I thought exactly the same thing. Ten years from now it’s going to be “Harry shot first”.
I can’t see Harry and Hermione the power couple of the Wizarding world like Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie. For all that Harry went through I was happy to see him with Ginny, the classic Girl Next Door type and her family giving Harry the life he never had.
As an aside I got a kick out of a line by Neville in the last movie. Rowling had veto power over anything that happened in the movies and said anything there would be considered cannon. In the movie at the pause in the battle Neville came across the gang on the great staircase and asked if they had seen Luna. That he was mad for her and wanted to tell her, because they might all be dead soon. Now there is match that makes your head spin.
I guess I’m a softy and always root for the happy ever after endings.
I got into HP rather late in the series. I remember having to wait for the last 3 novels to be published. But I remember seeing the movie posters featuring the trio and thinking “I hope they don’t do the Harry and the girl teen romance thing.” I was thinking of the silent treatments and other games that, as it turned out, Hermione and Ron played with each other. I just think it would have been worse if Harry was playing those games. And it’s such a cliche anyway.
Oh, and Hermoine has to enjoy feeling superior to people and Ron doesn’t seem to mind that (since the ogre in the ladies’ incident). Wouldn’t most males of her age find her insufferable? And he’s her passport into the real (versus books in the library) world of wizards and witchs. They’re a good match.
Indeed. In Half-Blood Prince, Hermione resented Harry for doing better than her in Potions class. Not to mention that Hermione cannot deal with CAPS LOCK HARRY™. In Order of the Phoenix, she wilts the instant Harry raises his voice about going to rescue Sirius.
For some reason, nearly every fanfiction author who thinks Ron and Hermione would be terrible together blames it all on Ron The Death Eater™ and not at all on Saint Granger™. I tell ya, it’s enough to make me turn Slytherin. 
Even if Hermione isn’t compatible with Ron, that doesn’t mean she’s compatible with Harry.
She’s already working on the prequel.
It seems like an inevitable match up to me. Ron’s mother is loud and his father is rather meek, or overwhelmed, in dealing with his family, and in The Chamber of Secrets is sort of a co-conspirator with his children dealing with the flying car. Ron would find being married to a strong woman, possibly one smarter than he, pretty natural. His interactions with Harry about the driving test at the very end of the novels reflect this. Hermione is a powerful witch, and so is Mrs. Weasly (as revealed in the battle of Hogwarts).
And there is that rather touching bit where Mr. Weasly and his wife have to prove that they are who they say they are, and the question is "what do I call you when we are alone together?’
“Mollycoddles”. They have a genuine relationship, a bunch of kids, and they have come to an understanding. Ron and Hermione live happily ever after. They have to - it’s a fairy tale.
Regards,
Shodan
I have to reread, but movie Ginny always struck me as a kind of tame wolverine, like her mother. The absolute picture of tolerant, nurturing kindness until a threat looms, and then she goes straight to murder without a second thought. ISTR she whipped a reducto spell on a death eater in the Department of Mysteries. Whether she meant to turn the guy to dirt or simply wreck a shelf onto him is unclear, but I’d bet good money she wouldn’t have lost a moment’s sleep if she’d killed someone while protecting Harry & her friends. So, “girl next door” with badazz powerz.
Harry & Hermione was too obviously a power couple and couldn’t have worked long-term. They friend-zoned each other pretty much from the beginning. Rowling got it right when she went with her guts and put Ron & Hermione together. She’s rethinking it now, but she’s trying to use reason to make what is ultimately an emotional choice.
Mollywobbles, I believe.
Awesome. Ron and Hermione never made sense as a couple. As Rowling says in the interview, he couldn’t have made her happy, and they’d be in marriage counseling. They’re just completely different.
Now that doesn’t mean that Harry and Hermione should have married. There’s no sparks there. As someone else said above, they’re more like brother and sister. Hermione should have married Krum, Harry married Ginny, and Ron…I dunno, Lavender or someone.
Yes, but that prequel, IIRC, will take place 70 years before Harry entered Hogwarts. Which would make it 9 years before Tom Riddle was conceived. So I can’t see any major canon modification. Rowling created a perfectly good fictional universe. Why not get some more mileage out of it?
