September 23, 2024 • 51 mins
In part 1 of this 2-part episode, Dave, Jon, and Ben are joined by super duper special guest expert - Kathy! (Dave's wife!) She is an expert on Harry Potter-themed parties and she shares treats, decorations, and games for the first 3 movies/books! Below is the promised Homemade Butterbeer recipe! After everyone shares their food related to the theme, they dive into favorite scenes, quotes, heroes, and villains of the Sorcerer's Stone. Ben shares his thoughts on the psychology of Harry Potter and these first 3 books/movies. Be sure to stay and listen to part 2 of this episode to hear more about Chamber of Secrets and Prisoner of Azkaban. It's a great time!
Butterbeer
From the kitchen of Kathy Thomander
Ingredients for Butterbeer Soda:
-Cream Soda
-Butterscotch Syrup (Torani is our favorite.)
Directions:
Add 1 Tablespoon, or to taste, Butterscotch syrup to every 1 cup (8 oz.) of cream soda.
Ingredients for foam butterscotch cream topping:
-1 (7 oz.) container marshmallow cream
-1 cup whipping cream
-2 Tablespoons Butterscotch Syrup, or to taste
-1/4-1/2 teaspoon Rum extract, if desired
Directions for cream topping:
Add container of marshmallow cream to a stand mixer bowl. Using the paddle attachment on the mixer, mix marshmallow cream on low until smooth. Add 2 tablespoons butterscotch syrup, and then slowly add whipping cream, a little at a time to the mixture, mixing on low and scraping the sides of the bowl constantly. Mix until smooth. When combined and smooth, use the whisk attachment and mix on medium speed until a little more whipped and fluffier, but do not over whip! Should have some volume but just be a light fluff.
To serve:
Pour soda and syrup in a cup according to directions above. Then spoon two heaping tablespoons (or how much you want) of the butterscotch cream on top of your soda, or however much to cover the top of your drink.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
Whatever really happened to dudes calling each other best friends?
(00:05):
Dave and John grew up in the 80s in New Jersey and they did everything together.
They were the quintessential best friends until they became teenagers and Dave moved away.
Fast forward to today and these two 40-somethings reconnected and decided to not only be besties again,
but to put on a podcast and share their reunion with anyone who will listen.
Welcome to Fat, Dumb and Happy.
(00:41):
Welcome everybody to the Wizarding World of Fat, Dumb and Happy.
Today we are talking about magic, wands, brooms, quidditch, wizards and witches and all things Harry Potter 1-3.
Oh man I'm so excited.
Spoiler alert, we will talk extensively about the first three books and movies so if you haven't seen or read them, stop the podcast.
(01:04):
Actually wait, no. Download, subscribe and rate the podcast 5 stars and then stop the podcast.
Grab the books and or movies and get on it. It is 2024 you guys and you're like the last person to not watch or read them.
Come on. It is going to be a magical episode. Writing the Hogwarts Express with me is my bro-host John.
(01:25):
How are you feeling tonight John?
Man I am feeling awesome. Let's get this. Let's do this. I'm ready. Let's go.
Yes, the long anticipated Harry Potter episodes. We're so excited.
This year's Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is our very own in-house special guest expert Ben.
How are you doing tonight Ben?
I'm doing great. I'm feeling magical. This is going to be awesome. I'm looking forward to it man.
(01:49):
Nice. We're excited. I don't know if we're going to make it to next year's Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher.
We always, you know, we switch it out every year so I'm just kidding. That's awesome.
Alright and we also have an extra, extra special guest expert.
Receiving her letter to Hogwarts tonight is my wife Cathy. Are you ready for an adventure tonight Cathy?
(02:10):
Yes I am.
It's just like magic.
It's just like magic. Like lock art. I love it.
Amazing. This is just like magic.
I probably am like the biggest fan I guess so thank you for allowing me to be on here.
(02:37):
Yeah. I love it.
So let me just explain real quick why we asked Cathy to be on this.
First of all, Cathy and I go way back with Harry Potter.
We met in 2001 and we were dating in 2002.
Early on in our dating we got the first book and we read it out loud to each other and we would sit and cuddle and read it.
(02:58):
I would try to do the voices. It was a good time.
And ever since then we got hooked.
Every time the book came out, every other book after that we got it.
We read it out loud to each other and it was always super fun.
We listened to the audio books in the car.
We've watched all the movies multiple times.
And then each of our three kids we've read it with them, watched it with them.
(03:20):
We've gone to the two visiting worlds of Harry Potter in the Universal Studios both in Florida and California.
Cathy has thrown numerous Harry Potter themed parties and she is amazing at them.
Decorations and food and games and everything.
So she is definitely our special special guest expert tonight.
So thanks for being on Cathy.
(03:42):
You're welcome. I'm so excited to be here.
It's an honor. Thank you.
My birthday is December 22nd if we're still doing those Harry Potter themed parties.
I'm just saying.
Okay.
Bring this muggle to the Wizarding World, man.
Oh man, we got to have you for sure.
We will throw the best party.
She has some blue powder to get over to Utah.
There you go. Yeah. Blue powder over here.
(04:04):
We're kind of diagonally over here.
You know, you do like Harry Potter.
Diagonally.
Diagonally.
I was rewatching all three movies and the headline is just so clever.
Yeah. Yeah, it's awesome.
Over to you, John, for the fat part of this episode.
Okay. Well, we can't have Fat, Dumb and Happy, especially the Wizarding World of Harry Potter episode without the fat part.
(04:28):
As you guys already know, we all picked something related and this was probably easier than most to do because there's so much food in this movie.
Like it's ridiculous how much food is actually in this movie.
Everybody kind of chose something that relates to it.
Let's start with you, Dave. What do you got going on?
All right. So I already mentioned it, but Kathy's amazing with her Harry Potter themed parties and the food and things that she does.
(04:50):
She has made us both actually some delicious butter beer, homemade.
She's showing off our Hogwarts mug from the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.
I got a Hogwarts mug, but it's just a like a hot chocolate type mug.
It's huge and awesome. And you can see the cream and the butter beer. Delicious.
(05:11):
What does it actually taste like?
So it's kind of like it's butterscotch flavoring.
So we've tried like so many recipes for butter beer, but this one I just see this.
I like this one. It's kind of it's basically like cream soda and the butterscotch flavored tirani syrup.
And then this topping is marshmallow cream.
(05:34):
And you stir that with like the butterscotch tirani syrup and a little bit of rum extract.
And then you add some whipping cream. You whip it up.
So it's kind of like kind of fluffy, but still runny.
And you put that on top. And that's what we do. Awesome.
That's served hot or cold?
This one's cold, but there's like hot butter beer and there's frozen butter beer.
(05:58):
I have yet to like master those, but like the cold one, we do that one a lot.
It's pretty easy to put together.
That's pretty cool. So that's what you both are doing for tonight's episode, right? Butter beer.
So, Kathy, are you cool with putting the recipe on the show notes?
Yes. Yeah. All right. We'll put them on there, then.
All right. So, OK, so they got the butter beer. Ben, what are you going to go on?
(06:21):
I'm jealous of them because I picked something that is not like really appetizing to me.
I think of that opening scene after Harry and the sorty hat scene, you know?
Yeah. Just bring out the food. It just magically appears.
And there's just like food everywhere.
And remember if there was actual turkey in it, but it makes me think of a turkey Thanksgiving dinner, you know?
(06:47):
When I watched it again, I saw there was like a blip where it looked like there was turkey in front of a mouthful, but that's just about it.
So it's still kind of a stretch. But, man, it always makes me think of that like first magical moment, you know, where he's like,
I am here and this is going to be so much better than under the stairs, you know?
Yes. And, you know, the ghosts are everywhere and all that kind of stuff.
(07:09):
But anyway, so I picked this frozen turkey because I didn't want to spend, you know, five days making a turkey.
The thing is, does microwave turkeys... They just don't taste the same, man.
So I'm going to try one of these out. Hopefully it's halfway decent, but they never really are.
(07:30):
So not worth the mind, I guarantee you.
Not the same, man.
Not the same.
It's all good.
All right.
Makes me think of Harry Potter, man. It just makes me think of Harry Potter.
Yeah, good choice.
So I am instantly regretting my choice.
This is not my first time having these, by the way.
(07:53):
And I even took these into work once and I made every single one of the people that were underneath me, you know, just for bonding experience,
to try one of these at random. And so what I got are the birdie bots, the different flavored beans.
Oh yeah.
And so what I'm going to do, everybody that's listening right now, listen to some of the grossness.
I'm going to pick completely at random. These guys are going to watch me.
(08:16):
These jelly beans can taste like anything. And look, I'm not going to lie to you guys, I might dry heat you during this episode.
This is gross.
So I have the chance of getting an earwax flavored jelly bean, dirt flavored booger.
Oh yeah.
Not that I would know what that tastes like. Black pepper.
(08:40):
And Kathy made a good point to me earlier today that like how did Dumbledore know what earwax tastes like?
Yeah.
Right?
Yeah.
Ah, birdie bots, every flavor beans.
I was most unfortunate in my youth to come across a vomit flavored one.
And since then, I'm afraid I've lost my liking for them.
(09:04):
But I think I could be safe with a nice toffee.
Hmm.
A lot.
Earwax.
Vomit.
Soap.
(09:25):
Lemon.
Sausage.
Oh man.
This one, if I get this one dude, I'm going to throw up, I'll tell you right now.
It's going to be rotten egg.
Oh man.
Marshmallow. Green apple.
Which I'm pulling for green apple. I think I passed. Okay. So awesome.
So what I'm going to do is during each movie that we talk about, you each get to tell me at random jelly bean.
(09:47):
And then I'll pick it random. Okay.
So anytime during the while we're talking about the Sorcerer's Stone, we'll do Dave. Dave, you can be number one.
All right. All right. All right.
And then Kathy during Chamber of Secrets, just at any random point, feel free to yell out jelly bean.
And then Ben, Prisoner of Azkaban, that's all you. Okay. Awesome.
(10:08):
Let's play this game forever. Let's just make this a permanent fat dumb and happy game.
Not awesome at all.
That's going to be mine and we'll see how that goes.
All right. Let's do it.
All right. So like we said, man, there's so much food in this, you know, even starting in the beginning when Harry, you know, he, he just calls himself a little birthday cake in the sand.
This kid. Yeah. And it's a nicely drawn little cake too.
(10:29):
And then all of a sudden here comes Hagrid with the real birthday cake, which actually the kind of delicious, which is why Dudley started eating it.
