MuggleCast 231 Transcript
Show Intro
[“Hedwig’s Theme” plays]
Micah: Because we’re just about five days away from getting Pottermore – or is it more Potter? – this is MuggleCast Episode 231 for June 18th, 2011.
[Show music begins]
Andrew: This week’s episode of MuggleCast is brought to you by Audible.com, the Internet’s leading provider of audiobooks, with more than 75,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature, including fiction, non-fiction, and periodicals. For a free audiobook of your choice, go to AudiblePodcast.com/MuggleCast.
And by Hypable.com, a MuggleNet for the rest of the fandoms in the world and created by MuggleNet staff. Visit Hypable.com for thorough and up-to-the-minute coverage around The Hunger Games, Glee, Doctor Who, The Hobbit, and many more. That’s Hypable.com – H-Y-P-A-B-L-E dot com.
[Show music continues]
Andrew: Welcome to MuggleCast Episode 231! It is a big, big episode. I think it’s fair to say this may be one of the biggest episodes we’ve done in a long time. And to talk about the news that’s been going on over the past couple of weeks, we have here Micah, Eric, Matt, and of course, your fantastic host, me!
Eric: Yay!
Matt: Woo!
Andrew: And we’re not doing Chapter-by-Chapter this week because like I said, there’s a lot of news. There’s too much news and this episode may be close to two hours. [fake sobbing]
Eric: Oh no!
Andrew: Even without Chapter-by-Chapter. So, I’m Andrew Sims.
Eric: I’m Eric Scull.
Micah: I’m Micah Tannenbaum.
Matt: And I’m Matthew Britton.
Andrew: Micah, what is in the news this week?
Micah: Not a thing.
Andrew: Not a thing?
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Andrew: Then we should have had Chapter-by-Chapter.
Eric: Yeah. We’re going to get e-mails.
News: Pottermore
Micah: It’s been a very busy news week. Let’s start with the mysterious Pottermore.
Andrew: Mhm.
Micah: And Andrew, you were involved in this whole process of revealing the name, and – tell us a little bit about it.
Andrew: Okay.
Micah: I mean, what you can, obviously, and how it all came about.
Andrew: Yeah, I’ll run through what happened – or what’s happened over the past week. Basically JK Rowling – this new project she has, Pottermore – clearly she wanted to get the fan sites involved so on Tuesday of this past week, multiple fan sites each had a coordinate for fans to punch in to a map and when you punched in the coordinates – like you’re a little hacker, you’re punching these GPS coordinates – it brings you to a location important to Jo/the Harry Potter world, and you go into Street View and you could see a giant letter there. Now, it’s not actually there, it was virtually inserted. So anyway, there were ten of these coordinates, made up ten letters, people slowly got each letter. They weren’t in order, you had to put them together yourself, and they revealed the name of this project called Pottermore. And fans were really excited. Then the next day, all the fan sites as well as a lot of the official sites such as Bloomsbury, Scholastic, the official Harry Potter movie website, and a bunch of Harry Potter fan sites, all added these banners that say, “The owls are gathering.” And you can click them, you can click the banner, and it brings you to a YouTube page which is counting down to June 23rd, where JK Rowling will be making a momentous announcement on YouTube. And if you notice these banners, guys, are really clever because more and more owls are showing up by the day on the banner.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: It’s kind of a…
Micah: Who’s cleaning up after them?
Matt: I know.
Eric: Yeah, that’s the real question.
Matt: You never see under the tree.
Andrew: Oh no, you see the poop. It’s showing up on the MuggleNet design right below it.
Eric: Oh no.
Matt: Oh, and you can mouse over it and what will happen?
Andrew: You sweep it up.
Matt: Oh.
Eric: Well, Micah, you know those guys who stole the Harry Potter books and leaked them early in past years, at gunpoint and stuff? I bet their community service is they have to clean up after those owls.
Micah: Oh, that makes sense.
Eric: Yeah.
Micah: Yeah.
Eric: They – [laughs] it’s kind of a fitting punishment.
Andrew: So the fan sites have worked – one representative from multiple fan sites has worked with JK Rowling’s people on putting this together. I was lucky enough to represent MuggleNet. I did get a sneak preview of Pottermore. Obviously, I can’t say what it is, and I hate being that guy who’s like, “I know what it is but I’m not telling you.”
[Matt laughs]
Andrew: So, I will say it is really cool, and – na na na na na – no, just kidding.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: I want to hear the theories from you guys. Obviously, everybody is trying to speculate what the hell is JK Rowling announcing. I’ve got to say, the name is awesome because people love hearing “Pottermore,” more Potter. That’s what they want to hear right now, when…
Eric: Well, is it Pottermore, or is it more Potter?
Andrew: No, it is Pottermore.
Eric: Obviously it’s Pottermore, so that’s – what does that mean? What is Pottermore?
Micah: Well, technically speaking, that’s more Potter, so…
Andrew: Right.
Micah: …it’s both.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: It’s not more Potter, though. It’s Pottermore.
Andrew: Well… [laughs]
Matt: For some reason, I keep connecting Pottermore with Paramore.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Yes, and I hate that. Somebody said that to me the other day and now all I think of is, [singing] “Whoa, whatever makes you break.”
Eric: So, how about this title for JK Rowling’s next project? This is the next project, this is the next thing she’s doing since completing the Harry Potter books, Pottermore. What’s…
Andrew: And when you think about it, it comes at such a good time, when Warner Bros…
Eric: It does.
Andrew: The three words – the four words coming out of their mouth is, “It all ends here.”
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: And sometimes just, “It all ends.” [laughs]
Andrew: Right, right.
Eric: Yeah.
Andrew: So…
Micah: And JK Rowling turns around and says, “Well, not really.”
Andrew: Yeah, right. Right. Warner Bros. is like, “Ugh, come on!”
Eric: Yeah.
Andrew: “We’re trying to market the end here and you’re saying there’s more.”
[Andrew and Matt laugh]
Micah: Yeah, what did you guys think about that, though? I mean, she makes this huge announcement right before the film comes out. Isn’t she taking away from it a little bit, or do you think she’s adding to it?
Andrew: No.
Eric: Well, the announcement is that there’s going to be an announcement at this point. It’s so weird, people are saying, “JKR announces Pottermore, da da da,” but we actually haven’t heard from her. The fan sites, we dealt with JKR’s people doing these coordinates. We still actually haven’t heard from Jo. She hasn’t tweeted for the seventh time on her Twitter. She actually created a brand new – there’s a Pottermore Twitter to handle Pottermore stuff. So I just – we haven’t heard from Jo yet. I’m itching to actually hear what she has to say about this. I can’t wait for the announcement.
Andrew: So, Micah, what do you speculate Pottermore could be?
Micah: Well, I would think that it has some tie to the encyclopedia because that’s the only thing that we know that she’s going to be working on that is related to Potter. That’s definite. She has stated that she would do an encyclopedia at some point in the future. So, I’m not sure how it ties in or if there’s more to it, but I do think it has something to do with the encyclopedia.
Andrew: How about you, Eric?
Eric: Well, we can assume that it does have to do with Harry Potter, right? Because it’s called Pottermore, obviously.
Andrew: [laughs] Yes.
Eric: So, I just – I don’t know what it’s going to be. It’s online. Whatever it is, it’s online, and I think, Andrew, even in your post you said it’s not a new Harry Potter book.
Andrew: Right.
Eric: This announcement is not a new Harry Potter book, so it’s something online and I just feel like it’s going to be either a resource or just a really cool place with content from Jo, like an online – somehow she’s going to work a way into releasing – providing new content, much like she used to do on her own website, but it’ll be themed and it will have certain rules to it, and maybe it’ll be like an online community. Just looking at the logo that was released on – I think it’s the YouTube channel, it looks kind of – I don’t want to say “cartoony” but it looks like it’s supposed to be something that’s inviting a lot of people to come partake in this experience. That’s just what I gathered from it. So I think it’ll be an online – like a place where Harry Potter fans can gather and there’ll be new, directly-from-Jo Potter content.
Andrew: How about you, Matt?
Matt: I haven’t – all I really know is that it has to be a companion to the original series because – I don’t really know, because the name really throws me off because to be honest, it’s a weird name.
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: It’s a weird title for anything.
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: Pottermore.
Eric: And this is the woman who gave us Xenophilius Lovegood, Rufus Scrimgeour, Dedalus Diggle.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: I mean, there are other names that she pulled out of a hat, for crying out loud.
Micah: Yeah.
Eric: Pottermore? Ehhh, I’m not sold on it. Sorry, Matt.
Matt: Yeah, I keep thinking either Paramore or The Raven with “nevermore,” you know?
[Eric laughs]
Matt: So I think you’re right, Eric. It probably will be something online because the fact is that she made Pottermore one word together, so it would be easy to put on a website or something. It’s just – to think of it as – I really hope it’s not an encyclopedia because I want like a ten-word title for the encyclopedia like “The-Realization-That-The-Harry Potter-World-Is-Over Companion: The Encyclopedia of Harry Potter” or something like that.
Eric: Mhm. Instead of Pottermore.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: Well…
Matt: Pottermore is just one word, nice and simple, so it seems like it would be easy to put on a website.
Eric: Well, I’ve always argued, too – look, there is an online encyclopedia for Harry Potter, it’s called the Lexicon.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: And what it is, though – it’s a summary of – or it’s all the facts that exist in the already-existing Harry Potter books, are compiled and…
Matt: Well, Eric, do you think that it might be a social network though?
Eric: Well, it could be. I mean…
Andrew: That’s the thing. A lot of people have thought they were really clever by digging up the trademark and one of the things that the trademark for Pottermore covers is some legal verbiage like [deepens voice] “a computer-to-computer social network, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah,” [normal voice] and everybody was like, “Oh, it must mean it’s a social network.”
Eric: Well, what does it say?
Matt: No.
Eric: What does it say specifically? What’s the trademark?
Matt: But do you think people actually – do you think if it was a social network, do you really think it’ll stand on it’s own and last? I mean, we’ve seen a lot of these kind of things.
Eric: But it’s coming from Jo.
Matt: It’s coming from Jo, okay, but even if it did come from Jo only the hardcore Harry Potter fans will go on it.
Micah: I’ll be the pessimist. I’ll be the pessimist. I’ll say, no, it wouldn’t last. I don’t think so, because you’re going to have to be providing content to it on such a regular basis. And I don’t know, maybe it’s something where she consistently releases information about the Potter series over a period of time, but even then, how long can that go on for?
Eric: Well, I think…
Micah: Unless it’s already pre-programmed into the site to release at certain dates.
Eric: That’s the thing. Wasn’t Pottermore – the trademark was trademarked like three years ago, wasn’t it?
Matt: Yeah, it was like in 2008.
Eric: That name.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: [laughs] So, she was set on that name for a very long – she must really like it. Well, the other thing is we don’t know what it’s for so I hope the name – final thing about the name for me, I hope it fits the content. I’m sure it will. Obviously it will, because…
Matt: She did announce that it’s going to be just as good as a new book.
Eric: Well, was that JK Rowling or Andrew Sims? Which one said it was going to be just as good?
Andrew: The news post that was made on MuggleNet and multiple fan sites was the verbiage that JK Rowling’s people wanted us to use, exactly.
Eric: Wow.
Andrew: We couldn’t change it.
Eric: So, just as exciting.
Andrew: Just as exciting as – it’s not a book, but we believe it to be just as exciting.
Eric: Well, hang on…
Andrew: The trademark, by the way – just to throw it out there – is, quote:
“Providing multiple user access to a global computer information network, online chat rooms, and electronic bulletin boards for transmission of messages among users in the field of general interest, and online facilities for real-time interaction with other computer users concerning topics of general interest.”
So, it’s a very broad statement.
Eric: Hmm, I hear forums, I hear chatrooms, I hear…
Matt: Oh, I hope not.
