Accio Lego

I mean, as the Weird Kid who decided that red pandas were superior back when I was ten I’d argue why not? Red pandas actually went by the name panda before giant pandas were referred to as such. Depending on the mold it’s possible that lego might also be hoping to reuse it for a raccoon, although while the two species share some similarities red pandas have a slightly different body shape and a much longer, fluffier tail.

Oh man, talk about a blast from the past. I’ve got one of these stored in the garage somewhere, along with the Hagrid’s Hut (a totally normal looking rectangular shack with a blue roof) and Burrow extensions. All the little characters should be stored in a little blue Bertie Botts Beans drawstring bag (yeah, that was a thing before the movies too). All the characters for this, and the original lego sets for that matter, were based off the early illustrations - I had to do a bit of research but it looks like the name of that original artist was Mark Brought. The reason there were so many star spangled cloaks in those first sets was those early illustrations as well. And Warner Bros must have been pretty tight fisted with letting any actual movie concept art get out back then - even the 2001 Hallmark ornaments were based directly off of Mark Brought illustrations!

As a bit of a divergence from the current talk of summer sets – it just occurred to me that the Sorting Hat set scheduled to come out in March still hasn’t been officially revealed on shop@home. I’m assuming that the 18+ labeling and talking aspect means Lego is planning on hyping it up with a reveal trailer and everything – which would be our first chance to actually hear what’s going on with the sound brick. As someone who’s actually pretty curious about what this thing sounds like, when do we think that official reveal and hype campaign will happen?

I think we’re far more likely to see the mountain troll or an improved Fluffy than a basilisk repeat while the last one is still on shelves. The last version of the great hall in the Chamber of Secrets set obviously came with Slytherin’s chamber - the most obvious way to set the new Great Hall set apart is to make it based off a different movie.

I’m going to hazard a guess from looking at the fuzzy spread of the castle in the March set booklets the the ‘Great Hall’ also encompasses the front courtyard and that massive grand staircase tower at the very least. Throw all that up on a rocky base and you’ve got a pretty massive set.

That could be compelling - and they could still technically do Halloween decorations and provide both normal and slashed versions of the Fat Lady. And I like the idea of getting Bem, he gets overlooked a lot as both a movie only character and a character who only appears to say a few ominous things in PoA and then is never heard from again, but it would be fun to see him lego form. The only issue I can see is that all indications suggest that this version of the Castle will be supported on a rocky outcrop with a subterranean layer under the main building. The Great Hall is set to be so large that there’s going to need to be a decent amount of material in the subterranean layer, and PoA simply doesn’t have much in the way of underground castle locations other than the start of the One-eyed Witch passage to Honeydukes. SS has the stone challenges, CoS has the Chamber and Slytherin common room, GoF features Snape’s office/stores and is the ideal time to include the Hufflepuff common room, OotP also features Snape’s office, and HBP has Slughorn’s potions class front and center, but PoA has very little to work with, which I can see the Lego designers making work for a smaller set but not something as huge as the Great Hall.

In the movies? Not that I can ever recall. In extended media? Actually yes. My first thought when reading that was “Murphy McNully?!?” He’s a Hogwarts Mystery character who uses a wheelchair and is supposed to be Lee Jordan’s predecessor as Quidditch announcer. Admittedly, Murphy is supposed to have graduated by the time the main story takes place, so this lego student probably isn’t him, but it does mean that lego has a pre-approved reference for what a ‘wizardy’ wheelchair should look like in universe.

Red Pandas and Orangutans don’t really share the same habitats either though do they? That’s why I wasn’t really expecting to see pandas for the jungle sub theme - their bamboo forest home is slightly different from a ‘traditional’ jungle. That said, I’m definitely going to need that red panda!

