Against my better judgement I decided to watch The Crimes of Grindelwald. Against better judgement, because I’m no friend to the first Fantastic Beasts movie (read how salty I am about that movie here), but I heard this one was better. And I’m aaaaalll about second chances (eventhough I was fairly certain I wouldn’t like this one either, but a girl can try to be impartial).

(spoiler alert: I wasn’t good at being impartial)

(spoiler alert: I get pretty nit-pickey on some stuff)

First off: the Good Stuff

Like with the first movie, everything looks great. Costumes are great, CGI on point. Queenie’s wig looked considerably worse, but not Jasper Cullen bad.

I liked Leta Lestrange a lot. I think Zoë Kravitz did a great job and made the most of her character. Her back story? Let’s not get into that already. That belongs to the Bad Stuff.

Newt is autism coded and I actually really apreciate that. I think Eddie Redmayne comfirmed it too, which is really great. His symptoms seems to be worse during the Hogwarts flashbacks too, which makes sense, because you usually learn how to deal with them as you get older.

The overal tone of the film is way more cohesive than the first movie. There are some attempts at humour and it still goes pretty dark material wise, but doesn’t teeter back and forth between the two as much.

Didn’t hate Jude Law as Dumbledore. But then again I have never hated Jude Law as anything.

The Bad Stuff

Or I should say, things that irked me personally. Obviously, these are my opinions and not applicable to everyone that saw this movie.

The overall problem can be surmised as follows: Don’t think about it.

The movie expects that you take what your shown at face value and don’t think farther than that. Which leads to a number of baffling situations that took me right out of the movie and right into “wait a minute…” territory. Some other issues I have with this movie aren’t as much plotholes as they are just things I personally disliked.

Issue 1: Really hates lizards, or really loves cronies

The movie opens with Grindelwald restrained to a chair, staring into The Void. A peephole opens and reveals a jailer looking in. A lizard appears next to Grindelwald for… reasons.

Up next the Minister of Magic from the UK and Madam President from America walk upto the cell and look through the peephole too. Madam President says that they took out his tongue because he was so persuasive (little side note: you use magic for everything but not a spell for that?).

So Grindelwald is going to be moved from the American wizard jail to the UK w izard jail and gets loaded up into a flying cart. Fine. I don’t get why you wouldn’t take a less risky form of transportation, but fine. The jailer we saw earlier sees them off. The cart is off into the sky. He apparates to the bottom of the cart. No one notices. Inside the cart, Grindelwald is starting to change. He’s actually the jailer! The person hanging on the bottom the cart is actually Grindelwald! He proceeds to hijack the cart and get back his servant (the jailer).

Wait a minute…

Why the fuck where they already swapped? When were they already swapped? It shows that the jailer, Abernathy, has a forked lizard tongue, suggesting that it was him that they actually took the tongue from. So when did that happen? That morning? How long were they already swapped? If they were swapped and Grindelwald was out, why didn’t he just leave the jail?

The lizard is there also. It really loves Grindelwald, so Grindelwald chucks it out of the window, presumably to show how much he doesn’t care. (I’ll be honest, I saw this coming up in a couple reviews and thought that the lizard thing was such an odd thing to comment on. I thought the reviewers were reaching for something negative to say. But it really does feel that out of place and unecessary and just odd in general).

Except he made his own escape way harder by hijacking the cart Abernathy was stuck in. Surely, if Abernathy was such a loyal fanatic, he wouldn’t have minded (even been proud) to be captured so his guru could go free. And it’s not like Abernathy really does anything of note during the rest of the movie, so… Just don’t think about it.

Issue 2: Law of the jungle in Paris

After Grindelwald escapes, months go by and he and his cronies have gone to Paris to look for Credence. He picks a house and looks on from the outside as his gang invades the home and kills the inhabitants. Then it cuts to a scene of him watching on the doorstep as funeral coffins (you know, the black, fancy ones) are carried out of the home. They then go and live in the place, but soon hear a noise from a nearby room. A child (like, a toddler) is sitting there, playing with his duplo’s. And they kill the kid.

Wait a minute…

Don’t the coffins suggest that a funeral has already taken place? So three days or so have passed? Was the kid sitting there on his own with his duplo’s for this entire time? Is the law in ’20s Paris surrounding houses where people have been murdered finder’s keeper’s? Did they buy the house? Didn’t the murdered peeps not have any relatives like…

Don’t think about it.