Harry does cook a lot for the Dursleys in multiple movies.
But then you got your other things like everything that was on the trolley that Harry Potter bought.
You had your chocolate frogs, your burning black flavored beans.
Like Ben was talking about everything that was in the Great Hall, the whole feast that they had there.
(10:54):
Yep. Yep. Man, if I could have those floating cupcakes, like come to me, that would be amazing.
I'd be on, dude, that would just be incredible.
Would you guys seriously, if you saw floating cupcakes, would you eat them?
I don't know. It depends on where I was.
Like if it was in public, maybe not.
If you're like somebody just finds those spells, you do that around my apartment? Absolutely.
(11:17):
Yeah. If it was in your apartment. Yeah. I guess that's true. You can trust it.
Maybe better. Just chilling in bed and she's like, not in the dungeon.
Not in the dungeon. No, no.
I'll eat it though.
And then one thing, and you guys talked about the Butterbeer.
The one thing I thought though that looked disgusting to me was the cake that they made.
(11:42):
And Dobby in the second movie drops on Seriously's boss's wife.
Yeah. That thing just looks so gross to me. Did it? Yeah, it did.
It did not look appetizing at all. It looks like runny icing and that was it.
Nice. Yeah. I don't know. That's just me.
(12:04):
So those are the things that we see through the movie.
What are some of the things that you like integrate into your parties, your themes that you do?
So for the first to the third books, let's see.
Something that I've done for my parties is chocolate frogs.
I bought a mold that you can do and you fill it with chocolate.
And I have found, this is just my opinion, like, because they're kind of pretty big.
(12:26):
If you put sweetened like a Reese's kind of peanut butter filling in there, if you make that in there or like caramel or something else,
it kind of breaks it up because it's a lot of just chocolate.
So we've done that. We usually have the birdie bots too as a party favor to give them.
So that's been fun. Poor Kaden though. One of the parties, was he like two or something? Yeah.
(12:49):
And like afterward cleaning up a day or two after, I guess there was one on the windowsill or something that he got there.
A little bite in it. Yeah.
A bite and I felt so bad because he had a bite of it and just had a reaction, of course.
I'm like, what in the, it was a vomit flavored one and I felt so bad.
Anyways, butter beer and told you guys about butter beer.
(13:12):
Oh, we've done the golden snitch where you get the Ferrero chocolates that are in the gold wrapper.
Right. That are like balls and then like cut out little gold wings in gloom, you know, so it looks like a little snitch.
Oh, cool. Golden snitch.
So that's been something I've done trickle tarts, cookie with tart filling and a little raspberry.
(13:34):
That's like my take on it. And then cauldron pies I've done. It's like those little spinach appetizers.
Oh, okay. Man, these ones are crazy good.
Oh, dang. Yeah. They're like little like cakes almost with like a light icing and a little raspberry on top.
Like a little cream, like a citrusy though, right? I forget how you did it.
(13:56):
Like a lemon kind of like filling and then whipped cream on top.
You can see in our picture too, Ben, I told it like the great feast. I think. Yeah. At one point I like turkey things.
So we've had like like chicken wings, little drumsticks, like, you know, things like that.
Isn't Ron like double fisting?
Yeah.
(14:19):
You got your great feast platter of chicken wings. That's awesome. Yeah.
So I've got that. Oh, I've also done, I don't have a picture of this, but I've done shepherd's pie and little cupcakes.
So it's individual, the meat mixture. And then like I'll do a little frosting tip for the potatoes on top and cheese.
And that's been pretty yummy.
And so good.
And then like my take on pumpkin pasties. I know you're feeling this about pumpkin, John, but. Yeah.
(14:45):
Anyway, no worries. But that's something I've done. It's like cream puffs and like a pumpkin filling and like a white chocolate.
I like them. I was telling Cathy, I'm like for John, that's the same thing as puking pastels.
They're just the same. They have the same effect.
We've done pumpkin juice. We've done hufflepuffs, which are just like cheese puffs.
(15:09):
Cheese puffs, yeah.
Oh, that's awesome. That's cool.
We've done dragon's breath, which is like the buffalo chicken dip.
Oh, look at you, man. Goodness.
And I don't know. There's other foods that we were thinking I could talk about with the other books and episodes.
So everyone will need to stay tuned for those other episodes of the podcast.
(15:33):
For the first one, those are some of the foods and drink that we've done for our price.
Cool, man. Dang.
Cathy, as far as these things you listed here or any other things about the first one,
whether it's a food or a decoration or an activity, what was like one of the biggest hits?
Oh, good question.
Dave, what do you think? Maybe you can help me with this because I...
(15:55):
My vote. There's so many good things, you guys. I'm serious.
Like, I need to show you all the pictures because like the decorations are insane.
But one of my favorite activities that Cathy's done is the Cloak of Invisibility.
So this is just... it's funny. Let me see if I can find the picture real quick.
So this is actually inherited from a family game that we did at a family reunion.
(16:20):
And it's an article of clothing that when you look at it, you have no idea,
especially if you're a guy, you have no idea how to put this thing on.
And so the idea is you try to put it on and whoever can figure it out the right way, the fastest, wins.
And it's like shiny, metallic, stretchy. It's like a swoop neck only over your head.
(16:42):
It's supposed to just cover the front or whatever.
And there's so many holes and there's a loop in it.
And you're like looking at it like, what do I do with this thing?
And so it's hilarious. When the guys are trying to put it on, we all have zero clue.
It was hilarious. I just couldn't watch. Oh my gosh.
So that was like our cloak of invisibility. Like these guys that are like, how in the world?
(17:06):
There wasn't a tag. Which hole do I go in? Exactly. Exactly.
Yeah, that was kind of funny. Like activity. That thing is not a onesie. That's what it looks like.
Yeah. I think the butter bear has been popular food and the chocolate frogs.
Yeah. Your chocolate frogs, Cathy, you know what it makes me think of is like, you know,
every holiday we use peanut butter cups come out with the pumpkin or the Christmas tree.
(17:30):
I need some chocolate frogs just filled with peanut butter like that.
Oh man, they need to do that. Yes. Harry Potter one like that.
Yeah. Yeah, John, I like it.
Because you're right, there's a lot of chocolate.
Yeah. Not only does she do the frogs, but she also does the box, just like the legit box you can get.
They have a little wizard like picture that goes in there. One of the parties she did pictures of all the teenagers that came.
(17:59):
It was pretty cool. You know, that party thing. I don't know.
Sometimes it's like, oh, I remember I did that, but I didn't do it for this one.
But I had put like their facts on the back to like about them and that they filled out like their information on the back.
So that was kind of fun too. I saw your other another food item was the herbology,
which is like a veggie tray. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's right. Yep.
(18:23):
I need these pictures to kind of like remind me because yeah, we have herbology. We did the veggie tray.
I love the flying letters. That's cool. It's like a yeah, this is this picture you can see is a flash, but like you usually can't really see the fish line.
So it just looks like they're flying letters coming out of the window or whatever. It's pretty cool.
I think too, we had done it during October and I had found these pumpkin jack-o-lanterns that have a light on the bottom.
(18:51):
And we drilled a hole through the little stem at the top and put, you know, fish wire on it and hung those from the ceiling.
And then I made homemade candles that we have to like all over. I collected for a long time.
I was trying to be, you know, budget friendly too. Yeah. Cool.
So we collected the paper towel holders and then spray painted them white. And I had done like a glue gun down the side.
(19:18):
Oh, that's what that is. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Like dripping candle. Right.
Spray painted that white. I had tea lights that I poked a hole and did fish wire.
And then I had to put like tape to kind of secure the light on. So right before everyone came, we put the lights on.
We put it with tape so it's secure. It doesn't quite fit in there. And then just staple gun it to the top of the ceiling.
(19:41):
And then that was, I think that was my favorite with the floating pumpkins too. Cause that Halloween, you know, time for the movie.
Do you save all these or do you make whole new stuff every time? This is amazing.
Oh, I keep everything. Like, and then we just like-
That takes so much work. I would never want to throw them out.
Yeah. I'm not throwing this away. So yeah, we've kept it all. And then like with every party, we've kind of maybe like bought something or added something just, you know, just to keep a budget in mind.
(20:12):
But I think now you can like totally buy those candles online. You know, you can buy a ton of stuff for like parties, but I don't know if they had stuff like that when we started and I wasn't interested because it was expensive.
I just like, you know, approval. Dave did a drawing of a Hogwarts castle.
I mentioned it in our jobs episode, but one thing that we did every Halloween was we'd have a theme for my job and we would just go all out.
(20:39):
And one time we had a Harry Potter one and I got asked to draw Hogwarts. And so I have this drawing. It's probably what? Like four feet by three feet or something like that.
And yeah, and I just drew, but it's just pencil. But yeah, try to draw the castle of Hogwarts.
And it took a long time and it was fun too though. So kept that too. I was like, we're not throwing this away. We're keeping this.
(21:10):
So I remember as a kid, drawing with Dave and Dave was just sitting there freehand drawing Calvin and Hobbes. And I was like, I gotta do something. This guy's drawing this like from memory or you know, why is he looking at it and drawing it and I can't draw crap.
And I'm sitting there like tracing, I have to trace it just to make it look even decent.
(21:31):
It was not that great.
Yeah, you're so you got some skills man. This is amazing. Yeah, ridiculously amazing. We need to do a fat dumb and happy party where we have all this stuff and we just have you over John or we go over to your place or something.
Come on down.
Yeah, for the party. Any other games or decorations you want to highlight.
(21:54):
Oh, we did like the nine and three quarters platform. Like, we bought brick tablecloth or something a big role of it on Amazon and so we just reused it like with every party and made it look like brick wall right in the front door so you got to go through it.
Yeah, yep.
It was kind of fun. But I don't know is there anything else saved that like, I always loved we had for like a photo opportunity we have this cut out box that says have you seen this wizard like they have for serious, you can like put your head in there and like you know
(22:24):
that was always all the spiders we had moaning Myrtle in the mirror. So we I use like lipstick and I wrote on our mirror, you know like enemies of the air, beware, basically, like the Chamber of Secrets with the red lipstick and then we had a picture of moaning Myrtle,
like, in the bathroom. And then we had like ministry magic sign like right above the toilet.
(22:49):
And then we had like a picture of people use the bathroom, you know, it's kind of fun.
That's awesome and overall, that is like that's amazing. And I'm glad that you guys hold on to this stuff. You can call down to Dave and say hey I need box Harry Potter number 37.
Yeah.
Yep.
