Subject: Reviews on Goodreads
Author:
Posted on: 2016-08-01 06:14:00 UTC
It has a decent rating there, but closer inspection reveals that the 'reviews' are mostly hype. I'd leave a rating myself to correct that, but I don't have a facebook profile. Will anyone who does please help correct the gross misconception that The Cursed Child is worthwhile?
And the whole mess with the Time-Turners still exist. I am beyond disappointed.
read:http://victorkrvm.tumblr.com/post/145680264471/in-depth-plot-summary-of-cursed-child-part-two
There's been a lot of agitation in this thread. A lot of hyperbolic statements and Internet sabre rattling. So I would like to remind everyone of a simple phrase:
JUST REPEAT TO YOURSELF "IT'S JUST A SHOW, I SHOULD REALLY JUST RELAX."
This is not the end of the world. Nor has J.K. Rowling "sunk her career," as she's going to be writing different books and making money off this franchise until she dies. All this rampant hyperbole does not reflect well on this community.
With that out of the way, there are a few final points I would like to make.
— How many of you have actually seen the play, or read the script? From what I can tell, it seems like only one person has actually done that so far. You can't have an intelligent conversation about something when only one person is in the know. I would recommend that people read the play for themselves (or, if you're in the UK, go actually see the play). Come to your own conclusions and your own opinions.
— As I said in another comment, The Cursed Child is a play, not a book. Stop treating it as a book. You can't consume the two in the same way.
Seriously, people, it's not like it's the swearing-in of Donald Trump or anything.
Some of the spoilers mentioned in this thread are a little baffling to me, though. Even with time travel, this story seems to not make very much sense - and to not be very good, but I was never fond of Potter, so.
Regardless of what Rowling said and may actually have meant when she said it, the flavor that Jack Thorne and John Tiffany added to the story to make it fit the medium and to allow the special effects team to show off cannot affect the base canon that is true in both bookverse and movieverse (and now also in stageverse), just like decisions made for the movieverse don’t affect bookverse canon.
The misunderstanding apparently was caused by nonsensical rumors that Harry Potter would be the Cursed Child in Harry Potter and the Cursed Child and that the play would be a prequel to the book series. So, in ancient, long-forgotten internet history, JKR insisted that no, it’s "NOT a prequel. Not. A. Prequel.", but "The story [not the actual play] of #CursedChild should be considered canon [actually a sequel], though. @jackthorne, John Tiffany (the director) and I developed it together [Thorne, Tiffany and the producers didn’t conjure it out of thin air]".
If the characters need to be cardboard-y to play to the back row, so be it.
What bothers me is whether the plot could work with characters who weren’t driven OOC, and thus could be part of the base canon and legitimately called "the eight story" rather than "vaguely based on some of JKR’s ideas".
So I’ll shut up now, purchase the script and read the thing.
HG
(Because I feel I might've left some misunderstandings in my previous posts. Also, I am speaking strictly for myself, not for Ix, nor anyone on this thread, or Twitter/Reddit/anywhere on the Internet that hates/enjoys The Cursed Child)
I understand there are various elements, which when put together, decide if a play is good or not. The script, the actors, the production crew, the effects, etc. I have not nearly enough knowledge about theater to judge these.
But I do have enough knowledge about Harry Potter to feel confident about judging the plot of The Cursed Child. Notice I specified "plot", because that's what matters to me; how much the information we've discovered in TCC are coherent with previously established canon information. I know all of my points may sound biased, but I think I care about this franchise more than an average fan, or a critic that watches it as just a play.
And maybe the play is brilliant as a stand-alone. Maybe it really is well-made, the production may be great, the actors may be spot on in their roles, but that's not what I'm focusing on. As someone who grew up with Harry Potter, who was in this world for 15 years, let me tell you PC that it wasn't nice reading all those new information that now are official and canon. I would react the same way if the same information were given to me on Pottermore website, as a book, or as a movie. That's what I meant by "the medium doesn't matter". The information stay the same.
tl;dr It's not the play I'm upset about; it's the new canon information it's given us.
A) Hyperbole is practically the foundation of the PPC and it's humor.
II) I think you over estimate the amount people outside of the community care about the PPC.
3) Regardless of the format, criticizing a story is pretty much the same. The Trolly Witch scene is stupid because it doesn't make sense not because we're looking at the wrong medium.
■) Only one of us has seen a physical copy of the script. I, at least, have read a pirated copy because I refuse to spend money on any more of Rowling's nonsense and even before the script was available, numerous websites had leaked overviews of the story, spoiling certain details, most of which have proven to be true. Armed with that knowledge I feel people can bemoan this failure of a story to their heart's content.
A) Wit. Snarkiness. Terry Pratchett. Those, from what I've seen, were the rock upon which the PPC was built. Hyperbole was a side effect.
II) Perhaps. But what about people looking to join? Or old members? Do they feel the same way?
3) Not necessarily. I can think of plenty of story elements that only fit in plays, and plenty that only fit in novels. Pretty much any soliloquy played straight, for example, only works in the context of a play. You do that with an otherwise normal character in a novel, the audience is going to start to ask "Is this person bonkers? Why are they talking to themselves so much?" The ending of Romeo and Juliet, written out as a novel, would probably fall flatter than a pancake under a bus.
As for the scene you bring up, I can't anything really specific about it 'cause I haven't read or seen the play yet.
—) Overviews do not a comprehensive reading make. The vast majority of people on the board seem to be going off of the snippets provided by one person. What are the context of those scenes? How do they fit into the play as a whole? Nothing beats looking at the thing itself. Do that, then complain.
(I'm not even going to bother with the anti-piracy rant.)
A) Perhaps, but it has become pervasive to the point that complaining about it is slightly rediculous.
II) If they're put off by people complaining about something that is objectively bad, albeit in a hyperbolic fashion, they wouldn't last long anyway.
3) This ignores the fact that people clearly know this is a script of a play. No one complains about the soliloquies in plays because they know that's an element of the medium. If someone complains about a soliloquy it's because the soliloquy was bad not because the person doesn't understand how plays work. Also how does that change anything about the script being bad?
—) Okay. I have done that, I am complaining. This is a poorly written story full of plotholes and stupid ideas, which blatantly contradicts established canon, and introduces several frankly distasteful ideas. Being a play does not matter because the very story itself is flawed and does not deserve the hype it has gotten.
It has a decent rating there, but closer inspection reveals that the 'reviews' are mostly hype. I'd leave a rating myself to correct that, but I don't have a facebook profile. Will anyone who does please help correct the gross misconception that The Cursed Child is worthwhile?
I'm baffled by it, but there's a huge number of critics who gave the play glowing reviews and Twitter is overflowing with praise. Why? I don't know.
I get the feeling this is going to become one of those fandom breakers. Like the Harmony/Romione shipping wars of old.
Or, at the very least, maybe give you an alternate perspective.
You (and everyone else currently losing their minds in this thread) need to remember that a play is not the same thing as a book. They cannot be consumed the same way. Thinking you can understand everything about a play just by reading the script is like thinking you can understand a song by just reading the sheet music. So much of what makes a play different comes down to performance; to how the actors embody the characters, to how the stage embodies the world as a whole.
A play is a strange beast, well removed from the normal expectations of literature. They are big, bombastic events with posturing heroes and sneering villains. It's important to remember that subtlety isn't a driving force in the theater. Nuance is all very well and good, but it doesn't necessarily play to the back row. There also won't be as much time spent on character development and the like. Most of that has to be communicated, as I mentioned before, by the actors.
From what I've seen, almost everyone in this thread has been treating The Cursed Child like a book. Stop doing that. Treat it like a play, as it was meant to be.
The main problem (at least for me) is not that it's a play, and I'm just reading a script. It's that the content revealed in the play is canon to the world of Harry Potter. As in, there really is a daughter of Voldemort, and a rule-breaking Time-Turner, whether The Cursed Child would be a book, a play, or a comic strip in a newspaper. It's the content that matters most for something that advertises itself as the "eighth story", not the means of showing it. And the play can be executed beautifully, but would you be willing to accept it if it showed, for example, Dumbledore resurrecting himself and having a hot and steamy affair with Malfoy? That's basically the same thing.
And if you truly believe so, then you have a problem. Either that, or you are engaging in wild exaggeration in an attempt to make your point.
Also, the method of presentation does matter. That's what shapes the story. Dialogue-driven plays are often much better received than dialogue-driven comic strips. Comics, in turn, are better at showing sights and scenes that couldn't possibly be performed on a stage. Changing the presentation can make differences to the canon.
Even the worse possible plot is acceptable, as long as it's presented in a proper manner? Sure, it's better to watch the actual play than to merely read the script, but it doesn't change the fact that the content stays the same on paper and on the stage.
