I think people's main issue is that they expected romance out of Harry Potter. There's always been a tremendous disconnect between the fanbase's overwhelming obsession with shipping, and the reality that the romance in the books was completely ancillary. The kids get crushes because that's an expected part of growing up, but nobody has a grand dramatic romance. Ron and Hermione don't get any big moment either, they just kiss in a hurry during the last battle. The main spiritual themes in the books are, first and foremost, Death (and the acceptance of), which is where all the most heart-wrenching writing goes into, and filial love second. There is not a single spec of writing in the books with as much feeling into it as Harry's thoughts when standing besides his parent's tomb. Rowling was quite candid that her feelings about dealing with her own mother's death was what formed the core theme of the story. The only truly plot-relevant "romantic love" in the series is an unrealized, tragic one-sided obsession. Even the Lupin-Tonks stuff happens mainly to set up the "Don't run off on your family, you deadbeat" scene and the eventual parallel with an orphaned kid raised by Harry so that he'd be taken care of in the ways he wasn't. The whole resolution at the end hinges on a form of love shown in a Jesus-like sacrifice for many, not a Love Kame-Hame-Ha. I don't think she "realized" anything, that's just projecting expectations on the series. She'd "spent 3 books doing basically nothing to get Harry and Ginny together" because the three books you're referring to are one where Harry has yet to ever express interest in any girl, one where he very briefly notes a certain girl (who has no dialogue) is pretty in a single line, and one where he briefly gets butterflies about asking that chick out in one chapter. There was more ink in GoF dedicated to Ludo Bagman's running from his creditors than romance. Even the books with romance don't exactly have much of it either, OotP nominally had Harry get a girlfriend and it ends up being only a few scenes of "this shit ain't working at all. Even the kiss happen off screen. The reason those books didn't have more romantic developments were not due to poor planning, it was because they weren't meant to have them, and a lot of the fanbase has never quite managed to come to terms with that fact.

⬆ upvote 0