BacktoBricks

Yes I think you're right. It's just as a community here we are noticing the change because of what we have become accustomed to in previous years. Reviewing a set when just released or at least extremely close to the release date so someone can literally order it there and then or order it soon so that they are still caught up in the initial hype or their desire for the product does make absolute sense. Case in point: I love the new 18+ 101 Dalmatian puppy set and if it had been available to order (not preorder) and for it to have turned up at my door within a few days of me seeing Tiago's review of the set a few weeks ago, I may have caved in to my rule of no more sets I have nowhere to display and bought it. Now three weeks later I still love the set, but my pragmatism is strongly objecting to the purchase. That being said, the fact there is so much coming out these days is also becoming a strong factor in putting me off purchases too ironically. When you know you will never be able to display all the castle sets or collect all the Disney or Star Wars you want and have places to put them, never mind the exorbitant and rising cost of it all, it can start to make you a lot more selective. I know it has me. Right now, we're not even in the days of Lego Pokemon. Too many options can become overwhelming.

Possibly, but the HP sets have been officially revealed for a month now and Swift Bricks for instance has posted an video showing her unboxing her big box of HP sets from LAN. I'm sure LAN members have the sets, although granted they could gave received them recently and not had time to review yet. But then all the Balrog reviews have come out from LAN around the same day even though that official reveal was later than the HP sets. I don't know, it just feels planned to me.

Hogsmeade train station was meant to retire last year and got extended until the end of this year, so maybe they extended it to keep a Hogwarts Express on shelves until the book nook release. If so, the book nook may be the only Hogwarts Express for the time being, poor substitute for a playset as it may be. The short cycle for the DA sets does baffle me. Like you say, the places will get less iconic so unless you have been collecting from the start they might not draw in new customers. Unless they think there is enough of a collectors base now that the sets will sell on minifigures and the theme alone. Maybe they are even starting to think that the less recognisable locations will do as well now or close too more iconic locations because those have been done so many times that a large proportion of customers have bought them enough times before. But all that aside, I can't help but think that if all the sets were on the shelves at the same time it would be a far bigger incentive for people to buy into them. Sure some people will just want one shop as a display or play piece, but a lot of people will want to collect the whole street and the ability to collect it in small pieces rather than pay out a huge amount in one go like with the D2C would I'm sure be very welcome to a lot of customers. I also get what you are saying about FOMO and the castle and I know I've had to resist buying things in this line because of it, but a lot of consumers aren't following leaks or EOL lines and will have no idea that the castle set they have just picked up won't ever be completed because they are too late to have grabbed this set or that set. I see people asking the question all the time on line as to how these new castle sets go together and do they go with the Chamber of Secrets from the last system etc. The constant changing of the castle is confusing to a lot of consumers from what I can see and some people don't even realise there has been a change in castle system let alone that they have missed certain sets until it's too late. So I think more than FOMO, Lego is just going with the lure of the theme and the pure consumerism for the product. I feel like they either can't or don't want to keep it all around for as long as the castle will take to complete so they will just keep releasing more sets and rely on the large fanbase of collectors and the large amount of one off purchases for sales. Speaking of castle, it does feel odd that with only three days until release date, nobody online has done a video review of the Main Tower set. I've seen other HP June sets reviewed, but so far the three biggest playsets (Tower, Privet Drive and QQS) haven't received any online video reviews from what I can tell. And I've only seen JB Spielwaren do video reviews of the smaller sets and the book nook. So I do I have to wonder what the embargo is on the reviews and if they have been told to wait until after the LOTR Balrog set has been given time, so as for it to not be competing for consumer attention with the HP sets of a similar price.

JB Spielwaren has reviews of Monster Book of Monsters, Fawkes, Hogwarts Express booknook and Herbology Class up on Youtube. Plus Privet Drive box was in the video of the booknook so they obviously have the sets and are just working their way through them.

