jedi_of_urth | HP sigh

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harry potter,
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HP sigh

So, because I could I wound up reading the TWoP HBP photo show and well...it reminded me why I hate that book.

All they seemed to talk about was the Hogwarts 90210 aspects, which I was really hoping they would tone down from the book. The plot of the book, though kind of thin, could have made up a good chuck of a movie length story without it having to give so much weight to the crappy ships of the book.

It was only my ability to hope that the 90210 aspects would be played down that had me all that interested in the movie, now that I'm back thinking they're going to make sure to sell that, and reminded of how much I hated it the first and only time I read the book, I'm back to not caring.

I will say that DH redeemed the series somewhat after the dren of HBP, but my love affair with the HP series died with HBP the first time around. Still, somehow I'm still worried the movie will manage to kill it more dead.

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Likely. But, seeing as I'll get dragged to it anyway, I'll be looking for all the subtext I can.

I think the writers really did believe H/Hr would happen. People say R/H was obvious since book four and, tbh, I found a lot of H/Hr moments in there--more than for the other side, and I think the filmmakers made the book from the same perspective.

Also: They do have really good chemistry together. Rupert and Emma have good friend!chemistry, but Emma and Dan really have that spark--which makes the subtext all the better.

Haha, exactly! Got to get enjoyment out of the film somehow, right?

Perhaps. I have to say that I honestly did reckon that R/H was fairly obvious from Book Four - mostly because I can never seeing Harry and Hermione betraying someone as easily upset as Ron. But perhaps I was always hoping that JKR would pull a rabbit out of a hat and suprise us. It was really the Ginny/Harry that came out of nowhere, tbh and bugs me more than the R/H.

Exactly! Emma and Dan really do have that spark... and shallow!point? They look so much better together!

Pretty much.

I'm usually the first one calling it when a Slap Slap Kiss couple is going to end up together, but until book six, I was a little bit baffled by the idea that R/H was omg tru luv 4ever or whatever. Which I don't know if that's willful denial on my part or just me expecting more out of her writing than I got, but whatever.

But, you know, friends, pairing up the trio, blah blah blah, I get that. Ginny herself came from nowhere in book 6, and, frankly, made things all a bit too Oedipal for me to ever be completely comfortable with Ginny/Harry...

They do! Rupert's a great actor, and he's Hollywood Homely, if anything, but he's far more suited for the goofy, occasionally awesome, comic relief, tbh.

I'm not real fond of very many slap slap kiss couples. I can handle a few but most don't work for me. And R/Hr is definitely one that doesn't work for me. They make each other miserable and/or act like idiots, I just can't ship that. Especially next to H/Hr with all it's awesomeness.

I remember when HBP came out and I was so disheartened just by the cover, because for some reason Ginny got to be equal to Ron and Hermione as members of Harry's gang, I loved the sextet in OOTP and if Neville and Luna had also gotten raises in importance it might have come off better, but it didn't happen, just as the cover foretold. And Ginny was the least interesting of the sextet.

You know, I'm bordering on going on a serious rant about this, I'm losing my HP zen at the first chance to get back on the subject.

I am more than I realized. But only couples like the Tsundere/Jerk with a Heart of Gold dichotomies. Those hit my buttons, because they complete each other, they make each other better like that--instead, yeah, they make each other miserable. It isn't a slap-slap-kiss couple--it was trying to be one and fell on its face.

I once saw a Photoshopped romance cover (for a contest) of a bodice ripper novel. The 'heroine' had long flowing red hair and the shopper had put glasses and a scar on the hulky, black-haired hero. The title? 'The Weasley Slut That Came From Nowhere'. I laughed so hard I cried.

Neville and Luna should have gotten more book time, it's very true. They were more fun, and actually had substantial roles in the preceding books!

Right, right, HP zen, right.

I think the problem is that it was trying to combine the slap=slap-kiss cliche with R/Hr being supposed friends, which really isn't a good combination in my mind, so it got tangled around itself and yeah fell on its face. It really failed to convince me that they were really either without Harry which is why the only time I buy R/Hr is when it's part of the OT3 where Harry's the glue.

After the way OOTP set it up to be the sextet adventures, and fandom ran with it awesomely, the fact that Neville and Luna got virtually nothing to do in HBP made me angry. Less so in DH, especially since they were obviously off being awesome in their own story and the point of DH was to be about the Trio.

Not that I really liked DH either, but at least some of my problems with HBP were less glaring there. Some.

Yeah, with Harry it works. Without him, it's like pairing up the two sidekicks and thinking that should work fine. And it didn't.

That remains one of my favorite scenes in OotP, is the sextet fighting in the Ministry. Very cool, and she actually pulled it off (even if the reason they were there made me yell at Harry for being a dummy and the consequences were sad). And then she squished it.

DH...it was fine, and I had fewer issues with it--until she basically equated H/Hr shippers with Voldemort in that one scene. Then I (at first) got pissed, and then I decided it was so ridiculous the only reaction was to think the whole thing ridiculous and go from there. It worked out okay.