The funniest thing about that one, is that any confusion would have been avoided if they had just cut the damn scene where Grindelwald is just staring at coffins being carried out of a house. It looked v dramatic though, so worth it, I guess.

Issue 3: Queenie’s entire arc

So where to start with this clusterfuck?

Queenie was one of the things I actually liked about the first Fantastic Beasts film. She was a little kooky, but also sweet, loyal, and didn’t hesitate to risk herself to help her sister.

Queenie has apparently drunk some Dumb Bitch Juice in between that movie and this one, because hoo boy.

So the first time we see Queenie, she turns up at Newt’s appartment with Jacob, who claims to have his memories back because “only the bad memories about magic got removed”. Don’t think about it.

Jacob is acting out of it (resembling a drunk person) and really clingy to Queenie, so Newt notices that something is up.

So my logical thinking brain went “Oh! Queenie was really upset that Jacob lost his memories after the New York debacle and attempted to restore them and it backfired spectacularly”.

Nope! Thought about it and shouldn’t have done that.

When Newt lifts the spell and it is visually shown as a pink heart dissolving into nothing, I knew I was in for some bullshit

Jacob really did get his memories back au naturel. He and Queenie started a relationship and Queenie wanted to get married, but because that would be illegal for Queenie if it ever came out and she would be imprisonned, Jacob didn’t want to risk it.

So Queenie put an unspecified (but judging on the heart CGI, probably love) spell on Jacob so he’d cooperate. That in itself is already such a stretch for the Queenie the audience is familiar with, but okay. So they start fighting.

Jacob apparently doesn’t care that much that she used magic to control him. He probably should.

Queenie calls him a coward for not wanting to get married. He calls her crazy (in a “you’re being ridiculous”way) and she takes, like, major offense to this and apparates away.

It’s not completely clear whose side we’re supposed to be on in this instance. I mean, obviously I think Queenie went majoraly balls to the wall dark with this love spell; but the movie kind of favours Queenie. Obviously we’re all unique and have our own opinions and blah blah blah, But movies have a habit of pushing (as subtle or unsubtle as they like) who they think is in the right.

For example, in Rent, the narrative backs up Mimi and criticizes Roger for not being “in the moment” because he didn’t shoot up with her.(Not being in the moment meaning here “I don’t want to do heroin and maybe you shouldn’t either.” Choices) It does this through lyrics and lighting.

Fantastic Beasts leave Jacob standing outside in the rain, pleading that “he didn’t mean it” as the camera zooms in on Queenie’s hurt and crying face as sad movie track #7 swells in the background, suggesting that the movie thought the “crazy” comment was worse than Queenie manipulating his consent. Opinions differ, I guess, but if I were Jacob, I’d be righteously pissed, no matter how cute my girlfriend is.

It does seem like an odd side to back when you know Tom Riddle was conceived while his father was under the influence of his mother’s magic to love her and portrayed as playing a part as to why he was so fucked up, but maybe I’m nitpicking.

Queenie goes to Paris to look for her sister, who’s there looking for Credence. She goes to the ministery of Magic, but Tina isn’t there, so she kind of just… wanders through Paris in the rain and gets taken in by one of Grindelwald’s cronies.

Why, though? Is she that upset about Jacob that she just forgets how to be a person? Are there no wizard hotels in Paris? Does she not have any money?

Don’t think about it. She’s sad, okay? Everyone knows that when you are sad all sense of self preservations just dissapears into thin air (see also: Bella Swan in New Moon).

But who is this character? Did Rowling just not like how she wrote Queenie in the first movie and though no one would notice if she just changed her characterization completely?

Next up: Queenie is at Grindelwald’s place, but doesn’t know that. He enters and says he has to back off. Grindelwald gives one of the most unconvincing join-me speeches since Darth Vader’s speech to Luke after he’d already cut off his hand. It went something along the lines of “join me and you’ll be able to love freely althoug my whole schtick is that I want to supress muggles don’t worry about it.” And she… falls for it?

Next we see her, Jacob finds her at Grindelwald’s rally, and they apologize to each other and Jacob is like okay, we need to leave, but Queenie wants to “hear Grindelwald speak”. It’s suggested that she’s there for the “free love” aspect of his ideology, but he says outright that non magic people are disposable so take from that what you will.

Somehow she expects Jacob to join her in joining Grindelwald, and he’s like “you’re crazy” and it’s the funniest moment in the whole movie. I had to pauze the movie I was laughing so hard.

But I guess it’s supposed to be, like, super heart breaking, because sad movie track #9 was playing.

