Transcript for MuggleCast Episode #509, What We’d Change About The Harry Potter Books and Movies
Show Intro
[Show music plays]
Andrew Sims: Welcome to MuggleCast, your weekly ride into the Wizarding World fandom. I’m Andrew.
Eric Scull: I’m Eric.
Micah Tannenbaum: I’m Micah.
Laura Tee: And I’m Laura.
Andrew: On today’s episode, we are going to share what we would change in the Harry Potter books and movies. This is going to be a really fun discussion. Unfortunately, of course, we are not in control, so we can’t be as optimistic about change as Taylor Swift was in her 2008 song “Change” – Taylor’s Version available now – but we’re going to complain about these things anyway. I don’t think anybody here understands the reference that I just made. Maybe Eric did.
Eric: I do, I do.
Andrew: Okay.
Eric: Very nice way of working in current non-HP news into the news HP podcast. Nice work.
[Andrew laughs]
Main Discussion: What we would change in Harry Potter
Andrew: We’re going to just jump straight into our discussion today. So this is not a discussion about plot holes; we’ve done that before. This is about our top annoyances with the writing, the overall character arcs, the covers, the titles, directing, etc., those types of things, and each of us brought to the table one thing we would want to change about the movies and one thing we would want to change about the books. And we also received feedback from the listeners; there are so many things that people submitted, and we’re going to have to do a part two on this discussion because there’s a lot of good stuff to discuss. So is everybody ready? I hope nobody gets angry by the end of this episode, okay? Everybody just try to chill.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Micah: I don’t know, Andrew. I’m bringing back an old segment. I might get a little frustrated.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Also, I’m just looking over your first complaint here, and it seems like you have some very strong feelings about it, so we’ll see how this goes.
Andrew: [sighs] Yeah, I know. I was trying to… I was basically just telling myself to not get too angry during this discussion.
[Laura laughs]
Andrew: All right. So yeah, I’ll kick things off, and we’re going to focus on the books first. What I would change about the books are Mary Grand-Pré’s covers, and I’m specifically talking about Books 5 and 6…
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: … because Books 1-4 go from full color to these single color themes for the two books, and then back to full-ish color for the final book. And for completionists, this is just hell to me when you’re looking at the books all together. She should have at least stuck with the single color theme for the final book. If she decided halfway through the series, “You know what? I’m going to stick with a blue and then I’m going to stick with a green,” for 7, she should have stuck with a single color as well. This is something that wouldn’t bother me as a kid; I didn’t really think about it. But now I look at all the books together, and it bothers me now. [laughs] And by the way, we also have four illustrated editions so far, right? Order of the Phoenix, I think, comes out later this year? If they suddenly switch to a single color theme for Order of the Phoenix, just like Mary Grand-Pré did, I’m going to lose my mind.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: Well, Andrew, you need to get one of those book covers that’s like, very white. Have you seen those? Where it’s pure white and they go over top of your existing books? That’s what you need.
Andrew: Yeah, that’s a good idea. People sell those on Etsy; maybe I should do that. And by the way, a related annoyance: The Cormoran Strike books changed up their theme and overall style beginning with Lethal White, which I believe was the fourth book. They used to have these somewhat original covers, and I really liked them, and now they changed the design of the covers and they look like every crime novel now. They don’t look unique at all, and I’m like, “Why?” So the first two or three books look original, look unique, and then you look at four onward, and they’re a completely different style. It’s very bizarre to me. Can anybody defend these terrible decisions?
Laura: Yeah, so first of all, Andrew, this is hell for you? To look at these book covers?
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Andrew: Yeah, yeah!
Micah: Mary is not coming on the show again; that is for sure.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Okay, I want to see if I can help you out here. So I think… and I can understand why, when you look at the covers all together for the first time and just think about them as a collective, I can understand why you might feel like, “Eh, Books 5 and 6 kind of stick out.” But I think the reason for that is because Mary Grand-Pré chose to focus on very specific scenes from the both of those books, and we know that when Harry is in the Department of Mysteries, there’s blue flames, so everything does have a blue cast, and it’s the same when they go to the cave in Half-Blood Prince, the potion is illuminating everything, and I think that’s what she was going for. I actually found this to be a nice departure from the fourth book, which I feel like is probably my least favorite cover, because it doesn’t actually capture anything that happened in the book. It was, like, Scholastic promotional photo of the Triwizard Tournament. That’s what it felt like to me.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: It was pretty basic.
Eric: Laura, Goblet of Fire is my favorite cover!
Laura: Well, Goblet of Fire is my favorite book; it’s just probably my least favorite cover.
Eric: Oh, it’s my favorite cover. Harry looks happy for the first… like, truly happy, and you don’t get a lot of…
Laura: But isn’t that out of line? Because Harry is not happy in that book.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: See, I took this discussion to mean that we were talking about the content of the books, not, in fact, the damn covers. [laughs]
Andrew: All aspects. Whatever you want to change, this is your opportunity.
Eric: This is what you would change given the opportunity, Andrew? You pick the covers would change?
Andrew: Yes! Yes.
Laura: But you feel like it would have felt better for you if she had gone for a single tone theme for Book 7. You could have at least been like, “The last three books…”
Andrew: At least.
Laura: Okay, I get it. For the most part, I would argue that the seventh book cover… it’s not one tone, but it is all very warm tones, orangey based, so I don’t think that she went completely out of left field with that cover. But yeah, I mean, I understand at first glance, but I think when you really sit down and realize – with the exception of Goblet of Fire – every other cover that Mary Grand-Pré has done has featured a specific moment from the book.
Andrew: Right.
Laura: In Sorcerer’s Stone, we have Harry playing Quidditch; Chamber of Secrets, we have them flying out of the Chamber of Secrets; Prisoner of Azkaban, them breaking Sirius out, etc., right? And I think that because she chose these very specific moments that came from the books’ climaxes in 5 and 6, she really didn’t have much of a choice but to go with those single color themes, because that’s what it looked like. That’s how it was described in the books.
Andrew: I disagree, but okay.
Micah: I also think that what happened is that you had Harry maturing over time, and I think you saw that reflected in some of the covers, right? You were talking about those single tones for Order of the Phoenix and Half-Blood Prince. But if we’re really interested in knowing the answers – I did mention earlier that Mary would never come on the show again after this particular segment…
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: … but she was on the show way back in 2009, Episode 172, and she actually explains the process of designing the covers – which one gave her the most difficulty, her favorite character – and she also talked about the connection between Books 1 and 7 and how there are curtains on both of them…
Andrew: Yes, that’s cool.
Micah: … and how she worked to create that kind of bookend, for lack of a better term. So it was a good interview; I would give it a listen.
Andrew: Yeah. Well, look, my closing point on this is that, Laura, not everything in the Department of Mysteries was blue, including the candles and the wisps and Harry’s skin and the jacket. Everything’s blue. And then the Half-Blood Prince cover, everything’s green. No, just… I could not live with myself if I decided to change the color schemes of these books halfway through the series.
Laura: You couldn’t live with yourself? [laughs]
Andrew: I wouldn’t be able to sleep at night knowing what I was doing to people, ruining what their books look like all together. In my opinion.
Laura: Well, the good news is there are so many different editions of these books that are available worldwide, and you can probably find one whose art matches your personal preference.
Andrew: Yeah, I’m going to go with the UK editions.
Micah: Branch out a little bit. You can go to the Potter Collector; I’m sure he has some recommendations on covers.
Andrew: Sure, sure. Micah, what’s your annoyance? [laughs] Or what would you change?
Micah: So the one thing that I would change that’s really at the top of my list is Philosopher’s Stone to Sorcerer’s Stone, right?
Eric: Ahh.
Micah: That has been such a big controversy, so I would change the title of the book and the movie here in the US back to its original, which is Philosopher’s Stone. And for folks who may not know, Scholastic made this decision to change the title of the first Harry Potter book because they believed it would sell better here in the United States. Clearly, however, this wasn’t an issue for the rest of the entire world.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: Oooh, oh, gosh.
Micah: So I believe that Scholastic made this decision because they think Americans are stupid and they don’t know what “philosopher” means.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Micah brought his angry dad voice out for this.
Andrew: Yeah, I got scared for a second there.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Andrew: Yeah, you know what? I actually agree with you; kids will not know “sorcerer” any more than they know “philosopher,” like, what that means, so I don’t really get that change.
