Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire

I notice that reading Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire over again, you get to experience all the things that you forgot about, seeing as the movie left them out. Goblet of Fire was the first incredibly long Harry Potter book. And up until now the movies tried to include most of the scenes and there only a few expendable bits of classroom life that were dropped from the original version. However, due to Goblet’s incredible jump in length, much of what we see in the book has been left out of the movie, and as I go through it this time I am delighted to remember things that I had read so long ago, most notably my favorite scene of the entire book, which of course was not in the movie.

Harry gets his foot stuck in a trick step on a staircase, and drops his screaming egg, which brings Filch and his cat, Snape, and Moody, all to the foot of the staircase arguing over the egg and the Marauder’s Map. I remember being on the edge of my seat when I read through it the first time and this time I read through with a delightful Snape-is-awesome grin on my face. Also gone is the ever important emerging Percy storyline, where in later books he betrays the Weasley family, which I had also forgotten due to its non-existence in the movies. Also missing is Hermione’s revenge of Rita Skeeter! Such a payoff, I love it!

What is interesting about JK is how often she hands us the ending of the book on a silver platter and how often it was missed upon first reading. It was a surprise to me when I first read that Moody was in fact the villain and Voldemort’s servant, but it is just silly how often it comes up, now that I know it and can look for it everywhere, reminding us that Moody was attacked the day before school, and how he emerges at Hogwarts in a burst of lightning, and how “someone” is brewing Polyjuice Potion and how he’s actually “Crouch” on the Maruader’s Map and on and on. But of course, being as that it is still considered a children’s book, when I was younger reading it I didn’t suspect.

Nick brought up an interesting issue when it came to the whole Christmas holidays….obviously these wizards are celebrating Christmas just like normal British kids…but wait a minute…don’t forget the Christ in Christmas….do wizards believe in that? Because certainly they wouldn’t believe from the ancient stories that Jesus was performing miracles, and that he would just in fact be a wizard that is dangerously showing off his magic in front of muggles. And in that case, wouldn’t they shun a celebration of a man who almost blew their cover?

Har har har.