Deathly Hallows

I don't know if there are any Harry Potter fans here, but those who are undoubtedly know about the release of the 7th and final book released tomorrow. Yes, I'm a fan.

I am one of the fans who couldn't be bothered waiting and found a pdf version going around, but rest assured I have every intention of buying my copy in the morning. Thus far I'm about 150 pages in and thoroughly enjoying it, a nice change from the disappointment I obtained after watching the new HP movie.

Any other fans?


PS: Saiya don't you dare drop in any spoilers that aren't in the designated brackets.

I GOT THE SCOOP CHUMMERS!

P.s. I really do have the scoop!

Oh I don't doubt it sir, probably wasn't that hard to find once the book leaked.

I've got the leaked one also, haven't read it yet... DL'ed it to mess with my sister who is a total Potter-maniac. I got her so mad she almost spontaneously combusted

Our copy is already pre-ordered though, so I guess no harm done to miss Rowling.

And the movie wasn't THAT horrible, I liked it, probably more than the previous ones. Couldn't be done better without having a 7 hour marathon.
Just hope the last book delivers, but I have this ugly bad-ending-is-coming feeling underneath my pants.

SaiyajinNoOuji-Trading Cards said:

I GOT THE SCOOP CHUMMERS!

P.s. I really do have the scoop!

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Same here friend!

Aeglos said:

And the movie wasn't THAT horrible, I liked it, probably more than the previous ones.

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I hated the first two, thought the third was ok and liked the last two.

This isn't really a spoiler, but

I havent read a sinle Potter book and seen a single Potter film, but I skipped the end of the last book with the intention of ruining things for a couple of Potter headed friends.

Just to be clear guys, don't take risks with spoilers here. As uninterested as I am in Harry Potter, I don't want to see people ruin it for others.

I admit I kinda do, during the midnight release of the last book we drove past book stores yelling out that random characters died. We didnt know who actually died but those Potter people looked about ready to lynch us.

Aeglos said:

I've got the leaked one also, haven't read it yet... DL'ed it to mess with my sister who is a total Potter-maniac. I got her so mad she almost spontaneously combusted

Our copy is already pre-ordered though, so I guess no harm done to miss Rowling.

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The one I downloaded only had the first ten chapters, I just finished the last 15 minutes ago. Loving it so far, I assure anyone who likes the other books, this one will easily meet their expectations. In Australia I believe the book is released at 9am which is..... 30 minutes. ;D

And the movie wasn't THAT horrible, I liked it, probably more than the previous ones. Couldn't be done better without having a 7 hour marathon.
Just hope the last book delivers, but I have this ugly bad-ending-is-coming feeling underneath my pants.

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It wasn't horrible, but for me Order of the Phoenix is my favourite book out of the series (for now), and one of my favourite books period. In addition to brutally cutting up the story for the sake of convenience, which I suppose is unavoidable for a movie adaptation, but they still changed many things seemingly for the sake of it. IMO no scene, except maybe one or two brief moments in the whole movie lived up how well Rowling portrays them.

People talk about how the Berserk anime is inferior to the manga, and of course I feel exactly the same way. What's interesting though is the anime was quite closely resembles the manga in many many places, yet a few added extra scenes and more depth in story, far better art and I would even argue that for some fiction, because it is on paper leaving more for the reader to interpret from a solid foundation of work can bring the best results.

The difference between the HP books and films, I have no doubt is far more different to in comparison to Berserk anime and manga, so it's a shame that many people see the books as kiddy and lame because of the portrayal of the films. The books would likely have a better reputation, although not a broad if it were not for the movies. I read The Philosophers stone on a whim less than two years and was pleasantly surprised, it went from there.

Aazealh said:

Just to be clear guys, don't take risks with spoilers here. As uninterested as I am in Harry Potter, I don't want to see people ruin it for others.

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I appreciate that, although if people have read it they would probably want to discuss pieces in spoiler brackets.

Well, my sister is reading our legit copy which she got about 5 hours ago. I'll have to wait till she finishes it for lack of quality in my leaked DL'ed version.
Managed to read about 30 pages before I gave up, and looked good so far.

About the movies/books;
Movies adaptations will always fail to please everyone, as everyone has a different preconception of the book.
And, well... you have to admit the first books are kinda kiddy. Harry being 11 years old and the theme being aimed at that age group you can't have much of an "adult" or overly sophisticated storyline, though it gets much more mature and interesting as the story progresses, and I think that's one of the strong points in the tale; the way it evolved with the reader (I started reading it at around that same age IIRC).

And since the first books are indeed kiddy, and on top of it the movies followed them much more closely in the first two or three, the kiddy-effect is doubled for newcomers to the series.
The lack of feature time to cram all the story contained the latter, more mature and rich story-wise books, ruins the natural story evolution you get when you read the books.

Si it's not entirely the movie's faults, it's just a collateral effect of not having unlimited movie running time. Since the people that read ALL the books, rarely say "This story is lame", it's the ones who watch the movies and/xor read the first or get to the second book and then give up who say that.

It's all the twentyfirst century's fault, where lazy unimaginative people prefer to watch a movie than read a book.

Sparnage said:

People talk about how the Berserk anime is inferior to the manga, and of course I feel exactly the same way. What's interesting though is the anime was quite closely resembles the manga in many many places, yet a few added extra scenes and more depth in story, far better art and I would even argue that for some fiction, because it is on paper leaving more for the reader to interpret from a solid foundation of work can bring the best results.

