Spoilers Fantastic Beasts 3 has been officially greenlit, and will be set in Rio de Janeiro

Between my deep distain for The Crimes of Grindewald (especially for the crime of Queenie's character assassination) and J.K. Rowling turning out to be a transphobic piece of shit, my interest in this series has dwindled greatly. I also really, really wish the series hadn't decided to do an epic series about the war with Grindewald instead of just focusing on, you know, fantastic beasts. That was by far the best part of the first film and not any of the Grindewald crap.

That said, getting rid of Johnny Depp and replacing him with the always amazing Mads Mikkelsen as well as Jessica Simpson's character seemingly having a much larger role does help my interest (oh, and Richard Coyle as Abeforth!). On the other hand, we don't even see Tina in the trailer. She's by far my favorite character of the first two films and yet she seems to be pushed further and further into the fringes of the series. Alas.

Either way, I won't be seeing it in theaters. Not giving Rowling any more money.

 

I actually thought Grindewald was mostly okay.

But yeah, I refuse to continue to support the franchise until the witch is gone.

 

Is that Ezra Miller with long hair? I've lost my interest with this series. I was bored with the first two movies and even after this one there's still another two planned. Ugh. Also don't much fancy supporting Rowling by watching this. I won't see it in theaters anyway.

 

Yeah, Ezra Miller is still in the series. I keep forgetting about his own shit, so that's another reason not to support this film.

 

Looks fun! Looking forward to seeing it in theatre!

If I went by not watching things with people I didn't like personally, I would be reading alot of books.. and me not seeing it wouldn't hurt J.K. in the least, but would hurt all the other people involved from the actors to the stage hands. If you enjoy the movies, go see them. But thats up to you.

 

Even putting aside the toxic stench of Rowling, Miller and then not-so-dear-departed Depp was there really any demand for this movie? The second one didn't do so great as I recall.

 

I wonder if the delay in the film had to do with Warners pushing to wrap this series up sooner than Rowling's original five film plan rather than the COVID pandemic or working around Katherine Waterston's pregnancy.

 

Honestly, I completely forgot Fantastic Beasts was a thing. It's been radio silence since Crimes of Grindelwald thudded it's way in and out of theaters.

Watching this trailer though...

 

What did he do ?

 

For a movie supposedly set in Rio de Janeiro, that's a lot of shots of snowscapes and gloomy gray hallways. Who could possibly have foreseen this?!

Oh, right:

I wrote that over two years ago now.

 

Richard Coyle!?! *SQUEEEEE!* If I could dance around right now, I would.

Plus, Mads is a MUCH better actor than Depp.

 

Mindboggling that after the tepid (at best) reception garnered by The Crimes of Grindelwald, Warner decided to keep pretty much the exact same creative team in place for this one. I would have expected a change in director at least.

 

I suspect Johnny Depp took the fall for most of that film's problems. Which is a shame. Not because Depp isn't problematic, but because he was the least of that film's issues.

 

As long as the story is a grimdark tale about a desperate battle against an evil wizard, replacing the production staff wouldn't do anything apart from disrupt what has to be a very well-oiled machine. Unless these last three movies are somehow great (assuming they aren't forced to wrap things up in movie four), this series was probably doomed the moment Rowling decided to do a "Voldemort, but with adults this time" five-movie story.

 

I loved the first movie and quite frankly I liked the 2nd movie.

As for the second FB movie being a failure because it made less than the first, that's a tried and true result.

The Wrath of Kahn made 31% less than "Star Trek the Movie" despite it being far superior (IMHO).

The 2nd Harry Potter made 9% less, and the third made 18% less than the first one. The movies didn't improve till the 4th movie and blasted into the stratosphere at the finale (as one would expect).

The first Fantastic Beasts movie, when graded against that powerhouse, was down 39% from Deathly Hallows. The 2nd FB was down 19.7 % from the 1st.

That first FB ranked 12th in 2016 and the 2nd FB ranked 20th in 2018 (after 5 Marvel movies, a Star Wars prequel and a Jurassic sequel)

Star Trek Franchise Box Office History - The Numbers (the-numbers.com)

Harry Potter Franchise Box Office History - The Numbers (the-numbers.com)

That's a long winded way of saying, while it didn't make as much as TPTB wanted, it was hardly a flop. Heck, it made MORE than Star Wars episode VIII The Last Jedi that year.

As for controversies from the 2nd FB, in our current climate where we see families get torn apart by political and/or religious disagreements over whether we should be fighting a virus that can kill you at a rate 8-10 times greater than the flu, the estrangement of Tina and Queenie at the end of "Crimes" can be seen as prescient. I'll watch "Secrets" just to see how they deal with that estrangement.

As for the lack of "Tina" in the trailer, I noticed that too and liked the theory this reviewer put forward in this video. (I don't know how to embed videos to show the screengrabs anymore. )

Secrets of Dumbledore Trailer Breakdown | Harry Potter Theory - YouTube

I must admit, I don't agree with all his theories, especially the ones about Creedence and Jacob.

I did like all the creatures we glimpsed in the trailer and loved watching "serious" Theseus crab walk like his baby brother.

As for JK and her personal statements over the last few years... I find it mind boggling that the same woman can draw the ire of the right for "turning Dumbledore gay"...

Rowling Lets Dumbledore Out of the Closet - ABC News (go.com)

... and the left for not making him "gay enough".

JK Rowling's history of discussing Dumbledore's sexuality | EW.com

Of course, her thoughts on transgender issues for some negated all the good she's done over 20+ years on many other issues. I wish people would take this opportunity, like the young stars of her first 8 Potter movies, to focus on expanding JK's thought processes on this subject the way she has expanded ours over the last 23 years.

A Complete Breakdown of the J.K. Rowling Transgender-Comments Controversy | Glamour

 

It's going to be interesting to see how they try and promote it. It's not like they can send the cast out and about on the usual talk show / interview circuit.

 

They'll probably just do everything virtually, like a lot of the studios have been doing since the pandemic started.

 

Not really what I meant. More to do with people asking them questions they won't want to answer.

 

I'm amazed at how closely these guys watch the trailers!

Here's another analysis that points out all the shots in Brazil, including the Brazilian school of Wizardy.

Secrets of Dumbledore: Full Trailer Breakdown (Easter Eggs, Hidden Details, & Things You Missed) - YouTube

 

So far, the movie has an even lower Metacritic score (49) than Crimes of Grindlewald (52). But hey, at least it's eight minutes longer, at 142 min.!