Fantastic Beasts Finds New Home on Peacock This Fall

The Fantastic Beasts trilogy is coming to Peacock this fall. Originally on Max, Fantastic Beasts will land on the new streaming platform, along with other Halloween titles, starting September 1st. The extended versions of the Harry Potter films are also currently streaming exclusively on Peacock.

The films follow the adventures of magizoologist Newt Scamander, played by Eddie Redmayne, and the rise of the dark wizard Grindelwald, played by Johnny Depp and later Mads Mikkelsen.

Fantastic Beasts received a mixed reception and poor reviews. Notably, two of its lead actors, Johnny Depp and Ezra Miller, were facing huge public controversies at the time. However, audiences were also dissatisfied with lackluster character arcs, lore continuity errors, and a lack of magic similar to the Harry Potter films.

The first installment, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, has a 79% rating on Rotten Tomatoes. The following two films, The Crimes of Grindelwald and The Secrets of Dumbledore, scored a 54% and 83% respectively.

The Fantastic Beasts Series Remains Unfinished

There has been no update on the “paused” franchise. Director David Yates previously suggested the films were just “parked,” leaving the door open for the creators to revisit the franchise in the future.

However, Warner Bros. has shifted its focus from feature films to TV adaptations as they develop a new Harry Potter series for Max. David Zaslav, CEO of Warner Bros. Discovery, said the Harry Potter television reboot is expected to premiere on Max in 2026. Fans are also hoping for additional series to be developed, one of the most popular being a prequel following the adventures of the Marauders, aka James Potter, Sirius Black, Remus Lupin, and Peter Pettigrew as students at Hogwarts.

“Face Your Fears” – Peacock’s 2024 Halloween Lineup

With the addition of the Fantastic Beasts franchise, Peacock kicks off the spooky season with a stellar Halloween programming lineup. TVGuide lists all the films and television shows coming to Peacock in the run-up to October 31st.

Peacock has unveiled its list of scary movies that will be streaming on the service starting next month, and it’s packed with classics like the
Saw
franchise, a selection of the
Halloween
movies, and, of course,
Leprechaun 4: Lost in Space.

As NBCUniversal’s streaming platform, Peacock will have all the Universal classic horror films like Frankenstein, The Mummy, Invisible Man, and The Thing. Other notable franchises include The Purge movies, Texas Chainsaw Massacre, and Night of the Living Dead.

The streamer is also premiering two Peacock original series, Teacup, and Hysteria!. Teacup is a horror thriller, inspired by the New York Times bestselling novel Stinger by Robert McCammon. Created by Ian McCulloch, and executive produced by James Wan, Teacup follows a group of neighbors in rural Georgia, after they are trapped together, and must cooperate in order to survive a mysterious threat.

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Hysteria! follows a high school heavy metal band, who capitalize on a fellow student’s disappearance and the 1980s “Satanic Panic,” by re-branding the band and appealing to the town’s obsession with the occult. However, the band inadvertently makes themselves the number one suspects after there’s an increase of murders, kidnappings, and supernatural occurrences in the town.

The first two episodes of Teacup drop on Thursday, October 10th, with two new episodes airing weekly through Halloween, and all episodes of Hysteria! premiere on October 18th.