What happened to the careers of the Harry Potter kids?

You can't have failed to notice Daniel Radcliffe's face plastered on billboards and buses plugging the DVD release of 'The Woman in Black', which is out this week.

Hammer films are aggressively pushing the low-budget-ish horror, and why not? It made a rather impressive £81 million during its theatrical run and got generally favourable reviews.

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While some found it hard to believe Radcliffe was a widower with a four-year-old son, it's still been a triumphant first effort away from Hogwarts for the 'Harry Potter' megastar, and suggests he could, possibly, enjoy a successful career outside the franchise.

The canny Radcliffe was aware he needed to do something totally different from Potter to move his career on. Speaking to Orange, he said: "I was never under any illusions that this would be the one film that I would do that everyone would suddenly go: 'Oh, he's no longer Harry Potter!' I don't think that's going to happen but I certainly think it'll start that."

His downbeat, sullen performance was the antithesis of Potter's wide-eyed pluck and will have alerted directors everywhere that he can carry a movie on his own. Radcliffe's next role is an even greater departure - gay poet Allen Ginsberg in barmy sounding 'Kill Your Darlings', which features Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac and William Burroughs drawn together by a murder. He'll also play a younger version of Jon Hamm aka Don Draper in the Sky drama 'A Young Doctor's Notebook'. Let's see how convincing that is.

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Radcliffe's younger Potter co-stars have also tried hard to distance themselves from the franchise with their post-Hogwarts work… with mixed success.

Emma Watson is arguably the biggest star of the lot but hasn't had a hit on her own yet, despite some solid supporting work in 'My Week With Marilyn'.

She's got two intriguing projects coming up though, the first is 'The Perks of Being a Wallflower', which looks awfully cheesy but is based on a best-selling book. The trailer made headlines after she donned burlesque gear, which is one way to distance yourself from Harry Potter we suppose.

She said of the film: "I feel like it's the perfect transition from Harry Potter to kind of a more adolescent movie. It's a little bit of an older tone. It's darker."

Watson also appeared in an odd costume for another project, 'The Bling Ring', about a gang of celeb-obsessed teenage thieves. She tweeted a pic of herself in slightly unconvincing chav get up (note the tattoos) and her character is described as 'rebellious'. Quite the opposite to goody-two-shoes Hermione Granger.

Sadly Rupert Grint's career doesn't seem to have quite taken off as yet, even though we thought he was the most talented of the trio. The Ron Weasley star also tried 'edgy' in 2008 flick 'Cherrybomb' (released in the gap between 'Order of the Phoenix' and 'Half-Blood Prince') and he even had a sex scene.

Since 'Potter' finished Grint has found high-end movie work hard to come by, though he does have a few projects on the go. He's shot what's described as a 'low budget Norwegian anti-war film' this year and will lend his voice to the British 'Postman Pat' flick. Grint also has a role in the Beach Boys biopic 'The Drummer' lined-up, where he'll play Brian Wilson's pal Stan Shapiro. At the moment though his most memorable non-Potter work is probably those milk adverts.

At least he hasn't released any guitar/rap singles. Draco Malfoy star Tom Felton has, with his band 'The Feltbeats'.

In a tabloid interview he said he was "thinking of doing some N-Dubz-style stuff... I am looking to get into the grime rap UK scene". We reckon he was probably joking, but you can see a medley of Tom's stuff here. We actually found it quite charming.

He's also managed to land some decent supporting turns in 'Rise Of The Planet Of The Apes' and 'The Apparition', and has a role in 'Grace And Danger' - a WWII effort with actor-turned-porn-star-turned-actor Tom Sizemore coming up next year.

Some more unusual endeavours for the Hogwarts alumni since the franchise finished filming include; Bonnie Wright (aka Ginny Weasley) starting her own production company called Bon Bon Lumiere; Clémence Poésy (Fleur Delacour) getting her kit off for 'Birdsong'; Katie Leung (Cho) almost quitting acting altogether before landing a part in a stage adaptation of 'Wild Swans'… and Matthew Lewis (Neville Longbottom) somehow transforming from geek to hunk.

We wish all the Potter kids well, and whatever they end up doing, let's hope they don't turn out like this…