Also, would you mind explaining how changing the presentation makes differences to the canon? What is the difference in me reading in a script "I'm Voldemort's daughter", and me seeing the actress saying "I'm Voldemort's daughter" surrounded by scenery, music and the whole ambience?
I'm not trying to be patronizing or anything right now. I'm legit curious.
I understand that the theater has limitations that you don't get when you read/write a book. I get that. But there was absolutely no need for the play to go out of its way to explicitly contradict canon when it's supposed to be a direct continuation of the books. I don't think it's too much to ask that we have some continuity between them.
I was trying to explain why a "huge number of critics" would praise the play. They don't necessarily care about every canonical detail and nitpicked point. They are more interested in the effectiveness of the play; how it speaks to them as an audience.
As for all the people on Twitter who might not necessarily have seen the play? Perhaps they are just happy to get something in the same universe after nearly ten years. It's important to remember that you, the people here, and the people on the Harry Potter subreddit are not indicative of the fanbase as a whole. Not even close.
This seems to be a prevailing issue in almost every community. Any group of people seems to think that they represent the majority of fans. Just look at the forums for any videogame and watch how many people insist that their personal opinions represent the majority.
The thing is though, I don't think that's what this thread is. As Data Junkie said elsewhere in this thread, hyperbole and vitriol is humor. It's just plain fun to get on the Board and find a bunch of people who you can complain about stuff with.
I appreciate how you're trying to keep the general mood here positive, but there's a certain point where the PPC is, at its core, a place for us to vent our frustration about lousy writing. Admittedly, that writing usually isn't canon, but I digress.
The PPC should not be a place to vent about lousy writing. Not by itself. It should be, above all else, a place to celebrate writing. To meet with like-minded folks and say "look at this funny/dramatic/awesome thing I wrote!" To improve your craft. To laugh about silly plot twists and unrealistic characters.
There's nothing funny about vitriol or anger (unless you're watching someone else be angry; that can be kind of funny). There's nothing entertaining about being so obsessed with something that the slightest change to the canon drives you batty. There's nothing laugh-worthy about frustration. Why should we embrace these negative feelings when it comes to something we're supposed to love doing?
But maybe I'm alone in that view.
So, for those of you brave souls who've read it (I refuse to touch it with a ten-foot pole), I have a question:
On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being the Star Wars Prequels and 10 being the Star Wars Holiday Special, how bad is The Cursed Child?
So The Cursed Child is half-again as bad as Star Wars Holiday Special. What makes it so?
I would have put it at a 10, on equal level with the Holiday Special. But the Holiday Special has a huge point in its favor: it's not considered canon-compliant.
Highlights include:
-Harry Potter getting thrown OOC, such as:
--Being afraid of pigeons.
--Telling McGonagall she doesn't know how to do her job and that he will get her fired if she doesn't keep Albus and Scorpius apart.
--Making a huge deal about Albus getting sorted into Slytherin despite promises to be supportive in the books no matter what.
--Assuming that Albus is the cursed child because of vague statements made by Bane, even though Harry had to deal with people making similar assumptions about him when he was in school. Heir of Slytherin, anyone?
Ron getting thrown OOC, such as:
--Getting reduced to dumb comic relief.
--Holding his wand the wrong way around.
--Confessing he doesn't remember his and Hermione's wedding because he was drunk.
--Endorsing date rape drugs. ("Nice to see my love potion being used well, I thought.")
-Trolley Lady turning into Wolverine.
--No, seriously, she grows claws and everything.
-Voldemort and Bellatrix having Ebony Dark'ness Dementia Raven Way Delphi as their daughter.
--Delphi being a huge canon Sue.
---Brews Polyjuice in mere minutes thanks to "special preparations"
---Has silver-blue hair
---Is a Parselmouth (understandable given she's Voldemort's daughter, dear lord, but still)
---Can fly without a broom, which is most certainly not genetic
---Calls herself the Augury and is the subject of a prophecy
----"When spares are spared, when time is turned, when unseen children murder their fathers: Then will the Dark Lord return."
---Is a stereotypically emo teen with a Dark And Angsty Past
--Somehow never was discovered despite the Trace?
-Cedric getting thrown OOC, such as:
--Turning into a Death Eater because he was embarrassed in the Triwizard Tournament.
--Becoming the first Hufflepuff to ever become a Death Eater.
-Ludo Bagman talking like he's announcing characters for Barney rather than the Tournament.
--"Dog diggity, Cedric Diggory—you are a doggy dynamo."
--"It's Viktor Krazy Krum."
--"Zut alors, it's Fleur Delacour!"
--"He makes us all go weaky at the kneesy, he's Cedric Delicious Diggory."
--"Yes, it's Harry Plucky Potter.")
-Not one, but two Sooper Speshul Time-Turners.
--The Idiot Plot revolving around Albus and Scorpius being desperate to save Cedric and Cedric alone. Um, why just him?
-"He needs to fly out of that maze naked on a broomstick made of purple feather dusters."
Apparently Delphi broke into Hogwarts over the summer to steal Boomslang skin and lacewing flies, even though she could have wandered to any old apothecary and bought those instead of going to all the trouble of breaking in. *sigh*
So the potion itself probably did brew for the full length, but there is absolutely no explanation for how she got the hair samples for Harry, Ron, and Hermione. And neither Albus nor Scorpius question how or why she has said hair samples.
Which is worse (IMO) than the potion apparently taking minutes to brew.
Well... they probably do go to whatever the wizarding equivalent of a hairdresser is. She might have got samples from there. Also, according to the wiki at least, boomslang skin is an unusual ingredient (which is why Hermione also had to break into Snape's private stores), and it's not sold in at least the Diagon Alley apothecary (which does not preclude the possibility that it might be sold elsewhere, but it's something).
I’m quite certain that the books don’t say where you can or can’t buy boomslang skin. Hermione stole ingredients that weren’t included in her second year standard potions lessons kit from Snape’s private store because she couldn’t leave Hogwarts to get them anywhere else.
The wiki, mixing all media, probably refers to the old, playful version of Pottermore. There, if you had not been sorted into Slytherin, you were stalled in CS 12 (in an animated picture of the entrance to the Slytherin common room) and couldn’t see any content past that point until you had successfully played the game of brewing Polyjuice Potion. This, of course, required to have all necessary ingredients in your inventory, and to make it more like the trio’s experience, you had to find the boomslang skin in an animated picture of Snape’s office in CS 5; you couldn’t simply buy it in the apothecary like many other ingredients.
Delphi is crazily prepared, considering that she allegedly only just heard about the Time-Turner, but this is not suspicious at all? What are Albus and Scorpius thinking? Unfortunately, we can only read (or hear, if we are lucky and got into the theater) what they say.
HG
A few things I feel compelled to respond to/miss the point of:
--Becoming the first Hufflepuff to ever become a Death Eater.
Hufflepuff still has the records of Slytherin and Gryffindor beat by a mile. Maybe Ravenclaw too, if we knew more about that house.
...And now I'm imagining each house having an 'IT HAS BEEN X YEARS SINCE A STUDENT HAS TURNED TO DARK MAGIC' signs. The larger the number, the more points your house gets at the end of the year. Slytherin has had some trouble recently when Voldemort rose for the first time and their sign kept getting re-set, but at least they've started catching up to Gryffindor after the Sirius Black incident. Ravenclaw has the occasional problems with evil geniuses, and Hufflepuff has consistently won the competition, with their numbers reaching into the triple digits. It's gotten to the point where some of the worse members of other houses have started encouraging Hufflepuffs to go dark just so they'd lose their lead. They've always failed... until two unwitting time-travelers provide the final straw.
That day, there was much confusion among the other three houses as to whether they should rejoice that Hufflepuff was down at their level at last or be scared of the new Hufflepuff Death Eater. Some brave students even ventured to be sorry for the Hufflepuffs losing one of their best members to the Death Eaters. Nobody's really unhappy about getting a chance to finally beat Hufflepuff, though.
-"He needs to fly out of that maze naked on a broomstick made of purple feather dusters."
I really want to see somebody pull that off on-stage. That would probably be worth the ticket price even if I have to spend the rest of the time on extended bathroom break.
WAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!
*long string of cursewords*
Watch the yelling, and... is it really a spoiler? Everybody knows by this point.
Or, rather, I got to look through my boyfriend's copy and take a few pictures of the pages. And...
*FLIPS ALL THE TABLES ON THE PLANET*
You guys. I can't even begin to say how much I'm crying right now. I wish I could say it was tears of joy, but they are not. Far from it.
Harry Potter has officially Phantom Menace'd itself. Except worse. Seriously, this makes the prequel trilogy look good by comparison. The leaked spoilers were true. All of them. I took a few pictures as proof, too. Apologies for some of the bad lighting, it was dark out.
