Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets Doesn't Make Sense? 

To all those mentioning that the basilisk was using the "pipes", as Hermione wrote: This addresses the plothole, but doesn't explain it. In order to attack someone, the basilisk has to leave its cosy pipes. So unless there are oak-trunk sized exits in the plumbing system every 10 meters, it will have to expose itself.

Umm..how did none of the *talking sentient paintings* see it??

And Arthur is supposed to be an expert on muggle tech, that's literally his job

First of all, thank you :) I love Harry Potter and it is so interesting to hear someone else’s ideas on logic mistakes. But I do have a theory on why basilisks are not every evil wizards pet. They wouldn’t be able to communicate with them because they aren’t able to speak parsletongue and they would be in danger as well because of having no control over them :) Really enjoy watching your videos!!

I am loving this re-read series of harry potter so much! There's no one else I'd rather watch bash my favourite book series ahaha love you merphy!

1. Remember, the basilisk is under careful control by Voldemort, its not just a wild animal let loose in the castle. Since Harry has a psychic connection to Voldemort, he could have heard the basilisk talking to Voldemort telepathically 2. The Dursleys could have easily banned Harry from using the house telephones. Remember, the story takes place from the early to late nineties... 3. I've noticed throughout the entire franchise that the wizarding world is particularly old fashioned or archaic as you say. Perhaps they are just sentimental or are aware of how easily the value of communication can be taken for granted through newer and newer muggle technology (potential Freudian slip there). 4. Tom Riddle says "Probably...". Since we know of Tom's disdain for everything muggle, perhaps he didn't care enough to know that the toilet system was copied from the muggles and probably thought that they had always been there. 5. The fact that they are extremely dangerous and hard to control (i.e. Tom Riddle could control it but Harry couldn't) and since most wizards aren't Parselmouths, they are just highly impractical to make at all. But it does bug the question: why didn't Voldemort just make an army of them in the seventh book since he can control them? 6. I've noticed that HP is full of plot conveniences. It seems that Rowling enjoys creating situations that seem dire or hopeless and then have a sudden ass-pull that saves the day. I guess constant suspense makes for good literature? I can forgive this however since it seems that Rowling didn't pre-plan all the books, more like she just improvised as she went along and unfortunately HP is riddled with plot-holes as a result but its nothing too drastic

I don't like it when an author writes something that is not PHYSICALLY possible to imagine. I totally agree on the pipes thing and the basilisk moving around without being noticed. Like, how big are these pipes??? How thick are the walls for a fat basilisk to move within them?? Another thing that is hard for me to imagine, is the Marauder's map. It is supposedly a simple piece of parchment. But how can Harry see ALL THE 7 FLOORS OF HOGWARTS on a map that shows everything from above?? The floors will blend on top of each other!! Also, Hogwart's grounds are huge but somehow the map is so detailed that Harry can see himselp on the map, tapping his wand on a statue, whispering a spell (book 3, when he wants to go to Hogsmeade). How can a map be THAT detailed? Is Harry using a microscope when looking at it?

Why do wizards have plumbing? Isn't that a "muggle" invention?

I always thought the car was being controlled by Dobby to save them from the spiders as Dobby has been doing stuff prievously to save Harry

They don't even need phones or owls, they just need a fire pit! Sirius was able to use some random dude's fireplace to talk to Harry in Hogwarts like a smoldering face-time! It doesn't even have a data plan, or a wireless signal strength, they have a more powerful version of a phone right in their hearth, yet they use... some avian bois. :thinking:

Two things could've been added in book 1 make things a bit less deus ex machina. Have the twins (3rd years in Harry's 1st) talk about phoenix abilities they learned about in Care of Magical Creatures. And second, have it mentioned that the Sword of Gryffindor has been known to appear to true Gryffindors in need.

Currently re reading this book. At the end of chapter 4 Harry and the Wesley's travel back to the burrow via floo at the leaky cauldron. Considering all the fuss of Harry arriving at Knock turn ally because he didn't clearly say "Diagon Ally", why didn't they just say "The Leaky Cauldron"? As always thanks for the vids Merphy xoxo.

I just realized how close I live to you. Keep up the great work.

About the phones... can it be something it was written, back when it was published (I checked, 2002), children didn't have cellphones. Or is it just where I live...?

