This is an encore presentation of an episode from June, 2011

Steve talks about Pottermore misconceptions, how Rowling changed the online world once before, cool and interesting sources of canon information, Galleons changing the world, the late Quidditch match in book one, and other bits of Potter lore.

Links:

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This is an encore broadcast of the first Harry Potter Lexicon Podcast from June of 2011. 

Welcome to the Harry Potter Lexicon Podcast, in this first episode:

Links:

The post Encore Episode: Did Dumbledore Walk Around With It in His Pocket? appeared first on Harry Potter Lexicon.

This is truly a case of “You had to be there.”

When I read this chapter for the first time, the day after the book was released, I distinctly recall feeling a little bit surprised by Harry’s reaction to Lucius Malfoy. I knew there was no love lost between them, of course. However, the fact that Lucius Malfoy would be skulking around the Ministry and taking meetings with Fudge seemed perfectly normal. Of course a slimy guy like that would be trying to get in tight with the Minister for Magic.

Here’s how Rowling describes it:

They had just reached the ninth-level corridor and Cornelius Fudge was standing a few feet away from them, talking quietly to a tall man with sleek blond hair and a pointed, pale face.

The second man turned at the sound of their footsteps. He, too, broke off in mid-conversation, his cold grey eyes narrowed and fixed upon Harry’s face.

‘Well, well, well… Patronus Potter,’ said Lucius Malfoy coolly.

Harry felt winded, as though he had just walked into something solid. He had last seen those cold grey eyes through slits in a Death Eaters hood, and last heard that man’s voice jeering in a dark graveyard while Lord Voldemort tortured him.

All that is true, of course, but for fans reading this in June of 2003, it had all happened several years ago. A lot of discussion, a lot of re-reading, a ton of fan fiction, and the filmed versions of the first two books had come out since. In other words, for most fans the last they had seen of Lucius Malfoy was in the film of Chamber of Secrets, as Jason Isaacs’ long white wig whisked out of sight after his characters had accidentally freed Dobby.

I supposed it’s impossible to explain for those who weren’t reading the books at the time how the three years between books four and five affected fans — how it affected the whole world. Between July of 2000, when Goblet of Fire was published, and June of 2003, when Order of the Phoenix debuted, Harry Potter became a world-wide phenomenon. The characters of Harry, Ron, and Hermione now looked in everyone’s minds like Dan, Rupert, and Emma. There were trading cards and action figures and jewelry boxes and who knows what else. The first Harry Potter convention, Nimbus 2003, was held in Orlando. The internet became the new way for people to communicate and online fandom was essentially invented by Harry Potter fans.

So much had happened and so much had changed since fans had read those last few chapters of Goblet of Fire that the next paragraph they read in Order of the Phoenix just seemed odd. Rowling described Harry’s reaction to Lucius this way:

Harry could not believe that Lucius Malfoy dared look him in the face; he could not believe that he was here, in the Ministry of Magic, or that Cornelius Fudge was talking to him, when Harry had told Fudge mere weeks ago that Malfoy was a Death Eater.

“Mere weeks ago”? It’s true, the graveyard in Little Hangleton had only been a couple of weeks ago in the story timeline. Fans had to come to a screeching mental halt and try to remember how they had felt three years before, when Cedric Diggory had been murdered, when the Priori Incantatem effect had given Harry just the edge he needed to escape the graveyard, when Fudge and Dumbledore had parted ways, and the “old crowd” was being summoned.

I would never want to lose the experience of reading the books as they were released, but sometimes I wonder what it would be like now to be able to read through the series for the first time without having to wait between books, so just experience it as one long saga.

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The last week or two has just been chock full of new stuff for members of the fandom.  We have a new audiobook version of Quidditch through the Ages which also has a dramatization of the 2014 Quidditch World Cup which is particularly entertaining.  We have a new gameplay trailer for Hogwarts Mystery, a new logo for the Wizarding World as a whole.  Everything came to a head though when the first trailer for “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald” dropped, giving us plenty of tidbits to pour over, which we did in this episode.

We first talked about all the other new things, one at a time, and then we dug into the trailer and discussed it in length.  If you haven’t watched the trailer yet, we recommend you watch the trailer before you listen to this podcast, as we’d hate to spoil something before you have a chance to see it.

The longest bit of discussion about the trailer has to do with this image from the trailer:

At first glance the image doesn’t make any sense, but as you start reading it carefully you can tell it is what appears to be a Lestrange Family Tree.

Shout outs to both the Super Carlin Brothers and the Harry Potter Wiki who digested this family tree before we had a chance to do it.  The Wiki, in particular, does a great job of picking apart every name and the connections between them, be sure to check it out.

