The Troll's Bathroom Debut: Does It Still Work?

DavidOkay, so get this. Halloween is three days away, and a CGI troll is ruining my week.

Becca HartwellRuining? David, you haven't even said which side you're on.

DavidOh, I will. Wait for it.

Becca HartwellHe will.

DavidI'm David, that's Becca, and this is The Sorting Room.

Becca HartwellThe news: The Direct reported that HBO's Harry Potter series redesigned the troll from Philosopher's Stone.

DavidAnd The Direct framed that first photo as splitting the fan base.

Becca HartwellSplit how?

DavidDown the middle, apparently. Half the Internet sees a bold new monster, and the other half is squinting at it like it owes them money.

Becca HartwellFair.

DavidThough a headline is a headline. I wanna see what's actually behind it.

Becca HartwellWhich is why we start with what's been shown before anybody picks a team.

DavidHere's my problem, though. That chapter is where Harry, Ron, and Hermione stop being three kids who tolerate each other and become friends.

Becca HartwellRight. So the real test isn't whether the troll looks cool.

DavidDoes the design still let a dig- Does the design still let a friendship form?

Becca HartwellAnd I think it does, easily.

DavidShut up. You do not.

Becca HartwellI do. A weirder troll can still get three kids in a bathroom.

DavidOh, man, we are about to fight about this on Halloween week.

Becca HartwellWhich is the best time to do it.

DavidHere's the plan. We'll go through what's actually been shown, then how fans reacted, then the book and the 2001 film as baselines.

Becca HartwellThen the one thing nobody can answer yet, which episode this lands in, and we both take a guess.

DavidAnd then grades. Mine will be petty.

Becca HartwellMine will be generous and correct.

DavidFine. But first, what we can actually see, the photo and the trailer. Okay, so get this. The full trailer dropped September 2nd, and the troll is in it. Not a leak, not a blurry set photo, official footage.

Becca HartwellAnd the season itself lands December 25th, eight episodes. So it's a Christmas gift with a troll wrapped inside.

DavidFun for the whole family.

Becca HartwellFandomWire's full breakdown of the trailer is where I'm getting those dates. It's a secondary source, so I'd hold them loosely, but it's the one that nails down both.

DavidFair. Now, what else is in this trailer? Because I keep hearing the troll isn't alone.

Becca HartwellRed Reactions ran a piece the same day, and its headline says the trailer reveals Quirrell, the Mirror of Erised, and the troll. So the dungeon troll is sharing a trailer with the other two big Philosopher's Stone beats.

DavidQuirrell, the mirror, the troll. That's basically a checklist of book one landmarks.

Becca HartwellRight. Three landmarks, one trailer, and the troll gets billing alongside the other two.

DavidHold on, though. The trailer shows the troll in a bathroom. In the book, chapter 10, that's where it ends up, the girl's bathroom with Hermione in there crying.

Becca HartwellAnd that shot is what people are poking at. FandomWire says the girl's bathroom troll appears looking unpleasant with a design stranger than the film's.

DavidUnpleasant , which I'd argue is the job description of a mountain troll.

Becca HartwellOkay, fair, but notice the wording, "stranger than the films." That's one report's description. It doesn't tell us how it moves, how big it is next to the kids, or whether it's actually scary.

DavidRight. So we've got a vibe word and a comparison, not a full portrait.

Becca HartwellExactly. And that matters for our whole question because a friendship forming in that bathroom depends on the kids reacting to something that feels dangerous.

DavidPlot twist, though, the image still traveled fast. A post from Feature First on X dated September 2nd share a first look at the troll and pulled in about 1.2 million views.

Becca HartwellWhich is a lot of eyeballs on one grumpy monster.

DavidRoughly the population of a decent-sized city looked at a troll in a single post.

Becca HartwellBut what were they saying? Because that's the part people skip.

DavidThat's the catch. The visible replies are mostly jokes, not analysis.

Becca HartwellSo 1.2 million views tells us the image reached people. It doesn't tell us they liked it or hated it or even thought hard about it.

DavidSure.

Becca HartwellOh, that's good. Keep that one.

DavidAnd honestly, that's the right way to hold everything so far. We've got an official trailer with a troll in it, a bathroom shot that one report calls unpleasant, and a post a lot of people clicked on. That's a mood word, a comparison, and a view count, and none of it is the scene.

Becca HartwellWhich is a perfectly good place to start as long as we don't pretend we've watched the scene. We haven't seen it move, and the sources don't describe the photo beyond how The Direct framed it. So what people felt about it is the next thing to pin down.

DavidSo the image is everywhere, but did fans actually agree on it?

