A bit of a sideways entry in my ongoing ‘Dragonball Z movie’ marathon. ‘The History of Trunks’ is a TV special made shortly after ‘Dragonball Z’ concluded that shows the ‘alternate’ timeline thatlead into the ‘Android Saga’. Essentially the reality that Future Trunks came back in time to warn Goku and the gang about in the anime series.

In this reality, Noone came back to give Goku the antidote for his heart virus, he dies and the androids are released 12 months later, the ‘Z’ fighters try to tackle them, but all of them barring Gohan and Trunks are defeated. Forcing Master Roshi and the surviving members of the gang to go deep into hiding and Bulma to go ‘underground’ to try and develop a way to defeat the androids.

For 13 years the androids tear across the planet doing what they want and destroying large swathes of the population, while Gohan tries to catch up with them for intermittent bouts to try and put an end to them. At which point a now teenage Trunks decides he needs to act to try and save the future, and turns to Gohan for mentorship.

I actually really quite liked the idea of this one, though I felt the execution of it was a little bit messy. the alternate ‘Androids destroy everything’ timeline is a particularly bleak narrative in the ‘Dragonball Z’ anime, and there are genuinely captivatingly awful moments here that make you realise just how much of a threat the original Androids really were.

However; where I think this special kind of botches is a bit is nowhere NEAR enough time is put into setting the androids up as a credible threat in this reality up front. In fact, rather frustratingly; they rush through Gokus death, the androids being activated and all the ‘Z’fighters dying largely using recycled footage from the anime in the opening 2-5 minutes of the special. with almost the entirity of the rest of the special being set 13 years after everyone died and Trunks trying to train with Gohan.

The issue for me is, because they rush all of that critical character building narrative, and worse still they do it with recycled footage, it makes the stakes feel woefully low. The Sadist in me wanted to see the ‘Z’ fighters have a good go of taking on the androids, to feel the weight of their deaths a bit more, to see that, these Androids were VERY much different from their anime counterparts and that the risks were significantly higher…but they gloss it over so that we can see 17 and 18 destroy an amusement park or try on clothes. it makes the sudden darker shifts in the 3rd act when Gohan and Trunks try an ‘all or nothing’ attack on the androids feel actually quite out of place when compared the relatively calm sparring the rest of the special has. Which is a shame as some of the most emotional moments in the entire franchise happen in this special, but they’re undercut seemingly to save money.

Id say the pacings a bit rushed, the tones a bit uneven, but the story itself is solidly told, gives a good idea of what ‘Future Trunks’ had on his mind ahead of his trip into the past, and closes the loop on the Android arc. Though part of me does wonder if the alternate reality Trunks described in the anime was better left to the imagination.

Visually, its about in line with the anime, a handful of VERY striking shots in the finale help just tip this over the edge into something a bit more than just the level of the series at this time. But otherwise it is kind of by the numbers.

If you’ve watched all of ‘Dragonball Z’ this is a pretty nice epilogue piece to sandwhich inbetween the ‘Cell Games’ arc and the start of the ‘Buu’ arc. But is it essential? No. No I wouldnt say it was. Its one of the better Dragonball Z movies/Specials. But I cannot stress enough how dissapointing it is that they didnt just chuck a bit more cash at this one, make it an hour total and give us a firmer opening act, rather than the clip show treatment.

I’ll almost certainly include this in future rewatches of ‘Z’ because It does give the series. a bit more weight, but I dont think I could say hand on heart this was one you absolutely needed to see.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dragon-ball-z-the-history-of-trunks/

Notable as being the last Dragonball Z movie before the time skip post ‘Cell Games’ ‘Bojack Unbound’ is a bit of a strange movie in all honesty. Painfully close to being a Dragonball movie thats almost unhappy to be one.

The plot picks up a year or so after the events of the Cell Games, and a new world martial arts tournament is set to take place, but this time with a twist! as the semi finalists planned for the tournament are being imported from a galaxy far far away! naturally the ‘Z’ fighters all sign up, apart from Goku, who’s dead still…and weirdly Vegeta who decided it wasnt worth his time.

