Please, no spoilers in this thread!
Please keep to speculation only: quoting from previous books to support your theories acceptable.
If you think it might be a spoiler: don't post!


This is your chance to stop reading if you want to be completely in the dark!

Personally, I really really hope Dumbledore isn't going to magically come back to life. That would really suck.

It has been pointed on another forum that Snape says in the first Potions lesson:


I'm not sure about that - there seems no chance for Dumbledore to have drunk it - whatever happened it seems that Snape's curse was the cause of it?

My brother and I are going to have a "Smash my Harry Potter". You know, kinda like "Smash My PS3/Smash My Wii/Smash My X-box 360". Except with this.

OR

We quickly read the last two chapters and shout out spoilers.

"Oh my GOD, Dumbledore came back to life....and SNAPE KILLED HIM AGAIN!"

Do interviews with Rowling count as spoilers? I'm pretty sure that she said DD is dead and isn't coming back - same with Sirius .

I agree with the above.

It would also pluck sums if he came back in a Deus Ex Machina sense. The point of removing Dumbledore was to force Harry to face his destiny alone.

dumbledore is dead and gone

I was thinking maybe it was just a ruse because it's going to be very strange without having him and with a different headmaster. Seems like she has enough to deal with in this book without dealing with the school adjusting to a new headmaster and the magical wold not having Dumbledore, but

a) she already stepped out of the pattern she's set up in the last book by having so much of it take place outside the school

b) Harry now has to take care of all this on his own, he can't fall back on Dumbledore, hide behind him, be protected by him, etc... Now he has more equal allies, but no one to hide behind. I feel like she definitely did it on purpose so he has to, as martyn said, face his destiny alone

If I was Dumbledore, I'd be very worried about removing myself from the situation and letting Harry go on his own. I've always got the impression that Dumbledore very cleverly manipulates Harry throughout the books - apart from in book 5 of course, where he admits he handled it allwrong at the end. Without that manipulation, I don't think Harry could be trusted to actually do anything right.

Yes, Harry is going to have to be the one who destroys Voldemort, so Dumbledore isn't actually needed for that. However, I can't see him giving himself up in order to acclompish that. I'm also unsure as to how Rowling is going to reconcile the Snape killing Dumbledore thing with Snape being on the Order of the Phoenix's side (which to me is a given - if Snape actually turns out to be a true Death Eater I would be very very surprised). That's why I voted for Dumbledore's death being a ruse planned by Dumbledore and Snape - I can't pretend to have the first clue what actually happened, but I'm fairly sure it wasn't what it looked like.

well the Snape thing you can explain away by the unbreakable oath he made in the beginning of the book to Malfoy's mother

Ahem, it's the Unbreakable Vow. Sheesh.

I'm sorry, I'm such a failure

so who is gonna die apart from that massive list of 16 people i read earlier?

Dumbledore is dead and gone, per JK Rowling herself (as someone already mentioned).


I dunno why people keep forgetting that Voldemort is probably going to die too. He never seems to show up in the "omg who's gonna die!?" speculation lists.

well that's kind of a given though

Dumbledore is definitely dead. It wouldn't have mattered if he had drank the draught of living death or otherwise consumed some sort of sleeping potion. It very plainly said in the book he was struck by the green blast of an avada kedavra curse, and we no that with the exception of Harry, nobody survives it. You could see how upset Snape was over the matter (the hatred in his face - presumably for himself - as he killed Dumbledore), and his furious response to Harry calling him a "coward". I don't remember for sure, but I'm certain there was a part in the book where Harry overheard a conversation/argument between Snape and Dumbledore in which Snape said something along the lines of "he couldn't do it" and "he wanted out". The whole incident was planned from the beginning - maybe not the EXACT way it played out, but that Snape would kill Dumbledore in the end. It was the only way to convince Voldemort's supporters that Snape was on their side, which would allow Snape to get close to Voldemort. Even with all the Horcruxes destroyed, Harry isn't skilled enough to destroy Voldemort on his own, but since the prophecy said that Harry is the only one that can kill him, he will have to make the killing blow. I believe Snape will need to assist him in this, possibly sacrificing himself in the process.

And people are really gonna be pissed off when Voldemort knew this ruse all along and kills Snape.

Don't forget that Wormtail is still in Harry's debt. According to Dumbledore anyway.

The prophecy doesn't explicitly say that Harry has to Kill VM. It just says that neither can live while the other survives.

But that's probably meant to be the gist

But the prophesy is already wrong because the two of them are living simultaneously.

martyn harry will be killed by voldemort and get brought back to life later.

I think it was neither can live for very long while the other is alive

Either way, we'll know soon - Amazon has despatched my copy!

GIGGIDYGIGGIDY!

DD is dead for sure, and Snape is in the perfect position to betray you know who.

I'm not posting in the thread, because I already read the book.

But it's .

You just spoiled it for me, jerkface! I demand that this ****** be banned immediately!

Actually, we just know that someone who looks like Dumbledore was struck by the Avada Kedavra curse. Don't forget there's polyjuice potion as a possibility and his brother Aberforth might be a twin brother.

Also, it's never explicitly stated what Malfoy's task is that Snape agrees to complete in the Unbreakable Vow. If it was simply "Kill Dumbledore" then by knocking off Aberforth you've done that. However, it doesn't seem in Albus' character to sacrifice other people like that, so this is really just wild speculation that I came up with before reading that Rowling has said Dumbledore is dead.

HEDWIG KILLS VOLDEMORT

that would be awesome

No, as much as I hate Malfoy and Snape, they're both going to end up being good guys in the end, and I think Dumbledore's gone for good - he can't protect Harry anymore

(though I've already said that last bit)

Just a heads-up -- Aberborth is the barman at the Leaky Cauldron.

Right, but Harry was alongside Dumbledore from the moment they departed Hogwarts until they arrived back at the astronomy tower. Seems unlikely that it could have been Aberforth all along, or that there was some sort of switch when Harry wasn't looking.

There was no switch because Rowling said that Dumbledore is dead.

Unless Aberforth was actually the one who was killed by Snape, and Dumbledore, in agony over his brother's death, committed suicide. In which case they're both dead anyway.

Well, that too

If he weren't, she would have made some cryptic remark. She wouldn't lie.

She didn't say Albus Dumbledore, just Dumbledore.

OMG!!!!

The context of the statement suggests that she is referring to Albus Dumbledore (just as when I wrote "There was no switch because Rowling said that Dumbledore is dead," the context indicated that I was talking about Albus Dumbledore)

Oh c'mon, she's got millions of people hanging on her every word--she purposely ****s with the context and the sentences to get different reactions. Who knows what she really meant.

That would be awesome, especially Malfoy, but I kind of get the feeling that he's to much of a cookie cutter obnoxious character to redeem himself now.

Stupid postman probably gave the packet to the neighbours, because my parents didn't want to open the door because they weren't exactly presentable.
But of course the stupid postman never writes a note to which neighbour he gives the packet.

this is the simple version of how i got mine
<Genki> HAY JIN
<sdfsd> SUP GENKS
<Genki> I GOT HARRY POTTER FOR FREE
<Genki> FREE
<Genki> $35 book!
<Genki> BRAND NEW
<sdfsd> $35? what a rip.
<Genki> yea
<Genki> my mom works in a bookstore, and so i was helping there for the release
<Genki> and after the last person gets done, i was like, BIRTHDAY PRESENT FOR MOM
<Genki> and then her boss was like FREE BOOK YOU J00

HERMIONE MARRIES HEDWIG