The big connection is that this family tree indicates that Credence is actually Leta Lestrange’s half-brother Corvus Lestrange V.  Naturally this mind-blowing reveal gave us plenty to talk about and our other topic of conversation we had on the docket we’ll have to save for a future episode.

There’s plenty more to talk about and figure out, for example, what the heck is that moose thing?  Also, stop obsessing about apparating onto the non-existent bridge!  The bridge does not exist in the books anyway, so apparating onto it doesn’t mean anything, and even if it did, they apparate to a point on the bridge far away from the castle, that could very well be where the boundary on that side of the grounds is.

We hope you enjoy this episode as much as we enjoyed recording it.

For our things that caught our eye lately, Steve was excited about yet another new Lego set (the Thestral Carriage from the new trailer), and Nick talked about a video he had watched this week about the reasons that Warner Brothers won out over Disney for the movie rights, and why Universal Studios ended up with the Wizarding World of Harry Potter instead of Disney World.

The post Episode 31: The Crimes of Grindelwald Trailer appeared first on Harry Potter Lexicon.

Episode 30 of our main Lexicon Podcast is shorter than usual and is all about discussing our new podcast, the Harry Potter Lexicon Minute.

We started the episode by talking about the rich collection of essays on the Lexicon and the recent feedback we’ve received telling us that we have incorrect information in some of these essays that were published before the books were all written.  We talked a bit about an upcoming new feature that will make it easier to understand just where in the history of the Harry Potter Fan community each essay was written.

We talked a bit about the first trailer for Harry Potter: Hogwarts Mystery and how excited we are for the upcoming game.

We then spent a few minutes talking about our new sponsor on our Support the Lexicon page.  Thanks to Magic Alley for supporting the Lexicon, and especially for sponsoring the new Harry Potter Lexicon Minute Podcast, we are very grateful.  To our readers, if you find yourself in need for some Harry Potter Memorabilia, please check out our friends at MagicAlley.co.uk.

The remainder of the episode was spent talking about our new feature, the Harry Potter Lexicon Minute.  Our editors (not just us) have been recording some great tidbits of Harry Potter fandom insights and if you haven’t checked it out yet, you really should check out the new podcast, which releases twice a week on Wednesdays and Saturdays, you can find it on the home page or here.

If you like the Harry Potter Lexicon Podcast as much as we do, don’t worry, we aren’t stopping this podcast, the Harry Potter Lexicon Minute is just an additional podcast for you to enjoy.

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In this episode recorded on December 19th, Steve, Nick, and Barbara all record from the same room, which happens to be a hotel room in Anaheim Hills, CA as we were on a Disney filled vacation involving Disneyland and touring the Walt Disney Studios.

Not much, we talked about mystery pages on the old lexicon that have shown up in analytics.

There’s now an official Harry Potter RPG coming.  We talk about how exciting this is and what we are hoping for out of the game.  Steve and Barbara talk about Stardew Valley, a game that it is mentioned this game is based on.  We also talk a little bit about Portkey Games, the new Warner Brothers Interactive and Pottermore for wizarding world games.

We also talk a bit about the latest updates (as of then) from the production of Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald and how much we are looking forward to it.

Our first of two main topics this episode is a discussion about the phrase “In his sixteenth year.”  Every so often we get feedback stating that we are wrong to put the murder of Tom Riddle’s parents in 1942 instead of 1943 as other sites on the internet are known to do.

Steve explains why the murders have to take place in 1942 because “In his sixteenth year” means “his sixteenth year of life” as opposed to “when he was sixteen.”  We also discuss a bit about the different levels of canon and how to make decisions on things such as what position James played on the Quidditch team.

Our next topic of conversation is about Gamp’s Law of Elemental Transfiguration.  The three of us had long run under the assumption that Gamp’s Law is the magic equivalent of a Scientific law, such as the laws of thermodynamics, or the law of gravity.  That is to say that it is an explanation of how magic works and why.  A recent essay that Steve had read, however, assumed that Gamp’s Law was actually a written legal law to prevent misuse of magic.

After our discussion, we are still pretty convinced that Gamp’s Law is a scientific law, but we’re eager to know what you think down in the comments.

We also take this opportunity to discuss what Gamp’s Law really is based on what we know of the wizarding world.

We hope you enjoy this special episode as much as we enjoyed recording it.  It is a rare treat that we can sit down together and record a podcast live.

The post Episode 29: “…and it was all just cabbage” appeared first on Harry Potter Lexicon.

