open/close all folders
Credence's fate
- Unless something was simply misinterpreted, it's said in this movie that Credence has the phoenix following him because he's going to die soon. But at the end of the movie, when Aberforth finally meets him, he tells him to "come home", and then helps him to his feet and walks off with him. So... Is he still going to die now? Or was his Obscurus the thing that was killing him, and now that he's with his father who loves him, that will cure him of it? Or is it something that's just not going to be clear until the next installment?
- Yes, he will die soon. The parasite has been poisoning him for thirty years at this point and he’s made it twice as long as Aunt Ariana who’s the only known other Obscurial who made it past ten.
- It's almost certainly too late for Credence—even if Aberforth's love could help, the Obscurus has been eating away at him for thirty years and it's pretty clearly going to kill him soon. And with Ezra Miller heading for a Role-Ending Misdemeanor situation, Credence will probably die off-screen before the next film.
Aurelius
- Supposedly Credence was ultimately born without Aberforth's explicit knowledge. Does that mean he was never actually given the name "Aurelius Dumbledore"? Did Aberforth plan on that name with the baby's mother, and Grindelwald knew that somehow, or did Grindelwald make the name up completely to suit his needs?
- My interpretation is that it's something Grindelwald made up. Due to the time period and out of wedlock nature of the pregnancy, I'd guess he was born with his mother's last name.
- It's possible that his mother chose Aurelius to fit in with the Dumbledore family's Alliterative Family tradition, even without Aberforth's input. Aurelius probably didn't get the last name Dumbledore at birth. But Grindelwald could still have tracked him down—he was around that summer, and probably knew the girl's name, so he could find her.
Lack of security
- Why does the Qilin, the animal that is used to select the overall leader of the Wizarding World, have no security? You would think that such an important beast would have a dedicated team of top-notch wizards guarding it at all times.
- Because the Qilin is not regularly used to decide I.C.W. elections anymore. It's said that wizardkind used to rely on it to choose their leader, but it's not said that they're still doing so currently. It's only brought out in the election shown in the movie because the guy in charge is in Grindelwald's pocket and knows he's already rigged it to choose him.
What happened to Nagini?
- Tina is given a line or two to explain her absence for most of the movie, but what about Nagini? She was shown at Hogwarts at the end of the last movie, but in this one she's nowhere to be seen. Did she abandon the heroes at some point in between, or is she just supposed to be busy with something offscreen?
- Nagini was written out because of Kim's pregnancy. I guess she'll be back for 4 for Credence's death and to meet Riddle. Lots of HP characters sat out installments with no explanation.
Insufficient Evidence
- So I get that Vogel is secretly a Grindelwald supporter. But I don’t understand how he can use the excuse of “insufficient evidence” to relieve Grindelwald of the charges against him. At the start of the first film we see a montage of Grindelwald killing aurors and blowing up buildings, he kills lots of American aurors in front of the head of MACUSA. We see various headlines about his attacks across Europe. In the second film he throws the Head of Incarceration for the ICW out of the carriage into the sea. There’s so much evidence against his crimes I don’t understand how Vogel can use that as an excuse and get away with it.
- Grindelwald is very manipulative and, as seen in the second movie, not extraneous to have his loyal servants do the dirty job for him. Considering the avaibility of shapeshifting potions and spells, I probably think he shifted Grindelwald's crimes on lackeys who acted on their own volition or something like that.
- Given Grindelwald's inspiration as a character, his ability to seize power by relying on a weak-willed German politician, circumventing laws and proper procedures and arresting anyone who might disagree with him isn't that far from possible. Especially given the time period.
The Thing in the Prison
- About the "thing" in the German Prison (whose design actually reminded me of the Blast-End Skrewts from the fourth Harry Potter book more than anything else): what's supposed to be? And, while crappy prisons with deadly guardians are nothing new, why keep a huge man-eating horror that will promptly attack and devour prisoners in their cells as soon as the lights go out (which seems to be randomic) and, judging by the final scene, no obvious means to keep it at bay given to the jailer? Prisons can be brutal, yes, but are supposed to keep people in alive if in bad condition, a place where they could randomly be impaled and devoured is pretty much an execution site with a side order of Fed to the Beast. If Vogel (and by extension Grindelwald) wanted Theseus dead, they could have just disposed of him as soon as they could (and maybe set up a halpless goon Polyjuiced as him for a while), while if they wanted to use Theseus or interrogate him on Dumbledore's plans they could have chosen a better prison without such high risks.
- According to the Movie Magic companion book for the film, the creatures are manticores, with the large one being the Queen - for some reason, the concept artists wanted a more scorpion design, as opposed to the traditional (and previously established in canon) appearance of a lion body, human head, and scorpion tail. As for why it dwells in Erkstag, no clue, other than apparently German wizards have terrible hospitality and a severe lack of human decency/empathy.
