Though it has been years since the last part of the Harry Potter franchise was released, magic is still in the air – and it’s only intensifying.

  Beginning in June 2016, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, a two-part play generated by J.K. Rowling and written by Jack Thorne and John Tiffany, will call London’s Palace Theatre home, bringing new and exciting revelations concerning the epilogue of the famed series to its millions of followers.  

  One such fan, junior Carsen Bateman, is optimistic about the play’s capacity for bringing the feel of the original series to the stage, but is concerned about its availability.

  “I’m kind of mad about [the fact that the play will only be in London] because I’m a really big Harry Potter fan, and I feel like it would be cool to see…how their lives were 19 years later,” said Bateman. “I’m not just gonna get on a plane and go fly to London to see it, so that kind of stinks, but it’s a cool idea.”

  This sentiment seems to be a common one among non-British Harry Potter enthusiasts, and some, like senior Emma Gruner, have already begun to hypothesize their own ideas about how the play should be distributed to a wider audience.

  “I assume that if [the play is] as popular as I expect it’s gonna be…either it’ll come here or someone will professionally videotape it and sell it as a DVD,” Gruner said. “That’s still…kind of a disservice because, you know, a lot of the fanbase is not in London…it doesn’t seem like the best decision to me.”

   To these students, Harry Potter has been a hugely ingrained part of their childhood memories; junior Addy Schefter, for instance, has been connected with the franchise since her early years.

  “I started reading [the books] when I was little, and my dad and I would always go to the premieres together,” Schefter said.  “They just bring that touch of fun and imagination to your life.”

  Gruner shares the same intense attachment to the famous series that she says changed her life forever.

  “I started reading them in fourth grade, I think, although it took me until sixth grade to actually finish the books,” said Gruner. “They had a huge influence on me, in my love of reading in general  and just my appreciation of what books can really do to you and your imagination and your…ability to immerse yourself in a story…and…this all sounds really cheesy, but it’s true.”

  Because of her immense dedication to the novels, Gruner has expressed some unique concerns about the play’s manipulation of J.K. Rowling’s original universe.

  “Well, I always kind of liked…the idea to imagine the next generation as we see fit, and…[Rowling] always said that she was never gonna write a sequel, so that just kind of threw me for a loop there,” Gruner said. “I think…the fact that it is a play…[is] gonna be interesting, to kind of explore how it can be done that way and…despite what it’s gonna do to people’s imagined realities of the next generation, it’ll still provide a lot of answers and a new story to entertain people and whatnot, so I guess it’s cool in a way…that she’s still keeping the excitement of the story alive.”

  However the storyline unfolds, J.K. Rowling will always have committed fans who remain begging for more of their beloved boy wizard, and Bateman counts herself among them.

  “I want her to continue [the series] because I thought it was really awesome, and…I just loved the Harry Potter movies,” said Bateman. “I just thought she was a good writer, and her films turned out nice. I know she had some part to do in her films with the representation and making sure it was still similar between the book [and the movies] so I definitely think she should continue [the series] and [the play] should come to America from London.”

  No matter how much time seems to pass between even the tiniest scraps of new information about Harry Potter, the series itself seems to have gathered together its famous Deathly Hallows – in other words, for those who are more of the Muggle persuasion, it can never die.