What Went Wrong With Harry Potter and the Cursed Child?

select some of you after a bit of hesitation I finally broke down and snagged a copy of this thing and like every other opinionated nerd with a moderately successful YouTube channel I'm gonna give you my two cents on it my name is Austin and here's my opinion on what went wrong with Harry Potter and the cursed child spoilers obviously now before we get down to the nitty-gritty I want to preface I do not consider myself an active potterhead mostly a closeted former one I read all seven books during their original publication run and like many kids I stood in line for the midnight release of books 4 through 7 at my local Barnes & Noble well actually starting with 6 I realized it was just easier letting the UPS guy handle the heavy lifting point is I've done a healthy appreciation and knowledge of the franchise but I haven't gone overboard I grew up with the original books at just the right time and the Potter series will always hold a nostalgic and special place in my heart I learned great life lessons from the books and like many of you I cried after finishing book seven because characters I had spent literally my entire teenage life growing up with were suddenly gone forever no book series ever hit me like JK Rowling's epic having said that after Deathly Hallows I considered myself retired as a Potter head the story was done and there was nothing more to look forward to last movie I saw in theaters was Prisoner of Azkaban I caught the fourth one on basic cable 5 6 7 & 7 Act 2 I skipped wasn't into it not saying they're bad just saying I wasn't into it you do you I say all that at the beginning so you understand I'm not some overzealous fanboy complaining about the new book being The Wizarding World equivalent of the Star Wars prequels nor am i some scorned troll who revels an unconstructive snarky criticism of a product I care nothing about a Harry Potter series is a franchise that hit me at the right time in the right place and now that I've had about a decade to reflect I can see some of the flaws yet still appreciate the story as a whole for the great piece of art that it is oh and one more quick disclaimer before any of you would be YouTube commenters get on to me I am NOT an expert on storytelling I don't claim to be this book we're talking about today will outsell everything I ever write ever furthermore the authors Jack Thorne and John Tiffany are way better than me and they have the film television radio and theater credits to prove it I've got nada I'm just a bored guy with a YouTube channel who had nothing better to do this weekend so no I'm not sitting here with some holier-than-thou attitude about the whole thing thinking I'm a better writer than the dudes that did I just found what art to me pretty glaringly obvious missed opportunities in the latest installment of a franchise that holds a special place in my heart and I find that interesting right so I finally cracked the book open on Saturday August 6th and had it read in a few hours I closed the book and had one immediate thought that was actually quite bad so the cursed child begins write his book 7 ends Harry Ron and Hermione are seeing their little offspring hop on the Hogwarts Express to go visit the land of make-believe and already we've got some interesting developments Harry is the big bad head of magical law enforcement Hermione's the Minister for magic and Ron inherits his brothers joke shop whatever man Harry's got two sons and a daughter Albus Severus James and Lily Albus if you remember from the epilogue is nervous he doesn't want to get sorted into Slytherin Papa Harry's like don't sweat it just ask the Hat to be put in Gryffindor and you'll be fine man the kids all hop on the train and pretty soon they're off I seen three the new young ones are walking around the Hogwarts Express and suddenly it's like we're back to book one all over again and I'm getting kind of nostalgic the kids are deciding which compartment they want to sit in and wouldn't you know it Albus stumbles upon the compartment with Scorpius Draco Malfoy's kid contrary to what we're expecting out of the Malfoy scorpius turns out to be a pretty nerdy 11 year old kid who's fairly soft-spoken he just wants to make it through his first year of school without kicking up too much dust al takes a liking to him and they hit it off much to the dismay as rows Ron and Hermione zunda written daughter scene 4 is where things start taking the fast track suddenly the kids are at the castle and they're getting sorted roses put in Gryffindor like we're expecting Scorpios put in Slytherin like we're expecting the Hat gets put on our boy al and wouldn't you know it contrary to what we're expecting he's sorted into Slytherin shocked and silenced by everyone in the scene and for the first time we the readers are thrown for a loop in the words of rose and Wow the first year comes by in flashes the kids are at their first flying lesson Madame hooch who's still alive apparently as I'm all put their hands out over their brooms and say up roses broom shoots into her hand instantly like we're expecting next go-around Scorpios comes up like we're expecting third time should be the charm for our boy how but wouldn't you know it nothing he's trying but it ain't happening Harry Potter first year seeker he is not then the giggling starts pretty soon comes the bullying suddenly we're back on platform 