5:28 they do that in Wizards of Waverly Place

5:35 Isn't the Flu Network the same as a telephone? Sirius uses it in book 4 like a telephone to talk to Harry.

I'm a huge hp fan but few things bugged me a lot. Those are, other than you've already mentioned are the first dobby who was elf somehow betrayed his master and gave harry warnings about things going to happen at Hogwarts this year when we all know how loyal elf are to their masters. Second very important is that the book "Hogwarts a history" doesn't have any reference of secrets of the chamber even though the legend was very very very famous and that is why Hermione, who had read that book by heart never knew until the Flitwick told them. Like what????? What??? What??????? WHATTTTT???????? The third thing is about moaning Myrtle, she was dead for fifty years, sulking around the bathroom and never gets to see the basilisk. Fourth, the most important is the disarming charm. In the last book, we come to know that disarming charms changes the ownership when in book 2( the dueling when snape disarm Lockhart, he flew and fell back) when none of this happens whenever you disarm someone. You just drew apart the owner and the wand( it was until book six) and then in book seven it was all changed. And even snatching wands( like Harry did to Draco at Malfoy manor) also became another reason to change ownership. An additional thing to this is that harry snatched that wand which Draco owned since he joined the school so how the heck elder wand's ownership was transferred from Draco to harry? And why didn't the part of Voldemort died the instant when basilisk fang dug into harry's because harry was a Horcrux. (Fawkes healed him blah blah blah) but we know how instantly the Horcrux is destroyed. Whaaaaaaaaatttttt??????

Fans: It's gotta be hard for that huge snake to go unnoticed around the school JKR: Actually, it's gonna be super easy, barely an inconvenience

Regarding the basilisk’s tooth breaking off in Harry’s arm: This one actually checks out. Snake teeth are pretty delicate and regularly break off and replace themselves. (A bit like sharks) It’s pretty common for a snake’s tooth to get torn out by struggling prey.

Merphy: "Ugh, why didnt the Basilisk eat the children?!" 😂😂😂

Riddle: "Ah right Phoenix tears I forgot". wow talk about the smartest wizard ever 😂

I never understood how Hermione is the only one capable of figuring out it's a Basilisk. Like aside from not knowing Harry can hear it whispering, the teachers all have the same clues as Hermione. How many possible things could have equaled Slytherin + roosters being killed + petrification? Not to mention it all happened before so they presumably had plenty of time to have figured out what happened the first time. But no, only this one 12 year old can see the big picture...

Also, Ginny says she couldn't wait to attend Hogwarts ever since Bill started his first year... But she was just born at the time 😂

A snake can’t eat stone. Unlike the movie, when I read the book, I literally pictured the petrified persons turning into stone

Arthur has been working in the Office of Misuse of Muggle Artifacts for years and he's fascinated by plugs and doesn't understand how a telephone works or even how to pronounce it properly? How did he not fail his Muggles Studies at Hogwarts?

Why Harry never helped Ron to buy a wand in the second book? He has lots of golden money. That's a true nonsense.

I’ve always wondered why no one-before Harry, I mean- ever questioned moaning myrtle about how she died...

Merphy: "Why doesn't someone with an evil agenda breed basilisks?" Me: "I agree! Also, why not farm Mandrakes? Walk into a place with a set of good earmuffs and a potted adult Mandrake. Pull the Mandrake... everyone dies!" (I wrote a short story about this a LONG time ago LOL)

It's not like cell phones were so popular in the early 90s when the book is set. Also I think the Dursley wouldn't have allowed Harry to receive phone calls. Of course Hermione could have at least tried.

My favourite bit is how nobody ever talked to the ghost girl in 50 years when she had the answer to a thousand year old riddle. Even the teachers never thought to ask her how she was killed.

Didn’t realize I wanted a horror version of HP where the snake eats the children but now I kind of do 😂

Harry, maybe: Oh woah what a dangerous situation *YEET THAT WAND*

Everything wrong with Chamber of secrets in less than 16 minuites (Book Sins)

‘Chamber of Secrets’ is actually my favourite book. :) I love how every teacher hated Lockhart, especially Snape and McGonagall. :)

To quote Hermione, “Pipes.” Pipes make noise, even hissing type sounds, all the time. People just thought it was normal plumbing noise. Only Harry could recognize it as speech.

