j_finchfletchley posted a comment on Wednesday 13th May 2009 11:12pm

Well, here's an interesting start — knowing that this will be a H/G story certainly gives Ginny's response to the article a little more fire, and I'd say that this just has to be the rock bottom that Ron will reach. Very interesting, also, to see Hermione's response to this, which does please me as the One Big Happy Weasley Family cliché has been far too much overused in fanfic, even if it is canon. Personally, while I've thought that Harry/Ginny has always had the potential to work, I've never, ever, been sold on the idea of R/Hr — their personalities just don't mesh.

Harry's response to the article, and its follow-ups is entirely in character based on his slow and steady return to stability — it's hardly surprising that such a thing could knock him back. Hardly surprising also, that it would be Professor X, and his wisdom, that would eventually bring him out of it. I wasn't too sure about Luna's article after the personal moments they shared in OotP, but on the other hand perhaps she is just responding in the only way she knows will get noticed. With regard to the arguments in the paper, I have to confess to being a little disappointed that you specifically stated there was only one of his friends on his side. As you can probably tell from my user-name, I'm a fan of Hufflepuffs and minor characters in general, and I can't help but think that it's a little out of character that not one of the DA wrote in to the Prophet letters page, or the Quibbler after everything that Harry did for them, even if Hermione and Ginny can't due to their incarceration at Grimmauld Place — sure a lot of them might be put off by the mutant issue, but he does have some people who would continue to support him.

For characters on the fringes, we can still glean a lot about them from the few moments we do have. I find it hard to believe, therefore, that after the moments we see between Susan and Harry in OotP, that the Prophet wouldn't end up gloating over a letter from the niece of the head of the DMLE supporting Harry as a mutant, that one of the other Ravenclaw DA members such as Padma or Anthony wouldn't use their brains to point out flaws in the arguments, that Colin Creevey wouldn't write a letter based on him having a mutant as a sister, or yes, even that the Prophet wouldn't write a sneering commentary regarding a letter from Justin on Muggle notepaper with his own letterhead. I understand why you need him isolated, but I just can't see that there wouldn't be at least one or two other people that would support him.

I did like to see your further development of Hagrid though — contrast him now to the Hagrid of book 1, praising Dumbledore and finding nothing to criticise him over, to his loyalty to Harry now and his more realistic view of the old man. The scene with him keeping the letter to himself and asserting his own beliefs was a key moment, I feel. You're clearly setting something up with the Sea Dragon, and it will be interesting to see what; definitely an entertaining addition to Harry's new pad.

Rather saddening to see that Bumbles is still trying his manipulations, even when he knows all of the things he has done wrong, but then I wouldn't expect anything else from him. The conversation with Minerva was also enlightening — I don't think these people still realise the damage that they have done and what it could cost them. The revelation about Snape is hardly surprising though; even in canon I couldn't begin to fathom why Harry actually named one of his kids after him — sure he ended up working for the right side, but he was still a bastard who'd made years of Harry's life hell through his unspeakable acts.

Overall, I'm definitely liking this foray into crossover-land. While I may have the occasional niggle, the main characters are in character and the story is progressing at a very nice pace. It will be interesting to see where you go from here. With regard to the issue mentioned in your A/N, and as I mentioned in my review for the last chapter, keeping the number of X-Men characters limited is a good idea as it turns into a bit of an unbelievable nightmare otherwise, trying to juggle all those characters. Maybe you could mention a few more of them in these asides though — even in the UK they will still keep in contact, so it wouldn't be too jarring for Harry to walk into a room to find Charles smiling as he reads Kitty's early entrance notice for college, or something similar. It's just a throwaway sentence as he puts it aside, but it does give readers a sense of the wider world without bringing in too many characters.

Keep up the good work. On to chapter 5!

j_finchfletchley posted a comment on Wednesday 13th May 2009 9:57pm

An interesting start to the third chapter, and it's good to see Ororo, as we haven't seen anyone other than the main four from the X-cast yet. I can understand why you have done it this way, even though the school teems with other people who live there, as your primary universe is the HP universe and things always work better when you limit the number of people coming in from the secondary universe, but it's still nice to have cameo appearances like this — Storm is, after all, Jean's closest friend outside of her relationship with Scott. It's for the same reason I'm more okay with the fact that we haven't seen the likes of Jubilee, as being Wolverine's sidekick in the anime she would have interfered with the growing relationship between Harry and Logan if she had appeared and you'd gone down the anime route with that character rather than the movie route (and I have to confess, I never liked her portrayal in the movies, or the actress that played her, but her marginalisation was necessary to allow the development of the friendship between Logan and Rogue instead.)

I like how you remind people of the fact that Professor X owns the manufacturing plant — it's easy to forget when you're watching the series or one of the movies and focusing on the plots therein that he is an extraordinarily wealthy man. He had to be in order to build and finance the X-Men. Bringing in Hank as an aside, that he shielded the electronics, is also a good way of letting people know that he is there, and expanding the cast of characters, without actually having him in the story.

I do rather think you excelled during the teaching scene between Xavier and Harry. Professor X is a very deep man to write, measured and with an understanding of literature and philosophy that was always intended to be a direct counterbalance to his nemesis. Magneto, despite the small flashes of conscience that he occasionally displayed in the anime (which gives him a lot more depth than in the movies,) still let his experiences of the holocaust and anti-mutant bigotry turn him into exactly what it was that he hated, whereas Xavier allowed his experiences to turn him into a teacher and pacifist, determined to help foster understanding. Very few people can write Teacher!Xavier so well, where he uses his wisdom to gently guide people to their own revelations and understanding (contrast Dumbledore, who'd rather guide people to his way of thinking.)

I was a little unsure as to the events with the Goblins, as it was a little stereotyped; I've lost track of the number of stories I've read where Harry has been the only wizard since time immemorial to know some sacred greeting to which everyone falls over in shock, before Harry finds out he's richer than Croesus, but it wasn't too jarring and Harry's solution to the Percy problem was rather innovative and amusing.

It's interesting to see just how far down to rock bottom you're sending Ron, and it's certain that he won't be able to crawl fully out of this hole. While I like to see him grow up eventually after he's portrayed in this manner, I have to admit that I'd be very disappointed in Harry if he ever truly forgave Ron now; it's one betrayal too far.

Interesting scenes at Gringotts and Diagon Alley, some innovative and some stereotyped — after all, how often have discrepancies turned up in the wills or hitherto unknown castles been left to him, but I can understand how it's necessary due to the X-Men needing to make a base in the UK. Oh boy though, the Ministry and the Order have really put both feet in it with heavy combat boots now — will be interesting to see how this turns out.

j_finchfletchley posted a comment on Wednesday 13th May 2009 9:02pm

Good continuation, and the opening scene was particularly enlightening — trust Hermione to approach the problem so scientifically. It also offers hope for her and Ginny, although I can't see much for Ron at the moment. In fact, I'm not sure I'd want Harry to forgive him even if he apologised now — he's proving to be just too childish and naturally bigoted. Molly appears to need a good dose of common sense as well, as she's one other character for whom my liking soured over the course of the HP series, as her blindness and overprotective nature started to cause more harm than good. Your portrayal of her here is a natural progression from her attitude in Order of the Phoenix.

One slight thing once the action shifted to Westchester once more is that I just wasn't 'getting' Logan at first. Although I was never into the comic-verse, I've followed him in both the animated series and the movies, and I just couldn't feel his personality coming through in the first danger room scene — the language and tone just wasn't gruff enough for him, as with the few kids he opens up to, particularly Jubilee in the anime, although you can clearly see his affection for them he hides it well under his exterior personality, using nicknames such as 'kid' instead of their given names, so that only they and a few who know him well can see what he feels for them. Here, he just doesn't seem gravelly enough and for that reason I couldn't associate him with the Logan I'm familiar with seeing. Contrast this with his own internal thoughts regarding 'a wacko with a private army' and the second scene in the danger room with the teleporting training, where he came across loud and clear to me.

I certainly like how you portrayed that Harry isn't immediately 'fixed' after his stint with the Dursleys and it's taking him slow steps to recovery, with the improvements caused by having people with good parental skills, and a positive mentor in Professor X, manifesting in his maturing personality. I love how he's now in a position to make such astute observations about the wizarding world now he's been introduced to so many of the positives of the regular world — after all, even with magic, who would want to live in such a backward society, and the one thought I had while reading the HP books is that in a hundred years or so, their society would be doomed. This thought resurfaced when I read your own 'Wizards Fall', where a plot bunny (thankfully shot before it could do any damage to the furniture,) imagined them emerging from their exile into a Star Trek style future to find that no-one actually cares about the magic they bring back with them as they can do anything it can with technology.

It's interesting to see the development with Hagrid. Most people simply keep him as Dumbledore's pawn without bothering to offer him any kind of character development. Also, it's a good contrast you wove in at the end, with the positive of Harry's family and his adoption compared with the incompetence and corruption of the "Government" back in magical Britain. Even though they don't know it, they're isolating him from the UK and further pushing him away simply by everyone following the path that comes naturally to them; Scott and Jean with their compassion and the Ministry with their corruption and incompetence.

Excellent second chapter — I'm really enjoying this one. On to Chapter 3!

j_finchfletchley posted a comment on Wednesday 13th May 2009 6:55pm

Well, this interests me, I have to say — not least because it involves the merging of two of my favourite universes, and I've only seen one other story, Minisinoo's 'The Room with a Computer' which has managed to do it with any amount of skill.

Firstly, I loved to see how you portrayed Harry's slow descent into anger and hatred, where he started out with nothing more than his righteous anger and a burning desire to put the Dursleys in their place, but which swiftly spiralled out of control as he was denied the love and support that he needed. I have to say that I was not impressed with either book 6 or book 7 — Harry became 'Dumbledore's man' again far too quickly and turned from the powerful wizard we see in books 1 through 5 into a mere puppet that slacked off and was happy to be led around by the nose in the old man's schemes.

Perhaps the one criticism I would make on this, and it's a minor one, is that I don't think you handled the repetition aspect of the 'Sirius was dead!' theme particularly well. I can see where you were trying to go with it, to emphasise his grief and loss, but something about it just didn't read too well — it didn't flow. To hazard a guess, I'd say you were inspired by David Eddings', 'Cyradis was weeping' at the end of Seeress of Kell, but whether it was the italics, the exclamation mark, or the shortness of the paragraphs between each one, I don't feel that you nailed it. Perhaps removing the italics/exclamation mark, and perhaps shifting a couple of them so they form part of the beginning of a couple of the paragraphs, such as 'Sirius was dead, and still Dumbledore droned...' might work better.

I do think you've got the tone of all the X-cast so far, and in particular Professor Xavier spot on though, both in movie and anime-verse, and I can't help but have Patrick Stewart's dulcet tones running through my head every time he speaks. I sense that you're going to be taking Jean in a direction that's going to be radically different from anything we've seen in all three types of 'canon' before, and that since she'll be acting as very much a mother figure to Harry, we won't be seeing Phoenix any time soon. As for Harry himself, you've taken a bold step with his powers, making them defensive and supporting only, as most would have given him some uber-power with which to smite Voldemort — having them to be a combination of Kurt and Kitty's is a novel way to go, although I can see why certain aspects were needed due to the things he needed to do in chapter 1. Perhaps varying the special effects so they weren't exactly like the operation of their powers would have made them seem less derivative, but that's just a minor stylistic point.

Overall a very good start, and I think Harry's friends are only just beginning to realise the true horror of what they might have started here, although it appears that Ron isn't going to cover himself in glory again. This is certainly shaping up to be the second HP/X-Men crossover that I've really enjoyed. On to Chapter 2!

Muggleborn Prince posted a comment on Sunday 10th May 2009 1:26am

You never fail to impress.

This instantly became a favorite.

ching965 posted a comment on Saturday 9th May 2009 10:33pm

Great story so far. I like the new Harry. I think being able to think for himself is very important. In addition, the new, more hardened version of Harry makes a lot of sense given how much he's been put through during his years at Hogwarts. Thank you.

The best to both of you.

slayersfan01 posted a comment on Saturday 9th May 2009 7:52pm

Another great chapter! I only read two HP/X-men crossover fics and it is this and HP and the World that Waits. The reason is they are the only ones worth reading, at least in my opinion. No offense to those who read others.

Anyway, I read your author's note and agree with you. There are so many fics revolving around the destruction of Voldemort. However, your fics are unique in that they concentrate on the lives, not the battles, of Harry and the others and I thoroughly enjoy them. I loved the Wizards Fall series, Dear Tom, Power of the Press, etc. No offense intended (praise instead), I find your non-Voldemort's destruction centered fics are better. They are more detailed, more engaging, more entertaining. I hope one day those missing plot bunnies find their way home.

Anyway, this chapter is excellent. I love the drama in this. Just one question though. Did Umbridge destroy the DADA curse since she came back for a second year?

Mihir posted a comment on Saturday 9th May 2009 10:02am

I see what you mean
Here's an idea, make Harry evil cause he was disillusioned/betrayed by the light where he sides with Voldemort, helps him, stabs him in the back the moment V succeeds and takes over!
Or, you could have Harry realise that Dumbles is pulling his strings early on (perhaps fourth year?) due to which he turns dark. Then he could kill V in the graveyard, bend the will of V's inner circle, return to Hogwarts and then take over! You could also have him drain and absorb most of V's power and all of his experience and memories through the scar somewhere
There you go! new ways of killing Voldemort ... I hope they have given you some ideas ...

darkleaf posted a comment on Saturday 9th May 2009 3:59am

In the end, Voldemort's demise is rather unimportant to the story. Personally, I usually end up skimming over most final battle scenes with Voldemort as I find the tale up to that point as well as the aftermath much more interesting. In your fic especially, something as simple as Harry teleporting Voldie's heart out of his body in a very quick and easy battle would be far more interesting due to the realization from the wizarding community that the greatest dark lord in history could be taken out so easily by a mutant.

The wizarding worlds reaction as well as the sub-plot regarding Ginny's immersion into Harry's new world of movies, jumpjets, electronics, etc... interests me much more than reading a massive angsty battle scene with Voldemort.

With your lack of interest in coming up with an epic way of dealing with the Dark Lord, I suggest sticking to the K.I.S.S method of dealing with him.

Finally, I'd like to congratulate you on an excellent fic. I look forward to reading future chapters.

Alrissa posted a comment on Friday 8th May 2009 10:51pm

"Update soon! XD" he types and smiles pressing the submit review button. The story has been quite interesting so far and he liked the various implications and possibilities this particular story held. Perhaps he should write a story of his own like this. A harem story. With a storm/jubilee/rogue/harry backdrop.

A clicking sound draws his attention and he finds himself staring down the twin barrels of a sawed off shotgun. It was the last thing he ever saw as a deafening blast splattered his brains across the computer and most of the wall.

"Trash." Alrissa muttered while cracking open the compact weapon to reload before holstering it. Consulting the list she nodded to herself. Only three thousand five hundred and twelve left to erase. She smiled as she left out the front door absentmindedly patting her Dire Plot Bunny mount as it grazed on the front lawn. A Guardian Muse's work is always fun.

Draklorien posted a comment on Friday 8th May 2009 12:44pm

Regardless of the direction I can't wait for the next turn. There are always complaints and suggestions that can be given by the readers, but ultimately it is our choice to read. Please take this as encouragment to continue regardless of where u end up! U have me so addicted this is being posted from my iPhone!

