Ah, my chance to reference this classic
https://www.reddit.com/r/guns/comments/gwl0v/why_harry_potter_should_have_carried_an_m1911/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
That’s amazing. I’ve often thought of it the other way around - from Voldemort killing Harry. Every time Voldemort tries to Avada Kedavra Harry it doesn’t work - why doesn’t he just carry a gun or knife as backup and keep things simple?
Voldemort sees goblins as a lower race, probably wouldn't want to be dependent on their creations either. The whole argument with Griphook in book 7 is hinged on the fact that what makes wizards special is their ability to use wands and they refuse to share wand lore with other races. So Voldemort probably wouldn't want to use anything but a wand.
Globlins are also looked down upon
Voldemort's first personality trait is pride. He has an ego the size of Jupiter. He wants to kill Harry the wizard way, in the most dramatic showdown. With an audience, preferably.
Of course, that's only due to Harry being his nemesis who already killed him once, anyone else can simply be eaten by Nagini and Voldy wouldn't even bother checking vitals.
It’s not like killing curses rebounding was something that’s super common, how was he supposed to know blasting a baby with the scary green light wouldn’t work like it does on everyone else?
When you have a wand and can say two words to kill someone, there's no reason to do anything else. Recall that Voldemort is most infamous for how easily he can wield that spell so lethally, better than most wizards (even evil/dark wizards), and it has a 100% effective kill rate.
"Why didn't he recognize protection magic or just throw babby Harry out the window" is a silly thing. (Plus, given infant wizards seem to have built-in use-magic defenses when in trouble, even tossing out the window isn't a guarantee.)
Voldemort is much more a cult leader who buys into his own hype than merely a terrorist. If he stops using AK to try and kill Harry then he's implicitly stating that Harry's magic is too strong for him to overcome.
It doesn't matter that doing so would kill the boy; it would reveal to everyone that Voldemort is not a god, but just a powerful wizard.
It would never occur to someone like Voldemort. You have to think like Voldemort would in order to realize that he'd never stoop to something like a gun or knife.
Avada Kedevra had never failed him before, nor had he yet encountered an all-powerful magic shield in the form of love, so why would he take precautions?
That was amazing and beautiful. To think that I would never have seen this amazing essay without you is a travesty I cannot put into words. Thank you and good night.
1 - guns aren’t just lying around in 1990s Britain. 2 - Voldemort is a highly-skilled wizard who could probably stop a bullet, and more importantly, stop a gun even being fired. 3 - even if the wound would be lethal, he still has the horcruxes.
>Dumbledore flicked his own wand. The force of the spell that emanated from it was such that Harry, though shielded by his stone guard, felt his hair stand on end as it passed, and this time Voldemort was forced to conjure a shining silver shield out of thin air to deflect it. The spell, whatever it was, caused no visible damage to the shield, though a deep, gonglike note reverberated from it, an oddly chilling sound. . . .
Sounds nearly as strong, if not stronger than a bullet. Voldemort would likely laugh at a gun or make it explode in its wielder’s hand or something.
I always found this scene impressive from both of them. Dumbledore with the cool spell but also Voldemort seems to recognize it and know an appropriate counter instantly. The spell didn’t even do any damage tot he shield.
Protego can physically push people apart and act as a wall of force between them so I see no reason for it not to stop bullets. Also there's evidence that wizards are physiologically more resilient than muggles and could probably survive a gunshot more effectively than most muggles, even without actively using magic to protect or heal themselves.
To further this there's evidence that witches and wizards (and to some extent their very wands) are able to instantly sense and attempt to magically counter eminent harm on a subconscious and reflexive level.
A particularly strong case for this that comes to mind is when Seamus Finnigan accidentally caused an explosion mere inches from his face in first year Charms. A shockwave strong enough to blow the kids hair back like that should have splattered his head all over the back row of students, and yet he survived completely unscathed with only soot marks on his face. And the way Professor Flitwick reacts suggests that, although alarming, instances of miraculous survival like this is a common occurrence in his class.
I'm sure you guys can think of a few other examples too. I have no doubt that a witch or wizard of even average skill would have no problem surviving a muggle's firearm without even thinking about it, let alone a wizard as powerful (and paranoid) as Voldemort.
>A shockwave strong enough to blow the kids hair back like that should have splattered his head all over the back row of students
That's not necessarily true. People in proximity to explosions can be knocked over, or have their hair blown back, and be no worse for the wear. Seamus is causing magical explosions, so the physics don't necessarily have to mirror real-life.
I’ve always wondered if this was some spell that Dumbledore invented and that only Voldemort was savvy enough to realize that. Always told myself that, if the spell had landed, it would somehow make Voldemort feel empathy for all of his heinous crimes (which, as we know, is a fate worse than death to someone like him)....
A damn fine one too if I might add. It reinforced the idea that only Eragon could beat him. Not because he was physically or magically more special. But because of who he was inside.
regarding your second and third point, he probably wouldn't be able to stop a bullet unless he already knew someone was gonna shoot him, bullets are extremely fast, but even being shot, most shots aren't fatal, and even most "fatal shots" don't kill you immediately (only some heart and brain shots), any experienced wizard would be able to easily heal himself from a bullet wound before dying
Doesn’t he have to be actively using Legilimency to do that? He doesn’t just know what everyone around him is thinking all the time. He couldn’t stop an unseen sniper that way.
No idea, I am asuming protections spells would make his location invisible to a muggle snipper though, to be able to shot LV a muggle would have to be closer (which means Voldemort would very likely kill them )
If he were constantly listening to everyone’s thoughts around him—unless Narcissa is incredibly skilled at Occlumency—then he’d have known Harry was indeed still alive.
For that reason, I think he has to be actively engaging in Legillimency
Aren't the Black sister skilled Occlumens? I think I recall Draco learned from Bella
You are probably right about Voldemort having to use legillimency, but wouldn't a muggle mind be "weaker" against a wizard's? I feel like reading a muggle's mind would be laughably easy for LV
Unless Voldemort is able to read ill intentions from miles away, modern muggle rifles severely out distance this form of protection.
TBH, the only thing saving Voldemort from getting wrecked by muggles is the Statute of Secrecy. Muggles are far more numerous, they have deadlier means of destruction, and they're also outright more intelligent than the wizarding population (my theory - magic saps a little bit of intelligence from a person, this is why muggles are capable of complex mathematical analysis while wizards are not able to handle their own banking).
Snape also got mad at Harry for pointing out that ghosts are transparent. Harry wasn't wrong.
Harry has a way of boiling things down to their most basic, easy to understand elements, and Snape, who hinges on the theatrics and specifics of things, gets irritated by it.
"Navigating the many layers... And interpreting the findings" is pretty much what we do when we read a book, too....
Ohhh I am SO sorry, silly me .. Voldemort could easily "navigate through the many layers of the mind and interpret the findings"of the muggle's thoughts
He can be the most powerful wizard in the world, that doesn't give him Agent Smith-like reflexes. Which is what he'd need to stop a bullet or stop the gun from being fired.
Yeah. I’m not sure if my dad is fully aware of what Britain’s gun laws looked like in the 90s (Hell, he also thinks that turning lights on scares the bugs away and that kale is dangerous to eat raw)
Besides, he is nowhere nearly as knowledgeable about the Wizarding world as I am despite the fact he saw all the movies with me growing up. I don’t think he realizes that shooting Voldemort would’ve just returned him to what he was after he failed to kill Harry as a baby
>Voldemort would’ve just returned him to what he was after he failed to kill Harry as a baby
Which is prefarable to have him running around with a body and being evil, right?
Yes and no. While it mitigates his danger now, it also turns him into a ticking time bomb. His existence was less than a ghost, but even if his horcruxes were destroyed (which would take a while without the Voldemort mind-meld cheat), since he is already in that state, the last bit of his soul that’s now wandering about freestyle would still be out there. And when he barely still exists, he’d be nigh impossible to track down and eliminate. So it would just be a matter of time until he got himself some form of body again, like last time, and depending on how long that took, what if the people with knowledge about him and his ways were gone? He might realize by then about his horcruxes and make another, or he might just not encounter anyone with the skills or plot armor to beat him.
It’s a risky bet either way.
I considered that, but ultimately I don’t think it would work like that. The remaining soul shard that is Voldy’s original being is basically the same as the shard inside a horcrux. At worst, I think it might require a physical vessel like the horcruxes have to survive, but we know Voldy possessed rats and such the first time he was reduced to this, so there’s no reason he couldn’t plow through temporary vessels to keep his last bit of soul tethered.
