It’s a tradition for me now, to buy midnight tickets for all of my most-anticipated movies. I saw Harry Potter this week. I’ll be seeing Captain America next week. I’ve been to numerous midnight shows and I am already excited for premieres that are nearly a year away (*cough*Avengers*cough*).

Midnight premieres are a uniquely interesting experience. For a movie enthusiast like myself, once you get a taste of those late-night showings, you’re ruined for all others. It’s not just the anticipation of a much awaited film. It’s also the tangible sense of audience camradrie: everyone that’s there is there because they want to be. They’re excited. They bought their tickets ahead of time. They love the movie already, and they haven’t even seen it. These are the people that talk backstories before the show and fall into reverent silence when the lights dim (and, if they’re like me, discuss plot details for the entire ride home).

Now imagine that vibe, times about 1000, and you’ll get a sense of the atmosphere for the premiere of The Deathly Hallows: Part 2. I’ve never been to a Harry Potter midnight showing before, but those who have told me that, in terms of fan support and presence, this one premiere far surpassed all the others. I can’t speak for the other theaters in the area, but the one I attended had The Deathly Hallows playing in all fifteen of their auditoriums (as well as several 3am showings for ‘overflow’ crowds) and of course, all of those showings had sold out more than a week before. This is a movie that made $32 million in advance ticket sales.

But it was more than just people buying tickets. People dressed up. They came in groups. They brought their books. They brought their wands. As we waited outside in a line that stretched out the front, along the side, and all the way down the back of the building, there was a ‘Fred’ and a ‘George’ running around with sparklers. You knew they were coming when you heard the cheers and whooping. People were snapping photos with their favorite characters like they were celebrity photo-ops.

Above all, they reminisced. Most of the people there were people my age, people who were right on the cusp of adolescence when the first book came out. And they could probably pinpoint with great accuracy where they were for the release of every subsequent book and film. I posted on Facebook that it felt as though I was at a giant Harry Potter-themed slumber party, and that’s really what it was like. A great big group of people who had truly grown up with Harry. I’m a later Potter-convert myself, but you know, it really didn’t matter. Long-timers and late-comers, we were all there for the same reason.

I haven’t posted anything about the movie, I realize. Or my own premiere memories (which consist largely of killing time by ‘talking geek’ with an awesome gal pal). Fantastic or not, the movie would still have been significant. But it was fantastic, it truly was. I laughed and I cried and I walked out of the theater, surrounded by flowing cloaks and pointy hats, and it didn’t really feel like I was saying goodbye.

I don’t normally get annoyed by things like this, but I guess we all have our breaking points.

Now, I can’t possibly be the only person that loathed that Aerosmith song. As far as I’m concerned, it is by far the worst part of a movie that already stars Bruce Willis and is directed by Michael Bay and is about bombing an asteroid to save the earth.

I really, really hate that song.

But even if you don’t hate it, do you honestly know anyone who has ever gone to see a movie because they heard there was a love song? If so, then we must be hanging out in very different circles. I’m pretty sure that Ben Affleck was not cast purely on his appeal to male moviegoers. Am I right?

So just how dumb does Matthew Vaugn believe women to be? Ooooooh, there’s a love song. There must be looove.

We womenfolk. We don’t see pictures on the big screen unless there’s romance and stuff.

Am I right?

You see, Mr. Vaugn, girls can be geeks too. Girls can be interested in character arcs and mythology and liberal interpretations of science. Though you may find it hard to believe, girls can be interested in things that do not involve kissing and/or poignant gazes. We actually have a brain between our ears that can appreciate storylines as much as we can appreciate a hot guy. Believe it or not, we can even appreciate both of those things at the same time, without our wee woman minds overloading.

Because if you want to make sure that women (and not just geeks) come to your movie, all you need to do is remind them who’s starring in it:

Am I right?