Okay, ﻿Today we're going to be discussing a topic I see come up a lot,
and that's Draco Malfoy
or more specifically, the redemption arc he supposedly deserves.
I see a ton of people saying that he deserved
a redemption arc in the books
and that even he deserved it a lot more than some characters that got one.
This is not going to be an in-depth character analysis,
and it's also not going to be
a head canon I have of how I would have liked things to go.
Instead, we're going to look at the character and actions of Draco
and in the end, discuss did he deserve a redemption arc?
Draco Malfoy, son of Lucius and Narcissa Malfoy,
who joined the Dark Lord in his plot to murder all Muggle Borns
and purify the wizarding race, keeping only the purest blood.
We see from our first time meeting him
that Draco was raised under prejudice
that was so deeply ingrained in him that blood superiority
was important to him too, that the Dark Lord's Hogwarts House
is the best and that blood traders are scum.
Throughout the early books, we see Malfoy bully, antagonize, lie
and showcase his own prejudice that he has accepted from his parents
to many people he deems worse than himself for all blood classes.
Malfoy continued his general pattern
of cruelty through his first few years of school.
We see that as he's given more power as a prefect, he happily abuses it,
picking on anyone not in his own house.
Then later, when Umbridge takes charge of the school,
he continues to abuse his power, docking points and becoming
a professional snitch and even showing how drawn to evil he
really is as he helps Umbridge capture Dumbledore's army
and is excited at the idea of her torturing students.
Draco was a terrible kid, a kid that bullied his peers, attacked
anyone he thought was weaker than him, including his teachers,
who was very drawn to evil
and who believed in blood supremacy and supported the cause.
Yes, this was ingrained in him as a young child, but at this age,
he's old enough to be questioning the things that were taught to him.
Instead, he leans into them.
After Lucius fails in his mission
to deliver the prophecy from the Department of Mysteries,
the Malfoys fall out of the Dark Lord's good graces.
Now that they're the target of his wrath,
we see the three descend from a lust for his power
and hatred into fear and revulsion toward him
and the beginnings of change.
In book six, now that Draco has more power given to him by the Dark Lord,
he continues with his threats and general horribleness
but suddenly he doesn't care about
the things that once gave him a power trip.
Though now that he's forced to fulfill a seemingly impossible task,
we start to see him change.
He starts looking ill and stops trusting Snape,
someone he looked up to up to this point.
He desperately tries killing Dumbledore many times,
nearly killing others in the process.
Then when he finally is able to fix the cabinet, he's thrilled.
When it comes to the time to kill Dumbledore for real, he can't do it,
but he also can't give up on his mission to kill him
because he feels he doesn't have a choice.
Eventually, the choice was made for him.
While he was saved from having to commit the murder himself,
he still leaves with the Death Eaters and continues to be on Voldemort's
side, albeit reluctantly, into book seven.
Now book seven kicks off with the knowledge that Voldemort has been
living in the Malfoy Manor with the Malfoys over the summer.
We see that the Malfoys now see Voldemort differently.
They don't want to make eye contact with him
and they're flinching when he's near them.
Yet they remain loyal to him.
When the trio is brought into the manor,
the parents are thrilled to be able to
get back into their master's good graces.
Though Draco seems to have already started to lose his loyalty,
he refuses to rat them out even though
it's clear to everyone else who they are.
However, even though we see the beginnings of the shift, it's only
a small shift, as he does still continue to actively
fight to fulfill Voldemort's will.
While you could argue that he didn't want Crabbe and Goyle to kill Harry
because of the change of heart he was starting to have,
I really think it's more of him still trying to execute Voldemort's will,
despite not really wanting to anymore.
Now we get a couple more scenes of him being loyal to his friends,
saying he's a Death Eater to save his skin and more.
I want to skip forward to his parents.
We continue to see the descent of the Malfoys'
composure, as they fear for their son's lives.
We see that their love for their son has become
much stronger than their loyalty to their master.
Until finally we actually see their loyalty to him break.
