I just wanted to tell you something I thought was quite funny. I just finished reading Book four to my 7 year old son last week and I had to laugh at his take on some of the things. When Harry was doing the first task, my son turned to me and said, "Mom, if he can do a summoning charm to get his broom, why doesn't he just say 'accio egg' and summon the egg too?"

I just thought this was cute because he has a point and yet, I had never thought about that before, but I was pretty blown away by the simplicity of it. Leave it to a kid to cut through all the drama etc and just come up with a solution.

Has anyone else with kids had a similar experience? Where there kids catch something like this in the stories. If so, share.

I just remembered another thing my youngest noticed. This time it has to do with the PoA movie. Why is it when wormtail turned himself back into a rat, his clothes were left behind, but when he was turned human he had clothes on? And how is it that Sirius can turn himself into a dog at will without a wand, yet we see that pettigrew uses a wand to turn himself into a rat?

Of course, in order to have a pg rating, the animagi have to have clothes on, but it is an interesting question. I think in the book, JKR describes Sirius's clothes, so he must somehow keep his clothes on when he transfigures.

It is late at night and I had too much to eat at thanksgiving and now I can't sleep, which is why I am probably thinking of these things. Sorry. moderators, feel free to shut this down!

Oh!! You double posted!! Bad girl!!!

Nah, I'm not going to shut this thread down.....why would I?!! It's really interesting!!!

You know, it's funny...my 7 year old nephew said exactly the same thing to me when he watched PoA.....I guess it's a reflection on Pettigrew's less-than-perfect magical abilities that he still needed a wand to perform the transformation while Sirius and James, being the powerful wizards they were, were able to do the transformation without the need for a wand.

But yeah, the clothing thing has always really amused me too... I was watching American Werewolf in London last night and I had to giggle when I saw him ripping all his clothes off, transforming, ripping some people's throats out and then waking up completely starkers in the wolf cage at the zoo.... I just couldn't help but wistfully imagine how my dearest Lupin manages....

I know they have to keep the clothes on for the PG rating...just like the whole 'how come the hulk manages to rip out of everything except his pants?' debate....but it's not logical really, is it? And I think that the filmmakers know exactly what their audiences are going to say, but they still gotta do what they gotta do anyway, you know... I think JKR has probably thought about that as well as just decided to brush over it by just saying that Sirius still had his clothes on, but at the end of the day, a wizard - I would have thought - would only be able to transform their physical body and not their clothes...which are an external thing, just like the sofa in the room with them or the curtains on the window...or the trees in the forest. You can't transform those as well...not unless they were transfigured, and even then they wouldn't be part of the animal....

Pity for people like me though....who would just loooove to see how David and Gary shape up beneath those baggy flannel shirts...**drools**

I suppose ,you can go down the route, that if Dumbledore can make a chair appear out of thin air, why can't another wizzard produce cloths. However, you would gather, if that's true, that Sirius would have a better dress sence.

Well I don't know. I think that there is some sort of limits on what you can make appear out of thin air because then you could go as far as to say you can make a house, food, clothing, money and everything you need appear out of just thin air, which makes having a job pointless (since you could just make everything appear....)

About the egg thing: In the 4th book it says that Harry thought of it in the end, and that he "couldn't beleive how stupid he was" or something like that.

But in the 1st book it says that McGonagall transformed in front of Dumbledore. I don't think she would've done that if she appeared stark naked in front of him after that. And she surely wouldn't transform into a cat and back in front of the students So I guess that they just keep their clothes on.

I've got a doubt now...*looks for book, finds it, frnatically searches chapter*...I couldn't find it either! Argh! But I was so sure I read it! I searched in "The Egg and the Eye". Or maybe it was me who thought "How can he be so stupid?". Hmmm...I'll look for that part again, but I'm supposed to be in bed now

Oooh, this post needs to be deleted. Darn computer, double posting everything....

