S01E29 — Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix
SPOILER ALERT: This episode and transcript below contains major spoilers for Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
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Featuring hosts Timothy Haynes, Donna Haynes, Rebekah Edwards, and T. Josiah Haynes.
It’s Dad’s favorite book!
Just kidding, Professor Umbridge makes him lose all sense of decency.
Learn our thoughts on Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix, how it compares to the film, and whether or not we believe the book is superior.
Listen to the other episodes in our Harry Potter series:
- Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone
- Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets
- Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
- Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire
- Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince
- Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows
Final Verdicts
If you haven’t listened to the episode yet, we recommend waiting to read our verdicts. (But you’re probably grown, so do what you want!)
The book delivers a deeply emotional and layered story, with rich character development, subplots, and pivotal backstory. The movie trims much of the nuance, focusing on action, Umbridge’s tyranny, and the climactic showdown, sacrificing depth for pacing.
Tim: The book is better
Donna: The book is better
Rebekah: The book is better
Josiah: The movie is better
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Full Episode Transcript
Prefer reading? Check out the full episode transcript below. It’s AI-generated from our audio, and if we’re being honest… no one sat to read the entire thing for accuracy. (After all, we were there the whole time.) 😉 We’re sorry in advance for any typos or transcription errors.
[00:00:00] Rebekah: Hey, welcome to the book is better podcast. We are a family of four reviewing a book to film adaptations. This is a clean podcast, meaning we do not use Swear words. We don’t say the naughties. However, uh, I will say that while there’s no cussies, this episode gets pretty dark. So this is not one I would probably listen to with, uh, the littlest kiddos around, if I may be so bold, just in case.
You know, unless they’ve read this book in, in that case, if you’d let them read it, I guess you can let them listen to this. Uh, we do have a discord server. If you are interested in chatting with us, asking questions for us to answer on episodes or just want to know more about the podcast, feel free to join that.
It’s free. There is a link in the episode description. Now we are going to spoil yet again, the entire Harry Potter universe. Sort of. We probably aren’t going to get into Fantastic Beasts or Harry Potter and the Cursed Child. Um, but we will most definitely talk about things that spoil not only this book and film, but the additional sixth and seventh book and sixth, seventh and eighth films.
So if you don’t want spoilers, go read slash watch before you listen to this. All right. As we introduce ourselves, today’s fun fact is. If you were a government official with immunity against criminal prosecution, like Dolores Umbridge, what would you do with that freedom? Now, my name is Rebecca Edwards. I don’t know why I said my last name there.
Is that a different vibe? Um, I’m the sister slash daughter of the pod and I’m starting today off with a different vibe. My voice is gone. We’re just like, we’re, we’re hammer hammering this out. It’s an exciting day, sort of. It’s a weird day, but a good one. Uh, what would I do if I was immune to criminal prosecution?
With my government job, um, I would probably listen in on people’s private conversations. Uh, like I would just like be the NSA and, and do that. I know that we don’t like to acknowledge that that happens sometimes, but like, it’s a thing. And I would just like want to know, but more like not because I want to know about plots more because I want to know if people really like me, like if they’re lying about that or if they’re telling the truth when they say they like me, so it’s definitely selfishly motivated.
That’s
[00:02:17] Josiah: actually the reason Dick Cheney was also listening to our phone calls.
[00:02:23] Rebekah: He wanted to make sure that they really liked him.
[00:02:27] Josiah: How much are they talking about me shooting that guy? A lot is the answer to that question. I’m T. Josiah Haynes and my address is 29
[00:02:39] Rebekah: I want to say that it was funny. Mom doxed her location sort of in, uh, episode two of our show.
Or sorry, episode three of our Summer of Potter, and my sweet husband looks at me, he goes, um, do I need to take that out? And I said, oh, it was pretty nonspecific. Also who’s listening to this podcast and trying to find us? I don’t, I don’t think that that’s really a concern right now.
[00:03:01] Josiah: You gotta have a, you gotta plan for the future though.
[00:03:04] Rebekah: You know what? If one of us goes into office in the future, before we come public with our campaign, I will make sure this episode is taken down. How about that?
[00:03:14] Josiah: Probably, yeah. Probably just take Doc Thing out for future reference. Mom could be a public official. Anyway. She could. I’m the brother son of this podcast cartel.
And if I had immunity as a government official, I would unilaterally pass executive order to weaken the centralized government and eliminate future executive orders.
[00:03:47] Donna: Uh, I’m Donna. I’m the wife. And mom of this cadre, cadre, we are
[00:03:56] Rebekah: eventually going
[00:03:58] Donna: to run out of words, but
[00:03:59] Rebekah: for now, there’s lots of words in the
[00:04:02] Tim: English language.
[00:04:04] Donna: So if I were a government official with immunity against criminal prosecution, what would you do with that? What would I do? I would. Drive for world peace and help old people because all the answers I came up
[00:04:25] Rebekah: with,
[00:04:27] Donna: because all the other answers I came up with were terrible and would never be allowed.
April 21st
[00:04:34] Josiah: is the perfect day, April
[00:04:37] Rebekah: 24th, not too hot and not too cold.
[00:04:42] Josiah: She was wrong on April 21st.
[00:04:46] Tim: Well, uh, I am Tim. I am the dad NPC of Rebecca’s life. Exactly,
[00:04:54] Rebekah: which is all that matters.
[00:04:56] Tim: I, um, if I could, if I had that immunity, I think I would spend all of my time looking for people who were misusing their power and bringing them, uh, Bringing them to justice.
[00:05:09] Rebekah: So you would be government Batman?
[00:05:11] Tim: I guess.
I don’t think I’d look as good in that suit.
[00:05:16] Rebekah: I assume you mean bring them to justice in that sort of way. Yes, not team up with them. Bring them to justice.
[00:05:24] Donna: I would bring them to just the White House and they would be with me. All
[00:05:30] Rebekah: right, well, we’ve got a ton to cover. Mom, why don’t you tell us a plot summary of Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix?
Oh, this was a
[00:05:40] Donna: crazy one for me for sure. So, Book 5 of the Harry Potter series opens with Harry having spent the summer to this point watching for news of Lord Voldemort’s return with zero communication from his friends or even his godfather. As the hero of our series saves his cousin Dudley from an unexpected Dementor attack, But he’s nearly expelled from school and charged of a criminal offense in return.
Ugh. The Order of the Phoenix, an organization of Dumbledore’s creation, is back in full swing after the return of Voldemort. But the Ministry and most of the magical world denies this is the case, attempting to discredit both Dumbledore and Harry. This year, Dolores Umbridge, formerly the Senior Undersecretary to the Minister of Magic, is posted as a Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher.
She spends the year campaigning against most of the students and attempting to wrest control of the school in favor of the ministry. Meanwhile, Harry experiences unwelcome connection to Voldemort. Seeing visions through the Dark Lord’s eyes and experiencing an emotional rollercoaster of a year which he was often unable to control.
To combat the Ministry’s attempted takeover of Hogwarts, our main trio creates Dumbledore’s Army, a secret club in which Harry teaches his classmates how to defend themselves against magical attack. At the end of the school year, and after the, the DA has been found out, and Dumbledore removed his headmaster, Harry’s final vision from Voldemort leads him to take a small team of DA members to the Ministry of Magic in an attempt to save his godfather.
Sadly, Sirius is killed, although only during his rescue attempt. Cornelius Fudge learns that Voldemort has returned. And Harry finds out that a prophecy made shortly after his birth has marked him, in the eyes of the dark, in the eyes of the Dark Lord, at least, as the one who must kill or be killed by he who must not be named.
Genuinely could not have made
[00:08:02] Rebekah: that any shorter, and it was so long.
[00:08:04] Donna: This
[00:08:05] Tim: book is so long! It is. Well, uh, the screen, this screenplay was written by Michael Goldenberg. Uh, it was the only one in the series that was not written by Steve Kloves. Uh, that may explain a lot. And that may also explain why the movie is very, very different from the book.
[00:08:28] Rebekah: So one thing that I noticed as I was watching yesterday and confirmed as we were looking up information about this book and film, and it upsets me because Well, because so much of what’s left out is, I wish it was not left out, but for some reason, this book, which you can’t see me audio podcast listeners, but I’m physically holding up the book.
It is three inches thick. Like it is so big. And for some reason, Order is not only the longest book, it is the second shortest book Movie, but Chamber of Secrets, which is the second shortest book, is the longest movie. Make it make sense, people. You could have spent 40 or 50 more minutes making this a better movie, but no, we could not do that.
We had to make it this movie, which is fine, and I like the movie. For the fact that it’s a Harry Potter movie, but I really like this book, and I don’t like what Anyway, let’s get started with changes to the plot and timeline.
[00:09:28] Tim: Well, this is one of those things that might have been added to the film. Um, the film skips over the intro in the book.
Where Harry listens to the news from outside the window, including him hearing a crack from someone apparating. Uh, it jumps right into Dudley and Harry in the park. Although the film shows Harry encountering D Dudley with his friends, rather than alone, as in the book. And the sky going dark in front of everyone at the park.
Interesting change. I will
[00:09:58] Rebekah: begrudgingly admit that I actually think that this was well done for a transition, uh, from book to film. I thought that the book was great, but I think the way they did it was very effective.
[00:10:12] Tim: I would like to have seen, I would like to have seen in the film some of, some of that intro portion, at least.
[00:10:18] Rebekah: Yeah, I did. I will say I didn’t like, I liked in the book that he was trying to hear the news and trying to hear what was going on and that could have been added to the film where he’s like, Voldemort’s back. What’s going on? I want to know the news. I want to know the news because that part was kind of definitely downplayed, um, in, in the film quite a bit.
So also after Harry saves Dudley in the film, the Dursley, In the film, the Dursleys see Harry and Dudley come back. They hear Harry get a howler from the ministry about being expelled, and then they just like leave to take Dudley to the hospital, and you see Vernon embarrassingly like signaling to Mrs.
Fig across the street, he’s not feeling very well. And then shortly thereafter, the order members come to the house, and they come to get Harry. In the book, there are so many more letters, there’s several howlers that come through. They explain Harry’s expelled. His wand is going to be confiscated. Now he’s no longer expelled.
Dumbledore’s at the ministry. They’ll determine his expulsion at a hearing. Don’t leave the house no matter what. So he gets like letter after letter after letter and they still don’t give him legitimate information. So at this point in the book, Harry’s like confined to his room for a few days and he writes to Hermione, Ron and Sirius and tells, uh, sorry, tells Hedwig not to come back until she gets good long answers, which we find out later.
leads her to like, heck, Ron and Hermione, and he kind of feels a little bit bad for it. That would have been fun to see. The Dursleys, yeah, it would have been fun to see. The Dursleys leave for a fake competition when the members of the Order’s Uh, when the members of the Order come to gather Harry. Um, one thing that I don’t like that was left out is that one of the howlers, we don’t know until the end of the film, but it’s from Dumbledore, and it says, Remember my last petunia?
