Welcome to the mailbag, where we answer fanmail that you send in, over the course of the week. For those that don’t know, we’ll take your questions, and if we don’t know the answers, we’ll try to get the answers from people that would know. We might even make something up! I have a very broad sense of humor, on top of a vast knowledge of film, music and comics with a wide range in taste and a great memory that serves to bring great comparisons or answers to your questions.
This afternoon, I saw the latest Harry Potter film, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince. I have to say, having never read any of the books but the seventh, it connected the rest of the movies to the seventh book very well. However, I do have a question, which I posed on my facebook status today, getting a string of hilarious responses. If you’ve not seen the movie, avoid this paragraph:
“When Harry and Gandalf go to the Mines of Moria, why couldn’t Harry use the the Patronus on the Dead Marsh creatures, when Dumbledore was all Odysseus. Instead, he had to cast a Balrog to fight them, when the Balrog is made of light, just like the patronus.”
The point of this paragraph was two-fold. First, it was to point out just how much J.K. Rowling ‘borrowed’ from The Lord of the Rings and repackaged into her own work. However, she also borrowed from some Greek / Roman mythology having them cross over what I instantly thought was a representation of the river Styx, followed by a spell that replicated a scene in The Odyssey. It was set in the Mines of Moria from The Fellowship of the Ring, though, as well as in the Dead Marshes, where Frodo falls in among the dead and Gollum swims in after him in The Two Towers. And then, Dumbledore looks exactly like Gandalf when he’s fighting the Balrog on the Bridge of Khazad Dûm. And with the fire behind him, it looks like he’s summoned a Balrog to fight.
This brings us to the second part of the question: could Harry have used his Patronus on the Dead Marsh things? Arguably it is a light based magic, like fire, and does work on creatures of darkness other than just Dementors. I think that Harry just needs to be in trouble now, so the patronas has been limited.
Anyone have some insight for me other than “read the book?” I don’t plan on reading those books. Too many great books to read.
Let’s get started with this week’s mailbag:
Q: When I bought the Prince Caspian Soundtrack I was looking forward to hearing Reepicheep’s theme. Instead I only got a few seconds of it in The Door in the Air. Are they planning to come out with a more complete soundtrack?
-Collin Layman
Paul: Unfortunately a complete recording of Harry Gregson-Williams’ score for either The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe or Prince Caspian is very unlikely. Perhaps someday there will be a limited print run of a thousand or two copies of the complete recordings. Perhaps this letter will help to generate some more interest in owning all of the score from either film.
Who’s up for complete recordings of the Chronicles of Narnia scores by Harry Gregson-Williams? I sure am!
And this was a light week, with only the one letter. Better one than none, I say.
Thanks for the explanation, Sharon.
However, light is never completely without heat, so the Patronus could have at least worked some. And you’ve just added to my case that she must have used the river Styx as inspiration for that sequence (in much the same way that Lewis did so for The Silver Chair). It exists in the Roman and Greek underworlds along side the Inferi, who also dwell there.
Yeah, there’s a lot of differences between a seaside cave and a mine, but there are a lot of similarities also. And there’s no evidence that this particular seaside cave wasn’t also mined, by magic or other means. 🙂
Meg is spot-on. A Patronus can specifically expel only a Dementor because it is based on happy experiences and memories, which a Dementor cannot feed on.
It is obvious that the Lord of the Rings and Narnia have influenced Rowling’s work, and she has said so herself on countless occasions. But suggesting that Rowling “borrowed” so heavily from Tolkien that Dumbledore is simply a “repackaging” of Gandalf is unfounded and uneducated. Paul, I greatly respect all the work you do on the site, but you’re basing your opinion entirely off of the fact that Michael Gambon in that scene resembles Ian McKellan.
If you call yourself a Lewis fan, it is so important to read works similar to his own, ones which he influenced. You will have a much greater appreciation and understanding for Harry Potter by actually reading the books than watching the films, which, while entertaining, do not begin to scratch the surface or wholly represent Rowling’s word. “Too many great books to read” — and these seven are some of them. To be honest, they really don’t take that long to read either. You could easily finish the six you haven’t read in 15 or 20 days, or fewer, if you read faster or commit more hours to reading eachd ay.
