#jacob x queenie

BIG SECRETS OF DUMBLEDORE SPOILER IMAGES BELOW

i will never stop talking about this scene it is simply perfect <3 also can we talk about queenie’s dress?? it’s so gorgeous

them <3

Queenie: What if we inverted our initials? I’d be Guennie Qoldstein!

Tina: I suppose Gina Toldstein doesn’t sound too strange.

Jacob: Kacob Jowalski?

Newt: It should be Scewt Namander: well, that’s not quite-

Dumbledore: Dlbus Bercival Wulfric Prian Aumbledore.

Grindeldore: Gellert Grinde…

Grindeldore: This is a stupid game anyway.

The third Fantastic Beasts movie is a deeply disappointing mess of a film that tries - not even hard - to save a sinking franchise. Only instead of being doomed by water pouring inexorably in, it seems the many plot holes and head-scratching twists act as all sorts of exits in the ship through which the magic inexorably escapes. The Secrets of Dumbledore proves many things, chief among them that it is never a good idea to try to capitalize on a very successful franchise just for the sake of money. The eight Harry Potter movies stand proud as one of the defining franchises of a generation, each movie critically and financially successful; now they are tarnished by the whims of this lesser, uglier, distant-would-be-sister franchise which tries too hard to emulate the success and magic of its predecessor. Only it doesn’t know how to do it. Or rather, JK Rowling doesn’t know how to do it.

BecauseFantastic Beasts is a case in point for why great writers don’t necessarily make great screenwriters. Retrospectively, it is even hard now separating the writer from the person; applying the adjective ‘great’ to Rowling seems a little bit exaggerated, regardless of her controversial personal views. As children growing up with each Harry Potter book and eagerly anticipating the next sequel, it was hard to take a step back, so engrossed and involved were we with the story. We lacked the necessary wisdom and intellect that come with age to assess the flaws of these books, no matter how much we loved them. Rowling has adopted the very bad habit of trying to keep interest in the Potter mythology by providing post-scriptum comments and other addendums that she did not write into her books, making it difficult for some to accept this as real parts of the story and for specific topics, not as some poor attempts at retconning her story to be more relevant in our own times.

The most infamous of those post-book revelations by now is that Dumbledore was gay and in love with Grindelwald. The reveal was largely negatively received, not because of its nature but because it was not written into the books and was only said by Rowling in passing. It was interpreted as a feeble attempt at inclusion in an otherwise overly straight array of characters. Then the second Fantastic Beasts film came and focused on Grindelwald and still did not acknowledge the relationship between the two wizards. The fault lies solely on Rowling, a probable combination of her personal views and of her dubious capabilities as a screenwriter. The three films of the Beasts franchise stumble largely in part because of their shoddy scripts and these were written by Rowling herself. Back when the first Fantastic Beasts was greenlit, Warner Bros agreed to the author’s demand that she be the only power behind the scripts, with absolutely no right on any rewrites. This move, which could only be fueled by ego, proved very dangerous and while the first movie was well-received, things got completely off-rails by the second with lesser financial revenues and critics turning away for the first time in the overall Wizarding World franchise. Warner Bros acknowledged the problem and for Secrets, Rowling - whether by her own volition or not - is not the sole screenwriter anymore, being joined instead by Steve Kloves, who helped pen previous Harry Potterscripts.

Following the woes of Crimes of Grindelwald,Secrets has the difficult task of righting the ship as well as restoring the magic that was still here in Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them. It only does so very partially, ending up just a tad better than its predecessor, and only because it seemingly wraps up its story - albeit in very loose ends - as opposed to the second one which had no proper ending. The problems were so colossal that in order to solve them, Secrets just decides to eschew a good chunk of them in a very dismissive way. A large part of the twists and turns of Crimes are just swept under the rug or retconned in an eyebrow-raising way.

