'Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince' Abridged: The Cynical Version

After seven novels, a spin-off book of wizard fairy tales that wasn't that good, and eight movies, the story of The Boy Who Lived Harry Potter draws to its conclusion with the release of the final film "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2." The lovable wizard went through a lot and can finally use a rest unless author JK Rowling takes lessons from George Lucas and decides to update the story or write some potentially awful prequels.

For those who managed to let Harry Potter pass them by and suddenly feel obligated to catch up with the series thanks to children or friends dragging you to the film, here's a handy little guide abridging the the sixth book/film to quickly catch up.

Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince

Let's get it over with: Snape kills Dumbledore and Snape is the titular Half-Blood Prince. Technically these are spoilers, but for this particular story they really aren't important elements compared to the concept of Horcruxes. Harry Potter and Dumbledore learn about these MacGuffins and how Voldemort created and uses them to keep himself alive. Destroying the Horcruxes will render Voldemort mortal.

But it's not so easy considering they don't know what shape the Horcruxes are or how many Voldemort created. But Dumbledore has confirmed destroying one (a ring) between this and the previous novel as well as Harry Potter destroying the book from the second story. As for what would have happened to Voldemort had the plot of the second story succeeded remains an inexplicable plot hole to this day.

So Harry spends most of the time in this story researching every little detail about Voldemort's life hoping to pick up clues on the number of Horcruxes and their forms. Meanwhile, antagonist Draco Malfoy is Voldemort's agent whose attempts to assassinate Voldemort are as successful as Wile E Coyote's plans to trap the Roadrunner. Snape is also assisting Draco, and Dumbledore is doing nothing to prevent the sabotage attempts happening underneath his nose.

The mind-numbing research Harry Potter does is broken up with his raging hormones kicking in and taking his best friend Ron's little sister as a girlfriend. Never mind that neither of them had much chemistry together throughout the series. Hell, Harry Potter had a more romantic tension with his flying brooms than Ginny. But it's a convenient pairing that JK Rowling hopes we simply accept.

Eventually Harry learns that Voldemort has seven Horcruxes total and Dumbledore has a lead on their third target. So they venture over to its location and discover that it is as usual filled with magical traps. They overcome and grabbed the cursed MacGuffin before hightailing it back to Hogwarts.

Conveniently, Malfoy decides to spring his raid against Dumbledore. Death Eaters invade but Harry Potter's Lucky Bastard Syndrome is now literally in a bottle so other students receive its benefits. So no one gets hurt except a minor character. And Snape kills Dumbledore. And the Half-Blood Prince Harry Potter was more interested in looking for than Horcruxes turned out to be Snape. And again, those two elements were not important compared to Horcruxes. Talk about misplaced priorities, Mr. Potter.

And that Horcrux Dumbledore and Harry Potter recovered? A fake. The story ends with a "To Be Concluded" feeling and we know that the final volume will be so dense and full of material that its book can be used alternatively for hand to hand combat.