jedi_of_urth | Half Blood Prince

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Half Blood Prince

So, went and saw Half Blood Prince this afternoon, so you lot get some thoughts.

First off in the massive amount of previews I'm left with PERCY JACKSON FEVER (why will the library not get back a copy of Last Olympian for me? WHY?). Am surprised by the lack of Twilight preview, just because I was expecting it, but for me it's all about Percy, and Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs, which looks awesome. I don't remember a lot of the previews, but I recall they were an odd mix.

Ha, Dumbledore ships Harry/Hermione, in the books it's McGonnagall as I recall, but either way it's cool by me.

As far as shipping goes, much like the book it shows exactly why Harry/Hermione rocks and the canon ships don.t. Canon ships are just people who have decided they like each other but really don't have half the connection H/Hr do.

Bellatrix is made of awesome. Batshit crazy and evil to the core, but she's SO DAMN COOL.

As with all the movies a lot of details got glossed over, smuched around, or just cut out. I notice this even though I've read HBP exactly once.

I felt the movie made Snape's final actions a little more clearly motivated by loyalty to Dumbledore where in the book I didn't find it very clear at all. Just by having him find Harry until the floor and Harry still being up and about instead of frozen as I recall him being in the book, and then having performed inflection rather than description on Dumbledore's side makes it all a little more obvious.

I think Ginny had more lines in her first scene than she has in either of the past two movies, and easily more in this movie than all the others combined.

LUNA'S HAT ROCKS. I don't even care that we should have seen in in OotP, we got to see it here.

Cormac may have been a total meathead, but he was a hot meathead, these things matter.

Oh my poor Neville, nothing to do in this movie so they force him to be a waiter. Don't worry Neville, you get to be awesome in the next book.

There are some changes to the story that I liked and some I didn't, as usual. Some of the Tom Riddle flashbacks that were really vital to the story were cut though and that seems like it could cause a problem.

Burning down the Burrow is totally an invention of the movie-verse, I wonder if they've really thought that one through. Aside from Bellatrix continuing to rock I wasn't crazy about that sequence, but at least partly because I'm not sure how it will work with later plot. Also I was distracted by the kids casting wordless magic, it's distracting enough with the adults do it because as I recall wordless magic is fairly advanced and a whole lot less common than it seems in the movies.

Here the thing, if I ignore the prior context on the canon ships I found them kind of cutish in this movie, even if I still think H/Hr were the cutest. As *teenage* ships, not as long term ones and not with their histories, but I could kind of see, in another story where H/G and R/Hr were the precursors to H/Hr, they could still be okay ships. But that's a lot of context to ignore.

In several ways I'm tempted to say I liked the movie more than the book in this case, more compact and so the fact that not much actually happens was less glaring than it was in the books. Also the Hogwarts 90210 aspects felt more...in keeping with the movie-verse than they did in the books (plus the fact that it was played through a H/Hr lens).

Plus the movie was very pretty.

I could probably write up more thoughts, but I think that will do for now. Really in spite of the fact that I react by dissecting the movie (and I could have done a lot more) I would say I enjoyed it. Not tons, but I did.

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As far as shipping goes, much like the book it shows exactly why Harry/Hermione rocks and the canon ships don.t. Canon ships are just people who have decided they like each other but really don't have half the connection H/Hr do.

I agree with this so much.'

Did you catch what looked like an abortive hand-hold at the end between Harry and Hermione? I might have to see the movie just to see if that really happened.

I actually liked both Hr/R and H/G much better in the movies than the books (there's, like 80% less violence and hypocrisy!) but Hr/H still seems about a billion times healthier than either. They're always so very there for each other. I mean, I didn't even realize that Ron was in the ending scene until Hermione said 'us' instead of 'me'; it was completely a Hr/H scene, emotionally.

I liked them a lot better in the movies than the books too, it cuts down on the nastiness and chest-monster-ness but they still feel very high school as opposed to the super wonderful connection between H/Hr. And the movie actually seemed to play up that fact more than the HBP book did.

