The planned Harry Potter spin-off, Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them, has a long way to go before it can start matching the incredible star power that defined the original eight-film series. But now they’re off to a great start, with the newest best-actor Oscar winner joining the fold.

Eddie Redmayne, who was the frontrunner to play “magizoologist” Newt Scamander in the potential new franchise, is now in negotiations to lead the film, according to Variety. The hold-up was Redmayne’s perfectly reasonable request to actually see the finished script, written by J.K. Rowling herself, before committing to the role. It’s hard to imagine that Redmayne was worried about the quality—“Yes, you created one of the most beloved fantasy stories of all time, but are you up to my standards?”—but given the ambitious twists some of Rowling’s characters have been handed in the past, he may have just wanted to know what he was really in for before signing on the dotted line.

The film, based on a book that Rowling published in 2001 that also serves as a textbook read by Harry, Hermione, and company in the main Potter series, will be set in New York City around 70 years before Harry’s story begins. Rowling describes it merely as “an extension of the wizarding world,” so while we might learn more about boggarts and hippogriffs, any new stories about Dumbledore, Professor McGonagall, or any of Harry’s other elders are unlikely. That is, until the Fantastic Beasts series gets tempted to go all Marvel on us and tie all the stories together. Until then, though, isn’t Eddie Redmayne and some creatures slightly more magical than this dog enough to keep you interested? We thought so.