With Harry Potter 5 opening soon, Warner Brothers is starting to lock things down for Harry Potter 6. They’ve already got the kids committed through all seven films, and now they have a director for the sixth film. David Yates, who directed the upcoming Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix has confirmed to SciFi Wire that he’ll be back for the next film, Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince.

This is incredibly significant, since it’s the first time any director has tackled more than one Potter installment since Christopher Columbus kicked the whole thing off with the first two movies. Warner Brothers must be incredibly happy with what they’ve seen on Harry Potter 5 to bring him back, and that means good things for your Potter viewing experience this summer.

As for Yates, he’s happy with what he’s doing. He says, “I am doing Half-Blood Prince, and I'm doing it because I love the world, I love the characters… I think I have more business with this world and these characters.” That’s exactly the sort of thing you’d want to hear from a guy preparing to direct more of America’s favorite teenage wizard franchise (take that Eragon). He has more he wants to do with it, and he told SciFi that he’s made a big tonal shift in the franchise for the fifth movie, a shift which he wants to develop even further in the sixth. That sort of style continuity is something Potter has been missing, and could certainly use more of.

We’ll get a chance to see Yates’ Potter product for the first time when Order of the Phoenix opens July 13. His next one, Harry Potter and the Half Blood Prince is currently looking at a release date sometime in November of 2008, bringing Potter back to the fall where personally, I think he belongs.