Fantastic failures in storytelling and where they’re heading
FANTASTIC BEASTS: THE SECRETS OF DUMBLEDORE, the third and likely final instalment in the Fantastic Beasts series, finds the franchise striving to rectify the missteps of its predecessors, with veteran Wizarding World director David Yates desperately trying to pull out of the narrative nosedive he and Rowling have plunged the series into.
The plot centres around Albus Dumbledore (Jude Law), who must thwart the dark ambitions of Gellert Grindelwald (this time Mads Mikkelsen) with the help of Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne) and a ragtag team of hastily assembled new characters, including Newt’s brother Theseus (Callum Turner), the charming baker Jacob Kowalski (Dan Fogler) – a rare holdover from the previous movies, and Hogwarts professor Lally Hicks (Jessica Williams). Together, they navigate a series of complex and often muddled subplots, from political machinations to magical creature escapades, all set against the backdrop of a looming wizarding war.
One of the film’s few strengths lies in its performances, particularly Jude Law’s portrayal of Dumbledore, which brings a mix of warmth and mystery to the character. He’s a far more compelling leading man than Redmayne’s Newt Scamander who continues to bumble around the film like he’s impersonating a partially sedated Matt Smith Doctor Who. The production design remains impressive, with beautifully crafted sets that bring the increasingly incoherent wizarding world to life and there are moments of genuine charm, especially in the interactions between the characters and the magical creatures, which add a whimsical touch to the otherwise dark and tangled narrative.
Where the film falters significantly, like its two progenitors, is in its storytelling. The narrative is cluttered with too many subplots and characters and lacks a real focus or any coherent idea of why the bad guys are the bad guys and what differentiates them from the supposed good guys beyond the fact we’ve previously met some of them in the HARRY POTTER films. Objectively, the Wizarding World as Rowling has articulated it is a cruel, class-ridden, almost theocratic monstrosity and the fact that Grindelwald wants to tear it down to replace it with his own brand of authoritarian ideals doesn’t make it easy to root for either side. Dumbledore being placed as the poster-boy for an unjustly uneven status quo is hardly the stuff of legend. Voldemort was a fascist supremacist, Grindelwald an authoritarian revolutionary whereas Dumbledore just wants to preserve a little bit of authoritarian supremacy, as a treat. What a mess these Fantastic Beasts have made of the Wizarding World, stripping away the wonder and revealing the grand hypocrisies and ubiquity of deeply entrenched inequality, prejudice and slavery. THE SECRETS OF DUMBLEDORE can’t escape the storytelling gravity well the narrative vacuum at the heart of the FANTASTIC BEASTS series has created. There’s simply no story to tell here that’s worth telling. The attempt to string a series of background details and some author’s notes together into a coherent storyline has created a deeply disjointed end product which makes it difficult for viewers to fully engage with the story or care about the stakes involved. The screenplay, in common with those of the previous FANTASTIC BEASTS movies, suffers from chronically uneven pacing and excruciatingly awkward exposition, making the overall experience feel drawn out and often tedious.
For sure, the frequent casting changes and the abrupt sidelining of previously main characters add to the film’s disjointed feel. Mads Mikkelsen replacing Johnny Depp as Grindelwald, feels like corporate cowardice although Mikkelsen’s a great choice, so was Depp. When your primary antagonist is on their third actor in three films, it’s rarely a sign that things are going well (unless you’re JAMES BOND) but it’s choices like sidelining Katherine Waterston’s Tina Goldstein, previously a central character, that jars the most, smacking of corporate committee thinking and an utter lack of any outline plan for the series. Her brief screen time feels like an afterthought, and one that only serves to remind you of her absence, even though there was nothing particularly compelling or interesting about her character in the first place.
Director David Yates, at the helm of his seventh Wizarding World film, seems creatively exhausted. The film often resorts to familiar visual tricks and set pieces that, while technically competent, feel repetitive and uninspired. This overreliance on established patterns underscores a lack of fresh ideas, making the film feel more like an obligation than a passionate continuation of a beloved series.
J K Rowling, who penned the screenplay, appears out of her depth when it comes to writing directly for the screen. Her struggle to translate her intricate and beloved world into a coherent and engaging screenplay is evident. The narrative lacks the tight plotting and character development that made her books so compelling. Instead, it feels bogged down by extraneous details and an overcomplicated plot that fails to resonate on a cinematic level while all she does it chip away at the foundations of her previous creations, revealing more and more of what lurked beneath the hallowed halls of Hogwarts. The magic, both literal and figurative, seems to be missing, and the film struggles to justify its existence within the broader wizarding world and to the wider going cinema audience.
With Rowling seemingly bent on funnelling her time and energy into her own brand of Voldemort-esque polemic, FANTASTIC BEASTS: THE SECRETS OF DUMBLEDORE may mark the point at which her dwindling creative powers Avada Kedavra’d her own franchise.