And Harry tries to demand she say, like, who it’s from, but she won’t tell him. And, uh, it’s just kind of a, it wraps a lot of that back at the end of the book. And, uh,
[00:12:20] Donna: yeah, I missed a lot of that. It also significantly, for me, it also significantly develops her character to more than just hating Harry. But hearing that, and it gives you the sense of, Yeah, she hated her sister, but there was still some kind of familial sentiment there.
So I did hate for them to leave that because that could have been a really cool, creepy, few second thing where the howler flew in. Um, but then they, they skipped the thing at the end. So yeah. When Harry first arrives at Grimald Place, he gets frustrated and has an outburst. His anger in the book is way more extensive and pronounced.
And this lays the foundation for how he spends a lot of the rest of the story upset. And part of this is because he’s picking up on Voldemort’s emotions. But in the film, he’s kind of mildly ignored, or in the film he seems mildly annoyed at best. And yeah, he’s frustrated about his friends, and he doesn’t know for quite some time that he’s getting these scenes into Voldemort’s head, or that he’s picking up on emotions like that.
Um, I liked these exchanges in the book. even though they’re, you know, they’re confrontations or whatever. But I like them where Harry would like take his frustration out on Ron and Hermione, mainly because in some of the situations Ron would actually stand up and speak up for himself. Because up to this point, you don’t hear a lot of pushback from Ron.
He’s like the dishrag friend. Oh, don’t get mad or don’t, you know, and his, his anger is, is touched on. But, and so I like, I like seeing Ron stand up for himself. Even really more with Hermione than Harry. He and Harry’s relationships. Yeah. Pretty cool.
[00:14:20] Rebekah: It was good. I think it was good character development because, like in the book, because in the third book in, or no, sorry, in the fourth book in film when he’s mad at Harry because he thinks he’s put his name in the goblet, like Ron’s anger is very like immature, and it’s just selfish and whatever, and so this was kind of, his character develops into someone who’s more like, Hey, wait.
This actually isn’t like the way that we’re going to be. This isn’t the relationship we’re going to have. And I liked that.
[00:14:46] Tim: I would have loved to seen these things in the film. More of this and less of Umbridge.
[00:14:53] Music: We
[00:14:53] Donna: know how you feel about Umbridge, Daddy. Well, we don’t know fully, I don’t think. I think we’re going to get more.
We haven’t really gotten there
[00:14:59] Josiah: yet. We haven’t. Well, speaking of a more minor antagonist, Percy betrays his family, Percy Weasley. In the film, it’s much more subtle. We just kind of see him hanging around Minister Fudge, but it’s not really explained explicitly, whereas in the book, it tells you what happens outright.
It’s very clear in how Percy betrayed his family by siding with the Ministry of Magic instead of believing Harry.
[00:15:27] Rebekah: I had a problem with this, although I talked about it with Josh and he’s like, It’s not a continuity error because it is shown on film. My only problem is it does feel like a little bit of a plot hole that we Visually do see Percy having betrayed them like he’s working for the ministry, he restrains Joe, he’s at the hearing and supporting Fudge and Umbridge, but it’s weird that no one in the Weasley family in the movie acknowledges that this would be like a big deal because their family is pretty close.
So I didn’t love that, like it was, I was glad that they at least showed it, but it was weird that they didn’t explain it at all. Or react
[00:16:05] Tim: to it? Well, that was the one way that they always seem to react in the book is, you know, the boys, the twins especially said, don’t say Percy’s name because mom always starts to cry and dad dad gets angry.
I could have done that once and kind of. Help that part along
[00:16:23] Donna: so in the chapter named the noble and most ancient house of black Which is omitted from the film But but in this chapter Harry Ron and Hermione helped clean out the black house with Jenny and Fred and George Um, they’re doing this to be of use to the order, which they found is pretty lame.
Uh, when they said they wanted to be of use, you know, they wanted to be involved in the big stuff. And, and their parents were like, Oh yeah, you wanted to help. This is how you can help, Blaves. Um, but we also learn more about Creature in this chapter and you see him skulking around and they use him. Um, So it’s not like they kept him out for CG purposes.
Creature’s already in the movie. Um, they can’t open an old locket, which is massive because it’s a huge easter egg. Um, but there’s several, they are plot irrelevant pieces in the chapter, as far as the whole serious, um, not serious black, but serious, serious word. The serious tone of the movie. Yeah, the tone of the movie.
Um, I think some of these additions, I think they could have lightened things up a little bit. Um, I love the one where there’s a telescope
[00:17:48] Rebekah: that, there’s a telescope that gives Hermione a black eye and she has to, like, she thinks she’s going to have to go to school with a black eye, which was kind of funny.
[00:17:55] Donna: Yeah, and there’s like, um, the, the doxies and of course, Weasley’s wizard, Weasley’s, they don’t really do a lot with it either, but the boys keep trying to get the doxies and stuff them in their pockets because they can use the venom and there’s just several things in there that, that knowing the movie was shorter.
makes it more frustrating that they didn’t add some of that stuff.
[00:18:19] Rebekah: Yeah, I was definitely thrown for a loop watching this the first time because I liked the book so much. So, after we see like a little tiny bit of, you know, the number 12 Grimald place, uh, Harry goes, To do his hearing. Um, I thought it was interesting because they knew about the location change for the hearing and whatever in advance, so they do change some of that stuff.
But after we go through that scene where he’s acquitted of all charges, fortunately, we immediately head straight to platform nine and three quarters in the book. There’s actually several days. And in the middle of that, we learn Ron and Hermione have been made prefects. As a reward for this, Ron gets a new broom, which is what allows him to try out for the Gryffindor Quidditch team.
And Mrs. Weasley has a breakdown when she goes to try and defeat a Boggart and then sees it take the form of her family members and Harry dead on the floor and she’s just caught crying and it’s just a really touching scene and you see what a, what a concerned mother that she is. That was so
[00:19:23] Donna: heartbreaking.
That whole scene in the book. That was tough. Was so tough.
[00:19:27] Tim: There is a listener question, uh, from Abby Lou Hu. Some people think the books have a continuity error in which Harry should have been able to see the Thestrals when returning to the train after the events of the third task. However, in the books, he does not see the Thestral until Order of the Phoenix.
Is this a continuity error, or did Harry just not notice Thestrals after the final task? I’ve always
[00:19:56] Rebekah: wondered about this.
[00:19:57] Tim: What do you think?
[00:19:58] Rebekah: This is a book error. It’s not even shown in the film, so it’s not a film problem.
[00:20:02] Donna: I mean, as far as what she knew, when she knew it, as she was writing. The author? Yeah, what, what Rowling knew, if you think about it that way, I can’t believe she’s writing four and puts this thing in there, and then it’s all published and gone, and then she writes five and goes, Oh, that’d be cool.
He could see the Thestrals. I mean, Does that sound right? Is that possible? Like, Josiah, you’ve written a book and published it. Have you been writing the next book and go, uh, this wasn’t really in that, and it could have tied, but I want it in this next one? I
[00:20:37] Josiah: mean, literally, yeah. She just made it up, and it was three years between books, it was already published, so she couldn’t change it.
I mean, true. The, the retcon I’ve heard. Is that Harry didn’t have time to process Cedric’s death at the end of Goblet of Fire. But in Order of the Phoenix, he had the whole summer to process it. Now I think that’s a little bit of a poopy answer, but That’s a stretch. That’s, that’s the best answer I hear.
[00:21:04] Rebekah: Yeah, my, my only confusion is that Um, she wrote them as horseless carriages from the beginning. And there is a part of me that’s like, like from the first book, and there is a part of me that’s like, I think you had a plan for what these might be or what they could become. And so it does seem a little weird to me.
But anyway, I do think it is this like continuity error in the books.
[00:21:25] Donna: So Hermione’s Campaign for Elvish rights is once again omitted from the films. Spew.
[00:21:36] Tim: The Society for the Protection of Elvish Rights.
[00:21:39] Donna: Yes. Elfish, by the way.
[00:21:41] Tim: Excuse my name. Elvish.
[00:21:43] Donna: Welfare, I think.
[00:21:44] Tim: Welfare.
[00:21:45] Donna: Welfare, yes. It continues in the fifth book, but the film, yeah, same thing.
They, they don’t use this at all, but in the book, it is funny, even though I’m not a huge fan of the spew arc. Um, but in the book, she leaves out clothes for the elves in the Gryffindor common room every night, like, that she can possibly get stuff knitted. And so she keeps thinking when she comes in the next day, they’re not there and she’s all excited.
They’re, Oh, they’re all going to realize they’re free. She set them free. I’ve set them free. And so one night late, late in the common room, Harry’s sitting there by himself and Dobby comes in and he’s starting to clean up the common room. Harry says something about the clothes and Dobby’s like, well, Well, Harry Potter.
[00:22:36] Tim: That’s why he’s wearing so many of the pieces. She’s the
[00:22:39] Donna: only one who will clean the common room now. They all hate her. Like, I would, I can just think of them going She’s
[00:22:48] Rebekah: like campaigning against slavery and they’re like No, now the one of us who’s not a slave, like, he has to do so much more
[00:22:56] Donna: work. He has to do so much work.
And I thought that was so funny because I could just imagine the little house elves in the kitchen going, If we could just decide which of these is her plates, we could spit in her food. But, you know, I have to say, even though I said that that story arc is not one of my favorites or whatever, I think it’s cool.
I think it’s cool because one of the things that some people criticize Rowling for and other people herald her for is the way she, she gets into a lot of political and social issues in these books. And this thing about the way non human or half human, whatever you want to call them, however they term them, the way they’re treated by the wizarding world.
Is she I mean, honestly, she could have left a lot of that kind of in the background and not made a big deal about it, but she doesn’t mess around when she talks about these. And I think it’s interesting that she takes the risk to explore it, whether you like it or not like it. And you can either find everybody gets their opinion there.
[00:24:03] Josiah: Wittich, I’m glad it’s gone from this movie, blah. They omitted it from the film altogether in the book. Ron actually joins the Gryffindor team. He proves to be a decent but unreliable player. And the Slytherins write a catchy song, Weasley is our king, which I think you heard a rendition of that. Earlier in this episode, it’s a ironic torture Ron during the matches, actually, when Draco Malfoy bad mouths, the Weasleys and the Potters, Harry, Fred and George attack Draco and they all get lifelong banned from Quidditch.
