12 Dumb Decisions In Harry Potter Movies We Can't Forgive

This one fails on both aesthetic and thematic levels, a pretty impressive achievement for what’s really only a minor change and was most likely made to reflect the style of similar fantasy blockbuster flicks around the time of the final film’s release.

When our heroes face off to defend Hogwarts and by extension the wizarding world at large by taking on the Death Eaters, the novel has their fallen enemies simply hit the ground and expire when killed since they are, ultimately, as mortal as anyone else. In the film, however, Voldemort’s followers and, even more controversially, Harry’s unnameable nemesis himself turn to a grey dust once killed.

It’s a bland stylistic choice which mirrors the look of most Potter competitors in the family-friendly fantasy world, but deprives the scene of its whole point—despite his lofty claims Voldemort is ultimately very much human, an important theme which is inverted when he instead turns to some vaguely magical unexplained mist upon dying.