Upper Deck is facing concerted online backlash after licensing a Harry Potter CCG

A week after Upper Deck announced a deal with Warner Bros. Discovery Global Consumer Products to create a Harry Potter collectible card game (CCG) on 7 January, game designer Marceline Leiman decided to rally against the collectibles company. On Bluesky, she implored the industry for help to push Upper Deck into retracting their announcement. She also pushed for change through the Block Collective, a grassroots, volunteer-run community of players, designers, and media professionals dedicated to challenging transphobia within the tabletop space. “We have a plan for continuing pressure through email campaigns, but we have been unsuccessful so far,” said Leiman, who’s also the founder of the Block Collective, in an email to Rascal. “Upper Deck continues to do wrong by their community, openly deleting and blocking discourse from appearing on their socials with no explanation or recourse.”

By now, the transphobia of Harry Potter creator, JK Rowling, has been well-documented. For one, there’s her numerous fevered diatribes on social media. There’s her use of her financial proceeds to fund anti-trans organizations. There’s also the cruel, provocative picture of her smoking a cigar in celebration of the UK supreme court ruling, which has stated the legal definition of a woman is based on biological sex. This has seen the grassroot movement to boycott the Harry Potter series intensifying, one of which is against the 2023 Harry Potter video game, Hogwarts Legacy. Similarly, the Block Collective is calling for a boycott effort against JK Rowling’s works, stating on Bluesky that it’s advocating for an “immediate stop to all purchases from Upper Deck”. “We haven’t been able to make direct contact with them, but our actions have gotten them to reply to us on multiple social media,” said Leiman. “Despite this, their response so far has been completely unsatisfactory. They have only said that they have Harry Potter games ‘in the works’, but make no promises to never do so, don’t acknowledge any wrong-doing so far [and] the outcry of their community, nor address their current plans to release multiple sets of Harry Potter trading cards. Outside of their messages, they have not shown any remorse or shared any plans for moving forward.”