why we have sympathy for the bad guys: #potterchat

To continue with the #PotterChat Blog Tour, I feel like I'm about to open the weirdest, smelliest can of worms out of the bunch. After reading this, please don't chuck old bananas and Rebecca Black hard copies of Friday, please (however pastries, copies of Lucky magazine, or a free apartment in my local area I will totally take!)

So from the past few days we've had an exciting series of posts. Jami touched base on how Harry Potter inspired her to write, Ava hit her too favorite Harry Potter moments, Bekah talked about Harry as a hero and how he wormed his way into our hearts, and today Kiki is talking about the magic of Harry Potter, from the setting to objects and people! All of them are shining a light of perpetual happiness and general good humor on some of the best parts of the series J.K. Rowling has crafted for us, like the ever-hilarious message to Snape from the Marauder's Map, or how Dobby proudly proclaimed that, outside of his freedom, he now received a Galleon a week for working at Hogwarts, even if he was tending to a drunken Winky much of the time.

But me, ever being the weirdo, chose to dance with my hands in the fire and show everyone why, deep down, we still have a soft spot for the evil guys in the books. Yes, you read that right. How exactly can you even consider sympathizing with He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named?! What about Draco Malfoy? Or the most talked about villain-playing-double-sides Snape? In the words of the shrunken head from the PoA movie, "Fasten your safety belts, clench your buttocks! It's going to be a bumpy ride!"

Let's start chipping away at Voldemort. Being the biggest honcho of the bunch on the Villain Scale (I will craft this one day but for now it's going to exist in my head >_>) we all know he's capable of doing plenty of unspeakable things. Killing Myrtle, Harry's parents, and Snape just to name a few, he holds no remorse what so ever for his actions. In no way should we feel even the slightest pinch of feelings for this guy short of anger. But think about it. He didn't turn into Voldemort overnight on a whim. From birth, Tom Riddle has been shuffled, sideswept, and abandoned like a used candy wrapper. His father conceived him under the effects of a Love Potion, an automatic bad sign. As soon as his father came out from the haze, he fled, never caring about the child Merope was carrying. His mother died after giving birth to him, from grief or complications, or both. From there he spent time in an orphanage like Annie, only there was no Daddy Warbucks to come to his aid, unless you count Dumbledore. Even there, he was shunned and stepped aside, only looked at when things went wrong.

Had those circumstances happened to any other person in the series, we'd sob. We'd grab our sleeves of our hoodies and blow into them as we wished we could hug Tom and give him a lollipop. But instead, because we only see him in his current form, a phobic of death who's trying to kill an innocent boy, we dislike him. At least Draco Malfoy had a fighting chance for redemption throughout the series.

For Draco Malfoy, things weren't the best in the beginning. He was a stuck up, snobbish boy whom Harry met and wished he could shove a pencil in his eye. For the first several books, it doesn't get much better. He constantly bullies Harry and sets him up for failure, picks on any person he can with the knowledge that his Daddy-dearest will cover his pale behind. But thankfully, by the end of the series, he seems to hold a touch of a human heart by being unwilling to kill Dumbledore and sparing Harry when he was caught and brought to Malfoy Manor. So why would we possibly like him? Just because of an ending? Why, or how could we feel for this cruel child?

Easy. His Daddy. Think about it. How would you behave if you had a Death Eater for a father breathing down your neck to be this perfect, snobby little brat and keep everyone else under your shoes? If his father had been out of the picture, Draco could have been so much more human, and realizing that, you have to feel a little bit for the boy. It was the biggest wild card in the series, Snape, that you had either the easiest time feeling for, or the hardest.

Serverus Snape was a man of many faces throughout the series. Instantly on Harry like white on rice, he left no room for the boy to breathe, least not without losing points from Gryffindor. If he wasn't subtracting points, he was demeaning Harry, constantly bringing him down for looking and behaving like his father. And then you have the big whopper of a moment: he killed Dumbledore in what looks like cold blood. Now, if he wasn't already blacklisted by most, having him kill Dumbledore certainly earned him a permanent mark on his record in the form of a large red smear. Yikes! No way could we feel any pity for this cold-hearted man. Right?

Wrong! Thanks to the lovely J.K. Rowling, we got to see a side of Snape we half-hoped for, and fueled sobbed for. While we gained insight into his tormented past and his unliked persona (very much like Voldemort, mind you) we also got to see him love, something no man who was heartless could ever do. We were granted the ability to see him hold a never-ending torch for Lily Potter, and his undying promise to protect the only remaining piece of her in the form of, you guessed it, Harry! In those few moments of his past, you probably felt the small black hole you had reserved in your heart just for him expand into a big red heart of gold, amazed that even after seventeen years, he was still carrying a torch for a woman he would never have. That, to me, earns every inch of sympathy I can feel.

That's it for today for me, but that doesn't mean the fun is over! Remember guys, this is a Scavenger Hunt, to keep your eyes peeled for those answers to the questions I posted earlier this week! They're on all the blogs and will pop up as the days go on, so keep 'em saved somewhere so when the times comes, you submit them and earn a prize! YAHOOOOO!

And with that, I leave a question for all of you readers! Have you ever had a character you hated so much, but still somewhere held a soft spot for them? Were they a bad guy or just a tragically misbehaving good guy? Leave your comments below!