If there is one thing that fans hate, it is giant plot holes in franchises, and Harry Potter fans are raging 27 years later about a big one. The Harry Potter novel series had a strange journey to the world, as they started out with plenty of weird plot holes and time changes, but this all changed around the time that J.K. Rowling published Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire, and there are some hints that she started taking her timeline a lot more seriously at this time, where the earlier books played it looser. However, at the same time, there was one thing that really bothered many readers, and they are still complaining about it today.
In a Harry Potter Reddit thread, the OP had a “hot take” where he still doesn’t like that Hagrid was hired at Hogwarts. “I love Hagrid. He is amazing….but this is a guy who was expelled in third year and has not even given OWLs, let alone NEWTs. He doesn’t even own a wand. He had the knowledge and practical experience and was definitely wronged by getting expelled but he was not qualified to be a teacher.” This led to a huge debate about Hagrid’s qualifications.
Did Hagrid Deserve a Job at Hogwarts?
Image Courtesy of Warner Bros.
It is important to go back and look at what happened to Hagrid before the Harry Potter series began. Hagrid was born to a wizard, who raised him, and a giantess, whom he barely knew. He enrolled at Hogwarts in 1940, and he had a pet called Aragog. After Tom Riddle (the future Lord Voldemort) opened the Chamber of Secrets and unleashed a monster to attack Muggle-born students until it killed Myrtle Warren (Moaning Myrtle), he framed Hagrid and claimed that Aragog was the killer. Hogwarts expelled Hagrid in his third year.
The Ministry of Magic forbade Hagrid from practicing magic again and destroyed his wand. However, Dumbledore was convinced Hagrid was innocent, and he talked then-Headmaster Armando Dippet into keeping Hagrid on as a Gamekeeper and a resident of the school. In 1993, when Professor Kettleburn retired as the Care of Magical Creatures professor, Dumbledore gave Hagrid the job. That is where the problems started for the readers.
Fans in the Reddit thread debated what actually happened. When one claimed that there were no potential candidates because they “chose to instead enjoy their remaining limbs,” someone responded that there were no other candidates because Dumbledore offered Hagrid the job “on the spot” when Kettleburn retired. In fact, someone else mentioned that Dumbledore did this all the time, offering jobs to Lupin, Mad-Eye Moody, Snape, and Slughorn without them applying for the position. “Well, it’s not like Dumbledore was famous for his teaching hires. (Or not in a good way),” wrote another Redditor.
This led to another Redditor admitting that Hagrid’s role as a professor was problematic. “I feel like Hagrid is the only one that totally doesn’t make sense,” they wrote. “The substitute teacher would have been better.” However, one more pointed out that Dumbledore hired a werewolf and a Death Eater, so Hagrid was actually a safer hire. Another pointed out the fact that nothing at Hogwarts in the Harry Potter franchise makes sense, as the students are always put in grave danger. “Hagrid getting a sweetheart deal as a result of his connections is among the more understandable/reasonable occurrences there,” they wrote.
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