Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return To Hogwarts
So… I think I still need a decade or two, just to process everything that I watched, everything that I heard and everything that I felt, that I am still feeling. And I beg you pardon if I come off as repetitive, uncertain or overly emotional. Because right now, watching this has taken me on a tumble in an emotional washing machine, to say the least. And then tumble dried me quite thoroughly.
To begin with, I have never been very good with goodbyes, especially the ones that are so final. However, I had promised someone that I would do this, and I am not a big fan of breaking promises, either, so here I go! Please do bear with me, on this one.
Have you ever shared a very deep relationship with someone who has been with you at your lowest, seen you through some of the darkest phases and just been there? And then one fine morning, right at the start of a brand new year, you had to bid them goodbye? Like no matter how hard you try, how much you delay the inevitable goodbye, you know that thing/person is going to leave. You know you can do nothing and you have tried everything in your power to hold that close, but this is it. You have to let that go. Well, that is exactly how I have been feeling, ever since I chose to hit on that “Watch Now”!
Harry Potter, the books as well as the movies, have been a massive part of my life, to the point that I have placed it over actual relationships, at various points of time in my life. I still cannot say if I am proud of this or not, but that is how it has been, and most probably will be, all my life! At the end of the day, everyone who has experienced this world, that is the magic that Miss Rowling has woven for us, her personal feelings and opinions aside.
Coming to Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return To Hogwarts, the special pulls at all the heartstrings of any Potterhead who has grown up experiencing and feeling the Potterverse, right from the first moment itself! In case you still haven’t watched it, I suggest you just go for it or maybe don’t. Either way, you will still be wanting more and more and more. Because let’s just face the facts, one can never have enough of Hogwarts.
If I have to tell you how it was, I’d say, I met the people behind the people who I had first gotten acquainted with when I was just five and then gotten to know a whole lot better as I grew up and grew older. These were the ones who were with me during all of the best moments of my life, and all those times when just going from one day to another seemed like a massive chore. And now all of them were there, at one place, and it felt like a goodbye, not the comma or the semi-colon kind of goodbye, it was the full-stop kind. While I know that the legacy that they have created will stay forever with me, this Reunion also meant that “This is it!”, there will be no more of them, on the screen, taking up their roles. So far, it was Harry Potter, Hermione Granger, Ron Weasley, and so on, but with the Reunion, it became, Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, and so on.
You might tell me that this is who they are and it is what it is, but to me, the former and the latter were for a very long period of time, the one and the same, but by the time, I was done with my viewing, the two parted ways. To be honest, they had, a long time back, since the time of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, Part 2. And yet, this time, the separation was more distinct, more final.
You might tell me that this is not what a review should look like. And I will apologize to you because yes, you are right, this isn’t. And trust me, I am in no shape or form, to ever be emotionally ready to review the Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts, ever! Because to me this is the Final Chapter, like a friend just said to me, “the final full-stop on the final chapter of the final book in the series!” It was bitter, it was sweet, it was happy, it was sad and it was the first time ever that I had to take a pause, every few minutes to get myself to stop crying, at least enough to see the screen properly. I will still have all the complaints that I had from the movies, about all the things that they could have done better, and when I do, I will go back to this particular special and think of all the times, these people, who portrayed some of my most favourite people, can still, “after all this time”, put a fond smile on my face and bring tears to my eyes, simultaneously, “always”, “till the very end”.