Just finished Deathly Hallows ***SPOILERS UNDER CUT!***

[thewayne]

Very much enjoyed it and have passed it on to the spousal unit.

And just to repeat the warning, SPOILERS UNDER CUT!


I knew Snape was working with Dumbledor, I was rather surprised by the method of his death, though. I thought his final pensive trick was good. I knew he would be redeemed in the end, I kinda like the way they did it.

I also liked the conversion of Kreacher. That was cool. And now we know why Rowling insisted that Kreacher appear in the film of Order of the Phoenix. The death of Dobby was pretty sad, though. I thought it would have been nice to see Bellatrix's knife that killed Dobby used to kill her. Still, Mrs. Weasley got her in fairly spectacular fashion.

Why do I think that Harry is getting a bit of Luna loving on the side? ;-)

I liked the revelation that Dumbledor was mortal and frail like the rest of us. He came off as so perfect, you had to know he had some serious flaws and weaknesses.

I thought the revelation of what happened to his hand in Halfblood Prince was pretty spiff.

Did Harry actually kill anyone directly? I don't think that he did, but I could have easily overlooked it.

One thing bothered me. During the initial escape, Hedwig is killed and Harry loses his broom. Why didn't he summon it back with an Accio? Likewise, when Harry et al were out camping and the other group of refugees come by and start doing "Accio Salmon!", why didn't Harry et al start emulating that?


One thing that I'm curious about is what Rowling is going to do in the future. She doesn't need to do anything, she has more than enough money to not write another word for the rest of her life. I'd like to see other Potterverse stories, they wouldn't have to continue with Harry et al though. But it would be difficult to top what she's written now, anything else could be a severe let-down. I'd definitely like to see what magic is like in other countries, especially in America, but the thing that is constantly reinforced to writers is "write what you know", and Rowling knows the British education and government system, so it could be quite hard for her to write anything else, at least with any verisimilitude.


I was kind of expecting Deathly Hallows to start with a time-gash. Re-reading Halfblood Prince and Order of the Phoenix, and seeing Order of the Phoenix, amply demonstrated that Potter and Crew were not up to a knock-down battle with Deatheaters, so how was Potter supposed to take on Voldy? I thought the "destroy the horcruxes" quest as a great way to sidestep that issue.


I hope they make the final movie three hours long. I'd say there's a good chance of it. I think the movie is going to be pretty spectacular, especially the final battle and the break-in at and escape from Gringot's.

Comments

[slashophile.livejournal.com]

Nah, Harry has never killed anyone, I believe. Said he'd never use the Aveda Kedavra unless it was absolutely necessary or somesuch. Said he didn't want to be like Voldemort. He stuck with mostly expelmarallus or however it's spelled, it seems.

Dobby and Severus hit me hard. And I damn well knew Sev was going to die, I've said it since book four, I believe. I literally sobbed when Dobby died because it was so unexpected and his last words were just so right. I loved it. Severus's desth repulsed me but it fit, I s'ppose. He died quietly and without fanfare (fanfair?), much like how he lived. Except without rude insults. But anyway, I think it was the right move. Although my SS/HP side really wanted one of those moments where they both just understood each other. Nothing fancy, just a general moment of clarity. But I'm glad Harry let everyone know the Severus was always Dumbledore's, not Voldemort's. And unlike most people I was happy with the epilogue, especially with the bit about Severus being the bravest man Harry ever knew. *sighs* I don't hand character deaths well and I feel like I read a fanfic that didn't give me proper warning. I dealt ok with all the other deaths but Severus...oi, that was just hard to swallow. And the things you found out afterwards made it just worse, the man never caught a break. Given part of it was his fault, but still. He had the capacity to love and show remorse, I just loved him, such a tragic, flawed hero.

I wondered the same thing about the salmon. Never did figure that one out.

JKR said for a long time after the 7th book she was done, but now that it's finally over and she's immersed herself in this world for 17 years; she's starting to have second thoughts. She said she'd love to think about doing books sorta like her magical creatures and Quidditch one again. And I'm hoping she'll change her mind about a prequel. Nothing huge or fancy, doesn't need to be seven years of the Marauders!era, just one or two books. I think it'd be fun, especially with all the new things we learned. And we never really saw when Lilly started to fall for James.

That final movie had better be damn long, I don't know what the hell they could cut, for goodness sakes.

[zentraedi-shep.livejournal.com]

In the scene when Dobby got hit by the silver knife, I thought for a second that the blade would swirl through the empty space where our heroes just disapparated and hit the werewolf into the chest... That would have been a really nice twist!

[ateji.livejournal.com]

I rather wish Hedwig had been mixed up with the stuffed owls the body-doubles were carrying. That would have been a nice, "Whew, sad thing averted!"

And here I quote Ursula Vernon regarding something that annoyed me: "Is somebody punishing fandom for all that Sirius/Remus fan fic?"

[quasar273.livejournal.com]

I thought that Harry should have ended up raising Teddy Lupin! Isn't that what a godfather is supposed to be for? Maybe he got into a custody dispute with Andromeda.

I'm . . . I don't know if disappointed is the word. Still trying to work it out. With every book it seems that Rowling uses less of the old information than we expect, or uses it in different ways than we thought she would, and adds more information. And that's her prerogative -- in fact, it's one of the cool things that has differentiated the canon from the fanfic. But I guess I thought the final book would be more about tying together info from the previous books (at last!) with less new stuff. Instead we had new Horcruxes (okay, knew that was going to happen) and then these three Deathly Hallows things coming out of nowhere. Those were kinda cool but still felt like a distraction to me. I wanted . . . I dunno. More about the veil Sirius went through, and its connection to Dementors? More about Godric's Hollow (okay, we did get some of that, but not a lot)? More about Fawkes, or Crookshanks, or any of the other could-maybe-be-an-Animagus critters?

I did like the backstory on Dumbledore, though. Good job making him imperfect but not evil -- that balance is one thing fanfic is really horrible at. The friendship with Grindelwald was cool, but can anyone really buy Grindelwald spending 60 years peacefully in prison?