End of an Era

So, unless you've been living under a rock lately (or you're my husband, who greets all my pop culture pronouncements with a blank stare and "Why would I care?"), you know that the final Harry Potter movie started this weekend.

I mentioned, half-jokingly, on Twitter a couple days ago how sick I was of Harry Potter. Then I made a joke about losing all my followers. When I checked responses later, I had two. One, from somebody whose user name was taken straight from the HP world, simply said "Goodbye." I checked. She was no longer following me.

The other, from a girl I've known since she was a baby and has grown into one of the most lovable young women I've ever met, asked anxiously if I'd read the books or anything - the idea being, I think, that only a person unfamiliar with HP could be sick of it.

I've read all seven books. I owned the first five before I needed the shelf space and donated them to my local library. I went to see the first four movies in the theater (something major for me - I'm not big on the movie theater. Unless we're talking LotR, because I saw each of those FIVE times in the theater. I was in college, okay? I did a lot of dumb things. Remind me to tell you sometime about dying my hair green. ON PURPOSE).

It's not like I hate Harry Potter (okay, well, I'm not too crazy about the character himself. Round about Book 5 I started wishing a Hippogriff would take him out). There are parts of the series I really like. I still think Prisoner of Azkaban is an absolutely brilliant book. Fred and George Weasley, all of the Weasleys really, are terrific (yes, even Percy). The humor, especially in the first few books, is delightful. The attention to detail, and connectedness between books, still blows my mind. I admire Rowling's creativity so much in building her magical world and peopling it with all the different species and creatures she did.

And I adore Emma Watson.

So I'm not being a complete curmudgeon here. I just honestly don't think the HP world is worth all the lavish devotion and hype people shower on it. The first three books, yes. The fourth one was still good, but not quite up to the standard of the first three. I hated the fifth book. Aside from Fred and George (and the occasional Ginny moment), I hated everything about it. The sixth book was better, but still disappointing. And the seventh was about on par with the sixth.

As for the movies, every single one was a disappointment. Especially the fourth, which is why I didn't bother going to see any of the ones after it. The first one was neat in a lot of ways, but it didn't come anywhere close to capturing the sheer joyous magic of the first book.

I've given a lot of thought to why the series (to me! I know many people differ from me on this matter) went downhill. It's not just that momentum is hard to maintain throughout seven books. Even though many people don't like them as much, I think everyone can agree that The Magician's Nephew and The Last Battle are two of the strongest-written books in the Chronicles of Narnia. Prydain only has five books, but they got better and better with each one (Taran Wanderer, the second-to-last book in the series, is one of my favorite books of all time).

It could be the length - as each book got longer, it got harder to keep them as zestful. Or it could be the lag time between them, making it more difficult to keep up an entertaining pace. It could have something to do with the fact that they started doing the movies while the books were still being written, forcing JKR to divide her attention.

My personal suspicion, however, has to do with those incredible details I mentioned earlier. The impression I got from reading the last few books was that Rowling got so caught up in bringing all those little details from the previous books into the final ones, so involved in making everything mesh absolutely perfectly, that she lost sight of the story itself.

Maybe I'm talking through my hat here. Maybe that's not the case at all. But one of the reasons Prisoner of Azkaban is my favorite of the series is that the connectivity is all (or mostly) within that one story. We see things at the end that make us flip back to the beginning and say "Ohhhh." NOT flip back to book one, two, and hunt around in book five because we think we remember that but we're not sure. That's cool, but it gets exhausting for both reader and writer. Book 3 still fits snugly within the series, but it's a fine book all on its own.

The other thing, of course, is that the characters had grown from the first two, but hadn't had a chance to get locked into the more annoying parts of their personalities yet. And Hermione vs. the boggart in the DADA final was priceless!

Do you think the entire Harry Potter series was brilliant, or do you agree that the final three books didn't live up to the promise of the first four? Do you think it's possible to get too clever, and end up losing sight of your story and characters? Have you ever found your characters getting stuck in irritating mode, and not been able to break them free?

Farewell, Brian Jacques

I just barely saw the news - not five minutes ago - that Brian Jacques died after a heart attack this weekend.

I am crying and still don't quite believe it. The man who created Martin, Mariel, Gonff, and all the rest, gone? It seems impossible. He should be immortal.

And in a way, he is. He lives on through his books, his beloved characters. His stories about tiny little creatures fighting for justice, freedom, and love against larger, more ferocious adversaries will ring true in the hearts of all who love such ideals, for as long as books endure. His legacy is a great one, indeed.

Less well known than Redwall, but just as good (in my opinion) was his Flying Dutchman series, featuring a boy named Ben and his faithful dog Ned, traveling the world as immortal creatures, righting wrongs and comforting those without hope wherever and whenever they went.

I will miss, terribly, anticipating a new book from him every year. Yet I am so thankful for all the books that he did write, that we are left with. There have been many writers who have tried to imitate his style, but none can match him. The world is a sadder place with this Weaver of Tales gone, but thankfully the tales themselves live on.

May your adventures in the next world be as grand as they were here, sir. And I know that wherever you journey through the Dark Forest, you will be accompanied by a grand troupe of mice, moles, hedgehogs, badgers, hares, squirrels, and otters, all laughing, valiant, and hungry.

You will be missed.

ETA: Mossflower was the first Jacques book I ever read, and it's the one I recommend to everyone to begin with. It's not first chronologically or in published order, but in my opinion, it sets the stage beautifully for the rest of the series. Plus, it features Martin, Gonff, and Dinny - who could ask for anything more?