And and Yeah. Yeah.

I wouldn’t have to. I’d be fine with that even. Yeah. Exactly. Just as, like, a a joke to them as, like, obviously, Harry doesn’t suck, but they were just leaning into it heavy.

And the and the worst part is, like, I I mentioned, we don’t really see Ron or Hermione much. Hermione were 3 words into the movie. Sirius just to, like, told them, like, yeah, people are disappearing. All this stuff’s happening. And Hermione, like this, like, dramatic moment.

We’ve already know about the art of Phoenix. We already know about Harry’s everything in the back story. Hermione looks off into the distance and says, wow, he’s really out there talking about Voldemort. It’s like, yeah. Where have you been?

Where have you where have you been this whole time? Oh, oh, he’s out there? I didn’t even realize that. In the movie canon, she was too concerned about not getting those letters at the end of last year that she forgot about the whole Voldemort thing. The letters from Harry and Ron went at the end of 4 when she’s like, you guys will write me.

Right? It’s like, wait. What? Voldemort’s back. You’re concerned about getting written to?

She she’s been checked out on this whole Voldemort thing since then. She’s like, guys, I just figured it out. Voldemort’s back. Like, what the hell? Yeah.

I felt like the whole all the school stuff in terms like the pressure for O. W. L. S was was really kinda taken out of it, which it’s it’s a long book. I get it.

But like you said, it’s just her Hermione and Ron just aren’t really big characters. They’re just, like, pieces set pieces in this thing. And I guess if you were to cut something, they spent, like, 15 minutes on Harry’s courtroom scene, which that could have been compressed down to to 2 minutes. Just like, oh, they say, you know, they say that you did this and he’s like, I I didn’t. And then Dumbledore comes in and he’s like, oh, we have this woman.

Okay. Gotta go. Bye. Well, the pacing for everything up to the first 20 minutes was, like, this is a normally paced movie. Yes.

It’s making sense. Yes. And then, like I said, at the 20 minute mark, which is, like, right after that, they’re, like, oh, shit. We know we have to now compress the 80% of the book in the next 40 minutes. It’s like, Oh, okay.

It’s like when you or I are taking ROWLs, we spend the first hour on the first three questions, and we’re like, wow. We really did a good job. And then you flip the page and you realize You’ve got a big another set of questions. You’re like, oh my god. And you just start circling things.

It’s kinda like half how this one felt. Did you have a favorite scene? Fred and George, scene even though the context wasn’t really great, the them leaving Hogwarts. I think that hit. I think that was pretty good.

Yeah. The whole I mean, not to bring more hates, but, like, the whole him nailing decrees into the wall, I don’t care. That was, like, 5 to 10 minutes of the film of him just showing him hammering. It’s, like, what is this who is this for? What does this matter?

Part of the montage. I don’t know. Maybe, like, stock up to Filters’ workout reg regimen because I feel like Filcher’s in the movie more than half the characters. Yeah. Not in the main characters.

Let’s be honest. Right? He was. Yeah. A 100%.

Yeah. Stock up to Filcher workouts. Well, he’s able to hammer those things with him. Yeah. That’s true.

You gotta respect it. Yeah. I guess, for me, my favorite scene, I don’t know, I guess, like, the hall of prophecy stuff, just to see all those prophecies everywhere, was pretty cool. The ministry itself, it’s our first look into the ministry, really. I did like the ministry as a whole.

I thought that was, like, a cool set and, like, setting. So, like, stuff that happened in there, I thought was was fun. I was it was unfortunate to me that we didn’t get more of the stuff going on with the Time Turners. I mean, when the guy’s head gets stuck in the Time Turner, it goes from, like, baby to old man or stuff like that. Wow.

That would have been cool to see. The whole brain situation with Ron would have been would have been cool to see. So it’s unfortunate it really just got chalked out to the the hall of prophecies with smoke monsters and then the veil room with smoke monsters. That that was unfortunate, but I did like the the ministry in general. And I thought the thestrals were were well done as as well.

Although the the the reason for them, they’re like, we gotta get out of here. Let’s fly. And it’s like, well, the thestrals have a good sense of direction. That’s why they’re important. And then they didn’t have their broons, which you don’t cover in because they don’t play Quidditch ever.

So Yeah. Like, the whole reason for them flying didn’t make any sense. So That’s that’s true. How did you feel about instead of Hagrid having a class with the thestrals and explaining it to them, it’s just like Luna and Harry in the Forbidden Forest and Luna giving the whole thestral talk. Yeah.

I didn’t I I was fine with that. I mean, she was just a great actress. I agree. I I have more Luna screen time I I wasn’t I wasn’t too upset about, which takes me to picking my character, which for this movie would, you know, similarly, we picked it for the book. But I thought Luna I I Lunar ombreage again for me.

Simple as that. It’s just Mhmm. It’s Lunar ombreage. I can do a montage about it, but I won’t. I want pound for pound or time on screen to impact Bellatrix.

Oh. I think she was she was more scary than Voldemort. Oh, Voldemort showed up, like, I don’t care. I wanna see more of Bellatrix. What she’s about?

Alright. Love, Hate. What do you got for love? I already mentioned it first, like, 20 minutes of movie. I thought it was very solid.

It was dark. It was kind of right to the point. I appreciate it. Although, I will say, I keep on looking out for Tonks because I remember you saying Tonks is Caroline’s favorite character. Mhmm.

And I was like, I don’t even know who Tonks is when you said that. I was like, I don’t remember her at all. Keep on waiting her to shine through, but when they introduce her in this, first of all, she’s super young. Secondly, I was like, is that Harry’s love interest in this movie? Because she was literally I fucking the shit out of him to to quote, wedding crashers.

Both of them, they were, like, flying and, like, winking at each other. But but I didn’t know this is the like, this new love interest in the movie. You mean when they’re super secretly wizard flying, like, through the streets of at the streets in the river Thames? And it’s like, what? Yeah.

It’s not very many people there. Don’t worry about that. It’s Caroline’s favorite character in the books, not necessarily the the movie. I feel like in the movie, she has whatever happens there. Didn’t she do, like, funny faces at Christmas, or is that in the next movie?

She did that. She was that was it. She was in the movie for the flying scene, and then she did, like, pig face, and they never showed her ever again. Yeah. It’s like, oh, she has the ability to make pig faces.

Weird. She’s much better in Game of Thrones. She plays the wildling Game of Thrones. Yep. Oh, that’s right.

Okay. Good call. Yeah. My first love was the direction of Ginny Weasley. So the director’s job of directing the the Ginny Weasley character.

Order of Phoenix should be the biggest movie yet for Ginny, and that’s saying something considering Well, the second movie, she should be, right? She should be in that as well, which she’s less of than in the book. But even in the book, she’s more of, like, bits and pieces of her in the background and then, like, her being really nervous or running off and stuff like that just to kinda lead up to the end. She’s not really having long conversations. It’s like someone asking, hey, Ginny, are you okay?

And then her being like, oh, I’m fine, but not being fine. Whereas in this book, she’s kinda starting to hang out with the gang. You know, she’s in the DA. She’s goes to the ministry with them. It’s a whole thing.

And, eventually, she’s Harry’s love interest. And, you know, this should be the really the movie that you ramp her up because she’s gonna be in the next one a lot or she should be with Harry’s growing love interest and then not really in the 7th one naturally because it’s kind of a Harry, Ron, and Hermione movie. But this one should be the one they really ramp her up in because she’s in the book a lot. Bonnie Wright, who plays Ginny, might be the worst actress I’ve ever seen in any movie ever. So I was really happy that they decided to just give her 0 lines and just have her look at the camera or look at a different character.

It was so well directed because I’m sure they had some lines for her and she opened up her mouth and they were like, Oh. You have no chemistry with Harry. You have no chemistry with movies, like being an actual actress. So unfortunately, we cast you when you’re 10 years old, so we can’t recast you. So we’re just gonna have to have you not say anything at all and just look around.

So so I was I was pretty pleased with that. I feel like this is a recurring thing that you keep on talking about how terrible she is, and she’s had in the 5 movies we’ve watched, she said 3 lines, like, to your point. So I’m like, I don’t know where you’re getting it from. So maybe in the next movie, that’s when you say it. Every time she’s on screen, I stare at her.

Yes. I’m like Exactly. Must be terrible at acting. That’s because you’ve you’ve led the witness. I’ve but, like, literally just staring at her being like, yeah.

She is doing something weird there. You’re right, D man. But I’m like, wait. Why am I looking at her? She’s not even talking.

But that’s the thing. It’s like every scene that she’s in, it’s like it has nothing to do with her, but you see her character because she’s just doing something out of sorts. It’s like she has earplugs in when other people are talking and is just, like, looking around confused at what’s happening as opposed to being like Yeah. Harry’s talking, Ginny, and he’s saying something that should frighten you, and she’s, like, sitting there smiling. It’s like she doesn’t she legitimately just doesn’t know what’s happening.

I don’t know if you’ve seen this on Instagram and they get there’s a clip of a guy going, like, I found this major flaw in Harry Potter. Watch here, and they just show Ginny Weasley as they this person doesn’t have a personality. Yeah. That’s it. 0 personality.

Yeah. Yeah. Zero personality. That’s great. I’m sure Bonnie Wright is a wonderful person, but it just has nothing, like, gives 0.

It it’s incredible performance. It’s amazing, actually. What are the what else do you feel love? The story choices were awful, but acting was great. So it wasn’t, like, their fault.

You know? So I also thought Harry did a, like, Harry gets better every movie acting wise. I agree. Caroline doesn’t think so. Caroline thinks he’s he’s bad.

I think he’s really good. I’ve seen him in there’s a one where he breaks out of prison. He’s amazing right there. I don’t know if you’ve seen that. I’ve seen that movie.

Yeah. He’s very good. Yeah. I was he’s the lead. He’s, like, on on screen the whole movie, and I’m like, this you’re like, oh, I forgot he’s an Harry Potter.

Like, you don’t think of him as Harry. He’s a South African. He’s doing the accent perfectly the whole movie. I think he gets better every movie. Mhmm.

So, yeah, I appreciate that, and we already mentioned all the other great casting. And the ending wasn’t terrible. I I or at least I don’t remember it being terrible. Oh, really? Oh, you hate it?

You have a bone effect. Okay. Good. Alright. Good.

We wanna get the streak alive. The end what was the actual, like, last scene ending? Oh, it’s like them walking by the Hogwarts Express? Yeah. The one thing that Voldemort doesn’t have is friendship.

And I was like, alright. I can I can at least live with that? That’s why they don’t have to worry. But the thing is, compared to last movie, it was so good. Yeah.

So did you have an issue with it? No. I didn’t necessarily have an issue with that that part. I thought that part was fine because that is a a main point of Harry Potter, so I’m glad they got it in there. It’s it’s that Dumbledore doesn’t have the capacity for love, compassion, friendship, like, all of the human traits that we hold to here.

Or are you talking about the actor Dumbledore? I always say Dumbledore instead of Voldemort. I don’t know why. Oh, the actor. I wouldn’t say that you’re wrong for that.

No. Michael Gambon, fuck you. No. No. Voldemort.

Voldemort doesn’t have the the capacity for those things, and and Harry is the equal and opposite to that. So even though, you know, Harry might not be as good of a wizard, he has the support of others, and because of that, you know, they’re able to prevail. So, yes, I’m fine with that. It was some other stuff that I didn’t like, which I’ll get into my hates anyways Okay. For the acting.

I continue to think that Emma Watson is not very good at acting. I don’t I don’t know about how you you feel like Hermione’s fine. Well, I saw the movie The Circle. Have you ever seen that? No.

It has, like, an all star cast as her, Tom Hanks. It’s everything about it, if you, like, read the description, everything I’ll think about it should be this movie’s gonna crush. And I would and she’s like the main person in it, and I was like Uh-huh. She is terrible at acting. Like, this is a terribly acted movie.

Mhmm. And, like, every time a part tells them that, they’re like, no. She’s great in Harry Potter. I’m like, I don’t think she’s good. I think it’s just she’s Hermione, so she’s good.

But acting wise, yikes. Yeah. I mean, one, they don’t give her enough lines to really, like you know, it it’s like she has one at bat and struck out. You’re like, oh, she’s terrible. So it’s not really that fair necessarily.

Every time she talks, it just seems like, I don’t know, like she’s just not very good. Like Ron, I think, is great and he has the same amount of lines. You know, he just plays that character really well. So I guess I’ll get into my hate. And it’s not necessarily the ending itself.

It’s the whole prophecy thing. I loved it in the book and we talked about it in the last podcast about the conversation between Harry and Dumbledore is maybe the best ever in the whole series. And we get a ton of lore. It’s like a really long conversation. We learn a lot about the future.

And in the movie, they decide for some reason that when Harry breaks the prophecy that he hears it. So we all hear it at the time, and then we’re just thinking about the prophecy as that whole fight is happening because I’m like, Wait, oh, what does that prophecy mean? You know, if I was hearing it for the first time, that’s what I’d be thinking. Where I feel like it would have been so much better to just do what the book did which is the prophecy breaks. No one hears it.

You can even say like, well, now the prophecy has lost forever. And then 10 minutes later, Dumbledore is like, actually, Harry, I do have the prophecy and I know it. And they jump into the pensive and they hear the whole thing. It makes it a bigger reveal there because then instead, he just, like, asked Dumbledore. He’s like, so the prophecy means that either Voldemort or I is gonna have to die?

And Dumbledore’s like, yep. And then it’s like, let’s go to the next scene. There’s just not this great long conversation between the 2 of them about the future and what this prophecy means and stuff like that that happens in the book. And it’s just really unfortunate because once again, it seemed like it was just a really quick scene that didn’t need to be quick, and that’s a really important scene that shouldn’t have been. Yeah.

Well, especially since it’s like the climax of the movie, you’re in this dark mysterious place. You don’t want that to be the most crucial lines to be said then. You want the action to seek for itself. You know, it just be, like, envelop you. You’re not, like, wait, what did they just can you replay that?

What did they just say within the props? That’s where you put that in a a still room and you have one camera on the one guy, one camera on the other person, they’re telling them that. Like that’s where you need that for, not all the stimuli going on and Yeah. No. I agree.

I I feel like we had just had this amazing battle. It’s like, oh shit, we didn’t get the prophecy out of it and then Harry and Dumbledore sit down. Dumbledore is like, oh, Harry. Actually, I was the one the prophecy was told to, like, step into the pensive. It’s like, oh, cool.

Like, now we’re gonna get it. So, yeah, unfortunate. What other what other hates? Dumbledore, awful. Just terrible.

I was thinking too. I was like, what’s good about this Dumbledore is, like, when I think I told you last one. I was like, when we get to the action scenes, that’s where he’s gonna shine. He’s gonna be much more, physical. And every action scene he’s in, he like, it has, like, a look of fear and, like, this isn’t gonna go well, like, acting work.

I’m, like Yeah. What? What’s what’s happening? Even when Trelawney gets fired, he’s, like, actually, like, you can stay here. And in the book, he’s, like, no, actually, I know what I’m talking about.

You don’t know shit. That’s why he comes in with that swagger Mhmm. And says you’re staying here, Trelawny. In the movie, he’s like, you can stay here, I think, Trelawny. And she’s like, well, I’m gonna change that rule.

And he’s like, oh, no. And he walks away being like, oh, no. What what do I do now? Like, that this is the weakest character I’ve ever seen. I don’t like, what is the point of Dumbledore?

He’s the weakest person. Just annoyed. Just annoyed with him. Not not enough swag for sure. He doesn’t have the dumb the dumby swag.

I couldn’t agree more. I don’t know why they they continue to, to to do this with the the movies, unfortunately. And 6th one, so I’m I’m interested to to see how that goes because, obviously, he’s he plays a much bigger part. Yeah. He dude, Yates is the director.

I we already talked about that a bunch of times. I’m not gonna say, you know, anything more on that. Couple little ones, Hermione calling Ron Ronald several times throughout this movie. Didn’t understand it. I don’t think she calls him Ronald once in the books, but she calls him Ronald.

When she’s, like, angry at him or something? Or Let’s listen for it in the books, I guess, but I don’t I don’t think so. And, I mean, even in the movie, the movie’s so short, she probably says him his name. She only has a few lines, and she calls him Ronald, I think, like, 3 different times. It was like, what?

What’s going on here? His name’s Ron, and you know his name’s Ron. Like, you wanna see him with his clothes off. Let’s not call him Ronald. And then the last one I had was when he Harry steps into the pensive to see the the Snape memory.

The the Snape with the toilet paper on his shoe gag, like, what is this? What are we doing here? Did you need to have the toilet paper on the shoe for Snape? That really bothered you. It did.

It just seemed like such low hanging fruit to to as a way to be like, oh, look at this idiot right here. It’s just such a stupid cartoon gag that they decided to do, and it’s also the wizarding world. Like, don’t they just vanish poo from their buttholes with a with a simple spell? Then you don’t need toilet paper. The toilet paper is never referenced.

Right? Is that correct? It must be. I’ve it has to be. Yeah.

It just doesn’t make any sense. It doesn’t make any that would you’re telling me in the 1000 of years of wand lore and all the jinxes and hexes and curses that people have created and all the ways they can do things with their wands that they didn’t don’t just vanish poof from their buttholes. They’re wearing, like, cloaks and they’re, like, discouraging, entrepreneurship kit. They’re probably, like, using outhouses still. They probably don’t even have, like, they’re, like, what is this whole system where you can flush things?

Like, the idea of the extendable ears, like like I said before, they’re like, so you put this thing in your ear and you can hear from further away. That’s been invented, like like, 1920. The microphone is invented. Right? Like, what if what’s going on?

Yeah. So Yeah. Those are the only things. I just thought the snake thing was it was just kinda silly and I don’t know. Alright.

My last one was, McGonigal knowing about this hand scar stuff and then just getting owned on the argument from Umbridge. Mhmm. The and also, like, there’s nothing more that annoys me than the whole when she was, like, stepping what taking one step up to show the arguments even and then one step. You know what I’m talking about? Like, so Umbra would make a point step up above.

I don’t know what that’s called but it’s called something. Yeah. Yeah. It’s called something but it we get it. Filmmakers would probably love it.

They’re like, look at this. It shows that, like, it’s like, yeah, but it’s so obvious. It’s not good if it’s that obvious. Like, the movie get out, if you, like, go back and listen to all, like, the stuff that’s in there Mhmm. And you’re like, holy shit.

That’s so smart. It’s, like, way above anything I could like, the second you watch it time you watch it, it’s almost better. Yeah. I agree. This is, like, you see that.

Oh, the first time I’m seeing it, and I’m like, that’s the dumbest thing ever. Oh, look. The subtlety there. It’s, like, the least subtle thing ever. And, also, it makes McGonagall, who’s another really strong character, looks super weak.

So didn’t care for it. Dumbledore and McGonagall both, like, strongest characters in the book are just so weak. Seems like the the one scene that they needed for McGonagall in this movie was when she gets reviewed by Umbridge, and she just owns Umbridge in the review scene. It’s like, oh, okay. Like, Minerva’s not getting stepped on by Dolores Umbridge, and, unfortunately, it just kinda goes the other way.

Oh, fuck. I see it. I get anger. I’m anger now. Why did we do this?

This is good. You don’t think about it after because I’ll keep thinking about it. Once you get it all out here, it’s over. Yeah. I don’t even wanna talk about studio notes or anything like that.

I did wanna shout out to Colin Bertram of the New York Daily News. I hope this man’s been fired. He gave the film a 4 out of 4 stars, calling it the best Harry Potter film yet and wrote that, and I quote, ‘Die hard Harry Potter addicts will rejoice that Yates has distilled J. K. Rowling’s broad universe with care and reverence.’ The complete and utter opposite of that, maybe like giant blade or a lightsaber.

No, a lightsaber is actually like, you know, maybe a rusty knife. A rusted, yeah, a rusted butter knife. Yeah. So whatever happened, that guy I don’t know what movie that guy was watching, and I think I’ve never known quicker that someone was not a diehard Harry Potter fan than by that review of him just telling what diehard Harry Potter fans are saying. Went into this not knowing what people thought of this movie.

So is this printed universally thought that it’s bad or good or one of the other? Because I went in and I was like, this is gonna be good. And I have no idea. It’s like a 7981 on Rotten Tomatoes. So I feel like people must like it and it made 900,000,000 out of a 150 to $200,000,000 budget, but the studio said they lost money on it.

I don’t know exactly how that works. So, yeah, I’m not I’m not really sure. I didn’t actually look too much into it because, like, I myself was just like, oh, wow. I’m so upset at how bad this movie was in in in my opinion. I got a one, listener email.

Okay. Shoot. You’ve got mail. This is from Jill in Houston. Oh.

She says now that we see how big giants actually are compared to humans Oh my god. Don’t. How did Hagrid’s dad and mom meet? Yeah. I know you Hagrid is a very an adult term, and I appreciate that you’re using that, Jill.

Fornicate. Yeah. That’s a good question. It is. So I assume went head first.

Right? Is that what we’re both assuming? Is that how babies are made? I don’t know still. So Yeah.

Well, I think if it was reversed, you know, if if he was the giant and In that position? Or No. If he was the if the father was the giant and the mom was the human or or, you know, wizard, whatever the case is, it would be more difficult. Although I think there are videos online that, you know, you could see, mister Hans being 1. Because considering it’s the the dad is the is the wizard and and the mom’s the giant, I I think it’s, you know, hot dog down the hallway situation.

Alright. Well, that that’s all I’m doing. Yeah. I mean It’s all that good shit. Health class must be really interesting in the wizarding world.

I’m just kinda surprised they don’t you know, they don’t have the important stuff really in at Hogwarts. It’s all the charms and defense against the dark arts when, really, we just need some, some health class. With all these these categories and all this conversation, would you recommend this movie? Or, I guess, what do you rate it? What do you how many buddies we give in this thing out of 4?

Probably like a 1.5 for me. It’s pretty low. I I think all the other 4 movies, the third one, I would probably give another chance just because how much everyone else likes it. So I’m probably giving that another chance down the road. All the other ones I’m continuing to watch the series 5, I’d almost put in the market a skip on that because it’s just I just did not think it was great.

I think we’re a similar mindset. I gave it 1.75 buddies on the 4 buddy scale. And really just because I think it’s a Harry Potter movie that it’s it’s tough for it to go lower. It was the worst movie I’ve watched this year, and I’ve watched about 70 movies. Oh, okay.

So Jesus. It it was tied technically at 1.75 with the original Dune movie, Dune made in 1984, which I might have to revisit that because I don’t think that movie was as bad as this movie. So maybe I’m not I’m not Jesus. Giving this low enough. Now that I think about how this movie was, Oh, wow.

Impressive. So 1.75 is is the worst. I’m usually pretty generous with you know, I’m fairly generous You’re being generous. Yeah. With with, like, that 0.25 extra.

Yeah. The mid tier ones. That that that’s unfortunate. But, hey. You know, we did it.

We made it through. How does it rank on on your movies? Is this your least favorite of all the movies, I assume? Yeah. I think it’s 4, 1, 2, 3, 5.

Yeah. I I think I have, like, 4, 3, 1, 2, 5 is I think what mine is. I can’t remember what I did for the last ones, but I know I like 3 a lot more than you did. It’s it’s the my least favorite for sure. So if that wasn’t clear from the last Yeah.

Check, watch, 45 minutes or an hour of of shitting on this movie. So if you also hated this movie, reach out to us and let us know. And if you liked it, please tell us why. But, Keith, what do we got coming up next? Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince book wise, and then the movie after that, and then we’ll wrap it up with book 7 and, the 2 movies.

So Yeah. Looking forward to it. Very much so. We’re we’re, you know, on the final lap as it were, and I hadn’t read, you know, Half Blood Prince in a long time, and I am thoroughly enjoying it. I caught probably 2:2 hours today of it, and it was, and it was a really enjoyable you know it’s good when it’s the middle of football season, and I really love to, you know, catch up on some football stuff.

And instead, I was like, you know what? I just wanna listen to Harry Potter. So There you go. Yeah. We know we’re liking it then.

Alright. Well, if this was cathartic, I appreciate that and I’ll catch you like next week for for Half Blood Prince. I love it. Alright. Alright.

Bye now. Bye now.

The Buddies plunged into the fifth installment of their magical marathon with “Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix” by J.K. Rowling. The Buddies discussed many important topics including: becoming radicalized over owl injuries, the Weasley twins’ mastery of guerrilla marketing, and whether Dumbledore’s penchant for secrecy deserves a Howler. The Buddies also pondered life’s important questions, like whether listening to audiobooks is an acceptable alternative to watching your child being born (spoiler: it’s not). So your practice your “hem-hems”, tell no lies,  and join us for this week’s episode.

Intro (0:00-1:30)
Stock Up/Down (1:31-28:32)
Favorite Scene/Character/Magical Elements (28:33-48:54)
Love/Hate (48:55-1:02:04)
Listener Email/Lingering Questions (1:02:05-1:05:19)
Conclusion (1:05:20-1:07:37)

NEXT Episode: Harry Potter and the  Order of the Phoenix – MOVIE
NEXT BOOK: Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince by J. K. Rowling

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to book club. I’m Dylan here with the man who tells no lies and has the scars to prove it. Keith, what’s up, buddy? I’m joined here by d man, the new dad to a witch, or can I say that?

I feel like that’s weird. Wizard, witch, in the family. Congrats. We took a little bit of hiatus. Well deserved.

Paternity leave from the pod. Unfortunately, I’m not getting any checks for that. But yeah. So I’ll be, a bit bleary eyed. And, yeah, I apologize for the hiatus, but, you know, having a kid kinda throws you through a loop.

I tried to, like, listen to the book, but as the wife’s pushing out a baby, you’re really not supposed to be listening to a book containing notes on the side. So I said I should probably really bear down and and focus on on this event. I didn’t want it to, I feel like that could have some long term lasting effects. But, here at the Buddy Book Club, we’re breaking down some bestsellers. And this week, we’re going to be talking about Harry Potter and the Order of Phoenix by JK Rowling, the 5th installment in the Harry Potter series.

If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read or reach out to any past episodes, you can visit our website, buddybookclub.com, or sign to our DMs on Twitter or Instagram, buddybookclubpodcast. You listen to us, iTunes, Spotify, review podcast. Please download. Give us a 5 star review. Even if you hate it, why not?

You know, congratulate me on being a father. Just just do that. That’s a comment, and I think it fits that, like, 3 word algorithm that that you need. If nothing else, give us a follow on social channels, please, and thank you. Keith, let’s jump into it with our standard process, stock up, stock down.

I think I know how to do this. Keith, stock up. What do you got? Yeah. Let’s start off light.

Just get back in the swing of things. Stock up becoming a radicalized terrorist? Listen, demon, I’m I’m pretty I’m a pretty rational person, I like to think, you know. I feel like I’m pretty normal. Mhmm.

However, let me just tell you right now, if someone fucked with my owl, I go full insane. Yeah. I go legitimately insane. I’m talking Mel Gibson in The Patriot when he, like, flips the switch, William Wallace, basically, if anything Mel Gibson is in when he flips the switch, that’s what I’m doing. I’m starting a full government rebellion.

I am I’m killing Filch just out of principle to start. Yeah. Ava Kadabah’s coming out. He’s dead. Oh, thank you.

That’s how we start. He’s done. Umbridge is next. We’re starting the whole war. When you you mess with Hedwig, you mess with my owl, that doesn’t stop there.

We’re not like, oh, that sucks. I’ll bring it to, like, the medical office. No, no, no, no. War. That’s it.

So the fact that Harry kinda calmly was, like, oh, this this is too bad. She’s hurt. I’ll just bring her to the wing. I’m, like, no. No.

No. No. It’s over. The way we starting a war now. Like, that’s that’s facts.

Right? Yeah. My my first stop is in Grubbly Plank who, I quite like Grubbly Plank, by the way. But my first stop is not her. My my first stop is to the, like, wizard machine gun arsenal.

And, Right. And I’m I’m just going postal on, on Gatling gun of wands where they just rotate and shooting spells. That’s a good idea, actually. We might get into some of that later because I have I have some questions about wand weapons. But, it’s a funny human trait thing that and I think we all have it, but when we see animals, specifically animals that we humanize, like pets, which includes owls in the Harry Potter universe, get hurt by someone, it just sends people into an absolute rage.

It’s so funny about that. And even when I was listening to this part, that’s really like I hated Umbridge before this. You know, all that bullshit. I couldn’t stand it. But you knew she was behind the owl situation, the Hedwig situation, and my loathing for her multiplied.

I actually think I was listening to this prior to actually having this kid. We were going to the hospital a bunch, so we would listen to the audiobook on the way to and fro. And I think we were listening to it in the car when this happened, and Caroline, like, audibly was like, I fucking hate Umbridge. And I was like, I I respect that because, yes, like, no one hurts someone’s pet. So, yeah, I’m I’m with you.

That’s a good way to radicalize. My first stock up, a good smear campaign stock up. The ministry and The Daily Prophet go hard in the paint against Harry in this book, and it’s pretty amazing to me that even though the ministry is an incredibly incompetent organization, they’re able to execute such a successful smear campaign against Harry’s character. And I think maybe that’s how some, like, a government organization or just like the government in general, can maintain its standing but be so terrible as they have to have a really good propaganda arm. I just think it’s so funny that even Seamus, who knows Harry, sleeps in the same room as Harry a 180 nights a year, is able to be turned by a couple of things said in the newspaper from some people that have never even met Harry.

Wouldn’t he naturally think what’s Harry’s motivation here? Does he just decide that Harry’s all of a sudden this arrogant, glory seeking, vain guy that the daily prophet in the ministry is playing him to be? Because he would presumably know better. I am having trouble connecting what happened in the 4th book at the end with how this works because Harry came back with the Triwizard Cup. Cedric’s dead, and they’re like, oh, it was Mad Eye Moody even though he wasn’t there, and there weren’t other people in the room when Mad Eye confessed, or was it just Harry that was in the room?

McGonagall, Snape, and Dumbledore. Right? Yeah. So and isn’t Dumbledore trusted? It’s just so crazy that the ministry is able to turn everyone against Dumbledore.

I really think the house points is really what it comes down to, like, 3 years in a row, him being, like, and a 100 points to Harry for house points. And they’re, like, goddamn it. Like, this guy, enough with this. You can’t really do that 3 years in a row without ruffling some feathers. But I do agree.

I think this book move over 1984. I think this book is, like, the best usage of showing how a dictatorship comes to power and, like, how you can turn people against each other and create this distrust and just create this narrative that is false. Everyone knows it’s false, but, eventually, you just start to believe it. So I think it’s a really good job. Yeah.

Yeah. I mean, I I agree. I thought, in general, it was it was frustrating because we’re, you know, we’re all Harry fans here. Yeah. But we that not everyone’s there with us in books 1, 2, 3, and 4 where they’re he’s fighting Voldemort.

So, like, you don’t you’re just, like, kind of hearing from afar, like, oh, and Dumbledore’s favorite gets another 100 points. You know? Like, you don’t really know the context, I I feel like. Yeah. And I wonder how much they do know about what Harry was doing in those situations because it’s like, oh, Harry saves the school again.

It’s like, come on. This kid can’t come to school every year and save it. You know? So I kind of agree with that. And even if they were saying it was a Voldemort thing, it’s like, okay.

So we’ve never seen Voldemort, but Harry’s seen him and defeated him three times. Like, I don’t know about that. What else do you have for stock up? Stock up hating house house. Oh, okay.

So you’re you’re anti Espu. Yeah. The crowd that I think was kinda hates house elves or just at least disrespects them. I’m kinda on their side. Kreacher kinda just sucks, He he’s the worst.

Like, he’s just Kinda love him. A shitty, shitty person. But it’s quite the the spin zone for Dumbledore to be, like, at the end, he’s, like, well, Kreacher wasn’t treated well. So, like, that’s why we deserve for him to kill Sirius. You know what I mean?

Like, it was just, like, Like, that’s that’s your spin zone? Like Yeah. It wasn’t Kreacher’s fault. Listen, Hermione and Dumbledore, if you want house elves to be to be treated like humans and be treated equally, then you need to treat them like human. You can’t just wear kids gloves around them all the time.

Like, oh, well, they’re like, they have to be treated differently and they have to be this. If they’re being a complete dickhead, you can say this person is being a complete dickhead. Otherwise, you’re just treating them like a different thing. Same thing with Hermione. She’s leaving all these, like, hats around for them to click.

She’s like, well, I’m smarter than you and I know better than you. So therefore, I’m gonna tell you what you need. Yeah. So how is that making them more human? You’re literally being like, I’m I know it’s better for you.

You’re treating them inferior, if anything. You’re doing worse than what other other people are doing. Any of their actions, you’re just washing away with, like, well, that’s okay. They did that. It’s like, this is the exact opposite of equality.

Yeah. I think Hermione is the classic case of wanting to do good coming from a a good place, but just missing the mark completely with her approach. So she’s somewhat forgivable, although I do agree. When Dobby comes in and says, they don’t wanna be free. They wouldn’t even know what to do, and she’s forcing this freedom upon them.

There’s a different way about that, and Hermione’s gonna grow and learn. I mean, we we know what she eventually becomes, and I’m sure she takes a different approach to that kinda situation when she gets there. But I I couldn’t agree with you more on the on the creature front, especially because, yes, Sirius was a dick to creature. No question about it. But think about how the, probably, the average house elf is treated in a, like, big, old wizarding household.

They’re, like, beaten, like, actually beaten and totally physically mistreated as opposed to just being yelled at and neglected. Like, Sirius doesn’t even ask him to do anything or he’s like, he should be cleaning up the house, but he obviously doesn’t. So, creatures just chilling. I agree with you for sure there and the fact that he’s like, oh, Kreacher wasn’t treated well. It’s like, what?

And and, obviously, Kreacher likes Bellatrix because she’s like a big dark arts person, but I don’t think Bellatrix or any death eater is treating house elves very well. But maybe they think they deserve it or something, some sort of, like, masochism or something. I don’t know. My next stock up and my last actually is, Guerrilla Marketing. You know, you and I are both in the marketing space and, have been.

We don’t know what we’re talking about. We, we’ve we’ve been there for a long time. The Weasley brothers, on the other hand, the twins, Fred and George, they’re at wizarding school. We’ve talked about this before about how at the school, they’re not really teaching people to be entrepreneurs, but Fred and George just have it in them. They are future billion galuniers, galuniers, or whatever the case is, because not only do they successfully use the students as guinea pigs, which I feel like has 2 approaches.

1 is the fact that they can objective a is they can trial and error the things they’re trying to create for their joke shop and fine tune them so that they can eventually sell them. But also, it’s gotta be creating this little communication, this, like, storyline between the students as to, like, oh, I did this and, you know, I was puking up blood for 24 hours until I figured out this other. It’s like, woah. What? You can do that?

You know, all these these crazy stories that are happening. Then, like, their grand finale before they actually leave school, their grand finale against Umbridge, it was absolutely perfect. It’s it’s the equivalent of, like, a a wizarding viral moment. No one leaves. No one just, like, leaves Hogwarts, or I assume if people do, it’s not in some sort of crazy cool fashion.

These guys go out using their new fireworks that they’ve created, blowing them up all around the school, this stuff that turns things into swamps. This amazing moment that the entire school’s there, not only does it work obviously against Umbridge, but as they’re leaving, they’re like, come check out Weasleys Wizarding Weasels on Diagon Alley, and the entire school is now guaranteed to go. And year after year, this story will be told about the Weasley twins going off against this terrible headmistress they had, and they’re gonna be like, yeah. Those are the guys that own the joke shop. People are like, I haven’t been there.

So it it was just a genius marketing campaign. And I don’t even know if they meant it for that, but I do know they meant it for that because they are this next level business geniuses. I like them keeping the little, thing of water in the hallway as an homage to them too. I appreciate that. Yeah.

Yeah. Exactly. Another thing. It’ll always be there. People who did that.

Oh, these guys didn’t know this joke shop. You gotta go check it out. They got awesome stuff. So I hope Dumbledore gave him a a graduate degree after Honorary degree? Yeah.

Exactly. They went to Hogwarts. Graduated, topped the class. They’re great. We produced that.

You know? You wanna take credit for that. Yeah. I would almost guarantee that one of them did not get that. Did not get what?

One of them probably didn’t. Oh, okay. Oh, Jesus. Postmortem or post what’s it called? Post podoptist?

Post post. Post, that was actually just in my head. Post. It’s an h word. Oh, god.

I wish it was smart. Yeah. Post humorous? It’s humorous. It’s posthumorous.

I’ll figure I’ll figure it out. It’s ridiculous, actually. Posthumous? Posthumous. There you go.

I know there’s an h in there somewhere. Maybe there isn’t. I don’t know. Hip hop. Hip hop.

They’re like After they did this, the their little act and flew out of there, I don’t know what it was about that moment, but I actually got kind of emotional reading it. Obviously, we love we love Fred and George here, but it was just kind of this fact that I think I got emotional because it’s like this journey is starting to come to an end to some degree. I know we have a couple books left, but I think it was like, wow. Like, Fred and George, they’ve been a staple of the Hogwarts experience for Harry and us listening, like, or reading it along with him, and now they’re not gonna be there anymore. And and they wouldn’t have been there anyways because it’s their 7th year, but, still, it just it felt kinda crazy.

Like, even, when you’re in college or something like that, you got friends that are a couple years older, and you have these awesome couple years, and then all of a sudden, they’re gone. And it’s just, like, everything’s different, and you realize, like, wow, I only got a couple years left too, and then I’m gonna have to join the real world. Yeah. I don’t know why, but it kind of it it hit me in a different way. Yeah.

No. I I gotcha. I gotcha. Now now we’re in that real world. What do you have for sucked out?

It’s hard to tell them doing chores. I mean, I never like chores. I still avoid them as an adult. I’m not an adult really. Chores make me cry like miss Weasley with, facing a boggart.

Yeah. I’m just not a fan. But let me tell you this, dude, man. If I show up to the Order of Phoenix and they’re like, yeah, so this is a club that you’re not allowed in even though you’re the only person that’s actually faced Voldemort and Yeah. Actually fought him three times and you’re the most skilled person, you actually have any context of how he came back and you have basically all the data that we need and all the information.

But you can’t be in, even though you should be in because you’re not old enough. I’d be pissed. It it basically be like LeBron coming out of high school. It’s like first 2 or 3 years he dominated. And then being like, well, actually the all star team only allows people that are 21 years or older.

Even though you’re the best in the league already. It’s like, what? It doesn’t it doesn’t make any sense. But to add intel to injury is, like, they get to the place and they’re like, alright. So I guess you can’t be in this club that we have that’s really important.

This club. Why don’t you start doing chores? Why don’t you start, cleaning everything up? It’s, like, I’m not a house elf. Mhmm.

I’m not doing this bullshit. Like, I’d be out of there. I’m I’d be so pissed. I’m, like, either let me in their club or I’m going somewhere else, or I’ll say, here. I’m not doing your work for you.

Like, you do that. You know what I mean? Like, I’ll do chores if I’m in the club, but don’t don’t make me do that. Didn’t care for it. Speaking about chores, it sounds like your significant other might also have this issue.

I saw that Instagram post of hers. Her car tire that she didn’t get changed or whatever, that tire was the baldest tire I have ever seen in my whole life. Like, if you Google imaged bald car tire Yeah. You would not find it on the top of the top of the top of the top of the top of the top. I was trying to say fast on the road.

It’s what’s the issue. The, like, fabric that’s so deep in the treads was showing through. Wild. It’s wild to me. Like, you just she never looked at it.

Yeah. To be fair, like, I don’t know any of the adult stuff either, so I wouldn’t even have noticed. I’ve been like, that looks good to me. That looks fine to me, but it’s the issue. Yeah.

