T-Minus 4 Days 'Til Last 'Potter' Film: Let's Recap, Shall We?

Warner Brothers is trying to gin up anticipation among Harry Potter fans with this retrospective video which features highlights from all the previous Potter films and a few scenes from the new film, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2.

They, along with ABC Family which has been running Potter movies all weekend long (we saw Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone on TV Thursday night), are working my resident Potterheads into a veritable frenzy. (Meanwhile, my 12-year-old daughter has been hurriedly re-reading as much of the book series as she can -- for the billionth time -- before we see the film this coming weekend.)

I hope the movie does justice to the moving end of the series in the book. I'd really like the series to go out strong.

'Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 1:' Nov. 19

Mark down the date: November 19.

That's when the second-to-last Harry Potter movie will be released: Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part I.

I'm planning on taking my twin 12-year-olds to see it on opening weekend as this series is absolutely beloved in my house. My twins have read and re-read and analyzed the entire seven-book series countless times. Our kids have dressed up for Halloween as various Hogwarts students for years. (My older son looked eerily like Harry Potter the one year he was The Boy Who Lived for Halloween.)

My husband and I have read the series as well (me twice) and we, as a family, have been reading it aloud to our 9-year-old. (We're a third of the way through the fifth book, Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.) I must admit, I'm really enjoying reading it together.

When I watched the newly-released trailer for Part 1 of Deathly Hallows, it was depressing and sad, as I see Harry as one of the more tragic characters in children's literature and the end of the sixth book/movie, literally made me cry. (No one had yet spoiled the ending for me.)

My husband and I went to see The Town this past week (which I recommend for a thoroughly entertaining two hours) and he saw a poster promoting Deathly Hallows and said it was upsetting to see the image of Hogwarts, on fire, under the heading, "It All Ends Here." *sniff*



Will you be among those on line to see Deathly Hallows?

Image credit: Warner Brothers.

New ‘Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows’ Trailer: Dark and Awash in Grays

The final book in the Harry Potter series, Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, is a long slog through a whole lot of somber, frightening darkness, both literal and figurative. Following on the heels of the emotional death of Harry’s mentor and protector, Albus Dumbledore in Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince (I was so very sad when I read that scene for the first time), there’s not a whole lot of jubilance and celebration to be had in Deathly Hallows as Harry, 17, matured and sought to figure out what needed to be done in order to challenge his nemesis, Lord Voldemort.

But geez, the brand spankin’ new trailer for the film series' two-part finale – part one slated for a November release and part two for July 2011 – is one long image of blacks and grays amid threats, battles galore and sinister Dark Magic. After watching it a couple of times, I’m left wondering if the film’s going to wind up being too dark and violent for my 11-year-old Harry Potter fanatics, who’ve seen all the movies (though my daughter refused to watch Dumbledore die on screen) and who've read the series of books so many times through that I’ve lost count.

What do you think of the trailer?