We fly through the tournament with relative ease until we’re down to four finalists including Gohan, Trunks and Krillin. But when the reach the semi finals, rather than some medium powered aliens meeting them. We have Bojack. an alien/demon who is allegedly about as powerful as Perfect Cell (give or take) who was previously known for his attempts to destroy the galaxy. He was defeated and sealed away in a star by the Kais, but with Goku destroying King Kais planet, the seal has been broken and Bojack is now ‘Unbound’ (see what they did there?)

With that, the gang must work together to take out Bojack and his crew before they destroy the earth and carry on their galaxy destroying plans…Oh! and Mr. Satans in this one, as he’s supposed to be the challenger they face in the finals…he’s comic relief for the most part.

The more I think about this one, the less enthused I am by it. The plot feels almost like a throwback to the early DBZ movies like ‘Dead Zone’ and ‘Tree of Might’. Its weird seeing an alternate take on the ‘world martial arts tournament’ given that around this same time, the exact same plotline would happen in the official anime as part of the Buu saga.

The weirdest part of all of this is the absence of Goku and Vegeta…and the sudden ‘stop/start’ involvement in the narrative. Goku is dead. he cant leave the afterlife, its an established canonical fact. And as such he spends most of the film just kind of…describing what the audience is seeing, and eventually they just full on break the rules of the series so that he can have a quick ‘saviour’ moment.

Vegeta is shown for the most part nowhere near the tournament, but then he randomly shows up, gets his ass kicked and then leaves again. Piccolo dips from the tournament all together and only shows up to aura farm, get beaten up, and then leave again.

And probably my biggest gripe, the tournament of power stuff is done and dusted within about 15 minutes of the runtime. I’ll be honest, id have just quite happily watched a ‘tournament of power’ movie with Bojack as the final villain. But they hand it off so quickly, as if IT’S getting int he way of a good story. when the reality is they burnt through there one good thing to get to an extended fight scene with almost no variety.

It feels like a conflicting narrative between the studio, the writer and the editor. With the writer wanting it to be a more ‘Gohan’ and lore driven story, the studio demanding Goku, Vegeta and Piccalo get SOME action in for the trailers, and the editor wanting to keep things on a steady course in line with how the series usually flows.

It results in a, not unpleasent, but very messy ‘thrown together’ feeling movie. This is a DBZ film that feels like its kids playing with action figures.

Bojack is hardly the most original villain in the series, And because of the pacing being the way it is, we never really feel bedded into the who these people are and why they’re doing what they’re doing. the pacings all over the place and tonally its massively inconsistent.

The Mr. Satan segments are fun enough, but its basically just a repeat of the Cell games ‘schtick’ sometimes lifting whole gags adhoc and just doinf them again. He doesnt really get to do all that much and his redesign isnt really my cup of tea.

While I can say the art direction and visuals here are nice, with the back half and SS2 Gohan looking particularly incredible, this is very much ‘Nice video, shame about the song’ a strong creative piece with almost nothing new to say or do.

Not one I can really actively recommend. I’d say its ‘inoffensive’ if your already watching the movies, you’ll probably get on fine with this. But if you’re looking to just watch ‘The Best’ this aint it.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dragon-ball-z-bojack-unbound/

‘Broly – The Legendary Super Saiyan’ is the 8th film in the DBZ movie franchise, the first of a trilogy of ‘Broly’ movies from this era, and one of the most universally loved movies in the DBZ series. Though; having seen it now, im not entirely sure why…Dont get me wrong! I liked it…but LOVED it? thought it was the best movie in the entire original run???…I wouldnt go that far.

The film opens with Goku and Chichi waiting on an interview to try and get Gohan into a prestigeous school, when Goku recieves a communication from King Kai asking him to head to his location asap. While this is going on the rest of the gang are enjoying Cherry blossom season by having a picnic (and a few drinks) in the park, when a mysterious spaceship lands, hundreds of soldiers emerge along with a Saiyan, who immediately make a B-line for Vegeta and inform him that they’ve been looking for him for decades, and that he is to return to ‘New Vegeta’ the future Saiyan homeworld to rule the new land as king, but ALSO to help them track down and destroy ‘The Legendary Super Saiyan’ a Saiyan folk lore character of unbridled power and destruction, who…is now apparently REAL and needs to be destroyed to ensure the peace of New Vegeta.

