S01E31 — Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows

SPOILER ALERT: This episode and transcript below contains major spoilers for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows.

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Featuring hosts Timothy Haynes, Donna Haynes, Rebekah Edwards, and T. Josiah Haynes.

The series ends, and we — love it? hate it? — you’ll have to listen to find out! We complain about review the book-to-film changes for Deathly Hallows compared to both movies and also cover some fun details about the franchise as a whole.

Don’t miss the final episode in our SUMMER OF POTTER!

Final Verdicts

If you haven’t listened to the episode yet, we recommend waiting to read our verdicts. (But you’re probably grown, so do what you want!)

The Deathly Hallows book offers a deeply layered story with intricate backstory, emotional depth, and careful pacing, while the movies condense key moments, add unnecessary action, and leave out critical explanations. The book captures the essence of sacrifice and hope, while the films lean heavily on visual spectacle.

Tim: The book is better

Donna: The book is better

Rebekah: The book is better

Josiah: The book is better

Full Episode Transcript

Prefer reading? Check out the full episode transcript below. It’s AI-generated from our audio, and if we’re being honest… no one sat to read the entire thing for accuracy. (After all, we were there the whole time.) 😉 We’re sorry in advance for any typos or transcription errors.

[00:00:00] Rebekah: Hey fam, this is the Book is Better podcast. We’re a family of four and we review book to film adaptations. And this is the last episode of The Summer of Potter. We’re 

[00:00:11] Josiah: sad to see it go, but so exciting. 

[00:00:14] Rebekah: We are we’re recording this in the evening and I thought, you know, we got to start it with kind of a like a really exciting like new announcer vibe.

I’m trying to like channel my inner Joe Rogan or he does the announcements for that weird stuff where people hit each other in the face, right? Can I do that? Did I do good? It was that good. 

[00:00:33] Tim: What is that? The slap thing? 

[00:00:36] Rebekah: No, slap fighting. No, I think he’s the announcer for, I, I, MMA, but I don’t remember what that’s called.

But anyway, which is irrelevant to this clean podcast in which we almost never punch each other in the face. And if we do, you don’t even see it because we’re not in the same room. 

[00:00:53] Josiah: It’s true. Good point. All 

[00:00:55] Rebekah: right. As we introduce ourselves for the last of these exciting episodes, um, I do want to say thank you guys so much for those of you who have joined our free discord.

Details on that in the episode description. It has been really fun to do this experience, uh, getting questions from all of you and just, you know, You know, engaging with the audience. What are you going to do? And, uh, I also wanted to say thanks cause we’ve gotten a couple of really good, uh, five star reviews recently.

If you have the time writing us a review on the, um, Apple podcasts or audible app, man, those are so helpful. They are really encouraging. You can also rate us five stars on. And you know what, if you want to rate us one star, like whatever, it’s, we’re recording this in the evening. This is like a different feeling that I have right now.

So do whatever you want, but like really make it five stars. 

[00:01:43] Tim: You’re less needy in the evening is, but 

[00:01:45] Rebekah: yeah, I don’t know, maybe. So as we introduce ourselves, we like to give a fun fact. And so this time we’re going to use a listener question as our fun fact. And I am going to Uh, kind of shift it when I answer.

So the question is, what do you think the most emotional part in the Harry Potter book or movie series is? Like what hits you the most? Well, she said Hallows, but you know, maybe the series. It’s up to you. I’ll let you play with it however you will. Not necessarily your favorite moment, but the moment that evokes the most emotion probably.

So I would say, um, my name is Rebecca. I am the daughter slash sister of the family slash podcast. And I think KVON 212 that the most emotional part is probably the death of Dobby. I watched that part again today in Deathly Hallows part one. And I think you’d be hard pressed to find a spot that’s worse than that, emotional wise, negative emotional wise.

I guess emotional could be positive, too. Um, Dobby’s death is really, really tough. But, I do have a very positive but emotional memory of enjoying the Harry Potter series, though, that I wanted to share. As part of this fun fact, it did happen in the real world, the muggle world, if you will. Uh, when I was a, I think junior, no, I’m sorry.

I was, yeah, I was a junior in college and I had my first part time job doing what I thought was going to be my dream job. The thing I do forever and always. And I lost that job. It was not a good experience. Dad was in fact there when I lost the job. And as an adult, I sat and cried in his lap about it. It was not a, not a happy experience, but I went home to my parents who, where I did not live, but for about a week, I think in a half, I just spent time with them trying to process and heal.

And during that week and a half, Deathly Hallows part two is released in theaters. And, uh, my mom, who also dyed part of her hair purple that week with me, uh, in solidarity as I was getting over. 

[00:03:59] Josiah: You said she also died and I was worried for a second. 

[00:04:02] Rebekah: She’s on the podcast with us right now. She is alive at this very moment.

In fact, uh, mom dyed her hair purple with me, but she and I went to the mall. We bought some Harry Potter gear. Hers was a really cool t shirt that says muggle that I honestly hope that she still has somewhere I haven’t seen it in a long time. I do. And I bought this really cute Gryffindor zip up hoodie that I’ve unfortunately lost.

Depressing. Um, but we went to the opening night. I don’t know if it was a midnight showing, but it was a late night showing of, uh, Deathly Hallows part two. And I found the post about it on Facebook and the photo of it. So maybe mom will post that photo to you in the, in the discord or on 

[00:04:38] Donna: our social media 

[00:04:39] Rebekah: so you can just enjoy that with us.

And 

[00:04:42] Donna: I’d not read a word of any book or seen any other film. Are you kidding? 

[00:04:47] Rebekah: Yeah, not 

[00:04:48] Donna: kidding. Did I know that? 

[00:04:50] Rebekah: I don’t know. Man, that’s a, that’s some good motherly support right there, so. I was willing. It was a great experience. 

[00:04:56] Donna: Yeah. Well, my name is Donna. I am the wife and mom of this little gene pool. Um, I said over and over and I’ve just said it, I know I just said it to at least two podcasts ago.

I’m emotional. So these are hard to pick one. Um, I think that one of the most, whether it hits one, number one, I’m not positive. One of the most emotional scenes in the film, in the films is at the end of Deathly Hallows During Snape’s memories. Where Harry sees himself in the crib and Severus is holding Lily’s dead body.

And he’s crying. Mm, mm. And I have crazy and I’m just nuts over that. It is so, Sad, and knowing all that I knew about, about Snape up to that time, and then seeing these memories pull a lot of things together. That was just a super emotional, uh, thing. I told you a little bit in, you know, in, um, Half Blood Prince, no, I’m so sorry, In Order of the Phoenix, I did share that the scene where Sirius dies the first time I read it.

And then I just about lost it because I did not see it coming. Um, that’s a super emotional thing for me. In the books, that probably would be the book memory. The book memory scene that, that gets me. So, um, but I enjoy them. Each of the books has something in them. You know, the eras, they just have a lot in them that, that evoke good emotions, bad emotions, laughter.

Um, yeah. And, and, uh, that’s one reason I like the series so much. 

[00:06:50] Tim: Well, my name is Tim, AKA the elder man, crux of the matter today. Um, and for me, it’s actually a very new memory. A new part that for me, because I just finished listening to Deathly Hallows and it is where Creature leads the house elves to fight against Lord Voldemort for Master Regulus.

It is, it is a very emotional spot for me and I was just, I caught it today and I thought, wow, that’s, that’s just great. 

[00:07:28] Rebekah: That is so good. I’m bummed that that was left out of the movie. I understand why, but man, that was really good. 

[00:07:35] Josiah: Yeah, Regulus really lost a lot from book to movie. He was a great part of the books.

Well, I’m Josiah. I’m the brother, son. I would say the most emotional part in the books and movies, if I’m just going by the last movie. I’ll try and stick to the last movie. I think in the book, it really struck me when Lupin and Tonks died. It was pretty sudden. 

[00:08:03] All: Ugh. 

[00:08:04] Josiah: That was And I didn’t expect it, even though I had seen the movie.

That’s how badly the movie adapted it. I didn’t even notice that Tonks and Lupin died in the Battle of Hogwarts. So it was 

[00:08:14] Rebekah: shocking because I don’t think I caught it when I was watching the film like I had to look for it But like we had said last time it was hard to recognize them because they didn’t like really look all the same So 

[00:08:25] Josiah: but having them have a child Really fleshed out in the books The, you know, what are we going to do with this kid sort of thing and then both of them are taken, you know, you immediately think of, of Teddy.

[00:08:39] Tim: Yeah, I was, I was glad that in the, in the movie, um, that when Rick, when, um, Lupin comes back as the ghost type. Memory. Mm. He, he does say, you know, that his son will, will grow up and eventually, uh, people will tell him why his parents died. So I was, I was glad for that, at least, that they did make reference to that.

That was, that was nice, but it was a very emotional thing. I agree. 

[00:09:07] Josiah: But from the movies, I think that maybe a good emotional part. The movies, the last movie did a good job of. Neville pulling a sort of Gryffindor out of the sorting hat to kill Nagini. Very heroic, very goose bumpy sort of moment. That was a 

[00:09:25] Rebekah: very epic moment.

[00:09:27] Josiah: That was, I think we were at the midnight showing. I think that was, everyone was Hootin and Harrah in. 

[00:09:33] Rebekah: Oh yeah. For good reason, for sure. 

[00:09:34] Josiah: Thank you. Kayvon 2 1 2. 

[00:09:36] Rebekah: Thank you Kayvon. We appreciate it. Dad, would you like to, uh, get into Sure. What this book is about though? 

[00:09:42] Tim: Okay. So for the plot summary, the last book and two Harry Potter films span the time that had the dark Lord not come to power.

Harry would’ve completed his magical education. Instead, he, Ron and Hermione set out to locate and destroy the hor cruxes, keeping Voldemort alive, holding his soul in so many different places along the way, they learn about the Deathly Hallows. Three objects that, when possessed together, can make one Master of Death.

After narrowly missing Capture and Death during this journey as the trio breaks into the Ministry of Magic, Gringotts and Hogwarts, the three join forces with Tim. Dumbledore’s army and the Order of the Phoenix to defeat Voldemort once and for all during the final battle of Hogwarts. The story ends with an epilogue, 19 years later, at which point we learn that Harry, Ginny, Ron, and Hermione are dead.