Life long
[00:24:46] Rebekah: ban in
[00:24:47] Josiah: air
[00:24:47] Tim: quotes. So there won’t be any quidditch in any of the subsequent books or films and all the readers go. Yeah Well in this book Ron first finds out about Harry’s detention torture when he’s sneaking back in from flying practice In the film, both Ron and Hermiote see his hand and encourage him to tell someone about these detentions while sitting in the common room one evening.
Harry refuses, but in a subsequent scene, McGonagall seems to question her disciplinary practices, those of, um, Umbridge. Suggesting that someone else has reported her black quill use. Uh, the scene with McGonagall doesn’t happen in the film. This leads into a comical montage in which many educational decrees are posted, and Dolores struts about the school, stopping students from various forms of rule breaking and observing teachers during their classes.
A real killjoy.
[00:25:51] Rebekah: I really actually liked the montage scene.
[00:25:54] Tim: Oh, I prefer the montage over the, uh, over the continual use of her speaking and all that kind of stuff.
[00:26:01] Donna: So, baby listeners, let’s just say up front, and we’ve probably mentioned this in other, I’m sure we have actually in other podcasts, Tim has an issue with torture.
We can watch action adventure films. You see bad guys get beat up and the good guys get beat on some, but he really struggles when it just becomes this gratuitous torture situation. And honestly, in the book, she went there, like, she was full on, I get it, it was over and over in the book. Yeah, she was full on trying to end him.
I mean, it, it, it was interesting just how evil. She that she was, I mean, it was, I think,
[00:26:42] Tim: I think the film, however, chose not to use a lot of the other things from the book that would have filled out characters and made the movie more well rounded and chose that this was the only really important thing happening in the story, and it just, it just gets old,
[00:27:03] Donna: but I did like the little piece there were Fred and George were sitting there with Nigel.
Yeah. And he was real sad, and they were kind of encouraging him. That’s not in The Way Later. Isn’t that in the montage, where she’s going around correcting everyone? No, that’s at the end. So sorry, I apologize.
[00:27:19] Rebekah: I know it’s at the end, because I just watched that part of the movie this morning.
[00:27:22] Donna: But I, anyway.
That was the part I was finishing. But I did like that that was in the, even in the film, even. I did like that, because, You see that Fred and George are cut ups and crazy and they’re hard on Ron and all those things but at the same time you see that they did have some heart for this little kid and I thought that was kind of a cool little piece of encouragement.
So speaking
[00:27:45] Rebekah: of Dolores takeover, while they play a large role in the book, there’s actually only seven educational decrees passed. During the course of this book, there are something like there’s 30 ish total, but a lot of them were passed and they were kind of just like laws on the books previously. Um, in the film, the ministry creates at least a hundred of these.
So the book or the film uses these to be kind of like an ongoing joke of like boys and girls must be at least, eight inches apart. And like, She there’s like a decree for every single rule that Umbridge puts into place,
[00:28:23] Tim: one of the show, one of McGonagall’s lines, this relates to it. One of McGonagall’s lines in the book, when Dolores is correcting her for not banning Harry and the twins from, uh, Um, McGonagall’s response, she says there’s another educational decree just passed this morning and she said, what, another one?
That just showed the frustration in the book.
[00:28:46] Rebekah: No,
[00:28:47] Tim: it’s another
[00:28:47] Rebekah: one. There are seven of these made during the course of Order of the Phoenix. So I thought as a fun little mini game mid episode, just to see if you guys test your trivia knowledge. What are the seven educational decrees that Umbridge gets pushed through in Order of the Phoenix?
Yes. In the book
[00:29:06] Josiah: is one of them that you’re not allowed to poop in the hallway and disapparate away the evidence
[00:29:11] Rebekah: That is not one of them. Although if that was happening, I Uh would hope That it stops
[00:29:20] Josiah: jk. Rowling tweeted years ago that that’s how wizards at hogwarts did it before indoor plumbing. Oh dear.
[00:29:30] Tim: What?
[00:29:31] Rebekah: Why?
[00:29:32] Tim: No. I think one of the educational decrees would have been, uh, that the High Inquisitor have the right to, uh, to sack teachers.
[00:29:42] Rebekah: It is decree number 23, which is the second one listed in the book, which creates the position of Hogwarts High Inquisitor and appoints Professor Dolores Umbridge to the role.
And that’s what allows her to review and sack teachers.
[00:29:55] Donna: There is a decree where, uh, groups of three or more gathering together is banned until the High Inquisitor reviews it and approves them to meet together. That includes all clubs, sports, blah, blah, blah.
[00:30:13] Rebekah: Yes, that is accurate. That is educational decree number 24.
[00:30:20] Tim: Anybody know 25?
[00:30:23] Rebekah: I will say that it relates to her position specifically as the High Inquisitor giving her an additional responsibility that relates back to what we just discussed with the Quidditch ban.
[00:30:32] Josiah: You can have hall monitors like Draco.
[00:30:37] Rebekah: So technically decree number 25 makes the High Inquisitor responsible for all punishments.
Wow. And so that’s why she was allowed to come in and ban them even though McGonagall was going to give them detention. I will also say decree number 22 is passed and mentioned early on in the book. It’s what was passed to allow the ministry to appoint professors if the headmaster couldn’t find a suitable candidate.
Uh, there are three more.
[00:31:03] Donna: Oh, you can’t, um, you can’t read the, there’s one about, uh, the, the periodicals. You can’t talk about or whatever, read, and it was when they posted Harry’s interview in the Quibbler.
[00:31:18] Rebekah: Yep. You’re not allowed to read the Quibbler. Uh huh. I believe that that is number 27.
[00:31:24] Donna: Yep. Uh, and, uh, and, uh, related to that, uh, even teachers can’t talk about anything that’s not related to their class.
Is that a separate one? Or does that go along? That is 26. That’s 26. Yep. Right. Because then the kids all started, they, they use that against her because if she would say something to him or whatever, they’d be like, well, that’s not really related to the class, Professor Umbridge, so blah, blah, blah.
[00:31:50] Rebekah: Exactly.
And then what was the final? Was it early or
[00:31:55] Josiah: late? Earth and Tars are hot.
[00:31:58] Rebekah: Yeah, I’m sure that was not it. No, the final decree is the one that was passed that allowed her to replace Dumbledore as headmaster.
[00:32:07] Donna: There you go. There’s our minigame. There’s a scene where Hermione asks Harry about teaching students real Defense Against the Dark Arts in, as we read in the book.
And he gets very angry with her at first and saying, you don’t know what you’re saying. And Ron has a great line here that goes, Oh yeah, basically. Oh yeah, Hermione, we’re stupid. We don’t, Harry never, he doesn’t know what he’s doing. He didn’t know all that stuff. And he’s like, come on, Harry, think about this.
So he, and it’s still in the book, he considers the topic, he finally agrees. In the film, they disgustingly shorten this. Yeah, that’s so sad. Hermione makes a vague comment about needing to learn how to defend themselves. And then the scene cuts to them entering the Hog’s Head. Yay! Like, oh! That’s it! Okay, great.
Harry does give a speech while they’re in there about, which relates back to an earlier thing in the book, but they use this in the Hogshead instead, and he gives a speech about it mostly being luck, and he had a lot of help, and there’s, you know, there’s a crowd of kids that come there to the Hogshead to meet.
Um, I did, I did like this part because Harry, it shows you, Harry genuinely doesn’t see who he is. He, he just does not see. He still doesn’t see that he does have a Savior complex. I mean, regardless of why or what, I mean, we can like that or dislike it, but he does. He, he’s like to a fault. He’s always gonna go he always feels like he has to do this.
He doesn’t see himself as Anything like he thinks so little of himself So I liked the fact that she had this here because you realize here were five books into this thing And he still doesn’t get the that he can make a difference and that he is making a difference. But he also doesn’t
[00:34:07] Rebekah: want
[00:34:07] Donna: to be in
[00:34:07] Rebekah: charge of things.
Yeah. Like he has a savior complex, but leadership is not something he loves. He would kind of prefer to be a little bit of the Batman character. You know what I’m saying? He’s not good.
[00:34:18] Tim: He’s not good at magic. I mean, in a lot of, in a lot of those things, he’s not good at studying and learning those things.
[00:34:26] Donna: He improves and his skills improve, but you’re right. It’s not through studying and understanding what he’s doing. Kind of like, okay, practical, I gotta do this, so.
[00:34:38] Josiah: Well, the Room of Requirement becomes a deus ex machina in the film. Neville discovers it in the film, essentially by accident, and Hermione exposits how it works during their first visit.
In the book, Harry learns of the room from Awe, Dobby, and realizes it was mentioned by Dumbledore the previous year, which is a fun little puzzle for readers to pick up on. Yes. No one in the D. A. knew about the room beforehand. In the
[00:35:07] Tim: Dutch translation of the books and movies, the Room of Requirement is called, and I do not speak Dutch, so I’ll do my best, Hammer von Hogenood, this is colloquially translated as Room of Extreme Urinary Urgency.
Coincidentally, Ron asks if the room would become a bathroom if the user really needed a bathroom.
[00:35:31] Donna: Sorry. I do look at a lot of trivia, baby listeners, I pull a lot of this trivia. If anything comes up about bathroom humor, I’m going to put it in the trivia. So if you guys want it, you can, you know, you can veto it, but don’t do it because I’m going to find more.
[00:35:49] Rebekah: By the way, I do want to say thank you to Josiah for helping me learn what a deus ex machina is. Um, I believe he mentioned it when we were recording episode three, and I literally was so embarrassed. I didn’t know what it was, but I was embarrassed too much to look it up or ask. And so while Josh was editing the episode, I was like, what is this?
And so I looked it up. So for those of you who were dumb like me and don’t know what that means, did you say you said that right when you were
[00:36:16] Josiah: just saying, okay.
[00:36:18] Rebekah: No, you said the phrase deus ex machina. That just means, like, a thing that’s the exact thing you need that just pops up in the middle of a story with no explanation or reasoning, like, just something that’s like an easy The perfect thing to
[00:36:33] Tim: fix what you have a problem with.
