MuggleCast 139 Transcript
Show Intro
[Intro music begins]
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[Harry Potter theme starts]
Jim Dale: [as Professor McGonagall] This is Professor McGonagall welcoming you all to MuggleCast hoping you all enjoyed – Dobby! Dobby, come here! Here! Dobby! [as Dobby] Yes, I’d just like to say how very pleased I am to introduce MuggleCast to all of you! Thank you! Thank you!
[Show music begins]
Andrew: Because I’m not on the show this week, so be prepared to fast forward through most of it, this is MuggleCast Episode 139 for March 30th, 2008.
[Show music continues]
Matt: [impersonating Andrew] Wahoo! Welcome, everyone, all you MuggleCast listeners. This is MuggleCast, I am Andrew Sims. Yeah! Yeah! All right! And we got some other hosts on the show, so we’re just going to pop it over. Is there anyone else in here?
Jamie: [impersonating Andrew] Well, yeah.
Laura: Yeah. Hey!
Matt: Hey!
Jamie: There’s more than one Andrew.
Matt: [impersonating Andrew] Yeah, this is Andrew! My personality, cocky self!
Jamie: [laughs] We should have a show where everyone’s Andrew. That would get confusing as hell.
Laura: Yeah, that would. But you know it does sound a lot like him. I guess…
Jamie: I am impressed.
Matt: Oh, thank you.
Laura: I know.
Jamie: Very impressed.
Matt: That’s a huge compliment.
Laura: Matt?
Matt: What?
Jamie: I’m sorry, we thought it was Andrew.
Matt: All of you know, Andrew’s not here, but the ones who are on the show, it’s me. I’m Matthew Britton.
Laura: I’m Laura Thompson.
Jamie: It’s me. I’m Jamie Lawrence.
Micah: And I’m Micah Tannenbaum.
Matt: Jamie is here, everyone! Finally, after a…
Laura: Yay!
Matt: …seventeen month delay of him being on the show.
[Everyone laughs]
Jamie: Was the show going seventeen months ago?
Matt: I don’t – it’s been something like that, hasn’t it?
Laura: Although, if you’ve measured it in blikle years, I’m sure it would have been much longer.
Jamie: It would have been, Laura. It would have been, but Pickle Pack is on its last legs, I believe. I know.
Laura: Yeah, it’s really sad.
Jamie: It’s going to be over very soon. It is very sad. By the way, by the way, the show, when are we ending it? Because it seems like it’s going on for longer than was the original plan. I’ve been out of the loop so much.
Micah: To answer your question…
Matt: Um, I don’t really know.
Micah: …Jamie, I did some calculations, actually. [laughs] The shows been going on for thirty-one months.
Jamie: Thirty-one months.
Laura: Oh my gosh.
Micah: Thirty-one months.
Jamie: That does not sound like a lot at all.
Matt: Well, it’s…
Jamie: Thirty-one months.
Matt: No, it doesn’t. It’s almost three years, though. That is a lot.
Laura: Well, it’s interesting that you bring that up because we do actually have an announcement that we’ll be getting to in a few minutes after Micah does his news…
Jamie: Oh, really?
Laura: …pertaining to the life of the show. So we’re pretty excited about that.
Matt: Oh, yes.
[Show music continues to play]
News
Matt: Now let’s take it over to Micah Tannenbaum in the MuggleCast News Room. After a month of being absent, he is back. So let’s go over to Micah.
Micah: All right, thanks, Andrew. As many of you are well aware, J.K. Rowling and Warner Brothers are involved in an ongoing lawsuit with RDR Books over a companion novels seeking publication by Harry Potter Lexicon owner Steve Vander Ark. The Associated Foreign Press reported earlier this week that Jo is expected to appear in court in New York City next month. A New York federal district court judge ordered earlier this week that the case go to trial beginning April 14 and Rowling’s presence has been requested by RDR Books. RDR lawyer David Hammer was quoted saying, “We asked for her and they said they would provide her. I would say it would be very unlikely that she would not appear.” The witness list must be submitted this week by April the 4th. We will keep you posted as this story continues to develop.
And on Friday the CBS Early Show did a piece on the growing sport of Quidditch on college campuses across the country. As previously reported in USA Today, Quidditch is becoming a very popular sport among college students, and now the school that began it all, Middlebury College, is going on an eight-school tour during their spring break recess. On Friday, Middlebury was at Amherst College in Massachusetts, and that is where the CBS Early Show broadcasted from. To see video from the CBS Early Show, be sure to head over to MuggleNet.com.
The Harry Potter book series has once again won Favorite Book at the 2008 Kids’ Choice Awards. As most of you probably know, Potter has repeatedly won for the award for Favorite Book in past years.
And finally, Nigel Newton, the chief executive of the U.K. Potter publisher, Bloomsbury, will disclose this Tuesday that the phenomenal success of Deathly Hallows was the major factor behind an increase in annual profits from £5.2 million to more than £17 million this past year. A report by the Sunday Herald continues that Newton “will claim that the Potter effect will continue for years ahead as the group dips into cash reserves of more than £40m, built up from past Potter sales, to promote new talent and to make further acquisitions.”
That’s all the news for this March 30th, 2008 edition of MuggleCast. Back to the show.
Matt: All right, thank you, Micah. Micah, has this been a good week of news or a slow week?
Jamie: Well, he’s just told you.
[Jamie and Micah laugh]
Matt: Well, yeah, but I wasn’t really listening.
News Discussion: J.K. Rowling Going to Court
Micah: No, it’s all right. It’s all right. I would say when you look at it it hasn’t had a lot of news, but the news stories that we have had have been pretty big. So first off, obviously, J.K. Rowling is reported to appear in court on April 14 here in New York City, and I say “here” because I’m pretty close to New York City. I don’t know if that would apply to Jamie and Laura and you, but it’s – she’s actually supposed to be on this witness list that is being submitted by April 4, and based on this article that was put out, I think it was earlier this week, all things sort of point to her having to show up. And RDR books, who would be the defendant in this case, says that she’s going to be there. I don’t really think that Jo probably wants to have to pick up and travel in the middle of the spring…
Laura: Yeah, it does kind of suck.
Matt: Yeah.
Micah: …now and have to come all the way to New York just for this trial, but it’s going to be interesting to see how it all plays out.
Jamie: Do you know how people swear an oath on the Bible? She should swear one on a Harry Potter book.
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Well, Micah, you and Andrew were thinking about going to the courthouse, right?
Micah: Well, I don’t know if you can actually do that, to be honest. I don’t know if it’s an open trial. I would think that some media would be allowed to attend to cover the trial and, you know, all that kind of stuff. It would be interesting because I would think that also maybe somebody like Jo would want the fansites to cover it and to get a real perspective as to what’s going on.
Jamie: I don’t think it works like that, though. I don’t think it’s like a movie premiere where you can jump up and down and scream and say, “Go Jo!”
Laura: No.
Micah: No, no. I mean just to kind of sit and observe.
Laura: But you know there will be people outside the courthouse doing that, though.
Jamie: Yeah, but that’s not the same as being inside.
Matt: Oh, of course.
Laura: Oh, I know, but it’s really bizarre when you think about it because here there’s this serious trial going on, and all these fans are going to convene and treat it like a premiere or a book reading. It’s just – I find that interesting.
Micah: Yeah.
Matt: Well, they’ll probably just show up just to show their support for Jo, I would think.
Laura: Yeah, that’s true. That’s true.
Jamie: [laughs] I’d laugh if she wins and then come November, we see the judge in like a walk-on role in Half-Blood Prince or something.
Laura: Yeah. [laughs]
Micah: No Americans, Jamie. No Americans are allowed.
Jamie: In what?
Matt: Oooh.
Jamie: Yeah, but I’m sure she can bend the rules to avoid a lawsuit.
Laura: I don’t think she’s going to have to bend the rules for anything. I think she’s going to win.
Jamie: She will, yeah.
Matt: Yeah.
Jamie: She will. It’s done and dusted.
News Discussion: New Picture from Movie 6
Matt: So let’s move on to our next big top news discussion. We got a new Half-Blood Prince pic, official from Warner Brothers.
Laura: Doesn’t it…
Matt: It’s…
[Jamie groans]
Laura: Doesn’t it feel like every time a new movie comes out the first picture we get, or one of the first pictures, is the three of them sitting in front of the fire, looking concerned about something?
Jamie: Yeah, exactly. It is the concerned syndrome.
Laura: It’s the same picture. [laughs]
Matt: But I mean, does it look kind of staged to you? Because to me it looks completely like they took this picture on purpose.
Jamie: Matt, it’s a movie. It’s a movie, of course it’s staged. [laughs]
Laura: Yeah.
[Matt laughs]
Laura: But I mean, you’re saying that it wasn’t actually taken from a scene, you think that they actually…
Jamie: Oh. Sorry.
Laura: …had to do a photo shoot, or something?
Matt: Yeah, I mean, because this kind of reminds me of one of those pictures from Order of the Phoenix when the Trio is in the Hog’s Head, and Harry looks like he’s about to get up, and then so does – I mean Harry’s already standing up, and Ron looks like he’s about to get up, and Hermione’s looking to the side.
Laura: Yeah.
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: Remember that photo I’m talking about? And we don’t really even see that scene in it, but, I don’t know, it just reminds me of the same picture.
Jamie: And also, just to remind you, to say that every time there comes the concern picture, and, you know, and then people draw up conclusions from it, they’re like, “Oh, I think it’s going to be a dark movie full of suspense, just from that concerned picture.”
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Well, there’s like a whole page of comments just about Hermione’s hair.
Laura: You know, who cares?
Matt: It’s this huge issue with every single movie. All the fans have to comment on how Emma’s hair is in the movie.
Jamie: It is exciting, to be honest.
[Laura laughs]
Matt: Yeah, have you seen the curls?
Laura: That’s the first thing I think of.
Matt: Well, honestly, I don’t like Hermione’s hair in this because it’s blonde, so I don’t really think she’s really going to be that good of an actress in this book, so I don’t even think – or this movie, so I’m not going to watch it.
Jamie: Cool. Same here.
Matt: All right.
[Laura and Matt laugh]
Laura: It’s just – I don’t know. It’s a nice picture, but I just feel like it’s always the same. They always have Hermione holding a newspaper, and it’s, as Andrew would say, the typical Emma Watson concern face. And then Ron always looks somewhat confused.
[Everyone laughs]
Matt: And he’s always in the back.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: It’s always Harry and Hermione in the front, and Ron’s always pushed in the back.
Laura: Yeah, that’s always bothered me. Anytime you look at the movie posters Ron is always in the back. What is with that?
Matt: I have no idea.
Laura: Seriously. He’s Harry’s best friend, guys, got to switch it up a little.
Matt: I know, and Ron’s eating walnuts. Who eats walnuts? In a bowl?
Laura: [laughs] Apparently he does that.
Jamie: Come to England then. You’d be surprised.
Matt: I guess so, I’m really not…
Jamie: That’s one of the less weird things we do.
Micah: What’s that? Sorry, I missed it.
Jamie: Eating walnuts.
Micah: Oh.
Jamie: From a bowl.
Micah: [laughs] Oh, you crazy people.
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: We do it during school.
Matt: [laughs] Well, have you guys seen – I mean on the Daily Prophet newspaper, is that Slughorn’s picture in it? Do you guys think? It kind of looks like the actor who plays him.
