AUSTIN FOLKERTSMA
senior editor
austin.folkertsma@my.tccd.edu

The third installment of the “Fantastic Beasts” series was a beastly deuce in the toilet. 

Half of the male characters looked like they were constipated. Probably because of this movie, and I wouldn’t blame them for it. 

Credence Barebone, played by Ezra Miller, looked like they had a really punchable face. 

I loved the concept of “the wand chooses the wizard” in Harry Potter, but instead, in “Fantastic Beast,” a wand is just handed to a muggle/human, and all of the wands look the same.

 No more Dragon heartstring or Phoenix feather. The prop designers looked really lazy when making the wands because instead of making each one unique, they just mass-produced a lot of the same wand.

Gellert Grindelwald, played by Mads Mikkelson, is plotting to take over the Wizarding World and start a war between the wizards and the muggles, so it’s up to Albus Dumbledore to stop him. However, he can’t do it alone, given the past between Grindelwald and Dumbledore, played by Jude Law, so he recruits trusted friends from Hogwarts to help defeat him.

The only two parts that saved this movie for me were the symbolism behind the pendant and a comedic crab-like creature’s dance scene, but I’ll get back to the second thing later on.  

The pendant held blood from Dumbledore and Grindelwald. It was a blood pact they had made to not destroy each other.

Dumbledore was always seen in hiding because he wasn’t able to participate in this war until the pendant shattered, allowing him to finally participate, but Grindelwald retreated into hiding before Dumbledore could do anything.

Newt Scamander, played by Eddie Redmayne, ventures into a cave to save his brother Theseus Scamander, played by Callum Turner, and he stumbles upon the crab-like creatures. At first, they appear to be tiny and harmless but then turn into giant scorpions with multiple stingers.

Scamander finds a way to get around these creatures by doing some old ritual imitation dance and along with it came Macarena-like music, which was pretty funny.

The classic “Harry Potter” music was also great, and some other instrumental music throughout the movie added to it.

Another grievance I have with this film is there are hardly any duels happening, and the ones that do happen looked fantastic, but overdone. It’s a 2 and a half hour movie, they could’ve incorporated some fantastic duels in there.

The overall film just seemed very low budget, and the plot itself was just woeful. 

The first movie was great, but the “Fantastic Beast” series just plunged from there. The series is scheduled to have two more movies, but how much worse can they really get from this film?

Especially if you are a Harry Potter fan and haven’t seen any of the prior “Fantastic Beasts” movies, don’t watch it because this movie will physically and emotionally hurt you. 

Whatever grievances people have in the defamation trial between Johnny Depp and Amber Heard case, leave it at the door. Depp did fantastic in the first two films as Grindelwald, and it saddens me that he isn’t in this film. Mikkelsen’s version of Grindelwald was average at best.  

Depp not being in this movie wasn’t all bad because this is the kind of film to single-handedly destroy someone’s career, and I don’t want that for him.