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Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
Why Did Lily Smile When James Hung Snape Upside Down? Was Lily Really the Sweet, Innocent Girl We Have Always Assumed Her to Be?
There’s a particular moment in Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix that I find quite interesting and, honestly, rather uncomfortable when examining Lily and Snape’s friendship.
During Snape’s Worst Memory, when James uses Levicorpus to hang Snape upside down in front of everyone, we get this description of Lily’s reaction:
“Lily, whose furious expression had twitched for an instant as though she was going to smile.”
Now, I don’t believe J.K. Rowling included that particular detail accidentally. The wording is deliberate. Lily’s expression briefly twitched as though she was about to smile, suggesting that, for a split second, she found something amusing about the situation despite her obvious anger.
To her credit, Lily immediately suppresses that reaction and remains visibly furious with James. She also intervenes and attempts to defend Snape. However, that brief reaction raises an interesting question about the nature of their friendship.
This is someone she supposedly cares deeply about, someone she has known since childhood and has repeatedly defended. Yet, when she witnesses him being publicly humiliated, her immediate reaction isn’t entirely one of horror or concern. For an instant, she appears amused.
I find that particularly revealing because genuine affection doesn’t necessarily mean you agree with everything someone does, but watching someone you care about being humiliated should hardly be an amusing experience.
Does this mean Lily was secretly cruel or that she never genuinely cared about Snape? Not necessarily. She was a teenager, and a momentary reaction doesn’t define her entire character. But it does make me question whether their friendship was as uncomplicated and unconditional as we’ve been led to believe.
Perhaps Lily cared about Snape but was also increasingly embarrassed by his associations, his behaviour and the person he was becoming. Perhaps their friendship had already begun to deteriorate long before the infamous Mudblood incident.
What do you make of Lily’s reaction? Was it simply an involuntary moment of amusement, or does it reveal something less flattering about her feelings towards Snape?
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
What is your favorite Snape quote?
To me the best Snape quote is when he is talking to Bellatrix before doing the Unbreakable Vow in Half Blood Prince.
Narcissa is coming to Snape to ask him to help her with Draco, but Bellatrix does not trust Snape and is going on and on about why she doesn’t trust him, and how he never has to do anything.
She even brings up the Department of Mysteries fiasco and basically calls Snape a coward. These are their exact words from chapter 2 in the book:
Bellatrix: no, you were once again absent while the rest of us ran dangers, were you not Snape?
Snape: forgive me, you speak of dangers… you were facing six teenagers were you not?
This is one of the best clapbacks of all time. After all it was 6 teenagers who use expelliarmus and stupefy; it’s not like any of the Death Eaters were in danger. And even after the Order showed up they are probably more capture than kill, and only kill in self defense.
Bellatrix was acting like they stormed the Ministry, and did something important. Snape humbled her and reminded her that not only was her mission far less risky then she would have you believe, but also the mission was foiled by said teenagers.
I’m pretty sure it is impossible to hate anyone as much as Bellatrix hated Snape in this moment; especially since at the start of this conversation she learned that Voldemort trusted Snape more than her.
I don’t think it’s explicitly stated Voldemort told Bellatrix, so perhaps Bellatrix was told by Narcissa, if that is the case then Snape knowing about it would crush her; since she considers herself the most loyal servant and the only one truly worthy of being under Voldemort. Earlier in the chapter we have the below exchange that shows Bellatrix isn’t as close to Voldemort as she would have us believe, which is why I think she may not have heard about the job from the Dark Lord. She must have been foaming at the mouth when she found out Voldemort told Snape a secret that involved her family, and he did not even bother telling her.
“You are avoiding my last question, Snape. Harry Potter. You could have killed him ay any point in the past five years. You have not done it. Why?”
“Have you discussed this matter with the Dark Lord?” asked Snape.
“He… lately, we… I am asking you, Snape!”
A decade in Azkaban couldn’t break her spirit but 10 minutes with Snape did the trick.
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
Just realised I can take a screenshot of any tweet using the copy link button.
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
The wildest one I’ve come across is that Lucy Gray Baird survived her confrontation with Snow in the woods and later reinvented herself as Greasy Sae, the tough old woman running the soup stand in the Hob. On the surface it feels like a stretch—the vibrant, rainbow-dressed performer who outsmarted the 10th Games turning into a pragmatic, low-profile survivor who trades in scraps and looks after Katniss after the war—but the open-ended ending of The Ballad of Songbirds and Snakes, her foraging skills, and the books’ mention of a forgotten District 12 victor make it weirdly tempting. It would also mean Lucy Gray never fully escaped Panem; she just learned how to disappear inside it while still quietly looking out for the next girl from 12 who refused to play by the Capitol’s rules.
Even more unhinged theories float around, like Lucy Gray somehow becoming (or mothering) Alma Coin, which would turn Snow’s first betrayal into the seed of the rebellion that ultimately toppled him. Sunrise on the Reaping keeps the mystery alive by showing a Covey grave for Lucy Gray without confirming she’s in it, while also locking in the family connection between the Covey and Katniss’s father, so the fandom’s still spinning stories about how much of District 12’s resistance was quietly shaped by the girl Snow thought he left behind. The ambiguity is clearly intentional, and it keeps the whole timeline feeling connected in ways the original trilogy never spelled out.