Yeah the final scene was all H/Hr until suddenly oh hey there Ron. It was only heightening how I recall that playing out in the book where Ron had nothing to say but was at least standing closer to Hermione's steadfast standing by Harry. It also reminded me also of this icon I have somewhere from the POA movie of "There's Harry and Hermione having a moment. And there's Ron" with arrows point at the two to better show the distance between them.

Some of the Tom Riddle flashbacks that were really vital to the story were cut though and that seems like it could cause a problem.

Oh, yes. I don't know why they didn't show the Hepzibah Smith bit. Dumbledore could've said, "Tom seemed to have a fascination for items from the Hogwarts founders, I'm not sure why. But these two went missing," instead of revealing the whole Horcrux bit early like in the books. There were lots of bits cut out from the book, but that one, IMHO, was the most important.

Burning down the Burrow is totally an invention of the movie-verse, I wonder if they've really thought that one through. Aside from Bellatrix continuing to rock I wasn't crazy about that sequence, but at least partly because I'm not sure how it will work with later plot.

THAT bugged me. Seriously, what was the point of it? Unless, possibly, to give Mrs. Weasley more incentive to kill her (like threatening her children wasn't enough incentive?!)

Yeah they could have at least hinted at the places Harry would need to look for the Horcruxes, maybe they'll find a list of possibilities when they find the real locket, but that does seem like it's going to give them issues moving the plot forward in the next movie.

I find movie-Molly really forgettable so I didn't even think of that but that *might* be a reason, if not a real great one.

Exactly. And they also left out that Harry had inherited Sirius' estate and house-elf, both of which play an important role in the last book. All these shortcuts are going to leave them with an awful lot of catching up to do. Or an awful lot of gaping plot holes.

PS. Happy birthday! :)

Well, I don't think people will be too *surprised* when that fact comes up but yeah, it's all emblematic or the fact that when the ignore relating certain elements of the story it may reflect down the line. Like if they include Bill & Fluer's wedding it's going to come out of nowhere, and they kind of need to include it because a lot of stuff happens there.

And thanks.

As far as shipping goes, much like the book it shows exactly why Harry/Hermione rocks

I've always thought that these two seemed to make a much better pair than Hermione/Ron did and this is coming from someone who's seen all the movies but only managed to read the first 2 books so far.

I do think that in the movies, Daniel and Emma have always had really great chemistry, which is probably why I've always liked seeing H/Hr onscreen together. Plus all the scenes between them are so sweet. I loved the scene between them on the stairs when Hr clung to Harry cause she was upset about Ron and the way he held her hand.

I felt the movie made Snape's final actions a little more clearly motivated by loyalty to Dumbledore

Ah yes, Snape. Now as I've said, I haven't yet read Book 6 so I wonder if you could clear something up for me. Did Snape utter the spell to kill Dumbledore because he'd agreed to do so earlier (the scene between him and Dumbledore when D. told him he'd agreed to something) or what? I was a bit confused about that whole bit.

I have my suspicions that if you only saw the movies and somehow didn't know any different from the books, how could you *not* think it was a H/Hr story? Of course I thought that about the books for a while because I didn't know how it ended (since it hadn't been yet written yet).

Gods, that scene on the stairs was so sweet and kind of where my statement that the R/Hr and H/G ships make sense as high school ships but long term H/Hr shines through. Because they're both interested in other people yeah, but they're clearly the ones who have a deeper connection.

Well in book 6 it isn't clear what motivated Snape, which lead to a lot of fandom speculation. It was I think fairly deliberately vague about whether Dumbledores "Please" was a "please kill me" or a "please don't kill me" but I have to confess I thought Snape had turned traitor on the good guys for a while. And just confusing and surprising all around.

But if you really want to know how it plays out...

(small spoiler space)

Actually now that I think about it, it's actually less obvious in the movie how weak Dumbles is after the stuff in the cave.