It it reminds me when I was in college, and and I’m an idiot too. Like, you know, I’m not I’m not I’m not picking on her in any way. She’s a wonderful woman. But I was in college, and my dad got in my car, and he was like, what what’s that ticking sound? And I was like, I have no idea.

He goes, I think that’s your engine. I was like, oh, alright. He goes, when’s the last time you get your oil changed? I was like, what is oil change? That’s the one thing I do know.

That’s the I remember just hearing, like, just try to change your oil and then your car will run forever. And I I never check-in there other than that. So And Jimmy was like, what I was like, what is oil change? He’s like, I cannot believe I raised you. Like, this is terrible.

How are you this dumb? Whatever. My first talk down is secrets, secrets are no fun. Secrets, secrets hurt someone. Dumbledore admits to Harry after the whole ordeal at the ministry that he’s been keeping information from him, and it’s pretty important information, honestly.

How do you feel about Dumbledore withholding all of this prophecy stuff from Harry until, not it was too late, but until a bunch of damage had been done. I didn’t care for it because especially since it seems like Dumbledore is like, I’m not the type of person to to hold your hand and show you how to do everything. I’m the kind of person that’s like I believe in other people so I’m going to equip them or let them do what they can do. Mhmm. So the fact that he was like I’m just not gonna tell you anything like against it seems like what Dumbledore’s character would be.

So yeah, I didn’t I didn’t care for it. We respect Dumbledore here, of course. But at the same time, you know, he goes through the reasons why he wouldn’t do it. And, basically, it’s almost like one of those episodes of a TV show where they just, like, flashback about previous episodes. There was a Seinfeld episode like this that was honestly terrible.

They’re just, like, talk about things that happened in previous episodes. Must be I skipped that episode. I’ve never seen it. It must be, like, a writer’s strike or something like that. Episode a 100.

So there’s, like, that’s sort of Let’s let’s mail it in for this one. So Dumbledore goes through all of Harry’s exploits in the 1st 3 years, but it seems like once the the 1st year when he has Quirrell, that whole thing, it’s almost better when someone has just experienced that trauma to just pile on some more trauma because it’s not gonna get worse really, so you might as well just let him know there that, like, hey, also, by the way, either you or or Voldemort is gonna kill the other one. That’s the situation. Or, potentially Dursleys and it’s like, oh, this is potentially dangerous because that’s the place he’s safe due to this super secret charm Dumbledore put on him. It’s like, hey, Harry.

I know you’d want to leave the Dursleys and they’re terrible people, but I have to tell you this prophecy thing because it’s kind of a big deal. Time is against you in these situations, especially once Voldemort gets back, it’s like, oh, now this could happen any time. You know, this showdown could happen at any moment. So it feels like when you do have time on your side, which is early on, you should really get on it and talk to Harry about it so that he can physically and mentally prepare for whatever is gonna come ahead. Yeah.

Probably not Dumbledore’s best. I think he is someone that wouldn’t convey information unless he’s certain. I’m not going to tell someone until I believe it. So I think that’s some of the delay too. I don’t think.

Well, it wasn’t a hypothesis. The prophecy was a prophecy. Like Oh, I guess the prophecy. Yeah. I guess that’s true.

And it came to him, so he knew. But was this conversation between Harry and Dumbledore, out of all the Harry Dumbledore conversations we’ve had in the past books, was this the best one? Maybe. I don’t know. What’d you think?

I think it was. I think it was like pretty handedly just because we get so much exposition on what happened. You know, we get so much lore of what happened between Voldemort and Harry and why Voldemort actually went to the Potters and attached to the Potters. And this wrinkle with Neville is really interesting to me if you to dissect and the fact that he picked Harry because Harry’s half Muggle and other but otherwise, like, just by Voldemort marking him, like, there’s a parallel universe where he did this to Neville, and who knows what what the story would be. You know?

It’d be Right. Neville Longbottom and the Order of Phoenix. It just doesn’t sound that good. You know? Yeah.

And I think on top of that, the payoff because of the lack of attention Dumbledore had been paying to Harry Potter and thus paying to us throughout this whole book was because it was so frustrating throughout the whole book. I need more Dumbledore. Where is Dumbledore? We normally get a couple bits of Dumbledore, like good bits throughout and then one payoff usually at the end, sometimes in the middle, but usually the end. And this time around, it’s like, wait.

What the heck? Like, we got 0 Dumbledore. He’s showing up places and then leaving immediately. So I think it was almost like that build up to that to that scene was awesome as well. Well.

But for me, mostly, I love all the, like, lore stuff. It was I know it now, so it’s hard to remember my initial feelings when I first read this book, but I’m pretty sure it was, like, pretty jaw dropping in, like, holy smokes. Like, this is why Voldemort went to Godric’s Hollow and and took out the Potters and and couldn’t take out Harry. Yeah. I mean, this is definitely Dumbledore’s best book.

All the scenes with him in it, like, actually fighting, actually, the Dumbledore army scene was awesome. Yeah. There’s a lot of lot of good stuff. But it was funny that, like, they’re, like, so this 15 year old boy just, one of his classmates get murdered right from his eyes. What we should do is just keep him isolated for the next month and a half, have no one talk to him, don’t give any information, keep him just separate from everyone.

That’ll that’ll be the best way to handle things. It seems like that’s when Dumbledore should’ve showed up and been, like, hey, Harry. Just so you know, there’s a lot more going on here that we can’t talk about because of x, y, and z. Do you have any other stock downs? Yeah.

Last one, the Weasley women’s stock down. Woah. T, man, as a reminder, who did Ginny go to the Yule Ball with the last book? Neville. And where did Ginny meet her now boyfriend, Michael Corner?

In the DA? No. Yeah. But where did he she meet him? Hogshead.

I don’t know. At the Yule Ball. She met him at the Yule Ball. Yeah. Went on a date with Neville to the Yule Ball, and then you’re meeting up with another dude there?

They went as friends. I don’t care. You at least don’t tell people that you that’s where you met. This is this is disrespectful of Neville who’s been disrespected upon disrespected upon disrespect upon. So I I didn’t care for it one bit.

Didn’t like it one bit. Well, in the in the words of Ginny Weasley and doctor evil, throw me a freaking bone here. She she was being nice and went to the Yule Ball with Neville. If she then found someone she wanted to snog with, then good for her. She didn’t disrespect Neville and, like, leave Neville at the Yule ball.

It was after dance with the one that brought you. Have you never heard that term? I thought it was you danced with the. Oh, yeah. Exactly.

Yeah. Okay. What other Weasley people you have to shut up? But yeah. That’s fine.

If you’re gonna do that, just don’t say you met him there. Just say I met him after class or whatever. I don’t at least it’s disrespectful to Neville. Come on. I’m trying to trying to help my boy out, Neville, out here.

Well, it’s kinda it’s kinda funny you say that because a lot of times people will be like, oh, like, how did you and Caroline? How did you guys meet? And I was like, oh, she used to be married to one of my best friends. Cut it. Cut that.

So, yeah, if, you know, if I’m with I’m with Ginny. I’m done with Ginny. Oh, I got it. I got it sometimes. Here we go.

I didn’t think about that. What was I gonna say? Oh, missus Weasley. I just didn’t like her vibe, this whole book. I mean, the last book she’s coming off, she’s, like, reading the Daily Prophet and believing it and being, like, oh, like, her mind is the worst.

Alright. Like, I was already kinda strike 1. Missus Weasley’s been, like, a mom figure. Like, I’ve always kinda given her the benefit of doubt. But this book, she’s doing, like, the same stuff, whereas, like, she’s I don’t know.

I just didn’t like her vibe, this whole book. And then Ron is is joins the secret defense club, you know, the Dumbledore’s army. Mhmm. And this is, like, the ironic part is that missus Weasley reaches out to him, not via mail, not via owl. She, like, gets a message to him being, like, you shouldn’t be in that club because you’re gonna get kicked out of school and that’s more important than anything.

It’s, like, you realize you’re messaging him not via owl because you’re worried about messaging him not via OWL because you’re worried about your government is messing things up. You literally can’t message someone because it’s because your own government, you don’t trust. Yes. This should be the priority. You should be defending yourself.

You’d be learning these things because, otherwise, this corrupt government’s gonna overthrow things and fuck you up. Right? So I I just didn’t like it. Didn’t make any sense to me. Yeah.

No. I I think the counterpoint and her real issue wasn’t the fact that he was gonna miss school or the government situation. It’s the fact that she’s a mom. She’s got Ginny who’s already been possessed by Voldemort. Her husband’s been attacked by Nagini and almost died.

She’s got 2 other sons that are in the order. She’s got Fred and George who are kind of loose cannons and you don’t know what they’re gonna do. So she’s worried sick all the time, understandably, which we know from when she saw the boggart and her worst fear is all for family dying. So it was it was really just to protect Ron so that he wouldn’t even get caught up in all of this stuff. I’m sure she wasn’t happy that Ginny was in it either.

It’s the fact that now her 2 youngest kids are preparing themselves to fight Death Eaters. Unfortunately, the, like, catch 22 of that is if they don’t join, then they don’t get those skills. And, unfortunately, the world is changing in that Voldemort’s back, so everyone’s gonna be at risk and you want people to be the most prepared, but I feel like you just wanna make sure your kids are safe. And I think for her, the whole thing was just about fear. Yeah.

Okay. No. That’s a good point. I’ll I’ll give you that. I got a couple more quick stock downs.

The wizarding judicial system stock down. I mean, I feel like it’s been a theme lately. We’ve talked about it in a couple of books. Early on the book, Harry goes on trial for his life, and it’s like a kangaroo court out there. You know, the times are changing.

The locations are changing. No one’s paying attention to the evidence. It just seemed like a terrible judicial system that people are giving you evidence, and they’re like, no. It didn’t happen. And people seem to be siding with the people that are saying, no.

It didn’t happen. What? You know? Yeah. I mean, become a radicalized terror.

Like I said, this is not the the owl thing is the last straw is my whole point. It’s like this is this is building up. Once you do that one last straw that makes you snap, you gotta go full. I’m almost decided it didn’t turn into Rambo. That’s where we get our introduction to Umbridge.

She starts off with her hem to hems. It’s like, oh my god. And they were you know, say she’s like a toad like woman, which is hilarious. And my other stock down is Hogwarts Accolades. I’m just not sure about them anymore.

You know, Ron’s a prefect. Why? Why is Ron a prefect? He’s a terrible student or presumably not a very good student. He copies everyone’s homework, and he’s not he just doesn’t seem to have any of the qualities of a prefect besides, like, the courageous things he does to help the school.

Yeah. I also thought it was funny that Dumbledore was, like, by the way, I didn’t I’m sorry I didn’t make you prefect because I didn’t wanna put more stress in your play. Then he started crying for that. I was, like, That’s a weird part to cry about. All the other things, like, it’s like there’s so many things that you could, like, get emotional about, and then that he was like, and I didn’t make you a prefect.

Did he start crying? And then on top of that, you get you get the house cup, which is the house cup actually a reflection of which house performed the best throughout the year? And I know this year. I realize that this year is totally fucked with Umbridge giving the inquisitorial squad the ability to give and take points, but it’s deeper than that. At the end, when Gryffindor has 0 points left, McGonagall wants to award the D.

A. Folks who fought Voldemort for battling Death Eaters not dying and exposing Voldemort, so she gives them 50 points each. You know, that’s, like, 5 Hermione answers in class. Yeah. It just it just doesn’t seem equitable to me.

So They’re street bucks. That that’s what they are. Do you have a favorite chapter in this one? The fight scene with Dumbledore and Voldemort was the first time seeing them 2 square off and first time seeing Dumbledore fight. And the first time really seeing an actual duel or, like, magic being used in a just, like, made up on the spot.

You know, they’re just, like, going for stuff that’s there. It’s almost like a video game or something. Yeah. No. I I love that.

It reminded me of, when we saw Yoda fight for the first time. I don’t know if you were in theaters for that where everyone just started clapping. I sure was. I started clapping. I was, like, let’s go.

So I’m not. It’s by myself. Yeah. And it was it was the same kind of, like, spontaneity where he’s, like, grabbing stuff from, like, pieces from the ceiling, like, throwing it at him and stuff. It’s awesome.

Yeah. He’s doing all the flips and stuff. Yeah. Exactly. Yeah.

The flips are so cool. The theater the theater used to be awesome for stuff like that. That movie sucked. But yeah. But yeah.

So I agree with you. That fight was pretty cool. Just seeing the spontaneity of a duel that can happen, you know, grabbing the the statues and stuff like that. Super cool. So that was your favorite part.

Yeah. What about you? It was probably not chapter 26, which is seen and unforeseen. And the reason why is because we start I started listening to that chapter, like, I was talking about when I was in the hospital when when my daughter was born, and we were there for 2 days or whatever, a day and a half. I would, like, try to listen to it, but as I was trying to fall asleep, but there’s all of a sudden a baby crying next to you that you’re just, like, totally not used to, obviously, and people coming in all the time.

So I’d be, like, kind of in and out of sleep. I probably started that chapter over 10 different times and never heard a minute of it. So I have no idea what happened in that chapter even though I’ve listened to it Yeah. Like, 10 times. So, yeah, I would say probably, I’m gonna count it once again, like, the Beatles medley.

Like, the whole department of mysteries fight situation at the end, I thought was fun. You see all this cool, random wizard stuff that they have in the department of mysteries. It felt like we’re deep, deep, deep into the wizarding world right now. You know, not only was the actual, like, hall of prophecies, like, super cool to to think about, just like that that thing exists and there are these people that, you know, put out these prophecies and they’re here. But then, from the brains to the veil, like, everything was super cool, and that was just, like, the background to this fight that was happening between a bunch of teenagers and some hardcore death eaters that was going on in the foreground.

Just love that in general. And, if it’s not that, then it’s just the chat with Harry and Dumbledore because, like I said, I love lore, and so that lost prophecy stuff was was super cool. Because I I did feel originally reading the book, I remember feeling like, oh, I can’t believe that prophecy got destroyed. Like, we’re never gonna know. And then when Dumbledore was like, oh, I was there, it was like, yes.

Tell me more. Tell me more. Right. Right. So I love love that stuff.

What about, favorite character? We had a few I’m I’m only gonna talk about the big new characters. I’m not gonna go through the list because at this point of the book, when it comes to, like, magical elements and spells and characters, there’s just, like, so many that happen in these books. But the big characters we have is, obviously, Umbridge, new character, Luna Lovegood, Gorp, I guess, Hagrid’s giant brother, Bellatrix Lestrange. I feel like she’s been referenced, but this is the first time we meet her.

And I added Cho here because although Cho is not a new character, we do spend a good amount of the first, like, 2 thirds of this book with her either present or discussions going around on about this, you know, because these kids are now 15 and those hormones are firing and, love is in the air. So so she she takes up a good amount. It was Luna Lovegood for me, clearly. Honestly, I just I just liked her. I like her a lot.

She’s a good hang, I think. Yeah. She’s just like kinda has that a positive vibe about her. People make fun of her all the time, like, right to her face and she’s like, yeah, not a big deal. It’s what it’s whatever.

Like, a lot of the these characters can learn a lot from Luna. 100%. She kind of lets things roll off her back. I did write in the book at one point like, you know, they need a good vibes person right now because everyone is bringing this like moodiness to the book And obviously, I understand because, like A lot of angst, teen angst going on. Yeah.

So just a lot of going on, so I get it. But you need something that’s a little more even keel. It’s just a good vibe that’s gonna bring the the attitude or, you know, bring some positivity. Yeah. That’s where she was.

And she’s, like, she’s good for a joke. She’s good for some some good conspiracies. I liked it. I like her a lot. She’s good for consoling too.

Like, there’s really nothing that Luna can’t do well, and she reads the room really well. She, like, reads other people even though she still definitely goes to the beat of her own drum. There’s no question. Yeah, which I like her. Yeah, of course.

She’s unique. I think the level of internal self confidence and not in like an arrogant way, just in like, I like myself, and I’m okay if other people don’t. Yeah. Or, like, I’m just gonna be me because I like the person I am. It’s awesome.

Luna’s just a great a great character, and the only problem was I had to listen to the wife talk my head off about how she should be in Hufflepuff and not Ravenclaw for, like, you know, why isn’t she in Hufflepuff? We’re, like, on a walk. She’s like, why isn’t she in Hufflepuff? Why isn’t she in Ravenclaw? And I think it is a good point because I think she does have those qualities.

But, you know, she probably put the sorting hat on, and, and the sorting hat gave her gave her the choices. She’s a free thinker. I think that’s why. Yeah. She’s a free thinker.

Those are free thinkers. For me. And I always describe her as being dreamy which is kinda weird to me because I always think, when I think of like dreamy, I’m thinking of like, you know, McDreamy. Yeah. You know?

Like, oh, I see. Yeah. So every time they’re like and she came with a dreamy look, it’s like, oh, damn. So she’s she’s got that game too. And they’re like Yeah.

Meaning she’s, like, out to lunch. And I was like, oh, alright. Yeah. But I that the whole hoverboard thing, I didn’t really think about before, but I was like, yeah. Actually, they make a lot of sense.

I don’t like labeling people. I think they should be in the warehouse they want. You know? That’s what I’m about. I mean, after the Sorting Hat song at the beginning, the only house I would wanna be in is Hufflepuff.

It’s all about xenophobic these how xenophobic these founders were. I had a I had a phone to pick about the the Sorting Hat. Okay. You can pick it now? I mean, the whole thing was it’s, like, hey, like, we can’t be separating each other into groups.

We gotta all come together. It’s, like, that’s what your only job is. That’s literally the only thing you do is separate people into groups. So when you you’re the person that’s doing this. Yeah.

It doesn’t make any sense. He has the whole speech. Then afterwards, he’s like, alright. Ravey talk. Yeah.

So we’re gonna now we’re gonna separate people in groups, and you’re all different for these different reasons now. And you shouldn’t get along. Yeah. Yeah. It’s it’s an interesting point.

That’s a actually, a really interesting point. Goddamn. We need to join together. Alright. I’m gonna support you.

Yeah. Now we’re gonna divide you all of you, and you’re all special for only for certain reasons. This is the only way we’re gonna identify you moving forward. The story is pretty fascinating, just the idea that oh, he’s like, oh, okay. So the founders came in.

You know? Gryffindor wanted some brave ones, so he only picked brave people. Slytherin wanted some cunning people, so he only picked the cunning. Ravenclaw wanted smart people and Shiloh, and then Hufflepuff took the rest. It’s like, oh, so Hufflepuff’s the only good one in this?

Like Yeah. The rest of you are just losers? No. It’s the other way around. All Hufflepuff’s the losers.

It’s like the people that couldn’t fit in to the other side. I know. But I just meant from, like you know, you’re starting a school, and that’s kind of one of the arguments with all college institutions and stuff now. Like, don’t you want a diverse population of people that come from different obviously, if you’re, like, you want people that are interested in going to school and and learning and people that are you know, have intelligence. I understand that that’s part of school.

But at the same time, it’s like, shouldn’t you want diverse backgrounds and diverse thinkers? And, you know, that’s what makes a campus interesting and those conversations interesting. At least, that’s the theory. My my college experience was more drinking and drugs, but, you know, that’s what it is. Pick your magical element.

I’m obviously not gonna go through all the magical elements because there’s so many here. Did you did you have one? Yeah. Mine was the the contract. Oh.

The the Dumbledore’s army contract. Yeah. That one Hermione did. Big fan. But how about Cho defending her friend after getting them was almost all expelled?

Zero sense. She just made a simple mistake. It’s, like, you mean she tried to get, like, 15 peep or no. It was, like, 25 people expelled? Yeah.

And you’re, like, that’s a silly mistake. You, Cho? Yeah. Like, what are you talking about? She’s like, yeah.

That was a really mean thing Hermione did. It’s like, shut the fuck. Like, you gotta I’m glad he broke up with the show after that. I forgot Cho said that. So she’s, yeah, she’s off the list too.

He’s like, that was so mean of what Hermione did to that. It’s like, you signed a contract. What what do you mean? Like, just don’t sign the contract than if you didn’t want to abide by the contract. And also, it wasn’t like they were they weren’t doing anything bad either.

So, like, the turns that went in to get them kicked out, it’s it’s not, like, for the good of the people. It’s malicious. It’s literally, like, the worst thing you could do, and you’re part of the club. It’s it’s malicious, and it’s turn Cody. Yeah.

Benedict Arnold. Yeah. Yeah. Choice should’ve just go and got in there and be, like, my bad. Yeah.

That’s a a big hand. My Hand. Her arm should break from saying hand up so quickly, Alaire. It it didn’t make any sense. I agree with you.

A 100%. I think I have to pick the rumor requirements talking about the DA. The rumor requirements in general, it just seems like the most cool aspect of the wizarding world that we’ve ever seen or ever will see. Like, Harry was so amazed by the mirror of Irrisad, and I understand why. Obviously, his parents passed away, But Dumbledore’s saying, no.

You gotta be careful. You know, people stare into this mirror forever. If I had a room of requirements, I would never leave the room of requirements. There’s no reason to. You’re there.

It’s like, oh, it’s a football Sunday. It’s like, okay. Cool. All of a sudden, there’s 16 TVs up there, all the chicken wings you want, like, endless, you know, a fountain of Miller light just pouring out, and all of the the bookies are just sitting there waiting for you to take all your bets. Seat.

Perfect. I love it. I mean, that’s my requirement now. If when I was 13, it was you know, there’d be plaster coating the walls. It it’s it’s a Jesus Christ.

You know, it’d be it’s a totally different Right. Right. You could do anything in there. That’s the point is it could be all of the cool things you wanna do. I wanna go bowling.

It’s, like, okay. Go to the room of requirements and just be, like, I wanna go bowling, and there’s gonna be the coolest bowling alley in the world there. I had actually had a as one of my hates, one of the things, because I mixed I mixed it up with the Mirror of Erised. I didn’t realize that people could just get in to it and expose all your secrets. Like, I I thought it was like the Mirror of Erised.

Like, you only can get into the room if you need the room. Right? Like, you can only get the The Philosopher’s Stone? Yeah. So, like, the fact that, like, they could just go in there and narc everyone out, it’s like, that defeats the whole purpose of the room.

The whole purpose was for you to keep this a secret, and the room didn’t do that. So I was kind of upset with the room, honestly. Well, I don’t know. The room wasn’t there to to keep a secret. The room was to provide them a place to practice, you know, defensive go in and like, how does a person think that?

I wanna go find Harry Potter. That’s what I’m required. You know, that’s the requirement I have. And then they just go where they are. Yeah.

You know? So there’s, like, go to a room that has all of his deep, dark secrets in it? Like, I don’t when does that work? Yeah. There’s a I’m sure someone on, like, Reddit or something has broke down.

Yeah. Has broke down all the the points of the remote requirement. But, yeah, overall, it just seems like a super cool it just it could be anything. Right? Like, it’s just, like, one of those, like, technology AI rooms or something that they that, like, Meta wants to be except it’s real.

You know, you just go in there and be, like, I want a hot tub. It’s, like, hot tub. Boom. Yeah. No.

I mean, it’s great. It is great. My runner-up was was the veil itself in the, at the end where Sirius falls through. Okay. I I need to ask you about that because I I that was one of my hits also.

I don’t know what a veil is. What is a veil? The thing they put over your head in a wedding? Like, that thing? Yeah.

Like, wait. What the hell is that? City of color in Colorado that’s just in this room? The the city city? Stand.

I had no idea what’s going on when they were like, they’re like, they opened up the veil, and I was like Yeah. I think that’s what you’re saying. Like, the thing that goes in front of your face at a wedding or whatever, but, like, a curtain almost. It’s just like a a doorway or, like, an archway that has a flowy curtain type thing through it, and they can hear voices on on the other side. But what is interesting is Dumbledore referred that to Fudge.

He was like, oh, there’s a bunch of Death Eaters in the death chamber, I think is what he called it. So is the Veil, like, the place where they murder people? Like, why is it there? What? Because he called it, like, the death room or, like, the death chamber.

So is that where they, like, murder prisoners? Yeah. That’s a good point. Yeah. I don’t know.

And and then I think in general, though, I also, in this book and this is probably one of my loves, but, I’ll just burn it here. But the way that JK approached Harry’s attempt to deal with Sirius’ death, I thought was really good. And for someone that’s probably, like, new to the I mean, that’s someone that’s definitely new to the wizarding world relatively so, and having someone close to them die. Oh, he’s, like, running to Nearly Headless Nick, seeing if he can become a ghost. He’s, like, confused and thinking he’s gonna come back from the Vale.

You know, he’s trying to talk into the mirror that he gave him gave him, thinking it’s the mirror of Irr said. Harry knows in the back of his head that none of this stuff is true, but you just he doesn’t wanna he doesn’t wanna believe it. Like, he knows that Sirius isn’t coming back, but he doesn’t wanna believe it. And I thought that, like, the anguish that he has without it being, like, so overt, and it it just, like, him bawling his eyes out all the time was really hard to swallow. It was real.

You know? Like, that that anguish that is him trying to figure that out and how he’s gonna deal with that was was really I thought that JK did a really good job with that. And once again, Luna comes in with just awesome stuff as always. You know? She’s definitely the person you want by your side when when things like that happen.

So overall, I liked it. Did you have a spell? A a spell from this one that that tickled you? The magical ears or extendable ears. Oh, extendable ears.

Yeah. I really kinda wanted more info on that. Are they are it would be interesting to me if it was like go go gadget expendable ears and they’re their own ears. Is that what it was? Or was it like just microphones?

Because like except like I think it was like extendable ears aren’t as cool if they’re just like, alright, I’m gonna put a microphone down here and like listen to the conversation. But if it’s their own ears and they’re like snaking them down, now I’m interested. No. I think it was more like the cup and wire situation. Yeah.

I didn’t care for it, though. I’m out on them. Never mind. Give me the long give me extendable ears. Like, go go gadget here.

And then they, like, throw it over, like, a balcony or something and hear up there. All of a sudden, a dog walks by and, like, grabs your ear and is yanking on it down the street? Sounds terrible. I know there’s a lot cooler things you could’ve done of the you know, with your ear rather than being, like, I’m just putting a microphone here. How do you feel about occlumency and the geniments the occlumency stuff that was going on?

Was that for you? Was that interesting to you? Or was that not interesting? It seemed kinda arbitrary of how it worked or how you block it or what the point of it was. And then ultimately he didn’t need to use it.

Right? He didn’t use it at all. Yeah. They’re like you gotta train you gotta train on it. You gotta train on it.

And you see you obviously knew something bad was gonna happen and then like after that they’re like and we’re done using it now. It’s like, alright, I guess that’s that. Yeah. I was I was kinda with you. I think that it obviously, it brings Snape into this in a in a new way because of this, you know, we get more background on Snape.

And I think it makes you realize, oh, if Snape, like, especially later on when they’re saying, you know, Snape’s undercover and stuff like that, or they were kinda saying that before, but, like, earlier in this book. But you wonder, like, how can he do that? But it’s like, oh, if he’s, you know, really good occulments, then he’s able to, like, kind of darker, like, you know, make it so the dark lord can’t see his his thoughts. So, like, that it becomes makes a little more sense for that story. But Yeah.

I think just in general, it was like, alright. Whatever. But it also seems like a pretty interesting piece of magic that probably, like, should be taught to most people. Yeah. It should be taught in, like, dark arts, obviously.

Yeah. Or or defense against the dark arts. That’s what arts. Yeah. Yeah.

You’re right. Yeah. Yeah. It’s like if people can go into your head and, like, steal your thoughts. It seems like, like, this is just like a credit card scheme, like a credit card Yeah.

Or a personal identification, whatever the thing is, all that fraud. That’s like what a really good wizard criminal would do. Right? Just use to be like, hey. What’s your passcode?

And then people are like, what do you mean? And they think about it, and you’d be like, oh, never mind. Yeah. It seems like that’s something that that, like, people should be teaching if that’s a branch of dark magic or just kinda any magic that that could occur. But, yeah, I wasn’t I was neither here nor there on it.

I’m gonna pick a non spell, which is the fact that it should be Avada Kedavra. Like, the the spell should be Avada Kedavra because it should be like, oh, Avada Kedavra has to be the best spell because you could just, like, immediately kill anyone and it’s all over. But the death eaters, for some reason, in the ministry of magic just, like, don’t use it. They they keep hitting the kids with, like, leg binding curses and curses that make them giggle and and stuff like this, but it’s, like, just kill them. What are we doing here?

Harry tries one of the unbelievable curses which is kind of just brushed under the rug. Yeah. He tries Cursea on Bellatrix. And it sounds like you really you need to pull it from, like, deep within your soul to use that spell. So my guess is it’s kind of like a video game where, like, you gotta charge it up.

You can’t just be using you can’t just be on davra cadavering left and right. You gotta you gotta build up that stanima and get that hate in in there and then be able to send it out. Oh. That’s what I that way I thought it was. Interesting.

So you’re thinking, like, even as a bad guy or whatnot, you can’t just, like, be thrown a lot of cadavers out there left to right. So I think you also have to have, like, extreme concentration. And, like, certain spells, it’s like Lumos is, like, yeah, whatever. I like the way you said that, like, a video game situation where it, like, charges up over time or whatever, where you can use, like, the little curses. It makes me think of how a wizarding battle would go, talking And so the strategy of the wiki.

Technology. Yeah. So if if there’s, like if you can’t Avada Kedavra people, you need that Gatling gun with all the wands in it or something like that. But I wonder how wizards fight battles because, obviously, there has to have been fights in the wizarding world. Do you know?

So I I wonder how they would do that if you can’t just, like, go around, you know, a vodacadabra, vodacadabra. Alright. What about magical creatures? In this one, we had probably thestrals and and giants are probably the big 2. Maybe, like, centaurs.

Centaurs came in more, but I guess I like the giants. Obviously, I thought that was kind of an interesting side story. So dude like that, Hagrid was like, you know, you’re not old enough to be in the order of Phoenix, but can you take this giant carry this giant in the woods for me? Like, not a big deal. Right?

Like, yeah. Alright. Yeah. We’re when Caroline and I were on that walk today, I was like, yeah, what do you like about, you know, Harry Potter in the order of Phoenix? And she was like, I thought the Hagrid was, like, you know, really out of bounds here asking the kids to, you know, do all this stuff that’s really dangerous, and they they shouldn’t be doing it.

Like, what? Like, she’s like, Hagrid took a turn. You know? He’s like, they’re He’s in every book. Yeah.

He’s I feel like this was like a next level, though. It’s like, you know, they could get expelled. Like, he’s getting he says to leave the school because he’s getting fired, but he’s like, yeah, break curfew, go into the woods in a forbidden forest, which you’re not even supposed to be in anymore because the centaurs Mhmm. Have kicked everyone out and find my half brother giant and read him a story? Like, what?

Alright. Let’s get into some love hates. What did you, love about Harry Potter and the other face? Every McGonagall umbrage interaction Oh. Just eject that right into my veins.

I I loved it. Just just great. McGonagall does not fuck around with anyone, does not take that shit from anyone. And the ultimate grudge holding is, like, now I’m gonna even make Harry even more of a or because he said he couldn’t be one. That’s the person I want on my side for this.

That’s pretty pretty nice. But then she didn’t do anything. I was like, you know, set up a plan now. What are you gonna how are you gonna help how are you gonna help Harry out? You know?

Yeah. Good point. Help him for his CV. Yeah. That’s a good one.

That’s a really good one. I didn’t even think about that because I all those interactions, you’re like, oh, you know McGonigal’s gonna come out on top and you just she just does not give a shit about, like, about Umbridge. But she does just enough where it’s like she because you know she can’t go anywhere. Dumbledore’s probably told her, like, hey, Minerva, like, you gotta at least stay chill because I’m out. You know?

So you gotta do something to make sure you can’t get out of here because we’re losing allies real quick. Yeah. I liked all the stuff that the professors did to subvert or whatever umbrage with, you know, all the stuff that the Weasleys did and them not doing anything about it, them kinda helping Peeves out to, like, screw Umbridge. They just they know the castle is not going anywhere, so it’s like, hey. Let’s make her life terrible as a headmistress and, you know, we’ll just live on with our lives.

I’m gonna say getting some of Snape’s memories. I loved that stuff because it’s not, like, lore necessarily, but you do get a lot of history of why Snape is the way he is, why he treats Harry the way he treats Harry. And it seems like it was just because James Potter was an arrogant, bullying tote rag. Those are Lily’s words, not mine. But I know there was, like, a kind of a part there was, like, a, you know, couple chapters in there where Harry was like, wow.

So my dad was just an asshole. And Sirius and Lupin were like, no. You know? Him and Snape just, like, had it out for each other, like, since the jump. But his dad even says and this is what Harry says.

He’s like, he said he just wanted to bother him because he’s alive, like, he’s breathing. It’s like because he exists is what he said. Like, I just because he exists, we shouldn’t bother him. It’s like, oh, his dad really is just a bully. Right?

Yeah. I I like that they made it so he had his parents as his, like, perfect images in his mind. It’s almost good. It’s like everyone’s human. He wasn’t that great in school but then he grew out of that.

Like he made he made mistakes. He learned from it type thing. Where Snape hasn’t. Snape still is a fucking piece of shit. So less less so much on Snape.

Yeah. Interesting. That’s probably accurate and fair because if you just took something that I, you know, that I had done in the past that I’m not proud of, that I’d done when I was in middle school or high school or something like that and showed me it or showed some of my family, they’re like, wow. Dylan’s just like, next generation. At worst.

Yeah. Wow. He’s a terrible person. But, you know, that doesn’t make up who you are, and you you can you can grow out of that. We’re all human.

Everyone makes mistakes. Yeah. It’s good. Yeah. It’s good that, as long as you can grow from it.

You know? I did like out here. They were like, Harry, he was, like, 15. And Harry was like, I’m 15, and I’m not a dick. Yes.

I was like, yeah. That’s a good point. That’s a good point. What else do you love? I just head down, hey, Zacharias Smith, get fucked, but, I don’t know.

I don’t remember what the note was, but I didn’t like that. Hiccups now. Damn it. You gave me the hiccups. Zacharias Smith was the one that was talking shit to Harry the whole time at the DA and be like, oh, we’re not gonna fuck, bud.

Either way. I think for this story, you know, the whole time at the beginning, we’re seeing Harry being, like, easily annoyed at people and just having a a really short temper and this darkness about him that we hadn’t seen before. And it was kinda here and there and definitely wasn’t explained, and you just thought, like, oh, you know, Harry’s a teenager. You know? Like, that’s that’s kinda gonna happen.

But then at the end, when it’s like, oh, this is just a little bit of Voldemort coming out in him. Now you realize, holy smokes. Like, this is this connection is more than just their phoenix core wands. Like, when Voldemort cursed him, that he left a piece of him inside Harry, and it just, like, creates so much more interesting stuff down the line. And then it also explains some of these moments when he had these, like, bouts of jealousy and all these things that are that are natural for us so that we’re like, oh, okay.

But it just seemed a little off for Harry to go that far, and now we kinda know why. At least that’s how I read it. Maybe it was just Harry, you know. I thought it was him just not being able to process grief and he was just like and no one’s helping him with it. So he just kinda was having these outbursts because of because of that.

He was, like, super upset with Hermione and Ron when they were, like, not getting that information. I was pissed too. I was, like, reading that being, like, I just saw someone die. What’s going on here? What about hate?

Does no one care what people are chanting at the stadium or have, like Yeah. Not do they not have ears at the stadium or do they not are they do they not have eyes? Like, it seems like things will happen to the stadium. Everyone’s aware of it and then, like, a fight will break out and they’re, like, how did this happen? It’d be, like, start turning on the Pistons fight where they go, like, go in the stands Yeah.

And start fighting them, but just being, like, starting it with them fighting in the stands. It’s like, you didn’t see any of the lead up in any of the stuff that happened before that or any of those things? Yeah. No? So, I feel like it’s just kinda a little disingenuous, especially from the teacher’s standpoint.

Yeah. It seems kind of interesting that I assume that JK took this from the, like, real big soccer chants and soccer rallies that that occur in, you know, in Europe. But it feels like at a school, there should be some sort of limits to what you can do. But at the same time, you know, the Triwizard Tournament, they had they ran out, you know, pins going around saying potter sucks. The whole, Weasley situation, it just it seems like that that’s really bad sportsmanship and potentially could make someone go crazy if you’re just doing that to a student over and over and over again.

I also have a quick bone to pick with that because Malfoy, the first match, when they do the whole Weezly thing, but then Harry catches the snitch, Malfoy’s, like, gloating about or talking shit to Ron. It’s like, Malfoy, you just lost. Like, no one just says to him, like, buddy, you just lost. Like, Harry just turned around and beat you to the snitch. It doesn’t matter.

I can let in 14 goals to to and we can score none, but it’s all gonna depend on you. And once again, you blew it. Yeah. You choked. You’re terrible.

Yeah. Especially after you win, would anything bug you? I would, like, not be offended. I’d be, like, bro, you’re you’re so bad at this sport. Like, you know, like, there’s nothing that would really get under my skin after I I beat them.

Yeah. If I had a really bad game, it would definitely bother me. But at the same time, we still won. So Right. I’m gonna I’m gonna laugh in his face and say, yeah.

Sorry. You know, you suck. But Yeah. And I know Madam Hooch was there, and I know the whole thing was once again like an umbrage ordeal, but the stuff that they were saying, none of the other professors, like, come and and stand up for Harry and the Weezes, and the stuff they were saying, they’re talking about Harry’s dead parents. And, yeah, I know physical violence isn’t the answer, but, oh my god.

You just you can’t say those things. My first hate is it has to be Umbridge. I mean, Umbridge has to be the number one hate for sure. And it’s a different kind of hate than normally because I don’t hate this book because of Umbridge, but I kind of do. It’s like a weird relationship that we have.

I just think that she might be the most despicable and hateable villain that has ever existed. I also think her her punishment wasn’t enough. I kinda wanted the Game of Thrones, like, the shame woman in, like, the little thing the torture chamber and leave her there for, like, for years years. That’s what she kinda deserved. Yeah.

So I needed a little bit more. That would have been more satisfying where you, like, just get her running away. I’m, like, that’s it? Yeah. Like, she should be brought up on charges of child abuse.

Yeah. You know, like, at the end of the day, at least. Attempted murder, she sent to Dementors at Harry. Oh, yeah. She admitted to sending the Dementors at Harry.

She used an unforgivable curse on him. Like, what’s the punishment for using an unforgivable curse? Well, did she use it, or did she she say she’s about to use it? I don’t remember. Either way, she’s just so despicable.

Every time she does her ahem, ahem, and, like, her her, like, I know best, She’s just such a unique and hateable villain that it was so good. Like, I I love that JK was able to create this character. It made this book sometimes worse because she’s in so much of it. In every scene, I’m just angry at Umbridge that people can’t just do anything about it and she’s this dictator at Hogwarts all of a sudden because she has, you know, the minister’s blessing, which also makes no sense. So, yeah, it’s it’s an interesting hate.

Definitely one of the top villains in my mind in anything I’ve ever read. Yeah. Well, the only person that’s more more of a villain than her is obviously Percy. But, yeah, other than that, you know? Yeah.

I mean well, yeah. I don’t even wanna talk about Percy. He’s he he he’s just he shouldn’t even be discussed. Yeah. I apologize.

Yeah. Not gonna bring his name up. The p word. Yeah. Yeah.

The worst. What else do you hate? Would wouldn’t you be pissed if you’re, like, the Weasleys? Mhmm. Wouldn’t you be pissed at Harry and like or all the other people’s kids parents for bringing them to the, Ministry of Magic?

Get lured there and then for no reason? There was like no reason for them to them to be there. Right? Would you be, like, why’d you bring all all our kids to this place to get attacked by Death Eaters? Yeah.