I'm guessing it's this year's consolatory OT UCS. Lego probably knows full well that a lot of people are going to be priced out of the Death Star, but don't want to lose all that OT UCS market. So the AT-ST is a nice little set they can release the same year as the massive Death Star without it overshadowing the Death Star in terms of popularity and which they can produce at the same time. Anything larger (if they weren't already released) like an AT-AT, Sail Barge etc would be bigger and compete for funds and production space, plus the AT-ST doesn't require lots of minifigures, although I would argue a driver would be at least warranted. That's my slightly cynical take anyway. And, and this is a big And, could it be Lego know it will fit in with next year's MBS ... MBS Ewok Village for 2026. A girl can hope right?

Just watched Tiago's review of both the new set of two cheaper Dalmatian puppies and the 18+ puppy and honestly they are both great sets. The smaller puppies, whilst clearly outdone by the larger set in terms of accuracy, are still incredibly cute and highly playable. The TV build is the only thing that is a miss for me, because whilst I like the movie scene, the puppies are dwarfed by the television in the movie, whereas the television build in the set is tiny compared to them. Even the included bone is bigger than the television so that aspect just seems weird. The larger set is even better in my opinion. As I suspected the pose can be switched from standing to crouching by simply switching the back and front legs. But the set also comes with extra pieces so you can change the design of the puppy to have symmetrical colour ears or eye patches in either black or white depending on preference. There are also multiple stickers so you can choose which puppy name to go on the collar and pieces to make the collar either red or blue. Both the body design of the larger set and the fact that there are a cheaper and more expensive puppy options clearly mimic the previously released Simba builds and Tiago credits Marcos Bessa as the designer of these sets as well as the Simbas. That being said, it's a fantastic set to showcase Marcos' design skills, but it makes me sad all over again that he's no longer a Lego designer. I got back in to Lego with his Ewok Village set and have always loved his designs. Whilst I have no idea where I would put it and have been sticking exclusively to minifigure collecting, I am seriously tempted to buy the larger puppy.

According to the write up on the Lego website, the Hufflepuff jumper girl in the Advent Calendar is indeed meant to be Hannah Abbott so a bit annoying that they made her an exact duplicate of Daphne Greengrass, especially when Hannah is never shown wearing her hair in that swept over side parted style.

The thing is, I don't think the girl in the Hufflepuff sweater is even meant to be Daphne Greengrass which just makes it even more confusing. As much as they have used the exact same head and hair as Daphne in the Great Hall, Daphne should be in a Slytherin sweater, so I would guess if anything it's meant to be Hannah Abbott.

I believe it's meant to be a Grindylow.

On one hand I really don't like the AC because it means no more character variants from the actual film scenes. On the other hand, the prints are very cute and I know we'll never get these kind of sweaters which I'm sure would crop up in the magical world for some magical families. The Malfoys wouldn't be seen dead in them, but I feel like the Weasley family could wear them for Christmas (Charlie can be in Romania). Not sure I like that new haipiece for Cedric and I dislike even more the thought of having to change hairpieces one way or the other to make him consistent with his other minifigures. The characters themselves are also nothing new or special. For children though, opening this once a day and finding either a Christmas sweater character or a small magical creature or item build they can display, I'm sure it will be quite magical.

Last year it was 2nd May so hopefully not long now.

All right, that's it. Dishonor! Dishonor on your whole family! Didn't see him coming though that was for sure, but so glad we are finally getting our favorite red dragon to accompany bottled Cri-Kee. Hope he comes in a smaller set down the line though or he will probably cost about half the set price.

Neville in his pyjamas is fantastic! Never did I think, even when the theme began again in 2018, that we would be getting teddy bear jammies Neville. The scene is complete. And Ernie is clearly the son of a Skywalker, but he's not a clone! Hurray! As for Flint, I'm guessing that toothy grimace is just so memorable. I'm glad he's returning, although I really wish they would decide what they are doing with the Quidditch uniforms. No cape here at all is disappointing when the last versions of Quidditch players in a set, not a polybag, had not only capes, but the rubber folded down hoods. For the price of the set, this minifigure is disappointing in that regard. You can say the 'budget' went on Fluffy, but realistically make more budget, the prices on these sets is ridiculous anyway, stop squeezing out every bit away from the consumer. Percy reusing the same robe piece will be disappointing to many I'm sure as he's very generic, but I'm glad the book minifigure still holds and hasn't been made redundant. The Great Hall set gave us the red jewel piece for the Philosopher's Stone so already they can't make up their mind what piece to use! Some of the inconsistencies in such a short space of time do baffle me. Gambledore has got to make an appearance next year surely? I thought the Chamber of Secrets would come next year, but now with the silhouette of the Astronomy Tower on the Main Tower box I'm not so sure. The Great Hall box has the Main Tower silhouette on it, so does that mean the AT is next year's big set or just it made sense for that to be the silhouette because the AT is the next big structure to the right of the Main Tower like the Main Tower is the next big structure to the Great Hall. Curious. Very Curious. Either way, if Gambledore doesn't make an appearance in the AT I would think he would come in some set next year as they have got to move on to cover more of the later films. Now just to wait several months until the set goes on deep discount or the minifigures and Fluffy aren't extortionate on BL anymore.