However in the book, Harry is also frozen in the corner of the room (can't remember if it was Snape of D. that did it) covered in the invisibility cloak, but either way it's pretty clear Snape *knows* he's there on some level (and I think he's the one that did the petrificus-ing). With his explanation that Harry is reserved for Voldemort it works.

But yeah, Snape was working for Dumbles. D. knew the horcrux outing would probably kill him and he was already dying from the hand thing (not that that's clear in the movie either) so he knew Snape would have to kill him off. I remember part of it was to save Malfoy, but I think there was probably more, but I'm drawing a blank on it. The last couple books are kind of fuzzy to me as I'm only read each one once.

Gods, that scene on the stairs was so sweet and kind of where my statement that the R/Hr and H/G ships make sense as high school ships but long term H/Hr shines through. Because they're both interested in other people yeah, but they're clearly the ones who have a deeper connection.

Completely agree. For me they have the strongest connection of any two charcters in the whole Saga.

It was I think fairly deliberately vague about whether Dumbledores "Please" was a "please kill me" or a "please don't kill me" but I have to confess I thought Snape had turned traitor on the good guys for a while. And just confusing and surprising all around.

Yeah it was confusing and vague, hence my question about it.

But yeah, Snape was working for Dumbles. D. knew the horcrux outing would probably kill him and he was already dying from the hand thing (not that that's clear in the movie either) so he knew Snape would have to kill him off. I remember part of it was to save Malfoy, but I think there was probably more, but I'm drawing a blank on it.

See I thought part of it might have been to somehow save Malfoy from commiting murder.

As for the hand thing with Dumbles...well that was just plain odd in the movie cause there was no explanation for it at all.

As for the hand thing with Dumbles...well that was just plain odd in the movie cause there was no explanation for it at all.

Also true. They really cut a lot of the Horcrux information out, the movie took too long just to let us know about Horcruxes but didn't get as far as informing us on them. That area really has me worried for the last story since they're going to have to back up a lot to have the story make sense.

Sure in the book Dumbles was dodgy about what was up with his hand but I think he did eventually explain it (if not the whole story) whereas in the movie...he really never did.

Sure in the book Dumbles was dodgy about what was up with his hand but I think he did eventually explain it (if not the whole story) whereas in the movie...he really never did.

No he didn't and it was frustrating. I mean I totally get that they can't put everything from the books into the movies cause they'd just be so insanely long but there are things that don't make sense when certain parts of the story are left out.

Yes Bellatrix is mad and evil but you do have to love her for that.

I was disappointed that they used Fenrir so little. I was looking forward to seeing him lots.

Luna is just fabulous. The hat, the glasses, the fluffy ethereal eccentricity...

Yes I'm sad not to have had much Neville here; but am hoping they'll right that in the films of the last book.

I was a bit puzzled by burning down The Burrow..Couldn't see the point of it; but maybe we'll get an explaination in the next film.

I'm with you there on Cormac; had Mr AJ sat beside me as I watched and I felt like a very pervy old woman for a while there....(eeep ! )

Me and Mr AJ talked about this and we reckon that our view of Snape's actions at the end might well be coloured a lot by havibg read the last book. We know already why he did this.

I agree though that it was a lot less ambiguous than in the book.
I so love Alan Rickman in the role though; ditto Maggie Smith as Prof Mc Gonagal.

Teehee at your icon.

And yeah, I was expecting Fenrir to have more to do, but then did they even mention that he's a werewolf? He was just another scary face I guess.

I can believe that we're influenced by actually knowing the Snape motivations now, but I also think having him leave Harry standing under the confrontation was the big one for me thinking it was shaded towards Snape's good loyalties.

McGonagall rocks my socks, in books and movies. I'm always reminded of one of my favorite teachers in high school, but she's also just that awesome. Never been a particular Snape fan though, I find him an incredibly frustrating character basically.

And yeah, I was expecting Fenrir to have more to do, but then did they even mention that he's a werewolf? He was just another scary face I guess.
Yeah, they left out any parts where he actually did anything in the book, so I dunno why they even cast someone as him. To give another recognizable Death Eater, I guess.

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Half Blood Prince

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