[00:36:36] Donna: Well, Filch is seen eating dinner set up outside of the wall that, uh, that does become the door to the room of requirement. This is in the film. Although there’s no reason why he would even know where the room is at this point or why he should be observing it. So to somebody who doesn’t know a lot of, hasn’t put a lot of this together or non book readers especially, it just looks like he’s sitting out in a random hall.
eaten because he can. Uh, it does look like that. The walls. Uh, somehow the students exit the room from a different hallway to get around Filch, but this separate exit from the room is a feature that’s not explained until the end of Book 7. And only because Neville figured out how to work the
[00:37:26] Rebekah: room. Yeah,
[00:37:27] Donna: exactly.
And there’s also a funny scene where Filch gets Valentine’s chocolates from the twins That caused him to break out in boils, which I think is, I did think it was funny. Uh, not that a person would break out into boils, but let’s get real, it’s Filch, okay? So, uh, weirdly, we also see students exiting the room in large groups from the door that Filch is watching.
And somehow no one sees them. A little bit of trivia on this subject. While we’re talking about Filch, Mrs. Norris has green eyes in this film for the first time. Every other film, her eyes were red. So, either they had got a cat with red eyes and switched it to a cat with green, or they changed it. They can change the cat’s eye color, and it was an ugly cat, by the way, but not the main character, which is a massive theme to the whole flipping series!
[00:38:28] Tim: See, I’m not the only one with something that they always think.
[00:38:33] Rebekah: Ugh! I watched an interview with Tom Felton yesterday where he takes like a Harry Potter quiz and he can’t answer some very basic stuff from the book and it’s like, okay, you’re the actor playing in the movies. Like, I guess I get why you wouldn’t do that.
But it reminds me that it doesn’t seem like there’s somebody on set that’s like, Hey, this doesn’t line up like, or, you know, in the writing room, that’s like, Hey, this really doesn’t line up with the book. This is something that book readers will be annoyed about. And there’s no reason to change it for the films.
It doesn’t actually help us. But what happens that bothers me the most. Is that there’s a scene where Filch was some of the members of the inquisitorial squad. They see Luna walking through the door of the room of requirement, like when it’s open for the DA lessons, and it’s the normal large door. They chase her down the hallway as the door closes.
The door transforms. It gets a lot smaller. smaller into a normal wooden door, they open it and they find a broom closet where they all crash into each other. But that’s inconsistent because that’s not how the room works because you can’t make it become something else and enter it being anything else while someone else is inside of the room.
[00:39:43] Tim: Another change or something left out rather, uh, moving toward the Christmas holidays. We don’t see much of Harry’s concerns about his perceived danger to others in the film after his vision of Mr. Weasley’s attacks. In the book, he worries extensively that he’s been possessed by Voldemort, only having his fears assuaged when Jenny, who has been possessed by the Dark Lord in the past, confirms to him that the signs don’t line up.
There are multiple days where he considers leaving the Wizarding World to protect the others because he Thinks that he’s a danger to everyone.
[00:40:22] Rebekah: One of the things that I thought was weird, as far as like when Harry finally has his vision of Mr. Weasley, and we’re kind of like getting ready to start seeing Occlumency and all that stuff start to come up, is the, the book scene I thought did this really well.
So he had the dream, they go get McGonagall, nobody believes him, but then McGonagall kind of believes him, so they take him to Dumbledore. Dumbledore, like helps them get out of the castle, which is basically 12 plus hours earlier than they should be leaving. And he knows Dolores is going to be upset about it.
So he helps them escape, get out of the castle. And it’s like, she was like mad that they got out early or whatever. And then they head over to number 12 Grimauld place and they kind of wait to learn if Mr. Weasley is alive and whatever. And so there’s like these, it’s really good, like the way it’s So weirdly, instead of, um, The way it’s done in the book in the film, he tells Dumbledore about his dream.
Dumbledore believes him send someone to Mr. Weasley. And then Dumbledore says, Harry, you have to take occlumency. And he sends Harry in the middle of the night for his first occlumency lesson with Snape. And it’s so weird. And I don’t understand it, why they have to do it in this way. And he’s like sweating because he just woke up from a nightmare and like magic system wise, I feel like Dumbledore would have known.
And he did know in the books that like, opening Harry’s mind at that point when it was so sensitive, like that wouldn’t have been a good idea. And so I just find that really strange personally. Um, and then in the movie, like we jump to Grimald Place at Christmas after that, but
[00:42:03] Tim: I thought that was weird.
Something else I, I missed, um, from the book that was not in the film, all of the scenes at St. Mungo’s, uh, when the gang visits Mr. Weasley, are cut from the film. This means we don’t meet Neville’s parents, his grandmother, in the closed ward, nor do we see Professor Lockhart again, just a reminder of that.
Which I think
[00:42:26] Rebekah: could have been really interesting. I know, I understand why they didn’t, but that would have been interesting.
[00:42:31] Tim: There’s also a side plot with Broderick. Bode getting a potted plant, which we find out is actually Devil’s snare in disguise. That’s only in the book. Neville instead shares with Harry after their return to school that his parents were tortured by Death Eaters but didn’t give in.
He tells Harry he’s not ready for everyone to know. It’s not stated that they’re still alive, but mad, nor that Harry actually knew this already, uh, years earlier, but had promised Dumbledore he wouldn’t tell anyone, including Neville.
[00:43:04] Rebekah: I missed this and if you’re not a book reader and just kind of are curious Broderick Bode was I believe an unspeakable in the ministry working in the um, Department of Mysteries.
I don’t think he was in the order but um, this subplot which totally understand why this book only the subplot with Bode who ends up killed by the devil’s snare um, and he loses his mind. It’s how you basically learn that if someone goes to the Hall of Prophecy and pulls a prophecy off the shelf that was not about them, like that they’re not named in it, that you will lose your mind.
And that’s why Voldemort had to try so hard to get Harry to go there. So they just do this differently in the movie, which is fine. But I did think in the book, for the book, it’s a very interesting little side plot, in my opinion. So
[00:43:54] Tim: in the movie, what is the What is the excuse or the reason why there’s not one great
[00:44:00] Rebekah: or Lucius Malfoy just says you because it was about you, you had to grab it or like he’s the one that states it, but it’s just stated outright and there’s no explanation for what else like what would have happened if someone else tried to get it.
[00:44:13] Donna: As you brought that up, it reminded me, I did read when I was researching that there was, there was script that included a small portion of that scene because they were going to bring Kenneth Branagh back just kind of as a very short part there to tie back to him and stuff like that. And. For budget constraints, they chose not to do it.
I do. I just
[00:44:39] Rebekah: want to make
[00:44:39] Donna: a comment
[00:44:40] Rebekah: though. This is the fifth film and all of the other films grossed like five times the amount of money that they cost to make. And you’re telling me you couldn’t have added a hundred grand or whatever it would have cost to have Kenneth Branagh? Like, do you know what I mean?
Like, that’s so funny to me. It’s almost like
[00:45:03] Donna: It would have been like a brief scene. Yeah, it’s like how much,
[00:45:06] Rebekah: how much money are we talking, like a million dollars, like isn’t that much money, but I can’t imagine that a very small scene with one important actor, like, I don’t know, even if you add up five million dollars, that barely changes the budget, in my opinion.
So I just think this stuff, so it’s like, oh, it’s a budget constraint. It’s like, this film series made more money than like, just about anything. So like, come on now, don’t give me budget. It also
[00:45:31] Donna: would give them an opportunity. To see Neville, you can develop Neville more, even if he was by himself, that he was there to see his parents.
[00:45:40] Tim: We had the same thing with Goblet of Fire. There was opportunity to deepen Neville’s character or broaden it so that you could see more about him, and they chose not to.
[00:45:49] Josiah: Yeah. Which is kind of sad. Well, let me tell you, the discovery of the D. A., Dumbledore’s army, is more destructive in the film than in the book.
Film Dolores breaks through the wall to the room of requirement using Bombarda Maxima, which I remembered in a previous episode of this podcast. I wanted to mention that, but in the book, it’s Dobby, House Elf, who warns the DA members. Many of them are able to escape, and members of the Inquisitorial Squad stop some of them in the corridors.
The film also adds a scene that is not in the book, in which the DA members are in a group detention and forced to cut into their hands with the black quill. Now in the book, this would conflict with Harry’s later conversation in which he shows Rufus Scrimgeour the scar on his hand, but that later book conversation is not a part of the film, so it’s not a plot hole in either one of the media.
[00:46:51] Rebekah: I want to clarify, that book conversation does occur in the film, but that part where Harry talks about, like, his scar, the scar on his hand is like a significant thing, that he has that, but not everyone was subjected to
[00:47:04] Donna: that.
[00:47:05] Josiah: Yeah.
[00:47:05] Donna: There’s no mention or reference to the book chapter, Career’s Advice, shown in the film.
In the book, this is when Harry meets with Professor McGonagall, and discusses the possibility of becoming an Auror, which Umbridge vows to prevent. During this point in the book, Harry also uses Umbridge’s fire to contact Sirius and Lupin to discuss seeing that, uh, Snape’s memory that we just discussed and find out why his dad was acting like a bully.
Um, this is also the chapter where during their astronomy OWL in the top of the astronomy tower, they hear a commotion out on the lawn, look out and see ministry officials going to Hagrid’s hut to sack him. And then after they get down and they’re starting to attack Hagrid and he’s out trying to fight back, that Professor McGonagall comes down the lawn and they see her robes I remember what a great description this was to, uh, see her going across the lawn and they, they attack her.
They stun her three stunners straight to the chest at her age. I love, uh, the, the nurse going through that and how shocked she is, but, um, yeah, a lot happens in the, in this. chapter, and to leave all of it out, I was really a little shocked.
[00:48:32] Tim: It seems like in the movie, they, they chose not to show how personally and intimately involved the ministry became in enforcing all of these things.
Yeah. You know, they do it just by the, the orders, the, the educational. Edicts or whatever, but they got a lot more involved, personally involved in dirty their hands even more, uh, in the books and in the film.
[00:49:00] Josiah: I think that goes into part of why Percy’s betrayal isn’t really detailed. I think they just reduced the ministry’s involvement, whether that was for political reasons to try to reduce government autocracy in a, in a teen kids type movie, or just to focus the ire on this is Dolores.
She is evil. I don’t know. We don’t really need all these other evil characters, we just need Dolores to be evil.
[00:49:31] Tim: Which, which makes it a little strange to me that at the end, um, Fudge has to resign and all of those things, because according to the newspaper, he was more involved in what was going on, but according to what happens in the film, that’s not, there’s not a lot of truth to that, it almost seems like it’s just Umbridge says, this is what we need to do, and he says, okay.
[00:49:54] Rebekah: Okay, so right after all of that happens, um, I believe we go straight into the chapter about OWLs. In the film, we just see the students quietly taking their charms OWL. It’s administered by Umbridge. It’s just her alone in the films, again, probably for the simplicity reasons of everything. In the book, though, there’s like a cast of ministry wizards that give students the various tests and the professors are kind of present.