Laura: I haven’t studied it that closely; I was too busy looking at Emma’s hair.
Matt: I know. Oh my goodness.
Laura: I just can’t get over it.
[Jamie laughs]
Laura: It’s so wonderful.
Micah: Wow. Really?
[Everyone laughs]
Matt: Nice input, Micah.
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: Well, what’s interesting about that, and I actually just looked at the picture right now, is it looks like the word “Ministry” is on the paper. So I was wondering if that could be the new Minister.
Laura: It could be.
Jamie: Or a book. Or a piece of parchment. Oh, sorry.
Micah: It looks like “More Disappointment at Ministry” if you read it.
Matt: Or “disappearances”
Micah: Yeah, “at Ministry,” so…
Laura: Yeah, that would make sense.
Micah: Or it could just be some person that disappeared. Ha.
Matt: Weird. I just have a feeling David Yates is going to do his whole Daily Prophet transitions again in this movie.
[Jamie laughs]
Laura: I thought those were awesome. Did you not like them?
Matt: Oh, I did! No, no, no, I did. Sorry.
Laura: What did everyone else think of those?
Jamie: They – I mean it was a gimmick, but it’s cool. Very cool. You know?
Matt: Mhm.
Jamie: I mean…
Matt: It definitely quickened the pace, at least.
Jamie: Yeah, it did.
Laura: Yeah, I thought it was a good pacing tool, because they could get across a lot of information without having to use up time in the film, I guess. Like stuff that we didn’t necessarily need to see acted out.
Matt: It’s definitely one of the biggest – Order of the Phoenix is the biggest book in the series, correct?
Laura: Mhm.
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: So, yeah, that would explain why there’s so many montages in the movie as well.
Laura: Yeah.
Announcement: MuggleCast is Dominating Podcast Alley
Matt: Let’s move on to some more announcements. Currently, MuggleCast is number one on Podcast Alley.
Laura: Whoo! Yaay!
Matt: Still, this entire month. It’s been MuggleCast March.
Laura: Way to go.
Jamie: Awesome.
Matt: It has.
Laura: We have to come up with some clever term for April, so we can…
Matt: Yeah, Mapril is still not doing it for me.
Laura: Mapril, ehh. Mapril.
Jamie: Isn’t that just adding the letter “M” to the beginning of “April?”
Matt: Yeah. It is.
Jamie: Oh. [laughs]
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: Mapril. And then Mmmmay.
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: May, that’s a stretch though, Jamie.
Matt: I don’t think the fans would get that, though. I don’t see the connection.
Jamie: Well, wouldn’t it be M-May? Or is it just Mmmmay?
Matt: Mmmmay.
Laura: [laughs] May.
Matt: Two Ms.
[Jamie and Laura laugh]
Announcement: MuggleCast is Changing
Matt: Let’s move on to one more announcement. The reason why Andrew is not on the show is because Andrew is currently in Oregon. Portland, Oregon to be precise, doing a little on-set visit to the Twilight film. Have you guys heard about this?
Laura: Yeah, yeah. Actually, he was…
Jamie: Boasting about it the other day.
Laura: …he met a few of – yeah! He’s just – he’s very, very excited. I just talked to him a little while ago, and he said that he’s seen – well, Matt, you said he saw all of the – for those of you who read Twilight, the Cullen siblings.
Matt: Yes, he saw all the Cullen family. The Cullen family is the vampire family, if you don’t know from the books.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: And he also talked to Robert Pattinson, whom you all know played Cedric Diggory in the Goblet of Fire film. And…
Jamie: Did some coke with him. [laughs]
[Laura laughs]
Micah: You mean drank some coke, right?
[Jamie laughs]
Laura: Smoke a little weed, you know.
Jamie: Yes.
Matt: Oh, gosh.
Jamie: I drank some coke with him.
Matt: And many of you are probably wondering why he is on the set. Well, this kind of leads into another announcement that we’ve all been talking about and deciding on for quite some time, and we’ve actually decided to – well, since I haven’t been on the show very much, does anyone else want to talk about this? This is a really big announcement.
Jamie: Huge.
Laura: Yeah, yeah sure. So, you know, a lot of people have been writing in for a while that are really, really upset about us ending the show in April or May because, obviously, there’s only so much Harry Potter content we have. But we know that there are actually a lot of fans who love other types of fantasy, you know, genres and other types of books and stuff, so we thought why not expand our show to encompass all those other fandoms? What do you guys think of that? Does that sound good? Yeah? No?
Matt: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I think it’s an awesome idea.
Jamie: With the new ones coming out as well; we’ve got Twilight, Spiderwick Chronicles…
Laura: Yeah.
Jamie: …you know, all that kind of awesome stuff, so…
Laura: Yeah, see we were thinking about Spiderwick, and we haven’t, you know, a hundred percent fit it into how we’re going to schedule the show, but here’s how we’ve got it broken down at this point. We’ve got the new show, the new MuggleCast, as you might call it, broken down into four different segments right now. We’ve got “Totally Twilight,” which is when we’re going to dedicate that time to like a chapter of the Twilight series, also we’re going to go over some movie discussion, obviously Andrew’s at the set right now, so he’ll bring us a full report, and it’ll be excellent. For those of you who are all about Narnia, we’re going to do a thing. Right now it’s called “Welcome to Narnia.” By the way, if you guys have any better suggestions for the names of these segments, please feel free to e-mail them in. We’re always open to suggestion.
Jamie: We are.
Laura: And in that I also mean, there’s all the Narnia movies going on right now, so that’ll be great. We’ll do Chapter-by-Chapter on that as well. And for those of you who are big Lord of the Rings fans, we’re going to have “Journey to Middle Earth,” which will of course cover analysis, and I think we’ll probably talk a lot about the upcoming Hobbit movie.
Matt: Yes.
Laura: So that should be pretty good. And we’ve decided that we will, of course, still have Harry Potter as part of our show.
Jamie: Because we started off as one, so we’re still going to end as one, you know.
Laura: Yeah, exactly.
Matt: Yes, exactly.
Laura: There would be no reason to cut Harry Potter out, and I know that would upset a lot of people too. Don’t you guys think?
Matt: Oh, yeah, especially. I mean they wouldn’t even listen to the show if we didn’t talk about, at least, ten or twenty minutes of Harry Potter.
Jamie: And they’d go around killing people.
[Laura and Matt laugh]
Jamie: Serial killing people, so you know, kind of….
Laura: Oh, God. We wouldn’t want to start a mass spree of serial killers.
Jamie: Can’t become responsible for deaths. Yeah.
Matt: MuggleCast kills.
Laura: So I think Andrew came up with this one – sounds like something he’d come up with anyway…
[Jamie laughs]
Laura: We’re going to put all that into a segment called Muggle-MiniCast, which I think he kind of took as a cue from the older shows when we would do the smaller episodes, you know, the twenty-thirty minutes ones.
Matt: Yeah, I remember those, yeah.
Laura: Yeah, so we’re going to combine a lot of that into, maybe, a twenty minute segment. So this is all – we’re hoping to put this into effect next week. Do you guys think…
Jamie: Well, also, you’ve missed out the fifth segment, which we want to do Star Wars, since that’s a huge, huge deal as well. People still like that as well.
Laura: Oh, really?
Matt: Oh, yes, definitely Star Wars. Yeah. We’re thinking about having another mini-segment for other stuff like Star Wars and Spiderwick…
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: …because since there’s nothing really coming out right now we’re just going to combine them all just in case there’s a new big news event or something to talk about.
Jamie: But – but on the Star Wars one, we want to call it Force Feedback, but we’re currently in talks with the lawyers at Microsoft because they make a gaming controller called Force Feedback.
Laura: Oh, that’s right.
Matt: Yes. Yeah.
Laura: Oh.
Jamie: Yeah, we just have to talk to them and stuff like that, but hopefully it should be sorted out soon, which is cool.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Hopefully it’s all great, and if you listeners are kind of concerned about if we’re going to keep doing Chapter-by-Chapter, we are going to do it, but we’re just going to kind of condense it into a ten to fifteen minute discussion at the very, very most, because, I mean, this is a lot of stuff to talk about. So everything’s going to be at least twenty minutes long.
Laura: Right. And I mean the way we figured it is that it seemed like a happy medium when you think about putting Chapter-by-Chapter into a smaller segment because you have people who think we either drone on about stuff too long, or you think people who think, you know, people who think we don’t spend enough time. So this way we can just pick out a couple of key things from the chapters and discuss those for seven or eight minutes each, and then it’ll all be good, I think.
Micah: I think it’s absolute crap, to be honest with you. I think you cannot take away from what we’ve been working on for the past three years now and change it over into something else.
[Matt sighs]
Laura: Uh, well…
Matt: Well…
Laura: Sorry, Micah.
Jamie: Well, we’re doing it. [laughs]
Laura: [laughs] Yeah, I mean, this is an executive decision here. I mean…
Matt: Come on, guys.
Micah: So where are Andrew and Ben?
Laura: Well, not – I mean, we all vote…well, Ben doesn’t matter anymore.
[Micah laughs]
Jamie: Kevin made the decision.
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: No, really, we really did sit down and talk about this for a long time. I mean, Matt, when did this talk originally start? It seems like it was like February.
Matt: This originally talked after…
[Jamie laughs]
Matt: …the Spiderwick movie came out and everyone was talking about like, “Oh my God, they’re going to do SpiderwickCast.” And, basically, that kind of – whoever really just wrote that to us or brought that to our attention, you pretty much made that decision for us.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Because you’re the ones who brought that into our heads.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: And we started discussing it, and I…
Laura: Yeah. Well, it’s funny because we viewed it as a joke originally. We kind of joked around about SpiderwickCast. But actually, I really think it’s going to be a good idea and I think that when you guys see it in action you’re really, really going to like it.
Jamie: Going to enjoy it, yeah.
Matt: I think it’ll grow on you, Micah.
Micah: No, I don’t think so, man…
Matt: Just have some faith.
Micah: I don’t think I’d continue on with this show if that was the case.
Matt: Ungh, well…I can’t…I can’t fire you, so we’re going to have to talk to Andrew about that.
Micah: Yeah, you definitely will. I’m not putting up with that stuff. It’s absolutely…
Laura: Well, will you…
Micah: …stupid.
Laura: Will you stay on through the end of this episode at least?
Micah: Yeah, maybe, I mean I don’t know. Maybe I’ll just drop out in the middle since you guys aren’t taking this very seriously anymore.
Matt: No, don’t do that. Please?
Laura: No, we really are taking it seriously, Micah.
Matt: Come on.
Laura: Gosh.
Micah: Just unbelievable. You guys have no dedication whatsoever.
Matt: That’s – All right, let’s not get into this.
Muggle Mail: Box Sets
Laura: Yeah, you know what? I’m sick of this. We need to move on. All right? So we are going to move on to some Mugglenet – Muggle Mail.
Matt: Our last Muggle Mail.
Laura: Yeah. Aw. Well, we might still do one or two more Muggle Mails.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: In the spirit of it.
Jamie: Spidermail.
[Laura laughs]
Matt: Spiderwebmail.
Jamie: Obi One mail. [laughs] Spiderwebmail.
[Laura laughs]
Matt: Okay, Laura, you want to get the first one done?