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
Something I don't get about Dune. Ive read a bunch of the books and very possibly ive missed something. If all the planets require the navigators guild to travel between planets across the imperium and the space navigators rely on spice to fold space and time. How did anyone get to dune in the first place?
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
The Bene Gesserit spent decades trying to understand the Honored Matres, but did they ever seriously consider using their own breeding program and Other Memory to uncover what happened during the Scattering? How did they overlook that possibility?
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
Something I don't understand about Dune:
If Feyd-Rautha was such an exceptional fighter, why did his arena victories need to be staged?
In Dune: Part Two, two of his opponents are drugged, while the third is deliberately left capable of fighting back. The whole spectacle turns Feyd into a hero in front of the crowd.
But the book makes this even more interesting.
Feyd and Thufir Hawat had their own scheme involving an apparently undrugged Atreides prisoner, designed to make Feyd's victory look even more impressive.
So was Feyd actually proving he was the greatest fighter in House Harkonnen, or was he just another product of the family's political manipulation?
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
“Avada Kedavra!” Harry said, pointing his wand at Ron.
“HARRY, NO!” Hermione screamed, but it was too late. A flash of green light shot from Harry's wand and struck Ron in the chest.
Ron stood there, blinking in surprise.
“Harry… what just happened?” he asked.
“I figured it out,” Harry said, holstering his wand. “The Killing Curse's incantation comes from the Aramaic אַבַדָא כְּדַברָא, meaning ‘let the thing be destroyed’. I did some more research, and I think it's very likely that our wizarding ancestors once used the same incantation to cure diseases. All you have to do is desire to destroy the disease rather than the person.”
He turned to Ron.
“Your wizarding lice are cured now.”
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
Babe, wake up new Ultron meme just dropped #VisionQuest
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
J.K. Rowling’s official “The Potter Family” essay (Wizarding World / formerly Pottermore).
The key passage explains that the Cloak entered the Potter line when Hardwin Potter married Iolanthe Peverell (Ignotus Peverell’s granddaughter).
She inherited it because there were no male heirs in her generation, then told her husband that “it was a tradition in her family that the possession of this cloak remained a secret.” He respected that, and from then on it was simply handed down to the eldest in each generation as a private family heirloom.
Earlier Potters treated the Cloak as a useful, never fading family treasure kept quiet, not as an object whose extraordinary origins (the Peverell connection and the Deathly Hallows legend) needed public or even internal investigation. James later showed it to Dumbledore (who recognized its significance), but the broader family practice had long been discretion rather than research. Harry is the first in generations to learn the full story, because the events of Deathly Hallows force the Hallows into the open.
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
I think this is one of the saddest moments in Deathly Hallows because Harry and Dumbledore are both right, even though Harry doesn't seem able to accept it.
Harry believes his grief is what keeps Voldemort out of his mind, and in a way, it does. But Dumbledore understands something Harry is still struggling to see: grief exists because you loved someone, and that love is precisely what Voldemort can never understand.
Harry had lost Sirius, and now Dobby. He was trying to bury the pain rather than face it. But grief isn't the opposite of love. Sometimes, it's what remains when you have nowhere left to give that love. 💔
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
As a kid, Harry learned and mastered two skills just to survive the Dursleys: mimicking other people's voices and throwing his voice.
And ever since he discovered he could do magic and got his hands on the Invisibility Cloak, he became an absolute menace to his enemies.
Snape keeps hearing his own Slytherins making fun of him.
McGonagall assumes it's just another one of the twins' pranks and ignores it.
Umbridge's illegal activities become public knowledge when she angrily yells about what she'll do to whoever keeps mimicking her voice, right in front of the Great Hall.
Voldemort is slowly losing his mind.
The Death Eaters are practically killing each other.
And Dumbledore is the only one who knows the truth. He lets Harry continue because, honestly, he's bored and finds the whole thing incredibly amusing.
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
There are computers in the future. Really, REALLY advanced ones. The two organizations with computers kept them a deep hidden secret (the Bene Gesserit Sisterhood and Ix though I’m willing to bet you could find some hidden computers on Richese, Kaitain and Junction). Standard computers —probably even more advanced than we have today— were also probably prosaic for organizations like The Guild and some of the greater houses. But when the books refer to “thinking machines” and “computers” — they were referring specifically to non-organic “artificial intelligence”. To prevent that from ever arising again, they banned the use of computers and especially networking computers more than needed.
Heretics of Dune:
Opposition arguments could not be shuffled away into Archival dust. Damn this dependency on computers! The Sisterhood had carried its main lines in computers even back in the Forbidden Days after the Butlerian Jihad's wild smashing of "the thinking machines." In these "more enlightened" days, one tended not to question the unconscious motives behind that ancient orgy of destruction.