And it’s this whole like developed process, which is really fun. Several of the ministry wizards that give the tests are really impressed by Harry, or they make comments about how they miss Dumbledore or how great like where’s Dumbledore or whatever. And Dolores gets annoyed, including by the missing Harry thing.
Um, I only bring this up because it’s not really relevant to the plot like the change isn’t a huge one, but I loved in the book that like it felt very overwhelming by this point. Harry literally gets to this point. There’s he he forgets that Snape’s in the order. And so he’s like, no one in the order is at Hogwarts.
Dumbledore is gone. Like, What you know, everything is hopeless. The ministries against us, whatever. And all of a sudden, all of these ministry people that like do the tests come in and you realize, actually, Dolores and Fudge are kind of on an island in some ways. Like, yes, they’re trying to influence public opinion, But there are a lot of people who like Dumbledore.
There’s a lot of people that he has a lot of grace with and a lot of like, um, credit with. And so I thought it was really cool to, in this moment of, there’s so little hope, there’s nobody here for us, Hogwarts is lost, whatever. You have this little beacon of like, Hey, it’s not all lost. Like I know McGonagall’s gone.
I know Hagrid’s gone. I know all these things just happened whatever and so I think that because you don’t sack Hagrid because McGonagall doesn’t have to go to St. Mungo’s like and because Dumbledore You know Dumbledore was gone, but there were other professors. I understand not doing it that way But boy, I would have liked to have seen some of
[00:51:57] Tim: that though Because the way the the movie the movie chooses to take harry’s thought i’m all alone and everything is hopeless Okay, let’s run with that And there’s no thread of hope, it’s all hopeless, you know, for whatever reason, Fudge and Umbridge are in charge of everything, and now, uh, they get to do whatever they want, no matter how horrible it seems.
[00:52:22] Donna: And to me, one of the most satisfying parts of the book, of the book, and it’s just a small thing, is when he takes his defense against the dark arts. exam and gets to the end and the little old man that’s given this exam says, I hear you can produce a, a Patronus, a fully corporeal Patronus. And Harry says, yes.
And he said, maybe for extra credit. And he looks at Umbridge. And if you know the Patronus charm, you have to think of something that makes you happy to be able To, to project this, this, uh, protection of the Patronus and he looks at Umbridge and, and is, has a satisfying thought, I’m sure, it’s not spelled out like this, of her getting, of her getting her just desserts, and he casts
[00:53:18] Rebekah: the Patronus, it says, he made icon, it’s like, It’s like he makes eye contact with her, imagines her being Sack, and says, Expecto
[00:53:25] Tim: Patronum!
Another change, the Weasley twins reign of terror happens, uh, later in the film than it does in the book, uh, during the OWLs, and, uh, it is the backdrop for which Harry begins to collapse as he sees the vision of Sirius. However, in the book, they set off fireworks a few weeks earlier and also create quite a bit more chaos.
Not all of which is ever removed from the castle. Uh, Harry’s vision of Sirius in this case happens when he falls asleep during his History of Magic exam.
[00:54:00] Rebekah: Fun little trivia. Does anyone remember what part of what the Weasleys did to the castle that day was left in the castle? By Flitwick, by the way.
[00:54:09] Donna: They flooded one huge area of the, of the main common space.
It is a fully fledged swamp
[00:54:17] Rebekah: in a corridor, I believe, um, and because it was such a, um, good piece of magic, as Flitwick, I believe, put it, uh, he cordoned off a little bit of it and left it there.
[00:54:28] Tim: Oh, wow.
[00:54:29] Donna: This scene where they exit, where Georgian and Fred exit. It was pretty cool in the movie. It was, it was a satisfying, uh, um, scene.
[00:54:39] Tim: I liked it. I thought it was well done and it was, it was fun that it was a compilation of things that had happened and they kind of squashed it all into one moment.
[00:54:49] Donna: Yeah. Well, when Hagrid takes the trio into the woods to meet Grop in the film, he noticed, he notes that he’s never seen the centaurs so riled.
Thanks to the Ministry restricting their territory. In the book, the group without Ron, who happens to be in a quidditch match at this time, uh, which gets pulled from the film, actually has a brief confrontation in which they discuss that they do not harm foals. This is what gives Hermione the inspiration and idea for getting Umbridge mixed up with the centaurs.
And I will say here, hearing Jim Dale consistently say, Forenzi, and then hearing Hagrid in the film go, Hey, Forenz. I have to laugh at that every time because it’s so casual and different than Forenzi, which somehow sounds a little more regal or something, I don’t know. Anyway,
[00:55:51] Josiah: just It doesn’t sound like friends.
[00:55:53] Donna: Yeah, it’s like, Hey, my brother, we stand on the corner together, drinking. Pepsi in heaven, hot dogs, yeah, baby. That’s my goal.
[00:56:08] Rebekah: Once Harry collapses, um, like after the Weasley stuff happens, he and several of the other students get in trouble with Umbridge, and, uh, That’s in the movie, it just kind of goes straight from like, he has the vision, gets in trouble with Umbridge and it’s very fast. In the book, he tries to contact number 12 Grimald Place from Dolores fire again.
So again, in the book, he knows that hers is the only one not being monitored by the flu network. That whole flu thing, Sirius almost getting caught one time, all of this stuff is cut from the film, just probably for simplicity’s sake. But anyway, he had contacted them. Sirius and Lupin previously, as we, I believe, mentioned, um, so that he could find out why his dad was being a bully.
So he goes back again and he’s trying to contact number 12 so that he can see if Sirius has really been taken by Voldemort. Because I think Hermione’s the one that says, hey, I Dumbledore said that you were going to see stuff like this. What if Voldemort’s trying to trick you? So he’s like, Hey, I’ll confirm it.
So he contacts them in the book. Harry talks to creature and creature basically implies that Sirius is in trouble and he laughs about it. And, or he like, I don’t know, whatever. It’s, it’s very much like, Oh my gosh, this wasn’t just a Voldemort, like lying to me. It was real. Sirius is really in trouble. Um, Basically, all this does is simplifies down the movie version of what happens with like them getting in trouble with Dolores, then the whole thing, um, where Dolores gets taken by the centaurs in the woods, and then, um, them getting on Thestrals and traveling to London.
In the book, there’s like, obviously a lot more going on in the middle and there’s several steps in between. Also, I don’t like in the film, this is the one thing that I thought was weird. In the film, it felt like they were just this random, easy way to fly away from the castle on Thestrals. Like they just found these Thestrals and it’s like, let’s go.
In reality, not in reality. This is a fictional book. Um, yeah. In the book, the point is that it’s also complicated. They’re not sure what to do because Harry can’t get to his broom and there’s just all of this other stuff going on. And, um, the Thestrals, they, they, uh, woo them in by getting raw meat because they’re attracted to the smell of blood and they have to, like, wait for enough Thestrals and Harry tries to, like, leave.
It’s really interesting, but not necessarily plot relevant.
[00:58:38] Donna: Yeah, it’s, um, a lot goes on there and there’s, to me, I think there’s a small inconsistency and you might not, maybe it’s not small, where in the book where creature lies, ba basically, um, almost, he almost lies, but you don’t see any evidence of him trying to punish himself after he does it.
But when Dobby goes to Harry, who is not his master, in the second book in chamber, everything that Dobby tries to say, anything, has to do with the Malfoys or anything, he’s beating himself. So I did think that was kind of interesting in the book that Creature, but Creature also, they allude several times to him being a little mad, like, like crazy mad, because he’s been cooped up alone a long time with with Mrs.
Black on the, in the tapestry and that kind of thing. And he thinks he’s talking to himself quietly,
[00:59:37] Josiah: but everybody can hear him.
[00:59:38] Donna: Yes.
[00:59:39] Josiah: The final battle in the Department of Mysteries. Is very retooled in the film in the book. Neville is tortured. Hermione is hit by a purple flame. At one point, briefly seems to killer Ron is attacked by a brain.
He goes loopy. There’s other things, really crazy stuff in the department of mysteries, but the movie, I don’t know. Streamlines this with, uh, the Hall of Prophecy, and then the adults come in and fight around the death Oh, it’s called the Death Chamber. Yeah, yeah, yeah. And then the adults come in and fight in the Death Chamber.
So it’s kind of the two part Oh, and it’s three parts, because then Dumbledore and Voldemort Dumbledore and Voldemort fight as the third part. Yeah,
[01:00:26] Donna: that’s it. Dumbledore and friends. That’s it. They come together. Oh, that is
[01:00:33] Rebekah: the ship that we did not know we needed. That was the
[01:00:36] Josiah: ship. So there’s kind of those three parts to this final confrontation.
And the first one is probably the most changed. I’ve heard people, multiple people, Say that they preferred in the book, how weird it is in there. And having seen the movie first, this was the first film I saw in theaters, the first Harry Potter film I saw in theater, in the theater. So I had not read the books yet.
It was very epic, is very mysterious, is very dark and moody to me. And I like it how it is in the movie, but how it is in the book. I do know that some people prefer that. I don’t think it would have come across well on film, such as Ron being attacked by a brain. I just don’t think that works with the aesthetic in the film of this.
All films are going for gritty realism, even in fantasy wizard dramedies. Yeah, but I just don’t think a big brain would have worked. It was there’s like, isn’t there like an octopus, Rebecca?
[01:01:41] Rebekah: Tentacles of thought. I think that’s part of the brain. There’s oh my favorite. Okay. My favorite is where there’s a time thing that they put on a Death Eater’s head and his head becomes a baby’s head and then it becomes a Man’s head and then it goes back to a baby’s head and it’s really creepy.
[01:01:59] Josiah: Yeah and stuff that happened That’s great that it’s in the book. Oh isn’t in the book. Don’t they break all the time turners? Yes, which is a little retcon for JK
[01:02:10] Donna: Rowling the kid the kids do right? It’s just part of they don’t do it on purpose It’s just one of the things that happens As they’re fighting, and I, I think the, uh, there’s a, a really funny piece there where, um, they start to curse or kill the guy whose head goes from baby to adult, and Hermione’s like, no, you can’t kill a baby.
Okay, Hermione, come on, let’s get with it. And Harry’s like,
[01:02:37] Rebekah: what? It’s very confusing, but he doesn’t have time to deal with it.
[01:02:40] Donna: But I can see, I can see losing it, um, for the sake of the film. So at this point in the film, they come together where there’s an archway, and Harry and Luna both remark about the archway.
