Board 8 > Best Harry Potter Character Round 2 Day 11 ft: Arthur Weasley v Dudley Dursley

(+) Yeah! (+)

Rules:
There may be spoilers for all seven books and 8 movies
Each match will last for exactly 24 hours. Any votes after that point will not count.
Discussion is encouraged but not required.
Make sure all of your votes are obvious. I should know who you are voting for, basically don't bury your vote in the middle of a paragraph.
No alt-voting.
Ties will be replayed the next day with the rest of the matches.
No vote-saves or rallying for specific characters. Telling people to vote is encouraged but don't tell them how to vote!
Don't complain about the seeds, they were the result of a save-my.
Because matches can overlap, results will be in this topic.
http://www.gamefaqs.com/boards/8-gamefaqs-contests/61327435

Round One Results:
(1)Remus John Lupin defeats (16)Igor Karkaroff 18-2
(9)Firenze defeats (8)James Potter 13-7
(5)Arthur Weasley defeats (12)Argus Filch 12-8
(4)Dudley Dursley defeats (13)Gregory Goyle 16-4

Today's Matches:
(1)Remus John Lupin
(9)Firenze

(5)Arthur Weasley
(4)Dudley Dursley

--
Warning_Crazy Winner of Board 8 Big Brother!
i may be running for senatorship (thanks nio) but i'm no SUPERNICEDOG

RJ
Arthur

EAZZZZZZYY

--
I can't control it! SuperNiceDog RISES!

(9)Firenze
(4)Dudley Dursley

--
Commodore
http://i941.photobucket.com/albums/ad258/CommodoreTN/niobunny.png

1
5

--
Menji+ What Will Never Be the Greatest.
http://img85.imageshack.us/img85/8184/ffxiii.gif

(1)Remus John Lupin
(5)Arthur Weasley

--
SuperNiceDog is about 20% cooler then the other gurus.

(1)Remus John Lupin
Lupin is perhaps the best DADA teacher at Hogwarts during Harry's time there. And he's certainly the most influential on Harry with the exception of maybe Dumbledore. I've never really liked the centaurs, and Firenze isn't much of an exception. He's a better teacher than Trelawney -- but not by much. Lupin ont he other hand has a nice strong backstory in addition to his teaching. He's a member of the order of the Phoenix. He's a werewolf. You can easily see why he, James, and Sirius became friends. Moony is awesome. It's a pity he wasn't full time DADA teacher.

(5)Arthur Weasley
One thing I really like about Arthur is how he has a sense of humor, but he's always there with the serious moments too. He gets excited about his sons driving his flying car -- he gets excited about muggle subways. He gets excited about a lot. He's one of the most reasonable adults in the series. And this is seen best in the fifth book, when he lets Harry, Ron, Hermione, Fred, and George sit in on the OOTP meeting. He doesn't want them joining the order, but he feels that they should know some things -- just like how he felt Harry should know more about Sirius Black. He also has a good rivalry with Lucius Malfoy. I'm surprised he doesn't know more about muggles, with as much as he works with Muggle stuff. But he's at least still far away from the other end of the spectrum where you have wizards wearing women's clothes because they like a good breeze. Dudley is a decent antagonist who has some good growth -- but I don't think it's really enough.

--
See You In Another Life, Brother.

(1)Remus John Lupin
(5)Arthur Weasley

--
Ni!

(1)Remus John Lupin

(5)Arthur Weasley

--
Not today

(1)Remus John Lupin
(9)Firenze

...

I can't vote here. These are two of my favorite characters and this match is cruel. One of them manages to do a lot in an incredibly low amount of screentime, and the other is given a lot more time to shine and succeeds. Blargh. I find it funny that both "professors" surpass their predecessors in the subject they teach. Maybe I'll man up and pick one later, but for now...

(5)Arthur Weasley
(4)Dudley Dursley

A wizard obsessed with muggles and a muggle afraid of magic. Sorry Arthur fans, but he's kind of boring. Easily the dullest Weasley outside Charlie who we know next to nothing about. I mean, he has the one quirk- an interesting quirk I might add, it'd be the equivalent of a muggle finding... iono accountants fascinating- but other then that he's just your typical, balding middle-aged dad. Even if you hate Ginny, Percy, Ronald, or Aunt Muriel, you can at least capitalize on the fact that they are interesting enough to despise. Whereas Arthur... I can't find any faults with the guy, which makes him boring. Even Molly has her one badass moment, but thus guy... can't think of a similar one for him.

