Spoilers galore follow. You were warned.
It's simple: just don't read this entry if you haven't read Half-Blood Prince yet. You'll regret it.
I've always been a Snape fangirl. I had my little fansite for a while. Twelve-year-old Malfoy fangirls with a crush on Tom Felton called him greasy and unwashed, but I, always inclined to distrust the third person-sympathetic narration, defended him as having had a difficult childhood. He may have been unnecessarily cruel to Harry, but James Potter was a real asshole to him. Yes, he's the adult; he shouldn't be petty, but he's human.
And who can resist him whipping out his badass dark mark tat in Goblet of Fire? Not this girl, fo' sho'.
And then Alan Rickman played him in the films, and my undying love was cemented.
Until J.Ro, bitch!queen, comes along and has him AK Dumbledore!
WHYYYYYYYYYYY?????????///!!!!!!11
WHYYYYYYYY??!?~?~?!?/1//111
I mean, everyone knew Dumbledore was going. This is the character responsible for "Death is but the next great adventure, Harry." And Richard Harris died, so if that's not an omen, what is? And yes, we've all seen Star Wars. Black-clad Vader has to kill beardy, robey Obi-Wan, because heroes have to save the day without aged mentor dependence. That's the way they roll.
And then we got to the end of chapter twenty-five, and I knew that motherfucker was going to die in the very near future. Something about "If I tell you to leave me and save yourself, you will do as I tell you?" gave me a strong sense of impending doom.
And then there's my mom, who, when I eagerly share with her that I think Snape is the Half-Blood Prince [which I felt certain of by the end of chapter nine. I know my Snape, let me tell you.], asks me if I think Snape is really on the good side, citing Dumbledore's "when I fuck up, I really fuck up" quote. And I refused to believe it, because I had embraced Snape's role as double agent with heart of gold. That unbreakable vow in the beginning is just to fool you into thinking Snape's bad, along the lines of obnoxious Harry's "SNAPE'S TRYING TO STEAL THE PHILOSPHER'S STONE" whinging circa book 1.
Alas, alas. Unless Jo has some Imperius Curse or other trick up her sleeve [please?], my heart is ripped out and split in twain. I knew Snape finally getting the DADA job was bad news. [I refused to believe he wanted it for quite a while; we only heard it from Percy, after all.] She probably just needed to keep with the stupid EVAR SINCE I SAID NO TO VOLDIE, NO1 SEEMS TO BE ABLE TO HOLD DOWN THIS JOB bullshit, so decided to backtrack on all of Snape's repentance.
Maybe I've read too much Slytherin Rising, but I believe it's nothing less than character assassination.
He just wanted to be loved!
But yeah, other, less heart-broken thoughts on Book 6:
Harry, however, had never been less interested in Quidditch; he was rapidly becoming obsessed with Draco Malfoy. Still checking the Marauder's Map whenever he got a chance, he sometimes made detours to wherever Malfoy happened to be.
I'm crushed. Absolutely. I still have a part of me that wants to believe Snape isn't totally fucked up at this point, but alas. He meant that Avada Kedavra. He had to. Or it wouldn't work, right? Right?!
I giggled terribly when Draco stupefied Harry and had much of teh thoughts that drifted askew with the room of requirement.
I'm thinking it's possible -- though I never liked Snape and now I HATE him -- that it was just because of the Unbreakable Vow, which he may have made just because he didn't want "Bella" to rat him out. And because Draco couldn't do it, he had to, and perhaps that's what the look of revulsion was all about.
Though who the fuck am I kidding. He's totally an evil son of a fuck. And I hope he dies. He scares me more than Voldemort. I hate him almost as much as I hate Umbridge.
R.A.B. = Regulus A. Black, I think.
Voldemort's backstory = FUCKING GREAT. It creeped me out beyond words. I love the Gaunts; they are just so damn weird. And Marope . . . God. I don't even know what to say about her.
The fact that Tom Riddle led two kids to a cave to fuck with them is so creepy that I can hardly stand it.