Episode 28 is finally here!  This episode (Recorded on November 25th) is all about a couple of recent fan theories we’ve come across lately.  We discuss the recent updates to the Lexicon, dissect the new cast photo, and debate theories we’ve seen online lately.

We began our podcast as always by talking about what’s new with the Lexicon.  We started with talking about the new header navigation, landing pages, lists and breadcrumbs.  We also talk about how we have a lot more A-Z lists.

When we get to talking about the original jkrowling.com website (and startrek.com) and how we seem to have lost a bit of that charm of immersive websites of the late 90s and early 2000s.  We talk about how it was lost in favor of more informational sites, how there was a resurgence with sites like pottermore, but then ultimately killed by mobile.

We then talk about some of the bigger new features including an overhaul of the search system (and hint at some cool new features coming soon) and about timelines.

We talk about the title of the new film “Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald” and talk about how we’ve lost the word “and.”

We talk about the new cast photo and about how it is a shame that Albus doesn’t have Auburn hair (Steve wishes Nick hadn’t mentioned the hair color, because before that he thought Jude Law looked excellent as Dumbledore).

We also mention the Holiday stuff going on at the Wizarding World of Harry Potter at Universal Studios in both Hollywood and Orlando.

We spend a while talking about a theory that comes to us from the Hogwarts Professor site.  The theory is based on the information on the aforementioned Cast Photo.  All of the characters have names except for the character played by Claudia Kim.  All we know about her from the Pottermore article is that she is one of the Circus Arcanus‘s “attractions” and that she is a Maledictus, “a carrier of a blood curse that makes her transform into a beast.”

We don’t know much about what a Maledictus is, other than this is different than an Animagus as an Animagus can transform into an animal at will, a Maledictus is cursed to eventually become a beast and this is outside of the Maledictus’ control.

Concerning the Circus Arcanus, we’ve also seen a bit of artwork (seen above) for a ticket to this circus.  Of the various acts advertised on this ticket, the largest advertisement by far is “The Enchanting Snake Girl” (“Alive! Beguiling! Mesmerizing!”)

In the first movie, we actually got to see an advertisement for the Circus Arcanus as well, and it also dedicated the largest bit of advertising space to The Enchanting Snake Girl.

The theory goes that the reason that the article gives names for everyone except Claudia Kim’s character is that giving her character’s name in the cast photo would “give something away.”  Because of this, the fan theory is that Claudia Kim is this Enchanting Snake Girl and that her name is (or is similar to) Nagini, and that the beast she is destined to turn into permanently is a snake, and that this snake will eventually become Voldemort’s familiar.

We spend some time discussing this theory in the podcast but we recommend you read the theory in full over on The Hogwarts Professor’s site.

Our second fan theory of the episode comes to us from one of Nick’s favorite YouTube Channels, the Super Carlin Brothers.

In a recent video, Ben Carlin theorizes that the reason that none of the first years in Harry’s year know anything about the sorting (including Hermione who we know has already read Hogwarts: A History at this point, Ron who grew up younger than 5 brothers who have all been through the sorting before, and Draco who prides himself on his knowledge of the way things work at Hogwarts) is that the secret of what the Sorting Hat can do is protected by the Fidelius Charm and that the hat functions as its own Secret Keeper.

This would prevent anyone from telling people who haven’t been to Hogwarts how the sorting works until the person has been let in on the secret.  As evidence of this theory, it is pointed out that it isn’t Dumbledore, McGonnagal or anyone else who explains what the sorting entails, it is the hat itself that reveals its role in the sorting (through song).

We discuss the theory and the problems with the theory and how to resolve these particular problems in order to make the theory plausible.

We hope you enjoyed this episode of the Harry Potter Lexicon Podcast, if you haven’t done so already, subscribe to get new episodes as they come out.

We don’t mention a question of the day in the show, but I’ll post one here, for our question of the day, what do you think of these 2 theories?  Was Nagini once a witch with a terrible curse that turned her into a snake?  Was the secret of the sorting protected by the Fidelius Charm (or something like it) and that’s why Ron, Hermione and Draco don’t know about the sorting in advance?  Please leave your answers to these in the comments and we’ll keep up the conversation here.

The post Episode 28: New Fan Theories! appeared first on Harry Potter Lexicon.

Steve and Nick began Episode 27 by talking about the task of moving remaining content over from the old legacy site into the current, modern Lexicon.  We also talked about the ongoing work on the Timeline system.

We talked about the 20th anniversary of Philosopher’s Stone, and about the new Harry Potter Book Club.  We also discuss the reason for pottermore’s less interactive design.