Harry can hear voices, nobody else, seemingly no one else hears, But Luna does come and say, Oh, I, I hear them too. They’re just over there, you know, and he almost walks over and puts his head through and they’re like, Harry, you can’t pull him away. Well, then Death Eaters come into that room, um, and begin to, to duel.
And shortly then in the, uh, the Order of the Phoenix comes, They finally get there, Sirius comes in, he and Bellatrix are fighting, and he’s, he’s dueling, he’s fought a couple of other people, and you can see, and I’m, love how they did this with Sirius, they don’t make a big deal about, in the film, about how dejected and lonely Sirius feels stuck in Grimmauld Place.
In the book, they make a bigger deal about it, that Harry’s worried about him, he’s used to being out in the fight. And so here, here they come, he’s up against Beldrix and he, he curses somebody and I don’t think it’s her, if I remember right, and then she kind of is, she sees her opportunity. while he’s stopped and he’s kind of let his guard down and she curses him about a cadaver and he falls backward through That arch and harry does not believe at first that he’s dead.
He thinks well, I heard voices He’s just on the other side of the arch Even though he fully heard her curse him and she knows what she said. She does not cast a killing curse
[01:04:25] Rebekah: on him in the book She knocks him back through the arch, but
[01:04:28] Josiah: it is
[01:04:29] Rebekah: a green did not
[01:04:29] Josiah: hear
[01:04:30] Rebekah: a
[01:04:30] Josiah: curse. Isn’t it a green spell?
[01:04:32] Rebekah: In, I don’t remember, but in the movie she does cast the killing curse.
In the book, that’s why he’s not, he’s like, not sure Sirius is dead because she didn’t. Cast a killing curse. She just knocked him back through the arch. Thank
[01:04:44] Donna: you for clarifying that because I did not remember that. That’s, that’s good. The first day I read this, which now I can’t even remember how long ago it was.
I’m listening to it. I hear the scene. He’s screaming, Lupin grabs him, and I stopped the recording. And I gen I’ve told you before, readers, baby listeners, I’m very emotional. And I lost it. I could not deal with the fact that everything else has happened to Harry. He finds his godfather, spends book four getting to have three or four conversations with him, not a lot more than that in book five, and then she kills him.
And I called Rebecca screaming, tell me that he comes back to life. Don’t you tell me he’s not going to die. And she’s like, mom, you didn’t know.
I didn’t now, even thinking about it now, remembering back to that, it emotionally. I was so mad. It gutted me. I was so upset. I almost didn’t go on and read six and seven because I thought you
[01:05:58] Rebekah: like took a break because you were mad about that. I was upset the first time. I was
[01:06:01] Donna: just like, it’s too much. He’s 15 16 years old.
This is too much rallying. You’ve lost it. I’m thankful I read the rest of the books, glad for it now, but whoo at the time. So if she was trying to evoke great emotion in the reader, well, she got it from me.
[01:06:19] Tim: One other quick change, uh, might not turn out to be quick, but, um, the events after the big showdown between Voldemort and Dumbledore in which Voldemort possesses Harry, those change quite a bit too from book
[01:06:32] Donna: to film.
What do you all think about those?
[01:06:35] Rebekah: I have so many opinions. This is one of the hardest parts for me. So one of my favorite parts of a lot of books is the way that the conclusion can use some sort of like exposition to just like help you understand why and what from earlier on in the books. So, in the book, here’s what actually happens, and this is canon, and this is what counts.
Dumbledore, Dumbledore makes an unauthorized portkey in front of Fudge. Fudge kind of gives him a face, but Dumbledore stares him down, you know. He says that he will give Fudge half an hour of his time, and then return to the Hogwarts. Returned to Hogwarts to see Harry. Harry gets mad at Dumbledore when they first begin talking once Dumbledore gets back.
He destroys a ton of stuff in Dumbledore’s office. He feels really bad about it later, but not at the time. He finally learns why Dumbledore has been ignoring him, why the prophecy was this weapon that they couldn’t tell him about. We learn more of the prophecy, the full wording of it, how it indicates Uh When he was born that the parents of this person would have thrice defied Voldemort.
He learns that Neville Longbottom may have been the person that the prophecy was originally meant to identify because it could have meant him or Harry. Uh, he also identifies that Harry’s choice to position himself against Voldemort and Voldemort’s choice to to attack Harry’s family. Even though Harry was the half blood like him, not the full blood like Neville, which is what Voldemort always said was the best, was part of the driving force of this prophecy coming to pass and that it affected Harry.
Um, we clarify why it is that Harry must live with the Dursleys. It’s because of your mother’s protection that she gave you by dying for you. It goes through your aunt’s bloodline. You have to live there. That’s why you have to keep going back. So Voldemort, you know, Can’t get to you while you’re there. So there’s so much exposition that basically ties all, not all, but most of the events from the past into the present and explains the meaning of the words of the prophecy, neither can live while the other survives.
And I mean, this was one of those scenes where I just, I think I reread it two or three times when I first read it because, and I reread it this morning again. Just because it’s so much like there’s so much rich story in it and you finally it’s like all this awful stuff has happened And then I finally breathed a sigh of relief like oh, thank God They’re finally gonna explain so much of this confusing crap.
So I like the way the book did it I know that not everything that they included was like necessary to keep but it was incredibly different from the film version
[01:09:19] Josiah: In the film, we only hear part of the prophecy, suggesting that Harry is the one with the power to vanquish the Dark Lord. And that the Dark Lord shall mark him as his equal, but he shall have power the Dark Lord knows not.
Other than Fudge saying, HE’S BACK! We don’t see any interaction with the minister from that point on, and Harry and Dumbledore meet later, after Harry has packed. There’s no Harry outburst in the film, like there is in the book, and Dumbledore gives him just enough information to know that Dumbledore felt at fault for Sirius’s death.
It’s also confirmed that one of the two, Harry or Voldemort, must kill the other.
[01:10:04] Rebekah: I just feel like you just leave so much out. It also is Like, I don’t know the way that Voldemort possessed Harry during the duel in the ministry, um, just is so different because it was meant more to like taunt Dumbledore, but like in the book, they set it up because Dumbledore has been ignoring him all year in the book.
They set up that moment and then. Dumbledore explains it later. They set up the moment so that Voldemort’s trying to get Dumbledore to kill Harry because he thinks that Dumbledore might think that he’ll kill Voldemort by doing that because Voldemort’s possessing him, whatever. And so then you find out in this same discussion, like, oh, I’ve been ignoring you because I didn’t want Voldemort to try and use you to get to me.
And on a prefect. It just makes a lot of it make more sense.
[01:10:54] Donna: Yeah.
[01:10:55] Rebekah: Yeah, and so I just, I feel like it’s weak, like, I feel like it’s weak writing in the movie, but again, I, it’s hard for me not to see the book as canon, so. And
[01:11:04] Donna: another part that we miss with this. It’s not between Harry and Dumbledore, but this is also where in the book, they’re in, uh, the infirmary, they’re in the nurse, um, they don’t call it the infirmary.
Homfrey. Yeah. Madam, they’re up with Madam Homfrey and they’re talking to Ron. And Ron said, Oh, yeah, because he and Hermione were both injured. That’s it. In the, in the Ministry of Magic, I was thinking, why are they up there? Um, but they’re talking and, and they look down and Umbridge is laying down there.
And Ron’s like, Oh, she doesn’t say anything at all. He said, except when I do this. And did he do the clip clop, clip clop or something? Like the centaurs and she, she gets scared and screams and like, it would have been a different room. You would have had to have a different set and I set up and all that.
But I just thought in the book, that’s another little feather in the cap for people who are like get Umbridge, I gotta see her hurt. I’ve got to see her punished. I thought that was just a very funny little scene. So
[01:12:11] Rebekah: it also is cool. I love in the book where it’s like, no one knows how he did it, but Dumbledore strolled into the forest and came back with Umbridge and it’s never explained.
He’s just, he like, he’s so formidable that that just happened. They do use some like daily profit montages to explain. Well, to briefly explain, but to display some of what the book talks about, like where the ministry admits Voldemort’s back and just a lot of those little things. Um, and like you said, we don’t see anybody in the hospital wing cause they, several of them got injured.
Um, we also, this was weird for me, I guess we didn’t skip the whole thing, but we skip a lot of Harry’s grief process. In the book, he talks to, he talks to Nearly Headless Nick about whether or not Sirius could come back as a ghost. Um, and that was a really, like, heart wrenching moment because he’s like, trying, like, what, what avenues do I have left?
Like, he can’t really be gone. And that grief was something he didn’t get time to process with Cedric, like, It felt like he was just in a daze, but this time he actually wants to deal with it almost. Um, also, this is my least fav, this is the last thing about our, the plot and timeline changes. And I hate this so much.
This was one of the things in the book that I wish somebody had made JK Rowling take out. This is probably one of the only little things. Harry opens this gift that Sirius gave him. Sirius gave it to him when he was returning from Christmas, from the Christmas break back to Hogwarts. Harry refused to open it because Sirius had made a comment that made him think like, it would be something that Dolores could catch, basically.
Um, that he’d be able to like, uh, or that she would be able to find out that he was communicating with Sirius. And so, to be the hero, he decides not to open the package. At the end of the book, he opens the package. It is a magical set, or it’s one mirror from a set of magical two way mirrors, and they can talk to each other.
It would have been completely private. It would have been nearly impossible for them to miscommunicate. Sirius more than likely would have kept the thing on his person all of the time. And even though he was up, um, helping Buckbeak, who Creature had injured, when Harry tried to find out if he was really at the ministry, like, he would have had it on him.
And that, to me, was like, it felt mean to put that in. Like, I still, every time I read this part of the book, I get angry that that’s part of the book. And I know it’s stupid. I know it’s fiction. Like, whatever. But it just, I hated it so much. And the two way mirrors actually do come up in the last film. Um, but they’re not mentioned as something Harry had.
They’re just something that
[01:14:48] Josiah: exists.
[01:14:49] Donna: They just exist, but. It’s just that extra dig of all that Harry’s gone through. And then he takes the mirror and shatters it and breaks it. It’s just like,
[01:15:00] Rebekah: yeah, I that was to that was a step too far. You kill the one person you set up that he’s like, genuinely still got family.
And then that was like the one thing that was like too much.
[01:15:12] Tim: We only have one setting change. The Department of Mysteries of the book is much larger, much more complex, including a room with many doors. There’s the brain room. The time room, the love room, and the space chamber. We see only the Hall of Prophecy and the death chamber in the film.
I thought that that was something sad that was missing from, missing from the film. I think it was a great opportunity again to do something more. It just, they didn’t even have to do a lot with it, in my opinion.