Laura: Well, and wasn’t it said in an interview that…? I don’t know if it was with Arthur Levine or with J.K. Rowling, but they genuinely just straight up said they did not think that the word “philosopher” would resonate with American audiences. I know we can be stupid sometimes, but come on, guys.
Micah: Well, this is also consistent with their decision to have J.K. Rowling change her name as the author, right?
Laura: Ooh, yeah.
Micah: She was going to be Joanne Rowling, and they said, “No, you need to make your name sound more masculine or more sterile and just be J.K. Rowling, because if kids see that a woman is writing this book, it’s not going to sell as well.”
Andrew: Right.
Eric: Yeah. I mean, I can’t speak to the publishing industry’s internal misogyny, or anything other than the fact that I support the decision of changing the name to Sorcerer’s Stone. In preparing this sort of defense, I actually looked up the term “philosopher,” and I really wanted to use Oxford English Dictionary. I was like, “Oh God, let’s see what the Brits say a philosopher is.” And then I found that the Oxford English Dictionary, OED.com, charges $100, so I’m not going to do that.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: So Dictionary.com defines a philosopher in several ways. Number one: a person who offers views or theories or profound questions in ethics, metaphysics, logic, and other related fields. Two: a person who’s deeply versed in philosophy. Three: a person who establishes the central ideas of some movement, cult, etc. And I’ll skip the middle ones, but definition six, categorized as obsolete: an alchemist or occult scientist. Now, I’m an 11-year-old, and for my birthday, I’ve just got the first Harry Potter book, and it’s Philosopher’s Stone. I’m like, “Oh my God, this is great. What is a philosopher?” I’m not going to know that an occult scientist… even the word “occult” eludes me at age 32 for what it specifically means. I guess “Americans are stupid” isn’t necessarily the winning argument I thought it was going to be when I was thinking about it, but I am grateful that Scholastic made this change, because Sorcerer’s Stone, with the alliteration, rolls off the tongue. I know what a sorcerer is because I’ve grown up with Fantasia and The Sorcerer’s Apprentice and all this other stuff. The word “sorcerer” immediately sparks what it wants to in me. Magic. A magician, basically.
Andrew: I think that’s right.
Eric: And I know this. “Philosopher” did not mean philosopher, even when J.K. Rowling used it, for hundreds of years.
Andrew: Yeah, it’s more palatable. I get it.
Eric: It’s a lot more palatable, and in fact, I would go so far as to say all of the book titles should be Sorcerer’s Stone. [laughs] If you want to change something, change all the other ones.
Micah: Wow.
Laura: Whoa. [laughs]
Micah: I mean, God forbid that we learn what a philosopher is, that we do a little bit of research…
[Eric laughs]
Micah: … and that’s part of the discovery, the part of reading the actual book is to learn more about what this actually is. Now, Eric, though, I am actually really glad that you said we should rename all of the other books, because that’s exactly what I’m going to do.
Andrew: Oh, no.
Eric: [laughs] What?
Micah: So I’m bringing back an old segment that hasn’t been done in years, called What’s Buggin’ Micah.
Eric: Oh my God.
Micah: And I figured, since they decided to dumb down the title for Americans for Sorcerer’s Stone, I’m going to do that for every other book in the Harry Potter series.
Eric: [laughs] Oh my God.
Micah: And I’ll start with Chamber of Secrets. Feel free to weigh in with your thoughts; I’m happy to have this conversation. So I say to myself, again, if you’re that age, what exactly is a chamber?
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Micah: Let’s just make this as easy as possible: Harry Potter and the Secret Basement.
Andrew: Oh.
[Laura laughs]
Micah: We love basements here in America, and some even have their own snakes.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: That’s right.
Andrew: Okay, yeah, I like it.
Micah: Prisoner of Azkaban. “Prisoner” is no longer a politically correct term here in America; we’d have to go with “incarcerated individual,” and honestly, that’s a college-level term. So let’s just go with Harry Potter and the Bad, Bad Man from Azkaban.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: I thought you were going to change Azkaban, because Azkaban, like, what’s Azkaban? I don’t care to even learn by reading the book.
Eric: The Bad, Bad Man…
Laura: That’s a good point. You could say the Bad, Bad Man from Wizard Prison.
Micah: Even better, Laura. See? We’re making changes on the fly here. Goblet of Fire. Does a 7-year-old have any clue what that means? I mean, when I think of “goblet,” I think of drinking, and Scholastic certainly would not want to promote underage drinking.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: True.
Micah: Therefore, we have Harry Potter and the Big Magic Cup.
Andrew: Okay, yeah.
[Laura laughs]
Eric: I can’t wait to see the book covers that we’re inevitably going to put out on social.
Micah: Order of the Phoenix, I think just there’s too much happening here. Can we as Americans even pronounce “phoenix”? I think it’s too hard.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Only Arizonians.
Micah: And so let’s call this book what it truly is: Harry Potter Hits Puberty.
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Such a world-relatable topic.
Laura: Agree. [laughs]
Andrew: And a lot of us are probably going through puberty while reading this book. [laughs]
Micah: There you go. Half-Blood Prince. We do not have princes here in America, minus the one very talented musician and the one we borrowed from the UK that now lives in Los Angeles; we’re not going to count them.
[Eric laughs]
Micah: We’re also not very good at figuring out riddles…
Eric: Oh, preach.
Micah: … and I think it’s important to stress the moral of this book, which is, “If you work really hard or cheat -” and we love to cheat in America “- you can achieve success.”
[Laura laughs]
Micah: Therefore, I’m going with Harry Potter Gets Good at Potions.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: We love to cheat in America. So true.
Micah: We do, we do. You’ve got to keep it on point. And then finally, Deathly Hallows, right? What in the world is this title?
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: “Philosopher” was a problem, but “Hallows” is okay? I’m just keeping it super simple. Harry Potter: The End.
Andrew: [laughs] Well done, Micah. Well done.
Laura: This is great.
Andrew: We’ll submit these to the publisher.
Laura: I cannot wait to see these altered book covers. I’m sure Jule is cursing your name right now, Micah.
[Laura and Micah laugh]
Eric: Is it just me or would you guys also buy those books? [laughs]
Andrew and Laura: No.
Andrew: I probably wouldn’t. Those titles are really bad.
[Laura laughs]
Micah: That’s the point.
Eric: Well, I mean, maybe if they change the color scheme on some of the covers, you’d be fine.
Andrew: One thing I’ll add – and I think we’re all in agreement – if a later Harry Potter book was going to be titled Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, Scholastic would have kept it that way. They wouldn’t have changed Book 4, knowing that Harry Potter was already well established and the title of the book wasn’t going to affect sales. But because it was the first book and they weren’t sure how it was going to do, they were doing what they could to make sure it’s sold, right?
Eric: They were setting it up for success. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with that.
Laura: I think so too.
Micah: I agree with you. I agree with you that they likely wouldn’t have changed anything else later on in the series. I think to your point, they wanted to make sure that it had that initial success, because also, marketing becomes a nightmare if you have to do that for seven books.
Andrew: Right. Now, that said, if Harry Potter didn’t blow up, maybe they would have changed all of the titles to what Micah suggested.
Eric: Some fun facts on the What’s Buggin’ Micah segment, since we were questioning before recording how long ago it was we did it, but it actually debuted on Episode 55 of MuggleCast.
Andrew: Okay.
Eric: Way back when, and it ran for about… there were multiple…
Micah: What was buggin’ me then?
Eric: It was J.K. Rowling did not update her website fast enough for you.
Micah: Oh.
Eric: And within five days… in fact, I think one of the other episodes was called “Micah Gets Results.”
Andrew: Yes.
Eric: The website was updated within five days of that episode airing.
Andrew: There you go.
Eric: So it really inspired us to continue that segment through, I want to say, about 150? I’m looking up the transcripts now. So yeah, we did it for a while.
Micah: Wow. Well, I hope you enjoyed that reinstallment.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: So what do you want to change, Eric?
Eric: So mine is actually relating to the plot of the books, although I will say we did not want to do plot holes, so my way of getting around this is talking about more of a contrivance of the plot. It basically comes down to Harry Potter is not a good student.