And their children are there getting ready to go to Hogwarts as students in a world that is now free of the Dark Lord Voldemort. Ta da! 

[00:10:58] Rebekah: Alright, well, we are covering changes that occur between, uh, Deathly Hallows the book and both Deathly Hallows films, so we are going to cover Uh, both movies in this, we do have some plot and timeline changes and a couple of things under characterization.

We are cutting setting changes this time, uh, just for time because we want to talk about some really awesome stuff about the series as a whole as we, uh, wrap up everything here. 

[00:11:23] Tim: And we’re going to try to get through this unlike the films, not having to break it into two massive parts. Um, We’ll see. For plot timeline changes, the film adds a scene near the beginning in which Hermione casts a memory charm on her parents, demonstrating the nature of the charm by showing her disappearing from photos in their home.

Just before she sets off to meet the others in the book. We only learn of this during dialogue between Harry, Ron and Hermione later. This was a very emotional scene though. Very well done. I actually really 

[00:11:59] Rebekah: liked this in the film. Yeah, I thought it was really powerful and pretty short to be so powerful.

[00:12:04] Josiah: Well, in the book, there is an extensive subplot about the life and lies of Albus Dumbledore by Rita Skeeter. One of my favorite parts of the early book. And I think very interesting. For multiple reasons, Harry is frequently consumed by his distress in learning so many secrets he wishes Dumbledore had shared with him.

It really colors his feelings towards the headmaster throughout the entire book. The film shows the book cover in a newspaper article, and while we learn of Grindelwald and Dumbledore’s familiarity and meet Ariana, both in Deathly Hallows Part 2, the Skeeter expose is not explored in the same way as it is in the books.

Not extensive at all. 

[00:12:46] Rebekah: What do you guys think of that? 

[00:12:47] Josiah: I just think it was one of the more interesting parts of the last book. You had Dumbledore die at the end of the last story. I think this is a very interesting and understandable way to deal with it, where Dumbledore does not stop being a character.

[00:13:03] Donna: Similar to other films in the series, the Dursleys are cut entirely from both Hallow’s movies. In the book, two lesser members of the Order come to retrieve Harry’s uncle. And in the first film of The First Hallows, we see just Harry alone in an empty house before other Order members come to escort him away.

Um, it eliminates, I hate this. There’s a such, there’s this touching moment. between Dudley and Harry and I like, I can see it in my head. I can imagine it in the movie because I kept thinking, isn’t that, isn’t that there? But it’s not. He starts out there alone. Um, but it’s really cool because Dudley He doesn’t understand why Harry’s not coming with them and he wants to stay with them.

I mean, it, it was just a really cool wrap up to their story after all that time to see Dudley just be like, why aren’t you coming? And then to reach out and like hug him to embrace him. It was just really cool. Um, so I’m sorry that’s not there. I’m assuming. It just had to do with more characters because they were at the house.

They’re already there at the set. Yeah, 

[00:14:22] Rebekah: they don’t get cut cut because you see them leaving the house. I was more referring to the fact they’re not in the second one, but they do get cut. You’re correct. Like we cut the touching scene. 

[00:14:31] Donna: Yeah. 

[00:14:32] Rebekah: I believe it’s a deleted scene. I did just look it up. I’m watching it right now.

I’ve never seen any of these deleted scenes. 

[00:14:38] Josiah: Oh, no way. I, they, they pop up on my Facebook reels, my Instagram reels. I’ve seen them multiple times, especially this one. 

[00:14:47] Rebekah: That’s so interesting. So the first part of the deleted scene. Petunia stands in the in the living room and says, I haven’t left this house in 20 years.

And then he like Harry says something about how like, they’ll come for you basically if you stay. And then as they’re getting in the car, Dudley says the thing about being confused as to why he’s not going with them. So as Josiah has pointed out several times throughout the series. A lot of the only, um, like, fights come in the form of two wands having red and green meat.

Uh, in the books this is like a really consistently used device. Harry uses the spell Expelliarmus starting at the end of Goblet of Fire where he and Voldemort have their wands meet. Uh, that’s where the red spark comes from, and the green is from the Avada Kedavra spell. And so, throughout Hallows, Expelliarmus is something that the other Order members point out as an ongoing device to Harry.

Like, hey, when you use this, the Death Eaters know that you’re the one casting the spell. And, um, that’s how they identify him on the flying trip over to what is in the movie. It’s the borough, but in the book, it’s something else. Um, they go to many locations and then meet at the borough later. And so in the film, the Death Eaters identify Harry in the sky because Hedwig attacks them to protect Harry.

She was flying free rather than kept in a cage like she was in the book. And in the movie, like, there are more wand meeting scenes at the end, which you will hear us talk about during this episode. But, uh, anyway, the whole, like, use of Expelliarmus isn’t used as a device to explain, like, Harry. That’s, it’s not like his signature spell in the movies like it was in the book.

[00:16:40] Josiah: Well, Rebecca, there was a listener question from at Deborah. To do with that scene. Was Hedwig a pointless sacrifice or a necessary plot device? 

[00:16:52] Rebekah: I hated it that Hedwig died, obviously. Yes. But I think if Hedwig had been alive there, there could have been a lot of things that would’ve been simplified that for the purpose of how JK needed to write the plot, like would’ve been, it would’ve been too easy just to send Hedwig on missions like.

to contact people and stuff like that. 

[00:17:13] Tim: I prefer the way they did it in the movie as opposed to the book. In the book, she’s still in the cage and accidentally gets hit by a spell and, and she doesn’t have anything to do. In the movie, she’s attacking them and she, she gets killed while she’s protecting Harry.

I personally That is actually 

[00:17:32] Donna: a good point. 

[00:17:33] Tim: Yeah, I personally think that She’s probably taken out because it was easier. 

[00:17:39] Donna: Okay, I have a different take on this. I think it was a necessary plot point because as much as we want to focus on the theme of the series being The power of sacrificial love, self sacrificing love, and that, that trope.

Another theme that goes along with that is death. She deals, she has so much death in this series, and I think it’s a hand in hand. And so where you were saying, had we could have gone on missions, I was thinking she’s so recognizable that she would be so easily tracked. What would they do with her? And so 

[00:18:24] Rebekah: that up in book five, that’s actually 

[00:18:26] Donna: how do you handle that?

But I still think the biggest thing, especially for the book, I think the biggest, thing about her death is, basically, other than Ron and Hermione, Harry had to be stripped of everybody else closest to him to develop. But it is the way that it was developed, for certain. It was also very brave of them to take on in the movie the death of an animal.

Because movies That’s very true. Movies are very about how they handle animal death. Moviegoers don’t like 

[00:18:58] Tim: death of animals, that’s true. Yeah, 

[00:19:00] Donna: so, kudos to them to handle it that way. 

[00:19:03] Tim: Alrighty, well, moving along. Book Voldemort’s wand causes Harry’s wand to shoot golden magic that Harry doesn’t recognize.

Uh, when their wands meet in the air in the great escape from Harry’s Home at the Dursley’s. Harry insists throughout the book that this was magic his wand had never produced and that this signaled something was off about the connection between the twin wands, though other adult wizards claim this is impossible.

It’s one thing Harry wishes Dumbledore was around to talk about, as Dumbledore understood that connection more than anyone. In the film, Harry gets away from Voldemort after his wand breaks, but Harry is continually saying throughout this, I didn’t make that happen. And everybody keeps saying, oh, you just did magic, you know, and your wand was used to it.

And he said, no, it was the wand itself that did the magic. 

[00:19:57] Josiah: I like the irony that In the book, he wishes Dumbledore were around to talk about it, but if Dumbledore were around to talk about it, then there would be no Elder Wand problem. 

[00:20:08] Donna: Yeah, very 

[00:20:08] Josiah: true. 

[00:20:09] Donna: True. Yeah, um, well, the book chapter, The Ghoul in Pajamas, details the length to which Ron and his brother, Brothers and father have gone to, to protect information about Ron’s whereabouts when he leaves to go with Harry and hunt cor cruxes.

Um, it’s not in the film, nor is it clear that Ron being absent from school would be a major issue for the Weasley family, or that the story is to be that Hermione goes into hiding as a muggle born and Harry will be thought to travel alone. And I, I thought this. For the book reader, like you get, you know, what’s going on, but they take that time to show Hermione in that very emotional scene, but they don’t take the time to show that Ron went to lengths as well to protect his family and to try to throw off the story.

And so I was, again, you can’t put the whole book into a film. And I know that’s a broken record. And maybe the, maybe this wouldn’t have really bought any, anything for the, for the whole thing of the movie, for the whole feel of the movie. But um, it was kind of, it was clever to transform the ghoul was into it.

He was, he said something like, yeah, he’s kind of getting used to it now and he is a 

[00:21:35] Rebekah: little, he’s 

[00:21:36] Donna: up there in my pajamas. He just 

[00:21:37] Rebekah: got out of the attic. Yeah. Yeah. I think that, I understand why they didn’t include the ghoul part and all of that. Yeah. I do think that it was interesting that we basically lost.

We lost all of the wedding preparations where you see Molly Weasley like progressively becoming more anxious and there was like this thing I connected with in the books now where as a mom, she is just like. Like you kind of know she knows they have to go but she’s so terrified because Ron her son and Harry who basically is her son That she feels like it’s her son like that They’re going to go and risk their lives and you you miss out on all of that and like how Ron’s dad kind of Gets it, but he understands.

I don’t know It’s just there’s some stuff there that I think maybe it’s only appropriate for the book But I did think was Really good character development and really like it like raised the stakes for more reasons than the broader like, oh, the wizarding world will be in trouble if you don’t help it raise the stakes to also be like, like, people care about you if you die, like it will matter.

It will matter so much. 

[00:22:42] Tim: I have a suggestion for re, for re editing the movie, uh, there’s quite a lot of time that they spend in the tent traveling where you’re, it’s just kind of, we’re walking around, putting up the defenses and we’re not doing much of anything. And I know part of that is, part of that is to make them, make it feel like they’re lonely and all alone and all that kind of stuff that.

I think, you know, you could have taken 45 seconds of that stuff and added some of this other stuff in. 