Becca HartwellGood question. Reaction is the next thing to pin down, and I'd rather read the actual wording than trust a headline summary. Counting views is easy. Reading opinions is messier.

DavidOkay, so The Direct calls the redesign frustrating. That's the whole verdict from a piece published September 25th, a single word aimed at the troll.

Becca HartwellFrustrating? That's the word?

DavidThat's the word. One word of verdict, and the split is in the headline.

Becca HartwellSo the headline promises a fight, and the article delivers one grumpy writer.

DavidBasically. I'm not saying they're wrong. I'm saying nobody's counted anything.

Becca HartwellFine. But somebody out there liked it, right? Because I did, and I refuse to be alone.

DavidYou're not. SuperHeroHype ran a piece saying the trailer has fans loving this change to the movies. It says the trailer shows the trio meeting the troll in the dungeon with a look clearly different from 2001.

Becca HartwellAnd the praise?

DavidIt quotes some fans on social media. One comparison is Pan's Labyrinth. Others just praise the CGI.

Becca HartwellPan's Labyrinth. Oh, that's the good kind of weird. Creepy, a little sad, a little beautiful.

DavidOr it's a fan being generous because the trailer was gorgeous, and they're in a good mood.

Becca HartwellWow, cynic.

DavidI'm a policy guy, Becca. I ask who benefits. A headline that says love and a headline that says split both get clicks.

Becca HartwellOkay, but that cuts both ways. Neither outlet gives us a count, so where does that leave us?

DavidMixed, honestly. Mixed. Some fans like it, one outlet is annoyed, and I can't tell you which side is bigger. Neither can you.

Becca HartwellAgreed, no majority. And I'll say it plainly, I can't claim the fans love it either. So let's argue on the merits. A stranger troll is a feature.

DavidOh, here we go.

Becca HartwellThink about it. A troll that looks like a movie prop is a troll you've seen before. Stranger means unsettling, and unsettling means the kids are actually scared when it shows up.

DavidOr stranger means a distraction. It's a flaw if you're staring at the troll's face and not at the kids'.

Becca HartwellEleven-year-olds are not staring at the troll's face. They're running from it.

DavidSure, but I'm sitting on my couch with a pause button, and the troll is up in a bathroom stall looking like a Pan's Labyrinth cousin.

Becca HartwellYou say that like it's a bad thing.

DavidI say it like a man who wants his troll dumb, big, slow, stupid. A troll should be a problem you can outwit.

Becca HartwellHold on. Is that in the book?

DavidThat's exactly the question. We can't say stranger until we know what it's stranger than.

Becca HartwellRight. The 2001 film is the one everyone has in their head.

DavidAnd that's the thing about arguing this on Halloween week. Everybody is carrying a different troll around. Some people picture the film, some picture the book, and some haven't thought about it since they were nine. Mine is a hulking lump with a club. Yours is apparently a Pan's Labyrinth cousin.

Becca HartwellSo before either of us says HBO went too far or not far enough, we should check the actual baselines. Otherwise, we're just two people arguing about a feeling.

DavidSo we need the book and that film side by side as baselines. Then we'll know if HBO moved the target or just redrew it. Okay, baselines. Book first. Geeks and Gamers sets the trailer's troll against the book's version, and the books are specific: lumpy, pale gray, bald, big ears, and dim.

Becca HartwellDim. That's the part you keep yelling about.

DavidBecause it matters. A dumb troll is a puzzle you can outsmart. Geeks and Gamers also says the trailer's look looks unlike the fans have pictured for years.

Becca HartwellPictured for years, meaning the movie troll mostly.

DavidMostly. And SuperHeroHype says the look is clearly different from the 2001 films. So HBO is departing from the book picture and the film picture.

Becca HartwellTwo baselines both left behind. Bold.

DavidOr reckless. I haven't decided.

Becca HartwellSee, I'm leaning the other way, and here's why. The face is the thing we're all fighting about, but I don't think it's the thing that makes the scene work.

DavidWait, what? Last segment you were arguing for the weird face.

Becca HartwellI was arguing a weird face is allowed. Different claim. Think about the 2001 bathroom. Hermione's screaming, the whole room is getting wrecked, and you can barely describe the troll's face. You remember what the kids do.

DavidRon with the feather, swish and flick.

Becca HartwellRight. The troll is a prop for that moment. Harry's on its back with his wand up its nose, Ron levitates the club, and Hermione lies to Professor McGonagall for them.

DavidOkay, hang on. That's three choices.

Becca HartwellThree choices. Harry goes in after Hermione. Ron uses the spell Hermione drilled him into in class. Hermione takes the blame. That's how a friendship forms, and none of it needs a particular nose.

