When news of a Harry Potter television reboot was announced, it got a mixed response from some fans. Though some believed the feature film adaptations remain timeless and shouldn’t be interfered with, others were eager to see the full story of the original books brought to life with all the details that the movies had to leave out. The first footage from HBO’s Harry Potter TV series has already confirmed that this is at the forefront of the new adaptation, along with confirmation of specific characters that were written out of the movies entirely.
Now, a new reveal from the official Harry Potter Instagram has confirmed a major part of Hogwarts lore that was obscured with frequency by the movies: the House point hourglasses found in the Great Hall. As fans may know, these hourglasses tally the “points” awarded and deducted from each house across the school year, moving up and down at the whims of the instructors, and adding major tallies at the end of the school year thanks to Dumbledore. HBO has revealed a fresh look at how they’ll appear in the new TV series, and it’s already a marked improvement over the movies.
A few things are worth noting about HBO’s new reveal for the Harry Potter TV series, the first being how vibrant the House Cup hourglasses will be in the new show. Not only does each one come equipped with unique and colorful gems, as depicted in the original text, but the shape is one that stands out from anything else quite like it. Furthermore, the house seals for all four of the Hogwarts houses can be found, along with the visage of each house’s founders in the artwork above. All told, it’s a detailed change for the show that marks yet another drastic switch-up from the movies.
In the Harry Potter feature films, the House Cup hourglasses are easy to miss, even though they’re present across much of the series. Part of this is the fact that their importance in the larger “race” for the House Cup isn’t utilized visually all that well in the first film, and by the time the other sequels have arrived, this little subplot has been all but forgotten by them. You might blink and miss them across the movies, not only because they’re seldom in focus, but also because they’re not all that interesting to look at anyway, appearing more like candy dispensers than hourglasses.
Season 1 of Harry Potter, bearing the full title of the first book, is already scheduled for a Christmas premiere this year on HBO, and Season 2 is already filming, meaning that the race for the House Cup will almost certainly get its time in the spotlight when the show arrives. That said, much like the movies, this subplot is going to go away at a certain point, especially as the stakes for Harry Potter grow a little higher than if he answered a question correctly in Potions class.
