Board 8 > Watched Fantastic Beasts 2 last night (Spoilers likely)

(+) Yeah! (+)

Anyone else been to see it yet? I was majorly disappointed because basically nothing happens and the entire movie seems to exist purely to set up the next movie.

It's a shame as the girlfriend and I had been really looking forward to it since Fantastic Beast 1 was our second date. We both left feeling the movie was bad and I'm usually very tolerant of bad movies

Haha yeah I saw it last night, it was pretty awful. Me and my friends had just finished a Harry Potter marathon and still left the theater super confused and disappointed. I think it's worse that the movie was more boring than it was bad
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Looks like it is getting panned in the reviews for the same reason I disliked it. They forgot to write an actual story into it and spent the whole time just world building / filling in backstory

Like I think everything that happened in the film could have happened in 15 minutes

That was my major complaint about the movie, but honestly I still kind of liked it.

I actually liked the drama and the characters a lot. Even though the plot didn't advance... at all, I still found it enjoyable since I'm a big Potter fan. But I think it was to be expected since it went from three movies to five.
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I just enjoyed it mostly for the fan service and it didn't disappoint in that regard.

Hogwarts!
McGonagall!
Mirror of Erised!
A kappa!
Quidditch in the background!
Boggart!
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I enjoyed the fan service. I like the story. I'm disappointed with them screwing with the hp canon.

It was very slow and I agree it spent the whole time setting up no. 3
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Oh and can we talk about Dumbledores brand new sibling that apparently never existed before?
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It's a cheap cash in designed to artificially extend the HP franchise's life span. Why do people waste their money on this crap?
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Well, it's J.K. Rowling writing, so it's at least a story the author wanted to tell. And the start was good, faultering on the pace but certainly better than one would expect from "adapting" a thin book that's basically a comedic bestiary.

That being said, hard to not blame The Crimes of Grindelwald on J.K. Rowling as well. The script is overstuffed in subplots, most of whom are padding that could be cut without any problem (now I realize how the books were more captiving because it's easy to follow a restricted plot, as it's mostly what Harry experiences; even the original Fantastic Beasts was better at just two plots, even if Creedence's parts were boring compared to Newt's), and then there's the questionable additions, including the spoiled one above. It's pretty, the characters from the previous one are still fun, but it's certainly the least satisfying of these movies.
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I feel like part of the problem is simply the restrictions of it being a movie. The whole backstory reveal/twist near the end of the movie wouldn't be out of place in one of the HP novels, but it just doesn't work well in the medium. That's why all the adaptations of the books usually left that stuff out. But it really makes me wish there were novel versions of the Fantastic Beasts movies that could flesh these things out more and make it work better.
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Well, the scripts have been turned into books. I have the first, was a fine read even without the visuals. This one, maybe the novel approach could work instead, as some added content and less jumping around plots might make it better.
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Just saw it. Id call it outright bad.
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I saw it this afternoon.

It was not good in any way.

The story was bad.

The plot devices were bad.

The characterization of established characters? Bad.

They just made so many decisions in this movie that are completely contradictory to anything resembling a good idea.
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It's hard for me to dislike anything harry potter related (I even love cursed child) and I still have to admit this movie was pretty bad.

No main plot of its own, and a lot of the subplots feel completely meaningless/useless. Like the leta lestrange stuff. I didn't 100% understand it, but I'm pretty sure I don't care about it.

BUT, I did like the queenie plot a lot, I wish more time was spent on that, and I liked grindelwald a lot, really well done villain IMO.

And I liked dumbledore, but I feel a little lied to, because I thought there would be way more hogwarts and dumbledore in the movie.

And I do like that twist referred to above, because I'm pretty positive there's way more to it. I mean Grindelwald has to be lying to creedence about who he is, he lied pretty much non stop about everything to him in the first movie. But I bet there's some cool trick where it's not a 100% lie, like ariana lives within him somehow.
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I really don't have a problem with the lack of meaningful resolution to the many plotlines since this is JK Rowling we're talking about, there's probably shit being played here that isn't going to pay off until the very last movie and I'm ok with that.
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I haven't seen this yet but it sounds really bad. I got that sense not just from this topic but just from the general idea of the film itself and reading a few reviews of it that kinda confirmed what I thought.

I loved 75% of the first Fantastic Beasts actually - like, I really enjoyed the actual, y'know, fantastic beasts themselves, and that scene in Newt's briefcase is genuinely awe-inspiring. Then it kind of lost the plot and got really weird and dark. The execution scene was really offputting in a bad way and then the big dark cloud destroying everything was just a stupid way to end the movie. That whole plot felt like it should have been a second movie itself - maybe the stuff with the orphans could have been good in the right context but it felt so out of place in that film where I just wanted a fun adventure with Newt and his fantastic beasts. Those parts I absolutely adored. The rest of it I hated. It was such a mixed bag.

