Harry Potter Films, Deathly Hallows Preview

[MNM]

I don't agree with that. In the early books, sure, he talked a good game, but he was basically a wuss when it came to the quick; books six and seven were him being shown to really be in over his head (same, ultimately, with his parents too). He was good at being a school bully, but not cut out for anything more.

I dont disagree that he was a wuss, and have no problem with him realising he doesnt have the stoens for the task he was given, it was more the crying about it to a ghost. It just struck me as way too fan fictiony, where so many people write Draco as a redeemable anti-hero type. It seemed even worse to me since earlier in the book Rowling had detoured to show us that Blaise Zabini was actually a male, which is another topic I see way too much in fan fiction for my liking.

 

[coolghoul]

and as for the relationships, I think Ginny should have just been the girl with the crush in the earlier books & Harry & Cho never realy splitting (and the way Cho was written REALY irks me & just about every Chinese friend I know) Ron and Hermione I saw coming, if Rowling had written him as a little less thick
so as to have some charm & competency, i don't think anyone would have had a problem with it

What's the beef with Cho Chang and the chinese depiction? (That sounds like the title of a book - "Cho Chang and the Chinese Depiction" )

Also, I don't quite get why people are so anti-epilogue. Is it because it lays their own ships in the grave of it-might-have-been? Even LotR -RotK had tons of endings... What's wrong with multiple endings? On the other hand, I was not as avid a shipper so maybe I don't get it.

 

[cultcross]

Considering Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows are significantly worse in every way than the likes of Prisoner Of Azkahban and Order of the Phoenix, then yes, it is hard to believe such statement.

Order of the Phoenix? Seriously? Each to their own, I guess, but OotP is, to my mind, the single worst of the books by a good margin. The books are all (well, 95+%) written from Harry's perspective, so his character is paramount to how good a given book's story is, and he spends all of book 5 being a decidedly punchable emo, bitching at everyone for no reason. And the death of Sirius was about as emotional as a brick wall - Hedwig choked me up more than he did.
It made the best film, because it has the most standalone story with a one-off villain who is there from the beginning, you don't have to create the external danger of an enemy who hardly ever shows up (much harder in film than the written word). Also, the prophecy is completely useless and tells us nothing that impacts the rest of the story other than a throwaway backstory for Neville.

There are only two scenes I am interesed in seeing in the final movie, the scene where a horocrux induced Ron sees Harry and Hermione making out and berating him, and the very romantic stuff of Harry and Hermione at Godrics Hollow. Both will rock. The rest of the stuff? Meh.

Do I detect a disappointed Harry/Hermione shipper?

I agree about the romances (particularly Harry/Ginny which came out of nowhere in HBP) save the one that really seems to drive MNM and darkwing up the wall, Ron/Hermione.

Essentially I didn't have a problem with the Harry/Ginny romance, if for no other reason than it's been hinted at almost since book 1. With all of the time Harry spends around the Weasely's, why not have Ginny develop a crush on him and have it bloom further? There are hints at Harry's being a bit jealous earlier on, I think. Consequently, I didn't find the Harry/Ginny romance so otu of the blue as some others did. The Ron/Hermione romance is more what puzzled me given that they are nearly polar opposites in personality, background, etc.

I can't say I really understand the idea that either 'main cast' romance came out of nowhere. Both seemed absolute certainties by the time they actually happened, to me. Ron and Hermione were being paired up almost from the beginning, in increasingly unsubtle hints. And Ginny crushing on Harry was established right from the start - as soon as he broke up with Cho, I saw it as an inevitability. We didn't 'see it coming' as much as Ron/Hermione, simply because the books are from Harry's perspective and he's oblivious to her affections until he shares them - like most people. The pairings as they happened were, imho, the only ones that could have made sense given the characters so far. In particular, Harry/Hermione would have been completely out of character for both, they have a fraternal relationship from the get go.

I adore Half Blood Prince because it does something that I don't see very often and that is to flesh out the main bad guy. We know so little about Voldemort in the beginning and to have it presented in that way was enjoyable. I liked the small things and the parallels. It was fascinating take on the steps it took for Voldemort to become who he was.

This is why I loved book 6 too - it remains my firm favourite. I was fascinated by the background we learnt on Voldemort, and the Half Blood Prince storyline wasn't half so pointless as the movie made it seem - although, it was very short and really just a framework for the 'important' story, the exposition on Voldemort.


Oh, and to those moaning about side-along apparition not being invented until book 6, that's just a Rowling trademark - new things get added to the Potterverse all along which start out rare or unusual and are suddenly commonplace from then on. Apparition itself was talked about in speculative terms in 'Askaban', when they aren't even sure the supposed dark wizard Sirius Black can do it - one book later, everyone can do it and its a driving test metaphor. If you don't like that aspect of Rowling, you must have got annoyed a lot more times than just side-along apparition.

 

[Thespeckledkiwi]

the one thing that bugged me that was added was the truth serum in Book 4. Why the hell did they not use that on Potter to clear Sirius' name or even use it on Sirius himself?

 

[cultcross]

the one thing that bugged me that was added was the truth serum in Book 4. Why the hell did they not use that on Potter to clear Sirius' name or even use it on Sirius himself?

To be fair on that one, GoF established that truth serum was strictly controlled by the Ministry of Magic and Askaban certainly gave the impression the Ministry weren't overly interested in the truth. However, why it wasn't used during the interrogation of Death Eaters is harder to explain away. Rowling occasionally does run into problems where the jeopardy she wants to create is endangered by the magical world in which it is set.

 

[Sephiroth]

yes, at the end of PoA Snape could have easily said "He's lying, and in league with Black, Minister, Veritaserum, I can have it in 5 minutes, with your permission...and ready the Dementors"

 

[coolghoul]

I would make it analogous to the "lie-detector". The technology is there but still we don't use it on the US on the person who's robbed a grocery-store or even a murder. There might be something associated with using Veritaserum.

Btw, I seem to remember Rowling answering the question about why not use Veritaserum on her website or in one of the mugglenet question/answer sessions.

 

[SiorX]

Oh, and to those moaning about side-along apparition not being invented until book 6, that's just a Rowling trademark - new things get added to the Potterverse all along which start out rare or unusual and are suddenly commonplace from then on.

There were a few dodgy examples though, I think. The most egregious being the introduction of a previously unheard of bit of wandlore which proves to be the defining 'gotcha' in Harry's defeat of VDM. Ho-hum.

the one thing that bugged me that was added was the truth serum in Book 4. Why the hell did they not use that on Potter to clear Sirius' name or even use it on Sirius himself?

To be fair on that one, GoF established that truth serum was strictly controlled by the Ministry of Magic and Askaban certainly gave the impression the Ministry weren't overly interested in the truth. However, why it wasn't used during the interrogation of Death Eaters is harder to explain away. Rowling occasionally does run into problems where the jeopardy she wants to create is endangered by the magical world in which it is set.

Rowling came up with an explanation for that on her site.

JKR: Veritaserum works best upon the unsuspecting, the vulnerable and those insufficiently skilled (in one way or another) to protect themselves against it. Barty Crouch had been attacked before the potion was given to him and was still very groggy, otherwise he could have employed a range of measures against the Potion - he might have sealed his own throat and faked a declaration of innocence, transformed the Potion into something else before it touched his lips, or employed Occlumency against its effects. In other words, just like every other kind of magic within the books, Veritaserum is not infallible. As some wizards can prevent themselves being affected, and others cannot, it is an unfair and unreliable tool to use at a trial.

It doesn't actually say that anywhere in the books, so there's no canon backing for it, but that's the author's own explanation for not using Veritaserum. I think the deus-ex potential of the time-turner bothered me more. I mean, if you can change time to do your extra homework, and save a hippogriff, it's a bit hard to justify not using it to save so many other lives. Though I think at the end of OotP they very conveniently accidentally destroy every time-turner ever, honest! don't they?

 

[Sephiroth]

I would make it analogous to the "lie-detector". The technology is there but still we don't use it on the US on the person who's robbed a grocery-store or even a murder. There might be something associated with using Veritaserum.

Btw, I seem to remember Rowling answering the question about why not use Veritaserum on her website or in one of the mugglenet question/answer sessions.

the polygraph machine is highly inacurate, you could twitch and give off a false reading

 

[Rowan Sjet]

Each to their own, I guess, but OotP is, to my mind, the single worst of the books by a good margin. The books are all (well, 95+%) written from Harry's perspective, so his character is paramount to how good a given book's story is, and he spends all of book 5 being a decidedly punchable emo, bitching at everyone for no reason.

Heh, I actually like that about the book, that he's a bit of an asshole. But then I like NuBSG so...

Do I detect a disappointed Harry/Hermione shipper?

I think you do.

I can't say I really understand the idea that either 'main cast' romance came out of nowhere. Both seemed absolute certainties by the time they actually happened, to me. Ron and Hermione were being paired up almost from the beginning, in increasingly unsubtle hints. And Ginny crushing on Harry was established right from the start - as soon as he broke up with Cho, I saw it as an inevitability.

Agreed, about Ron/Hermione. But why does Ginny crushing on Harry inevitably mean they get together? Given all the embarrassment it caused Ginny growing up, and how much stronger a character she became once she moved past her celebrity crush in OotP, it felt much more logical to me that the crush was merely Ginny's big obstacle growing up, and she could become a much better friend to Harry once she became less star struck over him. Indeed, Harry and Ginny become good friends in OotP, and she is able to give him a couple well earned kicks up the backside over his poor behaviour, while also living her own life, dating first Michael then Dean. By the end of the OotP, what can now be seen as a hint toward Harry/Ginny in HBP (Ron telling Ginny she can always find someone better than Michael, following their breakup, while looking pointedly at Harry) was to me at the time a strike against it (since Ginny then happily replies that she's already dating Dean).

But then HBP has it that she never let go of her feelings, and her dating of Michael then Dean was all part of a plan to show Harry the "real her", so he could then fall for her. Except, Harry never showed the slightest hint of attraction to her in OotP when this whole showing the "real her" was going on, and the first hint we do get of his feelings is when he misses her on the train to Hogwarts, due to all the fun they had at the Burrow, something we didn't actually 'see' and have to in fact be told about it.

It doesn't help that I'm not sure I like the the "real" Ginny in HBP, or at least the way JKR treats her.

This is why I loved book 6 too - it remains my firm favourite. I was fascinated by the background we learnt on Voldemort, and the Half Blood Prince storyline wasn't half so pointless as the movie made it seem - although, it was very short and really just a framework for the 'important' story, the exposition on Voldemort.

Voldemort's backstory, with all the plots linked to it (like the spider burial), is my favourite aspect of HBP as well, with Snape/HBP and Malfoy following closely behind. Though the thing I love most about the book is that the title is basically "Harry Potter and Snape".

To be fair on that one, GoF established that truth serum was strictly controlled by the Ministry of Magic and Askaban certainly gave the impression the Ministry weren't overly interested in the truth. However, why it wasn't used during the interrogation of Death Eaters is harder to explain away. Rowling occasionally does run into problems where the jeopardy she wants to create is endangered by the magical world in which it is set.

It's also been noted that Truth Serum can be fooled if you have sufficient notice or expertise (paging Batman).

EDIT:

Rowling came up with an explanation for that on her site.

Guess I was too slow.

Though I think at the end of OotP they very conveniently accidentally destroy every time-turner ever, honest! don't they?

Yep!

 

[MNM]

Do I detect a disappointed Harry/Hermione shipper?

I think you do.

I would have prefered that to Hermione/Ron for sure. However if you characterised my dislike of books six and seven as soley because Harry and Hermione didnt get together then that would be wildly missing the point of my criticisms.

If Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows had been written exactly the same, tone, style, plots etc as they were, with the only change being that Harry ended up with Hermione rather than Ginny, I would still have disliked them.

Oh and yes, I loved Order of the Phoenix.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

Is it so hard to believe that her writing actually improved over the course of the seven books?

Considering Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows are significantly worse in every way than the likes of Prisoner Of Azkahban and Order of the Phoenix, then yes, it is hard to believe such statement.

Same question and/or request to you. Precisely HOW are those two books worse than "Prisoner of Azkaban" - which is still my personal favorite of all seven, btw. I honestly want to know just why you feel the last two books are worse. Because evaluating these things is so subjective for the most part, I am always interested in what criteria folks use to make thees judgments.