[00:23:13] Josiah: Yeah, I mean, you were talking about wedding preparations. Once we get to the actual wedding of Bill Weasley and Fleur Delacour, in the film Harry does not disguise himself as a Weasley. Whereas in the book, which is so 

[00:23:25] Rebekah: weird, 

[00:23:26] Josiah: yeah, that is actually wild.

Madame Maxime appears in the film Wedding Only, and we see only a portion of the reception, rather than the entire wedding day as in the book. Victor Crum is not at the film wedding, except in deleted footage.

[00:23:50] Rebekah: So kind of moving forward, um, we don’t know in the film really that Remus and Tonks are having a baby. That’s not like made plain. In the book scene, Remus shares with Harry around this time, and I don’t remember if it’s at, like, Harry’s birthday party in the book, which is not in the film, like, the night before the wedding or whatever, that they are having a baby.

There is this little moment in the film where Tonks goes, Harry, uh, and, like, gets cut off, but, like, she never finishes her sentence. And then, like, we’re kind of, I think we’re supposed to know as book readers that that’s what she’s talking about. And then later on in, in the book, when Remus comes to Grimald Place, which, again, doesn’t happen in the film, He asks Harry to be the godfather to his child, Teddy.

Um, because Tonks and Remus Lupin both die in this book right after Teddy is born, that’s actually pretty significant because in the final scene, like the 19 years later scene, it’s mentioned that Teddy’s like at their house all the time basically because he’s the godfather and he’s practically like a member of the family.

Apparently, there is a deleted scene where Lupin does talk to Harry about this. I have an offer from Old Place location. 

[00:24:55] Tim: I have an offer. You okay? You okay? You can’t 

[00:24:59] All: refuse

[00:25:03] Donna: and you forgot at the, in the 19 year epilogue, 19 years later, that one of Harry’s kids runs bike. James runs bike and says. I saw, I saw Teddy, he was kissing, uh, snogging or Snogging or Kissing Vic. Yeah. That’s what they call making out. 

[00:25:19] Tim: Yeah. 

[00:25:20] Donna: Snogging. Vicis. Yeah, I know . Wow. We also learned in the book that the death eaters find the trio really quickly after leaving the wedding.

Due to the taboo on saying Voldemort’s name. So they, they say it when you’re reading through the book, they say it, they don’t, they don’t realize that immediately. They find out later in the book. It’s when Ron comes back, right? They find that later, but in the film. They’re still, they’re still found right away, like the, as soon as they go sit down in the little cafe or whatever, the guys come in and Harry notices one of them is, has actually has a wand in his pocket or something, but it, but it’s never explained how that happened, like, you know, and it was kind of interesting because it’s, it’s another little bit of tension.

because they’re like, could you still have the trace? Well, no, you’re 17. The trace breaks. That doesn’t count. Well, what could it be? What could it be? This thing going to be. And so I thought it created a little bit of extra tension around what was going on, which, which I thought was effective, but you know, 

[00:26:28] Rebekah: I do think it’s confusing.

Although I will say it does seem to be like, the filmmakers did at least kind of Give a little like head shake over to the book readers because in the film, Hermione says Voldemort’s name. Yes. And she says it and you can see the door to the coffee shop like in the background behind her head. Yeah. And then within a few seconds, basically just long enough to disappear somewhere.

The two people enter where like they are at the coffee shop. Um, so it’s like on that side, maybe it is a little confusing though, because I thought in the book it was a really helpful explanation as to this is why you, you know, it was really brilliant because it had to do with the fact that only people who were not really as afraid of Voldemort were willing to say his real name.

And I thought it was really good. And it is confusing in the movie because it’s like. There’s no reason that you would find them in the middle of a muggle street. So, um, now magic specific issue, uh, this is not actually a movie problem. This is only a book problem. Um, one of my most annoying continuity errors that I have found is that in the book, they’re in the coffee shop.

They’ve, um, stunned the death eaters or whatever. And Hermione. They, they’re talking about casting a memory charm on the Death Eaters and Hermione claims that she’s never cast a memory charm, but knows the theory and then obliviates the Death Eaters. But this can’t be true because she’s already told them in the book.

And we saw in the movie that she erased herself from her parents memory at the beginning of this book. 

[00:28:02] Josiah: Roasted. 

[00:28:03] Donna: So, J. K. Rowling, when you listen to this podcast in the future, because I’m sure at some point You’re gonna hear it. I mean, it will be the most famous podcast in the world. 

[00:28:12] Tim: You can, yes. Next time you can just, you can just say, jk, we’re, we’re like close.

We’re like this close. Yeah. 

[00:28:19] Donna: So just be admonished 

[00:28:22] Tim: Yes. 

[00:28:22] Donna: To do a better job. at getting that little piece of magic right. 

[00:28:26] Tim: Okay, here is a plot timeline, uh, change that I’m sorry that, that the film made. Ugh. Creature’s explanation of Regulus backstory is never seen in the film, although in the book we learn a whole lot about how Master Regulus decided to take Voldemort down and asked for his help, for Creature’s help, in retrieving the locket Horcrux from the cave where Harry and Dumbledore had found the fake.

We also find out that Creature never successfully destroyed it even though it was Regulus last command before his valiant death to allow Creature to live, and that this failure is one reason the house elf has gone half mad. In the movies, Creature isn’t seen or mentioned after their short stint at 12 Grimold Place, and the softening of the three characters and the house elf isn’t explored.

Which is really too bad, 

[00:29:23] Donna: but we had no spew either, so it doesn’t mean anything. 

[00:29:27] Josiah: Yeah, but Regulus’s story is so powerful in the book. 

[00:29:31] Tim: It’s, Oh, it’s so good. It takes a while for them to figure out, you know, the, the initials that they find. And once they find them, it’s really satisfying to find out the whole story.

And it really, 

[00:29:44] Rebekah: I will just say if you’ve never read this, What actually, like, Creature explains is that Regulus, who was Sirius Black’s older brother, correct? 

[00:29:53] Tim: Younger. 

[00:29:54] Rebekah: Younger brother, sorry. He was his younger brother, but he was always like a very good pureblood. He acted like a pureblood. He was actually a Death Eater, but Sirius says earlier in the series, like, we don’t know where, what happened to him.

He seems to have been killed. Shortly after Voldemort, like, gained a lot of his power. So Creature shares that Master Regulus found out that he was creating horcruxes and took Creature with him to that cave that Dumbledore and Harry were at in the previous book. Um, basically, he drinks the stuff like Dumbledore did and he replaced the locket with that fake one that they found.

Took the real locket and it, and the, the trio expects creature to say, Oh, and then he, like, then they got confused cause they’re like, wait, aren’t you supposed to be dead? Cause that’s what Voldemort did. He would use house elves and let them die in his place. And there’s, it doesn’t matter. There’s like a lot of details in there.

And then you find out Regulus didn’t want Creature to die, so Regulus allowed himself to be dragged into the water of the Black Lake by all of the Inferi, and Creature was able to apparate out of the cave, which Voldemort didn’t think about, because he never thought about lesser creatures than him. Um, and then Creature wasn’t able to destroy the locket, so.

Anyway, there’s this like, it’s so beautiful and touching and I cry like it’s very touching. 

[00:31:08] Tim: Yeah, Voldemort had used Creature to drink the water to make sure that it, you know, it would do what he was expecting. And then he put the locket in and put the potion in. He expected Voldemort 

[00:31:20] Rebekah: left Creature to die, 

[00:31:22] Tim: but Regulus had said, come back home.

So he did. He, he disapparated and came back home. And that’s when Regulus said, Oh, no, this is what he’s doing is wrong. And so he went and exchanged the locket, but this time he drank the potion and creature had to watch him be dragged into the water. 

[00:31:43] Donna: It’s so sad, 

[00:31:44] Tim: but it’s a, it’s a storyline I think that would have, would have helped a lot.

They just kind of kept creature as this bad character that has no redeeming value, but the book gets 

[00:31:56] Rebekah: a little better, deepens 

[00:31:58] Tim: it beautifully. 

[00:31:59] Rebekah: He does go after Mundungus earlier. Yeah, he does go after Mundungus and gets him because Mundungus had stolen the locket before, like, away from Kreacher. We also find out that it was actually mentioned in book five when they were cleaning out Grimmauld Place.

Um, but yeah, in the book he comes back, like we said, to lead the house elves against Voldemort and that’s not discussed at all. And 

[00:32:19] Donna: they also throw Dobby in there with him when they come back with Mundungus. I’m like, Wasted all this other time that you, Dobby was so important and now you have to throw him in because we’re going to see him get the axe or shortly, 

[00:32:34] Rebekah: like, ah.

So one of the things I don’t, uh, I understand why, but I don’t love that it gets cut is the three of them actually take a lot of time to plot their plans and take a lot of safety measures before they just kind of barrel into things. Um, they cut a lot of that in the film and instead we just see long extended scenes of them in the middle of nowhere doing nothing, which I understand is supposed to signify the passage of time, but like they spent a month getting ready to break into the ministry.

They basically look like they just like find three random ministry workers, knock them out, and then they’re like, well, what are we going to do when we get in? And they’re like, I don’t, we don’t know. Like, we’ll just hope for the best. They spent a month figuring this out. And it’s like, I’d rather have done the passage of time for them.

Not made them look irresponsible because they weren’t. They tried really hard to take this job seriously, like to take their prep, their mission seriously. 

[00:33:33] Donna: Ron’s splinching episode after the escape from the ministry. is much less severe in the film. In the book, much of his arm was entirely left behind from his body, and it takes him several days to heal, even through healing, even with healing potions.

Um, it was very uncomfortable. 

[00:33:58] Rebekah: It does look gross in the film. Yeah, they do make it gross. But it just looks like he has several strips of skin that have been, like, pulled off of his arm almost. Um, In the book, it, like, sounds more like he’s missing significant parts of, like, muscle mass and stuff. It was pretty bad.

[00:34:12] Donna: Yeah, and it does make sense that it’s a bad injury because that, that’s kind of the catalyst for him getting so irritable so fast. Because it’s not just them doing this together, it’s that he’s hurting and weak from the injury, so. 

[00:34:31] Josiah: Well, let me tell you, they made it a little better for Ron in the movie for that, but here they made it a little worse for him.

Harry and Hermione share a dance in the film after Ron leaves in a fit of anger. In the book, the two barely even talk during Ron’s absence, and Harry spends most of his time staring at Ginny’s name on the Marauders map. 

