I’m a huge video game fan, and this week is full of big news for me. The Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3, if you want to sound cool) is happening in LA, and this when we ludo-philes get some previews of interesting new hardware and upcoming games from all the big companies.
There is a tiny bit of Harry Potter news from E3, too. Below is a trailer for Lego Harry Potter.
Three other major story properties have gotten the Lego treatment in a videogame setting: Star Wars, Indiana Jones, and Batman. And all of them have been super fun for the whole family! If you have kids into videogames, or if you’re a big kid like me, this will certainly provide for some goofy fun!
Summit Home Entertainment, the company responsible for the Twilight film, has just announced that Saturday’s sales were, indeed, chart-topping. Over three million copies of the Twilight DVD were sold, and this propelled the DVD to the “Top Five Best First Day Releases in Two Years.”
Welcomed in with Twilight DVD release parties across the nation, along with special surprise guest appearances at several of them by cast members of Twilight and New Moon, the DVD’s success comes as no surprise to many fans. [...]
“We are incredibly appreciative that Twilight fans came out to once again support this film at our midnight events across the nation,” said Steve Nickerson, Summit’s President of Home Entertainment. “With such a successful first day sales, it is apparent that our fans remain passionate about the Twilight saga and want to own a piece of the Edward and Bella story they have come to love. We look forward to the continued success for both the home entertainment and retail sales of this property as a whole.”
The promise of success for the Twilight series was doubtless to the many Twilight fans around the nation and globe, and these record-breaking sales only go to prove that the Twilight series is, indeed, fan-driven.
One of the other four movies was Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix.
We Are Wizards is a glimpse into the world of fans inspired by Harry Potter and who have taken their love for the series a step further by creating songs, forming bands, establishing fan sites, and organizing campaigns in the name of fandom. Josh Koury’s documentary mainly pays homage to the small musical genre known as “wizard rock” [click to continue…]
Professor Stephen Brown of Ulster University, after conducting an interview study of readers ages 7 and up, says there are four types of Harry Potter readers, and they correspond to the four houses:
His research found ‘Hufflepuff’ readers take the tales at a slow, steady and systematic pace and enjoy re-reading the books over and over.
‘Gryffindor’ [...]
How do we read Harry Potter? How does our culture read it? What are the effects of celebrity culture on the experience of Story?
You can subscribe to the Hog’s Head PubCast through iTunes, or Odeo, and VOTE for The Hog’s Head for the month of August at Podcast Alley.
On Tap:
Harry Potter Conference: Searching for Platform 9 & 3/4
Daniel Radcliffe Naked: [...]
by Travis
I’m wondering what the marriage of celebrity culture to great literature is doing to Harry Potter.
The extent to which film has become normative in our culture is profound, especially as it relates to literature. We all used to joke about getting the movie version in order to do book reports in school (much to [...]
by Dave
An article on The Leaky Cauldron has touched on a different issue concerning the Harry Potter videogames: the potential that they might keep making them after Deathly Hallows. The game industry does have a habit of running moneymaking franchises into the ground, especially if they have marketing tie-ins that reach audiences outside of [...]
I suggested, upon hearing the news of the delay of the Half-Blood Prince movie, that the only silver lining to the news would be for Azkatraz 2009 attendees. The LA Times got a note from a member of Team Azkatraz, Heidi Tandy, saying that very thing. There is no way they’ll be able to accommodate everyone [...]
by Travis Prinzi
Despite the fact that the supposed next big Potter event – the release of the Half-Blood Prince film – has been delayed till next summer, the Potterverse will be alive and kicking, with lots of key events, until that film release. Here’s a breakdown, in as close to chronological order as possible. Consider this [...]
Sadly, I’m unable to attend Terminus, the Harry Potter conference in Chicago which starts Thursday of this week. I do, however, want to encourage any Hog’s Head readers, if you’re going, to make sure you attend James Thomas’s presentation. Here is the abstract:
It should be a fun forthcoming week in Harry Potter’s world.
Tuesday, the 29th, the Half-Blood Prince Trailer will be appearing exclusively on AOL. It will be our first live-action look at the new film. I really enjoyed what Yates did with Order of the Phoenix, but I have to admit I’m a bit nervous about this [...]
by Travis
What were you doing at this time last year? You were reading Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows. I remember dropping Sophia off with Tricia’s mom and heading to the park on two hours’ sleep (I had read until 5am), and then reading all day long.
Today marks the anniversary of the release of Deathly [...]
by Dave
Update: I edited this post for some grammatical mistakes. Sorry…I was in a bit of a hurry yesterday when I wrote it.
Jamie and I subscribe to Entertainment Weekly, my favorite section of which is Stephen King’s monthly column in the back of the magazine. While the magazine certainly isn’t especially [...]
by Johnny
Last night I made my way to the Sidewalk Cafe on Avenue A and 6th in Manhattan to see Draco and the Malfoys perform. Before they went on stage, we were treated to performances by Swish & Flick, Justin Finch-Fletchley of the Sugar Quills, and Whompy from the Whomping Willows. It was something to [...]
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Half-Blood Prince Game, The Sequel!
August 22, 2008by Dave
An article on The Leaky Cauldron has touched on a different issue concerning the Harry Potter videogames: the potential that they might keep making them after Deathly Hallows. The game industry does have a habit of running moneymaking franchises into the ground, especially if they have marketing tie-ins that reach audiences outside of [...]