the thing I HATE the most about the harry potter fandom (potterheads)
I donāt do a lot of "dramaā on my blog. most of the time I just post some art but now Iām done with you guys! (no Iām not gonna be talking about āyou-know-whoā, the mysterious āgender criticalā author of the harry potter books. or maybe not today)
1.Ā āELITISTā POTTERHEADS
Ā In our community, the potterheads who have read the books (they like to call themselvesĀ āthe real potterheadsā. that speaks volumes about their ego) like to look down on the harry potter films as though they were the shittiest film adaptations ever made and not even good films. First and foremost, the level of DISRESPECT, guys ! Besides, I know exactly why youāre doing that ! You want to be seen as intellectuals who prefer āelitistā medias such as books overĀ āpop cultureā. <<Because popĀ (air quotes)Ā ācultureā is for the masses. hew ! >>Ā If you were not blinded by your elitist big ass ego, you wouldāve realised that the Harry Potter films are one of the best - if not the best - film adaptations from books ever (ex: Percy Jacksonās and Artemis Fowlās fans know what Iām talking about).
2.Ā āItāS nOt LiKe ThAt In ThE bOokSā type of whingingĀ
I donāt say that we cannot make valid criticism about the films (ex: treatment of Ginny Weasley) but most of the time, the critics ofĀ āelitist potterheadsā revolve around theĀ āiTās NoT LiKe In ThE bOoKsā type of arguments.Ā
So letās address the main point of my argumentation:Ā
THE QUALITY OF AN ADAPTATION DOESNāT DEPEND ON ITS FIDELITY TO THE ORIGINAL WORK ONLY.
First and foremost, adaptations which are quite similar to the original work theyāre based on, arenāt necessarily good. I would go as far as to say that they are unsurprisingly bad. Letās take for example the Japanese live action film adaptation of āDeath Noteā released in 2006. Iām a big fan of āDeath Noteā, and yet I felt like I was attending a bad cosplay contest when watching this film. Almost everything is exactly like in the manga, but cheap.
More generally, such adaptations carry no ambitions, but to satisfy fans. These kind of films can be successful and praised by the fans in question, but they are hardly good or even interesting.
Now here are some examples are film adaptations which are the furthest from faithful to the original work adapted but are yet considered as great films. Comics such as āMen In Blackā and āThe Maskā are indeed particularly dark in comparison to their adaptation. In these cases, modifications were made in the adaptation to enable a larger public to discover a work that they would have never known otherwise. For example, children who watched āThe Maskā back in the 90ās must be all grown up now, and thus, can read the original work without being traumatised. However, if the film āThe Maskā was as dark as the comics, it is most likely that most of these children wouldnāt have known either the film or the comics.
Finally, I think, we must asses the quality of an adaptation like we would for a āregularā film.Ā
3. CUT SCENES (OR YOU DONāT NO SHIT ABOUT THE FILM INDUSTRY AND IT SHOWS)
On YouTube as well as on a lot of social networks, a lot of cut scenes of Harry Potter films can be found. Scenes that, according to Potterheads, should have been part of the film as if the directors decided to delete them on a whim, which is utterly wrong.
First and foremost, in the American film industry, the final cut doesnāt belong to the directors rather to the producers of a film. Only the most popular directors such as āTarantino and Friendsā are granted this final cut. Although the final cut lines up with the directorās cut most of the time, Iād just like to remind you that almost all directors are strings attached when it comes to the final edit of a film. And if you think suchĀ āminorā modifications to a film cannot ruin it, go see the remake of Rollerball (2002) which - as evidenced, by a lot of questionnableĀ edit choices-Ā ended up being nothing like it was supposed to be. We can speculate hours about how theĀ āreal filmā looked like but, unfortunately,Ā weāll never know.
All I want to say is whether a scene is removed from the film (or not) it is for a reason !Ā
Moreover, books and films are two different mediums.Ā
In a book we must TELL and in a film we must SHOW. Thatās why it is difficult to re-transcript internal thoughts in a film, for example. Thatās why some scenes, line of dialogues and even characters can be necessary in the books but completely irrelevant in a film.Ā
Ā For example, the scene in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part. 2, in which Draco ran toward Harry and throw him his wand. This scene would have made it more self-evident that Draco deeply regrets his past as a Death Eater and would have taken Harryās side if given the opportunity. However, his reluctance to join his parents in itself can be considered as a proof of repentance. Moreover, Tom Feltonās sad look conveyed all of Dracoās feelings. Thatās what I call acting ! AndĀ good one !Ā
do we need unnecessary lines of dialogues to see the regret in his eyes ?????
To conclude, (1)Ā donāt be an elistist moron (2) donāt criticise a film too harshly if you donāt know shit about cinema and (3) WEAR A MASK !Ā
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