I'll come back when you call me, no need to say goodbye
I'll probably be getting more and more emoitional as I write this entry, even though I swore to myself I wouldn't, but well... be as it may.
If you will practice being fictional for a while, you will understand that fictional characters are sometimes more real than people with bodies and heartbeats. - Richard Bach
Now we're back to the beginning / It's just a feeling and no one knows yet / But just because they can't feel it too / Doesn't mean that you have to forget / Let your memories grow stronger and stronger / 'Til they're before your eyes / You'll come back when they call you / No need to say goodbye. - Regina Spektor
Well, if you watched the premiere yesterday, you already know. If you didn't, here it is.
I felt horrible yesterday. Actually, I've felt horrible for a couple of days. It turns out that my blessed damn country hasn't yet bought the movie neither with subtitles nor in 3D; so they're only selling for 2D and dubbed. I am not watching the last movie dubbed, not for my life. We still don't know when they'll start selling tickets for the subtitled movie, if they will, so pretty much this year, which was going to be amazing, sucks.
And then on Wednesday I logged in at Veritaserum Forums, which was my first taste of the HP fandom, and there was a thread named "Goodbye" where people were leaving messages in case we wouldn't return there after the movie was released.
So, yesterday, after watching the premiere, I wiped away the tears and went to my bedroom to find the wand my grandfather made me last year, just in case. And I broke.
The thing is, I know -I know- that the final book was released in 2007, so the story truly ended back then, not now. I know that this isn't "the end" of anything, that as they said, the story won't die and Hogwarts will always welcome us back.
And yet I feel sad. Lost. Maybe it's nostalgic, after all. Because I remember all the good times I had reading about Harry, Ron and Hermione's adventures and then watching them on screen; all the things I've learnt thanks to the books (and to name them all would take way too much space, believe me); every good friend I met through fandom; the many things I discovered about myself, the satisfied need to believe in magic.
To me, this feels more like saying goodbye than it ever felt, because when DH was released, I was discovering the fandom, something I would have never dreamt of, so it didn't feel like the end, at all. If the fandom survived the books, then, why should I think that it won't survive the movies? I don't know. But I have seen fandom slowing down in the past times, and I'm dreading the day when I no longer feel like writing or doing anything related to Harry Potter. I guess that's a shared feeling, huh?
That's not happening anytime soon, but it will happen, I know it. And I just wanted to let everyone know how much this all meant to me. It's been an amazing ride. Thanks for sharing it with me. Other people might like Harry Potter as much as I do; there will be some who won't understand all the fuss about it. But only the people who took the stories and the characters and the magic and didn't just accept it passively but did something with it understand how big and magical this has been--and will always be.
As Dumbledore said in the beginning of the very first movie, maybe foreseeing this moment: "It's not really goodbye, after all."
Long Live to The Boy Who Lived!
Thank you.
Dessi
PS: And if you still feel like crying, check out this fanmix trilogy: The Life and Times of One Harry James Potter
If you will practice being fictional for a while, you will understand that fictional characters are sometimes more real than people with bodies and heartbeats. - Richard Bach
Now we're back to the beginning / It's just a feeling and no one knows yet / But just because they can't feel it too / Doesn't mean that you have to forget / Let your memories grow stronger and stronger / 'Til they're before your eyes / You'll come back when they call you / No need to say goodbye. - Regina Spektor
Click to viewWell, if you watched the premiere yesterday, you already know. If you didn't, here it is.
I felt horrible yesterday. Actually, I've felt horrible for a couple of days. It turns out that my blessed damn country hasn't yet bought the movie neither with subtitles nor in 3D; so they're only selling for 2D and dubbed. I am not watching the last movie dubbed, not for my life. We still don't know when they'll start selling tickets for the subtitled movie, if they will, so pretty much this year, which was going to be amazing, sucks.
And then on Wednesday I logged in at Veritaserum Forums, which was my first taste of the HP fandom, and there was a thread named "Goodbye" where people were leaving messages in case we wouldn't return there after the movie was released.
So, yesterday, after watching the premiere, I wiped away the tears and went to my bedroom to find the wand my grandfather made me last year, just in case. And I broke.
The thing is, I know -I know- that the final book was released in 2007, so the story truly ended back then, not now. I know that this isn't "the end" of anything, that as they said, the story won't die and Hogwarts will always welcome us back.
And yet I feel sad. Lost. Maybe it's nostalgic, after all. Because I remember all the good times I had reading about Harry, Ron and Hermione's adventures and then watching them on screen; all the things I've learnt thanks to the books (and to name them all would take way too much space, believe me); every good friend I met through fandom; the many things I discovered about myself, the satisfied need to believe in magic.
To me, this feels more like saying goodbye than it ever felt, because when DH was released, I was discovering the fandom, something I would have never dreamt of, so it didn't feel like the end, at all. If the fandom survived the books, then, why should I think that it won't survive the movies? I don't know. But I have seen fandom slowing down in the past times, and I'm dreading the day when I no longer feel like writing or doing anything related to Harry Potter. I guess that's a shared feeling, huh?
That's not happening anytime soon, but it will happen, I know it. And I just wanted to let everyone know how much this all meant to me. It's been an amazing ride. Thanks for sharing it with me. Other people might like Harry Potter as much as I do; there will be some who won't understand all the fuss about it. But only the people who took the stories and the characters and the magic and didn't just accept it passively but did something with it understand how big and magical this has been--and will always be.
As Dumbledore said in the beginning of the very first movie, maybe foreseeing this moment: "It's not really goodbye, after all."
Long Live to The Boy Who Lived!
Thank you.
Dessi
PS: And if you still feel like crying, check out this fanmix trilogy: The Life and Times of One Harry James Potter