Warner Bros Exec Provides Update on Harry Potter Spinoff Series

There’s been an update on Warner Bros.’s plans to launch a new TV series based on the popular Harry Potter franchise. There have been consistent talks on what’s next for Harry Potter ever since the original Harry Potter film series concluded with the release of 2011’s Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2. Fantastic Beats was launched as a prequel franchise but never gained traction with audiences, as this year’s Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore underperformed at the global box office. Warner Bros. is hard at work trying to resurrect Harry Potter for TV, with an executive stating there is a “tremendous amount of ambition” on their side.

Warner Bros. Television boss Channing Dungey spoke at the U.K. TV conference in London (via Variety), where she updated the status of another Harry Potter series to follow in the footsteps of the Harry Potter reunion that streamed on HBO Max, and the competition show Harry Potter: Hogwarts Tournament of Houses hosted by Helen Mirren. “There is a tremendous amount of ambition for that and we are engaged in a number of different conversations,” Dungey told Variety.

“I wish I could tell you that something was on imminent on the horizon but there is a lot of interest and a lot of passion for it, so absolutely,” she continued. “What’s great is that you see how the audience is so engaged and so ready. Our unscripted team did a fantastic ‘Return to Hogwarts’ special for HBO last year, that resonated so tremendously, then we did a quiz show, ‘The Tournament of Houses,’ that Helen Mirren was the host for. The audience is ready, they want to go, so we’re just to figure out what the right next step is.”

Fantastic Beasts 4 and 5, Harry Potter Spinoffs Stalled

According to a report from Variety, Warner Bros. Discovery currently doesn’t have any Harry Potter or Wizarding World movies in any stage of development. The publication stated that there are “no active discussions” between author and creator J.K. Rowling and Warner Bros. in regard to future films. That seems to include the ongoing Fantastic Beasts film series, which was supposed to have two more films. 

There were supposed to be five Fantastic Beasts films in total, but The Secrets of Dumbledore appears to be the last one in the series unless something changes at Warner Bros. The studio was reportedly waiting to see how the film performed at the box office before greenlighting the fifth and sixth installments. Secrets of Dumbledore made $405 million globally, which was a significantly lower total than the rest of the franchise.

HBO Max Still Interested in Harry Potter

Sarah Aubrey, Head of Originals for HBO Max, recently confirmed the streaming service is “very much in the business of creating new content for those [Wizarding World] fans and thinking what to do next.” 

Asked if that means HBO Max is developing a Harry Potter TV series, Aubrey told Variety, “There’s nothing like a Harry Potter fan, in terms of their endless appetite for storytelling and new ways of interacting with these characters … We don’t have a series in active development right now. But we are very much in that business, because fans are just clamoring for more storytelling.”