• The most infuriating and ridiculous twist Rowling tried to push at viewers was that Credance was somehow a long-lost Dumbledore brother. Other than being a frankly unnecessary attempt at making an original character more relevant, it also contradicted a lot of what was already known about the Dumbledore family. One dead sister revealed in Deathly Hallows was more than enough. Now we also got a secret brother. When did Harry Potter turn into such a Young and the Restless-level soap opera? This was absolutely not needed and put the spotlight onto Ezra Miller, an actor who was absolutely not the focus of these films. Warner Bros must have bit their fingernails following the various reports of Miller’s erratic behaviour in which they attacked people and were arrested on several occasions. I must admit that I was never a fan of Miller - their presence in the first two films was just okay - but here, knowing who the person was behind the character (which I didn’t even like) seeing their face every time Credence was on screen made me cringe. I just didn’t want to see them on my screen, I didn’t want them to have so much screentime and seeing Credance go wild with violence on Dumbledore, knowing that some version of it is also how they behave in real life was just very off-putting.

• So how does Secrets deal with the biggest twist that literally made the cliffhanger of Crimes? By retconning it into the stalest resolution possible. Faced with the criticism of that plot development (if we can even call it that), Rowling and Warner Bros could not backtrack and just say that well, Credance is in fact not a Dumbledore after all! No, he is, unfortunately. Only he is not a brother to Albus, he is the secret son of Aberforth! Soap-opera levels I’m telling you! This solution is the only one that could actually work with what we know of the established lore and also with reducing the importance of Credance as a character. It also contradicts everything Crimes was working for. What was all the fuss made about him being a Dumbledore? Why did Grindelwald target him specifically? Why did he tell him he was a brother to Albus? No one knows and no one wants us to ask the questions. Oh, and dear Ariana was an Obscurial! This is the latest example of woke revelations Rowling seems so fond of using, trying to make herself clever but really all it did for me was uttering a loud 'Really ?!’ followed by a heavy sigh. So the Obscurial thing runs in the family I guess. Aberforth was sexing up some random girl, who gets no mention at all; why she’s out of the picture, why was Aurelius abandoned, how exactly did Albus and Aberforth come to know of his existence… all of these points which could have been used to further develop the characters, are not even brushed aside. They’re not even considered.

That’s the second biggest flaw of Secrets. In having so many problems to solve, the film copies the exact same formula that doomed Game of Thrones’ final season a few years ago. The story is what counts, character development be damned. Here again, the action jumps all over the place - in a 'sort-of-funny’ way, the characters justify it because Grindelwald can somehow see the future and anticipate their movements, hence why they have to behave erratically - and the characters we’ve come to love and … um… care for? … are relegated to being simple pawns to be moved on a larger chess. One blatant example is the arrest and subsequent imprisonment of Theseus – for unclear reasons – which serves absolutely no other purpose than giving Newt a detour to the German Wizarding Prison to free his brother, which he does. But the sequence is the occasion to see another fantastic beast, so I guess that has to count right? It seems producers still don’t understand that what makes or breaks a movie (or a worldwide TV phenomenon) is the characters. Moving on from the fact that Rowling sidestepped Newt as the franchise’s original central character in favor of the more appealing Dumbledore, which renders the Fantastic Beasts title very moot and preposterous (seriously I will never stop ranting about the fact that this has become an incredibly mistitled franchise! What are the beasts here for if not for just pretending that the title is still somewhat relevant?) any personality that was left in the cast of Fantastic Beasts is seeped away in this entry. Crimes had at the very least this going on for it. Through its many twists and turns, it gave some of its characters some depth and set up stories that had potential. Here Dumbledore is essentially the only one who is allowed some semblance of emotion.

• Going back to Credance (and this is the last we will speak of him), the character is reduced (not that we complain about it) to being an angry boy who has no real use in Grindelwald’s grand scheme other than being so angry at Dumbledore that he tries to Obscurial-murder him. Then the big family reveal happens, and we see absolutely no gradual change, no emotional turmoil before he just decides to be a nice guy and go with his newly found father, no matter the immense issues left between them.

• Nagini who? Remember in Crimes of Grindelwald, Rowling tried another of her clever twists by attempting to write the backstory of Nagini, the snake companion of Voldemort, a reveal she says she sat on for a decade. Why she decided not to include it in the books then is an entirely valid question but in retrospect it was probably for the best because that revelation backfired spectacularly with an overwhelmingly negative response to an Asian woman cursed to eventually becoming subservient to an evil dark lord. (Not to mention that she had somehow to end up in Albania at some point). Nagini in her human form nonetheless made for a somewhat interesting character. Despite her dubious reasons for even being here, it would have been interesting to learn about her origins, and the path that would take her to Voldemort. She was also Credance’s only friend (or possibly more). At the end of the second film, she had seemingly joined the good guys which gave her even better potential given her eventual turn to evil. Secrets deals with her… by not dealing with her, erasing all traces of the character, and pretending it never happened. She is not even mentioned, her absence is completely unexplained, and it wouldn’t surprise me in the future if Rowling backtracks and says this was just a snake-woman coincidentally named Nagini but who shares no link with Voldemort’s favourite pet.