We talk about the casting call for Fantastic Beasts 2 where they are looking for teenage versions of Newt, Leta, Gellart, Albus and someone named Sebastian, which means that there is not 1 but 2 flashbacks since Newt and Leta were not teenagers at the same time as Gellart and Albus.  We try to determine if we’ll hear about the incident that got Newt expelled.  We wonder if Sebastian might be the student whose life was threatened.

We talk about how it seems like this movie in a way is sneaking up on us.  “Wait they are filming already?”

Harry Potter British Museum books:  Harry Potter: A History of Magic and Harry Potter: A Journey Through a History of Magic.  These books sound great, as it will include original drawings and manuscripts from Rowling.  There could be new canon from the notebooks we’ve all been desperate to get a look at.

We talk a bit about all of the “coincidental” events that help Harry on his journey.  Why send Hagrid with Harry to pick up the stone in the first place?  Why have the mirror out in a place Harry can find it (multiple days in a row)?

Psychopath as the headmaster (apparently) who purposely puts children in dangerous situations, just to see what happens.  Don’t go into that place, or you’ll die.  Sure it’s fine if as punishment for being out of bed, you send the person who was guilty of illegal Dragon breeding to take those kids into a forest full of monsters, and then split up.

So let’s believe, ok, the kids go to a year, come home and talk about how there’s a floor with monsters, kids being taken into the forest, and a kid nearly died fighting an evil wizard, should we send the kids back?  Ok kids, have a good school year!

Second year: kids get turned into statues, threatening messages written in blood on the walls, and a kid kidnapped and taken into a chamber with a giant snake that can kill you just by looking at you.  Hmm, should we send the kids back?  Have a nice third year kids!

Third year: you get to the end, kids tell their parents that Dumbledore hired a known Werewolf, it was common knowledge that a known murderer was repeatedly breaking into the castle, and the government purposely surrounded the school with dark creatures that like to suck out the souls of anyone who get in their way.

In general, kids in Quidditch where they fly 60 feet above the ground and are hit in the head with solid iron balls.  Kids do things in potions class where they accidentally lose body parts.  This is not a safe place.

And on top of this, the education is clearly lopsided.  Students are expected to write essays, but aren’t taught English.  They have to measure ingredients in potions but don’t take standard math classes.

https://strawberrytours.com/london/tours/free-harry-potter-tour

Sounds like a fun tour, and it is free (though they ask you to donate what you can).

Nick wrote about this on the Lexicon Blog when it started, but there’s a Kickstarter Campaign to create a pub and inn in London where he’s approaching this as a Tech Startup.  He’s doing hackathons where people in tech will compete to create the magic used in the bar.  He’s got RFID wands that will control the beer taps, he’s got floating candles using maglev.  One of the awards in the kickstarter campaign is to film short videos which will show up in the random picture frames in the restaurant.

The post Episode 27: The Hogwarts Deathtrap appeared first on Harry Potter Lexicon.

Episode 26 of the Lexicon Podcast focuses on Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (the schoolbook released in 2001 and a new edition released this week), and Quidditch Through the Ages (the book that was originally published along with Fantastic Beasts in 2001).

We first talked a little bit about the process of how we add new content to the site. We first create stub entries (empty entries) and then we make a list of articles that need content and our editors work on the list.

We then talk about the news of the newly published edition of Fantastic Beasts and we discussed the Audiobook a little.

Steve asks Nick if he likes the new stuff. Nick comments that it is interesting reading again even the old stuff because now we have more of an idea of who the “writer” of this book actually is. Now that we have some context into the life of Newt Scamander things feel more connected reading this book where previously our only connection to it was the mentioning of it as being one of Harry’s Schoolbooks.

Steve mentions that an issue he has with the new introduction is that it felt to him as just a “blurb for the film.”

Steve mentions the 6 new beasts were fine but if you are going through the trouble, why not give us a lot more than 6. But if you are going to include 6 you really should include more, for example why isn’t Pukwudgie as you have the other 3 house animals, but omitted Pukwudgie. Nick points out that Pukwudgie might be classified as a “being” rather than a “beast” since Pukwudgies are intelligent enough to hold real conversations (like House Elves and Goblins).

Steve then asks about the audio version and Nick talks about his experience listening to it. Nick comments that it is both great and annoying that Eddie Redmayne reads the book “as” Newt Scamander. This bugs Nick because the introduction makes it clear that this new introduction is being written now, but being read by Newt Scamander with a voice identical to the Newt Scamander of 1926 at age 29 even though in 2017 he should now be 130.

Nick’s other problem with the new book is that the old schoolbook indicated that it was the 52nd edition of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, but the new introduction indicates that the 2001 edition was a reprint of the first edition of the book.

