The Hog's Head

I've seen a lot of discussion centered around Remus ever since Deathly Hallows came out. A lot of people seem to think Remus was terribly out of character during most of DH. I've even seen people comment that JKR got him wrong (How is it possible for her to get her own character wrong beats me). So, I want to ask: what did you think? Was Remus OOC during DH, or was his character progression something believable?

I think for a man under stress of trying to take care of his family during a war and his being a werewolf, he was in character.

And I found the "JK doesn't know X character" people funny. So what was she doing originally, channeling the characters on the astral plane or something?

I would suggest the (perhaps controversial) idea that we didn't know Remus well enough to call the things he does in DH OOC.

Sure, in PoA we learn what he's like as a teacher to a thirteen-year-old boy — he was a pretty good one.  But Harry didn't know him adult-to-adult, and we really had little to no idea of what he was like in personal relationships — certainly no idea about how he behaves in a romantic one.  How do we know what would be in character for him there?

And although we see him intermittently working for the Order and advising Harry over the next few books, it's really only at the very end of HBP that we start to see what kind of a person he is in regards to romance.  Moreover, it's not until DH that he really treats Harry as an equal and speaks to him as such.

It makes perfect sense to me that Harry might start to learn at that point that he has some flaws and can make some mistakes.  There are plenty of people out there who are admirable in many areas of life but can have some issues when it comes to their own relationships.  Most of us, in fact.

Fandom tends to decide it knows everything about the characters it loves, even when they're secondary characters we don't see much.  So we forget how many assumptions went into our picture of those characters.  But having those assumed notions contradicted is a far cry from a character going OOC.

I agree, and I don't.

Let me try to explain that. We really don't know that much about Remus, that's true. I think, however, that we know enough to piece together and say that his behavior wasn't completely OOC, and in fact, follows a pattern.

We know of Remus, the werewolf, who first found friends at school. We know of Remus the Prefect who never dared to say anything when his friends did something wrong because, as JKR once said, his greatest flaw is that he wants to be liked.

We know of Remus the teacher, who despite everything, never confessed to Dumbledore about the secret passages, even when he suspected Sirius to be using them, because he was too scared of what Dumbledore might think of him.

And we know of the Remus who pushed Tonks away (we don't even know for how long!) because he didn't think he was worthy of her, and who only acquiesced after Dumbledore's death changed his belief system. Even then, it didn't seem like he was really sure his choice was the right one.

Knowing all of this, and despite what we don't know about him, it makes sense that he'd be scared. It even makes sense that he'd try to run away from Tonks. He's got serious self-esteem issues, and he honestly thinks that he's doing people a favor by staying away. 

Remus was always my favorite character, and when I first came into fandom, I was much more interested in figuring out why people shipped R/S than why they shipped H/Hr. Ah, that seems like a long time ago...

Anyway, back then, I never really expected for Remus to get a romantic storyline in canon, so I felt (mostly) free to toy with my own ideas about that as much as I liked (which was a lot!) It seems a lot of other Remus fans did, too--and many of those who did took their speculation down different avenues from where I did (see comment about R/S above).

Remus in HBP and DH acted exactly like I always imagined Remus-in-love would act. I thought his behavior was not only consistent with his previous characterization, it was also exquisitely in tune with what I had imagined. This made for a very satisfying reading experience for me--so much so that I was able to forgive JKR for his death more readily than many other Remus fans.

I think the people who feel Remus was OOC do so for one of two reasons. On the one hand are the people who never really thought much about Remus's inner workings and were surprised that Mr. Nice Guy could abandon his wife and unborn child and get unreasonably angry with a teenage boy for calling him on it. These would be the people who were fond of Remus, but not really fans--people who were more interested in Draco or Snape or Hermione or, possibly even (*gasp*) Harry than in Remus and what he does or thinks or feels apart from his moments in canon. On the other hand are the people who, like me, had thought a lot about Remus's inner workings, but had gone in such a different direction (perhaps deciding that he absotively, posilutely HAD to be gayer than gay), and therefore couldn't see his behavior for what it was. These would be the people insisting that Tonks is a "beard" or that he only married her because she was pregnant. I can see how they might think, when the guy that they believed to be gay and also decent and honorable was getting married to a woman and freaking out about her pregnancy, that he was acting OOC. (Please note, I don't mean to pick on R/S shippers, who, on the whole, have been quite reasonable and gracious about canon R/T. I'm talking here about a vocal few who just couldn't accept any re-working of their previous assumptions, who couldn't even concede that Remus might be bisexual.)

Anyway, while there may be exceptions to this, most of the criticism of how Remus was portrayed in DH seems to stem from one of those two lines of thinking. And while I can understand and have sympathy for them, the fact remains that they were RONG and I was RITE. *is smug*

Disclaimer: For goodness sake, please don't take this post too seriously, especially the ending. Thnx.

Joie

I agree that his behaviour was IC, much as it hurt to see him behaving like that. I've written looooooong posts on this topic in other places, because I just got so angry at people bashing Remus and denouncing him for abandoning his wife and child and getting mad at him and Tonks for fighting in the final battle. But the thing is, we've consistently seen Remus undervaluing himself. He's surprised when people care about him. He didn't really know what he'd done to deserve such good friends as he had at school, and he still feels guilt for what his childhood antics could have done. Therefore, is it any surprise to find him not understanding why it is that his wife needs him? Remus honestly thought he was of more use to Tonks helping Harry fight Voldemort. He couldn't see that his value as her husband, the man she loves, was worth more to her than the stigma, social ostracism, and danger of being with a werewolf. He wanted to do something to make the world a place where being associated with him wasn't going to get Tonks killed by Death Eaters. Yes, it was idiotic, but he did it with her best interests at heart, and I remain convinced that it was only meant to be a temporary measure.