[01:15:48] Rebekah: Yeah.
[01:15:49] Tim: Just some.
[01:15:50] Rebekah: I think that would have been an opportunity to make the film more interesting.
So let’s talk about the characters we meet. There’s a lot of new characters in this film. And so let’s talk about who we meet, um, and just how they changed this time.
[01:16:03] Tim: We do meet Mrs. Fig, but we don’t learn about how she took care of Harry earlier in life. And she’s basically a one time character in the film rather than an ongoing side character as in the books.
Because she explained to Harry the reason that you, that I couldn’t. Have you enjoy the time with me as the Dursleys probably wouldn’t have let you come back, but it was, you know, still an opportunity to be with you. You miss all of that. It’s just, you know, an insignificant thing.
[01:16:33] Rebekah: It is a little weird to me though, because she’s like, don’t put your wand away.
Like Dumbledore warned that this could happen. I’m going to go contact Dumbledore. Like, why do you know Dumbledore? Why do you live there? Who are you? It’s very odd to me, as just a movie watcher, it’s like you forget that that person existed, but they were a really weird character to just throw in with no, nothing, like nothing and no one that comes back.
It’s almost, it almost would have been easier to have either Mundungus do it, instead of waiting until later, or to have, figure out a way to rewrite that so it doesn’t involve a third wizard, I guess. Also,
[01:17:11] Donna: there’s all those, there are no lines about her in the first book. There’s a whole story about who she is.
In the first book, she’s, it’s not somebody she just pulled out in the air, but they explained her. Right.
[01:17:23] Josiah: Missed opportunity. Mundungus Fletcher is a character that comes in the seventh movie with a small but kind of important role in the Horcrux hunt. He is not introduced in the fifth film, but he is introduced in the fifth.
He’s part of the Order of the Phoenix, and he’s the one who shirked his guard duties, allowing Harry to face Dementors at the beginning.
[01:17:49] Donna: And he’s also dressed as the witch in the Hogshead, but, you know, Spa.
[01:17:57] Josiah: They sent the one person. One of my least favorite characters.
[01:18:00] Rebekah: Oh, you don’t like Mundungus, why?
[01:18:03] Josiah: Yeah, when we talked about it in the first or second Potter episode, I was like, he’s like a slime ball who never gets either redemption or comeuppance.
He’s just kind of there. And I, I don’t understand why he’s like, what does he have to do with the series?
[01:18:19] Rebekah: So another person I miss in this film and who also recurs in the books and doesn’t come back, doesn’t come in the films at all, I don’t think, although he may be kind of a background character. The portrait of Phineas Nigellus, the former headmaster of Hogwarts and Sirius’s great great grandfather, is not shown in the film.
So Phineas Nigellus is a recurring character in the books, plays a large role in Deathly Hallows. He has a portrait both in the headmaster’s office at Hogwarts and at number 12 Grimmauld Place. And, um, I was, like I said, I read the book chapter this morning about Dumbledore, um, talking to Harry at the very end of Order of the Phoenix, and Phineas Nigellus hears that Sirius, who was the last of his line, the last of his bloodline, heard that Sirius died and he very sadly leaves his portrait.
He does not believe it. It’s like touching oddly in that moment, so.
[01:19:10] Donna: Yeah. Um, I mentioned recently before about Rowling, you know, handling some, some tough social and political topics in the, in the series, um, and, you know, Umbridge has this very clear hatred of half breeds. And non magical folk, she, giant, she’s against, you know, she can’t stand giants.
And, um, this is very pronounced in the book, like it adds to the disgusting nature of her character. But it’s far less of an ordeal, deal in the film, although it’s not completely removed. They just pull back on a little bit. She seems almost softened a little bit in the film when they take her out into the forest and they encounter the centaurs for the first time with her.
And she almost looks like she’s trying to protect Harry and Hermione from them before she kind of loses it and start calling them names and stuff like that. And it, that is a departure from her character. There’s nothing that they portray in the film. that suggests that she would care about protecting Harry, especially Harry or Hermione.
So I thought it was kind of interesting that they wove it in like that. And I don’t know if it was on
[01:20:29] Rebekah: purpose. It could have just been like, you could interpret it that way, but it wasn’t intended. Uh, one thing I will also say that is a small but significant plot hole, in my opinion, is that in the book, you learn that Dolores Umbridge, evil as she is about everything else, Is also the person who ordered two dementors to attack Carrie.
She’s the one who set that whole thing up. That’s not mentioned in the movies. So it’s just like in the movies, it’s like, Oh, okay. Dementors literally just randomly were there. And then in
[01:20:58] Donna: the book, you know, she’s got that line where she was like, well, What Cornelius won’t know. I mean, he didn’t know about the Dementors and that worked out.
Um, little bit of trivia here talking about Dolores. Stephen King said, was quoted to say that Dolores Umbridge was the greatest make believe villain to come along since Hannibal Lecter. Which
[01:21:25] Rebekah: I mean, they wrote her very interestingly. She is very effective. Umbridge hater. Hey, massive Umbridge hater, man.
You want to tell us how you feel about her?
[01:21:34] Tim: Okay, what you just mentioned from the book, um, that it’s revealed at least in the book, she’s the one that set the dementors on Harry. Those kinds of things help me with the character because, because that shows that she was evil and she’s just. She’s just like that in the film.
I got the impression. She just has enough power to do whatever she wants. And she’s got the powerful people behind her. And in the in the film, she doesn’t do things deceptively. She’s she’s just out in front doing them. And I guess it was. You know, it would make, it would make a difference to me in the depth of her character if they had shown the fact that she was making these decisions behind, uh, behind Fudge’s back.
She was doing things that were, that were completely deceptive. I just feel like it would have filled the character out a little bit better, but I feel like they spent, they spent so much of the energy in the movie on just her that. You missed the fact that this is a movement. There are lots of people that feel the same way.
And there’s a whole group of people that feel a different way. The only smattering you get of that is the Order of the Phoenix. And we don’t see them a lot. We see them at the very beginning and we see them in that battle. Other than that, we don’t talk a lot about them at all in the film.
[01:23:06] Donna: Well, I did find it interesting about, um, About Imelda Staunton, everything I could read that I found, read, seen interviews, etc, etc.
She is a really cool person. She’s very delightful. She’s a very, she’s what I would think of as a classic British lady. She’s just, her personality and the way she talks in interviews and things like that. But she, I’m
[01:23:31] Josiah: personally glad that we got to see her as old Queen Elizabeth. I just thought she was very pleasant.
Yes. Just don’t wear pink.
[01:23:38] Donna: In the crown, right? And, but nobody else was even considered to play Umbridge. She was one of the ones like, like Alan Rickman for Snape and um, Maggie Smith for McGonagall that, uh, Rowling knew that this, these are the people I want. I mean, there’s nobody else even auditioned for it.
So I thought it was interesting. She has played, um, I don’t remember the name of the British series, but she did play another similarly evil character. In a, uh, a series she was in in the UK, but I don’t remember what that was, but this was interesting because you’re right, in The Crown, her portrayal of the, the Queen was amazing, I thought.
[01:24:20] Tim: Another character difference, um, Luna Lovegood was portrayed in the movies as a bit naive with her head in the clouds. Uh, the Luna of the book is a bit more mysterious at first. She makes a habit of vehemently defending and championing things that most people believe are untrue. Um, which makes it a little, a little, makes her a good bit deeper than just, Oh, I don’t really know what’s going on in the world.
I’m just nice though. It doesn’t bother me. That’s an act. She’s perfect.
[01:24:56] Rebekah: In the films, she seems a little bit more, I don’t know if aloof is the right word, but a little more like ditzy. Yeah, she seems a little bit more like an airhead. When in the, in the book, she’s like, no, I believe in this and you should believe in this.
And one of the reasons that they end up loving her as a friend so much is that part of her. That’s like, I’m willing to have an open mind more than you are willing to do that, and I’m fine with the fact that I’m willing to, you
[01:25:19] Donna: know, I like that. Ronald, you weren’t good, you weren’t good to your date. And she, they make this big deal about how very true and genuine she is, and she’s not afraid to ask weird questions or hard questions.
That make people uncomfortable. And you’re right. The uncomfortable
[01:25:37] Rebekah: truth thing is another great part of it. Yes. Um, also, one of my favorite trivias about the Harry Potter universe in general that I’ve ever heard is actually about Evanna Lynch who played Luna Lovegood. So, um, she was not an actor before auditioning for this part.
As a preteen girl, she was like 11 or 12, she was battling an eating disorder, and she read the Harry Potter books and found a lot of hope in them and in the character, in particular, of Luna. So she and Rowling became pen friends, and this was during when Ivana was in and out of the hospital because of her eating disorder that she was struggling with.
And Lynch credits Rowling and that pen friend relationship as a person who helped her recover. from her eating disorder. And so in 2006, um, Ivana Lynch auditioned in an open casting call for the part of Luna and Rowling didn’t know that she was the person cast until after it had happened. So she didn’t help her get the part.
She just was like, they had known each other before via letters. And so I thought that was really cool.
[01:26:38] Josiah: I remember seeing this movie in theater, a little teenage T. Josiah. I had a big crush on Luna Lovegood, because Anna Lynch made her radish earrings that she portrayed as Luna, uh, in her theatrical movie debut.
And she made a real splash in some hearts of, of teenage boys,
[01:27:01] Donna: including this teenage
[01:27:02] Josiah: boy.
[01:27:03] Donna: So let’s look at some info on the movie as far as profit and viewers and readers and all that good stuff. The book was released on June 21st, 2003. This is three years after the fourth book, so she had some time. And it is the longest book, I mean, it’s huge.
The movie released on June 28th, 2007 in Tokyo. July 11th, a couple weeks later, 2007 in the U. S. and then July 12th in same year in the UK. Book rating was 4. 5 out of 5 on Goodreads. Interesting it is because it is so long in this children’s series or young adult series. Um, but that’s because I think the others have been like 4.
4 or 4. 3. Rotten Tomatoes gave the movie a 78 percent critics rating and an 81 percent audience score. IMDb rated at 7. 5 out of 10. So it’s getting solid, uh, scores for like the rest of them have. It was a, it was between 150 and 200 million to produce. I couldn’t find a set. Nobody would sit on a specific amount.
But between 150 and 200 million to produce, um, opening weekend 77, 108, 414, uh, that’s in the U. S.
[01:28:31] Music: Yeah.
[01:28:31] Donna: Um, Order of the Phoenix had the largest first day gross of all films at that point. And was the first of the films to be released in IMAX. The USA Canada gross was 292, 382, 000. And the international was 650, 150, 000.