This movie seemed like it was going to double down hard on the parts I hated and also go hard on some deep lore stuff that I don't care about all while being Johnny Depp centric which I couldn't give a shit about. Jude Law as Dumbledore seems kind of charming, but other than that this seemed like a hard pass for me.

Mega spoilers

I just realized, why do the wizards care so much about WWII? I would think muggles fighting a big war wouldn't be that big a deal to them, they live in magical alleys and neighborhoods inaccessible to muggles. I guess cities being bombed from the air would be a nuisance, but the wizards can make magic barriers and teleport and they barely seem aware of the muggle world at all.

It feels like WWI would have been a mild nuisance for wizards, so learning that there'll be another one doesn't seem like a huge deal.
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Well, immediately afterward Grindelwald made the point of how long would it be before Muggles turned their weapons on wizardkind and waged war on them. I think the showing of WWII was meant to provide evidence of how barbaric and violent Muggles were and provide justification for attacking them first. It has been pointed out in the series before that generally wizards underestimate how capable Muggles can be, and that their stubbornness and refusal to use Muggle technology leads to them not being aware that Muggles can do a lot of things better with it than magic can (like communication). Showing stuff like tanks and nuclear weapons then ends up being a harsh reminder that Muggles are more dangerous and threatening than they assumed they were.
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Grand Kirby posted...

Well, immediately afterward Grindelwald made the point of how long would it be before Muggles turned their weapons on wizardkind and waged war on them. I think the showing of WWII was meant to provide evidence of how barbaric and violent Muggles were and provide justification for attacking them first. It has been pointed out in the series before that generally wizards underestimate how capable Muggles can be, and that their stubbornness and refusal to use Muggle technology leads to them not being aware that Muggles can do a lot of things better with it than magic can (like communication). Showing stuff like tanks and nuclear weapons then ends up being a harsh reminder that Muggles are more dangerous and threatening than they assumed they were.

I know it's a mistake to analyze Harry Potter logically, since this is a franchise with time travel machines casually used by twelve year-olds, but screw it.

It's repeatedly established that normal wizards basically don't know anything about muggles and don't think they're a threat, and the only ones who do are the ones with muggle parents. I remember in the book there's like a random guy who needs to dress as a muggle and dresses up in a woman's nightgown because that's how little he knows. Even Ron's dad, the muggle expert, knows nothing, and it's played for laughs. Harry learns that witch trials are thought of as a joke in the wizarding world because the muggles almost never caught wizards and when they did, the wizard could just make himself immune to fire and leave.

There's no way WWI was a big deal to the wizards. Like, there's no way wizards are going around in trenches fighting Germans or whatever. The only wizards killed in that war would be from bombing cities and being incidentally killed, and even then wizards can make force fields and teleport to Scotland on a whim. Most wizards outside of the main cast also don't seem to care a lot about muggle lives, I remember a part in Harry Potter where a radio host compliments a wizard specifically for defending some random muggles from Death Eaters.

Johnny Depp telling people that muggles are going to start another war with even stronger weapons than before should be mildly-to-moderately concerning to the wizards. Surprising but not horrifying.

I'm saying that if you want to play up the wizard racism angle, making it about how dangerous muggles are to wizards seems like the wrong way to do it after you spent so long establishing how wizards think of muggles as equals at best and most frequently as jokes.
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Anagram posted...

Grand Kirby posted...

Well, immediately afterward Grindelwald made the point of how long would it be before Muggles turned their weapons on wizardkind and waged war on them. I think the showing of WWII was meant to provide evidence of how barbaric and violent Muggles were and provide justification for attacking them first. It has been pointed out in the series before that generally wizards underestimate how capable Muggles can be, and that their stubbornness and refusal to use Muggle technology leads to them not being aware that Muggles can do a lot of things better with it than magic can (like communication). Showing stuff like tanks and nuclear weapons then ends up being a harsh reminder that Muggles are more dangerous and threatening than they assumed they were.

I know it's a mistake to analyze Harry Potter logically, since this is a franchise with time travel machines casually used by twelve year-olds, but screw it.

It's repeatedly established that normal wizards basically don't know anything about muggles and don't think they're a threat, and the only ones who do are the ones with muggle parents. I remember in the book there's like a random guy who needs to dress as a muggle and dresses up in a woman's nightgown because that's how little he knows. Even Ron's dad, the muggle expert, knows nothing, and it's played for laughs. Harry learns that witch trials are thought of as a joke in the wizarding world because the muggles almost never caught wizards and when they did, the wizard could just make himself immune to fire and leave.

