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I'd consider a 20% discount for a part exclusive set with Amazon as the partner fairly unlikely. Unlike most chain stores, Amazon doesn't really do store discounts like the "20% off all toys" that you might get otherwise before a major holiday. Rivendell (also a part exclusive set) has occasionally been discounted to something like EUR 410 or EUR 420, but a) that's still less than 20% off the EUR 500 list price and b) those instances were few and far between and it always sold out quickly. And that's a massive, high-price set with a fairly limited target group (basically AFOLs who like LotR and have a lot of money and room to spare)! The Flying Lesson has a broader appeal (both kids and AFOLs), a lower spending treshold, and it's part of the new system so a lot of completionists are going to want to get it whether it's good or not. So those are all the more reason for Amazon not to discount it much in my opinion.

Huh, Amazon Germany sells it at list price, too. Which - this set would already have been overpriced with the usual discounts factored in, but without them? No, thanks. Do you think that it's going to be the only (part) exclusive module of the new Hogwarts?

German YouTuber Brickstory has a video up where he walks us through the latest LEGO catalogue. The HP section includes all the known January and March sets except for the Flying Lesson. Is that one going to be exclusive or part exclusive (with one retail partner), then?

Yes, I know. I meant it's weird for me because that's not how I'd have depicted the scene based on the book at all. Most of the time the disconnect isn't so great. And on a practical level, this polybag seems considerably less useful than the Cho one which allowed you to army-build an entire Ravenclaw team with uniforms and brooms (and you got snitches to spare, too) whereas here you don't even get a Gryffindor uniform torso and no brooms, either. Sure, you'll have beater's bats, snitches, and quaffles, as well as enough statues to populate your castle, but it's a weird choice nonetheless.

As someone who read the books but only sporadically watched the movies, the polybag is hilarious to me - Seeker Harry has a beater's bat but no broom, WTF? Still, two minfigs and parts like the snitch make it better value for money than the previous ones. The Marvel polybag this year also has two figs, I don't think licenced themes used to do that (though City and Ninjago did), which is a welcome change.

I've said it before but a competitor has already done a book nook with the Hogwarts Express as its subject: Reobrix 66031. There's also others not made from bricks. Though the Reobrix one has about 3.000 pieces and the LEGO one is said to have less than 900, no idea how that'll work.

A lot of HP sets went EOL per the end of 2024. This included - no big surprises there - the last remnant of the 2018 modular Hogwarts system (Astronomy Tower), all the remaining sets of the 2021 modular Hogwarts system, and both Hogsmeade sets (though the Hogwarts Express with Hogsmeade Station remains on the shelves, but I guess that one counts more as a Hogwarts Express set than a Hogsmeade set). A slight surprise to me are Expecto Patronum and the Quidditch trunk, both from 2023 so they really didn't last long. The UCS Hogwarts Express also went EOL while much older UCS sets (microscale Hogwarts, Diagon Alley, and Hogwarts Icons) remain available but then we knew that this set hadn't been well-received. The EOL list also includes, and that's more of a surprise to me: all the connectible Forbidden Forest sets from 2024 (the Draco polybag and the cobbled-together Ron and Hermione one) excpt for the Aragog one; WWW (from 2023, with Ollivander's still on shelves and another playset DA set coming in Summer), and the Triwizard Tournament second task (from 2023 and with the Triwizard Tournament Arrival set still available). WWW especially puzzles me, as it seems to have been fairly well-received (given that LEGO are continuing with the playset DA line and especially its wacky pricing) and it's an integral part of DA which would hardly feel complete without it. And the Aragog set now contains a pitifully small slice of forest with clips but no more chance for expansion (since I don't think there are any Forbidden Forest sets planned). Has LEGO been that eager to break up lines in the past?

And how would that be a bad thing?

Presumably there will also be an advent calendar. We already have a strong indication that LEGO won't completely stop doing them (a Minecraft one has already been rumored), and the HP one was pretty much the best-received and (presumably) best-selling one this year (in contrast to the Marvel and Disney ones, which ended up being quite heavily discounted even by LEGO's own online store). Plus like I've said before I'd except the Main Tower to be similarly empty as the Great Hall and to need beefing up.

Ugh, 90s kids nostalgia bait winning out again. I suspected as much because most AFOLs are the right age, but was sort of hoping LEGO'd go for the broader appeal of TOS regardless. I mean I actually am from that 90s kids generation but TOS was vastly superior to TNG in terms of characterisation and storytelling. There goes the last of my interest.

I think 76389 was quite decent for what it tried to do (overpriced, yes, PPM should have been included, and the Great Hall was way too low) but yes, 4730 was the best representation of the Chamber ever. It also had what I still consider to be the best basilisk. They just don't make 'em like they used to!

Please watch RDJ's Guy Ritchie Sherlock Holmes movies, he's excellent in those and they were box office hits, too. Tropic Thunder, meanwhile, got him an Oscar nomination (though I haven't seen it).

RDJ and Tom Hiddleston hit it out of the park, that's true. However, I'd include Benedict Cumberbatch, Chris Pratt and yes, Brie Larson as well. She had a lot less to work with in terms of interaction with other MCU characters, but again I really liked her Carol who was half fun party girl, half angry avenger with a genuine warmth and humour that occasuonally shone through. YMMV of course. I think you misunderstand me. I certainly didn't mean to suggest that Bucky should have been the new Cap instead! I'm not thrilled with what the mantle of Cap stands for in the first place but even apart from that Steve's movies were mostly about Steve, then about Bucky, and Sam was just there. It would be like replacing Tony Stark with Rhodey - that also wouldn't work.

