Spoiler Warning
Grab some chocolate, because this ending has a lot to unpack. This is the ending of Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, book three of seven, explained from the first clue to the last letter.
And fair warning, this video is full of spoilers. If you haven’t read the book, watch my spoiler free review first. If you have, here is the quick answer. Sirius Black is innocent, Ron’s rat is the real traitor, and Hermione’s secret is a Time-Turner.
The Setup
Let’s catch up on where the story stands. Everyone believes Sirius Black betrayed Harry’s parents to Voldemort. Harry overheard that Black was the Potters’ Secret-Keeper, and that he supposedly killed his old friend Peter Pettigrew, along with a street full of Muggles.
Then the year runs out of room. Hagrid’s hippogriff, Buckbeak, loses his appeal and is sentenced to die at sunset. Ron’s rat Scabbers has been missing since Crookshanks seemed to eat him. And in her Divination exam, Professor Trelawney speaks in a strange voice and says the Dark Lord’s servant will break free before midnight.
That evening, Harry, Ron and Hermione sneak down to Hagrid’s cabin under the Invisibility Cloak, to say goodbye to Buckbeak.
Into The Shack
While they are there, Hermione spots Scabbers, alive after all. They carry him back toward the castle, and the rat wriggles loose when Crookshanks comes slinking toward them. Ron runs after him.
Out of the dark comes an enormous black dog. It grabs Ron by the arm and drags him into a gap at the roots of the Whomping Willow, and Ron’s leg breaks on the way. Then Crookshanks does something astonishing. He presses a knot on the trunk, and the violent tree freezes.
Harry and Hermione follow the cat down a long tunnel and up into the Shrieking Shack. Ron is on the floor of an upstairs bedroom, and the dog is nowhere in sight. Because the dog was a man all along. It is Sirius Black.
The Truth About Scabbers
Black disarms them, and Harry, boiling with rage, throws himself at him. Moments later, Harry stands over Black with his wand pointed at his heart. But Crookshanks leaps onto Black’s chest to protect him, and before Harry can act, Professor Lupin bursts in.
Lupin disarms Harry and then does something shocking. He hugs Black like a brother. Hermione, furious, blurts out that Lupin is a werewolf, and Lupin calmly admits it. She worked it out from a school essay and a lunar chart.
Then Lupin asks to see Scabbers. He says the rat is not a rat. He is a wizard, an Animagus, named Peter Pettigrew.
The Marauders
Lupin tells the story. He was bitten as a small boy, and at school he had three friends who discovered his secret. James Potter, Sirius Black and Peter Pettigrew became Animagi illegally, so they could keep him company as animals when he transformed. James was a stag, called Prongs. Sirius was a dog, called Padfoot. Peter was a rat, called Wormtail. And Lupin was Moony.
That is who wrote the Marauder’s Map. It also explains the Whomping Willow, which was planted to guard the tunnel to the Shrieking Shack, where young Lupin was sent each month. And it explains why Snape hates him. Sirius once tricked Snape into following Lupin into the tunnel, and James pulled him back.
Snape then appears under the Invisibility Cloak, wild with triumph and deaf to reason. Harry, Ron and Hermione all cast the disarming spell at once, and Snape hits the wall, out cold.
The Night Goes Wrong
Black explains how he found Pettigrew. In Azkaban, Fudge gave him a newspaper, and there was Scabbers on Ron’s shoulder, with a toe missing. The Secret-Keeper switch had been Black’s idea, a bluff to protect the Potters. Pettigrew was Voldemort’s spy all along, and he faked his death by cutting off his own finger.
Lupin and Black force Peter back into human form, and he pleads for his life. Harry believes Black at last. Then he steps between Pettigrew and the wands. He says his father would not have wanted his friends to become killers. They will take Pettigrew to the dementors instead.
They set off for the castle, chained together. Then the clouds part and the full moon shines, and Lupin has not taken his potion. He transforms. Black becomes the dog and fights him, and in the confusion Pettigrew grabs a wand, knocks Ron out, and escapes as a rat.
