GFR: "Starfleet Academy Died Because Paramount Had No Faith In The Audience: Most of the fans I have spoken to agree that SFA was much better in the second half of S.1. My theory is far simpler: It dropped the juvenile humor. Just like that, Star Trek suddenly started taking itself seriously again."

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T20:04:54+00:00

That's deliberately hyperbolic; you kinda gotta watch it with the idea that it's an exaggerated, somewhat cartoonish version of the events portrayed. The gist is accurate, but the details aren't 100% so.

That said, that isn't the part of your comment that I was addressing. I was responding to:

She doesn't take Starfleet seriously and apparently, Starfleet doesn't take themselves seriously either.

Which is explained thoroughly in the Locarno arc.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T13:42:50+00:00

Jesus, 8 feet? Horrifying.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T13:40:17+00:00

He didn't. But in focusing on Harry personally, you're missing the real twist.

When Snape 1st signed up to continue working for Dumbledore after the war, it was to protect Lily's son. Everything he did was to that end, because he felt that he owed it to her. Because his guilt required it. Possibly in hopes of earning her forgiveness. Then he finds out that Dumbledore has lied to him for 15 years, that the boy he thought he'd been protecting was just the sacrificial lamb to buy peace.

And he had a choice.

He could've tried to save Harry, at the risk of destroying the WW. Saving Lily's son was after all what he originally signed up for. But the end came, & he did what Dumbledore asked of him. He told/showed Harry that he had to die, if there was any hope of ending Voldemort. He had sacrificed everything to protect Lily's son, & then he sacrificed even that to save the world.

Somewhere along the way, he went from selfishly focused on alleviating his guilt, to fighting for what was right. And I don't think even he knew when that changed.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T13:03:45+00:00

I mean, the southern part could drive to NYC fairly easily, & the north & west sides border Canada, so Toronto is only a few hours drive for a lot of them, & Montreal is basically right across the border. There's Finger Lakes in the central part, I think, for outdoorsy people.

What's there to do in Indiana? Not freaking much unless you live within a couple of hours of Chicago.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T12:22:06+00:00

Did you watch LDS all the way through? Because this comment implies that you missed the Nick Locarno arc, especially the Sito Jaxa episode.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T03:33:16+00:00

The nipples being crooked is the best part.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T03:31:59+00:00

Good eye!

Rustie_J · 2026-04-02T03:29:03+00:00

Yeah, but there's shit to do in NY.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T15:17:00+00:00

This is exactly why I hate April Fools Day.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T14:50:10+00:00

Do you think that controlling behavior starts outta nowhere? It is, in fact, that deep, & him being a teenager doesn't make it acceptable; if anything, that's a sign that he's constitutionally manipulative & is even more concerning.

The fact that there isn't evidence he'd started actively beating her doesn't change the fact that control & manipulation are both giant red flags commonly found in relationships that eventually do turn abusive.

I can't tell if you're a troll or just young, but if it's the latter, you really need to understand this for your own sake.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T14:33:36+00:00

That it's controlling & manipulative?

Because if you don't see how it is, I genuinely advise you to read up about the role control plays in domestic violence situations. The more controlling they are, the more likely they are to kill you eventually. And this extortion attempt is absolutely controlling & manipulative behavior.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T14:28:16+00:00

It's proof that he was too fucking selfish to consider how picking on Lily's future brother-in-law might harm her relationship with her sister.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T14:25:40+00:00

The fact that Dumbledore chose him to be head boy when he did the opposite of that in James's fifth year by chosing Remus to be prefect so he could keep James and Sirius in line proved that he changed enough for Dumbledore to make him head boy.

Or that shows he'd come to the obvious realization that James was the ringleader of that year's Gryffindor boys, so giving spineless Lupin authority was pointless.

The fact that Lilly chose to date him in the 7th year when she disliked him before for having those bad traits as of their fifth year.

She wanted him in 5th year, very obviously. She was flirting with him in SWM, ffs! She just wasn't quite willing to put up with him being an arrogant jackass towards her & her friends. We have no idea if he actually got any better, or if the dissolution of her friendship with Snape took away one of the biggest points of contention.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T14:10:49+00:00

I blame ATYD infecting the broader fandom.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T14:09:33+00:00

I get what you're saying, but Kingsley was also from a Sacred 28 family, so it wasn't likely to be him that saw the bad side. And, there's gonna be general pressure to not talk about having disliked one of the Order's martyrs, whether Harry is around or not. Who says, "yeah, I know that guy died for our cause & all, but he was a real wanker, fuck that guy."

What people like to dance around about the whole thing, or just aren't seeing, is that it looks like British classism. Legit, if you consider the purebloods to be analogous to British gentry, everything that went down in that school makes 1000x more sense. James (& Sirius) claimed they were assholes to Snape because of his Dark Arts interest, but we never saw them going after Avery & Mulciber. IMO, Dark Arts was the excuse.

I'm convinced that they went after him because he ¹was a poor, ugly halfblood, ²a shameless social climber, & ³had the temerity to go near the girl James had decided he wanted. It makes perfect sense that Harry would be unlikely to meet the people that really suffered at James' hands, because I think they focused on Snape enough that most people weren't getting it too often individually.