[00:34:53] Rebekah: But she does do once in the film, like, it’s not like they cut that 100%, but he, it’s like a week’s go by kind of thing.

Uh, thoughts on this? This is one of the most controversial, I think, parts of this. 

[00:35:06] Tim: I did not care for their dance. I thought that it was strangely inappropriate and weird, a weird connection. I understood he was trying to lighten the mood or whatever. And, uh, Daniel Radcliffe is a weird dancer. 

[00:35:24] Rebekah: Yeah, it looks awkward.

I thought, I remember watching the movie for the first time in the theater and kind of thinking, Are they about to make them kiss? Yeah, that’s exactly what it looked like. I thought it always felt so romantic. And there was a little more of a hint to like people thinking this might happen in the, in the movies.

Like from time to time, I think it’s just so odd because there’s, it almost gives you the sense that the thing that Ron is scared of, which is that Hermione would want Harry instead of him, right? The thing that Ron is scared of, it’s like he leaves and in the film it kind of looks like 

[00:36:01] Tim: Harry tries 

[00:36:02] Rebekah: to be like, Oh good, he’s out of the way, I can do exactly what Ron’s afraid I want to do.

And I know that like some people are like, Oh, it’s not supposed to be romantic. Okay, well then pull out a deck of cards and be like, Hey, Hermione, I know you’re upset. Like come sit with me, like play a game. Let’s do something to take our mind off. Like do something that’s anything other than a dance would have been less romantic and like 

[00:36:25] Tim: awkward.

There were games that they played in the common room in earlier books. That would have been a perfectly fine thing to do. Let’s let’s let’s take our minds off what we’re doing and let’s just do this fun little thing that would have been less awkward. I agree. When Harry and Hermione visit Godric’s Hollow of the book, they use Polyjuice potion to disguise themselves as muggles from another nearby village.

But in the film, they go in as themselves. And while Hermione protests that they should have used Polyjuice, Harry states that he doesn’t want to return as someone else. This is in dramatic contrast to their careful planning and disguises as they know how significant a location Godric’s Hollow was. To not only Harry and Dumbledore, but to Voldemort as well.

This is a strange decision for the movie. This 

[00:37:16] Rebekah: was an eye roll moment for me. 

[00:37:19] Donna: I’m glad they included Godric’s Hollow. I’m glad that they went back to the Potter’s house to see that. Like, I liked having that visual in the movie, but to go back as themselves was just bizarre. 

[00:37:33] Josiah: Yeah, that is an eye roll moment.

Well, the Godric’s Hollow scene in the film And in the book, you as the reader don’t figure it out until near the end of the scene as Nagini reveals herself. The book scene also ends with a narrow escape, as in, seconds. In which Harry and Hermione disapparate just as Voldemort arrives. Whereas the film doesn’t show Voldemort in this scene at all.

This is one of my favorite scenes from the book. That is just a nothing burger in the movie. 

[00:38:09] Rebekah: Honestly, I agree. When Ron comes back in the book, he brings with him, uh, knowledge about a radio show called Potterwatch, but the Potterwatch show is not in the films. Instead, Ron from the very beginning of their travels just has a radio.

It’s the one that Harry and Hermione listened to when they danced. It’s the one that they listen to while they’re walking through a half burned out trailer park for some reason, uh, where it’s like they’re reading names of people who have died, um, at, I believe, at the hands of the Death Eaters. So in the book, this is actually really cool because, uh, they start listening and it’s during a pretty, I’m gonna say a pretty dark moment, um, During their thing, during their travels.

And I think it’s during one of the moments where they’re starting, they’ve started to wonder, like, is it just us? Like is this all over and it’s just us left and we’re the only ones that care or are fighting. And instead they hear this program that Ron’s been trying to find that you have to have a password and you have to tap on the radio, you know, to find it.

And it’s a bunch of their friends talking about updates in the war against Voldemort. And honestly, it is, It’s such a good moment. It’s very weird to me that they don’t use the radio for this. Like, they already had the actors that were being paid to do the films, and like, I don’t know, the radio, the way they switched the use of the radio just felt like a very Unnecessary change that I don’t think brought anything good to the film.

[00:39:43] Tim: I agree. 

[00:39:44] Donna: So, Hermione is passionate all throughout the books, uh, the last two books about the fact that the Deathly Hallows cannot exist. As soon as they come across the Hallows, she starts into this, no, it’s, it’s 

[00:40:00] Tim: just a fairy tale. It’s a 

[00:40:01] Donna: fairy tale. It’s horcruxes. We, we got to stay with the horcruxes. But in the film, she’s less opposed to the idea.

It’s just not made as big. Also, Ron’s curiosity about whether or not Harry’s cloak is the same one from the story is implied, but they don’t ever fully discuss it in the film in the same way they do in the book. In general, these ongoing discussions about the Hallows are almost entirely cut. And the three are caught by Snatchers immediately upon leaving the Love Goods rather than much later while they’re in the tent.

Part of this topic that bugs me, because they made Hermione much less concerned about this, you lose the fact that Hermione is a manipulative person. She said she wanted to go to the Love Goods, and then after they went to the Love Goods, she’s kind of like, Well, I just said that because we needed to do something and there’s several parts throughout these, the, the last book, there’s several parts of her dialogue with Harry and Ron that just reminded me more and more when I go back and think about the previous books.

She is very clever, besides being book smart, and she can manipulate them to do anything. Like, she’s all about following the rules until she comes up with the polyjuice potion in Chamber of Secrets. And then she’s all about following the rules until she cooks up the plan to take Umbridge out in the forest and possibly get her killed.

Like, they didn’t know that. They didn’t know what would happen. And so I think the change from book to movie here, it really cuts down on showing you how Hermione really tries to control things from the point of her cleverness. 

[00:42:07] Tim: What’s the title of the book? 

[00:42:09] Donna: Hermione and the 

[00:42:10] Tim: Deathly Hallows. Yeah, so we make them very unimportant.

I mean, I like the little, I like the little animated thing in the film. Yeah, I love the way 

[00:42:19] Rebekah: they did the story. 

[00:42:20] Tim: But it’s like, I, when I first watched it, And then read, read the book, it’s like, is this about Horcruxes or is this about the Deathly Hallows? Because it’s titled Deathly Hallows, but that’s not very important because we’re talking about Horcruxes.

[00:42:36] Rebekah: Yeah, they try to make it important when they talk to Ollivander later on, but like, I think the point is it just, it just feels like the Deathly Hallows were kind of a non issue. And in the book it’s, it’s a huge deal because the point is Harry has to decide Hallows or Horcruxes. Right. Hallows or Horcruxes.

And the ultimate decision that he has to make is like, I have to trust when I can’t see if Dumbledore wanted me to follow. the clues and gather the deathly hallows. He would have told me about that rather than making sure I knew about the horcruxes. And like you had, he had to trust and sacrifice his own, you know, wishes, um, and, and hope that his trust was not misplaced.

[00:43:24] Donna: The reason That the hallows are so critical to me, I get is Dumbledore discovered these as a younger man and he and Grindelwald that that’s when they began to discover them and the decisions he made at that point in his life led to his sister’s death because of their foolishness. I mean, at the point that they got into the big fight.

Where Ariana was killed, they weren’t having a whole lot of trouble. You know, they weren’t, they had just gotten to the point where their opinions were starting to differ resulted in the death of his sister. It caused him not to seek after more power. And in that big conversation at the end of the film, where he tells Harry, I foolishly thought that I was powerful enough.

to destroy that thing, and it led to me dying before I maybe needed to. 

[00:44:20] Rebekah: But then you also cut, you cut the stuff about his family. Yeah. 

[00:44:24] Tim: Moving along, Wormtail’s poignant death at his own hand that he was gifted by Voldemort is not seen in the film. After Wormtail is disarmed by Dobby at Malfoy Manor, we don’t see Pettigrew again in the films, but we also aren’t made aware that he’s dead.

I felt like I liked that scene in the book so much that I actually had visualized it to the point that I was certain it was in the movie. And then I watched the movie and it’s like, wait a minute, it’s not there. That must have just been my visualization. So I’m sorry worst 

[00:44:58] Rebekah: part, I think, of the way that they did it was that Not only is it not in the film, they’re in the middle of this very dark scene because Hermione’s being tortured like literally Bellatrix is carving a word into her arm, mudblood.

It’s really, really dark, really heavy. And they try to make it this tiny bit of comic relief because I just rewatched it. And what happens is Dobby knocks him and Wormtail goes, Oh no. And then falls forward onto his face. It’s like, so it’s like funny, but not well. I 

[00:45:32] Josiah: also assume that Peter’s feelings about Padfoot Prong’s Moony Wormtail plays into it that it’s Harry’s dad that he betrayed, and maybe after all these years he does, uh, feel remorse that that was his friend.

[00:45:49] Rebekah: Yeah. The like, Harry makes a comment when he’s talking to Dumbledore in his like vision of King’s Cross or whatever. He’s like, you knew Wormtail had regret there. You knew that he regretted basically betraying my dad. Yeah. He says it. Well, this is not a hundred percent like really a change, but the first Deathly Hallows film ends as Voldemort retrieves the Elder Wand from Dumbledore’s tomb.

Just after the scene with Dobby dying on the beach at Shell Cottage, after Bellatrix Lestrange throws a knife that manages to make it through his disapparating. Um, in the book, Harry saw this through Voldemort’s mind, which he’d been doing throughout the book, like watching things happen in Voldemort’s mind, which happens some in the movie.

Um, but in the film, we see this from Voldemort’s point of view. So, um, it’s just we see it play out that way. Um, I will say I had had a theory that like before these came out that I had shared with some people that I had also read the books and my theory was I think that this movie is going to end right after, um, Dobby dies.

I thought that they would wait to show you the thing where he steals the wand. Um, but I thought that Dobby’s death would be, like, kind of the end of the first film. So I was really excited that I was pretty much right about that. Um, and at the beginning of Deathly Hallows Part 2, they replay the scene of Voldemort taking the wand from Dumbledore’s tomb, like, to remind you of what has just happened, I think.

[00:47:16] Donna: And him, like, hovering there over Dumbledore. If you’re going to do something 

[00:47:20] Tim: in two parts like that, you have to be very careful where you end it. 