Laura: Yeah. Sure, The first one comes from Shannon. She says:
“In Episode 138 you guys were talking about box sets and to what extent people bought the books and movies in box sets. I think a very important thing to remember is the people currently reading the books and watching the movies: kids and their parents. By the time the last movies and books come out, the kids who sat with their mommies and daddies to read “Harry Potter” will be growing up. A lot of them will be going off to college, and who will get to keep all the “Harry Potter” books and movies? Mom and dad or the kids? So somebody is going to have to buy them all over again. The same goes for siblings. When there is one set of movies per household, and there are two kids in the family and one moves away, who gets to keep the movies? It happened to me when my older brother, who I shared the series with, moved to Washington D.C. He kept the old set, and I got a brand spanking new box set.” Well, Shannon…
Jamie: That is true.
Laura: …what I did before I left for college was I just ripped all of my DVDs off onto my computer, and then I…
Jamie: That’s cool. Piracy.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Mhm.
Jamie: Good. Awesome.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: We always support that here at MuggleCast.
Jamie: The thing is…
Matt: Of course.
Laura: I didn’t rip Harry Potter though. Don’t worry, Warner Brothers. I wouldn’t do that.
Jamie: Yeah, but to be honest, they own everything, so uh…
Laura: Yeah. [laughs] That’s true.
[Matt laughs]
Jamie: So you can’t really rip a movie and not cause them to lose twelve pounds, but…
[Matt laughs]
Jamie: I don’t want a brand spanking new box set because their new covers, especially here in the U.K., I don’t know if they are new over there, but they have these crappy stars on them. It’s all sort of like New Age and, you know, fantasy-ish, and it’s awful.
Laura: Yeah! They add stuff to the covers that you can’t take off, and it sucks.
Jamie: Yeah. I want an old style Harry Potter book. Old school. Not the new ones.
Matt: Well, they’re doing that with the movie covers too.
Jamie: [groans] What’s wrong with them?
Matt: They have these banners on the original Harry Potter DVDs. It’s like these little Celtic-style bands around the edges of it. It’s – I don’t know. I’m kind of mixed on that too.
Laura: Yeah. I don’t know…
Matt: Why do they have to mess with it? Seriously.
Laura: [sighs] You know, I don’t know. Maybe to grab people’s attention? But the way I think about it, it is not just people who need doubles of it that are going to buy it. I mean there are so many people who are fans of books like Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, Narnia, and they collect this kind of stuff. There are people who will go out and buy these box sets of books and movies, and they will never open them.
Jamie: It’s true.
Laura: They’ll just have them to sit on a shelf, and there’s nothing wrong with that, there’s nothing wrong with collecting, but that’s mainly why they do it, because there are a lot of collectors out there.
Matt: For a collector’s standpoint, and I agree with that.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah.
Jamie: But everyone’s got it. The box sets with the new books, everyone’s got them, haven’t they?
Laura: No.
Jamie: No, but I mean like it’s not rare. I can understand collectors getting like a first addition Half Blood Prince or whatever, but a box set? It’s a box set for a reason, because there’s nothing special inside.
Matt: But they…
Jamie: I realize that’s a bit cold hearted, but, you know.
Matt: Well, with just Harry Potter books in general, they don’t just sell a box set of the books, they also sell a Hogwarts carrying case with it too. I think that’s what a lot of the fans like to do too is just to buy the extra features that come with it. Which is why like a lot of companies release like two disc ultimate platinum ultimate special edition DVDs…
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: …with an extra bookcase that comes with the DVD or an extra DVD comes with it.
Jamie: Yeah. That’s true.
Matt: So I think definitely the special edition that comes with it.
Jamie: Which is annoying, Matt, because I searched for Family Guy the other day, because I wanted to buy the DVD, because it’s an awesome show, isn’t it?
Matt: Oh, of course.
Jamie: But there are like four million different box sets. And one’s like a hundred dollars and one’s like a hundred and one dollars, and there’s new stuff in each of them. Like one had poker chips, and I was like well, poker chips would be cool, but it’s a bit of a gimmick. I just want Family Guy, but then I thought well, perhaps I should get the poker chips since I’m buying the box set anyway, and what’s another twenty dollars when you’re spending, you know?
Matt: That’s…
Jamie: It caused me a lot of grief.
Matt: …exactly what they’re doing too. That’s their whole intention is for you to think…
Jamie: I know.
Matt: well, it’s only ten more dollars for this.
Jamie: I felt like a guinea pig. Yeah.
Matt: You’re conforming to the man.
Jamie: I know. I just feel like I’m lost now. I’m lost. I just wander this earth.
[Jamie and Matt laugh]
Jamie: I have no idea what my place in this world is.
Laura: You’re just a pawn in the game of life I guess.
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: Since we’re trying to keep Jamie on the show, Jamie why don’t you read the next Muggle Mail?
MuggleCast 139 Transcript (continued)
Muggle Mail: Gender Inequality in the Fandom
Jamie: All right. All right. Okay. This is from Graham Henson, 18, from Perth, Australia. Subject: Harry Potter male fans. Which I think should be “male Harry Potter fans.”
[Everyone laughs]
Jamie: But Graham says:
“There is quite clearly a gender inequality in the “Harry Potter” fandom. This really doesn’t extend to fantasy in general. “Lord of the Rings” for one. And I certainly think that masculine stereotypes play a role. For one, it isn’t considered manly to read at all for some stupid reason. However, if a man is to read, it should be a manly action book or at least one which is geared toward adults. As the “Harry Potter” series not only is a series of books, it is primarily a series which is marketed towards children, making it twice as bad for males to like. For females on the other hand, it seems that it is socially acceptable for them to like childish things, such as Hello Kitty…” which I haven’t heard of. It sounds crap.
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: “…and the like, which only weirdo nerd losers are allowed to like for some reason. Why? Why? Why can’t we all love Hello Kitty and “Harry Potter” equally? Oh, and the high amount of male podcasters is just due to the image of technology in society. It isn’t okay for girls to be into technology, but they do get “Harry Potter,” it seems. I absolutely love the show, easily the best Potter podcast around. From Graham.” Thank you, Graham.
Micah: Okay.
Laura: So, Matt and Micah, do you guys kind of want to give us a recap because Jamie and I weren’t on last week and I think you guys talked about gender.
Matt: Well, I wasn’t on. Micah, you were the only person who was on last week to discuss this.
Laura: Oh, okay.
Matt: What is this – what is Graham talking about?
Micah: Well, last week on the show I think that one of the voicemail questions, actually, was focusing on the fandom as a whole and why there seem to be more girls who are fans of Harry Potter and fans of the podcast as a whole. And also, with that being said, why are there also more male podcasters as opposed to female podcasters? And I think when you look at it, it kind of flows together and part of what Andrew was saying was look, with the podcast, it’s really a technological thing, and for some reason guys seem to be more into technology and working with all those types of things than girls do.” I’m not saying that that’s the case every single time, but that’s why, you know – we were talking about…
Laura: Clearly not.
Micah: …a lot of us got into it because of that reason. Yeah, we all read Harry Potter, but one of the cool aspects of it was being able to do a podcast, and I brought up the fact that I really joined because it was an online radio show, and I thought it would be, you know, just a great thing to get involved with. And, you know, Andrew kind of said something along the same lines, Mikey as well, and so even though we all love the books, this is kind of the reason why we got into it, because podcasting was just kind of this new cool technological thing, at the time, and still is today. And, you know, kind of the female following, we thought, was because we’re all guys, so…
Laura: Uh…
Matt: Yeah, maybe.
Laura: I don’t think it’s because you’re guys – and no offense, it’s not that I’m saying…
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: …that it’s – I’m not saying that the following is undeserved. I would never say that.
Micah: No, no, but, to be honest with you, Laura, Andrew’s answer, I think, bordered on a little bit more arrogance than the way I put it.
Jamie: [laughs] What did Andrew say?
Micah: I don’t remember his exact words.
Laura: What? He basically said that girls only listen because we’re a bunch of, like, squealy fangirly types and – what? Like, is that basically what he said? Or…
Micah: I don’t know if he put it like that, but – I don’t know. Maybe we should roll his audio from last week.
Matt: I was listening to – I was actually just listening to that part of the episode, and I think it must have been Mikey who said that the reason why, like, more guys like Star Wars and Star Trek and stuff than Harry Potter – honestly, I don’t think you can really compare that with Harry Potter because Harry Potter started as a book, whereas Star Wars and Star Trek started off as a TV show. And, generally, I think as gender goes, the males kind of watch a little more TV than read as in women – females tend to watch – to read a little more.
Micah: And you almost have to do polling on this and see, because…
Matt: Yeah.
Micah: …it’s like with Star Wars and Star Trek, though, it’s science fiction, and I guess guys are more into science fiction than they are into fantasy, which is kind of what Harry Potter is. So are more girls generally into fantasy books than guys? And, you know, it’s just weird. I mean I don’t know how, you know, Laura’s the only female host.
Jamie: There are so many factors that could explain it.
Laura: Well, there really are.
Micah: What’s that?
Jamie: There are so many factors that explain that, like, you know, a sort of – perhaps – you know how society’s organized nowadays, perhaps males – their time is better suited to, like, watching a specific program that’s set – because, you see, I have this theory that psychologists run the entire world. Like, you know, stuff is put on TV and, I mean, this is kind of conspiracy theorist, but it’s not.
Matt: Yeah. [laughs]
Jamie: No, no, no, Matt, seriously, like stuff is put on TV at certain times, specific times to suit, like, the audience. Like, they put it on – or, like – or, like commercials, you know, like, it’s all designed to go into your unconscious and activate, you know, desires and stuff like that. So I’m sure everything’s done for a reason, kind of.
Laura: Yeah.
Jamie: But, no, yeah. I think it just works out like that.
Laura: Well, and I think there is something to be said for gender interest. And just like you look at – I can’t say this for certain, but a lot of people I know who are fans of Lord of the Rings are male.
Matt: Right.
Laura: And a lot of people I know who are into Harry Potter are female, and one of the common factors I can link there is that the author of the Lord of the Rings was male and the author of Harry Potter is female. And think that there is a distinctive style that men and women have when they write. I think you can definitely tell when you read Harry Potter that the author is a woman.
Matt: Oh, definitely.
Laura: And there’s nothing wrong with that. It’s not to say that that’s a fault. Like, I would be a huge hypocrite to think so. But I just think that there is that distinct difference and, also, I read something a while back talking about how, I guess, Scholastic and Bloomsbury actually had Jo put her name as J.K. Rowling because…
Jamie: Yeah, it’s true.
Laura: …it sounded more like a male name so it would appeal to boys. So there’s a lot to be said for…
Micah: Yeah, I do remember that. They did do that.
Laura: …what different genders are interested in. And, I mean, it’s true with technology, too. I mean there are more men in the technology field than women. I went to join my school’s radio club, and I was the only girl there, and when I went to them and told them I knew how to podcast…
Micah: Must have felt a little bit familiar.
Laura: Yeah! Except they never really gave me any opportunities because I’m – I don’t want to, you know, be judgmental here and make any assumptions – but the only thing I can think of is it’s because I’m a girl, and when I went to them and said, “Hey, I know how to do this stuff. I can help you with the podcast,” they never contacted me, and never contacted me, and I was just like, “fine.”
Jamie: Sue them!