Now, some issues with the Wizarding world when compared to the Muggle world is actually wizards having residual superiority complexes. For literal thousands of years, wizards had better EVERYTHING. They could communicate easily, heal wounds and aid the sick with skill, and travel long distances in hardly any time at all. Wizards were just naturally better, with muggles hanging behind, practically living in the dirt by comparison. But since the advent of the industrial revolution, THAT is changing. Muggles have invented machines to do their work, telephones, cars, airplanes and computers. Now, the wizards are being left behind, still literally using quill pens and sending their mail off by owl, but their superiority complex is still intact. The wizards believe themselves better, even kindly ones like Mrs. Weasley thinks that she is just naturally better than muggles. At the rate it is going, you'll see the muggles have a vast dominance, even without the ability to use magic.

I'm a diehard Harry Potter fan but I completely agree with you, and have for a long time. It's strange to me how some people can't admit that the thing they love isn't perfect!

Am I the only person who wonders about the pipes in Hogwarts when the Basilisk is so big like a tree?

The plot conveniences you point out in the fight with Tom Riddle are actually some of what I find most significant in the story. I don't think Fawkes just happened to show up there. I strongly believe that Dumbledore knew there was a basilisk in the chamber and sent Fawkes there to assist Harry deliberately. Now you could still argue that Dumbledore's having a phoenix or that a phoenix being able to assist is the plot convenience. Through the whole series, the one constant regarding Dumbledore is that he's always manipulating events using information that he's gained through his research into Tom Riddle. He also seems to always be intentionally putting Harry into danger in order to help him grow as a hero, so I think Harry was there by the design of Dumbledore with the tools that would allow him to win the day.

Also, the paintings could say something?

On the owls thing and no convenient means of communication: fireplaces are basically both teleportation booths and video call machines.

The one that gets me the most is the “pipes” how big are the walls at hog warts that they can fit a giant basilisk through them!!!

The bird was specifically there to help Harry, so that's what it did.

"Everything lines up perfectly times in the end because plot convenience." Rowling: "....Dumbledore!"

“it is not perfect, but you still love it” - sees the ravenclaw t-shirt with a raven on it, ‘yeah that probably goes with the shirt as well’

"Clustercuss" omg that's adorable, I'm stealing that for when I'm around children.

As a self published author I am constantly searching my work for plot holes etc. Is it wrong that there’s some relief in knowing that even the series held up as the holy grail has some significant issues? 😬😕

“Bum-skeey, it never gets to eat anyone” 😂😂😂 this is why I’m always here for a Murphy video ❤️ the plot conveniences at the end line up so well that it feels like Dumbledore planned for this eventuality: “ok, fawkes, you be lookout while I’m gone; and if any students end up in the chamber, you go down there and pull them out.” Personally I can deal with plot convenience a bit better if Fortunate Power X has been established well ahead of the scene where it’s needed. Dumbles mentions fawkes’ healing tears and ability to lift many times his own weight in an early chapter, so at least she didn’t just throw it in right before the chamber scene. Also, I’m not a mythology expert, but I think those two abilities are part of the general Phoenix mythology, which, for me personally, makes it feel a little more organic. She didn’t just make up a whole new creature that had all of the plot convenience powers that she would need for the climax.

Didn't the third (?) book say that when Ron and Hermione tried calling Harry, Uncle Vernon quickly shot that down?

Well, they can talk without using owls and cell phones - just like did Harry and Sirius in the 5th book. Via fireplace.

Voldemort is honestly so dumb haha. So that'd be my response to what you mention of him not knowing about how there was another Parseltongue before him and Harry... I mean, that weakness comes into play later on in the books cuz he is so full of himself he never stops to think of the little things, such as him thinking that no one had found the room of requirement before him

Also Voldemort himself said that Harry have never beaten him using skill he rides the coat tails of better wizards who have all rescued him and made sure he succeeds

Maybe he only likes killing. He's actually a vegetarian.

When you’re done with this series, you could make one about how the books could have been written in a better way, especially making use of character development, underutilized plots, and various archetypal themes. I think people can become so used to a plot point that they can’t see past it to brainstorm other options. There’s almost an aspect of “but this is how it happened; it’s how it HAS to happen,” to it. A lot of writers I work with will have nourished a set idea of how a plot goes that they can’t see beyond it. If I suggest a stronger option, they panic in proportion to how important the plot point is to them. Seeing how even beloved stories like the Harry Potter books could be improved would be a good lesson in editing. Trusting your work to someone else is always so scary, but seeing how it can work out for a different series could promote more trust in the editing community. It’s not, in fact, about destroying the things a writer has worked years to iron out, but to make them stronger. It enables them to survive the nitpicking of others like me. 😂

"Maybe he caught whoever attacked him on camera." A few books later: "You can't use Muggle technology inside of Hogwarts..."

