Warner Bros.
It's confirmed: Professor Albus Dumbledore won't appear in "Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them," the upcoming "Harry Potter" spinoff movie.
The Hogwarts headmaster was rumored to be in the movie. In the time the movie's set - 1926 New York - Dumbledore is 45 years old and a Transfiguration professor at Hogwarts. He's also known to be friendly with Newt Scamander, the main character of the movie. Scamander was expelled from Hogwarts after endangering someone else's life with a magical creature, and Dumbledore tried to defend him.
Dumbledore is also explicitly referred to in the voiceover for the movie's first full trailer. "What makes Albus Dumbledore so fond of you, Mr Scamander?" says someone speaking in the voiceover.
But though he's part of the backstory, Dumbledore won't show up in the movie itself, according to a long feature Jeff Jensen wrote in print issue of Entertainment Weekly's Fall Movie Preview.
It's too bad for Michael Gambon, the actor who played Dumbledore in most of the "Harry Potter" movies. He told Express he badly wants to be part of the movie: "I want to be in it, yes," he said. "They've got a Dumbledore. They'll have a young Dumbledore, won't they? But I could be his dad. They could flashback to me."
Given his age, Dumbledore is pretty much the only core character from the "Harry Potter" series that could have appeared in "Fantastic Beasts." But, as Jensen notes, the movie takes place in the year Voldemort is born, so that may become significant in the story.
"Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them" will have at least two sequels, so there's still a chance Dumbledore will be part of J.K. Rowling's new narrative.