Laura: Screw you people!
Micah: Exactly! There you go. That’s not right.
Jamie: You could make good money, Laura.
Micah: Jamie will be your lawyer.
Jamie: Yeah.
Laura: Yeah. Awesome, awesome…
Micah: He’ll want a cut.
Jamie: [laughs] Yeah. 85 percent.
Matt: [laughs] Nice.
Micah: 85 percent. Then he’ll go up north and defend J.K. Rowling, so…
Jamie: Yeah!
Laura: Yeah! Okay. Cool, cool.
Jamie: I want a serious cut from that.
Micah: You have a budding career in front of you, Jamie. Just come to the U.S. and be a lawyer.
Jamie: Thanks. Okay.
Micah: No degree required.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: [laughs] All right…
Matt: Well, with also the gender issue, I kind of believe that women tend to take the books they read along with them more than the male gender does. You know what I mean? Like, I know my mom and my aunt are part of a book club, and most of all the book clubs I’ve seen are predominantly females. So I think that females – the female gender definitely talks more about the books they read more than the males do.
Micah: Yeah.
Jamie: That’s very true.
Laura: I mean, which again makes you guys, kind of, you know – which shows that you guys break that rule as well. You know, it shows that you break that stereotype, so it’s not just, you know, me being on the show that says not all women are not into technology.
Micah: Well, no, yeah, it’s…
Laura: You guys are doing the same thing.
Micah: What I said before, it’s certainly not the rule, you know. It just seems that, overall, it’s true that guys are probably a little bit more tech savvy than girls are.
Laura: Well, I wouldn’t say that girls don’t have the ability.
Micah: No, no.
Matt: [laughs] Girls have other interests.
Laura: I would say they don’t have the interest.
Micah: Right.
Laura: Sorry, I’m a bit of a feminist.
Micah: No, it’s fine, it’s fine.
Laura: You might have figured this out by now.
Muggle Mail: WWII Parallel
Matt: A bit?! Our next e-mail comes from Kylie, 15, of Daton, Ohio, entitled “Potter Watch Comment.” She writes:
“Hey, MuggleCasters! I wanted to share my initial thoughts about Potter Watch in Chapter 22 of “Deathly Hallows.” When I first read it my very first thought was that it was kind of like the radio news shows from World War II. The trio are pretty much the equivalent of the soldiers that were sent to fight off in Europe and Potter Watch was their glimpse back home to the rest of the wizarding world. I know that World War II connections are obvious and numerous, but those were my thoughts. MuggleCast is the only podcast I listen to and it’s so good. I don’t need any others. I love all those topics and discussions, not to mention the hilarious fun segments (Make the Music Connection is my favorite). Please keep doing such a wonderful job. Best wishes, Kylie.”
Jamie: I love your intonation, Matt. It;s superb. Especially all of the bits that…
Matt: I have to do it or I’m just going to stumble.
Laura: Okay, okay. First of all, can I please just ask – please tell me that nobody sat there and thought that she did it because of the podcasts. [laughs] Please tell me no one said that.
Jamie: She did what?
Laura: Well…
Matt: Well, there’s always a certain resistance to, you know, during a war or something, whether it’s on the radio or if it’s even like an underground newspaper.
Laura: Yeah. That’s what I think it is. I mean it would be – it’s definitely cool to hear it, you know, regardless, because it’s like, “Oh!” We’ve kind of been doing the same thing. So it’s definitely cool, but I’m not 100 percent sure it would be her, you know, acknowledging the show through the book or anything.
Jamie: Yeah, I don’t think it is. It’s a very nice thought, though.
Chapter-by-Chapter: Chapter 23, “Malfoy Manor”
Matt: All right, we’re going to move things off to Chapter-by-Chapter of Deathly Hallows. We’re going to move on to this week to just one chapter. It’s Chapter 23, entitled “Malfoy Manor” And where we leave our characters off from the previous chapter, apparently Ron told the trio that the name was taboo – Voldemort. And Harry accidentally let the word slip, and now they are being cornered by at least half a dozen wands at their tent. So now they’re caught.
Laura: Wow.
Voldemort’s Name is Taboo
Jamie: It seems quite a sort of blanket charm to be able to make a word taboo. Like, if that isn’t too difficult a spell then you can make – you know, you can do anything. That implies almost limitless magical ability. Like, other people could do it as well. It’s weird.
Micah: Well, one thing…
Jamie: They must be abusing the system completely.
Micah: One thing I always wondered was if his name was taboo before, because they always refer to him as He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named and all that other stuff. So I just wondered, when he was in power the first time was his name also taboo? Like you couldn’t say it?
Matt: I don’t think so…
Laura: I don’t think so.
Matt: …because I don’t think he had power over the Ministry at that time. Honestly, I think the whole taboo thing wouldn’t have happened unless he had that much control over the wizarding world.
Laura: Yeah, I think that’s what the crucial difference is, is that he had control over the Ministry in the seventh book, and I think He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named is just something that sort of came about from fear. Just like – it’s probably not the best example, but like for instance when you have curse words that people have come up with substitute words for, just because it’s something that people don’t like to say and people don’t like to hear.
Matt: Mhm, exactly.
Matt: Okay, so we start of with the chapter with Harry, Ron, and Hermione kind of – well, they’re in the dark in the tent because Ron used the Deluminator, and Harry sees Hermione pointing her wand at his face and using a swollen charm to blow up his face to unnatural size and unrecognisability. Is that a word?
Jamie: Yeah.
Laura: It is now. Okay, I don’t know. [laughs]
Matt: [laughs] So they’re captured by Fenrir Greyback, who apparently is allowed to wear Death Eater’s robes, but he’s not allowed to have a Death Eater mark because he’s not that great yet.
Greyback
Laura: Yeah. Does anyone find – and I noticed this while I was reading, the numerous times when Fenrir kind of made really disgusting comments about stuff he wanted to do to Hermione.
Jamie: Yeah, he’s a sociopath.
Laura: Yeah.
Jamie: He’s a brilliant character though, he’s an amazing character.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: He really is. And it’s interesting because I was actually just talking about this with a friend of mine a couple of weeks ago, and this friend in particular doesn’t read Harry Potter, and for a long time she’d been under the assumption that it was a children’s book, and I think that this is just another reminder that these books aren’t just meant for kids.
Jamie: It’s true, yeah.
Laura: Kids can read them, but it’s a book that’s meant for everybody. And you look at an issue like this complete objectification of women and then this guy clearly wanting to hurt Hermione.
Micah: Yeah.
Laura: I think it’s just another reminder that this is a very adult book.
Matt: It’s definitely a big reminder to also the children who read this that in a lot of situations when you’re in trouble people won’t give you lenience just because you’re a child.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: They will kill you if they can.
Micah: I was just going to say, it’s not just Hermione; he talks about washing Harry down with some Butterbeer.
Laura: Oh, yeah.
Micah: You know, he’s just a disgusting…
Jamie: Well, he doesn’t want to get indigestion, Micah, be fair.
[Laura laughs]
Micah: Yeah, that’s true. You don’t think – it’s not carbonated? That beer is not carbonated?
Matt: I don’t think [unintelligible] Maalox or something.
Jamie: [laughs] To be honest, I think I’d rather meet Voldemort down a dark alley then Greyback.
Laura: Me too.
Jamie: Because Voldemort, for all his sins, is a principled sociopath, which sounds anti…
Matt: At least you won’t feel anything after he kills you.
Jamie: Yeah, exactly.
Matt: Fenrir you’ll – well, let’s not go into that. I don’t want to talk about that. [laughs]
Jamie: He’s just going to kill you, Voldemort, because he doesn’t care about, you know – his powers, his goal, whereas Greyback, no one knows what his goal is, and ambiguity’s scary.
Matt: Fenrir also wants to scare his victims to the point of trembling.
Jamie: Yeah, exactly, yeah.
Matt: And breaks down. What I really love what J.K. Rowling does with every single – with the previous book, in Half-Blood Prince and in this book, she always mentions that Greyback smells like dirt, sweat and blood.
Jamie: And the tears of small children.
Matt: Oh yes, of course. It’s kind of like telling us what kind of a person he is, or what he does. That’s all in his mind that he’s always running, he’s always in the dirt, dirty and sweaty.
Laura: And killing people.
Matt: Yeah.
Micah: I’d say he’s a disgusting human being, but I don’t even know that he’s a human being, to be honest. [laughs]
Matt: You know, I never thought – it never entered my mind that Fenrir Greyback was a wizard. I always saw him as just a werewolf.
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: Until this scene when they mentioned he had a wand in his hand. I don’t know why.
Laura: Yeah, he’s definitely, I think, one of the scarier characters in the books.
Micah: It’s going to be interesting to see him in this movie.
Jamie: Would you bring him home to your parents?
Matt: Not without a bath.
[Everyone laughs]
Jamie: Awww, that’s so nice, Matt. Give people a chance, I like that. I like that. I mean he’s only a killer.
Matt: Yeah, I’ll put a muzzle on him first.
Jamie: Exactly, yeah. You can’t prejudge people just because they smell of dirt, sweat, and blood.
Laura: Just because they might kill your family?
Jamie: Yeah! Yeah, Laura. Open – broaden your horizons for God’s sake.
Draco’s Hesitation
Matt: Harry, Ron, and Hermione are taken up to Malfoy Manor to be shown to Voldemort initially. They’re going to Malfoy Manor to be inspected by the Malfoy family, and they are met by Narcissa Malfoy, and Lucius, and Draco. Now what I loved about this scene, especially, when they try to figure out if it’s really Harry or not, is that Draco is so hesitant with saying yes or no of confirming the identity of the trio. Why do you guys think that Draco was so hesitant when saying yes or no? I mean you always – you see him in Hogwarts always trying to get Harry, Ron, and Hermione in trouble, and this is like his biggest, huge moment to really just rat them out, but he doesn’t do it. Necessarily.
Jamie: There’s a difference between, you know, causing trouble for people and having all their blood on your hands. And he would have their blood on his hands completely.
Matt: Definitely.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: His – he knows that his decision basically is their mortality.
Jamie: Yeah, exactly.
Laura: Yeah. I think it’s just another example of – like when he couldn’t kill Dumbledore. Like, yeah, Draco may not necessarily be the world’s best guy, but he’s certainly not a killer. And even if you don’t like somebody – just imagine this – you’ve grown up with somebody through all of your teenage years, like you met them when you were eleven or whatever…
Jamie: Yeah.
Laura: …and then suddenly you’re seventeen years old and they die. Even if you didn’t like them, that is such a huge shock…
Jamie: It is, yeah.
Laura: …because you still grew up with them, and to – I don’t know, I couldn’t – I couldn’t turn somebody in like that. And I don’t think Draco could either.
Matt: Regardless of how – I mean you always have those people in, like, middle school and high school who you always pick a fight with and, you know, kind of like your enemies in school but never to an extent where you would want them dead.
Laura: No.
Jamie: Yeah, exactly.
Matt: That’s just a really bad position that Draco was in.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: I kind of actually have a little bit of sympathy for him in that.
Laura: Yeah, me too, because I feel like the thing about Draco is he just parrots a lot of what the people around him say, and because he’s honestly just such a spoiled rich brat, he’s never actually had to get his hands dirty, and then he discovers what all of that really entails and realizes that’s really not the kind of person he is.