OK, one BIG one for me (as I stated earlier) was the "tell not show" approach to the "brawl for it all" at Hogwarts. This would have been the time to pay off many many 2ndary character arcs, and the writer chose to utterly IGNORE it.

But the book was in trouble well before that, with the ENDLESS "Israelites in the desert" style wandering around. They accomplished NOTHING by doing so. Nothing proactive that Harry, Hermione, and Ron did was allowed to make a difference until the writer decided to drop a plot advancement on them.

The writer should have shown the trio DOING things that mattered, not waiting helplessly for some outside force to drop a "buff" on them (Snape and the sword, for example).

And don't get me started on Ron (AGAIN) being a jealous, thoughtless ass to the other two. Ron has ALWAYS been a bad influence on Harry, and faithless TO Harry to boot, which he once again proves in DH with his little "pity me" temper-tantrum.

Then there's Ginny. Cypher or stuttering fan-girl, she's ALWAYS been a non-entity before HPB. Then all of a sudden, it's "Harry LOVE Ginny...Harry must HAVE Ginny! *grunt, snort*"

Bullsh*t!

The younger Weasly female is her mother's daughter, and we all remember that bit about Molly "helping" Arthur along...

 

[darkwing_duck1]

Considering Half Blood Prince and Deathly Hallows are significantly worse in every way than the likes of Prisoner Of Azkahban and Order of the Phoenix, then yes, it is hard to believe such statement.

Same question and/or request to you. Precisely HOW are those two books worse than "Prisoner of Azkaban" - which is still my personal favorite of all seven, btw. I honestly want to know just why you feel the last two books are worse. Because evaluating these things is so subjective for the most part, I am always interested in what criteria folks use to make thees judgments.

Book six and seven changed in tone from the previous five books, nearly every character was written out of sorts, Dumbledore for example went from a powerful wizard who had just (at the end of book five) dueled with confidence against Voldemort to a weak old man with delusions of grandeur whos great plan for Harry to beat Voldemort was to tell him stories of Voldemorts past (which, indicently, showed that Voldemort was born evil, negating the message of early books where everything is a choice), Hermione after five books of barely noticing or bothering about Ron while being completely focused and into Harry (I could list volumes of such incidents but it would take forever, ask if you wish to know some specific ones I am refering to). Plot points that had been given a lot of time to develop in previous books were dropped and ignored, ie the Veil in which Sirius fell through. Go back and read the section of book five that focused on it and then see how it is never mentioned again, or the locked door in the department of mysteries, etc..

Then there were stupid plot points that were created in the final two books, Ron speaking Parseltongue to open the chamber of secrets, ignoring the fact that previously this was considered a very, very rare magical gift and not a learnable language, so if the first five books were still in force at that point, Ron making random hissing sounds would not have opened the chamber but resulted in Ron looking like Joey in the friends episode where he thinks he is speaking french. Do not get me started on the idiotic idea of side-along apparation and the amount of moments it made look retroactively stupid from previous books when it wasnt used, most importantly the fact that Harry's parents when attacked by Voldemort didnt simply grab Harry and side along out, instead James went out to attack Voldemort while telling Lilly to grab Harry and "run".

The "romance" was written horribly. suddenly, after years of not giving a rats ass about her, Harry suddenly had a "monster in his chest" and could think of nothing more than wanting to kiss Ginny. How Ron managed to "win" Hermione, not by truely changing from being someone who constantly was rude to her, but through nothing more than a book that told him how to act nicer when around women. Or the fact that Ron needed a personality change in the final book, where the author gave him many characteristics of Harry, making him braver (him saving Harry and then destroying the horocrux when the trio were questing), making him smarter (the Parseltongue incident, as stupid as it was, was supposedly Ron being smart to think of this) and so on.

Or how about Draco, a guy for most of the books growing eviler with every book, delighting when the Basalisk was attacking students and hoping that Hermione would be the next to be attacked (book two), how he delighted in the fact when he thought Buckbeak would be executed (book three), how he was happy and joked about Digory dieing (book four) how he joined the mini nazi league with Umbridge (book five), only for him to be "redeemed" in a very fan fiction way in the final book and the completely out of character moment of him crying and baring his sole to a female ghost..

