The second film in the Harry Potter franchise had a similar tone to the first. It followed a few characters who were way too young to take on such monolithic acting roles (and considering, did pretty good jobs) and kept things light-hearted. Most of the time.
As they always say, never work with children or animals. In this case, you’d better add magic to this list, as it seems to have caused the creators of the Chamber Of Secrets a fair few issues in maintaining the continuity of their film. Here are just ten of the errors we’ve found in this entry to the series.
What Color Are Harry’s Eyes?
The age-old question. The plot of Harry Potter and the glorious Snape-based twist that comes at the end is effectively based on Harry’s eyes. They’re his mother’s eyes. Why were the creators of the series incapable of making Lily just have the same eyes as Harry? In The Chamber Of Secrets, they don’t even bother keeping Harry’s eyes consistent.
They’re supposed to be bright, clear blue, but every now and again they flitter back to Radcliffe’s natural green. Seriously, what is the point in making eyes such a central part of this series and then ignoring them?
The Magic Clock Isn’t As Magical As It Should Be
The Weasleys have one of the coolest pieces of magical paraphernalia in the entire series on the wall of their topsy-turvy house. It looks like a clock, but instead of telling you the time, it tells you the location of every member of the family.
Of course, it is limited to a few specific options such as ‘mortal peril’ and ‘the garden’, but it seems like it doesn’t really work anyway. When Harry looks at it, it says Ginny is in the garden, but a couple of seconds later, she wanders down the stairs. Obviously, the clock should have had Ginny under ‘home.’
No. 4 Privet Drive Has Changed
When we saw No. 4 Privet Drive for the first time in Harry Potter And The Philosopher’s Stone, it was a big detached house connected to next door via a garage (in fact, you can see the actual house at the Warner Brothers Studio Tour in London).
In this film, we see that it is actually attached on both sides. They haven’t moved to a new house, though, as their address is exactly the same. When Ron and his brothers pick Harry up and pull the bars off of his window, it is actually quite incredible that none of the neighbours heard the commotion and looked out of their window only to see a flying Ford Anglia.
Invisible Basilisk Blood
When Harry got into a massive fight with a snake, we could tell trouble was just around the corner. In the end, Harry had to stab the blind Basilisk through the head with the sword of Godric Gryffindor, which had just presented itself to the young wizard. When he pulls it out, there is almost no blood on the blade. That seems reasonable, maybe Basilisks don’t really bleed?
The error actually comes later, when loads of blood has been added to it for the scene in Dumbledore’s office. What was the need to add extra blood? Why not just leave it in the state it was when it came out of the snake? Then there wouldn’t be any continuity problem at all!
Students Being Accompanied To Lessons Makes No Sense
When things start getting a little out of hand in Hogwarts, Dumbledore fears he may have to close the school. Before this drastic action is taken, Professor McGonagall introduces a few rules to keep everyone that little bit safer. One of which, is that all students will be accompanied to their classes by a teacher.
Given the relatively small number of subjects at Hogwarts, there aren’t very many active teachers working there, but should be at least 280 students. To accompany all of them would mean that every teacher would spend more time wandering the expansive castle than actually teaching their students.
Snape Getting Expelliarmus Wrong
During the duel between Snape and Lockhart, we find out that Lockhart is an essentially useless wizard and have our suspicions that Snape is pretty powerful reaffirmed. There has always been confusion about what the ‘Expelliarmus’ spell is supposed to do, due to its various portrayals in the films, but its main purpose is to disarm the opponent.
When Lockhart is thrown backwards by the power of Snape’s spell, he still has his wand in his hand. We know Snape wouldn’t get this wrong, and we know Lockhart isn’t powerful enough to counter it, so it must be an error.
‘Crowing Of A Rooster…’
In the book, we’re told that not only do ‘spiders flee before it’ (the Basilisk, that is) but that it can be killed by the crowing of a rooster. This was included in the film at first, but due to its obvious weakening of the Basilisk character, the scene was cut.
However, when Harry is reading the piece of paper that says, ‘spiders flee before it’, his mouth is moving in a way that would suggest he was actually saying ‘and the crowing of a rooster can kill it’. It was an important cut to make, but surely they could have reshot this one rather than weirdly layering the audio?
Vernon Doesn’t Know Where His Heart Is
This one might well be a bit of a stretch, but Vernon Dursley doesn’t seem to know which side of his body is the heart is on. He says to Harry that the family has housed him for years ‘purely out of the goodness of our hearts’, but then puts his hand over the right side of his chest.
Unless Vernon has a serious medical condition or is a Time Lord with two hearts, then this makes no sense. Then again, his point didn’t really need anatomical precision, so the likelihood is that he didn’t really give it much thought.
Ginny Is A Great Multitasker
One of the big reveals of the second Harry Potter film is that Ginny was responsible for the movements of the Basilisk, via the parseltongue Tom Riddle’s memory could provide her with.
However, about halfway through the film when Harry follows the sound of the Basilisk to find Justin and Nearly Headless Nick, we’d literally just seen Ginny quietly studying in the library. Either she has a twin, is an exceptionally fast runner, or has some multitasking skills we muggles couldn’t even dream of.
Why Isn’t Horcrux-Harry Destroyed By Basilisk Venom?
By the end of the final entry in the series, we find out that Harry himself was one of Voldemort’s Horcruxes, as a piece of his soul went into Harry when Lily protected him all those years ago. We were also treated to the very convenient plot device that Basilisk venom destroys Horcruxes. Why, then, was the Horcrux part of Harry not destroyed when he was struck by the Basilisk’s fang?
JK Rowling has tried to argue that it is because Harry wasn’t killed because Faux saved him (also, re-watch The Chamber Of Secrets and notice how Faux is literally the only important character and clears up every single plot point and flaw single-handedly), but she probably just didn’t realise her own error until it was too late.
