Looking Back: Harry Potter

[ShadowDog]

It's been a little more than 7 years since the Harry Potter series ended, enough time to step back from the mania and judge it overall with some perspective. I still listen to the Audiobooks all the time and will for the forseeable future, putting it in rare company along with a handful of Stephen King books (Duma Key, Bag of Bones, Doctor Sleep). And I still find them chock full of a sense of humor, though I will say JK's sense of humor is often a little childish for me but that's in tune with her intended audience so that's fine.

 

But the series holds up. Sure, it peaked with Book 5 and sure the 7th book was pretty awful. And I feel just as strongly now about the tardation of a housewife being able to defeat "the most powerful dark witch in the world", but most endings of epic series suck ass. The Dark Tower ending sucked 1,000 asses, so did the BSG and Lost finales if we include TV. That's pretty much the trend. And when it comes to books, at least, I still enjoy the epic series despite their usually limp curtain calls.

 

Ranking the books from best to worst:

 

1) OOTP

2) GOF

3) POA

4) COS

5) SS

6) HBP

7) DH

 

2nd biggest pet peeve: The cliched romantic pairings. I get why it's necessary, we've been with these characters for 7 novels and untold thousands of words, so its kind of a bummer if Harry ends up with Jane Butcher, someone he meets when he's 20 after the books are over. So I get it, but having all the main characters hook up with each other is trite and contrived so that's the tradeoff.

 

Biggest Regret: As shown in OOTP, Hagrid can box, yo. Not only that, stunning spells just bounce right off him. So it's disappointing he punks out during the Battle of Hogwarts. He'd earned an "onscreen" epic battle of awesome.

 

Weakest Book Long Mystery/Conspirary: The plan in GOF makes no ****ing sense. Barty Jr. could have made a teacup a portkey and invited Harry in for tea at any point that school year. JK can tap dance and rationalize all she wants to, but that complicated and convoluted scheme was completely unnecessary and retarded. The book is still fun as hell, and again it's targeted towards children so fine, but just saying.

 

Honorable Mention isn't really a logic problem as much as it's Harry never really being called out for being the dumbass he is. In SS, if Harry never intervenes at the end, then Voldy will never get the SS because Quirrel was never going to get the Stone from out of the mirror. Never. So despite him getting through all the other protections, Dumbledore's final protection would have worked. Only Harry showing up to "save the day" almost ruined things.

 

Harry's Dumbest Assedness: Harry had a LOT dumb moments. Too many to count. He's easily the dumbest series long protag we've ever seen. But his dumbest was in OOTP. So all year long, he's unable to communicate with Sirius, right? The Floo network is being watched, Owls are being frisked, etc. So there's just no way to get word to and from Sirius. It's a problem throughout the year and becomes the big plot point at the end because if he could have gotten word to Sirius the whole climax and Sirius' death could have been prevented.

 

Man, too bad he didn't know any House Elves who'd be willing to apparate and disapparate on command to take messages back and forth to Sirius and anyone else he needed to talk to, huh? We know House Elves don't give a shit about the "nobody can apparate in and out of Hogwarts" rule. And we know that Dobby would do anything for Harry. Boom, your own private and instantaneous Owl. Been useful during the year and crucial during the climax. True, there's the secret keeper spell on Sirius' house, but we don't know for sure that even works on House Elves. Even if it does, Dobby could go to the Weasley house and then use their fireplace. Or go to Dumbledore earlier in the year and ask for access. Maybe all that is too much to ask for, but it should have at least been brought up and dismissed like the other forms of communication were.

 

Not really a "plot hole" like I described it on Twitter, but it just occurred to me this last time listening to the Audiobook.

 

So, any random thoughts, lingering pet peeves, or retrospectives on the series now that we're 7 years on from it?

[Lucas1138]

Whoa... I'm still reeling from you listing HBP and DH as the worst two books of the series.

 

Aside from that though...