The homage/"rip off" of the Lord of the Rings with the Horocrux quest in book seven which was badly written, or the complete mess that was "wand mastery", which of course wasnt around in book five when the DA were dueling each other and regularly disarming each other of their wands...

Oh and the crappines of the epilogue...

I could go on and on, but the point is that I found near everything in book six and seven, the style of writing, the actions of the characters, the plot points used, the dialogue, the pacing, to be truely terrible, especially when compared to genuinely good books like POA and OotP.

In fact the only thing I found to be good of either the last two boosk was that in book seven, when Rowling was busy cementing the final relationship pairings, Hary and Hermione still got the most romantic scenes of the book. something the author has actually commented on since (around the end of 2008), in an interview for the books Harry: A History, where she says that in the final book Harry and Hermione share scenes that Ron is simply not a part of, how they are very intense and how the relationshiop question "could have gone that way" (Harry and Hermione).

Edited to add: Oh, and another thing that contributed to my dislike, the fact that the Patronus Charm, described in previous books as "complex magic", which even fully qualified wizards could not necessarily pull off, suddenly beacme the standard way in which every wizard and his dog sent messages to other wizards.

QFT!

 

[darkwing_duck1]

I agree. The epilogue may have worked for some people, but it's put me off every time I've tried to give it a go.

It's more "tell, not show", esp considering how Rowling said in interviews that all the stuff we wanted to SEE happening (the WW being redeemed from it's sins) magically happens between the end of the War and the Epilogue.

The War should have been WON by the WW finally growing up and joining the modern world (at least socially) in terms of things like class and race relations.

I agree about the romances (particularly Harry/Ginny which came out of nowhere in HBP) save the one that really seems to drive MNM and darkwing up the wall, Ron/Hermione.

Hermione is SO obviously the Lily of her generation. She makes a better match for Harry than Ginny "I'm a red-head, so Harry MUST love me" Weasley, aka the Potions Princess...

 

[darkwing_duck1]

Wouldn't it have been safer, for instance, for Moody to have used Side-Along Apparition to get Harry to Grimmauld Place at the beginning of OotP instead of flying?

Crap, methinks I've opened a can of worms for myself...

And the bloodbath that opens Book 7 would have been COMPLETELY avoided!

 

[USS KG5]

wait, did i completely black out and miss HBP?

That's pretty much how I felt after I walked out of the theater for HPB...I can't remember much about having seen it...

Well to be fair HBP as a book is essentially just a lead-in to DH, if you were to summarise its events you could do it in two lines: -

Harry finds out about Horcruxes.
Dumbledore is killed by Snape.

But of course it also leads in to the key themes for the final book, especially for Snape, and for the trio and their quest.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

The books are supposed to be told through and principally about one perspective, with the wider issues secondary and supporting.

Ok, an example of how that is NOT followed through in Book 7, and on a vitally important plot point. The Sword. Harry doesn't get the sword unless and until someone ELSE gives it to him.

What should have happened was Harry using the Map and Cloak to sneak back into Hogwarts to steal the sword himself.

Yes, some of the comical elements of the early books, and "left-out rebel" tone of the later ones don't really fit with Harry being both important and Dumbledore knowing he's important, the key The former can only be attributed to a sharp change in direction, but with the latter it could be argued that Dumbledore wanted to keep him both humble and non-pessimistic.

Which paints DD in a much more sinister light. Add to that his tacit admission in the "train station" that he KNEW Harry was abused by the Dursleys. Add to that his refusal to use his authority within the gov't to get Sirius a trial.

The writer didn't have the balls to go through with it, but it's clear that DD was grooming Harry to be a martyr (which he wound up being, but was deus-ed out of).

DD is a MONSTER, every bit as evil as Voldemort, just with better PR.

I thought she had gotten over the "obsession" in book 4 and in both that one and book 5 she had fine development that made her more likable not just as a fan but her own character. The relationship isn't deep but isn't meant to be-they like each other but not on serious, "one and only" terms.

Which is at odds with the Chest Monster that is described as Harry's reaction to seeing Ginny with other boys.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

But it (the Ron/Hermione romance) kinda mirrors real life where occasionally the girl will choose the (comparative) sidekick sort as opposed to the serious kid.