The Bene Gesserit kept computers around since the Butlerian Jihad. They didn’t trust Mentats for most of their existence (until they co-opted that school and absorbed it into the Sisterhood). Since they certainly weren’t going to give their collection of hidden supercomputers any capacity to communicate beyond those discrete systems (much less give it operatives like robotic drones), there was no danger in them and they were faster and more reliable than paper records.
After the collapse of the Old Empire (“The Millions Worlds”), humanity began using computers again. Multiple times throughout the final two books that Frank Herbert wrote that characters would call up information on a screen. That kind of action demonstrates at least some computing technology on the back end. BUT because of the fear of giving rise to an AI, they would never give those computers robotic drones or direct access to command functions. (So even if a ship became “self aware” a human would always be carrying out the functions and it’s not like they were going to wifi in drones for it to self-replicate.)
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
When Ron returned to Harry and Hermione in Deathly Hallows, he didn’t just come back with a different attitude. He eventually ended up with a completely different wand too, and there’s an interesting piece of wandlore behind it.
Ron originally carried his brother Charlie’s old wand, which had already been damaged during his second year. After leaving Harry and Hermione, he still had that wand, but during the escape from Malfoy Manor, he helped overpower Peter Pettigrew and took his wand. It was a chestnut wand with a dragon heartstring core.
This matters because wand allegiance isn’t always tied to the person who originally purchased or received a wand. Ollivander explains that a wand can change allegiance when its owner is defeated. Ron had helped overpower Pettigrew and taken his wand, so there was reason for it to accept Ron as its new master.
Harry experienced something similar at Malfoy Manor when he took Draco’s hawthorn wand. Even though Draco hadn’t been killed, Harry had defeated him and physically taken his wand. That victory eventually became important to the Elder Wand’s allegiance too.
But there’s no specific moment in the books where Ron’s new wand behaves differently around Harry or recognises him because they’re friends. Wand allegiance is about the relationship between a wand and its wielder, not the friendships that person has.
I find the parallel between Ron and Harry interesting, though. Both ended up with wands belonging to people they had defeated at Malfoy Manor, and both discoveries became relevant to the larger story of wand allegiance. Ron’s return didn’t magically change how his wand treated Harry, but it did mark the beginning of a new chapter in his relationship with magic.
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
Some of the quietest details in Harry Potter become really surprising when you actually stop and think about them.
This is more a list of a potterhead’s 2am realization. Some are not so creepy, just disturbing or even funny.
1- A wizard/witch could rape someone, most likely a muggle and Obliviate them.
2- Some royal families in history (can’t remember any example now), to keep their wealth or “blood purity” married no one outside their bloodline. Some Pureblood families did the same. Sirius Black once said ( I think it was him) that all Witches and Wizards are likely to be related. And of course, there are the descendants of Salazar Slytherin; they wanted to keep a pure bloodline so badly, you know what happened between cousins and even siblings. That might not be a creepy fact, but at least a little disturbing.
3- J.K herself, if I’m not wrong said something about Wizards and toilets. Because most of them, especially before nowadays didn’t use them. They’d just, for example, do the do during a conversation with friends, than use a spell to get rid of it. Or am I wrong? Please tell me if you have a better source.
4- Mad Eye Moody can see through clothes. Ladies, watch your panties. (That was horrible, I know).
5- Ron, from the time he was at least 11, had been sleeping with a ≈32 yo man named Peter Pettigrew. But just the thought of sleeping with a rat is disturbing. And before Ron, his older brother Charlie had the rat. Pettigrew had been sleeping with young boys for more than 10 years.
6- Sirius must have pooped in his dog form at some point.
7- Hagrid brought a half of a dead cow to his class once, to feed Thestrals.
8- Barty Crouch Sr. was killed by his son and buried in Hagrid’s garden, turned into a bone.
9- Both of Molly Weasley’s brothers, who were twins, were killed by Death Eaters.
10- And Lily and James were only 20 when they had a son, were made aware of a prophecy saying that son will be killed, were then forced to hide and not allowed to go out to stay stafe, and were 21 when they were murdered.
11- Harry was an abused child.
12- Dumbledore was very irresponsible. He is one of if not the most powerful wizard of all times. The Death Eaters aren’t as powerful as him, neither are the Ministry men, for he is a great duelist and come on, you know how powerful he is. Yet, he does nothing each time the school was under a menace of death, and never said things as they are, always being all mysterious and “The boy must do it on his own”.
13- Crucio was used on Hermione for a very long time when she was 17. She was also mutilated by Bellatrix. And think about how Crucio works, it makes you feel pain in your entire body. Think about it.
14- Snape probably had the saddest life in the story. Spinner’s End is a dirty place, his father was abusive, he wasn’t that poor but not rich, James and his friends were bullies to him, humiliating him quite badly if you think about it, and the one time he messed up was since then used as a label on him until his death. He was hated by everyone until his death, and beside his mother, probably never had affection from anyone, not even Lily.
Thanks for reading all 14 of them.
Actually, Scabbers was Percy’s (not Charlie’s) pet before he was Ron’s.
Compass Man 🧭 retweeted
Can someone explain why Odin locked Hela away instead of killing her, considering how dangerous she was? And how did he manage to keep her existence secret for so long?