Seems like there’s no pushback there. I’d be, like, you’re not hanging out with them anymore. Like, this dude’s a fucking bad dude. Yeah. Xenophilius, whatever, Lovegood would probably not care so much because he’d be like, that was a cool experience.

Yeah. It’s like, yeah. Obviously, you had to check out what’s going on. Yeah. Makes sense.

I think it was a dream. Of course. That’s a good point. I mean, Hermione was the only one that was talking any sense there, and it seemed like everything was moving way too fast, and it was out of Hermione’s control to to do anything. Granted, you know, once Kreacher says that, like, Sirius isn’t there, it’s like, oh, shit.

But then, I don’t know. Seems like they should have been able to do something, but they couldn’t. They couldn’t contact anyone from the order, so I get it. And if he had already seen Ron’s dad get killed by a snake and then all of a sudden he’s seeing Sirius about to be killed by Voldemort, then, you know, I feel like he had to he they they had to do something. So good on those kids for going.

I would have been like, yeah. Actually, you know what? I can’t make it right now. I’ve had the runs, like, nonstop, and I feel like I can’t I can’t do that. So, I’m gonna have to sit this one out.

I already talked about, Dumbledore not being a character, really, but then it kind of all makes sense at the end, so it’s not really hate. But the only other thing I really hated was was Jim Dale’s Bellatrix Lestrange or Lestrange accent. He’s like she goes super French with it, and I understand her name is Lestrange or Lestrange, whatever the case is. So, yeah, it’s it’s a French name, but that doesn’t mean you have to she’s all of a sudden from Beauxbaton. It’s like she has this super, super French accent, and it kinda takes away from her, like, sinisterness.

I didn’t hate it. I mean, it didn’t it didn’t really stick out to me. He has so many voices he could do. So Yeah. You throw in a French accent, it makes it so it’s like, oh, that’s the French person.

Up? Yeah. I’m fine with it. I I didn’t have an issue with it personally. But Yeah.

Maybe maybe it’s me because I’ve seen the movies and I know that it’s like Helen Carter who who does the who’s like the actress for her and she’s so good, which we’ll talk about in the in the next one. That to me, that’s what Bellatrix sounds like. Isn’t she just playing I’ve only seen pictures of it because I haven’t seen the movie, but isn’t she just playing the same character that she plays in Fight Club? Tonight, just I mean, that’s what the the makeup she has all looks like, but maybe I’ll be back. But but crazier somehow.

Okay. You know? Like, even more deranged. Yeah. Alright.

Yeah. Mhmm. Do you have any other 8s? My last one, and this is probably gonna come up too in our conclusion, but this actually end up being number 5 from my books. Really?

The reason that it’s good is because it’s so long and we get so much backstory. The final fight scene was a little convoluted to me. I didn’t really know what’s going on. Yeah. It was a long time.

But the biggest thing to me is that we’ve talked about this with our books. I hate when the mystery is the lack of communication. Like, the only re the drama is caused by people just not telling you what’s going on. So that’s the drama instead of it being like a mystery, like what is going on? No one knows.

So we have to figure this out. There isn’t like this like putting the pieces together. It’s just like this is what’s happening. This is what’s happening over here but we’re not telling you over here. That’s the drama.

I see what you’re saying. Which just, you know, just annoys me kind of because it’s like this seems like this could be simply easily solved. You know what I mean? Yeah. And it also seems like they know from Harry’s dreams that he’s in the Department of Mysteries.

Right. And they could just very easily be like, that’s when Dumbledore should just tell him. Definitely don’t go any don’t go any further here. Let me just tell you what’s up as opposed to being this roundabout, like, take occlumency with Snape, and then do this and do that. And then, obviously, you mentioned Umbridge.

It’s just, like, when I’m angry at reading the book 80% of the time, and I’m, like, and then you, like, attack an owl, it’s upsetting me. What about some lingering questions? Do you have any lingering questions on this one? We’re getting a little long, but I have a reader email. You’ve got mail.

Grady from West Virginia. In the book, they talk about how there are very few pureblood wizardry lines left, and everyone knows them. Most of them are dark haired, but is there some Game of Thrones going on here? Because, blonde hair and red hair are recessive genes. Mhmm.

So the question is, are the Malfoy’s and Weasleys just inbred? Absolutely. Because they’re both pure blood families. Right? Yeah.

Has to be. Are there other pure blood redheads and blondes? Yeah. And if there are, then those are the only options for the Weasleys. Because they were showing, like, the family tree.

Yeah. And everyone’s interrelated. It’s like, oh, we’re really And they’re all dark haired, and they’re all, like it’s, like, oh, yeah. This is all part of this one family tree. It’s also, like, I wonder if there even are, like, they might just say they’re pure blood.

But, you know, if you go back down the line, it’s probably, like, hard to actually Yeah. Yeah. Although, just the spoilers for the next book, we definitely need some inbreds in that next book. So Oh, yeah. So, like, I I don’t know.

I I think there’s something to it. I think, Grady’s got a good point here. Yeah. That actually very interesting. I I feel like the Malfoy’s definitely a bread, just that they have to be.

But the Weasleys feels like even red hair is even more recessive gene. So, yeah, I don’t know. It’s a it’s a really good point. It’s a really good point. Okay.

What about other good questions? Did you have any? I didn’t have any. Okay. I got a couple.

There’s an Easter break. They talk about Easter break. Why? Why is there an Easter break? Are wizards Christian?

Jesus risen from the dead. They have Christmas break. I mean, you didn’t realize that part. Yeah. But, you know, lots of people celebrate Christmas just because it’s, like, you know, for the for the presents, you know, but now there’s Easter.

I don’t know. Is Matt Eye really that good of an aura? I mean, we already know that he got put in a put in a box literally Yeah. By another person, and, you know, that was at his house. And then this time around, they go to the, you know, the Department of Mysteries, and Mad Eye’s immediately down.

It’s like, oh, Mad Eye’s down. It’s like, what? He’s supposed to be the best of all the ores. Like, shouldn’t he be doing some crazy stuff here, like throw out some hand grenades or something like that? He should be like Arnold Schwarzenegger in commando.

I think they’re confusing best and grittiest and toughest. He’s like Ronnie Lott, but he’s like 70 at this point. Right? So he’s like the guy that will like, he they’re flying back, and he’s in the cold. And he’s, like, I’m not giving out.

I don’t care it’s cold. You know? And the other one’s freezing. Like Yeah. So he’s tough, but he’s not actually that good, I don’t think.

That’s why I think they’re confusing those 2. You see what I’m saying? Yeah. Past his prime, but he’s still, like, the old grizzled vet. Yeah.

He he can handle, like, pain, but he’s just not really He’s not quick on the draw. Yeah. He’s not quick on the draw anymore. Got it. Why did Sirius not give Harry this two way mirror, like, 2 books ago?

At the end, it’s like, you got this note from Sirius that’s like, here’s this mirror. You can contact me whenever you want. We can talk through it. It’s like, You’ve been coming to me through fires and these roundabout ways? Think that it was because it was in his house.

Okay. But even then, when when he got to the house over the summer, it’s like, hey. We might need to chat this year. There’s a lot of crazy stuff going on. Voldemort’s back.

Take this mirror. Oh, yeah. Yeah. That’s a good point. Yeah.

I didn’t really I didn’t really understand that. Who gets awarded the House Cup for you? You already spoiled it. I gave the House Cup to the government. Oh.

We talked about the government being just incompetent, not very good at what they do, really not smart, not well run machine. But they they can run a goddamn smear campaign, like you said. Yeah. I mean, they’re great at building that distrust. Just a great overall job, you know.

It’s good to see an organization that isn’t very well run, you know, be proficient and be good at something and organize well. That’s kind of government I want. So, hats off to the government on on this one. Yeah. I’m gonna give it to the Weasley Twins.

I already went went over the reasons why. I just thought they really took this book for me. They they they’re what made this book Mhmm. Good for me. So so I’m gonna I’m gonna have to give it to the Weasley twins.

And then, your order. So is your order 43125. What about you? I got 43152. Okay.

So 2 still lasts. Yeah. I think 2, if you just double the size of 2, then 2 is a way better book to me. Yeah. I think so too.

If you had a lot more stuff, it would but the only problem is then you have to, like, fill that stuff. So, like, what is that stuff? You know, but we’ll never know. Yeah. But this book was half fulfilling.

It was, like, him and Umbridge and him and relationship with Cho and stuff like that. So I I think that would be cheating. I have no issue for, like, it’s just, like, there’s a book 2 of a series you can’t come out with a 600 page book all of a sudden. Yeah. We get no Quidditch in this.

You know, there’s not a ton of, like, school stuff going on with, like, classes and stuff really. It’s more of, like, talking about OWLs and, you know, then, like, them just saying the whole time they have so much homework, so much homework, so much homework. So I agree with you after rereading it. And granted, I spent a lot of time changing diapers with the baby screaming as I’m listening to this. So, like, that kinda takes away from it as well.

But I I I agree. It’s it’s it’s not the best. Alright. Where are we going next? We got the movie coming up next, and then, obviously, we’re on to book 6, The Half Blooded Prince.

So we’ll get keep the train rolling. Yeah. This is Harry Potter and and the Order of Phoenix, and we’ll catch you for the movie. I’m excited for you to watch this movie because I and this is one that I haven’t seen in a really long time either. So Okay.

I’m I’m excited to watch it too because I honestly don’t even remember what happens. I mean, I know what happens, but you know what I’m saying. Alright. Cool. I’ll catch you for that one.

Alright. Alright. Bye now. Bye now.

 The Buddies fly into the fourth installment of their Harry Potter book/movie marathon with Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. The Buddies conjured up a spellbinding discussion covering: Dumbledore choking out students, Beauxbatons’ Disney-on-ice entrance, and ranking the top movies so far. So put on your magical eye, start flicking your tongue, and join us for the Goblet of Fire movie discussion.

 
Intro (0:00-0:44)
Stock Up/Down (0:45-29:14)
Favorite Scene/Character/Movie Notes (29:15-39:11)
Love/Hate (39:12-49:46)
Conclusion/Movie Rankings (49:47-52:16)

NEXT BOOK: Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling

Transcript for SEO Purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to Book Club. I’m Dylan here with the guy who decided Barty Crouch junior should have that weird tongue tick thing going on. Keith, what’s up, buddy? Nothing wrong with, the flicking of the tongue, D Man.

Pardon? Here at the Bunny Book Club, we’re breaking down box office bangers, and this week, we’re discussing 2 1000 five’s Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire film. If you’d like to recommend a book or movie for us to read or watch, reach out to us about a past episode, or visit our website at buddybobookclub.com. Send us an owl on the Twitter or Instagram, buddy book club podcasting your list, iTunes, Spotify, wherever you get podcasts. Please download and subscribe.

Give it a 5 star review. Whatever you wanna do, please, and thank you. Keith, let’s jump into the movie with some stock up, stock down. What do you have for stock up? Stock up choking out students that show you up.

Okay. I mean, I had to start off with this. I think we’ve referenced it a few times in previous pause, but just full disclosure. I haven’t I haven’t seen this movie, but I had seen, like, the memes or whatever of this scene. And I knew that Dumbledore kinda takes a stern talking to Harry.

Mhmm. And I was expecting. I was ready for it. I was like, oh, this could be funny. Even though I knew it was coming, that that was that was kind of ridiculous.

Right? He puts his hands around his neck. Yeah. Like, he’s gonna choke him out. I was like, wait, what?

I didn’t know this happened. That was the worst part. Like, him yelling at him is like, okay, whatever. But he literally is about to choke him out. And the reason I think it is is because he subbed the age line, and he’s supposed to be this brilliant wizard.

And Harry somehow got routed. So he was like, you gonna show me up, bitch? That’s it. And he’s, like, about to choke him out. And he’s like, oh, yeah.

There’s witnesses here. I probably shouldn’t do that. Oh. But in general, this gets me to a larger point about the movies in general Mhmm. Especially with the new actor of Dumbledore.

I think he’s evil. Like, if I didn’t know the books let me just go through some of the things that he did in this movie. Well, first, he chokes him out. And then, Professor McAnno is, like, we should not let him in the tournament. He’s, like, nah.

We’re gonna keep him in there. I don’t care if he’s gonna die. Then we have the first event or competition. The the dragon of the Triwizard? Yeah.

The dragon. They all know it’s a dragon. There’s no secrets anymore. It’s just they’re gonna be there. Hermione comes through being a good friend is like, good luck out there.

You know, I know you’re scared but like you’re gonna get it. You’re gonna do great. She’s in the tent. Rita Skeeter shows up in the tent. I don’t know why she’s there.

Yeah. Dumbledore walks in. The only thing he says is, miss Granger, what are you doing here? What? What do you think he’s doing?

You don’t need to be a fucking supreme mugwub to, like, know that his friend’s here supporting her, and he didn’t say shit to Rita Skeeter who is shouldn’t actually be there taking pictures and stuff. And it was it was just super rude. What was the reason for that? The line in the movie. And then we have Harry that he comes out of the pensive.

In the book, he’s like, oh, I kinda knew you’re gonna look into this. It was I kinda left it open. Not too surprising. And this, he’s like, what the fuck are you doing? You shouldn’t be poking around my office, you dickhead.

And then Harry’s like, well, the reason I came here is, like, my scar has been hurting and, you know, I’m having a hard time. And his response is like, yeah, maybe you should stop being a pussy. That was linear. He just pulls out a memory, and he’s, like, just forget about it. Don’t worry about it.

It’s, like, that’s it? Yeah. Well, first, I think he he, like, runs over to this corner and, like, curls into a ball. Dumbledore does. It was really weird.

It was, like, a weird acting scene. He he runs over to a corner and, like, sits he I think he’s sitting on stairs, but he’s kinda, like, curled into a ball, like, really scared. And he’s, like, oh. He’s, like, I don’t know what’s happening. And then Harry, like, divulges something.

He’s, like, shut the fuck up, Harry. I’m thinking over here. It’s like, what? But anyways, yeah. I just thought, then none of it made sense to me.

But, choking ups choking out students that show you up, just remember that’s a stock up. Yeah. And, you know, I thought it was probably gonna take us 4 minutes to get into the Dumbledore situation, and it took us less than 30 seconds, because because it was on my stock down, so, you know, I’ll burn it now, was was just having your own take on a character. Because I don’t really know what Michael Gambon and or Gamban, I don’t know how to say it, but whatever, and the director, Mike Newell, were doing to the Dumbledore character in this movie. Because he was in the last movie, and he might not have been obviously, Richard Harrison and him are very different double double doors.

I’m okay with that. And in the last movie, it was, like, I remember how much I disliked him as Dumbledore, and then then I watched the the prisoner again, and I was like, oh, he’s actually not that bad. You know? It’s, like, a different take, but it’s not terrible. And this one, it just seems to go totally off the rails.

According to Wikipedia, it says that Gammon commentated on the state of the character in the film, and I quote, Dumbledore is no longer in control, and he’s frightened, end quote. Newell compared Gaiman’s performance with Richard Harris’ iteration in earlier films showing the character as, quote, fallible and not omnipotent, end quote, and, quote, inadequate rather than super adequate, end quote. All of the things that they say that Richard Harris did or that Dumbledore is not is actually what Dumbledore is. So I’m very confused of why they took that. Dumbledore’s no longer controlled.

He’s frightened. Dumbledore only gets frightened in the 6th book when he’s like drinking that potion and is no longer in control. That’s when he’s like visibly frightened. The rest of the time, he at least acts like he’s in control. Everyone looks to Dumbledore.

He’s like the the quarterback on a really good football team when, like, shit’s going crazy. You just look to him or the head coach, and it’s like, we’re good. We got this. So you just trust that person. He needs to be that person.

So whether Dumbledore is frightened or not, he never shows it in the books. And talking about how he’s fallible and not omnipotent, fine, whatever. But inadequate rather than super adequate, Dumbledore is super adequate. He’s the only wizard that vol Voldemort is afraid of. That is super adequate.

So I I loved your take on him grabbing him by the collar. He also full sprints at him, and it’s like Terry Tate off his linebackers, what I thought he was gonna do to Harry in that scene. He just sprints at Harry and then grabs him around the throat. It’s like, what? What is happening here?

He he shakes him like a British nanny. It it it made no sense, and it’s it’s more than that though. He’s screaming the entire movie. It starts right when his first line comes up when they’re at the welcome feast, and he just screams silence. Like, I’d I’d scream it into the microphone now, but I don’t wanna ruin anyone’s ears.

But, he’s like, silence. It’s like, what? When Harry’s name comes out, it’s Harry Potter, like, screams it. It’s like, Jesus. Dumbledore, have a level of chill on you.

Like, what what is happening? The whole Dumbledore character is an even keeled person. He doesn’t panic. I’m just not sure why they went so far the other way. And it’s because they want to have their own take on this Dumbledore character that you didn’t see in 5,000 pages of books that they wanted to expose in this movie.

It was just a terrible choice, honestly. It was terrible choice. Yeah. Agreed. Well, you also said, like, fallible, like, you know, he’s someone that’s he’s not perfect.

But, like, that’s what the reason that he is such a good person is because he says that himself. He’s very aware. He’s like, hey, listen. I make mistakes. Things happen.

This Dumbledore seems like he gets angry instead of making you know, he’s not like hand up. Yeah. That’s my fault. Like, I should have known or His decision to let Harry enter and participate in the Triwizard Tournament in the books is like, okay, let’s keep a super close eye on him, because there’s something more nefarious afoot. And and Dumbledore continuously throughout this series treats Harry like a guinea pig in the books, and he does it to his own dismay.

Like, he’s not excited about having to do that to Harry, but he knows that he sees the bigger picture, and he knows that if they’re actually going to destroy Voldemort, that like Harry is going to have to be sacrificed time and time again, and it kills him inside. And so exploring that inner turmoil that Dumbledore has makes a lot of sense to me, but putting this crazy, lunatic character on screen and saying that this is Dumbledore is is is just ridiculous. Yeah. He’s just mean, and he’s not likable. Just some tough choices here with that.

And and, honestly, it puts a whole cloud on top of the whole movie, in in my opinion. But my first stock up is is SPEW, which is what Hermione’s fighting for, the Society For the Promotion of Elfish Welfare. We really need this organization in this movie, or we at least need, like, SAG AFTDA for elves in this movie or maybe some sort of agency. You know, I feel like these elves need need agents, especially Dobby was such a hit after the second film that he probably has a pretty good agent. I don’t know where they were in this one because the elves are nowhere.

Where where did the Hells Elves where are the Hells Elves in this movie? Where’s Winky? Yeah. Where’s Dobby? And I feel like they took Dobby out because they wanted it to be more obvious that Mad Eye Moody was helping Harry, and they kinda put Neville in the in the Dobby spot, which I’m I I like that, actually.

Yeah. I’m okay with that. I’m okay with that. But no Winky, it’s and the entire Barty Crouch storyline, Barty Crouch senior, it’s kind of the whole point of this story to some degree is this Barty Crouch senior, Barty Crouch junior reveal at the end that he’s been alive and that he killed his dad. And it it kinda just because of this decision, it puts weird tentacles throughout this movie that don’t make a lot of sense to me, including when we talk about that pensive scene.

Harry goes up there to to talk to Dumbledore, but because we don’t have in the book, he’s going up there because him and Grum just found Barty Crouch senior acting crazy out in the woods. Everyone runs out of the office to, you know, go find Barty Crouch. But in this one, he’s like, hey, professor. I have to tell you something. And then for some reason, they all just leave.

It’s not it’s not clear why they’re leaving. They’re like, oh, hey, Harry. I’ll just wait here. And then they leave. It’s like, What?

Why did they just Yeah. Leave? So and it all kind of stems from not having Winky in here. I think also creating more house elves is a good thing for the storyline because there’s so many we just see wizards and stuff that having Winky in there, she doesn’t have to play a big part. And I know the the people that criticize our thoughts, which are fair, is gonna say, this is a massive movie.

It’s twice or, excuse me, book. It’s twice as long as Prisoner of Azkaban. Yeah. The director wanted to make it 2 movies. Yeah.

And I think there was a push to to make it 2 movies. It seemed like the studio didn’t have any interest. Why? I don’t know. Do they hate money?

It doesn’t make a lot of sense. I think the toughest part would be really finding or manufacturing a stop point, you know, like a culmination point where then you could move on to the next one. Probably, like, after the second task, maybe. Somewhere around there. After the second task, I feel like the third task comes up pretty quickly, and then we’re into the final stretch.

So I feel like it’d have to be earlier than that, and you just, like, extend Well, I think, like, you make the 3rd task before the 3rd task could be, like, all the pencil stuff, all of the background there. So, like, the first, I mean, if you were to cut in half, it would be much more centric on the Quidditch World Cup, like that would be longer. The build up to getting to the school and like everything that goes around there much more I think personal stories because, like, the the dancing was pretty long. That was a pretty big element of the movie. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. It’d just be an interesting you know, because you have to have at the end of the movie something like an oh shit moment. You know, even in the when they bring up the 7 books, it’s like, you know, Dobby’s death and whatever was was the end of that one. Right?

And and that felt like a good stopping point. I don’t know if there is one here, but either way, I’ve we needed we needed more house elves. And and I understand the, you know, the argument that, hey, it’s all a super long book. They’re gonna have to cut a lot of this stuff. Yeah.

My, you know, double reverse, UNO reverse card is they also added a bunch of stuff that I felt, and we’ll get into it, but I felt like wasn’t necessary or, like, made stuff longer that I didn’t feel like was necessary. And they really could have gotten to the meat of the book itself as opposed to doing some of these more frivolous things. I don’t know. It’s my dig. What else do you have for stock up?

Harry is an attention seeker stock up. I know a lot of the people were thinking that. Potter sucks. Yeah. Right.

The badges. And if I watch this movie, I don’t think they’re wrong, especially the scene after he defeats the dragon or steals the egg. Right? And in the book too, he’s like this nice, young, humble kid. Right?

He’s basically famous, but, you know, down to earth. And and his internal monologue is someone that, like, shies away from attention almost. I have no inner monologue. But in the movie, he completes that first task. Right?

Harry comes back, and he’s, like, all bloodied up and charcoal still from the dragon thing. And he and he shows up at Gryffindor Tower, which, like, it’s kinda like a player, like, keeping their uniform on and going out into, like, the bars with it on. It’s it didn’t really make a lot of sense. Like, you’re not gonna shower up or anything after, like, you almost got killed. I could go, like, get the the blood kind of checked out, make sure your, like, arm is gonna fall off or gonna have any sort of, bacteria that gets in there.

Yeah. Some dragon bacteria. Sounds really bad. Yeah. But so he keeps it on, and and that which makes me, like, oh, so he’s kinda just, you know, loving this, the attention that he’s getting from from this.

And then they hoist him up on the shoulders. And they’re like, yeah, Harry. Like, chanting his name. And if that’s not enough, he pulls the egg out. And they’re like, open it up, Harry.

He’s like, hey. Does everyone want me to open it up? He’s like, who wants me to open it up? Clap louder if you want me to open it up. It was like a wrestling promo.

I was like, what are we doing here? Like, I hated him at that point. I was like, fuck this guy. No. Don’t open it up.

I don’t wanna see it anymore. So and if that wasn’t enough, he gets down after doing that. And Ron’s like, hey, man. My bad. And he’s like, yeah.

You finally figured it out, dickhead. And he’s like, What? He said sorry. What else do you want? So he does love attention.

Yeah. I’m on their side. Although, I feel like we can’t like Ron too much because they added maybe the worst detail in this movie that has ever been added to any movie that was based on something, which is that Ron had seen the dragons. They mentioned that Oh, because he said that his brother showed him the dragons, and he just didn’t tell Harry. He just said Well, he told them as a third party by the community property or whatever.

He told someone of someone and someone. Yeah. I didn’t really like that. I didn’t get that. That.

It’s it’s it’s false. It didn’t come for it’s not canon. You know, it didn’t happen in the book. And it just makes Ron look like a dick because he’s like, oh, no. I told this person thinking that they would tell that person.

It would then tell Hagrid and Hagrid would tell you. Well, that was the whole moody thing though too though. So I mean I guess so. But at the same time, it’s like it just makes it seem like because Ron is his boy. Like, no matter what happened, like, this issue they’re having with each other, and the whole point of their relationship is is that they’re brothers, basically.

You know what I mean? It’s like all all this all this little stuff, it it’s not gonna matter in the end. And, also, it does make a ton of sense because he’s like, oh, now that I saw the dragons, you would you’d be crazy to put your name in. Sorry for like, my bad. I shouldn’t I should’ve, like, believed you.

But, like, you already saw the dragons, though, So why would you still be upset? So it’s like, if you saw the dragons, the first thing you do is be like, Harry, I’m sorry. I should’ve believed you. I didn’t realize how crazy this is. There are dragons.

Like, you’re gonna have to face a dragon. Not he’ll he’ll hopefully eventually find out from somebody. And then it’s like, oh, they actually are dangerous. Oops. Yeah.

Yeah. So but but I agree with you. I thought when he walked into the common room, I thought he was gonna do, like, the the ear cuff one side, you know, then maybe the other side. Like, who wants to grow it up? Open it up.

Yeah. He’s like a hype man or something. It was Didn’t didn’t care. Kinda wild. And speaking about Harry in general, my last stock up is it’s a little one, but but haircuts stock up.

I don’t know who decided on the costume and design staff or or ever to just have all these boys just just grow it out, just to show that they’re teenagers or something. But Harry looks like Macgruber in this. He’s got this almost, like, mullet y type type thing going on. I don’t hate it per se. It seemed like an interesting choice.

Like, him and Ron are both just super long flowing hairs, like, they’re in a, like, they’re in an eighties band or something like that. And I just thought it was an interesting choice. It wasn’t it wasn’t really a strong hate, but I felt like I had to mention it. I was trying to find the, the Austin Powers, like, as long as, you know, Free Love they’re just getting their 60 vibes on, you know? That’s all they’re doing.

I liked it. They look much more British boy band or British swinging sixties. As long as you can have lots of unprotected sex with lots of women or whatever. Yeah. Yeah.

Okay. Let’s get into stock down. What do you have for stock down? Making a good impression, stock down, I will say that when we get to Hogwarts, we see the Beauxbaton rolling. Mhmm.

Mhmm. And they’re dressed like Mary Poppins. They’re shooting out Tinker Bells. Every guy in the place is now on the ground. They’re all, like, in awe.

Yeah. I was, like, damn. Alright. That’s how you make an entrance. Then we get Durmstrom.

They come in with a shit out of water. They’re rolling in. It looks like they’re going to war, pounding their sticks on the ground. They’re like, did the war cry going on. The girls are all slobbering over them.

Viktor Krum is wearing a bear fur. Looks like like I’m about to about to, go Get Westeros or something? Go, Leo in that, one movie where he wanted an Oscar, actually. Yeah. What an entrance for both of them.

And then I’m, like, oh, shit. What’s Hogwarts about to do? What are we about to see here? Maybe we got, you know, something like the ceiling does some majestic show like the, Las Vegas sphere maybe? You know, that’s what I was thinking.

Dumbledore is, like, oh, yeah. I’m kind of the badass wizard. Let me show you what I can do type thing. Or, you know, worst case scenario, we’ll we’ll throw, like, the sorting hat out there. Right.

Have him sing a song. Right. Exactly. Worst case, nope. We’re gonna sing off tune to some random terrible song that has no purpose and no one knows it.

We have to put the lyrics up here so everyone sings it. What? Yeah. That’s the intro? We we have, like, the most historic school in the wizarding world, and this is what we’re doing?

Who gives a shit about this song? Terrible first impression. I would have left the school right after that. That whole scene was in one of my stock downs, which was walkout music, stock down. This when I was this is one of the things I was alluding to earlier where they went long on stuff that really had no need.

I did not understand what was happening in this scene at all, like, the welcome which is basically the welcome feast when Dermshring and Beboutin students are introduced. From beginning to end, it made no sense to me. It starts with Filch doing this, like, oh my god. I just pooped my pants run down the great hall, which didn’t make any sense. Real quick.

Can I say that Filch is the best character in this, this movie? Every time he’s on screen, I was laughing. He was absolutely hilarious in this movie. The entire scene of this scene was a mix of, like, cringe and uncomfortable laughter for me. So I was definitely laughing when he did the run, like, the poop my pants run that fall.

It didn’t explain why he was doing it whatsoever. It was just like he that’s how he runs, I guess. And then the Beauxbatons entrance, I guess this is how they’re gonna introduce villas into this because I guess they’re all villas. But they have, like, a gymnast on their roster who’s, like, doing in a leotard and, like, doing gymnast y things. And I had no problem with any of that.

I don’t I don’t know what your what the issue was. This Dermstring, they come out looking like almost like an act you would find as you’re walking around the park at Disney World. It’s just like, oh, look at these guys. They’re doing stuff, or or when you go into any city, and there’s, you know, guys there with a a a, you know, 5 gallon bucket that they want tips into, and they’re doing gymnasticky moves and but also some performance, performative dance. Why is this in here?

Like, couldn’t they just say, hey. Here’s Boba baton. Here’s Derbyshire. Yes. They’re regal in their uniforms.

That was good for me. I thought the Boba baton uniforms were quite nice, actually, the Mary Poppins ones you referenced. It just seemed like a a lot, and then the Hogwarts song comes on, and I said, what the fuck? Where are we here? What honestly, where are we?

This is not Harry Potter. This is some weird children’s movie that I just happened to find myself in. So, yeah, that whole scene was very confusing for me. Well, they they needed to introduce the schools and, like, what they’re about without having to narrate it. So they’re, like, we’ll just do something over the top.

So I I get it for the 2 schools. I was just really more upset with the the what what was the point of the song? We already know what Hogwarts is about. So why who is this song for? Hold on.

It doesn’t make any sense. Hold on. I agree. They did it so that we would understand what the schools are about. You don’t need all the pomp and circumstance to show that.

They already pretty much covered it. This one school comes out of a ship in a lake. Okay. This other school comes in a Cinderella chariot withdrawn with a bunch of pegasuses. Okay.

That’s 1. And then, the girls come in all prim and proper, and the guys from Dermstring come in all brooding. I got it. I figured it out. It’s I don’t need the dance routine.

You know, it’s, like, went so extra. He didn’t like the blowing the fire around Dumbledore, and he was, like, what is this fire? I’ve never seen this. It was terrible. It was honestly fucking terrible.

Alright. I didn’t I didn’t hate it as much as you do. I did hate the the the singing as much as you did, though. Yeah. The singing was definitely the worst.

No. The little girl being the gymnast was the worst because it was so confusing. I was like, why is she here? Listen. I I liked all the stimuli.

I don’t know. I mean, I it’s I’m a simple man. I I liked it. I was like, oh, that’s what they’re about. Okay.

Well, I was like, oh, they cut the entire actual Quidditch of the Quidditch match so I could watch these people do backflips in the great hall and then sing a song that we’ve never heard before. Checks out. Yeah. That that checks out. What else are for stock down?

Last one, movie ending stock down. And I’m not talking about the climax of this movie. I thought that was great. I’m talking about the very last scenes. I I’m convinced at this point that they’re trying to make they’re like, can we one up the last movie’s ending and make it even worse?

You mean, like, one down it? One down. Yeah. I was watching it at the end. I was like, okay, this movie is gonna nail the ending.

The last 3 were so terrible that they’re gonna get it. And they’re like, the the craziest thing is the ending is actually perfect. That great speech from Dumbledore, we pan up to the ceiling. Boom. End the movie.

Uh-huh. Instead, it turns into a completely different movie for the next 3 minutes to end the movie. It didn’t make any sense. Everyone’s celebrating after this, like, horrific, like, heart wrenching speech Yeah. Where, like, everyone’s, like, what a great school year.

School year. We get that for 3 minutes. We get Victor Crum being, like, yeah. Why don’t you, message me over the summer? We’ll see what’s up.

I’m, like, what what the hell? Alright. That was weird. And then the worst part is that Harry, Ron and Hermione have, like, the farewell scene. And this should be, hey, listen, we’ve been through some shit together.

We’ve had some ups and downs, but we’ll always be friends. Mhmm. We ride together. We die together. Bad boys for life.

Essentially, that should have been. Right? Instead, they just make Hermione seem super weak and, like, timid. And she’s, like, can you guys write to me this summer? And Ron’s, like, fuck no.

I’m, like, wait, what? And then Harry’s, like, yeah, I’ll do it every week. I’m, like, Harry, you bitch every summer about not being in contact with the wizarding world. Like, you would love that. What are you talking about?

It made it seem like they aren’t even good friends Yeah. At the end. I’m like, why would you be why would you not wanna write to this person? You’ve, like, spent 4 years of your lives with them, like, every day, and you’re, like, best friends. Yeah.

It didn’t make any sense. And then it cuts to, like, happy music and, like, going off in the sun. Like, didn’t we just see a dead person die, like, 4 minutes ago? Yeah. I I couldn’t agree with you more.

The once again, this is another thing that I said should’ve never been in in the movie, and they could’ve actually filled it with content that could have that should have been there. We get everyone in the courtyard hags in each other, tasking them to sign their yearbooks. It’s like, oh, can you just, like, put a little bit of Cedric’s blood on the page? Because, like, you know, rip. It was like, why is this happening?

Why is everyone so how is Voldemort’s back? Like, Dumbledore just said that. He murdered thousands of people. Like, go home to your families and cry. This is terrible.

And Yeah. It should have been like 9:11 just happened. Yeah. Exactly. It’s like, what a great school year.

And and then this the the 3 of them hanging out. I totally agree with you. If you’re gonna include it, that’s fine. Them looking out onto the lake, but being like our worlds are about to change, and we got each other’s back. We always have.

We’re gonna get through this together, because that’s not that’s what the story is about. It’s about them getting through it together and and working so well as a team, even though they have differences every, you know, every other day or whatever the case is. But but instead, it’s this weird thing about writing each other. It’s like, what? And just them, like, belittling Hermione, who is the smartest and best out of them all.

So I I Right. Right. Confusing. Confusing. My last talk down is just live sporting events in the wizarding world.

I’m out on them. Not only did we not get any Quidditch action, so I can’t really actually speak to the play on the field. But the viewing experience for the Quidditch World Cup looked horrendous. It was all obstructed views. Did you see the, like, buildings that they had created?

The when the minister of magic, who’s took over the Ludo Bagman’s job, but we haven’t even mentioned that, like, Ludo’s not in this, so, like, you know, so RIP to him as well. But when he’s doing his thing in his box that the Malfoy is like, oh, we’re sitting in the box and you guys aren’t, even though they are in the book. You look at the box, and it’s it’s like an erector set that you’re supposed to be looking through. So it’s a terrible viewing experience. You can’t see any of the the actual Quidditch match.

The leprechauns or the leprechaun itself, it wasn’t even a leprechaun, that looked cheesy. That looked like something anyone can do. That’s not magic. No villas to get our hearts going a pitter patter. And when we finally do start seeing people on brooms, it’s Crumb out there doing, like, motocross moves on his broom.

They just took motocross moves and said, okay. Do it on a broom. And then the whole experience culminates with death eaters basically doing a reenactment of the firebombing of Dresden on the tent community. Did you see how expansive that destruction was? Yeah.

And I also still don’t understand. There’s, like, thousands of thousands of wizards there. They all have wands, and there’s, like, 4 Death Eaters that walk there. And they’re, like, we’re all gonna die. Everyone, run for the hills.

Like, Can can you just like, 10 people just be, like, stun? Stupefy. And that’s it. Stupefy. Yeah.

Expel it. To that. Yeah. Yep. That’s it.

Let’s go home. Another another Scott evil situation. Right. Right. Yeah.

Yeah. Yeah. But when they do, like, the big pan out of the destruction, I was like, woah. Holy shit. He’s in a World War 1 battlefield.

It’s like post apocalyptic all of a sudden. You’re like, wait. What? What happened here? Yeah.

Like, they would after that, considering how many people were at the Quidditch World Cup, they would have gone back to school, and everyone would be dead because all those people were there. It’s like, I don’t think the Death Eaters like, 6 Death Eaters could do that much damage. But, hey. At least the time they got to spend in the wizarding tent seemed pretty cool. That was those wizarding tents seemed freaking awesome.

Out of a Moroccan bazaar or something like that, I loved it. I loved the tent, all all in. Yeah. I actually didn’t let mind the, that whole scene. I thought the same actually was cool.

It went all the way up like that. I thought it was pretty cool. That was interesting. And I did think they needed to kinda run through it quick because I needed to get to the the school. So I understood the cuts they made.

So I wasn’t super Yeah. I’m I’m more being a dick about it than anything else. Like, the the Quidditch World Cup in general sounds like a a fun thing. You know? But, The tent was the most important, which which is what we saw.

Yeah. I’m glad we saw the the tent. And they did include a couple, like, book type things in there that if you had read the book, you would see, like, the muggle who was leading or, like, wasn’t managing the whole thing. I was kind of upset that people were all dressed in robes, and they weren’t trying to be, like, fit in with muggles, which is what they’re supposed to be doing because that would have been kind of fun from a costume perspective. But without any explanation of that, it wouldn’t make sense to, like, viewers, so I get it.

Right. And and I understand cutting the actual Quidditch. Like, it’s this isn’t it’s not a sports movie. We don’t need to see The Quidditch. Like, I get that Crumb is the biggest guy in the world.

Like, that’s fine. If you’re gonna cut stuff from the book, I’m happy that hit the cutting room floor. There’s just a couple of times in here when they have these big, wide shots that it’s for a spectacle, like it’s for a Wow moment, but it just doesn’t tie in with reality whatsoever. That being one of them, and then the other one being the maze at the end when they show the entire maze, and it goes on for literally tens of miles. It’s it’s like, wait.

What? This maze goes from here until 3 mountains down? Like, no one it would take you a month to go through that maze. What what are we talking about? It looked nice, but if you stop and think about it for half a second, you’re like, that makes zero sense.

And having seen the movie several times, you know, that’s that’s what I’m doing. Do you have a favorite scene from this movie? And this is actually probably my favorite scene of all the movies so far. Yeah. This I really, really like this.

When Harry escapes, and comes back and the I I feel like I’m starting to use juxtaposition a lot because you use it a lot and it’s in a tool song. Cool. But when he comes back and, like, brings Cedric’s dead body and the music’s playing and it’s all cheerful and everyone’s like, great job. You guys did it, whatever. And he’s just lying there dead and he’s, like, crying over the body.

That hit me. I got chills. Yeah. That that that was incredible scene. By far the best scene, I feel like, or at least most dramatic scene in the movie.

That is how you nail it, where remember movie 3 we talked about how the big turn was, like, so it’s such a fizzle. It was such a it was so disappointing. This was, like, shit. But Dark Lord’s back. He just murdered someone.

This is a real person that was right in front of your eyes. It’s, like, dead. Dad’s there crying over the body. Like, oh my god. Like, this is This ain’t no kids’ room anymore.

Yeah. You felt that. By far the best best scene and, like, some the first time I felt something in in the Harry Potter world. So love that. It’s as far from little girl doing gymnastics in the Great Hall as we could have possibly gotten.

Yeah. You know? It’s like that’s that’s why that other scene bothers me so much because this is what this book is. It it’s dark. It’s real.

But I think you need the lightheartedness at the top to in order to make the death even worse. That’s why I like it. Need a it’s a small world after all kind of thing going on. It can be lighthearted and fun. You know, there are fun things that happen in the wizarding world.

There’s tons of fun jokey stuff that happens. The dress rope stuff, great. That’s showing fun, whimsical, whatever fun stuff, and then this takes it to the next level. I I get that. It’s just some of the stuff is just kinda cheesy.

But, yeah, I agree with you. That scene was great. I also like how it’s, like, big band polka music kind of playing. Right. Right.

That the music itself, it could have been, like, this dark, ominous music, but instead that made it even worse. Yeah. It was, like, shot brightly too. So just like the the difference between what Harry was feeling, what everyone else has experienced is such a contrast that it makes it even better. Yeah.

