Has Harry Potter Lost His Magic?

Two years ago, it was Harry Potter's world: The seventh and final book was making its way to stores, and the fifth movie -- "-- was due in theaters around the same time.

Since then, though, a book and movie called has sucked all the oxygen out of the Potter pop-culture atmosphere.

Not only was one in seven books sold in the U.S. last year written by the Twilight author, Stephenie MeyerStephenie Meyer, the movie version of the first installment was a huge hit despite its shakier-than-Jell-O cinematic merits.

Even the Harry Potter movie people seemed scared of the popular vampire franchise, pushing back eight months from its original date because the "Twilight" movie was due out close to the original Potter premiere.

All this leaves some observers wondering: Has the boy wizard lost his magic?

On the one hand, it's fair to say that fans were definitely annoyed to have to wait an extra eight months for a look at the most dramatic Harry Potter tale yet adapted. At the Web site of a British newspaper, an international assortment of earnest readers made their dismay clear. Some suggested a boycott of Warner Bros., the studio behind movies.

Here's a sampling, with the original grammar, spelling and punctuation intact:

"I think that the boycott idea is AWSOME because i've been waiting like 2 years for this movie to cocme out and i think that warner bros is being very VERY MEAN!!!!!!!! They even put out the trailer which made us even more excited to see it, now i am just mad! i think i will boycott warner bros!!"

"This is redicules. you always reales the movies in November. I say that if you whait thislong no one will like this company so i say that you reales it by March. Whos with me?"

"i cant wait to see it was well gutted that it dint come out when it was suppose too."

But on the other hand, there is reality. Harry Potter still has passionate fans. The Web site,reports more than 75,000 members in its online discussion community. These fans not only have no plans to boycott Warner Bros. for delaying the movie, some of them also traveled to Boston a couple of months ago for "LeakyCon," a convention that raised money for charities and featured the musical stylings of an astonishing number of Harry Potter tribute bands. which promotes the broader wizard-rock phenomenon, something I am not clever enough to have made up. Some of the Potter band names are hilarious. I'm particularly fond of Colin and the Creeveys, 50 Points from Slytherin and The Mrs. Weasley Overture.)

The event, put on by TheLeakyCauldron.org, wasn't just about bands, though. Two major names in young adult literature, Cheryl Klein and John GreenJohn Green, gave a keynote speech on the writing process. Klein was on the U.S. editing team for Harry Potter, and Green is author of "Looking for Alaska" and "An Abundance of Katherines" and "Paper Towns."

As impressive as this is, conventions aren't proof that the boy wizard retains his magic. That lies in the stories themselves, where the magic remains in abundance. Although a lot of people, including Stephen KingStephen King, made fun of J.K. RowlingJ.K. Rowling's writing for her use of adverbs, I tend to attribute that sort of nonsense to envy. She was obviously doing something right as a storyteller to attract such a huge following, and the truth is, her books hold up to re-reading quite nicely.

I picked up "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" again to get myself ready for the movie, and loved it more this time than I did the first. Once you know how the series ends, you can see the incredibly way Rowling structured the story, weaving little bits into the tapestry that would have great meaning later. All the while, she stayed true to her central theme: that a mother's love is the most powerful magic of all. And she keeps things refreshingly complex. Many secondary characters are a mix of good and evil -- sort of like how people are in the real world.

These books are good enough that they should be considered classics. The movies, for the most part, have been good, too. This is why I'll be at the theater the day "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince" opens. For me, at least, the magic is as strong as ever.