[Laura laughs]
Eric: And in fact, he’s not a good wizard, period. Plus exclamation point. He over-relies on his gut, throwing off a random Expelliarmus here and there when he’s in a sticky situation. My problem is that it works for him. He is allowed to continuously, again and again, get out of scrapes by just using his gut or the intelligence of his friends, and over time, this ruins the overall hero’s journey for me. So it just kind of gets to the point… I know we spent hours discussing, leading up to Book 7 in the first hundred episodes of MuggleCast, whether or not Harry would die, or whether it made sense for the whole trio to survive because there’s this huge wizarding war. And I think if I could remember going back, I was really excited to see Harry finally hunker down, learn nonverbal spells, even just get to the same level that every other wizard he knows is on, like Snape can do wandless magic or nonverbal spells. Snape at the end of Half-Blood Prince is making fun of Harry for not being able to do these things, and I was like, “Harry is going to spend six months… the seventh book could be years and years long, because Harry is going to become a good wizard.” No, it turns out he just doesn’t. So yet again, Harry bungles through Book 7, just… and again, in the end – I’ll make this short – he kills Voldemort with Expelliarmus, so what has he learned, really? That it’s good to be the hero of a major book series.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Am I wrong? Who wants to defend this?
Micah: Look, if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. Okay?
[Eric laughs]
Micah: And Expelliarmus has worked for him time and time again. Why not go with old faithful? And I think it’s important…
Eric: It’s a defensive charm! It’s not even an offensive spell! It’s defensive.
Micah: Well, he’s pretty much on the defensive most of the time that he’s fighting Voldemort, is he not?
Eric: Fair, fair.
Micah: And he learned the spell from Snape, didn’t he?
Eric: Well, vaguely.
Micah: I think there’s something poetic about that. We’re talking about the book here, right? That was J.K. Rowling’s intent that Harry’s signature spell comes from the person that he hates the most, because I think he for the most part, throughout the series – except maybe at the end – hates Snape more than he hates Voldemort. You brought up the point that Harry isn’t that great of a student. I mean, he does earn seven OWLs, same as Ron. We obviously expect Hermione to do better, and she does; she gets 11. But the only grades where he got below Exceeds Expectations were History of Magic, and let’s be honest, would any of us…? Maybe Laura would get high marks in History of Magic, but I think the rest of us would just do the same as Harry. Astronomy, and we remember what happened during that exam, right? Hagrid getting attacked. And Divination, so outside of that, he’s a pretty damn good student, I would argue.
Eric: I guess I’m expecting more from the hero who’s going to save the entire world, that he would look up to somebody like Dumbledore and be inspired by that kind of magic, that level of magic, and to see Harry not have to achieve that level of aptitude as a wizard was disappointing for me as a kid who wanted to read about this crazy hero, only to find out that he’s just some 17-year-old kid who dropped out of school the last year.
Andrew: Doesn’t that make him more likable, though? That he’s not perfect?
Eric: Does it, though?
Andrew: Yes!
Eric: I think to some people it will.
Andrew: It’s more relatable, because I’m not perfect. I’m glad that Harry kind of sucks in a lot of ways.
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: I, too, would only use one spell a lot of the time. [laughs] Just think of when you play a video game, you have certain moves that you really like. Like in Smash Bros., I love doing that Thunderbolt with Pikachu.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: That’s the only move I do, because I like it. B + down.
Micah: Oh, yeah, same here.
Andrew: Right? Exactly. [laughs]
Micah: It works really well too. I would also just add that from a student standpoint, Harry is very accomplished by an early age in Defense Against the Dark Arts, right? Especially from what he learns from Professor Lupin. And it’s that knowledge that he then takes to teaching through Dumbledore’s Army and equipping his classmates with a lot of what they need in order to fight moving forward, because they weren’t getting it from the school. So again, I’m just kind of disputing this idea that Harry is not a good student.
Eric: Well, as a quick rebuttal to that, so much about Harry, so much that Harry is good at, comes easily to him. Riding a broom is so second nature because it’s in his blood, right? His genes did it. His mother’s protection just comes to him. His wealth, it just comes to him. And there’s so much of it… casting a Patronus, again, something that’s extremely special and gifted and there’s adults who just can’t do it. And Harry works at it; at least with the Patronus, it takes time. But all this stuff really just does seem to come second nature. Hermione can’t even sit on a broomstick in the books without falling off, but Harry just… the second he touches one, he’s gold, and so I think that’s a little disappointing.
Andrew: All right, Laura, what would you change?
Laura: So what bugs me, and what I would like to see be a little different if I could change something, is that I would have more nuanced Slytherin representation in the books. I think the best examples that we get are Slughorn and Snape. You can also, I think, you can put Draco in here, too, because in Book 6, we really see him start to grapple with his role in what’s going on and realize that he’s bitten off more that he can chew. I think that it’s really great that we got to see some more nuance with them, and by nuance, I mean you’re not just a bad guy because you’re in Slytherin, or you’re not just evil, or you’re not just dumb like Crabbe and Goyle because you’re in Slytherin. The overall perception of Slytherins in the core series comes across as though being born into a family of Slytherins dooms one to a lifetime of wickedness. And I think to that point, it’s very clear that there’s been more of an effort in Fantastic Beasts and Cursed Child to provide that more nuanced portrayal of Slytherins, which to me indicates that the author and the creators knew this was a missed opportunity, because people are more complicated than one House being good and another being evil. Dumbledore even says himself in Book 7, “Sometimes I think we Sort too young.” You’re just boxing people in; that’s not what life is like, and I think that you do a disservice, especially to young readers, by teaching them if you see somebody who they’re of this particular group, or they hold this particular belief, they’re always evil, and that’s not the case. We’ve seen it with Leta Lestrange. We’ve seen it with Harry’s own son, right?
Eric: Well, canon pending, right?
[Laura laughs]
Eric: Depending on your… yeah.
Laura: Well, I think the author argues that it’s canon. So who wants to defend this choice?
Eric: So I’ll touch on this a little bit, because I think you did a really good job explaining. I think a very fair… it’s almost unassailable of a point because you’re like, “Listen, I think even the creators are working to go back a little bit.” What I’ll say is I think the problem is that in Harry Potter, you have his school rivalry with Draco Malfoy, and so you have the natural grievance there, and then you have his… Harry’s least favorite teacher, who openly insults students, in Snape being from Slytherin. And then you have every Death Eater except for Peter Pettigrew being from Slytherin, so it’s a big problem, because it really does paint all Slytherins as evil. I will say, for the purposes of schooling, the whole reason they Sort is so that like-minded individuals can be among their own, and I don’t see anything wrong with a House whose primary goal or primary characteristic or character trait is ambition being one of the primary Houses of Hogwarts. I don’t have a problem with that, because if you look at ambition, if you look at the types of behavior – because everything can go good or can go wrong – if you look at the bad side of ambition, you get really selfish people. And I’m not saying selfish people can’t exist in other Houses; they certainly do, but if that’s your defining characteristic, and you’re going to do what it takes at the expense of others, it makes sense that the people who end up being some of the most criminal… I’m treading very carefully here because I’m not equipped enough to talk about the nuance of mental health and people, but I’m saying if you look at the people who are going to be in it for themselves, it makes sense that they come from the House that values being in it for yourself.
Laura: I suppose. But I think, too, you can start going down the rabbit hole of making an argument about Hermione is very ambitious; she’s extremely ambitious, but the Sorting Hat didn’t even think about putting her in Slytherin, because why? The unspoken she’s not pure-blood enough to go there.
Eric: Ah, yeah.
Laura: And I just feel like you’re really locking readers and the characters into this assumption that all Slytherins are doomed to being prejudiced and doomed to being evil, and even when we do get, I think, Harry’s first positive Slytherin representative in Slughorn, it feels like Harry kind of ignores that he’s a Slytherin because Harry likes him, right?
[Eric laughs]
Laura: And so Harry never observes, “Oh, yeah, he’s a Slytherin.” That doesn’t happen.
Eric: I think Harry is… I don’t agree with that about what Harry feels about Slughorn. I think Harry is pretty creeped out by some of Slughorn’s more unsavory tendencies, but I think that’s the other thing that you’re mentioning is with families that have been in Slytherin because… this happens with the Weasleys; the whole family is in Gryffindor, all of them, and that’s a very common thing. So in our families we inherit our prejudices, and that’s what the character Draco Malfoy does later, where he has to come to terms with the reality of the real world, instead of just the pure-blood mania/Dark Lord supporting mania of his family. So I think that maybe a lot of people that were Sorted into Slytherin first picked up the habits, mannerisms, internalized beliefs of their Death Eater parents, and then had to really, in the modern age, grapple with what it means to be ambitious, but also to be a good person and also to be a little empathetic, a little understanding, and not turn into more of a bigot. So I’d say there’s something to it in the psychology that allows for a greater group of bad wizards to be from Slytherin, but I don’t think it should be as cut and dry as it is in the books. So it’s kind of a half-argument there.
