Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, Parts One and Two: The Official Playscript of the Original West End Production: The Official Script Book of the Original West End Production

I should probably start by saying that no one other than JK Rowling should be writing Harry Potter. Perhaps this plays better on stage, but I found a lot of the characters and their actions to be pretty flat. These characters are not written particularly well. It might have worked if we didn’t already have a very extensive background for each of these characters, making this iteration of them forced and hollow. As I know a few others here have already stated, this reads a lot like a fan fiction, and not necessarily a good one., First of all, Albus and Scorpius do not sound like kids. There’s a lot of time with them expounding on what great friends they are. They state it aloud a great deal, hug each other, have a lot of emotional moments, talk about their feelings, etc, For me, this came across pretty forced. It might have worked slightly better had they been girls, but even then it would have been forced and odd. It was not necessary for Ron, Harry, and Hermione to be stating constantly, “You’re my best friend” for the audience and/or the reader to know how they felt about each other. Their interactions made it obvious on a continuous basis. Here, I get that the author is trying to make certain the audience gets that Scorpius and Albus are devoted friends because they keep hitting us over the head with it. They must be best friends because they keep telling us (and each other) CONSTANTLY. They’re friends. We get it. Move on., Albus is actually pretty annoying. Harry and others keep saying, “Well he’s a teenager” (as he is in a large portion of the story), but even at Harry’s most emotional, growing pains moments (Book 5, Order of the Phoenix, the iteration I like to refer to as CAPSLOCK Harry because he yells…a lot), he is not this obnoxious or annoying. It would be less irritating if Albus’ issue was something concrete. This is hard to do, I know, when Harry’s character faced nothing less than the defeat of the most evil wizard of all time, and the possible destruction of the wizarding world every year., But Albus’ main issue? He’s dark and sullen because he thinks it’s such a pain to have a famous father. When his situation becomes more serious, it’s of his own choosing, not because he is thrust into a situation and has to dig deep within himself to face things. I did not really take to his character at all. His sullenness was simply annoying (as there was little basis for it), and his “I’m dark and moody” persona just seemed very forced. The other kids seem well adjusted enough. Albus just comes across like a spoiled child. There’s no real reason to sympathize with the character – he’s just obnoxious. Having a famous father is not the huge problem Albus is making it out to be., Speaking of forced, Ginny, Ron, and even Hermione to an extent are cardboard figures. Granted their characters have a few amusing moments here and there (hence the reason I gave 3 stars instead of 2), but they do not come across as developed, and considering the original stories gave a relatively extensive background for these characters to draw from, that’s pretty disappointing. Hermione is bossy. Ron is a putz. Dumbledore, who makes a cameo of sorts, is distraught (seriously, there is absolutely zero of the charm that the Dumbledore character usually has displayed here – just a lot of over the top weeping and drama)., Strangely enough, of the “main” characters involved here, Ginny seems to get the best treatment. Her character is the wise oracle that has all the meaningful things to say to soothe everyone else. For a moment, I had to double check to see if the story wasn’t called “Ginny Potter and the Cursed Child”., And then there’s Harry. Oh my god, what they’ve done to Harry. Harry spends a great deal of time in high angst. He’s EXTREMELY emotional, and indecisive, which was an odd choice for the author to make considering Harry is now an Auror, an occupation that does not have room for a lot of hand-wringing and blubbering. For seven books, the Harry character faced danger and the problems of being constantly in the spotlight, and he did not crumple as much as he does here. Here, he is reduced to a whiny, “Oh-my-God-Ginny-tell-me-what-to-do” kind of guy. He is Angst-y with a capital “A”. Did this author read the books? This is what he thought Harry would become as a result of the events of his earlier life? Are we to believe Harry has been reduced to an overly emotional, empty shell of a man? Seriously? This story would have us believe that post Hogwarts Harry has become delicate and damaged. Sorry, I don’t buy it., The actual story-line has some intriguing moments, and could have been far more interesting if it had been handled in a better manner. If you’ll pardon the pun, there is little of the “magic” of the wizarding world displayed here. There’s no