Weekend of Turkey, Battlestar, and Potter

[annathepiper]

As is our custom at the Murkworks, we had our annual Homeless Waifs Thanksgiving Day Turkeyfest, and this time around we had a very respectable turnout of 16 people, including children. Much obliged to mamishka, technoshaman, maellenkleth, dpawtows, epawtows, ypawtows, cflute, sksouth, fredpdx, and Mimi’s friend Chad who all showed up to make a wonderful evening. Callie brought her stepchildren with her as well and they were charming little tykes and very happy to play with the various toys we had around the living room.

flashfire has been spending the week with us as well, and we’ve been doing various low-key amusements since he’s had to be on call for work, which means he doesn’t have too much time free. We have, however, had quite a bit of fun attending both the Battlestar Galactica and Harry Potter exhibits downtown; last night, too, we saw the new Harry Potter movie.

Friday afternoon was exhibits day. We wandered downtown and had lunch at the Dick’s not far from Big Fish, as it turned out. It was really kind of weird actually getting that food in a sit-down restaurant. solarbird was amused by overhearing a nearby child asking another child, “Y’gonna drink that ketchup?”

From there we wandered over to the Seattle center to hit the exhibits. We tried Potter first, only to be told that we wouldn’t get in any earlier than 6:30. So we bought tickets for that time slot and hit the Battlestar exhibit instead.

The BSG exhibit was super-tiny, but what it had rocked. There were several excellent costumes from both the old and new series, an assortment of props, and interesting little snippets of videos spaced around the area. We were happy to see some of Starbuck’s stuff in particular, since Dara and I do miss our crazy TV girlfriend Kara, even now. ;) The big draw for this exhibit though was hands down the two Vipers and the Cylon raider, full size! solarbird took oodles of pictures. They’ll be going up for viewing soon enough, as soon as she figures out where to put them, I expect (her Flickr account is full).

Since we had time to kill, and since we hadn’t actually explored the Experience Music Project part of the building, we wandered around through the rest of the place as well. That was kind of neat, especially the display about indie music history in Seattle. The huge exhibit on Jimi Hendrix didn’t mean as much to me just because I have no background with his music; plus, I think I was a bit nonplussed by the huge sculpture of instruments in the lobby. I couldn’t help thinking gosh look at all those instruments that aren’t getting played, although they did look cool, I must admit. And apparently, the sculpture is set to play at certain times, though we didn’t catch that part.

solarbird, spazzkat, and flashfire also wandered through the Science Fiction Museum. I’d been in there before so opted not to look at that part; I wanted to check the swag shops and get me a Battlestar shirt, and also just see what else they had for sale. All in all a good way to kill time.

The Potter exhibit was doing mad crazy business, as you might expect on a holiday weekend, the first weekend following the opening of a Potter movie as well. It too was smallish, although bigger than the BSG exhibit. And unlike with the BSG exhibit, pictures were not allowed.

There were a whole lot of lovely costumes from the various movies: school uniforms and casual clothes for Harry, Hermione, and Ron; various teachers’ robes; Quidditch uniforms; and a lot of the Yule finery from Goblet of Fire. Those were neat, but I liked the set pieces better, such as the furniture from the Gryffindor dorms, Hagrid’s hut, and the big wardrobe and giant jack in the box from Prisoner of Azkaban. And there were props galore, including a Gryffindor notice board, a whole heck of a lot of Quidditch-themed props, and more. Big, big props though for the full-size figures of Buckbeak the hippogryph and a couple of the centaurs.

This of course leads nicely into talking about the movie. We did see Deathly Hallows last night, and since I never did get around to reading Book 7, now we’re getting into stretches of the story that are actually new to me (modulo the big best-known spoilers, which I am aware of at this point, yes). It was quite a bit different dealing with Harry, Hermione, and Ron outside the context of Hogwarts, and I rather liked that, even if the pacing of the movie could have used a bit of tweaking. Three words: too. Much. Camping.

(Paul in fact turned to us after the credits started rolling and said, “OH NO JOEL! CAMPING!”)

Dara noted and I agree with her that this is the first time that Voldemort and his followers really seem like a serious threat. The action scenes were certainly awesome, and I quite liked what we saw of the Malfoys and Bellatrix LeStrange. I must admit though that every time I see Ralph Fiennes as Voldemort I keep thinking “SAD MUPPET HAS NO NOSE!”