• Moving on to yet-another deeply disappointing point of contention is Queenie. Arguably one of the breakout characters introduced in Fantastic Beasts And Where To Find Them, she was paired off with Jacob in an instantly well-received love story. The second movie spent a great deal of time focusing on her inner turmoil, which stemmed from the pain she experienced of not being able to marry Jacob who is a Muggle. She resorted to deeply troubling ends and her fragile emotional state eventually made her embrace Grindelwald’s views on the basis that she would eventually, finally be able to be with the man she loved. This turn to evil for the greater good was one of the most heartbreaking twists of the film and it gave the character infinite potential in her story. The Secrets of Dumbledore infuriatingly does away with all that could come with this development, choosing simplicity instead of following on one of its few interesting storylines. Aside from the visual transformation showing not so subtly that Queenie is a pale version of her former joyful self, she is unfortunately relegated to just being a member of Grindelwald’s circle, useful only for her Legilimens ability. We spend absolutely no time on what her time with Grindelwald has been like, what effect it had on her own views, if she started espousing his beliefs or if she started drifting away (the film hints at the latter) … Her own goal – and what he promised – of a peaceful union between Muggle and Witch is not mentioned at all and the next time Grindelwald does speak about it, he is categorically against it. Sure, she still has feelings for Jacob but the potential of a former ally and lover going full evil in the name of love has been utterly wasted. Instead, she is just… standing there, very passive. And in another example of a character acting only out of necessity for the story, she returns to the good side in the final climax of the film, for no other reason than because Jacob tells her he still loves her. There is no internal debate, no emotional struggle with what she must have done, with who she is as a person and even worse there are no consequences. Grindelwald just dismisses her and Jacob, torturing the latter in the process but only as a demonstration for a larger crowd which greatly diminishes the importance of it. The film then tries to make some semblance of a happy ending with a wedding between the two but in doing so, it just kind of erases all that has happened between them, the drama and the trauma that must be there between them, and above all, Queenie suffers absolutely no consequence for having been part of the inner circle of one of the greatest evil wizards of all time.

• Aside from Jacob who is still the comic relief of the franchise and gets next to no development aside from a coreless wand (whaaaat?) which he doesn’t even use – really what was the point? – we cannot talk about Queenie without mentioning Tina. Katherine Waterston was the most vocal on her opposition to Rowling’s controversial views and it is all but a given that her role was drastically reduced in consequence, either by her own choice or Rowling’s. Officially, Warner Bros hides behind the COVID excuse, but it is a hard pill to swallow when Tina was the female lead of the first two movies. Even more preposterous here is the excuse by which they explain Tina’s absence. She is too busy with her work as Head of the Auror Department. Meaning she is in the country! She’s not even away! And you mean to tell me that she is busy working on something that’s more important than averting the rise of Grindelwald, given what his larger scheme for Wizards and Muggles is (which she witnessed first-hand)? More important than trying to save her own sister who has joined the enemy? The whole thing seems very much contrived and her only appearances towards the end of the movie just feel awkward. She also seems to be in some sort of relationship with Newt, seeing that he carries photographs of her but whatever happened between the two, we are not made privy to. I must admit that given that we know the two are to be married when all this mess is done, the first time I listened to the score and heard the final track, it instantly screamed wedding and I thought this would be Newt and Tina’s as a way of wrapping up the story as well as the character.