9 and 3/4 it's a year later I was waiting for the train to arrive with his pops but we can tell their relationship is starting to fracture his first words our expectations for this kid have been completely barked nothing went how we expected it would go our personal fantasies as readers of what Harry's son's first year at Hogwarts would be like were completely wrong how do we know that apart from the sorting and the broom mishap we see nada from his first year which we can infer means it was pretty boring I mean it wasn't like a Dark Lord attempted to come back from the dead or anything howl doesn't get a philosopher's stone moment his first year contained no great adventure and he was no great hero he didn't save the day because the day didn't need saving we don't even know who won the house Cup this is a formula break and it's cool we're used to the kids having a big adventure every year passing through year one without incident makes the reader sit up and take note the silence is deafening I mean nothing's happened this has got to be going somewhere we think to ourselves so year two happens in a flash and by the end of it rose as a chaser on Team Gryffindor and she wants nothing to do with Al and his best buddy Scorpius Scorpius has got a crush on Rose that's not very convincingly written come to find out Al's actually turning into a little antisocial preteen who hates the school and hates constantly being in his father's shadow go figure also Al's classmates constantly poked fun at for being a terrible wizard and there's rumors going around that Scorpius is the illegitimate son of Voldemort although this whole threads so clearly a red herring that even the writers don't seem to want to spend too much time on it time shift train rolls around yet again and Harry standing next out getting him prepped for year three I was a teenager now and boy do we know it he's totally done with Hogwarts at this point makes no bones about expressing his unhappiness with his dad what's worse scorpius's mom has died in lille alles lil sis gets sorted into Gryffindor our boy Al's the odd Potter out almost nobody likes him and he likes almost nobody we get a glimpse of his frustration when he lashes out at his classmates stage lights go out and scene five opens up Harry's office at the Ministry of Magic we find Hermione sitting in his desk chair trying desperately to sort all his paperwork out our old friend Harry enters the room fresh from a ministry assignment sporting a cut on his cheek he's just recovered the last remaining time Turner from a generic Nair do well he gives it to Hermione and she decides to keep it oh we're looking for a flashlight to cut our way through the obvious foreshadowing Hermione Pickers with Harry about his messy office then and I'm not making this up they get into a half page back and forth where Hermione tempts Harry to have a piece of toffee I guess it's a British thing me say this right here this could have been the greatest scene in the entire book and taken the story in a unique direction but the writers didn't go for it I'll explain what I mean by that maybe in a different video Harry and Hermione catch up on each other's kids and the scene ends with Harry heading home once he gets there he walks in to find the late Cedric Diggory dad Amos Amos is basically your generic orphan parent is demanding Harry used the time Turner to go back and save his son's life our old friend Harry's now the straight man of this series so he says no and Amos leaves in a huff with his niece Delfy scene seven at the Potter house and Harry's given some pre Hogwarts gifts to each of his kids in the attempt to win back his son's affection he gifts him an old blanket that he Harry was wrapped in as a baby when Dumbledore dropped him off at privet drive like any teenager Albus looks at the gift like wow moldy blanket thanks dad preciate it this kicks off the first major argument between father and son and it ends with Albus telling Harry and Harry responding with painful moment but a good moment story telling wise scene shifts and Harry's dreaming about the night Hagrid came to get him from the Dursleys then the scene takes a dark turn and we hear the unmistakable voice of Baldy Harry wakes up in a cold sweat and wife Ginny's right by his side they have a quick little heart-to-heart and whoa Oh wouldn't you know it Harry scar is hurting again that only means one thing next scene Hogwarts Express big surprise I mean at this point we've been on the train for four years and barely seen the castle at all what up with that Rose comes over to Albus and wants to make up start their fourth year off right I was like sorry Tut's Rose lets it slip that Papa Harry's got himself a time Turner and suddenly I'll start attaching a plan he grabs Scorpius and says here's what's up dad's greatest failure in life he lets some guy named Cedric Diggory die so we're gonna do what my dumb pops couldn't we're gonna save him now plans to hook up with Amos Diggory and let his intentions be known then he wants to steal the affer mention time Turner head back to 1994 save Cedric's life and then I guess prove how more awesome he is than his dad I don't know doesn't make any sense but again he's 14 years old so it's not like he's playing with a full deck first step get off the train and head to a missus pad in st. Oswald's this brings us to scene 11 also known as the best scene of the entire book on the roof