So this Jewish woman went and joined wizard Hitler and that’s the end of her ark in this movie. Don’t think about it. Just let the water into your lungs.

Issue 4: Newtina

Were they in love already in the first movie? Because I don’t think they were. I remember the first movie leaving off with them being kind of interested in each other, but not openly.

In this movie they’re just openly pining for each other, but I don’t get why. Like, Queenie says Tina’s mad at him because she only reads headlines of articles and thought Newt was marrying Leta Lestrange instead of his brother. And like, it’s been months since the events of New York, right, and it seems like they haven’t communicated or kept in touch in any shape or form, so it’s not like they gradually fell more and more in love.

Newt was pretty held back in the first film and it was heavily implied he was still very much in love with Leta, and in this movie it’s also implied he is still very much in love with Leta, but then five minutes later he’s just openly gushing to Jacob about “OMG Tina stood here look how tiny her feet are isn’t she so pretty omgomgomg”

Like, we’re just supposed to accept that that is where they’re at, right now, but I don’t really understand why that development was sped up this much.

Let me tell you this, though, it’s only accepted because it concerns a straight couple. As a queer person you start to see just how unsuported and subpar written heterosexual relationships often are. I think it’s mainly because we’ve been conditionned for decades to just accept that the leading guy and leading lady are going to end up together no matter what, so the effort into actually building that relationship to something believable is really not the priority of writers.

Usually, all a straight relationship need to be plausible to an audience is prolonged eye contact and some tired tropes like “I’ll catch you” and then he actually catches her and it’s supposed to be profound or something, but literally all he’s doing is not letting a person die. It’s not as bad in this movie as it can be, if I’m fair, but I can’t help but to feel that that relationship does nothing to add to the story.

But don’t think about it.

Issue 5: Everything Hogwarts

I don’t know how they did it, but Hogwarts didn’t even feel like Hogwarts. The only recognizeable piece of soundtrack plays when, during a swooping shot over the Scottish Highlands, you see a castle in the distance, but even with the theme playing, it didn’t really register to me as Hogwarts, because we see it at an angle it’s never (or rarely) been shown at.

This is mainly just a criticism in evoking emotions from the audience, which is obviously what this was supposed to do.

Dumbledore teaches Defense Against the Dark Arts, don’t think about it.

Mcgonnagal is there as an adult even though she wasn’t even born yet, don’t think about it.

For some reason, when the camera was following Leta through Hogwarts it was really shaky and distracting? It was just odd.

Dumbledore looks into the mirror of Erised, you know, the mirror that shows what you desire most; but except it shows a flashback to when he and Grindelwald made a bloodpact. So apparently what Dumbledore desires most is to turn back time and make more bloodpacts, I don’t know.

Issue 6: Nagini’s whole situation

Nagini made no sense, even a little bit. And then I’m not even talking about her snake transmorph powers (also does the dress transform along with her, like? It just dissapears when she’s a snake).

To sum up her role in the movie: accompanies Credence on his quest to find his parents and looks concerned while doing so. I think she doesn’t even have ten lines in total.

She’s just there so Credence has someone to sulk to.

It’s almost (read: most definitely) insulting to the intelligence of your audience that you expect them to just accept that Nagini was actually a circus woman who’s got a bloodcurse that turns her into a snake. Don’t get why she’s the main attraction either, seeing as animagi exist in the wizarding world.

Rowling may insist that maledicti and animagi are different, dammit! but ultimately they both turn into animals so I don’t know why she would be in a freak show.

Again with the unecessary relationships. This time with Credence and Nagini. For some reason.

Issue 7: Credence’s entire deal

So he died and then didn’t die and at the beginning of the movie is in Paris. Why? I don’t know, fill in the blancs! Do I have to do all the work here?

Credence ends up at a wizard circus, and we see that he’s being followed by a man and by this point in the movie, we also know that Tina has been tracking him down too. She has a special interest, I suppose, it’s not really explained why she’s searching for him. Now, this next part is something else, but follow with me okay.

The man that has been following him is actually out to kill him and his name is Yusuf. Yusuf made a bloodpact with his father that he would kill they who Lestrange (the father of Leta) loved most.

So Yusuf is convinced that Credence is Lestrange’s lost son. And he either has to kill Credence or die himself (cool pact, dad).

Now, Yusuf swore to do this because Lestrange abducted Yusuf’s mother through the imperius curse to marry her and she later dies in childbirth giving birth to Leta.