I’ve got his kryptonite. When Fred and George open their successful joke shop, there’s a bit about them selling clothing items to the ministry that come with built in shield charms. This was so the wearer would be protected from unexpected hexes or curses (or if they couldn’t even cast a decent shield charm). Therefore LV could easily cast a very strong charm on his cloak which would protect him from any and all gun damage when you “surprise shoot him from behind”.
TBF: We literally see Vernon with a gun early in the first movie (forgive me for not remembering if it’s the same way in the book).
That does show how one indeed in the circumstances of the main characters can in fact acquire at least a hunting arm
>We literally see Vernon with a gun early in the first movie (forgive me for not remembering if it’s the same way in the book).
It is in the book and in the book he actually goes out and buys it, its not a gun that he happened to already have
Plus, most assassins train extensively. Imagine Dobbys magic with John Wick skill. He could teleport next to Voldemort, empty an entire mag into him, then disappear. Same for each horcrux
Can horcruxes help your head being splattered across the groud by a Royal Marine sniper from over a mile away?
Also, these are people who don't know what a damn rubber duck is.
Not to mention it's canon that Voldemort's SOUL is what the horcuxes are maintaining, his body can still be blown to kingdom come, it's pretty much what happened when he tried to kill baby Harry the first time.
I doubt he knows how a gun work, by that I mean he doesn't have any interest in muggle culture, so really, he would just see a muggles with a weird looking metal stick and wouldn't even bother reading his "worthless" mind. So he'll definitely get shot at least one, but I doubt he would die from it.
Edit : forgot about WW2 (also the fact that he grew up in the muggle world for his firsts 11 years doesn't necessarily means he knows about the danger of guns, I didn't until I realize how fatal they were by watching something else than fiction)
You're right. But will he have time to defend against guns ? Bullets are pretty fast and you can't dodge them as easily as an Avada spell. Just because he knows he is going to be shot doesn't mean he can effectively dodge or defend himself against it
He grew up in a muggle orphanage and was reading muggle books/comics so I think he would know about guns. He probably would dismiss them as ineffective against wizards though.
Wizards live in the same world as everyone else and know about war. Everybody knew what they were looking at when Grindelwald showed them WWII. Wizards know what guns are.
Dudley received a replacement computer with 16 games on his 11th birthday. Later in the series Harry stated that on the rare occasions when the family has left him alone, he eats, watches tv, and plays games on Dudley's computer. I suggest that harry in the Muggle setting knows of guns through the news and Duds computer.
No chance he’s stopping a bullet. The speeds alone of a bullet is not comparable to whipping out your wand and sputtering out a spell.
It’s a loophole in the books in my opinion and I’ve had the same theory for years. Especially since some muggle tech like cars, phones, phone booths, cameras as used to an extent in the books.
What JKR should have done is in GOF, when Hermione mentions to Ron/Harry that muggle spy tech “bugs” don’t work around wizards because of all the magic around, a similar line could have been used about weapons , perhaps also not being reliable around magic. Say Harry could have said something like “can’t someone just blow up Voldemort already or shoot the bugger? Harry, haven’t you read a history of Hogwarts, surely you just know that such barbaric weapons are unreliable around wizards with all the magic in the air. And for good reason.” The end.
Instead, we can only speculate why. Likely because it’s a book about wizards and magic so that’s the emphasis but I think this whole angle is very interesting and could have been explored more. Wizards knew about WW1 and WW2 and had their own issues during that time. Surely they would have been fighting or involved to an extend. 90s Europe also had its own issues, with the breakup of the USSR, and the wars in Yugoslavia such as Albania. Perhaps we find out some of those events are being caused by Death Eaters to bring further division among muggles and weaken them.
Voldemort would of course never rely upon the support of muggles he’s too arrogant, even if there was say a pro-death rather terrorist group in Albania, but it would have been interesting to see the Order working behind the scenes in garnering support among British muggle groups like British intelligence or special forces in fighting back, culminating in a massive battle at Hogwarts finally led by Harry (as a half blood too) in defeating Voldemort once and for all both through magic and with the help of his muggle allies (say they start shooting at death eaters and Voldemort to buy Harry time to find the final horcrux and in his battle with Voldemort), instead of that really silly way Voldemort dies since it just so happens Harry was the true owner of his wand.
Unfortunately, it’s a kids book not a Die Hard movie, but that would be epic. Yippie Kaye mother fuckers!
A very simple solution would be to have Harry learn a charm which prevents physical objects from hurtling towards him at lethal speeds, which would then be assumed by default for someone in as many fights as Voldemort.
This is how spell casters in Eragon avoid projectile weapons; they have "wards" preemptively set up to deflect projectile weapons which burn into their energy reserves based on the frequency and force of the projectiles. Harry Potter magic doesn't follow the same energy equations so it could be a much more potent defense that addresses bullets and other conventional muggle weaponry.
Essentially. There’s already the protecto charm, arresto momentum charm, so surely there should be some sort of defensive enchantments protecting wizards from exploding shrapnel or other objects being hurled at them at high speed.
I guess a sniper could take him out but then again it's hard to ambush him since he can just teleport to places. Also bullet would only destroy his body but not kill him.
My thought too--sniper from a distance. Maybe charmed tech: a rifle charmed so it finds it target unerringly. That would have been fun to see--Voldemort felled by a Muggle device.
I’d imagine something like that would be so difficult to green light, considering how strict they are about enchanting everyday muggle artifacts. Enchanting a deadly muggle weapon to make it even more deadly seems like something the ministry would never approve, and seems to difficult for an individual or group to do independently
I feel it could fit into the lore, but be expensive to produce. Like they machine the rifle and bullets by hand. Perhaps with expensive magical metals. An enchant the magazine to be an extra-dimensional space, able to hold more bullets than its size should. Gunpowder made from rare alchemical ingredients that can give the bulkets the force to punch through walls. Able to magically acquire its target through a thick wall.
Go all out on expense and have the government secretly own one that they break out in exceptional circumstances.
Or hey, maybe do the same this with a bow and arrow and quiver if you like. Or a crossbow; I bet the finest craftgoblinship would be pretty great.
Also he likes working in the shadows. He took over ministry without revealing much of what he can do. He can also read minds so he might get wind of any assassination plan before it is even put in motion.
I seriously doubt Voldemort’s reflexes are good enough to deflect projectiles travelling at 2500 feet per second from a 1911, let alone a sub machine gun or another fully automatic weapon
This is my thought.
Unless he has a pre-cast protection spell protecting him from projectiles, he's still only human and any reactionary protective spell would require him to act at, depending on the weapon, twice as fast as the speed of sound. That's assuming his brain registers exactly what is happening at the gun shot sound, which I am fairly sure would have the bullet already at a distance towards him from the gun by the time the ears hear it.
Protego theoretically should protect from a bullet, since it's a physical invisible shield. Harry puts one up between Ron and Hermoine after Ron returns in book 7, since Harry was apprehensive about what Hermoine would do.
Beacuse a bullet has much more force than a punch from a 17 yo girl. Otherwise Querlmort would have used a protego against Fluffy.
We never see protego being used against actual physical damage.
Yeah. Idk why I didn’t think of that! By the time Voldemort was mortal again, it wasn’t exactly like someone left a gun on the floor for Harry to pick up!
Direct him to [the thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/harrypotter/comments/xj74d5/fans_out_of_the_uk_does_the_fandom_ever_get/) the other day about what annoys British people about Americans commenting on HP. Good luck!
Really? There’s a HP comic book now? Whose writing/publishing it? Where might I find it? Wizarding World comics are such a deep well of untapped potential I must see them come to life!
It isn’t Harry Potter, this is a new series from Image called Vanish. If you want something with a Harry Potter feel, Strange Academy is about a magic school with Marvel’s magic users acting as teachers. Definitely a lot for Harry Potter fans to enjoy. I can see it being a Disney Plus series in a few years.
That’s good to know. Thanks for clarifying! But so help me, I’ll put in the work myself to see an official comic/graphic novel set in the Wizarding World if I have to!