That's ridiculous amount of stuff is your guy but kudos to you for putting all that together and doing it on a budget that's amazing.
(23:12):
Absolutely well done.
I guess what she's on here she's the expert, the Harry Potter parties for sure. Kayla wanted one for like a birthday party and working with teenage girls in my church. Sometimes that was an incentive like we did an incentive party and they were so obsessed with Harry
Potter girls and I was like, oh yes, I am all about that. So we've done lots with the young women and teenage girls and then Kayla and, and then we've thrown some parties with us like because we just wanted to.
(23:44):
Yeah, and we had like a tournament one with a bunch of games, and actually Nick from the fast food episode, him and his team won for the Slytherin house at that party so you guys know he was answering all those quiz questions and stuff.
Yeah, he's a yeah.
I remember.
(24:05):
We miss you.
Good to come back. So I'm seeing this right Harry Potter will be 44. Yep.
His birthday is July 31 1980. It's good year. It's when I was born, so same age.
All right, well let's hit the main event. Let's get them the nitty gritty of the individual movies. So we have first off the Sorcerer's Stone.
(24:29):
First off, your favorite hero in that one. Dude, I love Dumbledore in the first one. I mean he's so he's such a sweet grandpa I know they change him out later in the movies but he's got so much hair, like, just his hair goes into his beard and
it's like five feet long it's so awesome. So, and of course his wise words, and he's like playful with the kids he's the best. What about you, Ben.
(24:54):
I just when I thought Hermione, she was, you know, I just loved how she was always telling them, don't do that.
Yeah, he and the one that like helps them accomplish like every rule that they break practically.
What about you, Kathy. You know I think I really love Hagrid. And this is like, he is such a hero because in the beginning he takes Harry and delivers them to the Dursley's house.
(25:21):
And he's so sweet. You just know he's got a tender heart, even though he's a man, and he's very protective of Harry because when he isn't getting his Hogwarts letters and he's going to take them, he totally shows the Dursley's like, I love that, you know that protective part of me is like yeah.
I would never lose Hagrid, you know, but not too much, you know, right. Oh, I love, I love Hagrid and good answer. She literally stole my answer.
(25:51):
But that's a good thing. No, no, that's a good thing because I completely agree with you and that same reason that I was even going to mention the same thing about you know him dropping him off at the Dursley's and little whinging and everything
and it is it's kind of like videos of like bikers, big old burly bikers and they're like, they're guarding these little kids and they're protecting people and helping little old ladies walk across the street and stopping their whole motorcycle crew to let these ladies walk across the street.
(26:15):
You know things like that. But yes, he is super protective of Harry. He brought him there. He shows up and I like how he tells Harry don't tell on me for giving Dudley a little tail.
He's like, I'm not allowed to do that. He just picks the door down and pushes the rifle upwards and even all the way through the end to where he gives the photo book of his parents at the very end was just like, that's what though.
(26:37):
Yeah, he's awesome. So yeah, I agree Cathy, 100%.
I think this is, I've seen it and I'm not sure, you know, fact check or whatever but I've heard that JK Rowling had based the character of Hagrid off of, she went into like a tavern once and there was this biker, like Hells Angel biker that came and sat next to her.
(27:01):
And she looked like Hagrid just big. Harry, and she was, you know, like, kind of like, oh my gosh, you know, there's this dude next to me and, and then he started talking about how his petunias were doing in his garden and like, like so unexpectedly about these other things and just the image of him and then talking about that.
I've never heard anyways that she based his character off of that experience that she had with the stranger and the tavern. And then the stranger and the tavern looks down at her he's like, I should not have said that. I should not have said that.
(27:33):
Yeah, that's a good quote from Hagrid.
I shouldn't have said that. I should not have said that. I shouldn't have said that.
Awesome man if that's true and we're not even gonna fact check that everybody because I just want that to be true. Right. It's got to be. It's true. It happened. It happened.
(27:54):
Nice.
All right, how about you guys's favorite or least favorite villains. It's crazy because I love the character evolution or development rather a Malfoy. I love how he becomes so dark at the end, I just think it makes such a great part of the movie.
And how you can see that like eats him alive and I'm sure we'll talk about that more later but like just him being this little hoity toity like rich kid that you know the pure blood kind of just little jerk.
(28:26):
And then, you know, I just think, you know, for him. I know he's not really villainous yet. His dad's probably more villainous at that point but for me it's Malfoy.
Yeah, I actually said Draco too I felt like he was just so ridiculously condescending for a first. Yeah, he handed up so well I just made me smile. You know I could picture how Harry felt about him, you know, like when he's first kind of inviting and he's like I can choose my own friends kind of thing.
(28:55):
Right. No, I said that about Dave too.
You'll soon find out that some wizarding families are better than others Potter.
You don't want to go and make you friends with the wrong sort.
I can help you there.
I think I can tell the wrong sort for myself thanks.
(29:18):
What about you Kathy. You know my brain kind of goes to Vernon Dursley.
I think the first one that right pick, you know, like the first, you're getting to know Harry and like, oh my gosh he's treated horribly you know, who's worse though him or Bertunia.
Gosh, yeah they're both terrible. Yeah, you can come from both together really good. Yeah, they're so bad.
(29:41):
Yeah, so I picked Professor Quirrell but kind of for a different reason like he's like my least favorite because he is like not scary to me it like really at all and he's kind of annoying even. So, I don't know like, it's like the bottom of the list.
You know what I mean. How can you be scared of the character that has been scared the whole movie he kind of yeah acts like you know yeah exactly.
(30:05):
He's already scared of you. Yeah, yeah, even when he like finally goes to fight him he's just doing what Voldemort tells him and he's like scared of Voldemort too so yep.
I'm more scared of the troll in the dungeon, then, Professor Quirrell, one little mess up in the movie if you've seen when Harry first meets Professor Quirrell.
He now obviously the back of the wears the thing on his head the back of his head is supposed to be Voldemort. But if you look in close in the where he meets him for the first time, you can see hair on the back of his neck.
(30:36):
Wait a minute.
It's Voldemort's beard dude.
Oh, yeah, that's good.
That's awesome.
Is this a good time Kathy to share that a little known fact about Quirrell. Oh yeah if you want.
Sounds like a good time for me. What's up.
It's in the book and short we'd seen it online.
But I guess in the book, Fred and George, they bewitched some snowballs, and they like hit Professor Quirrell and the back of the head with the snowballs is this like quick little like chapter 12, they got in trouble for it yeah, but basically like they are unknowingly like hitting
(31:11):
Voldemort in the face, tilting him with snowballs.
I love it. Interesting. So, so you're telling me there's books for this movie.
Yes, John.
Very interesting fact, guys. Check it out. Go to Barnes and Noble everybody.
(31:32):
That's hilarious. No, that's crazy.
Which the snowballs, so they didn't actually throw them.
Oh they're hitting Voldemort in the face. That's awesome.
How about you guys, your favorite scenes and one of your favorite quotes. I don't really have a favorite quote in this one, but my overall and this isn't really a favorite scene.
(31:59):
Every time I watch I'm just like, I love it. I love how Harry is just, it's more prevalent in the first movies obviously because he's finding out all about the wizarding world, but I love how he's impressed by the magic, you know, he's got nothing going on in his life, he lives under the stairs,
talking to the Burmese python that's in the zoo in the beginning of the movie but just the way that he can talk to the snakes he's impressed about that.
(32:21):
And then he removes the glass how it just brought a smile to his face that he, you know, he knew he did that. When Hagrid started the fire with the umbrella, you know, things like that, given the piggy wiggly tail.
Yeah. Even when Hermione gave the old Oculus Reparo, he was just fascinated by magic and how it works.
(32:43):
And that's something that can actually be done in his life. Yeah, so, and that's a theme throughout the movie and I'll kind of touch on the other ones throughout the other movies later but that's just so I don't have a favorite scene but that I do find awesome that plays through all the movies.
Yeah, I think so too, John. In fact, that's probably, you know, it's similar to what mine was like my favorite scene is that first meal at Hogwarts and the sorting hat, like, in part because what you said, you can see in his face that he's in awe of it all like I'm surrounded by magic
(33:15):
and this is amazing, you know, but also I love it just in the parts before it when everybody's anticipating what he's going to be sorted as. Yeah, yeah, like the professors and Dumbledore and everybody.
And it's all like, you can see the anticipation and everything and just, and the way like he looks over at Snape and you know touches his forehead, and then Snape does this side glance at Professor Quirrell, it's like a little bit of a, you know, like a foreshadowing
(33:44):
yeah, I didn't appreciate it my first time it wasn't my favorite scene of the first view, but I'm later views. I just kept catching little nuances in their expression. And just that first little scene of five or 10 minutes of just so many people's expressions like so telling
quote. So it's when Dumbledore says, it takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to your enemies, but a great deal more to stand up to your friends.
(34:12):
You know, and I love it but part of it is kind of funny to me because they're giving out points at the house.
Harry and Ron get like five points for like defeating a troll you know and saving money, and then they get, he gets like 10 points for standing up for his friends you know.
Like Ron gets 50 points for doing a really good chess match.
(34:37):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's just, it's just enough to for you know of course Griffin or to win so.
Yeah, like Dumbledore's just sitting there doing the math in his head real quick. Yeah, 505010 okay more points. Yeah, 10 more points.
(35:00):
Yeah.
I'm dying that chest. That's true. They could have walked around the chessboard there was plenty of space.
All right, Kathy, what about you what's your favorite quote and scene from the movie. The first movie. Let's see it well there's so many. Yeah.
And I agree with Ben, you know, like, just like his magic and just that having a sense of his identity, you know, all these lies, you know, about his parents, and who he is and not treated, you know, very well and everyone's like oh my gosh you're Harry Potter, but, but just
(35:35):
like, I think, along with that, his identity, it's kind of like, it's a happy sad but with when he's in front of the mirror of your side right yeah, and he sees his parents, and like that, I think like that warms my heart.
And one of the things is that he has, you know, an understanding of who he is and his parents and, and it's sad though. So my favorite quote is, I love like the scenes where Dumbledore and Harry just like to talk, you know, and the one at the end, where he says,
(36:10):
so Dumbledore is talking to him, and he says Harry. Do you know why Professor Quirrell cannot bear to have you touch him. And Harry nods no. It was because of your mother, she sacrificed herself for you. And that kind of act leaves a mark.
Harry reaches for a scar and he says no no. This kind of mark cannot be seen, it lives in your very skin. Harry asks what is it and Dumbledore says love Harry love.
