Retro Brick Reviews

You are thinking of Falconfan, but you're misinterpreting what he said. What it was was that someone was complaining that the set might only have the trio when a minifig-scale D2C should have at least 10 minifigures, to which FF replied that (to paraphrase) "There is no minimum number of minifigures for D2C sets." It could be seen as a hint, but I think it was just a general statement. Harry with battle damage on his face and torso, Ron in his ending outfit with a new face (one side unconscious), Hermione in her ending outfit, new Quirrell with centered Voldy face and dark brown suit, Spirit Voldy. That's 5. Add in a golden figure to make 6, and a reprint of Moments McGonagall makes 7. Not fantastic, but certainly a nice potential set with some great variants.

I'll give the full ranking (Complete with official name predictions): 1. Hogwarts Wizard Chess Challenge 2. Hogwarts Chamber of Secrets 3. Hogsmeade Village 4. Harry Potter & Hermione Granger Buildable Figures (If they're buildable versions of the modern minifigures) 5. Hogwarts Forbidden Corridor 6. Fawkes 7. Hogwarts Polyjuice Potion 8. Buildable Figures (If they're some weird new style)

I think it's WAY too early to make that claim, after we've only seen one minifigure for the summer. Not to mention that Tom seems to use the same back robes print from 2020 Draco (which is the same as CMF S1 Harry), just in dark grey. If we're including the Moments figures, 3/4 teachers have great new designs that live up to (and in some cases exceed) the quality we've come to expect from this theme. I doubt there's much to worry about in the figure department.

Anyway, I think the fact we're getting an entirely new Tom figure (regardless of quality) continues to show off a major plus of half of the sets being funky brickbuilds: The theme had the budget increased for more sets, but, since some of them are just brickbuilds with very few new prints/molds, the minifig-scale sets seem to have gotten a major boost in budget for figures and creatures compared to the last couple years (and especially to 2020, yikes.)

Personally, what I'd have loved is if they'd done what they did with Umbridge and CMF S2 Harry last year, and taken the one existing face print and just given it a new alternate print. The 2020 face with the new aggressive look on the back would've been fantastic.

Yeah. Not to mention that there'll inevitably be at least one new character in the June wave who won't get a new face print (Ginny, Colin, Dean, Justin, Rosmerta, etc.) while Tom gets a second face, and one that is both unnecessary and inferior.

Well, that's only a few weeks away.

Gotta say, that new Tom is... not great. The torso is fine (though I prefer the 2020 version), but those legs just don't work. I think they look better than Grindelwald (the only other modern HP figure to print black robes onto light legs), but not great. And that face... the alternate expression is fine, but why is his first face a confused look? When does Tom look confused? Also, the only thing they didn't change was the only thing I disliked about the 2020 figure: that mediocre hairpiece. Welp, this figure has convinced me to get the 2020 book, just so I can have a better Tom to go with the Chamber of Secrets.

The interview referred to is the infamous one where she first said that she regretted pairing Ron up with Hernione, and that Harry/Hermione would have been a much better pair. I don't think I have to explain why this is asinine and wrong, Deathly Hallows (book) does that rather well. Also, "Ron Erasure" was just a joke.

@Guyon2002

...Can you please just tell us? Pretty please?

Too early to know about the D2C. Kingwong's post much more likely means that the trio will be in their accurate costumes in the Fluffy set. I mean, those same prelims also include Lockhart wearing ninja robes, so I wouldn't go by them for what costume variants to expect.

Now, THAT would be a puzzling choice. A buildable kinetic Snitch would be a legitimately cool set for $30, especially if it used metallic pieces. Who would want a buildable Remembrall? How would LEGO make a buildable Remembrall, it's made of glass! Why would it come with Hooch, when Neville would be the obvious inclusion. It just doesn't add up in my opinion.

...Not going to disagree with you on the HP sets, since that's a valid opinion, but why are the Winter 2021 Star Wars sets viewed as so bad? It's the best X-Wing set yet, the second-best TIE (at the best price), Beskar Mando, a great Imperial Shuttle, and the Microfighter Tauntaun is fantastic. It's one of the best SW waves in recent years imo, I don't see the problem. The prelims just have the trio in 2018 jumpers as placeholders.

Well, Marvel had to wait 2 years for actual Endgame sets, and we should thank our lucky stars that they're coming at all. With HP, they decided to make one (1) wave of different-y sets to diversify the line and draw in more potential fans. (Which they will- I've told several of my HP fan friends who don't do much LEGO about these sets, and they're all excited for at least one or two of these sets.) In the long run, this will result in the theme getting a bigger budget so they can make more sets overall, which can only mean good things for when we get DH.

Okay, so 76395 is a $30 Buildable Snitch. (Unless it's a kinetic sculpture with all four balls swirling around, but a Snitch with flapping wings seems more likely.) Hopefully it uses a lot of metallic/drum lacquered pieces. That makes a lot more sense than a buildable broom (though I think a small buildable broom could be an accessory for Harry in 76392). That just leaves 76394, which FalconFan is semi-hinting will be another funky brickbuild. We're already getting an accessory and a bird, so I imagine the brickbuild will be something else, with around 600 pieces. Any ideas?

Confirmed. As are the $250 Wizard Chess and $120 Harry and Hermione buildable figures. All that's still left unknown are the $30 and $40 sets.

I was just thinking... Diagon Alley included that neat display plaque with an iconic quote from the movie and two fitting minifigures, is it possible that the same could be in this set? Asking because an official LEGO tile printed with "That's TotALLy bARbaRIc", "That's Wizard's Chess" would take this from a cool set idea I'll probably pick up to a day one purchase. I'm only half joking about that.

@Falconfan1414 just posted on his Insta story that he imagines 76393 will be two brickbuilt minifigs. While this certainly isn't confirmation, this does make more sense than two weird new-style figures. And this would make me a seer. I was originally going to make a low-effort meme if this eventuality came to pass, but it was so soon that I just made a low-effort sigfig variant instead. Enjoy.

I'd like to know this as well, even if it's starting to seem more like it'll just be random new figures, since I think someone would've said if they were minifig-styled.

Well, that's the most ominous way you could have phrased that, and with the most ominous timing, too!

Wait... Two years of great, fun sets that bring out childhood nostalgia, followed by a year of visually stunning sets and mostly perfect choices (albeit a couple of odd directorial decisions), and then one year that 90% of everyone can agree is absolute trash... Wow, it's just like the first four Harry Potter movies. (Albeit, now I'm in the 10% still excited for these sets.)

Oh golly, with all of Ms. Rowling's recent comments both on the Wizarding World and on real matters, I forgot that she also fundamentally misunderstands the characters and relationships she created. But yeah. First LEGO Dimensions, and now this. This LEGO Ron erasure is very unfortunate.

Okay, so @Falconfan1414 just posted on Insta an image of Harry and Hermione from DH2 for 76393, with the caption "I didn't choose this picture by accident." So, 76393 will be our first and only DH set... and it will be brickbuilt figures of 2/3 of the Golden Trio. I think that's absolutely hilarious, and I'm sure some of the reactions to it will be even more so.

I agree with this. Both 2018 and 2019 had a small, two set second wave in August, so I don't see why 2021 couldn't have two small minifig-scale sets in addition to the brickbuilt stuff. Also, again, @Guyon2002 soft-confirmed that 76395 is a Quidditch Class playset. If the $30 is minifig-scale, I think it's more likely that 7y394 is as well than it is that we have a wave of brickbuilds with one lone random playset.