Pottermania struck the Village by the Sea Friday.
More than 50 people lined up as early as 5:30 a.m. to watch “Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2” on opening day. The theater didn’t open until 8:10 a.m., and the movie was scheduled to begin at 9.
It was the first movie The Clyde has presented during a film’s opening weekend.
Nikki Enters, 19, was the first Pottermaniac in line. She arrived at 5:30 a.m. for her fifth Harry Potter movie opening in a row, stretching back to “Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire.”
“The draw is you finally get to see it,” Enters said. “It’s the end of an era.”
Enters, a Langley resident, was alone in her dedication, at least among her friends. She couldn’t convince anyone to get up so early with her to wait in line for a middle-of-the-theater seat.
“Langley looked like a ghost town,” Enters said. “There was absolutely no one here.”
The group of six 11-, 12- and 13-year-olds behind Enters arrived shortly after 5:45 a.m. Three of the girls said they are summer residents in Langley, and they kept perky with hot chocolate from Mike’s Place and the anticipation of watching their beloved stories unfold.
“We really, really, really love Harry Potter and we wanted to get a seat,” Natalie Fleming, 11, said.
“Our parents wanted us to go,” said Natalie Podell, 13.
Their parents may have regretted the decision when they drove them to the theater that morning, however.
“They were not as excited as the night before,” Fleming said.
A pair of Muggles (Potter lingo for non magic-using humans) decorated their sweaters in honor of the occasion. Joelle Tollefson is in Langley for the summer from Tokyo and got her friend Molly McEachern from Mukilteo to come over for the movie.
“We are the biggest Harry Potter fans ever,” Joelle said.
The two 15-year-olds decorated their sweatshirts the night before with fabric paint. Joelle spelled out what the series meant on her pullover from top to bottom: “1,090,739 words, 3,363 pages, 199 chapters,
17 hours and 14 minutes, 8 movies, 7 books and 1 story.”
Molly’s message was rife with Potter symbols. Her sweater read, “Mischief Managed,” a saying from the Potter stories, and included a wand, a snake, Potter’s lightning bolt scar, a potions book, the deathly hallows symbol, a broom and the final words of the series, “All was well.”
