There’s a quote from the Stephen Frears movie High Fidelity—which was repeated in the Hulu series High Fidelity and is a variation of a quote from the Nick Horby novel High Fidelity—that I think about a lot. “I agreed that what really matters is what you like, not what you are like,” John Cusack says, recounting the details of a successful first date. “Books, records, films—these things matter. Call me shallow but it’s the fuckin’ truth.” This philosophy is more than just shallow, it’s the musings of a deranged record store hipster who has become so consumed by the artistic depiction of human experience that he lacks any understanding of actual human experience. It’s also a philosophy I happen to agree with.
Interest, fandom, taste, whatever you want to call it, is more than just a description of the art you consume in private. It is often (and I would argue, always) a way of interacting with the world at large. To wear a band’s concert T-shirt or hang a movie poster in your dorm room or live tweet about a television show is to proclaim to the world, here’s what I want you to know about me. A lot of this desire is tribal. For example, you may identify as a “Trekkie” because you enjoy spending time with people who like Star Trek. But I’d argue it’s much deeper than that. I’d argue that culture is used as a sort of common language to outline the particulars of one’s identity.
Think of it this way: Star Trek fans have a very specific definition of what a Trekkie is. They are communal and enjoy going to conventions. They have an encyclopedic knowledge of various spinoffs and lore. They’re studious—so studious, they’re able to speak a language that doesn’t exist. This goes well beyond liking some TV show. When someone self-identifies as a Trekkie, they aim (at least on some level) to communicate something about their personality. Their fandom is shorthand. When they tell us they’re a Trekkie, we know what they mean.
You can play this game with most any cultural institution. Grateful Dead fans believe they’re mellow. D&D fans believe they’re creative. Philadelphia Eagles fans believe they’re “passionate.” I don’t mean to sound so condescending. In fact, all of these self-diagnoses may very well be true. But the accuracy and/or self-awareness of certain music/film/sports enthusiasts is not important. What’s important is that the conflation of interest and identity, while perhaps subconscious, is both inextricable and universal. Indeed, what you like matters more than what you are like. Because what you like is what you are like.
Now let’s take this principle a step further. If what you like is what you are like, the inverse must be also true. Which brings us to Harry Potter. Whether they’re forming book clubs or organizing themselves into houses or playing a game of (*vomits into mouth*) quidditch, Harry Potter fans want you to know they’re Harry Potter fans. In many ways, they view J.K. Rowling’s book and film series as extensions of themselves—like one would view a religion or creed. If you can’t tell by my supercilious tone, I am not one of those people. In fact, I am the complete opposite. I have never read a word of a Harry Potter book, nor seen a frame of a Harry Potter film. And it is not in my consumption, but in my avoidance of this godforsaken franchise that I derive a sense of personal identity.
Like a Potterhead touts his or her collection of Gryffindor merchandise, I take immense pleasure in telling people I’m a Harry Potter virgin. And believe me, that happens a lot. Such is the life of guy with no job and three movie podcasts. I’ll be introduced to someone through a mutual friend, that mutual friend will introduce me as “Nico, a guy who like movies,” and the conversation will inevitably spiral into a conversation about Potter, at which point I dive off the top rope with the most devastating of cinematic confessionals. “I’ve never seen a Harry Potter movie,” I’ll say, fighting off a devious smirk. And their jaw will hit the floor in shock, but also in condemnation, as if being a fan of Potter is a prerequisite to being a cinephile. When Harry Potter became Citizen Kane, I’ll never know.
So, where does this desire come from? Why take such pleasure in apathy, especially toward something so universally beloved? I mean, it’s not like passionate fandom is a foreign concept to me. If some asshole at a bar were to speak so dismissively about Star Wars or the Beatles or Seinfeld, I wouldn’t be able to contain my disgust either. So, I don’t think I’m intentionally ragging on Harry Potter fans. In fact, I don’t think I’m intentionally ragging on Harry Potter. I think this is about me, and my own unhealthy obsession with pop culture. Ignoring Harry Potter is my way of rebelling against my nature, of proving to the world that I don’t need to see everything, know everything, have an opinion on everything in order to be a pop culture fan. This has been a difficult desire to combat.
Somewhere around age fourteen, I developed an insatiable appetite for what I call “useless information.” This is not to be confused with “useful information,” the knowledge that has some utility outside of bar trivia. How to change a tire is useful; the names of all 17 American Idol winners are useless. How to play a musical instrument, useful; every Grammy winner for Album of the Year since 1970, useless. How to convince a woman to have sex with you, useful; the plot of Woody Allen’s Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex (But Were Afraid to Ask), useless. I don’t have a psychological explanation as to why, I just know I’m more fascinated with the latter. And that fascination, has become MY THING. Sports, politics, pop culture, technology, history, literature—I’m the guy who knows a little about a lot. Call it curiosity, call it FOMO, call it full-on neurosis. My thirst for tidbits cannot be quenched. Except for the curious case of Harry Potter, the one major cultural institution that I have ignored without regret. I couldn’t tell a Slytherin from a Hufflepuff, and it does not bother me one iota.
This is all to say my Potter cherry was popped this week, somewhat violently. At the hands of my malevolent podcast co-host, I was forced to watch Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (sometimes referred to as Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone) for the first time, ending a twenty-three-year streak of plugging my ears and shouting “la-la-la-la-la.” Twenty-three years of bucking the trend. Twenty-three years of fighting the mob. Twenty-three years of enraging my peers. Twenty-three years of holding on to my ignorance. Twenty-three years of being a goddamn individual. And for what? A crappy kids movie about a boy with a magic blanket. I know, I’m engaging in reckless hyperbole. By no means is this a bad movie. But as I sat through the two-and-a-half-hour (!) runtime, I realized that it’s simply not a movie for me. And I suspect the other seven aren’t either.
It’s just too late. I had my window—when every kid in middle school was reading the books, when all my friends lined up at midnight to see the movies, when I was young enough to get swept away by a fictional world and fanatical enough to learn everything about it. If I saw Philosopher’s Stone at age ten, Harry Potter may have taken the place of Star Wars—Ravenclaw bed spread, Severus Snape Halloween costume, hell, maybe even a few quidditch games. But, that’s the past and now I’m in my mid-twenties and I’d rather watch the last 45 minutes of Goodfellas for the 300th time. All I learned from watching Harry Potter is that I’ll never fully enjoy Harry Potter.
For years, this franchise represented something great—an illegible language, an artistic enigma, the final cultural frontier. As is often the case with popular culture, the idea of the art was greater than the art itself. Now, it’s a movie. Just a movie. I can’t help but feel like this experience destroyed a part of my identity. Being the guy who’s never seen a Harry Potter movie was interesting. Being yet another guy who saw one Harry Potter movie and never got into the rest is just downright depressing. “I’m tired of the fantasy, because it doesn’t really exist. And there are never really any surprises, and it never really delivers,” says John Cusack in High Fidelity. Yup, sounds about right.
Smartest guy in the room, dumbest guy outside of it.
