Let's talk Harry Potter or "Why I think Ron Weasley is a useless, terrified pussy"

Over the last few weeks, Krishni and I have methodically knocked out the entire Harry Potter series thanks to a combination of DVD's, HBO and Amazon Unbox.  Isn't technology cool?  Krishni and I will never be considered hard core fans.  She's never read the books; I only read the first two and found them to be poorly written.  I've been told that the Brit who wrote the books became a better writer as the series went on but like I'm going to invest 7,000 pages of my time in anything unless it was written by Shelby Foote, especially if it kind of sucks.

Rest in Peace, my good man

Over the course of the, what, 8 movies, Ron goes from being a mischievous, studly little boy ("I'll be the knight!") to "The guy who got out-manly-ed by his little sister".

"I'm Ginny Fucking Weasley"

Seriously.  A simple Google search for "Ron Weasley Terrified" locates many, many fan photos--some with unfunny captions--of Ron pissing his pants:

Ahhhhhhh!

Ahhhhhhhhhhhh!

 Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

 Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh!

ARRRRRGGAAAAAHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

Honestly, I'm not sure what Hermione saw in him.  

Now, to be fair, I'm a bit more harsh on the guy than just about anyone I know.  Krishni doesn't think he's as useless as I do and my dear friends and Harry Potter aficionados Mel and Amber expressed a similar sentiment.  After all, he did survive the entire series and stood by his pal Harry through thick and thin; except for, you know, those entire sequences during the films where he abandoned his friend to go cry in a corner somewhere.  

Of course, you may be saying something like "But Mike, in those photos above he is clearly running from danger or, you know, he has a spider on his head."  True.  Ron did go along on most of the adventures and did, in fact, have more than one spider on his head.  But you know who else constantly stared down death, fought in the wizarding war and battled terrifying creatures and giant spiders?  Everyone else in the freaking series. 

Even awkward homeboy Neville Longbottom--the butt of many jokes through the first half of the series--pulls it together to save the day on more than one occasion.  

 Pictured:  Bravery Personified

All that and he bangs that freaky--and I don't mean that in a bad way--Luna chick.  I know that there was a rumor going around that he was actually the chosen one and that he would be the one to ultimately take down the dark lord but didn't he sort of do that?  Worse case scenario he splits the victory with Harry, right?  Maybe 70/30?  

Look, I'm sure that Ron came off better in the books--anyone that has heard me bitch about the middle third of the series knows that I feel an awful lot was left out of the movies in the interest of time--but seeing how I've never actually read these books, Ron comes off as a total wuss.  And we know who wears the pants in his marriage.

Hermione totally could have done better.  

Much better