The infamous "Naked on a broomstick of purple feathers" scene:
Characters reacting to the discovery Voldemort has a daughter/more time travel crap:
The sooper awesum Time-Turner explained:
Delphi being a Sue (for context, Harry got his friends to use a bit of Transfiguration on him so he'd look like Voldemort):
I can't even, you guys. I just can't. This is badfic made legitimate canon.
I'm gonna be borrowing the book for a more thorough reading sometime within the next few days and I'm already dreading it.
Let us now welcome our newest Canon Sue, Delphi Riddle.
*touches heart and crosses wrists* For Voldemort and valor.
*curls up under a table and sobs*
...
Rowling actually isn't the author of the script. It's LITERALLY a canon badfic, and how she approved of it is beyond me. From the following article:
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/30/books/harry-potter-and-the-cursed-child-goes-from-stage-to-page-on-saturday-at-the-witching-hour.html?smid=tw-nytimes&smtyp=cur&_r=0
The elaborate rollout has all the flourishes that fans have come to expect for a new Harry Potter book. But for many nostalgic readers, this one feels different. “Cursed Child” is not a new novel, but a script of a play — a format that typically isn’t read for pleasure and almost never produces overnight best sellers. And unlike the previous seven books in the series, it was not written by Ms. Rowling herself.
In a sense, “Cursed Child” is more like sanctioned fan fiction than a new work by a beloved writer. Ms. Rowling worked on the play’s plot with the playwright Jack Thorne and the director John Tiffany, and while she helped shape the story, she has made it abundantly clear that she did not write the script.
The idea for the play, which explores Harry’s life as an adult and parent, didn’t originate with Ms. Rowling, either: She merely agreed to it when two theater producers proposed the concept.
Sigh. This is exactly why I'm skipping this entire fiasco and reserving my anticipation for Fantastic Beasts instead. Which, incidentally, has a script written by Rowling herself and not somebody else.
Now I understand all the anger. The Cursed Child was hyped up to be the eight book when it’s actually more like the ninth movie.
I still don’t get why nobody complained about Rowling approving the movies. Did Steve Cloves and Michael Goldenberg do so much better jobs, or is it just that the underlying novels are still recognizable, while this is not actually based on a novel?
HG
The Cursed Child wasn't hyped up to be the eight book. It was hyped up to be the eight "story" — the official continuation, so naturally people thought Rowling would have a lot more involvement in them. But the form wasn't important. If it was good and followed the rules established by other installments, it wouldn't matter if it was a stage play, a movie, or a comic book.
What's important is that this thing is canon. JKR greenlit Jack Thorne's script, so everything that happens in this play is confirmed to happen in Potterverse. As in, Voldemort. having. a bloody daughter. Or Harry being Atticus Finch-ed. Or a trolley witch turning out to be some kind of monster! By approving The Cursed Child JKR contravened everything she had established in previous books. JKR herself stated she didn't like the idea of Time-Turners in Prisoner of Azkaban (an info that as of now has disappeared from Pottermore):
"I went far too light-heartedly into the subject of time travel in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. While I do not regret it (Prisoner of Azkaban is one of my favourite books in the series), it opened up a vast number of problems for me, because after all, if wizards could go back and undo problems, where were my future plots?
I solved the problem to my own satisfaction in stages. Firstly, I had Dumbledore and Hermione emphasise how dangerous it would be to be seen in the past, to remind the reader that there might be unforeseen and dangerous consequences as well as solutions in time travel. Secondly, I had Hermione give back the only Time-Turner ever to enter Hogwarts. Thirdly, I smashed all remaining Time-Turners during the battle in the Department of Mysteries, removing the possibility of reliving even short periods in the future."
But surprise — here's a brand new Time-Turner that throws to garbage all the rules and limitations! The canon now contradicts itself!
As for the movies, while they did make minor changes, they still followed the story laid out by Rowling in her stories. They weren't ideas that came from Columbus's, or Yates's heads — they've already had the source to work on. I don't know how much was JKR involved in The Cursed Child's script, but from the looks of it she might as well have stamped her name only after reading it once.
Why can’t Voldemort have a daughter? Because he thought he didn’t need and thus didn’t want an heir? That’s irrelevant. Bellatrix wanting his child and he just wanting sex would be sufficient to get it done. You believe that Voldemort was too busy being evil to think about sex? What did he actually do personally during HBP? You think Voldemort was asexual? Sorry, if JKR says he wasn’t then he wasn’t.
I don’t see what is bad about being Atticus Finch-ed, but then I’m not sure whether I ever read To Kill a Mockingbird. (If I did, the German translation got a title you probably wouldn’t recognize if I retranslated it, and I don’t remember much of the book I’m thinking of, specifically no protagonist’s names.)
The trolley witch actually being an enchanted vending machine that doesn’t have a life beyond the Hogwarts Express and turns into a monster when somebody tries to get off the train early doesn’t contradict anything in the books, so where’s the problem?
Apparently time travel was outlawed and building Time-Turners is illegal now, so we got a canonical reason for why the Ministry didn’t build new Time-Turners after the Battle of the DOM (the big hole in Thirdly, I smashed all remaining Time-Turners during the battle in the Department of Mysteries, removing the possibility of reliving even short periods in the future.)
Since it is not available in the current version of Pottermore, Eloise Mintumble’s backstory is now as uncanon as silver prefect badges and Hermione’s eleventh O.W.L. (I’m still bitter about the latter). The books only implied that time travel is dangerous, not going into any details, so changing the timeline in unpredictable ways being the only danger doesn’t contradict canon. (Being able to change everything back rather than producing new unpredictable results may still be a stupid plot.)
Are you claiming that talking shrunken heads and a dragon leaving her nest to chase Harry all over Hogwarts are ideas that came from Rowling’s head?
HG
Does having a daughter sound like something Voldemort would do? Even since his return he was set on taking over the Wizarding World and ensure that everyone knew he was back. It was his second chance, something that he failed to do previously, but now he could finally do it. I believe that would occupy most of his thoughts, rather than thinking about an heir. No, I've never called Voldemort asexual, but I think he had better things to do in HBP than taking one of his groupies for a roll in the hay. I guess I would be more okay with this whole concept if a) the badfics didn't destroy it previously, and b) there was any hint that Voldemort wants to preserve his legacy in any other form instead of himself - his desperate attempts to achieve immortality, and his Boggart of his own corpse, are more than enough evidence that he didn't want to be removed from this world, or "leave it to the kids" to continue what he started.
The Atticus Finch point, I admit repeating after somebody, since I haven't read neither of the two installments. Basically the explanation I was given is that in Mockingbird Finch defends a person of colour out of sheer will to help, only to become a racist in Watchman.
No, that's not a contradiction, that's just weird. There was no implication that the trolley lady is something more than just an employee. Although, I'm not sure if I'd call her a vending machine, she still sounds human. I've heard that this might've just been Human Transfiguration that she used, so I'm just gonna let that thing go.
My point about Time-Turner thing is that Mintumble's backstory gave us a valid explanation as to why there is no Temporal Manipulation in Harry Potter. Anything more than a few hours lead to nasty consequences for both the user and Time itself. Yes, I know there might be different models of Time-Turners, and the one Hermione got was just for a personal use, but if we get one that bypasses the rules and leaves absolutely no consequences for the user (Albus and Scorpius didn't age 20 years when they returned), then how is that a good plot point?
To be perfectly fair I liked the idea of the talking shrunken heads in Prisoner of Azkaban film. It didn't bring anything significant to the canon (as opposed to Voldemort's daughter and OP time machines). And the dragon sequence... yeah, done purely for action. Wasn't a fan.
"Hermione attempted to study thirteen subjects before she dropped two" was the perfect answer to the question why Hermione needed a Time-Turner when other students who got twelve O.W.L.s apparently didn’t. But since JKR changed the number of Hermione’s O.W.L.s to ten in a newer edition of HBP, this is no longer true. Just like that, all the wonderful rules and explanations from Mintumble’s backstory you want to be applied are no longer true, since the text has been changed (actually completely removed) in a newer edition. So you have to go with what is said in PoA and CC, and that isn’t contradictory.
Nobody claimed that Voldemort wanted a heir, it’s sufficient and in character that he didn’t care for the potential consequences of taking one of his groupies for a roll in the hay. And since JKR didn’t show us what occupied all of his time since Bellatrix escaped from Azkaban, he may have done whatever she wants him to have done. I don’t say we should like it, but it doesn’t contradict anything in the books.
HG
She's already firing denials like this? Looks like she's expecting some backslash. I cannot help but ask why...
