Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, the latest entry in the Wizarding World franchise, is finally out in theaters last Easter weekend. Leading up to the release, there have been a lot of questions regarding how it will perform at the box office given the diminishing return of the film series and the fact that the fourth film hasn't been given an official greenlit. Now, its opening weekend results are in and it's not very promising.
Variety has reported that Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore opened to a solid $43 million in its domestic opening weekend. While it is an impressive number in the pandemic era and was able to lead the weekend, it is also the lowest number in the entire Harry Potter franchise. The previous film, The Crimes of Grindelwald, opened to $62 million when it was released back in November 2018 and later on grossed $655 million worldwide which was the franchise's lowest up to that point.
Even though the opening weekend numbers were not impressive by the franchise's standards, we still cannot officially declare that the film is a flop since it's still going to run in theaters worldwide for several more weeks and the overseas box office could definitely help on its overall performance. As long as it has legs and continuously performs decent enough at the box office, the studio could still end up calling it a success despite the rough start.
So what does it say about the future of the franchise? Are we officially going to get a fourth film? It's hard to tell for now. While its box office story is still not over, its opening weekend numbers are an indication that the studio might want to reconsider its future whether they will make the fourth film the last one, do some budget cuts on the next films since the third one had a production budget of a whopping $200 million, or even pull the plug entirely. Either way, a fourth film is still on the table as of now.
Per the official synopsis, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore is set in the 1930s leading up to the Wizarding World's involvement in World War II and "will explore the magical communities in Bhutan, Germany, and China in addition to previously established locations including Brazil, the United States, and United Kingdom. With Grindelwald's power rapidly growing, Albus Dumbledore entrusts Newt Scamander and his friends on a mission that will lead to a clash with Grindelwald's army, and will lead Dumbledore to ponder how long he will stay on the sidelines in the approaching war."
Returning cast members include Eddie Redmayne, Jude Law, Katherine Waterston, Dan Fogler, Alison Sudol, Ezra Miller, Callum Turner, and Jessica Williams. Mikkelsen joins as Gellert Grindlewald, replacing Depp who played the role in the last two films. David Yates is also back to direct the film.
Also Read: Fantastic Beasts 3 Finally Confirms Dumbledore's Sexuality
Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore is currently showing in theaters everywhere.
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