(36:34):
So that's one of my favorite quotes just rings true to me and just as a mom and you know I'm sentimental, so sacrificing and love, and it's very powerful.
That's awesome.
Very good choices I like it. So for me, like Kathy said there's so many good scenes I mean it's so hard and just for tonight just to pick one.
(36:57):
One of my favorites is Harry getting his wand at Ollivander's. I mean that like kind of like Kathy was saying about his identity and figuring out this like gift that he has and what makes him special, you know, and and then the wand is huge in the magical world
and so finding the wand that fits for him. I think that's really special and cool. And when we've gone to Universal Studios with our kids, our oldest daughter was one of those ones that they picked out at Ollivander's to like do the little experience.
(37:28):
And it was so magical for her and you know having the little special effects they do and stuff and and the guy that played Ollivander's was really good and stuff so I love that scene.
And then our second daughter actually got picked when we went the second time. Yeah, so both of them got to have that special experience pretty cool. Yeah, pretty special. My favorite quote is Dumbledore when he says,
(37:49):
It does not do to dwell on dreams, Harry, and forget to live.
I think that's a pretty cool thought. He's always so wise with the things he says and the idea that you know you actually have to live your life and do and try to achieve your dreams right? So yeah.
He says to him at the mirror right? Yep, at the mirror, yeah. Because he was spending all his time there. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly.
(38:15):
Yeah, speaking of the Mirror of Erised, that's one of the interesting differences that we have found between the book and the movie. John, I know you haven't read them. We're trying to sell this to you so you'll go out and read the books.
There's some pretty cool interesting things. But for the Mirror of Erised, in the film he only sees his parents right? But in the novel he sees his whole extended family standing behind him in the mirror, which is kind of cool.
(38:38):
So it's not just his parents that are kind of behind him, but he gets to see all that. Other interesting things, when the day of Voldemort's downfall, it's in the beginning of the book and Vernon Dursley encounters all kinds of wizarding world references.
There's wizards talking about the Potters or celebrating the end of the Dark Era. Professor McGonagall is reading a map while she's still a cat. And there's owls everywhere. I think that's kind of fun.
(39:07):
Another character that's a lot in the book but not in the movies is Peeves the Poltergeist. It's pretty funny because he does pranks and songs. And speaking of songs, actually the sorting hat sings a song too. And none of that makes it into the movie. So just some interesting differences between the book and the movie.
Alright, so John and I are Harry Potter nerds. If you haven't already figured that out from this episode, all the time we'll be texting each other stuff, just random things you know, but Harry Potter slips in there quite a bit. So I went in and found our texts back and forth about Harry Potter things that kind of have been like, man, why didn't they just do this or what's up with that, you know?
(39:45):
So here's some of the texts that I found in our text chain. So John was saying, I was just watching Harry Potter again and in the Sorcerer's Stone, when they get to the wizard's chest, there's clearly room to walk around the board. They didn't even have to play.
I got one that says, I forget, have we talked about the crazy point disparity in that movie? Like, you stopped a giant troll and saved Hermione's life. Plus five points. Wait, you stayed out late? Minus 50 points? Like, that's terrible.
(40:14):
And John said, if the troll in the girl's bathroom in the first Harry Potter movie fell two seconds earlier onto Harry, the whole series would have been over. You know, it's just like a matter of seconds.
Right.
All right.
Hey, John.
Kelly Bean.
No!
I was hoping he all forgets.
(40:36):
Oh, this is a ghost.
All right. Just so you guys can see, I'll do it at random.
Green peas, green peas.
I don't know what it is. I'm going to show you guys. I want green peas. Get out of here. I'm going to show you guys. And then I'll tell you what I think it is.
All right. Oh my gosh. This is like...
(40:59):
Because John doesn't like green peas.
No.
People don't.
Yeah, if people haven't been super fans of the show.
Green peas is like the worst. Oh, it looks like maybe earwax or something. It's light yellow or rotten egg.
Marshmallow.
Yeah.
You're so kind, Kathy.
Well, you don't even really like marshmallows either, right?
I don't. I'll take that up with the other ones.
(41:20):
Okay.
That's true. It's better than rotten egg.
I don't know.
I can't tell you yet, man.
Maybe it's earwax. It's kind of like not too strong.
I think that was just lemon.
Yay, lemon.
Yay. Not bad. Not bad.
Oh, thank goodness. Okay.
Dude, that's one for one. So far, so good.
(41:43):
All right.
You know, one of the things I like about Harry Potter, all the books really is just, and the movies, is the just seeing growth in Harry.
And there's just so much psychology that you see and you watch it.
And there's just so much that teaches you about like resilience and overcoming obstacles.
And I think that's part of the draw to it.
You know, you see him at the beginning struggling so much.
(42:07):
And every one of us struggles at some time in our life, you know.
And then you see what happens where he goes from there and see him overcoming obstacles and, you know, facing things.
And so one of the things that I noticed is like, you know, you have this comparison, I guess, between the way Harry faces something new versus the Dursleys, right?
(42:30):
And so the Dursleys, they don't want to deal with magic. It's like this new thing entering into their life.
They don't want to have a part of it. And they just like time and again, they just keep trying to ignore it.
You know, just try not to face it. Try not to think about it. Pretend it's not there, you know.
And it doesn't make anything better for them. You know, it doesn't really improve their lives at all.
(42:53):
And yet when you see Harry in the Sorcerer's Stone, he like time and again just accepts facing something new, you know.
He's willing to take it on and do something with it instead of like trying to pretend it's not there.
Or like if he had reacted to magic the way his adopted father, it would have been, it would have been no book. It just would have been horrible, you know.
(43:19):
But the fact that he's, you know, embraces change and is willing to do his best to make the most of it shows that he, you know, he has what in psychology we call an internal locus of control, you know, where he doesn't feel like everything is everything good or bad that happens.
His life is external. He feels like he can have an influence for change.
(43:42):
And it kind of shows like it's funny that snake scene actually is sort of symbolic of him being freed too, you know.
Like he leaves the Dursleys and is able to like be his best self. And he goes to, but he knows that he's not where he belongs and he's stuck there.
But then when he has the opportunity, he gets, you know, he's freed and he races it all and wants to go where he really belongs, you know.
(44:10):
So then, and in Chamber of Secrets, it shows for him like how much resiliency is somewhat dependent on community support, you know.
They show the Weasleys, like he's stuck in at the beginning, Dobby's like kind of ruins things for him and keeping him stuck in his house, you know.
And the Dursleys just like locked down the windows and everything and he hasn't been getting any communication from his friends and that really brings him into a bad place.
(44:41):
But when Ron and his brothers notice that he hasn't been responding to the letters, they worry about him and they check up on him and help free him basically, you know.
And it just goes to show like when we're in a rough place, how big of a difference people in our community that care and reach out to us and really try to bring us out of our funk, you know, and feeling stuck or something like that.
(45:06):
It really makes a difference in overcoming hard times.
Yeah, I like and the Prisoner of Azkaban, they show the psychology of, you know, people who've been through trauma and having to face that trauma again can be so devastating.
When he first faces the Dementor, like it, it really shook him up.
(45:28):
And I imagine it probably brought him back to when he was a baby and first attacked, you know, by Voldemort, you know, like that feeling of evil and everything.
And then every time afterwards, like you could tell that it's still weighing on him and anything even close to it just really impacts him.
But then they show how like remembering the good during bad times helps push you through those bad times.
(45:55):
And so when those bad things happen, and they bring back this flood of memories and evil and darkness in you, if you can just hold on to anything good that you remember and like focus on that.
It's hard to keep like two thoughts in your mind at the same time.
And it's like a power you have to like stop focusing and kind of fixating on the negative that is really driving you down. I think that's just like an awesome like metaphor there of like the Patronus, you know, imagining the silly thing, you know, that when they have the Boggarts that helps to face your fears to overcome and stop doing the bad.
(46:36):
Yeah, yeah, this is awesome. I love when you talk psychology on here on your podcast. And I think it's JK Rowling did such a good job in her books.
Just, this is a fictional magical story, right, but there's some real things in her stories like, you know, you're talking about the Dementors, and she said that they kind of represented like when she was going through and experiencing depression.
(47:03):
And I love like everything that you said about that. So I just want to add that, that like her real life experiences with these things, you know, with having to be resilient and she had a really hard life before she was writing these books and I just love how she incorporated real life
trials and depression and in like this story for kids that they can overcome, you know, like you were talking about resiliency and community support and remembering, you know, the good the having that Patronus, you know, conjuring it by tapping into those happy, joyful moments in our lives to help us so
(47:40):
Ben, you're the expert here on the psychology, but I just wanted to, that was something I wanted.
That's a great comment and I, you know, it's interesting to think about the, the third one where, you know, it comes so close to the kiss of the Dementor, and he had that hope that he thought his dad was going to conjure that that Patronus and, and then he realized he had to do it from himself from inside.
(48:04):
And I just think there's some interesting symbolism there too, that like, you know, we can find hope in others but also that ultimately has to come from within ourselves. So anyways, I thought that's kind of cool.
Thanks, that was really good.
I thought it was interesting and you see it especially in the books but even in the movies, sort of like Ron, you see each of the characters, almost through Harry's eyes. And so when you first see Ron and Hermione and everything like, it's like their caricatures in a sense, and as he gets to know them better like you start seeing them more deeply as well.
(48:42):
Yeah, but it's also like Ron and Hermione like almost extensions of himself is showing aspects of himself in psychology described like the ego and the super ego.
And in a sense, Ron represents the id of like, just those passions, and just like underlying feelings that like, you know, like drive us you know and so his fears is, you know, like he's the one most expressive when he's afraid.
(49:14):
And it's almost like excited when he sees the food, you know what I mean? And that's like, that's a part of every person, but it's like expressly shown through Ron, you know, and then the super ego is kind of more like the, almost like the conscience, you know that Hermione is always
like saying, hey, this is kind of against the rules and you know maybe, you know, like, hey, you need to think things through and be careful and all this stuff. And then Harry is like the ego that kind of has to navigate between the two and make decisions you know and in the present
(49:48):
and kind of consciously think through these things. And so I thought that was an interesting thing that she put in the story to kind of like help you, we could see our aspects of ourselves in each of the characters.
I had never thought about that before.
That's a super interesting connection for sure. Yeah, kind of an interesting twist on it if like one of those types of movies where you find out that people aren't real like it was always just Harry and that those other two were, you know, kind of like a beautiful mind.
(50:21):
But no, that's a super interesting super cool idea for sure. What else Ben? I don't know I just think it's cool how in general.