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Well, I'd say there's more than quite a few supplementary scenes in the manga. The story in the animated series contains barely 2/3rds of the original volumes it spans, and I think it really suffers from it. Even when the scenes are practically the same, the makers failed to exploit the media and they seem somehow less good a lot of time to me. I've seen the first 3 HP movies because like everybody I know fans of the series, and while I didn't find them exceptional I can understand why people (kids or others) like them. It's also not surprising and rather to be expected that the movies aren't as good as the books, it's always like that with adaptations.

on the differences between Berserk the anime and the manga, I felt that leaving out the Slug Count storyline in the anime was actually a good idea, left a bit of mystery surrounding Gut's past that you learned through the telling of the Golden Age story arc. Of course the Slug Count built up Guts part as the Black Swordsman but still, I felt for the overall story, it helped to make things a bit more interesting for the watcher, especially someones first experience.

As to the harry potter books, they're ok. Im still not sure why they blew up as they did as Ive read a ton of young adult/teen age fantasy series and while they are well written and have some neat ideas, I kind of felt them to be run-of-the-mill in terms of fantasy.

The movies have sucked though, end of that story.

Aeglos said:

About the movies/books;
Movies adaptations will always fail to please everyone, as everyone has a different preconception of the book.
And, well... you have to admit the first books are kinda kiddy. Harry being 11 years old and the theme being aimed at that age group you can't have much of an "adult" or overly sophisticated storyline, though it gets much more mature and interesting as the story progresses, and I think that's one of the strong points in the tale; the way it evolved with the reader (I started reading it at around that same age IIRC).

And since the first books are indeed kiddy, and on top of it the movies followed them much more closely in the first two or three, the kiddy-effect is doubled for newcomers to the series.
The lack of feature time to cram all the story contained the latter, more mature and rich story-wise books, ruins the natural story evolution you get when you read the books.

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The early books were more kiddy but I don't classify them in the kids book. They are less dark and as you said, revolved around the main characters at their youngest. If they were, it probably wouldn't have successfully attracted a more broad age group until later books.

Aazealh said:

Well, I'd say there's more than quite a few supplementary scenes in the manga. The story in the animated series contains barely 2/3rds of the original volumes it spans, and I think it really suffers from it. Even when the scenes are practically the same, the makers failed to exploit the media and they seem somehow less good a lot of time to me.

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I agree, although for you personally what do you think the Anime makers did wrong in regards to the scenes that were practically the same?

I've seen the first 3 HP movies because like everybody I know fans of the series, and while I didn't find them exceptional I can understand why people (kids or others) like them. It's also not surprising and rather to be expected that the movies aren't as good as the books, it's always like that with adaptations.

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Cutting down is usually necessary, and often the story needs to be adjusted in the process. What happens too much and what many fans complain about, is when they alter things unnecessarily, as if the creators intentionally want it different to give it it's own sense of identity or something. I'm sure sometimes it might work when a really good idea come, mostly it doesn't seem to be the case.

Sparnage said:

I agree, although for you personally what do you think the Anime makers did wrong in regards to the scenes that were practically the same?

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Well aside from small errors in interpretating scenes and other such stuff, having scenes animated and happening in real time prevents the reader/viewer from filling in the blanks with his own imagination. With still manga scenes, you see a character doing one thing and then another in another scene, and what's in between is up to the reader to imagine or guess, depending on what the author intended or provided him with. With animated works you can't have that because it's real time. This goes for any manga-to-animation adaptation, and if well done, the animated series staff will input their own material to fill in the aforementioned blanks.

So when animating the story and going from one scene to another with shots so similar to the manga originals that they're basically inert and almost still scenes themselves, that part left to imagination is lost, and in the case of the Berserk animated series it's not replaced by anything. The scenes happen in real time, but all the animation involved is a "travelling" while characters themselves are surprisingly static and motionless. This was probably done as much because of budget limitations than it was because of a lack of creativity, but in the end I think it really takes away from the series. I think it was Olivier that once said that the anime managed the exploit of being less dynamic than the manga, and I agree with that.

Yeah, and I suppose graphic fiction on paper is the medium between film and book in that it has room for more imagination than watching a movie, but still having a visual foundation books don't.
Also anime tends to follow the story more closely from the manga, I suppose that would generally lead to less disappointment than with turning a book into a movie in regards to more preconceived ideas of no visuals and dramatic story changes.


Anywho, half way through Deathly Hallows now. Unfortunately semester 2 starts for me tomorrow, so I can't Harry Potter binge anymore. :(

iamdani,

Maybe you should go back and read the entire series to help you with your terrible terrible literacy problem.

That second spoiler contained such poor grammar that you would need a code breaker to decipher it.

I find it odd that you have friends who enjoy reading, yet you wish to spoil the series for them. Obviously you are the intellectual inferior of the group - the "pity friend."

Fortunately my friends are not as juvenile and I, like them, enjoyed the book immeasurably.

Yeh, hey fux yuo idiot, HARRY ROX!

Now seriously guys, lets not wage war over our children's book preferences. I'm still a big fan of The Gorilla Did It, myself. =)

I like Tom the TV Cat.

Curious George... debate over.

HawaiianStallion said:

As to the harry potter books, they're ok. Im still not sure why they blew up as they did as Ive read a ton of young adult/teen age fantasy series and while they are well written and have some neat ideas, I kind of felt them to be run-of-the-mill in terms of fantasy.

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Couldn't agree more; exactly voicing my thoughts there.
The books were nice entertainment. A fun read.
But I've read better. Though that, of course, will always be a question of taste.
Though the Potter hype is easier to understand than the Eragon hype; that was so generic fantasy in my eyes that it totally didn't deserve that much attention *shrugs*

This last Potter novel though felt like some fanfiction (sometimes a bad fanfiction actually (that epilogue...)) to me.



Some of the best fantastical and inventive books for children (that I in fact still enjoy very much) are Roald Dahl's works :B