Narcissa could have easily asked Harry about Draco and gotten her answer
and then revealed that he was alive and turn
him over to her master, but she didn't.
Her loyalty had changed.
Then we see them during the final battle
rushing through Hogwarts, not fighting, not picking a side,
but looking for their son.
Finally, in the end, when Voldemort is dead and Hogwarts is recovering,
the Malfoys stayed behind in Hogwarts.
They didn't seem to fit
and they were huddled together, keeping to themselves.
Why stay?
Why not leave and go back to their manor?
Why not leave with the other Death Eaters that survived the battle?
Why stay in Hogwarts with the side that they were previously opposed to?
I feel like this alone says a lot
about how different things are for them at this point.
Now, don't get me wrong.
By the end of book seven,
the Malfoys didn't change their blood's superiority.
They just changed their loyalty.
This is better, in my opinion, because if someone's been actively
participating in genocide and then suddenly see how inhumane
they've been and how horrifying
their actions have been and how terrible their cause is,
it's not going to be a flip of the switch.
When they started being affected by the hatred they peddled,
they realized they didn't want to be a part of it anymore.
Now, after book seven ended, did they change their blood superiority?
We don't know. Maybe they stopped being outwardly and actively fighting
for this cause that they've been a part of for so long,
but maintained their thoughts on blood superiority and their stance
of being better than everyone else just on a smaller scale.
Or maybe they did continue on the track that we saw starting
in books six and seven, and they actually did
have a full arc and changed what they believed.
We don't really know. I think it's better this way.
I actually love that this was open-ended
because an absolute change in the fabric
of who you are and what you believe and what you've devoted your life to
fight for would have been such a hollow redemption.
We don't know if the Malfoys got a full redemption arc and after we ran
out of pages, their arc continued or if it didn't.
Honestly, it could have gone either way.
They could have become better people or they could have maintained who
they were and just not been actively fighting for the cause anymore.
I think there's beauty in that kind of honesty.
I think that if they had a full redemption arc in the seven books,
it would have been such a hollow redemption because it takes serious time
to have a full character arc from
participating in genocide to fighting alongside the good guys.
That takes time. That takes precision, that takes backsliding.
That takes internal struggle.
It would not have been satisfying if it'd happened in book seven.
Do the Malfoys, or more specifically Draco,
deserve a redemption arc in these books? I think no.
I think that it was actually written pretty perfectly,
open-ended enough that there's potential, there's possibility
for them to continue fighting for their redemption,
but not easy enough that there was no fight whatsoever and it just
happened because we wanted it to.
There's nothing more unsatisfying than a hollow redemption.
I'm really, really glad that we didn't get that in the books.
I also really like speculating, do I think
that they would have been redeemed or not?
I think that Draco is a lot more likely to have had some sort
of a redemption arc after it was all done than Narcissa and Lucius.
I think that they would have more likely
maintained their stature and their beliefs of blood superiority,
but would have kept it to themselves
rather than trying to fight for the cause more.
Draco would have been more likely to have actually fought for change,
but it would have had to have been a fight.
He would have had to change his entire belief system and what
his identity is wrapped up in. That would be a Zuko level arc.
Frankly, that takes time. That takes work, that takes focus.
It would have been disappointing to try to cram it into the books.
I love the way the arc's played out.
I love speculating, would he have actually fought for his redemption
or would he have stayed pretty much where
we left him in book seven, kind of in between?
Not really loyal to anyone.
I think that both could happen, and I love that.
I'm really curious to keep discussing this.
I want to know what you guys think.
Do you like the idea of him having a redemption arc?
Do you think it could have happened?
Do you think that he would have been more likely to
stay where he was and not have a full arc?
What are some scenes from the books that you can bring up
in the conversation, showing maybe why you think what you think?
I love continuing these discussions, so please
keep chatting with me about them in the comments.
I post videos every Sunday, Tuesday, Thursday and Saturday.
I'll see you guys again soon. Bye.
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