I think, our boy Danny Radcliffe kinda reached down deep for that scene too. I think he did a pretty good he did a pretty good job. That long hair must have been that’s what it is. Makes your brain go longer. Yeah.

So I think my favorite was rewind 15 minutes, but when he gets to the graveyard, like, the graveyard scene in general and the introduction of of Voldemort as a character, we can talk more about, you know, the new characters and whatnot, but Ralph Fiennes as Voldemort is fucking perfect. He is so good, and you need a real actor for that character. Not saying that there’s not a lot of real actors in the in these movies, but he’s like a Oscar winning actor. You know what I mean? Like, he’s he’s so good.

Well, he plays, like, the worst bad guy or real person bad guy ever, right, in Schindler’s List? Yeah. That’s true. I forgot. I think about him when I think of that World War 1 movie.

I think it’s World War 1 or World War 2 movie that he plays in. Oh, the Seinfeld movie there, I remember? Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Shit. What is that movie? That book wasn’t actually bad. I remember reading that.

Oh, you did? In high school. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting.

Yeah. I I like honestly, I like the movie too. If you if you’re into if you’re into dramas, it’s a great movie. Saw the movie. Isn’t he getting, like, bathed for, like, 2 hours, though, or something?

It was it was kinda weird. Yeah. It’s like a down pilot in Africa or something like that. And why can’t I think of the fucking movie? I was silent patient.

Is that what it is? No. That’s a that’s a book we read now. No book we read. Yeah.

It is something like that. Patient. Yeah. English Patient. There you go.

Yeah. Yeah. So, but, yeah, he was I just thought he was so good as Voldemort. The look of Voldemort was awesome. Like, that character design was was perfect.

Apparently, they’re gonna make his eyes, like, red and whatever, like, slits, like snake eyes. And he was like, nah. We’re not doing that. I’m too good of an actor for that. They’re like, okay.

Oh, okay. Interesting. Because that’s the one thing I did call out when I was watching on the couch with Care. It was that the only thing they missed was that his eyes are red. And, no.

I like it there. I like it. I like it. I like it. Yeah.

It made him more more human qualities. Those eyes are evil. So, like, that it’s just the actor’s eyes are amazing for that. So So I just I just thought that scene was awesome in general. They pretty much nailed nailed that one.

What about favorite character? Do you have a favorite character from the book that’s different or from the movie that’s different from the book? No. Same as the book. Mad Eye, I thought was incredible.

A lot of times you imagine what the character is like. They did it perfectly. That’s exactly who I I imagined what it was. Similar to, like, what Snape is, I feel like they really just nailed that character perfectly. I was super happy.

And you could tell he has all these, like, ticks and things like that, which are kind of telltale signs of of why he’s actually a bad guy, but like, at the same time, didn’t know the twist that you would just think, oh, he’s just a crazy person. So Yeah. So it’s Brendan Gleeson who who plays him, and I agree. I think he he played him perfectly. Mad Eye was awesome.

The character look was awesome. Like, every everything about it was great. But I do wanna ask you, his first lesson, we lauded it in our book podcast because everyone left that classroom being, like, this was the best lesson ever. Oh my god. The the 3 curses, that was wild.

This one in the movie doesn’t give off kind of best teacher vibes. It more comes across as, like, oh my god. This person’s a psychopath vibes. Right. Right.

That’s true. This movie was much, much more bread crumbs of Yeah. This guy’s a bad guy. Yeah. Like whereas in the book, it’s it would be very very hard to know that he was bad.

Mhmm. And this it’s like I mean, first of all, we get introduced to Barty Krush junior in the beginning of the book Oh, interesting. Or the beginning of the movie. Yeah. So which I actually didn’t mind because, you know, as a viewer, it had been pretty tough if you just all of a sudden were like and this guy’s the son of that other guy is only on screen for 5 minutes.

It makes a lot of sense for him to be included in that opening scene. Yeah. And then also the ticks like I mentioned like the lucky ending. You like the tick? No.

No. I didn’t actually necessarily like that but I just think that if you were someone that wants to like try to solve the mystery as you’re watching the movie, it’d be much easier to do that in this sense. Like, it was like right in front of your face I thought compared to the book where I don’t think if you read the book, there’s like no person that ever will be able to predict that in the book. The book is so hard to because there’s so much going on. There’s no way you could be like, oh, this guy that’s been helping him the whole time, he’s actually bad.

They’re like, wait, what? We also didn’t even know he was alive in the book. So it’s, like, to even predict a guy that’s not even alive. I I don’t like how they went about it to say, like, oh, you could have figured this out. They put so much effort into giving those breadcrumbs that it took away from it with the tick.

Like, everything else was fine for me. It’s like, oh, those are fine little breadcrumbs to leave. But then having him do the, like, the weird tongue thing, it just That was just to show that his dad knew who he was. That didn’t make any sense because he kills him, but we don’t have to hear anything about that. We never know.

No. They never say anything about it again, so it’s like, So, yeah, I agree with you. The one point when he does the tongue tick thing and his dad kinda goes bright eyed and is like, oh my god. Yeah. That’s great, but we don’t have any of the Barty Crotch backstory, so it doesn’t matter to the viewer.

It just kinda was weird to me, honestly. I don’t know who decided to sit down and be like, hey. We should do this so that we can, like so that on the second watch, people are like, oh my god. That was definitely MC, that tick. It’s like, yeah.

Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb. Dumb.

So my favorite character was Amos Diggory. We, you know, we kinda talked about it in your favorite scene, but, additionally, on top of that, he just seems like a swell guy. They took out all of the dick stuff that he says to Harry in the book and changed it to, like, Merlin’s beard, Harry Potter, really nice to meet you. Let’s go enjoy the Quidditch World Cup. It’s like, oh, sweet.

Seems like a nice guy. I mean, him crying out at the end, like, my boy. It it’s fucking gut wrenching. I don’t know if it’s because I’m soon to be a new parent or something, but it it, like, hit me so hard in the feels. It was, like, real.

I don’t know. It felt like that guy wasn’t acting. It felt it felt real, and it affected me. Well, I told you, it gave me chills. You just had it as ominous the whole time, and then you’re, like, something bad is gonna happen, and then the guy dies.

And so it just doesn’t hit it the same as, like, that. Everything’s amazing, and then all of a sudden, one second later, everything’s the worst thing ever could that could ever happen to you. You know, it’s just, like, holy shit. Yeah. So so I I thought not only did they do a good job with his character, but the actor and I’m sorry I don’t have his name, but he did a phenomenal job with the with the short amount of time he had on screen.

Yeah. And it would’ve been tough too if they made him, like, a dickhead, and then it wouldn’t have hit it hard. Instead, he’s, like, a nice, like, midwestern dad. If they made him, like, just insulting Harry, he’d be, like, maybe you deserved it a little bit. So yeah.

And so these are things that when you’re gonna condense a book down to this movie’s, like, 2 hours and 40 minutes long. It’s a long movie. But when you’re gonna condense a big book down to it, there are some things that are gonna get will get left out. I understand that. And some things you have to change.

Changing something like this seems to make a lot of sense. It like improves upon it. It’s kind of like what we talked about when the Marauder’s map situation came out with Lupin in the last one. And they kinda changed how that happened, which not only cut out a piece of the book, but it also made a little bit more sense to the story and didn’t miss a beat. This seems like one of those things where there’s a bunch I feel like in this movie that they cut or extended and then it did make a lot of sense.

So, for studio notes, I I didn’t really have a lot because it doesn’t really matter. I think it’s, like, an 88 on Rotten Tomatoes or something like that. I looked it up, but I didn’t even write it down. And it made almost 900,000,000 in theaters, which is interestingly enough, the 6th highest grossing Harry Potter movie, which, you know, I feel like both sevens, 1, and then maybe, I guess, like, the other ones, just, like, the later ones. But 6, there’s 8 movies.

So what made less? Book 2? Casting notes, we already talked about Brittney Gleeson and Ralph Fiennes. We had Rita Skeeter who she’s, like, a famous actress as well, but her storyline’s pretty much cut from from this movie as well. Let’s just slide into some love hates.

Keith, what did you love about Goblin Fire? Yeah. I already touched on it a little bit. I did think that they jumped around stuff but they covered the bulk of what they needed to cover and I know it sounds like you didn’t like it as much as I did but I thought for for this movie in particular, I never thought I was watching a movie. I was just locked in.

Movie 3, the like the whole time I was very very aware I was watching a movie. Like we we talked about some of the stuff they did in that where I was just like, what? Like what’s going on? Why are they doing like these things? It doesn’t like make sense of what’s happening.

Where this where there’s a length a lot of choices I didn’t like but the movie itself was very captivating. I was locked in the whole time. I wasn’t thinking about like stuff that like annoyed me, you know. They’d know me briefly but like I would just get right back into the movie. I think the pacing was great.

I actually think I liked a lot. Probably better than you. Yeah. I have a lot of hates but, like, the hates to me were the most important part of the movie in book in movie 3 was ruined. The most important part of the movie in this one was the best scene I’ve seen.

So, like, that’s the big difference where I can take a a shitty actor choice, but I can’t take a you ruined the best part of this book. Yeah. You know what I mean? So My my I guess, my only qualm with with what you said was the pacing aspect and because for me, this movie felt like a bunch of scenes that they just then put together. Like, it didn’t That’s true.

It didn’t have, like, a con there a continuation kind of thing. So, it was just like, oh, here’s this scene. And then we jump to somewhere else, and it’s this scene, especially because it goes throughout the whole year. And then it’s like, oh, all of a sudden, we’re over here, and then we’re over here. It’s just like it didn’t flow.

There wasn’t a lot of flow to it. It just seemed like they stitched to together a bunch of scenes. The 20 hour plus book task to make that into a 2 hour movie is, I mean, I gave them some some breaks there, like, but I agree, like, I mean, it it there was a lot of scenes, but I think the scenes were good, but you’re right. It it definitely could have been better flowing, but I think this is a hard Yeah. Hard ask.

Yeah. That’s fair. I loved the the characters. I know we talked about it already, but the the Mad Eye Moody, Voldemort, the graveyard scene, everything with with Moody in it, Even, like, his shot right after, Filch does his poop run of Moody, like, on the rocks looking up at the castle. Like, some of those shots were really good, and we don’t like the actual conversation that’s going on with Harry, Ron, and Hermione at the end.

But I did like that shot, you know, of them kind of overlooking the lake as, like, those people are going away, kind of like a transition to a new time. It checked out for me, so I like that stuff. And I thought the first task in terms of, like, how the the dragons look was probably the best iteration of dragon CGI. I feel like we’ve seen it. It’s they talk so much about how good the dragons were in Game of Thrones, and there were some good dragon scenes, but this came out earlier and, was better in my in my opinion.

So Well, I also think, yeah, just the three tasks in general, like, I had definitely have some complaints about them. But overall, that’s really what the movie was about, the 3 tasks. And I think they did a good job. Especially the first one, I I have really no complaints other than Dumbledore being a dickhead to Hermione for no reason. Yeah.

Mer mer people looks great. The mer people look awesome. Yeah. Second one was good. The only issue I had with that was Cedric gets there, like, right after Harry, and he’s the one that actually releases Cho Chang.

And in the book, he Harry is the one who gets there first, cuts the person off, and then, like, helps Cedric cut everyone else out. Cedric really was the person that won. Yeah. Cedric got there, like, a second after Harry in in the movie. Harry wouldn’t have gotten them out if he didn’t help.

Yeah. So, and, yeah, in the book, Harry, I think, like, gives Cedric a sharp stone or something to to Right. To cut her out. So Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. I agree with you there. I we we might have to talk about the 3rd task because we I will not agree with you there. What else did you love? I already mentioned it.

Filch just, stealing stealing everything he was in. They figured out Felch. Like, the first three, I’m like, this guy sucks. What what’s the point of him being here? Now he’s the the comedic relief.

Yeah. I love him. He’s he’s something like that. I honestly didn’t really love much else. So, what about hates?

Hermione in general just I I already mentioned earlier, but she just seemed weak and emotional. That’s not really her in the book at all. I really like her in the book because especially when, like, they wrote the whole gossip call on her, and she was just, like, yeah, I don’t give a fuck. Like, you know, I’m not gonna get mad. I’m gonna eat it.

Yeah. Like, I’m gonna now do I’m gonna, like, hit the books harder. And this, like, they write the gospel, and she’s, like, crying. And I’m like, Yeah. Hermione is, like, the Donatello ninja turtle.

Like, she’s the smartest one of the bunch, but she’s also a badass. You know? Like, she can also do the kung fu and shit. So and, obviously, they’re not doing kung fu and, in wizarding stuff. But, you know, she she’s even keeled, knows it all, and, like, has a plan.

Almost conniving, but in the best way. She’ll figure it out. The fact that she shows, like, no emotion at all and then she shows emotion at the ball, oh, that’s kind of interesting. Like she oh, she really does have feelings like that’s how it upsets her. But if she’s just showing emotion at all times and upset all the time and then it’s like she’s just whiny then.

She’s weak. She’s not, like, the character you need her to be. Yeah. It’s okay for her to show that, I felt like, at the ball with Ron because of their growing relationship. But But then she gets to, like, the gossip column and she’s crying.

And then, like, they’re, like, will you please write me at the end of the it’s, like, what? She wouldn’t do that. Yeah. I don’t know. That I don’t know.

It seemed out out of her character. So, for my 8s, we talked about movies for a lesson, Ron Sing the Dragons. The learning to dance scene before the ball, get it out of here. Who decided to add that? Oh, with miss McGonigal and, Ron.

Yeah. And Ron. It’s like, sure. This is probably that, like, levity or whatever the thing is to find. But it’s like a value over replacement, you know, as they say in the sports world, value over replacement.

Because it’s a fine scene. It’s it’s not good, but it’s fine to to show that. But the replacement is having all the other stuff that happened in the book in there. It’s like a 5 minute scene. You could have definitely fit in some Winky.

You could have definitely fit in some Ludo Bagman. You could have definitely fit in the Rita Skeeter storyline about how she’s a secret and a magus, and that’s actually Hermione’s whole plan from the get go, You know? You could have fit in Harry giving the money to the Weasleys to start their empire. There’s so many other things you could have slid in there with that 5 minutes than them learning to dance. And once again, it was just kinda, like, cut.

It’s like this scene just got, like, pasted in there. It didn’t it didn’t make any sense. So Well, the actors, fun fact, took 3 weeks of, dance practice to prepare for that scene. So they needed to keep it aired. So I was like, wait, 3 weeks?

They were doing, like, 1 step, 2 steps. Yeah. They’re doing it. And I’m an awful dancer, but I think I could pick that up in, like, a day. Yeah.

I think it was like a waltz. Like, a 1, 2, 3. 1, 2, 3. Yeah. Right.

I don’t think there’s much talent in that. Ugh. Yeah. So I I just thought that scene was pretty pretty fucking stupid. What else, Shane?

Yeah. I didn’t, like, left out the 3rd tab. Thank you. That’s where I’m going next. The trees and, like, the roots being the enemy, I’d much liked it better when it was just an actual maze with, like, enemies in the, you know, at the at the corners of the maze.

Not that like they left out the troll, which I thought would have been cool to add in. The worst part too of Dumbledore is, like, you’ll change when you get in there. But like, so it makes it seem like Viktor Krum goes crazy. You’re like, oh, it’s just because Yeah. The trees are crazy.

It makes it so the fact that he gets possessed, that should be like, what the fuck’s going on with Viktor? Why is why is he doing that? But instead you’re like, I guess it’s the trees that are making him crazy. It doesn’t it was stupid. They should’ve kept it the the same as as a book.

Yeah. It started off with the the giant maze that goes on forever, and I was like, okay. This is gonna be a problem. Someone just, like, is doing the computer graphic imaging or whatever and just, like, kept copy and pasting more maze throughout the shot that they had. I was like, you could’ve stopped somewhere.

And I was fine with it just being, like, super dark and misty. Like, that’s fine. Set a tone. No problem. But the whole point of the maze is it’s supposed to be the ultimate wizarding task.

You’re trying to it’s simple. You’re trying to find a cup, but strewn throughout this maze is different creatures from the wizarding world that you’re gonna have to get by or different things. It makes the most sense. Instead, the maze itself is the enemy. It’s like all of a sudden became The Shining, and, you know, the roots coming to get you, the tree’s closing in on you.

And then, the two biggest issues I have with the whole maze is Sedgwick uses expelliarmus on Krum, and it doesn’t even disarm him. It hits him in the chest. He flies away, and they even cut a close-up scene of Krum, a close-up shot of Krum holding his wand. It’s like, what? Expelliarmus is you disarm someone.

That’s literally what it is. And it’s like, okay. This is just another thing of these movies where all the spells do exactly the same thing. It’s just you hit someone with a laser beam and they fly away. It’s like, I hate that.

And then the biggest issue is they got the Cedric and Harry at the end going for the cup so wrong. That bothered me the most because it’s supposed to be that they both fought off Krum and they see the cup and they know they’re equidistance away and they say, you know what? Let’s just go But the scene after that’s so good, you forget. Yeah. You forget.

Let’s be honest. That’s the Let’s go grab it together, and they’re chums. You know? Let’s do this for Hogwarts. And it also helps Cedric’s case is, like, you know, he’s just a good guy.

Cedric is just a good guy. As simple as that. And instead, they’re, like, elbowing each other in the face, sprinting for this cup, and, you know, which then all of a sudden, the maze just jumps up and grabs Cedric, and he’s crying for Harry to come save him. It’s like, Harry is not the savior there. They’re just 2 kids in a fucking shitty situation that are gonna win it together because humanity prevails over evil.

And I know they tried to do that with, like, Harry being saying to him, like, oh, I almost thought I wasn’t gonna save you 2 to show, you know, how we can all be as humans. But, it just it it took the tone all the way the wrong way for me on that. How does it rank for the movies for you that you’ve seen? Because you’d seen the first one. Right?

But you hadn’t seen 2, 3, or 4. Yeah. I haven’t seen it. So now that you’ve seen them, how do you how do you rank all the movies? Kinda surprised you, I think.

I I think this is the best one. The other ones were either weren’t as well acted or they weren’t as well paced or they were, like, dumb like the third one. I think it’s 4, 1, 2, 3 for me. So Fascinating. I like this because our books are so far right online.

So, yeah. This was probably the 2nd worst, I would say. I’m gonna go with Let me ask you this. What if you look at all 4 of the movies, what’s the most memorable scenes? Because the to me, the death scene when he comes back and the Voldemort scene when he’s there and the dragon and the water scene are all in the top 10.

Mhmm. With the the top 2 being the death scene in the Voldemort scene. So I can’t even think of, like, what would be on that list from any of the other movies. That’s my biggest problem with the other movies. They’re, like, they’re not super memorable.

They’re just, like, oh, I watched something. Yeah. For this one’s, I’m, like, oh, I’m thinking about the movie after it. Yeah. That’s an interesting it’s a fair point, but I’d say my counterpoint would be someone could have, like, a sick touchdown in a football game, but still lose the game.

You know? So that that’s a memorable touchdown, memorable catch, if you will, whatever the case is. Would you rather go to a game that’s, like, 9 to 6, 3 3 field goals that wins the game, and you’re like, that was good. We won. No.

I’m saying that the the entirety of the game itself might be more entertaining even though there’s not one standout play that I was like, wow. That was a great play. So for me, my ranking is probably 3142. Okay. I can’t believe that 3 is the number one movie.

That movie, I still am pissed about that movie. I think it was it was trash, but that’s just me. Yeah. Yeah. That’s why we’re different.

You’re the artsy, you know. I have this guy who’s nominated for all these directional Yeah. You know? You just wanna see people get murdered. That’s it.

Right. Exactly. Well, I mean, I think we just you’re artsy. I like deck. What do we what do we get in there?

Exactly. Yeah. You’re fartsy. Alright. Alright.

What do we got coming up next? We got book 5, Order of the Phoenix. Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix coming up next. Alright. Well, that was Goblet of Fire, the movie.

We’ll probably catch you in a in a week or 2 for War of the Phoenix. Excited for it. Alright. Bye now. Bye now.

The Buddies read what might be their favorite book ever written in Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire. They are joined by special guest, and Harry Potter super fan, Jimmy for the fourth installment of the greatest series to ever live. This is a long one and they touch on pretty much every topic you can imagine. From the true dark lord, to wizard gambling, to going out on top (that is to say dying on top). So hold on to your broom handles, because we’re flying right into the action on this one.

Intro (0:00-1:16)
Stock Up/Down (1:17-30:37)
Favorite Scene/Character/Magical Elements (30:38-51:48)
Love/Hate (51:19- 1:03:39)
Listener Email (1:03:40-1:07:35)
Lingering Questions (1:07:36-1:10:06)
Conclusion/Awarding the House Cup (1:10:07-1:15:03)

Next EPISODE: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire – MOVIE

NEXT BOOK : Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix by J. K. Rowling

Transcript for SEO Purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to book club. I’m Dylan, here with the man who looks like he’s taking an aging potion. Keith, what’s up, buddy? Sophisticated dusting of gray hair, sir.

Sophisticated dusting. You’re just always trying to pass that age line. That’s that’s your thing. Yeah. I would’ve easily passed it.

We’re also joined by a very special guest who you may remember from one of our several Mitch Rap episodes. Jimmy, welcome back. Thank you very much. It’s a pleasure to be here. Harry Potter is one of my favorite book series, so, it’s an honor.

Buddy book cover. We’re breaking down some bestsellers, and this week, we’ll be entering the Triwizard Tournament discussing Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by JK Rowling. If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read or reach out to us any past episodes, you can visit our website, buddybookhub.com. Send us an OWL on Twitter, Instagram, buddybookhubodcast. You can listen to us atunespotifyreproduct.

You can podcast download 5 star reviews, all those things. Say hate if you want it. Doesn’t matter. Be a Malfoy. No one cares.

If nothing else, give us a follow on social channels, please, and thank you. Quick disclaimer for the Harry Potter series, there are spoilers. There’s gonna be spoilers for this book, Goblet of Fire. There’s probably gonna be spoilers for future books. If you haven’t read any of them, just let the whole episode play so that the algorithm works, but then don’t listen to it.

Keith, let’s get into some stock up, stock down. What do you have for stock up? Stock up, the return of the dark lord. Okay. Always great to have the true villain rise back up to power.

And and, of course, I’m talking about Moody, Barty Crouch junior. He is my true dark lord. Can I just go through his resume real quick and tell me why this guy isn’t the best and how he’s much better than Voldemort? He’s the 1st actual prisoner to escape Azkaban. He got away with it.

He’s not like Sirius getting getting, caught on the run. You’re saying he’s the 1st prisoner to escape because he did it before. Yeah. He did it before and he got away with it. Yeah.

He breaks away from the imperious curse. Is able to not be put onto that spell. Mhmm. Then he goes out disables and captures the best aura ever in Moody. He then he puts him under that same curse which holds him there even though he’s technically supposed to be the best aura ever.

Goes to Hogwarts day 1, and he starts bouncing, Malfoy like a ferret. I fucking love that. That was amazing. It’s not like there was Allen Iverson out there just dribbling him on the floor. I loved it.

He’s teaching kids how to fight off these spells. He’s teaching them all these dark spells. He prevents Harry from being murdered 3 different times with the 3 different tasks. Mhmm. So even though ultimately that wasn’t an end goal, he is a good guy.

I mean, everything about him is great. He kills his shitty dad at Hogwarts on the ground and gets away with it. The list goes on and on and on. Like, he’s by far the best dark wizard we’ve been introduced to in this book. And then we get the juxtaposition of him versus Voldemort, who’s like, I’m gonna show everyone how good I am.

I’m gonna fight this 13 year old, then lose this to him. That’s our our dark lord. That’s the person everyone’s, you know, jumping to follow. Let’s get Barty Croats junior out here. This is my guy.

Yeah. Let’s go. Yeah. That’s who I would follow. And I hate this as a stock up, Keith, because to tell you honestly, this was my house cup winner.

It was the dark lord, and the dark lord is Barty Crouch junior. Because Oh, god. Alright. Yeah. So I’m I’m upset you stalled for me, but it’s a 100%.

The classroom where he does the 3 unforgivable curses, that lesson, we haven’t seen a defense against the dark arts lesson that good since our Boggart dates with Lupin. So that lesson, phenomenal. So well done. I even appreciate how he taught the kids that, but also because he’s a a death eater and a terrible human being. He also made sure that Harry was there, whose both of his parents have died from Avada Kedavra curses, and he barely survived.

So he ruined his life from that. Hey, Harry. Here’s what it looked like when your parents died, by the way. And then also Neville. Like, hey, Neville.

I know you go see your your parents at Saint Bongo’s because they were tortured until they went insane. So here, let me show you what that looks like on a spider. Yeah. But he comforted both of those people after the fact. Yeah.

Well, it was, you know, from a from a different place in his heart, his dark, dark heart, but I respect it. Like, I’m not a big LeBron James fan, but I respect his game. I do also appreciate that, that he shows the imperious curse, which is basically, like, controlling someone. Right? And he and people are laughing because it’s, like, funny.

And he’s like, you fuckers. Don’t laugh at this. You know how evil this is? Meanwhile, 10 minutes earlier, he literally turns one of the students into a ferret and is bouncing him on the ground. It’s like, wait.

What’s the difference between these two things? So, I respect him a lot. And and just to add in, he goes the whole year basically doing a perfect moody impression. Oh, great actor. Yes.

Yes. And let’s think about it. It’s so good that in the later books, basically, the new moody is the old moody. It’s like basically the scene from Beer Fest Yeah. Where Landfill dies.

They get his twin in. They’re like, oh, we’re just gonna call you Landfill. The new moody is the old moody. He crushed that. Great reference and I couldn’t agree with you more.

It was one of my lingering questions was how did he do moody so well? Because you’re a 100% right. In the later books, it’s the exact same character, and it obviously would have had to have been because it was fooling Albus Dumbledore right under his long crooked nose. So I’m not sure how he was able to to do the Moody so well, considering that he was in prison for all those years and presumably didn’t run-in the same circles as as Moody during the, the heydays of the dark lord. So not a 100% sure how he got into the the character, but, yeah, he’s probably just another Dale Day Lewis, and and he just, you know, manned up and figured it out.

I I do love that Dumbledore never suspects Moody. And then Moody takes him away for, like, 2 seconds after he’s like, just stay here, Harry. At the end of the, Triwizard Tournament, he’s like, oh, I knew. I knew something was up. Like, this this was completely off.

It’s like, yeah. Bro, you had a whole year to be like, something’s wrong with this dude. Perfect. So well said because, yeah, that’s a 100% right. He’s, like, almost bragging to Harry.

He’s like, I knew the real Moody wouldn’t take you away from me. He’s like, And you didn’t know any other real Moody moments before this when maybe when you’re going off to your 5:30 bowel movement that you had to tell everybody about while they’re eating dinner? You didn’t you didn’t think about that. So, yeah, very very well said. I called back to you.

Rumor requirements, by the way. That’s that’s the room that that Dumbledore found, which will play into the later books. Spoilers ahead. Jimmy, what do you got for stock up? You know, in honor of, football season, I’m gonna have to go stock up parlays.

Just absolutely crushed it here with the Weasleys. I’m surprised that JK Rowling is up to date on her, you know, sports betting. But they come to the cup, the Quidditch Cup. The Quidditch World Cup. Yeah.

You know, with their entire life savings, we’re talking 37 plus galleons. And they put it all on a parlay. Now, you know, I know you’re a big time sports bettor, but normal sports people, they think parlays are for fools. Screw that. Parlays are the best part of sports.

And they just go all Absolutely. In. And even Ludo Bagan, he’s like, I’m gonna give you some good odds on this. This is a soccer’s bet. I mean, what are they even doing?

They’re betting on Irish to win but they’re also betting on Crumb to catch the snitch? That makes no sense. Why would Crum ever catch the snitch if he’s gonna lose the game? But they say, screw it. We love the odds here.

And they go all in and they win. And, you know, good for them because that’s what sports is all about. It’s all about potentially losing your shirt. Yeah. It’s a great call, and it was my 1st stock up as well.

Granted, I just went with gambling, but parlay makes much more sense. And for those that aren’t in the know, parlay is just when you combine multiple bets together to increase the odds. And you’re right that in the gambling circles, the wise guys aren’t aren’t fans of the parlay, but the 2 team parlay is where they’ll often bend the rules and allow themselves to do it because you actually get decent odds there. The 3 team, it starts to get a little crazy. But yeah, this particular bet, and I also enjoyed the fact that it was the their entire life savings of 37 galloons, plus they had a funny wand, which he threw in for 5 galloons.

Seems like a lot, but, yeah, they threw their whole life savings. It’s like I read the gambler, and I talked about it on the pod before, the Billy Walters book, who’s a, you know, one of the most famous gamblers in the world, and that’s what he would do. He’d spend his whole summer as a kid mowing lawns, and then get it up to, like, $300, and then he just bet it all on, on one horse or something like that. Just absolutely savage. The bet itself, I agree, a little questionable, but I thought Ludo as just like a first intro of a character, like Ludo Bagman, he’s, was making an early push for our house cup award with how hard he’s pushing those around him to gamble.

Like, he’s trying to get Barty Crouch to gamble. Like, he’s trying to get everyone that is in his voice distance, and he’s got a big distance because he does that sonarose on his throat, so he can scream to the mountain tops. But he’s trying to get every everyone involved. Keith, were you a big fan of the gambling aspect? Oh, I loved it.

I was trying to handicap what the odds would be there. So okay. I was thinking about this as well because Ireland wins is obviously the favorite, but if there was a prop bet for Crumb getting the snitch, he’s also the favorite because Ireland has a much better team, but Crumb’s the best seeker in the world. With those two things happening, though, I feel like the odds would increase significantly. I know, Jimmy, you were alluding to the idea that why the hell would Krum get the snitch?

It was my one of my lingering questions. So how did you feel about Krum getting the snitch, which Harry says is like he wanted to end the game on his terms because he knew that Bulgaria wasn’t gonna wasn’t gonna, like, score anymore or something, but they were only down a 160 points. They get one more goal. He catches the snitch. It’s a draw, which is much better than losing.

That was my thought exactly as well. You know? You’re down by, let’s say, 300 points, 400 points. You’re not coming back. Okay.

Krum’s catching the snitch. To just be down, and I think the final score was 170160, you just hold out a little bit longer and you might be able to win the whole thing. Which almost makes me think is is this like a Black Sox like scandal level with Krum that somehow the Weasley Twins got got aware of. Yeah. It just didn’t make a lot of sense because it’s it’s 2 goals.

Like, I know your team is worse, but you could score 2 goals. Get down by 140. Krum gets the snitch. You know, wonky faints him out there. So, yeah, I I thought that was great, and and I feel like we should move on from the gambling stuff because we could just talk about this the whole time, but I do have to say that this must be the best year for gamblers in the wizarding world.

You get the Quidditch World Cup and the Triwizard Tournament, which, of course, you can bet on. You have to be able to. It’s the UK. They got betting boots on every corner, so I can’t imagine a better year for sports gambling. Okay.

One more gambling question. Who is the favorite to win the Trip Wizard tournament? Like, who is the favorite to 4th? What do you guys think? So, obviously, Victor Crum’s a favorite.

We got the best athlete in the world. Ben, the guy that’s in the the the library studying him the books all the time. Like, that’s the ultimate combination. That’s, it’s like Tom Brady, but, like, if he were Michael Vick’s athleticism, that’s what it sounds like. Right?

Yeah. So Krome’s like a plus 120 or something. I see what you’re saying, but is is Krome’s intelligence a factor here? Because, like, if we’re talking like this is a crib Chris Webber situation where he’s calling a time out, he doesn’t have any time outs in the Twitch World Cup. Like, that’s gotta play a factor in the try was determined as well.

I I I think it’s, you know, Jamarcus Russell He’s booked smart. Like intelligence. He’s he failed the Wunderlich score. Don’t know if I’m putting my money on him. Yeah.

That’s a good point. Well, we have to think Krum started off with trying to do the conjunctivitis charm on the dragon which seems like a a long shot but it worked. You know, he’s able to do it. Then he does the the transfiguration to turn himself into a shark that he didn’t do super well. You know?

At that point, then he just gets, he gets the imperious curse on him. So that one’s a that one’s a tough call, but the him hanging out in the library was really just to see Hermione and Keith. Oh, okay. That makes more sense. Yeah.

I thought you’re just a a bookworm. I was like, I appreciate that. Yeah. So I I feel like him and Cedric would be up there. Krum’s probably the favorite.

Cedric’s right behind him. It has to be Fleur as 3rd because Harry’s 2 years younger. Like, he can’t possibly but it’s obviously a very good bet for those in the know because, you know, Harry’s Harry’s got that Gryffindor in him. So my first stock down is slave labor or excuse me, stock up. Slave labor.

Jesus. Okay. Yeah. Obviously not a fan, but hey, this this stock is selling for nothing, and we’re gonna buy here because we learn in this book that it’s house elves that are doing all the work around Hogwarts. You know, everything felt super magical when it came to eating at Hogwarts, especially now that we’ve seen the movies and seen a couple of the movies, and you just see these massive trays of all the things you would possibly want to eat just magically show up on the table.

We think that they’re just getting, I don’t know, Uber Eats dinner or something like that, but it’s house elves who are legitimately slaving down in the kitchens where it’s gotta be super hot. I can’t imagine the ventilation’s any good. And they’re putting all this food out for all these students and teachers. And then on top of that, they have to do all the cleaning. They’re talking about how they have to light the fires and the entire castle.

They clean everyone’s dormitories and whatnot, and they do it while no one’s there, no one sees them. I don’t know how this organization, because Hogwarts is an organization, how would this organization be able to function without this slave labor? Like, if they had to pay these people, these house elves, they’d be they’d be screwed, but they don’t. So here we go. Hogwarts is what it is.

All the magic is on the backs of these, these house elves. I kind of have to support Hermione and and Spew. I I gotta be on I gotta be on that team because I I just I I can’t stand for it. What say you? So you’re asking us if we’re against slavery or for it?

Exactly. You have to make a decision. Okay. Yeah. I’ll let Jimmy take that one first.

Well, it does kinda tie into my my one of my stock downs, which was the, the woke liberal media, which was AKA Hermione here. You have you know, you’re talking about slave labor. That’s a strong word but these guys love what they do and it really just goes to that, you know, slavery is in the mind not really, like, in reality. Oh, okay. And so every single person is telling Hermione’s like, look, these guys love what they do.

Like, you’re gonna make them unhappy. Hagrid even who loves all sorts of creatures is like like, get off this Hermione. Like, they love it. They live to work. They live to serve.

They’re basically the entire scene from Beauty and the Beast, you know. Be our guest. We got you. Hermione is, like, trying to unionize and it’s like, chill, Hermione. Because Hermione is an unhappy person and she wants to make other people unhappy.

And it’s just it’s really sad to see. At least pay him. That’s all I’m saying. You just give him give him a galleon here and there. I mean, Dumbledore came at it from from the right approach.

He he offered Dobby payment, and Dobby said that’d be wonderful. Dumbledore said, okay. I’ll give you, you know, galleon a month, and he was like, woah. No way. Give me a penny.

He was like, alright. Cool. So there’s an agreement there. It’s a contract. I I I stand I stand for that as opposed to just passing a house elf down.

And also the physical abuse has to go, which obviously doesn’t happen in Hogwarts. No way that would happen under Dumbledore’s nose. Like, no way Moody would be able to be an imposter. Or Old Baltimore would have already come to the castle 2 other times and defeated, defeated Aaron. Don’t get me wrong.

If you ask for your freedom, you should be allowed your freedom. I’m not going that far. But, you know, the rest of the unionization, let’s get out of here, Hermione. My other stock up was chat gbt. You know, a lot of times in the whizzing world, you know, magic makes you work smarter, not harder sort of thing.

And in line with that, we have Rita Skeeter who is not writing anything. She has this magical pen which just basically creates all her articles for her. She’s living the life and, you know, really, that’s kind of the dream. So she’s just interviewing. The pen’s just doing its thing.

I’m not even sure why she even needs to be there. Yeah. I mean, I have a I have a friend who I will obviously not name here who works for a very successful real estate company, and he said he uses chat gpt for legitimately everything he does. He just like, all meetings he does through Microsoft Teams, he just has it, like, transcribed. Summaries of the meeting, he just asked chat GPT to do it and then sends that out to people.

And if he needs to, like, read through some document, he just puts it into chat GPT, and he’s like, hey. Tell me the deal points in this. And then chat GPT, like, kicks it back out. And that’s how he does all of his work, and I was like, hey. Work smarter, not harder for sure.

I’m proud of you, and soon enough, none of us will have jobs. And then she put the setting in there too of, like, embellish everything and make make stuff up. So I think, yeah. She she had that AI, fine tuned pretty well. So, yeah.

Good good call. It’s too bad Rowling was obviously on top of this years ago. It’s too bad she didn’t take her $1,000,000,000 and just start chat GPD and then, you know, she would have Bezos. Well, she would create the very thing that would destroy her. We should ask Chad GPD to come up with the 8th Harry Potter book.

Keith, do you have any other stock ups? The last one, conspiracy theories stock up. Yeah. I I’ve obviously stocked up this a few times. But the problem with the people at Hogwarts, the ministry, the people reading the newspapers is there just isn’t enough distress or belief in conspiracy theories in the community at all.

And a lot of it’s not even really needs to be conspiracy theories. It’s just basic logic. Yeah. We’re we’re in the beginning of the book and everyone’s like, Harry must have put his name in. Harry must put his name in.

Like, it’s not one person being like, the Dumbledore has made that, like, age thing a little bit hard to do. And what would be the motive for him to put his name in there? Like, there’s not none of them no one asking, like, the other questions? I think the most logical answer is that Harry did figure out how to beat the age line and put his name in there because, I mean, it seems like he’s such a glory hog because every year, it’s like, oh, Gryffindor’s not supposed to win the House Cup. Oh, they won the House Cup because Harry did this.

So I get that as you’re a student that doesn’t know him, but at the same time, there I agree there should be a strong group of people that are like, well, let’s just say he didn’t, then what? You know, what what’s the deal with that? Well, you have to be such a powerful wizard that you can both break the age barrier, trick the the goblet of fire to then think of there’s a 4th house. So you basically have to be the best wizard, one of the best wizards in the school or the dark lord AKA Barracush Junior. Mhmm.

There’s no one leaping to the like, being like, what’s more realistic? Someone else did this nefariously? Or Harry did this by himself and is the greatest wizard of all time? There’s a couple other conspiracy theories. Nobody’s thinking that there’s a little bit of inside job, a little, point shaving, if you will, that’s going on with Viktor Krum and and the Weasleys boys.

Like, we already touched on it. Come on. Nobody’s put in that much unless it’s a sure thing on that kind of parlay. A little bit questionable there. Yeah.

The end, we get, obviously, do they think just Harry straight up murdered Cedric Diggory? Like, who where how do they think he died? What’s the logic there? It’s a kind of lingering question for me as well because how do they say that Harry’s story wasn’t true and that Dumbledore believes? And the idea being, I guess, Cedric died because of one of the creatures in the maze, and no one saw him or got to him in time, but then somehow they were transported by Portkey, like, out in front of people, or maybe that’s just been the movie there, transported in front of people.

And then what about Barty Crouch? It’s like, oh, the guy that was Mad Eye Moody all year was actually a death eater, and he did all this. So it’s either was Barty Crouch junior who somehow killed Cedric, but why would he kill Cedric to and he was trying to kill Harry Potter, but he didn’t succeed. It just a lot of it didn’t didn’t seem to No. No.

It doesn’t add up a lot. What do you think the prop bet on someone dying in the Triwizard Tournament would be? Because they do talk about it hap it’s happened years past. So I don’t even think it’d be that good of odds. It’s really not even surprising.