If the new Great Hall comes with the same number of minifigs as the 2018 version despite being twice the price I imagine many of us will be rather cross. My own theories on the line ups: Hogwarts: Great Hall – I’m going all in on my first year Halloween + stone challenges theory and guessing Harry, Ron, Hermione, Dumbledore, McGonagall, Quirrel, Snape, 4 minor characters (combination of teachers, students, and possibly a ghost), The Troll, and Fluffy Drumstrang Ship and Beauxbatons Carriage – Karkaroff, Krum, 2 uniformed Drumstrang students, Maxime, Fluer, Beauxbatons student, Hagrid Ollivander’s & Madam Malkin’s – Ollivander, Madam Malkin, Harry, Hagrid, Draco, Narcissa, 2 manakins Hogwarts: Potions Class – Snape, Harry, Hermione, Draco, Slytherin student (possibly Millicent Bulstrode?) Aragog Forbidden Forest – Harry, Ron, and Fang Also, just as aside, I love that this year’s $15 sets can essentially fight each other. It’s basically the closest the Harry Potter theme will ever get to those cheap mechs from the Star Wars and Superhero lines, and I think it’s hilarious. EDIT: the list for the Diagon Alley shops dropped while I was writing this of course. Bummer we aren’t getting Narcissa, but nice to have Madam Malkin confirmed, and having a flower vendor witch alongside her basically tells us which extra from the first movie they’ll be using for her appearance. Padma Patil is an interesting choice - makes me wonder if we’ll see her twin in the Great Hall (Neville does mention Parvati by name in that Halloween feast scene incidentally)

So, on the topic of collectible portraits – Hogwarts: Great Hall and Hogwarts: Potions Classroom definitely will. Based off the March sets Buckbeak, the Mandrake, and Aragog Forbidden Forest won’t. But what about ‘Ollivander’s and Madam Malkin’s’ and ‘Drumstrang Ship and Beauxbatons Carriage’? The pattern that I’ve noticed is that the portraits are included in sets that have at least one place to hang them (hence the March sets with portraits all being buildings), so I think the Diagon Alley shops is a pretty sure bet. And with how the Ship and Carriage acted as temporary residences for their respective students it seems likely that the interiors a homey enough to have portraits as well. So that’s probably 4 more sets with collectible portraits, 3/4 of which should come with 3 or more just based off size.

Definitely a pair that seem necessary for completion. The big sticking point for them is that both have rather unique hair styles (at least as presented in the first movie where they make their sole cinematic appearance). The Bloody Baron at least has a hairstyle that one could imagine doing double duty on a period aristocrat character in a cmf (like a male counterpart to series 24’s Marie Antionette inspired character), but the Fat Friar’s tonsure would have limited reuse value since lego has a policy against depicting explicitly religious figures – I presume that there would be an exception made for the Fat Friar as a fantasy character, and it’s not impossible since Madam Pince also had a unique hat+hair mold that hasn’t been used since.

I’ve definitely been hoping for the One-Eyed Witch passage since we started getting hints that there’d be a proper subterranean level with this system. I’m just not sure I’m expecting a PoA focused castle set this year. I suppose if we get two large castle sets and one or more of the medium sized sets is part of the castle too then it’s within the realm of possibilities. We might get a Great Hall this year but Lego definitely won’t want to release another Chamber of Secrets set when there’s already one on shelves, so I could see a big SS set featuring the Great Hall with the stone challenges underneath for the main flagship set and a smaller PoA set with the Hospital Wing, Lupin’s Classroom and the secret passage underneath being something lego might do this year.