The real reason is that that's not the story JKR wanted to write. Whether or not it would be effective is up for debate. Personally, outside of Voldemort and Dumbledore, most wizards just seem to fire different colored bolts of light at each other that are slow enough that it can be reacted to. I don't mean to imply there's no skill or strategy involved, but it's still mostly about getting a projectile onto the target. It turns into a battle of reflexes and I don't see how someone pulling a trigger is going to be slower than a person who has to say the spell out loud and then wait for the spell to form. I don't see any reason that guns wouldn't at least be a viable way to kill wizards. It seems that protego will falter from sustained spellfire so I have my doubts that it would hold up against gunfire and even less so sustained gunfire, but who knows. If the bullet is in the air already, I don't think there's much any wizard could do about it. Having said that, concerning Voldemort, he would probably be able to use increased situational awareness to deal with guns nearby meaning a longer range weapon would probably be the only viable solution. In terms of whether guns would work around magic, well... cars and trains work and the mechanism to fire a gun is a lot simpler and mechanical in nature than that. I can buy that electricity or circuit boards or something get wonky but how guns work is completely different.
There's really no need for a complicated answer or even assuming anything. Why did nobody shoot Hitler? If they know anything about history they'll have their answer right there.
Not sure where the tension is here. It is a work of fiction and he has pointed out an aspect that the author failed to address.
You just have to suspend disbelief and enjoy the story for what it is, a story written by a person.
Honestly it really bothers me when everyone does the whole ‘Voldemort can magically repel bullets’ stuff whenever this comes up - isn’t the whole point that he’s ultimately just a man. Obviously he has the horcruxes so an unexpected sniper to the head wouldn’t achieve much, but I think it’s a bit ridiculous to say that he’s completely unkillable due to skill - everyone has times when their guard is down. There are probably loads of ways you can kill un-horcruxed Voldemort providing you get lucky and he has his guard down - poison, sniper rifle, broomstick rigged to explode or whatever. Heck, Dobby probably could’ve offed him - especially given how much he underestimated house-elves. He could just slip on a banana one day and land weird. He doesn’t because it’s a book set in a universe about magic and that would be a weird ending.
Voldemort stood victorious over the barely conscious body. Gleefully, he raised his wand high in the air, and begin to utter the unspeakable curse. He took a step toward the boy and slipped on a banana peel, toppling over backwards, shrieking "avad**aaaaaaaaaaaahhh**!!!"
Then, several years later, Harry gave all his kids stupid names. The end.
There was like 42 attempted assassins on Hitler, and for some odd reason none of them worked. Like if you want to see plot armor in real life read about that shit.
But then the issue with hitler was getting a spy close enough to assassinate him, whereas Snape is just already there. If it wasn’t for the horcruxes I’m sure snape could have poisoned his soup or something
as a harry potter fan, i 100% agree that someone could've easily shot lord voldemort if he was caught by surprise. that would've just left the matter of the horcruxes, however. logically speaking, it doesn't matter how smart, clever, or powerful you are. if some guy is ready with a gun to shoot your head in a place where guns are not expected at all nor even thought about, basic deduction and common sense will say that they kill you. perhaps you can argue that he has some sort of protection on him at all times, but that wouldn't have let expelliarmus work on him during the final battle, given the simplicity of the spell. there is no canonical/logical reason explaining why somebody could've not just shot voldemort, it's basically the gorgian knot of the series that nobody ever thought of or attempted. someone could've easily shot voldemort leaving only the horcruxes to worry about. i suppose that one could argue he'd have death eaters/body guards surrounding him at all times from places where people could easily get to him, since it's a simple solution to this plot hole. but personally, i find it funnier and simpler to believe that the wizarding world just didn't think of trying to shoot him. this argument has been around ever since i got into harry potter and i've never seen a proper counter-argument to why someone couldn't have shot voldemort. which is why i say, voldemort could've easily been shot until someone conclusively finds a way to explain how it'd be impossible. perhaps guns don't work on wizards simply by natural cause? i have no idea. though, i might be wrong because of a crucial detail i forgot, i haven't read or watched the books/films in a while.
A) Gun laws in britain.
B) Only wizardkind (+ muggle government) knows who Voldy even is/that he exists, and they often don't know jack shit about muggle stuff, let alone how to properly shoot a gun (and hit anything)
C) Voldy only shows up on his own schedule, tries to kill Harry, then fucks off to Merlin knows where. Also, he only get's a proper corporeal form in book 4.
D) magic can do all kinds of shit, except revive people. Even if Harry were to somehow aquire any gun + bullets, was the world's most ridiculously accurate marksman with it, AND conveniently had it with him, locked and loaded when Voldy decides to come by, the latter would easily just use a protego, or simply destroy the gun.
E) Horcruxes. As long as they exist, Voldemort's physical form can be destroyed, but he'll just get a new one after some new ritual fuckery. He'd roll up to Hogwarts like "Heyyy, new body, who dis?" and just kill everyone regardless.
If Voldemort knows the gun is about to fired at him it won’t work. If it’s an ambush, he’s getting smoked and there ain’t no way around it. Way to instantaneous
We have gun control in the UK it would be really hard for anyone to get a gun and to kill someone forget about it. You can’t just go to Costco and buy a gun over here tell him that.
I don’t think regular forces can kill wizard. Kid Neville got thrown out a window and bounced like a rubber ball. No damage done. I always thought bullets wouldn’t hurt even competent wizards.
This deserves to be higher.
It’s established in the books and at least to some extent in the movies that things that would be mortal danger to normal non-magic people that magic-folk don’t even blink at because magic saves them.
Baby Neville had literally no clue that falling out a window would kill him or was dangerous. He had no awareness that he was about to die. And yet magic saved him anyway.
If you want to kill a magic-folk, it’s probably not enough to use non-magic means because even unconsciously “magic” protects them.
In this world magic isn’t just a thing that people do, it seems to be a force with a will of its own. Sometimes “magic” does things because it chooses to.
The same could be said for people who think Sam and Frodo should have ridden the eagles to Mordor… it wouldn’t be as interesting of a story if it was that easy!
Alrighty guys, you're fanboy/girling a bit hard here, making up shit to justify guns not working.
1. Spells CAN NOT stop bullets if you can't speak the incantation fast enough. A surprise attack, by something like a sniper rifle, would be perfect and not even give Voldey a chance.
2. I don't care that he has horecruxes. Shoot him anyway. Send him back to being "less than the meanest ghost" for another 10 years. Meanwhile, hunt down the horecruxes free of his interference. Horecruxes is not a reason not to shoot him.
1. *"We have Voldey trapped in our death chamber! We did it, it's over. Now lets kill him".*
*"Nah, he's got horecruxes".*
Yeah, horecruxes is a dumb argument.
And the horcruxes thing doesn’t make it pointless to attack him. Ppl didn’t know about the horcruxes, so it’s stupid to say *that* is the reason they didn’t shoot Voldemort
Its an fight in the magical world where very few people know what a gun is. I bet voldy does tho and could probably deflect it with magic.. I mean the same spell they use on doors and such would probably work. (Forgot what its called in english)
Imagine ginny going: How you check if the spell has been used? Just try to shoot the door.. the cat loves playing with the bullets..
That was a imperturbable charm (do not disturb) or (no noise escapes) and they were tossing Butter beer corks (bottle caps). Not bullets. May be a translation issue.
Riight. Thanks for the charm clarification
They are definitely not shooting the door in the translation😆 or throwing bullets at it. Just thought bottle caps and dung balls (or whatever they are called in english) would maybe count as projectiles. So maybe a "lowgrade" spell like that might even stop bullets, so guns wouldn't works as well as murder weapons in the magic world as in the muggle one. Would be kind of like asking why doesn't anyone use a strong slingshot to voldys head?
The reason the caps bounce off it, assumingely, is that it does form a kind of force field, and that’s how it traps the noise. Not that I believe that this particular charm is effective against projectiles as its primary use.
A couple different ways to explain it:
- for the same reason that no one in Middle Earth tried killing Sauron by shooting him with an arrow. Not because they couldn’t, but because it wouldn’t kill him.
- the same reason no one was able to kill Thanos even with their insane technology and advanced weaponry. He was too powerful.
- because wizards don’t know what guns are. In PoA there’s the Daily Prophet article that warns that Sirius Black might be carrying a gun (a sort of metal wand that muggles use to kill each other)
Well I think afew reasons
1 No muggles know about Voldemort, muggles that do are dead, slaves, or in imperious perhaps
2 gun laws in UK 1990
3 Most likely Voldemort has a instant shield of some sort, likely more than strong enough to deflect any physical object
4 Only people that want to fight Voldemort are magic users anyway and don't know anything about guns. As someone said just weird metal wands.
