Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Guest Post

Quick Note: Welcome to the final HP book series guest post! I can’t believe today is Halloween already. I still have more Harry Potter posts (and giveaways) I want to share, so I’m moving HP month into November with Thankful for Harry Potter month. Follow along! 

Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows guest post by Marissa

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Deathly Hallows.. ahh.. where do I begin? It’s the book that ended it all. We wrapped up loose ended mysteries, met new characters, lost favorite characters, and saw our golden trio all grown up. Because of all of this combined, Deathly Hallows means different things to so many different people. Some love it, some hate it, but one thing is for sure: everyone has strong feelings for it.

I don’t remember the release of Harry Potter and The Deathly Hallows. I was in the sixth grade, and even though I was an avid reader, I didn’t like to read books for my age. I was too busy reading Gone With the Wind to care about a boy with glasses.

Worst. Mistake. Of. My. Life.

I didn’t get into Harry Potter until my late middle school or early high school years, and even then I only became obsessed with the movies. Unfortunately, I never got to go to any midnight movie releases, which makes me feel like I’m not as much a part of the fandom as all of the other hardcore fans. However, in my defense, when I say obsessed, I mean obsessed. I would say in the span of five years I probably watched the movies over three hundred times. Sometimes I would just let them play in the background while I did other tasks because not only was I obsessed, they became comforting.

When I finally read the books, I was 19. I read all seven in about five days. I’m a double major at university, both of which are English based, so I have about zero free time to read. But I also have a four hour round trip commute to said classes, so I am in a perpetual reread of the audiobooks which I looooooove. I’m only on Goblet of Fire right now so I can’t make any comments about Deathly Hallows but if it’s as great being read to me as it was when I read it, well, I know I’ll love it.

The thing is, it’s hard for me to see why people hate the ending to the Harry Potter series, because, of course, I love it so much. I love it all, even and especially the epilogue. That’s where a lot of people tend to turn sour with the whole series. And now, with everything new coming out in the Wizarding World, people are taking that sour feeling they felt at the epilogue and transferring it to the new content.

I see a huge correlation between how someone felt about the ending of Deathly Hallows and how they feel about things like The Cursed Child, which is directly related to Harry Potter’s story. Interestingly enough, those who didn’t like the ending of Deathly Hallows, seem to be extra enthused with new content not directly related to the Harry Potter story, like the Fantastic Beasts franchise.

I’ll admit, there are things about the ending that I didn’t love, even though I loved it overall.

Most of the deaths, I can forgive JKR for. Most. But I cannot forgive her for Fred Weasley. Cannot. Will not. Shall not. Nope. I can forgive her for Remus. I can forgive her for Tonks. I can even forgive her for Hedwig. Fred Weasley? Nope. It’s one of those deaths that I don’t think she actually needed to do, and even she says she regrets it. PETITION TO CHANGE THE ENTIRE SEVENTH BOOK AND BRING FRED BACK PLEASE.

I don’t know though. Other than theloveofmylife Fred Weasley being brutally killed on the page in front of my eyes, there’s not a whole lot about Deathly Hallows I have beef with. (That’s a term the kids are using these days.)

As it were, I would have to implore the Harry Potter fandom to reconsider their stance on the ending of it all. Otherwise, we’re going to continue to get more divided as a fandom. And we know what Dumbledore said, “We are only as strong as we are united; as weak as we are divided.”