I feel so stupid now. When I was reading the GOF, I thought the whole sumoning charm was cool, I hadn't realized until now, that he could just do that.Jeez, and I am only a few years older then your son. Maybe younger kids are more opened minded to some things..

the other way to look at it is that if he said 'Accio egg' all of the eggs would come not just the golden one, and the dragon wouldn't like that very much, all of her eggs going away and all.

Well, because the solution was so obvious and simple, it is easy for a child to figure that out. I remember that I would see the world as just a simple place.

And adults (especially when it comes to Harry Potter) believe that everything shall be complex and difficult. Everything that is obvious is pushed aside (you notice that when reading a lot of the board posts).

I believe brkn made that point.

hmm yeah that makes a lot of sense. I mean when they learned 'Accio' in Charms class or whatever all of the pillows didn't come to them so that must be it...

well i think that harry shouldve juts summoned the broom without hesitatione cuz it is quick and easy to maneuver. besides if he tried to summon the egg wouldnt he have to stop the dragon from noticing it leaving? seriously! i mean how can a HUGE dragon not notice one of its eggs disappearing? i think that the flying thing was better.

i'm sure there must have been a rule against summoning the egg. that's just a bit too obvious.
also what RG's Babe said...you'd have to somehow get away from the dragon.

I think the biggest problem nobody has mentioned yet is that the dragon is on top of the eggs, incubating them I suppose. Forcing the egg to Harry by use of accio would either not work because the dragon skin would repel the egg(since she's covering them) or would summon the egg, but it would hit the dragon(again she's covering them) and break.

Yeah, I suppose that's a fair point, there.....

Plus, of course, it would have been far too easy and heroes in stories are notoriously thick when it comes to trying the most logical course of action....if they don't get shot at/driven at/get into a knife fight/dodge deadly crocodiles/escape laser beams just about to cut through their crown jewels ( ) etc, they don't feel like they've really accomplished anything....

Ah, the heroes lot is not a happy one......

Ooh, that's stirred a memory....does anyone remember a theory that surfaced a while ago about how the 'hero', as in myth, has to go through a certain number of trials before being able to reach his goal? It was something to do with Greek mythology or something.....Homer springs to mind, for some reason....did he write a poem about it or something?.....

Y'all have no clue what I'm on about, do you? No worries, I know what I'm looking for....I'm going to hunt that out because I'm not even sure if it's HP that the article was in relation to, but now that I'm thinking about it, it seems very significant.......mmm.....if any one does know what I'm on about (and kudos to you if you do.. ) feel free to mention it here, otherwise, when I dig it out, I'll start a new thread on it.......

Hold on, I have that book somewhere! Let me find it and see what it says...
(I'll put in what I find once I figure out where I put the book..)

So I was reading The Goblet of Fire today and I read the First task and wouldn't it make alot more sense for Harry just to call the egg to him instead of the firebolt? it would be really easy.

Well, it would have been very easy... And not what the task was about. They had to get the egg, yes, but getting first past the dragon. What's the difficult part or the intereting part of the task if Harry simply accioed the egg??

Just thought you guys might be interested to read this where the accio egg thing was mentioned before. I'm not going to shut you down, don't worry.... Just thought you might like to see what people had to say about this before....

They had to get the egg, yes, but getting first past the dragon.
No, they did not have to get past the dragon.

Ludo Bagman: "Your task is to collect the golden egg!"

But Charlie said they had to get past the dragon when he explained Hagrid what the task was about. Besides, what fun would it be, just seeing Harry accio the egg?

The event coordinators would have probably already thought about the possibility of the contestants simply doing the "Accio Egg" thing, so I bet the eggs themselves were charmed so that the Accio spell doesn't work on it.

But Charlie said they had to get past the dragon when he explained Hagrid what the task was about.
"Four..." said Hagird, "so it's one fer each o' the champions, is it? What've they gotta do-fight 'em?"
"Just get past them, I think,"

Key word "I think" in otherwords he doesn't know for sure and obviously he is wrong.