 

I'm with you, at least on first thought without having read OotP in ages, about the 'plot hole' though. I'll be interested to see if one of our own with a better memory than I can let us know if there was any reasoning hidden (or in plain sight) as to why they couldn't use Dobby for such communication.

[Guest]

Because nobody thinks about house elves. That's the constant theme of the series, and one that isn't REALLY addressed at the end: wizards think they're better than everyone else. Maybe not as bad as Voldemort, but you basically have two groups: you've got the Klan members in Voldemort's group and you have the institutional racists in the "good guy" group. The only person really willing to go beyond that is Hermione, and she seems more interested in doing the "right thing" than actually caring about those being oppressed and ignored.

 

It would have been more of a plot hole for the wizards to actually think of Dobby, because that would betray the character of the entire magical population.

 

And it's interesting that you say that OoTP is the best, as that's the one book I really don't like at all.

[ShadowDog]

Yeah, we'll all have different books we think are best and worst. That's the interesting part.

 

My problem with Half Blood Prince is two-fold. First, it feels like the first part of a two part movie. It feels like when you split up The Hobbit into three movies or DH into two movies, or I suppose that Twilight crap and the way they did the last book. The first part is all setup and the second part is all resolution. HBP felt that way to me, particularly in regards to Snape. With three years in between books, we all time to figure out what Snape was actually doing whereas if we'd been caught up in things and had the resolution right away that reveal would have been a shock. Ditto for the RAB mystery. We had too much time to think that shit out and figure it out. It's like if the mystery in GOF had a three year break in the middle of the book we all would have probably figured it out given the clues and setup in the first one.

 

My second problem with it was that it was the first book in the series to depart from the formula established in the first five. It just FELT different than the first five. For example, one of the pleasures of the first 5 books was Snape's lessons with Harry, how snippy Snape would be with him. Harry being a smartass back, Draco being a little bitch, etc. That was missing in this one. We only saw a grand total of two lessons with Snape and Harry, they were great scenes but we needed more. Ditto for Draco's run-ins with Harry and Co. I get that Draco had his own thing going on this book, and that's cool. Characters evolve, and i found the scene with Draco and Dumbledore completely fascinating. But I just missed their run-ins with Draco. They were always comedic and entertaining. Both the Snape and Draco encounters were always comedic highlights of each book up to that point and we pretty much lost them both.

 

Also, Draco turning on Snape after five years of totally kissing his ass felt completely unearned because it all happened off screen. One second he's kissing Snape's ass and the next thing we know he's disrespecting Snape left and right. Not earned.

 

So, for me, the whole thing read like Harry Potter fan fiction rather than an official novel in the series. Like it was close, and had it's moments, but didn't live up to the 5 books that came before it.

 

Having said that, the first two chapters are brilliant. I love the rundown of five years of encounters between Fudge and the Other Prime Minister. And Snape taking in every question and doubt Bellatrix has and countering and rationalizing them all with perfect pwnage was AWESOME. I sometimes listen to these first two chapters just on their own because they both contained on the first disc. Two epically awesome chapters. Hell, even the next chapter where Dumbledore pwns the Dursleys was spot on. So it's not a horrible book by any means, just not up to the level of the previous ones.

[Guest]

My biggest problem with OoTP is that, well, I won't say Harry deserves his treatment, but the character reads like an outsiders view of what a moody teenager should think. In all of the other books, Harry comes across as a real person. In OoTP, he not only doesn't understand why he acts certain ways, he doesn't have any motivation. That works if you're looking at, say, Draco or Ron, because the story isn't from their perspective. When you have the character who is the center, even if his internal motivation is stupid and illogical (teenage boy) he still needs to have something.

 

The good parts of the book:

-It sets up why it's so easy for Voldemort to take over. There are some pretty horrible wizards who aren't "evil," just bad.

