I just got back to the Bay area in time for the debut of "Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince."  I suspect you're going to tell me that HP isn't gay, it's a straight as an arrow children's story.  And as for erotic, well, I'm sure its a matter of taste as to whether you find werewolves, evil and all things vaguely Wiccan erotic.  It's the last third of m/m erotic romance, I'm talking of. Yeah, the romance part. That, HP has aplenty in my opinion. What's interesting to me is its context. 

Wicca did I say?  Well, if I'm not mistaken, in this perhaps oldest of religions the Mother Goddess plays the central role and various males serve to complement and sometimes even complete the Goddess in her different functions. The whole thing seems to me a bold palate in which to explore different possible romantic combinations: m/m, m/f, f/f and the ever elusive bi with everyone and anyone. I don't mean literally, of course, but the precursors and almost stereotypes all seem to me to be there if one but looks for them. 

I enjoyed this HP episode rather more than the others (I've seen them each 10 times or more), and yet...I don't really know if I'm going to see this one again.  I can't say why - it's all still sloshing around in my unconscious.  It's not that anything is lacking - this episode has it all and more than the rest.  It's something to do with the character's growing up.  They seem to be adults in adolescent bodies in a children's fantasy world, though that's of course exactly what they are, and the movie is really.  It reminds me of something I myself write about but I can't quite put my finger on it. 

I was trying the other day to decide if it was any one of the characters or the actors/actresses?  Then a flicker of light came to me:  I read all about this episode's debut in London but never once saw anything about the movie or its storyline.  All the comments were about the actors/actresses and how they were "growing up." Radcliffe doing live stage au natural.  Watson looking yummy chic.  Grint the new young girl's meow.  Felton the new young ladies grrrowl.  Interestingly, its Hermione Granger/Emma Watson who in my mind is slowly becoming the central figure in this every-possible-romantic-combination film that Wicca dictates she hold. Harry Potter/Daniel Radcliff is becoming her warlock, Ron Weasley/Rupert Grint her familiar. And what role does Draco Malfoy/Tom Felton play?  Why the Horned Male God, of course. And let's not forget Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore/Richard Harris/Michael Gambon, the perfect Father Oak/Father Christmas.  It's a classic Wiccan story including classic Wiccan romance in my humble opinion.

So why all this fuss?  Because, dear readers, I have been itching - dying - screaming - inside to tell you how much I've wanted to do an m/m erotic romance with a teasingly Wiccan flavor, and that's exactly what "The Edge of Madness" is in one of its many incarnations. It's a complex story with several different incarnations, after all, that's what Wicca and sci fi really are, aren't they? 

Gary Martine