One of the most powerful female fictional characters in recent years, Hermione Granger from the Harry Potter series has inspired generations ever since the books and movies came out. However, while the vast majority of her fans love her irrespective of her flaws, there are those who aren't necessarily impressed by her character.
Redditors have been vocal about the many times that Hermione ventured into morally grey areas, or behaved in an all-knowing or even cruel manner. However, it must be noted that most of the discussion here is rooted in the understanding of Hermione's character as written in the books and not as depicted in the movies.
Redditor Hamilfire loves Hermione but notes that she wasn't perfect. The fan says, "It is not okay that she attacked Ron with birds. It is not okay that she permanently scarred a girl." Fans will recall that Hermione had cast a charm in the sixth book to attack Ron with a flock of birds that drew blood, and in the fifth, she jinxed the parchment on which members of Dumbledore's Army signed so that Marietta Edgecombe was scarred after she betrayed her friends to the headmistress.
However, for the majority of fans, Hermione's actions had to be seen in context. She had been in love with Ron for a long time, but the latter was nothing but toxic to her. Similarly, Marietta did a despicable thing by giving away the location of the Room of Requirements to Umbridge and many feel that she had it coming.
According to SICRA14, Hermione "can be very judgemental. I'd say she is fairly close-minded." The Redditor feels she judges anyone who doesn't agree with her or contradicts anything she had read in a book.
But the bulk of Potterheads would agree more with Not_a_cat_I_promise, whose comment on this thread mentions that Hermione wasn't so much judgemental as she was skeptical, which was, in a way, a good trait to have. She wasn't comfortable with irrationality and liked to question everything.
Reddit user cloud_empress is frustrated about Hermione being written as a very stereotypically smart character. From being socially awkward to buying her friend a homework planner, she epitomized the stereotypes attached with being smart, and "her whole character centered around her being a teacher's pet."
But, once again, most fans feel that she shows character growth and her social ineptitude gradually vanishes over time. She is no doubt written as a typically smart young teenager, but just as Hermione Granger on Harry Potter has strengths, she also has her weaknesses and is never depicted as "perfect."
Cloud_empress also points out about Hermione that "beyond learning, she doesn't even seem to have hobbies." They feel that the character lacks depth and the reader never finds out what she really likes as a person, for instance, whether she is interested in history or if she reads fiction.
This idea isn't unpopular because it goes against the grain, but because most fans simply don't think about this. For them, Hermione Granger is intellectually inclined, clever and simply the brightest witch of her generation, without whom Harry and Ron wouldn't have survived.
A now-deleted Reddit user opines that Hermione makes it a habit of poking her nose "in things she has nothing to do with ..." She is also arrogant, dismissing people who knew anything she herself didn't, and self-righteous, always believing that everything she did or said was right.
Harry Potter fans would agree that Hermione could be an annoying know it all, but also that she was usually right, most of the time. She was arrogant and a tad self-righteous at the beginning, but most feel that she became more and more amicable as time went by. From being typecast as bumptious, she became a pillar of strength for Harry, and her heart was in the right place.
In another unpopular opinion, Redditor DarkLordRowan vents that Hermione doesn't really have a character arc at all: "Her character from the beginning of the series is almost identical to her character at the end of the series." The fan calls her personality "static unchanging," who only found meaning in trying to change others around her.
This is indeed controversial since Hermione Granger changed for the better by leaps and bounds throughout the series and the many fans around the world can vouch for her evolution. She became more mature, and even though she still often claimed to know what's best, she was a much better person by the end of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows.
A highly unpopular perspective is shared by HellStrike, who opines that Hermione should have been expelled from Hogwarts for leading "the headmistress into the Forbidden Forest so that she's squished by a giant ..."
But the overwhelming opinion here is that Hermione was perfectly justified in leading the evil Umbridge into the Forbidden Forest. If anything, fans loved the young witch for her quick thinking and for inflicting a punishment on one of the most hated Harry Potter characters. For the majority of Potterheads, Umbridge deserved what she got and there simply couldn't be a second opinion about it.
Hermione was, by nature, extremely jealous, points out the Reddit user aptly named OwlPostAgain: "She's not much better than Ron, to be honest," says the Redditor, implying that Hermione could get just as jealous as Ron at times. She also intentionally tries to make him jealous of her and McLaggen, with whom she had attended Horace Slughorn's party.
Harry Potter fans can agree that Hermione did make some bad mistakes, and she got possessive whenever she felt a tad threatened in her feelings for Ron. But it's also true that the latter remained blissfully oblivious to her feelings until quite late and often went out of his way to be rude and hurtful. The two developed a complicated relationship wherein they cared for each other but their monumental teenage egos wouldn't allow them to express what they felt.
Not only could Hermione be jealous, she could also get really vindictive, feels one Redditor. The fan reminds others that when Hermione placed the jinx on the piece of parchment that had been signed by the members of the DA, she hadn't informed them about the curse. Had she done so, then those who still betrayed Harry would have at least had their warning. But as it happened, the fan feels, "the hex was purely meant as a punishment that they weren't aware of, which is really vindictive."
Most fans here feel that Hermione was smart to think of jinxing the parchment so that Harry and his friends knew whom they could trust. What happened to Marietta was certainly terrible, but the DA was, after all, preparing for an impending war and the greater good probably seemed more valuable at the time.
Finally, darklooshkin puts up an entire list of all the many moments that Hermione Granger had broken the rules in Harry Potter that could be seen as worthy of severe consequences. From setting Snape on fire in her very first year and imprisoning Rita Skeeter in a jar to helping a suspected mass murderer, Sirius Black, escape, Hermione "may be psychotic, cold, calculating and probably developing a more than healthy blood lust by [the] series end," states the user.
But while things like keeping Skeeter in a jar were definitely morally questionable, it was these brainwaves that made Hermione an indispensable part of the trio. After all, Harry, Hermione and Ron were up against the most dangerous dark wizard of all times, so it might have been hard to beat him by keeping on the right side of law and being morally correct all the time. That said, some of the things the Redditor mentions certainly don't count as Hermione's brightest moments.
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