Why Harry Potter’s Reunion Mostly Ignores JK Rowling

HBO Max’s Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts premiered on the platform at midnight PST on New Year’s Day, and Harry Potter author J.K. Rowling was noticeably absent. The Harry Potter reunion special was announced in November of 2021, and audiences have been buzzing ever since. The special focuses on the cast and creators of the films and involves interviews with alums as they tour beloved sets, including Hogwarts and Diagon Alley. While some Harry Potter actors were missing from the reunion, the celebration involved dozens of cast and crew members, including Daniel Radcliffe, Emma Watson, Rupert Grint, Chris Columbus, and Gary Oldman. J.K. Rowling, on the other hand, was mostly ignored by the 20th anniversary reunion.

However, Rowling was not completely missing. Interview footage of her filmed in 2019 appeared in the special. She has become widely criticized in the years since that interview because of her disparaging remarks toward transgender people. She posted in support of Maya Forstater – who was terminated from the Centre for Global Development over transphobic comments. Judge James Tayler ruled that the termination was appropriate because her “approach [was] not worthy of respect in a democratic society” (via The Guardian). Rowling publicly disagreed. Several months later, in June 2020, she returned to the spotlight again after making statements insinuating trans women aren’t women (via Twitter). Multiple Harry Potter actors, including Radcliffe and Eddie Redmayne who plays Newt in Fantastic Beasts, released statements against her comments.

Many audiences have speculated this controversy is part of the reason she wasn’t featured more heavily. Nonetheless, Rowling’s team has reported this isn’t the case (via Entertainment Weekly). They have stated that Rowling was invited to return but chose not to. The reasoning they provided is that they believed there was already enough archival footage of her from the 2019 interview. People close to the situation also stated outright that her transphobic comments and any controversies around them were not factored into the decision.

Although Rowling’s team has said otherwise, it is difficult for viewers not to see the connection, especially considering that the 2019 interview was filmed just before she made the comments supporting Forstater. There was no new footage of her since the comments were made, and while she was favorably mentioned by several of the returning cast, including Harry Potter‘s Ginny Weasley actor Bonnie Wright, her name was only brought up a handful of times. The reports that the controversial comments had nothing to do with the decision have been a hard sell for viewers, who justifiably expected to see more of the person who created Harry Potter in the special. Other viewers of the franchise have been torn over their love for the series and their dislike for the author. For them, J.K. Rowling’s absence was for the better.

However, it is likely there is another reason for largely ignoring her besides the infamous comments. Although Rowling has been a large part of making the Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them movies – which are spinoffs from the original Harry Potter movie series – she was not heavily involved in making the first eight films. In the archival footage, Rowling recalled the difficulty they had with finding the perfect actor to play the boy who lived. This footage and several other clips may make it appear that she was very hands-on with the original movies, but she wasn’t. While viewers may have been caught off guard, perhaps there really was enough archival footage to fill her part in the movie reunion because she wasn’t as involved in the movies as audiences think. J.K. Rowling has made troubling comments, but the reason she didn’t return for Harry Potter 20th Anniversary: Return to Hogwarts might just be that she didn’t have anything else to say about the making of the original franchise because she usually wasn’t there.

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