DavidOkay, but I'm gonna push on how the scene is actually blocked. In the 2001 version, the troll is basically a wrecking ball. It smashes the stalls and the sinks, and the kids are scattered around the room ducking and scrambling.

Becca HartwellWhich is good staging, honestly. The chaos gives each kid a separate moment. Hermione is cornered. Harry's brave in a panic. Ron does the clever thing.

DavidAnd the book is different in one important way. Harry and Ron go looking for Hermione on purpose because they realize nobody told her about the troll. They come to her. She's alone and terrified when they arrive.

Becca HartwellSo the book gives you a rescue, and the film gives you more of a pileup.

DavidClose enough. Different shapes, same result. And by the end of that chapter, three kids who didn't much like each other have been through something together.

Becca HartwellWhich is the thing worth protecting. The troll is a pressure cooker. The kids supply the meaning.

DavidOkay, here's where the trailer matters. The trailer's bathroom framing has tiles and three students facing the creature. Geeks and Gamers describes exactly that shot.

Becca HartwellThree, not two boys running in on a girl cowering somewhere else.

DavidMm, careful. It's a single frame cut for a trailer, and a trailer wants a striking picture, not an accurate scene. If three kids are standing side by side, what happens to the book's version of the rescue?

Becca HartwellThat's the real thing to watch, and it's a question about the camera, not the creature. Where does the camera put Hermione? Does she get a moment alone before the boys arrive, or are they a unit from the first second?

DavidBecause if they're a unit already, the friendship isn't born in that room, it's just confirmed there.

Becca HartwellWhich could still work if the kids still have something to prove to each other. Honestly, I'd want Hermione to do something smart and the boys to do something reckless.

DavidAnd I'd want the room to feel small. Tiles are hard, loud, and echoey. Everything sounds worse in a tiled room. A club on a sink, a scream.

Becca HartwellRight. So the designers have a gift there. The room does half the work of making it scary, whatever the troll's face looks like.

DavidWhich I'll grant. That's my one concession. The friendship lives in what three kids do in that tiled room, not on the monster's face.

Becca HartwellNoted. David concedes.

DavidMm, don't push it. And to be clear, none of this settles whether I like the face. It just settles that the face isn't the scene.

Becca HartwellFair. That's a separate question from the one we can't answer at all. Does anybody actually know which episode carries this chapter?

DavidSomebody does, but not anybody we can reach. The only honest answer is that nobody outside the building knows.

Becca HartwellNobody?

DavidFanBolt has a release date explainer dated around October twenty-second to twenty-fifth, and it says HBO has not published a per episode schedule or release calendar.

Becca HartwellSo no episode titles, no running order.

DavidNothing. And FanBolt is a secondary source, a fan news site, not an HBO statement. It's telling us what's missing, which is useful, but it can't tell us what's coming.

Becca HartwellWhich means every placement we say today is a guess.

DavidA guess with a bow on it. Yes.

Becca HartwellFine. What do we actually have to work with?

DavidOne number. The season is eight episodes. FandomWire's trailer breakdown lays that out, and the premiere is Christmas Day.

Becca HartwellEight. Huh? That's not a lot of room for a book with this many landmarks.

DavidRight? Think about what has to fit. The sorting, Quidditch, the dragon egg, the mirror, the finale. Every episode is carrying a heavy load.

Becca HartwellWhich means something has to give. If every episode is carrying that much, a whole chapter might get a few minutes instead of a full act.

DavidOr the opposite. The troll chapter is a set piece and gets room because it's a turning point for the trio. We don't know which, and that's the point.

Becca HartwellAnd the troll chapter sits in the book's Halloween night, late in the first half of the story, well before the finale.

DavidOkay, so labeled clearly, this is speculation. My guess is episode four.

Becca HartwellFour. Why four?

DavidEight episodes. The troll lands right around the midpoint. The book's Halloween chapter is where the story swings from school life comedy into real danger. That's a natural mid-season hinge.

Becca HartwellMm, I like the logic. I'm going a little earlier, though. Episode three.

DavidThree?

Becca HartwellThe series has the whole season to cover the year, and the book gets from the first night to Halloween fast. Setting up the friendship takes one episode, maybe two. Then the troll arrives as the payoff, and the back half is free for Quidditch, the mirror, and Christmas.

DavidHold on. You're front-loading the friendship.

Becca HartwellI'm saying it has to exist before the finale needs it. Again, pure guesswork.

DavidFair, but there's a point for your side, too. If the troll is the payoff, the earlier episodes have to plant the friction between the three of them.