 

-Sets up Dumbledore as a bit of an idiot. Dumbledore is completely blinded by his desire to protect Harry, it's true. But his "protection" keeps putting Harry in more danger. So Dumbledore is old, he's powerful, he's smart, but he's blinded by emotion. It also sets up for a great payoff in DH when we find out WHY he's that way. It's not just because of Harry, it's because of Dumbledore growing up too soon, and he wants to protect Harry from that.

[Guest]

As for GoF, I always assumed that it was part of Voldemort's plan to mess with Harry. He's so messed up that he has to be a Bond villain.

[RamonAtila]

My favorite has to be GoF. To me, if the book didn't exist then the heart of the entire series would be lost. Hogwarts went international. It's what inspired me to work in hostels years later. Plus, the appearance of the skull in the sky. And Malfoy's family suddenly showing their true colors in the early stages of Voldemort's return. The mermaids, the games. It was an awesome book. The movie did not do this book justice. Come to think of it, the movies' quality started to decline with GoF.

 

OotP surprised the hell outta me cause I thought from the cover it would be really strong, but then it started slow and I got worried. But then it got really deep when the kids started rebelling against Umbridge and I felt an impact. I knew this book would make a good prelude to the last two books, which were an entity all on their own. The story felt sort of out of the way.

[NumberSix]

OotP was always my favorite because that's when all the major students -- not just Harry's Trinity -- started to come together like a true team, all Avengers Assemble and everything. I appreciate that DH took it one step further and took the team from a single large clique to the entire school population, a la the Buffy Season 3 finale, but it took so, so long to get there. Also, that DH ending: no. So OotP wins.

 

Absolute least favorite: GoF. Putting Hogwarts in a worldwide context and showing us other wizarding schools and styles was brilliant and well played. But the first several hundred pages are essentially a sports story, which is cool. Honestly, I've frequently liked sports stories a lot more than actual sports, but the thing about a great sports story is that it matters who wins and who loses. Even if your hero is the loser, then it's usually how he handles that loss, and then the journey becomes the meaningful thing, but it all works once you nail that climax, whether the ending is happy or tragic.

 

In GoF, after hundreds of pages of sports story, then we're told it doesn't matter who wins and who loses. The entire competition is narrowed down to Harry and Edward Cullen, and just as we're about to get our final sports moment of sports closure with the sports victory at the end of this epic-length sports story, the narrative swoops in to clinch that grand moment and PSYCH! SURPRISE VOLDEMORT IS BACK UR SPORTZ R STOOPID ROOOOOOAAAAAARRRR KILL KILL KILL KILL KILL the end.

 

Imagine, if you will: a Rocky sequel in which Rocky and Apollo Creed have weathered fifteen grueling, bone-shaking rounds against each other. Rocky's been ground into white Hamburger Helper, but the very last minute he musters up one last fraction of an ounce of courage and pulls off the Haymaker to End All Haymakers and catches Creed exactly in the secret sweet spot between his eyes or whatever. Creed goes down. The referee begins the count. The crowd goes wild. Marian is over in the corner holding her breath while hours' worth of tears glisten all over her face. Uncle Pauly is standing next to her hurling every obscenity known to Italy. Rocky can barely see through his swollen eye slits and it's taking the last of his phenomenal will power to stand upright without vomiting.

 

The ref keeps the count going slowly while the tension and the narrative momentum build. He gets to eight. He's almost there. He swings his arm up for the nine-count.

 

And then a Martian missile blows up Pittsburgh. The End. For Your Oscar Consideration.

 

That's why GoF sucks.

[Lucas1138]

Best: Half Blood Prince

 

Next best: Order of the Phoenix and Deathly Hallows

 

Next next best: Goblet of Fire

 

I liked it a lot at the time: Chamber of Secrets

 

It wasn't bad: Prisoner of Azkaban and Sorcerer's Stone

[RamonAtila]

The entire competition is narrowed down to Harry and Edward Cullen, and just as we're about to get our final sports moment of sports closure with the sports victory at the end of this epic-length sports story, the narrative swoops in to clinch that grand moment and PSYCH! SURPRISE VOLDEMORT IS BACK UR SPORTZ R STOOPID ROOOOOOAAAAAARRRR KILL KILL KILL KILL KILL the end.

