Warner Bros. Discovery chief David Zaslav dropped a ton of bombshells regarding the company’s upcoming slate of big budget projects, even if a lot of the talk in the aftermath was focused on his shocking failure to grasp even the most basic of arithmetic. One of the biggest takeaways is that Fantastic Beasts may have been dragged round to the back of the barn, but does anyone even care?
Looking at the vastly diminished critical reactions and box office performances of The Crimes of Grindelwald and The Secrets of Dumbledore, we’re inclined to say no. To give you an indication of how sharply and rapidly the Wizarding World prequel series has fallen off a cliff on both fronts, the third installment earned almost $410 million less than the first and dropped by 28 percentage points on Rotten Tomatoes, which is a disastrous feat to accomplish in the span of two films.
Thankfully, the potential public execution of Newt Scamander’s big screen adventures hasn’t sent shockwaves around the internet, because it’s a decision everyone had been expecting the ruthless Zaslav to make from the second he set foot in the WB door.
It was confirmed a while back that Fantastic Beasts 4 didn’t have a script, and hadn’t been given the green light to begin pre-production. Zaslav additionally stated that there are no Wizarding World projects currently in active development at the studio, either, which makes it feel all the more inevitable that the period-set saga’s magical goose is cooked.
Announcing five blockbuster right off the bat was always a questionable decision, but we’ll be very curious to see if an official announcement on the future (or lack thereof) is coming.
Published: Nov 4, 2022 04:17 am