If I Were Scripting the DVD Commentary for Half-Blood Prince…

So, I saw Harry Potter & the Half Blood Prince shortly after it came out. I have mixed feelings about the film, as I found plenty to both love and hate about it.

I figure the movie has been out long enough now to safely post details, but if you haven’t seen it and are spoilerphobic, you might want to bugger off about now.

And for the rest of you, I present my own version of DVD film commentary… you know the sort. The film executives and cast talk through the whole movie while you watch it. These can be kind of cool or uber annoying. Or both. But then again, that’s how I felt about the movie in the first place. 😉

Producers: Hello and welcome to Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince. We’d like you to pay special attention to this first scene where we blow our entire special effects budget exploding a bridge. Please bear that in mind for later.

Harry: I’ve always been a bit reckless, so I’m sure you’ll understand why I’m hanging at the local café, hitting on waitresses as I read my moving-picture, magical-headlined Daily Prophet in plain sight of a zillion muggles. And don’t ask where I got money for restaurant meals, either, cuz I haven’t got a clue.

Dumbledore: I’ve been working this gig for four movies now and I’m actually starting to understand my character a bit. Yay, me! Let’s get our new potions master and get back to Hogwarts.

Hermione: For all you book-obsessed detail-freaks, please notice that my hair has returned to its bushy state for potions class and potions class only. You’re welcome.

Draco: Finally… a chance to show all of y’all how awesome an actor I really am. Perhaps this will console me as toddlers burst into tears when they see me on the street.

Producers: We’re taking great pains here to represent the teen angst well, and we really think we did a bang-up job with it. Bear that in mind when you’re wondering what happened to most of the plot.

Voldemort: No fair! I got totally gypped! Half Blood Prince is supposed to be all about ME! The tragic family history that created the DARKEST MOST POWERFUL WIZARD EVER!!  And you give me two puny scenes that explain NOTHING? Don’t you realize who you’re messing with? I could kill you all right now, but that’s not really my style. So I’m off to formulate an elaborate plot where I exact my revenge against you sniveling imbeciles!

Producers: *clearing throats nervously* You may have noticed by now that the movie is more than half over, and we haven’t actually shown much about Voldemort at all. Sorry about that. Please let us make it up to you with a random and gratuitous scene where a dozen Death Eaters show up at the Burrow and chase everybody around a cornfield for a while.

Harry: HA! Told you I was reckless. Watch me take off alone after the lot of them.

Ginny: Lucky for Harry, I’m such a badass witch that I keep my wand with me even in the shower, just in case I have to scamper off in my bathrobe to save my cutie patootie.

Greyback: Look! Look!! There I am! Right THERE!! No lines, of course, or anything to conclusively identify me at all… but I got a full 2 seconds of screen time, and that’s something.

Death Eaters: Having surrounded the majority of the Order of the Phoenix and Voldemort’s arch enemy, we’ll ignore our strategic advantage and go home now. But not before we accomplish the *much* more important task of setting fire to the Burrow!

OOP & Weasleys: Oh noes! Our house is on fire! If only we were witches and wizards who could DO something besides clutch each other and shake our heads sadly.

Harry: Hermione! I’m glad to be back at school. Some crazy weird stuff went down at the Burrow over the break.

Hermione: You’re lucky you weren’t killed. But I’m strangely disinterested. Probably cuz I’m still upset about Ron.

Ginny: Ron and Lavender stole my meet-cute, so I have to kiss Harry in a cluttered magical closet and then run away instead. That kind of sucks, but at least I get to kiss him.

Harry: And that’s not the only way I get lucky in this film. I’m about to do an amazing acting job right here as I collect the missing memory from Slughorn with the felix felicis potion.

Producers: Yes, everyone. Be sure you enjoy that scene, cuz you’re going to be furious with us in a few minutes.

Dumbledore: Excellent work, Harry! Now we have proof Voldemort was making Horcruxes. Of course, since we’ve eliminated all the other memories of  Voldemort’s past from the film, it will be practically impossible for anyone to find them, but I never said this was supposed to be easy. Now, Harry, if you’ll just follow me into this cave which we have neglected to explain is personally significant to Voldemort.