Vegeta agrees, Trunks decides to follow him, and a handful of the rest of the gang end up being accidentally abducted for extra ‘Shenanigans’.

On landing however, they find quite a different story taking place, no sign of the Saiyan can be found, and on exploring ‘New Vegeta’ the gang find the planets enhabitants largely enslaved. When Goku arrives Him and Vegeta are introduced to ‘Broly’ a timid and quiet soul who our new mystery Saiyan ‘gifts’ to Vegeta in order to help him find this murderous Legendary Saiyan…However it may transpire that Broly isnt all he’s cracked up to be at a glance…and that the gang may have a fight for there very lives…and a mission to save a planet at risk of being totally destroyed.

Broly is an interesting beast in terms of ‘Dragonball’ lore, because its the first time in these movies that we get some actual Saiyan lore sprinkled into these films. Broly is a somewhat interesting villain, though not a particularly complex one, and thats ultimately the biggest thing that hamstrings the production. The Villain cant be that deep or complex, and once its established who IS the villain(s) of this piece, the film kind of starts to fall apart a bit, as it devolves into just endless fight montages, and not particularly creative ones.

The film clocks in at 72 minutes, and seemingly has the opposite problem to the last 2 films, they ran too short and needed 10-20 minutes to flesh out the context..this runs about 10-15 minutes too long and could have benefitted from the back end being tightened up a bit. This being the first of 3 films, I appreciate they need to set the ground foundations for this lore and these characters. But there were moments here that felt like they hammered their points a little TOO much.

That being said, the story itself is a pretty fun one for DBZ, this definitely felt like it benefitted from being a movie over being an arc in the anime, the pacings a little slower than the last two movies, but that slower pace does benefit it more than detract from it. Broly as a character design is fun, the endings a little underwhelming, but it compensates with some genuinely humerous moments and some really nice ‘iconic’ art direction and line delivery moments. and a killer score.

All in all? this is another one that I could recommend to someone who hasnt watched any of the DBZ movies. its maybe not as good as ‘Super 13’ or ‘Return of Cooler’ but it has enough going on to keep you hooked, and I came away from it glad I finally checked it out. AND! as an added bonus, now all this lores been established, it should make the next Broly movie even tighter and more solid! so I have that to look forward to!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dragon-ball-z-broly-the-legendary-super-saiyan/

The hits just keep on coming as we’re now fully into the ‘DBZ Movies are good now!’ era of the franchise. Our 7th entry in the series plays as an alternate reality ‘What If?’ type scenario…and its ‘What if, in the original ‘Android Saga’ timeline, Androids 17 and 18 had been destroyed by Goku, who took the medicine Trunks gave him ahead of time. Rather than him taking it later, nearly dying and the androids bringing the ‘Cell Saga’ into fruition?’

Well; the answer is they never activated Android 16, they both got massacred and their destruction triggered a secret underground robot computer of Dr. Gero to activate 3 more androids, Androids 13,14 and 15. They’re mission, unsurprisingly…is to kill Goku.

Well, Gokus out shopping with Chi chi and the majority of the rest of the gang are hanging out for a beauty contest (because of course they are…) When androids 14 and 15 start blowing up parts of the city, leading to a fight with Goku that takes the team out to the glacial field where they meet Android 13 and the revelation of the even deadlier ‘Super Android 13’ leading the whole team to pitch together to take this new deadly threat down!

Much like ‘Return of Cooler’ I feel like they’ve kind of nailed the formula here, this could have easily been a 15-25 episode arc of the series, but its just condensed down to a much more digestable format. Honestly my thoughts on this one are pretty much identical to ‘Return of Cooler’ its decently enough paced, has some nice lighter moments contrasting some genuinely graphic and darker tones. The art direction is rock solid, the dialogue is a bit more humourous and intentionally littered with Jokes.