'Canon' fanfic author have another name, ghost writers. Now, JKR didn't wirte the play, but she greenlighted it. She read it, and influenced it and said okay with the final result. It's like one of us asked someone else writing something about our aents, supervising the work, greenlighted the final product, then went all 'No, I didn't write that. It's that guy there. Blame them, not me.'
Now, I know the bold parts are yours, but insisting that hard about the fact she didn't write this the very day it was out... Someone is expecting backslash. And deserves it.
You're all missing something here. In this mess of a script, there is a single, shining light of awesome. It's so brilliant, that if you focus on it, you can't see the rest of the script. (Thank goodness for that.) What is this wonderful light, you ask? Simple: It is incredibly obvious that Lord Voldemort loves Pokémon Go. He adores it, and is a part of Team Valor, probably because their team color is the same general color as blood. He loves it so much, he forces all his Death Eaters to play it, and when he takes control of the wizarding world, he forces the entire wizarding world to play Pokémon Go and swear allegiance to Team Valor. Of course, this means that we can all resist this abomination by choosing to play Pokémon Go and aligning ourselves with either Team Mystic or Team Instinct. Let's have fun, protest this horrible script, and ignore the dreadful canon 'update' we're protesting, all at the same time!
And he cries not for the passing of one franchise, but for the death of a dream. The dream that he would someday taste the ultimate pleasure of continuation of his beloved book series. For it was Harry Potter who made me the happy soul I am today. How I agonized over the perfect way to thank Rowling for that.
.
.
.
But those dreams were dashed by the weaselly little book sitting there in our midst. The cowardly insignificant gonif who probably got lucky when Rowling slipped on the slime trail this loser left behind her. This mound of diseased hyena filth who's not fit to lick the dirt from my spats...!
But I digress. The time for sorrow has passed. It's time to look to a future filled with smiles. And I'll be smiling again just as soon as we take that book THERE... and slap it in that box THERE... and roll it into that vat of acid THERE!
(I'm getting updates as the book is read, if you're curious.)
The centaurs do indeed go off the rails from their original portrayal. Apparently they can sense "a darkness around [Harry's] son. Near [his] son." OotP Firenze would like to have a word with whoever thought of that.
Ron holding his wand the wrong way? It's not that he just holds it wrong. He holds it backwards. He comes running into the room to defend Hermione from a perceived threat and points his wand backwards. I can't even. This is not the Ron Weasley we know and love. This is a character who's been reduced to the stupidity seen in badfics. See for yourself:
And I'm not taking "It's the Bad Future!Ron, so it doesn't count" excuse. This guy has seen even more conflict than his canon counterpart. And he can't draw his own wand properly.
(Seriously, though, using Dumbledore's name in place of Merlin's? Wat?)
More to come as the ridiculousness spikes. I swear, I'm gonna MST this thing once I get my hands on a copy.
I'd bloody love do try that, though, I'll only really be able to offer jokespertise, not being all too familiar with the series.
Because the movies, while based on the same canon, are of their own continuity. That's why distinctions are made between bookverse and movieverse. Normally I'd say that this script that was released is part of the theaterverse... except Rowling has explicitly called it the "eighth story" and considers it to be canon for the books. Somehow.
With the exception of Prisoner of Azkaban, the movies were actually good. I was a huge fan of the books, read them all multiple times and bought them as they came out, but with that one exception I actually liked the movies better than the books.
What about the Prisoner of Azkaban movie did you not like? It's been a while since I read the book (college reading lists don't leave much time for pleasure reading), but I don't remember any glaringly terrible differences between the movie and the book, so is my memory just off?
Can I come?
The trolley lady turns into freaking Wolverine.
I can't even. I heard about this from the spoilers but even this seemed too ridiculous to believe. Guess the IO showed me.
(Also, this dialogue physically pains me.)
To my knowledge, very few things can extend a wizard's lifespan. Examples include Horcruxes, Unicorn Blood, and The Philosopher/Sorcerer's Stone. A magic train that can make you seemingly immortal just takes the cake.
...Mr. Bones' Wild Ride.
THE RIDE NEVER ENDS
I'm doing a political internship this summer, and the election is next week, so I completely forgot this was happening. I'll still probably have to wait until after the election, but it's good to know.
A few friends of mine and I are going to the midnight release to see what's what as soon as possible. Still clinging to that last shred of hope that this is just an extremely elaborate internet prank. *crosses fingers*
Currently, I have too many questions that aren’t answered by the spoilers I’ve seen.
True, there are lots of badfic elements. But as far as I know there is no law saying that a canon author is not allowed to write a canon-compliant parody of bad fanfic. Whether they are able to do it is another question. Which type of play is Harry Potter and the Cursed Child? A Comedy?
HG
It's supposed to be considered straight-up canon. See for yourself.
Events and characterization in the main timeline are canon. The alternate timelines are ridiculously improbable AUs to emphasize how dangerous time travel is. (If somebody could have calculated a greater than zero chance for Cedric the Death Eater happening, the side effects of changing the past wouldn’t be "unpredictable".) And Delphi got every Sue trait that is compatible with canon.
It may be possible to make all this sound plausible. Examples:
Theodore Nott worked with former members of the DOM’s time branch who got angry when Rufus Scrimgeour outlawed time travel, but not so angry that they joined the Death Eaters and were arrested after the Battle of Hogwarts.
Or:
The first wizards who explored time travel got on a wrong track and invented a device that barely did what it was expected to do, in an overcomplicated, dangerous and energy-consuming way that made it quite unreliable. But since this was the only known way to do it, it became generally believed to be the right way. New apprentices in the DOM’s time branch learned that this is how it should be done, and everybody tried to plagiarize the old patents, implementing minor improvements to make it look like original work while making it even more complex and unreliable. Only a complete outsider like Theo Nott, who had no idea of how to do it "right" could think of something genuinely new and actually do it better.
HG
I actually don't see much of a problem with Delphi's characterisation (ie, she's plausible), but, uh... Voldemort and Bellatrix? I mean, I can see it from Bellatrix, but Voldemort? Did anyone ever think he'd actually engage in that kind of relationship?
And, uhm. She was born 'a few months' before the Battle of Hogwarts, which took place (according to the Wiki) in May '98. So, uh... does that mean she was conceived immediately after Dumbledore's death? It would make 'a few' mean 'two', but I can't see it happening before then.
No, I'm going to go back to my first statement: that ain't Voldemort. What possible reason would he have for doing that?
hS
Voldemort is all about power and manipulation. For him, still being able to make a woman want it, despite his lack of attractiveness, may have been more satisfying than the actual act. Nobody claims that he intended to procreate. Or being able to make a woman want to bear his child may have given him the extra kick.
Also, I don’t see why it couldn’t have happened before Dumbledore’s death. Do you mean Voldemort and Bellatrix where too occupied and had no time to recreate? What exactly did they do in HBP?
HG
That doesn't strike me as the sort of power Voldy was into. He did magic and threats, not 'I can convince you to sleep with me'.
Also, seriously: it's Bellatrix. Remember how she fawned over him in Deathly Hallows? She'd sleep with him if he was a werewolf half-giant, half-Pukwudgie. There's no thrill in pulling that off. I just... don't see it as Voldemort's thing.
No reason it couldn't have happened before Dumbledore's death, no; I just figured a significant event would make a good place for it to slot in (inasmuch as there's any good place).
hS
He didn’t always depend on threats and curses. At Hogwarts, everybody except Dumbledore thought that he was a likable person and tried to please him.
Voldemort didn’t simply want to be evil. He wanted and believed to be superior in everything. But he was still just a man. Taking the price many men expect to get for being superior – all the women, or for a starter the one readily available – may convey that he was not one hundred percent inhuman yet, giving his last choice more impact.
I can see Rowling doing this.
HG
(And by "that", I mean Delphi being born before the Battle of Hogwarts)
...how is it that nobody noticed Bellatrix was pregnant while they were being held at Malfoy Manor? That wasn't exactly far off from the battle; unless she had a cryptic pregnancy or otherwise wasn't showing that late in her pregnancy. Yes, first-time mothers aren't as large, but not showing at all is extremely rare.
And going on for more "this directly contradicts canon" points:
1) Bane the centaur shows up at some point and blathers about how Albus' destiny is written in the stars, or something to that effect. We know from Firenze's Divination lesson in OotP, though, that the centaurs' methods of Divination are never so precise as that. And when they showed up in PS/SS, their main concern was that "Mars is bright tonight. Unusually bright." And later, "Always the innocent are the first victims."
2) I'd have to go digging to find the review, but one in particular took offense at Ron's portrayal, saying at one point he had to be shown how to properly hold a wand. I'm Really hoping that one's not true, because while Ron wasn't the best student, he wasn't an idiot.