Best line of the book: "I need to know what Draco Malfoy is doing inside you." What the fuck?
Worst scene in the book: The fucking hospital scene at the end, after Dumbledore dies, when instead of talking about, you know, the world ending and shit, Bill and Fleur are like "LOL WE R IN LOVE" and Mrs. Weasley's like "awwww lol" and then Tonks is like "I LOVE YOU REMUS," and he's like "I AM TOO OLD FOR YOU AND ALSO A LYCANTHROPE!" and she's like "OUR LOVE IS TOO PURE TO BE FOILED BY SUCH A THING!" and I vomited. I mean what in the SHIT.
Also, H/G + R/Hr makes me chunder all night long. It's just disgusting. Ron and Hermione don't even get along. They're so incompatible. Sure, the bickering and whatnot may indicate a crush when you're, you know, FIVE, but it's just ridiculous. And I liked Ginny more before she became a vapid, shallow, promiscuous slattern.
Dumbledore's funeral was the most depressing thing ever. I kept thinking he was going to pop up and be like "J/K!"
Malfoy is a douche.
Snape is a douche.
It makes me uncomfortable when Harry tries to use an Unforgivable Curse. He tried to Crucio Bellatrix in OotP, and now Snape. It just doesn't suit him. Which is obvious since they were both like "lol don't EVEN."
Luna is my wife.
I'm not sure how JKR can invent this Cormac chap. If he's a seventh year, it seems as though he'd have had to be mentioned at some point, especially since he's EVERYWHERE now. It's like how Luna is the weirdest girl in school but they just didn't notice her for FOUR YEARS.
Also, Harry's lust for Ginny would've been more acceptable if there had been even a moderate indication of it prior to the moment halfway through the book when the mythological sea serpent threatens to leap out of Harry's chest and strangle Dean Thomas. It came from NOWHERE.
I'm disgusted. But I loved it anyway. Because of the backstory and the last several chapters (the hospital scene notwithstanding).
Also, Chapter Two = SEX. It's just so cool. I have a thing for Bellatrix, see.
I'll shut up now, for real.
Oh, but Harry is totally a Horcrux. Book 7 will be so painfully depressing.
Oh, and Slughorn is a greasy motherfucker.
Too many "oh"s. D:
More like Harry's a h0r!!!111one Snapz.
Also, I enjoy yr description of Harry's mythological sea serpent. Glad I'm not the only one who was kind of WEIRDED OUT A LITTLE by that.
And did anyone notice when Slughorn called Ron "Rupert"? I wondered if that was a nod to the Grint variety.
Zuerst, I was very angry about the Snape issue after years of waiting for him to be shown as a hero somehow. Bogus.
And I didn't like the lack of detail. And the Ginny/Harry thing, which was extra bogus. She didn't even talk about them together at all!
The whole thing just seemed kind of thin to me.
What else- oh, when I read that Harry was captain of the Quidditch team, I thought I'd be in for some interesting stuff, but nope. And that Mclaggen character was more than a little flat.
But I'm not going to criticize anymore, because obviously I tore through it and liked it. It just felt like a bridge more than a complete story.
Sheesh Kate... Tom Riddle is a MAJOR hottie... I mean who CAN resist Christian Coulson, plus he's an English major and Cambridge which means he can write tons of "luuuuurrrely" poetry for me :0).
Wow! Your posters are amazing! Good call about RAB. And about Harry being a horacrux.
But Kate, don't be too broken hearted. Tom has a bunch of theories about Snape and Dumbledore cooking it up together. Very plausible!
DON'T DESPAIR! I think there's more to Snape and Dumbledore then appears. Knowing what a self-sacrificng lot Harry and Albus can be, I'd be willing to bet a little bit on Snape following orders he really didn't want to. Remember that argument that Dumbledore and Snape had, which Hagrid presumed was about 'over-working'? As for RAB, it could be Regulus Black, Sirius's little brother although I need to know his middle name before I can say for certain. Oops, just noticed that mariebernadette already put that. Ah well, it works though!