“I love this book, I just wish the ending were, ugh, different.” YES!!!!! Seriously when I read these books for the first time as a college freshmen (I know, I was late to the party), I was more into this book initially than 1 AND 3, but by the end was like... what just happened...

The real question is why the Minister of Magic didn't just hire a magic zoologist to hunt the monster? He has a department of disposal of magical creatures.

"Harry Potter and the Plot Conveniences." That's how I feel about GOBLET OF FIRE.

2:10 "How is no one seeing the basilisk?" - Great question. Because it's jusing the plumbing to get around the castle. That was hermiones big epiphany. It doesn't crawl out of the bathroom where the entrance is. It gets around inside the walls through the entire castle. Ignore pottermore stating that wizards didn't have toilets and we're all good. Why didn't it eat anybody? - Because it doesn't have free will. Whoever talks parslemouth controls it. Tom Riddle wants the bodies to be found. So: The snake doesn't get to eat anybody. The hissing in the walls: Harry has his ear right up to it, to hear it correctly. He hears words. They just hear a muffled hissing sounds through the thick school walls. It's an old castle. Stuff there always makes some sort of creaking or hissing noise. You tune it out. Harry doesn't, because it legitimately sounds like words to him. Why don't wizards use Muggle devices, if they're convenient? Because they are stubborn, prejudiced pricks who believe they are better than Muggles. In every way. They're kinda racist that way. So, asking "Why isn't that racist behaving rationally?" - is really a nobrainer. I think the car gaining sentients was foreshadowed earlier... but don't hold me to that. Never thought about the mighty convenience of it. Was just a cool scene for younger kids. The rest? Yeah. Mighty convenient. But it's the second HarryPotter book, when it was wayyy more geared towards children. So I never thought about it. I guess Rowling just put Harry too deep into trouble. So deep there was no conceivable way for him to get out. The same happened in Book 1, but only at the very end. There's always a greater force helping Harry (almost always Dumbledore), because he's not quite there yet. Nice video btw, I enjoyed it, in case this seemed like the opposite :D

I’m not disagreeing. But at 5:40 the middle ground between Apparating and sending a letter via Owl would be Floo... right? We see Sirius use it in book 4. .

Also, I love how a chunk of this video consists of you going "And then..." :-P

I find *The Chamber of Secrets* as the most magical book in the series. The one that mostly gave me feelings as I was attending Hogwarts :)