[00:47:25] Donna: Um, Bellatrix’s knife should not have disapparated with them. They were not touching it when they were in motion. Where in the ministry, when Was it Yaxley or Dollehoff?

Yaxley. Yaxley. He got her, he touched Hermione’s hand. And as, and they, in the book, he touches it. I think in the film 

[00:47:48] Rebekah: they don’t, they don’t do the magic the same way because I, I watched the ministry scene carefully and he just like jumps in at the same time and then you see them in the weird, like, face.

Flu flame kind of really is strangeness. Kind of. And so I think that, yeah, that’s, I think it’s definitely like a, an inconsistency in the magic system. I’d want to say in the book, the way they describe it is that Bellatrix had thrown it and it had hit Dobby just as he was disapparating all of them. So like it hit him the way they do it in the movie, I think is really just done because it makes for an interesting visual, if I’m being honest.

[00:48:24] Donna: A couple of conversations go on after the trio get to Bill and Fleur’s shell cottage. Um, this happens after they’ve, uh, buried Dobby and, and they’ve resolved that, that particular character in his story and Harry needs to talk to both Griphook and Ollivander. Who were taken to Shell Cottage from the Malfoys by Dobby.

That’s when he first came back to save them. Um, so, Harry has to make a decision which one to talk to first. And he picks Griphook and there’s some question in the book. Should I have done that first? Was that right? And, and a little bit of tension that goes on there, conflict. Um, but Griphook and Harry’s discussion, Um, About goblins seeing ownership differently than humans and then Bill Weasley’s follow up with Harry later is cut down in the film to Griphook just simply demanding the Sword of Gryffindor’s payment for helping them break into Gringotts because the swords goblin made and I was really sorry that they didn’t add this little bit of discussion with Griphook because it It really fleshes out goblins.

They have great anger toward wizards and witches and are very turned against them. But then Harry, second, after talking to Griphook, Harry and Ron and Hermione go in to talk to Mr. Ollivander, um, in the book, it’s clear that although Ollivander is familiar with the lore of the Elder Wand, he’s never heard of the Deathly Hallows.

In the film, he’s intimately aware of the details and does say, you know, he shared these things with Voldemort. Because he was being tortured and things like that. 

[00:50:25] Rebekah: I was really confused. I watched the movie and I thought, okay, so here’s where Ollivander says no, and then he says, yes, the Deathly Hallows.

Like, it was just odd, like, why he would know this. He kind of, I also was like confused because He tells Voldemort stuff about the Elder Wand, but like, is he saying that he didn’t, or that he did tell him about the Deathly Hallows? Like, I don’t understand what he was even exactly saying there, so I was very confused about that.

[00:50:56] Josiah: Well, what about this? Was this confusing to you, that the film added a feature of horcruxes, in which both Harry and Voldemort can sense the nearby presence? of horcruxes through a shrill electronic sounding noise. And also when the horcruxes are destroyed, they can sense it. But in the book, Voldemort does not realize what the trio of main characters is doing until they escape from Gringotts, which I think works a little better with the logic side of the plot.

[00:51:26] Rebekah: Seems like it almost undermines how horcruxes work or something. Him knowing when they get destroyed just really messes up the fact that like Dumbledore destroyed one at the beginning of book six. Like, did he not notice? Was that, like, irrelevant? Like, what do you mean? So yeah, I found that really confusing.

[00:51:45] Josiah: 100%. 

[00:51:46] Rebekah: And the diary in 

[00:51:47] Donna: chamber. 

[00:51:48] Rebekah: Oh yeah. So this is the point in the story at which, uh, they’ve gone into Gringotts, stolen Hufflepuff’s cup. Voldemort has gone on a rage rampage and kills a bunch of people and goblins, apparently. And this is in the book at the point where Harry’s like, okay, we got to do the next thing.

And I think that’s the first point where Hermione, I think it is, is like, don’t we need a plan? And they’re like, none of the plans work. Like the plans are useless. And so, yeah, there is no plan. So in the book they go and in the film as well. They apparate into Hogsmeade because you can’t apparate onto the grounds of Hogwarts.

Um, in both the book and film, a caterwauling charm goes off. It’s kind of cool because in the film, you know what it’s called, but it’s never called by name. And it’s such an interesting, I thought that was a fun little, like, Easter egg. Um, in the film, they don’t have the invisibility cloak, which they do, um, in the book.

In the book, the death eaters that are basically patrolling Hogsmeade, um, they try to get the invisibility cloak off of Harry, they see Harry cast a Patronus because they’re pushing Dementors all over the place in Hogsmeade, and then they escape into the Hogshead bar. And Aberforth Dumbledore, who is the proprietor of this Hogshead bar that we have heard of and seen but did not know that that’s a Dumbledore, like, we didn’t know that’s who it was until right now.

Um, he like, has them come into the, into the store, tells the Death Eaters that they mistook his, his, uh, goat Patronus. with horns for the stag that Harry casts. So then he goes and has this very extensive conversation with him. Similar to the film, Aberforth does discourage Harry from like following Dumbledore’s orders.

He kind of makes some comments about how the order is dead. The, uh, you know, Voldemort’s one. Um, his sister is mentioned in the film. However, in the book, we get a pretty long scene where Aberforth like exposits quite a bit of history of his family. So he talks about his sister, Ariana. Um, Ariana was a sweet young witch and she, like many young witches, similar to Harry’s mother, for instance, that we see a memory of later in the film.

She was doing magic. Some muggle boys saw her and basically decided to punish her, the little freak for it. Um, basically you get the, you get the idea that she has been attacked in some way as a child. Um, they do not go into detail. This is one of the kind of darker fan theories about what was being implied there.

Dumbledore’s father sees them, um, and attacks them, but he did not want the ministry to know why he attacked them. So he ends up going to Azkaban for three years because of his attack. Um, didn’t want them to know because what ended up happening was that Ariana lost her mind and she began to be unable to control magic that would just fling out from her at any given moment when she would become emotional.

So this is why she wasn’t able to go to Hogwarts, unlike what Rita Skeeter claimed. She was not a squib, um, but she could not control her magic and it was very dark. Um, he, he shares in the book that Ariana actually is the one that killed their mother. Um, when she was in a rage, uh, her magic, 

[00:55:16] Josiah: Kendra, 

[00:55:17] Rebekah: yep.

Killed Kendra Dumbledore. And then, uh, you find out that when Dumbledore and Grindelwald had become friends, uh, as they were seeking hallows, they were trying to figure out what to do. They got into a fight, I believe about the fact that Aberforth said, you can’t leave. You have to take care of us. There’s like, basically there’s no parents.

You’re the adult. And you can’t take this girl on a trek with you around the world. They all get into a duel, and none of the three of them know who did it, but one of their bolts struck Ariana and killed her. Man, it is The backstory is wild. It’s so interesting. And I thought that they would give us a little bit about Ariana.

Obviously, it’s a book exposition. I don’t expect all of that in the film. Um, I was surprised how little they said, and for some reason, although you kind of, you learn Hermione says something about like, Oh, is that your sister Ariana? We don’t really get any of that backstory. And Aberforth mentions that Harry’s hunting horcruxes, which he did not know.

Why would he know that? No one knows that. Like no one even half of like, most of the people don’t even know what a horcrux is. And then he sends them into the castle. So this. Yep. Very silly. Yeah, this felt like a miss to me. 

[00:56:33] Tim: It’s another place, I think, where they could have, they could have deepened the story.

Somehow this movie, it takes, it takes liberties with the script or with the book that, that don’t give it a deep feeling. It feels like it’s a, it’s a fan movie. It’s not a movie. 

[00:56:56] Josiah: Fun fact, I think there’s only two or three actors who appear in both the Harry Potter films and the Fantastic Beasts films. I can remember two.

Oh really? And one of them is the painting of Ariana Dumbledore. 

[00:57:12] Tim: Oh yeah, I do remember seeing that. Well, there’s another piece of backstory that’s cut from, cut for the film. In the book, we learn through Neville that Dumbledore’s army has been alive, well, and causing quite a stir for the Karas during this year at Hogwarts.

[00:57:30] Donna: I can understand it. I’m not thinking, oh, this is the worst part you cut out. Um, but, because they changed The use of the radio and kind of reduced it to not much. I think that the radio would have been a way to kind of connect that there are things going on on the outside, that there are things, you know, people are fighting and that kind of thing.

And, and they, they cut out the thing where they saw the guys, uh, at the river. When Griphook and Dane were there, and Ted Tonks, and the other goblin. 

[00:58:05] Josiah: Which I thought was a cool scene in the book only. Book McGonagall and other teachers attempt to send underage students away before the battle, whereas this is not mentioned in the film, and Phil McGonagall actually has Filch take the Slytherin students to the dungeon.

[00:58:21] Rebekah: Yeah, I think it’s not a character for McGonagall to do this, so. 

[00:58:24] Josiah: Yeah. I 

[00:58:25] Rebekah: think it’s a 

[00:58:25] Josiah: weird choice for sure. Especially when J. K. Rowling said in the book, Yeah, Dumbledore would never have done this. 

[00:58:31] Rebekah: Exactly. Like there, she makes a point to make sure that Harry says that to Aberforth when Aberforth is like, Oh, why are you sending kids of Death Eaters through my pub?

So in the book, I really liked that anyone who wasn’t wanting to fight and anyone who was underage, although a lot of them snuck back in, Could leave through the room of requirement out Aberforth’s pub and like get to safety which I thought again reinforces the character of those people like on that side.

During the scene where they’re all in the room of requirement and a bunch of uh order members are joining in, Percy stumbles into the room. Oh, have I missed it? Have I missed anything in the book? Uh, it’s a huge moment. It’s three books in the making. Percy has rejected his family. Yeah. Gone out of his way to hurt his family.

In, like, to be really honest. Uh, and in the book, he comes in and he apologizes to them. He, you know, says, I I was, uh, and he, he can’t even, like, think of the words and, uh, Fred and George, like, fill in the blanks and he’s like, I, I was, I was. Molly starts crying and it’s, it’s just this big emotional moment.

So they do have Percy show up in the film, but throughout movies five through eight. Percy just does, his failures and rejection of his family is just kind of taken out entirely. 

[00:59:48] Tim: Well, another change. In the book, Harry and Luna visit Ravenclaw Tower so that Harry can see what the Diadem looks like. Luna stuns one of the car caros and McGonagall is shocked to see Harry and Luna at the castle.