The ‘IF’ is what’s giving me pause here. It’s definitely a tantalizing possibility, but the image is blurry for a reason and it’s likely that the summer sets were very much still in the preliminary stages when these booklets were finalized. I’m reluctant to take anything as certain until we actually get some sort of visual confirmation - especially since we don’t even know for sure that the depicted sections of the castle are actually going to be the focus of the summer sets. Turning to more abstract speculation - what exclusive minifigs do you guys think will make an appearance in this year's large castle sets? Lego seems to like including desirable characters in those larger sets. 2018’s Great Hall featured the first ever Hufflepuff student and Nearly Headless Nick, and is still the only reboot set that a regularly colored Quirrel has appeared in. 2019’s Clocktower mainly went with exclusive Yule Ball variants, but it remains the only regular set you could purchase Gambon!Dumbledore in. 2020’s Astronomy Tower also featured exclusive Christmas variants, while also introducing Lavender Brown for the first time and rid the only regular retail set to contain a Slughorn minifigure. 2021’s Chamber of Secrets set introduced Professor Sinestra, Colin Creevy, and Justin Finch-Fletchly for the first time (all of whom remain exclusive to that set) and is currently the cheapest way to get Gilderoy Lockhart. 2022 had Dumbledore’s Office, which introduced Madam Pince for the very first time and featured Mrs. Norris for the first time since the reboot (both remain exclusive to that set). The ultimate point being that we’ve had only one large castle set (back in 2019) that didn’t introduce a new character, so I’m wondering who we think has the best chances of appearing this year? Personally, I’m hoping that the hints of book canon appearing in the Harry Potter theme and video game characters in other themes means we might see Binns or even Peeves. With students, Millicent Bulstrode, Ernie MacMillan, Zacharias Smith, and Alicia Spinnet have all made appearances that might not stand out to a casual viewer but are still easily identifiable. Katie Bell is in a awkward place since she only got lines when Georgina Leonidas only started playing her in HBP, so I suspect it will be similar to the Lavender Brown situation where we only only see her using that actress’s appearance in sets based off later movies. Likewise, Cormac McLaggen isn’t going to appear in sets based off earlier movies like it looks like we’ll be getting this year. I’m also curious if we might see Professor Vector. She never made a credited appearance in the movies, but like with Professor Sinestra, lego assigned her name to one of the more recognizable extras that make appearances at the staff table in the movies, so it’s possible the Lego will make a Minifigure of her since they’ve already done Sinestra.

I would also better allow them to fully use the molds they already have. For instance, there have been both toucan and chameleon molds introduced since the last time there was a jungle sub theme. The former is a South American animal while the latter is mainly found in Africa with some species appearing in Asia and the more tropical climates of Europe. A world tour would let lego use both preexisting molds while a single location wouldn’t.

Jbspielwaren’s page on instagram has a reel showing the two page spread featuring both the new castle system teaser (with a somewhat blurred structure with outlines for where the boathouse and Owlery fit) on one page, and the collectible portrait checklist on the opposite page. Unfortunately, there are no names on the checklist, just images.

The inclusion of Madam Malkin’s is rather exciting in my opinion. The proprietress is an obvious choice of minifig and she’s rather notable as being on the list of characters who made an appearance in the books but never the movies. And I’ve never hidden the fact that I love it when lego manages to sneak book content into the sets. And I’m curious to see which other characters flesh out the rest of the line up in this set. Assuming a similar number of characters to last year Diagon playset - we could easily see repeats of Harry and Hagrid, an Ollivander who may or may not be updated, Madam Makin, Draco with Narcissa, and a seventh character (be it Lucius or somebody random). I can see that being a pretty popular set.

Several of those a not jungle dwellers at all It's also prudent to remember that there’s already a Friends style capybara confirmed as well. So I’d be inclined to say this is less confirmation that we’ll be getting a Congo exclusive jungle sub theme and more an indication that we might see a variety of different locations across the jungle exploration branding.

Oh yes, I forgot Peeves. I’m pretty sure he’s made an appearance in most of the various video games over the years - the one sticking point is that his appearance tends to vary so wildly that there’d be a serious question of which should be used. Personally, I favor the Hogwarts Mystery design because it’s fairly similar to the old Pottermore artwork and thus feels like some sort of continuity. I particularly like the long belled hat, since Peeves having a hat is one of the few concrete things we know about his appearance. Wizards Unite Peeves pushed that hat a little farther and has a full on jester’s hat while keeping the same color scheme. I’ve definitely got mixed feelings about Hogwarts Legacy Peeves, he mixes things up with the color scheme and having a top hat, but part of that change is giving him a more human skin tone - which works alright in a game where he’s flying around and such, but might confuse kids in a minifig lineup. The bluish tint he has in previous incarnations makes it more obvious he’s a supernatural entity to the casual observer. At the moment, I think Wizards Unite Peeves is the closest to what you could do with current molds (since Legacy Peeves features fluffy blue hair under his top hat that the current molds couldn’t accommodate), but at the end of the day I suspect any poor lego designer trying to finalize their minifigure would be at the mercy of whatever WB decided they want to push.