The Dementors
Harry hears a dog yelping and finds Black by the lake, surrounded by a hundred dementors. He and Hermione try to protect him, and Harry tries his Patronus again and again. It is not strong enough. Hermione collapses, a dementor lowers its hood, and Harry feels its kiss coming.
Then a silver light drives them back. A shining animal gallops across the lake, and Harry faints, but not before he sees a figure on the far bank. He thinks it is his father.
Harry wakes in the hospital wing to hear Snape telling Fudge that the children were confused by a charm. Snape is about to be given a medal. Black is locked up, and the dementors are on their way to perform the Kiss.
The Time-Turner
Dumbledore listens, and he believes them. But there is no proof, and what they need, he says, is more time. He tells them where Black is kept, the thirteenth window from the right in the West Tower, and warns them that they must not be seen. Then he locks them in, and Hermione pulls out a golden chain with an hourglass.
It is a Time-Turner, given to her by Professor McGonagall on the first day back, and it explains her impossible schedule. Three turns take them back three hours.
They free Buckbeak first, so the Ministry’s axe falls on nothing. Then, hidden in the trees, they watch their earlier selves go down into the Willow. When the dementors close in at the lake, Harry runs out to see who will save them, and realizes that no one is coming. The figure was himself. He casts the Patronus, and a silver stag appears.
Then they fly Buckbeak up to the tower window, free Black, and race back to the hospital wing with seconds to spare.
What Happens To Everyone
Snape bursts in, convinced that Harry did it, but Dumbledore points out that the door was locked, and that nobody can be in two places at once. Only Harry, Ron, Hermione and Dumbledore will ever know the truth. Buckbeak is free, Hagrid is overjoyed, and Pettigrew is gone.
Lupin is the heartbreak. Snape lets slip that he is a werewolf, and Lupin resigns before parents can complain. He hands Harry back the cloak and the map, and says goodbye. Hermione drops Muggle Studies and hands in her Time-Turner.
Dumbledore then tells Harry that saving Pettigrew mattered. The Dark Lord’s servant now owes Harry a life, and that is a bond. Trelawney, he says, has now made two real predictions. Sirius writes from hiding, admits he sent the Firebolt, and encloses permission to visit Hogsmeade. Ron gets a tiny owl, and Harry grins at his Uncle Vernon about his godfather.
What It Means
So what is the book saying? First, it is about mercy. Harry’s choice to spare Pettigrew is the heart of the story, and Dumbledore says the time may come when Harry is very glad he did it. That is a seed for the rest of the series.
Second, it is about the father Harry never got to know. Lupin confirms that James was a stag, and Dumbledore says that, in a way, Harry did see his father, because he found him inside himself. I think that is the most beautiful line in the book.
Third, it is about justice and the people who never got any. Sirius and Buckbeak are both condemned without a fair hearing, and both are saved by three children and a very patient headmaster. The grown ups fail, and it is the friends who put it right.
Fourth, it is about time, and how little we can control. Hermione is terrified of changing anything, because wizards who meddled with time sometimes killed their past selves. Dumbledore tells Harry that the consequences of our actions are always complicated. Even a good deed, like saving a life, can have a cost, and that idea shadows the whole series.
I also think it is a quiet story about guilt. Lupin never told Dumbledore that Sirius was an Animagus, because he was afraid of losing his trust. Sirius blames himself for the Secret-Keeper switch. Everyone in this ending is carrying a mistake, and the book is kind about it.
My Verdict
Here is my verdict on the ending. It is the best ending in the first three books, and one of the best of the whole series. Every clue pays off, the emotional scenes land, and a double rescue in a single night is a stroke of genius.
My one quibble is that the explanation scene is long. But the time loop is so satisfying that I forgive it.
Tell me in the comments, which moment gets you most, Harry spotting himself across the lake, or Sirius flying away on Buckbeak? And if you want to see everything the book hid in plain sight, my clues video is next. Thanks for watching, and I’ll see you in the next one.
