It’s Halloween month… so naturally, Carrie has turned up to the studio as Carrie Potter.
This week, we’re heading into the magical world of Harry Potter to explore one of the biggest themes running through the entire franchise: death.
There’s just one small problem…
Carrie is a Harry Potter EXPERT.
Emma… absolutely is not.
In fact, Emma’s knowledge of the entire franchise is so embarrassingly poor that she admits she only watched the first few films before the Dementors scared her off completely. So while Carrie Potter arrives fully prepared, Emma is essentially trying to remember who everyone is.
But beneath the Harry Potter chat is something much more serious — and something we think the books and films do brilliantly: they introduce children to death, grief and loss without pretending those things don't exist.
Harry begins his story having already lost his parents. As the series develops, death becomes an increasingly important part of his world, alongside friendship, love, growing up and adventure.
We talk about whether stories can help children understand feelings they don't yet have the words for, whether fiction can provide a safe way to explore grief, and whether we sometimes try too hard to protect children from conversations about death.
We also get into some much bigger questions:
Can love outlive the person who gave it to us?
Does someone really disappear when they die, or do memories, stories and the things they leave behind keep them present?
Why are humans so fascinated by ghosts, souls and the possibility of an afterlife?
If you could defeat death, would you actually want to?
If you could bring one person you've lost back for just one perfect day, would you?
And perhaps the biggest question of all…
If accepting that we are going to die is part of what makes life meaningful, would immortality actually be a gift… or a curse?
Plus, Carrie gets to demonstrate just how frighteningly extensive her Harry Potter knowledge really is, while Emma attempts to survive an episode about a franchise she abandoned because of imaginary flying death creatures.
And of course, we finish with some Harry Potter-inspired Would You Rather questions that get surprisingly deep — and potentially very emotional.
This episode is sponsored by Walsh Funerals & Memorials.
Because ultimately, whether we're talking about witches, wizards, ghosts or real life, perhaps the biggest lesson is that death is part of life — and talking about it doesn't have to make it more frightening.
As always, we’re dying to talk to you.
And that’s us for this episode of It’s A Death Sentence!
If you’ve enjoyed it, found it useful, thought-provoking, or just found us thoroughly entertaining — which is entirely possible — please like, follow, subscribe and share. It genuinely helps us grow.
You can find us on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook and YouTube, and the podcast is now available on all major platforms, with the video version on YouTube and Spotify.
We’re also on Patreon if you’d like to support what we do.
And if you want to find out what we’re up to beyond the podcast, come and follow Dead Curious CIC on Instagram, Facebook and YouTube. That’s our Community Interest Company delivering creative death education workshops — because apparently talking about death wasn’t enough, so we decided to make a whole organisation out of it!
And finally… Halloween!
Come and celebrate the success of the podcast with us at our Halloween Masquerade Ball, Saturday 31st October at Moor Hall, Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham.
There’ll be food, a string quartet, live band, DJ, dancing until late and, presumably, some questionable decisions in fancy dress. Tickets are on Eventbrite — link Eventbrite Masquerade Halloween Ball ticket
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