This episode was a heartbreaking, beautifully put together piece of television. I'm not sure I've seen anything that so effectively brought home how cruel the AIDS crisis was. It hit me emotionally like a freight train, it didn't pull it's punches at all, and that's exactly what it needed to be. Awful, but honest.
This film falls into the trap of trying to compete with the Marvel universe style and making the effects and action bigger and the magic more dramatic. The problem with this is it totally undercuts all the movies that have come before it. A lot of the magic, especially Gridelwald's, is overpowered compared to previous films in the Harry Potter series.
The black shroud that covers Paris to summon his followers and the blue flames and dragons in the films climax are two key examples - compared to previous movies this would seem to be extremely powerful magic but in this movie it's apparently unremarkable. It really annoys me that this movie so blithely throws in things like this for the sake of impressive visuals, at the cost of the consistency of the universe which has been created over the previous 9 movies - and it makes me very concerned about the direction of the movies still to come. There are also canonical issues like people apparating on the ground of Hogwarts - something we've been told isn't possible since early in the very first book of the series.
Even putting aside the issues with Johnny Depp's private life, he is the wrong choice for Grindelwald. It's a one note, bland performance that just seems to recycle bits of other characters he's played in the past - it very much feels like you're watching Johnny Depp rather than Grindelwald. Colin Farrell did a much better job in the previous film.
Finally, as so many people have noted, the name is clumsy. It's clear the producers backed themselves into a bit of a corner after the first film, not knowing what direction they wanted to go in or if it would be the first part of a series. Now they feel like they have to continue the series under the "Fantastic Beasts" umbrella and as a result they're shoehorning magical creatures into the plot. It's messy and unnecessary. Or perhaps they just want them in there to churn out more merchandise. I hope they're taking the long break between films to really nail down the direction they want the series to take to ensure the remaining films are more coherent and consistent with the broader Wizarding World universe.
The best bit was the soundtrack, and it's visually beautiful. First episode was good but the next two were a bit of a mess.
Such a great, refreshing format that really makes a certain other long running reality competition seem very stale. It's often a bit confusing to work out who's actually leading and how each team's budget is going, but then again, a large part of the charm of the show is the competitive aspect takes a back seat to the contestants, their experiences and the destinations they visit.