Eric: …maybe, online – like MuggleNet Interactive or Leaky – Leaky has an interactive, don’t they? Where you go and buy spells and stuff? I hear all that stuff in that trademark. But…
Matt: I really hope it’s not, because – I mean, I’m not saying it’s a bad idea at all. I’m just saying, to say it’s just as exciting as a new book… [laughs]
Andrew: You don’t think a chatroom is just as exciting as a new book?
[Eric laughs]
Matt: No, because there’s a million chatrooms!
Eric: But it’s Jo!
Matt: Or more than a million.
Eric: It’s Jo.
Andrew: [laughs] It’s Jo.
Eric: Most chatrooms have creepers in it. Maybe there are anti-creeper charms placed on this site.
Andrew: What if Jo announces she’s going to be in the chatroom 24/7?
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Would that be an exciting development?
Before we continue with today’s episode of MuggleCast, we’d like to remind you that this episode is brought to you by Audible.com, the Internet’s leading provider of audiobooks, with more than 75,000 downloadable titles across all types of literature and featuring audio versions of many New York Times Bestsellers. For listeners of this podcast, Audible is offering a free audiobook to give you a chance to try out their great service. One audiobook to consider is The Hunger Games, the first in a trilogy of the same name. The series is hotter than ever right now because filming for the movie adaptation recently got underway. It’s one book and film series you are not going to want to miss. So for a free audiobook of your choice, such as The Hunger Games, go to AudiblePodcast.com/MuggleCast. Again, that’s AudiblePodcast.com/MuggleCast.
Eric: Well, could anything be as exciting as a Harry Potter book? Let’s be realistic.
Andrew: That’s a good question. That’s a good question.
Eric: Yeah. What can be as exciting as a new Harry Potter book, other than another Harry Potter book?
Andrew: Well, I think a good gauge on the interest in this is by looking at the Twitter and YouTube numbers for the respective Pottermore channels. On Twitter there are 60,000 followers already, and that’s in about five days – four or five days? And the YouTube has over a million views. Keep in mind there’s not even a video on it yet. It has a million views and it’s already getting a lot of honors on YouTube. It’s the “Most Subscribed All Time” in the United Kingdom.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: For the week.
Eric: Yeah.
Andrew: It now has 28,000 subscribers. Is that a good number? I mean, I guess it’s good without actually hearing an announcement from Jo yet.
Eric: So the first thing – it is good because people don’t know what it is and they’re still clicking onto it. So that’s the popularity that it’s gotten because of her name, or because of our passion, more specifically. But it’s also – that’s the one thing about doing a web project and not a book project: What about the disadvantaged children who don’t have Internet?
Andrew: Oh, that’s true. That’s very true.
Eric: How are they going to – [laughs] I’m not – I feel bad for the disadvantaged children. But…
Andrew: No, that’s a great point.
Matt: No, it’s…
Andrew: If you want to reach as many people as possible, you put out a book. It’s what made the books so successful. If JK Rowling did online books back in 2000, [laughs] it wouldn’t have worked out as well.
Matt: Well, she wants to reach out to the same fan-base that read her books. Therefore, it’s people who love to read books.
Eric: So…
Matt: So it has to – I mean, I would hope that she would put into consideration encompassing that part of her fandom, the ones who read the books the most.
Eric: And a book is something you can read at the beach. This…
Andrew: Well, I can do that with my Kindle, too.
Eric: [laughs] The Kindle…
Matt: Maybe it’s the new version of an e-reader.
Andrew: I don’t have a Kindle.
Eric: Well, that’s the thing. Okay, so look – with the Kindle, okay – JK Rowling’s last project which was Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows came out four summers ago and was number one highest-selling on Amazon…
Andrew: Mhm.
Eric: …for 150 weeks, until it was replaced by the Kindle e-book reader. And…
Andrew: Top-selling item on Amazon, yeah. It was Harry Potter, until the Kindle.
Eric: For years, until the Kindle. And – so we live in a world now where, four years later, Borders is closing all of its stores. Most of its stores. Borders is closing, bookstores are failing. The only person, the white knight who could save them – JK Rowling, whose books are guaranteed to sell…
Andrew: [laughs] The white knight?
Eric: …is – the person whose books are guaranteed to sell, chooses to do a web format instead of a new Harry Potter book. Is she contributing to the decline of the book?
Andrew: Now, in fairness, it hasn’t been announced what exactly this is. So nobody knows – well, it has…
Micah: Aside from you.
[Andrew and Matt laugh]
Eric: But you said it’s not a book.
Micah: And several other webmasters.
Andrew: I’m trying to word this properly. It hasn’t been announced whether or not it – okay, fair enough, she says it’s not a book. But we don’t know for sure if it’s just online or what exactly it is. So just keep that in mind while you’re putting down Jo.
Micah: Well, if it’s not online…
Eric: Oh no, I don’t mean to put her down…
Micah: …why is there a website registered? Why is there a Twitter account?
Eric: A Twitter – and you know she…
Andrew: Well…
Eric: …doesn’t use Twitter for – if it wasn’t a project she would work on, she’s not going to use Twitter and we know that because…
Matt: She doesn’t even use her own Twitter.
Eric: Yeah, she doesn’t use her own Twitter.
Andrew: But who’s to say Pottermore just isn’t an informational site, just like HarryPotter.com is an informational site for the movies?
Eric: No, JKRowling.com was supposed to be an information site and she put fun into it.
Matt: Yeah.
Andrew: All right.
Eric: Because it used to be an information site, and she made it more fun.
Matt: Anything about information, I want as an encyclopedia. I want it physically in my hand.
Andrew: So is Pottermore – will Pottermore extend the life of the Harry Potter fandom? I know it’s early to say, because we don’t know exactly what it is…
Matt: [laughs] It’s a little too early.
Andrew: …but is Pottermore…
Micah: Why don’t you tell us, Andrew?
Andrew: Will Pottermore live up to its name?
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Eric: What are your thoughts, Andrew?
[Matt laughs]
Eric: You’re hearing from us, but we’d like to hear from you.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: If you were a betting man, would you say…
Andrew: [laughs] No, I’m not doing that.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Andrew: There’s no room to mess around with that.
Micah: Well, the other thing, though, that Jo did talk about with respect to the encyclopedia – this was a while back – was that it was going to be for charity.
Andrew: Mmm.
Micah: And unless she’s charging some fee for people to use whatever Pottermore is going to be, then how are you generating any sort of money for charity?
Eric: Well, if you’re generating money you can donate to charity. And we know that Jo Rowling can match anything she gets to charity, or just give money to charity any day anyway. I mean, I don’t think that’s a real concern. I mean – no, it’s true…
Micah: Well no, the point is if this is the encyclopedia, let’s say, she did mention that the whole idea behind it was that the money was going to go to charity. So when you think “encyclopedia” you think, like Matt was saying, a physical book so that the proceeds end up going to charity.
Eric: Well, my point in bringing up the Lexicon as an online encyclopedia was that I never liked us calling this next book from Jo that we expected an encyclopedia, because what it’s going to be is backstory. Like never before seen – it’s not a collection of information – or it is, but it’s a collection of new information. She’s producing this entire history, this new history, and that’s what we were expecting in book form. If she does it online, I don’t really see why it would be harder, except less people are online. Books are farther reaching for now than e-books. But is it a sign of the changing times?
Matt: Well, are you referring to ñ are you saying that it’s going to be in e-book fashion?
Eric: Well no, I’m saying that if Pottermore involves releasing new information about the Harry Potter series, which really is ñ I don’t think it’s a stretch – because she named it “Potter.” She could have named it something else entirely. I actually didn’t expect her next project, or her next five projects, to have anything to do with Harry Potter. I would have still bought them and read them and got excited about them, just because it’s her and we know that she can write. The fact that it’s Potter related really begs the question. She’s – or there is no question. She’s going to release more information that extends the canon.
Matt: Right.
Eric: Or that extends the Potter series. So yeah, I don’t see – I mean, anything that she releases is new information, and I don’t think she’s going to create all new characters.
Matt: Oh, no.
Eric: So she is really going to tell us more. So this is I guess the web version of an encyclopedia book or a history, a new history, for the Harry Potter characters.
Andrew: All right. Well, I think we can leave it at that. Again, JK Rowling will be making her YouTube announcement June 23rd. I don’t think there is an exact time, so ñ I mean, I’m sure they have one in mind, but I don’t think we know it yet.
Matt: And it might be leaked before it even…
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Andrew: It’s not going to leak.
Eric: Well wait, we didn’t go into how exactly she did this, I mean the scavenger hunt thing. Did you guys play? Did you guys go in and find…
Micah: I did, yeah. I was excited because it kind of took me back to when she used to reveal things on her website, and…
Eric: With the “Do Not Disturb” sign?
Micah: …I got kind of pissed off that somebody hacked the site a day earlier and revealed everything, because…
Andrew: Yeah.
Micah: …I thought that kind of cheapened the whole announcement and what it was that she was trying to do. Now, one would hope that you could protect against that kind of thing, but I guess they didn’t think it was going to happen.
Andrew: No, it wasn’t even so much a hack, just that a clever person could view the page source and click around a little bit, and find the code where it has all the letters and the locations. [laughs] So it was just in the code of the site.
Micah: Got it.
Andrew: And that happens all the time, I guess it was…
Micah: But why not update the site until the following day at least? Have those three coordinates for Day 1…
Eric: Yeah, were they not expecting it? I mean…
Micah: …and not update the site until the following day? This way nobody could find them.
Andrew: But you could still find them in the code and it was getting around on the Internet. I’m glad that they just let us post the rest of them, because in the meantime all these other sites who aren’t partners were just releasing all the letters and what they presumed to be the name of the project.
Eric: Oh, I see.
Andrew: So it would have been bad for MuggleNet and all the other sites because we would have been stuck being like, “Okay, only three letters are out!” In the meantime all these other sites are like, “Here’s all ten letters. It’s “Pottermore”!”
Eric: Okay. So it was supposed to be a two-day event, right?
Andrew: Right.
Eric: Where they would release coordinates, and it was half a day. I didn’t actually get to play the scavenger hunt. I was at work from 10:00 AM until 10:00 PM that day.
Matt: I missed it.
Micah: You can still play it.
Eric: And by 5:00 PM – really? You can?
Andrew: Yeah, you can still punch in coordinates. Yeah.
Eric: Okay.
Matt: We won’t spoil.
Eric: To be honest, I heard JK Rowling had this huge announcement and I was – and that she wasn’t giving it away and that it was still going to be a week, and I was like, “I am too old for this.” That was my first thought. But it did seem…
Andrew: [laughs] Here’s the other thing to keep in mind, what’s been exciting about this is this is the first time Twitter has been around when JK Rowling has made an announcement. And it’s…
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: No, why I bring it up is because it was interesting to see people’s reactions on a social media service like Twitter where you’re getting these initial reactions from people freaking out.
Matt: In real-time.
Andrew: In real-time, right, as people are discovering the letters. And you looked on the Twitter trends and the phrases “More Potter” and “Pottermore” came up pretty quickly after the first couple of letters were discovered. And it was just fun because then we asked on the MuggleNet Twitter, “What do you guys think Pottermore is?” and we were getting answers by the second. I was just sitting there watching the @ replies come in. The Mac application lets you watch them come in in real-time, and it was fast and furious. And it was just really exciting seeing the fans react that way. And before Twitter you could watch a chatroom but everybody is on Twitter at the same time these days, especially when big news is happening. So it was really fun to watch the community react.
Eric: So the Pottermore Twitter did release the tenth coordinate, right?
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: Was that supposed to happen? Or…
Andrew: Yes, it was supposed to happen, but we knew the tenth letter anyway because of that little hack, quote on quote.
Eric: Okay, so the tenth partner was the Pottermore Twitter, right?
