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A Harry Potter spinoff film series based on an in-universe book, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, is in development at Warner Bros., and the company plans to make tie-in video game for the movies, it announced today.
J.K. Rowling herself will pen the screenplay for the first film, which is inspired by the titular creature compendium and will star its fictional author, Newt Scamander. Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them was a textbook that Harry had to purchase in the first book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. Rowling released it as a real book, along with another fictional Harry Potter tome, Quidditch Through the Ages, in 2001 for the charity Comic Relief.
The Fantastic Beasts films will take place 70 years prior to the events of the seven Harry Potter books. The series is "neither a prequel nor a sequel to the Harry Potter series, but an extension of the wizarding world," said Rowling in a press release today.
"In addition to the film series, Fantastic Beasts will also be developed across [Warner Bros.'] video game, consumer products and digital initiatives businesses, including enhanced links with Pottermore.com, Rowling's digital online experience built around the Harry Potter stories," said Warner Bros.
Video games based on each of the eight Harry Potter films were published by Electronic Arts. It's unclear if the new games would be made by Warner Bros. Interactive Entertainment, the video game division of Warner Bros., or if they would be licensed out to a different company.
