With the cinematic release of Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince coming later this week, I thought I’d revisit something that’s bothered me for a long time. Here at Cracked, we’ve discussed the Harry Potter universe many times before, discussing individual movies, deconstructing the novels, speculating about whether the characters are doing it and arguing about whether us contemplating children doing it constituted an arrestable offense. But one thing we’ve never discussed is the sport of Quidditch, or more specifically, what a festering sore of a sport it is.
A brief explanation for our readers who aren’t children or haven’t read the novels or seen the films or eaten the promotional Harry Potter Chicken Sandwich at Burger King. Quidditch is a fictional sport invented by author J.K. Rowling for the Harry Potter novels. In it, two teams mounted on flying broomsticks attempt to score goals on one another in a sort of aerial combination of rugby and baseball. Amongst their number are players whose sole job is to hit baseball sized objects at competing players, in an attempt to maim them. If you think that doesn’t sound too bad, you’re right. As described, that sport is awesome, like a dinosaur doing a huge jump on a BMX bike.
The problem lies with the Golden Snitch. The Golden Snitch is an enchanted flying ball which darts around the field of play while the game progresses. Two players from either team attempt to capture the Golden Snitch. Capturing the Snitch rewards the team with 15 goals and ends the game immediately. So basically, unless one team has accumulated a 15 goal differential over the other (i.e. a comprehensive ass whupping), whoever captures the Snitch wins. The rest of the players simply don’t matter. Even if your team is saddled with rookies, injured players or white guys, so long as your guy catches the Golden Snitch, you’ve won.
Imagine a football game, where you’ve got two teams running plays, throwing touchdowns and slapping each other on the ass. You know, football. But at the same time in the middle of the field you’ve got two guys playing tetherball. And the first guy to wind the ball completely up scores 93 points and ends the game. Your team could have Peyton “Laser Rocket Arm” Manning throwing passes to a platoon of Jerry Rices, and it wouldn’t make a difference if the other team had a real tall kid.
How could Rowling have written this down and not realized what a piece of stool she’d created? Clearly the rules of Quidditch were designed to offer a role where Harry Potter could win games single-handedly. In a universe that revolves around Harry Potter this shouldn’t be too surprising. That it’s done so clumsily boggles the mind–the rest of the novels are otherwise logically coherent. Is it possible Rowling has some sort of dyslexia where she’s unable to wrap her head around sports, or even to comprehend what’s going on while watching a sporting event? Sort of like what John Madden has?
I’m far from the first person to have noticed this. The real world sport of Muggle Quidditch attempts to take the fictional sport and bring it to life in meatspace. If it helps you to visualize, imagine a sport played by people who enjoy Disc Golf and Live Action Role Playing. Could one of these, horribly, horribly mentally-ill people have cottoned on to the fact that the published rules for the game make no sense? Why yes they have. Muggle Quidditch deals with the Golden Snitch problem in a sensible way–by chasing a spandex clad man across the field while trying to grab one of his three balls.
Both these men volunteered to do this.
Critically, the value of the snitch has been reduced to three goals, though its capture still ends the game. This no longer guarantees a win by capturing the snitch, but it still makes it nearly impossible to win the game without it. So it’s a small improvement, but not a total one. I guess expecting great things while observing people who run around wearing capes with brooms clenched between their legs is a recipe for disappointment and full body shivers.
Recall that in his first match, Harry Potter caught the snitch by accident, in his mouth.
I suppose I may be overthinking this. The first book where the rules were originally laid out (Harry Potter and the Escape to Witch Mountain) was written primarily for kids, and it’s reasonable for Rowling and her Editor to have assumed that children might not care too much about the tactical or strategic implications of the rules for the flying broom game. That nasally-voiced nerds like myself got a hold of the novels was a fluke–a once in a generation turdstorm of commercial success. That I care about the rules for a fictional game says more about me and the priorities I’ve made in my life (Doritos, Harry Potter, Loneliness) than it does about Rowling.
On the other hand, I have a column to write, and non-nude soul searching rarely gets more page views than angry calls-to-arms printed in capital letters. Extreme action is going to be required if we’re to get these novels and films changed now, which as near as I can tell IS THE ONLY ACCEPTABLE OUTCOME. I’m asking all Cracked readers who will be attending this week’s premiere of the new Harry Potter movie to do so with a ball hanging out of the back of their shorts. If questioned by theater management or the media, scream, “LOOK WHAT YOU’VE FORCED ME TO DO! LOOK AT THE RUIN YOU HAVE WROUGHT J.K. ROWLING!” Try and swing around a bit to get your snitch to collide with people nearby. If striking people with a spare testicle isn’t a positive way to enact change, I don’t know what is. Dangle proud, brothers and sisters. Dangle strong.
__
This entry was posted on Tuesday, July 14th, 2009 at 4:00 am and is filed under Harry Potter. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.
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November 5th, 2009 at 11:37 am
I don’t know what’s more disturbing to me: the fact that my 22 year old brain JUST realized the biggest bull shit rule in Quidditch, or the fact that I got annoyed at brian for being wrong about the World Cup game in Book 4. Cedric Diggory, really?? He’s the one who dies at the end. Alb Vega is right about Viktor Krum. The only Hogwart’s student that was mentioned as a professional Quidditch player was Oliver Wood and he wasn’t even playing that game AND he was a reserve player.
…scratch that. I’m disturbed that I know way too much about Harry Potter and am 22…
November 3rd, 2009 at 7:45 pm
In book 4, who captures the Snitch in the losing team is Viktor Krum, not Cedric.
Don’t argue with internet comedy writers AND another nerds without bringing your A+ game.
November 3rd, 2009 at 4:44 pm
1. quidditch=intense full contact sport, we had a player get a concussion while playing, and another twist an ankle.
2.Muggle quidditch can be played without a snitch and with a time or score limit.
3. by reducing the snitchs value to 30(50 by my league) it is still winable .
4.I have seen ninety point quidditch blowouts in snitchless games.
5. Book 4 Cedric digory catches the snitch when the ireland team is up by 160 points(16 goals) and his team loses.
Dont argue with a nerd without bringing your A game
October 25th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
fucking hilarious enough said
September 30th, 2009 at 3:37 am
I know this is a older article but whenever I see/read about rl Quidditch I can’t help but wonder why they don’t try to make the sport more legitimate?
As in, throw away the brooms, and the snitch dynamic has to change. I think a better way would just be to have an official use a pitching machine pointed upwards shoot a gold ball into the air randomly over the field, and only the two seekers are allowed to catch it. On a full sized field this would take both luck, and a considerable amount of skill (catching a fast falling light colored ball that may land anywhere on the field would be difficult). I just can’t help but think about how ridiculous the players look when they try to retain some of the whimsy of the game in the books.
August 29th, 2009 at 6:14 pm
Does anyone else think of Aussie football when watching Quidditch?
August 26th, 2009 at 12:41 pm
Fucking hilarious, great stuff, keep it up.
The rest of you poodle fuckers need to chill out, christ, it’s just humor, don’t run and tell your mom till she’s done blowing me.
