Review of Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them (2016) by M_Ridcully — 08 Sep 2017

I think if more people could set nostalgia aside they'd realize this is a much better film than the entire HP series. Moving to 1920's America setting and removing the angsty teenagers who have to save the world because the negligent adults are too incompetent are both absolute improvements.

Newt himself is an extremely underrated character, and brilliantly portrayed by Eddie Redmayne. See Pop Culture Detective's "The Fantastic Masculinity of Newt Scamander" on Youtube for a better examination, but I'll sum it up here: He's not macho or "The Chosen One" or a witty schmoozer. But he doesn't fall into the typical nerd/genius/outsider stereotypes either. He's quiet, introverted, humble and sensitive, but also confident in his abilities and sympathetic towards his beasts as well as humans.

The only major downside to the movie was that it couldn't decide which movie it wanted to be: a lighthearted romp about chasing down escaped magical beasts, or a dark conflict between wizards, anti-wizard muggles, and dark wizards. I personally preferred the latter, but it would not make a lot of sense to have Newt in a movie purely about that (and of course the former also brings child appeal and toy sales to the table).