This is dreadful. I highly enjoyed, even loved, the first Fantastic Beasts: the rambunctious Roaring Twenties-era Manhattan milieu; the delightful and inventive creatures; and an, I thought, endearing set of new characters, particularly those portrayed by Dan Fogler and Alison Sudol. Most of those pleasures are squandered here. The characters return, but they are largely separated and/or written in an obnoxious, unflattering way: as American witch Tina, for example, Katherine Waterston has to spend most of her scenes acting angrily juvenile over a false newspaper story. The fantastic beasts themselves become an afterthought.

The film leaps from Manhattan to London to Paris, but the gorgeous production design feels superficial and devoid of life. There is no energy in any featured locale, no sense of lives and loves and politics beyond the dour central "story."

Emphasis on dour and the quotes around the word story...Christ almighty is this film a bore, full of characters in which we are not invested very (very, very) solemnly explaining what is significant and why. The exposition is interminable and painful, and the film seldom feels productive in terms of moving the story forward; it is hard to imagine a mystery less beguiling and involving than dreary Credence's (Ezra Miller) lineage, and it builds to a hilariously contrived plot twist which is going to haunt this franchise.

The screenplay in general is a lamentable misstep for the beloved J. K. Rowling as a storyteller. She flashes an unexpectedly mean spirit with more than one ornamental child death (edgy!). She foregrounds almost encyclopedia-style B-plot miscellany over narrative momentum. And, most sadly, she fails to infuse her previously excellent world building with any genuine magic or mischief this time around.

I admit Jude Law cuts a striking and charismatic figure as a young Dumbledore, but his screen time is scarcer than I expected. Johnny Depp seems half asleep as Grindelwald; he feels out-of-place in a Potter film as a ultra-famous American movie star, and he is neither frightening nor seductive.

Yeah, I'm surprised by how messy the film is. It's basically just a setup for future installments, as a stand alone film it fails.

I’m dying to see this. Can’t believe how it could be so bad.

I didn't think it was bad. I quite enjoyed it. But someone who hasn't seen the first Beasts movie won't have a clue what's going on, and will still be quite confused if they haven't seen the Potter movies. This is a review section, so SPOILERS!

The Good:

1. Visual effects are great.
2. Jude Law as Dumbledore is great in every scene.
3. Opening escape scene
4. Hogwarts = goosebumps
5. Dumbledore and Grindelwald manipulating those around them is fun to watch and isn't given enough credit.
6. Leta Lestrange's boggart. Seriously creepy scene.
7. I personally thought Depp's portrayal of the self-controlled crazy of Grindelwald was well done.

The bad:

1. Grindelwald's crazy eye, why?
2. Queenie's turn only makes sense one way, to somehow protect Jacob, otherwise it's stupid.
3. The left field twist. Because there is zero mention of this in film or book, it's kind of insulting to die hard fans to do this. I'm sure there'll be a good explanation...
4. Leta Lestrange needed more meaningful character development for her actions in the third act to resonate (though I did like her "I Love You" in the general direction of both Scamanders).
5. Grindelwald "I hate Paris" ugh.
6. Jacob, Tina, Queenie are all not as effective as fun, interesting characters as they were in the first film.

On the whole, I enjoyed it, but it's definitely not for casual moviegoers because it's a setup movie and also requires you to know the background. Still, for me, flawed but fun. B+

Spoilers out the gate: Does that mean Ariana was impregnated by the muggle boys who attacked her? The problem is I still don’t care about Credence. This character drags down an otherwise solid movie just like he did with the first.

The first two thirds are pretty good though. The magic is amazing to behold and the beasts are as adorable as ever. It is fun to be back in the wizarding world as much as they try to convince us it is not. If Grindelwald wasn’t so damn evil one might think he was making sense. Is it fair that wizards have to hide among the muggles? He could have been comparable to Killmonger were it not for the child murdering and the writer’s controversial insistence on who plays him. But he is so damn evil and why the hell does Queenie join him? Gosh that last act was frustrating, but I was talking about the good things. I connected with Newt more than in the first movie, Redmayne does a really nice job making the character feel whole. We know what he wants, why he can’t get it and how he has to change in order to accomplish it. Tina and Jacob are pretty singleminded but still provide nice scenes. The Newt/Tina romance was effective, much moreso than the first.

The movie stops being good when it has to stop and explain what the hell is going on with the Credence sideplot. Nobody cares and it kills all momentum the movie built up. And they just enter this scene out of nowhere too. Weird editing. We then have to listen to Johnny Depp make a speech, see a too brief action bit and Credence is Dumbledore’s brother. Surprise!

It is too bad. I still liked the movie and will watch it again someday, but the story and technical issues near the end will be hard to get over.

Well crap, should not have read Flava'd's review.

Curse the holiday shopping season for keeping my mom at work so we can't see it until Monday or Tuesday. We always see the Harry Potter movies together, but I knew I should have jumped the gun and seen it tonight with someone else.

I think you will enjoy it Zwacks, but be frustrated by the same things I was.