• Another character whose importance Secrets retroactively lessened is that of Leta Lestrange. The inclusion of a member of the Lestrange family was no doubt an attempt to explore the ancestry of this prominent family in the Potter lore. Entire parts of the second movie’s plot revolved around her and her family’s long-lost member and one of the numerous twists was that this forgotten brother was not in the end Credance but Yusuf. Leta also had some history with the Scamender brothers, being engaged to Theseus but having been a close friend (and possibly more) of Newt. Then she was killed by Grindelwald and her relevance faded with her. Whatever seeds of rivalry between Newt and Theseus over her were brushed aside, Theseus is not even shown mourning over the loss of his fiancée (mind you, for those saying that it’s been a few years, Jacob casually mentions that he has known Newt for less than a year which means the insanity of these three films is compressed within a few months! Or maybe this is yet another mistake in this convoluted story…) and Yusuf, left largely with nothing important to do, provides absolutely no insight into his mind, his persona, his story. The Lestrange family link is another plot that Secrets just pushes on the side as something that didn’t work. Yusuf’s only role in the movie is to go be an infiltrated double-triple spy in Grindelwald’s circle which absolutely doesn’t pay off because he sort of disappears until the climax of the film, having provided no aid whatsoever for either side. In the process, he allows Grindelwald to casually destroy whatever memories he has of his sister and (seemingly) proves himself to be a good Legilimens since Queenie scans him and confirms to Grindelwald he is on their side. Or perhaps she lied. Or perhaps Yusuf really was and then had a change of heart. So many characters do so for no real reason and it’s excruciatingly boring to try and keep up.

• The same can be said about the various members of Grindelwald’s circle, the most prominent member being a woman who doesn’t even get a name (?), whose motives we don’t know, whose link or relationship to Grindelwald we know nothing about either … she and her pals are just there. And so many other characters make unwarranted heel turns it’s almost comical. The previous movie also showed this particular trend and it proved as head-scratching as it is now. Here for some reason, Grindelwald’s followers also include several high-ranking members of the German Ministry of Magic, including (it seems, I’m not even sure!) the Minister himself. But these characters are the latest in an ever-growing cast and understandably, don’t deserve the time that is not even given to the leads. So, obscure they are, obscure they stay. Why they joined Grindelwald in the first place, what role they play, which consequences some will have to pay at some point, it just doesn’t matter in this kind of bloated, over-simplified story.

• It’s almost sad that nothing can be said about Newt, the original titular character of the franchise, because aside from his endearing persona, he is unfortunately a rather bland character. Like Jacob, he stays very stale and gets no character development. For some reason at the beginning of this movie he is in the Amazon, alone and in search of a magical creature named qilin. Do not ask why. He’s ambushed by Credance and company, it takes two (!) Avada Kedavras to kill the qilin mother (since when?) and even then, she’s not entirely dead (!) and after overpowering Newt, Credance and company just leave him alive (for obvious plot-armor reasons) You would think there’s a reason why he must live but his survival has no incidence whatsoever because he has absolutely no role in Grindelwald’s plans. Newt’s new acolytes are his secretary Bunty, which is probably the only thing she’ll be remembered for and Lally, an Ilvermorny teacher who has been corresponding with him. And Newt does not even spend that much time with them to establish any real bond. Newt spends much of his time alone and the short time he is paired off with his brother unfortunately amounts to nothing more than a comical/tense escape scene. It has no real effect on Newt, or Theseus for that matter. 

• Yet again, much potential is wasted after Ilvermorny, the American Wizarding School, was tantalizingly mentioned back in the first film, prompting many to imagine what a visit to it would be like, what a contrast it would be to the Hogwarts we know. Lally unfortunately doesn’t provide any more information and for the unattentive viewer, she might as well be one of the yet-unseen teachers of Hogwarts. For the sake of bringing back the magic, the producers lazily settle for a return to Hogwarts, complete with the old John Williams’ theme and gratuitous shots of Quidditch and students in the Great Hall, in the process perpetuating the now-very-old trope of Slytherin’s gang of boys being snickering morons/implied-bullies. For some reason, the Great Hall at breakfast is the perfect place for Aurors, Muggle, Magizoologist and co. to meet and Dumbledore decides to discuss his big plans here rather than in his office. Minerva McGonagall proves that Nicolas Flamel can go f**k himself with his search of eternal life (yet another big absentee probably relegated to the closet of unwanted, unnecessary characters with Nagini) by persistently appearing as a teacher at Hogwarts, against all that had been previously established in her biography, notably that she didn’t start to teach there until decades later.