August 13th, 2009 at 5:56 pm
Maybe in hundreds of years we’ll have hoverbrooms and flying ai snitches and we can actually make the whole thing work, which lets face it, say what you will about the guys jumping around with a broom between their legs, if they could make quidditch work for real it’d be fucking awesome.
August 13th, 2009 at 2:08 pm
That guy in the video actually said that in hundreds of years from now stadiums will be filled with hundreds of thousands of people watching World Cup Quidditch. Noo trace of sarcasm. I have seen a lot of fans in my life, of all kinds, but that was still the biggest shock ever.
August 12th, 2009 at 8:29 pm
Just a few notes,
1. Darkmage, you’re a fucking moron. plane and simple, you are talking shit about books you haven’t even read, and basing your complaints about said books on the movies? How fucking stupid are you, seriously? Was your post in fact written by a kind social worker who translates you’re involuntary drooling into words to post on the internet?
2. Yes, Quidditch rules are a little broken, but it’s not a series of books about sports, it’s just an extra bit of fleshing out the wizarding world. Basically making them more similar to non wizarding folk and at the same time more different.
3. Complaining that harry potter and twilight are fucking up the mythology they’re based on is idiotic. It’s like criticizing The first Matrix (talk shit about 2 and 3 at will, I don’t care) because it wasn’t true to the way robots take over the world in The Terminator. Twilight, and LOTR and Harry Potter, Wheel of Time, Sword of Truth, all these are their own mythology that can do things however the fuck they want to do them. Most of the griping seems to center around twilight, so i’m going to use that as an example. Look at other vampire fiction. Lost Boys, you kill a vamp, they might explode or do all sorts of other crazy shit, Buffy, you stake a vamp and it immediately turns to dust, or makes painful sounds for the next several hours, even beyond the end of the movie. Some movies you have vampires stop being vampires when their creator is destroyed, others you don’t. Short version, damn near every vampire story has something about it that doesn’t mesh with the other versions, nearly every fantasy has elements that don’t remain true to rules established in traditional mythologies. If you don’t like that little detail, just spend your time reading something else instead of posting jackass comments on the web about how this book or that book sucks. Let people form their own god damned opinion.
Finally, ShellBullet, I feel a need to respond to you because your comment is most recent and kinda needs addressing imho. Who are you to advocate saying no to someones hobby? Do you see larpers going around typing in their penis compensating all caps SAY NO TO NASCAR (Incidently, Fuck nascar, watch it if you want, but keep that shit away from me) or SAY NO TO MUSIC. No, you don’t. Have you ever actually met a larper, or gods forbid, played in a larp? The participants of a larp are just people who have found an unusual (And fun) hobby, and aren’t hurting anyone (The idiot vamp larpers who try to involve non participants are the exception here) They’re just having their own bit of fun, you should leave them to it and, as I said above, instead of bitching about other people’s hobbies, pick up one of your own because you apparently have a lot of spare time on your hands (Says the guy who is writing an unusually long post)
August 11th, 2009 at 5:04 pm
If I ever saw people playing quidditch in real life I would take any objects at hand and beating them over the head to hopefully make them realize what they are doing. And also SAY NO TO LARPING
August 7th, 2009 at 11:06 am
Okay, I think Quidditch is pretty cool, though the point score for the snitch should probably be lowered, but this is still a damn funny article. Good job.
August 4th, 2009 at 4:20 pm
Look, it’s pretty simple. The seekers are the main event, but imagine a couple of hours of looking at two dudes looking for a snitch? Would have been the most boring sport in the world. So, you have, like, a warm-up act for people to watch while they are waiting for the real players to do something. Which is the chasers and keepers. Then, because that’s really just the same as soccer/handball, but in 3D, you add the final element: the beaters, who just fly around interrupting both of the simultaneously played sports, making it much more audience-oriented.
August 1st, 2009 at 11:26 pm
For gods sake. it would be one thing if they intended to make it a real, legitimate sport. These people are only trying to enact their wildest, saddest fantasies. Why the fuck else would you run around clenching a goddamn broom between your legs!? Also, how do the bludgeon ball things…whateverthefuck, work? Do they have a couple people on the sidelines lobbing bowling balls at the opposing team?
July 28th, 2009 at 9:56 pm
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July 22nd, 2009 at 2:26 am
There is another problem with the while snitch thing… If your team is down more than 15 points, why the hell would your seeker even try to catch the thing?
July 21st, 2009 at 1:23 pm
I think Rowling knew that she made it too big of a difference by the time she wrote the fourth book. In the Quidditch world cup, the team that catches the snitch and ends the game is actually 170 points back, even though they knew catching it would cause them to lose. She was probably trying to make it seem like a less important factor.
July 21st, 2009 at 11:45 am
I enjoyed this article, and found it funny, but the tetherball-in-middle-of-a-football-game analogy doesn’t work, and the other players aren’t irrelevant. The other team’s beaters try to knock the seeker about and prevent him finding the snitch, so how well his teammates protect him (and disrupt the opponent’s seeker) is crucial.
So if the tetherball game was taking place, but linebackers were trying to crash into them and guard their own tetherball player, it would make a difference!
July 20th, 2009 at 2:40 am
Surely the lack of balance could be addressed somewhat by removing the connection between the snitch being caught and the end of the game? If the matches are timed, and snitch catching is neither necessary to end the game nor ends the game itself, then the role isn’t as crucial, yes? The snitch would provide a significant, but not decisive, advantage, and the entire game strategy does not depend on the seekers timing their capture for when their team is either winning or less than 3 goals behind.
July 18th, 2009 at 5:52 pm
Ideas for IRL Quidditch
The idea of the snitch was stolen from the snipe, right?
We’ll have two guys go bird hunting for a sparrow released during the match. With M21s. Yea- I’d watch that.
July 18th, 2009 at 12:17 pm
“The rest of the players simply don’t matter. Even if your team is saddled with rookies, injured players or white guys, so long as your guy catches the Golden Snitch, you’ve won.”
Best line of the entire article.
July 17th, 2009 at 6:13 pm
Everybody knows that the scoring system for Quidditch is screwed up, but it’s seriously really fun to play. People should try it before they hate on it (and yes, I am the captain and founder of my college’s Quidditch team, though we do have a hard time getting people to take the time to play)
July 17th, 2009 at 5:44 am
J.K. Rowling’s “Golden Snitch” smells like lighning bolts, yeast infection, and broom sticks (or #2 pencils?).
July 16th, 2009 at 8:28 pm
DH:
Newer plan: Kill Stephanie Meyer, replace her with a wanna-be emo girl in middle school, title the book, “Sparkle Skin” and watch the dough roll in.
Did you know?
If you put 80 monkeys in a room with typewriters, eventually they will write Shakespear. They’ll write Stephanie Meyers in two days.
July 16th, 2009 at 8:05 pm
Sadly most of my attention in this article was the fact that Burger King doesn’t have any tie ins with Harry Potter (yes, I work there). It just goes to show I live a sad, sad life.
