Tut tut
How dare this show rip off the totally original "Harry Potter" series. ;)
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"Why spend your life making someone else's dreams come true?"
-- Ed Wood, the movie
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MovieChat Forums > The Worst Witch (1999) Discussion > Tut tut
I think youll find this came first
shareI can remember Worst Witch since Primary School, since my friend used to read the books. When I first heard of Harry Potter though, I was reminded of Worst Witch, but the main difference is Cackles Academy is an all-girls shool, but Hogwarts is mixed. They are still, however, VERY similar. Miss Hardbroom reminds me of a female version of Snape, and Miss Cackle reminds me of a female version of Dumbledore. Also, it shows the students of Cackles Academy in classes JUST like Harry Potter, like Potions and so on. The Worst Witch came out BEFORE Harry Potter, but I think Jill Murphy(the author) is underatted.
shareReally?
I saw the series before the first Harry Potter movie came out, and had previously read the first few books that had come out.
I always thought of Miss Hardbroom being Prof. Mcgonnical (SP?), but I do agree with you about the female version of Dumbeldore being Miss Cackle.
omg hello!! worst witch 1998 harry potter 2000 and somthing!! hmm let me see which came first?? worst witch duh!! its the other way around and it is totaly unfair i so agree with sunnygirly now that i think about it!
x||x a simple [girl] in a complex [world] x||x
I read HP first. When I read WW I was expecting it to be like HP, but I really thought they were nothing like each other. Yes, there was the boarding school that teaches magic and the evil potions teacher, but apart from that they are completely different, and both great within their own right.
sharethis weas JK Rowlings inspiration oh fool
really?... i mean really??? are all of you too stupid to realize that the first poster is joking??
share[deleted]
You might need to expand on that point.
Do you mean "The TV series is clearly an attempt to cash in on the Harry Potter phenomenon, but without getting sued"? That I will accept.
Since Jill Murphy wrote the books when I was of Harry Potter age (OK then, unembarassed Harry Potter age) and my (now not-so little) little sister watched the film so often the video tape got damaged I can't see anything else you might mean.
the original Harry Potter book came out in 1997, a year before The Worst Witch
yeh, a year before the worst witch came out AS A TV PROGRAMME.
i'm 17, and i was reading the worst witch when i was 6. harry potter didn't come out till i was 10. does that clear that little problem up for you, david.nisbet???
uh no worst witch cae out in the 80's
"a happy ending is a story thats not finished..."
uh no worst witch cae out in the 80's
did you mean the book or the tv programme? as the tv programme came out in 1998. as for the book; well thats been out for ages
i'm not a slut...i'm just popular
The Worst Witch was first published in 1974.
The Worst Witch Strikes Again (1980)
A Bad Spell For The Worst Witch (1982)
The Worst Witch All At Sea (1993)
The Worst Witch Saves The Day (2005)
The film starring Fairuza Balk as Mildred and Tim Curry was released in 1986.
The first series of the tv series started in 1998.
This is from the BBC's webpage on The Worst Witch:
"A Copy of Harry Potter?
The Worst Witch has been suffering on online review sites lately, with Harry Potter fans claiming that the series is a cheap copy of Harry Potter. This is not true. Although there are many similarities between the books, the first of the Worst Witch books was published more than twenty years before the first Harry Potter book, and more than ten years before JK Rowling had the idea for Harry Potter. Many of the themes present in both books also appear in many, many other boarding school books for children. Although the similarities are strong, the differences are even stronger, and each series is an excellent one in its own right."
Since the first Harry Potter book was published in 1997, this was after the first 4 Worst Witch books. The film was made in the 80s, again wll before Harry Potter. Even the TV series first aired in 1998, and since these things arn't made overnight must have been in planning well before HP was published, so I think that even the argument that it was produced to cash in on HPs success is a bit invalid, especially when you remember that HP took some time to reach it's massive status. The First HP film came out in 2001, the same year that WW series 4 "Weirdsister College" first aired, so no ideas from the films could be in the TV series. It is possible though that some ideas from the early HP books might have got into later WW series though, but I can't think of any ovious ones (although it's been a while since I've seen the later WW series, and then not in full). 2005 though saw both a new Worst Witch book, and also the "New Worst Witch" TV series, both of which could be accused of cashing in on Harry Potter, although in particular the publication of the book is not out of place with gaps between other books in the series, so perhaps Jill Murphy had another book planned anyway. Even if she did aim to cash in on HP though, I don't blame her, since she was afterall was writing WW books before HP was even a though in JKR's head.
shareIt's true my neice mentioned this the other day to me.
She has read the harry potter books and i decided to introduced her to The Worst Witch as i read them when i was younger.
She actually said that she thought these books were based on Harry Potter.
I had a hard time explaining to her that the books had been around since the 70's. And the Jk Rowling probably got her idea from them.
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Are you being sarcastic? Jill Murphy first wrote The Worst Witch in the 60's, but it was published in the 70's. The film of it came out in the 80's. I don't know when the first Harry Potter book came out, in the late 90's I think, but the movie didn't come out until after the Worst Witch television adaptation, I believe. So, both the original book and the movie were made before anyone even knew about Harry Potter.
share[deleted]
The Worst Witch is like traditional witches except not ugly hags and I knew it came before Harry Potter, I even read it before Harry Potter I was a lot younger.
Want something that you could call a Harry Potter rip off, a cartoon from 2001 called Ultimate Book Of Spells.
Its a magical school of girls and boys a trio like Harry Potter 2 boys 1 girl.
A teacher that can turn into a cat.
A talking book.