The lady is also penning a prequel play, which will be set during Harry’s Dursley stay pre Book 1.
This. I always thought the appeal of Ron was joining the Weasley family, which both Hs seemed to view as almost magical in itself. I also thought it made a bit of a statement about different classes, with the bright, lonely but well-off Harry and Hermione envying the working class but much happier Weasleys.
I think this is retcon #2, with the first being the “Dumbledore is gay” revelation made after the release of the final book.
Magichlorians?
The Hermione/Krum thing always creeped me out. When they were (briefly) a couple she was 14 and he was 18 or 19. And she was going to go spend the summer with him. Were she my daughter I would have said “no effing way” to her going off to Bulgaria/Romania/wherever to see her 4-5 year older boyfriend.
Maybe when she was 18 and he was 22/23, okay, but not at 14.
She was 15 (Hermione is nearly a year older than Harry), and Krum could have been as young as 17 AFAIK.
Hermione had at least one high-achieving, studious, super-competent and even glamorous guy at her feet: the international Quidditch star and Triwizard Tournament contestant Viktor Krum was not only impressed by her talent but romantically charmed by her. Even in the last book it’s clear that he still would have been more than happy to have a chance with her.
So it’s not like Hermione didn’t have other choices. She just liked Ron better, and I can see why. It’s true that Ron for most of the series was the most immature of the three friends, but when he grew up and became less insecure and annoying he was definitely a keeper, if you’ll pardon the pun.
- He stands up to Hermione. Even though he’s unconditionally admiring and supportive of her talent and intelligence (a major plus in itself for a very bright girl that a lot of guys are bound to feel threatened by), he doesn’t hesitate to tell her when he thinks she’s wrong.
This is reminiscent of the parental Weasleys’ relationship: although Arthur is usually deferential towards Molly’s more temperamental nature, every now and then he puts his foot down, and when he does, it’s Molly’s turn to defer to him. Not because either of them is weak or passive by nature, but because they genuinely respect each other. Ron and Hermione’s interactions echo that dynamic.
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Ron has a cynically pragmatic streak that counterbalances Hermione’s occasionally impractical idealism. She gets outraged and indignant at times when he jeers at her lofty high-mindedness, but she’s smart enough to (eventually) acknowledge his basic common sense. Although she’s got a serious goody-twoshoes attitude, at bottom she’s not really the prissy follow-the-rules-at-all-costs type like, say, Percy Weasley. Fundamentally she appreciates Ron’s rebelliousness and disdain for authoritarianism. She just wants him to use it in a principled way instead of for immature self-indulgence.
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Ron has more innate physical skill and courage than Hermione does. Hermione has lots of moral courage and would willingly jump off a cliff if her duty to others required it, but she’d be thoroughly freaked out by it and scream and flail all the way down. (Not that Ron doesn’t sometimes lose his head too, especially when spiders are involved, but Hermione’s way worse.)
One of the reasons she loves magic so much is that it brings her physical capabilities more in line with her intelligence (see, e.g., knitting hats for house-elves), but she still values physical skill in others. Ron can duel, ride a broomstick, and just plain move his body better than hunchy, slumpy, clumsy Hermione can, and she admires that.
- It’s very clear that Hermione’s physically attracted to Ron. From her embarrassed refusal to finish describing what Amortentia potion smells like to her, I think we can conclude that the chemistry is there. (By contrast, she never seems to have thought much of Viktor Krum’s looks.)
So yeah, I think Rowling’s original conception of their relationship was sound, and this speculation about retroactive pairing of Hermione with Harry is nonsense. Rowling may have changed her mind, but I haven’t.
I’m not saying that she carries a shovel,
but she ain’t messin’ with no po’ muggle.
Of course, if she had really wanted to go, she would have just wiped your memory. 
According to the Harry Potter wiki, it looks like he’s three years older than she is. Krum was born in 1976 and Hermione was born in 1979. Not that big of an age difference.
I don’t remember if it was in the novels, but in the beginning of the 2nd or 3rd movie there was some foreshadowing when Harry and the Weasleys met Hermione at that pub outside Diagon Alley. Hermoine hugged everyone hello except Ron. They just self consciously and awkwardly muttered “Hi” to each other.
And maybe Ron was, um, well equipped?