Yeah. That’s a good point because they have said, yeah, people die in the in the Triwizard Tournament. And how often does it happen? Is it supposed to happen? I’d say the odds would probably be, like, plus 500 that someone dies.

I mean, that’s And, Jimmy, if Keith hasn’t sent you that, Instagram video that I saw of the guy that’s parleying all the things that happen in the Triwizard Tournament. Keith, you have to send that to him because I I laugh every time I watch it. I have not seen that. My last stock up is and this is a quick one. Just the muggle penal system.

You know, we get our cold open, at the old riddle house, and Frank Bryce, they’re telling the story about how Frank stumbled upon the riddles dead. And you know what us muggle cops do? I’m not a muggle cop, but I’m a muggle, and we have police officers. The cops just don’t throw Frank Bryce the gardener in jail on hearsay and circumstance. They go in.

They say, oh, he obviously didn’t kill these people. They’re just lying here dead. That doesn’t look like there was any sort of murder. You’re free to go. They don’t just throw you in Azkaban without a trial and let the Dementor suck out your soul and make you insane after after 2 weeks.

They say, yep. No problem here. We’re gonna move on. And that’s why muggle police are much better than whatever this ministry of magic is. With that, we’ll move on to Stockdown.

Jimmy, what do you got for Stockdown? My other one was buying a 3 day festival pass to the, Triwizard Tournament. You know, you go to your favorite festivals 3 days. Usually, one day is, like, the ultimate lineup. And, you know, maybe one’s, like, okay and the other one’s, like, above average.

But you buy them all because it’s a good deal. And, you know, you buy it to the Triwizard Tournament here. And the 1st day, amazing lineup. You got dragons. You get to see them all.

You’re like, this is the best thing ever. This is the coolest tournament ever. 2nd challenge, let’s see. You’re just sitting there for an hour plus while they dive into a lake and you can’t see anything. That sounds terrible.

Why am I even here? Like, I can just read about that in the paper. I I wanna know exactly what were they were doing. Just sitting in their seats just like chilling? I don’t know.

Like, was there underwater TV? Like, what are we even doing? The third one, how about we do a maze where no one can see anything? Like, what in the world are we doing here? Isn’t this supposed to be about entertainment?

I’m not being entertained. It’s literally just like you get to see who the winner is at the end. Absolutely terrible planning. They had all this time to plan this thing and they have 2 of the 3 you can’t even see anything going on. Awful.

I couldn’t agree more. The lingering question for me was, is the second task of the Triwizard Tournament the worst sporting event to be a spectator at that’s ever existed? I think it is. I had spectator sports as a stock down as well. I think you also missed, Jimmy, the the Quidditch World Cup.

They show up to it. They have the best seats in the house. And what do they need to buy? Like, binoculars? And they’re like, oh, the binoculars are great because it slows things down and lets you replay it.

I’m like, so they’re just watching TV when they get into the the best seats in the the house? Like, so what’s the even point of being there? They need some TVs. They need some entertainment, updates here. So I a 100% agree with you.

Yeah. I almost felt like the Omnioculars was somewhat of a, like, a jab at how people go to sporting events now because even yourself, like, you know, if you go to a sporting event with a big screen TV that’s there, you find yourself, like, staring at it, especially if you don’t have, like, the greatest seats. But if they have the best seats in the house, if you’re at the 50 yard line, you’re not pulling your binoculars. Right? We have talked before about how Quidditch might not be the best of spectator sports just because there’s, you know, people flying all over the place and and the speeds and whatnot.

So I felt like the Omni oculars were an interesting creation, but also if you’re, like, trying to rewind and fast forward and there’s, like, real time going on. If it’s your first time being there and seeing that, you know, you probably just wanna take it in and and put the put the omnicholers down. But Yeah. I couldn’t agree more about the try wizard. The the first task is the ticket to get.

That’s where you wanna be there. Other than that, see you later. And I just assumed that the second task, they had, like, the underwater camera like they do in the Olympics for synchronized swimming, like, the group synchronized swimming. Yeah. That was the only way that they could make it worth sitting there for because I didn’t understand it.

But that they they don’t because the, the judges have to ask, like, the the mer chief merk person. Right? What what even happened down there? It’s like, why why are we even having judges then? Yeah.

That’s such a great point. Why aren’t the merpeople just judging? That seems like they should do it. But, yeah. They even the judges didn’t know.

They just sat there, had a glass of butterbeer, and and waited. Keith, what do you have for Stock Down? So that was one of mine, but the last one for me is Freedom of the Press, Stock Down. This book taught me anything that it’s it’s basically, if you don’t like what someone’s saying, especially in the press, you capture them, imprison them, and and and keep them in prison until they promise to do what you want. If someone reports a story, you don’t agree with it, just hold them hostage.

And that’s what Hermione taught me. And obviously, it is kinda funny that Hermione’s both fighting for the freedom of house house while also enslaving a person for reporting news you didn’t like. But it’s fake news. Yeah. Well, that’s true.

I do also wanna bring up the fact that Hermione gets mailed anthrax hazardous chemicals, and Ron blames her for it. He’s like, well, you shouldn’t have messed with Rheesquita. This is what you get. You get the poisonous letter. Say you’re getting it.

You have, like, smallpox in your arms and stuff now. That’s on you. What? Alright, Ron. I have a few questions.

1, no one’s looking through the mail or anything at at this children’s school, so people can just, like, you know the Unabomber can just send a bomb to Hogwarts. Is that normal, though? Are we anticipating that there’d be a common occurrence? The fact that it’s a wizarding world, you can just put a hex in a letter and send it, seems like people would do that stuff all the time, at least in my mind. I I don’t know.

But it was also one of my soft downs was just the media in general, and I know that you were going off doing, the Hermione thing. But I did love that JK just starts kids young with the idea that they just can’t trust the media. She taught all children that whatever you read Yeah. Is is gonna be, like, skewed one way or the other. Or the government.

For the next books. Not being able to trust authority has been, like, a main theme of Harry Potter in general. First, it was like, oh, teachers at your school. Okay. Now it’s the media.

You can’t trust what you read in the newspapers. And then the next ones are gonna be like, you can’t trust the governing bodies. You just gotta fight for your right. So I respected it. I loved the Rita Skeeter character in general.

I thought she was just like a great addition, although she’s a deplorable human being. My other question was, why isn’t there any good media person there? It’s a chart wizard tournament. Why is the only person that’s there, Rita Skeeter, who She’s got the inside scoop. Is just like a slant she works for the National Enquirer, basically.

That was my question as well because it’s like, you know, we’d see in the pensive in the past, she’s there covering the Nuremberg trials. Like, what, like, what in the world is is going on where it should -Does it all. – the Daily Prophet and Rita Skeeter, like, are the go to for news in this in this world. And Harry is even, like, questioning everyone. Like, oh, you must be reading the Daily Prophet.

Like, oh, you must be reading the Daily Prophet. And, you know, everyone’s kinda bashful about it, but that apparently is our only news source. Cornelius Fudge is taking truth from what Rita Skeeter is saying, even though he should know that her stories are complete what is it, libel? Is that the written one or slander the written one? Whichever one is the written one.

It blows my mind that she’s the only news source, and I understand that, okay, we all have kind of one news source. Like, all of these different companies kinda trickle up to to one giant, think tank here, but at the same time, it’s like, at least pretend wizarding world. At least at least do what we do and pretend that these things are different. A little bit of defense of Rita Skeeter. She’s not making things up completely.

She’s going the distance in terms of investigative reporting, turning into a, you know, a bug, getting, like, some shred of truth to then build a story out of it. You kinda have to do respect that. Yeah. Okay. So you’ve so far respected Rita Skeeter and slavery so far.

Bye bye. Take your time. Cheer for your time. She got the Hagrid giant story, which is, probably something that that shouldn’t be put in print, but at the same time, it probably should be known to parents if their teacher’s a giant. Although these prejudices, like Dumbledore is very clear on, are usually unfounded.

Let me let me back it up real quick there though. Didn’t all the giants side with Voldemort? Yes. Hey. You were on the bad side in World War 2.

Yeah. Maybe not all Italians were bad on World War 2, but you did side with the bad news. Woah. Back it up, may maybe the world was treating the Italians pretty poorly. And so, you know, the Germans said, hey, like, you know, we’ll treat you a little bit better.

Here we go. I’m, you know, I’m not saying that’s what happened, but that’s all Dumbledore is saying. He’s like treat the giants a little nicer because maybe then they won’t go straight to Voldemort when, you know, the world goes to shit. I’m just saying. Yeah.

Rita Skeeter, slavery, and Mussolini. Okay. Let’s we’ll we’ll keep we’ll keep going. Hopefully, we can get a couple more out of you. I had one quick stock down, which and I just need to address it because it’s been bothering me for several books.

I need to get off my chest. Wizarding beverages might be some of the worst beverages, even drank in the human world. I don’t understand it. Everything’s about pumpkin juice, butterbeer, and mead, which if you’ve had mead, it’s terrible. Butterbeer, I know it’s like hip at the Disney resorts and whatnot, but it it honestly sounds disgusting.

It’s like cream soda with with butter sauce in it. I mean, I’m sure in the actual wizarding world, it’s better, but it’s still not something I wanna crush, like, 6 of. And then pumpkin juice, like, haven’t these people heard of apple juice? Like, apple juice is delicious. Pumpkin juice, hard pass.

I think they’re they’re misnomers. I mean, would you think root beer would taste good? That sounds disgusting. Would you think Bush Lights would sound would taste good? No.

Those both are amazing beverages. So, yeah, I’m gonna put yeah. Bush Lights are delicious. So, yeah, obviously, it’s just a misnomer. I think you’re you’re taking you’re reading into it way too much.

You tell me pumpkin juice is not pumpkin juice? No. Do you think root beer has roots in it? Well, kinda. Got them.

Goblet of Fire, the longest Harry Potter book we have seen to date. It took book 3 and, like, doubled it pretty much. I mean, I was even texting Keith at the beginning when I just started reading it, and I was, like, 20% in. I was, like, we haven’t even got to Hogwarts yet. I’m still doing wizard world cup and all this other stuff.

I haven’t even got gotten to the meat of it. So there’s so much of this book. Was there any section or chapter that really stuck with you, and you said, oh, this is the best part of the book? Jimmy, what do you think? Think?

Yeah. I’d I had a pretty serious scene. It was indivination. And, you know, they’re talking about all the plants and everything. And Trelawny mentions Uranus.

And Ron just comes out of nowhere and says, hey, can I have a look at Uranus 2 lavender? Oh, my God. Like this is this is a 14 year old kid and he’s just shooting his shot. Just absolutely crazy. And this is what I love about J.

1. Rowling is she puts these little breadcrumbs, you know, like Sirius and Book 1. And here, too, we see it. We see the breadcrumb where Ron’s like literally just being like, Hey, Lavender, I want to see your ass. I want to see you.

And fast forward to book, I think it was, what, 6? They’re going out snogging everywhere. Ron shot his shot and then got it later. And when they’re looking for dates for the Yule Ball, Harry asks one of the Partil’s, twins and being like, Hey, Do you know if lavender’s free for my boy Ron? Harry knows.

Harry’s like, you know, the ultimate wingman. He’s like, Ron wants it. I’m gonna get it for him. And unfortunately, Shiara was taken but it’s just a a beautiful breadcrumb left by JK Rowling. And, honestly, it it made me laugh and made me cry.

And this is why Jimmy is such a great guest here because he’s not only on the same page as us, but I had a sneak peek into our listener mail, and he’s right on the same page as the listener mail as well. So I do have a follow-up, so keep it in your mind, but I just wanna say kudos to you. I couldn’t agree with you more. Keith, what section did you love? Every single scene in this book, I think, you could say is a favorite dude.

The book is just, it’s a 10 out of 10. In my mind, this is probably the best book ever written. The scene that I really and I told you, d man, the emotional journey that I went through. Like, I’d get done reading the book, I’d be upset. Or I get done reading the book, I’d be happy.

So the best part for me about this book is after the first Triwizard task, Harry completes the task. He survives. He’s one of the best. Ron may and him make up. Everyone’s having a good time.

We’re about to go on Christmas break. I felt like I was back in high school again, the perfect weekend. Everything was lining up. Felt good. Then I went back to the real world.

I forgot that that’s not where we’re at. But for that brief moment, I felt something again. So that that was my favorite. So did Harry. You were I think that was probably Harry’s peak for the whole thing too because he was so concerned about the driver’s return.

Generally, he got through the first task. No problem. Top marks. And then Ron’s defending him because Karkaroff is trying to throw him under the bus with a with a 4 out of 10, which is absurd. The the Russian judge should be kicked out for that.

The best part is he’s like, I would have given anything. I would have given 0 points just to know that Ron was back on my side again. Yet, when Harry gets a 1,000 galleons, he’s like, here you go, twins. Ron, you get nothing. You know, keep wearing your old school dress robes.

You know, I just feel like you could have thrown a cup couple galleons to Ron. Break them off, though. Yeah. A few. Yeah.

For sure. Mine was probably it’s a tie, I think, between the pensive chapter with Harry and Dumbledore. And I like that one not only because of the information we get about the past, which is always interesting in terms of like creating lore and canon and whatnot. And just the idea of we’ve been living in the present, and all of this stuff with Voldemort, it happened. And it didn’t happen that long ago.

It was 12 years ago that he went down, or at this point, it’s 14 years ago that that he went down. So to kinda see what went down, and these they are Nuremberg trials, very well said. So what happened there was really interesting, and I like that scene because we usually have to wait until the end of the book to get our Harry, Dumbledore one on one time, where Dumbledore kind of sheds light on things that Harry had no idea about that we obviously as the reader had no idea about. And this time we get it, like, 3 quarters of the way through the book. It was kind of a nice breath of fresh air to once again be back with Harry and Dumbledore just just chatting, just the 2 of them.

I was a big fan of the pensive. And then obviously, you gotta throw it in there, and we haven’t talked about it yet, but the 3 chapters back to back to back, Flesh, Blood, and Bone, The Death Eaters, and Priory and Kentatum are it’s like The Beatles medley from Abbey Road. Is it one song? No. But they are the sum of their parts.

And that scene, in general, is just like holy smokes. Like, it felt like this was what the entire series at that point had been building up to, and it paid off. Off. I love that we get the story from Voldemort’s perspective. Just the idea that we didn’t have any idea what he had been doing or feeling necessarily, and not that we really, like, support Voldemort.

We’re no death eaters here, except for maybe Jimmy, as he’s an access supporter. But you get his side of the story, which is, like, twisted and wrong, but at the same time, super interesting. And how it all played out and just the the plan and how the whole plan worked out, I thought was was awesome. So I loved it. Great ending with the Priory incantatem.

I also like talking about breadcrumbs. That’s the same spell that it’s Amos Digory. He uses that same spell on Harry’s wand at the at the, Quidditch Pearl Cup when they’re like, whose wand is this and what did this was this wand the same wand that that put the dark mark in the air? And he’s like, we can find out, and he does he touches the wand tips together and says, like, prior incantatem, and and that happens. So we get an idea of what that spell is, but we don’t even think about it.

It’s just such a throwaway moment, and then it comes back at the end of the book in a massive, massive way. Something from that, graveyard scene that and this is a little I don’t know if you guys thought the same thing initially, but, you know, I probably read this book 20 plus times. And this was the first time I realized that Crabbe and Goyle weren’t like the 14 year old Crabbe and Goyle, like, death eaters. I remember forever I’ve been like, wow, like, this is really early to indoctrinate some, 14 year old kids and, like, they’re just going to school. Like, when did they, like, find the time to become Death Eaters?

And I’m finally, like, hit me. Like, oh, this is definitely their dad’s. Yeah. That’s their last name. Oh, it could have been hey.

It could have been, like, Voldemort’s Hitler Youth. You know? Yeah. So that that was a that was a nice realization for me. You learn something new every time you reread.

Every time you reread, you learn something new. Let’s get into the burning and bots every flavor categories. Let’s go first with, pick your character. We had a bunch of new characters in this one. I’m not gonna go through them all, but Ludo Bagman rings a bell, obviously.

And I forgot to say we’re having that Ludo Bagman talk earlier that I just loved the fact that he paid the Weasley twins their bet money back with, like, the wizarding equivalent of gelt. You know, it’s like it was awesome. It’s like total trickster way to pay someone back, and I loved it. Barty Crouch, Winky, Rita Skeeter, Krum, Fleur, Karkaroff, Madame Maxey, and Mad Eye Moody, Amos Diggory. Who did you guys have for maybe a favorite or even a least favorite character?

I already spoiled mine. Mine’s Mad Eye Moody slash Barty Crouch. Yeah. So I’m not gonna go much more into it, but he’s just awesome. He’s exactly what we needed at Hogwarts.

I’m hoping he he shows it more. I can’t remember. So I’m hoping he does, though. Yeah. He will be in it, Keith.

Don’t you worry. Jimmy, do you have a favorite or least favorite? I don’t know if we call it the real Mad Eye Moody or the fake Mad Eye Moody, but just the Mad Eye Moody that just goes around doing whatever the hell he wants when he wants. Like, that’s just the best. Like and and all the other teachers are afraid of him.

So he just he’s allowed to do what he wants. It’s just incredible, you know, teaching the kids, like, unforgettable curses. Just I loved every minute of it. Yeah. I agree.

I had him as mine as well. It was moody with an asterisk for me, you know, because it’s not actually him. But, you know, we talked about the Malfoy thing, and the Malfoy thing all started because Harry issued a well timed yo mama joke, which we have to appreciate as well. And then talk about appreciation. We gotta send props to our boy, Hagrid, for finally clapping back at Malfoy.

Malfoy is in class, and he’s talking shit again, and Hagrid’s like, hey. Is that Mad Eye Moody over there? And it’s like, what? What? What?

What? He’s like, yeah. I might turn you into Farrar. Watch out. So, you know, I I I respect that as well, and I do think we have to have an honorable mention for mister Weasley.

You know, he’s on the list, because although he has a short stint in the book, he comes in with fire. At the beginning, the Dursleys refused to say goodbye to Harry, and and mister Weasley stops dead in his tracks. He’s like, woah. Not on my watch. I thought he was about to throw hands again, because, you know, we know mister Weasley’s just jacked out of his mind on creatine, and he’s, like, waiting to throw hands.

He doesn’t this time he lets he lets the twins take care of it on his behalf. But so Moody’s, I think, everyone’s favorite. I do have to say that my least favorite character is Amos Diggory, which is saying something because we do get introduced to Rita Skeeter and Lord Voldemort in this book, and yet Amos Diggory takes the cake here. He is just ragging on Harry to his face, which is so uncomfortable. You know, he says at the beginning, he’s like, the best man won.

I’m sure Harry would say the same. It’s like, what? Like, you’re you’re telling me in a in a Quidditch match that happened a year ago that you’re gonna say that I’m gonna tell you your kid’s better than me and what? He said, one guy fell off his broom, one didn’t. Don’t have to be a genius to know who the better flyer is.

It’s like, I’m right here, dude. I’m I’m standing right in front of you. That you’re not at the bar with your buddies shooting the shit. You’re talking shit straight to a 14 year old boy. Like, calm down.

Even Cedric’s like, dad, chill. And he does the same thing, at the end. So I was hoping Harry, when he was gonna offer them the 1,000 galleons, was gonna, like, do a, like, nope or something like that just to get back at Amos’ degree. But I I’m gonna push back on that. I mean, would you rather have the people snickering in the corner and wearing those badges or a guy come up to your face and say, listen, bitch.

My son’s better than you. What are you gonna say about it? And you’re gonna do nothing about it, which I respected, you know, right to his face. He’s not talking behind his back. He’s saying it right to your face.

What are you gonna do about it? Yeah. But you’re comparing him, this grown wizard, to a bunch of children who are wearing badges. He’s a grown ass man. Just be proud of your kid and and move on.

I mean, none of these guys have closed the yearbook. We all know that. Lucius Malfoy is is, like, still, you know, trying to kill kids in the in the in the hallways. So, I mean, we’re we’re all Not canon. Not canon.

Yeah. Voldemort’s being like, I’m gonna show everyone how good I am. I’m fighting this 13 year. I still can’t get over that. What a what a terrible move I am.

Yeah. Amos Amos Diggory was just, to me, like, the worst hockey dad who, like, goes on the ice and, like, starts trying to fight kids during a hockey game. Yeah, well, Harry got the last laugh. He killed his son, so it’s fun. Alright, let’s get into oh, hey.

Wow. I was going to move on, but yikes. Alright, you and Jimmy are on one side of the bus. I don’t go So let’s pick our magical elements here. So once again, a bunch of new magical elements that are, you know, new in this book.

We got port keys, the pensive. We’ve talked about apparating before, but like now people are like actively apparating, disaparating, and we hear about splinching, which sounds terrible. Wizarding tents, omnioculars, which you’ve talked about, the goblet of fire itself, phoeglass, Moody’s trunk, lots of others. Did you guys have a favorite magical element? I’m not sure I’d say favorite, but, like, the goblet of fire, I just have so many questions about.

1st and foremost like why can’t you just say I’m not competing? Like what happens to you? Like do you just die? Yeah. It’s pretty obvious that Harry’s like hey, I didn’t put my name in.

So if they say like okay Harry, like are you willing to put your life on it that you didn’t put your name in? And Harry says, yeah. And he just doesn’t compete. Like, he he still has to compete or or what? Like, I wanna know I wanna know what happens.

Part 2, what if he doesn’t try very hard? Like, he’s just like, hey. Give me the 0 marks on the dragon. I’ll just sit this you know, sit on the sideline. Does he die again because the goblet of fire just killed him?

I I need to know. That that’s probably the biggest one. And it it seems like it’s easy to manipulate since Moody’s just like, oh, I just added another house in, put your name in, and automatically did that. So I I just don’t I wanna know more about it. It’s a really good point because, yeah, why not why wouldn’t Dumbledore just be like, okay, if you didn’t put your name in, then you obviously don’t wanna compete.

So there’s, like, just don’t compete. Like, oh, what? Does lightning come down and strike some dead right there? And if that’s not the case, like you said, just take the 0 marks on every single one. Don’t get into the lake.

Don’t go near the dragon, and don’t enter the maze and shoot red sparks. Done. Over. If I got detention, and this is when I was most angry in the book when Harry got got good attention for, like, talking back and defending himself to Snape, and everyone’s, like, hating on him and, like, his best friends don’t even like talking to him. I’m a 1000% boycotted.

I’m not even I’m not showing up at all. I’m there’s not one chance I show up to that thing. Harry’s different than I am, I guess. But Yeah. I’d also put this, like, Harry Sucks badge on, lean into it, if they like to make it for myself.

That’s smart. Yeah. So those are 2 things I would do. Did you have a favorite magical element, Keith? This is more of a magical industry, but Okay.

The magical entrepreneurship, Fred and George creating the joke shop, amazing. You give me 2 or 3 chapters on just that. I’m I’m in. Why are his parents shitting all over them? That’s like they’re being super entrepreneurial and going out there and they just want to work for the shitty government instead.

Like, they’re doing something they wanna do. Like, this is gonna make the world better, in my opinion. You know, by the end of the of the book, we we hear that. Yeah. But this is why the wizarding world is not advanced.

We talked about how where are the underwater TVs? How why are these viewing vents so terrible? It’s because everyone’s stuck in their ways. We have the same families getting passed on generation to generation owning the same shops. We have no innovation.

We need more entrepreneurship, more innovations happening. Everyone’s dressed like they’re in the 1600 still. Let’s let’s revamp some things here. Yeah. I agree with you.

And you’d assume that, like, their parents know what people get at these joke shops because their kids have for years, and they’d see what Fred and George are creating and be like, wow. This is different. You know? This is something. They must also be really good at both potions and, the class McGonagall teaches.

Transfiguration and charms. Like, there’s, like, charms built into this. Yeah. Like, all these different things. Yeah.

Super educational to figure out how to do these things. Yeah. Absolutely. And I couldn’t agree with you more that they’re just, like, stuck in their ways. I mean, they hate muggles so much as a society that they haven’t even accepted pens.

Like, they’re still just using quills and ink. Quills. So Yeah. They go on spilling ink all over all the papers like what what? I think you know just use the space pen.

It’s from Seinfeld. It works upside down. I was partial myself. I thought the pensieve was pretty cool just in the sense of if you have you don’t have to do any, like, recording of stuff or anything like that. You can just, you know, live your life at a sporting event.

No one’s pulling out their phones. When fireworks are going off, no one’s pulling out their phones and saying, hey, everyone. Just look at these fireworks. Like, isn’t that cool? You just you watch it.

You enjoy your life. Then later, you put a little thought thread into the pensive, and when you’re 80, you can go back and enjoy all of those moments. I thought that was a a pretty cool That’s a good point. Yeah. I was a big fan of that and just wizarding tents in general sound awesome.

I mean I’m not a huge camper. I did a bunch of camping when I grew up, but if I had a wizard tent I would be all in. What about spells? We got we got a ton here. I’m not even gonna go through them because there’s so many.

Obviously, we have the, Well, mine is Cristiata’s curse. Okay. I’ll lead off with that. I’m sick. I’m sick in the head.

I think this is, like, the type of curse you need and the type of stuff you need to understand what dark magic is and make the evildoers eviler. So I’m all for it. Learning about Neville’s parents going through it, it makes you again be on Neville’s side and and root for Neville. And I thought it was a good addition. Did you have a favorite spell, Jim?

I don’t think they named the spell but Moody turning Malfoy into the ferret. I’m I’m curious how animals work here because, like, you can, you know, transfiguration, you know, you know, turning to the animal permanently being on the register. That seems really hard, but, like, how long can you just turn someone into an animal if you feel like it? I thought that’s, like, a really good element. That’s a good point.

And I I think I dropped out, back there, but I did just wanna add one thing to the whole pensive comment. And that was that Harry got really lucky that the scene that, like, he was in there was the Nuremberg trials and everything related to that. Like, could it easily been Dumbledore thinking about the days with, you know, Grindelwald and, you know, maybe some some unsavory scenes there. So and then maybe Dumbledore is going to jail for the rest of his life. Harry got into that stash, so lucky we avoided that.

Yeah. Harry could’ve learned some important life lessons if he’d heard some of this, or could’ve been Dumbledore recording his BM in the morning because he’s like, hey. You know what? That was pretty crazy. I just ran into a bunch of, chamber pots.

I need to record it, and then it’s just Dumbledore taking a poop. So, yeah, he did indeed get lucky. For me, kind of surprised. I thought Keith was going to be in Gorgio, and we all know why, but and I think the imperious curse as an unforgivable curse is maybe the worst possible curse. You already talked about how Barty Crouch fights it off.

Then you talk about how his dad eventually fights it off as well. Harry seems somewhat impervious to the imperious curse. So, you know, he immediately fights it off in class and then later against Voldemort. So, it doesn’t seem like it’s that good of a spell. If you have a strong mind, you can just beat it.

So it seems like it should be harder, you know, it should be harder to get out of. Yeah. So I’m gonna I’m gonna have to go with Assio. You know, it’s a simple one, but at the same time, talk about a way that I could soon be featured on my 600 pound life if I just had that spell at the ready because Sundays when the football season’s on, I would just be like, Assio Miller Lite over and over and over again, and I would never get up, and I would have 0 steps in the day. It’d be perfect.

I think just as one of the more useful spells in the wizarding world, I think that one’s it personally. What about creatures? Do you guys have any creatures you like? We got a bunch in this one. Leprechauns, vela, booboo tubers, blasted its roots, snifflers, mermaids, manicores, sphinx, dragons.

I mean, we’ve already seen dragons, but any one of those jump out to you? Velas perhaps? I think for me, it’s the sphinx. Like, just this random creature that they plop down and they’re just doing riddles and just like, hey, if you get wrong, I’m gonna kill you. So I’m gonna go for more of that.

I want a whole series based on what the hell sphinxes are doing in the wizarding world and like what’s their purpose. Did you think that the sphinx was actually gonna kill them if they did it or was that just like part of the part of the thing and they would have, like, stunned them and then that would have been that? I mean, I think it was attacked. I I will say that the riddle itself was kinda weird. I don’t know that, you know, hard to find word, you know, when you’re when you’re thinking like, like, really?

Is that is that what I would necessarily go with? It’s also very British, though. The r is is a is a British thing because I’ve personally thought I was like, that’s the easiest one I’ve ever heard. And it’s like, these kids are supposed to be 17. Like, they should figure it out.

It’s one word. It’s an animal. You know what I mean? Like, I think sphinxes are definitely up there for some of the more interesting character or like creatures in the wizard world. Because I’m also wondering like where do they live and they just go around like telling people that answer this riddle that they’re gonna murder them, and that’s okay.

I don’t know. Kinda like the toll trolls. They’re already they have that, that disposition of wanting to to kill people anyways, and someone’s like, hey. We got a job for you, and they’re like, yeah. Sign me up.

This is fun. So I think that’s just their their mentality. Yeah. I thought the both the vela and the and the leprechauns were interesting. And once again, I’m I’m not sure how the breeding thing works in the wizarding world because, like, a man and a giant, Tess, you know, slept together in a Hagrid, and, like, Fleur de la Courte has some vela in her, but they’re not human.

They’re, like, creatures, so I don’t really know how that works, and then where do we draw the line? Because then that brings the whole, like, house elf thing back up where it’s like, should they still be slaves if they’re like people? They’re humans, they’re humanoid. I don’t know. It’s confusing.

No one’s gonna mate with a blasted screw, but, a Veel is well, maybe someone would. Maybe Aberforth Dumbledore would because, we you know, he did some weird stuff to a goat that got him in trouble that was quickly talked about and then brushed under the rug by Dumbledore. Alright. Let’s jump into some love hate. Keith, what do you have for love?

Love, I mean, I already talked about it much. I like this book, but the amount of death in this book, I love that. It got real dark real quickly. You know, all of a sudden, we’re like, we went from 0 deaths outside of, like, Harry’s parents that we which we kind of Yeah. Referenced it now.

Yeah. Hear about, but we never see it. To, like, people dying left and right. When, Barty Crouch just, like, disappears, I’m like, oh, that’s cool. That’s just, like, we’ll find him later.

And it’s, like, no, I murdered him. And he’s under invisibility cloak. Like, he’s dead. You know, people are just dying left to write in this book. We went from 0 to, like, 8 deaths in this book.

So I’m all for it. Get darker. Get get more into the death scene. Yeah. It’s Appreciate it.

Like, have you seen the Rambo death tolls if you look at the different Rambo movies? It’s like Rambo 1 was, like, 2 people died. In the 2nd movie, like, 4 people died. In the 3rd movie, 47 people died. It’s like, oh, okay.

I think then and then next one, it was, like, a 150. So Yeah. So, yeah, that as well. Jimmy, what about you? What’d you love?

Obviously, I love the darkness. I also love the kind of whole challengers sort of relationship between Ron, Hermione, and Krum. This is the first book, like, we’re really getting into some, like, love dynamics and triangles. And, you know, Ron and Hermione have this game where, like, they’re both, like, trying to make each other jealous. And I think Ron’s not as aware of it as Hermione is.

And I wonder if Hermione even likes Krum at all or if he’s just a tool to use to get to Ron. I don’t know if you guys picked up on this on the ending scene where Ron asked Krum for a autograph, and Hermione just, like, has a sly smile. Hermione in her head is like, I am going to do some things with Krum and make Ron watch. Like, that’s that’s her mentality right there. Oh, alright.

Yeah. You went even further than I did. I I was in threesome. You went for the whole cuckold situation. I I mean, I think we can tell that’s what she’s into.

Yeah. No. I liked this book definitely show that these kids are growing up and, like, they’re interested in the opposite sex or the same sex or giants and giantesses. It doesn’t matter, but the point is that they’re interested in something, and we get that going further in the book, like, we’ve talked about with Lavender and whatnot, so I love that. For this one as well, I love the cold open with the riddle house.

Keith talks about it in the death stuff, but for the past two books, we’re just it’s Harry waking up in his bedroom at the Dursley’s, like, getting upset. The first one opens with Vernon Dursley. You know, they’re both fairly innocuous, and then things go awry, but for this one, it’s like immediately we’re in some different place. We don’t even know what’s going on. We’re starting with a muggle.

We’re not even starting with a wizarding person, and you’re seeing this crazy stuff happen with Voldemort that it was, like, such a great start to this that I immediately, you’re like, this book is gonna be different, and this book is gonna be amazing. You know that right off the bat. Mhmm. What else were you keeping? Harry and Cedric’s relationship partnership, despite seemingly being enemies and everything, I I did like that they were like sharing advice for each, of the different challenges and then kind of together like, hey, we’ll both win this together.

It really did make it so that when Cedric died, it like meant something. Whereas if they just were like, oh yeah, he’s the other guy that’s competing and like there wasn’t in like either just all love or all hate, you know, one way or the other, it wouldn’t have hit as much. But like the fact that there was some turmoil but also like he respected him and you know, different things there. I like that. It was like a full fledged relationship, which made the death much much harder.

Yeah. And and we obviously don’t live in Harry’s mind the whole time during the book, but you can imagine in the time we’re not seeing Harry on the page that he’s thinking about this situation with Cedric a lot because he, you know, he’s into Cho and Cedric’s doing that thing, but then at the same time, there’s, like, this camaraderie there, and they’re both Hogwarts champions. I did think that Cedric could have done a little bit better for him on the second task, though, besides just, like, go take a bath. It’s like, I literally told you it was dragons. Yeah.

Just say we’re going to the lake and we gotta save someone. Yeah. You set him up to, like, the the the bathroom. That was pretty nice. You know, like that Oh, yeah.

Big, like The bubble it wasn’t even, like, a hot tub. It was like a it was a pool that was all hot. It was pretty awesome. Yeah. And Myrtle’s just voyeuristic there.

She’s right out of Jimmy’s story, you know? I just felt like the story is just so well done. I know we say this a lot with Harry Potter, but this one, more than any other book, the story was was it was perfect. She was able to put so much into this book without it feeling like there was too much going on or, like, things were left hanging. There’s there’s a bunch of red herrings for what’s happening and who’s doing it that you almost forget at times that there’s something, like, very serious going on at Hogwarts.

We know from the beginning that Voldemort is trying to do something, but there’s so much other stuff happening that we sometimes, like, forget that’s even part of it until the end when it all comes, like, rushing back. And and I also love with the red herring stuff with, like, Ludo and Karkaroff because those are, like, our 2 biggest suspects, that they their stuff wasn’t just thrown in there to throw us off. It also had its own story arc. You know, Carcara being the death eater, and then, oh, that’s why he’s teaching the Dermeshoeck students dark arts, but then him turning. Okay, we get that.

And, Ludo, it’s like, oh, he’s just gambling. Like, but his gambling story was interesting with the, you know, they just throw it in in bits and parts with the goblins and then the Weasley twins. What are they doing? Oh, you know, so all that ties together so well. The ending, I felt like, was tied up so nicely.

You know, it’s like a sharper image gift that you pay the $10 extra extra to have it professionally gift wrapped is, like, how this thing came out. And by the end of this book, it really felt like she wanted to have a clean break from the early years at Hogwarts until what’s coming up next. And I think she did it so well with how Voldemort came back and just also just the the growth throughout this book of these characters. And now that they’ve seen the terrible things they’ve seen and how it’s gonna progress, it just felt like such an amazing break and such a great way to do it. I just thought it was it was perfect.

Yeah. A 100%. I I feel like there’s no stone, like, unturned in this one. Nothing skipped. No no element of the journey from the start to the finish that we like, they skipped, which I think as a Harry Potter fan, when you wanna be in that world for as long as possible, that’s much appreciated.

Yeah. That’s a great way of saying it because it you’d think that, oh, we have to I have so much extra I need to put in this book. We’re gonna I’m gonna have to cut all this other stuff we do. No. We actually get more.

We get the Sorting Hat back. We hear another sorting hat song, which we have missed for the last two books. We get the sorting hat back. She was able to put it all in there without making it, you know, a 1000 page book, but at the same time, it it’s long, but it it’s a page turner. Every page is is great.

Yeah. A couple of just quick last loves just to throw in there. Quidditch World Cup, loved it. We’ve already talked a lot about it, so I’m not gonna go back into it, but just such another great experience to get into the wizarding world outside of Hogwarts. Big fan.

Sorting Hat. And then I thought the Death Eaters were just great, the way they looked, the way they were explained, and also just the name. We didn’t even know about Death Eaters before. Death Eaters are just like a great name for a band of bad guys. I mean, we got Putties from Power Rangers, Foot Clan from Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.

I can’t think of some other ones, but I just think Death Eaters. It’s it’s it’s great. It’s it sounds like a metal band, and and that’s pretty much what, what the Death Eaters are. So Were the, Red Rising ones, like, Bone Collectors or something? Oh.

Bone Riders? Bone Riders. Yeah. Yeah. That’s, like, a name too.

Yeah. My Bone Riders. I like how you pulled putties out. Yeah. Putties.

Those are the foot soldiers. Yeah. That’s what they are. That’s the Death Eaters. I guess that’s true.

Yeah. They’re like pawns. They’re foot soldiers in Teenage Mutant New Jersey. They call them the foot clan. Oh, okay.

Yeah. Jimmy, do you have did you have any other loves before we jump at 8? My final love was just like the serious version of Dumbledore because we kinda get like a lot of joking Dumbledore in the past and you know the every flavor beans and earwax and all that. And this is the first time kinda starting with the fake moody where he, you know, busts open and does the, you know, stupefy spell and all that where he’s just now not joking at all. Like he’s coming in, he’s basically like, Voldemort’s back, this is what we’re doing, there’s no time to waste.

And I love spending a lot of time with that Dumbledore because you know, you just kinda trust him and you just wanna spend more time like, hey, like lead us to victory, what are you doing? Especially I think it all sort of culminates in the 6th book and and going on that adventure with Harry. I don’t wanna do any spoilers but the horcruxes. But, this is the first time we finally get, like, not playing around Dumbledore. Yeah.

We get Dumbledore the headmaster but we have yet to see Dumbledore the field marshal. And this is the first side of it, and it’s amazing. So let’s jump into hates. Keith, what did you have for hates? Big hit for me was early on in the book.

Harry gets invited by Ron to the prestigious World Cup, and the least you could do is buy the binoculars for Ron and not be like, now I don’t owe you a Christmas present. Like, bro, you’re getting invited to this thing with the best tickets in the house. I feel like you you don’t need to be like, nah, like, that rubbed me the wrong way. Come on Harry. Figure it out.

That’s funny because I read that totally differently. I read that as like, Ron being like a kinda dude who doesn’t want any handouts even though that’s kinda one of my hates is he just complains about not having money all the time. You know, either shut up or accept the handout. Yeah. I I thought he was like, no, like, I’m not doing it and and Basil Harris is like, no, to make him feel better, like, it’s your Christmas present.

It is kinda weird because I feel like, if you get invited to something and you’re not paying for it, you I feel like you’re like, alright, I got the I got the beers, you know, or something like that. But instead he’s like, I guess I’ll give you these binoculars. I read it like like Jimmy did. Ron didn’t want the handout, so he said it’s Christmas present kinda thing. Alright.

Fair enough. Then Harry also, like, Ron throws something at him later about money, and Harry kinda, like, brushed it off, like no big deal, which I thought I thought was pretty big of him. Jimmy, do you have any hates? Just to continue on that, like, Ron for a good portion of his book was was just a hate. He’s just moping around, jealous of Harry for like being in the Triwizard Tournament.

It’s like, hey, this is a day 1 friendship here. Like what are we even talking about? Like maybe just go up to him and be like, hey, did you really put your name in the gauntlet fire? Maybe just ask him instead of going on a little temper tantrum and being like, why is it always him and not me? Like, bro, first of all, you already got your best game wizard chest, like, little badge.