I disagree with almost everything you said and I think potterheads will mostly agree with me 1: The basilisk travels through the pipes of the castle and all attacks happen when the monster exits them; near the bathroom, in the corridor where water is splashed due to the broken pipes by the snake etc. Also, the creature obeys to Ginny Weasley, possessed by Tom Riddle; it is not free to eat or kill people and only targets muggle-borns and ennemies of the heir. That explains why nobody has seen it, it doesn't roam the school's corridors aimlessly but stays in the chamber or in the pipes. About the size of snake the book mentioned the length of the skin shed near the entrance; about 20 feet (6 meters), which is not as huge as portrayed in the films. The hissing of the snake could be a fair point although I believe it is mentioned the sound of the snake is rather soft as it is talking through thick walls. It might not be particularly noticeable in the bustle and hustle of the castle if one can't recognise words. 2: About Hermione, yea, she could have but she also knows what kind of relationship Harry has with the Dursleys and she knew it would have caused him troubles if a friend from school called him. Also we can assume that if she had done that Dobby would have found a way to stop her. 3: You didn't mention the Fire talking and the use of patronus to deliver messages as alternatives to owls and would be the equivalent of calling. 4: Don't really see the problem with the plumbing, we all know Voldemort thinks he is the smartest when he ignores so much about magic, life and his own family. Also in #2 he is the younger Tom Riddle version of V., who understands even less. 5: The creation of basilisks must be strictly controlled by the ministry as are all other dark magic artefacts and creatures. They surely have way to detect them and punish the ones who break the law. By your logic any evil doing wizard can just pull a wand and kill anyone why even bother with a basilisk. 6: I can't exactly remember how it's said in the book but they explain that the crash they had in the whomping willow somehow modified the enchantement and because the car suffered trauma and lived in the forest for so long it developed its own will and became wild. And in the book they meet the car in the forest BEFORE being attacked by the spiders, so your point doesn't stand here. Seems that you're basing yourself on the movies rather than on the books. 7: Again you're basing yourself on the movies here; in the book it clearly says that he throws his wand in order to turn Ginny on her back ( and at that point he has not seen TR yet and doesn't even know TR is dangerous). As for the help Harry gets, it is one of the most recurring themes in the series, I'm surprised you didn't pick up on that; in the words of Dumbledore: 'help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it'. I can't remember exactly how Harry says it but right before the bird appears in the chamber he says that Dumbledore is not so far from here to try to scare TR, wishing with all his heart that it is true. Saying this he formulated his need for D's help and the next moment the bird appears (representing Dumbledore) with the solution to his peril. And again at 11:26 you show the quote where Harry clearly asks for help to the hat. Same logic for Fawkes' tears, and its capacity to carry heavy weights, Harry received the help he needed and asked for. 8: I give you that the fact that basilisk venom can destroy horcruxes is convenient for the plot of #2, but in the context of the whole series it makes sense. The definition of what can destroy horcruxes is given in one of the later books, probably #7, as something that can destroy an object beyond magical repair. The venom is the most powerful and deadly in the world so it kind of makes sense? I actually doubt that you've read the books as many times as you claim, you missed the subtleties of the storyline and mostly based your analysis on the movies. The mark of great books is that they can be read and understood on several levels, the plain linear story, the cultural background it is embedded in, the philosophy, the recurring themes etc.

I always hated the phoenix thing. Never felt earned, I think I'd have forgiven it if they'd done more set up that Fawkes (who's tail feathers are in Harry and Tom's wands, apparently) has a connection to them both and then have the phoenix show up a few more times to show this connection. but nope. fawkes just decides to go fuck with the snakes because judge judy wasn't on in dumbledores office that afternoon. it's so weird. it's also so weird that so many fans just let it go - that a single magical creature can blind a giant snake, carry 4 people, heal mortal wounds and find harry potter when its bored.

Im glad someone else thought it was weird that hermoine never contacted harry in muggle ways

Fawkes is the absolute personification (birdification??) Of a deus ex machina in CoS and it's annoying for sure

Only a fellow Ravenclaw would talk about the books like this!!! Love your videos! Can't wait for the rest :D

The biggest convenience of the book is that somehow none of the basilisk's victims looked him directly in the eyes. It's ridiculous that all of them survived through pure coincidence.

Me: *sees title* Also me: Truuue 😂

When you said you were moving on to the plot conveniences I momentarily heard the Cinemasins guy in my head saying "Plot convenience is convenient"...this sounded so much funnier in my head lol

A lot of these can be summed as follows: "middle grade logic"... just remember that at this stage kids aren't quite as capable of digging through super complex logical thinking. Some, yes, but not a lot, and the fantasy and adventure aspects are emphasized simply due to the type of book that it is.

I thought the reason the car became sentient was because something happened during its time in the Forbidden forest since they crashed it

That's so true I realised the plot conveniences at the second reading in the first I just really wanted Harry to survive and didn't care how it happened

You're assuming 'plot convenience' entirely teleologically. You assume the plot had to turn out the way it did, if it could have gone a thousand other ways it's not plot convenience it's just plot. The way you're talking about it literally everything in every story is plot convenience.

What happens if a painting sees the basalisk? And I'm glad you said the snake always went around the castle from the girl's bathroom. I always assumed it exited the pipes at random points in the castle. Like the hallways open up to the pipes or something? Feels worse now that I'm putting it into words.

The forest became the cars home so could be it was just in that area right when they needed it but yeah, the whole car saving them was left wide open. Oh boy, the time turners are next.

I just love that you displayed the HP books with the spines and then put the chamber of secrets with the front! It’s a little detail but I just love it 😍 it’s like it’s a game and you have all the options and you select book 2 and it turns to the fronted it with the title and stuff 😅❤️

None of Harry Potter makes sense. It’s really bizarre when you try to actually follow it.

With Hermione using the phone book to look up the Dursley’s number, I assume based on the type of people they are that their number was private and wasn’t in it.

