Warner Bros. may have draped Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them in its finest invisibility cloak, ensuring that any story trinkets remained firmly under wraps as the Harry Potter offshoot eased into development. But after featuring on the cover of Entertainment Weekly’s latest issue, the updates from the London set of David Yates’ standalone prequel have arrived thick and fast.
In the wake of yesterday’s slew of photos – which shed light on Muggles and wizards alike around what we assume to be the Magical Congress of the United States of America – the outlet has now shared a brief outline of the core plot from Fantastic Beasts. We already know that Yates’ spinoff will take place 70 years before the Boy Who Lived entered the scene, but EW’s coverage all but sets up the premise of the entire 1920s flick.
While the initial idea pitched the film as faux-documentary, J.K. Rowling – who co-wrote the screenplay with Yates – had something bigger in mind. And so, we’ve arrived at Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, a fully-fledged feature film that is sure to have Potterhead rooted to the edge of their seats.
This case is one of those way-way-way-bigger-on-the-inside magical devices, and within are expansive habitats for a collection of rare and endangered magical creatures from Newt’s travels around globe. He discovers the American wizarding community is fearfully hiding from Muggles (who are called “No-Maj” in the States) and the threat of public exposure is an even graver concern than in the UK (remember the Salem witch trials?). Fantastic Beasts is the story of what happens when this uniquely skilled English wizard travels to wiz-phobic America and a variety of his creatures, some quite dangerous … get out of their case.
Eddie Redmayne toplines Fantastic Beasts as the brilliant Newt Scamander, while Gemma Chan, Carmen Ejogo and Jon Voight, Katherine Waterston, Ezra Miller, Colin Farrell and Ron Perlman complete the starry ensemble.
Warner Bros. will launch Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them for our Muggle eyes on November 18, 2016. Will it jump-start a trilogy at the studio? Time will tell, though WB has tentatively slated two follow-ups for 2018 and 2020.
