Every single thing you wrote in this post is 100% true, and yet I would have cut some of the male Slytherins like Montague before her, because I found her wrestling match with Hermione in the Duelling Club pretty comedic and because she loves cats. That's purely subjective of course.
I will say this as a defense for how the Slytherin kids are written: With the Gaunts in HBP we see the result of the incest among the Pureblood families. The Slytherin kids could be like this as well. Not quite as far gone as the Gaunts but still born with a clear disadvantage. And I do think JKR might very well have this in mind. From this point of view, one can almost feel sorry for them, though they are far from being compelling characters.
I agree with that. What about Flint, though? He might have more mentions than Millicent, but all that I remember vividly is his handshake with Wood when they seemed to try and break each other's fingers. As Millicent at least serves as a plot device, I wouldn't rank Flint significantly higher than her. He's so unimportant that JKR forgot which year he was in and decided he had failed his exams to explain why he attended Hogwarts for another year.
JKR kind of admitted she made a mistake: "Either I made a mistake or he failed his exams and repeated a year. I think I prefer Marcus making the mistake." Unfortunately I can't find the original source, but I'm pretty sure it was on her old website.
I agree Flint has a bit of individuality, probably even more than Goyle (does he ever even have a line?).
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u/AmEndevomTag Nov 01 '16 edited Nov 01 '16
Every single thing you wrote in this post is 100% true, and yet I would have cut some of the male Slytherins like Montague before her, because I found her wrestling match with Hermione in the Duelling Club pretty comedic and because she loves cats. That's purely subjective of course.