Harry Potter dominated the box office for a decade, there will never be another series like it.

[Lumos]

Its consistency was amazing but they were all undoubtably huge films. Sorcerer's Stone was they highest grossin move of all time back in 2001 behind only Titanic. And the last film also became the highest grossing non-James Cameron film ever. It broke the OW record twice and its 43.5mil midnight haul may be a record that never gets beaten. And that was just the films. The books were even crazier. If you look at the top 10 best selling books of the 2000-2009 decade all potter titles make the list....I think the da Vinci code was the only novel that managed to top some of the potter titles. But that was just one book. Potter had insane sales with every new release.

Edited July 14, 2014 by Lumos

[BK007]

Great thread, Baumer. I can't really say what anyone here hasn't said but yeah the HP series is an anomaly in terms of both the books and the films.  There was nothing like it before and, thanks to the sheer length of the series, there may very well never be anything else like it.

 

I wonder if there will be a day, in my lifetime, that WB decides that it needs to be rebooted.

 

I wouldn't think so because it is such a huge commitment if they wanted to do it right, plus unlike, well, any and every other movie role out there, no matter what you think of Radcliffe, Watson and Grint, they played the role for 10 years in 8 films. They are the characters.

 

I don't think it will happen...though I'm not sure if I'd be sad or happy if they did. Obviously all the films have ways to be improved, but this isn't a real reboot is it? If you reboot PS, you have to go all the way to DH, but if you screw up the film, there won't even be a CoS.

[redfirebird2008]

Perhaps the most impressive part of it is the domestic performance. They basically averaged $300m every time out. Even with ticket price inflation, 3D, and more IMAX than ever, just look at the dropoffs of other big franchises like Spider-Man, Shrek, Pirates, and Transformers.

 

Potter never reached the domestic high points of the above franchies, but it also never crashed and burned like they did in such a short period of time. That shows the loyalty of the fanbase and the filmmakers continuing to put out a product that satisfied the fanbase.

[AndyLL]

I'm a fan ( but not a fanboy ) of both the Potter books and movies.  Recently we've started rewatching them in our house.  There are many reasons this turned into an exceptional series of movies:

 

1) Actors - It's amazing.  They were 11/12/13 the 1st movie. ( my sons age ) They had to pick actors that matched the characters in the book and would continue doing so for 10+ years without any issues.  

 

2) Consistency in scheduling.  The books and movies came out at regular intervals without any big gaps.  Allowed the fanbase to anticipate the next installment.

 

3) Quality of the movies - Just got better and better each movie.  It made up for some of the weaker stories.  POA is a great example.  The time travel was stupid but the cinematography was fantastic.  Some of the later ones were fantastic.

 

4) Faithfulness to the books.  I know the fanboys will quibble but I thought the movies remained about as faithful as a movie can be to a book.  Rowling's being so involved was important.

 

5) Suitability of the books to be made into films.  Maybe this is a credit to the filmmakers but it seemed the stories suited the visual medium as well as the printed.

 

But let's not forget the books were a phenomenon.  It's been credited for bringing about a bit of a resurgence in kids reading.

[Fancyarcher]

Excellent article Baumer. Harry Potter was a cultural phenomenon indeed. I remember when me and everything in school wouldn't shut about the books. The same happened when the first few movies came out.

 

I don't think there will ever be quite another franchise like it, especially worldwide. It's one of a kind.

Edited July 14, 2014 by Pokearcher

[chasmmi]

Narnia potentially could have done it but they screwed up the casting (and a couple of other things) that cuased it to fade away too soon.

 

One thing that Potter really did well was the casting of the roles (considering how bad child actors can become). I'd say only Malfoy from the main group of kids was a total disaster casting wise.

[Moviedweeb]

Never say never. There will be another series as significant as Harry, it is just a matter of when and I am sure it will be a while.

[Fancyarcher]

I wonder if the new HP series starting with Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them will continue the HP success, or take a dip similar to the Star Wars Prequels and The Hobbit trilogy.

 

Um how exactly did The Star Wars prequels take a huge dip like The Hobbit later did? Adjusted for inflation there still among the highest grossing movies of all time.

[grim22]

Narnia potentially could have done it but they screwed up the casting (and a couple of other things) that cuased it to fade away too soon.