3) Apparently the play claims that Voldemort became a bad guy because he was lonely and friendless. Direct contradiction to the "conceived via love potion, can't feel love" bit. Or the "Voldemort doesn't need or want friends" bit.
I could draw up a more complete list later once I'm not on mobile and able to better find my references.
I never liked the "conceived via love potion, can't feel love" bit. Did Merope’s choice matter so much that Tom Marvolo never got a choice? Or would he have been able to figure out how this thing called love does work, if he hadn’t chosen to dwell in loneliness and delusions of superiority?
Maybe Dumbledore, bitter about Tom not taking the chance he had offered when he didn’t warn everybody about his experience in the orphanage, got this wrong? Harry believed until the very end that Voldemort could redeem himself. Or did he tease Voldemort with an impossibility?
Maybe the point of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is that there isn’t such thing like a Cursed Child, because choices always matter? (I still didn’t get the script.)
HG
0) While the trio were held in Malfoy Manor, they didn’t notice that there was a baby somewhere upstairs, born several months before the Battle of Hogwarts?
1) I need to see Bane’s exact words.
2) Was Ron shown how to properly hold a wand for a specific spell that requires a specific wand gesture Ron had never performed? (Learning never ends.)
3) How does "the play" claim anything? By making a character claim it? Are we supposed to believe this character? (Not everything printed in the Dayly Prophet is canon, although Rita Skeeter writing it is canon.)
The only reference I’ll trust is the official script.
HG
*sips tea* Hi, everyone! Like the Bunker? I got it from the Roommates fanbase. It's lovely in here. Plenty of seating, cushy beanbags, I think even a pillow-fort in the corner. We have tea and coffee, cookies/biscuits, cake and pie... just about any comforting snack you can think of, really. If things start to get a bit too real out there, just come on in and pretend they aren't happening! Everything will be just fine if we only ignore it. ^_^
~Neshomeh
I bring with me twig tea.
Twig tea is made from the stems of tea plants.
You also make paper from wood.
Why can't you make paper that you can put into a mug of hot water to make tea?!
~
Alternate, more thematic idea: a tea-twig wand. I imagine it's highly suited to soothing charms. (Are there soothing charms? There should be soothing charms.)
hS
Though the thing about paper is that its manufacture uses a looooot of unpleasant chemicals... though that said, rice paper is a thing... hm. Also the flavour probably wouldn't infuse properly due to the lack of surface area, and if you're going to make a strip of something made of tea in order to make tea, well, why not just use tea?
Also, don't think I didn't catch that Buffy ref. >=]
In similar vein, though, I want a wand from a spaghetti tree.
I bought two whole boxes of Diet Coke in case everyone's thirsty! Along with multiple boxed sets of Godzilla movies, just in case. ;)
Half of it's depressing, and we can watch it and say, "Well, at least it's not as bad as the real world." The other half is comedy, which will help reverse the effects of the depressing stuff.
Internet backlash is no fun for anyone. I also bring two decent-sized boxes of colored pencils, some small pencil sharpeners, a big bag of crayons (complete with crayon sharpener), a Buddhist mandala coloring book, a pony coloring book, and last but not least, a Disney coloring book. Have fun, y'all!
*hands over boxed set of Avatar: The Last Airbender*
*curls up in the corner hugging her knees*
I brought fortune cookies. Hopefully, something good will come out of them.
Hm, "All will be well". We'll see about that.
I brought marshmallows. Lots of marshmallows. Feel free, all.
[Perches in a corner and whittles a wand]
hS
I have movies (among them the Hobbit and Lord of the Rings movies, Ghostbusters [the original], The Incredibles, Inside Out, and The Lego Movie), the first three seasons of the Muppet Show, and assorted Mythbusters and Dr. Who episodes. I've also got lots of popcorn for us to watch them with.
Ooh, Mythbusters! Seems appropriate—"I reject your reality and substitute my own" and all. *g*
~Neshomeh
I really need to fix that soon.
and checked for lag. He considered looking left. Five seconds later, the drone looked left.
'Oh, bugger me.'
Five seconds later, a harsh, sharp voice crawled in from the speakers, grumbling 'Hooooh, buugggr mi.'
'Stupid bloody thing,' He hissed, shutting the intercom off and turning the knob again. The only thing for his voice to connect to was his drone, so the dumb thing connected to itself. He considered looking left.
The drone agreed.
'Thank God,' He muttered.
'Ffffflak hhhod,' the drone agreed.
Stocker grunted, and switched the intercom off, again. He'd done a bit of scanning earlier, and had picked up quite a collection of space scrap, just waiting for a worthy prospector such as Stocker to arrive and take advantage of. Stocker was an eternal professional, and took to the call like beer to the liver. He could have sworn he recognised the location, but was always one for the landscape over the numbers.
He'd chosen the real heavy stuff. Denton-Jensen M-66 Scrabber-Drone. It was practically a ship in itself, except you plugged yourself in from light-years away, rather than placing your fragile arse in a fragile chair in a fragile chassis, surrounded by decidedly un-fragile space junk.
The vision on the drone was still blurry, so he reached for another knob. All he could see was a bunch of black, with some grey splotches in the distance.
Stocker twisted the knob.
'Oh, bugger me.'
'OOooooooh, bgggrrrrrr m.'
Stocker shut the intercom off, and pulled the headset off, rubbing his eyes.
He put it on again.
'Oh, bugger me,' He mumbled, again.
'Ooooh, buuuuuggeer meee.'
Stocker shut the intercom off. So, that was where he recognised it from. Fair enough, then. All wars had to come to an end at some point.
There wasn't much of a sense to them, otherwise. Stocker was aware of that. It made perfect sense, in his head.
His eyes must have worked differently to his head, then, because the sight of Porter-moor station 02 floating, dead and broken through space, surrounded by warships and wreckage, all dark and dirty, seemed completely nonsensical to him.
Somehow, 'bugger me,' didn't seem an appropriate reaction, anymore.
(I don't know. Sifverse needed love, and I'm always prepared for love. And I like drones over bats with cute names, no offence, Ix. Or to bats. Or to people who hate the name Charlotte.)
I guess they wanted to beat a dead horse. The existing ending was good enough, but no, they wanted to create an expanded universe. *Lumos*
Honestly I don't expect the Potterverse will ever be left alone. It's living the unicorn blood life. A cursed life.
And the ending of the series proper, the epilogue, left me unsatisfied.
I'd like to say I'm baffled that people think this is great, but then again, I've seen what the Pit is like. If "The Real Us" can get rave reviews, then something endorsed by Rowling as canon shouldn't be so surprising...
I take some small comfort in the fact that Fantastic Beasts, at least, looks like it will be good.
Which is THE BEST book in the series so far, but gets bad press for the Non-Hetero males.
Practically made the story for me :P
There's what, a couple hundred people who have ever participated in the PPC and maybe a few thousand who have heard of it?Comparatively, I am pretty sure the number of Harry Potter fans out numbers the population of NYC.
And read the Reddit spoilers thread.
In light of what I've heard of that so-called story, no WAY am I touching it with a... uh... I don't think a ten-foot pole would come even close to cutting it in this case. As a matter of fact I doubt even a mile-long pole would, either.
...You know what, flock it. This utter travesty of a plot, in any adaptation, doesn't even deserve to be mentioned in annything discussing poles. Gross.
I understand why Delphi is a dumb idea, I get that part. But can someone fill me in on what's so bad about the Time Turner plot? I saw a mention in the link of different Time Turners allowing different distances back, so - like Harry's Cloak - it seems like one could be 40 years better than the others without too much difficulty.
So... help me out, here?
hS
Harry Potter has just gained their own version of the Star Wars prequels.
The consensus seems to be that the worst things about the prequels were:
-Too much politics, not enough action.
-It's rubbish to see your villain as an annoying kid.
-Way too much CG instead of practical effects.
-A thoroughly unbelievable fall arc for the main character.
-Rubbish romance.
-Sub-par acting from some characters.
-Meesa!
But, uh... none of those would seem to apply to this?
So - as an honest question - in what way are they comparable? Other than 'because they're bad', which obviously wouldn't answer my first question about why they're bad. ^_~
(Very evocative comparison, though!)
hS
JK Rowling said on Pottermore (in an article that has since been taken down, gee I wonder why):
"I went far too light-heartedly into the subject of time travel in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban. While I do not regret it (Prisoner of Azkaban is one of my favourite books in the series), it opened up a vast number of problems for me, because after all, if wizards could go back and undo problems, where were my future plots?
"I solved the problem to my own satisfaction in stages. Firstly, I had Dumbledore and Hermione emphasise how dangerous it would be to be seen in the past, to remind the reader that there might be unforeseen and dangerous consequences as well as solutions in time travel. Secondly, I had Hermione give back the only Time-Turner ever to enter Hogwarts. Thirdly, I smashed all remaining Time-Turners during the battle in the Department of Mysteries, removing the possibility of reliving even short periods in the future.
