The Last Potter

This will be the last post on Harry Potter…evah!

I finished the book this afternoon and was pleasantly pleased with how it all ended up. Since we’re clear of the release date I can talk freely.  Also, I’m putting a break here in case you haven’t read and don’t want to know the intimate details of the final chapter in the drawn out life of Harry Potter and friends.

Ron’s alive and marries Hermoine, has kids. Our boy Harry finally gets his Ginny and has kids named after family, friends and mentors. Snape was the good guy after all and Rowling does it simply and quickly so we can see what has really been going on with Dumbledore behind the doors of his office.

The opening and start of the book is great. We loose Mad Eye Moody at the start which is a bloody terrible thing. I loved his character (even more than Professor McGonagall who is an absolutely awesome character poise and all.) probably more because of the actor in the movies than the books. It sets the tone and send a clear message to the reader.

We’re going to lose a lot of people in the next pile of pages and we better be prepped for the worst. The list (I couldn’t remember) from Chiff.com as follows with my comments.

Professor Charity Burbage‘s death opens the book as she is the  Professor of Muggle Studies and to be honest I had no idea who she was until I read further.  Not a Harry Potter fan, I felt nothing terrible at not knowing.  However, Potter Fans are out there probably sending Fire and Brimstone my way right now.  We also lose Hedwig, which I didn’t even realize until I read it online just moments ago.  I don’t think I paid enough attention and may have dig back to find where the old owl kicks the bucket.  Of course Mad-Eye Moody falls to the ground to die, a terrible ending for such a great character.

Scrimgeour, the Minister of Magic bites the dust to be replaced by a Voldy company man and I really didn’t care about this one which might invite more hate mail from the Harry Potter world.

We lose Gregorovitch a wandmaker and I didn’t care about that one either.  This list is going to get me howlers by the minute.  Grindelwald, the dark wizard who again…don’t care about.

Bathilda Bagshot is killed (she’s some old friend of Dumbledore) to give Harry somewhere to go so the V man can eat him alive but that doesn’t work out very well.  Harry escapes another threat of death!

Dobby get his.  Which I actually felt bad about.  Dobby had gone from annoying to dangerous defender and I hadn’t expected it to make me wince.

Snape is blown away but not because Voldy finds about about his triple agent status.  We get to see more into the mind of the evil V man than ever before and it’s an interesting progression to see just how he got to where he was.

Crabbe, Tonks, Lupin and Fred Weasley die in the Final Battle of Hogwarts which as far as fights go, rocks the house that rocks the party.  We also lose 50 “red shirted” fighting members of Dumbledores Army, Order of the Phoenix and Hogwarts students.

Harry Potter does die but only to kill the part of him that is Voldy.  He meets with Dumbledore in a dream moment where we learn everything we had hoped to learn and more. You would think this would drag, but it doesn’t.  It was nice to see Dumbledore again and to experience his side of the story we’ve been told in and out of the previous pages.

Harry comes out of dream world, helps Malfoys know their son is still alive by whisper, they pronounce him dead, lie to Voldy and escape to find their son.  Harry meanwhile is marched into the school for all the survivors to see and at just the right moment vanishes beneath the cloak, another battle breaks out.  Bellatrix takes one in the chest by way of Mrs. Weasley in the only exchange that takes the language into PG-13 territory with a word that rhymes with witch. The final moment between Voldy and Potter begins and then ends with the Bad Man dead of his own curse.

Overall the books is a solid finish.  The middle literally sucks your soul like a dementor.  It’s great back history and shows you some things you didn’t know before but it takes forever to get there.  This could have used some work, but no book is perfect.

To review.  Opening chapters rock.  Solid foundation laid towards the middle.  Mucho sucko in the middle.  Mucho rocko at the end.  Seeing this movie on the big screen will need a master to compose in making it what it should be on film.

We find out what happens to everyone.  Neville becomes a teacher.  We also are given no ideas as to what happened between the end of the battle and nineteen years later on the 9 3/4 platform.  We’re also given the ability to imagine what happens after that train leaves for Hogwarts with another generation to wizards and witches to be…but something tells me Rowling will solve that problem in time or give someone else the wand to compose the rest of the story.

As for me, I’m happy to see Harry fade away.  It’s been a great run and I’ve enjoyed the books and will maybe enjoy the rest of the movies.  It’s time to move onto bigger and better books.