Sherlock Poodles

So I was rereading Harry Potter, when I came across this and thought- what if instead of Cedric Diggory, Cassius Warrington had been chosen to compete in the Triwizard Tournament?

Imagine Dumbledore calling out the name of the Hogwarts champion and it isn’t a Gryffindor, or a Ravenclaw, or even a Hufflepuff, but it’s a Slytherin. A student from a House most people hate.

Imagine Cassius Warrington getting up, and three out of four Houses are booing at him and shouting things like “NO!” or, “We can’t have a Slytherin champion!” or demanding a retry. But he’s a Slytherin- he’s been dealing with this shit since he got sorted, so he keeps his head high and joins the other champions.

Imagine Harry trying to catch Warrington alone because he doesn’t really want to associate with Slytherins (plus Malfoy has this tendency of being around the guy ALL THE TIME since he got chosen), but at the same time he’s also fair enough not to want him to walk into the first task unprepared.

Imagine Warrington walking over to Harry a few months later, and Ron and Hermione both jump into a protective stance, wands out, but instead of attacking Harry he just tells him to stick the egg underwater. (Because Slytherins don’t forget those who helped them out).

Imagine Warrington and Harry helping each other out in the labyrinth.

Imagine Harry being devastated when Peter kills Warrington- because Voldemort doesn’t care what house they’re form, a spare is a spare.

Imagine the uproar that causes among the Slytherins, because some of their parents really are Death Eaters and they know what really happened.

Imagine Slytherins reaching out, asking for help from classmates from other houses. They’re terrified, truly terrified because the being their parents claimed would never hurt them because they’re pureblood, they realize that he does not care.

Imagine Slytherins in the 5th book sneaking off to join Dumbledore’s Army, to learn more about who Voldemort is without their parents acting as a filter. 

Imagine the shock when they’re told what he’s really done.

Imagine that a few talented Slytherins went with Harry and the others into the Ministry of Magic. The others are a bit wary but they prove themselves as friends.

Imagine them being confronted by Lucius Malfoy in the the Hall of Prophecy, and when the Death Eaters descend, they know that any one of them could be their parents.

Imagine the shocked gasp of a Death Eater as they realize their own child, a pureblood, is standing defiantly with Harry Potter. They choke back a cry. They can’t let their child know that they were about to duel to the death.

Imagine a DA Slytherin facing off against their own Death Eater parent. That they make the decision to let their child defeat them, because in that moment, they realize that they love their child more than they fear Voldemort. They go down, mask unveiled, and the Slytherin kid has to be dragged from the fight before he gets killed.

Imagine Book 6 Slytherins getting more friendly and cooperative with the other houses. Two years of Voldemort terrorizing the muggle and Wizarding world, two years where their parents just up and leave some days, cringing from the pain in their arm, two years after the death of the first Slytherin pureblood, Cassius Warrington, killed by Voldemort’s right-hand man, and they’re slowly hitting the breaking point.

Imagine Slytherin kids keeping tabs on their parents, sending the information to Harry, who shares it with the Order of the Phoenix, and hoping that their parents won’t be killed.

Imagine Book 7 Slytherins low-key rebelling against the new oppressive Hogwarts staff.

Imagine the final siege on Hogwarts, where Slytherins stand proudly by their fellow houses, knowing full-well they could be fighting their own parents. Some Slytherins know their parents were in the fighting. They hope to find them first and sneak them away. Their fellow students understand. Professor McGonagall allows 7th Year Slytherin, Pansy Parkinson, to duel a death eater in her stead; her father is under that veil. She knows it.

Imagine the aftermath of the battle; every house suffered loses. Slytherin students crying over the deaths of friends they made in every house.

Imagine Harry staring over her head at everyone else until Hermione steps up–it doesn’t take long, but it takes long enough that when she does all eyes are on her as a source of motion–and says “we’re never going to forget this. They’re not going to get away with it” and the girlfriend just latches onto Hermione and everyone is in wands-out stance convinced she’s about to attack the shit out of Hermione, and then the girlfriend stares into her eyes and says “do you promise me” and Hermione just gives her this super-firm nod and says “I promise” and the girlfriend just collapses on her, sobbing. 

Imagine Dumbledore trying to give some flowery speech about inter-wizard solidarity while glossing over why, because Slytherins have always been a touchy subject, and Ron gets to his feet and says “Professor, I need to say something important” and Dumbledore is so surprised he just cedes the floor, and Ron–after that awkward moment when he realizes everyone is staring at him–says he didn’t know Warrington particularly, but he knows how Warrington and Harry played. That each was always cheering on the other. Both wanted to win, but neither was willing to undercut the other by underhanded means. He finishes up saying “I think–I think it’s important everyone should know he died being what a champion should be. Because he could have abandoned Harry and instead he stood up with him to play the game the honest way, and he died for it. And–and Slytherin House should be proud, and we should all be proud, because Warrington was a good bloke.” He sits back down all flustered because he didn’t actually stand up meaning to make a speech. And then Pansy Parkinson stands up before Dumbledore can take back control of the room and says “I want to tell Weasley thank you.” And all of Slytherin House raises a glass–to Warrington, to Weasley, to Potter–and the other houses follow suit. Many years later, Wizarding scholars will say that was the moment Voldemort truly lost.

