the unattainable goal of Hermione Granger

harrypotterconfessions:

So, first, some perspective. I was asked to post this during a group discussion in which I brought it up. We were discussing character integrity and how it is the one thing Jo asked the filmmakers to maintain when she signed it over to them before and after chamber of secrets, and my sides opinion was that they didn’t do that with a multitude of characters. And I mentioned this podcast and how Melissa hit the main problem with Hermione. So here it is, I’m sure it’s online somewhere else but I couldn’t find a transcript so I had to do it myself Dx It’s kinda long so half of it, and the source, is under the cut. Have fun discussing!

“Okay, okay, I’m going to tell you what Hermione sees in Ron. A trio is a balancing act, right? They’re equalizers of each other. Harry’s like the action, Hermione’s the brains, Ron’s the heart. Hermione has been assassinated in these movies, and I mean that genuinely; by giving her every single positive character trait that Ron has, they have assassinated her character in the movies. She’s been harmed by being made to be less human, because everything good Ron has, she’s been given. So, for instance: 

• “If you want to kill Harry, you’re going to have to kill me too” -Ron; leg is broken, he’s in pain, gets up and stands in front of Harry and says this. Who gets that line in the movie? Hermione. 
• “Fear of a name increases the fear of the thing itself.” Hermione doesn’t say Voldemort’s name until well into the books. that’s Dumbledore’s line. When does Hermione say it in the movies? Beginning of Movie 2.
• When the Devil’s Snare is curling itself around everybody, Hermione panics, and Ron is the one who keeps his head and says “Are you a witch or not?” In the movie, everybody else panics and Hermione keeps her head and does the biggest, brightest flare of sunlight spell there ever was.

So, Hermione—all her flaws were shaved away in the films. And that sounds like you’re making a kick-ass, amazing character, and what you’re doing is dehumanizing her. And it pisses me off, it really does. In the books, they balance each other out, because where Hermione gets frazzled and maybe her rationality overtakes some of her instinct, Ron has that to back it up; Ron has a kind of emotional grounding that can keep Hermione’s hyper-rationalness in check. 

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