Harry Potter

Warner Brothers did something horrible. They were, was and are always going to be Warner Bastards, Wasted Brainwork’s, Wanna-Bees, Worthless Boneheads and all those other names I called them. I do not regret sending those Howlers or signing those petitions, nor do I regret my stubborn claim not to go see the movie in theatres, not buying it on DVD, and I still stand by what I said about “screaming like a Mandrake”.

Because I made a stand, for one of the few moments in my pathetic life of shyness, I did it, and it felt so good. I have tons of bottled up anger inside me most of the time that I don’t dare to get out, and then when it comes out… it’s wonderful, although the consequences is much unexpected most of the times. My mum didn’t talk to me for a week once when it happened, although that had nothing to do with Harry Potter, so I might be getting a bit off the point here. Sorry.

Anyway… when I was in Stockholm queuing for The Tales of Beedle the Bard, I really didn’t mean to buy anything at all at first since the Collector’s Edition would be arriving in my mailbox, but then I just thought it would be really retarded, standing there the whole night, queuing for a Harry Potter-book for the first time in my life, and then not buying it. And then there was this girl standing in front of me (Why is there so many girls in the Harry Potter-fandom, anyway? Give us some gender variety, for god’s sake! Come out of your closets or wherever it is you’re hiding, because I know you’re out there. Thank god for Dreaner, I’m just saying… He is one of Sweden’s greatest HP-fans, even though he’s very modest about it, and he is just that, a male!) talking about her hopes of them having Harry, A History, so that she could buy that one as well. Then I just thought, what the hell, why not just go for it? And I did.

Now, The Tales of Beedle the Bard I finished in a flash just like with other HP-books (and there definitely wasn’t any horrible cheating with jumping to The Tale of the Three Brothers or not reading Dumbledore’s comments, because they are just holy, to me anyway), but Harry, A History was more of a slow-read. I was actually grateful for that, because while it was very good, it was something HP-ish that didn’t keep me nailed on one spot until I’ve finished it, and I didn’t cry nor had the usual amount of emotional breakdowns that I usually have while reading the HP-books. Here, finally, was something Harry Potter I could enjoy over some longer course of time. Something to read, to live and feed on until I would have to face the end once again, the fact that HP-books was over.

Too bad that didn’t really work out as I had thought and hoped it would.

Early morning on December 4th to even more early morning on January 11th. That’s what it took me to finish Harry, A History. And about a little less than half the book was read in the course of some hours, during this night when I should really be asleep but now is up writing this and trying to get it off my chest instead. (Usually these things don’t work much, only for a while, and then I’m crying and being depressed all over the place again. Who, me, unstable? Ha.) But never mind, I keep getting slightly off the point. (Although since I wouldn’t be here if it weren’t for Harry Potter, I guess everything coming from me is related to it. “Never underestimate what can save a life.” as the wonderful Aeris put it. Aeris is the awesome authoress of the Pokémon fanfiction Anomaly. Go read it now. I haven’t, since I’m occupied with the miles long Tales of Flame, but they’re linked, so I’ll have to do it eventually anyway, to understand all the insanity that’s going on in Tales of Flame. Now this, this is shameless advertising, so while I’m still at it, we can mention The Story of a Sailor Senshi, Special Generation and A Pirate’s Life for Me. Now this, this is off the point. But still.)

So yeah, the last part of Harry, A History was causing me to break down in tears again. Nothing new these days, but it made me realise a bunch of things in the process, apart from the paralysing, aching knowledge of that it was over again. It never ceases to scare me, that agonizing feeling.

The things I realised were that I have been angry. Really angry. At Warner Bastards, at that stupid Alan Horn, at them ruining the book, at everyone who was not willing to boycott and not go the movie in July 17. But that’s the thing about anger, it dissolves. You get tired of it in the end. And I love Harry Potter from the bottom of my heart, and it would only be stupid to let WB take that away from me. That’s what Immanuel did, tried to stop me from doing the things I liked. And here I’ve thought I had learned after all these years of trying to recover (although I never did, evidently, since I can’t really take the Religion lessons), but now I’m doing just the exact same thing to myself. And that is just sad.

So enough of this. By all means, never stop screaming like a Mandrake. Always hold your ground when it comes to things you think are right. It’s a Harry Potter movie, and that is all it’s ever going to be, and no one should expect anything more than that. It’s not the book, it’s not right and WB do not care about the fans. But that doesn’t stop the movies from being made for the fans and not for the money. All it takes are us knowing that, and then I think WB will know it in the back of their minds too. We pay for Harry Potter, and not for WB, because they don’t deserve our money. Harry Potter, on the other hand, deserves all the money in the world, because it saves and enriches lives everyday. And a human life is worth more than all the money in the world, isn’t it?

Enough of this.

Go watch (it has Snivellus!), and feel that wonderful and familiar feeling of expectation that only Harry Potter can infuse. I felt it for the first time in a long time yesterday, just because I've been angry enough not to let it pull me in. But it's too wonderful to evade, and I feel bad for neglecting what I've been living for, and for the reason to why I survived.