Recently, the official Comic-Con Trailer for Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes Of Grindelwald was launched by Warner Bros. Pictures. Despite the conclusion of the most adventurous and engrossing series of our times, the love and pure madness to see more of anything that remotely relates to the Harry Potter’s Cinematic journey is something that will never fade away. I will always fall short of words to describe the contribution of these movies and how fortunate we were to experience the brainchild of “J.K Rowling” come to life. So its better I do not attempt to do the impossible and straightaway take you through a nostalgic trip wherein you will find great insights and learning regarding the connection between Harry Potter and Fantastic Beasts.

“Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald” is directed by David Yates, from a screenplay by J.K. Rowling. The film is produced by David Heyman, J.K. Rowling, Steve Kloves and Lionel Wigram. Slated for release on November 16, 2018, the film will be distributed worldwide in 2D and 3D in select theatres and IMAX by Warner Bros. Pictures, a Warner Bros. Entertainment Company. It is the second of five all new adventures in J.K. Rowling’s Wizarding World. The film features an ensemble cast led by Eddie Redmayne, Katherine Waterston, Dan Fogler, Alison Sudol, Ezra Miller, with Jude Law and Johnny Depp. The cast also includes, Zoë Kravitz, Callum Turner, Claudia Kim, William Nadylam, Kevin Guthrie, Carmen Ejogo, and Poppy Corby-Tuech.

Before I begin to explain you the relationship, the following extract will help you rewind and set the context for the upcoming facts in this blog post.

”At the end of the first film, the powerful Dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald (Johnny Depp) was captured by MACUSA (Magical Congress of the United States of America), with the help of Newt Scamander (Eddie Redmayne). But, making good on his threat, Grindelwald escaped custody and has set about gathering followers, most unsuspecting of his true agenda: to raise pure-blood wizards up to rule over all non-magical beings. In an effort to thwart Grindelwald’s plans, Albus Dumbledore (Jude Law) enlists his former student Newt Scamander, who agrees to help, unaware of the dangers that lie ahead. Lines are drawn as love and loyalty are tested, even among the truest friends and family, in an increasingly divided wizarding world.”

Okay. Now that you are well versed with what this is all about, let go ahead and bridge the gap between the two Chronicles.

Many people either did not like the first part of this new series or did not understand the essentials. So, firstly there is only one character who is common with whom you will be able to relate quite well and that is Albus Dumbledore. The movie plot is such that it talks about the past story of Dumbledore and that too, 60 years before the beginning of Harry Potter’s Quest to come to Hogwarts. The story however revolves around 3 main characters namely Dumbledore, Newt Scamander and Gellert Grindelwald. Lets start with Newt. Newt is basically a special student of Dumbledore and also the one who is tremendously in love with magical creatures. This is the reason you saw in Fantastic Beasts: Where To Find Them that he is chasing new creatures, interacting with them and taking care of them. Not only that, he is very much interested in researching about these new creatures and going in depth to know their existence and potential. He is putting together all this information in form of a book. This is the exact same book which is seen to be taught in Hogwarts in the Harry Potter series. This character was never mentioned or seen in Harry Potter but in the movie Harry Potter and The Prisoner Of Azkaban, his name was seen on the Marauder’s Map which was given to Harry by Fred and George. There are 3 theories to this : (1) He must be there to visit Dumbledore as there must be some sort of Kinship, (2) His interest of creatures has brought him to save the BuckBeak, the hippogriff and (3) Must be mostly an Easter Egg which is the most likely explanation seeing the timeline.

There is one more connection of this character. Its very difficult to forget Bellatrix lestrange. In Fantastic Beasts, there is a mention of Leta lestrange who was seen as Newt’s Girlfriend. But the relation of Bellatrix and Leta is yet to be revealed.

Now lets talk about Gellert Grindelwald (Played Fantastically by none other than King of versatility in Hollywood, Johnny Depp). He is the main villain of the story and also the most connected character. He was one of the closest friend of Dumbledore and approached Albus with the intention of getting all the 3 Deathly Hallows shown in the the conclusion parts of the Harry Potter series which you all must be quite familiar with. Still to give you a recap : The Elder Wand, The Cloak of Invisibility, and Resurrection Stone. So, Dumbledore gets to know of Gellert’s plan and declares a war against him along with his brother Aberforth in which Albus’s sister .. Ariana gets killed and Gellert manages to run away from the scene.

After a few years, he returns to steal the wand from Gregorovitch (The wand maker) and this scene is seen in Deathly Hallows part one. Fantastic Beast is the story exactly from this scene onwards. Though we have not seen the elder wand with Grindelwald yet but we expect to see it soon in the second part. This character is also seen when Voldemort comes to confront with him in the Prison regarding the location of elder wand and who possess it.

This was in detail understanding of the plot between the two. If you wish to understand this simply then think of it this was. There have been 3 main wars that have taken place in the wizarding world. The first one was the war between Grindelwald and Dumbledore which remains to be the main focus of all five parts of Fantastic Beasts series. The second one was when Voldemort made his first attack and Order of Phoenix managed to battle it out and this war was over when Voldemort attempted to kill Harry but couldn’t pass through because of Lilly’s power of Love for her son. The last war was the one we all saw in the Harry Potter and Deathly Hallows Part 2 where Harry’s Army / Dumbledore’s army fights against Voldemort and Harry is successful to kill him finally.

Hope this explanation has helped to you to know more about the relevance of upcoming series of installments. I am attaching the trailer below. Do see it and let us all get ready once again to experience literal chills.