Andrew: Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Eric: Okay. But we knew it because that – well, I’m glad she still went ahead with it, you know? It says a lot about JK Rowling too, because Stephenie Meyer, who was writing Book 1 of Twilight from Edward’s perspective – the book was called Midnight Sun – she got hacked, and some of that book was released online and she gave up.
Andrew: Mhm.
Eric: I mean…
Andrew: Well…
Eric: Quote me if I’m wrong, but she was very upset and it took her…
Andrew: To be fair to Stephenie, though, a book leak is different than a title leak. [laughs]
Eric: It was a couple of chapters though.
Matt: Yes.
Eric: I read that part of Midnight Sun though, and it was awesome. It is above and beyond. It’s like my favorite thing that she’s written and I would really love her to continue it, but…
Andrew: Eric Scull, a TwiHard. Look at this.
Eric: A TwiHard, I’ve read it all. But Midnight Sun is really, really good. And it was just so disheartening to see that a few fans could really spoil it for everybody. And I’m so relieved that that’s not the case with Jo, that she’s still going ahead with whatever this Pottermore thing is. Andrew, you said I was putting down Jo earlier by saying she contributed to the decline of the book – or might be contributing to the decline of the book. But now I’m just going to say I think it’s really cool that she’s still going ahead, that she powered through, and that we’re still getting this announcement.
Matt: Wait…
Eric: And the most exciting thing about Pottermore – we don’t know what it is, but it’s coming from Jo. She – it’s…
Matt: How did, really, anything get spoiled though? All they did was just basically…
Eric: Well, the name.
Matt: …reveal what really any hacker could have found out. I mean, it wasn’t that big of a secret. It was just a little bit of fun to find out what the title was.
Micah: Well, it was just that the information was released a lot earlier, I think, than what they anticipated. So…
Matt: It was a day, wasn’t it?
Andrew: Mhm.
Micah: Yeah, yeah.
Eric: Well, fortunately they only planned to release the name this week, right?
Matt: Well, I…
Eric: They didn’t have the whole package to go.
Matt: To be honest, I’m kind of glad that they did it all within one day, even though it wasn’t intended.
Andrew: Yeah, two days, to me – because everybody was on Twitter like, “Oh my God, when’s the fourth letter coming out? When’s the fourth letter coming out?” And the fourth letter wasn’t supposed to come out until the following day. So all these poor people are waiting for a fourth letter.
Matt: Yeah.
Andrew: And if it hadn’t been hacked it wouldn’t have come.
Matt: Well, it also would have lost a lot of steam, too, after two days.
Eric: So they were only going to release three letters…
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: …on day one, and seven letters on day two?
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: That’s – why not do five and five?
Andrew: I don’t know.
Matt: Why not just pull each one of my teeth out?
[Eric laughs]
Micah: Because you got to have the Hallows and the Horcruxes.
Andrew: Ahhh, of course. Okay.
Eric: Wait, what do you mean?
Micah: No, I’m just joking. But no, it was cool. I was just going to say, if you actually went to the map, the places that you were taken to were places that had some sort of tie to the series. And there was a little graphic there, if you waited long enough, that popped up and described to you what its reference was to the series.
Andrew: Yeah.
Matt: That was cool.
Eric: Oh cool.
News: Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Trailer
Andrew: Let’s move on now to the other big story of the week, Micah, which is the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 trailer. I don’t know – I don’t think Warner Bros. knew that JK Rowling was making this Pottermore announcement at the same time, so I think this was kind of unintentional, for two big news items to happen in one week. But hey, it was a good week for the fans.
Micah: Yeah, definitely. And it’s what, I guess, we could call the final Potter trailer ever – for a movie. I’m sure…
[Eric laughs]
Micah: …there’ll be other stuff that is released later on, for DVDs and Blu-rays and other things like that. But…
Andrew: Right.
Micah: …this is it. This is the last trailer you’ll ever see for Harry Potter.
Andrew: And it really was, honestly, the best trailer. I mean, it told a story, which I really loved about it.
Matt: Mhm. It was a proper trailer.
Eric: Yeah, but all the other trailers – instead of saying that this trailer is the best because of that, all the other trailers were not as cool because of that…
[Andrew laughs]
Matt: Which is true.
Eric: …is what I prefer to say.
Andrew: But that’s okay.
Eric: They should have done what they did with this trailer with all the other trailers. Except the one thing they did do was they showed too much. This trailer shows way too much.
Matt: You’re one of those people?
Andrew: Well, he’s not the only one to say that.
[Micah laughs]
Andrew: Let’s – and that’s coming from someone who saw the movie, so imagine the people…
Eric: Yeah.
Andrew: …who haven’t seen the movie, what they’re thinking. There are a lot of recycled scenes in this trailer that were in previous trailers. So, for the sake of time and sanity, let’s just try to focus on the new clips. And there are quite a few in this trailer.
Matt: Thank God.
Andrew: And if you’re listening at home, you can load up the trailer, and you can kind of move along with us. We’ll give the time stamp of each scene that we’re talking about, so you too can watch what we are discussing here on MuggleCast.
Matt: Unless you’ve promised yourself that you weren’t going to see any of the trailers and want to be surprised when you see it in person.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: Yeah. And that’s good considering – to be perfectly honest, stay away from this trailer if you don’t want to be spoiled.
Micah: Because you haven’t read the books.
Matt: [laughs] Yeah, you haven’t read the books or anything, so you don’t know what’s going to happen.
Micah: And you don’t know what happens. [laughs]
Eric: No. Look, even if – okay – no, it’s not like that at all.
Andrew: I agree, Eric.
Eric: Because the question is, “How are they going to adapt it?” And this trailer answers all those questions. All the pivotal moments of the book are in this trailer, and that matters not because you’ve already read the books so you know what’s going to happen, but because the film adaptation is – the definitive film version is just as important as the book.
Matt: You see two minutes of a two-and-a-half hour film.
Andrew: Two hours.
Matt: Oh, I beg your pardon.
Eric: The most emotionally charged scenes from the film are in the trailer. Having already seen the trailer, you will go into the film and it will feel less fulfilling.
Matt: I have never felt less fulfilled though.
Andrew: Well, let’s discuss it anyway.
Micah: I don’t agree with that.
MuggleCast 231 Transcript (continued)
Scene-by-Scene: Lily Talking to Baby Harry
Andrew: At nine seconds, it’s the opening shot of the trailer and we see Lily Potter talking to baby Harry.
[Clip from trailer plays] Harry, be safe. Be strong.
Andrew: And it’s a very eerie start to the trailer because we see baby Harry and his mother. And I think it’s the first time we’ve ever heard anything coming out of his mother’s mouth, other than – oh yeah, no, this is the only time.
Matt: Mhm. Yeah.
Andrew: Or the first time. My question is, why didn’t they use the same baby who was in Sorcerer’s Stone?
Matt: Because he’s probably twelve at this time right now.
Micah: [laughs] I was just going to say that.
Andrew: Well, let’s do a Benjamin Button on that kid and get this right.
Matt: I thought they did a good job finding a kid who looks sort of like…
Andrew: Yeah. No, you’re right.
Matt: …the kid a decade ago.
Eric: I was going to ask you guys, isn’t this the same kid?
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: I mean, to be honest…
Andrew: It is pretty close.
Eric: …could they have – it’s close, it’s just that close. I was – immediately I was like, “Oh my God, that’s Harry Potter when he was a baby.”
Scene-by-Scene: Flashbacks to Past Movies
Andrew: So at fourteen seconds, we see a title that says “Every moment he’s lived” and there’s these flashback shots: Sorcerer’s Stone, experiencing his wand for the first time, the boats riding to Hogwarts for the first time, Harry seeing the Patronus in Prisoner of Azkaban, and Harry and Dumbledore about to enter the cave in Half-Blood Prince. And this is part of the thing I liked about this trailer, is it is telling a story. There is this little review. I mean, not even so much a review, but kind of – these clips lend to the buildup of this epic moment, all these great moments he’s had.
Matt: Has led to this.
Scene-by-Scene: Quidditch Pitch
Andrew: Right, as the next title says at 23 seconds. At 24 seconds, we see the Quidditch pitch from Half-Blood Prince, and we see it [laughs] during happier times.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Then it transitions to this flying shot of during the Battle of Hogwarts when it’s going down in flames.
Matt: Mhm. And I just realized this, too, while I’m trying to follow along: in the background you can see the Hogwarts castle getting attacked.
Andrew: Yeah, you can see the…
Eric: Wow.
Andrew: …spells trying to penetrate the protective charm.
Eric: Nice.
Andrew: Spells.
Matt: Charms.
Eric: So I guess they wanted a new Quidditch pitch anyway because they didn’t put a bubble over that.
Matt: Well…
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah.
Matt: …I’m sure it’d be easier to make since they destroyed it for the maze in Book 4.
Andrew: Yeah, I don’t think…
Eric: That’s true.
Andrew: …it was as important to protect the Quidditch pitch.
Eric: I don’t know. Somebody somewhere is very upset.
Scene-by-Scene: Dementors Around Hogwarts Castle
Andrew: At 30 seconds, we see a worried Harry Potter. It was kind of a clip we’ve seen before in other trailers. There are more review shots. And at 41 seconds – I don’t know if – is this new?
Matt: Yeah, this is new.
Andrew: Okay.
Matt: This is definitely new.
Andrew: 41 seconds, we see Dementors kind of hovering over Hogwarts Castle trying to get in, right?
Matt: Right. That’s what I think, too, because they’re all at a certain proximity from the…
Eric: I don’t think they’re trying to get in because there’s no bubble over Hogwarts. I feel like this is an early shot of Hogwarts under the Death Eaters’ rule during – while Harry and Hermione are in the woods. This is kind of the…
Micah: Eric, are you trying to say that this is when Snape is Headmaster?
Eric: Yeah…
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: …Snape is Headmaster.
Micah: Before he flees.
Matt: Exactly, yeah.
Micah: Or the protective charm gets put up.
Matt: So the protective charm isn’t put up yet.
Micah: Right. Yeah, yeah.
Matt: Because there’s no use for it at this point right now.
Eric: Right. The Death Eaters that are – the Carrows are torturing students and Snape is allowing that to happen.
Matt: Mhm.
Eric: And this is kind of – in the previous trailer I refer to as a military state where Hogwarts is very – not a happy place. I feel like the Dementors being stationed at Hogwarts is fitting with the kind of experience a student during that year would have at Hogwarts.
Matt: Yeah. And also it’s kind of influencing the weather a little bit too.
Scene-by-Scene: Voldemort Screams
Eric: Oh, and, Andrew, there was another scream by the way.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: In case you were wondering.
Andrew: You want to talk about that now? The first time I watched this trailer, I could not help noticing, as other people did too – people on Twitter brought it up – all the screams again with Voldemort! There are at least ten, and it’s just…
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: Honestly – this trailer is fantastic but it really distracted me.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Andrew: It bothered me a lot.
Matt: Yeah.
Andrew: It was all I could hear. And I blame that on Eric.
Eric: And I’m not apologizing. I’ve had a few people at reply me on Twitter saying, “Ever since you pointed out those screams on MuggleCast…”
Andrew: “It’s all…”
Eric: “Ever since you guys pointed those out, now we just notice them and we can’t watch the trailer.”
Micah: Yeah, it’s all your fault, Eric.
[Andrew laughs]
Matt: You just didn’t want people to watch the trailer because it spoiled too much.
Micah: You put the audio together for the trailer, clearly, and…
Eric: I – yeah, clearly. No, I didn’t say that…
Micah: …are now causing people to hear Voldemort saying “NYAHHHHH!” all the time.
Andrew: “NYAHHHHH!”
Matt: Well, it’s the same one we’ve been hearing since Book 5, I think, is when he shouted that…
Eric: Yeah – well…
Matt: …now famous bit.
Eric: I think it was – yeah, you’re right.
Matt: When he was fighting Dumbledore.
