Harry Potter Discussion [warning: spoilers]

Die, Potter, dieeeeeeee!

On a side note, friends and I are going to the book release in proper wizard dressing—just in order to scream out loud “Potter dies! Potter dies!” to the people in the queues.

Huhu huhuhu huhuhuhuhuhuhu

heheh… yeah…

me an my friend are going to the premare of the next movie (many people in the croud will most likely not have read all the books, i know i havn’t) and give the ol’ “SNAPE KILLS DUMPLEDORE!” holler!

oh by the way, snape kills dumpledore.

Today, after I wrote this post, someone from the forum sent me a private note about there having been a leak of the last book. I tracked the leak on the net and downloaded the book. I read the last chapter.

[spoiler]It’s called “Epilogue — Nineteen years later” and it tells the lives of the characters after the end of the story—just like Jo said she would probably do. I’m not gonna tell anything factual other than what I have just said, because I know many people are curious but end up regretting their own curiosity in the end. But let me mark here my impression: I was disappointed. Through time, as I read on the series, I had this feeling that Jo had stopped being a writer and started writing fan fiction of herself. The plots were shallow and not very well manipulated, the tools and twists she resorted to were cinematographic but didn’t have that literary thing, that which in the end makes books more interesting than cinema. Hell, even some fan fiction I read was better than the later books!

What I felt while reading the resolution of the characters’ lives was disappointment. I’m sure the book is full of turns and twists which will make you twitch in your chair as you read the book, but— Well, I suppose that, in the end, Potter was just meant to be yet another stupid story that won’t be remembered by anyone within a decade. Lets hope the leak I read was a hoax.

For the curious soul out there: once you get the book, and start to wonder whether or not it’s the same version that leaked and which disappointed me so much, open your copy on page 18. In the leak (supposed to be the Scholastic version, so this note is mainly for the Yanks), the page begins, “Albus’s brother, Aberforth, arrived at school.”[/spoiler]
As for myself, I’m not going to read the whole leak. Here’s what I’m going to do: now that I’ve read the last chapter (a fact that does not spoil anything for me, for I’m the “enjoy the whole thing” kind of guy, rather than a “get to the ending, get to the ending, the ending is sacred etc” freak), I’m gonna wait to borrow a friend’s copy; probably only gonna read it a lot later than you guys. I’m not in a hurry, really. Tomorrow, after confirming with someone whether or not the leak is indeed the real book 7, I’ll probably dump the files (to prevent from my own curiosity).

Please be careful with posting spoilers near the beginning of your posts.

Spoiler tags do not work for people connecting to the forum via phones. Wouldn’t want poor siiw to get spoiled because she was searching someone’s post history

Some [the next ten paragraphs have been deleted for extreme obscenity and a random pelvic thrust] idiot on Youtube decided to post who dies in Deathly Hallows after the leak had been announced. Luckily I turned away after reading only one name, but still… anyhoo, only 19 hours to go!

has anyone read the ‘what will happen in book 7’ book written by the mugglenet people? i got to see the two main authors talk at some bookstore…
it’s REALLY interesting!

We’ll understand if we never see you on the forum again, Bruno

YAY!!! I went to the pre-release party, and got my copy! Itt involved 5 hours of traversing through enormous crowds of screaming teeny-boppers while waiting for the boxes of books to be wheeled to the registers, but so be it.

i’m at page 113 right now

And i will read the things in the spoiler tags when I’ve finished

Crap I’m halfway through and halfta tell SOMEBODY

You too ShaggE

I finished reading it at 8am this morning.

You lot are so slow.

I wish I could say I liked it, but I felt ripped off after the first half of the book. The first half was amazing, then it turned into a poor fanfic as far as I am concerned.

I totally freakin’ agree, Mo

We ARE a slow lot

hmm

all i can say

yes, i read it now.

All I can say is, if it is all as anti-climactic as you all say…

Dune>Harry Potter

I finished it now. More in the spoiler tags.

welll I have to make 200 characters don’t I? So you don’t see it. Well I started my spoiler on purpose with something not that revealing. Actually it would only be about curiosity, so that doesn’t reveal a thing about Harry Potter. So why am I typing this then?

[spoiler]Bruno:“I’m not gonna tell anything factual other than what I have just said, because I know many people are curious but end up regretting their own curiosity in the end”
Aah so true, in fact I already heard too much from you and mohegan, while I actually only heard you didn’t like the ending. But hearing that I feared I wouldn’t like it, because I think I have an idea of what you would have liked. Yet I could still tell myself that the leak may not be true and eventually I forgot about it.

And seriously if you’re really curious, control yourself. I’m serious, because you probably regret it.

I do not like the ending at all. Seriously, I mean, especially the Nineteen years later thing. That’s like saying “and they lived happily ever after”, come on it’s not a fairy tale.

I’m disappointed he didn’t die, although I had expected it, I’m still disappointed. I really think he should have died. When I read about the deathly hallows and which one they posses, I though, maybe just hoped, that Ron and Harry would die and Hermione would survive. As it was in the story, the one with the cloak survived…

Also characters may die, but I didn’t get attached to any of them in this book. The only ones you are really following are Harry, Ron and Hermione. And neither of them dies. Surely the other books had build up their characters, but they die in a way you, or at least I, don’t feel anything with it anymore. They’re just characters, while in the previous books, when characters died this was not.

There are certainly great pieces in it, but the ending should be the best. The ending is what you remember the best, what keeps hanging, because it’s the last. And no I don’t like it. But after all it is a children’s book isn’t it?[/spoiler]

First some filler text in case someone fetches this post in the search page: Lorem ipsum dolor sit amet, consectetuer adipiscing elit. Vestibulum porttitor faucibus augue. Nulla ultrices malesuada nisi. Donec sit amet justo. Pellentesque pede elit, convallis at, venenatis sit amet, pellentesque non, nisi. Fusce quis diam. Nulla nulla est, viverra vel, congue sed, nonummy eu, nunc. Suspendisse feugiat. Class aptent taciti sociosqu ad litora torquent per conubia nostra, per inceptos hymenaeos. Sed sed mauris vitae nibh tempus viverra. Ut urna sem, pharetra a, tincidunt sit amet, cursus nec, mauris. Phasellus ac ligula. That’s good. Now on to the spoilers.

[spoiler]And let me disclaim once again that if I were you and hadn’t read the book (and was a spoiler freak—because I’m not one, and you might not be one as well, and in this case you have no problems with reading spoilers)—if I were you, I wouldn’t give in to my curiosity, because I’d know how much I’d regret that later. So be warned.

Like I said, the Harry Potter series ended, eventually, not like an original fiction series, but like a fan fiction of itself. Some of the latest happenings were tetrical. Since Harry’s failed attempt at relating with Cho, and the further misunderstanding with Hermione, it all felt like the author was one of those teenage fic writers of fanfiction.net, not Jo herself. To my surprise, a certain series of mock versions of the books four through seven, written by a friend of mine, were more enjoyable than the official ones.

So when book six finished with that dreadful hook for a following book—Harry the hero embarking on a cliché quest for the magic enchanted items that would allow him to kill evil evil Lord of Doom—it was already decided that the Harry Potter series would assume the structure of a fairy tale, inevitably. Jo’s originality and British wit were replaced with what feels like teenage cliché. People writing in Tolkien fandom forums can be more original than that.

Harry being a horcrux would be a nice turnpoint, if it weren’t so obvious that I even made a bet with Magnus he would be one. (Magnus, check our conversation history from when we finished reading Half Blood Prince: I was right on Ravenclaw’s something, Nagini and Harry being horcruxes).

And yet, there were some things I liked about this book. Harry, Hermione and sometimes Ron running away in hiding was very nice. Reading it was very realistic, and it had the good old sense of dark humour I liked so much about Jo’s former books: sharp criticism at modernity and its heroes. The form the Ministry of Magic was easily subverted by Tom had the paint of humour in the quill of misery. Those two things were outstandingly good in a book that, to me, would be a total lost cause.

Ron could have died. Nevertheless, his argument with the other two was very bold of his, and very enriching to his mostly backgroundish character. Very good, score for Jo. The introduction of deathly hallows, which could not be predicted by the readers no matter how many essays they wrote in the Leaky Cauldron (therefore, a Deus Ex Machina) was a good point for the book: shows she cared more about the plot than about the ending.

Dumbledore being evil in the past was a pleasant surprise. It was not at all forced, it fit his character perfectly, and it was unexpected. Very, very good indeed. Snape having promised to kill him if needed: poor. It would be far more interesting if Severus had had to make this choice on his own. Some of the plot devices were among the most cliché ever.

And, honestly, Lily, James and ALBUS SEVERUS?! Either Harry or Jo (or both) are seriously mental. How sad and traumatized! I didn’t like the epilogue, it would be better left out. The only thing good in the whole bloody chapter was Harry and Draco nodding. That’s all.

Well, after all Harry Potter wasn’t supposed to be a good book series. It won’t be remembered in, say, ten years. It didn’t change anyone’s life or add to literature, or do more than entertain us for a couple of days every other year. In short, it was just a bestseller. But it was good while it lasted, fun. If not for the plot, for the sake of criticizing it.[/spoiler]

Obligatory anti-search measure: hibbity jibbity hibbity jibbityhibbity jibbity hibbity jibbityhibbity jibbity hibbity jibbityhibbity jibbity hibbity jibbitymy name is francois the cooking sheep and oh how i love to dance.my name is francois the cooking sheep and oh how i love to dance.

[spoiler]I thought this was a fantastic ending to an incredible series. I don’t get how one can read it and still call it a children’s book, though. I definitely wouldn’t allow a young child to read it. (Or any of the books following Goblet Of Fire)

To be fair, the plot did have many deus ex machinas, and the most important deaths were barely mentioned. (I hadn’t even realized that Tonks and Lupin had died until at least a chapter after the fact. In fast paced scenes, I read faster, so I miss small details.) And I did find it odd that the entire trio survived, not to mention Ginny. I thought she was wand-fodder for sure.

