Author’s Note: SPOILER ALERT. We will be discussing the end of this story so if you wish to read it I suggest you do it now. This article is a parody review of the fanfic “My Immortal”. We do not know the author, but she seems like she’s fun at parties.
Once upon a time, there was a little book series called Harry Potter. From this book series stemmed all sorts of magical adventures, theme parks, cosplays, and of course, fan fiction. Fans from all around the world could come together and read alternate universes about their favorite characters, insert themselves into the magical world, and even create new love stories that otherwise wouldn’t happen.
The greatest of all these fan fictions came from a small user by the name of Tara Gilesbie, better known as “XXXbloodyrists666XXX” on Fanfiction.net. In this well constructed universe, she has re-created the Harry Potter characters we know and love in the way that they always should have been enjoyed, in what is perhaps their true and final form: Emo-goth-punk-satanist-vampires.
Seriously. (Siriusly?)
Every chapter starts with a nice and respectable note from the author to her devoted readers. This is a real author’s note from Chapter 7:
“AN: wel ok u guys im only writting dis cuz I got 5 god reviuws. n BTW I wont rite da nxt chaptertil I git TIN go vons! STO FLAMING OR ILL REPORT U! Evony isn’t a Marie Sue ok she isn’t perfect SHES A SATANITS! n she has problemz shes depressed 4 godz sake!”
(Our AN: Microsoft Word Spell Check tried to have a field day with this. We promise we’ve changed nothing from the original content.)
The most fascinating part of the author’s notes is the relationship with her BFF, Raven. It starts off positive; they are BFF’s, Raven often helps with writing, and everyone is happy. But then disaster strikes when Raven borrows Tara’s sweater and evidently forgets to give it back. The notes devolve from thanking Raven (or “fanging” her in Tara’s hardcore-gothic rhetoric) to cursing her name with long strings of expletives. And then, as swiftly as it began, the harsh feelings quell with the return of the sweater, and Tara is filled with nothing but gratitude for Raven’s help with the story once again. It’s a rollercoaster of emotions.
Not only do all the characters receive new names (The Boy Who Lived has creatively renamed himself “Vampire” to fit his new lifestyle, while Ron and Hermione now go by “Diabolo” and “B’loody Mary Smith, respectively) while there are even some new characters, including the main character, Ebony Dark’ness Dementia Raven Way (or more oftenly called “Enoby”). Enoby is a goth vampire who likes to (rather problematically) romanticize depression and self harm as she drinks her own blood, listens to My Chemical Romance, and hooks up with everyone's favorite bad boy Draco Malfoy (also Voldemort, but we’ll get to that later). In her 44 chapters, XXXbloodyrists666XXX truly captured the angsty essence of the fifth Harry Potter book in a way that J.K. Rowling just couldn’t quite get.
Another highlight of the story is her use of the English language, or rather, a complete disregard for the basic structural integrity of it. From constantly changing everyone’s names at a breakneck speed to not being able to consistently spell her own, it’s truly a grammar nazi’s nightmare. We will now give you a list of everyone’s name we could keep track of along with their goth names and their misspellings, because it’s Pulitzer-worthy material.
- Ebony: Enoby, Ibony, and sometimes just straight up Tara, which gives the whole story more of a meta feel.
- Draco: Drako, Darko
- Harry Potter: Vampire Potter, Vampir, Vampur, Vrompire
- Ron Weasley: Diablo, Diabolo
- Hermione Granger: B’loody Mary Smith, B’lody
- Dumbledore: Dumblydore, Dumblydork, Albert
- Prof. McGonagall: McGoogle, McGoggle
- Snape: Snap, Snip
- Lupin: Loopin
- Sirius: Severus, Sirius
- Hagrid: Hargrid (AN: This one was weirdly consistent through all 44 chapters.)
- Lucius Malfoy: Lucian, Luscious
- Voldemort/ Tom Riddle: Volcemort, Satan, Tom Bombadil (our personal favorite), Tom Andorson. Vlodimort
- Peter Pettigrew/Wormtail: Snaketail
- Hedwig: Same name as OG Harry’s faithful owl, but this Hedwig is not an owl. He’s very much a human that Voldemort eventually has sexual relations with, in a crazy turn of events.