Laura: Yeah, so we kind of agree.
[Laura and Micah laugh]
Eric: Yeah, we kind of do, but I would argue that if there is one place where you can hone your ambition that actually benefits everyone, it’s like why they do college study programs and stuff. And there’s also a lot of similarities between Ravenclaw and Slytherin.
Laura: Yeah, very true.
Micah: I think part of the issue, though, comes from the fact that even very early on in the series, Harry doesn’t want to be in Slytherin, and I think that gets into our minds as readers, and then from that point forward, we’re automatically thinking that Slytherin is this evil House that the people in it can do no good at all. And I also think it’s unfairly balanced, so to Laura, your point about just having more nuanced Slytherin representation, I think there needs to be more nuanced representation across the board. It’s always three versus one, right? There’s never even two versus two, or where Slytherin is on the side of Gryffindor or Ravenclaw. It just seems very… unless it’s Quidditch, and then they may seem to want the other team to win, but that’s about the extent of it. And I also think it’s because when you’re talking about Sorting too early, you’re labeling kids in a very young age, right? All of these Houses have specific traits that you’re then assigning to these very young individuals instead of just having Houses and just Sorting them for no other reason than it’s randomized and “You’re going to this House” or “You’re going to that House,” and I think it would make for a little bit less controversy.
Andrew: I also put this on Hogwarts leadership.
[Laura laughs]
Micah: Dumbledore.
Andrew: It would have been very interesting to see in the books them trying to get rid of this perception of Slytherins, and really, Hufflepuffs too. I mean, those two Houses get bad raps in different ways. Well, I guess it’s more readers who hate on Hufflepuff than the actual students at Hogwarts.
Laura: No, but we definitely see it in the books, too, because… was it Ron? Or was it Draco? I don’t remember which one of them said this, but it is very telling that I can’t recall which of these characters said this…
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: … because they both share this bias. One of them said on the Hogwarts Express, “Oh, I hope… if I got Sorted into Hufflepuff, I’d go home, wouldn’t you?”
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Yeah, “I think I’d leave.” It’s Draco Malfoy in Madam Malkin’s, yeah.
Andrew: Okay.
Laura: There we go. Yeah, you’re right.
Micah: Also, how current is the Sorting Hat, right? That thing has been in use for so long; time to have an upgrade to that thing.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Software Update.
Eric: Now I’m picturing the Sorting Hat, but it’s been made over by Jonathan Van Ness or somebody.
Laura: [laughs] That’d be great.
Eric: Just give it a touchup.
Andrew: Sorting Hat four point woke.
Laura: So basically, I think what we can all agree on is that the Sorting Hat is like an outdated piece of technology; it’s no longer relevant with current times.
Andrew: Right.
Laura: So ditch it. And I think that in UK boarding schools, I know that they actually do have houses, but to my knowledge, I don’t think that they’re pigeon-holing children into very broad themes of like, “Well, you seem quite ambitious, so we’re going to put you over here.” [laughs] “You seem very brave, and we’re going to put you over here.”
Andrew and Eric: Yeah.
Andrew: So before we get into our biggest gripes with the movies, here’s one thing we can all agree on…
[Ad break]
Andrew: Let’s move on to what we would change about the movies now. So as readers, we all care about the adaptations very, very much. And I think there’s an endless number of things we would want to change about the movies, so it was pretty difficult to just pick one thing, but one thing that really stood out to me was the Harry/Voldemort free fall fight at the end of Deathly Hallows – Part 2. They run around the school, Voldemort’s cloak wrapping around Harry as Voldemort just stares as it’s happening; it’s really tacky. And then that free fall, the heads morphing into each other, flying through the sky, and I was rewatching this last night… what was Harry thinking by pulling Voldemort over a ledge? If Voldemort wants to kill you, he could have just let you go, let you crash into the ground. You wouldn’t have been able to do anything about it.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Voldemort is the one who can fly, not you, so why are you pulling Voldemort off the ledge?
[Everyone laughs]
Andrew: I just… Voldemort could’ve just let him fall to the ground and die and that would have been it. No final duel needed. It’s just the thing is so dumb. Obviously, it’s not in the books.
Eric: It looks good in 3D, Andrew!
Andrew: Oh yeah, right. They were high on 3D back then too. Oh man, it was so bad. Why? I get why they wanted to; I hate to contradict myself. They wanted to create a bigger climax for the final movie, but this was the wrong way to go in my opinion. [laughs]
Laura: I agree. I hated… the whole climax of Deathly Hallows – Part 2 sucked.
Micah: Well, this should be fun.
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Andrew: Micah, you’re going to try to defend this decision?
Micah: Honestly, number one, I can’t believe I’m defending David Yates. And number two, given my next point that we’re going to talk about after this, this just seems really weird, but I’m going to try. And it kind of goes to a point you raised, Andrew: You needed an epic final battle sequence, and you couldn’t just have them meet in the Great Hall and duel it out. You needed to go through the grounds of Hogwarts.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: And that whole concept of them morphing into each other was symbolic in that these two had been connected since the beginning of the series, and here they are in the final moments; they’re still connected to each other. So Harry pulling Voldemort off the ledge there, that was the element of surprise. Voldemort didn’t have time to react; he’s more concerned about just staying alive himself. And I would say that I think the final duel between the two of them, it looked good on screen, but you had to get there somehow. And the fact that they’re battling each other all around the Hogwarts grounds… it’s a movie; you need the buildup to the final confrontation, and I think they delivered on that.
Laura: What do you think of Harry’s line where he’s like, “Let’s finish this the way we started it, Tom. Together!”
Andrew: “Together!”
Laura: And he pulls him over the ledge. [laughs]
Andrew: That line, I don’t particularly mind. It’s everything else that happens after that line that bugs me.
Laura: Right.
Eric: I haven’t stated my opinion yet on this, but I agree with Micah, actually, and it makes for a good movie.
Andrew: Huh. Wow.
Eric: That was what they’re trying to do, make a good movie, right? So I would say that that whole flying with the pyrotechnics, and the thing is…
Andrew: How about just a better duel on the ground? A better wand duel on the ground, like the Dumbledore/Voldemort one at the end of Order of the Phoenix.
Eric: Well, okay, that speaks to what Laura is going to be talking about in her thing. I think there were a couple of problems they avoided by doing this whole flying thing instead.
Andrew: All right. Well, I just really wish that didn’t happen in Deathly Hallows – Part 2. If I had a VHS tape, I would cut that portion of my VHS tape out…
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Micah: Oooh.
Andrew: … and just stitch the two areas together that should have cut from one to the next.
Micah: Not to bring up another past episode, but when we did interview David Yates on Episode 235 of MuggleCast, we talked about this. So kind of like… I love, Andrew, how you’re calling out moments that we can reference back to past episodes for guests that we’ve had on the show that will never come on again.
Andrew: [laughs] See, I kept my mouth shut during these interviews. I don’t know if I was a part of that David Yates interview.
Laura: You’re being a good soldier.
Eric: Here’s a quote from David. Again, all the MuggleCast transcripts are on the website, so this is very easy.
“I wanted that final confrontation between the two of them to be a little bit more expansive…”
Eric: Sorry, I should do this in my David Yates voice.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: [imitating David Yates]
“… and so that you had a greater sense of climax, given that we had spent so long with those characters, and their animosity and their hatred for each other. So it felt to me as though it would be much more personal and dynamic if they were to head off away from the rest of everyone and continue fighting, so that was the idea behind it. And we had an earlier version of it, which finished in a similar way to the book…”
[Andrew gasps]
“… and it worked really well in the book, but in a movie, I think we needed a more kinetic conclusion.”
Andrew: Eh, all right.
Eric: He said kinetic, meaning movement.
Andrew: Okay.
Micah: Get that deleted scene, though, Andrew.
Eric: Oh, you know what? Here’s a quote regarding the morphing.
“… as though they were one. For me, it kind of captured so much of their odd relationship together, that they’re kind of one, but they’re not one, in a weird kind of way. And so it was mainly to make sure that the movie felt like it had a theatrical enough ending to satisfy all the fans of the books and all the fans of the movies.”
Micah: You see? David and I agree.
