Half-Blood Prince

Given that blood-brothers Kungfucius and Kabitzin are reading the latest Harry Potter book, just thought I'd like to throw out my two cents. Major spoilers ahead, so scroll down at your own discretion ^^

***SPOILERS ***

This really isn't going to be a review-ish piece , since Saz's excellent review and Kabitzin's insightful notes are both fathoms better than anything I could write. Nevertheless, there are a bunch of wierd wiggly bits that keep on bugging me, so here they are:

1. Is Dumbledore *really* dead?
This is probably the biggest stinker, in my opinion. Part of the problem comes from the fact that death hasn't really been treated as an endgame situation in previous titles -- for instance, Buckbeak was beheaded previously, but was rescued using the time-turner (Book 3), while Harry's dead mother/father gave Harry pertinent battle advice at the end of Book 4. Similarly, given that Hogwarts is filled with ghosts (i.e. Nearly-Headless Sir Nick) and Voldemort keeps on coming back after getting beaten by Harry . . . I think it's likely that Dumbledore really isn't dead.

Is this a bad thing? In my opinion, definitely -- the first thing that springs to mind is Dragonball Z (sorry -_-), where resurrection was used so recklessly that death really wasn't a 'bad thing' anymore. The only good/non-anti-climatic resurrection example I've seen is LOTR's Gandalf, when he came back transfigured as Gandalf the White. Having said this, I don't think resurrection would be feasible for Dumbledore, since he lacks Gandalf's panache and strong persona.

2. Why did Dumbledore die so easily?
Another troubling question -- here's what Saz writes:

What I didn't like about Dumbledore's death was the fact he was pleading with Snape before he kills him. Somehow, I had always imagined that Dumbledore would go out fighting if he should go out at all. This end . . . barely able to stand and begging for his life, is not what I had envisioned for him.

Dumbledore has *always* been portrayed as the only wizard that Voldemort was afraid of, so it's plain weird to see him taken down by Snape. Given that Snape has been knocked unconscious by Harry ever since book 3 (during the rescue of Sirius), it's galling to imagine that such a low-level individual would be able to murder the greatest wizard of all time.

3. Is Snape really evil?
This exact question came up in an interesting interview w/ Rowling, but I think it's worth discussing nevertheless. Even though Snape killed Dumbledore in this book, I'm guessing that Snape will try to help Harry in the next book, but die in an unbelievably angsty way. I mean, come on, you can't just discard six books' worth of accumulated character development (^^). Ditto Wormtail.

4. What's with the Half-Blood Prince?
I was talking about this with J., who said "Just because it's a red herring doesn't mean it's good". And of course she's right -- although the Half-Blood Prince wasn't who I thought it was, it didn't turn out to be important.

5. What happened to the Quiddich and the funny bits?
Although it's rather entertaining to see Ron sucking face with a totally undeveloped character for half the book, the whole personal-problems-issue seems pretty tedious after reading about it in every other paragraph. From Saz:

It was very amusing to read about Harry's "little monster" that would often rear its head when Harry saw Ginny with her then boyfriend, Dean Thomas.

*snicker*

6. Malfoy is cool now.
And so he is -- not to cheer for the underdog, but Malfoy seems much more driven than Harry in this book -- he has the guts to try to take on *Dumbledore*, and shows his tenacity much more convincingly than the main protagonist. He's never been much of an equal to Harry in the previous books, but hopefully he'll power up in the final book.

*** END SPOILERS ****

Anyway, just my thoughts -- Rowling still has a wicked writing style, so her books are always a pleasure to read, but I dunno -- perhaps it's just a byproduct of the sixth book, but the forces of good seem way more sissy than the dark side.

PS: Quite old, but Saturday Night Live's Harry Potter skit is as classic as always ~_~