Harry Potter TV Show Trailer Reveals HBO’s Magical Remake, First Look at Dumbledore, Snape & More Characters

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The remake has to achieve the right balancing act between fidelity to the source material, nostalgia for the Harry Potter movies, and doing its own thing that justifies its very existence. Based on the footage, while it’s still early days, it’s set to achieve just that. Watch the Harry Potter trailer below:

Even beyond the footage, a couple of important details are confirmed here. Firstly, Season 1 will indeed be titled Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone, and secondly, the release date has changed. It was previously slated for sometime in 2027, but the Potter remake is now debuting at Christmas 2026, which sounds rather perfect.

HBO’s Harry Potter & The Philosopher’s Stone Looks Like A Worthy Remake

Image via HBO Max

The Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone trailer moves through all the story beats you’d expect. It starts off with the Dursleys, with Aunt Petunia (Bel Powley) in particular getting a good bit of spotlight as she cuts Harry’s hair and tells him he’s not special. Except, of course, he is, as Nick Frost’s Hagrid arrives on the scene to tell him. After learning that ~~yer~~ he’s a wizard, we’re off to Hogwarts itself.

There’s plenty of glimpses of magic to be found there, with Harry meeting Ron Weasley (Alastair Stout) and Hermione Granger (Arabella Stanton) on the Hogwarts Express, and then glimpses of several professors, including Severus Snape (Paapa Essiedu), Minerva McGonagall (Janet McTeer), and last but by no means least, Albus Percival Wulfric Brian Dumbledore (John Lithgow).

At Hogwarts, again, there’s plenty of story elements that’ll be familiar to fans: we see Harry and the Gryffindor Quidditch team preparing to face Hufflepuff, there’s scenes of lessons such as Herbology, and also just a general slice of Hogwarts life. The castle itself looks impressive – the Entrance Hall, in particular, looks brilliant.

At the very heart of this are the new Golden Trio, in particular, Harry himself. The kids all look to be absolutely nailing those roles, and while there’s not quite enough to gauge their chemistry together, it does look as though it’ll be getting their friendship right. The scene of them meeting on the train is wisely placed at the very end, and looks rather wonderful.

Some of the visual language is similar to the movies, perhaps inevitably, and there’s room for improvement with the lighting and color grading, but there’s enough that’s different here – the Dursleys, Hogwarts itself – that should make it stand apart, and alongside, the films as a worthy adaptation.

Alongside the trailer, HBO also released new still images (and sadly not magically moving ones) of several characters, including Harry, Ron, Hermione, Vernon and Petunia, Snape, and Dumbledore – check them out below: