Well, ladies and gentlemen, it is now the time you've been waiting for! That's right...some nobody's opinion of the latest Harry Potter book! Let's have a round of applause! Woohoo!
Okay, silliness finished. So, let's firstly get into our TL;DR version of this review. It's good. You should read it. The end.
...I should say before you continue reading here, there are spoilers of the play ahead. So if you don't like spoilers, leave now! I'm not going to spoil everything or major stuff but still.
You have been warned.
Okay.
Spoiler-Phobhic readers gone?
Anyone left either doesn't care about spoilers or has already finished the play?
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Right. Here we go.
To elaborate on that, Cursed Child is a script - its not a proper novel. It picks up with the Epilogue of Deathly Hallows and takes us forward four years over the course of the first act. Admittedly, this is an odd choice of medium to continue the story of a series of novels, but is eminently readable and I was still thrown back into the Harry Potter universe - the hidden magical corners of London, the sprawling grounds and floor of Hogwarts Castle and so forth. My only major regret with this choice of format is that the chances of me ever getting to see this performed are basically non-existent. But I digress - we're getting off topic.
At its core, it's a story about the strained relationship between Harry Potter and his youngest son, Albus Severus. Initially, I didn't care for Albus. He came across like an emo brat. You know - the ones that actually have it really good but keep crying about how nobody understands their pain and you just want to punch them? However, he did get better as the story went on, mostly because he was too busy being occupied with the plot to whine. And, to the story's immense credit, it did have a character call him out on his behavior about halfway through. Intriguingly, Albus is very clearly not a copy of Harry. He's a Slytherin for one thing, and his best friend is the Scorpius, the son of Harry's old rival Draco Malfoy.
On Harry's end, he is now an overworked government employee dealing with a very thorny problem: a former Death Eater was caught with a Time Turner - a more advanced version than we saw in Prisoner of Azkaban. This one can go back years into the past, instead of just hours. Which means that it could be used to restore Voldemort back to full strength. Add that to constant whispers of Voldermort's child (!), Amos Diggory demanding that the Time Turner to be used to restore Cedric Diggory, Triwizard Champion and first victim of Voldemort's return in Goblet of Fire.
Naturally, Harry declines - as he should. Because messing with the flow of time never under any circumstances ends well. But, of course, the Time-Turner ends up in irresponsible (though well-meaning) hands. Attempts are made to save Cedric Diggory from his death at Voldemort's hand, by disqualifying him from the Triwizard Tournament. This results in some various bad futures, including one where Hermione is the Defense Against the Dark Arts teacher and acts like Snape (!) and another one where Voldermort rules the roost with over-the-top evil things like the Blood Ball. And Voldermort Day. (seriously.). And Dolores Umbridge is Head of Hogwarts.
Of course, if we're really going this Time Travel business, this does beg the question of why nobody just went back and provided a list of the Horcruxes and their locations to someone in the past to destroy. Or killed Voldemort before he made the Horcruxes and was all powerful. Which, honestly, is why I think JK wrote the Time Turners out of continuity in the original seven novels.
Cedric Diggory, too, bothered me. I won't say too much about it but he's very, VERY out of character. The titular Cursed Child (no, I'm not telling you who it is) also came out of left field.
However, on the plus side of the Time Turner business, we got to see some old friends who were dead in the main timeline, revisit some iconic scenes from a new perspective (seriously, the closing scene of the climax was heartbreaking. No, again, not spoiling. Read it yourself if you haven't yet.).
All in all, it was a good trip back to the Wizarding World once again. And, as I said above, my biggest regret is that I will likely never see it performed. 8/10
Stray observation:
-Hermione is Minister of Magic and Ron now runs Weasley's Wizarding Wheezes. The leading politican of magic in Great Britian is married to a man who runs a joke shop. Ron/Hermione shipping forever!