Eric: But they’re the ones using this in the trailer. I’m not apologizing for pointing that scream out. Thank you, Andrew, for devoting enough time in the previous episode to count the screams.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: It’s what we do.
Eric: This is Warner Bros.’ fault.
Andrew: It is.
Eric: They’re putting this insane Voldemort scream – every five seconds in this trailer, there’s new wail and it’s the same wail.
Scene-by-Scene: Snape and Voldemort
Andrew: At 43 seconds, we hear a little dialogue from Snape and Voldemort. It goes like this:
[Clip from trailer plays]
Snape: You’ve kept him alive so that he can die at the proper moment.
Voldemort: Bring him to me.
Andrew: So viewers are getting this idea that what’s going on is – the reason [laughs] Harry hasn’t died until now is Voldemort has been waiting for just the right opportunity, and in this film…
Eric: That’s not Voldemort.
Micah: No, that’s Dumbledore.
Eric: That’s Snape talking to Dumbledore. Yeah. That’s continuity editing.
Andrew: Oh okay.
Eric: Our brain thinks he’s talking to Voldemort because the next shot is of Voldemort, but he’s actually talking to Dumbledore. That’s from “Snape’s Worst Memory.” That’s where – and in fact, one could see this as a complete spoiler, that Harry does in fact need to die. Maybe not for good, but he at least needs to die once in order for everything to happen.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: That’s what – they should not have shown Snape confronting Dumbledore.
Matt: Well, not everybody is as clever as you though, Eric.
Eric: Okay, fine.
Micah: Well no, I was going to say that, because there’s other parts of this trailer which reveal certain things about characters, and we get to that in the Resurrection Stone scene.
Matt: Yes.
Micah: The fact that Remus dies [laughs] is very much revealed in this trailer, and – but this scene with Voldemort, I wanted to ask you, Eric, because you’ve seen the film. He’s talking to Lucius, and is he talking about getting Harry or getting Snape?
Eric: He’s talking about getting Snape. That was – I feel like this is a…
Micah: Yeah, see that’s another misleading quote.
Eric: Yeah, because I don’t think Lucius – because they’re in the boathouse and not the Shrieking Shack, so they changed that. And also Lucius – this whole scene, Lucius isn’t in the Shrieking Shack from what I remember in Book 7, talking to Voldemort. Lucius and Voldemort – I don’t even know that they have any kind of conversation in the…
Micah: They don’t. Not in the book, anyway.
Eric: Yeah, in the book. So this is the added scene of Jason Isaacs.
Matt: Right.
Eric: But at this point, as you see in the trailer, he is asking Lucius to go get Snape. I think right before that he asks him where Snape is. And this is after Snape has fled.
Scene-by-Scene: Gringotts Cart
Andrew: At 47 seconds, we see the trip down to the Lestrange vault. We’ve seen clips from this before, but if you notice this track that they’re on – they’re riding down deep into Gringotts. I am telling you, this is going to be the next ride at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: I’ve been saying this for months. And now you look at this footage of this twisty, turvy, turny track. I can practically see Universal in the background of it. They’re setting this up perfectly for a ride at The Wizarding World of Harry Potter. That’s all I’m saying about this.
Matt: Because it does look like a roller coaster…
Andrew: Yes, yes.
Matt: …line, yeah.
Andrew: This is so going to be a ride. It’s not even funny.
Eric: But we’ve always…
Andrew: I feel like making a news post now on MuggleNet…
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: …just announcing it in advance. [laughs]
Matt: Just saving a post for it.
Eric: See if anybody asks you to take it down.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: That would be funny.
Scene-by-Scene: Dragon Escape
Andrew: Really. Yeah, exactly. If they ask me to take it down, [laughs] then I must be onto something. So at 49 seconds, we see the dragon, and this is the part where he’s already been let go by the trio, because you can see the trio on the back of the dragon, and the dragon is breaking a part of the track as he makes his way upward through Gringotts.
Eric: Oh, that’s what he’s doing.
Matt: Mhm.
Andrew: Because then the next scene – I think, because – yeah, yeah, there’s definitely somebody on the back of him, because the next scene you see a cart flying off of the track because the dragon broke it.
Matt: Yeah, it’s the goblins who are after him.
Eric: The – oh, yeah, the chasing goblins.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: Well – and then you hear somebody else wail, which I won’t get into.
[Andrew imitates Voldemort’s scream]
Matt: [laughs] Okay.
Eric: It’s like
[imitates Voldemort’s scream] as they fall down the pit at Gringotts. But…
Andrew: At 52 and 53, we see shots of Harry and Ron. And then at 53, we see them after they already broke out from Gringotts, riding on the back of the dragon. This looks like a very great scene, doesn’t it?
Matt: Yeah. Well, Harry – I mean Hermione is still in Bellatrix’s wardrobe.
Andrew: Yeah.
Matt: And then you see the three of them plunge into the water.
Andrew: Right, at 55 seconds in. We saw a brief version of this when we just saw people going into the water. As I accurately predicted on the last episode, this is when they jump off the dragon and land in the lake.
Eric: Right, and we actually see them falling in this shot which is cool. I like that shot.
Scene-by-Scene: Voldemort’s Followers
Andrew: 56 seconds, we see “On July 15th,” and there’s a beautiful, sweeping shot of all the Death Eaters on a cliff overlooking Hogwarts. We see them paving a way in the massive group to let Voldemort through to the top of the cliff to make his little warning to Harry.
Eric: [sighs] Why don’t we ever hear from any of these extras? Like, “Hey, I was an extra in Deathly Hallows when we ran to Hogwarts.”
Andrew: They’re not allowed to talk about it.
Eric: They’re not allowed to talk to…
Matt: No.
Eric: They can’t e-mail us and be like, “Hey”? Not even afterwards?
Andrew: Probably afterwards, but who wants to hear from extras?
[Eric laughs]
Matt: The most they can really say is, “I was actually included in this movie.”
Eric: Okay.
Micah: “I was Death Eater number 47 in scene…”
[Matt laughs]
Scene-by-Scene: Hogwarts Statues
Andrew: At the one-minute mark we see the entrance to the Great Hall, the statues coming to life.
Eric: Oh man.
Andrew: And we saw a brief – we saw a different angle of this in the other trailer, but we also hear McGonagall with this line:
[Clip from trailer plays] “Man the boundaries! Protect us!”
[Andrew groans]
Matt: God. [groans]
Eric: I have to pull out my Scottish translator here. What? Man the bound – what? What is she saying?
Andrew: “Man the boundaries. Protect us.”
Eric: Man the boundaries. Okay, okay.
Matt: She’s not Scottish.
Eric: [laughs] I’m just messing.
Andrew: I’m getting to have more to say about that particular shot when we can release our set reports, but we see McGonagall and Mrs. Weasley on the steps of Hogwarts surrounded by the Hogwarts…
Andrew and
Eric: Statues.
Andrew: Yeah. They’ve come to life because of McGonagall’s spell. [laughs] A really cool scene.
Matt: God, every time I see McGonagall, I always get goosebumps for some reason.
Eric: This is something where, in the book, it was an amazing scene, and…
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: Because it was – you can just imagine it, you can picture it in your mind’s eye. And now here it is in this trailer, we’re seeing it before the film comes out. But we already did in the last trailer.
Matt: Well, the adrenaline is really going now because it’s Hogwarts’s last stand and everyone – like, everything is coming to life.
Eric: Yeah, and Remus and Tonks in the next scene are reaching for each other. It’s really cool to build suspense.
Scene-by-Scene: Harry Looking at Hogwarts Castle
Andrew: At 1:06 we see Harry looking up at Hogwarts castle burning. Now, this must be when he’s down at the boathouse. I mean, the angle makes sense, right?
Eric: I don’t remember that angle, or that shot.
Andrew: Well, it’s just that he’s…
Matt: No, it is the boathouse because it’s the same window paints.
Andrew: Panes?
Matt: Panes, sorry.
Eric: Panes.
Andrew: Yeah.
Matt: [laughs] Paints. Yeah, it’s the same window panes.
Eric: It’s okay, Andrew said [incorrectly pronounces “gauge”] “gouge” earlier.
Andrew: Gouge? Yeah, that’s – gouge, gauge, whatever. Gauge?
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: Gauge?
Matt: Because behind Ron is the lake. And – no, that is right after “Snape’s Worst Memory,” probably.
Scene-by-Scene: Lupin and Tonks
Andrew: At 1:08 we see a shot we’ve seen before. Tonks and Lupin reaching in to hold hands, but for some reason they never can quite get there.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: 1:10, we see a title card, “Where it all began.” The card just before it says, “It all ends.” So, it all ends where it all began.
Scene-by-Scene: Voldemort Shoots a Spell
Matt: And then we finally get to see the thing shatter. I mean, we never really did in the other trailers. We just saw a big piece of light coming when the castle border gets shattered.
Eric: What shatters?
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: Oh, you mean the bubble?
Matt: Yeah, the big bubble just getting…
Eric: Oh, the bubble just disappears, yeah.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: Okay.
Scene-by-Scene: Professor Flitwick
Andrew: At 1:15 we see a shot of Flitwick, and he’s surrounded by statues, so I guess he’s kind of controlling there?
Micah: He looks afraid, though. He’s backing up.
Andrew: He does look afraid. I guess something’s happening with the castle there.
Matt: Well, his charms are not [laughs] working anymore, probably.
Eric: [laughs] Yeah.
Matt: So he’s like, “My work’s done.”
Andrew: Oh right.
Matt: “I’m going to go run.”
[Eric laughs]
Scene-by-Scene: Voldemort’s Followers Attacking Hogwarts Castle
Andrew: At 1:19 we see a shot of all the Death Eaters trying to penetrate the spell protecting the castle. However, at this scene you don’t see the spell, so I guess you really only start seeing it when it starts to be penetrated.
Eric: Oh. Yeah, when it starts hitting it. Yeah.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: That effect is really cool.
Matt: Or maybe it’s their first strike. No, no, it has to be when they are penetrating it, because it’s the same color. The spells are the same color as the dome was right before Voldemort smashed it.
Andrew: At 1:23…
Eric: Well, this is – yeah.
Andrew: …we see Death Eaters running – or no, no, these are the good guys. No, bad guys.
Matt: No. Because they – no, the good guys didn’t have giants. It was just…
Andrew: Right, okay.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: Except Grawp.
Matt: Yeah, Grawp was the only – he was the half-giant.
Andrew: The giant at 1:23 looks fantastic. I mean, he really does.
Eric: Yeah, that’s cool.
Andrew: And you see him running with the Death Eaters.
Matt: Looks a lot better than the Sorcerer’s Stone one.
Eric: Troll.
Andrew: If I were Harry I’d be more scared of that giant than Voldemort, [laughs] personally. He’s got a big…
Eric: Club? [laughs]
Andrew: …mallet sort of thing he could kill anybody with.
Matt: That’s what Voldemort should have looked like.
Andrew: Yeah, really. Voldemort should have been a giant.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Scene-by-Scene: The Malfoys Escaping
Andrew: At 1:24 we see a shot that Micah loved so much, he made it the MuggleNet “Big News” image. It’s Lucius kind of running away but turning back, and you also see Draco just over his head if you look closely. Now, what scene is this? I’m forgetting. Is this…
Eric: You’re forgetting?
Andrew: This must be after Harry kills Voldemort.
Matt: Is this when they go back to meet up with Voldemort?
Andrew: No, this is after Harry kills Voldemort, right?
Eric: No.
Andrew: Because it’s like the sunrise. No?
Eric: No, Voldemort is alive. Voldemort actually thinks Harry is dead and he’s just recruited people. And the Malfoys say that they’re with him, and they walk away.
Andrew: Oh.
Eric: Because Voldemort thinks he’s got victory right now. So actually, if I remember correctly, a lot of the Death Eaters actually Disapparate at that point. I could be wrong. Some of them do. Well, either way the Malfoys walk away.