Dudley meanwhile is a bully and a coward, or at least he was. I don't like him, but I have found him to provide entertainment value, usually through getting his comeuppance or getting threatened with magic as it's nice to see how a bully reacts to being bullied, but being a brat can be fun to watch/read about too. He also has his "making amends" scene with Harry, which was brief but admittedly well-done. Yeah, my vote here is a lot easier.

--
Arcanine: The best pokemon ever.
Dewott: The cutest pokemon ever.

(1)Remus John Lupin
(5)Arthur Weasley

--
http://objection.mrdictionary.net/go.php?n=5364544
Congrats to SuperNiceDog! Guru Champ!

Lupin
Dudley (hard to choose here, went for the one losing)

--
~ Ringworm ~

(1)Remus John Lupin
(9)Firenze

Firenze is kinda cool, but Lupin is a lot more important. Being the first decent DADA teacher, turning out to be one of the Marauders and a friend of Harry's parents, and becoming a member of the Order of the Phoenix, he was pretty cool. I felt like he was pretty underused in later books sadly, and the relationship with Tonks pretty much came out of nowhere, I wish we'd seen more of him. But he was pretty cool when he was on screen, and one of the highlights of book 3.

(5)Arthur Weasley
(4)Dudley Dursley

I like Arthur. Meanwhile Dudley is an ass for most of the series. So why would I vote for Dudley? Well, I like his redemption storyline. It's not overly developed, but she (Rowling) gives us just enough to see that Dudley may turn out to be a decent guy. For the first four+ books he's basically a bully and a spoiled brat. We hate him and we laugh at him whenever he gets his comeuppance (like with the ton-tongue taffy). We don't really question it.

But in book 5, things start to change when Harry saves Dudley from a dementor. At first, Dudley seems to be his usual obnoxious self with blaming Harry and trying to get him in trouble. But it seems like it made him start to think. For the next two years he stops harassing Harry and leaves him alone. And finally when the Dursleys are saying goodbye to Harry for the last time, he shows some concern for Harry (which requires him to stand his ground, marginally, against his parents) and admits that Harry saved his life. Ultimately, Dudley was a jerk as a kid. But lots of people are jerks when they're kids, and look at who his parents are. I can forgive him for that, in a way I'll never forgive Snape for bullying kids as an adult. Dudley's half-assed apology is the best redemption story in the series.

Harry and Dudley are never going to become close. But, it's nice to think Harry will have one relative who came to respect him. And if he hadn't had Harry around as an example, maybe Dudley would have grown up to be just like his parents. Sometime down the road I hope Harry and Dudley go to a pub together, get smashed, and laugh about how awful Vernon and Petunia are.

--
I made a living on time trial blowing myself off to cross the finish line at ludicrous speed. -transience

One more thing about Dudley, is that assuming Harry ever sees him again, he might start to come to peace with the way his father acted in the memories he saw. As a teenager, he couldn't accept seeing his teenage father being an ass. But as an adult, hopefully he'll start to see that people (like Dudley and possibly Draco) can change.

--
I made a living on time trial blowing myself off to cross the finish line at ludicrous speed. -transience

Lupin
...Dudley

--
http://img94.imageshack.us/img94/4418/dsc02035h.jpg
http://i38.tinypic.com/2zqtqur.jpg

Lupin
Dudley

(1)Remus John Lupin

(5)Arthur Weasley

--
Moops?
"I thought you were making up diseases? That's spontaneous dental hydroplosion."

(1)Remus John Lupin
(5)Arthur Weasley

--
Velcro - what a rip off.
Congrats SuperNiceDog, Oracle Team Mate and Guru Champ!

(1)Remus John Lupin

(5)Arthur Weasley

(9)Firenze
(5)Arthur Weasley

(spoilers)

(1)Remus John Lupin
(9)Firenze

So like...the book 7 scene where Harry calls Lupin a coward is in the running for the best scene in the entire series. Firenze doesn't have any great scenes; he has some decent scenes, but...yeah.

(5)Arthur Weasley
(4)Dudley Dursley

This is a really, really good match. And I'm kind of struggling with who to vote for. Dudley does have character development and a redemption scene. Arthur's muggle gimmick is pretty funny.

And...you know, I think I lean towards humor here. An enchanted flying car that he can only have because he rewrote the rules to allow it. His collection of spark plugs. His indecent enthusiasm about the subway. His eagerness to try stitches on Nagini's wound. The fact that he gravitates to muggle magic tricks in Fred and George's shop.

And now that people mention it...yeah, the Malfoy rivalry isn't bad either. Always taking swipes at each other. It's noteworthy that I think I care more about the Arthur/Lucius rivalry than I do about the Dudley/Harry rivalry.

