Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows (SPOILER INSIDE starting on page 3)

[Chimpy]

Before there was Lord of he Rings, there was Titanic.

That movie, and not anything after, is why Hollywood allows people to make 3 hour long pieces of crap. Everyone in Hollywood felt it was crap but figured "what the hell, 2 studios will both write it off as Waterworld 2.0, and we can go back to making short movies with sequels" but the 12 year old girls going back to see their darling Pretty-boy DiCaprio die again and again made studios realize that they could keep the attention of audiences through a couple extra hours of fluff.

The biggest problem with books to me is not the lack of proper editing (though that does get on the nerves at times) it is the fact that now, they have increased the font size and line spacing just so much that a book that would have been 250-300 pages in the 1980s is 400-500 pages now. They have probably done market research that shows that people are more likely to purchase a book with more "weight" to it, than not. It also alleviates the problem of not having enough books to fill the shelves in bookstores as they don't need as many books to do so.

[Phildo]

The biggest problem with books to me is not the lack of proper editing (though that does get on the nerves at times) it is the fact that now, they have increased the font size and line spacing just so much that a book that would have been 250-300 pages in the 1980s is 400-500 pages now. They have probably done market research that shows that people are more likely to purchase a book with more "weight" to it, than not. It also alleviates the problem of not having enough books to fill the shelves in bookstores as they don't need as many books to do so.

Also, it's much easier to read larger text.  My bad eyesight corroborates this.

On a related note, my dad is a middle-school science teacher and they were actually considering buying super-large versions of his textbooks because one of the kids had a major eye problem.  And I mean HUGE print.

[Margalis]

There is a difference between editing for length and editing for content. The third LOTR movie and King Kong could both have been shortened while making them better. That is different from shortening just to shorten.

However when something is a proven money-maker is makes sense for editors to be more hands-off. Especially when the artist involved may be fickle and not someone you want to piss off. Typically big-name, big-sales people get more leeway so they don't jump ship.

[Lantyssa]

I like long movies.  Kong was way too long.  By the time we reached New York I was bored.

[Margalis]

It was too long for the content. Like most MMORPGs. What made it long was the fact that when you think about it nothing really happened other than some CGI brawlin. I was bored before it even got to NY.

It was also a movie that simply didn't need to be remade. The remake added nothing at all.

[Ironwood]

The third LOTR movie [...] could [...] have been shortened while making [it] better.

"I disagree with what you said."

 

[Margalis]

I'm thinking mostly of the ending and the parts where Frodo and Sam looked longingly at each other. The movie as delivered had a lot of filler and a lot of the shots just lingered too long for no reason. Maybe that filler could have been replaced with actual story, sure. Again, I don't think it was too long, I think it was too long relative to what happened onscreen.

[HaemishM]

Ok, I've not seen Kong so I can't comment.  But the LotR stuff is bullshit.

Kong is about 20 minutes of all right followed by 2 1/2 hours of long shots, overlong Naomi Watts shots (and I think she's beautiful but damn) and way too much run run run!!!!

LotR was a mixed bag for me. Fellowship was fantastic and the Extended DVD was just heaven. Two Towers was good with the extended helping a bit. Return in the theaters was good, but I only managed to watch the extended 4 hour version once. A lot of it just seemed to be added for the fuck of it in Return, with the only parts I remember being really worth it were the Sauruman death (which the theatrical just totally ignored) and the Mouth of Sauron. Had he added the Scouring of the Shire to the 4 hours, I think I'd have had no problem with it, because that was an important part he left out completely. As it was, the added stuff didn't have the same oomph that the added stuff to Fellowship had.

[Phildo]

Speaking of King Kong, wtf was up with the vaudeville stuff?  Naomi Watts doing pratfalls for a CGI gorilla... completely destroyed the tone of the movie for me.

[Selby]

Return in the theaters was good, but I only managed to watch the extended 4 hour version once. A lot of it just seemed to be added for the fuck of it in Return, with the only parts I remember being really worth it were the Sauruman death (which the theatrical just totally ignored) and the Mouth of Sauron. Had he added the Scouring of the Shire to the 4 hours, I think I'd have had no problem with it, because that was an important part he left out completely. As it was, the added stuff didn't have the same oomph that the added stuff to Fellowship had.

This sums up exactly how I felt about Return.  Had the scouring been in there it would have been perfect.  Not because I'm a Tolkien nerd who feels their favorite scenes need to be included, but because it closed the Saruman section and closed the journey of how the Hobbits had gone from needing help at every turn to being able to stand on their own.  That said I did enjoy it despite it not being included, I just felt that 10-15 minutes of celebration scenes and jumping up and down could have been dedicated to it and not overly extended it or detracted from the movie.