Andrew: How is that satisfying? Morphing. “Oh, they morphed, wow. They are kind of one. Oh my gosh.”
Eric: I think it’s cool. I argued at the time we saw that movie that it was thematically very interesting.
Andrew: Eugh.
Micah: And Eric, I really enjoyed the impersonation, I can say. For that interview, I was literally sitting across the desk from him, and he is probably the most soft-spoken person I’ve ever met.
Andrew: He is.
Eric: He is the kindest, most soft-spoken. Absolutely.
Andrew: He’s Winnie the Pooh. All right, Micah, what would you change?
Micah: So switching gears, doing a complete 180 off of what I just defended…
Andrew: Is it? [laughs] Switching gears from director talk to director talk.
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Micah: Yeah, but instead of defending them, I’m going to be criticizing them. So I just feel that the series as a whole had too many directors, so the Harry Potter movie series suffered from too many changes in directors. Eight films, four directors. And consistency matters, and its lack thereof resulted in many favorite moments and plot lines not making the final cut, and characters being completely eliminated for reasons like pacing. I’m thinking also just the layout of Hogwarts, where we spend a good amount of time, it changed drastically going from Chamber of Secrets to Prisoner of Azkaban, right? The location of Hagrid’s hut changed. The Whomping Willow got a makeover. They added the covered bridge. The front door was accessed via a courtyard versus the front lawn. And to me, if you’re a fan of the series, especially when it comes to seeing it brought to life, you want consistency, and I think the problem is every time you bring in a new director, they want to put their own spin on things. And we didn’t really get a practiced hand until Order of the Phoenix. Yes, we had Chris Columbus for the first two, but it wasn’t until David Yates came on board that we had consistency through the final four films.
Andrew: Well, first of all, I think you might get your wish with Fantastic Beasts. It looks like David Yates is going to be directing all five of those movies, so you’ll get some consistency there. Second of all, I think what’s so great about franchises is that so many of them do have different directors. You get these different visions; you get these different takes on the story. So while things don’t exactly line up, it’s kind of like these movies are starting off on a blank slate when they get these new directors. In terms of the locations of Hagrid’s hut moving or the Whomping Willow getting a makeover, I don’t think that’s necessarily the director’s fault. It might be to an extent, but there are a lot of other people who are working on these movies who are working on the entire franchise, so I would put the blame more on them, especially somebody like Stuart Craig, the production designer. I’m okay with David Yates directing all five Fantastic Beasts movies for now, but I wish that there were more directors for the Harry Potter film series. I don’t like that David Yates took on the final four movies.
Eric: Yeah, I mean, if you look at Star Wars, even just the original trilogy before Ron Howard, Gareth Edwards, Ryan Johnson, all the other guys got to do – JJ, of course – the original trilogy was all different directors. You have Star Wars by George Lucas, Empire Strikes Back was Irvin Kershner, and somebody named Richard Marquand did Return of the Jedi. What it gives you is different-looking films, different-feeling films, slightly, subtly, but it’s still clearly in the same universe, and it’s still clearly a continuation of the series. But each of those films has its own flair and its own, I guess… there’s a French word, something about vivre that I’m thinking of. But anyway, so I think the change in directors has a potential to be a very good thing for something that’s going to last as long as eight films.
Andrew: Yeah, look how many people loved Prisoner of Azkaban, thanks to Alfonso Cuarón coming in and just doing his own take on it.
Eric: Much to my dismay, because I can’t stand it as an adaptation.
Andrew: I know, I know some people are definitely upset, but others it was just such a refreshing change after the first two movies.
Micah: Yeah, but I think also, too, when you bring in those different perspectives, they’re sacrificing different things. For example, with Alfonso Cuarón, you bring him in, he adds a more artistic flair to the films, right? I’m thinking of the Whomping Willow killing the bird every time a new season starts…
[Laura laughs]
Micah: … or the little ice coverings that come over the plants when the Dementors are close by, and there’s probably a dozen other examples of that. But when you’re watching that, it’s also taking time away from telling the Marauders’ backstory.
Eric: Right.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: So there are arguments that can be made both ways. And I think if you look at the series overall, the one thing the Harry Potter films did have, with the exception being at the director position, was consistency. The cast was consistent throughout the entire films.
Andrew: An amazing achievement, by the way.
Micah: The producers, right? David Heyman and David Barron were consistent. Steve Kloves as a screenwriter, with the exception of Order of the Phoenix, is there the entire time.
Eric: Yep.
Micah: Why would you not then look to have consistency at arguably the most important position? And that’s the director. So that’s my thoughts on that.
Andrew: Well, here’s the other thing to keep in mind: Some of these directors just want out. It takes over their lives. I’m serious, I’m serious. People do not like committing to a franchise for an extended period of time, because they have no other life, and they have no other cinematic life. They have to stay committed to this one particular film series, and it’s exhausting for people. This has happened with the Twilight and Hunger Games franchises too.
Micah: But you’re also directing the highest grossing film franchise of all time.
Andrew: Micah, Micah, money does not buy happiness.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: And David Yates isn’t the one collecting all that money, even though they might pay him more.
Laura: Hey, it sure helps.
Andrew: Yeah, I guess, but…
Micah: Your name is forever attached to the highest-grossing film franchise, most successful film franchise, of all time.
Andrew: Who needs their name attached to all 5,000 movies? Isn’t one or two okay?
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: I mean, Chris Columbus famously said he wanted to spend more time with his family. He was raising children when that… and casting half of them in the movies, so it’s probably for the better that he…
Micah: He was just disappointed Haley Joel didn’t get the role of Harry Potter, so he was out after two.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: They wanted him to do the third movie at least, but he said he couldn’t.
Andrew: And this just shows you how exhausted these directors are by the time they reach the end of these movies.
Eric: Yep.
Andrew: They don’t care if they’re working on the biggest franchise of all time. They want out. [laughs] They’re exhausted.
Eric: Well, speaking of somebody that must have been exhausted fairly early on in the production crew of the Harry Potter films, my complaint has to do with the wardrobe. I think that the wardrobe department just must have just quit or wanted something to do, either/or. My complaint about the entire movie adaptations is plain clothes Hogwarts students!
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: By about midway into the Harry Potter movies, you’ve got these Abercrombie & Fitch striped sweaters, bright pink jackets… the kids are walking around this school of magic looking like they came out of my high school…
Micah: And that’s just Dumbledore. Oh, sorry.
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: [groans] Well, bright… yeah, Dumbledore is allowed to be flamboyant; he gets a pass. Everyone else, this regular street clothes, stuff that I would have worn in the… I’m just kidding; I’m not that stylish. You just can’t… I cannot handle it. This is a school for magic.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Give me long, billowy robes, not only because I want to see them; I want to see how they work. I want to see having to do extraordinary feats of magic in robes. I want to see it done, because in my mind’s eye, in the books, it’s done. In the books, they even have hats! They have pointy wizard caps, and I think even J.K. Rowling realized how not practical that was because they only appear in the first book. But yeah, give me full on wizard dress robes. This is not a freaking Hot Topic. You’re not going to see the latest boy band concert, okay? MCR is not headlining Hogwarts. Why do I have to keep saying this? You can’t just wear whatever the hell you want to Hogwarts. Wear your damn robes. You are wizards, people. I’m sick of it.
Andrew: [laughs] Eric is biased because he’s a cosplayer. He needs some inspiration, and if they’re wearing Abercrombie & Fitch, he can’t be inspired.
Eric: [laughs] I was not expecting to be called out for my own personal fashion choices here.
Andrew: No, no, I’m saying you’re a cosplayer. You want to look like the characters in the books, and if they look like everyday Eric, there’s nothing to cosplay.
Eric: I think that’s fair. I didn’t even see that. I didn’t see that coming.
Andrew: I’m your therapist now.
Micah: Eric, if they would have kept Chris Columbus, then you would have had those robes throughout the entire series.
Eric: Actually, I love that you brought that up because I think it was specifically in effort to be different. This is one of those… it’s like the ice crystals; I like that, by the way. I like the art, whole style, but the departure… it was such a sharp edge that needed to be done, so all of a sudden, yeah, why wouldn’t Harry…? Or why wouldn’t Hermione just wear jeans half the time? But I think it was done for the wrong reasons. And then it stuck because Cuarón had started it; everyone else thought that it was the coolest thing ever, and also probably saved them money on black wool fabric, and then they just went that way forever. So it’s like all of the most iconic scenes from the later books – I wouldn’t say meeting Grawp in the forest; forget about that – but all the best scenes, they’re wearing street clothes, and I think it’s stupid. I just can’t stand it. I’m like, these are wizards. This is magic. This is not… I actually look to Harry Potter for escapism. Some people look to Harry Potter to see themselves; I don’t want to see myself. I want to see wizards in robes, waving wands, doing spells, and it just kills it for me if they’re all allowed to be regular old teenagers in street clothes.