I really like the Main Tower. Sure the logistics of the Mirror of Erised being at the top of the tower doesn't make sense, but there's loads of play value here and it feels really warm and cosy. Getting the Fat Lady portrait again outside of a limited GWP is great and I like Fluffy's heads more now that I can see them head on. Dumbledore having a skirt piece is also a nice surprise as I thought he would have legs to allow him to sit down in his office like Voldemort got the leg treatment in Malfoy Manner, and whilst I get why it's done, for display I think the skirts look so much better. Ernie seems to be using young Anakin's head with Luke Skywalker's hairpiece so the Skywalker genetics are strong there, but still good to have a student with a different expression. Speaking of, I think Lisa Turpin is using the same headpiece as Leanne from The Great Hall, but does anyone know if Marcus Flint is reusing a head? I still think his toothy look from his previous minifigure is great, but this one still captures his likeness I think.

Stinky Pete in the new Toy Story train would be appreciated as he's the only toy based on a human that hasn't been done with a normal Lego head rather than a mold. I don't think its going to happen, but ...

The new Fluffy looks a bit dopey in the picture to me, but it's one angle so I'm not going to judge it until I've seen more photos and probably it in person. Whilst the last Fluffy was pretty good with the molded heads, the combination of brick built and molds didn't work for me with the light grey joints showing. I much prefer this new almost complete mold for Fluffy, despite the obvious irony that Lego is by nature meant to be a brick built system. The original Fluffy still holds up extremely well though in my opinion and is probably one of my favorite elements from the original sets.

But extremely profitable for them I would have thought.

Probably, but then again I don't have Stitch and I don't think that one looks great either. They do make a good pair though. Am I right in thinking the Dalmatian is basically a copy of Simba, but with a different head? If so, what other characters do we think might get the buildable treatment whilst they have this body model going on? An Aristocat like Marie maybe?

From one buildable to another ... Buildable Angel has now leaked. I'm sure some will love it, but compared to the last buildable leaked it's just a mess to me. The benefit of another 1000 pieces I suppose.

Can you imagine if the new Clone Cadets showed up in the advent calendar after being in the GWP?

To be honest, I'm not betting on any new minifigures let alone a Mr Potato Head, but if we were going for new molds, then him and Slinky would be the top of my list!

The 101 Dalmatian set is too cute. Such good work by the designer and the pose ability is great. I could be wrong, but could it be that you can change the pose by switching the front and back legs, angling the body down and maybe putting the tongue piece in? I'm excited to see the Toy Story Celebration train set now. I know it's going to be a simple build, but the concept is fun. What do we think the lineup will be? One that covered characters from all the movies would be cool as a true celebration, but I'm guessing we'll get something like Woody, Buzz, Jessie, Bo-Peep and maybe an alien.

So does anybody else think we might get a buildable Harry Potter logo next year? Maybe 76464 the rumored 12+ set. I think the Harry Potter logo done smoothly like the Star Wars logo would make a collection centerpiece or just a casual fan buy as much as the Star Wars one does. Granted, the letter configuration with the jagged and uneven bottom to the letters doesn't make it as easy to make a standing logo as the Star Wars one, but I feel like Lego would find a way.

Shall we just say Really Expensive Tank and have done with it for now?

There's a rumor now that 40783 Coral Reef Diorama will be available on 21st April. The date is not confirmed though or the threshold, but I would think Belle's Castle would qualify.