"Good lord, Arthur," he said softly. "What did you have to sell to get seats in the Top Box? Surely your house wouldn't have fetched this much?"

Which is...good for Arthur, because he does a lot more than clash with Lucius, whereas Dudley spends most of his time clashing with Harry.

--
Cats land on their feet. Toast lands peanut butter side down. A cat with toast strapped to its back will hover above the ground in a state of quantum indecision

(1)Remus John Lupin
(5)Arthur Weasley

--
http://www.nbc.com/parks-and-recreation/exclusives/ron-dancing-animated.gif

1
5

--
http://www.backloggery.com/myimmortal

Remus and Arthur

--
When you've got a pretty-boy monkey on your back constantly calling you a puppet, you hardly want to seem like you're happy to be used. - DSakaCharanJ

(1)Remus John Lupin
(5)Arthur Weasley

--
(Maniac64 at work)
Guns don't kill people, Kinder eggs do. I saw it in a post on GameFAQs. ~FAHtastic

Lupin and Dudley

I was pretty upset that Dudley's redemption scene wasn't in the movie, with how much boring crap was in there giving him a 2 min scene wouldn't have been too much to ask.

--
http://oi44.tinypic.com/juac5w.jpg

Abstain

Ragtime Roast Beefy

How can you say no to this?


--
Jerry Sandusky is a football God! Jerry Sandusky is a football LEGEND!
http://youtu.be/B3fRhOfkc_w

bump

--
Warning_Crazy Winner of Board 8 Big Brother!
i may be running for senatorship (thanks nio) but i'm no SUPERNICEDOG

(1)Remus John Lupin
(4)Dudley Dursley

--
"Just drown them in maple syrup. sticky maple syrup." - Taslion

DeepsPraw posted...
Abstain

Ragtime Roast Beefy

How can you say no to this?


Ha HA! You can't!

Should be a crime to, in fact.

--
Arcanine: The best pokemon ever.
Dewott: The cutest pokemon ever.

yeah...

lupin
arthur

easy

--
XIII_rocks, the cream of XIII fanboyism.
The guru champ isn't such a SuperNiceDog, he made me change my sig!

Switch from abstain to

Firenze the Loyal aka the Blood Traitor aka the Common Mule

I'll throw him some support to make his loss look a bit better. He shows up in the first book just to threaten to kick Quirrel's ass with a ferocious charge in the Forbidden Forest, saving Harry and Malfoy and carrying the former off to safety- the act of baring a human on your back being considered an act of betrayal to his own kind. The thing is, Firenze is wise. He's read the stars and seems to know Harry is the only one who can eradicate the great evil from the earth, and is courageously willing to protect him even if it means being shunned by his own kind.

Later he agrees to serve under Dumbledore as Divinations professor when Trelawney is (perhaps justly) sacked by Umbridge. Before the poor guy can even fill the position, he's nearly stomped to death by the other Centaurs for this- as to work for humans is a blood betrayal- before he's rescued by Hagrid (well I guess the oaf is good for a few things every now and again). After he's filled the post, he proves to be a far more resourceful and effective professor than his predecessor, using Astronomy and Astrology to predict the future rather than tea leaf dregs and other "silly human methods" that often prove ineffective at best. His pretty palomino pony look had Parvati and Lavender swooning over him despite their previous loyalty to Trelawney, which I personally found hilarious.

He stood on the outskirts of Dumbledore's funeral, keeping guard and showing loyalty even to the man's memory. The last thing I recall him doing is getting injured at the Battle of Hogwarts, but he survived, and later rejoined his heard. I don't know if he continued to teach after that, but I assume not. The point is, he accomplished a lot in the little screentime given him, and he provides a stark contrast to the majority of the Centaur herd. Plus his relationships to Bane, Dumbledore, Trelawney, Parvati/Lavender, and even Hagrid, in addition to his bravery, loyalty, wisdom, and competence make him pretty interesting to me.

--
Arcanine: The best pokemon ever.
Dewott: The cutest pokemon ever.

Lupin
Dudley

--
Warning_Crazy Winner of Board 8 Big Brother!
i may be running for senatorship (thanks nio) but i'm no SUPERNICEDOG

^

--
Arcanine: The best pokemon ever.
Dewott: The cutest pokemon ever.

Lupin
Dudley

--
Who knew the Rivalry Rumble would be so predictable? SuperNiceDog, that's who.

^

--
Arcanine: The best pokemon ever.
Dewott: The cutest pokemon ever.