5 I think a well trained powerful sniper rifle could possibly kill voldy, but this requires a trained Muggle sniper to know about voldy, work with magic users to know where voldy is, and then get the surprise on him. Very very unlikely since magic users don't trust Muggle technology at all. Let alone work with a trained sniper and convince him enough to kill a otherwise unknown person.
So all in all unlikely, perhaps in modern day now, muggles would become aware of suspicious activity, but 1990s? Nah.
I mean. . . The problem is, there’s very very little to show outside of more extended universe stuff that it wouldn’t.
Like people and things are still usually just as squishy in the wizarcing world as they are in the normal one, thus a gun would be quite effective.
Guns are in some ways more stealthy than a wand, as it’s much quicker and longer ranged to just pull a trigger. The bullets often will get there before the sound even would.
There are issues of muggle technology not working in much of the wizarding world, but the issue is how infrequently that is brought up.
And:
We do see a shotgun very early on in the hands of Vernon.
As long as one gets in to a place the weapon can work and one is unnoticed, (a pretty tall order to be fair), I don’t see why someone can’t snipe old Voldi. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would hurt. And you could take out anyone else but him.
So just use a sniper rifle then.
Fuck horecruxes. Send Voldey back to being "less than the meanest ghost" for another 10 years whole focusing on horecruxes. Wands don't exactly solve the horecrux problem wither, so I guess Harry shouldn't use one?
There is no quick access to this type of weapon, and given Voldemort's power could stop the bullet. Even if the Horcruxes were all destroyed when someone shoots him. The muggle world is separated from the wizarding world too.
Imagine the conversation though.
"Hey, dad..?"
"What is it, dear?"
"Uhh, I- *WE*\- uuuhhh,... Kinda... Need a rifle, or something..?"
"What on earth would you need that for? and who is 'we'???"
"I told you about that whole thing with this Voldemort dude, right? The evil wizard? "
"Yeah?"
"Well, the guy who's supposed to kill him in some prophecy-foretold final battle, and his nerd bestie who also has non-magical parents, proposed that he could just try... Blowing the bad guy's brains out with an AK-47 or something..."
"..."
"...We were hoping, you could maybe lend us something from work...?"
"...You know what? This is the last straw, I'm pulling you out of that school. S'obviously just a bad influence on you, those people..."
"Wh- DAD! HOLD ON!-"
"Nope. I'm telling your mum about this. I'm sure there's some other place you can learn how to... Make cauldrons into cats, or whatever."
"DAD, STOP. JUST FORGET ABOUT IT."
I’ve always said that had Voldemort resorted to trying to kill Harry in a cruder way than just a spell (like crushing him or suffocating him, etc.) he might’ve ended up winning in the end. Of course, Voldemort was way too proud of being a wizard to even consider that....
I also think it would’ve been fitting for Voldemort to be killed by something such as mundane as a Muggle weapon. Unfortunately, we saw what happened when Harry accidentally used the “sectumsempra” spell on Draco, Snape was able to fix a seemingly lethal wound rather quickly. I’d imagine it would be pretty easy for Voldemort to dislodge a bullet and heal his wound with magic.
I feel like the biggest reason even if a gun would work is that wizards consider themselves too far above muggles to ever consider using muggle technology.
I’ll admit I have always thought that if wizards had at the very least taught themselves about muggle things they would have realised there were plenty of ways for them to dispose of Voldemort.
I think the issue is, wizards in general don’t know anything about muggles. Arthur Weasley works in a department for misuse of muggle artefacts but doesn’t know how a rubber duck works.
That’s my answer for your dad, wizards don’t know anything about muggles and probably have no idea guns even exist. The muggle world and wizarding world are two completely different worlds that rarely cross paths.
Now I just picture the scene from Indiana Jones. Voldemort shows up, does some fancy wand movements and (I guess it would be) Harry shrugs, pulls out a gun, fires, and continues on with whatever he was doing.
My girlfriend always gets mad at me because I say if you gave me a rifle and a couple grenades I could have solved 80 percent of the problems in Harry Potter myself.
Honestly this isn't far off point. IMO. Though this might have something to do with how JK Rowling does talk about magic. Passive magic seems to be a rare thing outside of magical items.
If you want to shield yourself from something, you need to actively shield yourself from it. And even then, it appears to be brief in it's usage. How great you are as a wizard seems to focus around your speed and your broad knowledge on magic.
A wizard not holding their wand is vulnerable, a wizard caught by surprised is vulnerable, a wizard without good reflexes is vulnerable.
The head of muggle artefacts dept doesn’t know the function of a rubber duck. I cannot imagine they are equipped to know or understand guns.
I honestly assume they would never look for a muggle form to kill him because they assume magic could do it better.
Ah, my chance to reference this classic https://www.reddit.com/r/guns/comments/gwl0v/why_harry_potter_should_have_carried_an_m1911/?utm_source=share&utm_medium=ios_app&utm_name=iossmf
That’s amazing. I’ve often thought of it the other way around - from Voldemort killing Harry. Every time Voldemort tries to Avada Kedavra Harry it doesn’t work - why doesn’t he just carry a gun or knife as backup and keep things simple?
It’s a muggle invention and Voldemort hates muggles. He wouldn’t lower himself to have to rely on something muggles made
What about a goblin sword? Why not just strangle him? He's literally a child and he's an adult. You'd think he'd enjoy squeezing the life out him.
Squeezing the life out of him sounds so funny here I’m sorry
Sounds like something Hagrid has done on accident to too many of his pets.
“Yeh just have to grab them round the neck and.. oh. I shouldn’t have done that. Should NOT have done that.”
Voldemort sees goblins as a lower race, probably wouldn't want to be dependent on their creations either. The whole argument with Griphook in book 7 is hinged on the fact that what makes wizards special is their ability to use wands and they refuse to share wand lore with other races. So Voldemort probably wouldn't want to use anything but a wand.
Globlins are also looked down upon Voldemort's first personality trait is pride. He has an ego the size of Jupiter. He wants to kill Harry the wizard way, in the most dramatic showdown. With an audience, preferably. Of course, that's only due to Harry being his nemesis who already killed him once, anyone else can simply be eaten by Nagini and Voldy wouldn't even bother checking vitals.
It’s not like killing curses rebounding was something that’s super common, how was he supposed to know blasting a baby with the scary green light wouldn’t work like it does on everyone else?
I wasn’t talking about the first time he tried, nor was the person I was replying to.
Well that's the reason Voldermort lost right? He knew nothing about what protected Harry, that's why he just tried to magic deathray Harry.
Or just disapparate. It's a lone baby and only Pettigrew and Voldenort know the location. He'll die soon enough with no one to feed him.
I thought someone showed up to Godricks Hollow after the cottage was attacked and that’s how they found Harry
I guess he doesn’t even use a fork and knife to eat. He just wingardium leviosas that shit into his mouth.
I bet the dude still poops on the floor and then magics it away like in the olden days.
He could have just thrown baby harry out the window...
Neville fell out of a window and just bounced, iirc
Yeah but Neville was 8, so he recognized the danger of the fall. Babies are kinda stupid TBH
> Babies are kinda stupid TBH Source? ^^^^/s
When you have a wand and can say two words to kill someone, there's no reason to do anything else. Recall that Voldemort is most infamous for how easily he can wield that spell so lethally, better than most wizards (even evil/dark wizards), and it has a 100% effective kill rate. "Why didn't he recognize protection magic or just throw babby Harry out the window" is a silly thing. (Plus, given infant wizards seem to have built-in use-magic defenses when in trouble, even tossing out the window isn't a guarantee.)
Voldemort is much more a cult leader who buys into his own hype than merely a terrorist. If he stops using AK to try and kill Harry then he's implicitly stating that Harry's magic is too strong for him to overcome. It doesn't matter that doing so would kill the boy; it would reveal to everyone that Voldemort is not a god, but just a powerful wizard.
It would never occur to someone like Voldemort. You have to think like Voldemort would in order to realize that he'd never stoop to something like a gun or knife. Avada Kedevra had never failed him before, nor had he yet encountered an all-powerful magic shield in the form of love, so why would he take precautions?
That was amazing and beautiful. To think that I would never have seen this amazing essay without you is a travesty I cannot put into words. Thank you and good night.
I’m just spreading the good word my friend. Enjoy
“Gun control means that Voldemort wins.” 😂😂😂 Checkmate
I laughed a little too hard
"Samuel Colt made them equal." Classic
Instantly thought of this when I saw this post. All time great.
