The End?

As a fandom that evolved with the release of each book and was hinged on theorizing and debating with each other between books and helping each other fill the void created by finishing the last sentence of the current books at our disposal, we wondered if the fandom would end with the release of Deathly Hallows, and it was only natural.

I mean, what really held us together? We were a group of relative strangers gathered online, most of whom hadn't met in real life or for more than five minutes in between activities at HP conventions.

But we survived.

We discovered what truly held us, as a fandom, together: our love for the works. It didn't matter that there wasn't another release to look forward to. It didn't matter that many of the mysteries we'd spent countless hours pondering alone, in chat rooms, on forums, on skype, etc. had been resolved in the final book. It didn't matter that we still didn't always have faces to put with the handles and avatars on forums for those we called “friends”. We were bonded by going through the HP experience together.

We experienced love, loss, and victory, not just with Harry and the other fictional people we'd come to love, but, by extension, with every true HP fan around the world who had read the words that drew us in so much. We went through Post-Potter Depression together after the tears had long since dried from our eyes.

And we survived.

Maybe deep inside many of us there was a tiny part that was saying “there's always a few more movies to look forward to”. And maybe that got us through.

But now we face the last movie release, and we are again wondering if we, as a fandom, will cease to exist.

If you are to honestly ask yourself if every “true fan” (by which I mean those that listen to wrock, go to conventions, dress up for releases, hold HP parties, host HP discussion groups, play Quidditch, etc.) will simply give up their love for HP upon seeing the last movie, what is your answer? I'd bet my broomstick it's a “no”.

There will still be conventions, fansites, and all the friendships we've forged through this fandom to hold us together. The fandom will not die.

Is that to say that I don't foresee a day when HP conventions are no longer held regularly or at all? No. Do I foresee a day when HP discussion groups are all but extinct? Yes. Do I foresee a day when wizard rockers don't tour anymore? Yes. But do I foresee a day when the forums that were a-buzz when HP news are completely gone and every HP fan I've met looks back at the HP phenomenon as a fad, a passing fancy, a youthful delight? No.

The fandom will live on as long as there are true fans out there re-reading the series, listening to wrock, going to wrock concerts, reading and sharing the series with others, discussing theories, making fanvids and parodies, and generally loving the heck out of these books.

"I shall never truly be gone unless none here are loyal to me."

My Fandom Pensieve Part 2

Have you been listening to PotterCast and MuggleCast from the beginning? If so, what are your favorite episodes?

As I said in an earlier post, I don't listen to any podcasts. Well, ok, I listen to one, but it's never really updated. It's also not an HP podcast. I simply don't have the attention span to listen to podcasts. I'm too visual for that. Plus, every time I've tried to listen to one, it seems the hosts go off on random tangents I don't care about or are forced to answer really stupid questions and respond to really stupid theories by listeners. I don't have the patience for that.

Evanna Lynch was cast for “Luna Lovegood” in the OotP film, which was later released in July 2007. Did you like the casting decision Warner Bros. made?

YES! Luna, I feel, was a casting that got us back on track. I felt like Fleur was the start of the decline in caring about how the characters should look and finding actors to fit that. Luna was an excellent way to show us that WB does care about what the characters should be like. Granted, she's not canon perfect since she has platinum hair rather than dirty blonde, I've been able to overlook that after seeing how much she really IS Luna!

Harry Potter fans and Wizrockers pushed a healthy campaign on YouTube. What is your favorite channel, and why?

I was a big fiveawesomegirls fan as well as a Black Sisters fan. There weren't many other wrockers that I watched on youtube, though I have perused Kwikspell's channel a bit too before we saw her in concert a few months ago and after we saw how awesome she was.

Where did you see the fifth Harry Potter film? What did you think of it?

I think OotP was my first midnight movie release. I honestly don't remember a lot about it, but I do remember it being around the time we made the HP door in our dorm when our non-HP roommate who didn't help with said door flaunted an early pass to see the movie in our faces. That was not a smart thing to do. I think things were thrown and curses were hurled (and we're not talking the babbling curse)!

I liked the fifth film. Yes, a lot was taken out, but it was all stuff I felt I could honestly live without, unlike the third. I think this was a good sign that WB was back on track in terms of caring about what the fans wanted and only excluding what they needed, even if they did continue to keep adding stupid stuff to the movies...which still makes no sense to me.

Where were you when you finally got your hands on the final book? What did you do during that night? Did you read the whole book?

