ok my actual thoughts. umm it didn’t really feel like the harry potter world? idk why like they obviously pushed that angle really hard but it didn’t come across for me? i think it’s cuz maybe i associate hp with two things so much: british-ness and school. although deathly hallows was mostly out of school and i loved that..
also i love the hp movies so i should theoretically like yates’ directing and i felt like in half of fb that came through, the half about like the political tensions and obscurus and stuff but then the other half of the movie is like wacky animal adventures that they STRUGGLED to link to the main plot and I’m just like??? i feel like they changed their mind about what they wanted the series to be about halfway through making this movie and added grindelwald last minute or……??? idk cuz i don’t get and i don’t get why the shaw family was there at all like they did nothing?? actually i think i just figured out what i perceive to be the problem, it felt like they took a quarter of four completely unrelated movies and put them together into one movie without connecting them at alllll lol.
like ok 1) they should never have used fantastic beasts as a starting point in the first place 2) it should have just been a wizarding world war movie in the first place since that’s clearly what they’re trying to make it now, which is another thing i don’t get the war was in the 40s and this is set in the 20s… are they gonna completely change the cast or age them up or what?
speaking of the cast whyYyYyYy was it all white people in their 30s!!!!! like break that down we have them acting all progressive now yet their movie is whiter than even most franchise movies these days?? and in new york???? and as for the age thing i just really don’t like the vibe i’m getting that they’re trying to distance themselves from YA…
also whYyyyyyyyYYYYYYYY did they have to cast j*hnny d*pp…… kms like you know he’s gonna have a big role later smdh. and I’m actually interested in the wizarding war and now it’s tainted, great
anyway like i said i liked some of it, the opening with the newspapers was cool and the climax was good like it felt well structured and finally enticing, umm there were tiny glimmers here and there that made me feel like it was the hp world but honestly again I’m shocked i didn’t feel it more. i think since the plotting was so all over the place and very confusing it didn’t have the opportunity to come through. and they were obviously trying to set up a franchise but at the same time left very little from this particular movie open ended and what was still connected was very strenuously and confusingly connected?
also as yall know i love a 20s aesthetic but i wasn’t feeling it here at. all. again part of it would be the whitewashing but it just felt like they didn’t want to commit and just went for vague 20th century. like they somehow managed to make new york feel fake and small lmao..
uh some of the animals were cute but they just felt so shoehorned into their titular movie lol. k can you notice I’m avoiding talking about the characters… i have thoughts but i… don’t want to be mean LOL. there were like loose threads here and there with the sisters that i felt could be interesting if explored but then the boys oh my godddjdsjdksjd what!!!!! i literally don’t know what was going on with them mainly newt like i am DYING to know what on earth the filmmakers were going for there. whew lord. like there was nothing wrong with him per se nothing problematic but i was just so confused and like concerned like is he ok??? is he even, like are the main four even coming back???? is this a one off story for them?? are there gonna be new main characters? how are they gonna keep calling the movies “fantastic beasts and x”?? we just don’t know. because the production development of this series is a mess
anywayzuh in conclusion i miss hp, which had heart and followed one main thing well and made! sense!