The new software is easy to use.
The new software is user-friendly. .e. murdering its previous owner
The Harry Potter Universe just got a little bit bigger with the release of the hotly anticipated Hogwarts Legacy. Every bit of leaked info has been analyzed with the energy of a thousand Hermiones and the resounding sentiment has been that it sounds well, kind of weird. The game centers around late 19th century Hogwarts students who are under threat from a goblin Uprising in which our favorite Bankers are apparently fighting for more civil rights. Oh and also, the game features a dark arts battle arena in which aspiring Slytherins can pay 10 extra dollars for the privilege of using the infamous unforgivable curses without repercussion. These strange choices coupled with anger over JK Rowling’s transphobia have marred the game in controversy long before its release.
Still, many already view it as inconsistent with the broader ethos of the beloved series, where good and evil are firmly established poles. But what if a game that villainizes goblins for agitating and forgives the unforgivable is actually perfectly in keeping with the broader philosophy of Harry Potter? That is to say, what if the Hogwarts Legacy controversy actually reveals something more complicated about the actual Legacy of Harry Potter?
Let’s examine it in this Wisecrack edition of Harry Potter and the Curse of Neo-Liberalism. Just so no one gets mad at me for not saying this: spoilers ahead for everything Harry Potter.
Harry Potter has always been viewed as a story about the underdog. You’ve got its three misfit protagonists: Harry, an orphan and unwitting savior of the Wizarding World; Ron, not wealthy, not super talented Weasley; and Hermione, a mudblood teacher’s pet. The three unite annually to defeat the dark forces of the magical world, often saving vulnerable lives in the process. Because of this, the series earned the love of Millennials in the general classification of pretty progressive. What with plot lines like Hermione’s fight to save the house elves from slavery.
A scholar, Pharah Mendelson, puts it: the series has been popularly interpreted as attractive, positive, and emancipatory. This progressive reading of Harry Potter is one reason why Rowling’s ascent into transphobia has been so upsetting for so many fans. The other reasons that her attitude frankly just sucks.
Don’t believe us? Go look at her Twitter account and just read the things that she says herself without being made to say those things.
And yet, if we look past our plucky heroes, this progressivism starts to look pretty superficial indeed. The Wizarding World is one deeply wedded to tradition and the status quo and the depictions of good versus evil throughout the Harry Potter canon. Anyone advocating for upending the status quo is almost universally marked as evil. This is true in regards to Hogwarts Legacy’s Goblin Revolution, where a disdained underclass attempts to change its status. It’s true of Voldemort’s objectively evil fight to establish a ruling class of pureblood wizards. And it’s true in Grindelwald’s desire to essentially prevent the Holocaust via mind-controlling Muggles.
The Harry Potter world is an inherently conservative one, then, where change is unwelcome. I mean, Hogwarts just got toilets like yesterday and before that, um, I guess that the wizards, and this is according to Rowling herself, would relieve themselves on the floor and magic the due to away. Yes, your favorite wizards would just, I guess, crouch, take a fat on the floor, and then use their wand not to scoop the not to push the but to make the go away like magic.
The importance of adhering to the rules that govern the status quo crystallizes in the final book of the series in which Harry beats Voldemort essentially by pointing out that Voldemort didn’t follow the rules for obtaining his wand i.e. murdering its previous owner.