The greater books that I have to read include Mitch Albom’s For One More Day, The Brothers Karamazov by Fyodor Dostoyevsky, The Everlasting Man, Orthodoxy, and The Man Who Was Thursday by G.K. Chesterton among others. That Rowling borrowed heavily from Tolkien is neither unfounded nor uneducated. While it is true that I have not read any but the seventh book in the series, it is also true that I have many many friends that have read all of the books, and we have discussed this fact at length.
Granted, if you read Robert Jordan’s The Wheel of Time, you’ll see Tolkien all over it. If you read Eragon, you’ll see a mixture of Tolkien, Lewis and Rowling within. If you read into Tolkien’s work, you’ll see reflections of both the Bible and Greek literature, as well as language used to bring the story forward. All great works have roots in other great works. I’m not saying that Rowling’s work doesn’t belong on a reading list for great works, she just doesn’t fit on mine. While it seems it would be favorable to read books that were influenced by Lewis and Tolkien, it can be argued that it is better to read books that influenced Tolkien and Lewis. This also includes writings that each of them wrote amongst one another, such as the works of Charles Williams. G.K. Chesterton, whom I mentioned above, as a great influence on their writing as Inklings as well.
And you’re correct, I am basing my opinion almost entirely on the fact that Michael Gambon, and Richard Harris before him, looks an awful lot like Ian McKellen in The Lord of the Rings. The costume designer opted, instead of being more original with the costume, following visually, the look that Tolkien described for his character. This leads me to wonder how Rowling described Dumbledore’s clothing. Was it based on her writing, or was this the invention of the costume designer?
Rowling’s decription of Dumbledore’s clothing is generally of long, flowing wizard’s robes. But it’s not particularly specific, i think, so his clothing would be largely created by the costume designer.
I’ve read somewhere that at one point Ian McKellen was considered for the role of Dumbldore, which would have been one of the worst decisions ever, because the characters would have been FAR too similar and comparisons, like the one you’ve made, would be absolutely inescapable in the minds of anyone who’d seen both film series.
I would TOTALLY be up for a complete soundtrack for either or both movies! I could listen to both of the soundtracks endlessly already, so an even more complete one would be wonderful!
Me too! 🙂 I would love to own the complete soundtracks.
I agree! I LOVE the soundtracks, and want more complete recordings!
I would LOVE to have the complete soundtracks of “Prince Caspian” and “The Lion…”. The music is absolutley amazing!!!
I’m up for the complete soundtracks!
Also, r.e. the harry potter thing… I don’t think Jk rowling fully ‘copied’ the Dumbledore character off Gandalf, but that hey are both products of the sort of cultural stereotype of the old wizard, Merlin-like persona. Additionally, he comes off a lot differently in the movies- if you’d read the books (yes, i know, you’re not going to :)) you’d know.
The most interesting thing that you said there, was that Gandalf was based on a stereotype of the old Merlin-like persona of a wizard. The main thing that you should know is that, until Gandalf, wizards were never portrayed like that. And, while Gandalf is called a wizard in many places, he is defined differently. He’s an Istari. He’s far from the Merlin type, as he doesn’t cast spells; he uses the abilities that he has like you or I use the abilities that we have. He’s just got those skills that he was created with. Merlin and Dumbledore create potions and cast spells.
In many ways, Gandalf – appearing in The Hobbit – redefined peoples’ perception of Wizards. He was so popular that he, consciously or subconsciously, influenced Merlin’s design in Disney’s The Sword and the Stone and Mickey in The Sorcerer’s Apprentice part of Fantasia as well as many other wizards over the next 60 years. However, Merlin’s portrayal, beginning in the late 90s, there’s been a lot of Merlin related TV series and mini-series (there’s even one now) that portray Merlin in the way that he was written around the 13th century. He didn’t have a tall-pointy hat back then, he merely wore a hood.
The Patronus is not light-based magic, thus why it is not a good way to fight the Inferi. It is powered by the caster’s happy memories and life and hope and love — it is a physical manifestation of hope and happiness — an anti-Dementor. As a Patronus is corporeal, it could possibly bowl the Inferi over, but it would probably only have as much effect as a live stag in that case.
Where can I ask a question for the mailbag???
Click on “Contact Us” on the menu, and fill out the contact form on that page. 🙂
In fact, there is a complete recording from LWW. It the complete recording session and consists of 3 CDs (76 Tracks). It contains pretty much all the music from the first film. I have never heard whether there is one of the 2nd movie as well…
HP is a bad thing from a Christian standpoint.