Like, you got that in book 1. Book 2, like, he was almost in almost in the Chamber of Secrets and stuff like that. I was like, dude, like, chill out. Like, Harry is your best bud. Just happy or scared for him or something.

Just be there for him. And it’s just it’s just a ridiculous move by Ron, and I just can’t support it. Yeah. That was honestly the only thing I had as well. It just seemed a little far out there for I know Ron is, like, you know, lived in the shadow of his brothers, and now he lives in the shadow of Harry.

But I feel like he would just he’s a good bloke. He would just ask and be like, dude, how’d you do that? And he’s like, I didn’t do it. It’s like, wow. Okay.

That’s pretty crazy. And because it’s if Harry’s like, yeah. Remember how I said I saw Voldemort in my dreams? And remember the last 2 years when we fought Dumbledore or fought Voldemort? Yeah.

So it could be him. So, yeah, probably. Wow. So, yeah, I I I felt like Ron wouldn’t have taken such a with such a hard line. Yeah.

When is, like, Harry lied to him also? Yeah. Because it seems like it was like, where’s that coming from? Doesn’t doesn’t make a ton of sense. It must be some some internal demons.

Yeah. You know? I think that’s all it was. Harry has a little bit of Batman in him where, like, all this time, like, Batman’s obviously helping people out, but then all of a sudden people hate him because one little thing happens and like blows up. Like, it’s the same sort of thing.

It’s crazy. It’s like, yo, Harry’s done all this stuff and all of a sudden the whole school hates him for being in the Triwizard Tournament. Like, it’s insane and it, you know, honestly, it’s kind of a little bit, either die a hero or live long enough to see yourself become the villain. I think people are just tired of Harry being on top. They just wanna they wanna topple him down.

Yeah. Him and Bill Belichick. You got mail. Buddies, I know you all talked about the cleverness from JK leaving bread crumbs that show up and reveal in later books, but I think the humor in this book had me cracking up more than I can remember. The juxtaposition, Keith, is that a word?

Of life threatening situations being less intimidating to Harry than getting a date to the ball was an amazing chapter with him and Ron trying to get dates. Harry’s inner monologue was fantastic while Loki stalking Cho, and then the debrief in the common room with everyone after was also gold. Especially considering that the bread crumbs for future relationships that play out over the series with everyone involved that turn Harry and Ron down. Fleur, Hermione, Lavender, and Ginny, all culminating in twins, Basil. Do y’all have a funny moment?

PS, stock down hand up again, not signing off Azkaban pod with mischief managed. That’s on me, magic. There we go. It was my magic. Got it.

Yeah. Great points there. And do we have a favorite funny moment? We got Jimmy’s, so considering I said I was I was saving it, I’m going to just say that that was that was mine as well. I mean, how could it not be magic, honestly?

It’s Ron’s quote is, can I have a look at Uranus 2 lavender? It’s it was it’s so good. It’s the first time I noticed it, and actually, it was the wife who I was asked I asked her what was a funny moment, and this is the first thing that she called out. So I didn’t even remember it once again, even though when I read it at the time, I laughed. But I forgot about it.

And then I thought about it, and I said, this is this is a joke that is pretty strictly English, and this book has been translated into, like, a 120 languages. I was thinking back to Chamber Secrets when they had to change all the Tom Morvallo Riddle thing. So I was like, I wonder what did they did in other languages. Naturally, the Internet has this. The best one was in Norwegian, they they couldn’t figure it out, but they tried to include Uranus.

So the sentence was, which I can’t say anything, but it translates to, can I have a look at your ancient anus? So so that one is is probably the best. Okay. Noted. Because there’s, like, in Dutch, it was like, can I have a look at your heavenly body?

And, like, in French, it was something like, can I look at your butt? Were they double entendres for all of them, or are they all Some of them are on the notes. Yeah. Some of them are on the notes. Okay.

So people read it like, what the hell? In other words. But it’s also interesting because they were talking about celestial bodies. And you know, so it’s Oh, okay. That makes sense.

It’s already like a double entendre in Trelawn in Trelawney’s class, so great joke. It’s a perfect joke because not only is it like way smarter than I could come up with, but it’s like too smart for kids and like just smart enough for the adults reading it. So, I thought it was I thought it was great. It’s it’s also interesting to note with the, the whole later books uneasiness with Ron and like Harry Gating his sister where he pretty quickly offers up, like, oh, you can just take Ginny. Like, really?

Mhmm. Yeah. Good point. That’s Ron being, like, a good pal there. Like, hey, you need a date.

Like, I I got you. Yeah. I had 2 comments. 1 to remind me, there’s a Basil in this book. So twins Basil.

I didn’t even know Basil’s a real name. I thought it was strictly from Austin Powers. So I really appreciated that. Second question for you guys also is, how long after Cedric died is Harry thinking, well, she Joe’s single now. Like, how long do you think it took him to do that?

Like, an hour? If he’s Dennis from Always Sunny, he’s going up here and be like, hey. I’m pretty torn up, but you saw I brought Cedric back. I mean Yeah. I know you’re torn up too.

Like, do you wanna both get torn up together? And and that that’s the move. We’re in the, the graveyard, and he’s like, what did you say, Biltmore? I I I was sorry. I was thinking about something else.

Yeah. I just miss what you’re talking about for the last 30 minutes. I was having some, fantasies in my mind. Alright. Let’s get into some lingering questions and some potpourri here.

We have, how did Barty Crouch pass off as Moody? I think we discussed that. The Triwizard Tournament, the whole tournament itself seems impossible unless you’re cheating. Right? No 17 year is gonna be able to walk into in front of a dragon that they didn’t even know was there, and then be able to steal an egg from underneath it.

Everyone cheats on every task. Yeah. It seems like it’d be, like, one of those things where you either had to have just taken the class or it’s a fun fact. It’d be, like, coming up against like an alligator randomly. You just be like, I have no idea.

I’m a just run zigzag. Zig zag? Yeah. Because am I supposed to stare at the eyes? There’s like 10 there’s like 10 things you could do that I’ve heard before.

Yeah. So So we we also had, Dumbledore stumbling into the river requirements, which we talk about later books because he needs to have a BM at 5:30 in the morning. I think we have a life maxim in this in this book that’s given to us, which is you don’t ask a woman if she’s pregnant, and you definitely don’t ask her if she’s half giant. That’s like asking Jimmy where he was in 1945. Right, Jimmy?

What did your grandfather do in 1945? Did anyone have any, like, lingering questions or or other things about this book? Yeah. I’m not gonna go too much into this just to keep it, you know, you know, pg 13 podcast. But you know, I I think it has to be at least addressed to the age difference between Krum and Hermione.

And all of a sudden, Krum’s like inviting her back to Bulgaria and like you’re the, you know, most amazing, you know, different girl I’ve ever met. Like what in the world like And in terms of miss the thing you’re going to miss most, it’s Hermione for Krum. Like what in the world went on between them 2? It’s a lingering one. So Krum is 17 or maybe 18.

He’s like a senior in high school. She’s a freshman. Yeah. He’d be like a senior in high school and she’s a freshman in high school. Definitely, as someone that’s about to have a daughter, like, no.

That’s not gonna fly. So I I I get it, but I don’t think it’s, That wasn’t that crazy in high school, though. Right? Mike, making that up. I mean, I never dated anyone because I didn’t talk to girls, but, like, that that wasn’t that crazy.

Right? Big, like, story, I feel like. Yeah. I feel like it happened, but it wasn’t that common. And also, I feel like there’s a big jump, like, halfway through high school as to what’s allowable.

It would skeeve me, but I know it did happen at my own high school. Like, it was a little scarlet lettery. I don’t know. I also won’t ruin it for Keith because I know he hasn’t seen the movie. But once you get to that, that podcast, there’s a line they add in that Hermione says about Krum that’s just, like, adds even more fuel to the fire.

Oh. Mhmm. Noted. I’ll be on the lookout. Alright, Keith.

Who gets your house cut? I kind of previewed it earlier, but it’s going to just in general investing, your money and things that matter. I really did, like, appreciate that Harry was, like, I don’t want this money. It’s dirty money. I’m gonna give it a 1000 countions to Fred and George to start something that is beneficial to other people, that makes people happy, makes people laugh.

And it’s it’s you’re giving it to your friends. I really respected that. I liked it. It’s a sentimental one, but, better than throwing the the S and P 500. Yeah.

Why not? It was blood money to him anyways. I I feel like Harry is more like on like Shark Tank. Like, he’s like investing. He’s like, oh, this is this is something this is something I wanna put some seed money into.

Yeah. A 100%. Plus, I mean, what is the marauder’s map worth? Because you know, the the twins give that to him. That’s gotta be Yeah.

That’s gotta be up there. Like so Harry’s really just giving him, you know, a little, thank you very much here. Let me let me help help you back. That’s a good point. That is a very good point.

And I’m kinda surprised he didn’t pull I mean, Grady’s in the moment, so it’s a great time to for the Weasleys to get in there and get that money. But I’m surprised he didn’t pull, like, a mister wonderful and try to get some royalties on it or something. Yeah. A penny for every one sold or whatever the furvy joke one sold. Jimmy, do you have a, a house cup winner?

One of my favorite stand up comedians is Anthony Jelinek. And he has a a great, you know, kind of one liners. And it it really epitomizes my pick. So my pick is Cedric Diggory. And, let me just read this, this joke and it’s People get weird when kids die.

That’s a fact. Like about a month ago, some kids in my neighborhood were playing hide and seek and one of them ended up in an abandoned refrigerator. That’s all anyone talked about for weeks. I said, who cares? How many kids do you know that get to die a winner?

And that’s that’s Cedric. Like, dude just went out on top. You won Quidditch cup the year before. Now you’re try wizard tournament. It was all going downhill from from there.

Like, he was gonna have kids with Cho. It was gonna be awful. He was gonna turn into his dad where he’s just vicariously living through his kids. And he said, you know what? I’m going out on top.

So cup for him. Yeah. He was gonna be one of those guys who’s stuck in high school for the rest of his life because that was his glory days. So now he’s entombed there forever, and he has the glory to go along with it. So it’s it’s a good point.

Although, he didn’t get killed by Voldemort. He got killed by Yeah. Cradogel. That’s a tough that’s a tough one. Tough one.

Voldemort had to have someone else, Avada cadaver you. But at the same time, that’s by Harry’s word. So, 1, people don’t believe Harry, so they’ll just say, oh, Voldemort did it. Or, 2, Harry could just Harry should do the right thing and just say it was at Voldemort’s hand. You know?

For me, I mean, I already said mine. It was it was the dark lord, which is, you know, Keith just stole it from me. Just straight up just straight up stole it. Did I make it a stock earlier? But stock up.

Stock up. It’s his first time. Yeah. He already bought it. So now I’m trying to buy, but but the market’s closed, and, yeah.

I thought I thought that was a great one. And he really is one of the better bad guys. The fact that he’s a good guy this whole time. It’s a classic movie who done it that ended up getting totally twisted around, and you realize your favorite character is actually the bad guy, which is perfect. They just they did it so well.

Mhmm. Jimmy, for you overall, where does Goblet rank in your in your 7 book series? I hate to do it but I think it’s number 1. Like it it really is. It’s it’s just the book that kinda had kinda had everything.

It was the first book that JK just like threw down and said, I’m just gonna do like these massive massive books and I know you guys love it and you’re not gonna complain how long they are. And you get movies now and you’re like, oh, like 3 and a half hour run time, 4 hour run time. Like, I don’t know if I wanna see that. With these books coming out, you would see the pages and you’re just like, I just need more. And I think this is the first time she was finally like, oh, you guys like really love this stuff.

Like, I’m just gonna give you more. And just I love reliving that feeling every time I read it. Her audience was growing in age with this story. So now it’s like, okay. The people that read this when they were kids are now teenagers.

Like, they’re ready for teenager stuff and also can read a longer book. So let’s, you know, write this for them, which which I appreciated. Keith, the first four that we’ve read, what’s your rank now? Yeah. This is gonna be number 1.

4312. Yeah. And I was always a 3 over 4 guy. You know, if you’d asked me right before I reread this, I would have said the same thing. But after rereading it, I I can’t not say that this is the best one yet.

So Wow. Yeah. There you go. 43 Changed your mind. 4312.

Guys, that was, a great thought. I’m glad we got to do this because I freaking love this book. Jimmy, it was great to have you. I’d like to leave you guys with a quote for the books from the books so we can remember it for next time, Keith. The quote is, and I quote, did you put your name in the Goblet of Fire, Harry?

He asked calmly. That’s, Dumbledore, by the way. So so we’re gonna discuss that, on the movie pod. But, Jimmy, once again, thanks for joining us. We really appreciate it.

And, Keith, as always, it’s a blast. Yeah. Thanks for having me. Really appreciate it. Love to be on, in the future.

Giddy up. Good stuff, boys. Bye now. Bye now.

The Buddies apparate into the third Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.  They got to chatting about: Wizards and their fashion choices, romantic scenes, Hermione’s workout regiment, and how Snape’s redemption arc got lost somewhere between the book and the big screen. So practice your “Lumos Maxima” for those late-night reading sessions, and join the Buddies as they dissect a film that’s darker than Hagrid’s rock cakes.

Intro (0:00-0:44)
Stock Up/Down (0:45-27:04)
Favorite Scenes (27:05-33:28)
Love/Hate (33:29-40:35)
Listener Email & Lingering Questions (40:36-46:03)
Conclusion (46:04-48:12)

NEXT BOOK: Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire by J. K. Rowling

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to the book club. I’m Dylan here with the man who makes me wanna out the moon. Keith, what’s up, buddy? You make me wanna be the what?

Oh, I’m sorry. That’s not true. Great song. Well, here at The Buddy Book Club, we’re breaking down some box office bangers. And this week, we’ll be discussing 2 1000 four’s Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban film.

If you’d like to recommend a book or movie for us to read or watch, visit our website, buddybookclub.com. Sign to our DMs on Twitter, Buddy Book Club Podcast. You can list us, iTunes, Spotify. Wherever you get your podcast, please download. Give us a review while you’re at it.

Follow us on social channels, please, and thank you. Keith, first timer for you? I’m excited. Let’s jump into it with some stock up, stock down. Keith, what do you have for stock up?

Yeah. Stock up. Snape? Oh. I I think I’m I’m buying his stock.

I sold it pretty heavily. I got the book. But is he even that bad in the movies? No. He’s not.

Right? He’s not in the movie. The few times that we see him, it seems like all he’s doing is either saving Harry and, you know, Ron, Hermione. And he’s being quite frankly just like a stern teacher. He’s not really playing favorites.

He’s not being, like, super Slytherin esque only. Mhmm. Malfoy talked back to him. He’s, like, shut up, Malfoy. At one point, I was, like, wait, what?

Like, he never says that in the book. Like, that’s so out of character. The one picture that really comes to mind is him holding Harry, Ron, Hermione behind him as he, like, defends them from the werewolf. From the werewolf. Yeah.

That is not the picture we get in the book, which I think the turn is not gonna obviously be as good now in the movies. But at the same time, I feel like it’s a little just moralistic. Like, the dude’s astern kind of secretly holding a grudge. The overall, like, this is the worst character of all time take I had in book 3 is not the same in the movie. Yeah.

He’s a dick, but he’s not, I’m gonna let 3 students die. I’m not just gonna bully Neville into the ground. Yeah. Right. I guess there was a lot of potions class scenes that made it to the cutting room floor, unfortunately.

It’s interesting because this movie runs, I think it’s 2 hours and 20 minutes, something along those lines. So it’s already a pretty lengthy movie, and throughout this, I may or may not have some some criticisms, but it’s tough because this book is just crammed with things happening, and it’s hard to translate that into film without some important side stories. You want to give the main plot line a lot of space to grow, but you don’t want to sacrifice too much of the subplots, and you also want character development. So it’s tough. My first stock up is puberty.

So, you know, getting moody, looks changing, and emotional changes can normally be pretty tough, but not with this film. And you might have thought I was going with puberty as in the fact that this film is 2 years later than the other ones and the kids all look older. But, no, I’m talking about the film itself. The film series hits puberty with this one. It’s it’s so dark and rainy, especially at the beginning, which I loved.

It opens up just already fairly just, like, grim in general and no pun intended. But I’m thinking about with Harry and the night bus. And then once they’re on the train, it’s not like, oh, this is a fun whimsical him and Ron in a car flying, and it’s beautiful day out. It’s like, no. It’s dark and rainy, and there’s Dementors.

So it takes a real serious tone. The music additionally turns as well. I’m not sure what the deal is with the chorus song when they get to Hogwarts. You know what I’m talking about? You’re the music guy here, so I know you keep on keep on telling me the music gets darker and darker.

But The opening does. That that was in reference to the opening. The opening gets, like, a little less whimsical and more spooky as it goes on. But when everyone gets to Hogwarts, they had, like, a minute and a half of those kids holding those giant toads that were singing the chorus song, like, double double. What was that?

Yeah. I don’t know what it was, but the vibe of that music, like, it was I just did a terrible rendition of it because that’s not what it was at all. But that fit the vibe as to, like, how this movie is gonna go. It was very, like, somber, but also upbeat. I don’t know.

It was crazy. But I liked it. And I guess the lyrics were taken directly from Macbeth, Shakespeare’s Macbeth, from what I I read. That checks out to me. I’ve I’ve got some comments on the movie that I don’t think you’re gonna like.

Okay. That’s fine. What else do you have for Stock Up? Stock Up, curls for the girls, tries for the guys. The whopping willows tree scene, was a bit chaotic.

Oh, with Harry and Hermione? Yeah. Yeah. I don’t get Crook’s face touching the the, like the knot. Yeah.

But we did get Hermione just getting absolutely yolked. I don’t know if you caught this, but Oh, yeah. Hermione gets picked up by the whomping Willow, and he’s getting thrown around at, like, 40 miles per hour, maybe a 150 if we’re if we’re talking, the Firebolt speeds here. Mid getting completely thrown, she puts her hand out and catches Harry one armed while he’s standing on the ground, just picks him up, bicep curls the shit out of him. Yeah.

And I was like, holy shit. While she’s holding on to him, bicep curling him, she then rips the tri workout out and throws him Mhmm. A fucking 2 seam fastball into the little hole perfectly. So what I think is what probably got left on the cutting room floor here is that she was using the time turner to go back and just hit the gym so heavily. She’s absolutely yoked out of her mind right now.

They’re like, where have you been Hermione? And she’s just comes in. She’s, like, dripping sweat, drinking protein shakes. I wonder what she’s been doing. She’s not been in the books.

She’s been in the weight skid. Yeah. I love that. And I, yeah, I definitely noticed it. In my outline, I had, like, pick your character or whatnot to see if there was someone different from the movie that you like from the book.

Anyhoo, mine basically was it can’t be Crookshanks because all of Crookshanks’ scenes were cut. I don’t know who his agent is, but whoever it was was not good. Not only did the movie’s friendship with Sirius, but they they him letting Harry and Hermione into the Whomping Willow, like you referenced, is changed. And I know that in some of these movies, they try to work in some action sequence into things that are not action y, like we talked about and I referenced with Harry and Ron driving the car in Chamber of Secrets. Like, there’s a thing where Harry falls out.

I thought that was fine. This was a bit much. It was like, what are we talking about? Whomping willows flying around hitting them in the chest? I was like, oh, that’s a heart stopper.

Like, no way anyone’s getting up from that. Couldn’t agree with you more, but what I did also find funny is on IMDB, they have these, like, at the bottom, there’s, like, continuity errors and goofs and, things that just don’t make sense or or whatever the case is, and sometimes they’re fun to read through. And one of the ones was about this. It was legitimately like, no way Hermione could have picked up Harry. He would, like, she would have had to weigh this much.

He would have had to weigh this much. I was like, wow. This I thought you were gonna be like, turns out Hermione can squat £750, rep a 150 down dumbbells, just our stats on some weight lifting. Yeah. I I I just I thought that one was funny on IMDb because it’s like, who goes to IMDb to say that?

Where there’s actual things that people said that’s, like, oh, that’s an interesting point. You know? Oh, like, when Snape gets thrown into the bed, the bed falls on him, but the next scene, he’s just laying on the bed, and it’s intact. It’s like, oh, that’s an interesting continuity error, but this thing doesn’t make any sense. Yeah.

I couldn’t agree with you more. I’m not a big fan of that scene whatsoever. Also, she slides in right after him. So did she just go full 360 around the Willow and was able to slide in? No one’s that athletic.

Tyreek Hill ain’t doing that. I don’t know why she’s not on the Quidditch team if she’s doing that easy peasy. Yeah. For sure. It just it also is one of those things where it adds time to the movie that I feel like other things could have been shown where it’s also pretty cool that Crookshanks knows the situation and, like, just walks up, hits the knot, and the tree goes limp, and you can get in.

Because even though they don’t explain the backstory with Lupin and the shrieking Shack, it’s one of those things that someone will go, wait. How did how does that work? And if they then ended up reading the book, they would say, oh, that’s so cool. Now I see how that whole thing ties together where this instead is just like a a crappy Disneyland ride. Let me ask you this, d man.

Who has more screen time? Mister Bigglesworth or Crookshanks? Oh, mister Bigglesworth for sure. Yeah. Yeah.

He’s like a main character compared to, Crookshanks even though Crookshanks should be the main character. Yeah. I think Crookshanks has, like, 3 scenes that he’s in. I don’t know. Maybe he was an ornery cat, and and they couldn’t they couldn’t figure it out.

My next stock up is just nature. I mean, nature’s stock is is already at a billion, but in today’s world where we’re all inside, we need a little bit more nature. And they say that it took 1,000,000 of years for the land to form as we know it, but it only took us one summer away from Hogwarts for Hagrid’s hut to go from sitting on flat ground to being on the side of a hill. I don’t know if you noticed that. Yeah.

The the whole geography and everything, topography, is that the word? Sure. It was much different, I felt like, which I didn’t mind, actually. I thought that was fine. And that’s why it’s a stock up for me.

I thought it was awesome. I thought there was I thought it was really well done that there was just, like, more wide shots of Hogwarts itself. And even the Whomping Willow when they showed it early on, it was, like, at the bottom of the hill, and Hogwarts is up on this cliff. And then Hagrid’s hut, they’re going down to it. But as they’re going down to it, in the background, it’s just this beautiful mountain range.

Also, over the summer, I guess, Hagrid put an addition on his hut because now the hut has a separate bedroom attachment. I don’t know if you noticed that either, but it’s different than the first two. But I thought it made it look more like what I expected it would look, I guess, or it made it look more fun and magical. And supposedly, this is the first film in the series to extensively use real life locations. In the first two, they just filmed it in studios pretty much.

And this one, the director was, like, Alfonso Cuaron. He was, like, we’re going outside for this. And so a ton of Scotland stuff. You know, we got Harry’s ride on Buckbeak, which was super cool around the lake and whatnot. Even Hogsmeade, the the houses in the in the winter when they were out there, I thought it looked really, really cool.

And also, they expanded on the scale model of Hogwarts. So the Hogwarts exterior, they said, was expanded by, like, 40%, which included that courtyard, which, like, a ton of scenes were filmed in. I wasn’t a big fan of the courtyard. It seemed just like a straight up steal from Rivendell in the Lord of the Rings movies. But other than that, you know, the clock tower, a bunch of stuff they added, it just looked more magical.

And I and I appreciate that because it should be. Right? This is Hogwarts we’re talking about. When you look at it, you should go, oh my god. And the first ones gave you a little bit, but why not just expand on it?

So overall, I just I loved it. The grounds felt immense. A lot of wide shots like I said. So I I was a big fan. I agreed with that.

Anytime you can make the world a little bigger, more magical, I’m I’m I’m here for it. Did you have any other stock ups? Yeah. Last one, just keeping in tune with that, romantic scenes and and scenery. Mhmm.

What do you think of the romantic scenes in this? Like, Ron and Hermione hugging and stuff like that? Oh, no. I was talking about Lupin and Harry. You didn’t you didn’t see the the romantic scenes they had throughout the movie.

They were walking around, birds chirping. I mean, first, we get the the meet cute, which is important for I’ve talked about meet cute and how important that is for rom coms here. But Lupin’s on the train, then the Dementors come and he saves them and then gives Harry a chocolate, and you’re, like, wow, that’s a nice little connection there. Yeah. Then they’re off in the forest, and they’re talk chatting 101, and then they’re gone on, like, that long bridge there and looking over that beautiful landscape and that, you know, that second nice second day.

Then they’re back at Lupin’s place in his room, and it’s, like, candles lit everywhere. And it’s, like, a gold lighting, which is just a weird scene. The whole everything about everything he was in with Lupin was just, like, why is why is the scenery necessary for any of this? I didn’t hate it, though. So it was a it’s a stock up for me.

Little engorgio for me, if you know what I’m saying. Yeah, there was a lot of walking and talking with Lupin, which I enjoyed. I like the heart to hearts. I did feel that they were platonic, but emotional and relationship y. Oh, Duggan, speaking about relationships, my next knockdown is, forgive and forget, stock down.

Or excuse me, stock up. Oh, my apologies. Stock stock up for forgive and forget because Ron and Hermione’s relationship is totally fine after Crookshanks kills Scabbers. He’s like, oh, Crookshanks killed Scabbers. She’s like, yeah.

No. He didn’t. And then after that, they’re hugging it out. They’re best friends. He’s given her props when she gives Malfoy the, you know, the right cross.

They kinda just threw out the entire drama between Ron and Hermione that is persistent throughout the entire book, and Harry as well. Like, Harry’s with Ron for most of it, but they just threw out the that whole idea that there’s drama between the 3 of them due to the Crookshanks scabber situation. I I feel there’s other scenes that they could have cut and I’d rather them do more character building, more lore. Those are 2 things that I wish there was just more of in this. Like the bus scene, that scene was awful to me.

I think that I was like I didn’t like it at all. It didn’t make any sense. The the night bus scene? Motion sickness, inducing, the weird pirate head talking, the, like, zoom in on the guy’s acne, you know. I’m like Yeah.

Why is any of this necessary? That seemed like the takeaway was, like, oh, this guy has acne. Let’s zoom in on I’m like, no, that’s to show that he’s super young. That that’s the only reason they mentioned it in the book as far as I know. It wasn’t like this guy is ugly.

Yeah. But they were just, like, zooming in on weird shit, and I was like, what’s going on here? And I was motion sickness that whole bus time. I thought the night bus scene went on for way too long. Cut that whole thing.

I couldn’t I like the I like the fun stuff, you know, them sliding between the 2 buses, like the magical stuff. But it went up for too long considering that there’s so much stuff left on the cutting room floor. It’s like, okay, we saw this cool bus that comes and gets you. Obviously, you need a way for Harry to get to the leaky cauldron because that’s what happens in the book, and, you know, he has to get there. So have the night bus come, pick it up, show it, squeeze through some stuff, have a quick thing about who’s Sirius Black.

Oh, he’s this guy that’s on the loose. Okay. Cool. Done. We’re there.

Yeah. It went on a little too long for me. Quick last one. Stock up. Early 2000s fashion.

Wouldn’t think this would be a stock up for a Harry Potter movie, but did did they just forget that they’re in the wizarding world and they wear ropes? Big hate. Big hate for me. Oh, okay. I I need to be in this world.

What are we doing here? Yeah. This is a again, this is why I’m, like, I’m very out on this director. Oh. Apparently, I read the note.

It was, like, yeah. He just wanted to, like, the actors to, like, dress as they think they should dress. I’m, like, no. No. No.

No. No. This is this is a a piece of literature that’s set in stone that is made. You do not get to decide, you know what? They’re just not gonna wear the attire of, the actual world they’re supposed to be in.

And just be, like, being in Star Wars and the guy just sort of puts those jeans on and being, like, well, I felt like Harrison Ford, like, dislikes wearing jeans. So let’s make him, like, you know, Han Solo have jeans now. It’s, like, no. That doesn’t make any sense. Late seventies Harrison Ford.

Nice ass in jeans. I’m just saying. Just saying. I agree with you, but I think the note is misread by you to some degree. Go on.

And I agree with this part. So when it comes to the robes, he was like, hey. I think you the actors should wear the robes as they think their characters would. So or as teenagers would really Yeah. I’m kinda proud of that.

So it’s like, you know, a little looser tie, someone doing a little something with the robe. That makes total sense because if you go to a school that has, like, school uniforms, people kinda do that that same thing. Right? Or at least that’s my understanding from watching School Ties and, other movies like that. So I think that actually makes a ton of sense.

Like, hey. Let’s not get so stuffy and tight when it comes to the students’ robes because they’re kids. They’re all gonna do stuff. They’re in boarding school, basically. But then it was also, like, oh, when they’re out of classes, they should wear what they would wear normally.

That part, I didn’t really understand because they’re still in the wizarding world. These people aren’t muggles. Like, when you see other people in the wizarding world, they’re not wearing Mickey Mouse T shirts and Adidas shoes and stuff like that. I mean, we get that in the next book here too when they go to the the World Cup and they, like, no one knows how to dress. Mhmm.

So, like, the fact that it just doesn’t Yeah. Make any sense that they’re now wearing normal clothing. Yeah. The final scenes when they’re all in just, like, normal street garb, I was like, wait Yeah. What?

So, yeah, was was not a was not a big fan of that. Let’s get to, Stock Down. What do you got for Stock Down? Stock Down motifs and other film school jargon. If it wasn’t already apparent, I I have no business being a movie critic.

Since we’re here, you know, I’m gonna get into it. I was watching a refresher of the movie because I’ve watched it, like, week and a half ago now, and I’m so far into Gobbler right now. I’m literally in that world. Like, I can’t imagine what happened in this movie. So I was just, like, shit.

What what good did I watch? Uh-huh. So I watched some guys’ film breakdown of, like, how beautiful Lee filmed and the motifs of this movie. And I just remember being, like, who gives a shit? Put this stuff in that needs to be in there.

It shows, like, how much, like, movement and stuff was going on in scenes that, in my opinion, took away from those scenes. Like in the background, do you mean? Stuff going on where he’s, like, and then he zoomed into his face and did it, like Oh, yeah. Stuff that’s, like, great art, like, art house filming, which Yeah. This content is so good.

You don’t need to over produce it or overdo things. The perfect example of this is the streaking Shaq scene where that should be the big reveal. That should be the most drama filled turn. That should be, you know, any movie you think of when you finally find out, like, the big twist. Yeah.

And you’re just, like, all you’re thinking about is, oh, my God. The camera in that scene is they’re just jumping around so much everywhere. There’s action here. There’s there’s going there. You don’t I, like, couldn’t even understand what was going on.

It didn’t make any sense to me. It it felt like almost like a a play or a musical. You know how, like, people are always moving around and because there’s, like, not a lot to do. Yeah. And those you kinda have to create that action.

Where that scene, this should’ve been just zoomed in on Harry, zoomed in on Sirius, and then then, like, talking back and forth. It should not have been any sort of and then the rat jumped off. And then the let’s get the wands out. Let’s kill them. Let’s do it.

And it’s just, like, up and down and, like, the whole musical camera chased the rat through the hole and Like, so it just completely fizzled the the whole thing for me. I was upset about that. I agree with you to some extent. I think I mean, Alfonso Cuaron is a phenomenal director for my understanding. I mean, he did Roma, won an Oscar with that.

Have you seen Children of Men? Yeah. Did you like Children of Men? Good. Yeah.

I mean, I just like dystopian stuff in general, so that that collapsed for me. Gravity, whatever. But I’ve heard people say that Children of Men is, like, one of the best films movies of all time. Yeah. Like, there’s a YouTube video of why Children of Men is, like, the best directed movie, and I’m too dumb to know.

So but watching stuff like that, I’m like, oh, that that makes a lot of sense. So when I see stuff that’s associated with this movie and they show those things, I go some of it, I go, oh, that’s really thoughtful and makes a lot of sense. And then other times, I’m like, this just relax. Like, don’t you don’t need to go so far. And I think the Shrinking Shack is a great example because they did something really cool with that Shrinking Shack set in that they, like, built this house that’s, like, on hydraulics.

So the house is actually, like, moving, which, you know, like waving with the wind. Like, they wanted to make, like, it would look like it was waving with the wind. It was so unsturdy, which I love because you see that going on in the background. But it’s hard to even see that happening because it’s just the camera’s just jumping around all over the place. And I I agree with you.

A big reveal thing like that, just just put the camera down and let the actors go to work because the content that they have is good enough to hold any scene. For sure. My first talk down is school, who needs it? There were no classroom scenes in this movie. I guess we have the Boggart scene, obviously, which we need.

We have a Trelawney lesson with the Grimm, which we need. And I I I think I guess you can include care of magical creatures scene when, you know, Malfoy gets bit. I just thought in general, they’re at school, and there’s no no school scenes. There’s so many other scenes in classrooms that are important to the story in the book, and unfortunately, those got cut. I’m not super upset about it because I understand, like I said, you know, at the top that things need to get cut and having, like, 10 potions lessons where Snape is just belittling Neville, like, probably unnecessary.

But, you know, 1 or 2 can’t hurt. I think that goes back to the scenery. Kinda that seemed to be the focus. The outdoors, the outside of the castle. Whereas, I think a lot of these conversations could have been just in the classroom walking by a classroom, walking by, like, I thought the cool parts were when they’re walking up and downstairs and they’re moving and there’s portraits.

I’m like, that is cool to me rather than, oh, that’s a cool forest in Scotland, like, but we can see that in the real world. So it’s not really too anything too crazy. I think getting a mix of both is important. And I think having the juxtaposition between these, like, beautiful outside shots and then Snape’s dungeon where Neville’s getting berated Mhmm. Is like a wonderful play off of each other.

So, you know, I wanted a little more mixture between the 2. And I just wanted more Snape, honestly, because it’s just not the Snape from the book in this one, like you said. So, what else did you have for Stockton? Stark Town already referenced it at the lore. I feel like you missed out on a lot of stuff that I think you could have just handled in a a flashback.

After the reveal happened, they do a quick flashback with the 4 best friends talking about life what at Hogwarts back in the day, you know, that you can uncover all the things that they missed. The Shrieking Shack, the map history, Pettigrew’s backstory, all that stuff of like, that’s key to I think future books and this book to solidify. Let’s let’s look at all this, like, background with these 4 guys that were really good friends and we had talked about it on the group chat. I would love to see a TV show of them 4. How did how did it get to that point where we’re all at Hogwarts best friends and then one of the friends turns the other one in and gets them killed.

That’d be a really interesting thing. We don’t get any of that. We don’t even know any of that. Right? If you’re if you didn’t read the books, you wouldn’t be tuned in.

Or maybe I missed it in the movie, but so I would just love the Morris or maybe the future movies will have that. It made my hates list, honestly, this stuff. And and this is actual all this other stuff I’m talking about the movie, I love this movie. I honestly do. I think it’s a great movie.

All the other stuff that I said bothers me, it really doesn’t. But this stuff actually fucking bothers me. No connection between James Potter’s gang and the marauder’s map. What? It’s their marauder’s map.

There’s, you know, Mooney, Padfoot, Prongs, and Wormtail, but they don’t explain that those people are these people. Like, they’re standing right there. Never explained. Nothing really on Animagi. There’s, like, Snape has one quick reference to it, I think, but not that Harry’s pot Harry Potter’s dad, James Potter, was a stag, which is the Patronus that he sees across the lake.

Excuse me. No explanation of the Fidelius charm, and thus, because of that, no explanation on how Sirius betrayed the Potters. It’s just like, oh, you were his friend and you betrayed them. How? How did he betray them?

Right. Right. Yeah. It’s like, what? And I agree that a flashback would be an interesting way of doing it, you know, just having with the fidelity sharps.

Something along those lines to just explain it or even it feels like it was would have been 2 seconds for Lupin at the end because Lupin is, like, mischief managed and closes it. So he obviously knows something about it. And I guess you’re leaving that open to the viewer to ponder. But it’s still a movie for kids. So And we have Gary Old man too.

Yeah. He’s a a terrific, terrific actor. You zoom in on his face, he you can see it in his eyes how upset and sad he is as he tells the story of what happened. Perfect. That would be amazing, you flash back as he’s narrating it.

Yeah. Because in that shrinking Shaq scene, he can just explain what happened with the Fidelius charm. And like you said, he’s a phenomenal actor. David Theulis, who’s Lupin, is also a phenomenal actor. Shout out to Dragonheart.

If anyone’s seen it, great movie. And he, at the end, could, when he’s doing the mischief managed, just say Harry could be like, woah. How’d you know how to do that? And he’d be like, well, this is actually mine. And in that scene too, could also then he’d be like, is your father me or whatever?

And he would say that his father, we were anamagi and his dad was a a stag, and then we’d all go, like, oh, the lake has patronus Harry’s patronus is a stag. Now it makes sense. So I was pretty upset with that. Like, that stuff, it seems like Yeah. That has to be in there, and the fact that it was left out for an extra long night bus scene.

Don’t love it. Don’t love it at all. My next and last stock down is, QuickDitch. So what also made the cutting room floor, and I’m not super upset about this if they had thrown in the other stuff that we just talked about, is we get no Quidditch in this movie, which is funny because we talked about in the pod how there’s so much Quidditch in the book. We get 3 Quidditch matches in the book and and a super long And then the opposite.

Quidditch final. Yeah. You know, specifically, they cut the the most importantly, like, the Quidditch Cup win for Gryffindor, which is, like, the first time they’ve done it in, like, super long time. I think at least you throw in at the end something along the lines that they won the Quidditch Cup. I don’t know.

But we do get what in the one Quidditch scene we do get, it’s the one, obviously, when Harry falls off his broom because of the Dementors. That was a good scene, though. You like that? Yeah. I thought it was I thought it was interesting.

I it was kinda weird that it went so high in the air, but I was like, that’s kind of a cool element to add in. And hate it. Yeah. Yeah. It was good and dark.

I like that stuff. The things I didn’t like was 2 kids getting struck by lightning, and and they just fell off their brooms. So it’s like, woah. There’s now 2 other dead bodies on the ground. Like, Harry’s still flying around?

Yeah. Yeah. And then I did appreciate that, someone gave Harry some Rec Specs because who doesn’t love a good pair of Rec Specs? Because it was big in the book that he couldn’t see through his glasses, and in this one, everyone just got Rec Specs on. So I appreciate it.

That’s just what Dana Radcliffe wanted. And he’s like, yeah. Keep them. Don’t worry about it. Did you have a, like, a favorite moment from this from the movie that you like?

I guess this is more of just loves in general. I thought the opening scene was great. I was, like, this movie is gonna be fucking awesome. That opening Aunt Petunia scene, great actress, like, him getting angry. You mean the Marge the Marge scene?

Marge. Sorry. Yeah. Played by the same woman that plays, miss Tranchable from Matilda. Oh.

Oh. Good good cat. Oh, well, she’s she nailed it. Yeah. And, like, him getting angry, I was like, oh, this makes perfect sense.

So I was I was strapped in once that happened. I was like, this is this is off to the right start. I thought Peter Pettigrew casting was perfect. He looks exactly like a rat. Yeah.

Whatever they did for the facials and stuff like that was was so good. Yeah. What’d you think about the werewolf? I I was okay with it. I mean, I don’t really know what a werewolf supposed to look like other than that one, movie there with werewolves versus, Oh, you love that underground or whatever that one’s called?

Underground. Yeah. Yeah. Great movie. Kate Beckinsale, your girl?

Yeah. I don’t think there’s, like, a defined idea of what a werewolf should look like. I mean, maybe a baseline, American Werewolf in London or something along those lines. And there’s obviously been werewolves in lots of movies, but I thought this one was just so unique and really frightening. It’s a it’s a frightening creature, this, like, the super long arms and kinda no fur on it.

It had, like, humanesque qualities to it. I just I just liked it. I was I was a big fan of it. So I like that. That scene when the werewolves come out was was up there for me.