I did think that Fellowship was the best and the extended version was just fantastic.  My major gripe with Towers is the way Gandalf is portrayed along with making the Battle of Helms deep go on for an hour when it was quite short in the book ;-)

[WayAbvPar]

Finally finished HPATDH. I dug it, and even kind of liked the 19 years later thing. Apparently that makes me a very bad person.


And look at that! I am already over it.

[Nevermore]

I finished it yesterday and I thought it was ok, but it could have been better.  I think the biggest mistake Rowling made was abandoning the framework of attending school at Hogwarts for this book.  I can't help but think that the Ginny/Neville/Luna story would have been a lot more fun to read.  She also killed too many characters apparently just for the sake of killing them.  It wasn't a bad story, it just wasn't as engaging as most of the other books were.

[Morat20]

Well, having read it -- I'll state that only a few moments in the book got a serious reaction out of me, and neither involved Harry.

The first involved Neville, a sword, and a hat. It's nice to see the geeks rise up.

The second involved Mrs. Weasely, who showed why you don't fuck with the moms of the world.

All the screaming, carping, hammering on about Harry Potter And the Massive Phenomenon, I don't give two shits about, although there are surely worse things in the world than large numbers of people excited about a book. In fact, I consider "large numbers of people excited about a book" a good thing, even if they're insanely over-excited and clog up my TV with it, because at least some of those people will go on to read other books, and by purchasing them, support authors who I really like.

[Nevermore]

Best way to avoid The Phenomenon would be to turn off the TV and read a book.  :-D

[Margalis]

The second involved Mrs. Weasely, who showed why you don't fuck with the moms of the world.

It was better when Ripley did it.

[Morat20]

The second involved Mrs. Weasely, who showed why you don't fuck with the moms of the world.

It was better when Ripley did it.

Nah, because with Ripley you knew she was a hard-ass already. With Ms. Weasely, it was an entirely different vibe. It was shocking, yet in character. Ripley's was just in character, but not surprising.

[Paelos]

I read the book, and on the whole I don't think it's nearly as bad as people are going to rip it apart. However, I do think, unlike her earlier works, that this book suffers in areas that a good editor or a fresh author could have prevented.

1 - She sounds tired. The whole book seems like she's done writing the series, she hates her characters now, and she wants to disappear. The obvious plotlines with no twists indicate this. The killing off of characters for no reason indicate this. You killed Harry's owl? Why you horrible bitch? That was just rude.

2 - On the plus side, she turned Snape into something you could like for a good reason.

3 - The camping thing was horrid, and absolutely excruciating to read. I understand the need to isolate the characters from the outside world and to work in the feel of a society that's now against them, but going on and on with them in tents was pointless. The effect she wanted was achieved by Godric's Hollow and the Lovegood house encounters. We understood they were hunted, we don't need to know they are foraging for mushrooms nightly.

4 - The King's Cross thing is the Matrix. I'm reading it and thinking, wow this is the Matrix. It's exactly the same right down to the nonsensically complicated round-the-way dialogue.

5 - On the plus side again, the Battle for Hogwarts was awesome. Giants, walking suits of armor, Professor MacGonagal kicking ass, Trelawney launching crystal balls at people, and the showdown with Voldemort. All of that was well done and worth the price of admission. Now, if only more of the book hadn't centered on crawling around in the bush, nobody would be bitching.

[Nevermore]

1 - She sounds tired. The whole book seems like she's done writing the series, she hates her characters now, and she wants to disappear. The obvious plotlines with no twists indicate this. The killing off of characters for no reason indicate this. You killed Harry's owl? Why you horrible bitch? That was just rude.

I read a Q & A she did the other day and she said the death of Hedwig was supposed to represent Harry's loss of innocence.  Personally, I can think of better ways to represent that but that's just me.

[Ironwood]

Hermoine swallowing his load would have been a better choice.

[MrHat]

Hermoine swallowing his load would have been a better choice.

Cuminus Faciala!

[Ironwood]

'Cause, see, what happened was he lost his innocence when Cedric died.  That's a fucking stupid answer from her.

She killed the owl because she hated the owl.

[Paelos]

'Cause, see, what happened was he lost his innocence when Cedric died.  That's a fucking stupid answer from her.

She killed the owl because she hated the owl.

Yeah, not to mention losing, you know, HIS GODFATHER. What a cunt.

[Nevermore]

You don't understand.  See, Harry's innocence was fractured into seven pieces, each residing in characters the readers loved.  But not the ones that were *too* important, the magic doesn't work that way sequels.  So she had to go and kill them all before Harry could truly loose lose his innocence!

Edit: happy?

[Ironwood]

"lose"

[Morat20]

5 - On the plus side again, the Battle for Hogwarts was awesome. Giants, walking suits of armor, Professor MacGonagal kicking ass, Trelawney launching crystal balls at people, and the showdown with Voldemort. All of that was well done and worth the price of admission. Now, if only more of the book hadn't centered on crawling around in the bush, nobody would be bitching.

Here's how I'd make the movie.

80% would be the fight at Hogwarts.