And Harry is serious an awful lot. I think Ron made her laugh.

OKay, I can buy that to a certain extent. My wife says I make her laugh, so .....

Ron made her cry and damn near got her KILLED (Book 1). Tore her a new one over a broom (Book 3). Was constantly winding her up with his laziness and slovenly ways (most of the books).

Rowling herself was setting up something deeper for Harry/Hermione all the way in Book 1 ("friendship and bravery and...[love]"). Then she tossed it aside for the fangirl who looks like his mother...

 

[darkwing_duck1]

Order of the Phoenix? Seriously? Each to their own, I guess, but OotP is, to my mind, the single worst of the books by a good margin. The books are all (well, 95+%) written from Harry's perspective, so his character is paramount to how good a given book's story is, and he spends all of book 5 being a decidedly punchable emo, bitching at everyone for no reason.

Gee, being stuck in Durskaban. His godfather STILL a fugitive. DD's "mushrooming" of him (mail ban). Near-death expereince due to the return of Voldemort...I'd be a little "emo" too...

Also, the prophecy is completely useless and tells us nothing that impacts the rest of the story other than a throwaway backstory for Neville.

No, the prophecy sets Harry up as a martyr, and that is what DD is grooming him to be at that point.

Do I detect a disappointed Harry/Hermione shipper?

Dissapointed that the LOGICAL pairing is tossed aside for half-assed, baseless pairings "because the author says so"?

Damn straight!

I can't say I really understand the idea that either 'main cast' romance came out of nowhere. Both seemed absolute certainties by the time they actually happened, to me. Ron and Hermione were being paired up almost from the beginning, in increasingly unsubtle hints.

Yes, because making a girl cry and almost getting her crushed by a troll is SUCH a good way to show her how you feel...or tearing her a new one about a broom...etc etc...

And Ginny crushing on Harry was established right from the start -

Yes, because creepy stalker fangirls make good girlfriends...

We didn't 'see it coming' as much as Ron/Hermione, simply because the books are from Harry's perspective and he's oblivious to her affections until he shares them - like most people.

No, they're baseless until the mysterious appearance of the Chest Monster. And there's STILL the bit about Molly "helping along" her relationship with Arthur...like mother like daughter...

In particular, Harry/Hermione would have been completely out of character for both, they have a fraternal relationship from the get go.

On the contrary, she all but throws herself (in an 11-year old way) at him right at the end of book 1 with the "friendship and..." line. Hermione is constantly being demonstrative with him, until the later books when she unexpectedly (and unrealistically) starts throwing herself at Ron.

This is why I loved book 6 too - it remains my firm favourite. I was fascinated by the background we learnt on Voldemort, and the Half Blood Prince storyline wasn't half so pointless as the movie made it seem - although, it was very short and really just a framework for the 'important' story, the exposition on Voldemort.

What? That Voldie was a 'bad seed'? That's not interesting OR particularly informative.

Oh, and to those moaning about side-along apparition not being invented until book 6, that's just a Rowling trademark - new things get added to the Potterverse all along which start out rare or unusual and are suddenly commonplace from then on.

The mark of a poor writer.

 

[darkwing_duck1]

Rowling came up with an explanation for that on her site.

JKR: Veritaserum works best upon the unsuspecting, the vulnerable and those insufficiently skilled (in one way or another) to protect themselves against it. Barty Crouch had been attacked before the potion was given to him and was still very groggy, otherwise he could have employed a range of measures against the Potion - he might have sealed his own throat and faked a declaration of innocence, transformed the Potion into something else before it touched his lips, or employed Occlumency against its effects. In other words, just like every other kind of magic within the books, Veritaserum is not infallible. As some wizards can prevent themselves being affected, and others cannot, it is an unfair and unreliable tool to use at a trial.

It doesn't actually say that anywhere in the books, so there's no canon backing for it, but that's the author's own explanation for not using Veritaserum. I think the deus-ex potential of the time-turner bothered me more. I mean, if you can change time to do your extra homework, and save a hippogriff, it's a bit hard to justify not using it to save so many other lives. Though I think at the end of OotP they very conveniently accidentally destroy every time-turner ever, honest! don't they?

You mean, she got caught with bad writing and tried to back-fill her way out of it.