Harry Potter and the mystery of the NBC schedule

Harry Potter fans were mystified on Sunday, March 17, when they flipped to NBC to head back to the magical world of Hogwarts by watching Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban to find out that, despite being previously scheduled and advertised to air on the network, what they got was a rerun episode of The Voice season 25. 

Was this the result of a mistaken polyjuice potion? Either way, it was a disruption to viewing plans, one which many voiced their displeasure with.

"Hey I thought Harry Potter was supposed to be on," one hopeful viewer replied to an NBC post on X (formerly Twitter). "Why are we not getting Harry Potter? Turn it on and instead all we see is The Voice. Kids are very unhappy" posted another. Others took umbrage that NBC had advertised that Prisoner of Azkaban was going to be on, only for that to prove false.

Some backstory, in a late February programming press release, it was listed that the first three Harry Potter movies would air on the first three Sundays in March as NBC Movie of the Week special broadcasts. On March 3, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone aired, then on March 10 it was Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. As viewers said in their reactions, there were ads that Sunday, March 17, would be airing Prisoner of Azkaban, with another programming press release from March 12 confirming Prisoner of Azkaban was scheduled for March 17. But something had changed and instead The Voice and an episode of Dateline aired in the movie's place. What to Watch has reached out to NBC for comment on the schedule change.

Now to be fair, network primetime coverage is always subject to change, whether it be for local or national emergencies or special events. However, that wasn't the case on Sunday. It appears NBC just opted to go with reruns of The Voice over the airings of the Harry Potter movie.

Adding to the confusion, NBC did not take special care to alert viewers that the change was going to take place. The official NBC Entertainment accounts on X and Instagram made no mention of the schedule change, instead only posting an image from The Office in celebration of St. Patrick's Day. Though the change was listed on the official TV schedule on NBC.com and looks to have been updated on TVguide.com as well.

Is Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban going to air on NBC in the coming weeks? And what about the rest of the Harry Potter series? Looking at the March 12 programming release, Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire was listed as airing on March 24 at 7:30 pm ET/PT on NBC, but as of right now the official NBC schedule and TV Guide has reruns of Password, The Voice and Dateline airing on March 24 in primetime.

If you want to watch any of the Harry Potter movies right now, you can stream all eight on Peacock. Or, as one disappointed viewer noted, you can buy physical media copies of the movies, ensuring you'll always have them instead of having to keep up with where they are on streaming or schedule quirks like this incident.