The Androids arnt exactly the most original ideas in the world (they feel almost like a soft launch of the concepts that would go on to fuel the Cell saga arc) but Super Android 13 is an interesting transformation and character design…and…Well the less said about Android 15 the better frankly *Nervous collar tug*

Much like ‘Return of Cooler’ I think the only issues I have with this one is its a little too condensed for its own good, and with another 10-15 minutes just to flesh out the androids backstory a bit more and to maybe give Super 13 a bit more to do, this could have been pretty close to perfect. As it stands the fact it feels almost like a twist on the existing lore and the speediness with which it skips through the plotting leaves it just a little bit rushed in my opinion.

STILL! with that being said, this is another one that I can wholeheartedly recommend checking out if you’ve only seen the DBZ anime, I had a really fun time with it, and Im really hoping this momentum keeps up!

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dragon-ball-z-super-android-13/

Well; it may have taken 5 films to get to this point, but we’ve finally hit probably the most solid DBZ movie that i’ve seen up to this point.

A direct sequel to ‘Coolers Revenge’ the film picks up a short time after the events of that movie and Dendae calling Goku and the team to head to new Namek, as a mysterious metallic object has latched itself to the surface, and appears to be absorbing the life force of the planet, and kidnapping the Namekians…On arriving it’s revealed that Cooler SOMEHOW survived being fired into the sun, and has merged with the alien metal object to become an even more unstoppable killing machine, hungry for vengence against Goku and the team.

And this is the first DBZ movie i’ve seen so far thats managed to really properly capture the tone and vibe that Ive been looking for in a DBZ movie. Everything up to this point has kind of felt like its been solely grounded in ‘Dragonball’ aesthetics and vibes with just a sprinkle of DBZ lore up to the beginning of the ‘Saiyan Saga’. Which is FINE….But its not what I come to DBZ for. With the reintroduction of Vegeta, the franchise FINALLY feels like the DBZ I know and love!

The plot is hardly the most original thing in the world, but its weird, dark and interesting enough to more than hold my interest, the art direction is creative, detailed and had some genuinely gorgeous moments included. The scripts strong, well paced and structured with some really nice dialogue choices and some genuinely funny moments at times.

The voice cast really give it there all. The score sounds perfect and the payoff is satisfying. Honestly? My only real criticism is, clocking in at 42 minutes this feels a little *too* fast. The story of this movie would have EASILY been 30-45 episodes of the anime, and while I think stretching it out THAT long would almost certainly have been overkill, I think an extra 20 minutes on this one to flesh out Cooler, more properly reitroduce Vegeta and get into the finer details of our mysterious space object would have really helped to give this thing the breathing room it needed to be absolutely top tier.

As it stands? this is the first DBZ movie I can fully and enthusiastically recommend, ESPECIALLY if you’ve only watched the anime before… I had a really good time with it, and if you struggled with the early DBZ movies, maybe starting with ‘Coolers Revenge’ and picking up from there onwards might be the best way to go.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dragon-ball-z-the-return-of-cooler/

If memory serves, this is the first ‘Dragonball Z’ OVA to directly reference the events of the manga/TV series. playing out almost as a ‘What If?’ ‘Coolers Revenge’ picks up in an alternate timeline where Goku defeated Freeza AND Vegeta seemingly, before returning to earth. Namek was still destroyed, New Namek never existed, Goku never learned instant transmission and everything from the moment Goku launched the spirit Bomb at Freeza onwards seemingly never happened.

In this timeline, its revealed that Freeza had a brother ‘Cooler’, and, on hearing of Freezas demise, Cooler decides to head to earth to kill the Saiyan that disgraced his families namesake. Meanwhile, back on earth, Goku and the gang are getting ready for a camping trip to blow off some steam after the whole ‘Namekian Genocide’ business…at which point Cooler and his cronies arrive, wreck up the place, and force Goku to once again fight for the lives of the people of earth!

Much like the special before it, ‘Coolers Revenge’ feels like the creators have kind of found a system and format for how these <60 minute specials should play out. On the one hand, the formula they’ve put together means that these stories very rarely end up awful now…On the downside, its INCREDIBLY repetative, and the fact that these specials ARE sub 60 minutes means we dont really get the nuance, backstory or character development needed to really truely appreciate whats at stake or why we should really care.

