Hey, I'm British, and I take offence at your statement.

If you think Stormtroopers are trained well, you must not have seen the original trilogy.

1. He used the button. The same button Han used.

But the brutality is the point of the scene. I took it as, well, more than a little Ramsey rubbed off on her. She seem a lot less Stark, less like her father, who killed people in ways which were not cruel, and more like the sadist that she herself suffered.

I don't think that's fair. I haven't seen any sexist attacks in this thread. I also think it's presumptuous to attribute motivations to actions taken by people that are anonymous.

Same. I'm British, so I don't get the whole American Football thing, and I also don't get the whole national anthem before every game thing.

But not really, because at least the friends take like 10 seasons to get too that point, and there are so many bumps in the road. Friends is about these guys navigating an idealised NYC, dealing with the standard non-traumas of perfect urban singles in the late 90's-early 2000's, searching for love. In a way it's kind…

Well, the Black family is criticised by Sirius himself for being too focussed on their magical bloodline, which has led to inbreeding. Like, that's something he explicitly points out, that the gene pool for these noble magic families is dangerously small. Kinda like European monarchies in the 18th/19th centuries.

I think the thing is Harry Potter's a children's book - it isn't going to have Tolkien levels of depth in its lore. While this does leave some glaring holes in its world, ultimately I enjoy the books for what they are, not for not meeting a modern standard imposed after the fact, that few authors of its time were…

Well, Tom Riddle's father was never in a relationship with Tom's mother - he was enthralled via love potion. That's hardly the same as a consensual marriage.

I don't get your comment. You said that the elder wand had to trade hands when someone was defeated, and that means that the last one to wield the elder wand usually dies. I said that there are numerous spells which can be used to disarm or defeat a duelist without killing them. It's a clear point of difference…

It's not just attachment. It goes further than that. When you attach to something, you still retain a sense of self, where you begin and the other thing begins. While some car enthusiasts might think of their cars as an extension of their body, they don't think of it as literally their body. Unlike Idols, who, fans…

It annoys me too. I guess we all crave romantic fulfilment so much that we can't bear to see a story which doesn't feature it in its resolution, to the point where something like Pacific Rim is praised for having the audacity to have 2 people act like human beings and not immediately shack up on saving the world…

In a story where the most used spells are non-lethal disarming projectiles (expelliarmus, stupefy).

While I don't think you're wrong, there may be something in the judgemental nature of (some) people demanding works of fiction become more inclusive which turns away potential allies.

Just a question, but why does it fall to Rowling to lead the charge for diversity? Surely Rowling is doing far better than many, who rightly deserve your attention.

I think it's a little worrying that most depictions of male friendship that have any degree of intimacy end up being seen as gay subtext. Codependent male platonic friendship does exist, I should know, I've had one.

Except Remus gets married to a woman, and has a child, so he's not all that queer, really.

Exactly. If Rowling had written a bunch of out-of-place scenes about Dumbledore, a notably secretive character, divulging parts of his sexual life which are completely unrelated to the plot, then it would have been criticised as forcing the issue.

I guess you could compare the ability for fans to construct their own fantastic narratives with the ability for readers to imagine and build worlds with prose. How many times have you heard, when a film's been adapted, book fans say 'that's not how I imagined character X!' or something similar. I think the fantasizing…