The “let’s just make this single movie a trilogy” strikes again. While not quite as bad as the Crimes of Grindlewald, this movie falls flat for many similar reasons, mainly that it feels way too long for the amount of plot the movie conveys. Most scenes feel either too long or unnecessary and the cumulative effect by the end of the movie is tiring. There are a few charming and funny scenes (the dumb crab walk in the prison for example), but it all feels irrelevant to the main plot.

The climax scene of the movie is also a great example of the sloppy storytelling found throughout the movie. All of a sudden we switch from what seems like an election, to just letting the Qilin choose the next leader and everyone is just going along with it? Not to mention earlier in the movie we are told that wizards did away with the Qilin selection because it was exceedingly difficult to find someone pure of heart enough, but don’t worry, there are two people in the crowd that the Qilin finds pure hearted enough… Then Grindlewald and Dumbledore fight a bit and them fighting breaks their blood pact trinket and there is not even a real attempt to explain it. It is all just MacGuffins and deus ex machina back and forth for three movies, so I guess it is fitting it finishes with one.

It was pretty clear from the start this one was going to be a mess of a plot when the messiness of the plot was explained away as a counter-measure to Grindlewald’s future sight. It justified any amount of unexplained surprises and confusing/unexplained decisions. Similar to the second movie, none of these lands and feels meaningful because there is no earned buy-in to any expectations about what is going on. Maybe there could have been some clever way to wrap it up that made for a satisfying romp, but this sure as hell was not it.