I cant fault the visuals, this looks like a beefed up, more refined take on the TV series animations. I cant fault Cooler as a character, though. I dont really know what seperates him from Turles, Lord Slug or any of the other ‘baddies’ from these films up to this point. He’s not quite as interesting or charismatic as Freeza and the lack of runtime means we dont really get to see his personality develop much past ‘You killed my brother, prepare to die.’ which is a real shame.

Coolers cronies arnt as enigmatic as the Ginue force, Krillin and Gohan largely go AWOL for a big chunk of this, Piccolo basically appears out of nowhere halfway into the story. This doesnt feel like a special or even particularly cinematic event. It feels like a 2 part ‘filler’ story within the TV series. Thats not inherently a bad thing, but it did make me wonder really why they bothered to make this a ‘special’ in the way that they did.

In short, ‘Coolers Revenge’ isnt a particularly groundbreaking Dragonball film. Its too short to allow the characters to develop and breath, or for the story to get the nuance it needs to be fully fleshed out. But its too long and deals too heavily in ‘non canon’ events for it to really fit in to the TV series or carry any weight behind it.

I know Cooler has a sequel special right after this one, so I guess if that ones any good, then this one will kind of become essential to understanding that one. On its own though? its kind of unremarkable. Im not unhappy i’ve seen it, given Coolers connection to the mainline TV series, i’d say it IS worth watching just as a bit of an oddity, and at <50 minutes, its hardly a mammoth watch. Im kind of glad I saw it at least once. But It’ll probably be a while before I watch it again.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dragon-ball-z-coolers-revenge/

The forth OVA ‘special’ from ‘Dragonball Z’ and I feel they’ve pretty much landed on a bit of a formula for these at this point.

The plot this time around revolves around ‘Lord Slug’ a mysterious power hungry being with a demon army who arrive on earth accidentally, learn about the dragonballs, with Slug using their power to grant him eternal youth, restored to his younger, stronger self, Goku and the team must work together to defeat slug once and for all.

Lets be honest here, this is essentially just a 50 minute reimagining of the ‘King Piccolo’ arc from ‘Dragonball’ just tiedied up a bit and with some new ‘Z’ characters thrown into the mix. In that sense, it feels incredibly derivative, and kind of throwaway (as most of the OVAs ive seen so far feel)

However, I will say the short does have some fun enough little moments, Lord Slug may be derivative, but he’s at least got a sense of menace about him, and (mild spoilers) but seeing an early ‘proto’ design for Gokus Super Saiyan form was fun!

Visually, the HD scan of this special is crisp and highly detailed, I thought the performances were solid, if not a little goofy (thats not a bad thing honestly!) I cant say I hated it, it just didnt really bring anything new to the table. a fine enough way to kill about 50 minutes. Absolutely non essential, not one i’d actively recommend. But if you’ve watched through all of ‘Z’ and just wanna spend some more time with the gang, this’ll almost certainly scratch the itch.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/dragon-ball-z-lord-slug/

A Statement before we begin –
tytdreviews.com/2026/01/03/a-word-on-j-k-rowling/

And with that, we’ve reached the end of the original film adaptation of the ‘Harry Potter’ films, and its realistically probably the best way this slightly wonky hodge podge of a series could have closed out.

The plot here picks up literal moments after the end of the first part, and what follows, is essentially, a series of large scale action vignettes as the gang try to do a raid on Gringotts bank, followed by breaking BACK into Hogwarts to look for the final Horcrux’s, leading to a final battle between Voldemort and the Death Eaters, and the students and staff of Hogwarts.

Really, this is less a 3 act movie and more just two massive action scenes with occasional lore dumps and pathos sequences. but plot wise, I kind of think it probably does the best with the material its been given as it possibly could really…or rather, given the setup theyd had to this point, I think what was cut out of the plot or changed wasnt problematic enough to completely throw the thing off.

I think the film keeps a relatively good pacing across the runtime, though it is a bit on the slow side at times, to the point that I did begin to drift into my phone in places, in part due to familiarity, and in part due to an ongoing issue I have wherein prolonged action scenes/fight scenes just end up kind of getting a bit dull and repetative for me.

I feel like they round off most of the characters stories fairly effectively, theres some half decent twists and turns. And while, like the last film, it is a shame that the extended cast of characters arnt quite as bedded in as the earlier films, they do get quite a bit more screen time here, which is better than nothing I guess.

