VOTD: 'The Aurors,' A Fictional 'Harry Potter' TV Show
Sometimes the best April Fool's jokes are great ideas masquerading as jokes. For example, ThinkGeek's Star Wars Tauntaun sleeping bag from a few years back, originally just a joke, eventually became a reality because it was so clever. We can only dare to dream that this awesome April Fools joke has the same fate. IGN has created a one minute trailer for a fictional television series called The Aurors, a Harry Potter themed series on FX that follows "an elite unit of law enforcement agents within the Ministry of Magic." Warning: If you are a fan of Harry Potter, watching this video and realizing it's a fake will be insanely depressing. Check out the trailer after the jump.
Thanks to IGN for such a bad-ass April Fool's joke. Maybe the powers that be at Warner Brothers can take note.
If you don't know what an Auror is, here's a description:
An Auror is a member of an elite unit of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement of the Ministry of Magic trained to capture Dark wizards and witches. Auror training is very difficult and intensive, so there are few qualified applicants.
On the "official" page for the series over on IGN, they describe the show as the following:
The Aurors is a 12-episode TV fantasy crime series based on characters established in the Harry Potter universe. The series revolves around an elite unit of law enforcement agents within the Ministry of Magic known as Aurors.
If shows like Heroes or Smallville or The Cape can get made, why not The Aurors? Well, there's that whole super expensive Harry Potter license to worry about, plus the blessing of J.K. Rowling, not to mention the legions so fans who would be all worried about how the show fits into the Potter canon (the current head of the department is a major character in the series, one I won't spoil here with the new film yet to be released). Still, what a great spin off idea. Where can we start the online campaign to get this done?
EDIT: I was reminded by /Film reader Marc B. that NBC has green-lit a pilot by Battlestar Galactica show-runner Ron Moore called 17th Precinct, which is a cop show set in the world of magic. That sort of fills the void left by the fact that The Aurors doesn't exist but, still, it's not Harry Potter.