A fond farewell to a legendary Hollywood series

Rating: 8/10 (29 December 2011)

Ten years ago when Harry Potter started it was simply mind blowing. Chris Columbus at the helm created a world and characters unlike anything we had ever seen on screen. I have never read the books and probably never will but I have enjoyed every single instalment of the series in different ways. However, post Goblet of Fire I personally began to see a gradual reduction in quality and story and characters. I suppose as they built up to the climatic inevitable battle against Voldemort that the sub-stories and characters would have to take a cut but its unfortunate. However, this is the perfect time for the series to bow out gracefully.
The main cast are still excellent in their roles. I don't think anyone was more born to play the three main kids than Daniel Radcliffe, Rupert Grint and Emma Watson. We have watched them grow into their characters and it is excellent. It was also great to see in this instalment the blossoming of romance between Grint's Ron and Watson's Hermione. The unfortunate part of the Deathly Hallows 1 and 2 is that the amazing supporting characters take a huge back seat role. The amazing Robbie Coltrane is barely existent as one of my favourites, Hagrid. Same with Maggie Smith and even Alan Rickman as Snape takes a bit of a backseat and that's really unfortunate because they were the heart and soul of the series. Ralph Fiennes is still excellent as Lord Voldemort though the final climatic battle actually turned out to be one of the most anti-climatic things I've ever seen in cinema.
What I mean is...8 films built up to this one climatic battle and its over in seconds and its not over in the way you would even expect. I don't mean to give anything away but this legendary literary and cinematic rivalry between Harry Potter and Lord Voldemort ends in the silliest way. However, it was also kind of nice to see a much understated character like Neville Longbottom played excellent by Matthew Lewis get a shining moment in the series. My final complaint was the ending in which we zoom ahead 15-20 years later to see Harry, Ron and Hermione sending their own children to Hogwarts. I suppose its a lose lose situation because I would have been annoyed if they had gotten older actors to portray them but seeing these 20 something year old kids playing 40+ year old adults was silly and they looked silly doing it. This was still the perfect ending to a great series, some truly outstanding visual effects as always and it was terrific that it all came to a head back at Hogwarts. If you watch this make sure you watch them all in order because together the series warrants at least a solid 9/10 but this instalment is a fond farewell but not the best in the series. 8/10