Matt: Yeah, because his mother is next to Draco.
Eric: Yeah, Narcissa has got her arm around Draco, and the Malfoys, it’s like, exit, stage right.
Scene-by-Scene: Dementors Entering Hogwarts Castle
Andrew: At 1:26, 1:27, we see Voldemort, he’s kind of got these cloth things floating around him.
Matt: Oh, you totally skipped, though, the thousands of Dementors.
Andrew: We’ve seen that before.
Micah: It looks like a dead giant, too.
Matt: Have we seen that? I have never seen that before.
Andrew: Okay, maybe we haven’t.
Eric: Dead giant on the bridge.
Andrew: At 1:25 we see the dead – right, we see a dead giant and Dementors kind of flying over all these dead people. I mean, this really gives you a good idea of the level of detail that’s going to be in this battle.
Matt: You’ve never seen this many Dementors either.
Scene-by-Scene: Voldemort’s Robes
Eric: And, actually, at 1:26 is a behind-the-scenes shot of Voldemort doing his laundry.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Eric: This is – he’s like washing – he’s actually air-drying his robes.
[Andrew laughs]
Matt: Yeah, what is that?
Andrew: Yeah, I don’t get – Eric, do you know what’s going on here? Or Micah?
Eric: He’s…
Micah: Well, Eric’s seen the movie. I mean – is Harry here at this point? Is he tying him up?
Eric: He’s laundering his robes. I mean, we don’t see Harry in the shot. He’s not in the shot.
Andrew: Yeah, he must be laundering his robes. I think Eric’s right there. [laughs]
Matt: That is so just awkward.
Scene-by-Scene: Harry’s Confrontation with Snape
Andrew: At 1:27, 28 – I’m going to play a little audio clip here.
[Clip from trailer plays] “Tell them how it happened that night! How you looked him in the eye – a man who trusted you – and killed him!”
Andrew: Great line! And so that takes place in the Great Hall. Harry is confronting Snape point-blank. The most interesting thing that stands out to me here – [laughs] and I noticed this at the test screening, too – is that Harry is wearing a cloak, and you just don’t see that anymore.
Eric: [laughs] Yeah, it’s true. Well, they handed him a cloak, I guess, on their way down to this. So Snape hears that Harry is in the castle, he calls this meeting because he’s still headmaster, and they actually hand Harry a robe on the way down. Somebody just gives him a robe so that he can blend in.
Andrew: So he blends in. But is he really blending in? [laughs] I mean…
Eric: Well, no – because he stands out because he gets irritated with Snape. But this moment – more than any other moment in any other Harry Potter film, I’m predicting here – really is going to sell, first of all, Dan Radcliffe as Harry Potter; second, is going to sell these films as being emotional and heart-wrenching. This moment is Dan Radcliffe’s and Harry’s shining moment in all of the films.
Matt: Mhm.
Eric: When he actually confronts this tyranny of Alan Rickman as Snape. And of course it’s in the trailer. Perfect!
[Andrew laughs]
Matt: Oh, it’s great.
Andrew: Well, of course, there’s more to it in the actual movie.
Matt: Well, you also see the trio, and the Order is right behind him.
Andrew: Yes.
Eric: And you see Snape disappear in response to Harry’s…
Andrew: Yeah, which…
Micah: But this was in the book, though, was it?
Matt: What?
Eric: No, probably not.
Andrew: No – yeah, I don’t think so.
Matt: No, this scene wasn’t even in the book.
Andrew: But it’s good. It’s good because it kicks off this new set of action when we see Harry rebelling within the castle, and now he has to get out. And we see, of course, Snape getting out too. And this is an alternative to, in the book, when there’s the fight in the…
Matt: Corridor.
Andrew: In the random corridor, right.
Matt: Mhm.
Andrew: And I’ll save my thoughts on this for when everybody sees the film, but I’ll just say right now I would have preferred they kept what happened in the book. But okay.
Matt: That’s usually the general consensus with all fans.
Scene-by-Scene: Voldemort Casting the Killing Curse
Andrew: [laughs] True. So after Harry makes that line, we see a flashback to Snape killing Dumbledore, which refreshes the audience on what kind of has been building up here. At 1:34 I think we see one of the greatest shots – sorry, 1:33 – of Voldemort. He’s casting the spell at Harry and he’s clearly putting in all his energy into this Avada Kedavra spell.
Matt: He’s clearly losing.
Eric: You can tell because of his scream.
Andrew: And I think he’s already down on his knees.
Eric: Yeah, maybe.
Scene-by-Scene: Molly Weasley
Andrew: So you can tell he’s losing. The only advantage here, he does have freshly-laundered clothes, so at least he’s feeling fresh, [laughs] despite losing this battle. At 1:36 we see a great shot of Molly Weasley, and I assume this is after Fred has died, because she’s very disturbed, she’s kind of – I don’t know. She’s thinking to herself.
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: Well, Madam Pomfrey is right next to her.
Eric: Is she?
Andrew: Oh yeah. You can hardly see her, but she is there. So this must’ve been after the battle.
Matt: It must’ve been after she killed “She-Who-Shall-Not-Be-Named.”
Scene-by-Scene: The Resurrection Scene
Andrew: Mhm. At 1:40, this is where I think people started saying, “Okay, we’re seeing too much!” [laughs] We see Harry in the Forbidden Forest, he’s facing his mother, got Lupin and Sirius on the right, James on the left. Let’s play a little audio from this part.
[Clip from trailer plays]
Harry: You’ll stay with me?
Lily: Always.
Sirius: Until the end.
[Clip ends]
Andrew: [laughs] So that’s when people were like, “No! Why are we seeing this?!”
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: As much as I love – I would probably say it’s my favorite scene in the seventh book, is the Resurrection Stone scene. And as excited as I was the first time I saw it, I kind of wish they didn’t show this.
Andrew: On the other hand though, it’s not a spoiler to people who haven’t read the books, because they look alive. I wouldn’t say they look dead, so…
Matt: No, I’d say if anything it’s a teaser to fans who have not read the books, because they’re like, “Wait, what?”
Andrew: Oh, that’s true, that’s true, because they know Sirius and Harry’s parents are dead and all.
Matt: Right, so they’re like, “Why are they back?”
Eric: Maybe it was…
Andrew: But it’s confusing because they don’t see Lupin – they’re like, “Wait, Lupin’s dead?”
Eric: [laughs] Well, the other thing, too – this is Harry’s most personal moment in the books. To see it on a trailer and not reserved for the film – is nothing sacred? Really? Can they not just keep that in the film and be content to…
Matt: Well, they kept I think the most sacred scene under wraps, and that’s King’s Cross.
Eric: Yeah, that’s true, but that also tonally – it doesn’t really fit the rest of the film because – and visually, because it’s bright white and these films are all about black.
Matt: Right. Well, they’ve shown basically every character [laughs] in this trailer…
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: …except Dumbledore.
Eric: [sighs] It’s ridiculous. You know what they should do is – you know how they released all those promo posters with Bella and McGonagall and all them? They need to do – for the Resurrection Stone scene, they need a Lupin poster, they need a dead Sirius poster, a dead Lily and James poster, for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2.
Matt: [laughs] And what does it say? “We’re back”?
Eric: [laughs] Yeah! Yeah, that’s what it’s going to say. Because why not? Because they’ve already shown them in a trailer, they might as well go all out because – you know what? I want to buy a Lily and James poster, and Warner Bros. should…
Matt: It is really great, though, that they inserted that little clip from Sirius saying, “‘Til the end,” because basically, you see in this entire trailer everything going to pot. Like everything is going to complete crap. And then all you see – and then you finally get to have Lily and Sirius, kind of the reassuring faces, say something that’s a little uplifting.
Eric: You’re very right.
Scene-by-Scene: Fiendfyre
Micah: And we also – the one thing we skipped over before this is, it looks like Goyle is falling into the Fiendfyre.
Eric: Yeah, sucks to be him.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: What’s he doing as he’s falling? He’s wailing.
Matt: “NYAAAAAH!” It’s the same Voldemort scream.
[Andrew and Micah laugh]
Scene-by-Scene: Ginny in the Courtyard
Andrew: At 1:44 we see – this must be the realization shot when they see Hagrid holding Harry’s dead body, because Ginny is running forward, obviously very shocked at what she’s seeing. And Mr. Weasley is kind of, I guess, trying to – yeah, he’s trying to grab her and hold her back because, you know, don’t want to get too close to Voldemort yet.
[Andrew and Eric laugh]
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah.
Scene-by-Scene: Acromantula
Andrew: At 1:44 we see a pretty cool shot of the trio running away from some giant spiders.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: And I don’t think we get any line like, “Ahhh! I still hate spiders!” from Ron because that would have been…
Eric: I was going to say, do you think Ron would overcome…
Matt: [laughs] No, Ron will be like, “Let’s get the hell out of here!”
Eric: [laughs] Do you think Ron would overcome his fear of spiders?
Matt: I think he’s seen enough…
Andrew: Well, he’s running away from them, so…
Matt: Well, we do see…
Eric: Yeah, you’re not going to face down something that’s fifteen times your size.
Matt: Well, during the locket we did see spiders, so his fear of spiders is still intact.
Eric: Oh right. Good point. Good solid point.
MuggleCast 231 Transcript (continued)
Scene-by-Scene: Destruction of the Diadem Horcrux
Andrew: 1:46, we see the giant Voldemort fire head in the Room of Requirement as the doors are shutting. It’s kind of a cool transition for the trailer because this is sort of another break in the trailer where another set of action starts off.
Matt: It’s a three-headed Voldemort.
Andrew: Is it?
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: Yeah. Well – yeah. The Fiendfyre in the film takes different forms but – without spoiling and saying what they are – this I believe is after the Horcrux has been thrown into the Fiendfyre that Voldemort’s face comes out of it. So it’s not like if you were to go into the middle of a field and cast Fiendfyre, you’d get fire that comes out with Voldemort’s face on it.
Matt: Oh, that’s a good point.
Eric: It’s not like that.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: So this…
Matt: Because – didn’t we see a lion or something in a previous trailer?
Eric: The previous trailer showed a lion and a badger, so [laughs] you kind of – or a snake, so you know that – well, the Fiendfyre does take the form of…
Matt: Well yeah, it’s magical fire so it’s probably taken all forms.
Eric: Yeah, like raging bull of fire. It’s really cool. But this – yeah, Voldemort is not one of the natural animals of the Earth. This is after the Horcrux has been destroyed. I don’t know who’s closing the door. There’s two very [laughs] Kamikaze style house-elves who are behind the doors closing them.
Matt: I hope not.
Eric: Just to protect Harry.
Matt: Well I mean, it’s the Room of Requirement. When no one’s in the Room of Requirement, it closes.
Eric: Does that mean that the fire – oh right, okay.
Scene-by-Scene: Harry and Voldemort’s Duel
Andrew: 1:47, we get this line from Harry to Voldemort:
[Clip from trailer plays] “Come on, Tom. Let’s finish this the way we started: Together!”
Andrew: And it kicks off another set of action. I am still not a fan, for the record, of this “Let’s clutch him by the neck and pull him overboard.”
Matt: I don’t think any fans are really – I mean, I feel like this is going to be that one scene that everyone just cringes when they see it.
Eric: The reason though – the reason that – I agree with you, Matt, but the reason is that they’ve shown it in every single one of these trailers. So not only in the first trailer where people were like, “Oh my God, Harry – what’s happening? He’s pulling him off a ledge? That wasn’t in the book!” Now…
Matt: Well, the whole thing about – oh sorry, go ahead.
Eric: Oh no, go ahead.
Matt: I think also one of the reasons why fans are just not happy with that is because Harry’s not supposed to touch Voldemort.
