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Here's something difficult to discuss on this board...the climax. How did it work for you? Did the story build to the climax well? Was the climax climactic enough (for lack of a better word) or did it fall flat?
Posts: 3567 | Registered: May 2003
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posted
Assuming this is referring to the final big scene where Harry actually gets the Stone... in a word, no. It didn't work for me. One of the few parts of the book that didn't. I was quite frankly disgusted by the heavy-handed, "villain tells all" exposition--reminded me of Scooby Doo.
Personally, I think Rowling could have left some of those details for readers to figure out (or forget about) themselves, and used a combination of Harry figuring things out himself in addition to some dialogue instead of doing it the way she did. Would have reduced the cheese factor.
For the plot itself, the build to the climax and the nature of the climax was fine... excellent, in fact. I just thought the execution of the scene was awful.
[This message has been edited by AeroB1033 (edited April 26, 2004).]
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I tend to agree with that. I thought that the climax was clichéd, and such a pity, because Rowling had been doing a nice work of misdirection during the course of the book. But the villain telling all could really have been cut.
Posts: 121 | Registered: May 2002
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posted
I think this is the point where everyone should remember that it was written for children, or young adults. Go talk to a teenager...after the fiftieth "like", and a few hundred "that's cool"'s, I think you may realize they might need someone to lay it out for them.
So I can easily overlook that just because the intended audience is not me. The fact that she managed to keep most people from realizing who the real bad guy was for the majority of the book worked for me.
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I have to tell you, I was impressed to find out it was Quirell...she never even made it seem like anyone but Snape was a real consideration. The kids knwe, and the plot was, in my mind, to get the adults to realize the truth.
As for the climax itself, I found that this was one of the few things the movie captured bettter than the book....not the leadup, just the scene with the mirror and Valdemort. When Valdemort offers Harry the power to bring his parents back to life I saw, more than the book ever showed, why anyone would be tempted to go to the dark side. Heck, Star Wars never made me figure that one out.
But in general, I wasn't all that bothered by the spelling out of the villian's plot. I guess I thought it was just YA stuff and this is what happens in a YA book. Heck, it just happened in an adult book Ir ead. (OK, but it bothered me there, so I've got a double standard.) But then again, maybe one of the reasons I liiked the book so much was the nice, simple, easy to understand nature of everything. It was all spell out for you.
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Well, see, I do understand that it was written for children. But even still, I think there could have been less cheesy ways of handling it. "It was then that Harry realized..." instead of everything coming out in dialogue. Leaving some of those little details out, because honestly, even kids don't need them to believe the ending.
And kids are smarter than you think, anyway. Their minds often work in ways that seem strange to us "sensible adults", but sometimes they'll shock you by drawing a conclusion that someone ten years older might've missed.
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For me, I agree with Aero. The "climax" if you will, although perhaps more realistic in a ... surreal way (don't ask), the idea that in the end the kids could have done nothing, and never discovered anything, and everything would have been fine ... is, well, anti-climatic.
All of this drama, save the world hype and then suddenly, it didn't really mean anything.
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Ahhh, that part didn't bother me, and we don't *know* that Harry didn't accomplish anything. Valdemort was right there and maybe he could have figured out a way to get the stone out?
Besides, purposeful or not, it was a great adventure with quite a climax. You had a sense that, more than having a purpose in its own right, it was setting Harry up for future adventures. It's like he earned experience points.
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I liked the threads that led into the climax: Harry's discovering of the Mirror of Erised, and seeing his parents for the first time, knowing that Voldemort was so weak he was barely managing to inhabit Quirrel with the help of unicorn blood, the power of his mother's love making his skin anathema to Voldemort, so many things that I was fine with the climax as a reader. Now, reading other's comments, I recognize some of the issues - I wonder if they will bug me when I read it again? I too like how stuff is laid out for the next time, and she just keeps creating layers/depth to the story.
I think the things that come after work too - Harry learns Flamel and his wife must sacrifice their own lives to thwart Voldemort, Hagrid gives him the photo album, etc. I guess I just enjoyed the book, and didn't find anything about the climax that rained on my parade!
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Well I read it, and didn't complain until afterward so I probably shouldn't complain at all. The book was interesting and the climax wasn't terrible, simply -- not what it could have been.
I must confess though, the worst point in the story, for me, was when he first arrived at Hogwarts. I mean after the sorting and into tehr eal school, classes and such. Random staircases flying about (which were portrayed stupidly in the movie) and all kinds of "weird" things, I actually set the book aside out of boredom and disinterest for a while. The only time I have done that in this series though.
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