Laura: So I have mixed feelings on this. I’m defending this. On the one hand, I definitely agree that starting in Prisoner of Azkaban, the clothes weren’t right. They were too modern, because we know that the stories took place in the ’90s, so they were wearing clothes that were very modern at the time the movies were filmed, and that just didn’t feel right. I feel like if they had gone for a street clothes vibe that fit the ’90s, maybe some tie-dye, I don’t know, some JNCOs…
Andrew: Tie-dye?!
[Eric laughs]
Laura: I’m kidding, I’m kidding. But I think that there was a way to do the street clothes that could have been less distracting, and it sounds, Eric, like it was distracting for you, like it took you out of the movie. And that’s why I would draw your attention to the first Harry Potter film where they do indeed wear plain clothes on a couple of very specific occasions in that film, in particular, the night that they are leaving Gryffindor tower to go break in and take the Philosopher’s/Sorcerer’s Stone – whatever your preference is there – they’re wearing plain clothes. They’re not wearing robes, but the clothes that they were wearing were, I would say, more discreet. Less flashy.
Eric: Khakis and a sweater, I’m thinking.
Laura: Yeah, exactly, exactly. Knit sweaters, things that didn’t feel out of place for the environment. So I think if they had stuck with that throughout the rest of the series, it might not have bothered you as much. I definitely found that everybody did look a little too modern, a little too trendy, but I think that they still could have done plain clothes without being that flashy.
Eric: So many stripes.
Andrew: I think it was all about the balance. The balance was just out of whack in terms of wizards clothes versus Muggle clothes. Maybe they went too heavy on the Muggle clothes starting in Prisoner of Azkaban.
Eric: Yeah, and they just never recovered. I’ll agree with that.
Laura: I will say that Prisoner of Azkaban is the story where we start to see more of the characters outside of an academic environment. Why would you wear your school uniform if you’re not at school?
Eric: Well, going to Hogsmeade is still a school trip, and it’s next to the castle. I don’t know. Why wouldn’t you be in…? I think you would almost be protected or be favored if you were a Hogwarts student; all the Hogsmeade people want to sell to you, so it makes sense to me that you would show off or wear still your badge or something from Hogwarts when in Hogsmeade, at least.
Laura: Yeah, I’m reading a comment from Rachel in the Discord, who says, “In boarding and private education, the uniform policy is normally super strict for the academic week, but then you get freedom at the weekend. Although, if you’re still on school grounds, there’s rules as to what you can wear.” But it doesn’t sound like you’re necessarily required to wear uniforms at all times, unless you’re attending academic functions.
Eric: I think that’s what I’m striving for, yeah. Just a little bit more of the… okay, so you can wear plain clothes, but it’s to your point, Laura, at Christmas or in the evenings or whatever, but have it still follow a set of guidelines, and have it be nothing trendy made in the ’00s.
Andrew: All right, Laura, what is your change?
Laura: [laughs] So this is… I mean, it’s a change/gripe that I would make, and it’s that they started using the Priori Incantatem effect in it felt like every damn duel after the Goblet of Fire film.
[Eric laughs]
Laura: This is the very specific effect where when two brother wands try to fight each other, they can’t, and then they’re connected. And you see this in, of course, Goblet of Fire, where it’s appropriate, but then you see it happen again in Order of the Phoenix when Dumbledore and Voldemort are battling in the Ministry of Magic. They don’t have brother wands. This is, I think, just them recycling an effect that they thought worked really well and established consistency in fight scenes for the audience that maybe was more of a fan of the movie than the book and wouldn’t really know the difference, but it really bothers me because this is a very distinct thing in the books, and I actually want to read you a passage. This is from Goblet of Fire from the Priori Incantatem chapter. “Suddenly Harry’s wand was vibrating as though an electric charge were surging through it; his hands seized up around it; he couldn’t have released it if he’d wanted to – and a narrow beam of light connected the two wands, neither red nor green, but bright, deep, gold.” And what do they do every time they use this effect? They have red and green flames going out and meeting each other in the middle. Stupid.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Micah: Yeah, it’s very Gryffindor versus Slytherin.
Laura: Yeah, and it drives home again that stereotype of “One of these people is pure good; one of these people is pure evil.” It’s just not very nuanced.
Micah: I totally agree with this, and I think… I remember our conversation from a couple of weeks ago when we were going through all the fan-made films and just how great those battle sequences were, and then you look at something that literally has hundreds of millions of dollars in production, and they can’t get it right, and that just drives me nuts.
Andrew: [laughs] I think visually… I don’t know. I don’t know.
Laura: But see, that’s the thing. That’s where I went too. It’s like, of course they did it, because visually, it could provide some consistency in these battles between what are considered to be very powerful wizards, right? Like, they’re so powerful that they can’t overcome each other immediately, so their spells meet in the middle and they have to concentrate on mentally pushing the spell to the other person’s wand.
Andrew and Eric: Yeah.
Eric: It’s a visual way of showing evenly matched individuals, the loading bar, status bar of the wands.
Laura: Exactly.
Micah: In the Ministry, Dumbledore looks like he needed a pair of sunglasses because he was just…
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: Yeah, I did not like that scene.
Laura: Oh, don’t even get me into the whole Pokémon battle they did in that.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Do you remember? I rewatched this scene the other night, and it’s like, Dumbledore is using wandless magic to ball up a bunch of water from the fountain and put Voldemort in it.
Andrew: Hey.
Eric: I think it’s cool as hell.
Andrew: Yeah, I really like that scene; I’ve got to admit.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: Oh, and again, it looks great in 3D.
Andrew: [laughs] That’s not why I liked it.
Laura: I am so glad that as a culture, we’re getting past 3D.
Andrew: Yeah, Hollywood tried to make some more money at the box office. It didn’t really work out; thank goodness.
Micah: Meanwhile, Squirtle is in the background.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: Yeah, exactly. Watching that scene, I felt like somebody was going to be like, “Pikachu, I choose you!”
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah.
Laura: But Dumbledore… there are very specific parameters set around this in the book. Dumbledore says they will not work properly against each other; if, however, the owners of the wands force the wands to do battle, a very rare effect will take place. And we see the effect take place during Harry and Voldemort’s final battle in Deathly Hallows, but they weren’t using brother wands anymore! [laughs] So it shouldn’t have happened.
Andrew: It’s a climatic… yeah. I think we all understand why they decided to stick with this effect and this look and this type of duel, but yeah, for book fans, it’s very frustrating.
Micah: Right.
Laura: And I will say, I was just reading Deathly Hallows to get myself more current on that, and reading over it, I was like, “Oh my God, is this an example of how a movie-ism influenced the book?” And I want to get y’all’s opinion here, because I think it is maybe a little vague, a little unclear. So when Harry and Voldemort cast Avada Kedavra and Expelliarmus at the same time, it says, “The bang was like a cannon blast, and the golden flames that erupted between them at the dead center of the circle they had been treading marked the point where the spells collided. Harry saw Voldemort’s jet green meet his own spell.”
Andrew: “Meet his own spell,” yeah.
Laura: So it sounds to me like this was maybe… because this sounds very different, and it should be different because, again, they’re not battling using brother wands, but it sounds very similar to the way this effect was portrayed in the films. It just makes me wonder if there was a little bit of influence there.
Andrew: Maybe. I hate to think that that type of thing occurs. We’ve talked about how actors potentially influence the writing of the books, so…
Micah: Well, green has always been associated with the Killing Curse, right? In the books.
Eric and Laura: Yes.
Micah: Okay. But it’s more so you’re saying they’re meeting right at the center, and it’s very similar to what we see happen in the final showdown.
Laura: Yeah, but then at the same time, it describes golden flames erupting between them, which is consistent with the book description of the first time we see Priori Incantatem in Goblet of Fire. So to me, it feels like the streams are being crossed here, a little bit, between book canon and movie canon.
Eric: Right.