You just made GoF sound even better to me!

[David]

for me, there's not a bad book in the series. in the 4300 pages, there are stretches in the books that were aggravating and terrible to me, such as the tension between ron and harry in the deathly hallows, harry being a complete vagina in OotP and all the Quidditch crap in Goblet of Fire.

 

as far as the romances are concerned, i wasn't really bothered by it. i was fine with it and the way they all played out, even though it made sense for harry and hermione to be together. why it didn't happen, is beyond me, but i didn't read the books for the romance. i read the books for the adventure, and what an amazing adventure it was.

 

my favorite part/focus of the series was the relationship between harry and snape. the way it played out and unfolded....i never could have imagined it and i don't think it could have been done any better. for me, personally, there wasn't a character i hated more in the book at one point. then as snape and harry played out, he ended up being a character that i ended up appreciating and understanding. a little creepy, as fond of lily he was, but in the end, i got snape. i understood him.

 

 

 

Favorite book is really a toss up between Prisoner of Azkaban and Half Blood Prince. Least favorite book is OotP.

[Cashmere]

Half Blood Prince is definitely my least favorite. I think it's because of exactly what SD said. It feels like a huge slog to get through all that exposition with very little action, and it doesn't "feel" like an HP story because it doesn't follow the formula.

[David]

It's really fascinating reading everyone's opinions on these books and which ones our favorites are and which ones aren't.

[The Choc]

I've always like 3 and 4 the best. Those are the 2 books that took it to another level. What I mean is that the first 2 books are essentially Voldemort has a plan to come back and Harry thrawts it. At that point I figured that's how all the books would be. A simple story where Harry wins in the end. The third book was the first one I think that started to feel different as Voldermort wasn't even in it and we got mor of a feel of the larger story. The fourth book then went to even another level with Voldermort actually coming back. When if finished 4 i definitely felt the story got a whole lot bigger.

 

My rankings would go

 

Goblet of Fire

Prisoner of Azkaban

Deathly Hallows

Half Blood Prince

Sorcerers Stone

Order of the Phoenix

Chamber of Secrets

[The Choc]

OotP was always my favorite because that's when all the major students -- not just Harry's Trinity -- started to come together like a true team, all Avengers Assemble and everything. I appreciate that DH took it one step further and took the team from a single large clique to the entire school population, a la the Buffy Season 3 finale, but it took so, so long to get there. Also, that DH ending: no. So OotP wins.

 

Absolute least favorite: GoF. Putting Hogwarts in a worldwide context and showing us other wizarding schools and styles was brilliant and well played. But the first several hundred pages are essentially a sports story, which is cool. Honestly, I've frequently liked sports stories a lot more than actual sports, but the thing about a great sports story is that it matters who wins and who loses. Even if your hero is the loser, then it's usually how he handles that loss, and then the journey becomes the meaningful thing, but it all works once you nail that climax, whether the ending is happy or tragic.

 

In GoF, after hundreds of pages of sports story, then we're told it doesn't matter who wins and who loses. The entire competition is narrowed down to Harry and Edward Cullen, and just as we're about to get our final sports moment of sports closure with the sports victory at the end of this epic-length sports story, the narrative swoops in to clinch that grand moment and PSYCH! SURPRISE VOLDEMORT IS BACK UR SPORTZ R STOOPID ROOOOOOAAAAAARRRR KILL KILL KILL KILL KILL the end.

 

Imagine, if you will: a Rocky sequel in which Rocky and Apollo Creed have weathered fifteen grueling, bone-shaking rounds against each other. Rocky's been ground into white Hamburger Helper, but the very last minute he musters up one last fraction of an ounce of courage and pulls off the Haymaker to End All Haymakers and catches Creed exactly in the secret sweet spot between his eyes or whatever. Creed goes down. The referee begins the count. The crowd goes wild. Marian is over in the corner holding her breath while hours' worth of tears glisten all over her face. Uncle Pauly is standing next to her hurling every obscenity known to Italy. Rocky can barely see through his swollen eye slits and it's taking the last of his phenomenal will power to stand upright without vomiting.