However, in the film, this never happens and Professor McGonagall sees Harry for the first time in the Great Hall. Probably not too big a change, but It is a change. 

[01:00:13] Donna: Harry, Ron, Hermione, Percy, and Fred are all together when Fred gets killed. In the film, this happens off screen, and they see Fred’s body upon returning to the Great Hall during the break in the battle.

There’s so much loss and so much that goes on. I’m okay that we didn’t see Fred die in the film, but it is a critical death in this. It’s not one of Harry’s closest friends, but it would have been unusual. That non Weasley’s all survived this whole thing. 

[01:00:50] Tim: Yeah. Do we see any named characters die on film?

[01:00:56] Rebekah: Lavender Brown is killed, but we don’t see that. Right. We don’t see the McCreevey brothers. I don’t think that that was really I don’t think the Creeveys are in the last film. That’s book 

[01:01:04] Josiah: only, I think. 

[01:01:05] Rebekah: Um, yeah, I think you’re right. We don’t. 

[01:01:07] Josiah: It’s all just, oh, look at these people who are Dead in the common hall.

[01:01:13] Donna: Yeah, you don’t see Tonks or Lupin. And honestly, I totally get that. There is a threshold there of sadness that I think you could reach really quickly if you’re not careful. 

[01:01:26] Tim: Snape’s memories of Lily, Petunia, young Snape, and the Marauders is far more limited in the film. Uh, the primary point of these memories seems to be to show Snape and Dumbledore’s plotting in the film, culminating in the truth that Harry must allow Voldemort to kill him.

In the book, you get a whole lot more of their relation his relationship with Lily. Um, but we see Snape’s Patronus as shown in the previous film, although we don’t see Dumbledore’s painting explaining that Snape must get the real Sword of Gryffindor to Harry. Um, so some of those things change, um, I think the film does a decent job of that.

You get enough of their relationship part for it to make a difference, but you also get the plotting part. So it’s done well enough. 

[01:02:18] Rebekah: I liked the memory section. I think that especially because of how much was cut. Third film about the Marauders. I felt like this was in line with what they had set it up to look like.

Um, 

[01:02:30] Josiah: Yeah. 

[01:02:31] Rebekah: I certainly, yeah, I certainly wish that there was more. Um, I, I do think that it was incredibly powerful that, you know, after he’s like learned a lot of these things and to kind of close out the memories. Most significant memory you see is Snape holding Lily’s dead body with Harry crying in the background.

I mean, 

[01:02:51] All: that 

[01:02:51] Rebekah: does soften you towards him more than probably anything else has done, like, to see his, like, brokenness. And so, I’m not a Snape lover, as you already know if you are listening to our summer of fodder. But I thought, I thought the films did this, like, the film did this really, really well. Um, But I agree that I would have liked to see a little more of the childhood stuff.

Um, I don’t even know if it’s clear that Petunia is the other person. 

[01:03:19] Donna: After this occurs, And you go into final battle and there’s stuff in there we want to talk about. There’s a thing that happens. It’s not really a change, but we would be remiss if we did not just pay homage to the awesome fight scene between Molly Weasley and Bellatrix.

They portray it pretty closely in the movie 

[01:03:43] Tim: to the book. That’s very satisfying. And I think it’s necessary. Yes. 

[01:03:47] Donna: When, when you see. Little Molly Weasley stand up to her and be like you and I’m not, I won’t go on into all this stuff she says, but I love it because yes, but you, you get to see Molly make that stand.

And it’s not just against, up against her children who already fear her. 

[01:04:10] Tim: She, you see her strength. I think it’s wonderful to see Bellatrix absolutely certain that she’s going to take Molly with no problem. And then you see the change on her face as she realizes, I’m gonna get it. And she does. 

[01:04:27] Donna: Yeah. So I was just threw that in for a minute.

Pro Molly, you know. 

[01:04:30] Rebekah: Well, the final big battle scene between Harry and Voldemort in the book is not really a battle. Um, and I love it. I love this book scene and I get that it’s not a per, it’s not going to be able to be perfectly, um, done like exactly as, as written in the film. Uh, there’s basically a lot of exposition where Harry, um, Make sure that Dumbledore or make sure that Voldemort knows that there’s a secret that Voldemort like one last secret He doesn’t know about and so they talk for a while.

They’re basically in the Great Hall, I believe circling one another holding their wands up and the 

[01:05:11] Tim: hundreds of others against the wall just watching 

[01:05:14] Rebekah: quiet and like Like they’re all transfixed, which I think again is like pretty Legit how it would be, I think. I think the biggest, like, bomb drop that Harry tries to, to reveal, Not only, yes, he says we’ve, we’ve destroyed all of the Horcruxes, And I will remind you at this point, the snake is dead, um, in the book.

This is a very, like, they, he knows before he has this conversation with Voldemort. This is like, Voldemort hit Harry, uh, Dumbledore and Harry have met in, uh, the King’s Cross thing, like, all of that has happened, the snake is dead, um, and the, the last big bomb drop is that Bessette, essentially, the wand is not going to follow you because Draco Malfoy is the one who, uh, disarmed Dumbledore when we got back from the cave and then I disarmed Draco Malfoy, so now his wands obey me, so, um, That is like the, the reveal, and then there’s a single spell, Harry’s Expelliarmus, yet again, like that theme that comes back up and over and over through the books, meets Voldemort’s Avada Kedavra, which is, I will say, the second time Only the second time in the entire series that that red green wand thing meets.

That Josiah’s mentioned several times. It’s like really annoying that that’s how they use, like that’s how they do a lot of the fights. And because their wands meet and Voldemort’s wand refuses to follow Harry’s, Voldemort becomes killed by his own rebounding curse. 

[01:06:49] Josiah: Yeah, in the final, uh, battle scene in the film, Harry and Voldemort fly around the castle.

There’s an added scene, not in the books. It’s right before which many Death Eaters apparate. To abandon the Dark Lord, including the Malfoys, who are at the castle during the book’s final scenes. But not the movies. They fled. The wands of both wizards meet more than just the final time. 

[01:07:15] Rebekah: Which is a break in the, like, the magic doesn’t work.

Again, it’s like, this is like the culmination of how this has been written. And like, then, I think I counted, I did. That their wands meet at least two other times before that last one, and every single time it is a green jet of light that comes out of Voldemort’s. 

[01:07:36] Josiah: Why doesn’t it do the same thing as it happens the last time, is what you’re saying?

[01:07:40] Rebekah: Well, the way they do it in the film, and I will give them a tiny bit of credit for this. Nini gets killed after it happens multiple times, and then after Nini gets killed, and then, then it happens again. Then it rebounds. 

[01:07:55] Josiah: Yeah. That’s weird because it’s not na because it’s like, yes, Nini is the one that’s keeping him from completely dying, but Nini is not the one who.

Let’s him have ownership over the Elder Wand. 

[01:08:08] Donna: Yeah. And Harry’s the last Orcrux. 

[01:08:11] Josiah: Yeah, Nagini is killed by Neville in the midst of these fights. Most of the exposition to wrap up loose ends from the book is left out altogether. For instance, Kingsley Shacklebolt is not mentioned as the next minister of magic.

[01:08:22] Rebekah: Yeah, he does give a little bit of information to Ron and Hermione about, on the bridge, like after all this is over, about just why the wand wouldn’t attack. 

[01:08:32] Josiah: So didn’t you find that so somber compared to like the celebratory nature of the book? 

[01:08:37] Rebekah: Yeah, I did. 

[01:08:39] Tim: I, I disliked this, this whole ending battle thing.

I watched the film first, and I thought it was strange given how it all ends. Once I read the book, I felt like the ending in the film was even more strange. I loved the ending in the book. I thought it was great. Um, I thought that the ending in the film, and we’re talking about the battle part of the ending.

Um, they’re bouncing all through the castle and apparating and disapparating to different parts of the castle. He’s knocking him down stairs and he’s, You know, Voldemort is pushing Harry off of this and, you know, it’s, it’s much more physical. But I think that’s part of what I really liked about the ending, the battle in the book is that it wasn’t that.

[01:09:35] Rebekah: Harry was exponentially weaker than Voldemort in a lot of the ways Voldemort thought mattered powerfully. He knew fewer spells, he was less experienced, his. You know, he was literally, there’s no reason why Harry should have been able to win that fight. The reason that Harry wins the fight is because Voldemort’s own desperation for never dying and his willingness to hurt anyone in the process comes back to bite him.

Like it’s because Of the way that Harry loves and the way that Voldemort refuses to love. That’s why Voldemort is killed. It’s not because one of them is more powerful. So, yeah, when Harry goes, let’s finish this, how he started it together and then he drags him off the side of the castle, that is maybe one of the dumbest Film choices, I think, through all of this series, like, oh, 

[01:10:29] Josiah: very silly.

Here’s 

[01:10:30] Tim: another point to why this battle scene is strange to input into the film is because it cost a lot of extra CG to do something that was not in the book and made the ending stranger. 

[01:10:47] Rebekah: It’d make less sense. 

[01:10:48] Tim: So it’s like you spent a lot more money. To make it weirder, rather than using the ending that was in the book, or that was closer to that in the book.

And Voldemort’s body, what was that? Voldemort’s body falls dead to the floor in the book. Um, later taken out of view of the other in the film, his body turns to ash as he dies. Eh, that’s kind of strange. Yeah, which is exactly 

[01:11:13] Josiah: what Avada Kedavra does. 

[01:11:15] Donna: I do like the fact That you would see him go away, rather than just his body, because they thought he was gone the first time he attacked Harry as a baby, and 

[01:11:27] Rebekah: Here’s why I don’t love that.

I have a problem with it because in the book, it felt like this worked because of the fact that we can see him. And he is dead and he is just as human as the rest of us now. And I think that in the, that was another, like in the film when it’s like, Oh, it just goes away. So now you have to trust the reports of all the people that were at Hogwarts and saw it happen to believe that he’s dead.

Like it just, it doesn’t like, it doesn’t feel like a good wrap of that, if that makes sense. So 

[01:12:02] Donna: this is a listener question from Deborah. What do we think about the final? scene with regard to the, like the quality of it. I think we talked in earlier episodes about how the cinematography, like in the fire, we taught it was so bad.

