Lorena Lobo
The beginning of 2022 has been magic for all the ‘Potterheads’ around the globe. The celebration of the 20th anniversary gained an outstanding reunion that took the fans back to the Wizarding World. But, with this anniversary, the debate that endlessly plagued the community returned. The Harry Potter Films versus Books: which is better?
Film vs Book
If you are in the Harry Potter fandom you have probably:
a) [re]read all the seven books several times
b) marathoned the eight films more than you can count
or c) done all the above.
Still, whether we prefer the novels or the movies, we certainly notice some differences between them. And the lack of some features of the books on the big screen lead us ‘Potterheads’ to tend to say that the books are better.
The Differences
It is inevitable that all film adaptations of books will lose their some of essence. It could be the loss of a specific scene or even a side character. And that happened with the screenplay adaptation for all the books in the Harry Potter series.
The website ScreenRant listed the top 10 book-to-movie differences in the wizarding universe. Amongst them, I personally highlight the absence of Hermione’s ‘Society for Promotion of Elfish Welfare’ or S.P.E.W. For the ones that have read the books, we all know the importance of Hermione’s fight and the importance of the house-elves in Harry’s life- and yet this never appears in the films.
Indeed, other stark differences can be seen, such as the song that the Sorting Hat sings before every ceremony, the incorrect explanation of who The Marauders are, the fact that Ron and Hermione are prefects during their sixth year, how Dumbledore “calmly” confronted Harry about putting his name in the Goblet of Fire in the book while bellowing in the film, and many more.
"Dumbledore asked calmly"… #HPCelebration https://t.co/paAuSkti7o
— Wizarding World (@wizardingworld) January 27, 2018
Our Emotions
However, it is not just the differences between the two that persuade us to lean towards the books or the films. Our emotions towards the franchise affect it, too – that sense of nostalgia for the first time you watched the movies or read the books, or the first time you did a Buzzfeed quiz sorting you into your Hogwarts house.
The journalist Naomi Pike said in her article at Vogue that millenials love a nostalgic throwback and, for many, the story of The Boy Who Lived is the ultimate childhood pillar.
And that is the exact reason why we remain so tangled up in the Wizarding World. We are all somehow connected to it.
Which one is better?
Having said all this, it is still hard to conclude which is better. We will have the group that agrees that the books are better, the ones who are devoted to the films, and the ones – like me – who have mixed feelings about it.
If we only look for the shortcomings of the films, we will undoubtedly say the books are better. But if we remember the nostalgia of watching any Harry Potter film for the first time, we will definitely say that the movies are better.
For example, the first movie ‘Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone’ will always be better than the book for me, because it was because of it that I entered this amazing magician world. The excitement of the five-year-old kid in me always comes back when I rewatch it. Meanwhile, the books (especially the fourth and sixth) are definitely better than the films in a number of ways.
So, the main conclusion for me is that the question proposed “The Harry Potter Films vs Books: Which is Better?”, does not have a specific answer. It has any number of different answers, from just as many different perspectives.
Featured Image courtesy of Shayna Douglas on Unsplash . Image licence found here. No changes were made to this image.
