Why making the new Harry Potter show is creatively bankrupt

Right now, the first signs of life are emanating from HBO and Warner Bros. Discovery's new Harry Potter television series. The first six cast members have been announced, including John Lithgow as Dumbledore, Paapa Essiedu as Snape, Janet McTeer as McGonagal and Nick Frost as Hagrid. Soon, we'll likely hear about more cast members and filming dates and all sorts of other details. The show is slated to cover the entirety of J.K. Rowling's book series over the course of about a decade, so HBO is in this one for the long haul.

If I'm being totally honest, I have beyond zero interest in this show. In fact, it makes me disgusted whenever I hear any news even remotely related to it. And while I usually try to not to crap on things too excessively, this is one instance where the frustration is too great to ignore.

Harry Potter and the Curse of Eternal Commodification

There are a few different aspects to HBO's new Harry Potter series that make its existence such a bitter pill to swallow. The first of those is that this is a blatant, obvious attempt by HBO's parent company Warner Bros. Discovery to milk an already exhausted franchise for even more money, in the least inventive way possible. The acclaimed run of eight Harry Potter movies came out in theaters from 2001 to 2011, bringing the magical world of Hogwarts to life on the big screen. That's not that long ago, certainly not long enough to justify a remake of this scale. It's not like this is bringing Harry Potter to a new generation; as someone with a bunch of young nieces and nephews, I can readily attest to the fact that kids are still engaging with and enjoying the movies plenty to this day.

Despite any insistence from HBO that this will be a more "faithful" adaptation of Rowling's books, WBD CEO David Zaslav made the motive for this new Harry Potter series crystal clear in 2023, when he mused at an investment conference that Harry Potter was an "underused" IP for the studio, with plenty of room to expand. The movies made deviations, sure, but they were far more faithful than the vast majority of book adaptations. This is all about the money.

In some ways, that's the most on-brand thing possible for Harry Potter. I worked in a book store during the mid-2010s, and was struck again and again by how shamelessly Rowling and the companies she works with exploit Harry Potter fans' desire for more Hogwarts, with flimsy tie-in books and more merchandise than you can shake a wand at. (Wand sold separately, of course.)

The most egregious example I witnessed was the release of the book version of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, the "eighth" Harry Potter story. That's the stage play which takes place decades after the main story, when Harry and Ginny Weasley's children attend Hogwarts. When the book version of the play came out, many, many fans misunderstood what it was because the marketing was intentionally opaque. No matter how many well-intentioned booksellers told people that this was a script book rather than a traditional novel, they still bought it, only to flock back to stores to complain or return copies when they realized this wasn't truly the eighth Harry Potter novel — not to mention that Rowling didn't even write it herself.

While The Cursed Child has gone on to have a successful theater run, I still think often back to that initial confusion and frustration about the script book. It's a perfect example of how Rowling and her associates are content to milk the desires of fans, rather than actually write something substantial enough to be worth their time and then market it clearly as such. I'm sure the play is fun, no shade at it directly, but marketing a bound version of the script as a new entry in the Harry Potter franchise when what you're really doing is giving fans a glimpse behind the scenes of a theater production is deceptive.

That brings us back around to HBO, and why I loathe that they're the studio backing this project. HBO has built a reputation for producing high-quality shows and movies, and for being a creative-friendly company because of how it backs projects other studios might not be daring enough to get behind. Without a studio like HBO, we probably never would have had shows like Game of Thrones, The Wire, Westworld, The Sopranos or The Last of Us. How is rehashing Harry Potter barely a decade after the films were released a good fit for the sort of vision this studio has historically employed?

There's also the fact that a Harry Potter show would be, by its very nature, a kid-friendly affair. It should be, since Harry Potter is written for kids, and simply has such broad appeal that adults enjoy it too. But once again, that feel like it's at odds with HBO as a brand, which is known for making adult-oriented content.

Put all of this together, and it feels like the Harry Potter show is a mandate from HBO's corporate masters, rather than something the studio is chasing because they have a genuine drive to produce it.

Maybe J.K. Rowling just needs another yacht?

The other very large reason that HBO's Harry Potter series is problematic is, of course, the J.K. Rowling of it all. When the Harry Potter books came out, Rowling was a well-loved figure who was happily toiling away at a series that was reshaping the young reader fantasy landscape. These days, she's best known for using her massive platform and influence to spread transphobic views.

Most recently, she posted a photo to X of herself smoking a cigar on what looks an oceanfront terrace to celebrate a UK Supreme Court ruling which is expected to adversely affect transgender people in the region, with the caption "I love it when a plan comes together." It's some jaw-dropping supervillain behavior, which has drawn sharp criticisms from other public figures like Pedro Pascal, one of the stars of HBO's series The Last of Us, who characterized Rowling's post as "heinous loser behavior."

It has been announced that Rowling will serve as an executive producer and have a large role in shaping this new Harry Potter series, but even more than that, she almost certainly stands to gain a huge financial windfall from it. Separating the art from the artist is something we all must make our own decisions with, but in this particular case, supporting Rowling's work means supporting Rowling financially, and she's directly using that wealth to prop up organizations like the one which filed the lawsuit the Supreme Court just ruled on in the UK.

And before anyone comes at me saying "Rowling is just defending women's rights" or some other nonsense, consider that last year she erroneously accused Algerian Olympic boxer Imane Khalif of being transgender (Khalif is a biological woman), leading to a firestorm of hate speech. If using her vast wealth and resources to attack one of the smallest and most vulnerable minorities in the world isn't bad enough, the sort of hatred and phobia of the other that Rowling is courting never ends with the group being initially targeted. And even if it did, the author's actions have been so reprehensible that HBO associating with her at all is its own sort of complicity in supporting that behavior. Even if some of the stars for the new Harry Potter show don't share Rowling's views, the stain of association will be impossible to wipe away.

Suffice to say, I will not be watching Harry Potter whenever it premieres on HBO and Max.

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