Imagine later that summer. Harry gets several owls on his birthday, all unsigned. The birds are plump and pretentious and well-cared-for. He will never know which Slytherins sent him their treasures: parchments with hexes developed by the Death Eaters; a strange locket that will only open if he whispers a special spell but that always shows him the picture he most needs to see; a page torn from a potions book that, brewed properly, will allow him extra time to summon a Patronus by giving him a few crucial seconds not just of happiness but of bliss. It doesn’t matter. Harry knows these gifts not as birthday gifts but for what they really are, and he treasures the locket and copies out the potion to send to Hermione and Mrs. Weasley, and when first summoned by the Order of the Phoenix he marches straight up to Dumbledore with the hexes and says “I can’t tell you where I got these, Professor. But they’re in use by the Death Eaters and I think you should have them.” Months later, Sirius will recognize the spell Bellatrix shoots at him, and will dive out of the way just in the nick of time.

The final battle. Everyone is there. Sirius somehow ends up herding a group of Slytherins. They all stare at him and he at them, across a centuries-old divide Voldemort has only succeeded in deepening. Then he remembers the hexes. Harry’s locket, now tucked under Sirius’ shirt because Harry’s friends are with him in this battle but most of Sirius’ are dead. The moment that happiness potion saved Remus’ life, his very soul. Snape’s final words to Harry, finally seen not as mockery but real true advice. What Harry said Voldemort said–his first words in his new form. They are kids, and they are sharing the same kind of hurt he once wouldn’t admit to, watching his mother burn his name off the family tree. “When we go in there, it’s going to be hell,” he tells the Slytherins. “Some of you are probably going to die. I might go down too, and if I do I want your best curser in the front. But I want you all to remember one thing. There are no spares.”  Later retellings of the battle never fail to mention the moment a group of angry, screaming teens burst into the Great Hall, wearing their green and silver as the badge of honor it should be, shouting NO SPARES, NO SPARES at the tops of their voices in between hexes and curses and the occasional physical punch. When Hermione is present, she always interrupts the storyteller to be sure everyone knows about the moment Blaise Zabini shoved her to the floor, dropped on top of her, fired off three curses in rapid succession and said “stay alive, Granger, we need you” before jumping back to his feet and vanishing into the melee–how, for all anyone knows, those may have been his last words, and she will not let his sacrifice go unnoted. 

The aftermath. Malfoy holds out a hand to Sirius, badly injured on the floor. Sirius asks how Malfoy is willing to trust him. Malfoy nods at his chest. “You’ve got my godfather’s locket,” he says, and when Sirius and Harry finally speak after the battle Harry gives his full agreement to the very first thing out of  Sirius’ mouth. They give the locket to Malfoy. Sirius grits his teeth and closes his eyes and opens them and says “He probably saved my life, giving Harry that.” He doesn’t say thank you. Malfoy hears it anyway.

The school reopens under a single banner: the four Houses united. The House rivalry is reduced to just that–a competition in fun–with those deep divides slowly healing to scars, and eventually away to nothing at all.

I want to see Zeus in a tailored suit and shaggy beard, a walking disparity of the loud, brash, post-graduate frat boy variety who can’t pass a woman on the street without catcalls, who has more one-night stands than he could possibly keep in his head, for whom adultery comes as naturally as the weather he predicts on the Channel 4 News—with startlingly accuracy, and an endless wealth of charisma.

I want to see Hera walking tall, six-inch heels and not a wrinkle in her skirt, knowing her boyfriend is cheating, and knowing with equal certainty that she is better, stronger, fiercer than he will ever be, a wedding planner with an eye of steel, spotting vulnerability, slicing it open, teaching every woman who crosses her path to value themselves over any mistake made in the name of men and love.

I want to see Poseidon in Olympic prime, a gym rat who skives off class to shatter backstroke records, who spends his summers lifeguarding at the city pool, who keeps an ever-expanding aquarium in his bedroom and coaxes all the pretty girls up to visit his fish, his charm as impressive as the earth-rending temper he generally uses to fuel his competitive nature.

I want to see Hades, big, hulking, quieter than his brothers would ever think to be, who dresses in neat dark clothes, and polishes his boots, and spends more time reading than fighting, who debates eventuality and ethics, who stoically reminds everyone how enormous, how terrifying, how inescapable a thing like silent inevitability can be.

I want to see Hermes in a beanie, with watercolor splashes of tattoo crawling up his arms and holes in his Chucks, a bike messenger with no helmet, no regard for the rules of the road, all cataclysmic laughter, lock-pick tricks passed along to every kid who thinks to ask, thumbing through his iPhone without a care in the world.

