If you can’t wait for Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, you’re in luck. There’s another highly anticipated Harry Potter prequel—and you can watch it online right now for free.
Voldemort: Origins of the Heir is a fittingly dark live-action fan movie that explores a key unanswered question from the Harry Potter series: How exactly did Tom Riddle become He Who Must Not Be Named.
Here’s how the Verge broke it down:
The film follows an original character, Grisha Mac Laggen, the heir on of the four Hogwarts founders, Godric Gryffindor. The film plays out in flashbacks: Mac Laggen is captured and interrogated at the beginning of the film, and as she’s questioned, we get bits and pieces of the mystery that she’s trying to solve. It turns out that she’s on the hunt for Tom Riddle, who she knew as a student at Hogwarts, and whom she suspects is involved with the death of a wizard named Hepzibah Smith, a descendant of the Hufflepuff family. Even though she knows Riddle’s hunger for power, she tells her interrogators that she believes that he can be redeemed.
It’s notable that the film ever made it this far. It was originally funded via Kickstarter but quickly triggered a copyright battle with Warner Bros. Tryangle Films, the creators of fan film, reached a settlement in June 2016 that allowed the movie to be released under a couple of key conditions. Aside from the obvious disclaimers noting that it’s not associated with J.K. Rowling or Warner Bros., Voldemort: Origins of the Heir had to be released for free and on YouTube.
That means you can watch the entire 52-minute film now. It might not be considered canon, but it’s next best thing.
READ MORE:
- 10 things you don’t know about Severus Snape
- 10 dark facts about Draco Malfoy
- Everything we know about Fantastic Beasts 2
H/T The Verge