Metanoios

I hope they make pearl gold versions of the centaur, goblin and house-elf eventually. I also had the idea to potentially use the the golden figures of the anniversary wave (Harry, Ron, Hermione,...) as the new monument in a Ministry of Magic atrium MOC (kind of the 19 years later version). Because Kingsley exchanges the "magic is might monument" from Voldemort's takeover with a new monument depicting the battle for hogwarts. So the golden trio statues would fit in universe, because they are the heroes of the battle and it would at the same time be a callback to the former golden fountain of magical brethren statues in the atrium (wizard, witch, centaur, house-elf and goblin)

Nick is on the roof on the left. I think this could really be a flying fawkes. Because if it was Hedwig the piece exists already and would be on there. This alone would make the set worth it for me

Other toy companies like Bandai present their prototype figures a year before their release on exhibitions to the public and they have preorder phases months before with official pictures. Lego wants to sell their product. The crackdown on "leaks" three months before release is ridiculous and isn't helping them sell anything. I admit that prelims are not ideal for promotional purposes, but they could just release the official pics three months before release and have preorder phases to estimate demand. Right now they have trouble on their own online shop with sets selling out fast. If they had the preorders early (like right now for example), they could ramp up production for those sets and have overall a more pleasant consumer experience. But what do I know with only two semesters of marketing and economics...

I hope it's a recolour into trans-blue or something.

They do come apart in modules like I described above. The less detailed style has to do with the anniversary line being a throwback to the 2001 to 2011 style. Look at the 2011 castle. The great hall exterior was'nt much more detailed then as well and it also contained random structures. The longest time the Harry Potter line consisted of this type of build and people back then loved and bought them anyway.

The roofs and towers are modularly interchangeable as well (at least for the tower in 76387 and 76389) which means the fluffy corridor set has 5 modular parts (3 for the tower + 2 for the corridor; roof can be detached and bathroom added for example or the Chamber tower section). 76389 consists of 9 individual modules. On the left 3 (Chamber + great hall + roof). Tower in the middle has 5 modules and then the chamber entrance door on the right is the 9th module. All building modules (except the roofs naturally) have the same pin hole connection distance/height as the 2018 sets

Yeah I considered the 2018-2020 sets also good, because I used them as parts packs as well. I like to MOC my own sets and tan, dark tan, medium nougat, sand green are useful brick colours. It is a building toy and for the most part I get more enjoyment out of it, when I go off the instructions. I hate most super heroes sets because the part selection is horrible colourwise with a few exceptions (like Wonder Woman 1984, some Batman movie sets). Marvel is worse than DC because Batman builds usually offer atl least good selection of black and dbg parts.

Promobricks were wrong by the way with one of their points. The pin holes on the june wave are in fact compatible with the 2018 to 2020 Hogwarts "modular" system. Look at the right side of the bathroom set. The technic pins are on the same height as previous models. I think the sets are good over all. Sure they could be better, but since I parted out the previous ones as well, because they were already too small scale-wise for me, I think the new ones work great as part packs

I don't think this is supposed to be the great stair case tower. Sinistra (that already) leaked is on top. I think it is more like a generic tower with a class room or another dormitory in it like the 2001 tower. The bathroom set can be placed under the tower section and over the the right chamber section.

Builds stay mostly the same. Only some colours might change, because the prelims usually don't include new recolours, prints or exclusive new moulds (the white/grey ones are prototype parts). The white part on fluffys back is either a new piece which allows the attachement of all three heads via mixel joint or is a recolour of an old part

Are they using the wand sprue piece for the harp strings? That would be kind of a cool part usage. Or it might be another piece. The tan on tan and bad resolution make it quite hard to discern. I hope the yellow pieces will be recoloured to pearl gold in the final product

@Roebuck At least there are owls in the Hogwarts set. And the basilisk looks great

Maybe that is the design reason why they went with sand green roofs again. If the base and the rocks are dark grey, the roof with the same colour would look weird and monotonous

A specialised moulded or good brick-built stairwell gargoyle would make that set a must-buy for me. If they managed to modernise the play feature of the original, that would be amazing. My expectations are getting to high again

A bigger set with more details would actually be cool

Ok I'm lowering my expectations further. The next wave will include a 250$ D2C cloak of invisibilty. Another Ford Anglia (but this time with a working invisibility booster). Also someone in Billund apparently figured out how to cast Repello-Muggletum on all the bricks. Or in other words, Lego went too far with their reduce-single-use-plastic-campaign and will just send out empty cardboard boxes starting this august

Wowowow if you think Assault on Hoth was overall pretty good, then what does "lower your expectations" really mean? I can go lower than Cursed Child sets but I really don't want to. I was only joking before but now I am afraid

I think the brick-built silver dagger would hurt him more... they could even include an exclusive printed tile with the epitaph

The app works fine on my phone. But I have one of the best mobile releases of 2020 so that might play a role. The image recognition and AR algorithm they implemented requires a fair amount of computing power, although there are no measures installed to prevent you from just scanning still images (which I definitely would never ever do or recommend). I just installed it to test it, because I work in data science and was interested how advanced their implementation was. Their were rumors about a canned addon to the Dimensions theme that was also supposed to have the scanning feature of minifigs. There is potential in this technology but they would have to think bigger, if it should be more than a gimmick, that gets boring in less than a minute.

Maybe this year marks the redemption arc of Lord Voldemort and KingNoKnow "Because they are the leakers we deserve, but not the ones we need right now"

Maybe GOT Season 8 is the perfect metaphor for the Harry Potter theme. At the beginning it's all hype and they can do no wrong. Then the cracks begin to appear, but you are still on the hype train for Cleganebowl, Valonquar-prophecy, Bran-the-Builder (Gringotts, Grimmauld Place, ...) and you have to believe that it can only get better after season 6 and 7. First two episodes are not bad, then it goes down-hill fast and before it is over, you try to forget about all of it. Burning the bluray discs in their cases. Waiting for a book, that you know will never be published

The 18+ sets have these dark and sometimes very low contrast instruction pages giving me PTSD and flash backs to the "The Long Night" episode from season 8 every time. It's just blackness for more than an hour... and me trying to figure out what's happening.

The 250$ D2C could also just be a package deal of 4 Harry Potter art sets titled "The Hogwarts Crest"

Maybe the wave is a tie-in with the vidiyo theme and Harry, Ron and Hermione are joining the Unicorn in the K-PAWP-Genre of the vidiyo app. It's already confirmed that we are getting a (furry) Cat-Hermione and this would certainly shock me

Says the one who is buying the 4+ sets I would give them a second chance, even if the wave consists of misformed minidolls and every set is a cross-over like "Harry Potter in Space", "Hermione's petting zoo" or Ron driving a speed champion (something from Ford)