Harry Potter and the Teenage Romance

Let me go ahead and say that this review may contain some spoilers. The book has been out for a few years now so everyone should have been able to read it. Otherwise you should get off your fat ass, turn off MTV and read a fucking book. Levar Burton didnt spend years on Reading Rainbow for nothing asshole.



Im a huge Harry Potter fan and Im not ashamed to admit that. It is a well written book series wherein the writing style and subject matter grows with the audience over the 7 year adventure of Harry, Ron and Hermione. It's a solid book series that has allowed JK Rowling to sleep on a mattress of money on a solid platinum frame. The movies each follow the books quite well taking a little artistic license only when necessary and never taking anything away from the story.


The Half Blood Prince does not open with Snape taking the unbreakable oath, instead we start with Harry sitting in a subway diner chatting up a waitress, you little horn dog. He looks out the windows to the Dumbledore staring at him, they then go and meet with with Slughorn and convince him to come back to Hogwarts. Nothing wrong with this scene, it shows well that Harry is maturing and isnt going to just sit at home anymore in fact you dont see any of the Harry's aunt, uncle or cousin which I was happy about because they are annoying characters anyway.

So, as in the book, Slughorn is now teaching potions and Snape is defense of the dark arts teacher now. While in potions Harry discovers a beaten up text book with lots of stuff written in the margins. He uses the notes to be top in his class in potions. The book also has some new spells written in it and is signed The Half Blood Prince.

You don't get to see Snape teaching at all though. Considering he is supposed to be a main focus of the story line you really dont see him very often. He pops up from time to time to drag Malfoy away after he gets caught sneaking around, he has a mysterious conversation with Dumbledore, then he comes to Malfoy's side at the end. For such a pivotal character I really wanted to see more of him.

Unlike the book though there really isnt much done to try to find out who the half blood prince is. The term is only mentioned half a dozen times in the movie and at the end when you learn he is Snape...it doesnt change anything. "Oh, ok," is the general feeling about it.

The acting is still top notch, after 5 movies the actors have their characters down and provide really solid performances. I would have liked more Nymphadora Tonks, both her and Remus are really marginalized in this movie.

There is a lot that is left out of this movie. Cho Chang is not in it at all, all but 2 of the memory scenes are removed. There is a stronger focus on Harry/Ginny and Ron/Hermione than I would have liked. They removed the destruction of Diagon Alley, the Death Eaters storming through Hogwarts, and Dumbledore's funeral. All of which were very emotional scenes that really added to the reading experience.

The movie ran ~2.5hrs, had they cut out some of the awkward glances and "snogging" and put in more wizard on wizard battles like what was in the book this movie would have been greatly improved. I know some of that will be added as a "Director's Cut" on DVD, you greedy bastards.

Oh yeah, Snape kills Dumbledore. If you didnt already know that, die in a fire and gtfo my internets.