A couple studio notes. It’s a 9086 on Rotten Tomatoes, which is interesting that the critics like it slightly more than than the fans do because a lot of people feel like this is the best movie. It grossed 800,000,000 worldwide and a couple casting notes. Alfonso Cuaron, as as we’ve talked about, Children of Men, Gravity Roma, Et tu Mama, Tambien was supposed to be really good. Obviously, I didn’t see it.

Talk about Art House. I think that’s that’s your Art House stuff. I I love me some Christopher Columbus. Chris Columbus, the, the director, not the, genocide guy. But he’s best, I feel like, with kids movies, and and this movie did take a different turn.

And I think it was up to Chris Columbus whether he wanted to direct it or not, and he chose not to because he wanted to spend more time with his family. He stayed on it in a producer capacity, but they kind of went around to a bunch of different directors. And I think Guillermo del Toro was supposed to, but they didn’t like his ideas that he was kinda gonna go super, super far off the edge, and he kinda convinced Alfonso Cuaron to to take it on. So, whether you like it or not, it’s definitely a a a different a different take. I do wanna ask you for the casting notes what you thought of our new Dumbledore.

Yeah. That was kinda in my hate. Oh, okay. So Richard Harris died shortly after the second film was released. The producers offered the role to Christopher Lee and Ian Maclellan.

Lee, which we obviously know from Lord of the Rings, Christopher Lee being, Saruman, and Ian McClellan being Gandalf. And that’s why McClellan didn’t take it because he thought it was too similar to Gandalf while Christopher Lee had some scheduling conflicts. I mean, I think the the original cast was absolutely perfect. He’s supposed to be just based off of just based off of, I feel like how I read him is he’s supposed to be kinda like silly but brilliant. Encourages independence, but also he’s like nurturing.

He’s supposed to be kind of like a comic relief, but also the most dangerous person in the room. Room. So he’s supposed to be like a, a mix between all those things. But he’s not supposed to be just like the stern person that’s like serious. Serious is the last word I would use as as him.

Right? He can get serious, but he is not his overall disposition is almost aloof at times. Right? Yeah. When he was talking every time, it just seemed like he was Professor McGonagall.

Like, we already we already have that. Like, you know? So I I didn’t get it. But, I mean, he wasn’t like a huge part of the film, obviously, but he just didn’t he just didn’t seem very silly or or happy or any of those things. I don’t know.

What do you think? I mean, I’m a huge Richard Harris guy. He’s phenomenal in Gladiator as well even though he’s, you know, very short lived in in Gladiator. I’m not a huge Michael Gambon fan in general, so I don’t love his Dumbledore. I think his Dumbledore has good moments, and then it has some really bad moments.

I think Richard Harris was almost this, like, wise old man who almost seemed frail at times, but which I didn’t love, while Michael Gambon seems, like, a little more feisty, which Mhmm. I like about him. But I thought in the first book when he gets the earwax, you know, oh, alas, earwax, he’s, like, quirky and funny in that way Yeah. That Michael Gabbin, I don’t think really has. And I think there’s other times where he gets, like, a little too serious where it’s, like, wait, Dumbledore wouldn’t be like that.

You know, Dumbledore is kind of, like, all knowing. For all 3 or 4 years, he does the welcome to Hogwarts. It’s it’s just a bit basically him doing a stand up routine for the first, like, 10 minutes, and he’s like, oh, yeah. Go here. You’ll die.

This guy’s kind of, a little bit out there, but I love that. That’s that’s what I like about him. Exactly. And this thing, he was, like, actually serious giving a speech. What’s what’s happening here?

Well, wait until wait until next one is. I’ve seen the obviously, that clip. So I mean, I’ve also, I think, negatively impacted by that clip. One clip I’ve seen, and I’m like, oh my gosh. We all we all probably are.

He’s not terrible by any means. I’m just a bigger Richard Harris fan, for simple as that. Do you think Gary Old man, David Theulis, Lupin? We also get Emma Thompson as Trelawny. You know, some some some big names.

How do you feel about those characters? You think they’re well cast? Yeah. I thought they’re they’re all solid. I think Gary Old man, I think they could’ve done more with him on on how he mentioned it.

Yeah. I think I’m assuming in future films, he’s let him cook a little bit more. Yeah. He’s not really I mean, he’s obviously not in for the Goblet because he’s not really in Goblet outside of, like, them talking to him in the fire as far as I can remember. And he’s a little bit in the other ones, but this is definitely his, like, big intro and you feel like outside of the prison tats he’s got on, he didn’t really do a do a lot.

Not sure where he got those prison tats. You think the Dementors are good with the ink? Because I imagine they’re not really good with the needle because, you know, based on the state of their robes, you know, I I don’t know. Maybe you got them beforehand. And once again That’s a fact.

Their, Sirius Black’s body and hands are made from Russian prison gangs, the tattoos on them. Oh. So what they are tattooing? Person as a man to be feared and respected. What what did you love about, prisoner of massacre in the film?

I already burned a few of mines, but I I didn’t mention also that Harry wearing number 7 at Quidditch. Are up there. I don’t know why that that there’s no mentions. I don’t think reference of numbers like the mute wearing uniform numbers, but I appreciate it. 7 is my favorite number.

7 is, how many books there are. So I assume there’s some symbolism. I’m sure I was hoping to have to find some fun facts on that, but doesn’t seem like anyone’s references it at all. I don’t know if I’m making it up. I thought it was, like, because, Sirius is a dog and werewolves are dogs and, Michael Vick murdered a bunch of dogs.

That’s, you know, Michael Vick wore number 7. I I just thought it was that that long. Stay there. And there’s the clip for the kids. My love is I feel like there’s more in this movie.

There’s more everyday wizarding stuff going on in in the background, which I love. You know, we we have the cleaning lady at the leaky cauldron. Because I’m always just wondering, like, what’s going on in this world? How do these people live? At the leaky cauldron, they got a cleaning lady who’s going around cleaning cleaning rooms.

It’s like, oh, okay. That checks out. And even the boys, which I actually thought was kind of a dumb scene, but I like the idea behind it of the boys in their dorm room on the 1st night back, like, eating those animal candies and doing the animal sounds. I I personally thought that the animal thing was kinda stupid. But the idea of just they’re not always in school.

They’re not always do they’re spending tons of time just chilling in their dorm rooms, you know, shooting the shit with each other, having fun. They’re 14 year old kids. So seeing that kind of stuff, I loved it. And even, like, Lupin packing at the end. It’s like, how does a wizard pack up all of his stuff?

And you just see Lupin, you know, magically putting everything in his place, just normal everyday stuff. Although, that specifically, I feel like was stolen directly from from Mary Poppins, but that that’s just me. So, did you have anything in Luvs? Dementors. I think they’re legit.

I didn’t imagine them floating like that. That was cool. Yeah. I thought they were just a really well done imagination of it and, you know, definitely that’s how I imagine them moving forward, which is which is cool. Yeah.

I I once again stolen from Lord of the Rings. But Oh, yeah. I guess that’s true. Yeah. But they were really, really good.

Yep. Everything about them fit with the description in the book and were scary. They were perfectly scary. For sure. And you can if someone’s interested, they can look into, like, how they did the Dementors and stuff, but it seems like it was pretty cool.

They did a lot of, like, underwater they wanted to do them underwater filming so they get, like, the things flailing like they should. Didn’t work out, but they were kind of able to use that footage for the special effects people to to do it. So, yeah, I thought I thought they were really great. My last love is Harry seeing Pettigrew on the map, on the Marauder’s map. It was a pretty good fix to the map situation in the book.

Yes. What we talked about last time with Fred and George would have seen if they looked at Ron at any time during their ownership of the map, they would have seen Pettigrew with Ron at night. Outside of that, I thought this was a good fix to the situation because it’s like, okay. Harry sees Pettigrew on the map, and that leads him to running into Snape. The map gets taken.

So and then Lupin gets it and Lupin sees it on the map. It made a lot more sense to me than Harry using this map the whole time and never seeing Pettigrew even though Yeah. He’s there. So the few times that this kinda goes off from the book, it it does it in the in the right way. What about Hades?

There was really no character turmoil to make Ron and Hermione’s characters more important. I feel like they should be involved more and have more story lines going with them, but it didn’t seem like that was necessarily the case here. Agree with you on that. For me, I didn’t really understand the the Boggart scene when when Harry steps up to the Boggart because and Lupin even says in the movie, oh, I didn’t want you to step up to the Boggart because I thought it’d be Voldemort, and that would freak people out. But he does step up, and it becomes a Dementor, and then Lupin stands in.

So it’s like, what? What? You know you know it wasn’t Voldemort. You know it was a Dementor. So Didn’t Yeah.

Didn’t really make a ton of sense. The twins somehow knowing about Harry and his invisibility cloak, I hate that just for the whole story in general. Harry’s invisibility cloak is pretty secret to just him, Ron, Hermione, and and Dumbledore, so didn’t love that. Like, they see some footprints and they’re like, oh, it’s Harry. It’s like, wait, what?

How? How? And 2 more quick ones. 1, fire bolt at the end as opposed to the middle. I know they cut all the Quidditch scenes, but who sent Harry the fire bolt is like a big question that’s going on throughout the book.

And then at the end, he gets it and then flies off into the sunset and it’s, like, freeze frame on his face. I’m not a big fan. I feel like all the endings of these have been it’s like you write that perfect essay in high school and then you just end it with, like and then so that’s that’s about that. And you’re just, like, period, and you’re, like, fuck it. I’m turning this around.

I was in the body. Like, everything else is good enough. Yeah. It’s like a whole headingsy black. How do we end this book or this movie?

Just fly Harry off on his fire bolt and then freeze frame as his face is screaming from happiness. Yeah. I feel like we should get, like, a a looming, like, next time, like, Voldemort’s still out there. Yeah. Why don’t we get a picture of, like, Pettigrew going down a trail that’s in Albania or something like that?

So, woah, what? He’s like, I told you I’d come back to you master and you just see, like, an ominous presence, like like, and he’s like, oh, no. And that’s it. Cuts. Yeah.

Then the movie ends. It’s like, master, I’m returned. We should be directors. I mean, we should really write this stuff. Even they have the Trelawney says that, like, oh, the the servant will return to their master or whatever by the end of the night.

And then at the end, it can just be like, you know, Pettigrew in this creepy ass wood being like, master, I’ve returned to you. It’s like, you know, boom. End credits. Not like, I’m here in Potter. I’m planning on a boom.

Whatever. The slow clap was fine. Slow clap. Slow clap. In general, the story just seemed to move super fast, and I get it.

It’s a dense book with, like, lots going on. It just kinda sped from scene to scene to scene to scene to scene, and everything was going so fast. That’s just more of a personal thing for me. I didn’t really, like, necessarily hate it. Well, the other scene that they said when I was watching that, like, filmmaking great thing was when you know how, mister Weasley takes pulls Harriet aside Yeah.

And is, like, tells starts talking to him. Yeah. And he just keeps moving. Oh, yeah. And then he goes to the next scene and goes and they’re, like, what an amazing piece of filming because they show all these things you need to see.

And I was, like, that was the most, like I just kept on thinking how stupid that was. Wait, you mean when when, mister Weasley just, like, drag him from one pillar to another pillar to a door? Yeah. And it was so obvious they were, like, showing this poster to show this poster. Like, how about be a little bit more subtle?

I thought filmmaking was all about being subtle, not being, like, see this poster? It’s funny you say that because I noticed it too. It’s like, what was wrong with having the conversation there? Or, like, if you want to have it somewhere else, like, why didn’t you go there the first time? I have a, a listener email.

Sure. What do we got? Billy from Michigan. You’ve got mail. Two part question.

Based on the movie, is magic that can be done on your cell phone app allowed? Harry’s under his covers using Lumos? Oh, yeah. Yeah. And second question, what what is more scary to you?

The Bogart turns into a snake or when it turns into a clown? Yeah. So that’s Billy from Michigan. Thank you for the questions. These are great questions.

I actually had in my lingering questions. Billy and I share a brain. So Harry can scream, Lumos Maximo over and over with no pre repercussions, but when he just accidentally inflates someone, it’s like he’s gonna get expelled. Yeah. Also, that spell sucked.

Why would you even want that spell? If it just, like, slightly it would first of all, if basically it was a flare, it would, like, light up the whole house, and then it would go for 3 seconds. Have you ever heard a flashlight thought? Like, it’s so much more effective. You have the muggles do have flashlights or torches.

You know, you can just use one. You don’t have to use a wand and you won’t get expelled. And the best part is 2 seconds after the Marge thing, which is 2 seconds after this Lumos Maximo thing, he’s like, oh, using magic outside of school could get you expelled. And I’m like, you just you just use lots of you you said spells, like, over and over and over again. So, yeah, that was hilarious.

And I could not agree with this person more. I’m not even, like, afraid of clowns, but that clown in particular was not funny. It was frightening and the snake was not. I think what end up happening was they were, like, this will be the next person’s thing that they’re scared of and we’ll just keep going through and maybe this was, like, and, like, editors didn’t realize that. So they, like, added a laugh track, but it was supposed to be a scary thing, I think, next.

Like, you know, they’re just running through it. Yeah. So I guess a spider, a snake, a clown, like, that made sense. But then they were just like, oh, shit. We didn’t we’ve got to turn the snake into something that’s not scary.

We’ll just add a laugh track. Don’t worry about it. Scary to scary with snake to to clown, and everyone started laughing. And, like, the clown is frightening. By far scarier.

Yeah. Yeah. Thanks, Billy. Appreciate that. Lingering questions.

Why did they replace Goyle? That was my my question. Did you notice that it was Malfoy Crabbe and then some other guy for all of those scenes? Like, how Oh, I read somewhere that he got injured or, like, injured his arm, so they had to write someone else in. Yeah.

I didn’t notice it, though. Yeah. Because I was, like, wait. They had Goyle at the beginning. He was there, and then all of a sudden, it was just some other guy, like, a stand in.

I was, like, did they just forget that they this was the guy who they, like, stage it with? You know, that’s, like, just for blocking purposes. But I’m pretty sure, and I didn’t look this up, I’m pretty sure there was a photo of Voldemort next to the fat lady when they first go to Gryffindor Tower. So anyone who’s potentially watching it for the first time or or what right when they go up the stairs, there’s a portrait right next to the fat lady, and it’s Voldemort as we see him in later movies. That is him.

So pretty interesting because I didn’t know that they had already come up with a character but once you see the character in the next movie, it’s like, Wow, that’s him right there. Caroline’s question which was a lingering one that I enjoyed and I don’t think we discussed in the last one, how did the twins figure out how to use the map? I had that same question. It’s a good question. Yeah.

They just kept going with random stuff until they figured it out. They, like, would, like, tap on it and be, like, reveal yourself, and it would just kinda give you hints along the way based off of what they’re looking for. Hey. We’re up to no good. What do you do?

Type of thing, you know, or something like that where it’s like, why were you in Filch’s, office? You know, why are you there? And it’s like, well, we stole you. It’s like, oh, okay. You know, like, I think there’s, like, some sort of progression because it’s magical.

I don’t know. That’s what I felt like. I can dig it. Yeah. Because if it’s only for those guys I didn’t know, but I I like that idea.

I was thinking that they could have just eventually guessed, like, we saw him this way. We’re up to no good. I don’t know if that would be the exact wording though, you know, that that they would use. So, yeah, I think I like your way better. The the map I mean, the map’s pretty sophisticated.

It probably They responded to Snape in the book. Yeah. You have greasy hair and a big nose. That was it for lingering questions. We addressed the cutting room floor stuff.

Did you have anything else for that? My last fun fact was, because in order to acquaint himself with 3 lead actors, director Alfonso Cuaron, had each of them write an essay for their characters. First of all, you’re coming into the movie. You should be writing an essay on the characters what you think of, not me. But this is actually shows that they know the characters really well.

Emma Watson wrote a 16 page essay, which is what I thought it was I heard it was 10 pages, but okay. Oh, whatever. Daniel Radcliffe wrote a page, and, Rupert Grant, who plays Ron, didn’t turn it in, which is basically what the characters would do. So he act they actually did the assignment correctly. So I appreciate it.

I feel like that’s not fair enough. Like, Rupert Grant was, like, that’s what Ron would do. But, like, Ron does his homework. He’s not he’s not a bad student. But he would like turn it in late or, you know, make a copy off of someone.

I think I think that’s fine. I’d pour a bunch of ink on it and be like, oh, it was there, but then this ink spilled on it. I don’t know, man. Movies are weird like that. It’s like I guess you’re gonna make 1,000,000 of dollars so, like, you can write you can write an essay.

But it I’d be like, come on, man. It’s like the new boss coming in and wanting to shake things up. This this guy. And I’d also be pretty pissed at Emma Watson who spent, like, all her time making, like, a 10 or 16 page thing, and he’s like, it was just really a test to see if you knew your character. What?

This is terrible. So that will do it for Harry Potter and the Prisoner of the Ask your end movie. What did you think for all of the movie? Like, what would you give it out of the 4 buddy system? It’s hard because they obviously books are always better than movies.

I probably give it a 2 out of 4. I really was not that big of a fan of it. I think I had to rank the movie that go 1, 2, 3. Oh, really? Use that as your favorites.

I’m a little nervous about these next ones. There’s too much going on. The first and second one, I think, just captured what I thought in my brain of the book much more than this one did. This one just did too much. I don’t mean to be so negative.

I get into these things too much. So No. That’s fair. And I probably would give it, like, 3 buddies. I’m not I didn’t say this was my favorite movie.

I think it’s a really good one. I think a lot of people say it’s their favorite movie. It’s definitely my favorite book so far. Tough for me to say. I I did like it better than the other ones, but a lot of the aspects of the other ones, I like more.

I think just overall, it’s, like, pretty pretty close for me where it’s not 2, I think, is is the worst in my opinion just because the CGI stuff I thought with the snake and stuff just just wasn’t wasn’t really for me. So it’d be between, like, 1 and 3. Anyhoo, we’re moving on to Goblet of Fire, the I remember getting this book and being like, oh my god. It’s so long. I am so excited.

Like, when has that ever happened? As a kid, you get a super long book from somebody and you’re like, why isn’t it longer? This book’s phenomenal. This book is unbelievable. I’m I’m, like, halfway out of it.

I’m just, like, so locked in. It’s an emotional roller coaster every time I I read it. Like, my body and mind change as I’m reading it. Like, I get really upset or I’m getting, like, really happy. I’m like, what’s going on?

You know? It’s like physically changing me. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.

I, we listened to a bunch of it on the 14 hour ride back from from Michigan, and it 1, it made that drive fly by. And 2, I was like, they’re not at school yet? It was like 8 hours into this book. It’s so good. And they’re not even at school yet.

It was it was wild to me. So yeah. Okay. Well, great. I’m excited to talk about it.

Hopefully, we’ll get that, next week, and we’ll have a special guest for that too, which I’m excited about. So, Keith, thanks for chatting Prisoner in Escobade, and I’ll catch you for Goblet. Indeed. Alright. Alrighty.

Bye now. Bye now.

The Buddies fly into book 3 of the Harry Potter series in, Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. They’re joined by special guest (with an appropriate name): Magic.  They discuss everything from taking a page out of Willy Wonka’s ‘how to deal with spoiled children’ book, to the questionable penal system of Azkaban. They also get into important topics around: The raging hormones of pubescent wizards, chocolate being the ultimate magical and non-magical cure, and how Snape is dead to them. So grab your Firebolt (if you can afford it), practice your Patronus charm, and join the Buddies for book 3 of the greatest series that ever lived.

Transcript for SEO purposes 🙂

Alright. Welcome to the book club. I’m Ticklefoot here with baby Carrot and rabies. We solemnly swear we’re up to no good. What’s up, buddies?

Well done. Well done. Hey, why am I ticklefoot? No. You’re baby carrot.

I’m ticklefoot. Oh, okay. Alright. Magic’s rabies because he’s the only person that has been bit by a dog and then in a separate situation had the rabies vaccine. My rabies vaccine’s expired.

Did imagine getting bit by Sirius Black? Do we know? He got bit by Sirius Bat. Okay. Alright.

Anyway Got him. We’re on fire. Alright. Here at the Buddy Book Club, we’re bringing out some bestsellers. And this week, we’ll be discussing Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban by JK Rowling.

If you’d like to recommend a book for us to read or reach out to us any past episodes, you can visit our website, buddybookclub.com, or send us an owl on Twitter or Instagram, buddybookclubpodcast. You can listen to us on iTunes, Spotify. Download and subscribe, write and review, all that good stuff. Normally, if you listen, you’re used to the 2 of us, but we had to have Magic on. He is a die hard Harry Potter fan.

We’re planning on getting some guests going for the Harry Potter series, but figured, you know, the first two, let’s just, you know Keith and I feel feel her out. But once we get to Azkaban, I mean, the Hogwarts Express is potentially off the rails, so we should get off the rails with it. So welcome, Magic. Returning guest, we’re we’re excited to have you. Thanks.

I’m happy to be back. I think we’re getting into when do I update my resume with 4 time guest on the BBC. I’m like, gotta be now. Right? Let’s get into some stock up, stock down.

Stock up. Keith, what do we got? Stock up, Willy Wonka. Oh. Perhaps the inventor of fuck around and find out.

I think he’s kinda was came up with that theory. But I mean, I was wishing this man was a professor at Hogwarts because Malfoy wouldn’t have a little cut in his arm. He’d be in a casket and, that’d be well deserved because a couple of things just really, really upset me for the Pirates first class. Mhmm. Care of magical creatures.

Every other class is dangerous. Let let’s start off with that. We got mandrakes that’ll knock you out if you don’t put your headphones on. We got duels going off in the hallways. We got dark art training.

You go out in the Quidditch field, there’s a 50% chance you break an arm or a neck. Like, this is a dangerous school. Even in potions later on, when they’re making a potion, Snape’s alright, Neville. You’re gonna have to try yours even though he knows Neville screwed up. So who knows what is gonna happen when when you take up a potion that you’re not supposed to have?

It’s part of being at Hogwarts. You have to listen and pay attention. Otherwise, it’s dangerous. Magic is dangerous. And that’s the same thing that happened with Willy Wonka’s factory.

You not listen to him. Shit’s gonna go pop off. And that’s that’s part of the process, and that’s too bad. Some people might die, but then the next person was gonna listen. Right?

The other thing is that Hagrid needed to start giving out negative points left and right. Mhmm. Mhmm. When Malfoy’s talking back to him, you’re the teacher. Be like, hey, Malfoy.

Look at me one more time. It’s negative 50 points for Slytherin. Like, shut the fuck up, bud. Alright? Like, I was getting pissed off for for Hagrid.

Stand up for yourself a little bit. You’re a teacher at this point. You can’t let him talk, like, over you and, shit talk you. So, we needed some person to come in here and start laying down the law. Couldn’t agree more.

That’s so well said. And I have a a stock down that’s gonna tie back into it, so I don’t I don’t wanna go too deep into that. But I was really upset during that first Care of Magical Creatures lesson because, like you said, Hagrid’s the professor here, and I understand he’s new and he’s trying not to ruffle any feathers, any hippogriff feathers, but you gotta put your foot down and be able to tell these kids to zip it and especially someone like Malvoise. So I’m with you there. Couldn’t agree with you, Mark.

Magic, did you have a stock up you’d like to share? A stock up? Hormones. Oh. These students, they are full fledged going into puberty now, and it is the hormones are raging all over the place.

You know, all the emotional outbursts and the the silent treatment over the cat. I don’t think I ever put this together until I was older. But in the Quidditch match against Cho Chang Mhmm. When he’s like Harry caught on his broom and saw the opposing Seeker and felt a lurch near his stomach that definitely wasn’t nerves. Like, yo.

What? Yeah. You know it’s near your stomach. Right? I I guess I wanted to talk about this anyway, so I’m I’m glad you brought it up.

Do you think that Hermione Ron issue, which continued for the entire book, and looking back on it, it’s interesting that book 1 in Sorcerer’s Stone, they were fighting the whole time, well, until they became friends, like, halfway through the book slash towards the end. In book 2, Hermione was kinda like out of the picture because she was petrified, and now in book 3, they’re fighting again. In their combined relationship, we’ve seen these people fighting more than they’ve been friends, which is interesting. But do you blame Hermione for this, or do you blame Ron and really Harry? Because Harry had no dog in the fight, yet just decided to back Ron.

Who do you blame Magic? I mean, I think they’re all to blame. Right? Like, you would think that the first 2 years, these guys know, like, it’s the 3 of us. We’re in this in this together no matter what’s happening.

Yeah. Things could get bad, but at the end of the day, we all gotta stick up for each other, you know, because weird that there’s not a lot of people looking out for them. The teachers are like, yeah. You guys got this. Like, don’t worry about it.

And Yeah. Unless you’re Malfoy. Yeah. And it takes Sir Hagrid, Pol and Ron, and Harry aside to be like, you 2 are being fucking idiots. Your friend’s going through a lot.

Like, what are you doing here? Talking about Quidditch? Like, you’ve been hanging out with Oliver Wood too much. What do you think, Keith? Do you side with anyone, or do you agree with Magic that ever everyone’s at fault?

I’m usually team Hermione, but I’m, I’m not in this case. All Ron was looking for is a little hand up. I thought my cat kind of was being a dickhead hand up. But but she’s like, nope. I’m not I refuse to say sorry.

And then she finally does say sorry, and Ron’s like, that’s completely fine. Don’t worry. But not a big deal. He was an old rat. That’s all he wanted.

Yeah. So I was on team Ron with that. I was on team Ron as well because, for starters, Hermione goes to get a pet, and she can get any pet under the sun, but she chooses a cat when her best friend has a rat. It seems like probably not the best mix of characters. And then, like you said, Ron was just looking for an apology off the jump, yet Hermione went straight into you can get another rat.

It’s like, what? But, like, excuse me. You can get another rat. He’s had this rat for years. It was Percy’s rat.

Then it got passed out to him. 12 years. 12 years with a pet. I couldn’t imagine if, like, someone ran over my dog, and I walk out. I was like, what the fuck did you just do?

And they’re like, just get another dog. Yeah. Yeah. It was old anyways. Parts are fun.

Yeah. I’m I’m team Ron. I’m not necessarily team Harry because I feel like Harry kinda should’ve played the middle a little bit. Yeah. Instead, he went heavy on Ron’s side.

My first stock up, and it’s gonna be a quick one, is miss Cleo. I I think you all probably remember miss Cleo, the commercials from back in the day. Maybe, maybe not. She’s the magical school bus woman? No.

That’s miss Frizzle. Come on. Yeah. Same difference. Well, miss Cleo is, like, the late night psychic who you could call she was Jamaican.

I can’t obviously, reenact the commercial, but it was it was phenomenal. So I would suggest, if you haven’t seen it, go YouTube miss Cleo. But she must have been making money. Like, she could afford those those commercial spots and stuff. And I feel like our our girl Trelawny, Cybill Trelawny, who we meet, is pretty much similar.

Like, she just kind of, maybe she got something right once and has just been riding it off into the sunset, and she believes her own shtick so much that even when everyone’s making fun of her, I was like, she’s kinda right though. So I guess someone’s gonna leave at this point, so I guess she did kinda leave at that point. Although she might not be as clairvoyant as she thinks she is, I would call her 9 hundred number and have her tell me what my future has in store for me. I don’t know. How’d you guys feel about Trelawny?

Yeah. When she was possessed by the devil and just rattled off the future, that’s kinda when I liked her. Other than that, I feel like she’s kind of a con artist. So Yeah. The devil version of her.

Talking about. Con artist. I love that. You can make predictions that are vague enough that, like, something is bound to fit into it. Right?

Like Yeah. So don’t we respect the hustle? Because she now has tenure at a school. She has, you know, room and board for free. She gets a pension, all for the hustle of her being a con artist.

So I I gotta respect it. And Haggard could take a note out of this book is, like, she just right off the bat class 1 predicts someone’s gonna die. Mhmm. That gets the student’s attention. You’re now paying attention to, like, what she’s saying.

So I think Haggard should have done the same thing of just, like, brought out something just killed, like, an animal right in front of them and been like, that you’re next if you don’t listen up. You know? Set the tone. Set the tone early. Just bring out Aragog from the forest, and just be like, here you go.

Remember what everyone thought was in the Chamber of Secrets? Yeah. This is him. Come at me. I think it’s a great idea to predict someone’s death right at the beginning, but my only problem is McGonigal saying it’s never been right.

Where we already know Hogwarts is a dangerous place, we’ve been here for 3 years now, I’m sure there’s students dying. We’ve talked about this on previous podcasts, so McGonigal saying no one’s died kind of surprises me. Keith, do you have another stock up? Yeah. Scapegoating stock up.

This really got my goat. Unintended. Alright. We’re back. We’re back.

If the the Hagrid class and the way things went down there was a 7. This is a 10. I’m I’m very very upset about this. Cyrus gets into the school and gets in the Gryffindor tower and we think he almost kills Ron slash Harry. Right?

Who’s to blame for this d man in in Magic? The Dementors at the gates that are trained guards that are supposed to stop intruders? No. The grown adults? The teachers that have wands at the school that are patrolling the hallways?

No. The portrait who literally controls the door who can decide who comes in and doesn’t? No. No. No.

Not them. It’s Neville’s fault. Every single thing that happened is all Neville’s fault. Because why? He wrote down the passwords that change every day and lost it.

So no one else has to take responsibility for anything that happens. It’s just Neville’s fault. Mhmm. So now we’re putting everything on him. Even his grandmother comes out and starts shitting on him about leaving passwords out.

This is a 13 year old boy. His job is not to protect the school from someone intruding it. This is ridiculous. The worst part too is that we discover that he actually didn’t lose the note. Yeah.

Yeah. I was gonna say. Crookshanks stole it. Sir, where is the pardon? Where is the slow clap?

Yeah. I didn’t see no slow clap, d man. Magic? It’s bullshit. I’m still pissed.

I’m ride or die on team Neville for the rest of these books now. I’m pissed. Neville had a really tough year between that and getting absolutely bullied into the ground by Snape. It was like, give this kid a break. And I’ve I’m on the record saying, you know, not really a big Neville guy, and I think that JK Rowling had a bigger plan for him after book 1 and then just was like, man, I don’t think so, and for the right reasons.

But at the same time, like, I feel I feel terrible for the kid. Yeah. Like, his backstory is just as bad as Harry’s. Right? Like Yeah.

With his parents and everything, and, nope, we don’t get any sympathy for him. Just like he said, he gets blamed for everything. And the first one, when he tries to stand up to his friend, they petrify him. Yeah. Pretty much.

Not come come with come help us. No. You stay here because you’re no good. They rig a mortise in and not in a good way. Wait.

What? Magic, did you did you have another stock up? Yeah. It’s, hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard. Oh, is this like a a sports club or something?

8 years since Gryffindor won the Quidditch Cup. This is the most talented team they’ve ever had. Yep. Harry’s got the Fireball. It would be pretty easy to say, like, yeah.

We got this. Let’s mail it in. But, no, it’s 6 days a week training. It’s Wood staying on top of Harry for Dementor lessons. Like, this is talent working hard, and in the end, it pays off.

I like that. Yeah. I mean, we are we’re on record once again saying how we as much we love Oliver Wood. I mean, Oliver Wood’s even in this book telling Harry to knock Cho Chang off her broom, literally kill another student so that he can get the the Quidditch cup. And and I really did appreciate how Wood hit the showers hard after that first loss to Hufflepuff, and, showers hard after that first loss to Hufflepuff and just Wood refused to get out.

You know? He was probably just in there with Moaning Myrtle, crying for hours and hours and hours, although big asterisk next to the Quidditch cup because Harry has an illegal broom. It’s really that simple. Harry has an illegal broom. The fire bolt should not be allowed in competitive play.

Malfoy was 500 yards in front of him, and Harry catches up because he’s got a fire bolt. Come on. Broom Technology is just getting out of hand. I’m not gonna rehash my previous arguments, but there needs to be a governor on these things. Well, can I speak to that actually?

Because we got some data for the first time in this book. First of all, it’s all about agility and quickness, you think. Right? The Firebolt accelerates to a 150 miles per hour. Wow.

That’s pretty impressive. That’s fast. In 10 seconds? Mhmm. That’s not fast at all.

My Nissan Sentra, I looked it up, I think, goes 0 to 60 in, like, 6 seconds or 8 seconds. A 150. How long does it take to get to a 150? Oh, wait. It can’t get there.

First of all, sir, how dare you? Wouldn’t you be out of the stadium? Yeah. Actually, that’s a really good point, Magic, because the stadium, I picture it to be like a football field. But let’s even say it’s 2 football fields.

And I know there’s a vertical element as well. You know, there’s a there’s a y axis that’s going on here, but Smart. At the same time, there’s never gonna be a situation which you need to be on your broom for 10 seconds. Maybe because the fire bolt people also use to travel, like, use their brooms to travel. Uh-huh.

It’s like that’s why they said that. No. That’s a good point. It’s not necessarily just a Quidditch thing. But are you buying a Ferrari to travel?

Like, the the whole point is it’s a competition broom. Yeah. Exactly. You’re buying the Nissan Sentra for the long distance. You’re not buying the Ferrari and talking about, oh, it’s really good on gas mileage.

Like, come on. That’s a good point. You want it to win the shuttle drill. You don’t want it to win the 100 yard Sprint. But I still think it’s it’s an illegal broom.

That thing was turning on a dime. I mean, he was doing some crazy stuff. But my last stock up is the US penal system. Penal? I’m not a big fan of the way that we approach, you know, our criminal justice system, especially when people are incarcerated.

We put innocent people on death row. We have 4 profit prisons here in the United States, which is just absurd. But you know what we don’t do? We don’t send criminals to a prison with guards that suck your soul and tell you go crazy. Some might say metaphorically that’s true, but I’m talking about quite literally.

Azkaban, although on an island way out at sea, doesn’t rely on its walls to keep prisoners in. It uses dementors to make prisoners incapable of a single cheerful thought. That is directly from the book, incapable of a single cheerful thought. Are we concerned about recidivism here? Like, people are eventually gonna get out?

Maybe. I feel like you can’t get out. You know why you can’t go out? Because they usually go mad within a couple of weeks. If they get out for some reason, they just go straight to Saint Mungo’s, like, that doesn’t help anybody.

It drains wizards of their powers. I feel like wizarding powers are so important. You know what I mean? It’d be like them taking your testosterone from you when you’re in prison or something crazy like that, And then we already know that the way wizards get into prison, like get into Azkaban isn’t fair either because Hagrid just goes. No trial or nothing.

He just goes. So I think the wizards have this whole prison system really screwed up, and later we find out a bunch of these death eaters come out and break out of Azkaban or whatnot. And and no wonder, they’re all crazy, because they’ve been in Azkaban. That’s the ministry of magic’s fault in my opinion. It’s a great point.

And I also wanted to know, like, if you committed a white collar crime. You you did something that wasn’t that high level. Are you going to that same prison? Are you going somewhere else? Like, do they have, like It seems like that’s the prison.

Oh, that’s just it? Yeah. I thought they’re, like, oh, the white collar crime is the dementor babies that are there. Like, they’re they’re sucking your soul out, but it’s not as aggressively. You know?

That’s what I was thinking. Yeah. Like, young man drakes? Gotta straighten them up. Yeah.

Yeah. We have not heard of another sort of prison. It seems like it’s just Azkaban. Okay. Keith, what do you have for stock Talk down Snape and by the commutative property, Darth Vader.

I kind of forgot how shitty Snape is because of the ending. You know, he kinda has to redeems himself. Mhmm. It’s very, very similar to Darth Vader where he he throws the the emperor down the the well or whatever that was there and, you know, kills him and saves Luke. And you’re, like, he’s just been misunderstood this whole time.

You forget what happened before in, like, the first movie where he’s blowing up planets and choking out people and killing younglings and just being the worst person of all time. You kinda, like, give him a pass. In this book, I completely forgot how bad Snape was. I think it’s fine, honestly, to if his mentality is Harry Potter’s a famous person, he needs to be shit on. Fine.

Like, I’ll I’ll let that pass. Hermione’s the smartest person in the school. She needs to be put in her place sometimes. You know what? That’s fine.

I I’m okay with that also. To bully and belittle Neville, not just in your class, but outside of the classroom and shit on a person that’s weaker and not as popular or strong or smart as the other students, that’s just cruel and I don’t won’t stand for it. I don’t care for it one bit. Snape’s dead to me for the rest of the series. I don’t care what he does at the end.

Dead to me. That’s all I have to say about that. Super fan Chrissy had emailed us about this. She was basically right on the same page with you about, about how Snape sucks. I guess you’re gonna be part of, a listener mail here, but I know he’s playing the fence and whatever, but can you imagine being a 50 year old man bullying children because your dad was mean to him?

It couldn’t be put better than that, in my opinion. Yeah. 100%. He’s going off against against Neville, and then at one point, you’re like, oh, he’s making this potion for Lupin, so whatever. But then he’s at the same time, he’s trying to get everyone to figure out that he’s a werewolf so that he can’t be a professor there anymore.

Like, close the yearbook, Snape. Snape. Move on. Okay? You got a tough childhood because you were bullied.

I understand that. And maybe that that’s the point is that, you know, these things are cyclical, and if someone’s bullied, they’re more likely to then bully people in the future. But, like, taking it out on on Neville like, I get Harry because, like, you wanna take him down a peg, but it just didn’t make no no sense to me. No. Yeah.

I mean, it it’s it’s one thing to do it with, like, a connection of, like, yeah. Harry’s dad messed with you, so you messed with Harry. But, right, Neville didn’t do anything to him. He’s trying his best. Maybe he’s not the brightest, but he’s trying his best.

Isn’t that all you want from a student? You would think, but, yeah, Snape’s the worst. Magic, what do you have for Stockdown? Well, nice segue and a little bit of a a teaser in the intro. Stockdown, feeling safe around animals throughout this You’re you’re selling that all day.

Whole book. It’s always something. Right? Like, right off the bat, chapter 1, we have to be reminded about how Ripper chased Harry up a tree Yeah. To attack him.

We’ve got this this great big dog looming kind of everywhere. Not really sure what it is, what it wants. Obviously, the Buckbeak attack, and then, like, to top it all off, do you know if your animal is even an animal or is it a human? Like, how can you really be sure after that, you know? And obviously, that all hit pretty close to home given the recent events around around here, but I will say I’m not gonna slow play it like Malfoy.

I can handle it myself, and I will not be asking anybody to skin my shrivel fig, so to speak. Yeah. There we go. Funny you said that because, one, you burned one of my stock downs, which is your dog bite PTSD. For those listening, magic was recently bit by a dog.

Ripper, the grim, werewolves, you know, which is really I think the lore around werewolves is really just people getting bit by rabid dogs and, you know, them going rabid. So, you know, it’s it’s just a lot for someone who got bit by a dog, and without modern medicine, probably wouldn’t be here today or have a hand. So props to you, props to modern medicine. And then a double good hit by you because I also had the shrivel fig skinning of the shrivel fig mentioned in a in a different stock up, which which I’ll get to right now because because we’re on it, and we’ve kind of been talking about this anyways. But stock down is standing up against bullies.

It’s what you should do, and, unfortunately, it’s what no one decided to do. When Malfoy gets clipped by the Hippogriff, he’s going, I’m dying. I’m dying. I’m dying. Guys, use that.

Use that later. When Ron, instead of, like, huffing and puffing when Malfoy asked Snape to help him in potions, you know, he’s like, oh, I can’t I professor Snape, I need Ron to help me. Just under your breath, be like, oh, I’m dying. I’m dying. I’m dying.

You know? Get get under that Getz collar, and and then Harry, he’s asked him to skin his shrivel figs. He should be like, yeah. I bet you want me to skin your shrivel fig, you sick fuck. You know?