"This is just one example of the ways in which, when writing fantasy novels, one must be careful what one invents. For every benefit, there is usually a drawback."
Then there's what an in-universe character had to say on the subject:
"As our investigations currently stand, the longest period that may be relived without the possibility of serious harm to the traveller or to time itself is around five hours. We have been able to encase single Hour-Reversal Charms, which are unstable and benefit from containment, in small, enchanted hour-glasses that may be worn around a witch or wizard’s neck and revolved according to the number of hours the user wishes to relive.
"All attempts to travel back further than a few hours have resulted in catastrophic harm to the witch or wizard involved. It was not realised for many years why time travellers over great distances never survived their journeys. All such experiments have been abandoned since 1899, when Eloise Mintumble became trapped, for a period of five days, in the year 1402. Now we understand that her body had aged five centuries in its return to the present and, irreparably damaged, she died in St Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries shortly after we managed to retrieve her. What is more, her five days in the distant past caused great disturbance to the life paths of all those she met, changing the course of their lives so dramatically that no fewer than twenty-five of their descendants vanished in the present, having been “un-born”.
"Finally, there were alarming signs, during the days following Madam Mintumble’s recovery, that time itself had been disturbed by such a serious breach of its laws. Tuesday following her reappearance lasted two and a half full days, whereas Thursday shot by in the space of four hours. The Ministry of Magic had a great deal of trouble in covering this up and since that time, the most stringent laws and penalties have been placed around those studying time travel."
... but isn't that exactly what the play seems to be showing? "how dangerous it would be to be seen in the past, to remind the reader that there might be unforeseen and dangerous consequences as well as solutions in time travel" in particular looks like practically a mission statement for Cursed Child. And all that stuff about time breaking down...
The massive-aging problem is probably the biggest one you mention, and it does seem fairly conclusive. But there's even wriggle room built into it - the 'benefit from confinement' aspect could mean that the Time-Turner has stabilised the aging issue over the length of its operation. Perhaps the initial attempt (pre-1899) used a Year-Reversal Charm, but was mothballed after the Mintumble incident.
I'm afraid I still don't understand. It sounds like you're saying a play showing time travel is bad, is itself bad, because JKR and someone in-universe said that time-travel is bad... which I'm sure isn't what you're saying, so what are you saying?
hS
From what we've already been told, experimentation with long-distance time travel (long time time travel?) has been severely restricted ever since the Mintumble incident, and even if experimentation had gotten to the point where they were able to time travel back not mere hours, but decades, what are the immense odds that the only two experimental time turners able to do that not only survived the destruction in the Department of Mysteries, but ended up in the hands of the people where they'd be most crucial to the plot? There's coincidences that move the plot forward, and then there's coincidences that are just plain outrageous.
Even ignoring the aging issue, how do Albus and Scorpius get away with altering the past so much only for things to instantly reset to normal once they go back? Yes, we had the My Immortal-esque alternate timeline, but that got eradicated with no noticeable side effects on the present timeline. When Mintumble did her thing, she "caused great disturbance to the life paths of all those she met, changing the course of their lives so dramatically that no fewer than twenty-five of their descendants vanished in the present, having been “un-born”" It doesn't outright say she directly interfered with their lives, just that she crossed paths with them (a rather tenuous interpretation, I know, so feel free to ignore it), which reads to me like the butterfly effect. And that's not getting into the problems her time travel caused for the present, what with Tuesday lasting two and a half days and Thursday only four hours. None of that happened in the play. Just go back, hit a reset button, and don't worry about having to deal with the consequences that should have arisen.
(Apologies if any of this is snappy or incoherent. It's six in the morning and I've been up all night so I'm probably not at my most lucid right now, but I didn't want to sleep on this.)
A few points I'm going to draw out:
-I hadn't twigged that there were two long-range Time-Turners involved. That, I agree, takes it out of 'single prototype' territory and into 'outrageous coincidence'.
-I don't think the Mintumble Effect is a full-on butterfly effect - it's way too limited! Only 25 people stopped existing, after 500 years? Either she literally appeared in a sealed cave and telepathically communicated with one person, or history in the Potterverse is very resilient.
Actually, we know it is, because it's possible for schoolkids to use a (short-range) Time Turner without changing anything. I think the setting works on the principle of 'if you're trying to keep things the same, you'll probably succeed'. Plus, of course, the usually counterpart: 'if you try to change things, it'll go out of control'.
So is it resilient enough to let them restore it to normal after their shenanigans? That's one for debating, I think.
-Why didn't next Wednesday run backwards, or some other time-breaks-down events? Well... who says it doesn't? >:D Maybe the sun never rises again after the night the play ends. But no, I agree that canonically listing side-effects and then ignoring them when convenient is bad.
-I get the feeling your objection isn't really centred on the contradiction of minor points of the canon, but on the fact that Cursed Child is pretty much Back to the Future - 'kid tries to make things better for his parents in the past but accidentally deletes himself', for instance - and that you don't think a Back to the Future storyline really fits the Potterverse. That, plus you don't like the dark timeline - is that because of the specific details of it, or just on general principles?
hS
(PS: And no, I don't think it was snappy. I don't think it was incoherent, either, but if I've totally misunderstood you, then it was. ^_~)
I reread the summary again and it turns out, the Time-Turners weren't relics from the Department of Mysteries— they were experimental ones designed by Theodore Nott... for Lucius Malfoy? 
That just opens up an entirely new can of worms. How the heck did he manage to develop in the span of about twenty years (assuming he started working on this at the end of Deathly Hallows) what the entire Department of Mysteries could not in centuries? How the heck did he manage to experiment with time so well he was apparently able to create not one, but two long-distance Time-Turners without causing any temporal distortions or anybody noticing? Was he just that good so as to get it on the first try? (Well, apparently not, because one of the Time-Turners is a prototype for the other, but still!) And what was Lucius Malfoy going to do with a Time-Turner, anyway?
...please tell me he was trying to set up this.
But seriously, AVPS jokes aside, I just don't get it. The script had better explain what's going on and why because otherwise I call major shenanigans.
Every witch and wizard who has heard the words 'Time' and 'Turner' placed together knows that they represent an inordinately dangerous piece of magic. Created by encasing an Hour-Reversal Charm in an enchanted sandtimer, the Time-Turner has the ability to transport its bearer back into the past. They are the only exception to the absolute ban on time-travel magic, a ban which every Minister has confirmed for over a hundred years.
Yet the danger of time travel is both greater and less than some students might think. Certainly, it is possible to erase yourself from history (for example by Obliviating your grandparents to forget their marriage), and indeed to alter the course of events quite substantially - imagine an unscrupulous or incautious time traveller Stunning A. Dumbledore during his celebrated duel with Grindelwald. But some of the dangers have been overstated, or perhaps mitigated; and this is best discussed in the context of the tragic fate of Madam Eloise Mintumble.
In 1899, Madam Mintumble travelled back on a study trip to the year 1402. Her trip ran far longer than anticipated, and on her return a number of Effects (later named after her) were observed.
The First Mintumble Effect: On her return to the present of 1899, Madam Mintumble immediately aged five centuries (less three years), and died shortly thereafter. The First Effect is simply this: that any travel forward in time will cause the traveller to age accordingly, whatever speed that time may pass at. This Effect is not alleviated by the common Time-Turner, and is one reason for the five-hour rule regarding these instruments.
Rumour has it, however, that Theodore Nott successfully negated the First Effect in his two illicit Time-Turners. Unlike common Time-Turners, the Nott variety are designed to take the operator back to a certain time, and then return them to the present. The initial prototype allowed only a five-minute stay, while the second instrument extended the limit indefinitely. Given Nott's known skills, it is possible the Nott Turners contain some manner of potion to negate the First Effect. Alternately, they may be designed to project or displace the user into the past, rather than utilising time travel as it is normally understood.
The Second Mintumble Effect: From Madam Mintumble's deathbed testimony (obtained by Legilimency), it is known that at least 25 persons who existed in 1899 before her trip were 'un-born' due to her actions. Yet the impact of her five days in 1402 is far less than might be expected: the general course of both magical and non-magical history continued exactly as before, despite the absence of several family lines and all their interactions with the world. Other persons of similar nature simply found themselves in the same circumstances - most famously in the case of Anne Boelyn, witch and wife of King Henry VIII, who according to Madam Mintumble's memories, ought to have been a woman named Elizabeth Spindle.
