While fans won't get a new Harry Potter movie in theaters this season — last year's schedule bump changed that rhythm — they do get a new DVD. On December 8, The Half-Blood Prince releases. Unsurprisingly, the sixth installment in the Potter series had some book-to-movie plot changes, a necessity when adapting such rich books. That said, there were a few changes that surprised us and left us wondering how they would affect the final two movies.
We surveyed top Harry Potter fansites to see which of the following movie changes they believed was most significant for the Deathly Hallows movies, as well as how they thought/hoped David Yates would deal with those changes.
1. Burrow burning down
2. Total absence of Bill and Fleur
3. Omission of big fight scene at Hogwarts
4. Harry not seeing/getting details of Tom Riddle's ancestry (Gaunts/Peverells)
5. No mention of Voldemort tracking down items from Hogwarts' founders for horcruxes
The fansites were pretty evenly split between the last two plot changes — the absence of Tom Riddle's ancestry and the significance of the items Voldemort used for his horcruxes. They also had some good ideas about how Yates could work around the issues these changes present. Below are their answers in full.
I think the most significant scene missing in Half-Blood Prince that will affect Deathly Hallows is Harry not getting details about Voldemort's ancestry. The other items, while significant, could easily be included by writing a few extra lines for the Deathly Hallows story. David Yates (director), David Heyman (producer), David Barron (Producer), and Steve Kloves (screenwriter) are a fantastic team who never have a problem adding, moving, and editing points of the stories to ensure everything flows well.
Despite Harry missing out on learning about Voldemort's ancestry in Half-Blood Prince, I think they could easily add a little back story explained by (perhaps) Slughorn in Deathly Hallows. Additional mini dialogue scenes could easily patch up the other areas missed in Half-Blood Prince as well. While some fans may see this as a cheap way of doing it, I personally understand that they can never include every major part of a book when adapting to a film. So simply put, we just have to go with the flow!