From Potter to Potty–Harry Potter & the Five Big Buts…

No, not sir Mix-A-Lot, but my latest column at Boomtron takes a look at the slightly convoluted path leading the grand Potter finale.  Here’s the opening graph to get y’all started…

WARNING! WARNING! DANGER, WILL ROBINSON! HERE THERE BE SPOILERS!

There are easier ways, right?  Toss the ring into Mount Doom and you’re done with it!Darth Vader’s your dad, love him and redeem his soul! The Red Skull (who, let’s face it, didn’t do much evil to begin  with, since all his plans – save one assassination – were spoiled by Cap) touches the wrong glowy thing and vanishes in a puff of cosmic smoke! Sure all those villains can come back, hale and hearty and ready to roll, but at least defeating them was quick, clean and made some sense.

And then there’s Voldemort.

To be clear, I think JK Rowling is hands-down brilliant. I’ve no doubt the seven book/eight film Harry Potter saga will be part of our culture, download, e-book or otherwise, for decades to come. At the same time, though, among the crucial hallmarks of great storytelling, I’ve always considered elegance and simplicity, well… important.  And there’s something wildly inelegant and increasingly complicated about the battle twixt Harry and Voldemort.

Not that the Empress has no clothes, but I think she could have dressed a little better.  Much of the series seems planned – hey, I’m tickled to go back to the first book and see mention of Sirius Black’s motorcycle.  Then, as we get to the end of the fifth book, The Order of the Phoenix, Dumbledore takes Harry aside and, for about a hundred pages, to says, in effect, “Here’s the real plot, but I kept it secret because I didn’t want to hurt you.”  At that point, I have to at leastsuspect a certain someone had written themselves into a corner and was now performing a variety of literary-contortionist moves to get out of it.

To read the rest, click here.

And be sure to also check out the Goodreads Giveaway for my upcomingzombie detective novel Dead Mann Walking!