There's no way WWI was a big deal to the wizards. Like, there's no way wizards are going around in trenches fighting Germans or whatever. The only wizards killed in that war would be from bombing cities and being incidentally killed, and even then wizards can make force fields and teleport to Scotland on a whim. Most wizards outside of the main cast also don't seem to care a lot about muggle lives, I remember a part in Harry Potter where a radio host compliments a wizard specifically for defending some random muggles from Death Eaters.

Johnny Depp telling people that muggles are going to start another war with even stronger weapons than before should be mildly-to-moderately concerning to the wizards. Surprising but not horrifying.

I'm saying that if you want to play up the wizard racism angle, making it about how dangerous muggles are to wizards seems like the wrong way to do it after you spent so long establishing how wizards think of muggles as equals at best and most frequently as jokes.

I read the spoilers because I don't care about the movie that much really

Did you take into account the fact that Harry Potter takes place like 60 years later? We haven't had a big world war in a while, so muggles might seem more like a joke in the present

Paratroopa1 posted...

I read the spoilers because I don't care about the movie that much really

Did you take into account the fact that Harry Potter takes place like 60 years later? We haven't had a big world war in a while, so muggles might seem more like a joke in the present

I did think of that, and I'm willing to grant that the wizards would no doubt know way more about muggle combat than 90s wizards, but there's no way they think of them as direct threats for the reasons I mentioned.
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If they really want a gritty dark Harry Potter i'd love for one to have an arrogant wizard starting up his Avada Kedavra and be immediately shot dead by a gun before he can finish.

Anagram posted...

Grand Kirby posted...

Well, immediately afterward Grindelwald made the point of how long would it be before Muggles turned their weapons on wizardkind and waged war on them. I think the showing of WWII was meant to provide evidence of how barbaric and violent Muggles were and provide justification for attacking them first. It has been pointed out in the series before that generally wizards underestimate how capable Muggles can be, and that their stubbornness and refusal to use Muggle technology leads to them not being aware that Muggles can do a lot of things better with it than magic can (like communication). Showing stuff like tanks and nuclear weapons then ends up being a harsh reminder that Muggles are more dangerous and threatening than they assumed they were.

I know it's a mistake to analyze Harry Potter logically, since this is a franchise with time travel machines casually used by twelve year-olds, but screw it.

It's repeatedly established that normal wizards basically don't know anything about muggles and don't think they're a threat, and the only ones who do are the ones with muggle parents. I remember in the book there's like a random guy who needs to dress as a muggle and dresses up in a woman's nightgown because that's how little he knows. Even Ron's dad, the muggle expert, knows nothing, and it's played for laughs. Harry learns that witch trials are thought of as a joke in the wizarding world because the muggles almost never caught wizards and when they did, the wizard could just make himself immune to fire and leave.

There's no way WWI was a big deal to the wizards. Like, there's no way wizards are going around in trenches fighting Germans or whatever. The only wizards killed in that war would be from bombing cities and being incidentally killed, and even then wizards can make force fields and teleport to Scotland on a whim. Most wizards outside of the main cast also don't seem to care a lot about muggle lives, I remember a part in Harry Potter where a radio host compliments a wizard specifically for defending some random muggles from Death Eaters.

Johnny Depp telling people that muggles are going to start another war with even stronger weapons than before should be mildly-to-moderately concerning to the wizards. Surprising but not horrifying.

I'm saying that if you want to play up the wizard racism angle, making it about how dangerous muggles are to wizards seems like the wrong way to do it after you spent so long establishing how wizards think of muggles as equals at best and most frequently as jokes.

I mean, the whole reason the International Statute of Secrecy exists is because of the threats Muggles posed to wizards. You don't spend all that effort hiding from people you think are jokes. And while it was mentioned that some witches escaped from the hunts unscathed, canonically a lot of witches and wizards did die during it particularly in the Salem Witch Trials, which is why No-Maj sentiment is so strong in America. So Muggles are capable of posing some threat. Of course, how much logically they could harm wizards isn't important, what matters in the context of Grindelwald's plan is how much he can get people to think they're in danger so that they can follow him. And it's not like people are easily swayed by unfounded hysteria against communities that are different from them, right? >_>
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Grand Kirby posted...

