Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: SPOILERS

[hypatia]

The big HP fans reread the entire series before reading the last book. Try that, and you'll answer many of your own questions.

What you're doing is like trying to watch B5 in pieces, separated by years. As you begin to forget the background, the story's richness and fullness will get lost.

Personally, I let the fanatics fill me in on such details, and I nod and think "yea, I vaguely remember that in the book..."

The hard-core fans really know the details of the characters and the story inside and out.

[Elenopa]

I think three fandoms is enough for me.

I have a pretty good working knowledge of G&S, Swallows and Amazons, and B5. those are the things I know inside out. I'll leave Harry to others thank you very much.

[hypatia]

Fanfics make it worse: they aren't well thought out, based on fandom, not knowledge of where the author was actually going with these characters, etc. etc. No, I don't think you should reread it all. Just understand: she explained a lot more than you realize, you just didn't make the connection, it's o.k.

Babylon 5 had the same problem. Keep up on the story, carefully, or you will get lost. I understand the movie "Pirates III" is much the same. More reason to rewatch my DVDs of the first two, just in time to watch the third when it comes out on DVD (next Christmas, maybe, or so?).

Or I ask the real fanatical fans who have memorized more of the small details.

[A_Ranger]

Originally Posted by Elenopa

I think three fandoms is enough for me.

I have a pretty good working knowledge of G&S, Swallows and Amazons, and B5. those are the things I know inside out. I'll leave Harry to others thank you very much.

What is G & S?

[Elenopa]

Gilbert and Sullivan.

Two guys who wrote operettas just over a hundred years ago. I've performed most of them (Just missing Patience, Princess Ida and The Grand Duke). Marcus sings the first verse of 'A Modern Major General' at the end of Atonement.

[hypatia]

A friend of mine combs ebay and yard sales for cheap DVDs. He picked up a copy of the G&S play "The Mikado".

Starring..... starring.... Eric Idle.



This ought to be quite interesting.

[Quagmire]

You didn't have to be immersed in HP fandom to figure it out. With how long the books already are taking even more time out to say, "for those of you who don't remember the climax of book two or weren't paying attention while reading earlier let me spell out what's happening for you" would turn reading them into some kind of infinite loop. The books used to have awkward recaps of the previous books in the first chapter or so but eventually the flow of the story became more important than the few people who jump into a series in the middle without bothering to find out what happened before.

If you want an easy answer to how Neville got the sword out of the hat: Magic.

It also seemed self explanatory from the easy atmosphere in the epilogue and the lack of a rallying point in Voldemort that the Death Eaters weren't the same threat anymore. While who ended up doing what job and how the remaining DE's/Umbridges were dealt with than how many kids everyone had the story Rowling was telling was the coming of age of Harry Potter. Given that goal the epilogue made sense. Of course I say that as someone who thought it was possible that all the Horcruxes but Harry would be destroyed, Voldemort killed and returned to Vapormort, and Harry finally falling on his sword so to speak. Obviously all of us let our desires and theories cloud what's actually there in the books but now it seems that it should have been obvious what was going to happen in a general sense.

Who died and how also seems obvious if you look at how they affect/relate to Harry.

Just like how I can't judge the movies until the second viewing allows me to get past the changes from the book a second reading will probably make it easier to enjoy what's there instead of how it's different from what we had in our heads.