10 Great Harry Potter Characters That We Never Got To See On Screen

It's sometimes easy to forget in amongst all of the magical happenings that the story of Harry Potter is taking place in the same United Kingdom that we inhabit, though the inclusion of the Millennium Bridge and a song by the Ordinary Boys (of all the songs that could've been chosen) makes the chronology of the film series unclear in comparison to the books, which are set between 1991 and 1998.

That timeline places it predominantly in the premiership of Conservative Prime Minister John Major, who succeeded Margaret Thatcher in 1990, with a brief foray into the era of Tony Blair following the landslide victory of his Labour party in 1997.

The Half-Blood Prince's opening chapter details an encounter between the unnamed Prime Minister and the newly appointed Minister Of Magic, Rufus Scrimgeour. This establishes that the former is aware of the latter's presence and the world that he represents, though he is clueless about it and powerless to impact upon it in anyway.

The man on the page greatly resembles Blair, so Rowling may have taken some creative liberties by featuring him in office in 1996, or even have forgotten that Major, remembered for little other than his fondness for cricket, even existed.

Including the scene in the film could've been a funny way to start (and a Michael Sheen cameo as Blair would've been a nod to the actor's other portrayals of the man). Instead we got Harry flirting awkwardly with a waitress.