Becca HartwellRight. The friction has to be on screen first. Hermione being insufferable, Ron saying something cruel about her. That all has to land before the Halloween chapter can pay it off.

DavidPlot twist. We could both be wrong, and it's a Halloween-timed episode nobody expected.

Becca HartwellOh, don't. The premiere is Christmas Day. No chance they're lining it up with an actual October thirty-first.

DavidFair. No airing calendar tricks. So the placement is a coin flip between three and four, and the sources can't break the tie.

Becca HartwellAnd honestly, I'd rather the show take its time getting there than rush it.

DavidAgreed. A rushed friendship is the one thing that would make the troll pointless.

Becca HartwellWhich brings us to what we actually came for.

DavidThe guesses are on the table. Now the verdicts. Does the friendship still form? Okay. Verdict time. I'm giving the design a B-minus.

Becca HartwellA B-minus. Spicy. Defend it.

DavidSimple. The kids can still do everything they need to do in that room. Ron has his wand, Harry has his nerve, Hermione has her fib. The design doesn't stop any of that.

Becca HartwellSo why the minus?

DavidBecause a weird face costs you a beat. If the audience spends two seconds going, "Huh? What is that thing?" That's two seconds not spent on three eleven-year-olds panicking.

Becca HartwellTwo seconds. That's your entire grievance.

DavidIt's a B-minus, Becca. It's a small grievance.

Becca HartwellFine. I'm giving it a B-plus, and I'll tell you why it isn't an A. Nobody outside HBO has seen the scene.

DavidHuh? True.

Becca HartwellTwo, we have one photo and a few trailer shots. That's a still of a creature and a glimpse of Heil. We haven't heard the sound it makes. We haven't seen how it moves. We haven't seen how long Hermione has to scream.

DavidOh man, the scream. That's half the scene.

Becca HartwellRight. So my grade is on the setup, not the payoff. The setup is a cramped bathroom, three kids, and a monster that looks like it belongs there. That's promising.

DavidPromising. See, that's where we split. I hear promising. I hear trust us.

Becca HartwellYou do hear that a lot, don't you?

DavidEh, I'm a recovering optimist. Wait for it, though. Here's my honest worry. A scarier stranger troll can tip the scene towards horror, and then the friendship beat gets crowded out by the jump scare.

Becca HartwellOr the opposite. A creepier troll makes the kids' choices cost more. If it's a lumbering lump, nobody's scared, so nobody's brave.

DavidHmm. Okay, that's a fair shot.

Becca HartwellThank you.

DavidDoesn't change my grade.

Becca HartwellOf course it doesn't.

DavidThough I'll tell you what would move it. Weight. If I can feel this thing in the floor when it walks and the kids have to scramble around it, I'll happily take the minus back.

Becca HartwellWeight, not the face. So you're agreeing with me?

DavidI'm agreeing the face isn't the whole grade. I'm not agreeing it's free.

Becca HartwellFine. And here's what would move mine down. If Hermione has nothing to do but scream and wait, I'm marking it down, whatever the troll looks like.

DavidBecause her fib to the teacher is the last beat of the chapter.

Becca HartwellExactly. That lie is what turns a rescue into a friendship. A gorgeous creature with a lazy ending is a C in my book.

DavidThat's harsher than I expected from the generous one.

Becca HartwellGenerous is not the same as easy. I'd rather be fair about the grade and wrong about the scene than the other way around.

DavidSo where does that leave us? Does the friendship still form?

Becca HartwellOn the evidence we have, yes, probably. But I'd say probably, and I'd say it with my fingers crossed behind my back.

DavidMine are crossed too. They're just holding a B-minus.

Becca HartwellStop.

DavidOkay, so before we let you go, here's the question to chew on all week.

Becca HartwellOh, I have been waiting for this one all episode.

DavidIf the troll looks this strange, who moves first in that bathroom? Harry, Ron, or Hermione?

Becca HartwellHermione. Easy. She's the one who actually knows what a troll is, and she's the one who ends up on the floor.

DavidHold on. Knowing and moving are different things. Hermione knows the facts and still ends up on the floor. Ron's wand work is what actually saves her, and I say Harry acts first because Harry never thinks.

Becca HartwellNever thinks. Fair. That's going on a mug.

DavidTell us who you'd bet on and tell us why, because the reasoning is the fun part. Same rules as always. It's a guess and will cheerfully be wrong.

Becca HartwellFollow The Sorting Room wherever you listen and send set photos, rumors, or book details to @sortingroom on social.

DavidAnd if you're out trick-or-treating, check every bathroom door twice, especially the tiled ones.

Becca HartwellHappy Halloween, everybody. Don't scream. You'll wake the troll.