stunt_muppet

1. Killing off Hagrid would have seemed, to me, like shooting some poor first-year in the face (or, to use the old example, AK-ing a baby beagle). He's just so sincere and well-intentioned and relatively innocent that it would have been mean-spirited to kill him.

3. "How do you spell 'Slughorn is a paedophile?'" A ha ha ha ha. Thank you for pointing me to that one.

4.a. I must go find these interviews. And it would have made more sense if Teddy died, as a contrast to "the boy who lived".

Still, I don't agree with Rowling here; she killed off enough people to make her point, and I don't think the "echo" effect was necessary. From where I'm sitting, Teddy serves no narrative purpose except to keep Tonks and Lupin out of the way. *grumble*

7. Well, she was making me uncomfortable, anyway.

13. I like his precisely because he started out so clumsy and bumbling. He's grown the most out of almost every character except The Trio, and I enjoyed watching him evolve.

That said, it would have been nice if Ginny was given a more prominent role. She felt like an afterthought in this book.