Last week, Harry Potter fans rejoiced at the announcement from Warner Brothers that J.K. Rowling will be penning a screenplay based on an extension of the Wizarding World she first dreamed up in 1997.
The movie, which is intended to be the first of a series, is entitled “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.” It will focus on the author of the Hogwarts student’s textbook, Newt Scamander. The film will take place in New York 70 years before Harry Potter’s time.
Growing up in the 1990s and 2000s, much of the student population at Pacific Lutheran University grew up with the bespectacled boy wizard and followed him through his journey to defeat Lord Voldemort. We were there when the first movie came out, there at countless book release parties and were there a mere 10 years later at the midnight premiere, decked out as our favorite character from the series.
The series taught us valuable lessons about bravery, loyalty and the importance of friendship. Now, we get to see a different perspective of the Wizarding World through a character we know almost nothing about, except that his grandson marries the beloved Luna Lovegood. It will be a whole new experience for Potter fans around the world, and fans at PLU are looking forward to the film series.
Junior Emily Mansfield said she remembers dressing up as her favorite Harry Potter character, Dobby, for Halloween one year when she was in second grade. Her love for Harry Potter continued throughout her schooling, and she attended the midnight premiere of the final Harry Potter movie when she was a senior in high school.
“It’s gonna be awesome,” Mansfield said. “J.K. Rowling is the best person to write the screenplay for this, since she wrote the world it’s created in.”
Though many fans wouldn’t trust anyone else to write the screenplay, as they trust Rowling whole-heartedly with a world they grew up in, others aren’t convinced anyone should be writing it.
“We’ll see how it [the series] turns out,” sophomore Dylan Nehrenberg said. “It should remain done. It ended on a good note and WB shouldn’t milk the series for more money.”
Warner Brothers expects this new series to do well. While they announced the movie last week, WB also announced plans to feature elements of the movie into the Wizarding World of Harry Potter in Orlando.
If the movie goes according to plan, the young adults who grew up with Harry will have a new series to look forward to from the same mind that brought them their childhood.
Although it won’t feature our favorite characters, it will give us a look inside a new element of the Wizarding World and introduce us to a new wizard we may grow to love as much as we love Harry.
