Warner Bros. are apparently looking to keep the Harry Potter money coming in from one of their most lucrative franchises by announcing an adaptation of the Harry Potter spin-off book Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them. They have lured the author J.K. Rowling in to create a potential new trilogy of movies.
The book itself was released in 2001 and was designed to be a copy of the book of magical creatures that Harry uses in his lessons in the first novel, Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone. Given that it was a mere 42 pages it is a bit of a surprise that the studio have decided that the time is right to translate this to the big screen. Much more has been done which much less though.
Rowling herself was recently interviewed and explained that it would be “neither a prequel nor a sequel to the Harry Potter series, but an extension of the wizarding world”.
She continued on the topic of how this idea came about: “It all started when Warner Bros. came to me with the suggestion of turning Fantastic Beasts into a film. I thought it was a fun idea, but the idea of seeing Newt Scamander, the supposed author of Fantastic Beasts, realised by another writer was difficult. Having lived for so long in my fictional universe, I feel very protective of it and I already knew a lot about Newt. As hardcore Harry Potter fans will know, I liked him so much that I even married his grandson, Rolf, to one of my favourite characters from the Harry Potter series, Luna Lovegood.”
As for the movie itself, it has a US release date of November 18 2016 with no director currently attached.