So Leta was conceived through rape. Super dark.

Lestrange immediately remarried another woman who also died in childbirth (a real plague among the rich in the early 19 hundreds) giving birth to supposedly Credence.

But wait, there’s more.

I don’t exactly remember why Lestrange sent both his kids off to America by boat. It might be because he caught wind of Yusuf and his dad’s pact. Annyways, there’s a storm and Leta explains that the baby wouldn’t stop crying (also, Leta is like 10 in this flashback, so I don’t know exactly the timeline) and she wanted to be rid of him just a moment so she switches him with a baby (the baby that’s actually Credence) in the other room that was quiet. But then the ship starts sinking and she’s pulled along with the help before she can switch back her actual brother (or open her mouth to say a damn thing, I guess).

So the boat sinks and the other baby dies. The shot of this baby dying (a bundle of linnen floating underwater) is shown to be her bogeyman during her flashback at Hogwarts. I thought bogeymen took on the shape of what you fear most, not what you feel most guilty about.

So it turns out, we still don’t know who Credence is. Yusuf’s story was an entire misdirection. How does Yusuf react to his whole reason for living not being there anymore? Fuck if I know! He dissapears until the end of the movie, but it was very cinematic, okay.

But wait, there’s more!

That entire subplot, including Leta’s confession, was another misdirection because at the very end Grindelwald reveils that *drumroll* Credence is a Dumbledore!

When I tell you that I had to restrain myself from throwing my laptop to the ground, I’m not exagerating.

If the rest of the movie was perfect, I would still hate it on principle for this alone.

Why Rowling feels the need to write such convoluted back stories, I’ll never know. I’m starting to think she thinks that’s how you make interesting characters.

Also Yusuf? The guy whose entire adulthood had been centered on finding this kid and killing him? After Leta’s entire reveil that her brother is actually already dead, we get no reaction from him whatsoever. You don’t see Yusuf at all anymore until he’s needed for the group effort to stop Grindelwald at the end.

Grindelwalt’s notoriety

So this is something that I noticed in the first movie also, but is even more noticeable here because, well, now he’s officially the main antagonist.

So he’s supposedly this master manipulator that threatens to divide the wizarding world, but like, where is the divide?

His impact on the wizarding world is only really told to us. There is no worldbuilding that indicates that there is a great portion of the wizarding community that think he’s got the right idea? No offhand remarks from extras, no seperate faction in the ministery of Magic that’s like “well, we don’t support him personally, but you can’t dissagree with him entirely.” That kind of thing?

You feel like everyone in the wizarding world is on the same wavelength of him being a criminal and terrorist, but that’s not how that works?

And Rowling knows this, since she did include the aspect in the Harry Potter books. Did she forget how the far right gains support? It starts quiet enough but is usually pretty open and loud before the rally’s happen. I mean, just turn on the tv and look at the news and you’ll know. Read history books about how Hitler even came to power and it’ll tell you that it’s gradual. Like, if Grindelwald is supposed to be a paralel for Hitler, shouldn’t it, you know, at least follow some of the aspects about how facism began to rise to power in the non magic world?

Like, it really feels he had maybe ten or so followers and all of the sudden that entire theater is filled to the brim. Anyway, something that bothered me immensely. Don’t think about it.L

Leta’s sacrifice

So when Grindelwald is already escaping, but lashing out at Newt and Theseus with his Blue Eyes White Dragon, Leta calls out to Grindelwald and he reacs for… reasons.

Is Leta Lestrange someone of incredible importance to him? I don’t know.

He says like “Leta Lestrange, hated and sneered by the wizarding community” and I’m like where?

This is never shown in the movie, except if you count her flashbacks where people talked shit about her behind her back in Hogwarts. That’s not so abnormal for anyone. I’ll tell you this: everyone got talked shit about behind their backs when they were in highschool.

She’s engaged to someone of a good name, it’s never shown that she’s disliked by any of her peers. No backhanded compliments, no sneers as she walks by, no nothing. So this kind of comes out of left field. She said to Dumbledore that she was wicked as a child, but all we really saw during her flasbacks were her casting a silence spell on a girl that was mean to her and see her form a friendship with Newt. Yes, she swapped the baby, but since it was plainly stated that ther fatherd didn’t want her and really loved his son, it’s like dumb kid decisions that ended up for the worse. Also I’m assuming no one knows about that? So this entire offhand comment is just weird.

