Today, a new trailer debuted for Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald. This marks the sequel to 2016’s Fantastic Beasts, the first film spinoff of the Harry Potter franchise. Warner Brothers showed off the trailer, which introduces Jude Law as a young Dumbledore. Eddie Redmayne returns as Newt Scamander, and David Yates once again directs. As with the first film, J.K. Rowling wrote the screenplay. This one will serve as the second of five films in the spinoff series. Check out the trailer below.
As one can see, the trailer begins to tie the Fantastic Beasts series back into familiar lore from the original Harry Potter films. The first few scenes take place at Hogwarts, with Dumbledore taking center stage. The main conflict of the film revolves around Grindelward, played by Johnny Depp, a dark wizard hellbent on ruling over Muggles, or as they’re called in America, No-Majs. Since it’s still technically a sequel to Fantastic Beasts, Newt Scamander enters the fray, along with pals Porpentia, Jacob, and Queenie.
It should be interesting to see how this film manages to tie the Fantastic Beasts storyline into the Grindelwald conflict. While this film will obviously focus a bit less on the “fantastic beasts” themselves, it still manages to showcase a few magical creatures. Pickett, Scamander’s pet Bowtruckle, a sort of anthroporphic twig, returns in the new film. New creatures include what appears to be a Kelpie, a sort of ride-able seahorse. Thestrals, ghoulish flying horses from the main Harry Potter series, also make appearances in the trailer.
The decision to cast Johnny Depp has come under a lot of fire recently due to accusations of abuse by former spouse Amber Heard. This information came shortly after the release of Fantastic Beasts, which featured Depp’s debut in the series in a brief appearance. With a much bigger role in the sequel and the growing Me Too movement to end harassment, Johnny Depp has been the focus of much ire from fans. According to The Verge, both Yates and Rowling decided to stand by his casting.
The film also stars Katherine Waterston, Ezra Miller, Zoe Kravitz, Dan Fogler, and Alison Sudol. Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelward arrives in theaters on November 18 of this year.