And, and some of the, the Quidditch scenes and stuff that was up in the air. Did we think this got a little better? Do you think the quality was any better? We don’t like the fight scene. The way it is. But what did we think about the quality of it? The look of it 

[01:12:32] Tim: was part of part of the look of it was the fact that they were in some of those scenes they were spinning around and they were almost ghost like as they were entangled with each other.

So that’s kind of muddy. As far as the cinematography goes, 

[01:12:47] Rebekah: I am going to be honest. I would love to answer this question. I’ve never once been able to watch that scene without just rolling my eyes. And so I, I have a really hard time focusing on it enough to answer this question. I mean, from what I can.

visualize and remember from just seeing it today. I want to say, I think it was like better than they did with Sirius in the fire and some of the other things that were the CG just like didn’t age well. I think that they got the point across they were trying to make, um, you know, cause they have like Harry and Voldemort’s faces kind of transform into each other’s and they’re trying to make that connection of Harry being the final Horcrux and stuff.

[01:13:24] Josiah: And they want a big visual before the end. 

[01:13:27] Rebekah: They do, but at that point, Harry’s not the other Horcrux. It’s like, I don’t know, it’s just like the, it just doesn’t, it does not work for me. Such a dumb choice. I don’t think it worked. 

[01:13:36] Josiah: Yeah. I mean, the cinematography was probably good, but it’s a distraction from the illogic of the anti climax.

They wanted a, they wanted a visual climax. And so they took away from the, Narrative climax. 

[01:13:52] Tim: Mm hmm. Well, the last plot timeline change, uh, is Harry goes to Dumbledore’s portrait following this battle, goes to his portrait in the headmaster’s office to ask what to do about the Elder Wand. Deciding to bury it with Dumbledore after using it to repair his own wand.

While in the film, Harry breaks the elder wand and throws it off a bridge at Hogwarts. And there’s no scene with Dumbledore’s portrait nor an explanation of how the wand got re his own one got repaired. Have 

[01:14:26] Donna: him tell, have him say that at King’s cross. When this is all over, if I’m victorious, I will put the wand back where I found it so that it, he could have said it there.

I mean, if he wanted. You gotta break it. 

[01:14:40] Rebekah: Break it. Are you kidding me? The Elder Wand. You broke it. Why? Why 

[01:14:47] Josiah: would you do that? Well, it’s an Elder Wand, Rebecca. You break it. That’s what you do with elder wands. 

[01:14:52] Rebekah: Eugh. Well, I said this before, but we’re going to skip changes to the setting, most of which were essentially the same.

Uh, there were just a couple of characterization things I wanted to, uh, cover. One of which I, I briefly talked about this in the last episode that I would say it here. Um, in. Film six, Greyback, uh, the, the werewolf Greyback was Fenrir, one of the kind of lead Death Eater guys. That’s not a Death Eater. He’s like in this, in this book and film sections, he’s like a snatchers, what they call them.

They’re kind of like, Thugs that try to get people for Voldemort, but they’re not the same as Death Eaters, like they don’t have the Dark Mark. Um, but for some reason in the seventh and eighth films, Greyback gets a boss, kind of. He was not the lead snatcher. In the book he was, but in the films, They add a movie only character by the name of Scabior, um, and he seems to be in charge of the werewolf and, like, the other snatchers.

So, we see him several times. He kind of becomes an important character. No idea why. Very weird. 

[01:15:57] Tim: Out of nothing. Maybe Greyback’s funny makeup is hard to speak through, and it was awkward, and so they needed somebody with no makeup, because that’s what you end up with. I mean, honestly. The guy that is, you know, In charge of him is just a person.

[01:16:10] Rebekah: Honestly, because of the whole thing with the contact lenses that Harry didn’t wear, yes, I can believe that that could have been it. 

[01:16:18] Donna: Well, let me tell you a little bit about good old Cho. Dean, Cho, and Jenny. Wait, Cho and Jenny were Harry’s exes. I mean, but Dean wasn’t, right? No, I don’t 

[01:16:31] Tim: think so. Dean was Jenny’s ex, right?

[01:16:33] Donna: All of his exes do live in Texas, but I didn’t miss some subplot. No, you didn’t. Wait, okay. Dean, Cho, and Jenny, back to the point, are seen at Hogwarts, assumedly still attending as students, when Harry arrives at the school for the final Battle of Hogwarts. And this is in the film, where they all appear there.

Okay. That, that’s where we see them in the film. In the books, we learn that Dean, who is Muggle born, is on the run. He’s actually arrested by the same Snatchers who take the original trio to the Malfoy Manor. Cho, who was a year ahead of Harry, would have graduated the previous year. Although she does arrive at the book at Neville’s request, fight with the other.

So she does come through the pork in the book. 

[01:17:22] Tim: Yeah, he does. Come back. 

[01:17:23] Donna: Uh, he does. She does come back from there. And then Jenny didn’t come back to school after Easter, knowing that she would have been used to try to get information on her parents. about Harry once Ron was revealed to be traveling with him.

So he comes 

[01:17:38] Rebekah: back 

[01:17:38] Donna: with, I believe with Fred and 

[01:17:40] Rebekah: George, right? Like they bring her after they 

[01:17:42] Donna: get the summons as well. Cause Molly says, why did you bring her? We, we couldn’t leave her. She’d be alone. Yeah. Yeah. Mom, that’s what we’ll do. We’ll leave her at the house by herself. All the rest of us are here risking life and limb.

[01:17:56] Tim: A lot of these changes don’t necessarily cause you to go, what if you’re just a movie watcher and you haven’t read the books? 

[01:18:04] Josiah: Crabb, played by Jamie Waylett, does not appear in either of Halo’s films you may have noticed. In the final installment, his presence in the Room of Requirement is filled by Blaze Zabini, played by Louis Cordice.

Cordiche? Who knows? Waylett was arrested and found guilty. A violent disorder in real life during the London riots and his character of Crab was cut out of the Harry Potter films, the last two movies because of that. When 

[01:18:31] Tim: real life meets 

[01:18:34] Josiah: movie life. And I think it was Goyle had to be absent from one of the middle movies for Because he’d broken his arm?

For health reasons, yeah. 

[01:18:43] Donna: As we move down into the trivia section, for this last, uh, book and two films, we wanted to give you some more expanded numbers. The book release for Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows was July 21st, 2007. And that happens to be a very special day. In the life of our family, besides the fact that the book came out, I mean, I would love to tell you that we were all at Barnes and Noble at midnight and we slept on cots until it opened so we could get in and buy the book.

However, that is not what we were doing that day. We were planning and putting the final preparations on the wedding of our sweet podcast, uh, founder, Rebecca Edwards, and her lovely husband, Josh, our producer. So, happy anniversary to them. And yeah, the book is released that day. 

[01:19:44] Rebekah: My sweet husband waited up until the midnight book release the night before our wedding to get that for me.

To get it for you. And he had it. Oh, very very sweet. He said, oh I got you a wedding gift when we got to the hotel. And I said I didn’t know that that’s a thing people did so I didn’t get you anything. So he said, well I have a wedding gift and my only gift. Thing is, you’re not allowed to use it tonight.

And I said, well, what the heck is it? And so I opened it and it was the book. And I said, are, are you sure? 

[01:20:09] Tim: Are we sure we’re not going 

[01:20:09] Rebekah: to read it tonight? But I stay true to my word. And I read it later when we were in Florida. Don’t you need to go and take a prolonged 

[01:20:16] Donna: shower or something? I mean, yeah, you know, do something.

The film Deathly Hallows part one was released. First, at the Odeon Leicester Square on November 11th, 2010, and then the rest of the UK and the US on November 19th, 2010. Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 was released on July 7th, 2011. At Trafalgar Square, 

[01:20:46] Tim: eight months later, 

[01:20:47] Donna: yeah, it’s crazy. And then, uh, and then I’m not thinking it was in the square, probably a theater on Trafalgar Square.

They probably didn’t throw it out 

[01:20:57] Tim: in the square. 

[01:20:59] Donna: An outdoor, they just put a big sheet. up hung a sheet off a building and probably showed it like just 

[01:21:05] Tim: throw the reels out there. People will watch it on their own. 

[01:21:09] Donna: Hundreds of house elves surround. Um, 

[01:21:13] All: okay. 

[01:21:15] Donna: Let’s see. Okay. Uh, that occurred on July 7th, 2011.

And then in the UK and us the release for the rest of the, Those two countries in the world was July 15th, so a week later, 2011, the book was rated on good reads at 4.6 out of five, uh, rotten Tomatoes ratings. Part one got a 77% and part two a 96%. That’s stupid. 

[01:21:49] Tim: Okay, so, but the total spent on eight Harry Potter films is over 1.

15 billion dollars. 

[01:22:01] Rebekah: That’s not even real. Like, when you get to those numbers, I don’t even, they’re not real. 

[01:22:05] Tim: Then you get in to the profit, the worldwide income from it. Is 7. 77 billion dollars. It is, it is 6 to 7 times more than they spent. And that doesn’t include any of the merchandise. That doesn’t include any of the, the theme parks and all of that kind of 

[01:22:31] Rebekah: stuff.

The net or the worth of the Harry Potter, like, thing is like 20 something billion dollars still. 25 

[01:22:38] Tim: billion with a B? 

[01:22:39] Rebekah: Yeah. 

[01:22:40] Tim: Yeah. Well, do you want to know how much people were paid? Please tell me that they got a few dollars out of that 7. 7. Daniel Radcliffe got a few 

[01:22:49] Josiah: dollars. Daniel Radcliffe was on a pretty, pretty exponential rise.

He got in order of the movies, he got one, two, six, 11, 14, 24 million. And then for the last two movies, he got 25 and 25, I think, a million dollars for each film. So. He’s, uh, I think he broke a hundred million. He’s a millionaire. 

[01:23:13] Rebekah: You think? That’s amazing. In 

[01:23:15] Josiah: ten years. 

[01:23:16] Rebekah: So comparatively, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint, like, uh, I just lost his name that we just said out loud.

Daniel. 

[01:23:23] Josiah: Daniel Radcliffe. Daniel Radcliffe. He played 

[01:23:25] Tim: Harry Potter. You might recognize him. He wears these funny round glasses. You know, he just sleeps in the way 

[01:23:30] Donna: that it is, I guess. His name is up on that grid. His name’s up on the grid. Okay, so Daniel Radcliffe. Daniel Radcliffe. 