- Dolores Umbridge: Doris Rumbridge
- Willow (An original character based off of Raven. Fangz, Raven.): Wilow
- Tom Rid: This was the only name this character went by, but it’s important to note that he was not Voldemort like in the original story, but just a guy who worked at Hot Topic that our heroes frequented between My Chemical Romance and Good Charlotte concerts.
- Trelawney: Trevolry or Professor Sinister or Professor Sinatra. Maybe Trevolry and Sinister are separate professors? We don’t know either, it’s one of our many questions for XXXbloodyrists666XXX.
- Filch and Mrs. Norris: Mr. Norris and Filth. Filth is the cat, Mr. Norris is the janitor.
- Morty McFly: We assume she’s talking about Marty McFly, who might as well make an appearance in this absolutely bonkers story.
What makes this fanfiction stand out above all the others, in our opinion, is the author’s use of dialogue tags and descriptors. She likes to use words like “roared” and “shyly” in completely wrong scenarios and adds “sexily” to the end of most actions and sentences. Take this amazingly constructed sentence, for example:
“‘Hi Vampire.’ I said flirtily as I started to sob. Draco hugged me sexily tryont to comfrot me.”
Or:
“‘No!11’ we screamed sadly. Snap stated loafing meanly. He took out a kamera anvilly. Then...he came tords Darko!1!”
Or, my personal favorite:
“‘No you fucking bastrad!1’ I yielded.”
“Yielded” is often substituted for “yelled”. So close.
Her use of spells is done with incredible disregard for what the actual spells are. Avada Kedavra is turned into the typical magician “Abra Kedabra” while Expelliarmus is turned into “Crookshanks” (which, as any HP fan will know, is Hermione’s cat). The best spells are by far the spells that conjure guns and knives, but not just any guns, black guns with red pentagrams and MCR painted on them.
After looking at My Immortal from a careful psycho-literary lens, we think it’s important to dissect exactly where the root of the conflict comes from to get a real understanding of this piece’s merit. The true villain in this story isn’t Voldemort, who speaks exclusively in Olde English and frequently uses “thy” and “thou” to address other characters (which shows some solid character development on XXXbloodyrists666XXX’s part, in our opinion), but all of Ebony’s insecurities. She is just too perfect and too many people love her because she is too pretty, and she wishes she was ugly and normal like everyone else. It’s hard to be a goffik in this world of preps and Mary Sues, as she affectionately calls her haters. So relatable.
The greatest plot twist of all happens when Professor Sinister and Dumblydore have to send Ebony back in time to prevent Voldemort from ever becoming Voldemort. She is sent back to the 80’s (apparently MCR and Green Day were a thing in the 80’s) and is forced to seduce Tom Bombadill, or Satan, as his friends call him. Ebony is successful in seducing Satan, much to the disdain of Draco, who gets with Snap for his revenge! Ebony must navigate time and space to stop Voldemort from killing Vampire and Draco.
Just when she thinks her plans are going smoothly, James Potter (or “Samoro”) shoots Lucious and Ebony jumps in front of the bullet!
It’s at this point when the plot is taken over by our good friend and a true American hero, the FanFic hacker, who manages to break into Tara’s account and writes a chapter of their own. They send Ebony to her own personal spot in hell and return Harry Potter to its rightful state in the universe in a chapter of refreshingly correct grammar and spelling. It serves as something of a palette cleanser for us avid readers. Then they have a good LOL and give us the real chapter.
As it turns out, Ebony lives! Because she is a vampire, and only wooden stakes can kill vampires (although the author spells them like “steaks”, which is an amazing mental image). She makes Satan and Hedwig get back together and everything seems to be going just fine, until--gasp!--she accidently brings Satan to her own time! Now Voldemort is here to kill them all and, in what might be the greatest cliffhanger of all time, Ebony knows she must stop fighting her destiny:
“I cried sexily I just wanted 2 go 2 the commen room and slit my wrists with mi friends while we watched Shark Attak 3 and Saw 2 and do it with Draco but I knew I had 2 do somefing more impotent.
“Abra Kedabra!” I shooted.”
It ends here. We never hear from our good friend Enoby Dark’ness Dementia Raven Way again. What ever happened between her and Draco? Does she defeat Voldemort? Will she be able to do it with Draco one last time? How much more depressed could she get?
The world will never know.
Tara Gilesbie, wherever you are, we hope you’re doing well.
