The Crimes of Grindelwald: A Crime
Return to Hogwarts (Ma_C02013 Flickr)
The second installment of the Fantastic Beasts saga was released to theaters on November 16th. This film deviated from the magical creatures and fixated on dark wizard Grindelwald, who has a shady agenda for pure blood wizards to rule over muggles. A young Dumbledore (Jude Law) enlists the help of former student Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) to stop halt Grindelwald’s plans.
Harry Potter fans have taken major issue with this latest prequel. For starters, the timeline is completely off. When comparing the dates shown in the movie and observing the extensive history from the books, they do not align. Professor McGonagall would not have even been born yet, nonetheless a young professor at Hogwarts. Not to mention the bomb that is dropped in the last scene; Credence is actually Dumbledore’s long lost baby brother, Aurelius. J.K. Rowling has already indulged us buffs with deep Dumbledore family history, never once mentioning a brother named Aurelius or any fourth sibling for that matter. We know that Dumbledore’s mother Kendra was killed by his sister Ariana in 1899. So in order for her to have given birth to Credence, he would be 28 years old, but it is revealed to us that he is a mere 18. The natural reaction to this is HP followers theorizing she faked her own death and ran off. Dumbledore’s father having Credence with another woman is implausible as well because he died in Azkaban after being imprisoned there in 1891.
Another flaw with this chapter is the lack of character development. Viewers were thrilled to see the introduction of Nagini, who in the first 7 Harry Potter books was Voldemort’s snake. The movie gives this an exciting twist by exposing she was actually a human girl, destined to one day take on the body of an animal permanently. The let down is how little she is featured after this big reveal. We only see her again comforting Credence, with only about 3 lines in the entire film. There are so many new characters that are never properly developed, so their decisions and actions seem random and sporadic to us; like Queenie suddenly joining Grindelwald’s army.
These two prequels certainly leave a lot to theorize over. All we can do now is hope for answers to our endless questions in the next installment.
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