News on the summer Star Wars sets says that a Cal Kestis minifigure is going to make an appearance – so consider this my open reminder to Lego that both Charlie Weasley and Professor Cuthbert Binns have official video game appearances, and as canonical book characters are much more accessible to the wider casual audience of their fandom than the player character of a pair of console games. Just saying you could give them to us at any time and be taking even less of a risk than with Cal…

$200 and 1732 pieces is definitely too small for the preliminary concept Burrow we saw leaked in the survey last year. It’s far more likely that 76435 is a decent sized 18+ set that’s not actually a D2C - similarly to the Hogwarts Castle and Grounds set from last year. The reason we don’t have any info on a larger D2C or gwp yet is because the leaks we’ve seen for the summer wave so far a filtering through secondary retailers, who need to know things like the number of sets for each theme, prices, and rough sizes, so they can decide how many units they want to stock in their store. D2Cs and GWPs don’t show up on such lists because they’re exclusive to Lego.

Oh I agree. I actually love the portraits design wise and all of them look lovely. The ‘nothing special’ comment is in reference to the subjects, 9/14 of which most fans won’t be able to attach a name to. I’m eagerly looking forward to collecting them all though - some of the nameless ones are among my favorites actually. What’s really got my interest piqued is the possibility of a gwp this year. I know we don’t have a set number or anything concrete yet, but in 2021 when the chocolate frog cards were introduced the gwp was the Gryffindor dorm module with a 16x16 plate slide into the back wall that you could display all the tiles on. I can’t help but wonder if this year’s will do something similar with the portraits. Like a new version of the staircase gwp from ‘22 with blank spots for the collectible portraits - or perhaps just a hallway - we haven’t seen what the main castle sections look like in this new system do it’s hard so say what could fit in there.

Another iPhone user here - you might just be using the wrong app. These aren’t technically QR codes (which you don’t need an app for on iPhones anymore anyways). The codes people are scanning here are apparently called ‘Data Matrix Codes’ - which are more closely related to barcodes and typically used for internal company purposes. Apparently androids can natively read these type of codes the same way they (and iPhones) can read QR codes, but iPhones can’t (I can confirm that iPhones can’t natively read data matrix codes - I found a couple on products already around my house and my iPhone camera ignored them while registering the QR code that was also on one of the products). One of the Redditors from the previously linked posts had an iPhone and apparently used an app called ‘Code Scan’ by KURZ which can scan a large variety of codes including actual QR codes, bar codes, and the digital matrix codes we want to look at here. It’s free and gets good reviews. I’ve downloaded it and it seems to work but I haven’t gotten a chance to test it in the wild yet.

Excellent! As expected, Slytherin has joined the other three founders originally seen in the first incomplete promo. Sir Cadogan was in the original promo too, but I still must say I’m rather pleased he’s included. The rest are fairly random - obviously they’re all based off of portraits seen in the background of various shots, and some are based off of real historical portraits, and some have been given proper names in supplemental material like the video games, but not anything truly special.

Looking at the 2023 thread, by this time last year the set names had already dropped, so we could realistically see them any time now. It’s just a matter of a leaker getting ahold of a the right list.

Both Buckbeak and the pixie feature new prints (Buckbeak has significantly more feathers on his face and the pixie is winking). And while the glow in the dark spider isn’t new, it is pretty rare - having only appeared in a handful of sets during one year a while ago. But yes, no new molds.