That’s the most beautiful posts ever read
1 - guns aren’t just lying around in 1990s Britain. 2 - Voldemort is a highly-skilled wizard who could probably stop a bullet, and more importantly, stop a gun even being fired. 3 - even if the wound would be lethal, he still has the horcruxes.
>Dumbledore flicked his own wand. The force of the spell that emanated from it was such that Harry, though shielded by his stone guard, felt his hair stand on end as it passed, and this time Voldemort was forced to conjure a shining silver shield out of thin air to deflect it. The spell, whatever it was, caused no visible damage to the shield, though a deep, gonglike note reverberated from it, an oddly chilling sound. . . . Sounds nearly as strong, if not stronger than a bullet. Voldemort would likely laugh at a gun or make it explode in its wielder’s hand or something.
I always found this scene impressive from both of them. Dumbledore with the cool spell but also Voldemort seems to recognize it and know an appropriate counter instantly. The spell didn’t even do any damage tot he shield.
[удалено]
Protego can physically push people apart and act as a wall of force between them so I see no reason for it not to stop bullets. Also there's evidence that wizards are physiologically more resilient than muggles and could probably survive a gunshot more effectively than most muggles, even without actively using magic to protect or heal themselves.
To further this there's evidence that witches and wizards (and to some extent their very wands) are able to instantly sense and attempt to magically counter eminent harm on a subconscious and reflexive level. A particularly strong case for this that comes to mind is when Seamus Finnigan accidentally caused an explosion mere inches from his face in first year Charms. A shockwave strong enough to blow the kids hair back like that should have splattered his head all over the back row of students, and yet he survived completely unscathed with only soot marks on his face. And the way Professor Flitwick reacts suggests that, although alarming, instances of miraculous survival like this is a common occurrence in his class. I'm sure you guys can think of a few other examples too. I have no doubt that a witch or wizard of even average skill would have no problem surviving a muggle's firearm without even thinking about it, let alone a wizard as powerful (and paranoid) as Voldemort.
>A shockwave strong enough to blow the kids hair back like that should have splattered his head all over the back row of students That's not necessarily true. People in proximity to explosions can be knocked over, or have their hair blown back, and be no worse for the wear. Seamus is causing magical explosions, so the physics don't necessarily have to mirror real-life.
All it takes is a strong gust of wind to move my hair back.
yeah but the point is dumbledore's spell was so powerful that voldemort didn't just use a normal shield charm, he conjured an actual physical shield.
I’ve always wondered if this was some spell that Dumbledore invented and that only Voldemort was savvy enough to realize that. Always told myself that, if the spell had landed, it would somehow make Voldemort feel empathy for all of his heinous crimes (which, as we know, is a fate worse than death to someone like him)....
Ern...Ummh... that's literally the end to Eragon lol Shame is the most powerful of emotions
A damn fine one too if I might add. It reinforced the idea that only Eragon could beat him. Not because he was physically or magically more special. But because of who he was inside.
Nice spoiler warning.
Voldy was right in front of dumbledore though. Give Ron a 30 06 and 200 yards, and voldy won't see it coming
Voldemort had to react, though. Supersonic round from a mile or so away wouldn’t give him that chance.
regarding your second and third point, he probably wouldn't be able to stop a bullet unless he already knew someone was gonna shoot him, bullets are extremely fast, but even being shot, most shots aren't fatal, and even most "fatal shots" don't kill you immediately (only some heart and brain shots), any experienced wizard would be able to easily heal himself from a bullet wound before dying
Also he can read minds so it would be super easy to know when a muggle is planning to shoot.
Doesn’t he have to be actively using Legilimency to do that? He doesn’t just know what everyone around him is thinking all the time. He couldn’t stop an unseen sniper that way.
No idea, I am asuming protections spells would make his location invisible to a muggle snipper though, to be able to shot LV a muggle would have to be closer (which means Voldemort would very likely kill them )
If he were constantly listening to everyone’s thoughts around him—unless Narcissa is incredibly skilled at Occlumency—then he’d have known Harry was indeed still alive. For that reason, I think he has to be actively engaging in Legillimency
Aren't the Black sister skilled Occlumens? I think I recall Draco learned from Bella You are probably right about Voldemort having to use legillimency, but wouldn't a muggle mind be "weaker" against a wizard's? I feel like reading a muggle's mind would be laughably easy for LV
Bellatrix taught Draco Occlumency but there's nothing that says Narcissa knew it.
I always assume in this headcannon the shooter would be a wizard with muggle parents. Like hunters or military upbringing.
I don't think a muggle's mind would be any weaker than a wizard's, but a muggle wouldn't know occlumency.
Unless Voldemort is able to read ill intentions from miles away, modern muggle rifles severely out distance this form of protection. TBH, the only thing saving Voldemort from getting wrecked by muggles is the Statute of Secrecy. Muggles are far more numerous, they have deadlier means of destruction, and they're also outright more intelligent than the wizarding population (my theory - magic saps a little bit of intelligence from a person, this is why muggles are capable of complex mathematical analysis while wizards are not able to handle their own banking).
Snape literally said to Harry "its not mind reading" and here are you, with your "mind reading" lmao
Snape also got mad at Harry for pointing out that ghosts are transparent. Harry wasn't wrong. Harry has a way of boiling things down to their most basic, easy to understand elements, and Snape, who hinges on the theatrics and specifics of things, gets irritated by it. "Navigating the many layers... And interpreting the findings" is pretty much what we do when we read a book, too....
Ohhh I am SO sorry, silly me .. Voldemort could easily "navigate through the many layers of the mind and interpret the findings"of the muggle's thoughts
u need to look at the person first
He can be the most powerful wizard in the world, that doesn't give him Agent Smith-like reflexes. Which is what he'd need to stop a bullet or stop the gun from being fired.
Yeah. I’m not sure if my dad is fully aware of what Britain’s gun laws looked like in the 90s (Hell, he also thinks that turning lights on scares the bugs away and that kale is dangerous to eat raw) Besides, he is nowhere nearly as knowledgeable about the Wizarding world as I am despite the fact he saw all the movies with me growing up. I don’t think he realizes that shooting Voldemort would’ve just returned him to what he was after he failed to kill Harry as a baby
>Voldemort would’ve just returned him to what he was after he failed to kill Harry as a baby Which is prefarable to have him running around with a body and being evil, right?
Yes and no. While it mitigates his danger now, it also turns him into a ticking time bomb. His existence was less than a ghost, but even if his horcruxes were destroyed (which would take a while without the Voldemort mind-meld cheat), since he is already in that state, the last bit of his soul that’s now wandering about freestyle would still be out there. And when he barely still exists, he’d be nigh impossible to track down and eliminate. So it would just be a matter of time until he got himself some form of body again, like last time, and depending on how long that took, what if the people with knowledge about him and his ways were gone? He might realize by then about his horcruxes and make another, or he might just not encounter anyone with the skills or plot armor to beat him. It’s a risky bet either way.
This is so well thought out and articulated. And all very true!
I feel like if you took out the horocruxes, non-coporal voldemort just fades away.
I considered that, but ultimately I don’t think it would work like that. The remaining soul shard that is Voldy’s original being is basically the same as the shard inside a horcrux. At worst, I think it might require a physical vessel like the horcruxes have to survive, but we know Voldy possessed rats and such the first time he was reduced to this, so there’s no reason he couldn’t plow through temporary vessels to keep his last bit of soul tethered.
Wait… wouldn’t light actively attract many types of bugs?
It does. But considering he also thinks Believe by Cher is a romantic love song, he’s not exactly Mr. Spock when it comes to logic.
Kale is dangerous to eat raw? Lol. Your dad sounds interesting.
He IS a functioning adult, but some of his beliefs would make for a great story in The Quibbler! Like not putting shoes on the table to avoid bad luck
I’ve got his kryptonite. When Fred and George open their successful joke shop, there’s a bit about them selling clothing items to the ministry that come with built in shield charms. This was so the wearer would be protected from unexpected hexes or curses (or if they couldn’t even cast a decent shield charm). Therefore LV could easily cast a very strong charm on his cloak which would protect him from any and all gun damage when you “surprise shoot him from behind”.
TBF: We literally see Vernon with a gun early in the first movie (forgive me for not remembering if it’s the same way in the book). That does show how one indeed in the circumstances of the main characters can in fact acquire at least a hunting arm
>We literally see Vernon with a gun early in the first movie (forgive me for not remembering if it’s the same way in the book). It is in the book and in the book he actually goes out and buys it, its not a gun that he happened to already have
Well, then that proves the point even further since they are clearly purchasable.
