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The news that the original Harry Potter books are being remade into a TV series proves how badly the Fantastic Beasts movies dropped the ball. The prequel series started relatively strong, but audiences’ interest fell with each subsequent film. This isn’t to say that the Wizarding World franchise as a whole is dead since the success of the Hogwarts Legacy video game and the Wizarding World theme park proves that the fandom is still going strong. However, the lack of news over Fantastic Beasts 4 and the official announcement of a Harry Potter remake has shown that Newt Scamander’s story missed the mark.
After the Harry Potter books and movies came to a close, it was clear that the wizarding world still had stories to offer. The beloved series had solidified itself within popular culture, and such a massive fantasy world meant several avenues that spinoffs could explore. Stories about the Marauders’ generation, Voldemort’s entire backstory, and the truth about Dumbledore’s past were all things audiences were hungry to see on the screen—and so the Wizarding World franchise was born. The first step in this was the Fantastic Beasts movies, but though it was set up with the best possible fan following, the Harry Potter reboot plan proves things didn’t go as well as they could.
Fantastic Beasts Was Supposed To Revive Harry Potter, But It Failed
The Fantastic Beasts movies should have been the perfect way to expand on the Harry Potter series. It explored the wizarding communities of other countries worldwide, especially the United States, and dove deeper into the history of mysterious characters like Albus Dumbledore. Newt Scamander was a unique character who was easy to cheer for, and the fact that he was an adult perfectly reflected the growing age of the fandom (since the original child audiences had since all grown up). On paper, Fantastic Beasts should have been a shoo-in for success—but it is now at a standstill.
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald was when things started going downhill. Suddenly, the franchise’s focus was shifted to Dumbledore rather than Newt, which meant the story was dangerously close to canon territory. To make Newt and Dumbledore’s stories meld together, Warner Bros had to work hard to hammer in details where they didn’t necessarily belong—and the result was a forced rather than organic plot. Add in the controversies surrounding J.K. Rowling and the legal troubles of actor Johnny Depp, and the attempt to revive the Harry Potter series began to take a nose dive.
Fantastic Beasts 4 Likely Will Never Happen
The troubles with the Fantastic Beasts series continued into Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, when Gellert Grindelwald was recast, Albus Dumbledore’s character was significantly altered to be a better man than the Harry Potter series implied, and Tina Goldstein, Newt’s main love interest, was nearly cut from the plot entirely. The film wound up with a domestic opening of only about $42 million—considerably lower than the first Fantastic Beasts movie at $74 million. The writing seemed to be on the wall—it would be hard to justify the cost of Fantastic Beasts 4.
Warner Bros was eerily silent about the franchise’s future after Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, with even actor Eddie Redmayne admitting (via Screen Rant) that he hadn’t received any news about Fantastic Beasts 4. Then, the news that the studio was working on a plan for a 10-year-long Harry Potter TV reboot seemed to put the final nail in the coffin. It’s unlikely that Warner Bros would dump money into both projects, especially with Secrets of Dumbledore‘s failure. Newt Scamander has likely been left in the dust.
Why A Harry Potter TV Remake Is Happening Instead Of Another Movie
The Harry Potter TV remake proves that Warner Bros has recognized the benefits of such a format. Though the original movies are much beloved, they have long been criticized for cutting out the nuances and side plots of Harry’s story. This was, of course, unavoidable. The Harry Potter books contain 1,084,170 words—they were never going to be summed up by eight films. Though not based on books, the Fantastic Beasts movies were planned to cover events that spanned 20 in-plot years. As it turned out, this just didn’t work.
A Wizarding World TV series can fix all of these problems. By remaking each beloved book into a season, the Harry Potter TV series can take advantage of the nostalgia while still providing screen audiences with lots of new content. Then, once all the subplots and nuanced details of Harry’s story have been adapted to the new series, it will mean a stronger foundation for more Harry Potter movie and TV spinoffs—that way, the Wizarding World franchise can avoid its Fantastic Beasts mistakes.
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