Eric: But – I mean, I made my case for it in previous shows where I said that the idea that on film everything has to be slightly more realistic where these archenemies – the fact that they’re in close proximity to each other makes it more exciting. But the fact that Warner Bros. has shown this in every trailer where Harry’s pulling him off just draws more attention…
Matt: Mhm.
Eric: …to the fact that it wasn’t in the book.
Matt: Well…
Eric: And what’s getting lost is this line that Harry says, which is in this trailer, but by this point people who have seen him are just not paying any attention. It’s actually a really good line, to “finish this where we started it: together.” And I feel like that’s a fitting line for when you’re going to wrap your arms around somebody’s neck and throw them off a cliff.
Matt: Now, is this scene with them jumping off the cliff – is this the same time when Voldemort grabs Harry’s face and says, “Why do you live?” Because I’m afraid they’re going to overexpose the whole close proximity of Harry and Voldemort, because that’s what – in the books at least, that’s what everyone was waiting for, is when they finally meet. And I’m just worried in the movie they’re just going to have way too much of it, and then people will get desensitized by how close Harry and Voldemort have interaction with each other.
Eric: That’s a good point. I mean, wasn’t one of the…
Matt: Because it’s a pivotal part in the books when Harry approaches Voldemort and they duel. It doesn’t happen that often.
Eric: Well, I would argue that the distance – when Harry goes to Voldemort – are you talking about in the end at the forest?
Matt: Well, the forest, too, but also in the castle.
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: Because Harry has his grand resurrection scene in – well, in the book it was the Great Hall, now it’s the courtyard. But those are really the only two parts where Harry and Voldemort ever were face-to-face in at least that half of Book 7.
Eric: Well, wasn’t – in both those scenes, wasn’t it really about, though, that Harry and Voldemort were quite a ways away from each other, but that they were talking to each other anyway? Like when Harry approaches Voldemort in the forest, he’s coming from the clearing – or he’s coming into the clearing and Voldemort’s at the other end of it, and all the Death Eaters are in between them. And there’s this pregnant air, where it’s like thin air. There’s no space between them, but there is, so it’s like all the Death Eaters are waiting to see what Voldemort does because Harry has come. And in the Great Hall, everybody is watching Harry and Voldemort talk to each other. They’re on a first-name basis, but they’re still – in order to duel, they’re standing quite a way away from each other, aren’t they?
Matt: Well, yeah – no, no, it’s…
Andrew: Let’s continue this discussion when we actually see it, because we’re going to be talking about this like crazy when the movie actually comes out. So…
Matt: Okay.
Andrew: And we can give it more context when we see the actual scene. You guys are doing good. I’m just saying we’re going to be talking about this a million times, so let’s save it for when we actually see the movie.
Eric: But Matt’s right. Yeah, wasn’t one of the first promo posters – or promo pictures of Voldemort grabbing Harry’s face?
Matt: Yeah.
Andrew: Yeah, it was. Yup.
Micah: Well – yeah and I mean, I think it goes back – like Eric was saying, we talked about it in past shows – is it being sort of the Hollywood element to it where you constantly need to have that big epic battle…
Andrew: Right.
Micah: …where you’re talking about having the fight taking place all over Hogwarts.
Andrew: I agree. I agree it adds some tension when you see them touching, but just book-wise it doesn’t…
Matt: Right. Well, I have nothing against him grabbing his face or anything, I just want it to be in the right place. I don’t want it to be prolonged throughout the film.
Eric: Yeah. Yeah, that’s fair.
Andrew: At 1:55, speaking of Harry and Voldemort, we see them dueling within Hogwarts. Voldemort is high up on some steps, whereas Harry is lower down the steps. And…
Eric: Oh wow.
Andrew: At 1:56 there’s a cool close-up shot of Voldemort really trying to put his energy into his spell.
Matt: Mhm.
Eric: Yeah, he crinkles his non-nose.
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah, I know!
Eric: [laughs] Look at that concentration! That’s awesome.
Scene-by-Scene: Professor Slughorn
Andrew: At 1:59 we see a new shot of Horace Slughorn putting up his protective charm on the castle. And in the film it’s cool because you see all the teachers together putting up the spells so it goes from McGonagall to Slughorn to Flitwick to – Pomfrey?
Matt: So it is a protective charm?
Andrew: Yeah.
Matt: Okay, because I thought it was like a Patronus.
Scene-by-Scene: Bellatrix Lestrange
Andrew: No, he’s putting up the charm. At two minutes there is a shot – and this is another one where I think people were like, “Ahhh, too much.” Bellatrix sending the spell at Molly. And at two oh – oh, it’s actually – they’re actually pretty separated.
Matt: Yeah.
Scene-by-Scene: Chamber of Secrets
Andrew: So we’ll get to it in a second. We’ll see Bellatrix’s response to that spell in a second. At 2:03 we see in the Chamber of Secrets when Ron and Hermione are being chased by the giant water Voldemort figure.
Eric: Whoa! Totally missed that. Yeah, these scenes – barely any…
Andrew: Anything left? [laughs]
Eric: Yeah, I missed that. Watching it. I didn’t – well no, I mean, I didn’t really – and I don’t think even in the trailer you can tell that that’s what’s happening.
Matt: Right.
Eric: It’s just chaos.
Matt: Well, I think that has to do with a lot of – I mean, of the trailer entirety because – I mean, only hardcore fans are going to go shot-by-shot of all these trailers and then realize, “Oh my God, they showed way too much!” But if you just saw the trailer in a film, like in a movie trailer in the theater, you wouldn’t have caught a lot of this stuff.
Eric: Well, I think the exception is, though, the dialogue, what they – because a lot of these shots don’t have any dialogue, so when there is dialogue – and a lot of it is title cards. So when there is dialogue, it’s important. The fact that they chose to make the dialogue in this movie be the most pivotal moments, like the Resurrection Stone scene and Harry confronting Snape, is what I’m disappointed about.
Matt: Mhm.
Scene-by-Scene: Patronus Charm
Andrew: 2:05, there’s a shot many people are actually wondering about, it’s: who is casting the Patronus?
Eric: What is it?
Andrew: We see…
Eric: Like, that’s a Patronus?
Andrew: Well…
Matt: No, I think it kind of connects to Movie 3…
Micah: Or it looks like a Patronus. I don’t know.
Matt: …with the Patronus being the ultimate shield.
Andrew: Because we do see it push away all the Dementors.
Eric: Hmm. Well, it doesn’t help that in the split second before that happens, Voldemort is like conjuring something. His arms are like in…
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: …and he spreads his arms out like, “RAAAH!” And…
Micah: I think we get a better shot of it towards the end of the trailer, but it looks like Lucius.
Eric: Really?
Andrew: Yes. Or my guess could be Aberforth. But why would it be Lucius? That doesn’t make sense to me.
Matt: Yeah, I think you might be right, Andrew.
Eric: Oh, it’s Aberforth.
Matt: It must be Aberforth because the hair looks just like…
Eric: Dumbledore.
Andrew: It does look long but it almost looks Lucius-long. And the cloak he’s wearing looks like a Lucius cloak. But…
Matt: Could it be Xenophilius?
Eric: Does Apple have the high-def trailer available?
Andrew: Yeah, I’m looking at the 1080 but it doesn’t help.
Eric: [laughs] We need a 2160p.
Matt: I mean, it’s…
Micah: I think it is at the end of the trailer, though, once we get there.
Andrew: Okay.
Matt: It’s definitely an Order member.
Micah: You see the spell itself.
Eric: Why do you…
Scene-by-Scene: Molly and Bellatrix’s Duel
Andrew: Okay, so at 2:07 is when we got a badass shot of Molly Weasley. Give it up for Molly Weasley! We see her sending a spell, I guess, at Bellatrix.
Eric: [imitating Molly Weasley] “Not my daughter, you bitch!”
Andrew: Yeah.
Matt: Yeah, no. It’s definitely the Killing Curse.
Eric: Yeah, it’s green.
Andrew: Yeah, because there’s that green flame. And it cuts to a shot of Voldemort, kind of to make you think Molly is shooting it at Voldemort, but we all know that’s not the case.
Eric: [laughs] He deflects it with his mind.
Scene-by-Scene: More from the Battle of Hogwarts
Andrew: 2:08, there is a shot of – it looks like Mr. Weasley with Kingsley behind him shooting a spell, probably at a Dementor or Voldemort, but – and then, cool shot at 2:10. The camera is slowly creeping in as Voldemort is crawling to the Elder Wand. And then it cuts to Harry at 2:12 and we see that he, too, is crawling to it to get the wand.
Eric: That’s cool.
Andrew: And a couple of more dueling shots between Harry and Voldemort, dragon, Harry shooting a spell around the corner.
Eric: Tonks getting killed.
Andrew: There’s a lot of action, folks.
Matt: Voldemort Apparating.
Andrew: Voldemort Apparating. Now, Micah, where did you say – what were you talking about – the person – we see Nagini, too, at 2:15 with Voldemort. Nagini kind of wraps up with Voldemort for an escape.
Matt: Well, he’s waiting for Nagini to come to him so they can both Apparate together.
Andrew: Yeah, yeah.
Matt: Because at this point she hasn’t been – I mean, of course, she hasn’t been killed, so Harry hasn’t been dead yet.
Andrew: And Harry has to keep…
Matt: So this is very early on to the battle.
Andrew: Micah, what were you talking about with the…
Micah: Oh. You know what I was talking about, actually, is when he actually casts the spell, you see it go out and hit all the Dementors.
Andrew: Oh okay.
Micah: That’s what I was talking about. So it is a Patronus of some sort…
Andrew: Okay.
Micah: …like Matt was saying.
Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Trailer – Closing Thoughts
Andrew: And we get the title and that’s it! That’s the final trailer for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2. It was kind of a surprise, we weren’t really expecting the second trailer, but we did get it.
Matt: [laughs] Yeah, we really did get it.
Andrew: And everybody loved it. I mean, it really got people excited. And I thought, again, it told a great story. We understood why it all ends here, we understand Voldemort’s anger, what Harry is fighting for. Harry says somewhere in the trailer, “I don’t want anyone to die for me.” It’s just very emotional. So, let’s continue on now with other news. [laughs] There were some other news stories.
Matt: [laughs] There’s more?
Andrew: Not as big as the trailer and Pottermore, but there were other things, Micah.
News: Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Rated PG-13
Micah: Yeah, a lot of stuff related to the trailer, though – or sorry, to the movie. Actually, today we learned that Deathly Hallows – Part 2 has been rated PG-13 and we kind of found that out in a roundabout way. There was a TV spot that aired last night and in that TV spot at the end, you hear that voice say, “This film is rated PG-13.”
Matt: [in a comical voice] Rated PG-13!
Micah: And so I guess that’s a giveaway, even though the MPAA has not officially posted it yet on their site. I don’t see it…
Andrew: No surprise there.
Micah: Yeah. I mean, that’s the rating that it’s going to ultimately get. And the BBFC, though, has posted on their site that the film will be rated 12A, which is the PG-13 equivalent in the UK.
Andrew: All right, what else is going on in the news?
News: Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Runtime Released
Micah: The other big piece of news concerning Deathly Hallows – Part 2 is that it’s going to be the shortest of the entire series in terms of…
Andrew: Length.
Micah: …the length of the film: a 125 minutes.
Andrew: Mhm.
Micah: But when you think about it, though – and I’m usually one who is really critical of the films. [laughs] But when you think about it, I mean, two hours and change kind of makes sense. I mean, it is another half of a movie.
Matt: So in all honesty, it’s a five-hour film.
Micah: Exactly.
Andrew: Four and a half. I mean, if you want to get exact about it. But…
Micah: Why do you think people get upset about this?
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: Well, mainly, Micah, if you look…
Andrew: Because I wrote in the headline, “Film is shortest of the eight.”
Eric: “Shortest of the series.”
[Everyone laughs]
Eric: Like as if that was…
Andrew: But again – I brought this up, I think, during the test-screening episode – two hours does feel good. It does not feel rushed. It doesn’t feel too short. It doesn’t feel too long. It’s just right. It’s like porridge.
