6 Harry Potter Questions We Have For J.K. Rowling After Cursed Child

This article contains major spoilers from Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, and is meant to for people who have either seen the play or read the script book. Or are J.K. Rowling. If none of those apply to you, read on at your own risk!

Harry Potter and the Cursed Child is truly a magical and thrilling experience to see play out on stage. While the stage production allowed for some spectacular effects and a suspenseful pace, which builds between parts 1 and 2, seeing (or reading) the eighth story told this way is undoubtedly an adjustment for those of us who are used to the novels. With that in mind, there are parts of Cursed Child that likely couldn't be fleshed out. J.K. Rowling is well known for her notes and outlines, which makes us hopeful that she'll share further details and information about some of the twists and reveals that she, Jack Thorne and John Tiffany offered in the eighth story of her beloved series. With that in mind, we've compiled a list of lingering questions we'd love to have answered...

Why do the time-turners work differently in the play than they did in the books?

Maybe this is really a matter of how the story was presented to us in the play, versus how things played out in Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, but the way I always understood time travel and the time turners in the Harry Potter universe, was that whatever will happen, did happen. Meaning, Buckbeak never actually dies because Harry and Hermione would go on to travel back and save him. And Harry's patronus shows up to save him and Sirius from the dementors because Harry survived and went back in time to send the patronus. It's all a loop, right?

In Cursed Child, Scorpius and Albus change the timeline. They make alterations that shift things so that when they return to the present, the world is different. Are we misinterpreting how the original time turners worked? Does that mean that there was, at one point, an alternate timeline out there where Buckbeak is dead? Because if so, how does Harry survive the Dementor's kiss in order to live to go back in time and save himself?

Or do these new time turners have the added ability of rewriting history and making changes to what will be?

I'm inclined to think it's the latter, and that the time turners featured in Cursed Child came with the added, more powerful ability to alter the past. Still, I'd love a detailed explanation about how this works. Preferably with graphs and drawings to illustrate the timelines.

How did Cedric end up becoming a Death Eater?

We know that Scorpius and Albus' efforts to humiliate Cedric succeeded a little too much after the second task. After their shenanigans, the Hufflepuff Seeker somehow went from Hogwarts champ to murdering Death Eater. And we have no information beyond that as to how exactly that transpired. Was it simply a matter of him losing his self esteem after the ordeal? Did the kids at school give him such a hard time that he turned to the dark side? Or was there more to it than that? Who recruited him? When did he actually join the Dark Lord's supporters? And what other horrible things did he do besides kill Neville Longbottom? Answers please!

And that brings us to our next point...

How exactly did Neville die?

In the darkest timeline, Cedric goes on to become a Death Eater and kills Neville. But how did it happen? Were they dueling? Was it a spur of the moment encounter, or was this an assassination situation? Also, when did it happen? Are we to assume it was during or near the Battle of Hogwarts? Or was it at some point before then? Neville wasn't exactly a star pupil during his last year at Hogwarts, when he was splitting his time between defying the Death Eaters in charge, and helping to lead Dumbledore's Army in Harry Potter's absence.

Neville's death only occurs in the Voldemort-Wins timeline, so maybe it doesn't matter how he died, but we have no doubt that J.K. Rowling knows the exact circumstances surrounding his death. Hopefully she'll give us the details sometime.

When did Ron become a total goofball?

Let's face it, if one of the trio were to earn the "Most Changed" award in Cursed Child, it would be Ron. Sure, of the trio, he's probably the one most likely to crack a joke, but prior to Cursed Child, he was never really the prankster type. We want to believe that this evolution in Ron's character has a back-story. Harry and Hermione went on to take serious jobs at the Ministry, and they grew up to be relatively serious people. Ron, not so much.

Is this the result of him spending so much time with George at the joke shop? Or was Ron always destined to be the more laid-back goofball-dad type? Looking at his father, the apple didn't really fall far from the tree. It just seems like a shift from the Ron we knew in the books.

What is the deal with Voldemort and Bellatrix?

So, Voldemort and Bellatrix were getting it on. We know they did it at least once, as they produced a child. We know Delphi was born sometime before the the Battle of Hogwarts, where both of her parents were killed. And we know Bellatrix was either Voldemort's most faithful supporter, or at the very least, in his Top 3. But was their relationship romantic on any level? It's unlikely that Voldemort actually loved Bellatrix. He didn't seem capable of love. But what was really going on between the two characters? Were they trying to produce a child? Did Voldemort even know about Delphi and did he get to meet her? Did he have any involvement in naming her? If he did know she existed, did he intend to play the role of the child's father? There's a story there, and as unsettling as it is to picture whatever was going on between these two characters, let's face it, we're curious.

What happens to Delphi?

This one's more of an open-ended question, which is why we're putting it last. Last we see Delphi, she's bound and whisked away. Presumably, she's brought back to the present and imprisoned in Azkaban. But is that really the final fate of the only daughter of Lord Voldemort? And what exactly is the sentence for murdering a kid, trying to alter time and attempting to bring the Dark Lord back? If Rodolphus Lestrange could be released within a couple decades for his involvement as a Death Eater, I can't imagine Delphi will stay in prison forever. And that's assuming there aren't lingering Death Eaters out there plotting to break her out. So, what happens next? Who does she become? Is there more to her story?