 

The ref keeps the count going slowly while the tension and the narrative momentum build. He gets to eight. He's almost there. He swings his arm up for the nine-count.

 

And then a Martian missile blows up Pittsburgh. The End. For Your Oscar Consideration.

 

That's why GoF sucks.

The Wrestler just kinda ends.

[Pong Messiah]

Worst to best:

 

1. CoS: Sophomore Slump
2. SS: Charming, but the most "lightweight" of them all fo sure
3. GoF: Nothing bad about it. Just liked the ones above it better!
4. PoA: A lot of fun, and Rowling was obviously getting more sure of herself.
5. DH: Would be higher, maybe even in the top spot, but it's just too damn long and too convenient at times.
6. HBP: This is the oddball of the group, but I loved the hell out of it.
7. OotP: The camaraderie and Dolores is way cooler than Boba Fett.

I love the series because it is fun, not afraid to get its hands dirty every now and then, full of memorable characters (some of whom I really, really like!), and despite being aimed at a younger audience, I rarely felt insulted or pandered to. J.K. Rowling deserves a ton of respect for crafting her story in such a way, IMO.

 

Just as importantly, it works as a great bond between parents and children. Would have to take off my mittens and socks to count all parents I know whose kids discovered reading and fantasy settings can be a great place to lose themselves through HP, and I think that is great.

[NumberSix]

That's how it worked for us. JC, my son, and I saw Sorceror's Stone first in theaters, then got into the books as a family read-along thing as the movies rolled out. We did that until halfway through reading OotP, when my son decided Potter wasn't his thing anymore. That hurt a little, to be honest, but JC and I read the rest of the series from there on our own. (Silently to ourselves, I mean, not aloud beyond that point.)

[David]

That's how it worked for us. JC, my son, and I saw Sorceror's Stone first in theaters, then got into the books as a family read-along thing as the movies rolled out. We did that until halfway through reading OotP, when my son decided Potter wasn't his thing anymore. That hurt a little, to be honest, but JC and I read the rest of the series from there on our own. (Silently to ourselves, I mean, not aloud beyond that point.)

Ugh. I dread the day my son starts (unintentionally) hurting my feelings.

[Driver]

Yeah, I still think the whole thing is a bunch of lame rip-offs of about a million things that came before it, and I still am annoyed by the fact that grown adults exploded the NYT best seller list, threatened to ban people from message boards over spoilers and several other instances of idiocy over books MEANT FOR CHILDREN.

 

That said, my kid JUST finished the first book and was pretty into it. Easily the biggest book he's read. Kind of a big deal because as a writer/reader type I've had a hell of a time getting him interested in reading and it' been frustrating.

[ShadowDog]

I think you're giving way too much weight to intention. the Looney Tunes cartoons were originally MEANT FOR ADULTS.

 

So what.

 

Rocky Horror Picture Show wasn't originally meant for people to throw s*** at the screen.

 

so on and so forth

 

rip offs (seriously Neil Gaiman should sue and would win), logical holes, the s***** ending ... those are all fair complaints but the made for children thing is weak

[RamonAtila]

Yeah, I still think the whole thing is a bunch of lame rip-offs of about a million things that came before it, and I still am annoyed by the fact that grown adults exploded the NYT best seller list, threatened to ban people from message boards over spoilers and several other instances of idiocy over books MEANT FOR CHILDREN.

 

That said, my kid JUST finished the first book and was pretty into it. Easily the biggest book he's read. Kind of a big deal because as a writer/reader type I've had a hell of a time getting him interested in reading and it' been frustrating.

Star Wars ripped off a lot. Ditto Tarantino. What about them.