 

One thing that Potter really did well was the casting of the roles (considering how bad child actors can become). I'd say only Malfoy from the main group of kids was a total disaster casting wise.

 

That is a good point. The drop between "Lion, witch and the wardrobe" to "Prince Caspian" to "Whatever the hell it was called" was huge. What happened there? I haven't seen any of the Potter or Narnia movies, but there was always news when a new Potter movie was coming out whereas Narnia just disappeared after the first one.

[grey ghost]

How would they reboot?Weren't all the books already adapted properly?Fans probably don't want a retread or non-JK Rowling stories.

[TServo2049]

To answer Pokearcher: Episode I actually did have admissions consistent with/slightly higher than the original runs of the sequels. ESB/ROTJ/TPM's first runs all adjust into the $600m's. It's II that dropped almost 40% from I - a film-to-film admissions decrease on the level of The Lost World: Jurassic Park - and III only increased 14% from II, it wasn't THAT much of an improvement. They were huge, yes, but not as huge as V/VI/I.

Edited July 14, 2014 by TServo2049

[CJohn]

So I see Noctis hacked into Baumer's account. Interesting. 

[Donald]

Am 20...... hope I live long enough till the nest rebootBtw. All the harry bks sold over 50 mill copies wwSoceres stones sales are even above 100 mill copies ww

[Donald]

Ps....its above 50 mill copies each!^

[Fancyarcher]

To answer Pokearcher: Episode I actually did have admissions consistent with/slightly higher than the original runs of the sequels. ESB/ROTJ/TPM's first runs all adjust into the $600m's. It's II that dropped almost 40% from I - a film-to-film admissions decrease on the level of The Lost World: Jurassic Park - and III only increased 14% from II, it wasn't THAT much of an improvement. They were huge, yes, but not as huge as V/VI/I.

 

Still the Hobbit dropped much bigger.

[Noctis]

I couldn't believe baumer created this thread. Pretty unexpected.

 

Harry Potter has been the most consistently huge franchise ever released in cinema. I think everyone has discussed why the films have sustained their longevity and retained a clear majority of their audience with each film. Hell, we often see series collapse around their fourth film.

 

SS: 56m

CoS: 44.9m

PoA: 40.1m

GoF: 45.2m

OoTP: 42.5m

HBP: 40.2m

DH1: 37.1m

DH2: 45m 

 

Just to point out, DH2 had an absurdly low 3D share during its run, and give a 5% surcharge to GoF/CoS and they still wouldn't top DH2. 

 

But for 6 films out of the last 7 to sell between 40m-45m tickets shows incredible consistency. Potter, domestically, may have never reached the heights of franchises like SM, Pirates, and Rings, but Potter never dropped anywhere remotely as hard as any of the franchises. And its huge success domestically is also telling, as it's the only major British-made and British-produced franchise. Overseas, Potter is absolutely beyond reproach. The 7 films averaged $600m+ overseas, before the explosion of developing countries. In 2D. That is an amazing accomplishment.

 

Not even the amazing Two Towers dethroned the (IMO) utterly mediocre CoS overseas. $585m vs $617m.

 

8 films in 10 years. Any studio would have expected the series to sell well below 50% of its peak. DH1 was the easy low point. It still managed to sell 2/3 of the tickets SS did, and DH2 4/5. 

 

But one of the biggest reasons Potter was so consistently huge is that because the characters, stories, and themes deepened, darkened, and matured throughout the series. There is no other series that had such a dramatic shift in tone with time. Play SS, and then play DH1, and the difference in tone is just incredible. 

 

Stephen King said it best about why the Potter series sustained its popularity and appeal:

 

The Potter books grew as they went along. That, I think, is their great secret (and not so secret at that; to understand the point visually, buy a ticket to Order of the Phoenix and check out former cutie Ron Weasley towering over Harry and Hermione). R.L. Stine's kids are kids forever, and the kids who enjoyed their adventures grew out of them, as inevitably as they outgrew their childhood Nikes. Jo Rowling's kids grew up...and the audience grew up with them.

