It was in July of 2000 when I finally gave in to Harry Potter mania and picked up the first book. It was the summer that Goblet of Fire came out and I remember what a big deal that book's launch had become. In the days and weeks following its release, during my nearly daily trips to the Calgary airport, I remember seeing kids and adults alike completely absorbed into this big fat book completely oblivious to the rush of humanity around them. I decided that a book series that was having this much of an effect on the general population must be at least worth looking into. I bought Philosopher's Stone which was ossum and then I quickly bought and read the rest of the available books. Just like Dwight Shrute my favorite is The Prizoner of Azkaban followed closely by The Goblet of Fire. At that point I joined the longer suffering fans of the series in the nearly eternal waiting game as the remaining books and then movies came out. Having just seen the final movie I can honestly confirm a feeling that I have feared for some time now. Although I have enjoyed the entire series of books and movies the highs reached in the third and fourth books were never again attained in the later books or in any of the movies.
Even though DH2 has the advantage of containing several of the "r" words mentioned in my previous post on Catching Fire (resolution, redemption, retribution etc.) as well as the series climax it just didn't quite live up to my hopes for the final movie.
To be fair, I think one of the main reasons for my waning interest in and general lack of wonder for the final movies is just a time thing. It's just been too long. They tried to stretch HP out for as long as possible to make as much money as possible but for me it's just been half a decade too long.
Apparently since Harry first entered Hogwart's there have been extensive renovations done inside Gringott's bank vault caverns. What used to be a system of quaint trolley cars is now a full fledged rollercoaster complete with 100% realistic drop of death spur line. (Don't forget your I.D.) I suppose they figured they could use a new ride at Harry Potter Land in Florida so this explains the
Another thing that kind of put me off of the later movies is the battle scenes. Particularly the suspiciously ballistic and/or explody nature of the spells being hurled to and fro betwixt the non-muggle types. I mean why spend seven years in magic school if, when the chips are down, it seems you could do just as well with something like this.
I remember thinking that it's a good thing they didn't have cars at hogwart's or surely there would have been a car chase thrown in there somewhere too. Yikes!
In DH2, as you know Harry finally defeats Voldemort but apparently his timing was just a bit off. When he returns from his final battle to what you would think would be a hero's welcome everyone is in the middle of high tea and pretty much ignores him. What's up with that? I guess he should have delayed his entrance until they had cleared the crumpets and crustless sandwiches.
It just seemed like way too little for the reslolution of a seven year struggle.The kinda-lame climax was followed by a "19 years later" epilogue which was just as out of place in the movie as it was in the book. I think there were two reasons it was in the book. One was so that J.K. Rowling would have an excuse not to continue the story in more books. Two was to convince everyone that Hermione and Ron really did end up together and Harry did in fact marry Ginny. Her?
I never could fully buy into Ron/Hermione and Harry/Ginny. I would have had Harry with Hermione and Ron with someone... else. As for Ginny, don't really like her much and would probably have just sent her to public school for muggles in London somewhere.
The creation of the forcefield dome over Hogwart's was pretty cool. It was fun to see Kelly Macdonald as Helena Ravenclaw. I've always liked her. It was nice to see Snape's true nature revealed. I guess overall the movie was fine but... I found that, now that it has indeed all ended as the movie poster says, I wasn't really moved and didn't really care. Did I mention that it's just been too long? I guess I've already moved on. 7/10
P.S. What was with that fourth wall breaking blatant "Aliens" reference in the middle of a Harry Potter movie? I'm usually fine with the occasional outside reference, especially the ones that don't go over my head, but this one was over the top and took me right out of the movie. It was so obvious too. Even though the first few words were slightly different, the situation was nearly exactly the same and even before she finished I was thinking that the next two words out of her mouth better not be what I think they're going to be but of course they were and suddenly I was watching Ripley in that loader robot thing fighting the Alien for the life of poor little Newt.
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