Fantastic Beasts: Crouching Scamander, Hidden Badass

 

I assume the Nundu we see in the trailer (and we know Newt has in his case from FB1) has something to do with the plan to take down Grindelwald. If he has a trained Nundu that basically makes him as powerful as a small army of wizards.

 

You'd also have to assume Newt is willing to murder everyone he encounters along with anyone else in the immediate area since the Nundu along with Fiendfyre is the closest thing the magical world has to a nuke, not exactly a precision-solution to a dark wizard problem in metropolitan Paris that could be countered by two spells; the bubblehead charm and the killing curse.

I think that whole "Nundu has never been supressed by anything less than 100 wizards" is just another example of JKR not knowing how to count or not thinking her sometimes slapdash worldbuilding through. An apex-predator like that would depopulate entire continents and oceans would be the only reason there'd still be anything alive in this world.

 

Voldemort you kinky fuck.

And no wonder Harry's first crush is Cho Chang, the ol' Asian!Maledictus!Scar!Horcrux connection. Rowling you sly dog. /s

 

Eh, it can bebalanced out by things like extremely low birthrates and slow reproduction cycles. Maybe it's a basilisk scenario where they do t come along naturally?

 

Grindelwald was dueling what 10 Aurors or some shit? By all accounts and from what we’ve seen newt is quite talented. I’d presumably put him somewhere between Snape and Sirius

 

FFS, your OT3 sucks!

I'm so sick of these unrealistic slash pairings.

 

Actually if you consider the scope of Newt's achievements I'd say he could have a mind surpassing Snape or Sirius.

We know he was expelled from Hogwarts. We don't know when but we can assume it was after his O.W.Ls because he got to keep his wand. Knowing this, we also know he has a Nundu in his case. As well as pretty much every dangerous creature there is.

I'm assuming that Newt never had any interest in duelling. "I don't do sides," Dumbledore loving him because he doesn't have any interest in power etc.

His brother is built up to be a big deal in the first movie and is confident enough to think he can take Grindlewald albeit with help.

This all points to Newt being a character that is essentially a fuckload of wasted potential. These movies give me the feeling that he could be one of the greats if he ever deigned to show any motivation or effort at all.

The dude is too busy with his pets for the world's nonsense.

That's also why he's the perfect protagonist to frame the Dumbledore/ Grindlewald conflict. The series can be about them but also Newt.

 

There's also an indication that he may have the (limited) ability to replicate the magical abilities of the creatures he has studied. Like an HP "blue mage".

I believe the bit where he spreads out that yellow cloud, perhaps to see the past events that have occurred in a location, is supposed to be an example of this.

 

Also, calling it now: Newt gave Fawkes to Dumbledore.

 

A very interesting point, and as good a starting point as any to elaborate a bit on an issue that has caused me no small degree of trouble in the recent past. I had not thought of the possibility before, and I sincerely hope that it will not prove to be true. I have no desire to ever find out how their bond came to pass in a film, be it through Newt or or other means. It‘s one of those little mysteries that made the character of Dumbledore special for me through the early books and the later changes to his characterisation, including the revelations about his background seen in Deathly Hallows.

Now, on to the reason for my specification of "in a film." The flawed nature of the later Potter films – their inaccuracies, omissions and, at times, overall quality – have, in retrospect, somewhat soured me against canon reveals through any medium other than the written word. And even that, as evident in the case of Pottermore, can be problematic. This was something that troubled me about the first Fantastic Beasts as well, even though I only recently recognised it as my main umbrage with the film. It‘s fine, in terms of quality, certainly not the worst David Yates film of the Potterverse, it just lacks a lot of the worldbuilding that the early Potter films established by virtually using the books as shooting scripts (a virtue which, I believe, was extensively discussed throughout the recent rewatch here on the forums).

I am reasonably confident that JKR actually had a fairly good idea how Fawkes and Dumbledore came to forge their relationship, given the former‘s importance in CoS and the way she obsessively plotted out some of her characters‘ futures. (This, as an aside, is not the case for me when I look at the whole Maledictus/Nagini business, which, if pressed, I would guess was made up on the spot as the Fantastic Beasts scripts developed, or at least has a much more recent origin than she has claimed, though whether through a healthy dose of mistrust concerning her Twitter profile or any more fundamental reasons I could not say).

However, as JKR has proven over the course of last decade, she seems determined to tear down the veil surrounding the last vestiges of ambiguity in the HP series in a frantic quest to please the masses and stay in the public eye, which, arguably, is a lot easier by revealing more and more Potter trivia than with her Galbraith pseudonym.

If she absolutely has to reveal something like this in the future, I‘d much rather she put it in a short story collection together with other Potter-related tales, and have the proceeds go to [her charity] Lumos.

 

I'm super excited for this movie. The first Fantastic Beasts was really good...especially the suitcase scene.

 

I think she had the general idea when she named Nagini, as the name comes from a woman who's able to turn into a large snake. Too coincidental for me.

 

"It will be clear Dumbledore is gay in new Fantastic Beasts film, says director"

 

The same people who demanded this will now say that whatever is done is too little and the confirmation comes too late. Entire articles pretending to be movie reviews of FB2 will spend their 500 words on only the scene that will confirm Dumbledore's sexuality and pass judgment based on this one thing. If there's anything else they mention, they'll go for Johnny Depp/Amber Heard drama and not anything actually related to Depp's performance in the film.

I'd add "calling it now", but that'd be like predicting that the Sun will rise in the east tomorrow.

 

Welcome to modern journalism. Try not to slam your head into the wall while you're here.

 

New trailer that explains why everyone ends up in Paris.

 

That "drama" involved physical and emotional abuse Depp "allegedly" inflicted on Heard. In the #MeToo era, that is the sort of thing worth bringing up when certain actors are casted in a prominent role in a prominent movie franchise.

 

But it's also not something we should condemn the movie for, which some people have already done.