The event coordinators would have probably already thought about the possibility of the contestants simply doing the "Accio Egg" thing, so I bet the eggs themselves were charmed so that the Accio spell doesn't work on it.
Maybe, but Harry wouldn't know that so wouldn't he still try?

Chronologically, Harry was first aware of the dragon threat , then he was told by Mr. Bagman he had to retrieve an egg away from a dragon. Harry's goal for the dragon was to use magic to get past it without serius injury, and his objective for the egg was just to retrieve it to complete the Task. As the dragon can cause death easily, it was Harry's responsibility to focus on how to defend himself. I agree it would have been easier per se for Harry to attempt a Summoning charm on the golden egg, but it was right of him to focus on getting past a dragon.
Also, how do you think the dragon would have reacted to seeing one of its precious eggs being magically attracted by a person? Her maternal instincts might kick in very quickly, charging at Harry with fangs, fire, and horns. The dragon keepers may restrain the Horntail, but the damage would've been done.

Harry probably could have easily Accioed the egg to him and easily gotten the egg, but remember, the goal wasn't just to get the egg. He also had to get a score from the judges. And I don't think many of the judges would have too generous with their score if Harry would have just Accio the egg to him. They wanted to see wizarding skills; not just a spell many studnets learn in their 4th year.

And another thought is that it might be hard to Accio an egg with a huge dragon protecting it, with it always in the way, and coming after you all at the same time.

I agree. As I said before, it takes away the action of the task and the fun, the risk, the drama... The scene would have been quite dead without that. Why would the students have to be over sixth year if there wasn't any risk?

Accioing the egg is a good point but I agree with Hallia, what would be the point of doing the task if you'll make it easy. I think Dumbledore had also thought of this one but maybe, they put a charm or spell against accio.

And Harry based his moves according to what Mad- Eye Moody's sort of advice. He was thinking about flying and he was concentrating about getting the egg by using his Firebolt. And Harry has so many things in mind to think about this accioing the egg: he and Ron had a fight about the Triwizard Tournament, Gryffindor House thought that he put his name in the Goblet and I would like to add, well, Cho Chang.

They made it a point to say that dragons are incredibily difficult to cast spells on - maybe that anti-magic shielding includes their eggs as well. And even if it's a fake egg, the judges would want the task to be as realistic as possible.

Another thought - the magic dampening of a dragon might be more like a shield than the dragon's skin. And maybe that shield extended around the nest.

You're right, that would've been easier, but I think harry would have still had to get past the dragon, not just get the egg. The task was to get past the dragon AND collect the egg, but if harry only got the egg he would have to try to get past the dragon by foot and with the egg in his hand. So I think that getting his firebolt was a better idea.

There's also a storyline-related possibility... Barty Jr. needed Harry to win the final trial, and to that purpose, he wanted to give him as much advantage (points wise, didn't the highest-scoring champions get a head start into the maze?). I think that, the scoring for the tournament would have included a portion of the points for showmanship- that would make sense for this type of competition- like having seperate technical and artistic scores in competetive skating, or automatically giving a more difficult dive an extra point or two. So by suggesting to Harry that he use his firebolt, Barty was ensuring that Harry would have a chance to get the crowd and judges excited and provide a good show. Harry, having been agonizing over this ever since hagrid showed him the dragons, and knowing he has very little time left to come up with any other solution, and realizing that it's going to take him pretty much the rest of the time he has left just to learn the spell, seizes on this and goes with it- there just isn't time for him to stop and think 'hey, wait a minute.....'