[NumberSix]

 

That's how it worked for us. JC, my son, and I saw Sorceror's Stone first in theaters, then got into the books as a family read-along thing as the movies rolled out. We did that until halfway through reading OotP, when my son decided Potter wasn't his thing anymore. That hurt a little, to be honest, but JC and I read the rest of the series from there on our own. (Silently to ourselves, I mean, not aloud beyond that point.)

Ugh. I dread the day my son starts (unintentionally) hurting my feelings.

 

Part of the parenthood deal, unfortunately. In addition to the family Potter sessions, I used to read to him every night at bedtime. We went through a lot of books that way -- nearly all of Dr. Seuss, over half the Oz books, the first few Chronicles of Narnia, some Roald Dahl, etc. When he got old and finally called it off...yeah, that sucked.

 

Some of it's just that inevitable march toward independence. And kids wanna go forth and find their own tastes and favorites, too.

[Driver]

rip offs (seriously Neil Gaiman should sue and would win), logical holes, the s***** ending ... those are all fair complaints but the made for children thing is weak

No it isn't-- it is YA. YOUNG Fiction. So was Twilight.

I'm not saying it's a crime for an adult to enjoy books geared to younger audiences-- I have a few YA books I re-read every year.

 

But, and call me a snob, but when the most read books the world over, by adults, are books written for kids, I think that's kind of a sad state of affairs.

 

 

Yeah, I still think the whole thing is a bunch of lame rip-offs of about a million things that came before it, and I still am annoyed by the fact that grown adults exploded the NYT best seller list, threatened to ban people from message boards over spoilers and several other instances of idiocy over books MEANT FOR CHILDREN.

 

That said, my kid JUST finished the first book and was pretty into it. Easily the biggest book he's read. Kind of a big deal because as a writer/reader type I've had a hell of a time getting him interested in reading and it' been frustrating.

Star Wars ripped off a lot. Ditto Tarantino. What about them.

 

What's your point?

 

Star Wars is an amalgamation of several influences, but it isn't a direct copy of anything. That's part of what made it so iconic. QT, is a pro rip-off artist, lifting from various movies to make his own narratives-- but at the same time no one makes movies like Tarrantino. In both cases we're talking about people taking a slew of influences and wrapping them up into a unique stylistic shell.

 

Harry Potter was a kid-friendly near point by point lift from Neil Gaiman's Books of Magic.

[RamonAtila]

I heard they were both influenced by T.H. White books

EDIT: The big clincher that makes everyone lose their **** is that Book of Magic also contains an adopted orphan boy, who learns of his higher calling, and it contained magic.

But the fact is that Gaiman and Rowling were inspired by The Sword in the Stone. It was about Arthur (The Wart) a boy who was an orphan and adopted and was made to feel inferior to his adopted brother meeting a wizard and learning about his higher calling and magic and yadayadayada...

People go especially crazy when they mention "Harry Potter ripped the owl idea from Book of Magic!' when the fact is that both owls were ripped from Archimedes the owl in The Sword in the Stone.

Harry went to wizarding school. Rowling went completely in her own direction with the mythology.

I see no less a parallel with Star Wars. A New Hope was basically an EXACT RIP of the Japanese story The Hidden Fortress masked in Flash Gordon. George admitted he hastily used the plot of The Hidden Fortress to turn his Star Wars idea into a script.

And Flash Gordon...A young blonde dude who, accompanied by his wise older friend, travelled to another planet and defeated an evil tyrant, Ming, who had a serious Asian vibe going on. Do we forget Darth Vader's design is a rip of a Samurai?

I think you were heavily biased here comparing Harry Potter and Star Wars. Tarantino films are a whole different story. What frustrates me is yes his films are unique but in a way really not. Like Woody Allen films and Simpsons and Family Guy many shots and soundtrack music we've come to love from him are direct rips from other films. Is that bad? No. But I cringe when people say they didn't rip.

[Cerina]

Good God. Snobbery abound.