Harry Potter as a franchise is one that still to this day people are vividly obsessed with, with fans still celebrating the franchise (whether books or films) in their own way through fan clubs, buying merchandising and other personal projects that showcase their appreciation for the J.K Rowling books. While that is admirable, it is hard to overlook the franchise’s questionable narrative choices and how it went about telling its story. Many of the books, while considered better than the movies by the fan-base, have a lot of glaring issues that have hindered the films themselves, like filler plot lines, useless characters, an inconsistent tone, and a lack of any real character or even story development throughout until the final entries. It wasn’t until the movies reached the sixth novel, The Order of the Phoenix, that people started to realise the cracks in Harry Potter. After it was stated that the dark lord, Voldemort (played by Ralph Fiennes) has returned to the wizarding world,  Harry Potter (played by Daniel Radcliffe) is having to deal with a difficult kind of evil as he is now being deemed a fraud by the Ministry of Magic (who are essentially the government of the wizarding world) and even most of the students at Hogwarts, believing this to be a desperate attempt at fame rather than an actual warning. To make matters worse, due to the Minster for Magic, Cornelius Fudge (played by Robert Hardy) fearing Dumbledore (played again by Michael Gambon) plans to overtake the position, sends a plant from the ministry, that being Dolores Umbridge (played by Imelda Staunton) to Hogwarts to teach the students in a less practical manner and one that suits the Ministries desired learning curriculum. Slowly seizing control over Hogwarts, the students are left feeling helpless as dark forces grow on the outside and left with no other choice due Dumbledore being annoyingly distant, Harry and his friends form a secret army together and practice magic under the eyes of Umbridge to prepare for the upcoming war. This movie is the one that even fans of the movies view as the least out of all of them, and it’s easy to see why. With a dull story, bland writing, pointless add-ons, and a conclusion that seems to amount to nothing, its not a movie to get excited for. With that said, small aspects hidden within have enough of a standing point to make the movie worth seeing once at least

For a franchise that started out with a simple premise but one that had likeable creative environments and small magical elements that at least gave the world a charming friendly touch, everything that seems likeable and fresh has been drained from this universe; where the film’s main color seems to be grey and blue, magic is barely used and what is isn’t that creative, and a story that seems to bring nothing that would make it interesting in the world of witches and wizards. The set-up has potential, with a direction that is almost a satirical look on how governmental figures can overuse their power through fear and hold learning facilities hostage to slow down progress even though they think they’re in the right. What was instead given was neither satire nor straight-up storytelling, just another filler plotline to hold the story hostage until it gets to its final moments. Nothing is developed, nothing is intriguing, it’s not a likeable tone, some story decisions are downright stupid, and it’s just all around boring. The structure of the story is also a mess; with scenes popping in and out of moments where it’s either confusing as to when they took place or if they even happened at all. This comes from the new director, David Yates, who would be the franchises sole director going forward as he would helm ever future Harry Potter instalment (even when they transitioned to the Fantastic Beast series), and he does not provide a very good first look. The film is disjointed, visually unappealing, tonally bland, lacking in depth and intrigue, and provides barely any meat in a film that seems to at least have some merit come its ending. While The Goblet of Fire is a worse story as nothing about that film holds any worth outside of its climax, it at least knew what it was trying to tell, scenes felt in the right place and for what it was, it did convey what it wanted to in a balanced way. While this movie is technically less boring, the film’s layout is far worse, the script by Michael Goldenberg doesn’t offer anything interesting from the books and truncates seemingly important components in a noticeable manner, and it paints an unfortunate picture of what kind of tone and style Harry Potter will now be going down. The only time things get a bit more interesting is during the climax; where there is a least some decent action, a cool different location in which it takes place in, and an active pace and energy that was sorely lacking in the rest of this film, even if the pay-off is extremely weak.