The finale itself? is a tad anticlimactic, made all the more iffy by a post story time skip sequence (which I wont get into here…but it does rather take the wind out of the sails of the production). I feel like it probably did the best it could to translate what was a quite involved passage in the books to the screen, but I think they maybe oversimplified it a little too much, leaving it just a bit on the flat side really.

On a technical level? we actually see a few wobbles here, which was surprising, broomstick sequences looked terrible compared to when its been handled in previous entries, theres definitely an overuse and misuse of CGI in this entry, generating some frankly bizarre and low quality imagery, and the CG doesnt really mesh all that well into the live action sequences. It very much felt like they hadnt quite finished polishing the effects up for this half really…as mentioned, it comes to something when effects here look worse than effects from the 2nd or 3rd film in places.

Direction and cine wise, its fine. its about on a par with the first film, though with a lot of the shoot being studio based, it does rather make this entry feel a little pokey and smaller budgeted than the previous films. Part one was FILLED with sweeping location shots and panoramic views. Part two has a couple of moments like that, but a lot of it is CG generated and feels a bit lifeless as a result. Not helped by the fact that, the aesthetics they cultivated 5 films ago at this point, have now fully cannibalised themselves, leading to an overly dank, border pastiche of the kind of style they were trying in earnest from ‘Goblet’ onwards.

Otherwise though? its a big budget studio picture, it looks find, the edits solid, the creative vision is in line with the other entries in this series…it all just feels a little overly safe on that front though. Which is a bit of a shame.

Performance wise, Maggie Smith really shines here for me, and the core cast get probably their finest moments in the series. But other than that, its all rather flat again. Actors just going through the motions, paycheque motivated, but little else. I think a big hinderence at this point is that the story has shifted the narrative to the Trio predominantly, meaning all these wonderful characters cultivated over the last 7 books are relegated to abrupt ‘Bursting in’ moments that last a couple of minutes at most. Or a border non speaking background role. Ron, Hermione and Harry were pretty much always the least interesting characters in this series, and to collectively, spend nearly 5 hours in there company in these finale films is almost chronically teetering on the insufferable. Its kind of unavoidable really because thats how the books go too…but I feel like we really missed out on some great final turns from this cast because off it.

And the soundtrack feels like a ‘greatest hits’ at this point. Its good, but its SO so tired…

All in all? I struggle to muster solid enthusiasm for ‘Deathly Hallows Part 2’ or the complete ‘Deathly Hallows’ as a closer for this series. Apart, we have an opening part that feels positively glacial and could be used to treat insomnia, and a second part that feels weirdly isolated and struggles to realise its best interpretations. Combined? this is border insufferable.

What I will say, is between these final two films, the heart of the series still feels like its ticking away somewhere in the background, the vibe that runs across all of these films, keeping them consistently (if not vaguely) tied to each other. Deathly Hallows 2 may not be my favourite entry in the series, but it closes things off in a way that wasnt terrible, and I do feel if push came to shove, that I wouldnt dislike watching it again. I absolutely couldnt recommend this film, or the series at large having rewatched them all now. But it was kind of nice to go back through these films 25 – 15 years on and see how the series was able to captivate people back then. I get it…even if it isnt necessarily for me.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/harry-potter-and-the-deathly-hallows-part-2/

A Statement before we begin –
tytdreviews.com/2026/01/03/a-word-on-j-k-rowling/

Chalk this one up to just not really being my cup of tea. Im still ultimately kind of bewildered as to why they split the final Harry Potter book into a two part movie, as it effectively creates a very unfortunate scenario where the first half is all set up and no pay off, OFF THE BACK of ‘Half Blood Prince’ which was another film that was basically all set up and minimal pay off. The second half of this story gets to reap the rewards of nearly 4 hours worth of set up and planning…while this 2.5 hour entry is almost pathalogical in its attempt to put the audience to sleep.