July 16th, 2009 at 5:51 pm
“…by chasing a spandex clad man across the field while trying to grab one of his three balls.”
Testicle humor is welcome humor in my book. Hi-larious article!
July 16th, 2009 at 11:26 am
Reed: There HAS to be one person who got rich writing fan-fic or no-one would bothe-Hang on a minute, that’s a good thing. OK - new plan: rob Stephanie Meyers.
July 16th, 2009 at 11:03 am
Okay, seriously. JKR’s style isn’t that complex, she’s no Hemmingway or Dickens, but it’s still better than average. But the reason the books were successful was because she created a fantastic world, rich characters, and a complex and intricate plot. So that, AJD, is why her slightly simplistic prose is forgivable.
And should we REALLY worry about her writing when Stephanie Meyers is a millionaire? She writes like a sixth grade girl on a fanfic site.
July 16th, 2009 at 10:54 am
AJD u r so smart. Plz give the world ur story to save me from jk rowling’s bad righting. Hellllo, giant spiders? Dusn’t anybody read LOTR’s anymore? Tolkin obviusly created that, along with wizards, and magic, and da heros joorney. How cud rowling take that mythic storytype told so much throughout hstry, make an imaginative world wif good and intresting caracters? Wat a ripoff. I hate her 2. Thank u, ajd, 4 shwing me the light.
July 16th, 2009 at 8:13 am
Harry Potter is a curse set loose on helpless dumbass children and their uneducated elders who decided to start reading at the age of 32. The whole collection is a corrupted melting pot of stolen ideas and disturbingly familiar themes and settings. J.K.-I used the ideas from better book series-Rowling can suck my balls, she’s not an author she’s a leech. What the fuck happened to the world that this type of bullshit writing can be considered of any quality. The only good thing I can say about Harry Potter is that an untalented and uninspired author used the intelligence level of your average retard and her parasitic ways to make herself excedingly rich, which I can find no fault with.
July 15th, 2009 at 9:55 pm
PoeticAvarice:
Way to make yourself look like a douche. Just because we know how the game works doesn’t necessarily mean we’re Harry Potter fans. I (against my will) heard it from a friend who likes the series, that’s the only reason I know what the hell Quidditch is, and why people seem to enjoy it. Otherwise, I wouldn’t have understood a word of this article since I’d be too busy, oh, I dunno, making something of my time.
Yeah yeah, go ahead and send me replies telling me to shut up and die or whatever, but words don’t make me act. They make me rebel against whoever’s demanding that I do something that I refuse to do.
Good luck getting me to be quiet about this issue.
July 15th, 2009 at 9:17 pm
Man, this article is hilarious!
I never thought about it this way before, but you’re right. Stupid adolescents with their attentions striving ways…. ^_^
July 15th, 2009 at 7:36 pm
Here, lets settle these arguments (it’s sad that I even have to use that word). ANYONE with ANY knowledge of this game, aside from what they may have seen in a movie, is fucking retarded. Let it go, it helps no one to argue fiction. Doubly so for arguing fiction for adolescents.
July 15th, 2009 at 6:31 pm
Seriously PP, just shut up. I never even read the books so I’m not defending those. I’m just telling you to shut up because nobody likes an assface.
July 15th, 2009 at 5:09 pm
article sucked….again….quit while you re behind buchholz!
do something good and bring wolinsky back, at least he was funny!!
July 15th, 2009 at 5:01 pm
To pp:
Because I have better things to do with my time than argue about the obvious flaws of this that and the other.
and before you start, that does NOT include insulting people for being annoying, whiny bitches.
July 15th, 2009 at 12:54 pm
Correction: Catching the snitch earns the team 150 points. Usually that is enough to win the game BUT there have been cases where the team that catches the snitch STILL loses. See the fourth book, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.
July 15th, 2009 at 12:45 pm
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July 15th, 2009 at 11:30 am
@Jason Haley: Dang. I’m not being completely serious. I’m trying to expose how much you guys care about a children’s book/movie series that has a few flaws. Why don’t you bash pokemon or batman or any other popular franchise because they all have flaws.
July 15th, 2009 at 11:18 am
Theenie (who is a genius) writes:
“I just wanted to say that Reed’s comment has to be the funniest thing I have read yet on Cracked and I am a huge fan of this site. I hereby nominate Reed as a new writer on Cracked devoted entirely to Harry Potter-themed articles and videos.”
Reed will accept said nomination, so long as it was not written in sarcasm, and thanks Mr/s. Theenie for her words of kindness.
In other news: we are getting way too serious about this Quidditch debate. It’s a game. played on broomsticks. I cannot accurately discern who is a troll, who is a geek, and who is a blithering idiot (Well, I certainly fall into that last category).
Can’t we just agree that Emma Watson is hot and get on with it?
July 15th, 2009 at 10:33 am
Ok, I have to say this article was REALLY hilarious. Easily the best I’ve read on Cracked in a while… short and packed with funny.
“Your team could have Peyton “Laser Rocket Arm” Manning throwing passes to a platoon of Jerry Rices, and it wouldn’t make a difference if the other team had a real tall kid.”
I never even realized how utterly retarded Quidditch really is until I read this article… thank you for opening my eyes.
July 15th, 2009 at 10:30 am
You know I never thought about the rules of Quidditch before. I wonder if JK Rowling knew of the inherent flaw of her game, or if she blindly thought it up in a probably LSD induced “dream” she had when she was “poor?”
July 15th, 2009 at 10:04 am
This article reads like it was hashed together in about 2 minutes. Stick to returning comfort wipes. It came out a lot funnier. The harry potter thing is really getting overdone a bit. This is almost as bad as all the batman bullshit is getting to be.
July 15th, 2009 at 9:42 am
Does anybody else think PP’s being a bit of a loudmouth and needs to can it before we all get pissed off because he’s being fucking annoying and the opposite of helpful?
I do.
July 15th, 2009 at 9:05 am
Too much time, way too much time.
July 15th, 2009 at 8:11 am
@Darkflame: talk about obsessed. lol. You seriously get so offended? Look at it at another angle: the main characters are kids. Of course Harry will be told some bullshit about “the power of love” saving him. His mom died, and he needs to be told it wasn’t for nothing. And he is better than others at spells and such. The “genetic condition” thing was partly a joke.. How would we know? Oh and how do you know luck isn’t affected by his magical aura or some shit? We are talking about the world where MAGIC is a reality. MAGIC. And the fact that Dumbledore is the smartest: it could be just rumors made by kids. Kids need an idol; they’ll make anything up. He was offered to be Minister of Magic? Big deal; it’s politics, not skill of magic or intelligence..
BAM! /end rant
July 15th, 2009 at 7:59 am
No Sam Andrews, it’s the other way around. People who write articles like this and complain take Harry Potter too seriously.
July 15th, 2009 at 7:40 am
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July 15th, 2009 at 7:39 am
Hey now - calm down with the name calling, etc. Just be glad that they are reading at all!