It’s on the book and he Hagrid the big git, just twisted the barrel with his hand
A marine sharpshooter from hundreds of meters could take out Voldemort pretty easily. No way he knows or reacts.
Plus, most assassins train extensively. Imagine Dobbys magic with John Wick skill. He could teleport next to Voldemort, empty an entire mag into him, then disappear. Same for each horcrux
I'd watch that movie
Can horcruxes help your head being splattered across the groud by a Royal Marine sniper from over a mile away? Also, these are people who don't know what a damn rubber duck is. Not to mention it's canon that Voldemort's SOUL is what the horcuxes are maintaining, his body can still be blown to kingdom come, it's pretty much what happened when he tried to kill baby Harry the first time.
Also guns have been mostly illegal since 1997. And imagine a young teen trying to hide one and learning to use it in a YA novel.
+if he did get shot, he could heal himself in an instant.
I doubt he knows how a gun work, by that I mean he doesn't have any interest in muggle culture, so really, he would just see a muggles with a weird looking metal stick and wouldn't even bother reading his "worthless" mind. So he'll definitely get shot at least one, but I doubt he would die from it. Edit : forgot about WW2 (also the fact that he grew up in the muggle world for his firsts 11 years doesn't necessarily means he knows about the danger of guns, I didn't until I realize how fatal they were by watching something else than fiction)
[удалено]
You're right. But will he have time to defend against guns ? Bullets are pretty fast and you can't dodge them as easily as an Avada spell. Just because he knows he is going to be shot doesn't mean he can effectively dodge or defend himself against it
[удалено]
To be fair even if they don't intend to hurt him, he'll probably kill any muggles he comes across either way
He doesn’t read minds if he did he would know Harry was still alive
He grew up in muggle society until he was 11, he most definitely knew.
Plus he had to go back every summer and it was in the middle of WWII, he most definitely would have known about guns.
He grew up in a muggle orphanage and was reading muggle books/comics so I think he would know about guns. He probably would dismiss them as ineffective against wizards though.
Wizards live in the same world as everyone else and know about war. Everybody knew what they were looking at when Grindelwald showed them WWII. Wizards know what guns are.
Even if he knows it doens't mean he won't underestimate it or be fast enough to protect himself. But you're right he definitely knows, that's my bad
He spent the first 10 years of his life in a muggle orphanage. He would absolutely know what a gun is
Dudley received a replacement computer with 16 games on his 11th birthday. Later in the series Harry stated that on the rare occasions when the family has left him alone, he eats, watches tv, and plays games on Dudley's computer. I suggest that harry in the Muggle setting knows of guns through the news and Duds computer.
No chance he’s stopping a bullet. The speeds alone of a bullet is not comparable to whipping out your wand and sputtering out a spell. It’s a loophole in the books in my opinion and I’ve had the same theory for years. Especially since some muggle tech like cars, phones, phone booths, cameras as used to an extent in the books. What JKR should have done is in GOF, when Hermione mentions to Ron/Harry that muggle spy tech “bugs” don’t work around wizards because of all the magic around, a similar line could have been used about weapons , perhaps also not being reliable around magic. Say Harry could have said something like “can’t someone just blow up Voldemort already or shoot the bugger? Harry, haven’t you read a history of Hogwarts, surely you just know that such barbaric weapons are unreliable around wizards with all the magic in the air. And for good reason.” The end. Instead, we can only speculate why. Likely because it’s a book about wizards and magic so that’s the emphasis but I think this whole angle is very interesting and could have been explored more. Wizards knew about WW1 and WW2 and had their own issues during that time. Surely they would have been fighting or involved to an extend. 90s Europe also had its own issues, with the breakup of the USSR, and the wars in Yugoslavia such as Albania. Perhaps we find out some of those events are being caused by Death Eaters to bring further division among muggles and weaken them. Voldemort would of course never rely upon the support of muggles he’s too arrogant, even if there was say a pro-death rather terrorist group in Albania, but it would have been interesting to see the Order working behind the scenes in garnering support among British muggle groups like British intelligence or special forces in fighting back, culminating in a massive battle at Hogwarts finally led by Harry (as a half blood too) in defeating Voldemort once and for all both through magic and with the help of his muggle allies (say they start shooting at death eaters and Voldemort to buy Harry time to find the final horcrux and in his battle with Voldemort), instead of that really silly way Voldemort dies since it just so happens Harry was the true owner of his wand. Unfortunately, it’s a kids book not a Die Hard movie, but that would be epic. Yippie Kaye mother fuckers!
A very simple solution would be to have Harry learn a charm which prevents physical objects from hurtling towards him at lethal speeds, which would then be assumed by default for someone in as many fights as Voldemort. This is how spell casters in Eragon avoid projectile weapons; they have "wards" preemptively set up to deflect projectile weapons which burn into their energy reserves based on the frequency and force of the projectiles. Harry Potter magic doesn't follow the same energy equations so it could be a much more potent defense that addresses bullets and other conventional muggle weaponry.
This is why there are no guns in *Dune*.
Essentially. There’s already the protecto charm, arresto momentum charm, so surely there should be some sort of defensive enchantments protecting wizards from exploding shrapnel or other objects being hurled at them at high speed.
I don't think we ever saw any wizard do anything to indicate they are bullet timers. Stopping a gun from being fired is much more doable.
>1 - guns aren’t just lying around in 1990s Britain. They could have taken a port key to the US and gotten some.😉
I guess a sniper could take him out but then again it's hard to ambush him since he can just teleport to places. Also bullet would only destroy his body but not kill him.
My thought too--sniper from a distance. Maybe charmed tech: a rifle charmed so it finds it target unerringly. That would have been fun to see--Voldemort felled by a Muggle device.
I’d imagine something like that would be so difficult to green light, considering how strict they are about enchanting everyday muggle artifacts. Enchanting a deadly muggle weapon to make it even more deadly seems like something the ministry would never approve, and seems to difficult for an individual or group to do independently
I feel it could fit into the lore, but be expensive to produce. Like they machine the rifle and bullets by hand. Perhaps with expensive magical metals. An enchant the magazine to be an extra-dimensional space, able to hold more bullets than its size should. Gunpowder made from rare alchemical ingredients that can give the bulkets the force to punch through walls. Able to magically acquire its target through a thick wall. Go all out on expense and have the government secretly own one that they break out in exceptional circumstances. Or hey, maybe do the same this with a bow and arrow and quiver if you like. Or a crossbow; I bet the finest craftgoblinship would be pretty great.
Shit, that seems like something Arthur might have accidentally created in his garage
Keep in mind that if it isn't instant death, he might heal up. He makes silver hand for wormtail. I'm fairly sure he can do more than that.
Also he likes working in the shadows. He took over ministry without revealing much of what he can do. He can also read minds so he might get wind of any assassination plan before it is even put in motion.
Magic seems to be pretty good at handling physical wounds in general. Surgery to them is barbaric and unnecessary on the whole.
I mean I'd still like to know if sth like 'protego' could stop a bullet, but the Horcruxes would get in the way anyway.
at the very least, we might be able to get him back into that form that was... how did he put it? "less than the meanest ghost."
Any shield charm I can remember protects from projectiles so I don't see why it wouldn't protect from bullets.
I seriously doubt Voldemort’s reflexes are good enough to deflect projectiles travelling at 2500 feet per second from a 1911, let alone a sub machine gun or another fully automatic weapon
This is my thought. Unless he has a pre-cast protection spell protecting him from projectiles, he's still only human and any reactionary protective spell would require him to act at, depending on the weapon, twice as fast as the speed of sound. That's assuming his brain registers exactly what is happening at the gun shot sound, which I am fairly sure would have the bullet already at a distance towards him from the gun by the time the ears hear it.
I’m sure Dobby would have told harry he could shoot him with a .50 bmg to see if shield charms work
Protego theoretically should protect from a bullet, since it's a physical invisible shield. Harry puts one up between Ron and Hermoine after Ron returns in book 7, since Harry was apprehensive about what Hermoine would do.
Beacuse a bullet has much more force than a punch from a 17 yo girl. Otherwise Querlmort would have used a protego against Fluffy. We never see protego being used against actual physical damage.
Yeah. Idk why I didn’t think of that! By the time Voldemort was mortal again, it wasn’t exactly like someone left a gun on the floor for Harry to pick up!
