Azkaban is for lovers
My thoughts on Prisoner of Azkaban are completely disjointed and ramble-y. Basically: i loved it. I use the word "gorgeous" a LOT.

I. LOVE. RON. That's my conclusion. I love him in the books, and he's gotta be one of my favorite movie interpretations, because Rupert Grint is awesome. The nightmare about the spiders? SO CUTE. And i loved the boys' dormitory scene, because... i don't know, there aren't a whole lot of times we see the kids just being kids, outside of a school/endoftheworld context and stuff, and it was adorable to see the boys goofing around in their pajamas in the middle of the night, like teenagers. And Ron in his knit cap was SO CUTE (oh, did i say that about him already?). Oh! "When did she come in? Did you see her come in?" whenever Hermione showed up for class, that was hilarious.

HARRY/HERMIONE!!!!!! When she took the invisibility cloak off of him at Hogsmeade, that was so delicate and gorgeous and sad and wonderful. GAH. And of course, i knew the whole end would be rife with it, as they're running around together... and it IS. The hand slap over the time turner is the BEST. Complimenting her Draco punch! Falling on each other beneath the whomping willow! Hermione standing between Sirius and Harry! The protective hug when Buckbeak fends off werewolf!Lupin! OH, when he took the wand out of her pocket in the Shrieking Shack- HOT. That Harry, he's a smooth operator. And even though i'm more into the H/Hr, the Hermione/Ron was good too. How she kept calling him Ronald (hee!), the hand grab watching Harry and Buckbeak and their befuddled looks afterward (but see, she grabbed him cause she was scared for Harry!), her tending to his injured leg ("probably gonna have to cut it off" BWAH! Just like Draco told Pansy! Those boys, such drama queens). And for those of us who just can't decide, there was the groping...err, comforting embrace they all shared after Buckbeak's "execution". Threeeeeesome! Oh Alfonso Cuaron, marry me.

Lupin didn't look like how i imagine him, but his personality and how he interacted with Harry were pretty good. Loved the boggart lesson- even though Snape-in-Neville's-grandmother's-clothes was in the preview, i diiiiiied laughing. Damn, i love Alan Rickman. He's basically the reason i love Snape at all, because he's so fucking awesome in the movies (when he stormed into Lupin's classroom slamming the shutters with his wand? KICKASS). They made him a lot less batshit crazy/insufferable bastard-y at the end, though. He's so much more despicable in the book, completely beyond reason, and when he yells at Hermione- gah. In fact, the whole Shrieking Shack scene seemed a bit rushed, everyone running around and barging in and explaining things. It is very expository in the book, too, but it also seems to last longer and be more paced out. The Sirius/Remus was great, when Sirius was trying to prevent him from transforming? Oohhhhh, so beautiful. I wish the Moony Wormtail Padfoot and Prongs revelation had been put in, because that was one of the most surprising/waycool things for me the first time around, and it really ties it all together, with the map and the betrayal of the fellowship and Harry's patronus. Speaking of the map- AWESOME. Fred and George giving it to Harry is one of my all-time favorite things, and that scene was so funny. And hearing "i solemnly swear i am up to no good" makes me incredibly, incredibly happy.

Oh, oh, one of my favorite parts was Harry riding Buckbeak for the first time. Visually, it was so gorgeous, and... i don't know, it just made me happy. I LOVED Buckbeak, the effects on him were awesome. We've come a long way from Firenze and the quidditch game in the first movie. A loooong way. OH, OH, speaking of quidditch- the match in the rain. FUCKING AWESOME. I was so looking forward to seeing that, because it's so different from all the other quidditch we've seen, so much more perilous and dark and cool. I was surprised they made the dementors fly, but i guess it was pretty cool for them to be gliding around and swooping in all creepy-like. I only wish they had been on the ground during the quidditch scene, because i love that part in the book, how Harry starts to feel all soul-sucky and looks down to see the dementors all on the field looking up at him. It's creeeepy. Oh, and i was a little sad they left out the Ravenclaw game (the Slytherins pretending to be dementors!) and the quidditch final (Woooood! The happy happy team hugging! Aw!), but i suppose they were dispensable, and they didn't really need three quidditch games taking up time in the movie. But STILL.

Uhm, other random things i liked: Harry reading under the sheets at the very very beginning, the Knight Bus and the kicky music that played during that sequence, the photo of the Weasleys in Egypt, Draco's "it's killed me!" (that fucking cracked me up in the book, i'm so glad they included it) and his animated drawing of Harry getting zapped playing quidditch, the giraffe going through the portraits in the background during The Flight of the Fat Lady scene, Hermione mentioning Ron fancying Madame Rosmerta, Honeydukes looking almost exactly how i imagined it, werewolf!Lupin and dog!Sirius fighting (SO AWESOME. holy shit. That was vicious.), EXPECTO FUCKING PATRONUM (because it's badass! I wish the stag had actually run the dementors away, that's what it doooooes, but it still looked awesome), the time lapse as Harry and Hermione went back, Harry and Ron falling asleep in front of the crystal ball (i wanted Ron to make his comment about it being foggy out, though. I love them in Trelawney's class, how they just get bored and mock everything.), OH OH, the whomping willow as the seasons changed, i LOVED that. Really, it was all so so gorgeous, even moreso than the first two. The shots through the clocktower... all the special effects looked so nice. And the KIDS. They are SO PRETTY. Emma is just ridiculously beautiful, and Dan, with his hair all messy, and Rupert is so taaaallll (i LOVE that he's actually taller than the other two, because SO IS RON!), and all of them in their hipster muggle clothes (Harry when he leaves the Dursleys with his jacket and jeans and shoes! love) and i still adore how they look in their uniform ties and button-down shirts. And i can't get over how much they've grown. It's CRAZY.

I'm trying to think of more stuff i liked about it, but it's getting harder to remember. I really liked Sirius- again, didn't look exactly how i imagine him, but most stuff doesn't turn out that way. He had good post-prison vengeful craziness, and the bonding with Harry was nice (agggghhhh, i got choked up when he talked about imagining entering Hogwarts again as a free man. Siriuuuuuuuus!) I loved seeing him as Padfoot, although i imagined him a bit less wolf-like, more uhm... dog-like. Bigger, or something. But whatever. The werewolf looked coooool, those long limbs and how he really looked part-man. OH, stuff freezing when the dementors were near, that rocked. (ha ha, reminded me of The Day After Tomorrow) The train going dark was really nice and eerie. In fact, there was a lot of neat dark stuff- i mean, in addition to in terms of story- the settings and things, rain and night and the dementors and the Shrieking Shack, a lot of it is very ominous. But that's how it goes, things are gonna keep getting darker.

What else, what else... i know i'm probably leaving out a bunch. I wanna see it agaaaaaaain! And i want SCREENCAPS! Sooooo much prettiness. I know, that's all i'm ever obsessed with, but really now. It was SO PRETTY. Oh, and the credits! Even the CREDITS were fucking awesome. I always stay for credits, so it's nice when they're interesting, and these were so fun to watch. Overall, it was a fantastic movie, and i enjoyed it so much more than the first two. It was more... lyrical, more of a work of art in itself with more careful imagery (the whomping willow and the clocks come to mind) than a direct paper-to-screen version of the book. Of course, i noticed pretty much everything they left out or changed because i just re-read it, but only a few of those changes bugged me. In a perfect world, they'd be able to fit in everything, buuuuuut movies can't go on forever, i know (dammit).

Hey, you know what? I LOVE HARRY POTTER. Yep. It's true.