[Eric and Micah laugh]
Andrew: It’s at the right temperature. It’s just right.
Eric: You mean Baby Bear’s porridge?
Andrew: Baby Bear’s porridge. It’s just right.
Micah: But…
Andrew: And two-and-a-half hours would have dragged it out. Honestly, I was watching this test screening and being like, “All right, let’s go! Come on!” [laughs]
Eric: Well, maybe the music will help speed things up.
Andrew: Yeah.
Eric: Pace-wise.
Andrew: Yeah. It’s fine.
Eric: We’re not saying it was slow, but it is two hours dedicated to strictly the Battle of Hogwarts.
Andrew: Exactly. And that’s why it feels like porridge.
Micah: What more could you want, though? I mean, there’s only so much that’s left of the book.
Matt: Yeah.
Andrew: Yeah. I mean, I guess…
Micah: At this point.
Andrew: …if I would have asked for anything else to be longer I would have said the epilogue.
Eric: Yeah.
Andrew: Maybe.
Micah: Which, also, we haven’t seen anything from.
Matt: Oh, yeah, yeah, you guys.
Eric: Because they look creepy.
Matt: So put that in your pipe and smoke it.
Eric: They look creepy. They don’t look right.
[Micah laughs]
Andrew: What else is going on in the news?
News: Exclusive Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Scene at MTV Movie Awards
Micah: Well, we mentioned the TV clip, but there was also another clip that aired at the MTV Movie Awards. Andrew, Matt, you guys were both there. It’s a pretty – now this – you want to talk about putting stuff out there that people probably don’t want to see. This was a shot of – a full shot of Harry entering the forest to confront Voldemort and him actually getting hit with the spell. You see Hagrid tied up by the Death Eaters. And again, a little surprising to reveal that much.
Andrew: But we’ve seen this clip before. The only thing that was really new was the shot of Hagrid saying, “Harry! No!” which was great, but a lot of that – the walk up – we’ve seen that before.
Micah: Well, he does get hit with the spell in this, too.
Matt: Right.
Andrew: Oh okay.
Micah: You didn’t see that before.
Matt: But…
Micah: Harry dead.
Andrew: [in a deep voice] Harry dead.
[Micah laughs]
Andrew: Yeah, it was good. I’m glad there was some presence for Harry Potter at the MTV Movie Awards. And by the way it won – the only thing that it did win was Best Villain and that went to Tom Felton who was there.
Eric: To Tom Felton?
Matt: [laughs] For a character who was in all of five minutes of the movie.
[Micah laughs]
Eric: What were the contenders? Because there’s…
Andrew: Well, it was the – it was Twilight.
Micah: Twilight, Twilight…
Andrew: And listen…
Micah: …Twilight, Twilight…
Matt: Actually, no.
Andrew: Here’s the thing.
Micah: Oh, for Villain?
Andrew: Twilight won because the fans went out and voted. The official…
Matt: More than once.
Andrew: Summit really went onto their Twitter and Facebook, and said, “Hey, everybody vote. Everybody vote.” Warner Bros. didn’t really do that. Maybe they don’t care and that’s fine. But people are wondering why Twilight wins. It’s just because more people are voting.
Matt: All right. Well, I think it’s also…
Micah: Well, I think…
Matt: …a hopeless cause really at this point with the MTV Movie Awards because…
Micah: They’re a joke?
Matt: I mean, Warner Bros. doesn’t want to say “Vote for us, vote for us,” because they know they’re not going to win.
Andrew: That’s not true!
Matt: I don’t think…
Andrew: They can win if they get more votes.
Matt: No, no, but – yeah, they win if they get more votes, obviously. But I think…
Andrew: But they don’t care because it’s the MTV Movie Awards.
Matt: Right. It’s honestly just to promote other things that MTV is affiliated with.
Andrew: What else is going on?
Micah: Well, I think it’s the audience, too. I mean, you look at MTV’s audience and what – it’s pretty similar I would think to the audience that reads Twilight. Wouldn’t you agree?
Andrew: Yeah. But people look at the MTV Movie Awards and they say, “Oh, Best Movie. How could Twilight win that?” Well, because people are voting. The MTV Movie Awards aren’t like the Oscars where it’s like this group of people…
Matt: Mhm.
Andrew: Group of fifty people who get to decide. It’s the actual people – fans who are voting. And there were more Twilight fans who voted because Summit pushed it more.
Matt: Well, also because a lot of the fans vote for who they want to see come up to accept the award. And they want to see Robert Pattinson and Taylor Lautner come up, and…
Andrew: Right, the Twilight fans want to see Robert Pattinson come up more, and they’re…
Matt: No, they’re heartthrobs. That’s why teenage fangirls want to see – that’s what they want to see.
Andrew: Twilight fans want to see Robert Pattinson! Harry Potter fans want to see Dan Radcliffe!
Matt: Oh okay. Fine. You’re – I can’t talk to you about this.
[Andrew laughs]
Micah: Okay.
Andrew: What else is going on in the news?
News: Deathly Hallows – Part 2 NYC Premiere Date Announced
Micah: Other bit of news, during a contest announcement we found out when the US premiere of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2 will be taking place: on Monday, July 11th.
Andrew: Party!
Micah: And it’s in New York City. We already knew that. But I’m assuming – Andrew, what’s the name of the theater that they always go to?
Andrew: The Ziegfeld?
Micah: Yeah.
Andrew: But that wasn’t – for Part 1 it was not at the Ziegfeld, it was somewhere else.
Micah: It was in Lincoln Center.
Andrew: Yeah. So we don’t know where this one is going to be. But hopefully somewhere where they can actually shut off the streets so the stars can go and meet the fans along the red carpet. That would be nice.
Eric: The only time they had a problem was when they did it at Lincoln Center, right? I mean, at the Ziegfeld they closed it off – the street?
Andrew: Yes.
Eric: Or it was arranged so that there was room for fans to meet actors.
Andrew: Yeah, they need to figure it out so the street can actually be shut down.
Micah: It’ll probably be back there I would think. I mean, probably they just couldn’t get the theater for the time of the year that Deathly Hallows – Part 1 was released.
Andrew: That’s true. That’s true.
Eric: Because of all those Christmas concerts.
News: Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Soundtrack List Released
Micah: And speaking of Deathly Hallows – Part 2 – even more news – [laughs] the soundtrack list was released earlier this week. Has anybody taken a listen?
Andrew: It’s not out yet.
Micah: Are there actually any – oh, it’s just…
Andrew: Yeah.
Micah: …the names of the songs, not the little previews.
Andrew: But it gives you an idea of the layout of the film. It starts with “Lily’s Theme” so you know that it’s going to start with Lily, [laughs] with that shot, just like the trailer did. Or no. Does that make sense, Eric?
Eric: No, we didn’t even see her talking to Harry in the preview, that I remember. We saw some…
Andrew: No, we did during Snape’s – or no.
Eric: No, we didn’t. This is when Voldemort is downstairs, she’s trying to prepare Harry, but I guess it’s new to me. The fact that it opens with “Lily’s Theme,” it could be direct because Lily is actually appearing on the screen or it could just be Mr. Desplat misleading us. Or the idea that he is trying to tell a love story and it is a love story between Lily and Snape.
Andrew: Hmm.
Eric: That “Lily’s Theme” would just be the name of the generic, overall theme that they’re going to play iterations of…
Matt: Yeah. No, you’re right, Eric.
Eric: …during “Snape’s Worst Memory.”
Matt: I think that’s exactly what it is. It’s just an encompassing theme that they will show throughout the film, especially with “Snape’s Worst Memory,” but we will get probably a taste of it in the opening scene with Lily protecting Harry.
Andrew: The soundtrack, by the way, will be released July 12th.
Eric: Sweet!
Matt: No, I want it before that.
Eric: [laughs] Although – actually, I did want to mention these other track listings, some of them. First of all, “The Grey Lady.” So she’s got her own track, which shows that that’s going to be at least a big enough scene to have one of those.
Micah: With Cee-Lo?
Eric: [laughs] “In the Chamber of Secrets.” [laughs] In the Chamber of Secrets has its own soundtrack.
Micah: Is that a rap? “In The Chamber of Secrets”?
Eric: I’m sure it is.
Matt: Well, because there’s already a track called “The Chamber of Secrets” from the second book – or from the second film, so that’s probably why they had to kind of tweak it a bit.
Eric: Also, the – yeah.
Micah: That’s a pretty suggestive title.
Eric: “Broomsticks and Fire,” and also “Courtyard Apocalypse.” So that’s probably my favorite title.
Andrew: That is cool.
Eric: Other than “Showdown.” [laughs] Twenty-three is just called “Showdown.”
Andrew: “Showdown.”
Matt: I think the last title is kind of cheesy, though.
Eric: “A New Beginning”?
Matt: “A New Beginning.” How about “The Epilogue” or “Scar”?
Eric: [laughs] How about “Nineteen Years Later”?
Andrew: How about “All Was Well”? That would’ve been good.
Eric: Yeah. Yeah, really.
Matt: I like “Scar.”
Micah: How about “Pottermore”?
Andrew: All right, Micah.
[Matt laughs]
Andrew: [laughs] Pottermore.
Matt: It’s the last thing Harry says.
[Eric laughs]
Matt: “Pottermore.”
News: LEGO Harry Potter: Years 5-7 Gets Positive Review at E3
Micah: All right, switching gears here to video games. LEGO Harry Potter: Years 5-7 was previewed at E3, the big video game and electronics convention last week, actually, or maybe even two weeks ago at this point. And it got an overwhelmingly positive review just from some different features that it has as compared to Years 1-4. So – I mean, no real surprise there, but good to hear that in the early stages it’s getting positive reviews.
Andrew: I’ll believe it when I see it!
Eric: Yup.
Micah: Okay.
Matt: I don’t know, Books 1-4 were really good.
Andrew: And Micah, the last news story of this gigantic news episode.
News: Order of the Phoenix & Half-Blood Prince Ultimate Editions Released
Micah: Yes. The Ultimate Editions for Order of the Phoenix and Half-Blood Prince were released on June 15th, I think. Or – is that right?
Andrew: June 14th, Tuesday.
Micah: June 14th, close enough. You did a…
Andrew: Little review.
Micah: …little bit of a review. You saw them? You liked them? They’re good?
Andrew: Yeah. I mainly just watched the documentaries because, again, we’ve talked about this a lot. There’s a new part of this eight-part documentary with each Ultimate Edition. The most interesting thing was in the “Evolution” documentary, that was probably one of the best ones to date, lots of great archival footage. But Chris Columbus says that he wanted to split Book 1 into two films!
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: And he said the first film would end after Harry’s first Quidditch match. I cannot believe they were actually considering splitting the books that early on.
Eric: It’s shocking.
Andrew: Because if they started with Sorcerer’s Stone, they would have had to split them all!
Matt: Mhm.
Eric: Well – yeah, it’s true. Well, I think though that you have to consider what kind of a technical achievement it is to actually – you have to create Hogwarts. I think in thinking that, he was just thinking about how much work had to be done to actually produce a film version of these books, because they’re so wonderful, they’re so monstrous. And also, by that point maybe he didn’t know what would – how he would begin to cut stuff and actually mold it into a film, and not just follow the whole book page by page.
Andrew: Thank God they didn’t split it though.
Matt: Yeah.
[Eric laughs]
Andrew: The timing would have been so bad.
Eric: Yeah.
Matt: That would have also hurt the franchise for putting more of the books into films.
Eric: Yeah, I agree.
Matt: Because I don’t think the public [laughs] would have let it go as long as it did if each movie was in two parts.
Eric: Well, the – plus the actors would be so old.