of the Hogwarts Express Albus and Scorpius plan to use little magic and hop off the train oh brother where art thou style once it passes under a viaduct just as Albus is making ready with the cushioning charm Scorpius gives them a nervous nudge what follows is the most over-the-top hilarious and adventury seen this hardcover mess has to offer the trolley which suddenly morphs miyazaki style to some night terror demon spawn with wild hair and spikes for hands this innocent little background character we've known since book 1 suddenly becomes a monster from our nightmares and I love it I mean why on earth does this lady exist how is this a good security setup I mean as attempted murder really the best method to deal with mischievous 14 year olds don't answer that but you know what it's so ridiculous and funny I don't care it's the first real action scene of the play and once the pair jumps off the Express to escape it suddenly feels like we're off on an adventure then the next scene it's a board meeting way to take the winds out of our sails minister Hermione's called a special meeting of the powers that be and she's desperate to get a plan going to deal with the new mysterious enemy nobody's interested Draco so put out with the rumours and Sons dealing with it's cool he's not game to help out either Albus and Scorpius hike up to Saint Oswald's Centre for wizards who can't read good wouldn't you know it Amos gives him the cold shoulder some 14 year old kids aren't gonna do diddly to bring back Diggory in his mind so he starts sending them packing then Delfy his hot 20-something niece convinces him to give the boys a chance and after a bit of back and forth and this finally gives them his blessing on the condition they take Delfy along for the ride stop right there and if you've been around the block before with harry potter you're probably already sensing delphi's the big baddie pulling the strings behind the scenes i started having my suspicions right here just makes literary sense for her to be the traitor in hiding scene 15 harry wifey hermione and hubby are all over at the potter's house eating dinner together they recap the main story thus far like we're on a tea show and pretty soon a now comes swooping in with the bad news Albus and Scorpius are coming up missing next scene the boys plus Delfy are knocking back some Polyjuice potion x' and morphing into Harry Ron and Hermione respectively Q hilarity q rapport building only the trouble is besides Albus Delphian scorpy haven't really been fleshed out very well as characters and as a result the team feels rushed together and they don't play off each other nearly as well as the folks they're morphing into did at that age I don't blame the writers I blame the medium that they're stuck in scene 17 we cut back to Harry Ron Hermione Ginny and Draco for another round of catching up airy and draco are now playing the role of concerned fathers looking for their missing kids and both aren't too happy about it back to a land company and the heist begins time turn is being kept in Hermione's office and they make their way to it doing their best to avoid detection problem is real-life Hermione shows up and fake Ron Weasley played by our main man al has to distract her weirdest scene in the entire book takes place here now playing the part of Ron starts putting the moves on his own aunt and go so far as to suggest having another baby and gives her several very very awkward passionate kisses is it weird you betcha does it work as a funny scene I mean sure if you're into that they finally get into Hermione's office and they start the search for the time-turner what follows is a relatively contrived game of riddles that harkens back to the final potions test in the philosopher's stone it's a scene that probably works on the stage but if you're just reading it things feel rather convenient you're telling me her Maya the genius of the entire book series relies solely on a game of riddles so simple a 14 year old could solve it again lots of readers will promptly complain about this scene but I'd forgive it based on the fact that it probably plays pretty well on the stage also because McGonagall lampshades it later in the story so the kids get the time-turner and the plan to save Cedric is in full motion stage cuts to black act one ends and the intermission starts a stop right here for a progress report yes the story is headed toward some problems by-and-by this is the best act out of the entire book we've introduced the characters thrown some twists in and we're starting on an adventure act one is the strongest act of the entire story if you don't like it leave the theater now cuz it ain't getting any better than that one bathroom break later in the audience piles in for act 2 stage lights come up and we're back in privet drive covered under the stairs little orphaned harry's getting the business end from Aunt Petunia and just as the dream starts getting dark my main man house shows up out of nowhere we're in durmstrang robes and Valda mort's voice returns Harry wakes up again soaked and sweat again Jenny again continues her role as the concerned wife and Harry realizes his dream is telling him where his son is at stop right here for a second let me throw in two pennies the whole dream sequence thing comes off is way too convenient but I've been a lot cooler if Harry played detective for once and figured out his son's plan after some