Grown up

Hundreds of Harry Potter fans braved humid weather to cheer the eagerly-awaited worldwide opening of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince, at midnight on Wednesday.

At Wanda International Cinema, Capital Cinema, and UME Beijing cinema, hundreds jostled to get tickets to the premiere, hours before its opening. Similar scenes were reported from other cities such as Shanghai, Hangzhou and Chengdu.

In this sixth installment of the series of big-screen adaptations of J.K. Rowling's Potter tales, the cast is past the kiddie stage. They are now teenagers, forced to deal with weightier issues of mortality, memory, confusion and loss.