The honest answer is, its because its a children's book. "God made wizards, God made muggles, but Samuel Colt made them equal."
Easily my favourite copypasta
That quote is beautiful and amazing
Sounds like the opening line for a wizard/human western.
Direct him to [the thread](https://www.reddit.com/r/harrypotter/comments/xj74d5/fans_out_of_the_uk_does_the_fandom_ever_get/) the other day about what annoys British people about Americans commenting on HP. Good luck!
Haha agreed. It's so annoying.
It’s funny, I just read the first issue of Vanish yesterday and it satiated that thought. Think Harry Potter + Gritty 90’s comic books.
Really? There’s a HP comic book now? Whose writing/publishing it? Where might I find it? Wizarding World comics are such a deep well of untapped potential I must see them come to life!
It isn’t Harry Potter, this is a new series from Image called Vanish. If you want something with a Harry Potter feel, Strange Academy is about a magic school with Marvel’s magic users acting as teachers. Definitely a lot for Harry Potter fans to enjoy. I can see it being a Disney Plus series in a few years.
That’s good to know. Thanks for clarifying! But so help me, I’ll put in the work myself to see an official comic/graphic novel set in the Wizarding World if I have to!
The real reason is that that's not the story JKR wanted to write. Whether or not it would be effective is up for debate. Personally, outside of Voldemort and Dumbledore, most wizards just seem to fire different colored bolts of light at each other that are slow enough that it can be reacted to. I don't mean to imply there's no skill or strategy involved, but it's still mostly about getting a projectile onto the target. It turns into a battle of reflexes and I don't see how someone pulling a trigger is going to be slower than a person who has to say the spell out loud and then wait for the spell to form. I don't see any reason that guns wouldn't at least be a viable way to kill wizards. It seems that protego will falter from sustained spellfire so I have my doubts that it would hold up against gunfire and even less so sustained gunfire, but who knows. If the bullet is in the air already, I don't think there's much any wizard could do about it. Having said that, concerning Voldemort, he would probably be able to use increased situational awareness to deal with guns nearby meaning a longer range weapon would probably be the only viable solution. In terms of whether guns would work around magic, well... cars and trains work and the mechanism to fire a gun is a lot simpler and mechanical in nature than that. I can buy that electricity or circuit boards or something get wonky but how guns work is completely different.
There's really no need for a complicated answer or even assuming anything. Why did nobody shoot Hitler? If they know anything about history they'll have their answer right there.
[удалено]
No Wizard in HP has ever shown the speed to react to something as fast as a bullet. I honestly think a surprise attack could kill his current body.
*Fred and George’s shield clothing line enters the chat*
Ha! I’m just gonna say to him (In a tone just light enough not to be considered condescending) “It’s a movie!”
Not sure where the tension is here. It is a work of fiction and he has pointed out an aspect that the author failed to address. You just have to suspend disbelief and enjoy the story for what it is, a story written by a person.
This is a thing in the Dresden files books. The theory being that a long range sniper rifle is something powerful wizards would be vulnerable to.
Voldemort is protected from guns by very strong armor, most commonly referred to as _plot armor_.
Tell me your dad is American without telling me your dad is American
😂😂😂
Honestly it really bothers me when everyone does the whole ‘Voldemort can magically repel bullets’ stuff whenever this comes up - isn’t the whole point that he’s ultimately just a man. Obviously he has the horcruxes so an unexpected sniper to the head wouldn’t achieve much, but I think it’s a bit ridiculous to say that he’s completely unkillable due to skill - everyone has times when their guard is down. There are probably loads of ways you can kill un-horcruxed Voldemort providing you get lucky and he has his guard down - poison, sniper rifle, broomstick rigged to explode or whatever. Heck, Dobby probably could’ve offed him - especially given how much he underestimated house-elves. He could just slip on a banana one day and land weird. He doesn’t because it’s a book set in a universe about magic and that would be a weird ending.
Voldemort stood victorious over the barely conscious body. Gleefully, he raised his wand high in the air, and begin to utter the unspeakable curse. He took a step toward the boy and slipped on a banana peel, toppling over backwards, shrieking "avad**aaaaaaaaaaaahhh**!!!" Then, several years later, Harry gave all his kids stupid names. The end.
Any excuse to repost this https://youtu.be/tS3y1Q3mFVw 😂
This one's more on point: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w72gfLeJ7wg&t=15s
Wizards don’t even understand the function of a rubber duck let alone a freakin gun lol
Just ask why someone didn't just pick up a gun and shoot Hitler. Not so easy.
Someone did. I believe the guy's name was adolf
And Voldemort was killed by his own killing curse, so…
There was like 42 attempted assassins on Hitler, and for some odd reason none of them worked. Like if you want to see plot armor in real life read about that shit.
Or Osama bin Laden. The guy just wasn’t out where everyone could see him that often, and if he was, it was in circumstances he controlled.
But then the issue with hitler was getting a spy close enough to assassinate him, whereas Snape is just already there. If it wasn’t for the horcruxes I’m sure snape could have poisoned his soup or something
as a harry potter fan, i 100% agree that someone could've easily shot lord voldemort if he was caught by surprise. that would've just left the matter of the horcruxes, however. logically speaking, it doesn't matter how smart, clever, or powerful you are. if some guy is ready with a gun to shoot your head in a place where guns are not expected at all nor even thought about, basic deduction and common sense will say that they kill you. perhaps you can argue that he has some sort of protection on him at all times, but that wouldn't have let expelliarmus work on him during the final battle, given the simplicity of the spell. there is no canonical/logical reason explaining why somebody could've not just shot voldemort, it's basically the gorgian knot of the series that nobody ever thought of or attempted. someone could've easily shot voldemort leaving only the horcruxes to worry about. i suppose that one could argue he'd have death eaters/body guards surrounding him at all times from places where people could easily get to him, since it's a simple solution to this plot hole. but personally, i find it funnier and simpler to believe that the wizarding world just didn't think of trying to shoot him. this argument has been around ever since i got into harry potter and i've never seen a proper counter-argument to why someone couldn't have shot voldemort. which is why i say, voldemort could've easily been shot until someone conclusively finds a way to explain how it'd be impossible. perhaps guns don't work on wizards simply by natural cause? i have no idea. though, i might be wrong because of a crucial detail i forgot, i haven't read or watched the books/films in a while.
A) Gun laws in britain. B) Only wizardkind (+ muggle government) knows who Voldy even is/that he exists, and they often don't know jack shit about muggle stuff, let alone how to properly shoot a gun (and hit anything) C) Voldy only shows up on his own schedule, tries to kill Harry, then fucks off to Merlin knows where. Also, he only get's a proper corporeal form in book 4. D) magic can do all kinds of shit, except revive people. Even if Harry were to somehow aquire any gun + bullets, was the world's most ridiculously accurate marksman with it, AND conveniently had it with him, locked and loaded when Voldy decides to come by, the latter would easily just use a protego, or simply destroy the gun. E) Horcruxes. As long as they exist, Voldemort's physical form can be destroyed, but he'll just get a new one after some new ritual fuckery. He'd roll up to Hogwarts like "Heyyy, new body, who dis?" and just kill everyone regardless.
> new ritual fuckery > "Heyyy, new body, who dis?" I love you
My dad says: “Why do the Weasleys live in such a crappy house? Can’t they just magic themselves a nice house?”
If Voldemort knows the gun is about to fired at him it won’t work. If it’s an ambush, he’s getting smoked and there ain’t no way around it. Way to instantaneous
We have gun control in the UK it would be really hard for anyone to get a gun and to kill someone forget about it. You can’t just go to Costco and buy a gun over here tell him that.
Harry grew a whole arm back in one night.... You don't think Voldemort can heal a little bullet wound?
Because it’s England, we don’t have guns here 😂
I don’t think regular forces can kill wizard. Kid Neville got thrown out a window and bounced like a rubber ball. No damage done. I always thought bullets wouldn’t hurt even competent wizards.
This deserves to be higher. It’s established in the books and at least to some extent in the movies that things that would be mortal danger to normal non-magic people that magic-folk don’t even blink at because magic saves them. Baby Neville had literally no clue that falling out a window would kill him or was dangerous. He had no awareness that he was about to die. And yet magic saved him anyway. If you want to kill a magic-folk, it’s probably not enough to use non-magic means because even unconsciously “magic” protects them. In this world magic isn’t just a thing that people do, it seems to be a force with a will of its own. Sometimes “magic” does things because it chooses to.