Draklorien

Dustin Hoeppner posted a comment on Friday 8th May 2009 12:10am

Will you finish the story soon. I like the idea of a crossover of X-Men and Harry Potter.

Dracolych69 posted a comment on Monday 4th May 2009 6:09am

<b>I DEMAND A REFUND!</b> All $000,000.00 That being said, good story so far, and yah, new and interesting ways to off Tom are getting difficult, so if you want to, sure. This is after all one of two stories that I have read that deal with Harry and X-men in any way/shape/form. So what ever is fine. Considering your other work, I have faith that the Llama will persevere.

Owen 77 posted a comment on Saturday 2nd May 2009 8:26pm

As far as i am concerned i agree, the whole Voldemort thing has been over-done. As long as you cover it properly, not just a quick one-off battle, i could see this story going long past it.

Maybe dealing with the muggle-wizard war you are hinting at, & dealing with mutants inside & outside the wizarding world.

Illusia posted a comment on Saturday 2nd May 2009 5:20am

It was so nice to see you've updated and truthfully, I've not been interested in this story because it'll be powerful Harry defeating Voldemort. I rather like the betrayed angle and how you handle that. If you don't like to mess Voldemort in here, then don't. Make Harry a dimension walker, for all I care and he steps into a universe exactly like this but without Voldemort and ppl have betrayed him there for the heck of it :) Do what must to stay interested in this! Hell, put Bob in the actual story to solve it but I really hope you continue this. Although I read your other works as well.

jakjakattk posted a comment on Friday 1st May 2009 12:46pm

as long as you keep posting I will be there to read. the only thing that I ask it more humor, there just are not any funny stories out there right now and I have come to depend on the little bit of jokes that you leave for us at the beginning and end of postings.
This was a good chapter and I look forward to the next. If the story goes that way that you have outlined it should be good for a different type of read.

minervakitty posted a comment on Thursday 30th April 2009 12:18am

I'm not surprised that Harry wanted to make an entrance. Will Harry be making a brisk buisness with cell phones and laptops? Will the missing girls will be the motivation for Harry to sort of save the Wizarding world. I think that Dumbledore really needs to work on his reaction to Snape a little bit more. I'd be surprised if Snape got a reality check. The wizarding world seems to need a good reality check for them to realize that they need to get off their behinds for Harry wanting to save them.

DobbyElfLord posted a comment on Wednesday 29th April 2009 11:42am

I was watching X3 and thought of this story and your closing note. Since the Jean and Harry relationship is so important to the story thus far, what if when Harry kills Voldie, Cyclops is killed/MIA. Now Harry has to deal with a Dark Phoenix he really doesn't want to hurt.

I'm sure you already have the plot planned, but I thought this was an intresting, non-Volie centric direction

Thanks,
Rick
DobbyElfLord

liquidfyre posted a comment on Tuesday 28th April 2009 8:31am

I KNOW I KNOW have voldemort get a splinter and die from an infection then bring in a GOOD badguy so to speak

Vkasu posted a comment on Tuesday 28th April 2009 7:42am

Hi!

First I want to say sorry if my english is bad but I'm french and, if I can understand english well when I read it, it's a lot more harder to write in it.

Then, I must say I love this story. You really did manage to combine Harry Potter and X-men in what I think is a realistic way. And I don't really see any OOC character.

But I really wanted to react on your end's note about Voldemort. I really can imagine how it can feel repetitive to always write the same old end of the Dark Lord.

But if you introduced the mutants on Harry's side, why don't you do the same with the Dark side ?

For example, you can easily imagine another mix of wizard and mutant who has the power to control Voldemort and is the true Dark Lord spoken in the prophecy.

Or make Voldemort discover Logan's mutant power and I can see him trying to gain it just to catch another way to immortality. It's his true goal after all...

If this was what you meant by "going in directions that few will anticipate", then I'm sorry to have taken your precious time (after all, I like most of your stories and would like to read more).

If not, well, I just wanted to give suggestions to help if this was possible.

Bye,

Vkasu