I've talked about this as well in this post, so I shan't repeat myself.

Melissa Anelli, head webmistress at the Leaky Cauldron publishes “Harry, A History.” Where were you when you read the book?

I just finished this book, actually. I bought it around the release of the Half Blood Prince film at an HP display at Barnes and Noble, but I didn't get around to reading it until we were on our way to Infinitus. I liked it, but I found it very difficult to follow since it wasn't really in any recognizable order. I found myself having to take notes at times to figure out what points in the fandom we were discussing since she liked to jump from talking about the DH release to that time such-and-such happened before OotP. So, the majority of this book was read on a plane on the way to and from Infinitus since I was trying to finish it before Melissa came to the Cincinnati Library for a signing and wrock concert after we got back from Infinitus. Obviously that didn't happen, and I didn't end up going.

What did you think of part 1 of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows film? Did you like where they left off?

I did like DH1. It was pretty good, though some of the deaths didn't get the respect they deserved, in my opinion. I liked the end a lot because it leaves so much time to deal with the other stuff in part two (though after watching only two trailers, I'm worried about them adding too much to fill up said time). But it did its job of getting me excited for DH2 (DON'T SPOIL ME!).

We went a midnight release for that one too (as we have for every film since OotP). We weren't on the news that time, like we were for HBP because Brae and I dressed up, but we did get some odd reactions. For example, I was wearing my Slytherin robes. Slytherin, right? They're all green and have a big “S” on the front with the Slytherin crest. I've got a big green tie on too and a green prefect pin, Slytherin quidditch pin, and a “Potter Stinks” pin. It's hard to even think for a moment I'm, say, a Ravenclaw. But what do about four people start shouting the moment I walked into the theatre? “Oh my God, look! It's Luna!” WTH? Is this some alternate universe where Luna is a Slytherin? Anyway, that viewing was cool. Here are some pics.

My Fandom Pensieve Part 1

I didn't know how much I really wanted to be involved in the Fandom Memories project that LeakyCon is undertaking because I didn't think I had that many interesting memories and, if I did, I didn't have many or any pictures or videos to back them up. But I caved for an AccioLeakyCon video, and now I'd like to go back and answer a few of the other questions.

Do you remember what fan sites you went to you when you first came online for Potter?

I discovered Mugglenet first of the big fan sites. I honestly don't remember how I found it, but I probably just searched for “Harry Potter” when I first started my HP forays online and stumbled across it after the Warner Bros.' film sites. I didn't find Leaky Cauldron for a few years for some reason, and it never really drew me in the way Mugglenet did for some reason. So, I ended up joining Mugglespace and Mugglenet Interactive long before Leaky Lounge and all that. Now I check them both regularly, though.

Do you remember what you thought of Dan, Rupert, and Emma when they were cast originally for the films?

I watched the casting process closely on Mugglenet right off the bat. I actually had a lot of faith in WB at this point, so I knew they wouldn't let me down (this faith lasted until Prisoner of Azkaban was released with the horrendous replacement for Richard Harris and a complete deletion of the entire Marauder's story). When Emma, Rupert, and Dan were revealed to have been cast, I was fairly pleased; they all looked close to how I'd imagined the trio, but I wondered even then if they would be able to pull off these roles. I cut them some slack in Sorcerer's Stone since they were young, my patience with Rupert grew thin during CoS, I ended up giving up hope for Rupert's acting in PoA until it got a little better in OotP, and Emma's never bothered me until I noticed her eyebrow thing (seriously go turn on any HP movie and watch her eyebrows...she cannot act without moving them every five seconds. I guess that's how she thinks people express all emotion?).

When was the first time you saw a Wizard Rock show? Which bands did you discover on MySpace?

My first wizard rock show was only a little over a year ago at the YMCA about forty minutes away from where I live. We were trying to get in the mood for Infinitus, and I discovered a wrock show happening about a week beforehand, so I demanded that we go. The bands were Skyway Flyer, Witherwings, Tonks and the Aurors, and The Remus Lupins (though we left at the beginning of their set because we had to meet Brae's grandmother for lunch and neither of us cared too much about The Remus Lupins). It was pretty cool, and we met some awesome people there that were also going to Infinitus (and are going to LeakyCon this year as well)!

I discovered a few bands through MySpace, but most of them were found through searching Youtube for their songs. Of the bands I listen to regularly, I found The House of Black, Marked as His Equal, and Riddle TM on MySpace. I found the rest on Youtube.