wonder., *MINOR SPOILERS*, When it was decided that Albus would be in Slytherin, I thought they were going to go somewhere with that, but no. There was a bunch of “A Potter in Slytherin?” but that was essentially it. There wasn’t much expansion as to why Albus ended up in Slytherin when everyone else in the extended Potter family was in Gryffindor. They could have done a lot with that, but …no., Hermione being the Minister of Magic was a fun situation, I thought. Given the character’s past personality (and her magical skills) I thought it would only be a matter of time before she became Minister. There seemed to be a difficult time translating her to the stage here though. Yes, Hermione is bossy and very driven, but she was always uber-focused because she wanted to learn everything. She wasn’t bossy for the sake of being bossy, and because she enjoyed being in charge of everyone. She craved knowledge. I don’t get that from this Hermione., And Ron. They simply didn’t know what to do with Ron. He is now the easy-going prankster who works with his brother George. He seems to have been given a joking type of personality, much like Fred would have had. I found that to be an odd choice because the Ron character spends much of the books trying to determine who he is in a family of over-achieving older siblings. He didn’t have this joke-y type of personality before. It just seems odd that the choice was made to morph him into a Fred replacement., As an aside…although we don’t see a great deal of him, Draco has a few interesting moments here. He, also, is a little angst-y for my tastes, but I thought it worked for he and the trio’s kids to not have interaction that was automatically negative., *END SPOILERS*, I honestly think the story had some interesting plot possibilities. It simply was not handled very well. As stated before – it reads like a fan fiction. The names are all there, but there isn’t a lot of depth to the characters. There’s not a great deal of logic to how they went from who they were to the people they have become in this story., If this story ever becomes a film, it might actually work if they request that JK Rowling polish a few things in order to make it more in line with the Harry Potter canon, rather than wishful thinking fan fiction., ETA: I forgot to mention one of the things I found strange about the dialog. Several of the characters (Ginny and Scorpius to begin with) begin to sound like psychologists talking about people having “daddy issues” and “craving acceptance”. This was especially odd coming from the younger characters. Who talks like that?

I should probably start by saying that no one other than JK Rowling should be writing Harry Potter. Perhaps this plays better on stage, but I found a lot of the characters and their actions to be pretty flat. These characters are not written particularly well. It might have worked if we didn’t already have a very extensive background for each of these characters, making this iteration of them forced and hollow. As I know a few others here have already stated, this reads a lot like a fan fiction, and not necessarily a good one., First of all, Albus and Scorpius do not sound like kids. There’s a lot of time with them expounding on what great friends they are. They state it aloud a great deal, hug each other, have a lot of emotional moments, talk about their feelings, etc, For me, this came across pretty forced. It might have worked slightly better had they been girls, but even then it would have been forced and odd. It was not necessary for Ron, Harry, and Hermione to be stating constantly, “You’re my best friend” for the audience and/or the reader to know how they felt about each other. Their interactions made it obvious on a continuous basis. Here, I get that the author is trying to make certain the audience gets that Scorpius and Albus are devoted friends because they keep hitting us over the head with it. They must be best friends because they keep telling us (and each other) CONSTANTLY. They’re friends. We get it. Move on., Albus is actually pretty annoying. Harry and others keep saying, “Well he’s a teenager” (as he is in a large portion of the story), but even at Harry’s most emotional, growing pains moments (Book 5, Order of the Phoenix, the iteration I like to refer to as CAPSLOCK Harry because he yells…a lot), he is not this obnoxious or annoying. It would be less irritating if Albus’ issue was something concrete. This is hard to do, I know, when Harry’s character faced nothing less than the defeat of the most evil wizard of all time, and the possible destruction of the wizarding world every year., But Albus’ main issue? He’s dark and sullen because he thinks it’s such a pain to have a famous father. When his situation becomes more serious, it’s of his own choosing, not because he is thrust into a situation and has to dig deep within himself to face things. I did not really take to his character at all. His sullenness was simply annoying (as there was little basis