Draco’s even shitting on Lupin. Like, he comes up. He’s just saying Lupin dresses like his old house elf. It’s like, oh, excuse me, Draco? You think Lupin dressed like your old house elf?

Whatever happened to your house elf? Oh. Yeah. Oh, that’s right. I tricked your idiot father into freeing him.

That’s, you know, that’s a real shame. They they are quite useful, those houses. I guess now you’ll have to scrub the skid marks out of your underwear yourself. Like, come on. Bring the heat against this guy.

So it just bothers me every time, I guess, when no one just gives it gives it back to Malfoy. At least Ron kinda decides to fight him at times, which I appreciate. At least he’s ready to throw hands at him like his dad. Go, mister Weasley. Hermione actually threw Oh, yeah.

That’s right. Hermione. The only people who have thrown hands in this story so far is Hermione and Arthur Weasley. Them’s the facts. I would say the same thing too, though, when the they’re on the train.

Look who it is. It’s Malfoy. It’s like, bro, get off my dick. Go sit down in your car and not be like, why are you bugging on me right now? It doesn’t make any sense.

Just just go bother someone else. Really? All you think about is me, isn’t it? All he does is just continually come up to Harry all the time. It’s like, bro, am I in your head all day every day?

I think he’s in love with him. Maybe that’s what it is. Brent free. Maybe Harry’s just go to him, kiss him on the mouth and say Yeah. I know you’re in love with me.

So here. We tried it. Did it work? Yeah. Do you feel better?

Keith, what else do you have for stock down? Yeah. Last one. Quick ditch or a credit strategy, stock down. We’ve all seen soccer where the aggregate matters, where teams play differently based off of what they need to get into the playoffs and things like that.

Mhmm. By that, I mean, this is more of a British thing or more a European thing, not a US thing. We don’t really play much aggregate games here. But Slytherin’s up versus Gryffindor. They’re up by 50.

I didn’t really understand why Malfoy was even looking for the snitch. Just play or help your team out. Just go man advantage the whole game. You just try to be a chaser. And then you get up a ton of points.

And then Harry’s like, well, now I have to help man advantage now. You know, I have to come in. And now you’re seeking for the snitch by yourself. Yeah. And at the same time, you can also play and then be like, hey, yo, if anyone sees the snitch, let me know.

I’ll go off and get it. Otherwise, let’s just get a huge lead. We’ll win this thing. It seemed like there was no strategy. I feel like Wood would have came up with a good strategy here, but they didn’t.

I don’t know what was going on. So Stock Town, cryptic strategy. Yeah. It’s a good point. I almost wonder if your keeper should be like your backup seeker.

If the game’s not even getting played on your half of the pitch Yeah. Just a good point. Keep your keep your eyes on a swivel. Is it only the seeker that can catch the snitch? Do we know?

If you’re a keeper and you see it, be, like, boom, got the snitch. Game over. I feel like you’d have to be wearing a special uniform, like, if you’re a goalie or you’re, what’s the guy in the, like, in the volleyball that sets that can only send it or whatever? That’s a great name too. Rover or the Libero.

Is that what it is? Re Roberto. Ribeiro. Right? That’s what you said?

Oh, there you go. Yes. Yes. I said Rover and Libero, and then I pronounced that one. Yeah.

Libero. I like that. I like that too. Been watching a lot of volleyball Olympics. Love it.

Keith, these are great points, and I was with you a 100%. I was like, oh, cool. So you just don’t need to be a seeker right now, Malfoy. Instead, he’s just like once again, maybe he’s just in love with Harry. He just wants to be close.

Yeah. That’s a good point. Like, Flint or whatever. Is that Marcus Flint? Is that the captain?

I think so. He was like, alright. Here’s the strategy, and Malfoy was like, I don’t really get a ton of alone time with Ares, so I’m just gonna fly. I’m just gonna fly with him if that’s Yeah. If that’s chill.

It’s like, no. That’s not chill. Yeah. And and I’m gonna burn one of my loves here because we’re talking about quick ditch, but lot of Quidditch in this book. We really haven’t had a ton of Quidditch.

Magic, you didn’t reread 12. Right? You just jumped in for 3? I mean, you’ve read them a bunch of times. Yeah.

You’ve read them a bunch of times, but you might not remember that there is very little Quidditch in the first two books. I’ve seen the movies a bunch, and I know you have as well, so my memory was kinda tainted by that because Quidditch plays more of a factor in the movies, but there’s very little Quidditch in the books. We get 3 separate Quidditch matches in this book, which is phenomenal, and including the final, which we’ve been talking about. It was a whole chapter. It wasn’t just a couple pages.

It was a whole chapter of things happening, then over going the other way, then things happening again, and then eventually the stitches got but it was it was great. I was almost like, is prisoner of Azkaban a sports book with Harry Potter as the background? I mean, you got the elite group of seekers too. Right? We get we meet Cho and Cedric for the first time.

Oh, yeah. Good point. Good point. Yeah. Malfoy, Harry, Cho, and Cedric being your your 4 seekers, like, 4 pretty influential characters to the storyline.

And we also have Ginny Weasley in the stands who’s the future Gryffindor seeker. So hers. I guess yeah. Whatever. People at the top.

People should know. Dispose our comment. And, also, if someone’s, like, I can’t believe they ruined that Ginny is the future Gryffindor seeker, then, 1, that’s awesome. I’m glad you care this much. And 2, get over it.

Just a a quick one plan on the Quidditch thing too. Right? Like, the wizarding bookings stocked out. Gryffindor got their win. Minerva Magali had cashed in her ticket.

Like I mean, she was so jazzed. You know she was so jazzed. She was she was hitting up the brandy heavy that night. I I had a couple quick ones. This one’s super quick, so we’ll go with it, but summer birthdays.

Harry Harry pretty much has a shitty birthday every year. I mean, we know he had with the Dursleys, but from 11 to 13 when he’s a wizard, really unfortunate. Obviously, in his 11th birthday, he found out he was a wizard, so that probably isn’t the worst, although he went off into the night with this giant man who he didn’t know, so that that could be concerning, but imagine if he was at Hogwarts during his birthdays. He would have the most magical birthdays. He’s the most famous wizard in wizarding world, and he’s at Hogwarts with all of his buddies.

He’s probably getting letters from all of these people across the world like, hey. Thanks. Really appreciate you. Even Malfoy is probably sending him love letters during his birthday. So, yeah, summer birthdays, Stockdown.

I, myself, had a summer birthday. I invited my whole class, and, 4 people came. So, I’m still a little bitter. I was 26. I think my last lockdown was minister of magic.

I’m just not really sure it’s an important job. Are we sure? Are we sure it’s an important job? Because the minister of magic’s part of his job is to oversee the execution of a Hippogriff at Hogwarts. It’s like, what?

This is the the most important person in the in the wizarding world, and he’s gotta go to Hogwarts to see this creature get murdered. I was thinking about it. I was like, maybe the ease of transportation in the wizarding world allows for so much more. Like, it’s not like he has to get on air force 1 and then, you know, spend hours and hours going across all these time zones or whatever. It’s just Great Britain.

He can take flu powder. He can apparate. He can ride a broom a 150 miles an hour. So maybe because of that, you have a, like, a fuller schedule and you’re able to do the little things, but shouldn’t that be farmed out? Like, aren’t there bigger and more important stuff to do?

Or I guess, potentially, he’s already in in Hogsmeade because he knows that Sirius Black’s there, but also, isn’t that for the the FBI special squad or something like that, the hit squad or whatever it’s called? I don’t remember what these things are. What are they called? Because Harry becomes the one. Right?

What are they called? Ar ours. Ores. Or yeah. Yeah.

Like, shouldn’t there just be, like, a fleet of ores taking care of this? I don’t know. It was Neville’s fault, and so don’t worry about that. Yeah. No.

Yeah. So I just wasn’t really sure about about the minister of magic. To me, Fudge seems like he’s like the the peacetime king. Right? Like, when there’s nothing wrong, he’s fine.

Like, a social chair, like, just make the rounds and say hi. But when shit hits the fan, like, just makes it many times worse than it actually is. Managed to lose 2 convicts within a matter of a couple hours by just leaving them both alone. Yeah. It’s a good point.

No clue what he’s doing. Yeah. He probably just walks around. People are like, oh, he’s got a bowler hat. Like, that’s that’s silly.

Isn’t that fun? Like, isn’t isn’t that fun? Isn’t the wizarding world fun because of this guy? And then when shit really hits the fan, he’s got he’s got nothing. Do we have a favorite chapter in mind?

And I’m only saying this because the Mooney wormtail padfoot and prongs chapter is one of my Alzheimer’s. That whole reveal of the serious pedigrew thing. Obviously, it hits a little different when you know it’s coming, but it’s still pretty much chills worthy. And even earlier on when they said, like, oh, didn’t you know Sirius Black was your dad’s best friend? It was like, what?

Any other parts of the book that that hit you good? For me, and this is more of a obscure, but I really like the the Bogart scene. I think it’s the first time that I feel like we’re in a classroom setting where we’re really learning something, where it’s, like, alright, here’s the problem, here’s the solution, and now let’s put it into real life. Yeah. Test it out.

I was, like, I wish I was in that classroom. Right? It just felt real, and I kinda wanna see what my Bogart would be Everyone’s. I think that’d be kind of a cool thing to see. I also just think, the obvious favorite character in this book was Lupin.

So that kind of really showed him, like, oh, he’s a really good teacher. He knows what he’s doing. And he’s an FDR disciple because he says, the only thing we have to fear is fear itself when he tells, Harry about that. But, anyways Yeah. Yeah.

I think he also said that day that Pettigrew lost his finger was a day that will live in infamy. Oh, and that’s, I don’t know what that part is. Progression. Yeah. Magic, what did what did you like?

Yeah. I mean, I agree with Keith. Right? Like, fave character is definitely Lupin by far. It has to be.

The best teacher they’ve had. Like, even the exam he gives them at the end, like, the obstacle course of everything they learned throughout the year, and of it being all useful stuff too. All these creatures have dark magic in them, and like here’s how to beat them, and I’m gonna test you on that. It’s not one chapter or scene per se, but all of the the one on ones with Harry and Lupin were my favorite parts of this book. I couldn’t agree with you more.

He’s so good. Keith, great point with the teaching element too because we’ve been in this school for a long time, and we really haven’t got a lot of classroom experience besides Snape just bullying children and McConnell here and there transfiguring stuff. We haven’t had anything successful, and it usually comes with the defense against, so that was the Boggart stuff, was was quite enjoyable, and Magic grade point with the final as well because it was pretty much just like American Gladiators or even Nickelodeon Guts. Like, at the end, it’s just like an obstacle course. Like, what a great sign ninja warrior.

It’s a ninja warrior, but then there’s evil creatures at each end. And since we’re talking about magical creatures, we do every episode, we talk about the the best magical creature, our favorite in in the book, and this is the best one so far for actual magical creatures and maybe the best of the series, if I’m thinking about it. We got redcaps, which are goblin like creatures that live wherever there’s bloodshed waiting to bludgeon those that get lost, and they said they live on battlefields, which made me think about what wizard battles must be like. It was like, what are ancient wizard battles like? Because that sounds super badass.

Can we can we have a shogun version of of Harry Potter? Because I wanna hear that even though there’s no battles in that book, god damn it. We got kappas, which are scaly monkey webted water dwellers that strangle people who wade into their ponds. Pretty fucked up. Hankypunks, one legged creatures that look like it’s made of smoke with a little dangling lantern.

It lures travelers into bogs, gets them lost, and fucks them up. Awesome. Flobberworms, not so cool. We’re not gonna spend any time on there. I don’t even know if we’d consider Crookshanks.

Would we consider Crookshanks a a magical creature? Because although he’s a cat, he has some interesting abilities. What say you? Yeah. I feel like he’s communicating with Sirius.

Right? So I feel like that’s not speaking English, though. I don’t understand how that worked, by the way. But yeah. Yeah.

Neither do I. And he got our boy Neville in trouble. So but we’ll allow it, though. I’m gonna allow it. And then, obviously, Boggarts, which we, talked about before, and then the big two, Hippogryphs and Dementors.

Magic, did you have a a favorite of that group? Well, you missed the Grindelos. Oh, of course. How could I? Which which may may or may come back into the to the slides.

Yeah. That’s a good point. Maybe I just forgot it because it’s thinking it’s, like, stuck in my mind. It’s, like, oh, we’ve already seen grindolas, but those are Cornish pixies that we saw in book 2. Mine actually veers off from your list a little bit.

I don’t know if you would consider it a creature, but I would throw the the night bus into contention. I had that under magical element. Elements. Fair enough. Either way, creatures are usually, like, living and breathing, but at the same time in in this story, there are interesting things that live and breathe.

So, I’ll I’ll allow it. Seems like so such a perfect thing in like a magical world of someone who’s just stranded and needs help. Like, well, there’s gotta be some sort of magic to get you out of this situation, right? If you can just stick out your wand arm, it helps on the way. Picture yourself.

It’s it’s late at night. You’ve thrown a couple back. You’re stranded in Harvard Square about to piss your pants. What better use for a night bus than that. Right?

Have a have a bathroom, have a bed, get your way home. Yeah. I mean, that’s that’s really key. As someone who may or may have been in that situation before, with someone else on this podcast, then yes. And then I was bullied, and you never stood up for me.

There’s a lot of there’s a lot of, things going on. There are a lot of crosses happening here. Keith, what did you have for a magical creature? Mine’s gonna be outside as well, and you might have had this as a magical element, but I had the monster book of monsters. Yeah.

That was also on a magical element. Well That’s fine. Too bad. That’s fine. That’s fine.

At least at least he’s closer than mine. The reason why, one, is it reminds me of Kramer’s coffee table Coffee table book. Coffee tables. Yeah. That turns into a coffee table.

I mean, it’s the exact same premise. I love it. And then 2, and I think we all can relate to this, but to stop the book from being so aggressive slash angry, what do you need to do to it, boys? You need to give it a good stroke. And I think we all can agree on that.

So there’s a life lesson in there. You gotta stroke its spine. Oh. What’s the difference? It’s like a massage.

I’ll take it. I don’t know. I honestly thought red caps were obviously, Dementors are, like, the most fucked up. So, like, we’re we’re there. And especially, Keith, you haven’t watched the 3rd movie yet.

No. I haven’t watched it yet. They did a good job with the Dementors, although, once again, stolen. Absolutely 100% stolen. Our boy, JR Tolkien, would have something to say about this, but, yeah, I mean, Demetrios, Hippogryph’s both wonderful, and Buckbeak, we’re gonna see Buckbeak more, which we love, but redcaps being these goblin creatures that live with his bloodshed and they’re waiting to bludgeon those that get lost, I’m thinking of a World War one battlefield.

Keith, we’ve read World War one books. We’ve seen the movies and whatnot. It’s just people spending days dying on the battlefield, and your guts are hanging out, and then all of a sudden, a goblin like creature stumbles up to you and starts beating you to death. This is pretty messed up. Pretty messed up.

I would think almost. Right? Yeah. But it’s probably not the last thing you wanna see before you die. Well, maybe they do see that, you know, in his lip just to tell the tale.

Or you’re the medic. You’re going out there to save someone, and there are a bunch of redcaps around, and they they bludgeon you, and your buddy’s laying there. He’s gotta walk. This Harry Potter world is pretty messed up. For magical elements, I had the night bus we just talked about, the monster book of monsters, crystal balls, the marauder’s map, the fire bolt I considered, and the time turner.

I feel like the Marauder’s map just because you would know all the scuttlebutt in the school. Like, you’d know what everyone was do which is kinda sketchy now that I’ve been saying it out loud. But I guess you’d know, like, who’s dating who and, like, who’s sneaking out. You’d you’d have a lot of, survivor type secrets if you if you’re playing the game of survivor. The Muradonite, that’s so cool, but we all think, oh, why wouldn’t everyone else come up with it?

Because I but I think it’s like the social network. It’s like Facebook. You had have to be this brilliant wizard to program it and make it. I think that’s why I thought it was kinda crazy. No one talks about, like, how the fuck do these dudes create this thing?

It’s, like, probably, like, insane magical talent to do it. Right? So it’s basically being, like, a programmer. I’ll burn a lingering question because how are these 4 guys and actually, 3 guys. Gonna throw a Pettigrew out because he’s a little No.

Yeah. He didn’t do shit. Yeah. How are these guys so intelligent and hardworking that they’re able to create a marauder’s map, become Animagi, and James Potter be the best Quidditch player since sliced bread, and Lupin be a werewolf. There’s just so much that they have to do, and they’re redid it within this time period of their 7 years there.

And granted, we don’t know what happened to them afterwards, but we know, obviously, Lupin being a werewolf, he eventually became a professor. He doesn’t have a ton of money. These guys should be the next billionaires in the wizarding world. Right? The next Galliunias.

Mhmm. So I just don’t even know how they had time to do all this stuff. Well, Harry and Ron and Hermione are just are doing the same stuff. They’re out there in Russian. They’re not creating.

They’re they’re living fast and loose. You know, they’re kind of coming up with solutions on the fly. They didn’t do with, Voldemort every single term, then they’d probably fucking creating stuff out of, thin air like these guys were. They don’t have the time to be the entrepreneurs that, their fathers were. So I guess, so Harry knows, like, 3 spells.

You know? How dare you, sir? I know he’s got he’s got gumption, and he’s got that it factor, but I want him on my team for sure, but he’s not the purple ninja turtle. He’s Steve Jobs. He’s put he’s surrounding himself with people that are important.

That that’s all you need to do. I mean, that’s a good CEO right there. Yeah. Sure. Sure.

I’ll allow it, but he’s he’s not creating the Marauder’s map. That’s for sure. He wouldn’t even know where to start. Steve Jobs didn’t create the iPhone, but he, he found the person to do it. Alright.

Best spell. And The mad magic, did you have one? Sorry. I I mean, one one point about the map and then one other magic element, which we didn’t discuss that I just thought of. I think it it’s worth bringing up what real ones, Fred and George, are for having the map for so long.

Seeing their brother sleeping with a dude named Peter Pettigrew every night and not telling anyone or not calling him out on it, just like letting him letting him figure himself out. Yeah. It is interesting. And obviously, it’s a lingering question as well. The other magic element that I just thought of was, what’s in that chocolate?

Everybody’s, like, eating chocolate and suddenly just, like, feels better. We is this laced with something? It’s, like, this can’t be just your standard chocolate. Right? No.

I disagree. Have you seen that episode of Band Brothers when they get into Holland? The GIs from, The 100 and First Airborne give that little Dutch kid a chocolate bar, and his eyes light up, and he has the biggest smile on his face even though he’s seen people murdered around him for the last 5 years, and his father looks over and goes, he’s never tasted chocolate. That’s why. That’s why.

Chocolate has that special, special, special thing. Mhmm. So I appreciate you bringing that up. Otherwise, we would have never talked about it. Chocolate just that’s what it is.

I mean, hell, if the wife goes 4 days without chocolate, we’re we’re in we’re in a tough situation over here. So, you know, I gotta make sure that she’s it’s like she’s seeing dementia’s left and right, so I gotta make sure she’s got all the chocolate she needs, especially when she’s 7 months pregnant. Do we have a favorite spell? We got a few more spells in this one that we haven’t had in other books. I’m gonna go through the ones I I had quickly.

Waddi Waddi, which is just an interesting game for spell. Lupin uses it against Peeves to get the chewing gum out of the keyhole. Not sure, but that also answers Magic’s previous listener mail about what you could do to peeves, so had to include that. Impervious, Hermione uses it so Harry’s glasses repel water. Genius, but also probably should become standard with glasses in the wizarding world.

And 2, Hermione probably should have thought of this when there was torrential downpours in the morning, they were walking down to the pitch, but no big deal. Ridiculous. Ridiculous. Ridiculous, of course. Lumos expelliarmus, we have those returns.

Obviously, we’re gonna have them every time. And then the other 2 I had were ferrula, which is when the bandages strapping to Ron’s feet to help splint his leg. Pretty useful. And Mobley corpus, which is a way to drag a body around that’s unconscious. Keith, save that.

You know, you might need it for your late night activities. I don’t know if anyone had any other ones. No. That was mine. Mobius Corpus.

I was thinking more of the the the magic reference earlier. Your buddy is a little bit hammered at the bar. He’s he’s a little bit bigger than you, and you just put that on him. You you put your wand out, and you get that bus, and you throw him in it, and it’s easy peasy lemon squeezy. I mean, that’s that’s that’s all we needed right now.

So you’re combining the night bus and the Mobley Corpus. Exactly. So get your night out settled. Because I think one thing people would say is, like, why do they need the night bus when they have flu powder and they have they can apparate? It’s like, well, flu powder relies on you being able to say things clearly, which you’re gonna be like, I’m I wanna go to tag and you’re gonna mess that up.

And then apparition is, like, very high and technical. So you don’t wanna do that and fuck up when you’re hammered. Right? So I think the bus is, like, is a kind of a necessary thing. Yeah.

It’s a great point. Apparition, you could get spliced. That would be terrible. And then the flu powder because you you assume in the wizarding world, everyone’s in a tavern that has these giant fireplaces that at any point, someone could just throw some flu powder and be like, I’m going home. But, yeah, you’d have no I bet you in the wizarding world you know those videos you see online sometimes of people that wake up in other people’s houses drunk Yeah.

Which happened to a buddy of mine. Pretty common. Yeah. Pretty funny, but maybe that happens all the time in the wizard world because everyone has a fireplace. There’s flu powder being used.

People are just like, I’m going home. Throw the flu powder in, and and who knows where they end up, but it’s probably someone’s living room. Magic, did you have a spell that, that you liked from from the book? It’s the pretty obvious one, the Patronus charm. Oh, I live in Yeah.

Wow. Obviously, the most useful in this book will definitely become useful as we go. Like, I couldn’t help when Harry was learning how to do it, I couldn’t help but think of the movie Hook, when Peter Pan’s learning how to fly. You’re doing it, Peter. Think of a happy memory.

And it’s like searching your searching your brain for like what your happiest memories are, but you can’t bullshit it. Right? Unless you’re truly happy, it’s not gonna work. I thought the answer was not to be happy. It was that you have to believe in yourself.

He was only able to do it when he knew he could do it. It. So it’s it’s basically it’s all mental, I figured. It is interesting that twist at the end when they’re like, how did you know you could do it? He said, well, I saw myself do it before.

Yeah. Positive reinforcement, positive thinking. Imagine yourself doing something. Yeah. That’s probably why because of that experience.

It’s why throughout the series, like, Harry just has the best patronus. The first time, it just worked out really well for him when he needed to call on it for a big thing. Yeah. With that being said, do you guys have an idea of what your patronus slash, if you could be an animagus, your animal would be? I’m going with the the river hawk, the one that, you know, we have everywhere in Cape Cod, which is the osprey, which is my my favorite bird because I think flight is important.

Well, I feel like it’s not that important in this world, though, when you can fly. With a broom? Yeah. Yeah. That’s a good point.

But still, I’m still gonna go with it because it’s just a badass animal. I was thinking my initial one would be one of my favorite animals, the killer whale, the orca. But, really, on land, it wouldn’t be so useful. Fair enough. Yeah.

I’d be just flopping around. What did you have, Keith? I’d be a cheetah. I think you’re the the fastest land animal. 0 to 60 in, like, 3 seconds.

Much faster than a fireball. I wonder when you are a cheetah, if you have to also, like, consume like, cheetahs can run that fast, but then they have to lay down. They’re like you after Thanksgiving, after, you know, after you eat that fast. It’s like, I just gotta lay down for, like, 2 hours. It’s lucky that I don’t have to have an imagination about this as someone who’s taken the the Patronus quiz many, many years ago and have been thoroughly satisfied with my result of an Irish wolfhound.

Oh. Those are like the ones from Robin Hood. Right? Yeah. The they’re big.

Irish wolfhounds are reserved, soft spoken, and patient with a quiet inner strength to remain calm in stressful situations. Oh, wow. So I said, yep. Giddy up. And and, yes, those are the dogs from Robin Hood Prince and Thieves with Kevin Costner.

If you haven’t seen it, go see it. Best movie ever. We already talked about characters, so I’m not gonna go too deep into it because we all agree on Lupin. It has to be Lupin is the wife’s number one character throughout the entire series. She actually said Lupin and Tonks.

I’ll allow it. I’ll allow it. She’s not had chocolate for a couple days, so I had to I had to allow it. But, Sirius Black, we get intro. These are only new characters.

Sirius Black, Peter Pettigrew, Trelawny, Stan and Ernie of the night bus, Aunt Marge, Cornelius Fudge. And as magic throughout there, we get Cedric Diggory and Cho Chang who will play into later books. I mean, I feel like all these people kind of, except for a Marge, kind of play into into the later books. So we’re getting back into new characters, which I feel like we didn’t have a ton of in book 2. Quickly, let’s go through some love hate stuff.

Keith, what did you love about Prisoner of Azkaban? Love wise, Fred and George just around Percy, just just awesome. I think that this is one thing too that growing up in New England. Tell me magic if I’m wrong, but when someone thinks they’re too good to get on their high horse, big New England thing is just Think you’re better than me? Yeah.

You fucking think you’re better than me, kid. You just start shitting on them immediately. Fred and George pulled this off perfectly around Percy. I was laughing constantly anytime, like, Percy’s around and they’re together. Amazing.

I think that’s just must be a mass hole thing. We’re all fine setting gentlemen where I Yeah. Okay. Alright. What about in Italy?

When you lived in Italy, were they like that? Think, oh, Boccona Pepa. Oh, no. My time in Italy was filled with with curse words, and everybody trying to outdo one another. So it sounds like New England except with, Yeah.

We have craft shake parmesan, and there they they grate it. What did you have for Love’s Magic? I loved all of the the connections we get to Harry’s parents in this from getting to meet some of their friends. Thought the the way that Harry in the beginning with the Dementors when he could hear his mother and eventually father’s voice, but didn’t fully wanna, like, let that go because he had never had that to them. I thought that was a really unique way to look at it.

I know I don’t like that, but it’s like I’ve never heard them before. Now, I hear them. Like, I don’t wanna get rid of that. And it’s pretty fucked up premise too, the idea you hearing your parents in their death throes, but wanting to hear that because you haven’t heard their voices before. Although, I feel like in the mirror of Erised, he probably heard their voices and could internalize that, but I know that wasn’t their actual selves.

But, yeah, it’s pretty messed up, but also understandably conflicting. I think that’s a that’s a really good point. Did you though, Magic, because it was in one of my hates, did you have any issue with Lupin playing extremely coy to the fact that him and James Potter were best friends and knew each other super well, and I’m sure he had tons of awesome stories about his dad to tell Harry, but instead was just like, yeah. I knew your dad. No.

I don’t really blame him. I think he was already showing a little bit of favoritism towards Harry and, like, being a werewolf teacher at a school. He’s already on pretty thin ice, like, as we found out at the end, enough to to lose his job. So I think not trying to to shake his position too much, and he didn’t know Harry yet. Now that he’s met him, like, obviously, toward the end, we get a lot of that, but that’s that’s after we’ve had all those that time together and gotten to know each other.

Yeah. I just feel like he would you don’t it’s not favoritism to just say, like, oh, I knew knew your dad. I had a teacher in high school whose son was in the class. I wasn’t like, oh, he’s giving him an a because he’s his son. Maybe I thought it, but, just say, hey.

Just so you know, like, your parents really did love you. You know, just give him something. Throw the kid a bone here. The only thing he’s gotten so far is Hagrid giving him a, picture book of, you know, of of his of his parents. So I have the Quidditch final as mine, which we’ve already talked about, and I love throughout all of the Harry Potter books.

I love the sneak peeks into the future that we get, you know, the breadcrumb trails. And I think we’ve talked about this before, but Joe Rowling does such a great job of leaving these for us and having such a wonderful outline that we’re able to then, on rereads, follow them back. Dumbledore saying that when Harry’s like, oh, hey. Trelawny kinda went crazy, and I think she had a seizure, and Dumbledore’s like, oh, she now has 2 correct predictions. We all know, oh, what her other prediction was, and it also Dumbledore not being so surprised by it, it just shows that Dumbledore knows that that first prediction.

I guess guess what I’m trying to say is this whole time when Dumbledore is like, oh, Voldemort’s kind of back. Voldemort’s kind of back, and Dumbledore doesn’t seem to flinch or be that concerned about it is because he knows. You know? He knows about that. So having read the future books and then rereading these, it’s like, oh, shit.

You see all this stuff. I love all the the breadcrumb trails out there. And then even the Snape issues, although he’s having them with the gang of, like, Lupin and Sirius, but that gang, We learn so much more in later books, and it allows us to feel a little bit worse, 1st Nate, but then also he’s such a dick throughout this that it just goes away immediately. Did you have anything else you you love that you wanna call out, Keith? I had a couple quick ones.

And I went meant I meant to mention this in the last couple books too, but the way that JK describes, like, eating and then being sleepy after and being like and then they went right to bed because they were so tired. There’s something about it that just makes me reminds you of being a kid and, like, trying to stay up late but you’re, like, so tired and you had such a good day. Yeah. That doesn’t happen anymore. The book near the end, I hadn’t even got to the ending yet and I was like, the book could end good right now and no drama could happen.

I’d I’d love this book. Because it was just, like, I’ve been in the Hogwarts for a year. This is great. Yeah. It was a good year at Hogwarts.

It really was. Magic, you got anything else for love? It’s it’s kind of along that line of one of the biggest turning points in the story of, like, where things start to get a little darker. It wasn’t not that, like, the first two books were, like, a monster of the week per se, but they didn’t solve all of the problems in this one. Right?

Like Pettigrew cut away, and that’s gonna, like, obviously play a huge part of where we go now. Yeah. But it wasn’t like, yep. We had our year at Hogwarts. We beat the bad guy at the end, and let’s reset it for next year.

Yeah. Good point. That’s the best point, I think, really. You win the house cup. The first two is like, oh, a re is this becoming serialized where it’s just, you know, gonna be one story and then we kind of rehash it and it’s the same story over again, but, like, slightly different?

And this one, it’s just totally on its own. And, additionally, with the first two, the final scenes with, you know, fighting that monster, your monster of the week, like you said, it’s only, like, 30, 40 pages, maybe if that. And this one, we get a super long, drawn out situation, drawn out in a good way, I mean, with them at the Shrieking Shrek and then everything happens, and so, wow, that was crazy. Sirius is about to die, and you realize, holy smokes, there’s still more time in this book, and they time turn and do it all over again, but from a different perspective. It was awesome.

Like, it really is. I can remember as I was listening because I read some of it and then listened to it. As I was listening to the end of it, I can remember reading it for the first time and 100% not putting the book down from the second they go out to Hagrid’s hut to see Buckbeak’s murder until the end. And it’s hard to be that much of a page turner where you’re just crushing it like that. Yeah.

Any hates for you, Keith? Hermione was kind of a buzzkill at times. I feel like I wouldn’t necessarily trust her as a friend if you’re like, listen. I’m going to use this broom. She also like took the bottle away from Hagrid and told him to stop drinking.

He’s an adult. Let let him, like, blow off some steam. You know what I mean? Like, there’s a couple of things where I was like, just you don’t know better than everyone, Hermione at all times, you know? Like, let people live.

Make let them make their own mistakes. Yeah. So didn’t didn’t care. That’s why you, like, don’t trust the person anymore as a as a friend. So I didn’t care for it.

See it, but at the same time, she and Harry’s she always has everyone’s best interests Agreed. In her mind. You know what I mean? Like, the Hagrid stuff is, like, I kind of agree. It’s, like, that’s kinda weird.

At the same time, Hagrid does have his issues. You can warn the person and say, this is my opinion. This is what you should do. But then after that, you, like and they say, I disagree. You you can’t just go over their head now.

I don’t like that. You don’t like her knocking, saying she didn’t knock to McGonig? Yeah. I think you gotta be, like, this is what I believe you should do. Things happen and then you let me learn.

And then for the rest of her life, she thinks Harry’s death’s on her hands because she didn’t stop him. Hey. You tell someone not to touch the stove 10 times because it’s hot and then they reach out and touch it. The only way they’re gonna learn is if they touch it at one point, then they’ll never do it again. Right?

So Harry’s gotta he’s gotta live his own experiences. Can’t just be holding his hand at all times. Coming from a stove toucher, I get it. Magic, what about you? Any any hates?

I think anytime that you’re introducing the idea of time travel, it’s pretty tricky to, like, establish the rules. Yeah. Yeah. And it’s hard because the like you just said, the last chapter or 2 of the book when they have that whole time traveling scene is, like, so riveting and you can’t put it down. And I think it’s really well done and that the original events are already explained by the time traveling thing.

Mhmm. But how they, like, the way that she introduces the time turner to the story by having Hermione do that for classes, I don’t really think I love that because as as it’s mentioned many times, we must not be seen, we must not be seen. Yet she’s in 3 classes at once with all these other students, and then Ron and Ernie are comparing notes about seeing Hermione. Yeah. So the rules of that, like, throughout the school year, I thought was a little iffy, but obviously willing to forgive it for for what we get at the end.

Yeah. It wasn’t in my notes, but I couldn’t agree with you more. And I will say the only movie that did it really well was, Timecop featuring Jean Claude Van Damme. Go back and watch that. Great film.

But but, yeah, the whole thing of them saying we should be seen, but then it’s, like and they’re asking her the whole time, hey, how are you in all these classes? They could very easily figure it out. They could be like, hey, Ernie. Hermione thinks that she was in class, so, yes, she was with me. It’s like, no, she was with me.

You found out. Out. And, honestly, my only biggest gripe about the Time Turner, because I do think that JK handled it pretty well, is that it created the Cursed Child, which is not canon, and if they have people have the ability to do that kind of thing with time turners. They wouldn’t just give them to children where, like, Hermione could just go back to pre Voldemort and, like, do some messed up stuff. But it’s like, oh, they trust her because she’s a good student.

She could lose it. Someone could steal it from her. Crookshank could take it off her neck. Give it to Sirius. Sirius could go back and change every I mean, Harry could take it and be, like, hey.

No, Hermione. We’re not going 3 turns. We’re going 50 turns, and I’m going to save my parents. Lingering questions, Keith. What lingering questions do you have?

Where did you govern them in your heads? I have just one. Did Harry’s parents get great life insurance? How does he have so much money in the bank? And what type of company is issuing life insurance policy when you know Voldemort is trying to kill them?

Yeah. I mean, you answered your own question because they created the Marauder’s map in in high school and also where it became Animagi. So his dad obviously had some sort of side business that was, like, wizarding technology, like, poop powder. You don’t even have to poop. You just put a little poop powder in your shorts, and the poop goes to a waste dump, like, a 100000 miles away.

Great answer. I wasn’t expecting but that that answers it completely. I mean, obviously, duh, this is Yeah. Easiest. If you didn’t give me the example of poop out, I wouldn’t have no idea what you’re talking about.

But that example really solidified it. And the poop got solidified up. Yay. Yeah. I got it.

Yeah. Nader, did you have any lingering questions? 10 out of 10. No notes. House cup.

Keith, who gets your house cup for this one? I’m gonna go in front of this one because I know this one might be, down the road. You guys already referenced it, a bunch, but Cho Chang gets my house cup. Woah. What?

Yeah. Yeah. You like that? Because she batted the eyelashes at Harry a couple of times. So if you didn’t have a crush on Cho Chang and this this is the first inanimate object I had a crush on, is that what’s called an animate object?

Non human, non real person? Your mattress was the first, but yeah. Go on. Goddamn it. This is bringing back some waves of memories of, falling in love with Cho Chang.

And, my future prediction, I don’t know what happens, but I think he’s gonna marry, marry Cho Chang, and they’re gonna live happily ever after. And so we’ll see what happens. Oh, I love it. Magic, who is your house cup? I think we’re all on the same page, and I’d like to get out ahead of this one too, and go with Crook Shanks.

Oh, yeah. That’s what feels good about. Little mister not falling for any of this bullshit. Knew the whole time. Was it the sneak scope?

I don’t think we talked about was going crazy the whole point. Yeah. That’s good. No one paid any mind except for Crookshanks. Like, something’s not right here.

Figured it out. Got in league with with Sirius and was was pretty much an integral part of of uncovering the big truth here, and I don’t think any of this happens without Crookshanks’ involvement. Yeah. Crookshanks is like the Internet sleuth. Don’t fuck with cats.

Right there. Here we go. Don’t fuck with Crookshanks. So my house cup was actually going to go to the inventor of the sneoscope because it sees through Peter Pettigrew being a rat, which it feels like everything has the like, all the magical elements so far have this asterisk. I mean, even Harry’s invisibility cloak, which we learn later, is, like, one of the most magical things.

It’s like Frodo’s me thrill, but even that, Dumbledore kind of can see through it, and on the Marauder’s map, right, Harry can be seen when he’s on it. So it’s, like, how strong is that? But the stinker scope seemingly can see through everything. So whoever invented that, props to them. I’m also gonna give an honorary honorary mention to to Dumbledore because throughout all of this series, the institutions, the authority is always wrong.

They they can’t get their shit together, and they lead us astray and us being the characters because we’re obviously characters in this book. But Dumbledore is like, yeah. Fuck it. Like, I’m gonna make up the rules. Yeah.

You’re not supposed to time turn, Hermione. Use time turning to go and save these people. Oh, you’re not supposed to do this. Harry, don’t worry about it. Just just go.

Just go handle it. Although, we do have issues with him putting all of his resolve into a a 13 year old boy, but save time. Dumbledore gets an honorary mention honorable mention as well. Before we get out of here, we have to finish our rankings. I’ll start with Magic.

You’ve read the whole series, and you didn’t read the first two with us. But how does Azkaban rank in your 7? I mean, the first three, I think, is a pretty consensus 312. In the 7, it’s definitely top 2. Hammering it down in in top 2.

And on a reread, it it felt like it it deserved to still be there. Yeah. Oh, yeah. Keith, we’ve only done the first three so far. Where does it rank for you?

312 as well. I do think that for me I remember 3 being one of my favorites, but for me, the the reveal wasn’t obviously didn’t hit as hard. So and I was, like, getting angry with them being, like, just ask the right questions. So a little bit were taken away from me for that, but I still think it’s starting to hit its stride. You can obviously see on this book.

Yeah. 3312, couldn’t agree with you more. And I agree at the reveal point, you’re just, like, serious. Tell these people to shut the hell up and start explaining yourself Yeah. And not being, you know, being around the bush here.

Bigulous. Yeah. Time is of it. It’s like, yeah. I did kill your parents.

Like, he said it. He just said it. But, woah. Hold on. Hold on.

That’s not exactly what I meant. That went on for, like, 10 pages. I was like, just get to the freaking point, Sirius. I loved it. I’m excited to continue because I remember Goblet being I mean, I know I love Goblet, but I I I’m excited to do it.

And I’m really excited to watch the movie with you, Keith, because you haven’t seen this one and it’s a great movie. Magic, it has a bit I mean, your name is Magic. Why wouldn’t we have you on for Harry Potter? But No. You know, it’s been an absolute honor once again 4 times.

4th time is is not enough. If you wanna come on for a later episode, do let us know because we’d love to have you back. Thanks thanks for coming. Thanks for having me. And, Keith, I’ll catch you for the movie, hopefully, like, next week because I’m excited to watch it.

My brother-in-law hasn’t seen or read any of these, and he’s, like, I’m gonna start watching Harry Potter tonight. I was, like, oh, wow. Don’t fucking tempt me with a good time, buddy. I I wish I could get my mind, Obliviate. Obliviate.

Yeah. Obliviate. Got it. Yeah. Alright.

Well, that was Harry Potter and the Prisoner of the Squid Game. Check out next time for the film version before we get on to Goblet of Fire. Keith, magic, it’s been real. Alright. Alright.

Bye now. Bye bye.