A Fandomy Post! Shocking, Isn't It?

[heidi]

Wheee, fixed coding in recs section!

From last week's hp_fridayfive:

1. How do you feel about Dumbledore's avoidance of Harry in OotP?

I was very unhappy with it in the course of the story, and especially when I got to the end with Sirius and the veil, because there was a linear causation from one to the other. I understand why he thought he had to do it, but I think he was wrong - just like he was wrong not to bring Kreacher to the cave!

2. Name a favorite crackpot Potter theory.

That the Blacks are descended from Rowena Ravenclaw, and the Tapestry was originally created by her.

That Scabbers transformed in the night while at the Weasleys for all those years and Manchurian Candidate-ed either Percy or Ron - or both.

When Hagrid said he "flew" to the Hut on the Rock, he flew via Thestral, which Harry couldn't yet see.

3. Do you think Sirius (consciously or not) mistaking Harry for James actually caused more harm than good?

I don't think he really did, actually. I think he wanted to see aspects of James in Harry, and that's it.

4. Tonks: Love her, hate her, or somewhere in-between?

She was full of potential in OotP, but I hate the idea that she'd lose her powers because of unrequited love. Ginny didn't! Nor did Ron or Hermione or Cho or anyone else - why, randomly, Tonks?

Silly plotline.

5. What Hogwarts house would you definitely NOT belong in?

Slytherin. I am just not that cunning. At all.

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Supernatural recs:

Two by big_pink:
Dazzleland - “Someone goes over Niagara in a barrel. You gonna jump in and try to save them?” – Dean Winchester, Crossroad Blues. Sam’s making plans, and they don’t include his father or hunting. They might not even include Dean. High school in two time periods, with spoilers through Croatoan. WIP but nine chapters are up and it's close to finishing. It's as gen as an episode - or three - of the show.

Red. "Something evil is killing treeplanters in the forests of the Pacific Northwest, possibly the same predator that Dean narrowly escaped years before. How Grimm will things get before the brothers figure it out?" Completed fic, discussion of sexual abuse and very bad things, some het, and again, as gen as an episode - or three.

unperfectwolf's Days Dawning; Pure Morning- an outside perspective on Sam in his first two years at Stanford, from the perspective of his roommate

mahoni's untitled ficlet based on Home

musesfool's Give Me a Leonard Cohen Afterworld - "Sam wakes up one morning, and it's as if he's living the life he'd always dreamed of having. There's just one small problem." I was shaking through most of this fic, terrified of how it would end - this is probably technically a horror-free "episode" - no monster of the week - but there is major emotional "horror" and it kept me shaking. Meep.

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copperbadge is writing "episodes" of Heroes to keep us all going through the hiatus! Chapter One: Facing the Firestorm
Chapter Two: A Family Decision
Two Steps Back, with a focus on Claude and Peter - how Parasite could have gone, but didn't - by philote_auctor

Comments

[anthon1.livejournal.com]

When Hagrid said he "flew" to the Hut on the Rock, he flew via Thestral, which Harry couldn't yet see.

YES. :D

[heidi8.livejournal.com]

:D THANKS!

[graycie23.livejournal.com]

I agree completely about Tonks. What was JKR trying to accomplish with that? Because it was an absolutely ridiculous red herring, wasn't it?

Sigh.

[mahoni.livejournal.com]

I hadn't heard any of those crackpot HP theories. I've really been out of the loop for a long time, I think.

That Scabbers transformed in the night while at the Weasleys for all those years and Manchurian Candidate-ed either Percy or Ron - or both.

I do like that one, though. Hee.

that she'd lose her powers because of unrequited love.

Wait. What? That was a part of...which, OotP? *struggles to remember* I totally don't remember that. I must've blocked it out of my memory because how...goofy.

Thank you for the rec. *glomps*

[heidi8.livejournal.com]

They're all theories I came up with back when I was actually posting on HPfGU - well, other than the Blacks = Ravenclaw one. I have no clue where that came from.

Power!Drained!Tonks was in HBP because she was pining for Lupin. Then he agreed to lurve her, and she was all Perky And Pink-Haired again, la. : wutevres

[blackink.livejournal.com]

Because Tonks is totally my favorite character in the series --

I don't think she lost her powers solely because of unrequited love. I really don't. Because yeah, that WOULD be ridiculous, unless it's her major character flaw or something, wearing her heart on her sleeve.

