More Harry Potter movies are coming, but what is a ‘Harry Potter movie’?

Warner Bros. Pictures’s management is experiencing an existential crisis. From Discovery’s purchase of its parent company, WarnerMedia, to the budget cuts that followed, and the losses reported ahead of an earnings call on Thursday, the studio’s future looks fuzzy. Warner Bros. believes that any kind of cultural revival is possible. Discovery CEO David Zaslav, starts with franchises — and involves making a whole lot more of them.

Zaslav shared his ideas for how the company would prioritize its largest franchises during that earnings call:

Focus on the big movies that are loved, that are tentpoles, that people are going to leave early from dinner to go to see — and we have a lot of them. Batman, Superman, Aquaman – if J.K. can be arranged. [Rowling]On Harry Potter moving forward, Lord of the Rings. What’s the deal with Game of Thrones. How are we managing a number of large franchises? We’re focused on franchises.

“Do something with J.K.” could mean that Zaslav wants to remove Rowling from the series’ theatrical future, or that WB simply has ambition to broker a new deal with the Harry Potter writer. But as it stands, it’s a potentially troubling statement, considering the once-beloved author’s consistent remarks that many have deemed transphobic. Zaslav didn’t specify Rowling’s creative contribution to the Harry Potter series, other than to state that it is ready for continuation.

Curiously, the CEO also said to investors that the studio hasn’t “done a Harry Potter movie in 15 years.” That isn’t exactly true. WB, technically, is currently in the middle a new Harry Potter series with Fantastic Beasts. Rowling oversees the writing and supervision of this series. Fantastic Beasts seems like a non-issue for anyone. (Ouch?)

Warner Bros. Pictures

While the first Fantastic Beasts movie — which, of the three released so far, happens to be the one that’s least directly connected to the original Potter story — made a killing at the box office, the other two have struggled to amass American viewership. The Crimes of Grindelwald couldn’t match its predecessor’s highs in 2018, and Secrets of DumbledoreIt was an instant hit, but failed to reach the $100 million domestic box office mark. So if that’s what attaching Rowling (and her constant transphobia) to the franchise gets you, what’s the point?

In short, Warner Bros. holds the rights to Harry Potter in partnership with Rowling. All future Potter projects will have to be handled by her and her company as well as WB. But beyond agreeing to let WB produce more movies, it doesn’t seem that Rowling adds too much value to this series — because right now, it’s unclear what the “Harry Potter franchise” ultimately is. Do Warner Bros. and Zaslav hope to bring back their original cast of adults or to recast them as older actors in order to tell the story about the Wizarding World’s next crisis? With Fantastic Beasts bombing and the focus back on Harry himself, it also seems like WB might not be so keen on the Marauders prequel — which would follow the generation ahead of Harry’s during their time at Hogwarts — that fans have spent years clamoring for.

Warner Bros. Pictures

The best solution for Zaslav Bros. and Warner Bros. may be the most simple: Harry Potter and The Cursed Child. Rowling was in charge of the production, but Jack Thorne (who adapts it) wrote the script. His Dark Materials for WarnerMedia’s HBO), is a sequel to the original Harry Potter story and follows the children of the series’ main characters. The show has been wildly successful since it premiered in 2016, and thanks to a recent reconstruction from a two-night Broadway event into a one-night show, continues to sell out wherever it’s playing. A movie adaptation of the story could reduce ticket sales. However, fans might enjoy a sequel with kids who are further into the Hogwarts experience.

It’s no surprise that Warner Bros. wants to use franchises to dig itself out of its current hole. As Zaslav himself said, the company has a lot of them and they’re pretty popular. House of the Dragon has just finished a massive first season, the return of Henry Cavill’s Superman has the whole internet excited, and it’s hard to ignore the fact that Amazon Studios’ biggest show of the year came from a franchise that Warner Bros. still holds the movie rights to.

Warner Bros. is obvious to go back to Harry Potter. The franchise continues its popularity despite all of this. But finding a way to bring that success back to movie theaters won’t be easy.