The plot of this film revolves around our trio picking up almost immediately after ‘Half Blood Prince’ setting up to head out and travel the globe looking for the Horcruxes that will ultimately put an end to Voldemort. And while I will admit there are a couple of decent set piece moments here such as the time spent in the Ministry of Magic, and the final 15 minutes or so. the remaining 2 hours mainly consists of Harry, Ron and Hermione arguing, walking endlessly and occasionally warping to a new location. Its like ‘The Lord of the Rings’ but not as well written, with twice as much walking…and sad.

I need to be clear here, even at this point, I dont actively HATE this movie, but this is about as close as i’ll get to hating a film in this series. Its essentially left me feeling largely ambivolent towards it. I dont dislike it, but I sure as hell am unhappy it wasted so much of my time.

The pacing is glacial for the most part as, what the film makers intended to be character building/lore developing set pieces, wind up feeling like endless arguments, bickering and collective grieving over everybody being dead. Oh yeah, thats the other side of this, everyone in this series that made it even remotely fun or entertaining is now either dead, absent or gets a 2 minute cameo and is then never seen again.

Instead, we spend the entire time more or less with our trio, as they have brief moments of interacting with new characters who are just kind of dull, or they’re arguing with each other, which feels hollow when you know that they all pretty much HAVE to sort out their differences before the end, or the second films going to be mercifully short.

The dialogues rough, the performances are lumpy and uneven, while it isnt quite as awkward as the other films in this series, the cast here, at this point in time are positively itching to get away from this franchise, and it shows in their performances. which feel half hearted and not at all focussed on sincerity or genuiness to the audience.

While on a technical level I cant EXPLICITLY fault the direction and cine. It all feels quite tired by this point, as what began in ‘Goblet of Fire’ and was mastered in ‘Order of the Pheonix’ has now eaten itself to the point that it feels bland, beige and incredibly unoriginal. This is just murky, brownish/blackish/blueish sludge cinema, a colour grade that plagued this era of film and video games, taking all vibrance and uniqueness out of the picture. and here its done especially poorly.

While technically, its playing all the right notes, it absolutely isnt playing them in the right order.

Add to this an uninspiring soundtrack, the aforementioned struggling performances and CG that, somehow isnt holding up as well as the previous films…and you end up feeling like you’ve been served up half a meal where every foodstuff has been unceremoniously filled with stuffing.

I sincerely feel for cinema goers back in 2010, who had to watch this for WELL over 2 hours. Get to the end, and then wait 12 months to ACTUALLY see something happen. Because, in my opinion at least? this film was an absolute slog to get through for the most part, with even the interesting bits somehow ending up being twisted into inanities.

Even the posters bloody running…Bring on Part 2…

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/harry-potter-and-the-deathly-hallows-part-1/

A Statement before we begin –
tytdreviews.com/2026/01/03/a-word-on-j-k-rowling/

Aaaand we’ve pretty much crossed the ‘Event Horizon’ of this series now. ‘Order of the Phoenix’ was the culmination of 3 films desperately trying to find its vibe and style after the exit of Chris Columbus from the franchise. It was refined, knew what it wanted to be, was lean and understood the characters. Yes; there were a few awkward performances here and there, and yes, in the grand overarching plot sense of things, it was kind of a filler story to slowly drip lore into the series ahead of the big wrapping up. But it was coherent, consistent and for the first time since ‘Philosophers Stone’ the series felt like it had found a new identity that sat comfortably with it, and a tone and vibe that didnt feel *too* forced.

Then, theres ‘Half Blood Prince’ an almost Cannibalisation of the last film into a kind of…self referential sludge for lack of a better descriptive. As the aesthetic and tone of the last film, morphs almost into an attempted impersonation of itself. This entry, to me; feels like they took the last film, ran it through an AI video prompter and asked it to make a natural feeling sequel to just that self contained story.

Narrative wise, we get largely bogged down in half hearted and somewhat awkward character pieces, that purely exist to more firmly insert the kind of ‘lore’ into the series that really should have already been firmly in place 3 movies ago. The characters dont really get a whole lot of personal development in this movie, as the emphasis is on setting up the players and scenarios for the big ‘2 part’ finale. So we as the audience have to make do with a LOT of awkward and slightly cringey romance sequences and ‘feelings’ talk the feels less like it was written with heart, purpose and intention, and more that it was written to give the characters a quick and dirty B-plot because the A-plot alone is a bit repetative.