for it), and his “I’m dark and moody” persona just seemed very forced. The other kids seem well adjusted enough. Albus just comes across like a spoiled child. There’s no real reason to sympathize with the character – he’s just obnoxious. Having a famous father is not the huge problem Albus is making it out to be., Speaking of forced, Ginny, Ron, and even Hermione to an extent are cardboard figures. Granted their characters have a few amusing moments here and there (hence the reason I gave 3 stars instead of 2), but they do not come across as developed, and considering the original stories gave a relatively extensive background for these characters to draw from, that’s pretty disappointing. Hermione is bossy. Ron is a putz. Dumbledore, who makes a cameo of sorts, is distraught (seriously, there is absolutely zero of the charm that the Dumbledore character usually has displayed here – just a lot of over the top weeping and drama)., Strangely enough, of the “main” characters involved here, Ginny seems to get the best treatment. Her character is the wise oracle that has all the meaningful things to say to soothe everyone else. For a moment, I had to double check to see if the story wasn’t called “Ginny Potter and the Cursed Child”., And then there’s Harry. Oh my god, what they’ve done to Harry. Harry spends a great deal of time in high angst. He’s EXTREMELY emotional, and indecisive, which was an odd choice for the author to make considering Harry is now an Auror, an occupation that does not have room for a lot of hand-wringing and blubbering. For seven books, the Harry character faced danger and the problems of being constantly in the spotlight, and he did not crumple as much as he does here. Here, he is reduced to a whiny, “Oh-my-God-Ginny-tell-me-what-to-do” kind of guy. He is Angst-y with a capital “A”. Did this author read the books? This is what he thought Harry would become as a result of the events of his earlier life? Are we to believe Harry has been reduced to an overly emotional, empty shell of a man? Seriously? This story would have us believe that post Hogwarts Harry has become delicate and damaged. Sorry, I don’t buy it., The actual story-line has some intriguing moments, and could have been far more interesting if it had been handled in a better manner. If you’ll pardon the pun, there is little of the “magic” of the wizarding world displayed here. There’s no wonder., *MINOR SPOILERS*, When it was decided that Albus would be in Slytherin, I thought they were going to go somewhere with that, but no. There was a bunch of “A Potter in Slytherin?” but that was essentially it. There wasn’t much expansion as to why Albus ended up in Slytherin when everyone else in the extended Potter family was in Gryffindor. They could have done a lot with that, but …no., Hermione being the Minister of Magic was a fun situation, I thought. Given the character’s past personality (and her magical skills) I thought it would only be a matter of time before she became Minister. There seemed to be a difficult time translating her to the stage here though. Yes, Hermione is bossy and very driven, but she was always uber-focused because she wanted to learn everything. She wasn’t bossy for the sake of being bossy, and because she enjoyed being in charge of everyone. She craved knowledge. I don’t get that from this Hermione., And Ron. They simply didn’t know what to do with Ron. He is now the easy-going prankster who works with his brother George. He seems to have been given a joking type of personality, much like Fred would have had. I found that to be an odd choice because the Ron character spends much of the books trying to determine who he is in a family of over-achieving older siblings. He didn’t have this joke-y type of personality before. It just seems odd that the choice was made to morph him into a Fred replacement., As an aside…although we don’t see a great deal of him, Draco has a few interesting moments here. He, also, is a little angst-y for my tastes, but I thought it worked for he and the trio’s kids to not have interaction that was automatically negative., *END SPOILERS*, I honestly think the story had some interesting plot possibilities. It simply was not handled very well. As stated before – it reads like a fan fiction. The names are all there, but there isn’t a lot of depth to the characters. There’s not a great deal of logic to how they went from who they were to the people they have become in this story., If this story ever becomes a film, it might actually work if they request that JK Rowling polish a few things in order to make it more in line with the Harry Potter canon, rather than wishful thinking fan fiction., ETA: I forgot to mention one of the things I found strange about the dialog. Several of the characters (Ginny and Scorpius to begin with) begin to sound like psychologists talking about people having “daddy issues” and “craving acceptance”. This was especially odd coming from the younger characters. Who talks like that?