I mean, the whole reason the International Statute of Secrecy exists is because of the threats Muggles posed to wizards. You don't spend all that effort hiding from people you think are jokes. And while it was mentioned that some witches escaped from the hunts unscathed, canonically a lot of witches and wizards did die during it particularly in the Salem Witch Trials, which is why No-Maj sentiment is so strong in America. So Muggles are capable of posing some threat. Of course, how much logically they could harm wizards isn't important, what matters in the context of Grindelwald's plan is how much he can get people to think they're in danger so that they can follow him. And it's not like people are easily swayed by unfounded hysteria against communities that are different from them, right? >_>

I'm sure some wizards realize that muggles could be a threat, but Johnny Depp is trying to whip large numbers into a frenzy. I know it's just one room, but the room is clearly supposed to represent many more wizards, and Johnny Depp seems to think there will be more sympathetic anti-muggle wizards around. Besides, looking up the Harry Potter wiki, the only confirmed witch hunts that killed actual witches were in Salem.

Like I can accept that wizards are being misled into thinking that muggles are a threat to them, but it needs to be set up better. There needs to be a news article about Flerpinius Brazenwonker, famous wizard, killed by a muggle in a bar, or something like that. There needs to be two extras talking about these newfangled muggle murder machines called "tanks." You need a wizard in the background glaring at the American guy because he's a muggle and everyone is afraid of the muggle. Instead there's zero indication that the Harry Potter world of the 1920s is different from the 1990s world in how it views muggles until Johnny Depp tells people out of nowhere that there's another world war on the horizon.
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These movies just give me a headache. So goddamn boring, and no reason to care about anything that happens in them or their characters.

Plus, for gods sake, Rowling, give us a good reason already to think the bad guys could possibly be worse than the status quo. Weve all gotten absorbed into social justice discourse by this point, and youre blinking a whole lot of unfortunate implications to set off conversations about it.
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Apparently the movie screws up on continuity as well.

Professor McGonagell was born in 1935 according to Order of the Phoenix, but she's an adult in Fantastic Beasts 2, which is set in 1927.
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Anagram posted...

Apparently the movie screws up on continuity as well.

Professor McGonagell was born in 1935 according to Order of the Phoenix, but she's an adult in Fantastic Beasts 2, which is set in 1927.

Oops
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Waluigi1 posted...

Oops

It's even better than that, according to what I read.
McGonagel mentions that her mother wasn't a teacher, so it can't be her mother. She also says that her father was a muggle named McGonagel, so it can't be her grandmother. That means the only explanation is that it's an unrelated woman named McGonagel.

Rowling is really good at coming up with weird ideas and terrible at thinking of how they interact with the world or continuity.
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Also for some reason Dumbledore is teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts instead of Transfiguration, because we need to shoehorn the Boggart scene in from Book 3. Its honestly made me realize that the entire idea of having a class dedicated to trying and make a worst fear or traumatic event from your past into a joke is a horrible, horrible idea. Just wonder if the Lestrange chick actually did use Ridikkulus on her nightmare.
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Logience posted...

Also for some reason Dumbledore is teaching Defense Against the Dark Arts instead of Transfiguration, because we need to shoehorn the Boggart scene in from Book 3. Its honestly made me realize that the entire idea of having a class dedicated to trying and make a worst fear or traumatic event from your past into a joke is a horrible, horrible idea. Just wonder if the Lestrange chick actually did use Ridikkulus on her nightmare.

Eh, just say that he transferred classes.
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Dumbledore was kicked off the post during the movie though, so he could have moved on to a different class later easily.

The McGonagall thing can't be resolved without some serious retconning though. I feel that was something that was just thrown in for the people who followed the movies more than the books since she was presented as much older in those.
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One thing worth mentioning about the WWII stuff

I don't necessarily think it was all about trying to scare wizards with a practical future threat.

It was hate mongering. He was just trying to bring out the irrational hatred that the pure-blood wizards already had toward muggles. Even if they logically know they aren't in real trouble, they're more than willing to jump on any reason to preemptively turn against them they can get.

I absolutely think it was Rowling's narrative on Trump and modern racism though; that's pretty apparent.
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Johnbobb posted...

One thing worth mentioning about the WWII stuff

I don't necessarily think it was all about trying to scare wizards with a practical future threat.

It was hate mongering. He was just trying to bring out the irrational hatred that the pure-blood wizards already had toward muggles. Even if they logically know they aren't in real trouble, they're more than willing to jump on any reason to preemptively turn against them they can get.

I absolutely think it was Rowling's narrative on Trump and modern racism though; that's pretty apparent.

No, its been obvious even from the first book that Grindelwald was supposed to be some kind of WW2 stand-in.
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as for the movie itself, I thought it was "alright." There wasn't much of a real plot but it was still enjoyable to watch, for the most part.

Confession: I dozed off briefly a few times. Partially because the movie dragged, and also partially because I just didn't get much sleep last night.

