One Weasley plot hole from both the Harry Potter movies and books is still heavily discussed among fans of the franchise. With just one minor book change, HBO’s upcoming take on Harry Potter can finally fix the 27-year-old plot hole and put to rest one of the most persistent logical frustrations about the franchise’s magical world.
The closer we get to the Harry Potter show’s Christmas 2026 release date, the more long-standing fans of the franchise grow skeptical about how it will turn out. While the skepticism is justified, it is hard not to be a little excited about what the new show will bring to the table. The Harry Potter movies are still incredible, but their limited runtimes forced them to floss over many details from the original J.K. Rowling books.
Some chapters of the books, too, are ridden with plot holes and inconsistencies that just cannot be ignored even to this day. With its long runtime and serialized format, HBO’s Harry Potter can not only cover way more narrative ground from the books than the movies but can also finally rectify some logical leaps that made little sense in the novels’ stories.
One of the logical leaps revolves around Fred and George Weasley and their discovery of the Marauder’s Map in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Prisoner of Azkaban Didn’t Explain Why Fred & George Never Saw Peter With Ron On The Marauder’s Map
Peter Pettigrew in the Marauders Map in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban
Fans of Harry Potter have endlessly argued and discussed why, despite having access to the Marauder’s Map for a long time, Fred and George never noticed Peter Pettigrew with Ron. Some defend this discrepancy by saying that Pettigrew was not even a well-known figure before Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban.
Owing to this, the Weasley twins might have assumed Ron was with a random Hogwarts student instead of realizing that his pet rat, Scabbers, was an animagus. However, it still seems strange that they never grew suspicious about Peter’s name showing up with Ron’s a little too many times.
Considering how mischievous the twins are portrayed to be in the books and the movies, they certainly would have used the map to spy on their siblings. And if something unusual came up, they also would have used it to investigate further for their own amusement and use it to play pranks.
The fact that none of this happens in the books or the movies and the twins simply seem oblivious to Peter Pettigrew’s constant presence beside Ron creates quite a few loose ends. Not everything in the incredible fantasy franchise can be tightly put together with no narrative inconsistencies. It is still hard not to see how the books and the movies could have resolved the map plot hole with a few minor story changes.
Fortunately, for the upcoming HBO adaptation, it has the chance to address this story issue from the Harry Potter books and movies and potentially fix it with one change to the original storyline.
Fred & George Must Notice Peter On The Map In The HBO Harry Potter Show
Fred and George Weasley talking to each other in Harry Potter Deathly Hallows Part 1
The books and the movies established that Fred and George used the map for practical mischief. They seemingly knew nothing about its origins and probably did not even take its accuracy too seriously. By establishing how they notice Peter in the maps with Ron without growing suspicious about it, the HBO show could resolve the underlying plot hole.
Given how Peter, too, was also not a household name in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, the show could establish that the twins just dismiss his appearance on the map as glitch, a ghost, or simply the name of some forgettable student they have never interacted with. This alone could perfectly establish how the twins came chillingly close to unraveling the truth about Sirius Black’s innocence before anyone else.
HBO’s take on Harry Potter could also later feature a perfect payoff sequence in which the twins connect all dots and, like Harry, realize that the map does not lie. Even when it comes to other existing plot holes, there is a lot the Harry Potter show can do to fix them and elevate itself above its predecessors.
Hopefully, if the upcoming Harry Potter show attempts to change the source material, it will be for reasons as purposeful and dramatically satisfying as this one.
Release Date
December 25, 2026
Showrunner
Francisca Gardiner
Directors
Mark Mylod