Timeline problems in this book, some of the changes to connect to the film and the rest of the book series. For example, in 2001 Dumbledore was not alive. Of course, there were date issues no matter what, for even in the 2001 editions, the Quidditch Through the Ages.

After our arguments about inconsistency, we go back to talking about the audio book. We play a tiny clip of the audiobook (I highly recommend you go get a copy yourself to hear the rest) and talk about some of the interesting things, like the background sounds and the way he handles footnotes.

Steve then launches into the fandom history and talks about what the situation was like in 2001 when the schoolbooks set was released. These books are vastly different than the things that come out in like Pottermore Essays.

A significant portion of all of what we know about the Wizarding World beyond the events of the book comes from these 2 little books, we learn a history of magic through 2 very different perspectives, Sports and Zoology, and we talk about how if we had gotten A History of Magic or Hogwarts a History instead, it might not have been such a rich tapestry, a feeling of real people.

We mention that the new edition does not have the graffiti but it does have new artwork. The pictures in the original were drawn by Rowling and were canon, but the pictures in the new edition are not canon (but beautiful).

We talk about how some of the canon we get from these books are very subtle, for example, there’s a mention of an 1884 Daily Prophet article, which means that the Daily Prophet has been published for more than 100 years.

We have a conversation about Dragon Pox, which we know originally came from Peruvian Vipertooth Dragons but someone from England had a case of it in the 1100s, that implies that European wizards were aware of and even visiting the Americas (otherwise how else do they get a disease that comes from a dragon that lives in Peru) long before Muggles. Nick points out that the History of Magic in North America series on Pottermore has a statement in there saying the same thing, but it doesn’t imply that it was as far back as the 12th century.

“Though European explorers called it ‘the New World’ when they first reached the continent, wizards had known about America long before Muggles. Various modes of magical travel – brooms and Apparition among them – not to mention visions and premonitions, meant that even far-flung wizarding communities were in contact with each other from the Middle Ages onwards.”

It also could simply be that the Peruvian Vipertooth Dragon wasn’t named until well later and originally existed in places other than Peru.

Nick then forgets where to look up Thestral, Steve immediately remembers and says to look up Winged Horses because it was a part of that. Nick then notes that at least in the Google Play Books version, searching for “Thestral” or “Thestrals” doesn’t work and feels like an idiot for forgetting that Thestral was under W.

We get into a conversation about just how richly detailed the wizarding world in Rowling’s mind. Steve mentions how the books were so detailed that in 2001 he was able to draw up a map of the grounds of Hogwarts and a few years later when Rowling finally made up a map of her own, it matched almost exactly, not because he guessed well, but because the picture was so clear in her mind that the details that leaked out supported that map.

If you haven’t got a copy of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them and Quidditch Through the Ages, we highly recommend you get it, and if you want to support the Lexicon at the same time, use the links above if you want to get them from Amazon and your purchase will help us out.

You could help us out by buying anything from Amazon as long as you use our link to Amazon, the Lexicon will get some credit from the purchases.

You can also support the Lexicon directly by becoming one of our Patrons on Patreon. At the end of April we will take all of the patrons we’ve received donations from and turn them into raffle tickets to raffle off the King Ice MACUSA Key Necklace we mentioned in the last podcast.

Our next podcast will likely be another J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World Crate unboxing since Nick received his shipping notification the same day this was recorded (the box has actually already arrived and I’m painfully avoiding opening it until we can record the unboxing). If you want to get your own J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World Crate from Loot Crate, go to lootcrate.com/hplexicon and use promo code HPLEXICON to get $3 off your order and support the Lexicon at the same time. The next crate (which will ship in May) is themed “The Dark Arts,” to find out more about that, check out Steve’s blog post about it (or just go to lootcrate.com/hplexicon and read it there).

Thanks as always to Harry and the Potters for allowing us to use their song for our theme music.

Steve: Some of the great posts from our editor Cathy on the Lexicon’s Facebook Page and Twitter Feed. If you don’t like us on Facebook or follow us on Twitter yet, you should, we have great posts going up every day, even more than just stuff from the lexicon, but related fandom news as well.

Nick: What caught me is from this very book. The little hints that more details are to come as more documents become declassified by the Ministry of Magic really excite me

“As more documents become declassified over the coming years, I will be freer to speak openly about my role during that dark period in our history.” — Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them: Foreward by the Author

Did Dumbledore’s Portrait write the original foreward or did Dumbledore write it before he died? Also, can a portrait really be “Delighted?”

Please give your answer to this in the Pensieve below, or any other comments you have about the new edition of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.

The post Episode 26: Fantastic Beasts and the 2001 thirst for canon appeared first on Harry Potter Lexicon.