Originally posted on my blog at https://rantandraveaboutbooks.com/2016/08/26/rave-review-of-harry-potter-and-the-cursed-child/, I pre-ordered this book a few weeks before its release date and held on to it for the past few weeks until the hype died down. I read very few reviews for this book, knowing only a few basic facts before I went into it. I didn’t even read the synopsis when I ordered it on Amazon because I didn’t want to risk any spoilers., Luckily, the synopsis didn’t give away the story. I’ve read some mixed reviews about this book, and I can honestly say that the hardcore Harry Potter fans will have issues with how time travel is handled. I went into this as a new adventure, happy to have another Harry Potter story. That’s it. I didn’t analyze every book in the series or make too many comparisons because I wanted to enjoy this story as if it were the lost novel J.K. Rowling stashed away in some drawer. I don’t care about the loopholes or the inconsistencies or the fact certain characters are missing from the story. Okay, I care a little bit, but I did not let it disrupt my enjoyment of this book., If you’re expecting this book to be a continuation of Harry Potter, you will be disappointed. But if you’re like me and you’re thrilled just to get another glimpse into this world, then you’ll probably rave over it. Another thing to consider is that this is a play adapted to a script book. With plays, the time is limited, and they had to cram a fair amount of information into a short time frame. There are almost always some minor inconsistencies in plays. It’s just how it is and it’s something I’ve come to accept after over twenty years of going to the theater. If you’ve never seen a live production and you’re expecting a full length book with all the questions answered, again you will be disappointed., What I Love About This Book…, I forgot how much I missed Harry, Ron, Ginny, and Hermione. I think I missed Ron most of all. I loved him from the second I read about him in Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. He’s such a goofball and it was really nice to see him again. He had a few lines that made me laugh and go aww, Ron, I love you., Harry is still Harry just older and sort of grouchy. Even though the books were about Harry, I was more of a fan of the secondary characters. My opinion didn’t change after reading this book, and I was glad the focus of this book is on Albus Severus Potter and Scorpius Malfoy., I really like the dynamic between Albus and Scorpius. From the start, everyone is hating on Scorpius and he was my favorite character from this book. Each scene with him only made me like him more. He could’ve chosen to be the bad guy at certain parts but the underlying story, just like the original books, comes down to friendship. That’s what I always liked about this series and that part remained intact., We get to see Snape again!!! I forgot how much I missed him, too. He was down to help the kiddies and I loved that he was willing to take one for the team once more., We see a little bit of Dumbledore, and there’s a really cute exchange between Harry and him where they discuss their relationship. Harry is very annoying in this book, which is why I was glad he wasn’t the focus. But I liked how his conversation with Dumbledore’s painting helped him to see what was wrong in his relationship with Albus. They constantly butt heads because they think they’re so different but it’s because they’re so much alike., My favorite book in the series is Harry Potter and The Goblet of Fire, and for that reason, I was really happy with the plot of this book. I loved being able to revisit parts of my favorite book with the help of a Time-Turner. And without going into detail, that also means you get to see some of the characters from back then, which was really exciting., I have always liked Draco Malfoy, and I guess if I had to choose a house I would’ve been sorted into Slytherin. I never gave much thought to this, mostly because I always thought with my personality this would make sense. I love characters like Snape and Draco. Who cares what house they’re in, right? That’s my thinking., I also liked the development of Harry and Draco’s characters as family men, and even though they’re not going to hug it out and have a sleepover, I did like that they had come to sort of understanding by the end of the book. There’s a secret about Draco that humanizes him a bit by the end, which I think had a lot to do with Harry’s change of heart., The Parts That Made My Heart Hurt…, Although Hagrid was not a character in this book, we did see him through Harry’s dreams. For me, Hagrid was the reason I was sucked into the first book in the series. Well, that and the fact the Dursleys were child abusers and I was so angry about it that I kept reading to make sure Harry got away from them. Sorry for the short rant but I really hate the Dursleys. Anyway, hands-down Hagrid is one of my favorite characters in any book. There is a serious tear-jerker moment where we get to see the past, and when Hagrid sees baby Harry, oh my God, my heart melted. It reminded me why I love Hagrid so much. He’s such a sweetie. I just wanted to hug him., There are a few scenes at Godric’s Hollow, and if you’ve read the books, you’ll know what I’m talking about. I don’t want to get into the specifics, but my heart literally hurt for Harry. I was hating on him most of the book until this one particular moment., Harry and Albus’ relationship was painful at times, but I was really happy with their overall character development. Some of the exchanges between them made it feel like they were strangers and not father and son. It was sort of depressing to see Albus feel somewhat like Harry did as a kid when he had a father right there. I thought it made sense to some extent, considering Harry did not grow up with a father. It was also very sad to read about., There wasn’t much I disliked about the book, which is why I gave it 5 Stars on Goodreads. I think I was just too excited to have another Harry Potter book that I was willing to overlook some minor issues with things that J.K. Rowling attempted to fix throughout the series, only for them to reappear in this book. Just writing this review made me miss it even more so I decided to start watching Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone. I own all the movies through Amazon, so I couldn’t resist throwing it on just so I could see some of my favorite characters on-screen. And now I need to do a reread of this series, most likely some time closer to winter., I really tried to limit this review to character development, and I didn’t give any spoilers, not unless you count who made a reappearance, even though I didn’t mention all of them, but other than that, I didn’t reveal any of the plot. You’re in for hopefully a pleasant surprise if you haven’t read the book yet.