And the total bring that brings the total to nine hundred and forty two million six hundred and three thousand three hundred ninety one dollars
[01:29:03] Tim: Just shy of a billion dollars
[01:29:06] Donna: You’re saying they made some money Um, it was the first it was the second pg 13 rating of the series It was filmed in england and scotland for exterior shots Back in leavesden film studios and watford for interior scenes They filmed from, uh, February to November of 2006.
Except for a one month break in June where Harry, uh, where Daniel Radcliffe and Emma Watson had to take some, uh, standardized testing at school for their, where they were in school. For their actual school. For their actual real life education.
[01:29:44] Tim: Um, also, Initially, Helen McCrory, who plays Narcissa Malfoy, was cast as Bellatrix Lestrange.
Uh, however, saying that her insurance wouldn’t cover a pregnant witch, she had to give up the role to Helen Abominem Carter. She was, however, able to take on Narcissa’s role in Half Blood Prince. And that surprises me because I think she did a great job. And just in the small bits that I saw, you kind of like her.
And you understand her motivation. And from the very beginning, I can’t stand Helena Bonham Carter. Um, in, which is the point. She does that and you just don’t like her right from the get go.
[01:30:26] Donna: The award for the most coordinated, that’s my personal award I’m giving. And I know they’re so concerned and want to make live appearances for it.
But Matthew Lewis and Rupert Grant, um, They were banned from being within five meters of Alan Rickman’s car, which was a sweet BMW after they spilled a milkshake in Alan’s car during the Goblet of Fire taping.
[01:30:52] Tim: Oh, my. I think it’s that’s great. And here’s another interesting little bit. The Department of Mysteries was the first completely CG set used in the franchise.
Building it complete with 15, 000 crystal balls would have been expensive, impossible to keep clean, and even worse to set up between takes. So, it is CG.
[01:31:15] Rebekah: Dang.
[01:31:16] Donna: That’s wild. I didn’t pick up on that.
[01:31:19] Josiah: Looks really good.
[01:31:20] Donna: The tiles that they used in the rooms, you know, they went for that subway like ish feeling in the ministry, in a lot of the ministry.
There were like 300, 000 little tiles. Well, they couldn’t afford ceramic tiles. So they used heavy cardboard and painted them all. And that’s, that’s what the tiles are that you see, uh, in the, on the walls. Yeah, I thought that one
[01:31:44] Tim: was probably the set of some old building that had been filled with that kind of stuff.
Crazy. The magic of movies.
[01:31:52] Rebekah: Also, this is a technically a location setting change. I didn’t mention, I thought it was interesting. In the book, the Ministry of Magic is said to have dark wood walls. Oh, my tiles. Interesting. Also, last little fun little trivia that I love. The code to enter the ministry of magic from the telephone booth, which is the visitors entrance that Mr.
Weasley brings Harry in when he has a hearing the code. Oh, well, also, they go in that way when they’re trying to save serious. It’s 62442, which spells magic. In T9,
[01:32:26] Josiah: very guessable,
[01:32:28] Rebekah: very guessable, but let me tell you two funny things about this. Number one at Universal Studios, there is a phone booth in the Harry Potter world area.
And if you put the correct code in 62442, um, you get a little Easter egg there, which I’m excited to experience when I get to go hopefully next year. Now, the other thing that I think is funny is, If you are like under the age of 25, you don’t know what T9 is. And so that’s irrelevant to you. I’ve tried to explain to all the kids that live with me how the code we chose for our door is a word that all of them associate with one thing that we all have in common, but none of them know what T9 is.
And so it doesn’t make sense to them because the door code thing is not T9. Like it’s not set up that way.
[01:33:15] Josiah: I T9, but I know like, obviously that’s how I texted in high school. Yep.
[01:33:20] Rebekah: Well, why don’t we give our final verdicts and similar to what we’ve been doing in the other Harry Potter films, give us an idea of what your favorite scene was from Order of the Phoenix and tell us if you like how it was portrayed in the film.
So I’ll go first, um, because mine are always so easy for Harry Potter. Uh, the book is always better for all of these. I’m going to have I know it’s a spoiler. Um, so I said in episode three that, uh, As Prisoner of Azkaban is my second favorite of the Harry Potter movies. This is not my first favorite. Um, it’s probably higher on the list, like third or fourth.
Um, I do like the movie, but watching it around the same time I read it is tough because there’s so much that changed that I wasn’t a big fan of, but that’s okay. Like obviously nobody asked me. Um, I do think that the book was better. I think there were a lot of misses here, but I think that there were a lot of misses in most of the adaptations that they did because I’m always going to feel that way as a book reader.
Um, My favorite scene from Order, there’s a lot of really good ones, but my favorite one genuine, genuinely is when Harry is asked to cast a Patronus for a bonus point in his defense against the dark arts OWL. He looks at Umbridge, imagines her being sacked, as he makes eye contact with her and says, expecto patronum, and it just Feels good.
And it’s like, it’s like right before she gets her real comeuppance and, and all of this stuff. And I was, it’s so satisfying for whatever reason, like, it feels like the first time he’s allowed to like openly defy her, but it’s It’s not open, but it’s like he gets to defy this person who’s oppressed him and it’s like very satisfying.
Um, it was not in the film at all. They did the OWLs very differently. Um, I didn’t feel like she got like the comeuppance wasn’t resolved. I would have liked to see her in the hospital wing afterwards. Um, but it doesn’t, it feels like she gets what’s coming to her sort of. Um, so I wasn’t particularly happy that they cut that out, but.
[01:35:23] Tim: That’s my
[01:35:24] Rebekah: verdict.
[01:35:25] Tim: I think the book was better. I think the movie spent too much time on Umbridge. I realize she’s the primary antagonist, but, uh, there were lots of other possibilities to spread it out to, to give it more depth. I like the movie better. This is my least favorite. I liked the book better than the movie.
This is my least favorite book, my least favorite movie, and my least favorite character. It’s difficult for me to get through this. I had to read, and I had to watch, and this is the most difficult have to that we’ve done so far for me. Oh, I didn’t say my favorite scene in the movie. I do, I do have a favorite scene.
It may not be in the book. I don’t remember if it’s in the book, but when they do the firework, that’s the dragon that chases her out. I love that.
[01:36:15] Rebekah: Oh, yeah. The, the firework scene is so satisfying in the book too.
[01:36:20] Donna: Um, so my favorite scene in the book is this conversation that Harry has with Nick after Sirius has died.
And it does actually answer a great question about why are there ghosts floating around Hogwarts but you don’t see ghosts floating around other places. You know, why, why wouldn’t you see him in the, at the borough? There could be ghosts of family members, why don’t you see that? And Nick, he explains that in the book because there is a choice to linger on in this ghostly form, but he chose it because he was afraid, but Sirius wasn’t afraid.
you understand, one, that there is a finality of death, and Dumbledore does try to get Harry to see that, but two, it also makes you feel for Nick and for the other ghosts too, that you, you realize they made this choice to hang around, but that wasn’t, they don’t really see that as noble. They see it as, I had a choice and I didn’t really want to do that, but they look to others who did.
die and were willing to go valiantly or to die and not return, that the ghosts see that as a better thing, like a more mature thing. And I thought the conversation between them was touching. Harry didn’t want to believe him. And Nick kept saying, Harry, he’s not going to be here. And it was a hard conversation, but I thought it was very touching.
Um, it was, I’m okay with the book. I’m not crazy. I felt. I felt like Tim said, I agree with him that reading them and seeing at the same time and you mentioned that too, Rebecca, it made it hard. I don’t, when I reread the series, I’m not normally just watching the movies with them, but putting them together like this, well, oof, it was rough.
So. I’m going to definitely go with the book, even though the movie is shorter and gets through quicker. Um, I am going to go with the book because it develops a lot of, of this world and of some important characters to me. So that’s my verdict.
[01:38:35] Josiah: Well, one of my favorite scenes from the whole series is in order where Voldemort and Dumbledore have magic bite and spoiler alert, I assume that J.
K. Rowling knew. that Dumbledore would be no more at the end of next book, and that he would not have an opportunity to fight So I do believe it makes sense from a logistical standpoint that she had to put this climactic battle in the fifth out of seven books, because I feel like if you had gotten to the end of the series and Dumbledore and Voldemort had never fought, that would be kind of unsatisfying.
So I think they did an excellent job in the film. I think it’s by far the most exciting magic fight. in the film series because it’s not just red and green color flashing. It’s actual Although they do
[01:39:30] Rebekah: that between Voldemort and Dumbledore, I will say, which I do find a little weird.
[01:39:35] Josiah: So I think they did a great job in the film.
This was the first film I saw of the Harry Potter series in the cinema. It has nostalgia for me. You know, I had a crush on Luna. I thought that the ending climax of the film where they’re in the Hall of Mysteries. And then Sirius Dies is the best sequence in the whole film series. The, so the six of them going off on their own, away from the adults, I don’t know, this is a very coming of age sort of thing, going away from the adults, going to this dark scary hall of mysteries, and fending off Death Eaters.
Going into the death chamber and the adults come the adult good guys come to help fight the adult bad guys ending with the Horrible serious death which took me by surprise. I like those sort of shocks in things I understand why someone wouldn’t and then you get to the Dumbledore Voldemort fight such an epic Climax to the book and film, but I think the book almost did it better in some ways You It’s my favorite movie of the bunch, not my favorite book.
I’m going to give it to the movie, maybe to be contrarian, but I do have extra nostalgia for this movie, especially compared to like the next film, which spoiler alert was such a disappointment. I think this movie. Took the coolest things about the book and made them a little cooler and it really worked for a little teenage Josiah So I’ll say the movie was better for this one.
[01:41:13] Rebekah: Well, there you have it If you enjoyed this episode on order of the Phoenix, please leave us a five star rating or review. We love them They are great for getting new people to discover the podcast. You can find us on xbox. tv Instagram and Facebook at bookisbetterpod. If you want to send feedback, ask us questions to answer on future episodes, and just generally have fun with the hosts and send memes back and forth, you can also join our free Discord server at the link in the episode description.
Order of the Phoenix is a book in which, sadly, Harry loses his favorite fluffy dog and godfather, Sirius Black. This week, our family also lost one of our fluffy giant friends, Mr. Basil. Having our podcast recording this weekend gave us all a reason to spend time together and focus on something we really enjoy doing, so thank you for spending that time with us as we move on from a loss and for giving us a reason to be together.
[01:42:08] Josiah: Thanks, Mr. Basil.