July 15th, 2009 at 7:18 am
hey…hey… I am a manager of a LARP (live action role play)
I understand this makes me both strange and utterly unable to remove the word GEEK from my forehead
but PLEASE do not put me in the same category as these f-ed up weirdos…
July 15th, 2009 at 7:18 am
Good Christ on a crutch. I always thought that Twilight fans were the worst kind of literary scum, but you Potter fans coming out of the woodwork are truly opening my eyes.
July 15th, 2009 at 5:23 am
[...] This image needs a caption, BAD (taken from http://www.cracked.com/blog/quidditch-is-bullshit/) [...]
July 15th, 2009 at 4:33 am
There should be no points for the snitch. It gets released 15/20/30/whatever min. after the start of the match, and when it’s caught the match ends, with whoever is ahead winning. The seeker of whoever is ahead tries to catch it, the seeker of whoever is behind tries to prevent the other seeker from catching it. If the match is tied, it cannot be caught.
This way seekers have to play both O and D, & the real game is played by the other folks (beaters? jerkers? rimmers? I forget).
July 15th, 2009 at 3:17 am
I’ve been saying this for years. This article is way too late.
July 15th, 2009 at 3:16 am
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July 15th, 2009 at 2:17 am
I’d just like to point out that practically everything in Rowling’s Wide World of Wizarding is based on some retarded in-world tradition rather than any sort of logical thought process, so Quidditch actually fits right in.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:04 pm
I think that the realism of the Snitch problem can be solved easily… with bullets… or paintballs. First “Seeker” to catch one in his hand ends the game and wins fifteen points…and a high five from Mr. T
July 14th, 2009 at 10:45 pm
@darkmage thank you for pointing out the real problem with harry potters world. Yes the rules of quidditch might suck but @ Umm and @nova it is a mythical law( for those of us that are educated) witches and wizards dont mix just like water and oil the difference is like locking an atheist and a roman catholic in the goat gods sacrificial shrine and telling them they cant leave till they work out their differences. But then again this is someone elses fantasy those fetish sites are also wrong
July 14th, 2009 at 10:42 pm
@PP: Pretty much everything you said is stupid and wrong. This is going to become a stupidly long rant now.
“This is stupid. The snitch is hard to catch, and by that time, the scores can easily differ by 15pts.”
Really? If so, then it must be a reasonably frequent occurance. Oh, wait, it isn’t. We only see it happen once, in the World Cup. Even people in the book weren’t expecting that, so clearly it isn’t that common.
“Oh and teams can’t just concentrate on cathcing the snitch, geniuses, or else the opponent will easily score more than 15 pts the regular way.”
Actually, there’s only one person allowed to do that. The rest of the team can do whatever the hell they like, they have nothing to do with it. I don’t think they’re even allowed to touch the thing, since it is the seeker’s job and only his. It’s like two people playing a separate game have ended up in the same pitch at the same time, essentially.
“No the Harry Potter is involved in everything because he is very special and powerful due to a rare genetic condition.”
…Did you actually write this? Seriously? Genetic condition? I’m going to take it as fact that you don’t even know what these books are about, since you fucked up such a basic, general-knowledge level fact about the main character.
Just to put you straight, Harry Potter survives being killed by the most evil wizard ever by the power of love. That isn’t a metaphor, his mother’s love for him when she dies literally becomes some sort of magical anti-Voldemort shield, and somehow he also accidentally gets a piece of his soul stuck in Harry as well. Nothing to do with genetics.
Also, Harry isn’t that powerful anyway, he only has a handful of spells that he knows, and defeats most people due to special magical occurrences, like the twin wands he and Voldemort have. If he wasn’t so lucky, he’d have died quite a few times.
“He isn’t a random student involved by luck.”
It could just have easily been Neville Longbottom, you know. I’m not kidding, it actually says this in one of the books.
“Dumbledore is simply a principle; no one said he was some king or the smartest wizard..”
They do continually say that he is the most powerful wizard alive or something parallel to that, I can’t remember how she words it. If even the evil lord of evil darkness is reputed to be scared of you, I’d say you’re pretty powerful. And as for “king”, well, he declined an offer to be Minister for Magic, so he’s clearly capable enough to be leader of the wizarding world.
So, in summary, shut up because you clearly know nothing about what you’re talking about.
And proof-reading this post, I realise that even though it’s been a while since I read any of the books, I still remember all this crap. Wow.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:11 pm
Here’s my revision of Quidditch:
Same rules, and the golden snitch is worth 150 points, and wins the game. But, the two bashers, who try and knock people off their brooms are also armed with twin black powder smooth bore dueling pistols. At any time, they are allowed to try and shoot any of the other contestants. Since smoothbore pistols aren’t very accurate, the likelihood of striking another player isn’t too great, but they have two pistols, which means two shots.
Any basher which hits another player, gets awarded 30 points. A basher that manages to shoot a Seeker gets 50 points.
That ought to liven up the sport some.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:04 pm
Great article. And I mean, GREAT. You just voiced what we nerds around the world have been thinking for more than a decade.
July 14th, 2009 at 9:45 pm
so i’ve played quidditch on PS2, and its one of the coolest games in the world haha, and you get so good at one point, you could let the other team grab the snitch and still win. It is one bad ass game. Eather its a bad ass game or im a strait bad ass, and being that im playing a video game, im going with the former, not the ladder
July 14th, 2009 at 9:31 pm
Winning doesn’t solely depend on the seeker. The other team members must ensure that their score+150 will still be higher than the other team’s score. There is one instance in the book, the World cup, where the seeker caught the Snitch but his team didn’t win
July 14th, 2009 at 9:28 pm
I’m dangling when I see it out of devotion to cracked
July 14th, 2009 at 9:02 pm
joi. can suck a fat bag of dicks
July 14th, 2009 at 9:00 pm
I can’t believe you actually used the word “Meatspace”
July 14th, 2009 at 9:00 pm
You are definitely not overthinking it. It even points out in the first book that the Golden Snitch has soooo many points that the team whose member catches it almost always wins. And it really is such bullshit!
July 14th, 2009 at 8:55 pm
PP, you’re a tremendous tool who takes Harry Potter way too seriously.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:48 pm
This is stupid. The snitch is hard to catch, and by that time, the scores can easily differ by 15pts. Oh and teams can’t just concentrate on cathcing the snitch, geniuses, or else the opponent will easily score more than 15 pts the regular way. Harry Potter is involved in everything because he is very special and powerful due to a rare genetic condition. He isn’t a random student involved by luck. Dumbledore is simply a principle; no one said he was some king or the smartest wizard..
July 14th, 2009 at 8:08 pm
@Jason- And it would be COOL.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:41 pm
Y’know, that’s always confused me too. Why bother with a Quidditch TEAM, when only ONE GUY needs to be given a shit about? Just put two guys in the ring, let the other balls fly around, and see how long they last while going after that damn hummingbird-ball (I don’t call it Snitch). That’d be the whole game right there. Pretty much.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:26 pm
I will dangle.