They show, were always made to kind of like root for the underdog. Right. They also want to be the best so like they show Harry winning at Quidditch and winning the House Cup and in a sense, having a chance to be the best of things and many times.
(50:44):
But also he's sort of the underdog who's like knows nothing about magic you know like he's the most lost of all the characters you know in a sense. Yeah. And a lot of the other characters are kind of underdogs too you know you see Hagrid who
he's not allowed to use magic at first and like and Ron, who's often put down because his family's poor, and you know, really you just go through like the best characters, and they're often the ones that have something against them like some handicap that you kind of want to root for them
(51:18):
and you know, overcome and grow from. And, and yet they each have their time to shine too. So it's kind of cool that way. Love it. I love it. Good stuff. Thanks Ben. You always bring good stuff to the show about psychology.
Hey, thanks so much for listening to part one of this episode stay tuned for more fun and part two.
Whatever really happened to dudes calling each other best friends?
(00:05):
Dave and John grew up in the 80s in New Jersey and they did everything together.
They were the quintessential best friends until they became teenagers and Dave moved away.
Fast forward to today and these two 40-somethings reconnected and decided to not only be besties again,
but to put on a podcast and share their reunion with anyone who will listen.
Welcome to Fat, Dumb and Happy.
(00:41):
Welcome everybody to the Wizarding World of Fat, Dumb and Happy.
Today we are talking about magic, wands, brooms, quidditch, wizards and witches and all things Harry Potter 1-3.
Oh man I'm so excited.
Spoiler alert, we will talk extensively about the first three books and movies so if you haven't seen or read them, stop the podcast.
(01:04):
Actually wait, no. Download, subscribe and rate the podcast 5 stars and then stop the podcast.
Grab the books and or movies and get on it. It is 2024 you guys and you're like the last person to not watch or read them.
Come on. It is going to be a magical episode. Writing the Hogwarts Express with me is my bro-host John.
(01:25):
How are you feeling tonight John?
Man I am feeling awesome. Let's get this. Let's do this. I'm ready. Let's go.
Yes, the long anticipated Harry Potter episodes. We're so excited.
This year's Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher is our very own in-house special guest expert Ben.
How are you doing tonight Ben?
I'm doing great. I'm feeling magical. This is going to be awesome. I'm looking forward to it man.
(01:49):
Nice. We're excited. I don't know if we're going to make it to next year's Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher.
We always, you know, we switch it out every year so I'm just kidding. That's awesome.
Alright and we also have an extra, extra special guest expert.
Receiving her letter to Hogwarts tonight is my wife Cathy. Are you ready for an adventure tonight Cathy?
(02:10):
Yes I am.
It's just like magic.
It's just like magic. Like lock art. I love it.
Amazing. This is just like magic.
I probably am like the biggest fan I guess so thank you for allowing me to be on here.
(02:37):
Yeah. I love it.
So let me just explain real quick why we asked Cathy to be on this.
First of all, Cathy and I go way back with Harry Potter.
We met in 2001 and we were dating in 2002.
Early on in our dating we got the first book and we read it out loud to each other and we would sit and cuddle and read it.
(02:58):
I would try to do the voices. It was a good time.
And ever since then we got hooked.
Every time the book came out, every other book after that we got it.
We read it out loud to each other and it was always super fun.
We listened to the audio books in the car.
We've watched all the movies multiple times.
And then each of our three kids we've read it with them, watched it with them.
(03:20):
We've gone to the two visiting worlds of Harry Potter in the Universal Studios both in Florida and California.
Cathy has thrown numerous Harry Potter themed parties and she is amazing at them.
Decorations and food and games and everything.
So she is definitely our special special guest expert tonight.
So thanks for being on Cathy.
(03:42):
You're welcome. I'm so excited to be here.
It's an honor. Thank you.
My birthday is December 22nd if we're still doing those Harry Potter themed parties.
I'm just saying.
Okay.
Bring this muggle to the Wizarding World, man.
Oh man, we got to have you for sure.
We will throw the best party.
She has some blue powder to get over to Utah.
There you go. Yeah. Blue powder over here.
(04:04):
We're kind of diagonally over here.
You know, you do like Harry Potter.
Diagonally.
Diagonally.
I was rewatching all three movies and the headline is just so clever.
Yeah. Yeah, it's awesome.
Over to you, John, for the fat part of this episode.
Okay. Well, we can't have Fat, Dumb and Happy, especially the Wizarding World of Harry Potter episode without the fat part.
(04:28):
As you guys already know, we all picked something related and this was probably easier than most to do because there's so much food in this movie.
Like it's ridiculous how much food is actually in this movie.
Everybody kind of chose something that relates to it.
Let's start with you, Dave. What do you got going on?
All right. So I already mentioned it, but Kathy's amazing with her Harry Potter themed parties and the food and things that she does.
(04:50):
She has made us both actually some delicious butter beer, homemade.
She's showing off our Hogwarts mug from the Wizarding World of Harry Potter.
I got a Hogwarts mug, but it's just a like a hot chocolate type mug.
It's huge and awesome. And you can see the cream and the butter beer. Delicious.
(05:11):
What does it actually taste like?
So it's kind of like it's butterscotch flavoring.
So we've tried like so many recipes for butter beer, but this one I just see this.
I like this one. It's kind of it's basically like cream soda and the butterscotch flavored tirani syrup.
And then this topping is marshmallow cream.
(05:34):
And you stir that with like the butterscotch tirani syrup and a little bit of rum extract.
And then you add some whipping cream. You whip it up.
So it's kind of like kind of fluffy, but still runny.
And you put that on top. And that's what we do. Awesome.
That's served hot or cold?
This one's cold, but there's like hot butter beer and there's frozen butter beer.
(05:58):
I have yet to like master those, but like the cold one, we do that one a lot.
It's pretty easy to put together.
That's pretty cool. So that's what you both are doing for tonight's episode, right? Butter beer.
So, Kathy, are you cool with putting the recipe on the show notes?
Yes. Yeah. All right. We'll put them on there, then.
All right. So, OK, so they got the butter beer. Ben, what are you going to go on?
(06:21):
I'm jealous of them because I picked something that is not like really appetizing to me.
I think of that opening scene after Harry and the sorty hat scene, you know?
Yeah. Just bring out the food. It just magically appears.
And there's just like food everywhere.
And remember if there was actual turkey in it, but it makes me think of a turkey Thanksgiving dinner, you know?
(06:47):
When I watched it again, I saw there was like a blip where it looked like there was turkey in front of a mouthful, but that's just about it.
So it's still kind of a stretch. But, man, it always makes me think of that like first magical moment, you know, where he's like,
I am here and this is going to be so much better than under the stairs, you know?
Yes. And, you know, the ghosts are everywhere and all that kind of stuff.
(07:09):
But anyway, so I picked this frozen turkey because I didn't want to spend, you know, five days making a turkey.
The thing is, does microwave turkeys... They just don't taste the same, man.
So I'm going to try one of these out. Hopefully it's halfway decent, but they never really are.
(07:30):
So not worth the mind, I guarantee you.
Not the same, man.
Not the same.
It's all good.
All right.
Makes me think of Harry Potter, man. It just makes me think of Harry Potter.
Yeah, good choice.
So I am instantly regretting my choice.
This is not my first time having these, by the way.
(07:53):
And I even took these into work once and I made every single one of the people that were underneath me, you know, just for bonding experience,
to try one of these at random. And so what I got are the birdie bots, the different flavored beans.
Oh yeah.
And so what I'm going to do, everybody that's listening right now, listen to some of the grossness.
I'm going to pick completely at random. These guys are going to watch me.
(08:16):
These jelly beans can taste like anything. And look, I'm not going to lie to you guys, I might dry heat you during this episode.
This is gross.
So I have the chance of getting an earwax flavored jelly bean, dirt flavored booger.
Oh yeah.
Not that I would know what that tastes like. Black pepper.
(08:40):
And Kathy made a good point to me earlier today that like how did Dumbledore know what earwax tastes like?
Yeah.
Right?
Yeah.
Ah, birdie bots, every flavor beans.
I was most unfortunate in my youth to come across a vomit flavored one.
And since then, I'm afraid I've lost my liking for them.
(09:04):
But I think I could be safe with a nice toffee.
Hmm.
A lot.
Earwax.
Vomit.
Soap.
(09:25):
Lemon.
Sausage.
Oh man.
This one, if I get this one dude, I'm going to throw up, I'll tell you right now.
It's going to be rotten egg.
Oh man.
Marshmallow. Green apple.
Which I'm pulling for green apple. I think I passed. Okay. So awesome.
So what I'm going to do is during each movie that we talk about, you each get to tell me at random jelly bean.
(09:47):
And then I'll pick it random. Okay.
So anytime during the while we're talking about the Sorcerer's Stone, we'll do Dave. Dave, you can be number one.
All right. All right. All right.
And then Kathy during Chamber of Secrets, just at any random point, feel free to yell out jelly bean.
And then Ben, Prisoner of Azkaban, that's all you. Okay. Awesome.
(10:08):
Let's play this game forever. Let's just make this a permanent fat dumb and happy game.
Not awesome at all.
That's going to be mine and we'll see how that goes.
All right. Let's do it.
All right. So like we said, man, there's so much food in this, you know, even starting in the beginning when Harry, you know, he, he just calls himself a little birthday cake in the sand.
This kid. Yeah. And it's a nicely drawn little cake too.
(10:29):
And then all of a sudden here comes Hagrid with the real birthday cake, which actually the kind of delicious, which is why Dudley started eating it.
Harry does cook a lot for the Dursleys in multiple movies.
But then you got your other things like everything that was on the trolley that Harry Potter bought.
You had your chocolate frogs, your burning black flavored beans.
Like Ben was talking about everything that was in the Great Hall, the whole feast that they had there.
(10:54):
Yep. Yep. Man, if I could have those floating cupcakes, like come to me, that would be amazing.
I'd be on, dude, that would just be incredible.
Would you guys seriously, if you saw floating cupcakes, would you eat them?
I don't know. It depends on where I was.
Like if it was in public, maybe not.
If you're like somebody just finds those spells, you do that around my apartment? Absolutely.
(11:17):
Yeah. If it was in your apartment. Yeah. I guess that's true. You can trust it.
Maybe better. Just chilling in bed and she's like, not in the dungeon.
Not in the dungeon. No, no.
I'll eat it though.
And then one thing, and you guys talked about the Butterbeer.
The one thing I thought though that looked disgusting to me was the cake that they made.
(11:42):
And Dobby in the second movie drops on Seriously's boss's wife.