What was your first Harry Potter conference you attended?

I kind of already covered this in my two posts on Infinitus (part one and part two), so I won't cover it again and bore you all here.

Where were you when you read OotP, and who were you with?

I read OotP at my godmother's house in Louisiana. We were staying with her over the summer, so my mother had to take me to get the book (at the same Kroger we'd return to for every subsequent HP book release after my mother moved two blocks away from my godmother a year or so later) and I spent the next few days reading, having to be torn away to eat and do things my mother and godmother wanted to do like go see movies and shop. The majority of my time, when I wasn't cramming in a chapter in the car to some store or other, was spent on my godmother's couch next to her candy jar which was empty long before Sirius' death, meaning I had to scrounge in the kitchen for comfort food and chocolate to help with the depression I felt.

Were you pleased with the new direction Alfonso Cuaron took with the Prisoner of Azkaban? Leave a few comments letting us know what you thought, and still think, of the third film.

Ha! I'm sorry, but that question is ridiculous! I have yet to find a HP fan that was “pleased” with the new direction Alfonso Cuaron took with PoA! I mean, it was devastating! The first two films were so close to the book, and then they cut so much to make time for artsy shots of withering flowers, leaves falling off the Whomping Willow, and all that! I saw it with my brother who happened to be in town, and I remember glaring at the Dan fangirls sitting next to me who squealed every time he came on the freakin' screen and laughing out loud when Sirius' soul came out of his mouth! I still think it's the second worst HP film, only because GoF came along to eclipse its badness with the new action movie tactic they took there.

Fan Creations

There are oh-so-many creations out there dreamed up by avid fans of the series that it was difficult for me to create a semi-coherent post on my favorite forms of expression of HP-love and my favorite examples of said expressions.

I've discussed fan fiction a bit in the past. While I do love me some fan fiction, I prefer older fics or future fics because, generally, the canon is left pretty much intact. Marauder's, trio era, and new generation fics bother me most often because they aren't even remotely close the story. There are a few shining examples of fics that follow the story closely and add their own spin on events we didn't actually see or weren't fully let in on in the books. However, I do not want to read about pairings that aren't remotely possible (i.e. Harry/basilisk, Dumbledore/Harry, etc.). I will stand for some more whimsical pairings/events that still have some basis in the stories (i.e. a story where Luna and Ginny date for a bit before going their respective ways is ok in my book because we know a lot about Ginny or Luna when they're not with Harry). That said, I don't read or write much fan fiction anymore.

Not being the least bit talented in the visual arts, I do have great respect for fan artists, and I've seen some EXCELLENT examples of it. The most memorable of these were probably in the gallery at Infinitus, but I do remember a few pieces that stopped me in my tracks when I stumbled across them online.

Fan films are another matter. (I shall devote an entire post to Starkid, so don't really look for that here.) Being an actress and a sometimes director, I have high expectations when you mix my favorite art form with HP. I've actually wanted to make fan film for a few years, but I didn't think I could put it together and be impressed with it at all. That didn't always deter some fans, though. I don't want to be mean and call out anyone who put hard work into a fan film, so I'll leave it at the fact that I watch several of them, but I have yet to find a single one that is impressive at all (unless we're talking about impressively hilarious...for a drama).

But what about other writing? I've discussed role play in another post, so I guess that only leaves the books about the fandom. I have Erin Payne's The Ultimate Unofficial Guide to the Harry Potter Fandom on my Amazon wish list, and I hope to get to read it soon. I have, however, read all of Harry, A History by Melissa Anelli, and I loved it, though I did find myself with an aching desire to be able to go back in time and relive the height of the fandom and become more involved in the real life fandom in addition to the online fandom. I also cannot wait for Dear Mr. Potter, and I'm counting the days until we receive our pre-ordered copy!

There's so many amazing fan creations out there that I cannot even begin a list of my favorites! It's also been a long time since I've really read most pieces of fan fiction, examined most pieces of fan art, and been that involved in seeking out these fabulous reminders of how much HP means to its fans that I feel like reliving my original reactions would be impossible or seem fake. The last thing I want to do is provide a cheap personal narrative for you guys to read.

The important thing is that these creations are there as a testament to the series, to the fandom. Some we'll look back on and laugh, some we'll look back on and cry. Some will instantly transport us to our favorite moments in the books or fandom. And some may be forgotten, but the purpose behind their creation will not.