For Cracked’s honor.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:23 pm
HEY, Disc Golf is awesome
July 14th, 2009 at 7:03 pm
Actually, it’s 150 pts for the Snitch, but it still is kinda silly. 50, even 100 pt margins aren’t too uncommon.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:02 pm
i really liked this article the first time i read it, in 2001, on a different website, written by a different person:
http://brunching.com/harrypotter.html.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:47 pm
I’ve thought about how to revise Quidditch to avoid this problem. Here’s my idea:
There are five golden snitches. Each team has four people (rather than three) who play Chaser. At any time, one of the Chasers is playing as Seeker.
When a Seeker captures a Snitch, the Snitch flies to the center point of one of that team’s goals, where it sits immovable for the rest of the match, making it harder for the other team to score goals. NO POINTS are awarded for capturing a Snitch.
A Seeker who captures a Snitch immediately becomes a Chaser, and the next designated Chaser becomes Seeker.
When one team has captured three Snitches, the game ends, and the team who’s scored the most goals is the winner.
Oh, and by the way, each goal is worth one point. Possibly the stupidest part of the game, which you failed to mention, is that all scores are divisible by 10.
Why have I thought about this so much? Not only because I love Harry Potter, but because I think it could potentially make an awesome video game with my rules.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:40 pm
Here’s an idea– why not play “muggle quidditch” on bicycles? that would be infinitely less asinine than clentching a non-flying broomstick between your legs.
Actually, bicycle quidditch sounds like fun. Anyone in Alaska up for a game?
July 14th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
the only part i love about quidditch is oliver wood. what a sexy beast. rawr(;
July 14th, 2009 at 5:32 pm
This comment section was officially over a while ago, when Vengevega won it with an excellent and astute observation.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:26 pm
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July 14th, 2009 at 4:37 pm
Yes, this has been noticed before. Ten years ago, when Harry Potter got big. And ever since. And you offered no new observations. Thanks for wasting my time again, Bucholz.
July 14th, 2009 at 4:07 pm
Loved this article with all my nerdy Quidditch-loving heart.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:59 pm
The snitch is rarely caught, supposedly. My biggest problem is, what if some gay wizard messes with the game? And what’s the deal with Voldemort, he wants to live forever and Hogwarts Academy is trying to stop him with a wizard boy? That’s just silly.
July 14th, 2009 at 3:29 pm
There was one time in the books where the snitch didn’t decide the game. The fifth (?) book, Goblet of Fire, I think. The Irish won the world cup, but Krum got the snitch. Only movie I remember. Because of everyone’s favorite disco vampire, Robert Pattinson (Edward). *sigh*
July 14th, 2009 at 3:17 pm
Hey will…it is the queen of spades that is worth 13, you noobzor!!!!!
HP4L….woooooo
fuck i hate the entire series…but hermione is kinda hot
July 14th, 2009 at 3:09 pm
nice article though according to the rules of the game the team whos seeker catches the snitch first gets 150 points. like in that match in goblet of fire where krum got the snitch but ireland still won
July 14th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
Banana - I think that’s the sort of thing we’ll start seeing now that you need to be a graduate to get any kind of job. Someone’s written too many psychology/film studies essays by the sound of it. Surprised he didn’t mention the symbolism of the ball-grabbing.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
I bet if you could somehow return all the lunch money that’s been stolen over the years from the readers of this article, we could fix the economy.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:37 pm
“That it’s done so clumsily boggles the mind” . . . no it doesn’t. Rowling is a hack with no training nor skill in writing who stumbled upon a genius formula for serialized adolescence. But her method of assembly is still trite and contradictory. See other Cracked articles about how useless Dumbledore is.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:26 pm
“Try and swing around a bit to get your snitch to collide with people nearby. ”
Happily.
July 14th, 2009 at 2:05 pm
a related, but somewhat random comment: in my local newspaper today, there was a review of the new harry potter movie that mentioned quiddich. it said, and i quote, “the visual of the phallic broomsticks between the boys’ legs as they zoom around the playing field highlights the sexual undertones the new movie grapples with.”
hooooooooooly crap. i didn’t know whether to laugh or cry when i read that. it made me both excited and disgusted. is that bad?
July 14th, 2009 at 1:59 pm
When will danglestrong wristbands be available for purchase?
July 14th, 2009 at 1:58 pm
@Laughdamnyou
Pod Racing was actually really damn tight though.
July 14th, 2009 at 1:44 pm
[...] http://www.cracked.com/blog/quidditch-is-bullshit/ [...]
July 14th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
The mind-boggling stipulation of the golden snitch rule in Quidditch reminds me of getting stuck with the ace of spades in the game Hearts. What a bull-shit rule: Every heart is worth one detracting point, but the Ace of spades is worth thirteen?! Perhaps Rowling was the instigator of the shitty card game as well.
July 14th, 2009 at 12:31 pm
The only reason the snitch seems so important in the Hogwarts games is that those games are freakishly short. Seriously, they last anywhere between 5 and 30 minutes at most. The big thing in actual Quidditch is that the match literally can’t end until someone catches the damn thing. I would imagine that after a couple days straight of playing, every player stops interacting with the other balls just to catch it. Besides, the fourth book showed how important the Chasers are. The guy who got the snitch lost the match for his team.
Actually, the third book pointed out how Quidditch points made sense even in Hogwarts. The games were based on point margins, not whether or not you won the game.
As for real-world Quidditch…no comment.
July 14th, 2009 at 12:25 pm
did somebody called darkmage accuse somebody else of standing a good chance of being a virgin forever? i say just, it was ages ago, but i’m just getting round to crackeding it now
July 14th, 2009 at 11:58 am
*classic*
July 14th, 2009 at 11:55 am
I have been a long time reader (seems like a couple years now - but I could be totally off as in my world time tends to flow on a total diferent scale than the rest of the world) and have never posted a comment. The main reason being it seemed entirely pointless to leave a message - considering my motive for posting I would say my intuition was completely correct.
I just wanted to say that Reed’s comment has to be the funniest thing I have read yet on Cracked and I am a huge fan of this site. I hereby nominate Reed as a new writer on Cracked devoted entirely to Harry Potter-themed articles and videos.
Yes - I do like Harry Potter
Yes - I am entirely lame
Yes - I have nothing better to do
July 14th, 2009 at 11:35 am
In professional games, goals are scored a lot faster, so catching the snitch isn’t as big a deal. It doesn’t even guarantee a win. (This is shown in the Triwizarding Torney chap in the beginning of Goblet.)
There’s only one seeker per team who catches the snitch.
July 14th, 2009 at 11:27 am
C.B Walker……Is that a distorted view reference?
July 14th, 2009 at 10:53 am
If you read the supplementary book “Quidditch Through the Ages,” you’ll find that the addition of the snitch happened later, after all the other positions were created, so it wasn’t stupid from conception. (oh god, did I just type that!?). And one team did win without catching the snitch in Book 4. I always figured Rowling made it a joke on purpose.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:52 am
I had the same reaction the first time I heard the rules of Quiddich explained. My immediate off-the-cuff idea was that the snitch should still end the game but not be worth any points (or certainly not 150 points) that way the seeker has to catch the thing while his team’s ahead and prevent the other seeker from catching it while his team’s trailing. What if he catches the snitch just as the other team scores a goal that puts them over the top? Cool.