Thus, the Second Mintumble Effect is: the past may be changed, but it is broadly resilient. The reverse is also true: should a traveller alter a major historical event (as happened in the Potter/Malfoy incident), the existence of people in the present is unlikely to be endangered, unless their lives directly depend on said event.
The Third Mintumble Effect: The third effect is the most serious, and the least understood. Following Madam Mintumble's trip, rescue, and death, ripples began to be felt in the fabric of time itself. The famous statement that 'Tuesday following her reappearance lasted two and a half full days, whereas Thursday shot by in the space of four hours' is, so far as can be determined, precisely correct. But this effect had not been observed in previous experiments, which had also not run afoul of the Second Effect. It seemed that the Third Effect occured only as a result of the Second: if history is changed, time's flow is disrupted in the present.
The five-hour rule for regular Time Turners was instituted primarily to prevent such effects: it prevents a witch or wizard causing significant changes in events that have already occured. Whether the Nott Turners were able to overcome the Third Effect as they had the First is unknown - according to the Minister's testimony, all the changes made to history were rectified before enough time had passed to observe the Third Effect in action. We have no evidence to show that this is not the case, nor that there has been any of the mass memory manipulation that would be needed to cover up a Third Effect incident.
~Huinesoron, Professor of Magical Artefacts, &c
(Basically, assume anything you don't recognise was invented by me. I'm trying to rationalise the stated facts, not necessarily say what JKR intended. ~hS)
The Time-Turner used by Hermione Granger during her third year appears to be a one-way device. Harry and Hermione traveled three hours back in time and then simply relived these three hours to catch up to present time and sneak in to take the place of their younger selves who just vanished to the past. Hermione obviously did something similar whenever she used the Time-Turner to sit in a classroom or do homework (or sleep) while she was also sitting in another classroom. It isn’t surprising that wizards who tried to use this type of Time-Turner to travel several centuries back in time did never return.
So, isn’t the First Mintumble Effect just: "Catching up from 1402 to 1899 took 497 years, and since Madam Mintumble was in no state to sneak in and replace her younger self, her corpse was only found five days later near the place where she had vanished; this was misinterpreted as Madam Mintumble having spent five days in 1402"? This would be consistent with PoA, but is contradicted by the official statement "... she died in St Mungo’s Hospital for Magical Maladies and Injuries shortly after we managed to retrieve her."
Was Madam Mintumble brought back by the safeguard we see in Theo Notts prototype, but in her case it was set to five days rather than five minutes? This contradicts "we managed to retrieve her" and "Eloise Mintumble became trapped, for a period of five days". How did she expect to return before the safeguard kicked in? Should the safeguard have been set to a shorter time? Also, if a safeguard was always there, shouldn’t it have kicked in for Hermione? Catching up to the present time through reliving the hours she traveled back doesn’t help. Technically, Harry and Hermione are still three hours in the past because, had they stayed in the natural timeline, they should already be three hours further in the future when they finally catch up to what they think of as "present time". Five days (or whatever time the safeguard is set to) after they traveled to the past, the safeguard should kick in and make them skip three hours to re-establish the natural timeline.
Did Madam Mintumble (or the rescue team that "retrieved" her) use a more advanced Time-Turner that actually had a travel-forward function? How would this be applied? Turn counter-clockwise to travel back in time and turn clockwise to travel forward? Would travelling to the furture be possible? And why could the rescue team not travel further back and "retrieve" Madam Mintumble when she had only spent some hours in 1402?
May the text have been taken down because the upcoming time-travel plot made somebody re-think it and they realized that it’s nonsense?
HG
The Time-Turner per se didn't exist in 1899; they are a specialised magical artefact designed to mitigate the Mintumble Effects - a stabilised time-reversal charm with strict limits on range. Rather, Madam Mintumble cast her own temporal reversal charm, the incantation for which is strictly controlled by the Department of Mysteries.
Her retrieval, so far as can be determined from the records, was accomplished by a modified Prior Incantato spell. Researchers have proposed various methods by which this might have been accomplished: some speculate that Madam Mintumble's wand was left behind in 1402, and thus was present in the Department of Mysteries to be directly interacted with; others propose that a wand with matching core was obtained, and somehow a Priori Incantatum effect was induced across time; still others, that the Unspeakables were able to access and reverse the charm simply through the room in which it was cast.
Whatever the case, it seems that Madam Mintumble's rescue was effected five days after her departure, and left her spending five days in the past. No other witches or wizards travelled back to collect her, or else they would have been equally affected by the First Effect: the returning spell simply dragged her through the timestream at high speed, allowing the aging process to continue. (It has been speculated that this, rather than the Second Effect, is the direct cause of the Third Effect shockwave; understandably, no research has been conducted.)
There was no safeguard on the charm used by Eloise Mintumble. It is unlikely, in fact, that a single-cast spell such as she used could even be safeguarded.
As for the Minister for Magic: in a rare interview following the Albus/Scorpius affair, she confirmed that she has 'always felt older than [she] should be', and that she believes her use of the Time-Turner at Hogwarts added a month or more to her age. The safeguard on her Time-Turner only limits the distance back one can travel in a single casting (and induces a cool-down period to prevent multiple castings); it does not include a 'spring-back' effect. The Nott prototype's 'spring-back' is unique, and a consequence of the Turner's unique construction.
~Professor Huinesoron, &c &c
(Eeeeeeverything in here is wild speculation. Your interpretation is just as valid. ^_^)
We can only go as people already did for Episode One, Madoka Rebellion and similar: pretend the Cursed Child does not exist.
"I reject your reality and substitute my own"
What the hell is a Cursed Child?
What's it made of?
Is it a Mexican dessert?
Sounds like something nonexistent, yet, very, very stupid.
So it's a good thing whatever that is doesn't exist, right?
Right?
If the contradictions hadn't been already established, I think the whole "go back and change time to see what might have been" plot could have been interesting, if cliché, but the devil is in the details (ack, it's definitely bedtime, it took me five minutes trying to think how that phrase started. But yeah, contradictions like this are why I shout at the TV while watching Doctor Who). As it stands, though, Albus and Scorpius really shouldn't have been able to break canon like they did and it just bugs me, to put it mildly. I wasn't even thinking Back to the Future, but now that you've said it, that sounds about right. :P I was thinking of it in more AU terms.
The dark future itself could have been better done, IMO. It was a great idea in concept, but in execution it just sounded extremely cheesy to me. "For Voldemort and valor"? The Scorpion King? Bleh.
(As a side note, remember how Hermione had to turn over her time turner the number of hours she wanted to go back? I just love the mental image of the boys standing there while turning the hourglass over and over and over and over and over... even if that's not what happened.)
-Ix, going to bed now. Or soonish. Maybe. Something like that.
I think to some extend I'd need to see how it actually falls out in practice before declaring JK Rowling a Suethor. Fiction is littered with evil regimes who have little slogans to start or end conversations with - they show up quite often in high fantasy, usually when the Good Guys have to infiltrate a temple or palace without giving themselves away. Though honestly, given Riddle's character, I can't imagine he'd accept not being Lord Voldemort in their catchphrase.
(Crackpot theory: they do it because Voldemort literally told them to. And he told them to because that timeline also includes the tracking jinx - so it lets him know exactly where everyone is any time he wants. Think about it, he'd do it and all.)
(As to The Scorpion King... yeah, nah. "There is only one Lord of the Rings", etc - Voldy would hate that.)
I'm gonna keep that image of turning the turner some 175,000 times and treasure it forever. :D I wonder what kind of RPMs you can put in a Time-Turner before it shatters? Is there a spell for that?
hS
It's not possible. Meyer bribed people to propose her fanfic of Harry Potter and show she's the 'best'. There is no way in any possible 'verse that Rowling approved this... waste of ink, paper and time.
The tiny bat fluttered in through the window, a scroll clutched in her feet.
"What's the matter, Charlotte?" Lady Iximaz asked, a furrow creasing her brow. Charlotte landed on the desk and folded her wings anxiously, not saying a word.
Lady Iximaz popped open the seal on the scroll and read it. Her hands shook and the parchment fell to the floor as she slowly sat back in her chair, staring blankly at the wall. There she stayed, frozen in place, her mind racing as she tried to comprehend what she had previously thought to be impossible.
"Hey, Ixi?" her brother said, poking his head into the room. "I've got some more notes on the scrying system I've been devising and though you'd like—oh no. What happened? What's wrong?"
Lady Iximaz slowly looked up. There were tears in her eyes. "It appears... the last of Air'ihpotre has fallen to the Marizu."
(Of course, I'm still clinging to that one last hope that it's still a hoax, or it won't be so bad once we get to see the script for ourselves... but ouch.)
