Fantastic Beasts 4 has reportedly been banished to development hell after the IP floundered with recent releases. Although J.K. Rowling, the author and screenwriter, initially outlined a series of five movies, the director has recently delivered disheartening news to fans regarding the next installment.
In a recent interview on the Inside Total Film podcast, series director David Yates revealed that development for the fourth and fifth movies is on pause. He is taking a break from the series but is positive that Newt Scamander will be making a return in the future.
“With Beasts for a minute, it’s all just parked,” Yates shared. “We got to the end of [the third film, 2020’s Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore] and we’re all so proud of that movie, and when it went out into the world, we just needed to sort of stop and pause, and take it easy.”
He adds, “I’m sure at some point, Newt may well be back. Who can tell? We haven’t had any in-depth conversations.” It isn’t the first time that Yates talked about potentially not returning to the Fantastic Beast series, either.
Earlier this year, the director revealed that he was exploring other non-Wizard projects after focusing on the Harry Potter series since 2005. He has been part of the Wizarding world since 2007’s Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix and has only directed two movies not related to the J.K. Rowling franchise. Yates most recently worked on Pain Hustlers, released on Netflix just last week.
Having Yates out of the director’s chair is a major blow to the project. However, if Yates isn’t available, Warner Bros. Pictures could opt for a new director for the sequel(s?). It will not be the first Harry Potter-related project to change its director as the first four movies in the main series had three different filmmakers.
One of the likely factors that led Warner Bros to take a pause for developing a sequel is the dwindling success of the Fantastic Beasts franchise. Things started strong, as 2016’s Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was a commercial success earning over $800 million worldwide.
The second movie, The Crimes of Grindelwald, earned significantly less, grossing just $650 million. The Secrets of Dumbledore limped at the box office, taking home just $407 million against a massive budget of $200 million.
The likelihood of seeing Fantastic Beasts 4 is slimmer without Yates and the franchise’s box office performance. Warner Bros. previously said that the future of the series would greatly depend on the box-office success of the third movie – and we all know how that turned out!
Warner Bros. is also shifting its focus on making a Harry Potter TV series for HBO Max. Last April, Warner Bros. announced the TV project, turning all seven books into a TV show that will be a decade long and is said to be much closer to the books than the original movies. With the TV show being developed, the prospect of making a new movie for Fantastic Beasts is now very slim.