Micah: And it’s also worth mentioning – I don’t know if one of our patrons wrote in about this – but the actual end scene with Voldemort kind of just… I don’t even know how to describe it. He just kind of evaporates into thin air. That always bothered me.
Eric: Instead of… yeah. It was a very important point in the book that Voldemort leave his corpse behind because he wasn’t special. He was just… in the end, he had a dead body like everyone else’s.
Micah: Well, Bellatrix had a similar effect, too, right? Where she kind of imploded…
Andrew: Disintegrated. That’s the word I’m looking for.
Micah: Yeah, there you go. That’s the word. And maybe that was just their way of killing off the evil side, but I just… I mean, it’s not like we haven’t seen the Killing Curse used in the films and the effect that that has.
Eric: Right.
[Ad break]
Andrew: Okay, we received some submissions from listeners as well; these cover the books and the movies. Micah, kick us off.
Micah: Yeah, so first off, we heard from Danielle about the movies, and she says,
“How the movies got less colorful as they went on. You can’t even watch the last two movies during the day because they’re so dark!”
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Yep. Somebody mashed up every frame of every Harry Potter movie into one image, and you can visually see the films getting darker over time. As we make fun of here on the show from time to time, the cast and crew, when promoting each new movie, would say, “It’s the darkest one yet. It’s the darkest one yet.” And literally, it was the darkest movie yet. [laughs]
Eric: As somebody who’s run MuggleNet’s caption contest for 17 years now, I can say it’s grueling, pulling screenshots that work from the later Harry Potter films. I up the brightness by at least 150 each time – it’s insane – just to be able to see what’s on the damn screen. I’m pulling from the Blu-rays! It’s not a clarity issue; it’s the lighting of the scene issue. Awful.
Andrew: I just put a graphic into our rundown, and you guys can see how the movies start off brighter, and then as it goes on, darker, darker, darker. There’s one bright moment at the end; it’s when Harry is in limbo with Dumbledore. Other than that… [laughs]
Laura: Oh, yeah.
Eric: Oh, I love this feature that takes a screenshot or the predominant color of any one frame and then gives you all the frames of the movies, yeah. And it’s like, totally black.
Laura: Yeah, you can see right where Half-Blood Prince is. Everything is green.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: Just like the cover!
Laura: Yep. [laughs]
Micah: That’s what it is, Andrew. Mary Grand-Pré had some influence on the last couple of films.
[Andrew sighs]
Eric: So the next one comes from Steph with a book complaint:
“I got super invested in the Tonks/Lupin relationship and their book death gets such minimal notice that I missed it altogether the first time I read through Deathly Hallows.”
I agree. Not only does their death feel cheap, it is not given the same amount of screen time as Fred’s and some of the other deaths that are occurring during those moments. I can see easily how someone might miss the fact that they died, and I’m sorry that you did.
Andrew: I think Rowling has implied before that that’s war. Things happen in a flash, and there’s not time to focus on all the death, each death.
Laura: Okay, this next one comes from Kaitlyn, and it’s a movie gripe:
“My absolute biggest critique: In Deathly Hallows – Part 2, Harry breaks the Elder Wand and throws it away rather than fixing his own wand first. It would have taken five extra seconds to include!”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Laura: Yeah. I remember seeing this and being like, “What? Why?”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: It’s edgy.
Andrew: Save it, yeah. All right, this next one is from Julianne. It concerns the movies.
“It drives me nuts that they didn’t include SPEW in the movies! It’s such an important piece of Hermione’s character development. She goes big but doesn’t necessarily go about it the best way, considering that she doesn’t really include the house-elves in her effort to improve conditions for the house-elves. But then, she seems to learn from this and do a much better job creating Dumbledore’s Army and make something really powerful happen. That development is completely missed out on in the movies.”
Laura: True.
Andrew: I agree. A TV adaptation, if that ever happens, they need to include SPEW, because there’s also just a lot to say there. Especially… it could also be a commentary on the Muggle world, what’s going on here.
Micah: Yeah, I think unfortunately, here it was just a lot to do with the fact that house-elves in general weren’t included in the movie, so it’s hard to include SPEW without the house-elves. More money. They didn’t have enough money for the house-elves. Pacing, all that stuff we hear so much about.
Andrew: Right, they had to give it all to David Yates to direct a billion Harry Potter movies.
Micah: That’s right.
Eric: Right, every time the same director gets retained, they get an up in their salary because it’s like, “Hey, I’m still doing good work.” And so maybe that’s why there’s not the same director for all eight films.
Micah: Well, speaking of pacing and character development, Issy writes in about both the book and the movie as it relates to Grawp’s existence.
“I love the idea of giving Hagrid some family, but Grawp is used purely in both the books and the films as a one-scene moment. His character is completely devoid of any development, and just an excuse to get them away from Umbridge when there were a million more inventive ways to do so.”
Eric: Hard agree with Issy here. Grawp, unfortunately, is useless.
Andrew: It’s good observation. I hadn’t thought about that before.
Micah: Isn’t Grawp in the final battle too?
Eric: I mean, he’s one of several dozen creatures in the…
Andrew: Yeah, like a background character.
Eric: Yeah, yeah. It’s not like he wins the war for them.
Andrew: He’s no Neville.
Eric: [laughs] Can you imagine if Grawp had the same kind of glow-up as Neville did?
[Andrew and Laura laugh]
Eric: This one comes from Ericka. It’s a movie complaint.
“I can’t get over how they added Bellatrix burning down the Burrow in Half-Blood Prince. Half-Blood Prince is one of the best books, but it has made that movie completely unwatchable to me.”
Andrew: Well, I don’t know about making it completely unwatchable, but I know we’ve also been very critical of that scene that they added, and I remember, again, going back to what the crew has to say about decisions like this; they wanted to add in a little more fear, a little more darkness into the movie, and this was their way of doing that.
Eric: A feeling that the danger has come home, that it has really reached…
Andrew: Nowhere is safe!
Eric: It has breached your front porch. Yeah, thematically, I think it works for the reasons that they stated. I just wish I could see it; even the fire looks dark and gray.
[Everyone laughs]
Laura: Well, and also, don’t worry, because their house is just fixed in the next movie.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: It’s magic. The whole thing’s held together by magic to begin with. It’s magic!
Andrew: It’s the cornfields protecting, though, I think.
Micah: The movie opens in a very similar way, right? Where they take out the bridge in London.
Eric: So cool.
Micah: So to that point about instilling fear, I agree. But again, when we’re talking about things being left out, this is another example of where, possibly, instead of spending time and money on burning down the Burrow, you could have been going back into one of the memories that were left out of Half-Blood Prince.
Laura: Oh, you mean like actually Merope Gaunt leaving baby Tom at the orphanage, and getting more of that? [laughs]
Micah: Yeah, something like that, or Bob Ogden visiting the Gaunt home.
Laura: All right, this next one is from Angela. It’s a book complaint: “I wish we would have had more time on Harry and Ginny’s relationship growth.”
Eric: Yeah, there are certain things that the book does wrong with that, like omitting the three weeks of their relationship, the happiest time of their lives, but the movies do it even worse. The movies just totally botch her development, and it’s a huge crime.
Micah: Eric, aren’t you filling that void?
Eric: I am filling that void. It is an ongoing…
Andrew: Eric, people are asking. You’ve got to get that out already.
Eric: It’s been nearly two years, but by July, it will be finished.
Andrew: By July, all right. All right, George. I’m going to call you George R.R. Martin. [laughs]
Eric: I deserve that title. I deserve it.
Laura: Eric, do you think that you could share a small excerpt of your fanfiction on next week’s episode when we talk about fanfiction?
Eric: The first two chapters, which I’ve written, of the fanfic are available. I read them out loud. Our friends at Fanatical Fics Podcast, and I recorded that audio with them, and it’s actually on our Patreon. So I’ll just draw people’s attention back to that.
Andrew: Beautiful, wow.
Laura: Awesome.
Micah: Is it called “The Winds of Weasley”?
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: I will say, apart from George R.R. Martin being a much more successful writer than me, the comparisons are very apt, and I’m deeply hurt by that. But yes, it’s true.
Andrew: Eric is the first author to record the audiobook before the book is even finished. That’s a remarkable achievement.
Eric: [laughs] It was actually a great segment.
Micah: Yeah, what happens when it goes to your editor? You’re going to have to rerecord everything.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Oh yeah, I don’t know. I don’t know. But nevertheless, it’s fun, and I am really seriously working on filling that void. The movies just obliterate all of a lot of these characters, unfortunately.
