Hey everyone,
Welcome to another installment of Harry Potter Theory.
Today, we’re going to be discussing Harry Potter- the boy-who-lived, and a rather disturbing
instance in which he’s able to effectively use CRUCIO- the t*orture curse.
Now- we’re taught quite early on that the Unforgivable Curses are to hard to use, largely
due to the fact that they are ‘horrible’ spells that require GENUINE intent for them
to work properly.
In this case, we’re discussing Crucio OR the Cruciatus Curse- which is arguably the
hardest one to wield without proper intent.
Crucio literally translate to ‘I t*orture’ in latin, so you can already begin to get
an idea of what this spell does.
Crucio is most often used by dark witches and wizards and a known proponent of Crucio
is Bellatrix Lestrange, who used it to t*orture Alice and Frank Longbottom.
When cast, crucio inflicts excruciating pain on the victim - pain so excruciating that
it is considered to be torturous.
Casting Crucio is said to require a wand and incantation, and its effects are said to vary
depending on the casters desires and emotions.
To produce the excruciating pain implied by the name, the caster must despise the victim
and enjoy causing pain.
Harry Potter, after crucio was cast on him, described it as feeling like ‘his head was
being split open’ while ‘having his bones set on fire’.
But Harry hasn’t just been on the receiving end of Crucio.
Evidently, our boy wonder has actually attempted to use Crucio on numerous occasions, which
is awfully surprising considering Harry is well…good..and this spell t*ortureS people.
The first time Harry attempts to use Crucio is on Bellatrix Lestrange following the tragic
death of Sirius.
“Aaaaaah… did you love him, little baby Potter?”
Hatred rose in Harry such as he had never known before; he flung himself out from behind
the fountain and bellowed, “Crucio!”
Bellatrix screamed: the spell had knocked her off her feet, but she did not writhe and
shriek with pain as Neville had - she was already back on her feet, breathless, no longer
laughing.
Harry dodged behind the golden fountain again.
Her counter-spell hit the head of the handsome wizard, which was blown off and landed twenty
feet away, gouging long scratches into the wooden floor.
“Never used an Unforgivable Curse before, have you, boy?”
she yelled.
She had abandoned her baby voice now.
“You need to mean them, Potter!
You need to really want to cause pain - to enjoy it - righteous anger won’t hurt me
for long - I’ll show you how it is done, shall I?
I’ll give you a lesson -”
Harry was edging around the fountain on the other side when she screamed, “Crucio!”
and he was forced to duck down again as the centaur’s arm, holding its bow, span off
and landed with a crash on the floor a short distance from the golden wizard’s head.”
As you can see from the passage above, when Harry tried to use it on Bellatrix it just
didn’t work that well, and the reason simply boils down to the fact that he just wasn’t
sinister enough to use it effectively.
Even with the fresh death of Sirius, Harry did not have enough hate in his heart to t*orture
Bellatrix.
Which is why I think it’s quite disturbing that not long after, Harry WAS able to use
the spell (to its full extent) on Death Eater Amycus Carrow.
“It’s not a case of what you’ll permit, Minerva McGonagall.
Your time’s over.
It’s us what’s in charge here now, and you’ll back me up or you’ll pay the price.”
And he spat in her face.
Harry pulled the Cloak off himself, raised his wand, and said, “You shouldn’t have
done that.”
As Amycus spun around, Harry shouted, “Crucio!”
The Death Eater was lifted off his feet.
He writhed through the air like a drowning man, thrashing and howling in pain, and then,
with a crunch and a shattering of glass, he smashed into the front of a bookcase and crumpled,
insensible, to the floor.
“I see what Bellatrix meant,” said Harry, the blood thundering through his brain, “you
need to really mean it".
This passage always confused me because while spitting in McGonagall’s face is certainly
grounds for some kind of reaction from Harry- the t*orture curse always seemed a bit extreme.
Furthermore, how come Harry was UNABLE to wield it after something incredibly dire like
the death of Sirius, but completely ABLE after something comparably innocent.
Expelliarmus would have been completely appropriate in this moment, but Harry CHOSE to harness
his HATE and t*orture someone.
So- what gives?
How did this happen?
Is it because Harry was a more experienced wizard?
Or is it because his difficult life led to his ability to harness HATRED?
Does this mean that Harry is not as good of a person as we may have previously thought?
Is this mostly glossed over altercation actually one of the DARKEST moments in the series?
There are two possible explanations here:
Harry genuinely DID have hatred in his heart, and he was embracing it.
After all that Harry had endured over the years, he simply became jaded, and by effectively
using the t*orture curse he was tapping in to his new ‘darker’ side.
This would suggest that Harry is maybe not as ‘pure’ as we initially thought.
OR
There is a distinction between ‘enjoying it’ and ‘meaning it’.
We’re taught by Bellatrix (who’s not the most reliable source) that casting crucio
requires you to both ‘mean it’ AND ‘enjoy it’.
But I think that the second ‘requirement’ stated by Bellatrix is more of a romanticism
than anything- she was inexplicably twisted after all.
I think that the curse simply requires intent- meaning, and in this instance Harry was able
to wield the necessary INTENT to cast the curse.
While the fact remains that torturing someone is awful- and while Harry COULD have just
used another spell in this particular predicament- I don’t think that Harry’s use of the
spell necessarily means that Harry enjoyed it- he simply saw a purpose for it and wielded
pure, unadulterated intent.
This does bring up another question though.
Why wasn’t Harry able to effectively use the spell years earlier?
Harry KNEW what Crucio was when he cast it on Bellatrix the first time, so he must have
known that it required INTENT.
Why didn’t it work that time?
Was it simply because he was a younger, less-experienced wizard?
I think that this boils down to a few things.
Harry actually WAS less experienced.
The first time Harry tried to use the spell was, well, the first time he tried to use
the spell.
Becoming good at something requires repetition, and magic is not excluded from this principle.
Why do you think Harry is SUCH an expert at Expelliarmus?
He had a lot going on.
Sirius Black, Harry’s godfather that he had only just recently rekindled his relationship
with, was just killed by Bellatrix.
Harry, still young and having only witnessed death on a few occasions, was likely overcome
with emotion.
Sadness, shock, disgust, anger- these are likely just a few of the emotions that Harry
was overcome by- so it stands to reason that Harry’s ability to focus in on just ONE
of these emotions effectively - anger, hatred, would have been inhibited.
His emotions were simply all over the place, so I’m not surprised that he wasn’t able
to t*orture someone.
In the case of Mcgonagall, it was a much more controlled environment.
He knew who Carrow was, there was no real pressure for him to act there and then, and
Carrow spitting in McGonagall’s face was able to elicit a feeling of pure RAGE in Harry,
which he was able to harness.
McGonagall being spat on didn’t make him sad, it made him ANGRY- which made Crucio
the perfect weapon in this moment.
What do you guys think?
Was Harry’s ability to use crucio the result of pure, unadulterated and most importantly
HARNESSED rage?
Did Harry ENJOY torturing Carrow?
Does this scene demonstrate a distinct lack of innocence in Harry’s character?
Leave a comment down below with what you think.
And that’s it for this video.
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Until next time
Remember
Happiness can be found even in the darkest of times, if one only remembers to turn on
the light