Harry Potter: 10 Fascinating Hidden Meanings And Metaphors

9. Snape Is The Vampire Of The Story

It's so easy to label Severus Snape, head of Slytherin and Defence Against The Darks Arts wannabe, as the bad guy in the first film. After all, he's played by Alan Rickman, so what more evidence do you need, exactly? Snape is a fantastically layered character though, and actually, he's almost vampirical in the series.

Firstly, there are those deathly black robes that he wears, coupled with the pale skin and sinister smirks. Then there's question of whether he ever sleeps - he's often seen wandering about the castle - and then there's the contrast between him and Lupin, the werewolf; no, I'm not suggesting that vampires and werewolves are enemies, this isn't Twilight, but when Snape set his class an essay on how to recognise a werewolf, a cheesed off Lupin sets one about vampires.

J. K. Rowling actually denied that he was a vampire categorically: "When people devote hours of their time to proving that Snape is a vampire that I feel it's time to step in, because there's really nothing in the canon that supports that," she once said. He might not physically be one, but there's no denying the imagery; the films definitely imply he's the otherworldly, gothic figure of Hogwarts.