Professor McGonagall Will Appear In 'Fantastic Beasts 2,' So Study Your Transfigurations

Harry Potter fans already knew that the upcoming Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them sequel would feature a younger version of Albus Dumbledore played by Jude Law, but it turns out he's not the only iconic Hogwarts professor whose backstory the new movie will explore. A newly unveiled cast list reveals that Professor McGonagall will appear in Fantastic Beasts 2, so get ready to see a younger version of McGonagall alongside young Dumbledore.

According to new reports, Irish actress Fiona Glascott will portray the iconic Harry Potter character Minerva McGonagall when she was in her 30s in Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald. Nothing else is known about how McGonagall will play into the new movie, but we might see her in her first years as a professor at Hogwarts.

For hardcore Harry Potter fans, this casting announcement may actually be pretty confusing. In the saga's canon lore, Minerva McGonagall was born in 1935, and did not begin teaching at Hogwarts until sometime in the mid-1950s. But Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald will be set in 1927, which is eight years before McGonagall was ever born. It is safe to assume that the movie will simply ignore this break in Harry Potter canon in order to feature the beloved character's backstory.

Fans of the series did not learn much about Minerva McGonagall's life before becoming the transfiguration professor at Hogwarts in either the Harry Potter books or movies, but author J.K. Rowling wrote up a full biography for the character on her website Pottermore. According to Rowling's entry about McGonagall, the powerful witch comes from a "half-blood" heritage, and her relationship with the Muggle world is a huge part of her backstory. Early in her life, McGonagall fell in love with a Muggle man, but that relationship ended in heartbreak. After graduating with top marks from Hogwarts, McGonagall went to work at the Ministry of Magic, but promptly quit due to the anti-Muggle prejudice that she witnessed there. She then applied for a teaching job at Hogwarts and developed a very close friendship with fellow professor Albus Dumbledore.

This younger version of Minerva McGonagall will be played by Fiona Glascott, an Irish actress known for her roles in 2015's Brooklyn and 2002's Resident Evil.

Since Fiona Glascott's casting as Minerve McGonagall was only recently revealed, it sounds like McGonagall will only appear in a few brief scenes of Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald, but there is the possibility that she could take center stage in future sequels.

Of course, the main storyline of Crimes of Grindelwald will focus on Albus Dumbledore's long and complicated rivalry with the dark wizard Gellert Grindelwald. The Hogwarts professor will enlist magizoologist Newt Scamander to track down and stop Grindelwald's evil plan, which would launch a war between the magical world and the Muggle world.

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald is flying into movie theaters everywhere in just a matter of days. The new movie arrives on Friday, Nov. 16.