Harry: I’ll follow you anywhere with no questions asked, even though you haven’t explained a bit about why this necklace is important. Or how you know it’s a horcrux. Or how I might be able to find the others. Here’s that potion you asked for.

Dumbledore: I may be deathly ill from the poison here, because I desperately need water. But despite the fact Harry wasn’t actually able to get me any, I’m about to spontaneously recover enough to kick some serious ass.

Producers: Don’t the Inferi look cool? Everyone please remember that later on.

Dumbledore: Well, contrary to the oft-repeated unbreakable rule, we’re going to go ahead and just apparate right onto the Hogwarts grounds. And I somehow I know that Draco’s coming to bump me off any minute. You might expect me to paralyze Harry or something, but instead I’m going to just tell him to hang out a floor below. That will be extremely helpful.

Draco: I have acted my butt off all movie, and now it’s my big moment. Any last words, Dumbledore?

Dumbledore: Since I’m not busy casting silent spells on Harry, there’s really no reason I shouldn’t be able to disarm a naughty school boy, but for some reason I won’t bother to do that.

Harry: The Death Eaters have turned up. I can see everyone, but for some mysterious reason, none of them can see me. And I’ve completely changed character and  will stand here like a stump until Snape shows up and snuffs Dumbledore. How’s THAT for reckless?

Producers: Hey… remember how cool the bridge looked when it blew up? And those Inferi? Weren’t they awesome? Yeah… they were the best… So… anyway… no final battle scene. Sorry.

Death Eaters: Woot! We’ve killed Dumbledore! And we’ve met with no resistance whatsoever! Let’s smash things!

Harry: Pay no attention to the fact that, with no confusion of a big battle, it’s pretty hard to believe that no one bothers me as I chase after Snape all alone.

Snape: I’m uber emo, so I do sort of enjoy flipping my hair and shouting “I AM the Half Blood Prince!” But I still think I was better in the book.

Producers: So, er… we know you all were really looking forward to the emotional wallop of Dumbledore’s funeral. But… um… instead we’re just going to have everybody raise their lighted wands sort of like lighters at a rock concert. But, hey… the Inferi were way cool, right? KThxBai!

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Under Cover

Kate Schafer Testerman posted this little activity over on KT Literary. You can read the full rules on her site, but in a nutshell: the task was to design a book cover using a randomly generated author name, book title, and cover image.

So I decided to play along (It’s the least I can do after I made her the unwitting star in a Broadway-style musical.)

It should be quite obvious that my random name was “Tricia Forbes” and my random title was the verb “Fold”:

I think it turned out quite well. =)

This one time… at band camp…

Okay, I never actually went to band camp.

But I was in a band.

No, not that sort of band. A supercool 80’s rock band, circa 1987.

Of course, we had no musical training whatsoever, unless you count forcing my 7-year-old cousin to show me what she’d learned in piano lessons for the previous 2 years. One of us was slightly tone deaf. And we had no instruments, save my beloved casio keyboard/calculator (about 12 inches long):

BUT…

We were thirteen years old…
One blonde, one brunette, AND one redhead…
who had watched Dirty Dancing at least 100 times and memorized all the dance moves.

AND

We had an original song– music and lyrics composed by yours truly.

I KNOW! How could we not have made it?

Perhaps it was because we only performed in my best friend’s basement. Alone. Or maybe it was because we never quite hit on the right combination of jelly bracelets and legwarmers. I’m afraid the world may never know.

Sadly, (or perhaps not-so-sadly) I don’t have the capacity to add the original tune to my wordpress blog. However, you may rest assured that Mr. Kiddoc feels it was perfectly representative of the time period and could have been a HUGE hit in 1987.

So I present for your amusement,

It’s a Fantasy

It’s a fantasy
That I dream each night
I envision you
Holding me tight.
If you’d take a chance
Like I wish you’d do
Then my fantasy
Could be coming true (It’s coming true!)

