Will Grey's Anatomy Star Kevin McKidd Play Arthur Weasley In HBO's Harry Potter Series?

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Now that Kevin McKidd is no longer terrorizing audiences as his demonic Dr. Owen Hunt on "Grey's Anatomy," the Scottish actor is, ostensibly, free to do something else. So will he play Arthur Weasley, patriarch of the red-headed and disadvantaged Weasley family, in the forthcoming "Harry Potter" TV series?

We honestly don't know, but McKidd addressed the rumors in an interview with Entertainment Weekly. "I saw something about this," McKidd said. "And listen, I would never say never. I'm a massive Harry Potter fan."

So why do people think McKidd might play Arthur, aside from his distinctive red hair? There are a few reasons. First, as EW notes, Gracie Cochrane — who's set to play Ginny Weasley, the only girl in the large family besides her mother Molly, in the TV series — recently followed McKidd on Instagram, though that could be totally unrelated. (Maybe she just started watching "Grey's Anatomy.") There's also the fact that, while the first season of "Harry Potter," titled "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone," is set to release on Christmas of this year, Arthur doesn't appear in the first book or film and makes his debut in the immediate sequel "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets." 

Still, the fact is that unless McKidd is straight-up lying because he's been sworn to secrecy, we know as much as he does about him potentially playing Arthur in the "Harry Potter" series. Interestingly, though, McKidd told EW he almost appeared in the original "Harry Potter" film franchise as an entirely different character.

Apparently, Kevin McKidd narrowly missed out on a role in the original Harry Potter film franchise

On some level, it would be sort of perfect for Kevin McKidd to appear in "Harry Potter and the Philosopher's Stone" because, apparently, he narrowly missed an opportunity to appear in both parts of "Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows." (Remember when every single series-ending movie got split into two parts?) I'll let McKidd explain:

"When I did a show called 'Journeyman' before 'Grey's,' we were on the bubble and waiting to find out if we we're picked up [for season 2] or not. So I was under contract and [director] David Yates sent me a letter offering me a role in the final two 'Harry Potter' films, and I was unable to do it because I was waiting to hear if 'Journeyman' was picked up or not, and then it was not picked up."

McKidd also told Entertainment Weekly that the character he would have played was some sort of werewolf, and the only prominent werewolf who appears in the "Deathly Hallows" movies is Fenrir Greyback, a dangerous werewolf who bites with abandon and was ultimately portrayed by Dave Legeno. (Hilariously, one of Fenrir's victims is the eldest Weasley son, Bill, but he's played by Domhnall Gleeson — McKidd wasn't young enough to convincingly play this particular redhead at the time.)

"So I missed out on that chance of being in the final two 'Harry Potter' films back in the day, which still makes me sad," McKidd said to EW. "The idea of getting another crack at that, because I was asked to be in it once, already gets me very excited. So listen, if those rumors can turn into something real, I would be very happy about that."

Kevin McKidd is the wrong choice to play Arthur Weasley for a number of reasons

With all of that said, I am here to tell you that, actually, Kevin McKidd shouldn't play Arthur Weasley. The role, which was originated by Mark Williams in 2002's "Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets," is that of a bumbling, lovable, and dorky dude who likes playing with batteries and other non-magical (or "Muggle") artifacts. Yes, he is described as tall, rangy, and thin like his sons, but while McKidd fits the part physically, his vibes are completely wrong. For 18 seasons of "Grey's Anatomy," McKidd made a name for himself as the tough-as-nails army veteran Owen Hunt, who was also, by quite a long shot, the show's all-time worst character. Before that, his big role was as an intrepid fighter on the HBO series "Rome." Does this sound like a guy who tinkers around with broken radios?

You might not think there's a ton of overlap between "Harry Potter" and "Grey's Anatomy" fans, but both are pretty important to certain subsects of millennials (including me), and seeing the man behind Owen Hunt play the distinctly lovable Arthur Weasley just feels ... wrong. Still, there's already a lot that can go wrong with the "Harry Potter" TV series. The first trailer was pretty sludgy-looking and appears to present audiences with a shot-for-shot remake of the original film franchise for some inexplicable reason. It also looks like we're going to get potentially lengthy gaps between seasons that might give viewers enough time to move on to something else entirely. Ultimately, though, we'll have to wait and see if this red-headed actor takes on the role of Arthur Weasley ... and commits to a very long filming schedule.