Actually, the rules of Quiddich aren’t necessarily bad as they are, it’s just that the gameplay isn’t accurately depicted under those rules. Any sensible team would spend less time trying to score goals that don’t count for anything and more time dogpiling on the other seeker to prevent the automatic win. And they’re all carrying bludgeons. This is a sport that could make professional hockey look like synchronized swimming. Very cool.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:46 am
About someone stating that witches and wizards do not mix,
its true. Its a really common misconception that wizards are male witches. the term “witch” is unisex.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:28 am
@Pedgerow
Hate to be a stickler (actually, fuck that no I don’t), but the only time Harry ever suspected someone of being the bad guy and was right was Draco in book 6. Other than that, the kid’s got the IQ of a potato, and not just any potato, but the inbred potato at the bottom of the sack.
Book 1: Snape is so mean and treats me like shit he must be evil. Oh wait, it’s the retard with the speech impediment.
Book 2: Oooooh, neat, a talking book. How do you know so much about the Chamber of Secrets Mr. Riddle? I don’t really care how you learned so much about a place that the smartest teachers in the schools know fuckshit about. Oh wait! It’s you! And your names an anagram, holy shit-biscuits.
Book 3: Sirius Black killed me parents, oh wait, Ron it was your fucking rat who has slept in the bed next to me for three years. More importantly, why the fuck did you sleep with your rat? (No way could Harry predict Scabbers was evil, or that he had been assraped many times).
Book 4: Who put my name in the Goblet of fire? Who could it be? Not the rugged old wizard soldier with the demon eye. Why is there such an elaborate scheme to get me to this graveyard? Can’t whoever is doing it just stun me and take me there? Oh, it was the rugged old wizard soldier. Bye, Cedric! Enjoy your afterlife as a GLISTENING FUCKING VAMPIRE.
Book 5: I’m so moody! Snape doesn’t teach me occlumency well! Voldemort is trying to invade my mind? You think that vision of Sirius being tortured is fake? Bu-but it’s so real, man. I like, saw it. Fuck you I’m going. Shit, it was a trap…
Book 6: Draco is evil! I know it! He’s working for Voldemort! I know he is I know he is I know he is! I was right? God I’m such a fucking genius.
Book 7: Snape is a monster! I don’t know WHY he saved my life thirty times before, there just CAN’T be more to the story than what appears to be! And since my track record is so good (1 for 6, I believe), I know I’m right. Why are there Death Eaters at Hogwarts? Wouldn’t parents just keep their kids at school? Why don’t the teachers who AREN’T death eaters kick some ass? HORCRUXES GALORE! Oh, snape, you WERE so caring. I’ll name one of my kids Albus Severus, one of the most contrived, ugly, fantastically cheesy tributes in the history of literature.
Okay, so I loved the books. I can still make fun of them…
July 14th, 2009 at 10:26 am
Muggle Quidditch needs to be made illegal for being too god damn stupid.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:25 am
All these weak movies/books have weak sports written into the plot for the weak video game adaptation. Why can’t we get some Afgani goat-carcass polo going over here?
July 14th, 2009 at 10:18 am
Man, remember the time when Cracked articles were actually funny and not half-assed attempts at humor? I miss those days. Wait, sorry, that never happened! My bad.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:18 am
Great article! Very funny, and a good example for us new guys.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:13 am
Call me SHERRIFF Dangle.
July 14th, 2009 at 10:12 am
That was the EXACT same thing I thought when I heard the rules of this sport. “so basically, whoever catches the snitch wins? whats the point in the rest of the players else then?”
I’m not a big fan of Harry Potter btw (not in a holier than thou way, I’d just feel wierd reading a book recommended by my mum, my friends sister and my 13 year old cousin). saw a couple of the films and they were so-so.
I just hate it when something like this is thrown ina story, that doesnt make sense, that makes no real difference to the overall plot.
OK, in Terminator Salvation, the Terminators had about 10 chances to kill John Connors OR Kyle Reese, but decided for some reason they had to do both. But the film would have been a bit short otherwise, so I can let that go.
Making a half way sensible game, with defenders, attackers, a goalkeeper, (ok, and broomsticks and magic) seemed like it made sense. then she throws in this “oh yeah, automatic win” thing for harry to do…………..
July 14th, 2009 at 10:11 am
From Darkmage comment:
“Also, Muggle Quidditch has to be the gayest sport on Earth designed by some sad fan-boys destined to be Virgins forever!”
Agree on that buddy, you know who else falls in that sad virgin demographic?
Guy who flip his shit about wizards and withces getting together
IN A FUCKING WORK OF FICTION
July 14th, 2009 at 10:06 am
So Chris Bucholz…Qdch is the only thing that makes you call Bullshit in the Rawling Universe huh?
July 14th, 2009 at 9:40 am
The rules make more sense if you read through the books. I think it’s also a cultural thing, the Brits are familiar with the idea of games of cricket that can go on and on for days, Quiddich is suppose to be similar, so that a 150 point spread is actually a common occurrence,
Still, it’s mostly stupid.
July 14th, 2009 at 9:40 am
Harry Potter is the perfect example of something nice utterly ruined by obsessed assholes.
When I first saw my fellow classmates prancing around calling each other ‘muggles’ and waving sticks, I said, “fuck that that shit.”
July 14th, 2009 at 9:38 am
I suspect that Chris Bucholz was recently teleported magically to Hogwarts, and scored loads of goals at Quidditch, but lost because the other team found the Snitch. I therefore also conclude that Chris Bucholz lost to some children, and is being a bitter whining pussy about it.
And the Snitch so totally isn’t the worst example of pro-Harry Potter bias in the Harry Potter books. What about all the times Harry “just suspects” someone is a bad guy, and is right every single time? Even when that person spends the first 400 pages of the book helping puppies and orphans? “Ooh, I don’t like Snape, even though he saved my life 50 times and never asked for so much as a thank-you. I’m going to disproportionately abuse him and treat him like a boxing glove full of scrotums for the entire series.”
July 14th, 2009 at 9:36 am
I read books for a living, and i hated Harry Potter. That could also be cause I had to dress up for all of his release parties. But I respect the hell out of Rowling. She created a series that made everyone read.
That being said, I would have liked the books more if the last page explained Harry was actually in an insane asylum, and the all the books had been a creation of his sick, twisted mind.
That or he died. Either or.
July 14th, 2009 at 9:35 am
Oh yeah CBWalker? You’re a poop head! You have poop for a head, and that’s disgusting!
Also, Harry Pothead, I agree. That is exactly what the article said in a much more funny manner.
July 14th, 2009 at 9:19 am
C.B. Walker, if you’re going to be an asshole, at least attempt to be a little more creative.