The Malfoys
Matt: Mmhm. Well, and he’s also not really under his father’s protection anymore, either. I mean he always looked up to his dad. He’s not – I don’t really see him as Lucius Malfoy’s son, technically, because he’s not really the kind of person that Lucius is. Lucius just kisses up to whoever he can just to get power.
Laura: Mmhm.
Jamie: Yeah, but also about – sorry, go on.
Matt: No, sorry.
Jamie: Okay, well I was going to say you can also – I mean Lucius and Narcissa display sort of something that I think completely separates them from everyone else in that they’re still parents and they still – however much they kiss up to Voldemort, and everything, they still put Draco above everything else; whereas if you look in – is it the beginning of Half-Blood Prince when – when they go to Snape’s and Bellatrix says how if she had children, she’d, you know, give them up to the Dark Lord?
Matt: Be proud or something…
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: Definitely.
Jamie: Immediately.
Matt: Well, no. Well, at the very end of Deathly Hallows, too, they portrayed their much love for Draco by pretty much betraying Voldemort. Or Narcissa did that, basically.
Jamie: Yeah.
Harry’s Vision
Laura: Mmhm. Yeah, also something that – I mean we should probably just mention that happened a little bit before this – was Harry on the way to Malfoy Manor kept getting visions of Voldemort going to Grindelwald, and basically he was trying to get the Elder Wand out of him. So I mean at this point Harry’s not quite sure what that’s about, but…
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: Just thought we should mention it, because people – people get kind of bent out of shape when we don’t mention things, even if there’s not much discussion to be had about them.
Matt: Oh, yeah. Well, we can’t just talk every single sentence on the chapter, though, that would just be…
Laura: Oh, oh yeah we can. Didn’t you know that our new segment’s going to be Word-by-Word?
[Micah laughs]
Grindelwald vs. Voldemort: Who is More Evil?
Matt: Oh. I did – I did not know that. Okay. Oh, then that’s all better then. Well, since you were talking about that, I really like that quote that Grindelwald told Voldemort. It was like, “I knew you’d come, but your journey was pointless. I never had it.” Like Grindelwald was waiting for Voldemort to come.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Because he knew what he was after. From the get-go.
Laura: That’s very interesting.
Matt: Mmhm.
Jamie: And Grindelwald just doesn’t seem evil then, he seems like he’s recovered, and I think that solves…
Matt: No. He doesn’t.
Jamie: Huh?
Matt: No, I’m saying – I’m agreeing.
Jamie: Oh, right. Okay. I was just going to say that – it sort of- I think that solves the “who’s the more evil wizard?”, and Voldemort I think is leagues more evil than Grindelwald, because, obviously, he’s capable of redemption, and Jo has pointed out on many occasions that Voldemort is beyond help. Anyone’s help.
Matt: Mmhm. Oh, yeah. Definitely. I never really saw – after reading a little bit of this you can tell that Grindelwald was never really evil. That his whole vision of being evil was mostly due to most of the publicity that the whole – that his whole thing got.
Jamie: Yeah. Yeah.
Laura: I think – I think the thing about Grindelwald is, regardless of whether or not he was evil, he never really got the chance to act on it. So it’s almost like irrelevant, really.
Matt: I think it’s just that – I think Grindelwald’s just mainly just like a link to Dumbledore’s past.
Laura: Definitely.
Bellatrix Freaks Out About the Gryffindor Sword
Matt: Okay, so, we get a little bit into the sword when Bellatrix enters the house. Apparently, just before Bellatrix was about to announce to the Dark Lord to come over to Malfoy Manner, she sees the sword of Gryffindor and she starts to panic to, you know, to a grand scale, because apparently she had – she has, in her mind – the sword is in her vault at Gringotts that apparently Snape had given her to put in her vault. So – although she doesn’t know that that sword is actually the real one and the one in her vault is the fake. But the reason why she’s freaking out so much is because there’s something else in her vault that’s really, really, you know, valuable to Voldemort.
Laura: Well, I think…
Jamie: No, no, no, she’s freaking out because she thinks it’s a Horcrux.
Laura: She thinks that they stole it, yeah.
Jamie: Yeah, she thinks that – yeah.
Laura: She thinks that they took it out of her vault.
Matt: Well, yeah, she thinks that they took the Horcrux out of her vault.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah, well, that’s what I meant. Sorry, I didn’t put it right.
Laura: No, that’s okay.
Jamie: You become more articulate, Matt.
Matt: Don’t even start with me, Brit.
[Jamie and Laura laugh]
Ron and Hermione’s Moment
Matt: Basically, Bellatrix gets really pissed off about the sword being stolen and she sends everyone but Hermione down to the cellar with the rest of the prisoners. And what I really loved about this little thing right here was when Ron was screaming out to Bellatrix to take him instead of Hermione, to put him in her place.
Laura: I know! Awww!
Matt: That’s like one of the very first times you ever see him proclaim his love for Hermione. He’s, you know, sacrificing himself for her safety.
Laura: Yeah, I just have to say when I read that, and I’m sure every other girl around the planet was like, “Awww,” because it was…
Matt: I think every single guy was like, “Here we go…”
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: Woah-ahh. Give…
Laura: [laughs] That’s so mean.
[Jamie and Matt laugh]
Jamie: We’re more emotional than that, the male species.
Laura: But it was – the whole scene where Bellatrix tortured Hermione was awful. Not awfully written, but just awful to read.
Matt: Awful to take in.
Laura: Yeah.
In the Cellar
Matt: Yeah. Well, while Ron – okay, Hermione’s getting tortured in the background, but let’s go with Harry and Ron right now. They’re being sent in the cellar where they meet Dean, Luna, and Ollivander and Griphook.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: So, yeah. So, okay, they finally find Luna; they know where her whereabouts are. And they are hearing the screams intermittently that are Hermione’s screams, and Ron is just screaming out Hermione’s name over and over again and – oh, Dobby came! Oh, no, no, no, no, I’m sorry, I’m skipping ahead. Sorry. After they’re hearing Hermione’s screams Harry quickly goes into the pouch that Hagrid gave him and looks into that mirror, and he sees Dumbledore’s eye, and he starts screaming.
Laura: Or what he thinks is Dumbledore’s eye.
Matt: Yeah. Quotes – “Dumbledore’s eye.” And he screams out, “Help us! We’re in the cellar at Malfoy Manor!” And then the eye blinks and runs off, and then a few seconds later Dobby comes.
Jamie: Lucky.
Laura: Yeah. And this ending, of course, we all know what happens at the end of the chapter, which is very sad, but from that point we know that Dobby takes Dean, Luna, and Ollivander?
Matt: Yes.
Laura: That’s right.
Matt: And then he takes them and as – but right before they go, Dean and Luna proclaim their allegiance to Harry, saying they want to help. They don’t want to leave Harry.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Which I thought was really sweet.
Laura: Yeah, they are cool. And I thought that the way that – even though when the trio was separated, the fact that they are still able to work together as a team – I think that’s really cool, because Harry was listening very intently while Ron was going crazy, and he heard Hermione say that the sword was a fake. And so of course he goes to Griphook and says, you have to tell them that this is a fake sword or else we’re doomed. So, you know, that’s what Griphook does and – yeah.
Matt: So after Draco takes Griphook and – to, you know, inspect the sword, they hear Dobby come back again, right? Don’t they? Something keeps…
Laura: No. No, it’s…
Matt: No, they hear a snap. They do hear a snap because that’s what – that’s why they call over Pettigrew to come down and see what the noise was.
Laura: Yeah, maybe they heard the crack of Dobby disapparating.
Matt: Yeah, I think that was it. Well, anyway…
Laura: And they send Wormtail.
Peter Pettrigrew’s Hand
Matt: Pettigrew, Peter Pettigrew, comes down, and Harry and Ron decide to ambush him and tackle him. But there is one incident.
Jamie: This scene was weird as hell. I did not understand this.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: It’s hard to talk about it because I don’t really – I got lost.
Laura: It was one of those scenes that I really had a hard time comprehending what exactly was happening, and I had to read it a couple times tonight. And, essentially, what I got from it was that the hand that Wormtail has – and maybe I should go over what the scene is, just for a refresher – but, essentially, when they ambush him, Wormtail puts his hand around Harry’s throat and Harry says, “Are you really going to do that? You owe me, I saved your life once before.” And what I got out of it is that the hand depended on a certain amount of strength from Wormtail, or at least a certain amount of self-preservation, and the second that Wormtail faltered, because he did, and he knew that Harry was right, the hand turned on him and took him instead.
Matt: Do you think that was Voldemort’s intention? Like that’s – because he knew what kind of person that Peter Pettigrew was, that he would just – since he betrayed the Potters so quickly he was afraid that Pettigrew would do the same thing. So at the moment where he falters his allegiance the hand would kill him?
Laura: Yeah, I would not be surprised at all. That completely sounds like something Voldemort would do.
Jamie: Oh, you think so? That’s very interesting, yeah.
Laura: Yeah.
Jamie: That’s very interesting.
Micah: Yeah, I agree with that, Matt. I think that as soon as there was that moment of hesitation in Pettigrew’s mind…
Jamie: It would kill him.
Micah: …that the hand automatically would kill him. Because, who knows, you know, in that situation what’s going on? I mean, obviously, in this case it was – it was dealing with Harry, but, you know, it’s possible that had he done anything else that would be in betrayal of Voldemort, that the hand would just take care of him. And I like Laura’s point, though…
Jamie: It’s very good.
Micah: What you were saying about how he’s just – or was it Matt? That he’s not a reliable person. You know, we’ve seen him sort of go back and forth between sides all along.
Matt: Yeah. No, I mean it’s – it’s definitely – I mean, Voldemort’s not stupid. He – he knew – he used Peter Pettigrew to his advantage because he knew what kind of a person he was. But he also knows how dangerous it is to keep a person like that at your side when they’re so easily persuaded. So I – I also think that’s a good job on Voldemort’s part to keep…
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: …Peter Pettigrew on his side.
Laura: Yeah, see the thing is…
Matt: Because it’s a really strong hand. So as long as he has it he’s a good ally, but once he starts to betray, that hand will turn on him and kill him.
Jamie: It’s like a…
Matt: It’s obviously not intentional. It was – sorry.
Jamie: Sorry. No, go on. No, no, that’s okay. That’s okay.
Matt: No, it’s okay. I’m – I’m done.
Jamie: Okay, well no, no – I was going to make a stupid reference. Have you guys seen The Neverending Story?
Laura: No.
Jamie: Oh, well, there’s a…
Jamie: Oh, well, this is going to be lost then. But there was a big rock guy built out of rocks who ate rocks, and he had extremely strong hands as well. I don’t know why I thought of that. That’s a weird process.
Laura: [laughs] Okay.
Voldemort the Manipulator
Jamie: No, no, but going back to Harry Potter, I was going to say that when Bellatrix brings Griphook up, and then after he tells her it’s a fake, she slashes another injury in his face. It just goes to show that she’s completely soulless apart from when it comes to Voldemort. So she was terrified when her allegiance to Voldemort was doubted, and then as soon as it was shown that she hadn’t screwed up and she hadn’t lost her – lost the Horcrux, then she was fine and back to normal and hurting people.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah. Oh no, I definitely agree with that.