I think she genuinely cared deeply for/loved/whatever Remus, and for a longer time than we saw in the series. I think they did know each other through Sirius, no matter what Ron or Ginny or whomever says in HBP. And it wasn't the fact that he refused her advances that got to her -- it was the fact that he was running around with feral werewolves, underground and without real just cause. He was in an extremely dangerous situation, no matter how much he downplays it in the Christmas chapter, and Tonks, as an Auror, recognized just how deep in a pile of shit he really was.

So, in short: the fact that he was putting his life on the line in a major, major way that went above and beyond, quite possibly because of Sirius' death and losing his 'last friend'. So basically I think Remus regarded it as somewhat of a suicide mission, and Tonks, who HAD just lost the only family she had that wasn't completely horrible, wasn't prepared to lose another close friend/someone she was in love with.

I also think it's entirely possible something NC-17 rated happened between them immediately after Sirius' death, or even before. For the former, after his death, it'd have probably been comfort!sex for Remus that Tonks read too much into, or else it was emotional for both of them and Tonks was the only one who was willing to act on those feelings, given Remus' excuses.

Or, for the latter, that they had already started something, perhaps earlier on in OotP, and then when Sirius died, Remus went all kamikaze on her for whatever reason, either that he'd just lost his best friend, or that he didn't want to get close to her to lose her too, or that he didn't want her getting close to HIM only to lose him to the war like he'd lost James, Sirius, and to a lesser extent Peter.

...okay, that wasn't so short, but still. :D Bottom line: I think Tonks was seriously upset and lost her powers because she thought she would never see Remus again because of his 'suicide mission', with a potential 'bad break-up' and her being upset that he was making excuses to keep his life in the shit-hole instead of actually attempting to share it with someone to make it better also being factors.

Because going all emo because of sudden unrequited love is just silly, and when it comes to plotting, Jo is anything but silly.

[marie-j-granger.livejournal.com]

Thank you for explaining this theory about Tonks so much better than I could have! I'd heard a variant of it before and vastly prefer it to the simply unrequited love explanation. Because yeah, it's silly.

I've sometimes wondered why Jo seemed to take power away from almost every one of her female characters in HBP. Tonks we've talked about. Hermione.... well, she seemed like a different person to me. She didn't care about S.P.E.W. anymore, she didn't listen to or help Harry, and she went psycho-jealous about Ron and Lavender. Ginny was given a lot of Hermione's former intelligence, but she only really served as the object of Harry's chest monster and then his girlfriend. The two members of the Order of the Phoenix who died before the book started were both female, one of whom was a potential candidate for Minister of Magic (or at least a highly placed figure in the Ministry). Luna and Professor McGonagall were about the same, but McGonagall may not even be allowed to be the headmistress in DH because they may close the school. Even Luna was kept out of the final fight right away when she and Hermione were duped by Snape's deception.

[blackink.livejournal.com]

It really IS odd that all of the sudden her female characters were reduced to powerless symbols instead of characters unto themselves. Maybe it was just a fluke of the plottage that she didn't mean to do? I'm not sure I could see why Jo would actually do that, and she seems to be all for women's rights and everything, being a strong woman herself.

Hm. But yes, I definitely think there's a lot more to the relationship between Remus and Tonks that we see throughout HBP. There's hints of a really good friendship, if not a relationship itself, in OotP as well, although I suppose they're not nearly as overt as the situation between Remus and Tonks in HBP.

I'd really like to pick Jo's brain about their relationship, figure out her reasoning and all. Hopefully we'll get at least a line or two of backstory about it, or at the very least clarification, in DH.

[marie-j-granger.livejournal.com]

I'm sure it was unintentional. My theory (when the book came out) was that with her being pregnant during most of the time she was writing it and trying to manage a house with two older kids and a husband, never mind the Paparazzi interest in her, she was feeling less powerful than normal and that bled into her work.

I think you're right. Andromeda Tonks was Sirius's favorite cousin, so it's not unlikely that he babysat for her daughter sometimes. Tonks may have then known Remus, one of his best friends, for years. Maybe she even crushed on him while she was in her Hogwarts years. And we don't know what job Remus had before teaching for a year at Hogwarts. Maybe he'd been an Auror during the first Voldemort war and was drummed out by the anti-werewolf legislation. If so, he could have been one of Tonks' trainers.

I agree that I'd love to see backstory on this couple. It's probably the only ship I sail that's going to be canon.

[storydivagirl.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the recs. I'm so behind on my SPN reading, it's not even funny.