Remus thought that by running away to help Harry, he was being brave and helping to fight Voldemort. Harry made him realise that the bravest and best thing for him to do at that point was to stay with his new family. When the final battle came around, Remus went to fight so that his son could have a world that was worth living in as the son of a werewolf. And because it was the most important thing he could do for the world at that moment. Because he was brave, and noble, and I really don't think he would have thought twice about it.

Remus' modesty and his self-worth issues have been apparent, I think, since we first met him in book 3. We also saw that he's willing to face grave danger in terms of fighting Voldemort or facing Death Eaters, but that when it comes to personal relationships and confrontations, he's often unwilling to do what needs to be done. But at heart, he was a brave man who wanted to do right by others. Sometimes he got what was right wrong, and sometimes he was too afraid to do it. But I think everything we saw in DH was just a logical continuation of the character traits he showed in the other books.

This is why I made myself a "Remus defender" icon at lj!

Yours,

JK

I agree with what Starbucks and JK Ashavah have said, and would like to add onto that.

When I first read TDH, I was in the "ZOMGOOC" camp. I was so certain that JKR had made Remus someone he wasn't, had gotten his character confused with Sirius.

Then I thought back to PoA.

In PoA, he:

- Thoroughly maintains that Sirius killed James, despite being James's greatest defender, despite hating the dark side to the point of leaving his own brother, to the point where Remus makes a mild mention to Harry that Sirius is about to get the Kiss of Doom.

- Very much guilt trips Harry for using the map, to the point where he uses Harry's parents. That's not something a nice, well mannered guy does.

- Nearly kills Pettigrew - his former best friend - for betrayal. Perhaps the Full Moon didn't help, but nonetheless he was close to being a murderer.

At a time of peace and calm, Remus is well mannered and very nice. We get those moments in all four books he features in - moments during the war that are as happy as is possible. Heck, he's jubilant when Teddy is born. But when Remus has a reason for urgency, he is tense, and he'll do or say whatever he darn well wants.

So yes, I think Remus is In Character, because I think Remus is just that complicated. Fandom wanted him to be the guy who always manages to stay level headed, myself included, but Remus isn't. He's been through too much to be, IMHO.

I maintain that he's not that nice and well mannered. He was a Marauder, after all. We tend to see him as the nice Marauder, but frankly, do we really think he went through seven years of being friend with Sirius and James by always being the nice one? We need to give him a bit more credit.

Of course, I wish we'd seen more of this side of him, but considering his friends, and his bride, I think we can assume he wasn't exactly what people make him out to be. 

The only thing about Remus's character that made me go during my first read was the scene with him and Harry at 12GP. But going back to that scene after knowing the whole story, and rereading over the previous scenes with him and Tonks - it's not that weird. The man has always thought people were better off without him, and here he is, knowing he's gotten someone pregnant, and he's having thoughts about how he's not good enough again. He's worried the baby will be a werewolf; he thinks Tonks is better off without him. He's afraid he's made things worse. It's a weakness of his, but he's always had this weakness, ever since his Hogwarts days.

Don't you get the sense that Harry reacted just as Sirius and James would have reacted in Hogwarts days? Remus without his friends was a different person, and I think it's because, while they were there, they were good at yelling at him, and helping him see when he was being stupid. Harry kind of did it this time. And, it's not that Remus was happy about it at the time, but I think having the truth thrown right into his face helped him.

Oh, I quite agree. I think Harry was acting very much like how Sirius and James would've acted if they were in that situation with Remus. I think they would've probably been even more harsh on Remus than Harry was, and since they were best friends, Remus would've been more likely to listen to them. I'm glad he did eventually listen to Harry, though.

In character.  One of the things I've noted on rereading is Remus' reaction when Tonks gets back late from Harry's escape from Privet Drive.  His face is "set and white", he sounds "almost angry", and when Tonks mentions that Bellatrix "wants very much to kill her" he becomes even more tense.  I think he extrapolated from there that Bella was after her at least partly because she'd married a werewolf, he blamed himself for putting her in danger, and he only became more afraid for his family when he realized she was pregnant.  The fear and responsibility and the sense of guilt (completely unfounded, but that's another characteristic of Remus as we saw in HBP) finally got to him, and he just wanted to get away from it.  How many times has Harry tried to leave people because he feels he's putting them in danger?

When I first read that Remus wanted to go with Harry, I thought it was odd, but understandable. With James, Sirius and Dumbledore all now gone, Remus would feel a bit responsible for Harry's safety. And he would justify his leaving his family by thinking they are safer without him. This makes sense since Remus has seen the people he cares most about killed. What would have been  OOC is if Harry had said yes, and they'd had a party and Ron had shown up in a toga.

I had a happy moment when I thought: YES! GO! Because, well, I just wanted to see/read more about Remus. As the conversation progressed, it became obvious why he wanted to go, and why Harry wouldn't exactly agree with his reasoning.

I've also seen people suggest that the almost bubbly Remus that shows up to announce the news of Teddy's birth is OOC too. This is, again, the result of people not understanding Remus, I think, or simple underestimating him. I know we've seen this image of his as a rather serious character, but he is perfectly capable of expressing happiness. He was also a Marauder. I don't buy the whole he just planned while Sirius and James did everything image fandom seems to give him.

Remus is not a serious character. Yes, he often acts it, but he's shown his light hearted, silly side more than once. After all, in PoA he hexed gum up Peeve's nose!

So no, Remus being all jubilant was not OOC.