Listener Tweets: Pottermore and Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Trailer
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah. Well – yeah, I guess it would have taken longer to film all that, so they would have aged more. That’s true. Okay. Well, that is all the news we have. To wrap up the show, we have some tweets from those of you who follow us on the MuggleCast Twitter which is Twitter.com/MuggleCast. We recently passed 20,000 followers, by the way. So thank you to everybody who follows us there on Twitter.com/MuggleCast. Of course to everybody, like I was saying earlier – was lighting up Twitter with their thoughts on the trailer and Pottermore. We’ll start with some tweets about Pottermore. Reading Bridget said:
“My main question about Pottermore is, why is the teaser website logo all futuristic and metallic looking? How does that fit ‘HP’?”
So Bridget is really digging deep, looking for any clues possible.
Matt: I don’t think it’s very futuristic, unless she means that it being metallic means it’s futuristic. But the font is pretty magical.
Eric: Well, the font is whimsical. The font is distinctly not the Harry Potter font though. Why would you name a website “Pottermore” and not use the Potter – the font that is established, that is so cool.
Andrew: But I think it is kind of whimsical.
Matt: I mean, it’s very wizarding world. It’s just not Harry Potter strictly font from the books but I think that’s mainly because they’re trying to show that there is kind of something besides Harry Potter that’s going to be encompassed in this. It’s going to be like something more of the wizarding world rather than just Harry Potter itself.
Eric: So you’re talking about the “more” as opposed to the “Potter” part of “Pottermore”? [laughs]
Matt: Yeah, it’s encompassing more than Potter.
Eric: Cool.
Andrew: AJRoller says:
“I’m thinking Pottermore is most likely going to be an online ‘HP’ encyclopedia, but I’m hoping for some kind of MMORPG in Hogwarts.”
An MMORPG is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game.
Matt: Oh.
Andrew: I used to play one of those, it was called The Sims Online.
Eric: [laughs] You played The Sims?
Andrew: Yeah. Oh yeah.
Eric: What was your family’s name? [laughs]
Andrew: Oh, it was pathetic. Well, in The Sims Online you can only play as one person. I was Cledispoodum. I made up that name.
Micah: [laughs] What?
Andrew: For some reason, I liked the name Cledispoodum.
Matt: And poo?
Andrew: Don’t ask.
[Matt laughs]
Andrew: An MMORPG is an interesting idea because you play with other people in an online world, so it would almost be like you lived within Hogwarts in an online world. And there had been rumors about an MMORPG for a long time with Harry Potter.
Matt: Yeah.
Eric: We’ve even said they should do that, right? Grand Theft Dragon, was it? Or Grand Theft Hogwarts?
Andrew: [laughs] Yeah, I mean, it would be interesting. World of Warcraft is so popular and it’s based on fantasy and magic, so a Harry Potter one is an interesting idea.
Matt: Yeah. Pottercraft.
Andrew: Nataliexelaine1 says:
“There are so many possibilities for Pottermore, the whole situation seems unreal. I love the way Jo announced it, I’m excited!”
Matt: Was there a question or anything?
Andrew: No. It’s a comment.
Matt: Oh, it’s just a comment. Okay.
Andrew: And I agree, it’s so exciting to get a new announcement from Jo. I mean, when’s the last time we got an announcement from Jo? It was like the Deathly Hallows title, right? So it’s been like four years.
Matt: Well no, she announced her Twitter.
Andrew: [laughs] That’s not…
Matt: But she didn’t tweet anything.
Andrew: AngeMar has actually a negative comment about Pottermore. She says:
“Pottermore: :/ (slant face) I’m not excited until I know what it is! Trailer: amazing!”
Eric: Awww. Well, do you think that this is the pen and paper that Jo talked about on her Twitter, that she kept referencing, that it’s this project, Pottermore?
Matt: [sighs] I don’t know. I mean, I would really hope so.
Eric: Because she said “pen and paper.”
Matt: Right.
Eric: And if it’s online…
Matt: So that would give further proof that it’s going to be…
Eric: …it distinctly does not involve pen or paper.
[Andrew laughs]
Matt: Well, just because it’s online – I mean, everything is online. It doesn’t necessarily mean it’s going to be strictly an online entity.
Eric: Okay, okay. But that means it’s digital though. If it’s online, it’s digital.
Matt: No. Well, if it’s online – yeah, the website is online but there’s also YouTube, so…
Eric: Okay, you…
Matt: I mean, what other way could she promote this besides it being on the Internet?
Eric: Yeah, that’s a good point. Well then my final question about Pottermore is: If it’s going to be part YouTube, part content-on-site, if it’s going to be fan-interactive, is it really – is it healthy to have all these fans living on this new Pottermore website? I mean, to be honest, I was thinking of starting to eat healthier…
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: …get more exercise once Harry Potter ends, and instead I’m going to set this as my home page and really start delving into the forums because I’m obsessed. That’s what I do.
Matt: Well, for all we know she could probably just abandon the website and the YouTube thing once it’s announced.
Eric: Just for fun?
Matt: If it has nothing to do with really an online community. Yeah, which is…
Andrew: Matt is saying Pottermore.com and the YouTube are only to promote, announce…
Eric: So it could be something…
Matt: I’m not saying that’s what it is, I’m just saying that could be a possibility.
Eric: Pottermore. Yeah, okay.
Andrew: BriannaMak says:
“The trailer was pure genius. It was pretty sad though. I felt like my childhood is actually coming to an end.”
JuliaIsMagic says:
“The trailer had me hyperventilating and crying. It’s really getting everyone excited for the final film.”
Eric: [laughs] A trailer has never had that effect on me.
[Andrew laughs]
Eric: [laughs] Hyperventilating?
Andrew: QRAlex said:
“The new trailer was epic and awesome, hands-down best one yet, except for that terribly annoying Voldemort scream.”
Eric: [whispers] Yes! [laughs]
Andrew: LiaCataLopez says:
“That trailer was designed to make you cry. The part in the forest with Lily and the others was heartbreaking.”
I agree, Lia.
Matt: It was heartbreaking. It was only two seconds long so…
Andrew: TomWilshaw says:
“Harry says, ‘I have to go back, don’t I?’ then someone else says, ‘It’s a suicide mission.’ That kind of reveals what happens.”
[Matt laughs]
Eric: Does Harry say that?
Andrew: I do hear somebody…
Micah: Yeah.
Andrew: …say it’s a suicide mission.
Matt: Yeah, it’s Aberforth saying it to Harry.
Andrew: Oh.
Matt: When he’s saying he has to go back to Hogwarts.
Andrew: AlexD336 writes:
“The new trailer showed way too many new scenes. Wished I didn’t see it.”
[laughs] And finally, KyleJames182 says:
“The trailer was not what I was expecting. When they show Lily, I cried. The part I don’t get is the big blue dome blast. Thoughts?”
Eric: The big blue dome blast.
Matt: The protective charm around Hogwarts? Is that what she’s talking about?
Eric: Hmm. You’re talking about the Patronus.
Micah: I think she…
Andrew: He…
Micah: Yeah, Aberforth. I think that’s what…
Andrew: Yeah.
Micah: …we were talking about.
Matt: Okay, the big Patronus. I’m actually really happy about that though, because it really connects all the films together strictly because…
Micah: You know what that means?
Andrew: What?
Matt: What does it mean?
Micah: It means that there’s a goat in the movie.
[Matt gasps]
Andrew: Woo-hoo!
Matt: No, no, no, no, no, there might not be.
Andrew: Everybody say baa!
Eric: Baa!
[Micah laughs]
Matt: Oh no, there is a goat in the movie, that’s right, at Hogsmeade.
Micah: No, I’m saying his Patronus is a goat.
[Andrew laughs]
Matt: His Patronus is a goat, but he does produce a Patronus goat in Hogsmeade to get the trio into the Hog’s Head.
Micah: That’s true.
Announcement: LeakyCon 2011, Deathly Hallows – Part 2 Tickets
Andrew: Cool. Okay, to wrap up the show today we have a couple of reminders. We have some updates about LeakyCon 2011. It’s the conference being held in Orlando, Florida over the release of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows – Part 2. The Leaky Mug is going to be taking place the Thursday of the conference at 3:00 PM. The MuggleCast will be on Friday at 4:00 PM. That MuggleCast will of course be our big movie review show. We will have it online after we record it. We know people are going to be itching to hear our thoughts! And we’re of course going to be including the thoughts of everybody who was there at the MuggleCast, because we’re going to have a microphone. People can come up and rebut different things, cry along with everybody else, all that good stuff. You can also buy your tickets now for Deathly Hallows – Part 2. This is kind of a news item, but if you would like to buy your tickets we couldn’t make it easier on MuggleNet.com. There’s a banner literally right at the top of the website [laughs], and you just click it and you can purchase your tickets through Fandango for midnight showings as well as screenings taking place July 15th onward.
Eric: Cool.
Announcement: Dear Mr. Potter
Andrew: And finally, a Dear Mr. Potter update. Micah, could you give us that one, please?
Micah: Yeah, sure. Dear Mr. Potter has opened their pre-orders. They’ve been open for a while now but for people who don’t know what the book is – Andrew and Eric, you guys both contributed letters to this.
Andrew: Yes.
Micah: As has Melissa over at Leaky. And it’s really stories about how the Potter series has impacted your life, right? And what it’s meant to you over the course of the last several years. And…
Andrew: Yeah, it’s…
Micah: Go ahead.
Andrew: Well, I got a PDF version of it to review. It’s really well done. I mean, just visually they did a great job with designing it. Also, Evanna Lynch wrote a letter too, and she actually doesn’t address Mr. Potter, she addresses Luna. So she writes to Luna which is actually really funny because of course, she’s the actress who plays Luna in the films. So it’s really well written. Definitely check it out. What’s the website?
Micah: That’s a good question. I will look that up.
Andrew: I think it’s…
[Micah laughs]
Eric: It’s DearMrPotter.org, isn’t it?
Andrew: Yes. And what’s good about the website, actually, is that anyone can write in. It runs on Tumblr, so anybody can submit their own letter and then it’ll be posted there on the website. So it’s fun to just visit DearMrPotter.org to see letters from everyone, even ones that haven’t been published in the book.
Micah: Yeah, and all the proceeds are benefiting the Harry Potter Alliance. And the book officially goes on sale on July 1st, but of course you can pre-order at the website.
Andrew: It will be on sale at LeakyCon too, and it’s like a – the best way I can describe it, it’s like a Chicken Soup kind of book. You know the Chicken Soup for the Teenage Soul, all that stuff? This is like a Harry Potter one. Definitely check it out.
Eric: It’s a testament to the fact that we all know to be true, which is that Harry Potter changes lives.
Andrew: Yes.
Micah: And the other cool little piece of information is that fifty randomly selected pre-ordered books have a chance to win an autographed copy from Rupert Grint. So…
Andrew: Oh neat.
Micah: Yeah. A lot of cool stuff that’s – like you said – it’s also an inspiring book, I think, when you read all the stories kind of together…
Andrew: Yeah.
Micah: …as kind of how Harry Potter has changed their lives.
Show Close
Andrew: And finally, MuggleCast.com, the website you need for everything concerning this podcast that we put out every other week. You can click on “Contact” at the top to write in about anything that we’ve discussed on today’s show. I know we didn’t get to any e-mails this week, but we’ll include them of course next week like we always do.
[Show music begins]
Andrew: Also, on the right side of MuggleCast.com you’ll find links to our iTunes, our Twitter which is Twitter.com/MuggleCast, our Facebook which is Facebook.com/MuggleCast, and our fan Tumblr which is MuggleCast.Tumblr.com. Thanks to everyone for listening. It’s been another great show. I’m Andrew Sims.
Eric: I’m Eric Scull.
Micah: I’m Micah Tannenbaum.
Matt: And I’m Matt Britton.
Andrew: And we’ll see you next time for Episode [in a funny accent] 232! Goodbye! Goodbye!
Eric: [laughs] Au revoir!
[Show music continues]