Yes, the majority of the A-plot here revolves around Harry finding a mysterious potions book belonging to someone known as the ‘Half Blood Prince’ and while that mystery slowly stews on and off in the background, our other A-plot revolves around Harry and Dumbledore doing some espionage on Hogwarts latest (and returning!) potions teacher Professor Slughorn. and when I say these two plot points are a bit repetative, what I mean is that each act of this film can be summed up as follows:

*Harry approaches Slughorn to try and get some information, he’s rebuffed.
*Harry expresses feelings for GIRLS to people for a brief window.
*Harry and the gang ponder who the ‘Half Blood Prince’ might be and debate the morals of using the book in lessons.
* Ron and Hermione HEAVILY imply theyre interested in each other
*Harry Approaches Slughorn again to try and get some information, and gets a tiny bit.

Repeat in 15 minute chunks until the final 20 minutes or so, when the plot suddenly flips into the prologue of the next film, which is a 4.5 hour ‘fetch quest’ with a final few twists thrown in to ensure folks DO actually come back.

Its not inherently unwatchable, but I would say the scenes with Slughorn are pretty much the peak of this movie, and they’re genuinely pretty funny and engaging, but a film cant really survive off of Jim Broadbent alone…equally with the film being laser focussed on these 2.5 plot points, it means we get SIGNIFICANTLY less time with the characters that actually make these films fun, the teachers dip in and out fleetingly, but dont get a whole lot to do, the Death eaters and supporters of Voldemort get the same treatment and the Order barely get 10 minutes before they’re boxed away. It just feels messy, trying to cram everyone into a 2.5 hour film whether they actually feel organically involved in the narrative or not.

As such, the pacings a bit off as well, This doesnt so much feel like a coherent 3 act film, and more like a series of sketches and lore drops stapled together. its consistently toned at least in what its trying to do. But the fact that it feels almost like a tribute act to what came before left me feeling like narratively, the series had kind of hit the wall. it felt derivative of itself at times here, which is never a good sign.

Same goes for the cine and direction. As with all these films, I cant really fault them on a technical level, they’re well made, visually impressive films that still hold up over 15 years on. But the ‘freshness’ of this series here is definitely starting to waver. Like the script, the aesthetics they’ve chosen feels derivative of the previous film. Like the film makers looked at the last film, forgot that THEY made it, and went ‘Aww! thats really good! We should do something like that!’ So they made a film that feels like ‘Order of the Pheonix’ without any of the refreshing ‘new-ness’ that ‘Order’ brought with it.

There are some very impressive set pieces, the edit is nice and tight, the CG still largely works, and the score ties the whole thing together, but its kind of inescapable that this one just…feels like everyones kind of ‘done’ with it, and just want to get this and the next couple of movies out of the way and over with.

Performance wise, well, as mentioned we have Jim Broadbent. He’s probably the saving grace and single fantastic performance in this. Everyone else feels like they’re coasting. I expect that from Gambon at this point, but Daniel Radcliffe is clearly phoning in his scenes here because…through a mixture of battling alcoholism through most of the filming of this and probably feeling like he was basically ‘untouchable’ I suppose he thought he could just…Do whatever he wanted at this point. But when Alan Rickman isnt even really trying, you know things are stale. and the feeling kind of reverbarates across most of the major cast.

Ultimately; ‘The Half Blood Prince’ was built from the ground up to be a prologue to the finale, and thats basically its biggest flaw. A production that feels like its sole existence isnt to tell a story or engage the audience with a meaningful plot. But a film thats sole purpose is to get the audience to a place where the finale is set up and ready to go, while wearing the skin of the last film and trying desperately to convince the audience that its ‘just as good’.

I cant personally say I disliked it, but if it wasnt for the fact theres only the two part finale left at this point, i’d have probably just stopped here…instead. we carry on, and I think thats probably my end thought on this one. If you’ve got this far, you might as well do the last two. but if this had even been 1 or 2 movies earlier in the series. This would have been the film I bailed on…while things were still vaguely kind of enjoyable.

source https://letterboxd.com/tytdreviews/film/harry-potter-and-the-half-blood-prince/