Laura: I think in both cases it goes to show that, you know – and I mean we already know this, but Voldemort is an extremely good manipulator.
Jamie: Yeah.
Laura: You know? Because he knows exactly the right things to say to Bellatrix to keep her, you know, sort of cooing at his side, and then he knows what exactly to give Wormtail to sort of keep his allegiance, but at the same time he draws that fine line by saying, you know, “The second Wormtail turns his back on me, he’s going to die, and I don’t even have to be there for it to happen.”
Micah: Yeah.
Jamie: Yeah.
Micah: I feel it’s that way with a lot of people, though.
Laura: Yeah.
Micah: I mean he doesn’t care who dies at his expense, so to speak. You know? It – it doesn’t have to be Wormtail. I mean just in this case it is, but he doesn’t care about anybody just as long as it’s him who ends of prevailing in the end.
Laura: Right.
Matt: Well, I’m sure he has a slight favoritism to Bellatrix, ‘cause we – we noticed that in the very last chapter…
Micah: Yeah. Yeah, you’re right.
Matt: …in the Hogwarts scene, he shows a little concern, but…yeah, I definitely agree with that.
Harry and Ron Try to Save Pettrigrew
Laura: You know what I found really interesting, though, kind of switching to another perspective, is that when the hand starts strangling Wormtail Harry and Ron try to save him.
Micah: It’s their nature.
Laura: And I found – I know, and it’s just interesting because you consider, like, they are such innately good people [laughs] that even though they’re all in danger, their friend is upstairs being tortured, if there is someone in front of them dying, even if that person is a bad person, they still try to save him. And it’s interesting…
Matt: Well, yeah. I think a lot of people could relate to that, too, I mean it’s – someone is killing themselves right in front of their face. Their – your initial reaction would be to try to stop that from happening.
Micah: Yeah, I mean think about all the movies you’ll see, like, in the end the kidnapper or the murderer will try to put the gun up to their head and, you know, essentially kill themselves, and you always have the cops or the people who are there that they’ve tortured for so long, try and jump and save them from doing it. I just think it’s a natural thing that people just try and do. Plus, two life debts are better than one, so…
Laura: [laughs] Yeah, that’s true. That’s true. Good point.
Escaping from the Cellar and the Fight That Follows
Matt: Okay, so after Pettigrew’s death, Harry and Ron run up to the foyer, or whatever place this is taking place at, and there becomes a huge fight between Ron, Hermione, and Harry, and, you know, the Death Eaters, and – which really kind of just splits them apart is the huge chandelier that falls down onto Bellatrix and Hermione. And we find out that’s due to Dobby, who comes in to help them save themselves.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: So you guys want to elaborate a little bit on what happens after that?
Laura: Well, essentially, like you said, there’s a bit of a showdown, you know, and of course – at first Harry and Ron kind of have the upper hand, but then Bellatrix sort of puts a knife to Hermione’s throat and says, you know, “drop ’em or she dies.”
Matt: Right, and that’s when the glass chandelier falls.
Laura: You know what I found interesting about that – and I guess this might be me reading too much into it – but it seems like it would have been in Bellatrix’s character, at least I could see her doing this, that the second Harry and Ron drop their wands that she would have slit Hermione’s throat anyway.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: It just seems like something she would have done. I don’t know, but, you know, of course would have kind of ruined the plot.
Micah: She’s crazy. She’s just nuts, man. She’s like out there with Fenrir Greybeck.
Jamie: [mimicking Micah] She’s nuts, man.
Laura: Yeah.
Micah: [laughs] What’s that?
Jamie: [still mimicking Micah] She’s nuts.
Micah: She is, Jamie! I’m serious. She’s nuts, man.
Jamie: Dude.
Micah: She’s out there with Fenrir Greyback, dawg.
Jamie: Dawg, man, dude. I think we should rewrite Harry Potter and…
[Micah laughs]
Jamie: …completely Americanize it.
Matt: Well, if it was us who were writing the Harry Potter series, the trio wouldn’t live past the first book. If it was…
Jamie: Why, because we’re sadistic?
Matt: No, because I just want them dead.
Jamie: Ah, so you’re sadistic?
Matt: [laughs] I’m just kidding.
[Jamie and Matt laugh]
Matt: Yeah, but I do see that that is in Bellatrix’s character to, you know, just to fool them – to trust them – to trust her that she wouldn’t kill.
Laura: Yeah.
Micah: Yep.
Dobby’s Death
Matt: So, okay, Dobby comes in to save them and Dobby grabs on to Harry – Dobby grabs on to Harry, who grabs on to Hermione and Ron, and at the very last second Dobby just disapparates with them, and while they’re floating out there’s kind of like a little jolt with Dobby’s hand, right? There’s something that signifies to us…
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: …that Dobby’s doing something. Like…
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: …he’s pulling them away or something.
Laura: Well, Harry said that he felt Dobby squeeze his hand, and his arm sort of jerked, and he thought that Dobby was trying to steer the direction in which they were going. I think that was when Bellatrix stabbed him.
Matt: Yeah.
Jamie: Yeah, I think so too.
Matt: Well, she stabbed him – did she stab him or, like, throw her knife at him? Because they weren’t really very close, were they?
Laura: She might…
Jamie: She throws it.
Laura: She stabbed him or threw it.
Jamie: She throws it. She throws it.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah, she does something. I always thought she threw the knife at him.
Jamie: No, she does. She does.
[Jamie and Laura laugh]
Laura: She impales him with a knife, whether by stabbing or throwing it.
Jamie: [laughs] No, no, she does! She throws the knife. She definitely throws the knife.
Laura: [laughs] Okay, is it that big of a deal? He still gets stabbed.
Matt: He’s so gung-ho about this. Okay, let’s just go with that.
[Laura and Matt laugh]
Matt: So, after she stabs him – after she throws the knife at him, why do you think he was squeezing it? I think the reason why he felt a really big squeeze from Dobby is because Dobby was trying to fight the pain until they were gone. Until they were safely back. Like, he was fighting death while he was out there.
Laura: Yeah. Yeah, I think that works just fine.
Matt: Okay.
Laura: I mean, also, if, you know, I were holding…
Matt: Well, he has a freaking knife in his stomach, too.
Laura: …someone’s hand and someone stabbed me, I think right when they stabbed me, I might jolt a little bit but, you know, that’s just me.
Matt: I think…
Laura: I don’t know how you react when people stab you.
Matt: Ow! Ow! Ow! I would probably do that. Okay, so, that’s pretty much the end of the chapter. No, no, it’s not! It’s not! Sorry.
Laura: [laughs] And then…
Matt: I don’t want to…
Laura: So sad.
Matt: …relive this scene again. That’s why.
Laura: Aw. Well, as we all know, Dobby dies and it’s really, really sad.
Matt: It’s really sad because the last two words that come from Dobby’s mouth is, [whispering] “Haaaaarry Poooootter.”
Laura: Yeah, and I think one of the – the way the chapter ends is so, I thought, really heartbreaking too, because it said something about how his eyes were reflecting the stars that they couldn’t see, and I was just like, “Oh, no!”
Matt: Yeah, his eyes glazed a bit and you could see the reflection of the stars. That was horrible.
Laura: It’s a bloodbath in this book. [laughs]
Micah: It’s probably the worst death in the series for me. What about you guys?
Jamie: No, Sirius, Sirius.
Micah: I knew you were going to say Sirius. Okay, I’m sorry.
Jamie: It’s okay.
Micah: But, what do you guys think? I mean…
Laura: I think it was one of the worst.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: I would have to say.
Matt: It was definitely one of the most emotional scenes in the book. Not in the series, Jamie, in the book.
Jamie: All right. Okay, okay, that’s fine, Matt.
[Micah laughs]
Jamie: That’s fine, Matt.
Matt: Well, I think it’d be a more emotional scene in the book rather than when we see it in the movies because we see Dobby in pretty much every single book after Book 2. But we’ve only seen Dobby in the second movie.
Laura: Yeah, and I mean, do we even know if Dobby’s going to be in the film?
Micah: I would hope so.
Matt: Yeah, I can pretty much – yeah, they’d better.
Micah: They’re splitting it in two and they should probably think about including…
Laura: Yeah, that’s true. That’s true.
Matt: Are we going to have a little musical tribute to Dobby’s death?
Laura: Yeah, but I think we’re going to have to make Andrew come up with that because I don’t have anything.
Matt: Okay, so…
Laura: Give him some work to do since he bailed on us this week…
Jamie: Yeah.
Laura: …to go hang out with Robert Pattinson and Stephanie Meyer. Jerk.
Micah: Oh man.
Matt: Yeah.
Micah: But something about being free, I would think. Right?
[“I Want to Break Free” by Queen begins playing]
Matt: Yeah. “I want to break free!”
Laura: “Break free!” [laughs]
Jamie: Oh yeah. Yeah. Oh, god yeah.
[Song continues to play for a while]
MuggleCast 139 Transcript (continued)
Harry Gets the Elder Wand
Micah: There was one more thing, I just didn’t know if we should bring it up. Maybe, maybe not. The Elder Wand. Harry actually gets it in this chapter, doesn’t he?
[Song ends]
Matt: Oh, yes, he does! I forgot to talk about that. Yeah, he steals two wands, doesn’t he? He has two wands in his hand.
Laura: Yeah. Yeah, that’s right.
Matt: It definitely says he grabs Draco’s wand. And little does he know what he has in his hand.
Micah: Ooooo….
[Laura laughs]
New Segment: Houses
Matt: All right, so let’s move on to – let’s move the show along a little bit. So, we’re going to move on to our next segment. It’s relatively new. And Laura and I were talking about this the other day. Laura, do you want to emphasize a little bit on it?
Laura: Yeah, yeah. A while back, you, me, and Andrew were driving through the nothing that is Southern Maryland. We were talking about – you know, on the show we’ve never actually talked about what our Houses are. In all of this time of doing our shows, we’ve never, ever done that. So, we thought, it might be kind of fun to go around and talk about what we think each others’ Houses are. Maybe, eventually, if people like hearing about it, we can talk about other people. Like maybe celebrities, or you guys could send in your thoughts about who you might like to hear us talk about in reference to their House. So, there you go. Let us know what you think of
it.
Micah: So, we’re doing who we think each other would be in? Or who we think…
Matt: I think it would be a little funnier if we guessed who the other person is.
Laura: Yeah, I think so too.
Matt: Instead of just who we think. Because that’s kind of ignorant and, really, who wants to hear what we think about ourselves? It’s funnier if we try to talk about other people.
Micah: Well, I think for the first one we should try and – isn’t that what you were saying, Laura? We’ve never discussed on the show what Houses…
Laura: Yeah, we’ve never talked about us.
Micah: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: He’s saying like let’s…
Matt: Okay.
Laura: …decide for each other. Micah, I would tell you. We all would tell you what we thought you’d be in.
Micah: All right. Do I get to agree or disagree?
Laura: Yeah. Sure, sure.
Matt: Yeah. You can say who you think. Yeah. All right. So, we’re going to move on to Micah, since we’re talking about him. So, Micah, who do you think – what House you think you should be in?
Micah: I would say, probably, Ravenclaw. What do you guys think of that? Do you agree/disagree? I mean, you guys know me pretty well by now.
Matt: Ummm….
Laura: Well, you know, you’re definitely intelligent and I think that’s…
Jamie: Logical too. So, yeah. Probably Ravenclaw.
