Reaction Post

[potentiality_26]

I will do that meme eventually, I promise.  I've just been really busy lately.

But I did go to see Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them.  It had a few problems that I’ve heard people talk about already, but it was an enjoyable movie overall and I liked it.  There's one thing I need to get off my chest, though:



I’m a little baffled by the wizard-muggle (no-maj) relationship in the movie.  It’s based around the idea that the American wizards are so determined to avoid something like Salem happening again that they’re completely unwilling to interact with humans at all.

That works, except (and I’m kicking this one over to the kind of people who reread the books all the time, because it’s been a while for me and maybe I’m just totally wrong about this) don’t I remember someone once telling Harry that wizards were almost never (or straight up never) killed in witch trials?  That they just did spells to keep the fires from burning them and that one guy liked it so much he kept getting caught?  Without the threat of a Salem-like event, the American paranoia makes very little sense.  The vibe in the original Harry Potter series was that wizards lived separately from humans not because they were afraid of some X-men type shit if humans knew they were out there, but because they thought humans were kinda lame.

Again, I could be completely wrong about this and remembering some other book series, but there was nothing in Harry Potter up to this point that suggested that humans were (or could be) a threat to wizard-kind, and then this movie comes along and suggests that that wizards are genuinely worried that there could a war with humans???

Either humans are a threat to wizards or they aren’t, you know?  And the original series doesn’t make a whole lot of sense if they are- and I’m way more attached to the original series than I am to this movie, fun as it was.


Anyway, I did like the movie.  Maybe I'll do a proper reaction post later.
  

Comments

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

Well...here's my take on it...

1. No-Maj could easily be accused of being a witch and then...they really would die and the Magic community would feel really bad. There were also plenty of Muggles hurt during the war with Voldemort even though that was in the future, there were definitely incidents before then that made that a realistic worry.

Of course, they also would have seen what the army did to the No-Maj Native Americans, too.

2. A witch or wizard might forget their spells in a stressful situation and die anyway.

3. Verbal harassment hurts, too.

What seems really weird is that the No-Maj interaction rule apparently wasn't lifted until 1965 during the Civil Rights movement?

So, does that mean that Jacob and Queenie move overseas? I forget what Honeydukes history is but now I'm kind of imagining they founded it or at least ran it together.

[verdande-mi.livejournal.com]

This film just really worked for me. I was drawn into the magic and didn't really let myself be critical or much thougtful :) I was just in awe and had fun!

[icecream-junkie.livejournal.com]

Hi, I saw your comment on rogueslayer452’s LJ (the one where you said you dig Percival Graves/Tina Goldstein :D ) and decided to check out your journal, because I am obsessed with need more people to talk to about Fantastic Beasts. (Feel free to tell me to bugger off and take my obsession elsewhere. ;) )

I think you have a point with your comment. Knowing the Harry Potter books this does indeed seem odd without any context being added to it. The movie itself didn’t explain the situation in America very well, because it focussed on the story and left out a lot of background information that would have helped to understand the situation better (I really wish JKR would write a novel about this era). However, I think that while wizards and witches have found ways to be able to survive being burned alive (as said in the Harry Potter books) it’s not impossible to kill them – even for muggles.

First of all, while wandless magic is possible, many wizards and witches rely on wands to perform magic and their spells might not be as effective without a wand (at least I think I read something along those lines on Pottermore) and many other magical solutions require supplies (potions, etc.). Take away the wand/supplies and it might be easier to harm a wizard/witch and while it might still not be easy for muggles to kill a wizard/witch (even if they don’t have their wand), it’s probably not impossible. Therefore, it’s smart to avoid exposure and the constant risk to your life that might come with witch trials if there is indeed a risk that witch trials might be a thing (e.g. Second Salemers). After all, you don’t want to constantly have to look over your shoulder.

The movie is also set in a time where muggles have guns and have just proven that they are very imaginative when it comes to inventing new weapons to kill each other (e.g. Word War I). Some of these weapons might easily kill a wizard/witch if they are ambushed. So why take the risk?

And even in the Harry Potter books they mention laws that are in place to keep magic hidden from muggles. So while they might not be overly worried about muggles posing a threat in the UK in the 1990/2000 era, they still don’t want them to know that magic exists. I have no problem believing that wizards/witches had more reason to be worried about exposure in the 1920ies than they had in the 1990ies/early 2000s. It’s hard enough to be different in the modern world. I would imagine that it was a lot harder in the 1920ies. The first half of the 20th century is not necessarily a time I would associate with tolerance.