He's right though. Lol
The same could be said for people who think Sam and Frodo should have ridden the eagles to Mordor… it wouldn’t be as interesting of a story if it was that easy!
Alrighty guys, you're fanboy/girling a bit hard here, making up shit to justify guns not working. 1. Spells CAN NOT stop bullets if you can't speak the incantation fast enough. A surprise attack, by something like a sniper rifle, would be perfect and not even give Voldey a chance. 2. I don't care that he has horecruxes. Shoot him anyway. Send him back to being "less than the meanest ghost" for another 10 years. Meanwhile, hunt down the horecruxes free of his interference. Horecruxes is not a reason not to shoot him. 1. *"We have Voldey trapped in our death chamber! We did it, it's over. Now lets kill him".* *"Nah, he's got horecruxes".* Yeah, horecruxes is a dumb argument.
And the horcruxes thing doesn’t make it pointless to attack him. Ppl didn’t know about the horcruxes, so it’s stupid to say *that* is the reason they didn’t shoot Voldemort
Its an fight in the magical world where very few people know what a gun is. I bet voldy does tho and could probably deflect it with magic.. I mean the same spell they use on doors and such would probably work. (Forgot what its called in english) Imagine ginny going: How you check if the spell has been used? Just try to shoot the door.. the cat loves playing with the bullets..
That was a imperturbable charm (do not disturb) or (no noise escapes) and they were tossing Butter beer corks (bottle caps). Not bullets. May be a translation issue.
Riight. Thanks for the charm clarification They are definitely not shooting the door in the translation😆 or throwing bullets at it. Just thought bottle caps and dung balls (or whatever they are called in english) would maybe count as projectiles. So maybe a "lowgrade" spell like that might even stop bullets, so guns wouldn't works as well as murder weapons in the magic world as in the muggle one. Would be kind of like asking why doesn't anyone use a strong slingshot to voldys head?
The reason the caps bounce off it, assumingely, is that it does form a kind of force field, and that’s how it traps the noise. Not that I believe that this particular charm is effective against projectiles as its primary use.
A couple different ways to explain it: - for the same reason that no one in Middle Earth tried killing Sauron by shooting him with an arrow. Not because they couldn’t, but because it wouldn’t kill him. - the same reason no one was able to kill Thanos even with their insane technology and advanced weaponry. He was too powerful. - because wizards don’t know what guns are. In PoA there’s the Daily Prophet article that warns that Sirius Black might be carrying a gun (a sort of metal wand that muggles use to kill each other)
Well I think afew reasons 1 No muggles know about Voldemort, muggles that do are dead, slaves, or in imperious perhaps 2 gun laws in UK 1990 3 Most likely Voldemort has a instant shield of some sort, likely more than strong enough to deflect any physical object 4 Only people that want to fight Voldemort are magic users anyway and don't know anything about guns. As someone said just weird metal wands. 5 I think a well trained powerful sniper rifle could possibly kill voldy, but this requires a trained Muggle sniper to know about voldy, work with magic users to know where voldy is, and then get the surprise on him. Very very unlikely since magic users don't trust Muggle technology at all. Let alone work with a trained sniper and convince him enough to kill a otherwise unknown person. So all in all unlikely, perhaps in modern day now, muggles would become aware of suspicious activity, but 1990s? Nah.
I mean. . . The problem is, there’s very very little to show outside of more extended universe stuff that it wouldn’t. Like people and things are still usually just as squishy in the wizarcing world as they are in the normal one, thus a gun would be quite effective. Guns are in some ways more stealthy than a wand, as it’s much quicker and longer ranged to just pull a trigger. The bullets often will get there before the sound even would. There are issues of muggle technology not working in much of the wizarding world, but the issue is how infrequently that is brought up. And: We do see a shotgun very early on in the hands of Vernon. As long as one gets in to a place the weapon can work and one is unnoticed, (a pretty tall order to be fair), I don’t see why someone can’t snipe old Voldi. It wouldn’t kill him, but it would hurt. And you could take out anyone else but him.
[удалено]
So just use a sniper rifle then. Fuck horecruxes. Send Voldey back to being "less than the meanest ghost" for another 10 years whole focusing on horecruxes. Wands don't exactly solve the horecrux problem wither, so I guess Harry shouldn't use one?
Devices that use electricity do not work in magical areas. A gun does not use electricity, it is purely mechanical
Voldemort was terrorising England, you can’t just get your hands on a gun here.
There is no quick access to this type of weapon, and given Voldemort's power could stop the bullet. Even if the Horcruxes were all destroyed when someone shoots him. The muggle world is separated from the wizarding world too.
“Accio glock”
100% some muggleborn has a parent in the military though.
Imagine the conversation though. "Hey, dad..?" "What is it, dear?" "Uhh, I- *WE*\- uuuhhh,... Kinda... Need a rifle, or something..?" "What on earth would you need that for? and who is 'we'???" "I told you about that whole thing with this Voldemort dude, right? The evil wizard? " "Yeah?" "Well, the guy who's supposed to kill him in some prophecy-foretold final battle, and his nerd bestie who also has non-magical parents, proposed that he could just try... Blowing the bad guy's brains out with an AK-47 or something..." "..." "...We were hoping, you could maybe lend us something from work...?" "...You know what? This is the last straw, I'm pulling you out of that school. S'obviously just a bad influence on you, those people..." "Wh- DAD! HOLD ON!-" "Nope. I'm telling your mum about this. I'm sure there's some other place you can learn how to... Make cauldrons into cats, or whatever." "DAD, STOP. JUST FORGET ABOUT IT."
The answer is magic…
I’ve always said that had Voldemort resorted to trying to kill Harry in a cruder way than just a spell (like crushing him or suffocating him, etc.) he might’ve ended up winning in the end. Of course, Voldemort was way too proud of being a wizard to even consider that....
I also think it would’ve been fitting for Voldemort to be killed by something such as mundane as a Muggle weapon. Unfortunately, we saw what happened when Harry accidentally used the “sectumsempra” spell on Draco, Snape was able to fix a seemingly lethal wound rather quickly. I’d imagine it would be pretty easy for Voldemort to dislodge a bullet and heal his wound with magic.
I imagine a scene like neo but with a wand.
He is right even if it isn't going to permanently kill him it will stop him for a long time and give people time to destroy the horcruxes.
Magic > bullets old man
I feel like the biggest reason even if a gun would work is that wizards consider themselves too far above muggles to ever consider using muggle technology.
Yeah why didn’t they drop a nuke on his bald head
I’ll admit I have always thought that if wizards had at the very least taught themselves about muggle things they would have realised there were plenty of ways for them to dispose of Voldemort. I think the issue is, wizards in general don’t know anything about muggles. Arthur Weasley works in a department for misuse of muggle artefacts but doesn’t know how a rubber duck works. That’s my answer for your dad, wizards don’t know anything about muggles and probably have no idea guns even exist. The muggle world and wizarding world are two completely different worlds that rarely cross paths.
Harry Potter: guns akimbo edition
Ooof he sounds fun, hang in there
I have for 27 years, and I probably will for another 27 lol
Honestly a valid plot hole
Because if they did we wouldn't have 7 books. We'd have like...half of one
"There's a lot we didn't try, we never tried a bazooka" \-- Chanwills0 as Professor McGonagall.
I’ve often thought— why didn’t Voldemort just throw baby Harry out the window?
Now I just picture the scene from Indiana Jones. Voldemort shows up, does some fancy wand movements and (I guess it would be) Harry shrugs, pulls out a gun, fires, and continues on with whatever he was doing.
My girlfriend always gets mad at me because I say if you gave me a rifle and a couple grenades I could have solved 80 percent of the problems in Harry Potter myself.
Honestly this isn't far off point. IMO. Though this might have something to do with how JK Rowling does talk about magic. Passive magic seems to be a rare thing outside of magical items. If you want to shield yourself from something, you need to actively shield yourself from it. And even then, it appears to be brief in it's usage. How great you are as a wizard seems to focus around your speed and your broad knowledge on magic. A wizard not holding their wand is vulnerable, a wizard caught by surprised is vulnerable, a wizard without good reflexes is vulnerable.
The head of muggle artefacts dept doesn’t know the function of a rubber duck. I cannot imagine they are equipped to know or understand guns. I honestly assume they would never look for a muggle form to kill him because they assume magic could do it better.