Uhh, So How Old Is Professor McGonagall Now?

We know it's rude to ask a lady's age, but...

Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald came out last week and (*cut to Harry Potter fans looting the streets, emitting blood-curdling shrieks of rage*).

There are been much confusion and hurt centered around the prequel/sequel’s climactic reveal, which (spoiler alert, dinguses, in case you didn’t realise we were about to give away the ending)…

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…ya sad boy Credence Barebone (Ezra Miller) is revealed by Grindelwald (name redacted) to be a descendant of the Dumbledore family line. Does that make him a secret brother to Albus (Jude Law)? A surprise cousin? Or was Grindelwald simply referring to his Obscurus and not Credence himself?

Believe it or not, this confusing retconning of Albus Dumbledore’s lineage isn’t the biggest thing angering OG HP fans. Rather, it’s the mangled timeline of witch kween Professor Minerva McGonagall.

See, according to Harry Potter’s official Wiki (citing her Pottermore biography and quotes from Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix), Minerva was born in 1935 and began working at wizard school Hogwarts in 1956. Okay, cool.

Except, The Crimes of Grindelwald takes place in 1927, and in it, she pops up as a full-grown adult teacher at Hogwarts, depicted by actor Fiona Glascott, taking over from Dame Maggie Smith.

Oh, and she also appears in a flashback set at approximately 1910, in which Minerva is also a teacher, despite it taking place approximately 25 years before her birth.

This means Professor McGonagall, whom we initially thought was 56 during Harry's first year at Hogwarts (1991), was actually closer to 101.

Twitter had some… theories?

Okay y’all are mad because of the mcgonagall thing but did y’all ever think maybe that’s her mother?!? #CrimesOfGrindlewald #McGonagall

— Lydia (@Lydia76673682) November 18, 2018

Hm, Professor McGonagall is immortal

— J.K Rowlingbot 5000 (@jk_r0wling_) November 16, 2018

Of course, most canonical contradictions in J.K. Rowling's Harry Potter saga can be explained by either saying a) they used a Time Turner or b) they lied.

Well, all except this contradiction:

The biggest plot hole of #FantasticBeasts Crimes of Grindelwald is that Grindelwald has the power to look like Colin Farrell and chooses to look like a bloated david bowie cosplayer with an iron deficiency

— Dana Schwartz (@DanaSchwartzzz) November 13, 2018

Read More:

Movie Review: Fantastic Beasts: The Crimes of Grindelwald Is the No-Maj of Sequels

Header Image: Warner Bros. Pictures