Hey there. I'm the Mad Maudlin mentioned in the article, and I think you do a great job here articulating what Fyrdrakken and I couldn't when we were put on the spot. Across all my fandoms, very few female characters "spark" for me the way males do, and their self-contained nature is a very big part of it. Hermione isn't a character sometimes so much as a plot device. You compare Hermione to Ron, but you know, even Ron has ongoing character drama that carries over from book to book--his frustration with his family and his feelings of inadequacy. They're not exactly plot-driving conflicts (except a bit in GoF) but they're there, at least, which is more than we can say of Hermione--in the end, she's too much like a jumble of traits without a sense of "personhood."

One thing I did mention to Ms. Traister, but which she apparently felt no need to include in the article, was that I relate much better to some female characters outside of HP--the women of Firefly, for instance, and Teyla on Stargate: Atlantis. They spark for me, probably because they are much less self-contained and more integrated into the plot. (I have other gripes about the article, but this clearly isn't the proper forum. :-))