The Wizarding World of Harry Potter or the Harry Potter Universe, as you prefer to name it, is one of the most successful.
Only in the cinema, his income is close to eight billion, an amount similar to what he has in merchandise plus other equally lucrative ventures in video games and books, among other industries.
After the success of the initial saga (the adaptation of the novels), JK Rowling and Warner Bros. have taken care to keep it alive by building a universe transmedia that added the theater with “Harry Potter and the cursed legacy” (which takes place in the future, with Harry’s children as protagonists) and, above all, by “Fantastic Animals”, a spin-off prequel that becomes the author of the eponymous book (in the original story it is a textbook); however, what started out successful is now at risk for three main reasons:
The market segment has changed and has failed to add new followers
The Harry Potter books and early novels appealed to teen-age boys who grew up with the characters for seven years. Today, those kids are in their late twenties or early thirties. While the first films also had children who became young adults as protagonists, “Fantastic Beasts” falls on adults and its history has become increasingly darker and more politically tinged.
So while it’s still appealing to those who followed the original story, it doesn’t have the same appeal to today’s kids and teens. “Fantastic Beasts” has forgotten, for example, what became a key tool for “Ghostbusters: Afterlife”, where the central characters are teenagers, allowing them to create a link between them and their parents or grandparents. For today’s generations, “Fantastic Beasts” is not the cinematographic event that it was for those at the beginning of the century.
The box office has been declining
While the Harry Potter movies all made more than 700 million, most more than 900 and with an upward trend that exceeded one billion in the last installment, those of “Fantastic Animals” have been falling.
“Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them” cost nearly $200 million, made 814; “The Crimes of Grindewald” with a similar budget, grossed 655. The expected for “The Secrets of Dumbledore” is lower.
On the one hand, there is the effect of the pandemic that has harmed many titles, but that others have shown makes no difference or does not stop its impact (the best example in “Spider-Man: No Way Home”).
In its premiere last week, “The Secrets of Dumbledore” has the lowest debut of the entire series both in the North American market and in the rest of the world. As if that were not enough, in China, the second market, the titles in general are taking time to arrive and there is also the fact that Russia has been left out.
The combination doesn’t factor in a US debut in the mid-50s, below “Sonic 2,” and even if “Sonic 2” holds onto second place. Internationally, it may be able to exceed 100 million dollars. The point is that, on average, a film falls 60% each week, hence the importance of the debut being as high as possible, so if it were 100 million, the next one would get 60, one after 36 and so on. successively.
The talent has been involved in controversies
Starting with JK Rowling, who has made controversial statements about gender, transgender, transsexual and religious issues, followed by Johnny Depp’s divorce from actress Amber Heard, who has accused him of mistreatment and abuse, and very recently by the accusations (dismissed at press time) of physical aggression around Ezra Miller have made recent films look tainted.
Depp was removed and replaced in the series; a similar path seems possible for Miller, who does not see in this his first incident. In the case of JK Rowling, it’s more complex: for example, she was practically left out of the 20th Anniversary reunion which was an HBO Max special; however, being the author, many fans who belong to the minorities of whom she has expressed herself badly or those who sympathize with them or disagree with her points of view, have chosen to stop following the series, especially since there is a contradiction in a series that has been integrating relative aspects (Dumbledore is gay, for example; there are scenes in the second part that are clearly a sign of showing diversity and inclusion) and an author that clearly does not have them.