She pretends to follow him for a second but when he turns to leave she casts a curse at him which he deflects and then distracts him, I guess, while Newt and Theseus escape?

Except they could’ve escaped the whole time if she like, gave them a signal or something and then escape herself. Like, Theseus is still wacking at Grindelwalds blue fire arm when Leta is fighting him so I don’t know what that “distraction” really did. So Leta dies. And she was like the last at all intriguing character in this whole series.

And then after everything is over Newt hugs Theseus and is like “I chose my side” and I’m like it took you an entire genocidal maniac to almost destroy two world cities to come to that conclusion?

Final thoughts

Yikes on a bike, how are they gonna come back from this one?

Thoughts during viewing

1. Newt’s assistant. Odd addition to the movie. Is she just there to sell the fantasy that Newt is desireable and clueless? She kind of also dissapears from the rest of the movie sooo… #relatable, I guess.
2. Jacob. So Jacob has his memory back for… reasons. Some bullshit about only erasing bad memories? Sound like sSoome Rowling Railroading to me. Maybe she realized too late that Jacob was the only likeable character in the first movie. Because honestly? He’s the only one I don’t feel awkward watching in this.
3. Tina in that leather jacket looks nice, I’ll give them that. I support that jacket.
4. So you make Nagini into a human and then give her like 2 lines? Rude. I also don’t really get the novelty of her act? Aren’t animagi pretty common in the wizarding world? Or at least common enough to not make a circus act around it. Anyways, maybe I’m looking to much into that. The whole thing was just a bad decision, in my opinion. Especially since she doesn’t really do anything? She’s there so Credence has someone to play off of, I think. But that could’ve been anybody. It could’ve been someone with a more interesting characterization than “you know Voldemort’s snake? You remember that snake that he had? That’s her. Isn’t that cool that the snake that Voldemort had is also in this prequel? Isn’t that novel? Everything is connected.” Everything shouldn’t be connected. How about you write a good story first and fanservice later.
5. Were Newt and Tina in an established relationship before? Did I blackout during that revelation. Because the first movie ended with them beginning to like each other romantically and in the second Newt’s like “Omg Tina stood here how amazing look how tiny her feet are Jacob what do I say to her omgomgomg”. Since when? Can’t be in very steady communication either since he didn’t know Jacob has his memories back and in a relationship with Queenie or that Leta Lestrange was engaged to your brother and not to you. This feels very hamfisted, but they’re straight so that eyecontact they made in the first film wad probably enough of an ouverture to make this seem plausible.
6. Okay, this one’s nit-pickey, but imma include it anyway because it bothers me: It does a lousy introduction of Hogwarts. The school comes first frame after a swooping overhead shot over the mountains and shows the castle in the distance, but it’s never really been show from that angle before in any of the Harry Potter movies, so it didn’t even register to me that that was Hogwarts. If the theme hadn’t been playing, I probably never would’ve guessed. If this was meant to invoke some kind of nostalgia in the older viewers, it wasn’t done effectively. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think the most used establishing shot of Hogwarts is something like 
7. 
   