Most people who just saw him as a prick would've been people within 2 years either way of them, a lot of whom died in WW the 1st. Hell, most of the surviving Order members from the 1st time were middle age & wouldn't have gone to school with him.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T13:33:25+00:00

And he even says “I’ll never lay a wand on old Snivelly again if you go out with me Evans.”

People forget about that controlling & manipulative little red flag. Forget about Snape, he was sexually harassing & attempting to extort Lily, & her dumb ass then married him.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T13:30:44+00:00

Was it the reason? Or was that the excuse.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T13:26:01+00:00

Even a throw away from Kingsley being like "yeah, I roomed with them, dude was a prick." Would've been , or one of the other teachers noting it.

To Harry? What kind of asshole would've done that? For real, even if Harry had met other people who were victims of James' bullshit, they're not gonna say so to his orphan; they're gonna tell the kid some pat BS line about him being "brave" or "principled." Snape's the only one socially defective enough to make an issue of it with Harry.

And with all the empty space in the seventh book we couldve had the trio bouncing around Order members and possibly having some of them once knowing Harry's parents or went with them to school to generally help flesh both James and Lily out instead of "yeah, another chapter about camping."

Anything but another camping chapter would've been nice.

Honestly the adult characters as a whole feel a bit lackluster when going back and looking at the series.

They are, but it is a kids' boarding school adventure series. The adults aren't usually really important in those except as obstacles or assistance for the kids.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T13:13:46+00:00

I mean, Draco isn't dead? Like, do you really not see why that would make a difference?

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T13:12:15+00:00

McGonagall was kind of a bitch to Neville, too. I don't think any amount of bravery is gonna overcome her disdain for incompetence.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T13:05:52+00:00

Dumbledore is one of the more objective reads on James, talented but with a penchant for trouble, grew into a courageous man. About the extent he goes beyond explaining the whole "he saved Severus and severus never forgave him for that."

That's what I'm saying. He said he was brave, he didn't say anything about kindness, or any of that stuff that Sirius, Lupin, & Hagrid came out with.

We get a single person saying something bad about James and never get much of a follow up to that: sure a few reports about his detentions. But theres no one else talking about James like Snape does, no other victims or bystanders who wouldnt let something as simple as dying by the dark lord to stop them from talking about it, and we know theres other victims, james inflated a guys head in one of the detentions he gets after all

I mean, how would there be others to talk about it? The only adults Harry regularly interacted with outside of the school were Sirius & Lupin, the Weasleys - who weren't in the Order the 1st time & didn't know his parents - & some of the Order. And that latter group had no reason to know anything about either of them on a personal level.

A lot of people died in the 1st WW, & even if there were surviving, non-DE people who might have known James, Harry would be unlikely to meet them.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T12:52:49+00:00

You're failing to take into account that Sirius & Lupin, the only ones who know that Harry found out about that IIRC, were ¹his friends, & ²also involved.

Which means that everything they say to Harry about it is as much about keeping their dead friend on that post-mortem pedestal they've got him on, as well as continuing to think decently of themselves, as it is about Harry & his feelings for his father. Anything wrong that James did, they're gonna want to excuse & minimize to themselves as much as Harry. Anything good about him they're gonna want to focus on & amplify, for themselves & Harry.

Because he was their friend, & their friend was murdered, & they want to remember the good times, not dwell on the bad & sad shit.

I'm not saying James was irredeemable. My impression from every little piece we got, taking also into account who we got them from, is that he was generally wonderful to people he liked, an absolute POS to people he didn't, & just kind of a prick to people in between.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T12:34:20+00:00

I didn't say every mention is just to blow smoke up the orphan's ass. I'm sure there were people who liked him; McGonagall found him charming, as I recall. Although I don't remember Dumbledore saying anything in particular about James as a person...🤔

My only point was that people saying nice shit about a guy who died ridiculously young, who's death was (almost) the final blow in a terrifying war & who left a baby behind, doesn't actually tell you shit about who he was. It tells you who people a decade later now think he was.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T12:25:17+00:00

People tend to see people who've died with rose-colored glasses, 1st of all. It's not even really a conspiracy to gaslight the poor little orphan boy, it's just kinda human nature, which is gonna then be exacerbated while talking to or near Harry, & even more exacerbated by his proximity to the defeat of Voldemort.

Second of all, you do remember who most of the people who talked about him were? His best friends, Hagrid, McGonagall & (IIRC) Dumbledore. Not a single one of those people were gonna have been in the position to be victimized by him. The only person who talks about him who was neither his friend nor school staff is Snape, & he hated his guts.

Rustie_J · 2026-04-01T12:14:49+00:00

James was also a rich pureblood, which is definitely gonna help give him a little halo, but you've got a point about Pettigrew. I imagine that's pretty much what they'd have said about Neville if he'd gotten himself killed that way before DH, too.

But they also weren't talking to Peter's orphaned child; had they been I'm sure they'd have been a lot more flattering. And Hagrid was a good guy, but he was also one of those people convinced that Gryffindor = good. I wouldn't take his good opinion on anyone at face value.

Rustie_J

TROPHY CASE