When she arrives at Hogwarts, most people don’t pay much attention to her, since she seems so harmless, even if she is annoying. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: Umbridge is the best Harry Potter villain. It also shows just how dangerous fear can be, with Fudge so terrified of Voldemort he almost ruins the Order’s chance of doing anything to stop him and leaves Hogwarts vulnerable by forcing Dumbledore out. We’d seen before that characters like the Minister and Lucius Malfoy didn’t have everyone’s best interests at heart, and used the government to get their way, but Order the Phoenix is the first time Harry realizes that the Ministry can control pretty much anything, including the truth.
Showing us that the Wizarding World has politics just like anywhere else brings a new and much-needed dimension to the series. They also try to interfere at Hogwarts, sending one of their worst to undermine the headmaster’s authority and hinder the students’ education (We’ll talk more about Umbridge later). The government of the Wizarding World is so invested in refusing to admit Voldemort is back that they try to slander Harry and Dumbledore in the press. But it isn’t just the Death Eaters that are after him now.
The world Harry knows is a lot more sinister this time around, with the war between Voldemort’s followers and the Order of the Phoenix beginning. The Wizarding World is Much Darker This Time Book five is the first where the characters are at war and have to deal with figuring out who’s “good” and “bad” in a more complicated way. But it isn’t until Order of the Phoenix that the consequences of You-Know-Who coming back are really clear. Voldemort’s return is plenty dark: blood magic, Death Eaters, and a fight to the death all certainly aren’t “just for kids”, and Cedric Diggory’s death is the first time someone dies in the books right in front of Harry who’s considered to be “good”. But it isn’t until the end of Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire that most people mark the moment the series became more mature. Once that happened, the books started to get a little darker and more grown-up, especially with the introduction of plots like Sirius Black being framed and the Triwizard Tournament. But it didn’t take long for fans of all ages to fall in love with the series. When Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone was published in 1997, it was marketed as a middle-grade novel, for fifth to eighth- graders. The Harry Potter books were originally supposed to be books just for kids.
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