Yeah. That thing just looks so gross to me. Did it? Yeah, it did.
It did not look appetizing at all. It looks like runny icing and that was it.
Nice. Yeah. I don't know. That's just me.
(12:04):
So those are the things that we see through the movie.
What are some of the things that you like integrate into your parties, your themes that you do?
So for the first to the third books, let's see.
Something that I've done for my parties is chocolate frogs.
I bought a mold that you can do and you fill it with chocolate.
And I have found, this is just my opinion, like, because they're kind of pretty big.
(12:26):
If you put sweetened like a Reese's kind of peanut butter filling in there, if you make that in there or like caramel or something else,
it kind of breaks it up because it's a lot of just chocolate.
So we've done that. We usually have the birdie bots too as a party favor to give them.
So that's been fun. Poor Kaden though. One of the parties, was he like two or something? Yeah.
(12:49):
And like afterward cleaning up a day or two after, I guess there was one on the windowsill or something that he got there.
A little bite in it. Yeah.
A bite and I felt so bad because he had a bite of it and just had a reaction, of course.
I'm like, what in the, it was a vomit flavored one and I felt so bad.
Anyways, butter beer and told you guys about butter beer.
(13:12):
Oh, we've done the golden snitch where you get the Ferrero chocolates that are in the gold wrapper.
Right. That are like balls and then like cut out little gold wings in gloom, you know, so it looks like a little snitch.
Oh, cool. Golden snitch.
So that's been something I've done trickle tarts, cookie with tart filling and a little raspberry.
(13:34):
That's like my take on it. And then cauldron pies I've done. It's like those little spinach appetizers.
Oh, okay. Man, these ones are crazy good.
Oh, dang. Yeah. They're like little like cakes almost with like a light icing and a little raspberry on top.
Like a little cream, like a citrusy though, right? I forget how you did it.
(13:56):
Like a lemon kind of like filling and then whipped cream on top.
You can see in our picture too, Ben, I told it like the great feast. I think. Yeah. At one point I like turkey things.
So we've had like like chicken wings, little drumsticks, like, you know, things like that.
Isn't Ron like double fisting?
Yeah.
(14:19):
You got your great feast platter of chicken wings. That's awesome. Yeah.
So I've got that. Oh, I've also done, I don't have a picture of this, but I've done shepherd's pie and little cupcakes.
So it's individual, the meat mixture. And then like I'll do a little frosting tip for the potatoes on top and cheese.
And that's been pretty yummy.
And so good.
And then like my take on pumpkin pasties. I know you're feeling this about pumpkin, John, but. Yeah.
(14:45):
Anyway, no worries. But that's something I've done. It's like cream puffs and like a pumpkin filling and like a white chocolate.
I like them. I was telling Cathy, I'm like for John, that's the same thing as puking pastels.
They're just the same. They have the same effect.
We've done pumpkin juice. We've done hufflepuffs, which are just like cheese puffs.
(15:09):
Cheese puffs, yeah.
Oh, that's awesome. That's cool.
We've done dragon's breath, which is like the buffalo chicken dip.
Oh, look at you, man. Goodness.
And I don't know. There's other foods that we were thinking I could talk about with the other books and episodes.
So everyone will need to stay tuned for those other episodes of the podcast.
(15:33):
For the first one, those are some of the foods and drink that we've done for our price.
Cool, man. Dang.
Cathy, as far as these things you listed here or any other things about the first one,
whether it's a food or a decoration or an activity, what was like one of the biggest hits?
Oh, good question.
Dave, what do you think? Maybe you can help me with this because I...
(15:55):
My vote. There's so many good things, you guys. I'm serious.
Like, I need to show you all the pictures because like the decorations are insane.
But one of my favorite activities that Cathy's done is the Cloak of Invisibility.
So this is just... it's funny. Let me see if I can find the picture real quick.
So this is actually inherited from a family game that we did at a family reunion.
(16:20):
And it's an article of clothing that when you look at it, you have no idea,
especially if you're a guy, you have no idea how to put this thing on.
And so the idea is you try to put it on and whoever can figure it out the right way, the fastest, wins.
And it's like shiny, metallic, stretchy. It's like a swoop neck only over your head.
(16:42):
It's supposed to just cover the front or whatever.
And there's so many holes and there's a loop in it.
And you're like looking at it like, what do I do with this thing?
And so it's hilarious. When the guys are trying to put it on, we all have zero clue.
It was hilarious. I just couldn't watch. Oh my gosh.
So that was like our cloak of invisibility. Like these guys that are like, how in the world?
(17:06):
There wasn't a tag. Which hole do I go in? Exactly. Exactly.
Yeah, that was kind of funny. Like activity. That thing is not a onesie. That's what it looks like.
Yeah. I think the butter bear has been popular food and the chocolate frogs.
Yeah. Your chocolate frogs, Cathy, you know what it makes me think of is like, you know,
every holiday we use peanut butter cups come out with the pumpkin or the Christmas tree.
(17:30):
I need some chocolate frogs just filled with peanut butter like that.
Oh man, they need to do that. Yes. Harry Potter one like that.
Yeah. Yeah, John, I like it.
Because you're right, there's a lot of chocolate.
Yeah. Not only does she do the frogs, but she also does the box, just like the legit box you can get.
They have a little wizard like picture that goes in there. One of the parties she did pictures of all the teenagers that came.
(17:59):
It was pretty cool. You know, that party thing. I don't know.
Sometimes it's like, oh, I remember I did that, but I didn't do it for this one.
But I had put like their facts on the back to like about them and that they filled out like their information on the back.
So that was kind of fun too. I saw your other another food item was the herbology,
which is like a veggie tray. Yeah. Yeah. Oh, yeah, that's right. Yep.
(18:23):
I need these pictures to kind of like remind me because yeah, we have herbology. We did the veggie tray.
I love the flying letters. That's cool. It's like a yeah, this is this picture you can see is a flash, but like you usually can't really see the fish line.
So it just looks like they're flying letters coming out of the window or whatever. It's pretty cool.
I think too, we had done it during October and I had found these pumpkin jack-o-lanterns that have a light on the bottom.
(18:51):
And we drilled a hole through the little stem at the top and put, you know, fish wire on it and hung those from the ceiling.
And then I made homemade candles that we have to like all over. I collected for a long time.
I was trying to be, you know, budget friendly too. Yeah. Cool.
So we collected the paper towel holders and then spray painted them white. And I had done like a glue gun down the side.
(19:18):
Oh, that's what that is. Okay. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Like dripping candle. Right.
Spray painted that white. I had tea lights that I poked a hole and did fish wire.
And then I had to put like tape to kind of secure the light on. So right before everyone came, we put the lights on.
We put it with tape so it's secure. It doesn't quite fit in there. And then just staple gun it to the top of the ceiling.
(19:41):
And then that was, I think that was my favorite with the floating pumpkins too. Cause that Halloween, you know, time for the movie.
Do you save all these or do you make whole new stuff every time? This is amazing.
Oh, I keep everything. Like, and then we just like-
That takes so much work. I would never want to throw them out.
Yeah. I'm not throwing this away. So yeah, we've kept it all. And then like with every party, we've kind of maybe like bought something or added something just, you know, just to keep a budget in mind.
(20:12):
But I think now you can like totally buy those candles online. You know, you can buy a ton of stuff for like parties, but I don't know if they had stuff like that when we started and I wasn't interested because it was expensive.
I just like, you know, approval. Dave did a drawing of a Hogwarts castle.
I mentioned it in our jobs episode, but one thing that we did every Halloween was we'd have a theme for my job and we would just go all out.
(20:39):
And one time we had a Harry Potter one and I got asked to draw Hogwarts. And so I have this drawing. It's probably what? Like four feet by three feet or something like that.
And yeah, and I just drew, but it's just pencil. But yeah, try to draw the castle of Hogwarts.
And it took a long time and it was fun too though. So kept that too. I was like, we're not throwing this away. We're keeping this.
(21:10):
So I remember as a kid, drawing with Dave and Dave was just sitting there freehand drawing Calvin and Hobbes. And I was like, I gotta do something. This guy's drawing this like from memory or you know, why is he looking at it and drawing it and I can't draw crap.
And I'm sitting there like tracing, I have to trace it just to make it look even decent.
(21:31):
It was not that great.
Yeah, you're so you got some skills man. This is amazing. Yeah, ridiculously amazing. We need to do a fat dumb and happy party where we have all this stuff and we just have you over John or we go over to your place or something.
Come on down.
Yeah, for the party. Any other games or decorations you want to highlight.
(21:54):
Oh, we did like the nine and three quarters platform. Like, we bought brick tablecloth or something a big role of it on Amazon and so we just reused it like with every party and made it look like brick wall right in the front door so you got to go through it.
Yeah, yep.
It was kind of fun. But I don't know is there anything else saved that like, I always loved we had for like a photo opportunity we have this cut out box that says have you seen this wizard like they have for serious, you can like put your head in there and like you know
(22:24):
that was always all the spiders we had moaning Myrtle in the mirror. So we I use like lipstick and I wrote on our mirror, you know like enemies of the air, beware, basically, like the Chamber of Secrets with the red lipstick and then we had a picture of moaning Myrtle,
like, in the bathroom. And then we had like ministry magic sign like right above the toilet.
(22:49):
And then we had like a picture of people use the bathroom, you know, it's kind of fun.
That's awesome and overall, that is like that's amazing. And I'm glad that you guys hold on to this stuff. You can call down to Dave and say hey I need box Harry Potter number 37.
Yeah.
Yep.
That's ridiculous amount of stuff is your guy but kudos to you for putting all that together and doing it on a budget that's amazing.
(23:12):
Absolutely well done.
I guess what she's on here she's the expert, the Harry Potter parties for sure. Kayla wanted one for like a birthday party and working with teenage girls in my church. Sometimes that was an incentive like we did an incentive party and they were so obsessed with Harry
Potter girls and I was like, oh yes, I am all about that. So we've done lots with the young women and teenage girls and then Kayla and, and then we've thrown some parties with us like because we just wanted to.
(23:44):
Yeah, and we had like a tournament one with a bunch of games, and actually Nick from the fast food episode, him and his team won for the Slytherin house at that party so you guys know he was answering all those quiz questions and stuff.
Yeah, he's a yeah.
I remember.
(24:05):
We miss you.
Good to come back. So I'm seeing this right Harry Potter will be 44. Yep.
His birthday is July 31 1980. It's good year. It's when I was born, so same age.