- The classical one could have been easier to animate I'd say. Then again, given that apparently the Skrewts in the books are half-manticores this one could be a more arthropode subspecies (which Hagrid used to breed the Skrewts), so it's not totally out of the blue.
- As for why Theseus is being held there, probably just so they can get rid of him without anyone having to kill him directly. If memory serves, Theseus is head of the British Auror department and in staunch opposition to Grindelwald, both of which are good reasons for them to want to get him out of the way.
- The Fed to the Beast bit also solves the problem of Priori Incantem with Implausible Deniability - "WE didn't do anything to him; check any of our wands and see there's no Avada Kedavra for him. Maybe he's just off on a bender and didn't tell you."
The year the film is set
- A minor point but when Lally meets Jacob, she says he first met Newt "a little over a year ago". However, the film is set in 1932, five years after the previous film. So did she misspeak or is this yet another example of J.K. Rowling being absolutely terrible at math?
- Most likely a case of Rowling being terrible at math, plus with the constant gaps in production, she and Steve Kloves most likely forgot the dates established prior. Or they just didn't care enough to correct it.
- Or Lalie might have made a mistake or been misinformed. It is a bit unlikely that she'd be off by as many as five years, especially given the seemingly renowned events that Newt and Jacob went through together, but the only person she was shown speaking to before this movie was Flamel; we don't know that she's ever met Newt in person, we know she hasn't met Jacob, and so she must have been filled in on the exact details by someone else. Jacob was also supposed to have been Obliviated at the end of the first movie and thus would've "forgotten" about Newt until the second, which may explain at least some of the discrepancy, too.
Dumbledore at Hogwarts
- In the second movie Dumbledore was teaching Defence. Is he still teaching and if so, who's taking over all his classes while he's running around trying to sort out everything?
- Yes, Dumbledore is still teaching. As for who is covering his classes, he literally asks Minerva to cover for him before he leaves for Berlin.
"Half a dozen" suitcases?
- "Half a dozen" copies of Newt's suitcase are demanded from the suitcase-shop guy, right? That can only add up to 6 copies; with Newt's original, they would be 7 total. Yet there are 5 suitcases in total, so only 4 copies were made. This seems even too extreme of a math mistake to be a case of Writers Cannot Do Math, so what gives?
- Just because we only see four copies being used in the plan doesn't mean only four copies were made. My guess is that Bunty thought everyone involved in their initial meeting would need a case, considering a big part of the overall plan was that no one knew what anyone else was up to. She might've asked for six replicas thinking that Yusuf and Dumbledore might need one, but by the time the climax rolled around, they both turned out to be preoccupied with separate matters. Plus, it throws off Grindelwald's precognitions as to how many suitcases he should be expecting, so it doesn't hurt anyone for the count to be off by two.
- Also, the original case had Newt's workshop and all the rest of his creatures in it, and Dumbledore may not have wanted to risk them being harmed (or worse, accidentally getting loose like they did in the first film and wreaking havoc on their plans). So the original may have been kept behind at Hogwarts, meaning all of the cases shown were copies, and Bunty created a similar habitat for just the qilin in one of the duplicates.
- Tina Goldstein was also supposed to have a proper role in the film, but had to be written out. So it's possible that one of the copies was to be hers, and they just forgot to change the "half a dozen" line from Bunty. If we assume that all five cases used in the climax were duplicates of the original, and that the sixth copy was meant for Tina, then that adds up perfectly.
Grindelwald knowing he's unworthy
- Shouldn't a Visionary Villain like Grindelwald, or at least his most dedicated supporters, expect that the Qilin would pick him without interference?
- He did expect the Qilin to bow to him. The screenplay explains that, when he first sees and interacts with the Qilin that he's looking at it expectantly, waiting for it to bow, and when it doesn't, he decides to slit its throat.
Replicating suitcases
- Why couldn't they just use the Doubling Charm to replicate the suitcase instead of having them handmade? Seems like quite an unnecessary hassle for the suitcase maker to have to do it so quickly too.
- Objects that are replicated via the Doubling Charm don't last long, and will rot or tarnish much quicker than the original. Considering the plan is for the suitcases to be completely identical, the risk of the copies degrading too quickly, thus giving away which cases are fake, is not worth it. Plus, there's the fact that the original suitcase still houses dozens of magical creatures, and it's never really said what happens if the Doubling Charm is cast on living beings. For all we know, this might result in dozens of lifeless bodies, since, if the charm can't replicate a Horcrux's soul fragment, it's doubtful it could copy an entire soul.