Two sidekicks with very little in common, or connection outside of Harry. I mean, I love Willow/Xander and all, but they had their own relationship outside of Buffy whereas R/Hr is entirely formed round Harry.

Yeah, the sextet in the Ministry is great, and I feel like I should be kind of head smacky at Harry for falling for it because Harry is a far from perfect character. But that dynamic could have been the foundation for some awesome storytelling, but she just didn't go there, for reasons that I'm not wholly clear on, besides it not fitting with her outline which makes you wonder why she had it happen in the first place.

I've forgotten that part, I remember the "love her like a sister" bit which make me make faces at the book and have to walk away for a bit, until I just decided to laugh at it, because it was really just dumb. But as far as story structure I had fewer issues at least. Or I just cared less by then.

Hmm, see I never thought Ron would get all that upset if Harry and Hermione got together, mostly because I didn't think he really had that strong a feelings for Hermione. Once I accept that he could I can see your point maybe, but even then I'd end up treating Ron's jealousy as more of a "He's Harry Potter so he gets everything" kind of deal and not because he was hugely upset he didn't get Hermione herself. In my head he just decided he wanted her to be his girl, and yeah might have been hurt that she loved Harry, but in the long run he'd realize they were avtually happy together.

Yeah, I have for a long time had R/Hr issues.

Harry/Ginny is just weird, and really wrong. Not hot wrong, just regular wrong. H/G is basically everything Harry never wanted in the books where the characters actually made sense to me.

It was the books that made me a shipper, I'd heard mumbling of HP fandom and R/Hr shipping, but I came to my shipping choices on my own (once I found fandom though I'll admit it was what turned me onto Ron/Luna, but I withheld judgment on it until book six when it suddenly made sense to me (even though at that stage I really doubt JKR intended it)). And once I realized it and I read the book in that light everything made sense...and then I found out people though R/Hr was also obvious and I was baffled because it wasn't to me.

So yeah, I wouldn't be surprised if the movie writers were at least keeping the ship options open until JKR came down firmly on a side, but now...we'll see I guess because as much as I may have issues I'm sure I'll end up seeing it before too long.

It was the books that made me a shipper too, on my own as well. (Ron/Luna would have actually been really cute, and, yeah, it was fandom that got me to look at that.) And, yeah, I read the books through a lens of H/Hr from about book three onward. R/Hr always, always confused me. I get some of the reasons people like the ship, but the evidence I found in the books was always overwhelmingly H/Hr, in my opinion.

We'll see how it goes, eh?

H/Hr pretty much only hit me upside the head in OOTP, but I'd probably always been leaning that way, I just hadn't checked in with it on a shipping level until then. It hardly came out of nowhere it just grabbed me and *made* me ship it there and woke me up to all the details that had lead up to it being so glaringly *obvious* in OOTP that H/Hr was total true love.

Funny story, I went to go see GoF with a friend of mine who shipped canon couples, she came out thinking the movies had a decided H/Hr leaning, I came out thinking they cut out the most awesome H/Hr moments in the books. I'm not sure what this says about either of us, but I always remember it.

OotP was the big H/Hr book. I think that's the point where she let the story get the furthest away from her, regarding the shipping, though it had been going on all along (without her realizing).

Haha, I think both are true. They did cut out some of the best H/Hr moments--but they also gave it quite a strong H/Hr slant, curiously. Funny, that.

I think I agree with you. Without realizing she wrote such a beautiful friendship ship which in OOTP converted a lot of people like me who weren't committed to a ship before, especially in a book which implied that the power of love was Harry's greatest weapon against Voldemort (has always bugged me that that really wasn't such a big deal afterward). But there are several noticeable and sudden character changes after that, which is sad since I really liked the characters in OOTP and not really in HBP.

You're also right there. There is a fair H/Hr leaning in the movies, it just isn't because they kept the same reasons for it as in the books.

Spoilers from seeing the movie! (although not terribly spoilery).
There was a lot of H/Hr on-screen stuff, but they framed it as simply platonic. There was a lot less R/Hr stuff than in the book, imo.

Good to know, on both fronts (even if they had to frame it ad platonic). Did they keep the hysterical bird throwing scene in that totally proves to me why H/Hr works and R/Hr doesn't? Plus how's the H/G stuff manage?

Lol... slow!responder is slow at responding. I'm guessing you've seen the movie by now, so answering that they left in the awesome bird scene is kinda irrelevant. *sigh*

Well yes, I have seen it. And the bird scene was even more decisive in the movie than the book as to which ship it *should* be in the end. Now with extra H/Hr cuddles and togetherness.

A decent part of me does think the movie PTB are total H/Hr shippers because the sure don't shy away from letting it show up.

A decent part of me does think the movie PTB are total H/Hr shippers because the sure don't shy away from letting it show up.

Yup, especially since they seem (at least in this movie) to play up the H/Hr parts and downplay (somewhat) the R/Hr parts.

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