Laura: Yeah. Although I have to say, you’re a little bit perverted sometimes. And it seems like most of the perverts are over in Slytherin.
Micah: Yeah. I knew that was coming.
Laura: Yeah, I mean, I don’t know.
Matt: But you’re…
Micah: Wait, wait, who’s perverted in Slytherin?
Laura: They just all make – they’re more likely to make comments about people. You remember on the train in the sixth book where they were talking about how hot Ginny was in the train – all the Slytherins were.
Jamie: But, Laura, all boys talk about that. Come out from under the rock!
Matt: That’s true.
Laura: Yeah, but…
[Micah laughs]
Laura: No, but – I mean – I’m not under a rock, okay? But it just seems like there – never mind. Fine then!
Jamie: No, no, no! It’s fine. Go on, keep going. Keep going.
[Matt laughs]
Matt: Micah, I think you should be in – my reason why you should be in Ravenclaw is probably because a lot of the Ravenclaws tend to be
very hesitant with what they initially say. They think about what they’re going to say before they say it. And since that’s what usually you do, especially on the show, you pretty much wait until you have something logical to say in the show to bring your points. And I think that’s one of the biggest Ravenclaw attributes.
Laura: Think before you leap, basically?
Matt: Yeah.
Micah: Yeah. And I don’t know how many Jewish people would be in Slytherin. You know? I don’t know if that would work.
Laura: Oh, yeah, yeah. That may not work out very well.
Jamie: True.
Micah: Can you imagine like – no, I’m not going to say anything.
[Laura laughs]
Micah: That would be crossing boundaries I’ll can get in trouble for.
Matt: Yeah. See, that’s why I couldn’t comment on that because I didn’t want to…
Micah: Could you just hear like – I mean, honestly, I don’t know. Like, “Harvey Waltenberg – Slytherin!”
[Everyone laughs]
Jamie: That’s genius, Micah. That’s genius.
Micah: “Paul Rubenstein – Slytherin!”
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: Just doesn’t fit, does it?
Matt: Let’s move on to Jamie. Jamie, what House do you think you’re in?
Jamie: Well, I want to be in Gryffindor. I just – to me it’s the only House for me, Gryffindor. I think I put other people before myself.
[Everyone laughs]
Jamie: And I’d like to think in the heat of battle I’d sacrifice myself for other people.
Matt: Would you, really?
Jaime. Yeah, no. I seriously would. I seriously believe I would. Obviously, it’s hard to tell because, you know, you aren’t in that situation.
But, honestly, I think I would. And I don’t think I’m stupid, but I don’t think I’m insanely clever. And I don’t think I’m a complete doofus. I don’t think I’d be in Hufflepuff. Sorry, I’ll offend loads of people by saying that. And Slytherin, I think, is just a bit mean, to be honest. So, I want to say…
Matt: Yeah, I can believe that. I can see you as Gryffindor.
Laura: Yeah, me too.
Jamie: Awww!
Laura: That makes sense.
Jamie: Thank you.
Matt: Why don’t you want to be in Hufflepuff?
Jamie: Full of doofuses.
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: No, no. I don’t. I just haven’t particularly felt any draw or affinity towards Hufflepuff like I have for Gryffindor, to be honest. And I like the Gryffindor common room. I think it symbolizes what I like: Chairs by roaring fire, camaraderie, that kind of thing. Unlike the cold, heartless Slytherin dungeon. And… yeah.
Micah: We have fire.
Jamie: What? What, in Slytherin?
Micah: Yeah, we have fire down there.
Matt: Yeah, they have fire.
Jamie: Yeah, but it’s like a crappy one in a stone wall. I don’t know…
[Everyone laughs]
Jamie: I want a roaring log fire, and the hum decent chatter…
Micah: But Ravenclaw, too. I think Ravenclaw, I don’t know – Slytherin – I’m just trying to defend them a little bit.
Matt: Let’s move on to Laura now. Laura?
Laura: You know, I’ve never been able – I think I’m just a Muggle, you guys, I don’t know. I’ve never been able to pick which one I thought I would fit into. Maybe that’s lame of me.
Jamie: No, no, no, go on. You have to say one.
Laura: I have – oh my God. I don’t know…
Jamie: You get a free MacBook Air if you say.
Laura: Oh really?
Jamie: Yeah.
Matt: Well, you’re very political, and you’re very…
Jamie: You are very political.
Matt: And you love to read, apparently, and…
Laura: Apparently? Okay.
Jamie: Only erotic fiction, Matt.
Matt: Oh, that’s right. Only fan-fiction.
Jamie: Yeah.
Laura: That’s my favorite. You know, RestrictedSecion.org?
Jamie: Yeah.
Laura: I love that place. That’s where I always go.
[Jamie laughs]
Micah: Is that a real site?
Laura: I actually read that before I read Harry Potter. Yeah, it is. [laughs]
Micah: Wow.
Laura: It’s like NC-17 Harry Potter fan-fiction. It’s so bad.
Matt: Ooo! Link me.
Jamie: Awww…
[Jamie and Matt laugh]
Laura: I don’t know, I just – I guess I always feel like people think about the best aspects of themselves when they place themselves in Houses, so…I don’t know. I feel like I could be really obnoxious and be like, “Well, I read a lot, so I could be a Ravenclaw.” And, “I think that I’d sacrifice myself for my friends, so I’d be a Gryffindor.”
Jamie: Well, yeah, yeah, there are different qualities, but it has to be like – which one do you think you’d be in if you had to pick your…
Matt: The one – your biggest attributes…
Laura: I guess – Ravenclaw, fine. Ravenclaw. I would be a Ravenclaw.
Matt: Well, since you can’t decide, I would think Hufflepuff because…
Laura: You’re a…
Matt: …he wanted all the rest. Remember? She said “I’ll take the rest, don’t wanna participate…”
Laura: Nooo, I don’t want to be a loser!
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: Wow.
Laura: Just kidding. I’m just kidding.
Matt: Oh man.
Laura: Hufflepuffs are not losers.
Matt: Well, now I can’t say what House I’m in. I always saw myself as a Gryffindor also, but I was always really ashamed of saying it because everybody wants to be a Gryffindor. So…
Jamie: No, I know what you mean, there is that – sorry, go on.
Matt: It’s just, everybody talks about, “Oh, I’m in Gryffindor because the trio’s part of it.”
Jamie: Well, exactly. Yeah.
Matt: But, it’s – it’s like – so if I say I’m a Gryffindor, then that technically means that I’m just conforming to what all the fans want – say they are. And it’s just not true.
Jamie: No, I think you would be a Gryffindor. I think you would be a Gryffindor. I’d have put you in there.
Matt: Yeah, I tend to talk a lot, and don’t necessarily think about what I say before I say it sometimes. And I think that’s a Gryffindor attribute.
[Jamie laughs]
Matt: A lot of people don’t see the negative aspects of being a Gryffindor, like…
Jamie: They don’t, no.
Matt: …everybody has their good and bad. Everyone thinks that Gryffindors are just the perfect House, and that’s really not true.
Jamie: It’s not true at all, no.
Matt: They tend to be very brave, but they also tend to be very headstrong with what they believe, and…
Jamie: And reckless.
Matt: And reckless, definitely. I mean, even though they have good intentions, it’s not always the best intentions.
Jamie: Yeah. Yep.
Matt: So…
Jamie: Absolutely. Absolutely.
Matt: So, yeah, I would say Gryffindor.
Laura: ‘Kay.
Matt: M’kay.
Jamie: I think you would be a Gryffindor. Definitely, yeah.
Matt: Oh, thanks. We have the same House. You two, Laura, Micah, you have your blue room, we’ll have the red one.
[Jamie laughs]
Laura: Okay. [laughs] All right. Well, if you guys all liked that then you can write in to us at, you know, each of our little at staff dot mugglenet dot com e-mail addresses, and you can suggest ANYBODY that you would like to know what their House would be, and we’ll discuss it.
Jamie: All right, well – well I think – well can I say – I think that this should be used by psychologists to help evaluate people, like – the Houses, you know – if you self-identify as a Gryffindor then that says a lot about you, so I look forward to the day when it’s up in every psychologist’s office. You know, a huge Hogwarts banner with the four Houses, and then you pick one, and then they’re like, “Mmm…interesting…”
Laura: Because they control the world, right, Jamie?
Jamie: Yes they do, Laura, yes they do. Very good. Very good. They do control the world.
Micah: They really do.
Jamie: They do.
Matt: Yeah, no, with all seriousness they run our freaking world.
Micah: They do.
Matt: It’s true.
Micah: They honestly do. You think those guys charge what, $150-200 an hour or whatever they do? Think about how much money that is.
Matt: That’s at least $10.
Laura: [laughs] What?
Micah: I’m going to sit in my basement…
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: …and make $150-200 an hour just talking to people.
Jamie: Amen.
Matt: Well, no, you don’t even talk. You just listen.
Jamie: You listen. You just listen, yeah.
Micah: How interesting.
Laura: And pretend to write on a clipboard.
Matt: Mmhmm.
Make the Connection
Laura: All right, so, I think, Jamie, we were going to have you do some Make the Connections for us before our time is up.
Jamie: Okay.
Matt: Have you got any?
Jamie: Why, has everyone – I can make some up if everyone’s feeling…
Laura: Yeah, yeah, do it. We’re feeling adventurous.
Jamie: Are we?
Matt: The fans really miss it. They – they really want you. I was trying to do it while you were gone and I just…
Laura: They really want you.
Jamie: Awww, I’m sure you did it well. I’m sure you did it well, Matt. I’m sure you did it well.
Micah: It was awful.
Matt: I just – yeah – it – it blew.
Jamie: Okay. Okay, Laura, you have to…
Laura: Oh boy.
Jamie: …make the connection between Harry Potter, obviously, and a fossilized mammal buying out the Fox T.V. Network.
[Everyone snickers]
Laura: Gosh… A fossilized – a fossilized mammal, you said?
Jamie: Yes, stop – stop splitting hairs, Laura, and get on with it.
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: You know, I guess it’s kind of along the lines of Voldemort taking over the Ministry, because he was so old. I mean he’s like what? A hundred and something?
Jamie: He’s old, yeah.
Laura: Yeah, he’s pretty old.
Jamie: Either way he’s old, yeah.
Laura: And he’s basically taking over this huge industry that has such an effect on their world, so I think that would be it.
Jamie: That’s good, very good, very quick. Very impressed. Okay. Matt?
Matt: Yes.
Jamie: Okay, you sir, your challenge is to make a connection between harry Potter and tripping over a set of stainless steel playing cards on the top of Trump Tower.
Matt: Stainless steel.
[Jamie laughs]
Matt: We all know that Trump pretty much wants to be associated with everyone, and he read on one of the wizarding cards that he spent 200,000 pounds on to get a steel version of to play with Neville Longbottom. But what he was intending to do was – he was going to – he was going to have Neville play with him on the very top of Trump Tower and as he – Neville came up he tripped over one of the steel Dumbledore wizarding cards and fell of the building.
Jamie: That’s very good.
Matt: But he bounced, so it’s okay.
Jamie: That’s very good, Matt, but that’s a story, that’s not a connection
[Laura laughs]
Matt: There is no connection…
Jamie: No..