On the plus side, the plot revelations were stunning, and the final battle was as epic as I expected. I hve to disagree with Bruno, I think Harry Potter will be a timeless classic, if not for the actual books, then for the incredible rags-to-riches story of J.K. Rowling herself.

Sadly, there is no possible way the movie version of Deathly Hallows will be anything more than a bucket of fail.[/spoiler]

Rant with LOTS of spoilers, beware. Obligatory text: blaaah blaaaah blaaaah, I don’t know what to say in the obligatory text… blaaah blaaah blaaah. I must disagree, I enjoyed this book (but I enjoyed them all, I can’t see them objectively, I’m too attached to judge them fairly). Some more text, blaah blaaah. Blaaaaah blaaaah. Blaaaah. Anything I feel like saying here would need a spoiler tag of it’s own, so I can’t say it. I used to divide my old class into the 4 houses, making a list of who’s in what house, and then at the end of the term I bought candy for the house that won the most points (points were awarded by me, obviously, for homework done and stuff like that). I used to wear Harry Potter-like robes to school, and I had a wand too, just for fun lol. Sometimes I feel like Luna Lovegood…

Okay, here comes the spoiler text.

[spoiler]I need to rant, I’m sorry, I need to! This is not a review or opinions about the book…

goes silent… I promised myself I would finish knitting my Slytherin-colored scarf if Snape survived… I’m going to finish knitting it anyway, in his honor.

/me bursts into tears.

Snape is (was?) my favorite character, I always believed he was good (see my earlier posts in this thread, you’ll see). Even throughout the seventh book, I still believed my theory to be right - I kept thinking, the silver doe MUST be his! I knew he would prove himself in the end.

I am mourning, okay?? lol. I’m mourning. Forgive my silly and pointless rant… I’m mourning.[/spoiler]

And I just noticed smilies show up within spoiler-tag areas removes all smilies.

are you serious?

that quote put the anti spoiler text out of the way, but i’ll put some more since i’ll probably install a mod soon that removes quoted messages from search results so you see what someone actually posted instead of the quote, which can be quite confusing sometimes, especially if you are a mod and need to check on someones post history um maybe I said too much now

Lots of spoilers below so beware.

[spoiler]hugs olesia
i’ll start with a non spoiler spoiler, are you sure you want to read this, read the book first if you haven’t done so. It’s still time to go back, it’s not too late.

ok, if you are sure then.

I’m not warning anymore. Last chance.

I decided to read it just to follow the story and not to annoy myself over things that didn’t fit or were boring or, you know, just read the story and not analyze things. But sometimes i couldn’t help myself. The duels are so boring. I find at least. Things were so easy too.

I found it not funny that snape had to die, i also always had the feeling he would be good in the end, and i’m glad that turned out to be right.

And come on… the final battle. Voldemort : i give you one hour to deliver potter. And later. You have until midnight.
Then you already know he’s going to lose. Come on, just finish the lot of, are you the lord of evil or what? /rant

But it really took a long time to take off i felt, but i felt that in the recent books too. I mean voldemort is back and such and a war is looming or whatever, and we get 50 pages of a wedding. Arg! Anyhow.

I found out lupus died only from reading ShaggE’s post, lol. can’t use smilies.
Some things were the same as usual, and i grew a bit bored of again a duel, etc. She always does that. in the first 100 or so or more pages of the book she describes one or two days, maybe a week, and then later it’s “weeks went by without anything happening” I had a feeling sometimes she had ran out of things what could happen, so she just said: nothing much happened until …

Somethings i already felt i knew while reading it, things others point out as surprise, like harry being a horcrux, it didn’t come as a surprise at all, actually i assumed that was the reason he had to die.

the thing that surprised me was that D-D already would have died and chose to die the way he did.

Furthermore there are a lot of things that annoy me, but it is a children’s book so i can’t say anything, but the adults are so stupid in those books ><. But I guess it’s supposed to be that way since the children always have to save the day.

I liked the scene in the ministry of magic building.

What i did like too was harry’s N-D-E, shall we call it that. (have to use - since otherwise the acronym mouseover thing shows up in the spoiler)

I wonder who that baby was on the floor, was that voldemort? Or was it explained somewhere and did i miss that. At the last 200 pages or so i was getting tired but i wanted to finish the book before falling asleep.

Also there was a nice quote there, if something happened inside your head, it doesn’t mean it isn’t real. (something like that). I liked that.

[/spoiler]

This turned out longer than I thought.

Beware if you reply and don’t want to read spoilers, the text shows up in the topic review below the reply.

Anti-search: Spiderpig, Spiderpig. Does whatever a Spiderpig does. Spiderpig, Spiderpig. Does whatever a Spiderpig does.Spiderpig, Spiderpig. Does whatever a Spiderpig does.Spiderpig, Spiderpig. Does whatever a Spiderpig does.Spiderpig, Spiderpig. Does whatever a Spiderpig does.

[spoiler]The baby on the floor was indeed Voldemort, I believe. His soul, at least.

Just wanted to add that Dumbledore’s line about things in your head being real would make a great slogan for this site, lol.[/spoiler]