Harry Potter and the Biased Misinterpretation of Fiction

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Did you ever read Goosebumps? Some surprisingly hairy stuff goes on in those stories, despite that the protagonists are always twelve years old. Anything goes, except of course sex. Kids seem to crave this stuff.

Now that I think about it, Harry Potter has some good lessons for young people. The fact that characters one is encouraged to think of as heroic at the beginning of the series, are in fact the opposite, and vice-versa, and that Potter himself is a very flawed hero, at best. Lessons most people don't learn until later in life, if ever.

Nope, I haven't read Goosebumps.

Some of it's actually not bad.

I haven't actively played video games since the Super Nintendo. In those days, a lot of games were about moving to the right and killing everything in your path. I don't know if the...um...legacy of that kind of thing in video games has any effect on the ethics of a modern game like "Hogwarts: Legacy," as opposed to the ethics of Rowling's fictional universe.



Yes, the Slytherin "villains" Severus Snape and Draco Malfoy are almost always red herrings. The actual culprit of the book's mystery is usually somebody else who seemed trustworthy. In fact, I sometimes compare bully Draco to the bully character Red Herring from the cartoon "A Pup Named Scooby-Doo," who was always suspected by Freddy Jones, but was never guilty, except in just one episode.

Many people seem unable to accept the idea of a flawed hero. One person claimed all the characters in "Harry Potter" were "flat" because they still had their basic character flaws at the end of the last book, i.e., Hermione is still bossy. Apparently, all people are supposed to scrub away their most basic character flaws by the time they're 17 years old.

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I was also thinking about the backlash against George Lucas after the "Star Wars" prequels were released. How he, too, was this revered creator of a fictional universe who kind of fell from grace in the eyes of some of his fans. While not as political as the backlash against Rowling, at the time, Lucas was basically accused of being the rich movie mogul in his ivory tower who was out-of-touch with what the young 20-somethings in his audience found acceptable in a film. Jar Jar Binks was not only considered an annoying character, but was also accused of being a racist caricature. Today, however, now that the young people who said those things have become "old" people, the narrative seems to have flipped, with Lucas considered a victim of the "entitled fanboys" who forced him to sell his creation. Likewise, since the revelation of what happened to Jar Jar's voice actor Ahmed Best after the negative reception to the character, in some circles, it's now considered offensive to NOT like Jar Jar!

Last edited by vividgroovy on 13 Oct 2023, 6:00 am, edited 1 time in total.

Ahmed Best is alive and well, and sometimes works as an adjunct professor at Stanford University.  He has a prolific acting career, too.

That's good. Apparently, he struggled with his career and mental health issues after the negative reception to Jar Jar. Some blame the fans for disliking the character, though I rarely, if ever, saw the voice actor singled out when people complained about Jar Jar. One Left-leaning Disney YouTuber I used to watch apologized for once making an innocuous Jar Jar joke in an earlier video. Best being a "PoC actor" is a factor in this. I just think it's ironic that once the character was considered a racist stereotype and evidence of Lucas being old and out of touch. Whether or not he really was a stereotype is up for debate. But I rarely see that accusation leveled at the character today.

The Star wars fandom was so disappointed with Disney's sequel trilogy (The Rey/Kylo series) that they naturally became nostalgic for Jar Jar and the prequels. A lot of kids who grew up with the prequels were actually fond of Jar Jar's character and since they now represent the 20-40 yr old base of the Star Wars fandom it isn't surprising they are more favourable toward Jar Jar and Ahmed best than the fandom in the early 2000s. The latter bemoaned the prequels as not carrying the torch of George's legacy from the original Star wars. As somebody who lived through all three eras, it isn't a contest, I can't bring myself to watch the original Star wars, the acting and effects and characters are so weak.

What saved Star wars for me was the animated Clone Wars and Rebels.

In my opinion, the only major thing that the Harry Potter series felt flat on was romance.

The films absolutely made a mess of Ginny. She's barely on screen and we don't really find out anything about her. Which is why the romance in the films between Ginny and Harry felt awkward. She has more of a personality in the books, so I guess the romance there makes more sense. However, we don't really see that on screen. It just sort of happens out of nowhere. I felt uncomfortable. There's just no chemistry.

I couldn't really get behind Ron and Hermione either. Does anyone else think that it felt a bit last minute? I have heard that to be the case. I mean, I guess there was some build up with the whole typical 'Ugh I can't stand her' to 'I love her' trope. Even so, I didn't find it to be that interesting.

It didn't help that the actor who played Ron felt uncomfortable kissing the actress who played Hermione. I can't say I was surprised to hear that as I remember watching the film when it came out and thinking that it looked a bit stilted.

I actually can't think of a romantic pairing in the series that I felt invested in. Maybe Lupin and Tonks at a push. Which is fine, that's not the focus of the story. It's a mystery / action adventure at heart. Still, there are other action-based stories I enjoy which, in my opinion, have much better romances.

The lack of romance in Harry Potter was largely due to the story/plot line still in the genre of a children's book. Where romance blossomed it was done in a way that was similar to a tame teen novel

Personally I liked the romance between Annabeth Chase and Percy Jackson in the Percy Jackson series (minor spoiler, I guess). Whilst it's a set of stories which mainly focus on action, the romance element is also fairly enjoyable in my opinion. It remains age appropriate for its young audience, yet I remained interested in the development of the romance. I love the banter they have.

Personally I didn't feel that engaged with Harry and Ginny, but perhaps that's just me. I think that romances can remain age appropriate and still be interesting.

I agree, Daniel Radcliffe and Bonnie Wright didn't pull it off. You could see on-screen they were forcing it. The worst was when Neville declared his love (out of the blue) for Luna Lovegood. I think the cast started as child actors and knew each other quite well. As they got older it must have been weird for them to display "love" for each other even if it was only acting,

"Back to the Future" was my trilogy growing up, but I was a casual "Star Wars" fan. As a Disneyland fan, my favorite "Star Wars" things are the theme park lands and attractions. Perhaps that's why I usually prefer the more lighthearted, swashbuckling, adventure serial aspects of the series. The personal drama with Luke and his father is fine, too. However, what people now seem to be interested in seeing in "Star Wars" is politics and a grounded war story and as I understand it, the new material seems to be leaning into that as well.

I've heard that "Clone Wars" and "Rebels" are supposed to be good, but I never got into them. I reviewed the "Clone Wars" pilot movie when it was in theaters and found it "meh," but I understand the series got better after that. It's funny that people seemed to hate Ahsoka Tano when the movie came out, when she was a perky, optimistic character (I didn't really care for her either, comparing her to a Disney Channel sitcom star) and now that she's brooding and disillusioned, people seem to love her.

Do you mean the Ashoka series? yes, fans wanted perky proactive 14yr old animated Ashoka with Ashleigh Eckstein's voice. One of the problems in live action is the time jump to an older middle aged Ashoka who is jaded and dealing with order 66 and her master becoming Vader. In the passing of Star wars from Lucas to Disney the development of well loved characters has been put on hold or handled poorly.

That's interesting. I thought the fans preferred the brooding Ahsoka. Sorry to hear it hasn't been handled well.

It's understandable that a character would be jaded after going through all that. But with the original trilogy, while the darker parts were always there, they were deliberately less focused on. There are some people who are baffled that "A New Hope" isn't about Luke being "realistically" depressed over the deaths of Uncle Owen and Aunt Beru and Leia being depressed over the destruction of Alderaan.

Valid point, however Luke had a father figure in Ben Kenobi. Ashoka was basically on her own after leaving the order and being betrayed by her friend Baris.