I now remember that Ariana was attacked at a very young age, pre-Hogwarts, so Credence can’t be her son. Or maybe they’ll just say “Rita was wrong” to cover her tracks. Nothing else really makes sense. Unless maybe Albus had a straight-phase after Grindelwald? Or maybe, judging by his looks and personality, he is the product of Aberforth ... and the goat.

He is Dumbledore's brother, not his son or nephew. Right?

[Er, spoilers]Grindlewald calls Dumbledore Credence's brother at the end of the movie

Well so far as we know, Albus’ mother died when he was young and his father went to Azkaban before that.

That leaves one explanation, the obscurial survived Ariana’s death and found a new host. So Grindelwald is being manipulative, but not exactly lying.

This probably is most complicated exposition since Reloaded. There are certain moments I like, but it just never really builds any momentum and the London and Paris backdrops are surprisingly weak, and never make much of an impact. Rowling clearly had no idea where this series should go after the first film and this film is as a result a mess of no main characters and multiple plots going on at once, but none ore finished so we're left with more questions than we began with.

Hopefully WW box office at least gets this to a third film to try and work it out.

Funny that Rowling is taking a lot of the blame. What about Warner Bros? What about Yates?

Because people don’t like the screenplay and she wrote it and she has complete creative control. She has not relinquished the rights to WB to do what they want.

But Yates is the director. It is possible to make a great film out of a bad screenplay. If the film is bad, blame Yates too! Rowling did not organise production and decide on the final edit. KJ as usual is woman-bashing.

It also doesn't help that Eddie Redmayne has chosen to make his character's main feature to look awkwardly away, shake his head, and fumble over every line. He's slightly a step above Napoleon Dynamite but not playing it for laughs. Such a boring main character. At least Depp and Law brought a little life and interest to their roles but their more glorified cameos.

So yeah, I thought this was pretty dreadful too. Already not a fan of the first one, that did have some charms though, The Crimes of Grindelwald is just not more than a dud. There's some a few nice magical moments in here, and it starts of well enough with Grindelwald's escape. I also like Kravitz and Law role in their roles, and the production design is well choreographed too, but it's all so empty. There's no emotion in the film, and I cared even less about the characters in this. Fogel and Queenie were highlights in the first film, but unimportant here. Depp looks the part of evil wizard, but there's no sense of character to him and Claudia Kim does not do more than look hot either. There's like no emphasis on any of the creatures and the central story line is such a bore. I actually did doze off too, the whole plot about who's Credence is uninteresting, and the reveal didn't feel huge either. Actually it's all well acted and quite pretty looking of a film, yet nothing feels to have merit, it's too long with most of it redundant.

D+

Best part of the whole movie was the flashback mini-tale in Hogwarts. Made you think why in the world were we bearing through these other stories when there's plenty more interesting ones to be told in the school setting.

This would have been better as a book, but I wouldn't say its as bad as everyone is saying. It's actually really good and enjoyable until the exposition dump two thirds in. Even that was enjoyable as a fan, but no way would a casual viewer follow it. I applaud what they tried to do here, but it definitely would have been better if Rowling got a screenwriter to help her streamline the explanation bits. But all the Grindelwald and Dumbledore stuff, the stuff with the four main leads, the beasts, wizarding Paris, and all the performances were good. Leta Lestrange is a good character who deserved more time. I hope they shorten the franchise into four movies to ensure the story gets finished, but I'll be there for all five none the less.

B+

1. Order of the Phoenix A+
2. Deathly Hallows Part 1 A+
3. Deathly Hallows Part 2 A+
4. Chamber of Secrets A+
5. Prisoner of Azkaban A+
6. Sorcerer's Stone A+
7. Half Blood Prince A+
8. Goblet of Fire A+
9. And Where to Find Them A
10. The Crimes of Grindelwald B+

I guess that is possible. Would be a little weird but plausible. The other possibility is the father had a child in Azkaban. We don't know when he died.

As for the movie, I give it a B+. I agree with some other posters that it isn't for casual movie fans. It is too much for Potter fans. I did like Jude Law as Dumbledore, and hope he gets to do more in a sequel.

It does have a very hot and cold thing.

Pretty much all these characters have to die in the next one. A Charming girl has become the most evil snake of all time. Whatever the hell happens to Credence, and Newt is a non factor for the entire Potter films outside of one encounter that he didn't even have in this film, and no one has ever heard of him.

It's after films like these and the Hobbit films that actually make me appreciate the SW Prequels more and more.

I wonder what a conjucal visit in Azkaban is like. And what does it say about a person it they can perform in front of dementors? There must be a porno out there to answer my questions.

The last half hour of this movie is an absolute mess. The screenplay is incredibly stupid and the twists at the end come out of left field and are poorly executed. I didn't hate it - it's gorgeous to look at and the performers all do strong work - and it does work for about an hour and 15 minutes of its runtime. But it just goes off the rails in the final stretch. I can understand fans being pissed. For me this whole franchise just feels like it's treading water until the actors from Harry Potter age enough so they can do a "Cursed Child" film. B-