She had not ventured into Air'ihpotre since her first visit to the Federation of Academia, yes, but she remembered and enjoyed its famous stories all the same. She had been curious but not driven to investigate whispers of the newest tale, though one particular detail from it--that a famed witch actually had dark skin rather than the assumed light--had intrigued her.
But this...
"They're saying it's fallen? Is this true?" she asked.
Diane nodded sadly. "As far as I've heard. My lady, I know you're very...protective of things that you loved as a child. For your own health, please, do not look into these dark rumors any more than you have to. I beg you. I can't bear to see you get that angry again. Especially after the last barbarian..."
eatpraylove sighed. "Thank you for your work and your concern, Diane. I will protect my mind the best way I know how: By finally finishing Air'ihpotre's most famous story."
"You haven't finished reading it?" asked Miguel. "But it's been done for almost four years! You were outside that bookshop when they announced the final volume had arrived!"
"That was my mother," said eatpraylove. "Miguel, I told you, I had to process the ending of the fifth part and then got sucked into Federation affairs. And there are so many other things in this world to read and learn about! ...I will finish the saga. I owe it to myself, if not some of my fellow knights."
Diane curtsied. "I hope you enjoy it, my lady. Do you need me for anything else?"
"You and your son are dismissed. Thank you again."
Once the fairies had gone, she put her head in her hands. "Fallen to Marizu...I knew they had troubles, but I always thought the will of their people and Jaikaiar was strong enough to overcome any barbarian.
"Mighty Kanon, I pray that Jaikaiar's champions be protected and healed, and that their land be restored. It has gone through so much pain and suffering."
"My lady... oh, I'm sorry."
Lady Kaitlyn extracted herself from her husband's arms and smiled at Freckles. "Don't worry about it," she said. She glanced at the bundle of papers in the messenger's hand. "News from Tumblar?"
"From Tamblor," Freckles corrected. "It's... my lady, it's..."
"Why did the Chaetters have to name their town after somewhere that already existed?" Kaitlyn shook her head. "It's thoroughly unreasonable."
Huinesoron, now leaning against the wall, gave a cough that sounded suspiciously like "El-Jheycom".
Kaitlyn glared at him. "That's different."
"I never said it wasn't."
"Hm." Kaitlyn turned back to the breathless messenger. "Well, then: what news?"
Freckles bit her lip, then held out one of the messages. "It... here."
Her mistress took the paper. She skimmed the first few lines, then went back and read them more carefully. Her eyes widened as she read, and her hand began to tremble.
"Kaitlyn?" Huinesoron stepped closer. "What...?"
"The Marizu," his wife said in a hollow voice. "They've... Air'ihpotre, it's..." She drew in a deep breath. "Air'ihpotre has fallen to the Marizu. The flag of Roe Lin flies over Hockwart now."
"What?" Huinesoron tried to pull the paper from her fingers, but she refused to let go. "That's impossible. What about their campaigns in the west? What about the war-beasts they were rumoured to be breeding in the Valley of Fantastic Beasts?"
"Armies and monsters mean almost nothing when your armies have no hope," Kaitlyn said. She held the page out to him. "Jaikaiar has declared her support for Roe Lin."
Huinesoron's jaw dropped. "But she's always been the staunchest supporter of-"
"Has she?" Kaitlyn demanded. "Think about it! Hasn't she decried the deaths during the Hallowed Campaign as 'unnecessary'? Didn't she commend the Harmony Fleet for their strength and persceptiveness, even as they unloaded fresh troops for Roe Lin's assaults? Is she not," she went on, her face turning grim, "the mage behind the Curse of the White Scorpion which felled the walls of Hockwart itself?"
"But," Huinesoron spluttered, "but-"
"The Guardians of Hockwart owe alliegence to her," Kaitlyn said, "and they were seen arrayed alongside the Beasts of the Isle of Morn in the battle lines of Roe Lin. There can be no doubt." She laid the sheet of paper almost reverently on her desk, then crumpled back into her seat. "It's..." She lowered her head, covering her face with her hands. "It's just like the Weaver all over again..."
Thanasius Ampelius closed the book he was reading and put it down on the table with a gentle thud. “What is it, Einar?” he asked the man who approached him, scroll in hand.
“I think you should read it for yourself, milord,” the bright-haired mage replied.
“Very well.” The Baron took the scroll from the mage and used the book he put down and a large piece of amber to force it to stay flat for a while. He read it twice, then tugged at his goatee and looked up. “It’s confirmed?”
“Aye. Eyewitnesses.”
“Then the Marizu have struck another blow at the Scholars’ Empire.” Thanasius sighed. “Please deliver this message to the Seneschal and Karrin the Blue in the Monastery; they ought to know, too.”
“Whatever will you do, milord?” Einar seemed to perk up as he asked this question.
“What I always do. It is not something that is in my ability to change.” Thanasius handed the scroll back to the mage.
“Oh.” Einar seemed to deflate and left the room; the Baron returned to his book.
At first, he thought it was some mistake. Then a sick joke. Then he denied it could even be possible.
But there was no possible way to avoid the sad reality. His country was now nothing but a den of Marizu, its former glory now completely forgotten.
It took him quite moment to collect himself, but once it was done, he went in his room in order to take Legard, the tome of Nicodelli and donning his armor. He then exited the inn, putting on his burgonet helmet. Saving Air'ihpotre could be impossible, but surely some sort of revenge could be found...
(I'll take HP badfic suggestions. I've no doubt about finding something bad enough, but if someone want to see some badfic missionned to oblivion...)
"Nope," said Falchion, perched upon his master's gloved arm. "Totally real."
"No. I refuse to believe it," Skaer'morys growled.
"Sir Hardric did, too. But there's nothing anyone can do anymore. It's over." The bird bowed his head sadly.
But Skaer'morys facepalmed. "No. It isn't. It ISN'T! There's gotta be some sort of remaining stronghold, there HAS to be."
"The Valley of Fantastic Beasts, perhaps?" the metallic bird suggested. "Surely there'd be survivors hiding there..."
Rashida, who had had her hunger sated the hour before and had been trying to doze off before Falchion's news had disturbed her, shook her whiskered head. "That valley hasn't been inhabited for centuries. I don't know what lurks within there, either, but I doubt there's any way one would be able to build even a log cabin within a mile of the place, let alone a functioning village."
"I'd take any number of dangerous creatures over a Marizu any day," replied Skaer'morys, his eyes blazing. "That settles it. We're going to Air'ihpotre."
Falchion nearly fell off his master's arm. At the same time, Rashida's hackles raised as she let out a sudden roar. "WHAT?!"
"I didn't say right now," replied Skaer'morys. "But we have to go there as soon as we can."
"Master, that's a patented Very Bad Idea!" Falchion cried, his bladed feathers ruffling. "Regardless of whether or not there are still survivors taking refuge in the valley you speak of, the rest of the place has been utterly overrun. We'd be dead before we even set foot within the border!"
"I'll take my chances," said Skaer'morys. "I may have left a few things behind after I visited that realm a few years ago, and it's about time I got them back. Besides, if Sir Hardric's going there like you said, there's plenty of reason for us to back him up."
"Master, please," said Rashida. "I am one of the oldest, most experienced monsters you've mastered to date, and as someone with such an esteemed position, I have be honest with you: I don't care about you or your problems. This is suicidal, and nothing can convince us otherwise!"
Skaer'morys shook his head. "If we don't go, Sir Hardric will be venturing there on his own. And on top of that, if we stay here and do nothing, we'll know if there are any survivors left, let alone if any have hidden in the valley. Sorry, guys, but we've got no other choice."
Falchion shuddered. "I still think this is a bad idea."
"You and me both," replied Rashida.
"Then let's get to it!" Skaer'morys gazed off into space, his expression betraying a glimmer of hope. "C'mon, you two. There's a certain knight out there who could use our help."
(tl;dr: This whole debacle is making me more eager for the Fantastic Beasts movie than ever, though that's not saying much. And Hardric, I'd be totally down for doing a Potterverse co-write mission with you sometime! If you're interested too, well, you have my e-mail. ;D)
It was a slow day, one he spent practicing the martial art of Puz An Do, the same art and design style he modeled his Psychopomp's Hand and Seamaiden's Chains after. Presently, he was utilizing his Dizzy Chord keystone to find a partner to practice high level Technical patterns with. He was flicking his way through the Magic Circles produced and projected into the air above the stone, when he noticed a commotion occurring in the circle connecting him and his fellow Knights.
He moved the circle front and center and spread his fingers, causing the circle to display the runes the Knights were communicating with. While he didn't know the exactly wording, magic allowed him to know the words almost instinctively.
Air'ihpotre had fallen
He had only ventured in the area's borders, but he understood weight of the event. He briefly paused briefly, but moved to his armory. Fully equipped, he walked out into the streets.
The people needed some hope.