Matt: How the hell can I make a connection with that?
Jamie: [laughs] The whole point of Make the Connection is – You just made up a story. Although, I like your way of doing it. It shows drive, initiative and feeling, which are misplaced attributes in today’s world. Well done.
Matt: Well, isn’t it my thing to never get this segment anyway?
Jamie: Yeah.
Micah: Pretty much.
[Everyone laughs]
Jamie: Laura, Micah, yours is to make a connection between Harry Potter and a rare breed of leopard opening a new terminal at O’Hare International Airport.
Matt: This is in Chicago.
Micah: No, I know.
Matt: Oh, okay. I’m sorry, jeez. I was just really proud of myself for knowing that.
Micah: Oh, Okay. That’s a good job. Nice job. A rare breed of leopard, huh?
Jamie: Yeah, an extremely rare breed of leopard.
Micah: Well then you could just compare it to Crookshanks being able to mysteriously open up the passage to the Shrieking Shack.
Jamie: That’s good. No, that’s good.
Micah: Yeah.
Jamie: Very good, I like that a lot, yeah
Micah: And Crookshanks is sort of a rare breed, isn’t he?
Jamie: Yeah, he is.
Laura: Yeah, he is
Jamie: Well, a clever cat like that.
Laura: Well, he’s part Kneazle.
Jamie: Yeah.
Micah: All right, that’s my job. I’m done tonight.
Jamie: I liked that, I liked that a lot.
Micah: I still go back to the one…
Matt I think I’m so…
Micah: …about Hedwig blowing up. I don’t remember what you asked me to make the connection on, but that was still my favorite one.
Jamie: What was that?
Micah: You made some really cracked out connection about something blowing up and I compared it to Hedwig exploding…
Jamie: I remember, that was awesome, yeah. Beautiful, beautiful, guys, beautiful.
Matt: All right, well I think that does it for this week’s episode of MuggleCast.
Micah: Thank God.
Matt: Next week – just want to let everyone know that Andrew will be back. Yeah, that’s right!
Jamie: Yeah, yeah.
Matt: He will be fresh out of the…
Jamie: Yeah, yeah.
Matt: …Twilight movie set to definitely come and discuss some of the interviews that he had with the cast and crew of the shmovie. Shmovie.
Micah: If he not like over on the Hannah Montana set or something like that.
[Everyone laughs]
Matt: Yeah.
Contact Information
Matt: So, let’s remind everyone about our contact information before we wrap up today. Laura, if anyone wants to send anything to the P.O. Box, anything pickle related, what do they do?
Laura: Well, I don’t know where they’re going to send anything pickle related, but if you want to send us some gold, you can send that to:
P.O. Box 3151
Cumming, Georgia
30028
Matt: Eve!
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Are you going to keep going or…
Matt: Yeah, yeah, okay.
[Everyone laughs]
Matt: Okay, here we go. You can also call in a MuggleCast voicemail. We’re going to get back to them soon, I promise. I’m sorry. [laughs]
Laura: [laughs] You – Oh my god. You’re just supposed to give the numbers, Matt.
Matt: Yeah, please, please, please, please, please…
Jamie: This is what happens when Andrew isn’t hosting the show.
Laura: All right, you can also call in and leave us a voicemail over Skype. You can do that on your Skype username or you can call us with a few of our numbers. We have 121-820-MAGIC if you are in the United States. If you are in the United Kingdom you can dial 020-8144-0677. And if you’re Down Under you can call us at 028-003-5668. Please keep your question under 60 seconds and eliminate as much background noise as possible. You can also visit us at MuggleCast.com for your handy feedback forum and contact anyone of us. You can also use out first name at staff dot mugglenet dot com. Matt, you are now matt at staff dot mugglenet dot com, right?
Matt: I am.
Jamie: Who…
Laura: You are, excellent.
Jamie: Who did you have to pay off do get that e-mail address?
[Matt and Laura laugh]
Micah: Brent.
Matt: You don’t even want to know.
Laura: Didn’t we have another Matt at one point?
Matt: Yeah, we did, that’s why I couldn’t have it.
Laura: Yeah.
Matt: No, I still can’t, I can’t have Matthew. It was just Matt.
Laura: Yeah, Matt. Well, no one calls you Matthew. Anyway…
Jamie: I call you Matthew.
[Laura laughs]
Matt: Don’t, please? You can call me Mattie.
Jamie: No, because I can’t say that properly.
Laura: Oh please, can I start calling you Matthew? What’s your middle name, Matt?
Matt: Thomas
Jamie: Oooh!
[Show music begins playing]
Laura: Can I start calling you Matthew Thomas? When I get mad at you?
Matt: Yeah, you can say Matthew Thomas, or Matthew Tom. My mom does that.
Laura: Awww. That’s cute.
Jamie: Matt Tom.
Laura: All right, well… [laughs] …also, don’t forget about our community outlets. You can go to the MySpace, the Facebook, the YouTube, the Frappr, the Last.fm, and the fanlisting forums, where a few of us are answering questions. I think that’s what me, Matt, Andrew… Micah? Have you been answering questions over there?
Micah: Yeah, now and then I do.
Matt: Yeah, yeah.
Laura: Yeah. Jamie, Jamie. You need to go over there…
Jamie: Okay, I will.
Laura: …and register for an account. You’re such a liar.
Jamie: No, no, I have an account. I have an account. Seriously, I do.
[Laura and Matt laugh]
Matt: [imitating Jamie] Please, please, I beg you.
Jamie: Seriously, I beg you.
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: Have a heart, Laura. Have a heart.
Laura: You know I don’t have one of those, Jamie. I have a steel pump. It’s far more efficient.
[Jamie laughs]
Matt: She’s a girl.
Jamie: Ooooh…..
Matt: Sorry.
Laura: Excuse me?!
Matt: What?
Laura: Yeah, get quiet. That’s what I thought. Anyway, also please Digg the show at Digg.com, and I don’t think they can vote for us at Yahoo!Podcast anymore, can they? I think they got rid of that.
Matt: Yeah, no, they got rid of it.
Laura: Yeah, sorry. I’m reading from the Episode 128 transcript, because, you know, some people don’t get the transcripts up in a timely manner.
Micah: And what exactly do you do for the show, Laura?
Laura: I’m here, Micah.
Micah: [laughs] Yeah, I know.
Laura: I’m here. Okay?
Micah: I know. I know. I know.
Laura: All right.
Micah: We love joking around with each other.
Laura: And…
Matt: Yeah…
Micah: Whatever. Anyway.
Show Close
Laura: All right, I think that wraps things up, so for this episode, I’m Laura Thompson. Forever a feminist.
Jamie: I’m Jamie Lawrence.
Micah: I’m Micah Tannenbaum.
Matt: I’m Matt Britton. [imitating Andrew] And I’m Andrew Sims. We’re going to see you all next week for Episode 140.
Laura: With our newly implemented show program.
Matt: [imitating Andrew] Yeah! Yeah! Yeah!
Laura and Matt: [imitating Andrew] All right!
[Laura laughs]
Laura: All right, bye.
Micah: Bye.
Matt: Bye.
Jamie: Buh-bye.
[Show music ends]
Blooper 1
Matt: [imitating Andrew] Whoa-hooo. Welcome, everyone! Picklepack… God darn!
[Everyone laughs]
Matt: Okay, one more time.
Blooper 2
Matt: Okay, well, let’s – Micah, do you want to introduce yourself?
Micah: I did.
Laura: He already did. Just be like, “Now…
Matt: “…for the news.” I’m sorry.
Laura: “…let’s go over to Micah Tannenbaum.”
Matt: All right. Well, now let’s go over to Micah the Muggle…[fumbles over his words]
[Everyone laughs]
Micah: Well, you can say I’m back this week…
Laura: Can we just leave it like that?
Micah: …because all the contest winners have been doing stuff for the last…
Laura: Oh yeah, you could do that.
Matt: Why don’t you talk about the contest?
Laura: Well – he has – why don’t we do that after he does the news?
Matt: All right. Well, let’s…
Laura: Just be like, “Micah Tannenbaum is back after…”
Micah: Like a month because Andrew did it for a while – or Andrew did it for a week, then the two people did it, so I haven’t been around.
Jamie: Who’s the two people?
Micah: We did a contest. We said – we had them send in the news and…
Jamie: Oh, that’s cool.
Micah: People voted on who they thought was the best, and those two people did it for two weeks.
Jamie: Oh, that’s cool. Awesome. Awesome.
Micah: Revolutionary.
Matt: Well, now let’s take it over…
Micah: Now…
Matt: Sorry.
Micah: I’m done.
Matt: Sorry. Okay. Well, let’s take it over to Muggle… Damn, what’s your name?
Micah and
Matt: Micah.
Micah: We’ve met before, I think.
Matt: Now let’s take it over to…
[Laura laughs]
Matt: We have at least once. Okay.
Blooper 3
Laura: Get to know different people.
Micah: It’s a step up from…
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Oh, my God. You’re a giant…
Jamie: Genius. Genius. Genius.
Laura: For the record, I never brought him home to my parents. Okay.
Micah: Ten points to me.
Blooper 4
Becca: I’m on the radio! I’m on the radio!
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: What?
Matt: Who the – what the hell was that?
Laura: Bye, Becca.
Micah: Your who?
Matt: Oh. Is that your neighbor who’s apparently a big fan?
Laura: No, no, that’s a friend of mine.
Blooper 5
Jamie: What’s a male feminist? Like a person…
Laura: A slave driver?
Jamie: Oh, that’s so – that’s so sexist, Laura.
Laura: [laughs] I’m just kidding. I’m just kidding! But were you talking about the male equivalent of a feminist or a man who is a feminist?
Jamie: Because, see, I wasn’t sure. [laughs] Both.
Laura: [laughs] Okay. Well, I would say that we’ve had some very good examples of the male equivalent of a feminist throughout history.
Jamie: Masculinist.
Laura: Yeah!
Jamie: That sounds like a musician.
Laura: There have actually probably been quite a few of those. You know, they’re really big on invading other people’s countries. And killing their…
Jamie: Oh, Laura, that is awful. That’s so sexist.
[Laura, Matt and Micah laugh]
Laura: I’m not saying about you, I’m talking about masculinists, as you say… [laughs]
Jamie: No, you can’t say that the male equivalent is chauvinistic. That’s your claim.
Laura: Well, it is. You know I’m just kidding.
Jamie: I know. I know.
Laura: Not really, but…
Jamie: Giggety.
[Laura laughs]
Jamie: Matt, do a Family Guy impression.
Matt: Yeah, yeah, I got it. [laughs]
Jamie: No, do one. Do one. Sorry.
[Matt laughs imitating “Family Guy”]
[Jamie laughs]
Jamie: All right.
Laura: Okay.
Matt: I think we can skip the next e-mail.
Laura: Do you want to?
Matt: It’s the same thing that we talked about.
Laura: Yeah, I wasn’t sure if we wanted to, like – see, I thought this was – this next e-mail is actually kind of offensive.
Jamie: Yeah, ’cause it’s from a girl, isn’t it, Laura?
[Micah laughs]
Matt: Yeah. I like this, though.
Laura: No, no, no, I said I thought this was offensive.
Jamie: Yeah, whatever, whatever. We know you’re all in league with each other.
Matt: Yeah.
Laura: Yeah, we are.
———————–