[01:23:35] Rebekah: Daniel Radcliffe. Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, and Daniel Radcliffe all started out at a million dollars for Sorcerer’s Stone.

Uh, Emma Watson and Rupert Grint ended with Deathly Hallows. They each made 30 million for the, the combined. So he made 50 for the combined. They each made 30. So his, his salary went up the most, but I mean, I mean, the stupid thing’s got his character’s name on it. I mean, he obviously has the most significant part.

He is 

[01:23:59] Tim: the titular character. 

[01:24:00] Rebekah: Yeah. 

[01:24:01] Tim: You can tell the people that are going to get money from the movie more than just salary by who’s listed on the movie poster down at the bottom. You get the, you know, produced by starring this person. The stars don’t always get their name in that spot. 

[01:24:18] Donna: Um, we didn’t want to get into a lot of odd trivia pieces here like we do with our other episodes.

But I thought that Hagrid and Snape were both characters that had very significant roles in the film series. But so much of our attention is drawn to the main trio and to Dumbledore. And so I wanted to add a few things here. about the two of them, and so Rickman, I think we had said once before, that he was Rowling’s only choice for Snape.

The studio, however, had wanted to go after Tim Roth, but He chose to go with one of TJ’s favorite films, the 2001 version of that some people say is Planet of the Apes. And so 

[01:25:06] Tim: the train wreck, quote 

[01:25:09] Donna: unquote movie, um, shortly after Alan Rickman started to play Snape. J. K. Rowling shared character secrets with him and we mentioned this before as well that he was the only character that she gave extra insight to about who they were over the course of the series.

But here are some of the things that she told him. Snape had loved Lily since they were students. That his protection, but also his antagonism toward Harry, stemmed from his love for Lily. Rowling stated, and this was a quote, He needed to understand, I think, and does completely understand and did completely understand where this bitterness towards this boy who’s living proof of Lily’s preference for another man came from.

Directors would ask Rickman where he would come up with motivation for some of his scenes and he would just say he knew something they didn’t know. It dawned on me in this last couple weeks, as we’ve been preparing for this one, I know now why I have a draw to Snape about this. And I’ve said, you know, several times, but he was tortured.

His character was tortured by a love that was lost, mostly in part, to his bad decisions. And a life he could never have, but he was fully aware. It was because decisions he made. And I have to say that, um, my mom passed away in, in 2021. And, um, my mom and dad were married for over 50 years when my dad passed away, he passed away in 2010 and I knew most of their life together.

Um, but I found out a lot since mom passed away about even more about their relationship. And honestly, I loved both of my parents and I came to love and forgive my dad, but my mom made a decision to stay with him through a torturous relationship. He was so abusive to her and as I knew her, as she got older.

I kept seeing her become more and more closed and bitter in her life. And I hated that because she was a wonderful person and an intelligent person. And she had a lot to offer people. But the last two years she was alive, she lived with us. Yeah. And, um, I realized during that time just how closed she was to relationships.

She didn’t want to get to know new people. And she had opportunities to do that, but she didn’t want to do that. And somehow I see a connection there where the choice that she made to stay with her husband, but the outcome of that was she also. Never was able to forgive, and I think that’s one of my, one of the reasons I like going through this series repeatedly because it shows me possibilities and all the things that Snape could not overcome.

Harry was able to overcome, and it’s just a great story of redemption. Well, I think that’s good insight 

[01:28:37] Rebekah: and hopefully encouraging. Thanks for letting me share it. Always. We just had a couple of other things that always, always, um, we just had a couple of other interesting things we discovered about the series as a whole that we wanted to share before our final verdicts.

So, um, Ian Hart, who played Professor Coral is the only Harry Potter actor to appear in only the first and last films. He was the primary antagonist, obviously the dark arts teacher, in Sorcerer’s Stone and in Deathly Hallows Part 2. He has an uncredited scene as part of Snape’s memories. 

[01:29:16] Tim: Well, there were also a few of the actors who say that their children or family gave them no option but to play their roles in Harry Potter.

Fiennes says he was encouraged by family. Uh, Richard Harris, 11 year old granddaughter, threatened never to speak to him again if he turned down the role. And Robbie Coltrane only accepted the role of Hagrid after his children urged him to do it, even though he was the first person to be requested specifically by Rowling.

Wow. 

[01:29:46] Donna: That’s pretty cool. Good thing Richard Harris got those two movies in there. Good for his granddaughter. 

[01:29:52] Josiah: Yeah, they wouldn’t have talked for the last two years of his life. And let’s include even a list of awards that this film franchise has won in the description. I think that would be fun. Oh, that sounds good.

[01:30:03] Rebekah: Yeah. I’ve heard it’s won quite a few. Well, a 

[01:30:06] Josiah: few. Yeah. 

[01:30:07] Rebekah: Why don’t we share our final verdicts again? We’re going to say what our favorite book scene is from the Hallows book. And do you like how it was portrayed in whichever of these two films it was? And, uh, Dad, would you like to go first this time? 

[01:30:22] Tim: Sure, I will go first.

Um, my favorite book scene from Hallows is the ending battle. I love how, how that works. It is not portrayed in the film in a way that is satisfying to me. I will say that when it comes to my verdict of book or film, this one I would have to give to the book because I think I really liked the details and some of the things that they left out of the film for me made it a, a deeper and broader film, uh, to be a standalone thing to say, this was a great movie, not just, this is a Harry Potter movie.

So, uh, that’s me. 

[01:31:07] Donna: So my favorite. The book scene is not happy, but it’s the way Dobby’s death was written, specifically the dialogue between him and Harry there at the very end. I thought it was lovely, it was well handled, um, and it evoked the emotions it should have. It was very tender, um, the book, the movie handled it all right.

I mean, it’s all right. In the movie, I’ve already said, I mean, definitely the scene where Snape is holding Lily after she’s been killed. Oh, yeah. Um, his emotion there and what he, his, his, just his whole portrayal there is incredible. I want to say that, I mean, I do like the book better. But if I had not watched, if I had not read the books, I think I would have liked the movies better.

But even now, and I think we went, we found this like with Twilight too. These are movies we’re going to watch again, and even though after reading the book, we see so much that that got cut, whether we liked it or not, or whether it was smart or not, whatever we didn’t make, we didn’t get to make those decisions.

I’m still going to watch those again. I’m still going to connect these characters and these things. with the richness and the, the expanded knowledge of the book. I’m, I’m glad that I started reading it and continue to read it. And so that would be my verdict. 

[01:32:42] Rebekah: Well, I’m glad that despite it being a very rough week of my life, that, uh, you wanting to just be a good supportive mom, uh, led you to watching your first Harry Potter film, I guess, which was a weird one to start with.

Part two, I said at the beginning and it’s true. I liked the book better in comparison for all of these. So I’m not, none of minor spoilers are shocking, but, um, I did mention earlier on that, uh, prisoner of Azkaban is actually my second favorite of all of the Harry Potter films. My first favorite is hallows.

Part one, which apparently people think is bad or boring. I don’t know. Um, and unfortunately for people or fortunately for me or whatever, I think the reason that I like it best is because it tonally and story wise, despite the changes that were made, felt the closest to me for the experience I had reading the books and what the story felt like.

It wasn’t all the decisions were the same. But the tone of things felt right. It felt like reading the book in a different medium. Uh, my favorite scene was probably when in the final battle, Molly Weasley says, not my daughter, you bleep, bleep, bleep, you know. Um, and then she kills Bellatrix and I love it because in the book, it talks about how like dad pointed out, um, Bellatrix at first is basically like, Oh, you chunky mom.

Like, what are you going to do to me? And then very quickly realizes how formidable, like that a powerful mom can be. And so I just like, was always so inspired by that. And Molly didn’t have to flaunt her power. She was just a concerned parent. And then just that really just kills it. And honestly, it is one of the best like book film scenes, I think throughout the series where I love.

The way that they did it. So book definitely for me, I prefer how those part one quite a bit. How’s part two was really challenging. I read my post from when I saw it back in 2011 and I apparently really liked it. And I think that experience was still awesome, but I think looking back objectively, it’s like on the lower end of the ones I want to rewatch because I was disappointed with some of that.

[01:35:05] Josiah: Well, I think the book is definitely better. In this case, I think that the movies really peaked at 4 and 5 for me, and 6 was bad, 7 was fun for character development, but it was, it was very slow, and the last film, when I first watched it, which, Dad and I were on a missions trip When we first saw it and we in Alabama, I want to say after the tornadoes and we took a couple hours with the rest of the group we were with because it was, you know, worldwide event and we went to see it.

And I remember liking it at the time, but it was only soured. With the passage of time, I really fell out of the coconut tree in my opinion about this movie, especially after reading the book, which is really good, but so much of the film doesn’t make sense, particularly after what’s the moment, Rebecca, I feel like it’s before let’s finish this the way we started, but.

I feel like maybe, definitely after that, nothing makes sense in the rest of the movie. It’s just completely inferior to the book story. So I’ll stop there. The book is just better in basically every way. And the movies were, uh, a sad way to end a series for book fans, but I think they were visually satisfying for movie only fans anyway.

[01:36:37] Rebekah: Awesome. Well, that is our final verdict for The Final Potter. At least until Max releases the first season of the show. Thank you so much for joining us, uh, for our second episode. It has been a whirlwind trying to get these out every week, but I hope you have enjoyed this process with us just as much as we have.

Uh, if you enjoyed this episode. Props to the producer. Heck yeah. Woohoo! Uh, if you enjoyed listening with us. Yes, Rishree. Oh, thank you. Please leave us a five star rating or review. They help us out. a ton. Um, especially if you can do it on one where you get to write a full review. Uh, you can find us on X Instagram and Facebook at book is better pod.

If you’ve got feedback questions for us to answer, want to suggest something you’d like us to cover or just have fun with us, you can join our free discord server at the link in the episode description. Um, again, thanks for listening and until next time, all is well. 

[01:37:33] Tim: Mischief managed. Spell y arm ous.

[01:37:40] Donna: The Hogwarts thon song in the book where they do The song, the Hogwarts thong song. 

[01:37:48] Tim: We should never record in the evening.