I think the reason behind why Fawkes came to the chamber bringing the hat was because of what Dumbledore said earlier. He said sth like help will always be given at Hogwarts to those who ask for it and then when Harry was helpless he kept saying someone please help me or whatever.

"They don't really bother me... it's always bothered me..." 😂

What I find frustrating with the ending is that with the world is still so new that Rowling had multiple opportunities to set up the defeat of the Basilisk, in a "monster of the week" format. Have a chapter where Harry learns about Basilisks and there weaknesses in defence against the dark arts, or from Hagrid etc. As much I love the books I notice that Rowling is much more of a world builder than a storyteller, once she backs herself into a corner (which she does v. often) rather than retracing her steps as it were, she barrels forward. Which is a pain because the world, the arcs and the whole whimsy of the world are delightful and if the story contained these little flourishes where the characters outsmart the bad guy it could of been a whole other level of special.

On the letters... it is archaic, especially when you realize that the magic system accommodates the immediate transportation or sending of letters... You tell me that they can appear anywhere almost immediately, but they cannot simply appear a letter on the threshold of a house or at a specialized table for the mail.

6:45 because basically every wizard, even the Weasleys, are deeply prejudiced against muggles. In this case, it's tremendous condescension

The only benefit I see to the plot convinces is that it makes sense that of course Harry has to be super lucky to win and not die, the kid is like 12. It actually makes less sense in book 1 that there is this all powerful stone that could be used to make someone immortal (a certain returning dark lord perhaps) and its security is beaten by a bunch of 6th graders.

So basically Harry is ta’veren.

Fireplace Chats...and not in the FDR muggle way. 😄 This is the Wizard version of a phone call. Lol. Basilisks are...DANGEROUS. And uncontrollable, unless you speak Parseltongue. So, it makes sense that we dont have a basilisk making factory. 😄 Plot conveniences are a biggie; but...Harry does the DUMBEST thing possible which many times, creates the NEED for plot conveniences. Like. Dropping his wand IN THE CHAMBER OF SECRETS. Why!?!? I never understood that. ( My othet pet peeve...different book - Harry doesnt think to ACCIO the map and egg he dropped when getting stuck on the stairs. AND he's always leaving his dad's INVISIBILITY CLOAK like it's a old scarf; i mean..it's his Dad's legacy to Harry, and he treats it as invaluable to a forgettable knickknack depending on what's needed. Whew. Ok..im done. 😄) Have an awesome day!

I have just always wondered why Dumbledore (or any of the professors for that matter) never realised the monster was a basilisk. I mean, it make sense that it is a snake since, you know Salazar Slytherin is a Parseltongue, all the spiders leave the castle, people are getting petrified. I mean really, the most brilliant wizard of all times couldn't put that together. Or, what's even worse, why didn't he think to ask moaning myrtle about how she died, he was at the school when it happened, he must know about her existence. I understand that the case was kind of closed after hagrid was caught but why not just ask her if it was some crazy spider, which just doesn't make sense. Also Dumbledore didn't really trust or believed Tom anyway so this would have been a good way to check if he was telling the truth or not. Or at least he could have asked her when the chamber got re-opend. Also, I am kind of curious how Ginny & Tom got out of the chamber all those times. I don't think they had a phoenix-ride every single time.

"Harry Potter and the plots of conveniences" 😂😂😂

Plus, can we just agree that there's a big problem with the book cover (at least in the original version that was sold in Brazil)?! I mean, there are WINDOWS in the cover but the chamber is supposed to be really in the underground. This has always bugged me even as a 12 year old.

About the Chamber of Secrets plot conveniences, I believe Dumbeldore always seemed to know what Harry was up against so maybe...I might be wrong...he sensed that Harry needed help down in the Chamber and knew what would kill the basilisk, and accordingly sent Fawkes down.

