I spent all of last night wondering how to go about this. Cause honestly, I cannot allow myseThis review is also posted on my blog illbefinealonereads
I spent all of last night wondering how to go about this. Cause honestly, I cannot allow myself to let it go.
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The circumstances of this release seemed kind of sketchy from the beginning, didn’t they? Or did they seem sketchy only to me? J.K. Rowling surprised us all with the announcement of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, and I’m not going to lie and say that I felt the excitement for this installment. I didn’t. I didn’t mark any dates on the calendar, I didn’t take part in any Harry Potter parties. It just seemed odd to me.
It’s not because I’m not a Harry Potter fan, I am a huge fan. J.K. Rowling shaped me into the person I am. If it wasn’t for her, I never would’ve began writing, her books were my go-to read for years, she made my imagination run wild. I have so much respect for her, the story of how she came to her success is incredibly inspiring, especially to unpublished writers like yours truly. And I will always be a fan. But this time, I wasn’t feeling that fandom excitement.
When I woke up on the 31st, I just went about my morning. Washed up, then visited the balcony. Fed the cat, gave him fresh water. Got myself a glass of water to accompany me while I do my morning routine of checking my social media.
Then I went on Goodreads. It only dawned on me that it was Harry Potter 8 release date when I saw that everyone on my timeline had started reading it. Then I opened my e-mail, and I saw the e-mail from pottermore about the book. So I got it. Let’s just say, I give in to peer pressure easily.
I immediately started reading, because, well… I decided to be a book blogger almost a year ago, and I’m expected to be on top of all the book releases (I am not on top of anything. I am not very good at book blogging, or reviewing, or being on time. Matter of fact, I don’t even have a following to expect me to be on top of anything. But I still felt as if it’s something I needed to do right away).
It didn’t sound like J.K.’s writing right from the beginning. I know that other two writers are involved, and it’s just based on her story, but I still felt like some J.K. should be showing through in the text. And it just didn’t. I didn’t feel any Hogwarts magic, I felt more like I’m reading something posted on AO3, and it was incredibly frustrating to read. I took so many breaks, and used that time to rant to my friends about what I was reading, already coming up with theories about what I was reading and why.
And I’m just going to scratch the surface right now, with the things I minded the most because I don’t have the energy to dig in deeper. I swear, I am tired of this book, and it’s only been a day. I also wanna note that it will have some spoilers, so read at your own risk.
The golden trio in this book isn’t the golden trio we know and love. It isn’t the golden trio that we had in the books, it’s more like the golden trio from the movies, only… worse. Their actions make no sense whatsoever. None of the characters sound like themselves. As I said before, it’s more fanfiction that canon, I will not accept it as cannon.
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(view spoiler)[And then we have Albus and Scorpius, who are confusing af. It’s supposed to be a friendship, but it’s borderline relationship, but also, every single time we have a loving moment from those, it’s ruined by a third party presence, as if Jack and John go back on everything that they have previously set up in a very obvious manner.
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I also gotta say that I honestly don’t understand Albus as a character at all. Scratch that, I don’t understand any of the characters at all. Albus turns out to be a Slytherin (that is not a spoiler though, you can see it’s going to happen right from page one), then everyone begins to ignore him (what did you expect the premise to be, except for a Harry Potter book 1 stereotype). Yes, you read that right. A family of brave Gryffindors is scared shitless of a frightened Slytherin kid.
And don’t even get me started on Voldemort’s love child. (hide spoiler)]
If that doesn’t scream J.K. Rowling to you, I don’t know what will (I was told once that I need to mark my sarcasm… so: sarcasm).
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It’s frustrating. The whole script, the plot it is all so frustrating. But none of it is as frustrating as the fact that J.K. Rowling approved this, she allowed this. And as a fan, I feel let down, but I also feel taken advantage of. I fell for a silly marketing stunt, and what I received is far from what I was promised when I clicked on ‘add to cart’.
In the end, I just wanna say this. I think everything J.K. is doing (with pottermore, with this 8th book) is because she feels like she owes us, the Harry Potter fans. And if someone is actually reading this, and that someone meets J.K. Rowling someday, please let her know on my behalf, that she owes me nothing. She already gave me everything with the first 7 books, she already granted me a wish when she let those books be turned into movies. She already taught me everything about friendship and family, and she taught me so much about writing that I’m actually doing it. And I will forever be grateful for it.
While we're still of Harry Potter sequels, I hope this is the last one. Sure, J.K. has the right to do whatever she likes with the franchise, but from now on it’ll only look like a well-oiled money machine and that isn’t what I want to think about when I think about my childhood.
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