Potter style sleuthing instead of getting everything handed to him on a silver platter thanks to magic dreams or something so the old guard meets up in McGonigle's office to get her help scene for owl scorpioned Delfy are in the Forbidden Forest training for the mission they're gonna go back in time to the Triwizard Tournament disarm cedric on task 1 then travel back to the present and I guess save the day or something I don't know Delfy is clearly trying to play on both underage boys hormones and she gives a la kiss on the cheek but gives Scorpius nada we've been cool to see this theme played out a bit more with the two friends fighting with each other over a girl who's way too old for either of them but like most things in this book it's dropped before there's a chance to really develop it so pretty soon Harry's in the forest hunting around for owl and we get a quick cameo by Bane the Centaur Bane is useless this scene serves no purpose to the story beyond getting a Meo from the original books Bane doesn't do diddly to help find out and only offers up to hairy dangerous well duh scene six edge of the Forbidden Forest al Scorpius and Delfy pull out ye olde time-turner and start with the twisty twist right as Ron Weasley shows up the stage starts to transform and suddenly were making like the DeLorean and headin back in time Triwizard Tournament circa 1994 wait you know what this is takin forever I'm not doing this play-by-play anymore but for Sirius here's a quick little note about this particular scene when Albus is standing in the crowd during the Triwizard Tournament and he sees his dad for the first time it doesn't have nearly the effect it should at least not on the page you got to remember Harry is the exact same age as Albus in this scene Albus has this warped view of what Hogwarts life was like for his dad he assumes his father is at the height of popularity and loved by all Albus hates this because Albus is not popular and he's constantly bullied by the people around him on the page when Harry's name is finally announced there's cheering from the audience although the script tells us it is noticeable that the cheering for Harry is slightly less than that for Cedric if I'm in charge of script rewrites here's how I'm changing that sentence Albus needs to see that his dad didn't have an easy time of it his assumption of Harry's popularity needs to be challenged at some point and you know this is the time to do it Arry was not popular at Hogwarts in book for the student body rumor mill was that he was a cheater an attention hog who always needed to be in the spotlight remember rumor was he put his own name into the Goblet of Fire somehow and wanted to be the center of attention for the fourth year in a row even his own Grif and her buddies started hating on him even Ron was getting sick of him so in this scene if Albus hears cheers he just thinks to himself yeah there's my dad on the other hand if Albus expects to hear Cheers but here's booze instead it makes him for the first time start to view his father in a different light and question the facade he's built of Harry's younger years also another side No would have been pretty cool for Albus to actually see Harry battle that dragon you know you get the sense the entire book that Albus just assumes his dad was this amazing superhero who never took his share of licks so if Albus sees his dad get his robe singed and his death-defying skills on the broomstick our main character gets an unspoken teachable moment maybe it wasn't so easy being daddy after all but thanks to the plot no that happens because in this world the time-turner device only gives you five minutes or so in the past to mess around all right back on point I said I wasn't going scene by scene and here's when that rule takes force why you ask as this is where everything starts going downhill they managed to disarm Cedric like the plan called for time gets snapped back to the present everything seems hunky-dory except pretty soon we realized things are off couple hours later and Albus finds out he's in Gryffindor Hermione's suddenly now the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher a total snake face at that Andros Loras doesn't even exist this reality is messed up that's right folks Harry Potter and the cursed child goes full-on butterfly effect they've changed the past but now the presents all wonky and it won't do so they gotta go back again and undo the damage done by the first time they went back and then that makes everything worse so they gotta go back again to repair that and for 88 pages were in a time travel story ripped right out of the 2007 writers strike season of heroes alternate timelines and parallel universes are totally not Harry Potter well I sounded like a total fanboy when I said that didn't I time travel was used very rarely in the original series because time travel does nothing but create narrative problems and stories the only time our heroes travel back in time is book three and we end up learning that in this universe timeline is self-fulfilling and all exists in a single loop this has tried once in the series - if he results and then never touched again in fact in book 5 Rowling deals with the time-turner problem by destroying a mall in an awesome fashion this is where they should have stayed dead this totally convoluted storyline lasts the entirety of act two and half of act 3 so there's no way to filter