When rereading the Harry Potter books or watching the movies, it's hard not to stumble onto
little inconsistencies here and there.
From limited career options to the logistics of Polyjuice Potion, these are just a few
Harry Potter details that don't make sense.
After a young witch or wizard graduates from Hogwarts, they're expected to join the adult
wizarding world, and part of that is figuring out which career works for them.
During the fifth book in the series, Order of the Phoenix, Harry visits Professor McGonagall
for a required career advice meeting, and they discuss which classes Harry should take
to qualify for his desired post-grad job.
However, besides becoming an Auror — a "dark wizard catcher" — post-Hogwarts options
seem pretty scarce, especially according to the adults in Harry's life.
It's never revealed what Harry's parents, James and Lily, did for a living, but almost
every adult he knows growing up either works for the wizarding government, the Ministry
of Magic, or teaches at Hogwarts.
Though there is a wizarding hospital, St. Mungo's, which is stocked with Healers, and
some talented athletes might become Quidditch players, this means there are roughly four
viable career paths in the wizarding world.
The stage play Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, which serves as a sort of sequel to
the original series, seems to confirm the lack of career options — as adults, Harry,
Ron and Hermione are all employed by the Ministry, with Hermione even serving a term as the Minister
of Magic.
In Harry's third year at Hogwarts, he discovers the Marauder's Map, an enchanted, moving map
of Hogwarts that details every secret passageway, contains every room, and shows the user where
every single person within the castle is and whether or not they're on the move.
A password-protected cheat sheet to the school, the map is immensely useful to Harry throughout
his time at Hogwarts and beyond.
And, as it turns out, it was his birthright all along; Harry's father, James, helped create
the map during his own time there.
“I solemnly swear that I am up to no good."
Harry is given the map by Ron's brothers Fred and George, the notoriously mischievous Weasley
twins, who have been its custodians for years, but this seems a bit off, considering that
the map apparently contained a huge, conspicuous secret the entire time they had it.
Peter Pettigrew, one of the map's creators and the man who betrayed Harry's parents,
spent 12 years posing as Ron's pet rat and sharing a dorm room with Ron and Harry, and
apparently, Fred and George didn't pay much attention to the strange name hanging out
with their brother for years.
The twins may be troublemakers, but they're not stupid!
It just doesn't add up.
One notable feature of Hogwarts is that it's filled with magical, moving portraits, and
students and professors alike can communicate with the seemingly sentient subjects within.
From the portrait of the Fat Lady, who guards the Gryffindor Common Room, to the former
headmasters and headmistresses living in their own commemorative portraits in Dumbledore's
office, this world is filled with painted personalities who are fully capable of carrying
on conversations with anyone who tries to talk to them.
“Password?"
"Caput Draconis."
"Wow."
Though Harry never directly learns the rules of portraits, it seems as if they're only
created when a wizard dies; after Dumbledore's death in Half-Blood Prince, his portrait appears
alongside his predecessors in the headmaster's office, and as it turns out, he dispenses
advice to Severus Snape, who takes up the post in the seventh book.
Even so, the exact mechanics of these magical portraits remain bafflingly unclear.
There's definitely some part of the person within the portraits, but does it only contain
the knowledge they possessed until their death, or can the portraits continue to evolve?
"Eyes like the devil, he's got, and a soul as dark as his name.
It's him, headmaster.
The one they all talk about.
He's here.”
Every portrait Harry encounters seems to be able to process and learn new information,
making the concept all the more confusing; naturally, the magic behind this went unexplained
throughout the series.
Harry encounters plenty of action and adventure during his time in Hogwarts, which seems par
for the course for a kid constantly evading the most dangerous dark wizard of all time.
As a result, he also encounters plenty of injuries — from regrowing all of the bones
in his arm to recovering from deadly curses.
The medical staff at Hogwarts is usually on high alert, and the school nurse, Madam Pomfrey
is capable of mending broken bones in the blink of an eye.
Madam Pomfrey's skills extend beyond life and death circumstances as well; when Hermione
ends up cursed with expanding teeth, the nurse shrinks them so that they're cosmetically
perfect, even though Hermione's teeth weren't perfect before she was hit with the curse.
With that being said, it's a little odd that so many characters in Harry's world, including
Harry himself, wear glasses.
If Madam Pomfrey or any healer at St. Mungo's can cure poisoned snake bites and broken legs,
why can't they fix something as simple as astigmatism?
One of the most interesting potions in the wizarding world is Polyjuice Potion, a brew
that allows the user to transform into any other person for one hour, as long as they
have a "bit" of that person — which, in Harry's experience, typically means a hair
or two from the person's head.
In Harry's second year, he and Ron impersonate two Slytherin students, Crabbe and Goyle,
to figure out if Harry's nemesis, Draco Malfoy, is using the Chamber of Secrets to attack
Muggleborn students.
“Why are you wearing glasses?"
"Uh… um… reading."
"Reading?
I didn't know you could read."
Then, in Harry's fourth year, it turns out that one of his professors is not the actual
Auror Mad-Eye Moody, but a Death Eater pretending to be Moody thanks to the potion.
Despite the difficult brewing process, Polyjuice Potion is a constant factor throughout Harry's
journey.
If Polyjuice Potion seems too good to be true, you’re right — there are any number of
problems the user could encounter while using it, beyond Hermione accidentally using a cat
hair in Chamber of Secrets and ending up in the hospital wing.
Even if you look exactly like the person you're impersonating, anyone who knows them well
enough would likely notice if your mannerisms are off.
The entire situation could be blown wide open when someone whose hair has been used for
Polyjuice suddenly doesn't remember conversations or experiences they had with other people.
Polyjuice might seem foolproof, but it's far from it.
"You're lying, Dolores.
And one mustn't tell lies.
Stupefy!"
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