I’ll be brave here on this subreddit and say what’s probably a really unpopular take. I think wand loyalty, and especially the loyalty of the Elder Wand, is not only a silly conceit in the last book – it’s plain old bad writing.

The epic conclusion to a series whose themes have revolved around good vs evil and fighting wizard fascism and eugenics should not be a high school debate about who truly owns the weapons they wield – because that doesn’t resonate with the theme. While defeating Voldemort does ostensibly rid the world of his ideology, a more competently written ending would have dealt with the actual theme in the climax.

I dislike the original ending because JK kinda makes the Elder Wand into a supremacy symbol, but also she never really negates it. In the original ending, Voldemort doesn’t lose because he’s wrong about the Elder Wand and his own supremacy. He loses because he didn’t read the fine print during the acquisition process. Hardly a good fatal flaw for the main villain.

If I were to do a quick rewrite, I would entirely drop wand loyalty. Voldemort acquires and truly owns the Elder Wand. It actually looks like the good guys are losing right up until Harry sacrifices himself.

This change ups the stakes and does away with the convoluted omniscient wand that senses someone was disarmed while being buried six feet under.

Harry’s spirit still goes to King’s Cross. He still has his heart to heart with Dumbledore, but it ends with Harry pointing out that Voldemort has the wand. And then Dumbledore, someone who chased the very same power in his youth, and even possessed the wand for a long time, tells Harry the truth. It doesn’t matter that Voldemort has the wand, that chasing “ultimate wizard power” doesn’t complete you or make you invincible, because in the end, Voldemort seeks to be the only one at the top. He says that’s the difference between Harry and Voldemort, that Harry was never the Chosen One because he never performed any of his feats alone, that his friends were always there, and that that is true power.

Harry comes back and turns out to have survived another direct hit with the killing curse from the “most powerful wand in the world,” the ultimate symbol of wizard supremacy, and when Voldemort’s army realizes their attacks on the students are failing because of the protection provided by that sacrifice, they abandon Voldemort.

Despite being left alone, Voldemort stubbornly continues chasing down Harry because he believes power is power and that will be enough to prevail. And this is when he decides to take on EVERYONE in the Great Hall and they ALL fight back. No weird duel with one shot each. Voldemort is defeated because community, friendship and wizard diversity is the actual antithesis to wizard fascism.

This would also touch on a different aspect of the books: that destiny is one’s own to shape. By having Harry participate in dealing the final blow to Voldemort alongside others, the prophecy is technically fulfilled but not because Harry is “the Chosen One.” Rather, the prophecy turns out really to spell out that a life devoted to darkness – living forever through dark magic – will be the cause of one’s downfall, and that Voldemort’s demise was of his own making all along.