it out of the story you can't filter it out because it's the basis for the entire plot of the play it's confusing unnecessary and obviously only exists so the audience has an excuse to go back and revisit some of the cool moments out of the original books it's stuffed full of pointless cameos that ring hollow every step of the way because we're not revisiting the characters we love we're looking at some alternate universe fan fiction version of the characters we love it stinks Dumbledore Snape umbrage Cedric Moaning Myrtle for crying out loud characters who are all past their expiration date characters whose presence in this setting would be better felt than seen they all pop up in bizarro form none of them are their authentic selves and it feels empty cameos work if the cameos serve an actual purpose if it's just an excuse to play around with a character that's no longer relevant to the universe it won't work there's a reason characters usually only come back from the dead in comic books and cheap daytime soap operas you feel me so by page 200 they finally manage to write the ship and get things back to normal I was slightly less mopey Scorpius is slightly less cowardly and Delfy well she's come up missing the boys plan to take the time turn her out to the back forty and blow it up with the wizard equivalent of a shotgun blast and it looks like everything's about to be wrapped up Yeah right if you read this book and make it to Act three Scene 15 and you still don't know where the rest of this play is going or how it's gonna end I just I don't know I can't help you turns out delphi's the big baddie Voldemort secret daughter and she's out to prevent the untimely demise of her know knows daddy by the end of act 3 she's brought Albus and Scorpius with her back to the past destroy the time Turner and left them for dead act 4 is all about Albus and Scorpius trying to get a message somehow to Harry in the present to warn him about her evil plan Albus finally manages to alert his daddy by using wouldn't you know it that moldy baby blanket that Harry gifted to him way back in act 1 Aryan the gang got to travel back in time to 1981 the night Harry's parents are murdered but how they gonna do that without a time Turner no worries draco malfoy shows up out of nowhere and it reveals he's got the most powerful time Turner of all time and he's just been you know holding on to it for no reason in particular so they used the time Turner and traveled back to 81 to save the boys and have a final showdown with Delfy wouldn't you know it they win Harry then decides to stick around and watch his parents be murdered and he makes his son watch it by his side because whatever then they all travel forward in time to where they belong and everyone lives happily ever after yeah that's the book so where did it all go wrong five scenes in the second Harry gets that time Turner and hands it over to Hermione we're not reading a Harry Potter story anymore unless you want to call it like Harry Potter and the multiverse experiment or something scene five could have easily played differently and been written to totally change the course of the story more on that again at another time the story was starting off great giving us a quick glimpse of Albus his first few years at Hogwarts and how living in the shadow of his father was making him absolutely miserable then the ghost of Cedric Diggory comes into the picture and everything takes a nosedive I don't mean ghosts like an actual ghost because the Harry Potter franchise has ghosts I don't mean ghosts like nearly headless Nick ghosts I mean ghosts in a figurative sense once this story decides the adventure is gonna be about going back in time and saving Cedric Diggory character no reader particularly wanted save we started going down the path of no return entire alternate timeline thing feels so fanfiction it's not even funny and it's a shame because check this guess how much of this book is spent time hopping initially like a lot of it you take that section out and you're left with practically nothing no character development because the character development is erased every time the timeline changes and there's no investment and what will happen the rest of the story because no matter how bad it gets you've already established that anything and everything can be undone with the twist of a necklace as a tough sentence to get out there remember way back when we talked about how Albus is uneventful first year was a formula break the time-travel stuff is a genre break and it ain't so hot a lot of people think they know how Harry books work but then I don't know nothing I'm gonna break it down for you lickety-split cuz this video is way too long here's JK Rowling's big secret Harry Potter books aren't fun because they're fantasies with magic and wizards and sorcery and Quidditch and whatnot Harry Potter books are fun because Harry Potter books are mysteries think about it every book in this series is a boarding-school mystery wrapped in magic the mystery of what that huge three-headed dog is guarding in the Forbidden corridor the mystery of who or what is petrifying students randomly throughout the school the mystery of Sirius Black why he escaped Azkaban the mystery of who put harry's name in I gotta fight the mystery of Voldemort's plan to take over the world again the mystery of the half-blood Prince and the mystery of Voldemort where did he come from