 

 

Harry Potter connected on such an incredible level with Millennials all over the world. Growing up with the books and the films was an incredibly personal experience. I was 9 when SS came out, and I absolutely fell in love with it. And I'd just graduated from high school when DH2 was released. 

 

There was an article that compared Superman to Harry Potter, and why Superman became iconic in the 1950s, while Potter became the revered fictional hero of 2000s. It's because Harry Potter, as a character, isn't anything special in terms of talent. Superman was invincible and powerful like no other, but the people of this generation found it hard to relate to him. They related very much to Harry because he was an ordinary boy, and the only reason he was able to defeat Voldemort in the end was because Harry knew how to love. Voldemort didn't and that was his downfall.

 

The Potter films and books have been a story about the redemptive power of love. And that is a great message.

 

I'll leave it at that. There will never be anything like Potter, and the ones who grew up with the characters know how intimate the journey was. It gave a lot of people all over the world happiness. 

Edited July 14, 2014 by Noctis

[The47th]

Narnia potentially could have done it but they screwed up the casting (and a couple of other things) that cuased it to fade away too soon.

 

For me the problem with Narnia comes from the source: the Prince Caspian book doesn't have any of the charm of the first one. They should have fixed that in the movie adaptation somehow.

 

5) Suitability of the books to be made into films.  Maybe this is a credit to the filmmakers but it seemed the stories suited the visual medium as well as the printed.

 

That's true in most cases, but I find the last two books incredibly difficult to adapt faithfully into film. And it's surprising because by then the film series was in full motion. Rowling wrote those books that way, and she didn't care how difficult it would be for the screenwriters and producers to adapt them.

 

The Half-Blood Prince dedicates more time to Voldemort's flashbacks than anything the main trio are doing. That's why it's probably the most unfaithful movie of all: because if they paid attention to what it really is important in the story, the main trio would have been relegated to mere supporting roles.

 

Now, the problem with the Deathly Hallows is that the story is structured in a way that the events are linked to each other as cause and effect, so that if you write off a single one of them the story stops making any sense. The solution used by the screenwriters? make two movies and take out Dumbledore's backstory.

 

I still don't see why COS was a disappointment.

 

Quality-wise, I think the problem with the Chamber of Secrets is that it's a too literal adaptation. They made one of the longer films of the series out of one of the shorter books.

 

I read somewhere she's not a billionaire because of all the money she's given to various charities etc.

 

Yes. By 2003 she was already richer than Queen Elizabeth http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/2979033.stm

 

And in 2012 she was dropped from the Forbes list of Billioners because of her charitable donations, estimated in $160 million

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/03/15/forbes-billionaire-list-rowling_n_1347176.html

 

I'll like how this series becomesmore mature as it goes

 

In my opinion, the only time they failed to mature with the same rhythm than the books was with Goblet of Fire. They massively played down the horrible tragedy of the Crouch family, even portraying Crouch Jr. some kind of clown. They pictured him as the type of mindless villain you would expect from a direct-to-video Disney sequel.

Edited July 14, 2014 by The47th

[a2k]

Great post Noctis.

 

Kudos to WB. It was a very difficult production to handle - retaining the actors, controlling budgets, the correct scheduling, finding the directors, decisions around the tone of each movie, and after all else, selling the movie with great marketing....a lesser studio would have bungled it.

[redfirebird2008]

But one of the biggest reasons Potter was so consistently huge is that because the characters, stories, and themes deepened, darkened, and matured throughout the series. There is no other series that had such a dramatic shift in tone with time. Play SS, and then play DH1, and the difference in tone is just incredible. 

 

 

I have only seen bits and pieces of Potter, but Batman probably has had the biggest shift in tone. It happened twice too. From Burton's gothic opera to Schumacher's neon camp to Nolan's gritty crime drama. Schumacher is the key there. I don't think Potter has ever been that campy.

[Noctis]

I have only seen bits and pieces of Potter, but Batman probably has had the biggest shift in tone. It happened twice too. From Burton's gothic opera to Schumacher's neon camp to Nolan's gritty crime drama. Schumacher is the key there. I don't think Potter has ever been that campy.

 

I meant from a rather lighthearted tone with a few dark moments to a very dark and bleak film with only a few lighthearted moments. And from a single series. Not random adaptations of different stories regarding Batman.