About the basilisk, I think that Ginny could have created it herself and it could eat only acromantules/spiders at first because it was too weak, but that's just my speculation. And I imagine there are no basilisks in Wizarding World as there's no one able to control them without parseltongue and they don't serve any purpose (imagine someone trying to raise something equally deadly, like a lion, there's no point to it and much danger as it has to be fed before it grows stronger). And there are better ways to kill people (for example that deadly plant), more reliable than freakin basilisk, and easier to hide than it. Even with a magical suitcase it would be problem to transport a basilisk as it would jump on you as soon as you'd open it, right? I am not sure how Newt is dealing with this but his creatures "aren't dangerous" (in his opinion, not mine), so there's that. But those plot conveniences, I don't know, the tail and the tears are too much but I thought using that fang in the moment of great weakness was pretty smart from Harry. And loyalty to Dumbledore thing always bothered me, why not just bravery that summoned Fawkes? This doesn't do anything, especially that we don't know the details about what connects Dumbledore to the phoenix or not see the bird more often. I guess I regret that there's also nothing for Ron and Hermione to do this time. She at least finds about basilisk but Ron could help Harry find where it's hidden and figure out Moaning Myrtle's secret or like find a chicken to kill basilisk (seems like something Ron would do...) and also figure out the route through tunnels back from the Chamber. The car thing also could be explained better, why it came to save them, is this like cars have a soul situation? I regret this haven't been solved throughout series. EDIT: I've read HP books years ago, so I don't remember the details, it's more of what I know from the movie.

The biggest plot convenience for me was that ALL of the basilisk's victims managed to avoid looking it directly in the eye. Sure, Hermione and Penelope were on their guard, but the others just HAPPENED to have a camera/ghost/puddle of water on hand. About the whole Chamber ordeal: didn't Fawkes come to Harry's rescue because he showed loyalty to Dumbledore? Fawkes wasn't like "Hmmm, I think I'll just grab my hat and sword and explore the Chamber of Secrets, just for fun!" It's still awfully convenient, I agree, but Harry *sort of* earned it...

What bothered me about the chamber of secrets was that Hagrid was expelled for being the heir or Slytherin and setting the Basilisk on people. Why would they keep him on the school, free to go about the castle and continuing?! I was also bothered that the basilisk didn't eat anyone...

This is also my least favorite from the series. Not only were there a ton of plot conveniences, but the action that brings them all about is confusing. To me, it reads like an author created a situation as the climax of a novel but struggled with how to put it all together. Everything ended up feeling clunky and everything happened, not because it flowed together, but because it was forced to happen in order to tie together all the plot points. I think this was the only time in an HP novel where the action was written in a way that I couldn't visualize what was happening.

So I hear this gripe a lot, the 2nd plot convenience you had about people not being able to hear the Basilisk. You have to remember that the Basilisk was roaming around in the piping and Hogwarts is of course a very old school. If you've ever been in an old building for a long period of time you'll notice that the pipes in the building make extremely loud hisses that almost sound like the building's going to like explode, but like most things after a while you get used to it and you don't react to it anymore. So I think the implication is that Ron and Hermione think that the pipes are hissing where Harry recognizes the hissing as language since he's a parsletongue. And in case you were wondering, because I've heard this retort a lot, parsletongue is not characterized as words in the books specifically and it's usually described simply as a hiss.

I'm a Ravenclaw, too. Those are very good points you've made, some of which I ashamedly admit I didn't notice. I always assumed that the basilisk can't eat the petrified people for some reason. Perhaps their skin is too hard or something. If they had any imagination, they'd turn lighters into floo-phones. Tom also believed that no one would find his Horcrux in the junk room of Hogwarts. He was stupidly arrogant. I honestly believe that the way he found the CoS was by winning Felix Felicis in 6th year Potions class and drinking it for the purpose of finding the CoS, then suddenly needing the loo so bad that he went into the girls' bathroom and washed his hand at the right sink. Then he claimed his genius found it. (I think the car Herbie was enchanted by one of Arthur's ancestors and he used the same spell on his car - either that or JKR stole that idea from those movies.) I don't know why Tom didn't have Ginny's wand and then disarm Harry with that. That would make sense if JKR wanted him disarmed. That's all I can think of regarding your comments.

Do Basilisks even need to eat? Seriously, what has that thing eaten for the past CENTURIES?!

"Clustercuss?" That's one I've never heard before.

I took "it's using the piped" to mean the basilisk was inside the piping all over the school, then it would come out at different points and attack whoever was nearby. I never thought it came out only from moaning Myrtle's bathroom and travelled the corridors from there lol The bit about the plumbing is the dumbest thing JK has ever written (and that is saying something). Why did they even install plumbing? How is that better than instantly vanishing stuff with magic? It's one of those instances where JK really should just have said "i made a mistake, let's all just ignore it", because the convoluted nonsense she has to retrofit into the story is far far dumber than the original mistake.