This reminds me of the movie Boyhood. Have you heard of it? It's about a family growing up over the years, from the kids being children up until their adult years (or almost adult, i forgot), and they used the same actors over the 12 years it took to film the movie. It's quite an interesting concept, and it was a pretty good movie too

As interesting as this topic is to me I'd better refrain from writing about it or I will end up writing an essay here xD
I delved into that topic last year, in depth, for my thesis. I read so many books on that topic and I must have read the first HP for at least 3 times.
The only thing I can tell you is that people read everything into Harry Potter. I was surprised how many gay stuff they can get out of the whole story (although I doubt it was intended that way except for Dumbledore). E.g. some authors see phallic symbols in the books everywhere (the wand being one e.g.).

But I have to say that the books are about growing up, tackling teenage issues, growing responsible for one's actions etc.

@Jacob oh that's a shame about the book store. I always hear people from England saying 'Why would you wanna live here? it's so gloomy and rains all the time' but that's actually a big reason why I wanna go to England. And, this is so random, it's such a minor detail , but.. the grass! It must be so green among other reasons


I didn't know that the HP book contents didn't shift much I imagine it was a bit easier to show the characters maturing in the movies, considering the actors WERE actually growing up while filming. I just know that there is a very definite and obvious maturity throughout the movies. The first ones sit more as standalone movies than the later ones. I feel like the movies move from being a bunch of kids on an adventure/s (you can watch the philosopher's stone, for example, without needing to watch the next movie to understand the story) to relying a lot more heavily on the storyline and complexity that has been built up throughout the series (eg in the later movies I feel like I need to watch the next movie to get a full sense of the story and have questions answered or storylines feeling complete).

And I think that because the first movies feel more like standalones it kind of further emphasises the intended audience's age maturing. Like you don't expect a child to be able to understand or have the attention span to follow along with a complex storyline as much as you would an adult.

lol maybe the grass isn't greener on the other side (of the world). I'm just so used to seeing dead grass all the time except in the middle of winter, which it is right now. How high is the temperature getting over there?