One more day of vacation tomorrow. We’re going to wander around Pike Place (and I am likely to do a fruit run with my marketboys), and then amble in the direction of I Heart for serious sushi goodness to send James home again on a tasty note.

Mirrored from annathepiper.org.

Comments

[wrog]

Three words: Too. Much. Camping.

Haven't seen the movie yet, but that's in the book. In fact it's so much in the book that, even though I normally completely forget pretty much every aspect of the plots of Harry Potter books within about a week or so of reading them, this was bad enough that I (still) remember it.

And of course, you'd think this would be at the top of the list of things to leave on the cutting room floor, but I guess not. Sigh.

[annathepiper]

The impression I've gotten from others is that this is a fundamental problem with Book 7: the protagonists are away from the really exciting stuff! So you'd have to rewrite huge swaths of the story to make it play better on screen, and then you'd go and probably piss off the fan base in a different way.

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

I'm not even that into the books and don't necessarily think of them as separate entities (like, it's all 'the Harry Potter storyline') and even I think of this as 'that whole long weird segment where they are camping or something and have a stupid boring fight about nothing', like it was a strange break.

Maybe Rowling felt like things were getting too intense for a YA book and wanted less action for a bit? I don't know. The whole thing kind of fell apart for me in the last few books, which I imagine it did for other people too.

[framlingem.livejournal.com]

There was much less camping in the film than there was in the book. I generally summarize the book as "Harry, Ron, and Hermione go camping and listen to the radio to find out about the exciting events going on far away".

Seriously - why would you take your protagonists away from the action to send them hunting macguffins at the climax of your seven-book-series? I don't get it.

I did love the animation for The Three Brothers, though. And Luna's dad!

[annathepiper]

The animation AND Luna's dad were both indeed awesome. :D

And yeah, meh, pulling Harry and Hermione and Ron off into the woods and giving us only glimpses of the really interesting stuff going on elsewhere... bah. Plus it didn't even have the consolation of the hunt for the MacGuffins actually having much, y'know, hunting. A lot of it was "Harry sits around in the woods while Hermione read read read read read read read reads".

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

Honestly, I think JK Rowling couldn't pull it off with them in the action. I think she doesn't have the skill or the will: Dad Weasley was (very clearly, and admitted later by Rowling) supposed to die in book five and she chickened out, which made the book much much less than it could have been, and set, I think, either a bad precedence or at least a warning that she can't manage the war & death aspect necessary for the last book. Just about everybody who dies in the book does it off-stage. I think she lacked the guts and very possibly the skill.

The animation, though, *was* awesome.

[annathepiper]

Mmm, I know who dies and how but didn't know most of those deaths were in fact offstage! Shame. Between that and what people are telling me about the interminable camping, I'm not terribly eager to finally dive into Book 7!

(I'll change my mind maybe if Rowling finally caves and permits the series to be released electronically. I still ain't carrying that monster around with me in print to work.)

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

I didn't know they hadn't been released electronically. What, does she think she's preventing piracy by doing that? *snort*

[annathepiper]

That is apparently exactly her reasoning. Last I heard she had finally caved and there were rumblings that this would happen; someone must have explained to her "um, ma'am, your books are already ALL OVER THE INTERNET."

Harry Potter Is Deathly Boring

[mizkit.livejournal.com]

I really had great hopes that they'd make the movie much better than the book and have all the interesting stuff on screen because they aren't necessarily as wedded to Harry's POV for the films. I was disappointed in my hopes, clearly. Seriously, though, you coulda made that movie into a really exciting 20 minute intro to the second half of the book (Hedwig dies! Steal the horocrux! Harry and Ron fight! ACK A SNAKE! Find the sword! Dobby dies! Move on, new cup!), instead of an excrutiating 2.5 hour movie of its own.

Furthermore, I'd have to re-read the book to be sure, but I'm pretty sure the _one scene_ in the entire book I was looking forward to came immediately after the find-the-sword scene, and it wasn't in the movie. *headdesk*

Re: Harry Potter Is Deathly Boring

[annathepiper]

I was trying to figure out how the heck they could have done this with less OH NO JOEL CAMPING! in it, and it sounds like your idea would have been awesome. 'Cause yeah, we really didn't need a movie about mostly camping. ;)

I wasn't deathly bored per se but I was bored enough that I was really rather wistful when Harry had the brief glimpses of what was going on with Voldemort. And thinking, 'well gosh it'd be nice to see these things PLAYED OUT ON CAMERA OR SOMETHING'. But hey!