Another take on this with relation to the overall storyline... Barty Jr. needed Harry to win the final trial, and to that purpose, he wanted to give him as much advantage (points wise, didn't the highest-scoring champions get a head start into the maze?). I think that, the scoring for the tournament would have included a portion of the points for showmanship- that would make sense for this type of competition- like having seperate technical and artistic scores in competetive skating, or automatically giving a more difficult dive an extra point or two. So by suggesting to Harry that he use his firebolt, Barty was ensuring that Harry would have a chance to get the crowd and judges excited and provide a good show. Harry, having been agonizing over this ever since hagrid showed him the dragons, and knowing he has very little time left to come up with any other solution, and realizing that it's going to take him pretty much the rest of the time he has left just to learn the spell, seizes on this and goes with it- there just isn't time for him to stop and think 'hey, wait a minute.....'

the whole chapter would be boring if harry just accioed the egg and he would probably get a low score for doing sumthing that easy and unimpressive

hiya silversotrm and welcome to the VTM forums..it would be great if yu could please read the rules (there is a link in my siggy) double posting is not allowed on the forums..if you have to add something you can hit the edit button and type whatever it is you need to add into it then hit submit modified post
if you have any other questions feel free to PM me or one of the other prefects and/oe mods!

another thing about the "accio egg" thing is that it'd be really obvious and really dull and wouldn't show off Harry's skill or whatever if Harry just whipped out his wand and said "Accio egg." And it might kill Harry off of the book, because the other champions might be so mad that Harry got his egg in like 4 seconds and they wasted twenty minutes trying to do the same thing so they'd murder him and all go to Azkaban and become Death Eaters. But that's just my opinion.
Cheers.

Forget "accio golden egg"! What about "accio triwizard cup"? We saw that one work

In many places it appears Wizards don't think with the same logic as muggles. I think they just didn't think of doing this.

That is so weird. ( No offence madamepomfrey) i would have never thought of that!

I magic

if he could do that with the egg, then that really would defeat the purpose, would it not?

but then, even if he couldnt, then why didn't he just "accio triwizard cup", as bajab said? or ""accio Firebolt" in the maze and just fly over all of the obstacles?

Whoa, good call there madampomfrey!

I honestly would have never though of that. It seems younger children are smarter than they seem. They view the world as strictly black and white, to them, there's no grey. They just see and believe what's in front of them. What you said about Harry saying accio, that is so obvious yet we are oblivious to that because it seems that it had to be so much more complicated. But really, it could have been as simple as that.

However, I also agree that Jo wouldn't make it that simple. It defys the whole purpose of the competition. But then again, who knows what she wanted us to think?

Well it is really an interesting topic,it seems how your son was intelligent.Some times i also thought why Harry didn't said that.But i think it was not quite helpful,thats why he didn't said Accio egg.

It probably would have made it a lot easier if harry just said "Accio Egg" but it would have taken all the fun out of it. harry had already decided to fly because that's what he was talented at. still he knew how to use the spell and why he never just said accio egg we'll never know. perhaps jk wanted to try out a new and more fun way to enjoy the first task. plus just having harry say those two words would have made it shorter. just the way i guess jk decided to write the part of the book.

Im going to assume for the sake of the intelligence of the fine wizards who organized the triwizard tournament that they had placed an antisummoning charm on the egg so the champions could truly display their magical prowess. I believe it would be similar to the charm on the locket in the cave. yes it made for a wonderful story to read the different ways of retrieving an egg but i think the more acceptable answer would be that would be the easy way out

Exactly Albus. In fact, I would not be surprised if the locket incident in book 6 was, in a way, a means for JK to address this issue for us. I think even she would admit that it is easy to get involved into the complicated plot you create, only to aviod the obvious solution. So she wanted to let us know that the obvious solution had been addressed.

Anyway, this reminded me of another great Alan Rickman film, Galaxy Quest. In the film, Tim Allen, playing a satirized version of William Shatner, has to go through a rediculously designed ship interior in order to find the "off button" to the self-destruct system. The path was so treaturous because it was built to match the TV show that inspired it. Allen asks the obvious question, "who would design a ship like this?" The path was created with the cool way the scene would look in mind, not with the kind of functionality that translates into the real world. One sign of JK's sucess as a writer is how few times she falls into this narrative trap.

-Fish