I want to see Athena with reading glasses pushed high on her head, six books in her bag and a switchblade in her back pocket, her clothing as neatly ordered as her mind is feverish, brilliance and temper clashing and blending, doing her best to look dignified—even when her brain chemistry rockets ahead of her well-intentioned plans.

I want to see Apollo splattered with acrylics, board shorts and Monster headphones and a beautiful classic car, busking on street corners, not because he has no choice, but because the sunlight catching on a sticker-patterned acoustic is summer incarnate, because music is blood, because the act of creation is the ultimate in sublime.

I want to see Artemis in ripped jeans and haphazard topknot, star of the soccer team, the track team, the archery team, who rides a motorcycle, and keeps a tribe of girls around her at all times, and does not care for men, for expectation, for anything but volunteer hours down at the local animal shelter and falling asleep under the stars.

I want to see Aphrodite in sundress and scarf, homemade jewelry and lavish amounts of bright red lipstick, who is excellent at public speaking, at theater auditions, at soothing bruised egos and sparking epic fights, who kisses as easily as she breathes and scrawls poetry onto bathroom stalls.

I want to see Ares all but living in the boxing ring, cutoff shirts and sweats, red-faced under a crew cut as he punches, punches, punches until the noise in his head dims, a warrior with no war, all crude jokes and blind fury, totally incapable of understanding what it is to sit, think, plan before running screaming into the fray.

I want to see Demeter with the best garden you’ve seen in your life, with a lawn care business she runs out of her garage, a teenage prodigy grown into a joint-custody single mother, who teaches her carefree daughter all she knows while scaring off the hopeful neighborhood boys with the pet python draped across her shoulders.

I want to see Dionysus with a joint in one hand and a bottle of wine in the other, baggy hoodies and three-week-old jeans, who brews his own beer in his basement and greets all visitors with a fresh pack of Oreos and half-stoned theories of the universe, of birth and death and partying mid-week, because why not, man?

I want to see Hephaestus with a workshop taking up the majority of his house, whose kitchen is overrun with blowtorches, whose bathrooms are home to all manner of hodge-podge invention, who walks with a cane and forgets his laundry for weeks at a time, and strings together the most beautiful steampunk costumes at any convention at the drop of a hat.

I want to see wood nymphs fighting against climate change, waving their signs and pushing for scientific progress. I want to see epic heroes sitting down to Magic: The Gathering tournaments, poker brawls, Call of Duty all-nighters with beer and snapbacks. I want to see Medusa working a women’s shelter, want to see Achilles training for deployment, want to see Prometheus serving endless community service stints for what he calls providing necessary welfare with stolen goods.

Hmm..interesting.

And one quickie wiki search on Eleonora and I find out it is a short story by Edgar Allan Poe (Like it said in the comments) and it has a sort of ‘happy ending’. 

So it really is making me think about how this trailer has a big chance of being real and Netflix is being sneaky (Much like in the book series). Plus, look at how many easter eggs are in that trailer. That amount of attention to detail is insane. From the close up of the Gramophone playing a record with the title of The Gothic Archives (a band that provided the theme music for the series when the audiobooks were originally released.) to the many other small nods for those who have read through the books. 

What was fascinating about the book series was that it taught the readers to question authority. Never trust what someone says instantly, just because they are an adult. To ask the right questions and seek the right answers. 

Granted this may just be me grasping at straws, but until we get someone standing up and saying ‘Hey I made this’. I will always question and wonder. And that is a beautiful thing.  

Deep Sea Goosefish (Sladenia) are anglerfish from the deep sea who lack the furious, devilish facial expressions of the classic deep sea anglerfish.

They sit their podgy bodies on the sea floor, resting on four, thick fins adapted for walking.

They have the classic lure for attracting prey but it isn’t luminescent.

I’m sure things change when dinner comes along, but when they’re just sitting there they look like the sweetest little deep sea puppies!

Which I actually agree with.

But in the same article the writer complained (I’m paraphrasing) “If you cast a black guy as Tony Stark, no one will think of him as Tony Stark, they’ll always think of him as Black Tony Stark.”

I have to point out a big flaw in that logic:

Children.

Everyone in the older generation thinks of Obama as “the black president.” You know who doesn’t think of Obama as “the black president”? 10 year olds. Obama is the only president they can remember. He got elected when they were two.

There are children who listen to Fall Out Boys’ “Centuries” and don’t know they borrowed the opening riff from Suzanne Vega’s “Tom’s Diner.” As far as they’re concerned, that’s Fall Out Boy’s riff.

There are children who don’t remember that The Rock was Dwayne Johnson’s wrestling name.

My favorite version of  A Christmas Carol is The Muppet Christmas Carol. I don’t care how Bob Cratchit was written in the original story because as far as I’m concerned, the real Bob Cratchit is a bright green frog puppet that’s my canon you can’t stop me.

There are a dozen incarnations of every possible comic book character. And every vigilante superhero we read about today is based on the original vigilante superhero – The Scarlet Pimpernel. There is no real version, there is only your favorite version. Every version that isn’t your favorite is going to feel fake to you.

Prince charming by ladyskorpia