• And finally, after as many detours as in the film, we can focus on Grindelwald. I will say it from the get-go. Johnny Depp’s performance was superior. There, it’s been said, and it is out there. Now, Mads Mikkelsen is an incredibly talented actor (I personally loved his work in Hannibal), and he does wonders in trying to salvage the role. His Grindelwald has charisma and some chemistry with Jude Law’s Dumbledore. He becomes quiet and menacing – essentially a toned-down version of Hannibal. But Depp had an edge on the character that Mikkelsen does not (or perhaps chose not to explore). Depp’s Grindelwald had equal (and I’d argue, more, in light of his closing speech in Crimes) charisma. He was also quiet and menacing, in his own way. But what Depp gave to the character – as he did with all the roles he played – was a touch of craziness, that subtle hint that behind the veneer, there was this real possibility for sheer, axe-crazy, madness. There was real hidden danger, something that Mikkelsen, in his calm demeanor, changes into quiet threat. Mikkelsen exudes fear and respect, not letting anyone near while Depp infused some sort of perverse accessibility to the character, which made him all the more enthralling and seducing – and that more dangerous. It is much easier to imagine a warmer, more tender version of Depp’s Grindelwald in his past relationship with Dumbledore than Mikkelsen’s more aloof iteration. Following Depp’s departure, Grindelwald also reverts back to a more formal appearance. Warner Bros pushing Depp through the door was a PR disaster for the movie, especially after they had previously backed him up through the second film. Considering the current outpour of support for him and Ezra Miller’s fall from grace, the joke is on them.

• Despite being the second most-important character of the film, Grindelwald also suffers immensely from the bad writing plaguing Secrets. The previous film ended with him having made a very charismatic speech that gained him hundreds of followers. That was in Paris. For some reason, at the beginning of this movie, he is ‘wanted’ and with a lot less followers. And we’re now in Berlin. Again, do not ask why. Then mid-film, he is absolved, again for reasons, and allowed to present himself at the election for the next great leader of the Wizarding World (!) The nuances and subtleties which composed his reasons for his actions, presented in the second film as wanting to avoid the horrors of the Second World War and protecting the Muggles from themselves and from inflicting unimaginable destruction (he could see in the future back then but inexplicably, he needs a qilin in this movie to do so…) are eschewed completely in this film, dashing in the process so much potential at exploring what the involvement of the Wizarding World would have looked like in the Second World War. Instead, it is reduced to a simple fascist retread of Voldemort’s later motto of ‘Wizards being superior to Muggles’. This removes much of the complexity that characterized Grindelwald and unfortunately, without that, there’s not much left.
  

• It would have been interesting to dive into his past, learn his story, what his relationship was to Albus and how these ideas were born between them. It would have been interesting to actually see the ‘greater good’ beyond his hatred for Muggles. Instead, we are treated to a very closed-off version of the character, which commands respect but whose thoughts we are not privy to. Crimes succeeded on some level because it gave viewers some insight to his private thoughts, what made him act this or that way, but Secrets downgrades him to the standard villain to be defeated. Ultimately, his past and love story with Albus is rendered moot because like so many plot devices that seemed interesting at first but were not properly thought through, Secrets just does away with them in the most bizarre and contrived way. The blood pact between the former lovers was a formidable item that prevented the two from ever attempting to harm each other. Given that Potter-lore established that the two eventually found a way to stalemate in one of the most formidable magical duels of all time, it was incredibly exciting to see how we could ever come to that place. But that was really overestimating Rowling’s creativeness because she breaks the blood pact at the end of this film, and nobody understands the how or why. A killing spell from Grindelwald is countered (!) by two unnamed spells from Albus and Aberforth and that, somehow, is what breaks the blood pact. Albus and Grindelwald then engage in a duel and it’s the most understated, disappointing duel ever. Lasting perhaps less than a minute, it’s made essentially of the two of them apparating and disapparating to avoid each other, locked in some sort of alternate dimension in which they are alone, preventing unwanted destruction to the real world. Aside from the melodramatic hands on each other’s hearts and the ‘Who will love you now Albus?’ - unfortunately undermined in its harsh, shouted delivery - there isn’t much to save in this scene which still serves as the final appearance of Grindelwald. The duel results in a stalemate and before he can be arrested, Grindelwald escapes. By the way, now that we think about it, I must ask, what WERE those secrets of Dumbledore (aside from Credance’s unuseful brother-retconned-nephew)? Because if we’re talking about the secrets he had with Grindelwald, well, surprise, they’re still…secrets.
  