Chorus:

It’s a fantasy
It’s my hopes and dreams
You’re the one for me
This I know
Tonight I’ll wish upon a star
And wherever you are
I hope you feel my love
for you forever

Cuz in my fantasy
We are lovers, you and I
And you say that we’ll
Be together ’til we die
You will notice me
On that magic day
And you’ll say to me
Those three words I wish you’d say.

(Repeat chorus)

It’s a fantasy
It’s a fantasy
It’s a fantasy*

(* the last one should be whispered for dramatic effect, natch.)

So… now for the audience participation:

Guess the NAME of my band. Alternative names may be suggested in the comments. 😉

Yee-frickin’-Ha!

After an inordinate amount of stalling, I have finally made the changes to Chapter 19.

That was the editing I was dreading the most.

Hopefully, the rest will go quickly now!

In other news, another new edition of toying with titles:

More Playing Around

I’m so stalling. It’s not even funny.

I’ve had all day where I could have edited Chapters 18 and 19 (apart from a brief skirmish with work), but instead I’ve touched up other chapters, done global word searches, researched agents– done everything BUT edit the next two chapters.

Chapter 19 will be the biggest edit I need to do. And I’m not sure what I want to do with it. So I keep avoiding it.

To prove my case beyond a shadow of a doubt, I offer this into evidence. I present Exhibit A:

I am toying with titles, flap copy, and covers again. So sue me.

Okay, so more cover kookiness…

Nobody seems to have an opinion about the covers. So, I brainstormed a bit and came up with this: I used the photo from Cover Option 3 and faded and sepia-toned it for the back cover. I think I like it.

(Back) (Front)

Click images for larger views.

The back description is just a quickie-one… needs work, obviously. I just wanted to see how it looked.

Any opinions are welcome!

Progression

I am learning lots of things as I continue in this quest to finish a novel.

For one thing, I have learned what a “word war” is. Essentially, it is a contest for a group of people like myself who are writing novels to compete on who can write the most words for their story during a fixed (e.g. 10 minute) time frame.

I have also learned that my husband has some sort of superhero power that allows him to know the moment I have been asked to join one of these contests and further instills in him a need to come from wherever he might be and discuss such pressing issues as “What should we have for dinner tomorrow?” and “What time will Thanksgiving dinner be this year?”

We would never have learned that he possesses this unique skill, had I not started writing this novel.

As I get more and more into the meat of the story, I get more and more nervous about writing it. It’s a very different kind of nervousness than I started with.

My initial nervousness was an “Oh, snap! What am I thinking?! I can’t write a novel!” sort of nervousness.

My new nervousness comes from believing that I will finish this novel. I know the things that will befall my poor main character, who is still fairly clueless about what is in store for her. And I am stressed to write it.

So I think I was stalling today. I looked up recipes, trying to decide what she should cook for dinner, which– although relevant to the plot was probably not the best use of my time today. *snort*

I am heading for bed now. I hope tomorrow’s chapter will go quickly. I have reason to hope; I think I’m ready for it. 😀

Imaginary Soundtrack

Today, I couldn’t write. So, instead I compiled an imaginary soundtrack.

You know, for the imaginary movie based on my still-at-least-half-imaginary novel. 🙂

It would have:

1. Blackbird (The Beatles)
2. Daughters (John Mayer)
3. The Letter (Natalie Merchant)
4. Half Acre (Hem)
5. If Love Was a Train (Michelle Shocked)
6. I Got a Name (Jim Croce)
7. Ray of Sunshine (Go Sailor)
8. Omaha (Counting Crows)
9. Where I Go (Natalie Merchant)
10. This is the Day (The The)
11. I Will Remember You (Sarah Mclachlan)
12. Dream a Little Dream of Me (Nat King Cole)
13. Change (Tracy Chapman)
14. Missing (Beck)
15. I Will Never Be the Same (Melissa Etheridge)
16. These Dreams (Jim Croce)
17. Trouble Sleeping (Corrinne Bailey Rae)
18. Elsewhere (Sarah McLachlan)
19. All That I’m Good For (Hem)

That’s a CD’s worth of appropriate tunage. 😉