Did I miss something with Queenie? I know her and Jacob fought a bit but I feel like I must've missed something significant for her to just straight up join the guy trying to massacre all the muggles
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Logience posted...

No, its been obvious even from the first book that Grindelwald was supposed to be some kind of WW2 stand-in.

Originally he was, but I definitely think modern politics are being incorporated into it now
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Johnbobb posted...

Logience posted...

No, its been obvious even from the first book that Grindelwald was supposed to be some kind of WW2 stand-in.

Originally he was, but I definitely think modern politics are being incorporated into it now

No, thats just a side effect of bad timing and lack of creativity making it look topical by accident.

Or maybe it is, in which case Im even more disgruntled.
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Johnbobb posted...

as for the movie itself, I thought it was "alright." There wasn't much of a real plot but it was still enjoyable to watch, for the most part.

Confession: I dozed off briefly a few times. Partially because the movie dragged, and also partially because I just didn't get much sleep last night.

Did I miss something with Queenie? I know her and Jacob fought a bit but I feel like I must've missed something significant for her to just straight up join the guy trying to massacre all the muggles

Not really. Grindelwald has the opportunity to kill her and doesn't. She wants to bang a muggle but the American government says no, Grindelwald says people should be able to do what they want but also that muggles should be separate from wizards, so her motivations make 100% sense and shouldn't be criticized whatsoever.
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Logience posted...

Johnbobb posted...

Logience posted...

No, its been obvious even from the first book that Grindelwald was supposed to be some kind of WW2 stand-in.

Originally he was, but I definitely think modern politics are being incorporated into it now

No, thats just a side effect of bad timing and lack of creativity making it look topical by accident.

Or maybe it is, in which case Im even more disgruntled.

It's written by JK Rowling, and given how vocal she's been about modern American politics for the last few years, I'd be shocked if that wasn't at least a part of it
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I'm okay with the fear mongering, if that's the direction they wanted to take it, but they didn't really do that except for that one speech.

Like one of the things we knew about Grindelwald is that his credo was 'for the greater good', but that almost never came up in this movie. That would have been a fantastic justification for his actions if they made it seem like he was really working towards what he believed would promote the greater good.
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Johnbobb posted...

Logience posted...

Johnbobb posted...

Logience posted...

No, its been obvious even from the first book that Grindelwald was supposed to be some kind of WW2 stand-in.

Originally he was, but I definitely think modern politics are being incorporated into it now

No, thats just a side effect of bad timing and lack of creativity making it look topical by accident.

Or maybe it is, in which case Im even more disgruntled.

It's written by JK Rowling, and given how vocal she's been about modern American politics for the last few years, I'd be shocked if that wasn't at least a part of it

Literally all Ive heard about her and modern discourse is 1: That stupid Harmonian reignition, and 2: being pithy about Pewdiepie or something.
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I think any similarity of Nazism to Trump is completely due to the similar way in which they behave.

Musta taken you all weekend to figure that one out, @PerfectChaosZ
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She definitely intended Grindelwald to be Hitler originally (they're both defeated in 1945, etc), but given how much she openly hates Trump and how unsubtle Grindelwald's "muggles should be separate from us" speech is, it's obvious the Trump hate has crept into the character.
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Anagram posted...

Johnbobb posted...

as for the movie itself, I thought it was "alright." There wasn't much of a real plot but it was still enjoyable to watch, for the most part.

Confession: I dozed off briefly a few times. Partially because the movie dragged, and also partially because I just didn't get much sleep last night.

Did I miss something with Queenie? I know her and Jacob fought a bit but I feel like I must've missed something significant for her to just straight up join the guy trying to massacre all the muggles

Not really. Grindelwald has the opportunity to kill her and doesn't. She wants to bang a muggle but the American government says no, Grindelwald says people should be able to do what they want but also that muggles should be separate from wizards, so her motivations make 100% sense and shouldn't be criticized whatsoever.

Wait are you being serious or sarcastic?
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Waluigi1 posted...

Wait are you being serious or sarcastic?

I was being serious at first and sarcastic about it making sense. I'm fine with Queenie joining the bad guys, but she joins theme because she's frustrated about not being able to bang a muggle, and Grindelwald just said muggles should be separate, which makes her actions nonsensical. I guess her character is that she's airheaded and not very smart, but come on. Also she can read minds, so she should probably know Grindelwald plans to kill "most" muggles, unless he was lying to his closest followers earlier.
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Oh ok yeah I agree it was really dumb.
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Not really
@Logience

I'm not sure how much sense Queenie is supposed to have to be honest. She's a pretty loopy character.
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