July 14th, 2009 at 9:18 am
Not only is the idea of running with a broomstick between your legs ridiculous but the fact that people have made an actual organized sport is even more outrageous. I watched the people make fools of themselves. It was never meant to be played by muggles. I say muggles without quotations because some idiots actually decided to make it an actual word. “A being without magical powers.” Who in our world has magical powers? By the way, for the game of Quidditch. The fact that the snitch gets you so many points is because it is insanely impossible to get…supposedly. It was said in one of the books that a game went on for months? or years? I don’t quite recall. A team could have gotten more points than the other team plus more than what the snitch would give them and and still win. It’s just a matter of communication between them and well…luck
July 14th, 2009 at 9:04 am
Ladies and gentleman…let’s welcome Werty!!! Werty, come on down big guy! Tell us, how does it feel to be a cockgobbler?
July 14th, 2009 at 9:00 am
I’ve played quiddich. It’s actually quite fun. I hadn’t even read all the books when I started, I was just invited by a friend. Now I play as the snitch. How often do you get an excuse to throw people at the ground for no reason?
The game in the book seems kind of broken, but the real world game is quite well balanced. We’ve had people catch the snitch and lose (miscommunication, or they’re being stomped so badly they want to get it over with).
July 14th, 2009 at 8:57 am
Wow Darkmage…just…holy shit wow…
I was just sitting here, trying to come up with some funny statement I could say to reply to your comment. You know? Something that would give everyone reading these at their work desks a little smile, maybe even a chuckle. Yet I just kept reading your comment over and over and shaking my head. Long story short, I couldn’t come up with anything, because the truth is, the thought of your existence kept making me feel bad.
So congratulations, Darkmage…you’re officially the bottom of the nerd barrel…and I have nothing I can say to make you look worse. I’m retiring. Hanging up my cleats. I’m done.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:50 am
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July 14th, 2009 at 8:43 am
This guy would kick Harry Potter’s ass all over the field, whilst finger-fondling Hermione without missing a rub! http://www.imdb.com/name/nm1292175/ Boo-Yeah!
July 14th, 2009 at 8:43 am
Uh…can I say without fear of reprisals that the harry potter novels are complete, absoulte, retarded shit and that I only watched the Goblet of Fire movie because it had a jailbait Emma Watson?
July 14th, 2009 at 8:41 am
I watch the movies for Emma Watson now.
Oh, and fights between older wizards. Because the kids in the books/films suck big fat cock, but the fights at the end of the fifth movie between the Order of the Phoenix and the Death Eaters? And then the one between Voldemort and Dumbledore? Kickass.
Anyway, you got it Bucholz. I’ll dangle proud. It’d be nice to have SOMETHING resembling male genitalia for once.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:39 am
bucholz tuesday
July 14th, 2009 at 8:25 am
I’m actually going to the premier, and feel that I would be thrown out if I went along with your snitch idea. Although it IS tempting.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:22 am
Great article Bucholz you may just become the sleeper candidate for best Cracked writer of 2009. Also, penis.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:19 am
I’m proud to say that my school has (or had) a quidditch team. also, coming from a major harry potter nerd here, Bludgers (hah. the other team BLUDGEONS them with the BLUDGERS. Anyone?) are bigger than baseballs, described as only a bit smaller than the soccer ball sized Quaffle.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:15 am
Kinda funn…. Wait…. WHAT??? You have a Scientology ad on your site? LOLLLLLL! Do they even read the site before they buy space? Great on you Cracked.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:14 am
@Darkamge.
Really? ‘darkmage’? You really went with that one as your name?
Also, Wizards and Witches DO NOT mix? Is that like a law of mythology? Like how oil and water don’t mix? Or like how Anyone and You don’t mix when they hear you talk about mythology?
July 14th, 2009 at 8:08 am
Good, funny article. Dugg (can’t believe I’m forgetting this for these articles).
I’m beginning to get convinced that the Harry Potter books weren’t that good.
July 14th, 2009 at 8:00 am
I agree with Jeremy Henderson’s point.
It’s like a guy wearing crocs lecturing people on fashion.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:56 am
And yet you seem to have read her books. As you say “Go fuck yourself. I donnot give a damn about what I write because it will make a ton of money anyway.”
July 14th, 2009 at 7:51 am
I’m sorry, but someone calling themselves Darkmage has just declared that witches and wizards being taught the same lessons in the same fictional school is retarded because it doesn’t conform to the hard and fast rules of folklore.
It is an absolute outrage that some kind of Irony Police hasn’t yet been dispatched to his house to punch him until he shits himself.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:47 am
I didn’t even have to read this article to know it has to be around the snitch problem. J.K. Rowling is a hack & I laugh that so many fools buy her books & see those crappy movies. I read the first book & saw the first movie (Didn’t pay for either). When she’s not ripping off other writings, she tries to come up with something original herself. And when that happens, something like quiddich is “created”. HAHA! Total shit!
July 14th, 2009 at 7:41 am
Actually, I had a similar reaction to yours when I saw this for the first time. On a bored day at work (and in anticipation of the new movie coming out) I was looking up some HP things. I remembered my problem with Quidditch and decided to take a glance at the rules. Finding the golden snitch “ends the game” but it does not guarantee a win (the movies state this incorrectly, but the books I believe explain it better). Yes, unless you’re down 15 goals, you will be the winner, but a single win doesn’t really get you anything anyways. Total POINTS over a season, not win-loss record, is what matters in the final standings.
Yes, it’s still a little bit of BS, but not nearly as bad as I thought.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:33 am
@ Laughdamnyou - Did you notice that all the films you mentioned have one major thing in common? They all suck.
Twilight and Potter have something else in common: They cant get their heads around basic mythology and folklore. Twilight totally fucked up Vampires and their mythology in the same way Harry Potter did with Wizards and Witches. I lost all respect for the Potter World the second I heard witches and wizards were being taught the same things at the same school, which is obviously retarded if you read any folklore on the subjects. Witches and Wizards DO NOT mix.
I still watch the films and try to ignore the obvious retardation but I point-blank refuse to read the books.
Also, Muggle Quidditch has to be the gayest sport on Earth designed by some sad fan-boys destined to be Virgins forever!
July 14th, 2009 at 7:16 am
What is it about ridiculous myth based fiction and fanciful made up sports?
Harry Potter had Quiddich,
Twilight had freaking Vampire Baseball,
And the New Star Wars Trilogy had Pod Racing.
is this a prerequisite to write these kind of books or movies, you have to insert one incredibly inane and pointless sport in there to break up the plot?
And in the vein of silly made of sports… Bulletball anyone?
July 14th, 2009 at 7:13 am
How does one get stoned of their ass?
July 14th, 2009 at 7:11 am
@ privatepyle
I hope you meant the Guitar Hero thing ironically. If so, kudos. If not, wow.
July 14th, 2009 at 7:03 am
2 things:
– Even if it’s a book for kids, you don’t give kids enough credit. I’m pretty sure I could have seen how retarded the rules were even if I was six years old.