The old characters, despite having a total of four movies built up around them, are still pretty boring and even relatively useless in the grand scheme of things. Some barely get more than two lines in the film, and even a character like Sirius Black (played again by Gary Oldman), who was built up as this very important character is written off these films in such a quick and hollow manner that it makes all of his past moments feel entirely useless (although the book seems to suffer the same problem. Since these characters seem to have barely developed since the first movie, the audience isn’t inclined to care for them as much because they have outgrown the characters in almost every level, so when there’s nothing new to gain, it loses purpose. Thankfully some of the new additions aren’t actually that bad and do a good job sprinkling in any sense of life and energy into this dull film and by extension, dull universe. There’s a new student called Luna Lovegood (played by Evanna Lynch) whose pretty memorable and the actress is clearly having fun playing her, Helena Bonham Carter as Bellatrix is also pretty memorable, with her crazed look, condescending voice and tattered clothing allowing Carter to really let loose on the crazy and have fun being almost manically evil without coming across as hammy, and Delores Umbridge is on an entirely different level. In a franchise with villains that are pretty forgettable, nothing is forgettable about her, and she steals every scene she’s in and is beautifully played by Imelda Staunton. Her disgustingly uptight attitude and devilish fake smile hiding a sadistic monster has clearly stayed in the mind of viewers everywhere, to the point where she has become the most hated character in the whole franchise (which is crazy when you considered the main villain is a literally wizard supremacist). Even if that sounds negative, it means that at least people remember her and in a movie with little memorability, that counts for something. Most of the kid actors are grown up now and it’s harder to defend their often-stale delivery and blank expression, particularly on Radcliffe who is given more screentime and therefore, given more opportunities to showcase some less-than-impressive acting. While he hasn’t mastered everything yet, this movie shows he has a good talent at expressing anger; to the tone of voice to the expression, that stuff is done pretty well and proves that underneath some awkward deliveries, he can act pushed in the right direction.

Harry Potter has never been one that frequents in action, but with the new tone and direction that this franchise goes towards, it was obviously going to come in at some point, and what is shown isn’t that bad. It’s mainly kept til the climax and while it’s nothing more than simply pointing sticks with lights coming out, it does feel like it’s upped the ante and uses its more grounded atmosphere in a way that at least makes sense and feels used rather than just a substitute for actual creative magic. Some of the locations during the climax feel a bit nicer to look at too; like a dark room with lines of shelves containing prophecy orbs or a huge room with a ghostly veil in the centre, or a expansive lobby with ornate statures everywhere. There’s a pretty cool duel with Dumbledore and Voldemort during the end which at least gives some more creative imagery that is scarcely seen in this franchise anymore, so it definitely went off on its highest point. With that said, the dull visuals really do hinder this movie harshly. Since the film’s dark tone isn’t interesting, it doesn’t feel warranted or earned, instead like its bleaching everything to pretend it’s being more adult. The writing is also pretty bad; not only is the dialogue subpar at best, but so many moments and characters are either pointless with rushed conclusions or shoved in out of nowhere with no presence or meaning. The dull visuals also hurt the effects drastically, with nothing feeling real anymore and even most of the generated effects (except when it’s a spell) don’t look to impressive, especially a certain giant during the middle of the movie.

It’s debatable whether Order of the Phoenix is the worst of the Harry Potter movie franchise as it does have a few memorable moments and is not as heavy on the darker tone as some of the other lesser ones, but it’s definitely not good. At this point, it was obvious that the dark tone was not working for this franchise and instead draining what little enjoyability was left. The story is a waste of time, the characters are still boring, the writing is forgettable, and the tone and world building are horribly executed. While it has a few new memorable characters, a decent climax and one or two moments that work okay, it doesn’t save the film as a whole. Regardless of quality, it didn’t stop people from coming back for more and it certainly wouldn’t stop something as massive as this franchise from continuing to thrive (the author would do that herself eventually). This movie is unfortunately not something to fight for.

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