All right, well let's hit the main event. Let's get them the nitty gritty of the individual movies. So we have first off the Sorcerer's Stone.
(24:29):
First off, your favorite hero in that one. Dude, I love Dumbledore in the first one. I mean he's so he's such a sweet grandpa I know they change him out later in the movies but he's got so much hair, like, just his hair goes into his beard and
it's like five feet long it's so awesome. So, and of course his wise words, and he's like playful with the kids he's the best. What about you, Ben.
(24:54):
I just when I thought Hermione, she was, you know, I just loved how she was always telling them, don't do that.
Yeah, he and the one that like helps them accomplish like every rule that they break practically.
What about you, Kathy. You know I think I really love Hagrid. And this is like, he is such a hero because in the beginning he takes Harry and delivers them to the Dursley's house.
(25:21):
And he's so sweet. You just know he's got a tender heart, even though he's a man, and he's very protective of Harry because when he isn't getting his Hogwarts letters and he's going to take them, he totally shows the Dursley's like, I love that, you know that protective part of me is like yeah.
I would never lose Hagrid, you know, but not too much, you know, right. Oh, I love, I love Hagrid and good answer. She literally stole my answer.
(25:51):
But that's a good thing. No, no, that's a good thing because I completely agree with you and that same reason that I was even going to mention the same thing about you know him dropping him off at the Dursley's and little whinging and everything
and it is it's kind of like videos of like bikers, big old burly bikers and they're like, they're guarding these little kids and they're protecting people and helping little old ladies walk across the street and stopping their whole motorcycle crew to let these ladies walk across the street.
(26:15):
You know things like that. But yes, he is super protective of Harry. He brought him there. He shows up and I like how he tells Harry don't tell on me for giving Dudley a little tail.
He's like, I'm not allowed to do that. He just picks the door down and pushes the rifle upwards and even all the way through the end to where he gives the photo book of his parents at the very end was just like, that's what though.
(26:37):
Yeah, he's awesome. So yeah, I agree Cathy, 100%.
I think this is, I've seen it and I'm not sure, you know, fact check or whatever but I've heard that JK Rowling had based the character of Hagrid off of, she went into like a tavern once and there was this biker, like Hells Angel biker that came and sat next to her.
(27:01):
And she looked like Hagrid just big. Harry, and she was, you know, like, kind of like, oh my gosh, you know, there's this dude next to me and, and then he started talking about how his petunias were doing in his garden and like, like so unexpectedly about these other things and just the image of him and then talking about that.
I've never heard anyways that she based his character off of that experience that she had with the stranger and the tavern. And then the stranger and the tavern looks down at her he's like, I should not have said that. I should not have said that.
(27:33):
Yeah, that's a good quote from Hagrid.
I shouldn't have said that. I should not have said that. I shouldn't have said that.
Awesome man if that's true and we're not even gonna fact check that everybody because I just want that to be true. Right. It's got to be. It's true. It happened. It happened.
(27:54):
Nice.
All right, how about you guys's favorite or least favorite villains. It's crazy because I love the character evolution or development rather a Malfoy. I love how he becomes so dark at the end, I just think it makes such a great part of the movie.
And how you can see that like eats him alive and I'm sure we'll talk about that more later but like just him being this little hoity toity like rich kid that you know the pure blood kind of just little jerk.
(28:26):
And then, you know, I just think, you know, for him. I know he's not really villainous yet. His dad's probably more villainous at that point but for me it's Malfoy.
Yeah, I actually said Draco too I felt like he was just so ridiculously condescending for a first. Yeah, he handed up so well I just made me smile. You know I could picture how Harry felt about him, you know, like when he's first kind of inviting and he's like I can choose my own friends kind of thing.
(28:55):
Right. No, I said that about Dave too.
You'll soon find out that some wizarding families are better than others Potter.
You don't want to go and make you friends with the wrong sort.
I can help you there.
I think I can tell the wrong sort for myself thanks.
(29:18):
What about you Kathy. You know my brain kind of goes to Vernon Dursley.
I think the first one that right pick, you know, like the first, you're getting to know Harry and like, oh my gosh he's treated horribly you know, who's worse though him or Bertunia.
Gosh, yeah they're both terrible. Yeah, you can come from both together really good. Yeah, they're so bad.
(29:41):
Yeah, so I picked Professor Quirrell but kind of for a different reason like he's like my least favorite because he is like not scary to me it like really at all and he's kind of annoying even. So, I don't know like, it's like the bottom of the list.
You know what I mean. How can you be scared of the character that has been scared the whole movie he kind of yeah acts like you know yeah exactly.
(30:05):
He's already scared of you. Yeah, yeah, even when he like finally goes to fight him he's just doing what Voldemort tells him and he's like scared of Voldemort too so yep.
I'm more scared of the troll in the dungeon, then, Professor Quirrell, one little mess up in the movie if you've seen when Harry first meets Professor Quirrell.
He now obviously the back of the wears the thing on his head the back of his head is supposed to be Voldemort. But if you look in close in the where he meets him for the first time, you can see hair on the back of his neck.
(30:36):
Wait a minute.
It's Voldemort's beard dude.
Oh, yeah, that's good.
That's awesome.
Is this a good time Kathy to share that a little known fact about Quirrell. Oh yeah if you want.
Sounds like a good time for me. What's up.
It's in the book and short we'd seen it online.
But I guess in the book, Fred and George, they bewitched some snowballs, and they like hit Professor Quirrell and the back of the head with the snowballs is this like quick little like chapter 12, they got in trouble for it yeah, but basically like they are unknowingly like hitting
(31:11):
Voldemort in the face, tilting him with snowballs.
I love it. Interesting. So, so you're telling me there's books for this movie.
Yes, John.
Very interesting fact, guys. Check it out. Go to Barnes and Noble everybody.
(31:32):
That's hilarious. No, that's crazy.
Which the snowballs, so they didn't actually throw them.
Oh they're hitting Voldemort in the face. That's awesome.
How about you guys, your favorite scenes and one of your favorite quotes. I don't really have a favorite quote in this one, but my overall and this isn't really a favorite scene.
(31:59):
Every time I watch I'm just like, I love it. I love how Harry is just, it's more prevalent in the first movies obviously because he's finding out all about the wizarding world, but I love how he's impressed by the magic, you know, he's got nothing going on in his life, he lives under the stairs,
talking to the Burmese python that's in the zoo in the beginning of the movie but just the way that he can talk to the snakes he's impressed about that.
(32:21):
And then he removes the glass how it just brought a smile to his face that he, you know, he knew he did that. When Hagrid started the fire with the umbrella, you know, things like that, given the piggy wiggly tail.
Yeah. Even when Hermione gave the old Oculus Reparo, he was just fascinated by magic and how it works.
(32:43):
And that's something that can actually be done in his life. Yeah, so, and that's a theme throughout the movie and I'll kind of touch on the other ones throughout the other movies later but that's just so I don't have a favorite scene but that I do find awesome that plays through all the movies.
Yeah, I think so too, John. In fact, that's probably, you know, it's similar to what mine was like my favorite scene is that first meal at Hogwarts and the sorting hat, like, in part because what you said, you can see in his face that he's in awe of it all like I'm surrounded by magic
(33:15):
and this is amazing, you know, but also I love it just in the parts before it when everybody's anticipating what he's going to be sorted as. Yeah, yeah, like the professors and Dumbledore and everybody.
And it's all like, you can see the anticipation and everything and just, and the way like he looks over at Snape and you know touches his forehead, and then Snape does this side glance at Professor Quirrell, it's like a little bit of a, you know, like a foreshadowing
(33:44):
yeah, I didn't appreciate it my first time it wasn't my favorite scene of the first view, but I'm later views. I just kept catching little nuances in their expression. And just that first little scene of five or 10 minutes of just so many people's expressions like so telling
quote. So it's when Dumbledore says, it takes a great deal of bravery to stand up to your enemies, but a great deal more to stand up to your friends.
(34:12):
You know, and I love it but part of it is kind of funny to me because they're giving out points at the house.
Harry and Ron get like five points for like defeating a troll you know and saving money, and then they get, he gets like 10 points for standing up for his friends you know.
Like Ron gets 50 points for doing a really good chess match.
(34:37):
Yeah.
Yeah.
And it's just, it's just enough to for you know of course Griffin or to win so.
Yeah, like Dumbledore's just sitting there doing the math in his head real quick. Yeah, 505010 okay more points. Yeah, 10 more points.
(35:00):
Yeah.
I'm dying that chest. That's true. They could have walked around the chessboard there was plenty of space.
All right, Kathy, what about you what's your favorite quote and scene from the movie. The first movie. Let's see it well there's so many. Yeah.
And I agree with Ben, you know, like, just like his magic and just that having a sense of his identity, you know, all these lies, you know, about his parents, and who he is and not treated, you know, very well and everyone's like oh my gosh you're Harry Potter, but, but just
(35:35):
like, I think, along with that, his identity, it's kind of like, it's a happy sad but with when he's in front of the mirror of your side right yeah, and he sees his parents, and like that, I think like that warms my heart.
And one of the things is that he has, you know, an understanding of who he is and his parents and, and it's sad though. So my favorite quote is, I love like the scenes where Dumbledore and Harry just like to talk, you know, and the one at the end, where he says,
(36:10):
so Dumbledore is talking to him, and he says Harry. Do you know why Professor Quirrell cannot bear to have you touch him. And Harry nods no. It was because of your mother, she sacrificed herself for you. And that kind of act leaves a mark.
Harry reaches for a scar and he says no no. This kind of mark cannot be seen, it lives in your very skin. Harry asks what is it and Dumbledore says love Harry love.
(36:34):
So that's one of my favorite quotes just rings true to me and just as a mom and you know I'm sentimental, so sacrificing and love, and it's very powerful.
That's awesome.
Very good choices I like it. So for me, like Kathy said there's so many good scenes I mean it's so hard and just for tonight just to pick one.
(36:57):
One of my favorites is Harry getting his wand at Ollivander's. I mean that like kind of like Kathy was saying about his identity and figuring out this like gift that he has and what makes him special, you know, and and then the wand is huge in the magical world
and so finding the wand that fits for him. I think that's really special and cool. And when we've gone to Universal Studios with our kids, our oldest daughter was one of those ones that they picked out at Ollivander's to like do the little experience.
(37:28):
And it was so magical for her and you know having the little special effects they do and stuff and and the guy that played Ollivander's was really good and stuff so I love that scene.
