I’ve just come back from seeing Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, and it’s a pretty lame movie. Here is my review, my in-depth critical analysis of the film:
That’s all—bye!
Just kidding. I’ll elaborate a bit. I adore the original Harry Potter series, but so far nothing in Fantastic Beasts can match it in terms of characters, excitement or emotions. Many are calling Crimes of Grindelwald the worst film in the Potterverse to date. I actually enjoyed it a little bit more than the first Fantastic Beasts, but dammit that is one low, boring bar.
In 2007, just after the release of The Deathly Hallows novel, J.K. Rowling announced Albus Dumbledore is, in fact, gay. And that he was in love with Gellert Grindelwald.
Dumbledore wasn’t in 2016’s HP prequel Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them. He’s back in Crimes of Grindelwald, played by hunky Jude Law.
Leading up to release, there have been conflicting stories about Young Dumbledore’s sexuality onscreen.
Early reports said there would be no mention that Dumbledore is gay. Then Ezra Miller emphatically denied that.
Well, I’ve just seen the movie, and no, no. Dumbledore is not gay here. We get one awkward line where Law’s Dumbledore says he and Grindelwald were “closer than brothers” that will get some nervous laughter in some screenings, and go completely unnoticed in most. Dumbledore and Grindelwald swap blood in a flashback via the Mirror of Erised, but that’s not gay. There’s nothing gay here.
And on top of that the movie is an overstuffed mess. Don’t waste your money.
This is just the latest example of feeling insulted by a major tentpole film kinda-sorta having a gay character but not really.
The cast of Solo: A Star Wars Story said Donald Glover’s Lando Calrissian was pansexual. That was nowhere in the movie.
Tessa Thompson has said Marvel’s Valkyrie is bisexual. There is no mention of that in the MCU.
Deadpool is pansexual in comic books, but best of luck ever seeing mention of that in the movies with Ryan Reynolds.
And I’m sure I’m not alone in thinking it’s more insulting and hurtful to the LGBTQ+ community to have these blockbusters tiptoe around mentioning us rather than not even bring us up in the first place. It feels like we’re taboo. Our sexuality is just as honorable as anyone else’s, and we shouldn’t accept anything less than equal representation in 2018.
Sort of related: Ezra Miller just came out as gender-fluid, which is great. But in my opinion, all of the showboating the actor has been doing on the red carpets for the movie (dressing up as a 'human sex toy' and as a glittery glam rock take on Hedwig the owl) has totally upstaged the movie. Not that it’s a hard movie to upstage. I just saw it and I’ve already forgotten mostly everything about it.
And now a word from GLAAD “..
And now a word from GLAAD “……………………………….” . As usual nothing. GLAAD serves only as another cocktail party venue for the A list fags.
I think that it’s all done
I think that it's all done via coded references: In Deadpool I, Deadpool gets pegged by his lover; in Thor Ragnarok, Valkyrie reacts to Hela killing her lover; in Wonder Woman, an Amazon warrior slides knees-first to be by Antiope's side when she's killed on the beach; and Dumbledore's refereence to being close to Grinwald seems to be a similarly coded message. ….. I don't expect to see much more than that for movies that seek to have worldwide distributtion. After all, look at what Malaysia just did to the subtextual gay references in Bohemian Rhapsody.