While this is clearly done to serve as a de-facto series finale in the event Warner Bros pulls the plug on the franchise, Grindelwald’s larger scheme seems to fall flat given that he spent much of the first two films targeting Credance only for it to come to nothing and assembling followers of his views and trying to achieve power, only for it to come to nothing as well. Grindelwald’s rise had no effect on the Wizarding World as a whole except being equaled to the rise of fascism and racism; unlike what Peter Jackson did with The Hobbit, no link is established to bridge Fantastic Beasts’ conclusion to whatever comes with Harry Potter. Rowling’s established mythology asserts that Grindelwald’s reign of fear lasted a few more years before he was finally defeated which is probably the content of the two planned final films of the franchise. She has stated that the fifth film would push to 1945, which is (not so) coincidentally the end of the Second World War, all but confirming that the event plays a role in Grindelwald’s story. Neither film has been greenlit so far and though it is possible that Grindelwald’s potential might be restored if Warner Bros decides to continue with the franchise (and we could finally witness a real version of that historic duel) we shouldn’t get our hopes up that Rowling will know to include all that’s missing in Grindelwald’s story. That’s not even mentioning the fact that he has the Elder Wand, has been potentially researching the Deathly Hallows and that it surely must be tied to his larger plan, or that his favourite symbol is inexplicably not the Deathly Hallows but a complete custom one…

All this amounts to a disappointing film, tasked with course-correcting the flaws of its predecessor but proceeding to do so in the worst ways possible. The Wizarding World franchise’s fall from grace results in a standard Hollywood blockbuster, shining with CGI and big spectacle sadly hiding a deep hollowness of plot holes and bland characters. It is quite sad to see such a downgrade, especially from such a beloved world. The Secrets of Dumbledore cannot even argue that it is visually better than Crimes because in spite of its beautiful CGI, it does not boast any visually arresting sequence like the one that closed Crimes (that one above). Even Crimes’ opening sequence was better than Secrets’. The only aspect that has been consistently good over the entire three films is James Newton Howard’s musical score which – much like Ramin Djawadi’s work on Game of Thrones – elevates the film to levels it could only dream to achieve without it. The composer’s work for the Beasts franchise is one of his best and the skill with which he weaves the various themes and leitmotifs is rarely seen. The result, especially noticeable in CrimesandSecrets, is an incredibly pleasant musical score, made of various returning themes that convey way more meaning and emotion than what actually transpires through the screen.

Critics have said that The Secrets of Dumbledore is a better film than Crimes and that it more resembles the first film, being a funnier adventure and achieving the task of recapturing the magic. I’d argue against that point. Secretsis not a better film than Crimes, or only marginally so, and most probably only because it does try to wrap up its numerous storylines. But the plot devices by which it solved the problems of Crimes are problematic in themselves as well. Solving a problem by pretending it didn’t happen is not a solution; it’s just an extremely lazy form of writing. This should be demonstration enough that Rowling shouldn’t be allowed to pen the future scripts of the following films – if they ever happen. Having written some of the past Harry Potter scripts, I doubt that Kloves is behind most of the problems plaguing this one. Financially, the film is also largely underperforming. Warner Bros can again hide behind the COVID excuse and pretend that the numbers will be good nonetheless. But with the lowest opening of any film in the Wizarding World franchise, and a cume that’s nearing only $400 million (the first and second movies made roughly $800 and $650 million respectively) it is evident that more and more people are not fooled anymore by the simplistic Hollywood-blockbuster formula. The very existence of the two next films relies on the critical and financial performance of this one. That no work has even begun on them yet in a sign that Warner Bros hesitates, and they have good reason to between the box-office failure, the mixed reception, and the incredibly problematic people behind the scenes. Neither Rowling nor Miller have been punished the way Depp was; even if Miller could be written out, Rowling is unfortunately here to stay. Many people have pushed for the film to be boycotted and instead are pirating it. I will admit that I checked it out – and rather lately - only out of curiosity and because I had nothing better to do, and because this particular world (and story) retains some sort of interest to me (I did grow up with Harry, Ron and Hermione after all, and I experienced firsthand the phenomenon that surrounded the excruciating wait and release of each book and subsequently, of each film) but there was no doubt that I wasn’t going to the movies to see it and boy am I happy not to have paid for such a disappointment. There is even a part of me that would have been quite fine if I didn’t get to see the movie at all. Magic can die, indeed.