10 Harry Potter Plot-Holes That Are Actually Aren't
4. Why Did Harry Not Use The Time-Turner To Prevent His Parents' Deaths?
The Plot-Hole
The Time Turner is able to take a person back in time. It should be easy for Harry to go back and, if not beat Voldemort, at least warn them. That way his parents will be alive in the future.
But Wait...
Thing is, this is not Star Trek. Despite the fact that JK Rowling has stated that the Time Turner only allows travel six hours into the past, thus rendering this plot-hole moot, the Time Turner does not allow travel back to the present. Should Harry somehow manage to succeed in thwarting Voldemort he would be trapped in the past, forced to watch his infant self grow up alongside his – the infant self’s – parents.
And therein lies the rub. While past Lily and James would do their utmost to care for the deeply traumatized future-Harry they would never be his parents: future-Harry was an infant when his parents were murdered – he never knew them and they never knew him. Worse, even should he be able to return to the present he would find parents who had never lost their son: the Harry they know would be completely different to the person time-travelling Harry is.
Harsh though it is, even should he succeed the people Harry wants so desperately to save would always be strangers to him. Heartbreakingly, the echoes Harry sees of them will forever be the closest thing he gets to ever meeting his parents.