The Harry Potter franchise is one of the most impressive film adaptations since The Godfather and The Lord of the Rings, condensing over 4,000 pages of world-building into eight groundbreaking pictures that refined J.K. Rowling’s fantastical vision for the silver screen. However, that’s not to say that all storylines survived the cinematic chopping block. Among the films’ many overlooked and stripped-down plotlines, Percy Weasley’s arc, is so incredibly condensed that it’s worth wondering if the movies would have been better served not including it at all.

In the Harry Potter books, Percy Weasley is the black sheep of his whimsical family, caught between the hijinks of Fred and George and the precarious adventures of his youngest sibling, Ron. In many ways, being a black sheep in the Weasleys means being a goody two-shoes, and Percy takes that to heart, adopting a studious, somewhat pretentious atтιтude at Hogwarts that follows him to the Ministry of Magic in a subplot that sees him turn against his family and Harry. Although the films do depict this storyline, Percy largely disappears from the later Harry Potter movies.

Percy Turning On His Family Was Never That Interesting A Story

It’s Not Percy’s Fault—Blame Voldemort Or The Boy Who Lived

In the books, Percy Weasley transforms from the attentive Gryffindor prefect into a fiercely loyal agent of the Ministry of Magic who disowns his family and directly aids Cornelius Fudge in his smear campaign against Harry Potter for ᴀsserting Voldemort’s return. Furthermore, Percy’s tenure as Fudge’s executive ᴀssistant saw him actively play a part in enforcing the Ministry’s oppressive and harmful policies, which sought to strip Professor Dumbledore of his power and control the behavior of students at Hogwarts through the infamous “Educational Decrees” of Dolores Umbridge.

While Percy’s plotline injects tension into the Weasley home and contains elements of collaboration and family strife, it ultimately has little influence on the greater story at hand, with its political weight paling in comparison to that of the spiraling wizarding conflict. Furthermore, his eventual reconciliation with the Weasleys doesn’t pack the same emotional punch as other juicier parts of the later novels—in part due to its significance to the overall plot, but primarily because of the lack of time spent on his character.

The Movies Should’ve Cut It Completely But Weirdly Left Part Of It In

The Filmmakers Should’ve Committed To One Side

The issue with Percy Weasley’s storyline in the books is only exacerbated in the Harry Potter movies, largely due to their insistence on depicting the storyline without going the full mile through resolving his arc. By trying to play both sides and please fans of the character while only including parts of his already-modest subplot, the films created a weird, unfinished version of Percy. This unresolved plotline becomes all the more confusing when he shows up in the final battle of Hogwarts fighting alongside Harry, which the film never addresses.

At the end of the day, Percy Weasley is a minor character in a sweeping, grandiose saga that depicts a multi-generational wizarding war and the main players dictating its ultimate fate; it’s understandable why the filmmakers felt they had to shelve parts of Percy’s storyline to streamline the greater narratives of the books for mᴀss audiences.

However, by not following through on Percy’s storyline of redemption, the films created a loose end that feels rushed and unfinished—that is, if people even noticed it in the first place, since Percy’s appearance in Harry Potter and the Deathly Hollows: Part II is so fleeting it’s truly a blink-and-you-miss-it cameo at times. So, as the new HBO Harry Potter series is gearing up for release in the next potential year, here’s to hoping that it can fix what the original films did to Percy—and all the Weasleys, for that matter.