Andrew: All right, this next one’s from Jill, also concerning the book:
“It annoys me that JKR folded Snape into her theme of ‘love’ as portrayed in the books. JKR portrays many healthy kinds of love in the books, and Snape’s version of ‘love’ is not one of them. That kind of obsessive, single-minded devotion is unhealthy and shouldn’t be regarded as a redeeming character arc for him. He made a ton of bad choices and abused children along the way to his final moments as a character. Loving someone does not justify this. I wish JKR had a different character arc for him in the end. It’s a little twisted to see how so many people consider him to be a paragon of the ‘love redeems all’ theme from the books.”
Andrew: Interesting take there.
Eric: Love that.
Micah: All right, get ready, Eric, because Chelsea writes in on the book front about Book 5 Sirius:
“In Goblet of Fire, we see a Sirius who is loving, supportive, concerned, and an excellent role model and father figure to Harry. Book 5, we see a moody, adolescent, bitter man who is selfish and withdrawn. I know you have discussed this before and said it’s his lack of development as a person due to spending 12 years in jail. However, I can’t help to think it was just to distance the reader from Sirius, to soften the blow when he died. It would have been 100 times more devastating to have compassionate, fatherly Sirius killed than this distant, moody, selfish man. Personally, I would rather have had the lovable Sirius die without his character being blemished and deal with the devastation.”
Eric: I love this. I think it’s important that the book did highlight Sirius’s flaws and bring them to light in a very real way; I don’t think it’s unrealistic that Sirius had those very specific issues that Molly and them bring up in Book 5. But I think that Sirius was done dirty by the author. The decision to kill him did end up resulting in a lot of, I think, negative aspects being more prominent during the last year of his life. And I think that this is spot on because in Book 4, the joy that you get thinking about Sirius, literally in paradise, sending Harry a different tropical bird every week, writing to him, you just think, “Here’s a competent wizard who is living his best life and eluding the stupid policemen.” It just gives you a lot of hope, and Book 5 is a real downer, so I get that 100%.
Micah: Yeah, I would say… I mean, I know that Chelsea brings up the fact that we’ve made the argument that he spent 12 years in jail, but it’s also like he’s being sent right back to jail, and I think that has a lot to do with his attitude and his personality, right? He gets essentially locked down in Book 5, and then he’s on the run in Book 4, so it’s not like his life has changed all that much. He’s just in a different kind of prison.
Eric: Isn’t that life in general? [laughs]
Micah: Yeah, but I think you can’t necessarily fault him for that type of behavior.
Eric: So this next one comes from Ali; it’s a book complaint.
“I’m currently rereading from the start, and all the fat-shaming is making me deeply uncomfortable. It’s pretty much nonstop in the scenes with the Dursleys for the first four books or so, which I find especially problematic because it’s used to (completely unnecessarily) underpin the negative characterization of Dudley and Vernon. I’m still hoping to read the books to my kids someday, but I will definitely be altering those descriptions as I go, because I absolutely don’t want them to grow up with the same internalized weight stigma I did.”
Eric: This may be one of the best responses we’ve gotten, total. It’s 100% fair and accurate, in my opinion.
Andrew: Yeah, I think this is one of those things that, if this series was written from scratch again today, elements like this would probably not be included.
Eric: Right. Roald Dahl does this a lot too; characters that are bad on the inside are described as obese and grotesque on the outside, and it’s a trope in fiction writing. I agree with you; it would not be written the same today, even if written by the same author, I think. There might be some more consideration there. But yeah, the early books, oh, all about Dudley’s double chin. All about it.
Micah: And you can probably, since she is part of the family here, add Aunt Marge to this as well.
Eric: Right.
Laura: Yeah. And who hasn’t had a double chin at some point? I mean, really.
[Andrew laughs]
Laura: We’ve all been there. There’s nothing wrong with it.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: I think pretty much everybody has a double chin these days, too. It’s just impossible not to in the year of COVID.
Laura: Yeah, that’s true. This last submission comes from Katie, and it’s a gripe about something not being represented in the films that we saw more of in the books. Katie says,
“The lack of sassy Harry in the films. So many great lines and moments that remind us that Harry is still just a teenager going through school, such as, ‘There’s no need to call me ‘sir,’ Professor,’ and ‘That’s my nickname,'”
… in talking about the Roonil Wazlib moment…
[Eric and Laura laugh]
Laura: … where he grabs Ron’s Potions book.
Eric: “Yeah, you know, it’s what my friends call me.”
[Laura laughs]
“All great moments that lead to him sassing and teasing Tom in the final battle before him having a very human death (which is another pet peeve from the movies). I think it would have made the films a little more appealing to some folks.”
Andrew: All right, well, lots to change for future adaptations of Harry Potter, book or movie. [laughs]
Laura: Yeah, and I think it’s also right to say that we critique because we love, right?
Andrew: Yes.
Laura: We’ve had a lot of fun today. Obviously, some observations are more serious than others, but this is just part of doing critical textual analysis, y’all.
Andrew: Yeah, we criticize because we care. That’s a very good reminder.
Micah: Of course.
Andrew: And it’s a lot of fun to talk about stuff like this. Of course, we love the books and movies for many reasons, but that’s not as fun of a discussion. “What do you love about Harry Potter? Well, here’s what I love about Harry Potter.” Everybody knows we love Harry Potter in many ways.
Micah: I was serious about Americanizing the book titles, though.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: We’ll take care of it. We’re on it.
Andrew: If you, the listener, have any feedback about today’s discussion, you can email MuggleCast@gmail.com or send a voice memo to that email address using the Voice Memo app on your phone. You can also call 1-920-3-MUGGLE; that’s 1-920-368-4453. We have a Muggle Mail episode coming up in a couple weeks, and I’m sure we’ll revisit this topic then, and I think down the road, we’ll do another installment of this discussion, because there are so many elements to talk about. Like I said, we received many, many submissions from our listeners, so we’ll get to those in the future.
Quizzitch
Andrew: It’s time for Quizzitch.
[Quizzitch music plays]
Eric: Last week’s question: What two phrases do the twins bewitch Percy’s badge to say? Looking for two phrases from two different books; this is a really interesting one. We were talking about the Weasley twins on last week’s discussion, which I have to say was very well received; very happy about that. In Chamber of Secrets, the twins bewitch Percy’s prefect badge to read “Pinhead,” and in Prisoner of Azkaban, they bewitch his Head Boy badge to read “Bighead Boy.” So those were the two answers I was looking for. Entries by George’s Ear, who participated…
Andrew: Wow.
Eric: … and Swaggy Maggie were actually incorrect. They mentioned “Humongous Bighead,” not “Bighead Boy,” so sorry about that. Play again. But correct answers were submitted by… I mention only because of the cool usernames; I really want those people to continue submitting. But Suhas, JojoB, Ali F., Shannon, Dilesh, Kerost, Ellen, Ryan, Huntar, Irene, Hi Jason King, Stephen, Bort Voldemort, Kaitlyn Yang, Asuna, and others got the correct answer. Congratulations, everyone. And next week’s question: What is the British television series from 2003 which was directed by Harry Potter director David Yates and scored by Harry Potter composer Nicholas Hooper? Looking for the name of the British television series. And submit your answer over on the MuggleCast website, MuggleCast.com/Quizzitch.
Andrew: So to wrap up today’s episode, if you could take a moment to do the following, we would appreciate it, as they all help us continue to grow and run MuggleCast: Rate and review us on Apple Podcasts, or wherever you listen to MuggleCast. Follow us on social media; we are @MuggleCast on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and YouTube. And finally, join our community of passionate listeners today at Patreon.com/MuggleCast. Shout-out to all of our patrons, because without you, we truly would not be doing the show today. Listener support lets us spend more time in the wizarding world and less time doing boring Muggle things. By pledging, you’ll receive instant access to bonus MuggleCast, the ability to listen to us record live each week, early access to each new episode as soon as we finish editing it, our Facebook and Discord groups, our monthly Ask Me Anything videos, random fandom-related posts – I posted a very, very cool book I discovered in a used bookstore a couple of weeks ago; people were really liking the pictures I posted – and so much more. Check out all the benefits at Patreon.com/MuggleCast, and thank you for listening to today’s episode. I’m Andrew.
Eric: I’m Eric.
Micah: I’m Micah.
Laura: And I’m Laura.
Andrew: Bye, everyone.
Laura and Micah: Bye.