[WayAbvPar]

Hermoine swallowing his load would have been a better choice.

In that case, I have a bit of innocence to rid myself of as well.

[Phildo]

Did anyone else feel like she implied in the earlier books that she might resurrect Sirius?  I thought the whole doorway to hell thing was incredibly vague.

[Merusk]

1 - She sounds tired. The whole book seems like she's done writing the series, she hates her characters now, and she wants to disappear. The obvious plotlines with no twists indicate this. The killing off of characters for no reason indicate this. You killed Harry's owl? Why you horrible bitch? That was just rude.

I read a Q & A she did the other day and she said the death of Hedwig was supposed to represent Harry's loss of innocence.  Personally, I can think of better ways to represent that but that's just me.

Bah that's a pure bullshit answer, but it wouldn't have sounded as clever to say; "Hedwig was a plot device, and like Apparation an 'untraceable messenger owl' like I've used her as in the past eliminates the whole alienation feeling I was going for in the overly-long camping forays... so the owl had to go. Same reason I had to give the characters a 'oh crap they can trace our apparating!' scare."

[Morat20]

Did anyone else feel like she implied in the earlier books that she might resurrect Sirius?  I thought the whole doorway to hell thing was incredibly vague.

I thought it was just a doorway to wherever the dead go. Hell, heaven, whatnot. Wizard version of capital punishment, before they got merciful and just condemned you to a life of having your fucking soul eaten.

[eldaec]

I had no problem with the death of Hedwig and Moody, that was probably the quickest way she could make clear that the death eaters were in the ascendancy, bad shit was going down, and this is IT.

Plus it would have been hard to write Moody as angst filled and as generally useless as the other adults.

Snape was always understandably doomed, but he died like a bitch, right now he's sitting about in literary hell with Mace Windu discussing how much it sucks to discover your author couldn't think of a way to kill you with just a little dignity.

The deaths of Dobby, Fred, Tonks, and Lupin were badly handled though, "oh, we won/got-away, and oh X is now dead, I'm sad".


I didn't feel like Sirius's return was promised. I felt more like she was saying flat out Sirius aint coming back, and Harry is going to whinge about it for a while yet.

[Margalis]

Is whinge actually a word? I see this all the time now. Is it just a poorly-spelled whine?

[Merusk]

The deaths of Dobby, Fred, Tonks, and Lupin were badly handled though, "oh, we won/got-away, and oh X is now dead, I'm sad".

Actually I thought Dobby and Fred were handled pretty well.  Dobby got more attention than Fred, but it was due to when it happened.  Fred's was just fine becuase, hey, war sucks and sometimes that's just how it goes.   Lupin and Tonks, however, were pure shit.  "Everyone's crying around fred.. oh and Lupin and Tonks are dead too."  Fuck, I didn't even realize they WERE dead until Harry's wandering around 'remembering those who died' and they're mentioned again.  I had to backtrack to figure out just what the hell had happened, only to discover it was a throwaway, "Oh they're dead too" line.

THAT is a shitty death.

[Samwise]

Return in the theaters was good, but I only managed to watch the extended 4 hour version once. A lot of it just seemed to be added for the fuck of it in Return, with the only parts I remember being really worth it were the Sauruman death (which the theatrical just totally ignored) and the Mouth of Sauron. Had he added the Scouring of the Shire to the 4 hours, I think I'd have had no problem with it, because that was an important part he left out completely. As it was, the added stuff didn't have the same oomph that the added stuff to Fellowship had.

This sums up exactly how I felt about Return.  Had the scouring been in there it would have been perfect.  Not because I'm a Tolkien nerd who feels their favorite scenes need to be included, but because it closed the Saruman section and closed the journey of how the Hobbits had gone from needing help at every turn to being able to stand on their own.  That said I did enjoy it despite it not being included, I just felt that 10-15 minutes of celebration scenes and jumping up and down could have been dedicated to it and not overly extended it or detracted from the movie.

I'm so glad I'm not the only one who thinks this.   

Also, I agree with pretty much everything people have said above about HP7.

[Phildo]

It's been two years since I read my last Potter book, and all I remember is that I got a very strong impression that Harry would figure out a way to bring Sirius back.  I mean, the door was in the department of mysteries, after all.  I think that I assumed she would have Harry discover exactly what that mystery was after a year or two of being obsessed with it.

[Engels]

One thing that struck me as either incredibly odd, or incredibly British, was her refusal to deal with 17 year old boys' sexuality. Hermione and Ron in the woods being chased by the world and they don't even get a flutter in the groin? Does this woman know any 17 year old boys, ferchrissake? Potter, ok, maybe he's too traumatized to get a boner every 5 min like I did when I was 14-17, but the rest of them? No way.

And I don't think it was because sexuality is too 'adult' for a children's book. I mean, she's got a freakin body count going, what's a nocturnal emission gonna hurt?