And then our second daughter actually got picked when we went the second time. Yeah, so both of them got to have that special experience pretty cool. Yeah, pretty special. My favorite quote is Dumbledore when he says,
(37:49):
It does not do to dwell on dreams, Harry, and forget to live.
I think that's a pretty cool thought. He's always so wise with the things he says and the idea that you know you actually have to live your life and do and try to achieve your dreams right? So yeah.
He says to him at the mirror right? Yep, at the mirror, yeah. Because he was spending all his time there. Yeah, exactly. Yeah, exactly.
(38:15):
Yeah, speaking of the Mirror of Erised, that's one of the interesting differences that we have found between the book and the movie. John, I know you haven't read them. We're trying to sell this to you so you'll go out and read the books.
There's some pretty cool interesting things. But for the Mirror of Erised, in the film he only sees his parents right? But in the novel he sees his whole extended family standing behind him in the mirror, which is kind of cool.
(38:38):
So it's not just his parents that are kind of behind him, but he gets to see all that. Other interesting things, when the day of Voldemort's downfall, it's in the beginning of the book and Vernon Dursley encounters all kinds of wizarding world references.
There's wizards talking about the Potters or celebrating the end of the Dark Era. Professor McGonagall is reading a map while she's still a cat. And there's owls everywhere. I think that's kind of fun.
(39:07):
Another character that's a lot in the book but not in the movies is Peeves the Poltergeist. It's pretty funny because he does pranks and songs. And speaking of songs, actually the sorting hat sings a song too. And none of that makes it into the movie. So just some interesting differences between the book and the movie.
Alright, so John and I are Harry Potter nerds. If you haven't already figured that out from this episode, all the time we'll be texting each other stuff, just random things you know, but Harry Potter slips in there quite a bit. So I went in and found our texts back and forth about Harry Potter things that kind of have been like, man, why didn't they just do this or what's up with that, you know?
(39:45):
So here's some of the texts that I found in our text chain. So John was saying, I was just watching Harry Potter again and in the Sorcerer's Stone, when they get to the wizard's chest, there's clearly room to walk around the board. They didn't even have to play.
I got one that says, I forget, have we talked about the crazy point disparity in that movie? Like, you stopped a giant troll and saved Hermione's life. Plus five points. Wait, you stayed out late? Minus 50 points? Like, that's terrible.
(40:14):
And John said, if the troll in the girl's bathroom in the first Harry Potter movie fell two seconds earlier onto Harry, the whole series would have been over. You know, it's just like a matter of seconds.
Right.
All right.
Hey, John.
Kelly Bean.
No!
I was hoping he all forgets.
(40:36):
Oh, this is a ghost.
All right. Just so you guys can see, I'll do it at random.
Green peas, green peas.
I don't know what it is. I'm going to show you guys. I want green peas. Get out of here. I'm going to show you guys. And then I'll tell you what I think it is.
All right. Oh my gosh. This is like...
(40:59):
Because John doesn't like green peas.
No.
People don't.
Yeah, if people haven't been super fans of the show.
Green peas is like the worst. Oh, it looks like maybe earwax or something. It's light yellow or rotten egg.
Marshmallow.
Yeah.
You're so kind, Kathy.
Well, you don't even really like marshmallows either, right?
I don't. I'll take that up with the other ones.
(41:20):
Okay.
That's true. It's better than rotten egg.
I don't know.
I can't tell you yet, man.
Maybe it's earwax. It's kind of like not too strong.
I think that was just lemon.
Yay, lemon.
Yay. Not bad. Not bad.
Oh, thank goodness. Okay.
Dude, that's one for one. So far, so good.
(41:43):
All right.
You know, one of the things I like about Harry Potter, all the books really is just, and the movies, is the just seeing growth in Harry.
And there's just so much psychology that you see and you watch it.
And there's just so much that teaches you about like resilience and overcoming obstacles.
And I think that's part of the draw to it.
You know, you see him at the beginning struggling so much.
(42:07):
And every one of us struggles at some time in our life, you know.
And then you see what happens where he goes from there and see him overcoming obstacles and, you know, facing things.
And so one of the things that I noticed is like, you know, you have this comparison, I guess, between the way Harry faces something new versus the Dursleys, right?
(42:30):
And so the Dursleys, they don't want to deal with magic. It's like this new thing entering into their life.
They don't want to have a part of it. And they just like time and again, they just keep trying to ignore it.
You know, just try not to face it. Try not to think about it. Pretend it's not there, you know.
And it doesn't make anything better for them. You know, it doesn't really improve their lives at all.
(42:53):
And yet when you see Harry in the Sorcerer's Stone, he like time and again just accepts facing something new, you know.
He's willing to take it on and do something with it instead of like trying to pretend it's not there.
Or like if he had reacted to magic the way his adopted father, it would have been, it would have been no book. It just would have been horrible, you know.
(43:19):
But the fact that he's, you know, embraces change and is willing to do his best to make the most of it shows that he, you know, he has what in psychology we call an internal locus of control, you know, where he doesn't feel like everything is everything good or bad that happens.
His life is external. He feels like he can have an influence for change.
(43:42):
And it kind of shows like it's funny that snake scene actually is sort of symbolic of him being freed too, you know.
Like he leaves the Dursleys and is able to like be his best self. And he goes to, but he knows that he's not where he belongs and he's stuck there.
But then when he has the opportunity, he gets, you know, he's freed and he races it all and wants to go where he really belongs, you know.
(44:10):
So then, and in Chamber of Secrets, it shows for him like how much resiliency is somewhat dependent on community support, you know.
They show the Weasleys, like he's stuck in at the beginning, Dobby's like kind of ruins things for him and keeping him stuck in his house, you know.
And the Dursleys just like locked down the windows and everything and he hasn't been getting any communication from his friends and that really brings him into a bad place.
(44:41):
But when Ron and his brothers notice that he hasn't been responding to the letters, they worry about him and they check up on him and help free him basically, you know.
And it just goes to show like when we're in a rough place, how big of a difference people in our community that care and reach out to us and really try to bring us out of our funk, you know, and feeling stuck or something like that.
(45:06):
It really makes a difference in overcoming hard times.
Yeah, I like and the Prisoner of Azkaban, they show the psychology of, you know, people who've been through trauma and having to face that trauma again can be so devastating.
When he first faces the Dementor, like it, it really shook him up.
(45:28):
And I imagine it probably brought him back to when he was a baby and first attacked, you know, by Voldemort, you know, like that feeling of evil and everything.
And then every time afterwards, like you could tell that it's still weighing on him and anything even close to it just really impacts him.
But then they show how like remembering the good during bad times helps push you through those bad times.
(45:55):
And so when those bad things happen, and they bring back this flood of memories and evil and darkness in you, if you can just hold on to anything good that you remember and like focus on that.
It's hard to keep like two thoughts in your mind at the same time.
And it's like a power you have to like stop focusing and kind of fixating on the negative that is really driving you down. I think that's just like an awesome like metaphor there of like the Patronus, you know, imagining the silly thing, you know, that when they have the Boggarts that helps to face your fears to overcome and stop doing the bad.
(46:36):
Yeah, yeah, this is awesome. I love when you talk psychology on here on your podcast. And I think it's JK Rowling did such a good job in her books.
Just, this is a fictional magical story, right, but there's some real things in her stories like, you know, you're talking about the Dementors, and she said that they kind of represented like when she was going through and experiencing depression.
(47:03):
And I love like everything that you said about that. So I just want to add that, that like her real life experiences with these things, you know, with having to be resilient and she had a really hard life before she was writing these books and I just love how she incorporated real life
trials and depression and in like this story for kids that they can overcome, you know, like you were talking about resiliency and community support and remembering, you know, the good the having that Patronus, you know, conjuring it by tapping into those happy, joyful moments in our lives to help us so
(47:40):
Ben, you're the expert here on the psychology, but I just wanted to, that was something I wanted.
That's a great comment and I, you know, it's interesting to think about the, the third one where, you know, it comes so close to the kiss of the Dementor, and he had that hope that he thought his dad was going to conjure that that Patronus and, and then he realized he had to do it from himself from inside.
(48:04):
And I just think there's some interesting symbolism there too, that like, you know, we can find hope in others but also that ultimately has to come from within ourselves. So anyways, I thought that's kind of cool.
Thanks, that was really good.
I thought it was interesting and you see it especially in the books but even in the movies, sort of like Ron, you see each of the characters, almost through Harry's eyes. And so when you first see Ron and Hermione and everything like, it's like their caricatures in a sense, and as he gets to know them better like you start seeing them more deeply as well.
(48:42):
Yeah, but it's also like Ron and Hermione like almost extensions of himself is showing aspects of himself in psychology described like the ego and the super ego.
And in a sense, Ron represents the id of like, just those passions, and just like underlying feelings that like, you know, like drive us you know and so his fears is, you know, like he's the one most expressive when he's afraid.
(49:14):
And it's almost like excited when he sees the food, you know what I mean? And that's like, that's a part of every person, but it's like expressly shown through Ron, you know, and then the super ego is kind of more like the, almost like the conscience, you know that Hermione is always
like saying, hey, this is kind of against the rules and you know maybe, you know, like, hey, you need to think things through and be careful and all this stuff. And then Harry is like the ego that kind of has to navigate between the two and make decisions you know and in the present
(49:48):
and kind of consciously think through these things. And so I thought that was an interesting thing that she put in the story to kind of like help you, we could see our aspects of ourselves in each of the characters.
I had never thought about that before.
That's a super interesting connection for sure. Yeah, kind of an interesting twist on it if like one of those types of movies where you find out that people aren't real like it was always just Harry and that those other two were, you know, kind of like a beautiful mind.
(50:21):
But no, that's a super interesting super cool idea for sure. What else Ben? I don't know I just think it's cool how in general.
They show, were always made to kind of like root for the underdog. Right. They also want to be the best so like they show Harry winning at Quidditch and winning the House Cup and in a sense, having a chance to be the best of things and many times.
(50:44):
But also he's sort of the underdog who's like knows nothing about magic you know like he's the most lost of all the characters you know in a sense. Yeah. And a lot of the other characters are kind of underdogs too you know you see Hagrid who
he's not allowed to use magic at first and like and Ron, who's often put down because his family's poor, and you know, really you just go through like the best characters, and they're often the ones that have something against them like some handicap that you kind of want to root for them
(51:18):
and you know, overcome and grow from. And, and yet they each have their time to shine too. So it's kind of cool that way. Love it. I love it. Good stuff. Thanks Ben. You always bring good stuff to the show about psychology.
Hey, thanks so much for listening to part one of this episode stay tuned for more fun and part two.
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