The very first teaser trailer for Fantastic Beasts: Crimes of Grindelwald returns to Hogwarts to give us our very first glimpse of Jude Law’s Yung Dumbledore in action, and it’s totally glorious.
On Tuesday, Warner Bros. released the first full teaser trailer for the sequel to Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. Renowned magizoologist Newt Scamander still seems like he might be the protagonist in these movies, but a much younger Albus Dumbledore steals the spotlight here.
The trailer opens on achingly familiar rolling green hills that lead to Hogwarts, where tons of Ministry officials (presumably) show up to interrogate Albus Dumbledore about a rumor that Scamander is heading to Paris. They “know” that Newt is working under orders from Dumbledore, but Albus, ever the suave and mysterious genius, deftly dodges their questions.
The Crimes of Grindelwald takes place several months after Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, and it will continue a globe-trotting adventure to stop Grindelwald that takes Newt and Dumbledore to Paris.
Jude Law is looking really good as Yung Dumbledore already.
The trailer also teases the return of the cast from Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, namely Tina and Queenie Goldstein along with Muggle — ahem “No-Maj” — Jacob Kowalski. There’s also a first-look at new characters from the magical circus in Paris, but Dumbledore totally steals the show.
Credence Barebone is definitely back, and we get a quick shot of him bonding with actress Claudia Kim’s unidentified Maledictus. She has a blood curse that allows her to transform into some kind of beast, but in the trailer, her dark energy looks an awful lot like an Obscurus.
One welcome change we also see in the trailer is that Johnny Depp’s Grindelwald is starting to look more like a bonafide Potterverse villain and less like a clownish ghoul that crawled out of Tim Burton’s dreams.
Grindelwald actually looks pretty villainous here.
The trailer also teases Dumbledore’s reliance on Newt, and he says, “I can’t move against Grindelwald. It has to be you.” Dumbledore perhaps carries too much emotional baggage considering his complicated history with Grindelwald, and for the time being Newt will spearhead efforts to foil the dark wizard’s evil plans.
For now, part of that means Newt teaming up with his brother, Theseus, to do some epic magic by slamming their wands against the ground. Who knows what they’re doing, but it’s bound to be pretty awesome.
Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald will be released in theaters on November 16, 2018.
Check out that trailer one more time:
