The above image was posted just an hour or so ago at the Harry Potter Fans LiveJournal Community. It was credited to this website and is said to be a preview picture of the upcoming fifth movie installment of J.K. Rowling’s phenomenal Harry Potter books.

When I first saw this picture, my reaction was: WTF?

Two (2) questions sprung to mind right away, as it happened and will most likely happen with other fans:

1. Where is THE scar?
The lightning-shaped scar on his forehead is not merely Harry’s physical identifier – it is a mark made by The Dark Lord himself that has impact on the entire magical world. Don’t tell me that it just, well, disappeared!

2. Why are his eyes BLUE?
Okay, aqua at best. But still. His eyes are green, as in the very eyes that a hell of a lot of people said he inherited from his mother Lily. “You look just like your father, but you have your mother’s eyes.” As in his mother’s green eyes.

Or maybe it is just all those lighting effects on the image, hence the screwed colors and the mysterious disappearance of otherwise very noticeable markings.

As for the shorter, barber’s cut hair: I have no problem with it. Perhaps Harry was over the Beatles by the end of Book Four and became a fan of, say, The Backstreet Boys or BoyZone when the OOTP arc rolled about?

Spider-Man outs himself to the press, says the current front page of Yahoo!

I was, to say the very least, surprised to read further that our favorite web-slinger had publicly revealed his identity to the mass populace of the Marvel universe by unmasking during a press conference in New York City. It is almost unthinkable to envision the rather awkward and nerdy photographer Peter Parker facing the media and the public as a whole and admitting that he is Spider-Man.

Marvel admits that this turning point in comic book history took off in the seven-issue Civil War series launched last month.

In the story, the government passes The Super-Hero Registration Act, which requires all masked crimefighters to register, revealing their identities in the process. This surprising piece of legislation was triggered by a showdown between super-powered heroes and villains that caused the deaths of hundreds of innocent civilians.

Spider-Man belongs to one of two (2) bitterly conflicting factions. That is, he and other superheroes sharing his sentiments are championing the aforementioned Registration Act.

On the other hand, other crime-fighters such as Captain America are not keen on giving up their cloaks of anonymity, literally and figuratively.

I can recall that there is also a similar Mutant Registration Act that was tackled in the pages of the X-Men family of titles years ago. This caused various mutant groups – the Mutant Liberation Front comes to mind – to resort to violent acts akin to terrorism against those who initiated this law.