how can he be defeated and lastly the mystery of the Deathly Hallows they all follow the same formula each book has an initial mystery and you pick up clues here and there along the way red herrings tried to pull you off course but eventually the truth is revealed in a final battle takes place Harry Potter books our mystery books disguised as fantasy books Harry Potter and the cursed child is a time travel book disguised as a Harry Potter book think about it if you stripped all the magic and Wizardry you know the Harry Potter stuff away from the Chamber of Secrets what do you have pretty cool murder mystery story if you strip all the Harry Potter stuff away from the cursed child what do you have well the reason Harry Potter and the cursed child feels so unlike a Harry Potter story is because it isn't and so we finally get to the bottom of the mystery that we're attempting to solve what went wrong with the cursed child why is this book failing to win over longtime fans well what if I told you the answer was on the back cover Ryan so let's get this straight there is no eighth story a full term at Hogwarts is seven years and by calling it the eighth you've immediately placed it both canonically and quality-wise on the same level as the original series call me crazy but I think the biggest problem this book had going for it was the advertising campaign from the classic hardcover dust jacket to the monotype Baskerville font the marketing team at scholastic went all out and clearly wanted consumers to understand this is the 8th Harry Potter book problem is it isn't it's got a name on the cover but even the least engaged fans read three scenes into this and they say to themselves JK Rowling didn't write this let's talk about writing style as an author JK Rowling's got a great voice you read through the Harry Potter series and it's full of whimsy subtle humor and a tone that general audiences can pick up and enjoy she's great at describing location emotion and conveying the importance of the moment she's just specific enough to give you an understanding of what's going on in the scene just generic enough that you can fill in the spots in between with your own mental image of what's happening she doesn't beat you over the head with details unless they're important she's also subtle she'll place key information in the middle of her prose and she won't draw attention to it until it becomes important later and even then on repeat readings you'll still find some stuff you missed the first time and you'll go the curse child has none of this part of the reason why is it again it's a stage play there's really no room for prose but beside that the story totally lacks subtlety and non-obvious foreshadowing besides that Rowling as an author cares less about action and more about feelings and characters dialog is usually clever and serves a purpose the curse child's dialogue attempts humor and has more misses than hits one of the problems with this play is that it doesn't do what good place is supposed to do which is namely move the plot along through dialogue most of the dialogue scenes don't advance the plot in any way for example the general meeting scenes lots of arguing not a lot of character story development a lot of these scenes feel like they're only there to give the theatre crew time to prepare backstage for the big action scenes coming up also read into this what you will but having two guys write for a series written usually by a woman might explain some of the problems I'm not being sexist just saying generally speaking guys prefer to write action as opposed to meaningful character development and dialogue a lot of action in this book not a lot of development just saying to sum up Harry Potter and the cursed child's getting flack mainly because the problems present in it are magnified by its insistence at being known as the 8th Harry Potter story think about it like this if this story was released without the dust jacket and fanfare if the book looked like the paperback runs of Quidditch through the ages and fantastic beasts and where to find them for instance there wouldn't be nearly as many people pulling it down don't you think a cursed child is cursed by the insinuation that what we're reading is how harry's happily ever after actually played out and compared to the long journey of his school days it ain't that happy I'm sure the cursed child is an awesome stage play to watch it sold out through 2017 it's got one of the most talented cast and crews around it already is and will continue to be a financial success by all accounts the cursed child will be one of the more profitable aspects of the Harry Potter franchise I made this video simply to explore some of the issues I have with the story when taken at face value so how would I fix it well that's another story for another time thanks for watching don't forget to Like and subscribe for more or don't I don't really care

Channel: austinmcconnell

Views: 3,846,756

Rating: 4.7897377 out of 5

Keywords: harry potter, the cursed child, harry potter and the cursed child, what went wrong, what went wrong is harry potter and the cursed child, new harry potter, harry potter stage show, what went wrong with harry potter and the cursed child

Id: rq-9BnHPjsY

Length: 31min 17sec (1877 seconds)

Published: Sat Aug 27 2016

Reddit Comments

[u/CX-001]

The longer i listened, the more he sounded like a less eccentric Sam Rockwell.