Last night we went and saw the new Harry Potter movie, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

Another good job on the movie adaptation's for Harry Potter. Other than the first two films, of which the less said, the better, the movies have all been quite good. I still think the third one, which fixed the problems with the earlier ones and set the template for the rest of the series, is the best.

This movie had two advantages over the previous one (Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix). First, the book is shorter. That allows for fitting in all the important elements without feeling too rushed. As it is the movie does have a very quick pace, and will probably be difficult to follow for non-fans, and the titular character gets much shorter shrift than in the book. Second, the book is better. Phoenix is the weakest of the seven books, with too much angst from Harry and other story problems. Half-Blood Prince is a stronger story and gets to start tying up and paying off some of the story arcs that have been building from the previous five books.