The boy who lived will never die. His creator — and his production team — love him too terribly much.
After J.K. Rowling catapulted teen fiction into a new stratosphere with "Harry Potter," the bestselling book series in history, she conquered Hollywood with an eight-movie film franchise that stands as the second highest grossing.
When the end credits rolled on that final movie in 2011, to casual fans it seemed like Harry's world had come to a natural conclusion — an epilogue sent the now thirty-something characters on their wizarding ways.
But it was far from over. Sunday (at 12:01 a.m., to be precise) marks the latest chapter for Pottermania and its ballooning economy. Fans across the country are slipping into robes and painting lightning bolts on their foreheads to celebrate the release of the book "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child."
Alison Nguyen, president of the Harry Potter Literature Club at the University of Minnesota, said she went numb at the close of Harry's original adventures. "I don't know what to look forward to," she thought at the time.
Fear banished, ahead lay an avalanche of new movies, plays and books.
While many fans are charmed to rejoin the Hogwarts gang, others worry that this expanding list of products could wreck their beloved universe. The new book is being promoted as the "eighth story," yet it's actually the script to the play of the same name now onstage in London. Rowling, a powerful hands-on author, is raising her wand to light the road ahead — but is she just selling out?
Casting a spell on fandom
Rowling became the world's first billionaire author, then dropped off that list after giving away a fortune to charity. Still, estimates put the franchise's worth at $24 billion.