– This is simply the most glaring example of why I can’t stand Harry Potter. I love children’s fantasy books, like LOTR, Narnia, Brian Jacques, Ursula LeGuin. But I can’t stand Rowling. The reason, as you’ve pointed out here, is this: she doesn’t think through or put any time or care into what she creates. This is reflected both in her repetitive and poor writing, and in the fact that nothing in the books makes sense. It’s like she’s giving me the middle finger with every sentence I read, saying “Go fuck yourself. I don’t give a damn about what I write, because it will make a bunch of money anyway.” Sorry. Rowling is just awful.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:53 am
So what do they call Quiditch in the Harry Pothead series of books?
July 14th, 2009 at 6:49 am
“I always that it was kind of gay to have a phallic shaped object in between your legs”
You mean, besides the one that’s (supposedly) already there?
July 14th, 2009 at 6:45 am
I’m completely a non-sports person, but even I felt the Snitch was silly. There was only one game in all 7 books where the team losing ending up winning by catching the Snitch. Just plain silly.
On a happier note, I’m going to go see the movie at midnight tonight!
July 14th, 2009 at 6:45 am
@Chrysalis
Let’s not be so hasty turning tables. While it’s true that I passed on pretty much every trilogied, franchised dung-pile since Matrix—which was an awfulawfulawful thing to do to the first movie—I’m not trying to say it makes me special.
Oh, I long for the days when I could pretend to be a sorcerer! Or a hobbit! Heck, I read the Tarzan series of pulp paperbacks as a kid—I imagined I was fighting gorillas and lions and protecting the African jungles from hateful poachers while charming the bloomers off English ladies!
But about the time I could drive a car and heavy-pet a date, I didn’t need to immerse myself into fantasy realms where I replaced the ersatz hero. I didn’t want to be a Twilight vampire. I didn’t desire to be a midi-chlorianed Youngling. I don’t want the school buses to transform into alien robots. The money-grubbing nature of these franchises astonishes me, as does the willingness to spend on them.
Me, personally? I took up playing Guitar Hero instead.
;^}
July 14th, 2009 at 6:39 am
Not to elevate Ms. Rowling too much, but I think she new exactly what she was creating and that she was satirizing the complexities of cricket.
Rather like the bizarre currency valuations were a satire of British money.
That being said, any modern adult who plays ‘quidditch’ is an idiot. It’s like playing air baseball.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:37 am
funny article, no disrespect but where did Swaim go to?
July 14th, 2009 at 6:33 am
This article was f’in hilarious from start to finish. “Dangle proud, brothers and sisters. Dangle strong.” That’s how you end with a bang, or in this case, about 5 seconds of hard laughter, 10 seconds of idiotic chuckling, then about 5 minutes of thinking up everyday situations where that quote could be used.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:31 am
Who is this Harry Potter I keep hearing about?
July 14th, 2009 at 6:26 am
The scoring goals of Quidditch is merely a spectacle to amuse the audience while the Seekers find the Snitch. I mean, would you like to spend between five minutes to a month just watching the two Seekers fly around, no real action? I wouldn’t. Plus, Rowling details in Quiddich through the Ages that brooms have Invisible Cushioning Charms.
Although a game of tetherball while there’s 12 other players zooming around their heads would be rather interesting.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:26 am
spot on, you sir win the analogy award of the month.
oh and spoiler - hermione kills hagrid.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:22 am
No. Fucking. Way.
When I read that bit about Muggle Quidditch being actually played, I thought maybe it was a one off demonstration match to celebrate the release of the new film, and another decade of virginity for the players, but fuck me with a Nimbus 2000, it’s REAL.
Allow an otherwise respectable news channel to elaborate.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5UfPij5ABdo&feature=fvst
Notice how not one of them had greater muscle mass than your avergae Cystic Fybrosis sufferer, and the “Snitch” is possibly the gayest thing to hit the internet since…well it might actually BE the gayest thing to ever hit the internet.
And these are college kids, here. Were talking 17-20 or so. All freaks and geeks. These people will be running the world one day. They’ll be doing our taxes, presiding our drunk and disorderly charges and mind controlling the horde of killer robots that will inevitably wipe us out.
Forget the picture of you topless and throwing up on Myspace. if any potential employer recognises you from one of these clips, you’re just fucked.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:18 am
Wow. I never thought of it like that. I always that it was kind of gay to have a phallic shaped object in between your legs; I guess this distracted me from the pointlessness of it all when all you have to do is grab a golden ball…
July 14th, 2009 at 6:11 am
Please do not muddy the sport of Disc Golf by tying it to Quidditch.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:06 am
Chris, THANK YOU for pointing this out. That’s bugged me since the very first book, and ten times as much when I played a Quidditch video game (don’t judge). There was no point to Chasers, Keepers, anything. The Seeker won the whole damn game, every time.
The idiocy of the rules is only slightly tempered by points being cumulative over a season, but come on. Rowling even had to make that silly World Cup game where Bulgaria loses despite getting the Snitch just to excuse her own dumb rules.
Great books, fun-sounding game, one idiot rule that screws it all up.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:05 am
emma watson is hot. that’s why i’m gonna watch the movie. anyone else?
July 14th, 2009 at 6:03 am
This pissed me off when I read the very first book. The football/tetherball analogy is perfect. It was like Rowling starting feeling bad and thought people were going to ask questions so she included a game where someone caught the snitch and lost in the 4th book, despite it being ridiculously stupid that one would catch the game ending ball if it causes you to lose. A 15 landslide. Goodness.
July 14th, 2009 at 6:01 am
I’m going to see Harry Potter with my boyfriend tomorrow….this request of yours could prove interesting…
July 14th, 2009 at 5:54 am
@privatepyle: You are unique and special because you don’t like something other people like.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:51 am
Thanks a lot for that Stool wikipedia page. Made my day.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:51 am
Wow…an article in which 99.9% of the population don’t give a crap. Bucholz, who’s normally very funny, kinda just showed up on this one, no?
July 14th, 2009 at 5:45 am
Who’s this Harry Potter, and why does anyone care what happens to a wussy little snitch?
Are you people actually reading that drivel? What, the supermarket was out of InTouch magazines?
July 14th, 2009 at 5:36 am
@StuBone: No, drunken quidditch sounds like a non-prison recipe for an broom handle up the ass.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:34 am
i am doin that ball thing! maybe i will run into fellow cracked enthusiasts
July 14th, 2009 at 5:31 am
@ Stu, yes, it would be better.
Oh, and with the author, I feel ya, it really doesn’t make any sense to me either.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:20 am
I feel so dirty now. . .
July 14th, 2009 at 5:10 am
And once again Harry Potter crumbles before the might of the Cracked Website. It’s no suprise that Quidditch was made for Harry Potter simply because the universe revolves around him. In real life he wouldn’t be able to play Quidditch since the cool kids would see him simply as a nerd. In addition he wouldn’t end up with a hot chick again because he’s a nerd.
July 14th, 2009 at 5:06 am
Would the game improve if it were Drunken Quidditch? Me thinks yes.