>>40
I don't know, in a lot of cases, they're actually worse than the older classics.
Not all the time, but I've never seen a world as detailed as Tolkien's. I've never had a series that made me wonder about what mankind would really be like in 20,000 years like *Dune*.
The some and total of JKR's world is "Take bits of British culture and BS some fantasy elements around them." A lot of things are silly just beneath the surface. Why enslave magical creatures to dig in your garden and make your dinner when you can do so by magic? If you can appear *anywhere* by either portkey or floo powder (neither of which actually require the user to cast a spell), why do students take *trains* to Hogwarts?
At least in Tolkien, he managed to keep his magical abilities consistant. Magic could only be done by highly trained wizards, so it made sense to see people travel by horse, or plow a field.
And really, the some and total of the moral question is simple good and evil. Harry never doubts that he'll stop voldy, he never questions it, and so on. He's basicly the Cloud Strife of the fantasy novel world. He just wants to get Sephiroth, and it's all possible because he's the hero.
Muaddib was somewhat of a better hero -- he's somewhat afraid of his gift. Sure he's supposed to be a messiah, but all he wants to do is avoid the disaster he knows is coming. He fulfills prophecies even, not because he's the zomg hero, but because he's trying to avoid a disaster he feels is coming. In later novels, he tries to undo his own cult.
JKR doesn't have that kind of meat in the story.