I can't help but observe that even if Hermione had been male, and just Harry's friend - even if we take out all notions of sexism or relationship dynamics from this problem - killing him off is still not really the best solution. This was a character who was growing, who was admittedly more interesting than Harry, and who was on a path that could've potentially put this character at or even above Harry's level of rational thinking. But now we're just left with Harry again, and it feels like settling for second-best.

Perhaps later chapters will convince me otherwise, but for now I am suspicious that the direction this story is going is not the best direction for this story.