   and in Fantastic Beast it goes

    Yes, this is nitpicking

8. McGonnagal is there for… reasons. Don’t think about it.
9. I don’t think Dumbledore was a DADA teacher?
10. When Leta is walking through Hogwarts he camera is really shaky, but I don’t know why and it’s honestly distracting
11. I do appreciate that Newt is autistic-coded. Like, I really do appreciate that, this isn’t sarcasm. I think Eddie Redmayne comfirmed it too, which is awesome. I’m not autistic myself, but have some of the symptoms, I guess? So it’s great to see that represented on screen. See, I can be nice if I want to.
12. I don’t know what exactly prompted that conversation Leta had with Dumbledore but I like her a lot. It’s probably the first time in this movie that I actually felt for one of the characters.
13. WHY DID QUEENIE BECOME STUPID ALL OF THE SUDDEN THIS MAKES NO SENSE SHE MADE A 180 CHARACTER FLIP SINCE THE PREVIOUS MOVIE WTF.
14. But her reaction to Grindelwald is actuall me @ Johny Depp though.
15. that’s like the most unconvincing “join me” speech ever. No way she’s going to fall for that
16. 
17. She fell for it.
18. Why is Dumbledore seeing himself making a deal with Grindlewald in his younger years when he’s looking into the mirror of Erised. Is that what he most desires? To turn back in time and make blood pacts? And he even chuckles too like, man, remember when I was a dumbass? Unbelievable.
19. Still don’t get Tina and Newt’s whole thing
20. NAGINI GOT ANOTHER LINE. THAT MAKES LIKE THE THIRD ONE. “It’s another “Credence.” but you know, we take what we can get in this household.
21. “Nicolas Flamell” 
22. So Newt and Tina get into fight at the ministary of magick and Tina defeats Theseus, Newt’s brother (non-lethally); to which Newt comments “This might’ve been the best moment of my life.” But I don’t think Theseus was really build up as a bad person? Like he tries to get Newts permission to travel internationally back at the beginning of the movie. He seems like an okay guy who’s doing his vague non-descript job and sees Newt sneaking into the Ministery by pretending to be him, so naturally he would assume something shady was going on. Especially since they’re running away when he hasn’t done anything yet?Are we supposed to hate him because he’s marrying Leta and Leta is portrayed to be still in love with Newt? If she’s still in love with Newt, why would she marry Theseus? Is it just a status thing? I mean it looks like she cares about Theseus.
23. I’m crying the familiar cats when they lose their magicked up form look like cats straight out of a sims game
24. So Yusuf Kama (the guy who’s hunting Credence) explains that his parents were seperated because Leta’s dad used the imperius curse on his mom to whisk her away from Yusuf’s dad. His mother then gave birth to Leta. So Leta was conceived through rape, eventhough it’s not said with as many words in the film. To up the ick factor, a black woman is forced into marriage and giving birth by a white man. See, Rowling, when people said you needed to better with representation in your work, this isn’t what they meant. Putting POC in your movie but giving them shit storylines doesn’t do anything for anyone. Nagini is a Indonesian woman, as is said in the movie (played by a Korean actress), given like four lines total and zero personality. There was a real possibility to write a good character to accompany Credence on the search for his family, but instead an already established character was brought back, changed into a person, and is really just there to look concerned for Credence instead of, y’know, interacting with him on any level. She’s an afterthought. The entire subplot about Yusuf hunting down Credence feels like an afterthought to bring more of that Drama and something was needed to get them all to the cemetary. Conveluted back-stories doesn’t make a good character per se and I honestly think Rowling doesn’t know this.
25. So wait, Yusuf’s entire life has been about kiling Credence because he promised his dad to kill Lestrange’s son, and they don’t even show his reaction after Leta explains that the son is already dead? Wack.
26. Okay, let me get this clear. Grindelwald did the crimes, he did terrorrist acts to provoke non magic people and that’s why he was locked up. And now in his speech he uses future wars (that the people at the rally assume to be real for… reasons. Unless that skull thing from which he vapes 100nic has a lore that I’m supposed to know about) to be morally superior… makes sense. But you know what, people are dumb, so that makes sense in-universe, so I’ll let it slide. But with this, he suggests that wizards don’t influence wars at all? Except Newt said in the first films he was involved in WWI in what seemed like some sort of wizard army regiment. 
27. Here’s my gripe with Grindelwalds entire storyline: it’s never built up. We see all these wizards at his rally looking really hatefull at the aurors present, but when was all this hatred built up? I had this same issue with the first movie. Grindelwald’s impact on he wizarding world is never really shown in the wizard’s day to day life. There aren’t any off-hand remarks that “he might have a point” or any disdain towards non magic people in general, except when they were in New York, and it was made clear that that wasn’t because of anything Grindelwald did, but just how American wizard law was. So I’m like, where did all these wizards come from? Wasn’t there any faction in the ministery of magic that didn’t outright side with Grindelwald but had the same ideology? If they want to follow the WWII far right movement parallel, then it should’ve been shown to be more gradual. And it’s funny (well, not funny. More odd) that Rowling did do this in Harry Potter (because lbh it’s the same villain with a different coat on). Voldemort was built up as a genuine threat, and it seeped gradually into the kid’s daily life until the sixth book’s climax.
28. Again, pretty weak “join-me” speech. But also again, people are dumb, so eh.
29. Credence, you stupid.
30. Omg, that was like a whole-ass sentence for Nagini.
31. IT HAPPENED! I FINALLY LAUGHED DURING THIS MOVIE!
32. wait, is Leta despised by the wizarding community? Maybe it’s because THE MOVIE JUST SHOWS HER HAVING A TOUGH TIME AT HOGWARTS and throughout the rest isn’t treated any differen than other wizards that I missed this tidbit.
33. Wait, why is Leta sacrificing herself as if Grindelwald wasn’t already leaving? 
34. Ending reveal? Wack.