But that space is probably actually meant to house a corridor since it has a secret entrance.

This. I didn't even like Steve Rogers but he was Captain America. The movies did a good job of showing us who he was, how his life experiences had shaped him into the person we knew, what he valued and fought for. I didn't like the character and often disagreed with his actions but he felt fleshed-out. Sam Wilson was just his buddy with the wings, Bucky had a lot more backstory than him. There was no real reason to care about Falcon and calling him Captain America now doesn't change that. In Captain Marvel's defense, I think Brie Larson's take on the character was excellent. I also think The Marvels was, in terms of storytelling, actually one of the MCU's better recent efforts. At least it was fun! But it definitely suffered from the overall decline of the MCU, from coming right after Secret Invasion (and then not even being consistent with it in terms of continuity, though that's probably a blessing given the stupid things Secret Invasion did to the continuity) and yes, from not giving Captain Marvel decent backup. I mean Dr Strange got Wanda as his co-star and Captain Marvel got Monica Rambeau, that's not really comparable. As for LEGO Marvel: Do we know if there's going to be a polybag bext year and if so, who will be in it?

Rumours for 2025 include a single Pirates of the Caribbean set under the icons theme (presumably the Black Pearl) as well as an entire wave based off the Netflix adaption of the One Piece anime/manga. Set numbers for the latter are 75636 through 75640 with 75639 being over 1.300 pieces and 75640 being 18+ and over 3.400 pieces. Those might well be a ship and/or a significant location (i.e. port). I'm not sure how much use the minifigs will be for a more traditional pirates setting unless you really like straw hats (though Usopp's outfits from the show, Luffy's, and even some parts of Zoro's might work), but there should hopefully be some good stuff here.

Yes. Seriously, why wouldn't it? It's one of LEGO's best-selling themes. The "most detailed" moniker refers solely to the modular Hogwarts system in any case, which is only a part of the HP theme. I'm sure they'll find some other superlative for the next iteration. This. I don't like the yellow hair for Draco und Lucius, I much prefer the old tan hair. And I really hate LEGO's tendency to signify femininity by having characters wear lipstick, no matter how inappropriate this is for the character in question. The D&D CMF series even had a barbarian warrior wearing lipstick!

The rumour was posted at the usual place. Both sets will reportedly come out in the second half of 2025. I've said in another thread (and was viciously attacked for it) that LEGO seem to base a lot of their recent product decisions on their competitors' existing products (i.e. Notre Dame, solar system model, microscale Hogwarts and Grounds, 2025's booknooks based on licenced themes in general and specifically the Hogwarts Express one for HP after Reobrix has already done both). Now they"re taking over the Star Trek licence from Bluebrixx and at the same time attack Bluebrixx' and Reobrix' pirates themes with One Piece and PotC sets. I really think there is a pattern of trying to assert market dominance in order to prevent customers from switching brands here. EDIT: Consensus at the usual place and in the Pirates subtheme of Eurobricks seems to be that the PotC set will be the Black Pearl (that's apparently a given) in midi scale with a Jack Sparrow minifig (I'm not sure where those details originate and how accurate they are). The Star Trek set is likely the Enterprise because what else would it be, but it will be interesting to see which iteration. The 90s kids that seem to be LEGO's main target group these days would have grown up with TNG, but personally I think that TOS is more iconic, and also that more people who grew up with TNG would be willing to buy a set based on TOS than the other way round. As for One Piece, right now the main thing I'm curious about is how they're going to do Zoro's three swords. Minifigs cannot hold stuff in their mouths. Do you think he'll hold two swords in his hands and maybe have some sort of utility belt for the third? (I guess they could always cheat and use scenes from past the mid-way point of season one, but come on, Zoro needs his swords!).

According to Brick Tap, both PotC and Star Trek are coming in 2025 under the Icons theme (one set each). According to Brick Tap that's the case, yes. Would PotC qualify? The last set (the Silent Mary) came out in 2017, I think, and they're not returning as their own theme, but still ...

Thanks for the find! After watching it my opinion hasn't changed, that set is definitely a need-not-buy for me. The interiors look terrible and all the cool details of the original Alley get lost in microscale. To me, Gringotts is the only building that looks halfway decent both inside and outside. I'm assuming there's a market for it though, as the original microscale Diagon Alley GWP from a few years back still sells at very high prices even though it looks just as bad to me. Good find, thanks! I'm honestly a little baffled since the last Quidditch-themed polybag was like two years ago, but polybags are always good for parts availability. I had reason to BrickLink a Golden Snitch the other day and I got it for an acceptable price locally, which probably wouldn't have happened if the Cho polybag hadn't made them more readily available.

A bunch of people are speculating that it might be Magneto. Nothing concrete, though. Well, Star-Lord's helmet is EUR 80 and only about 600 pieces, so at least the price-to-pieces relation doesn't seem far off. But maybe it's less a helmet and more a cowl or something, thus fewer pieces? Or maybe it's a tiny Ant-Man helmet.

Well you probably weren't far off. Some of the lowlights from HP for Summer 2025 include: 76445, 390 pieces - USD 60, 76451, 639 pieces - USD 90, and 76452, 795 pieces - USD 100. If LEGO are continuing like this, in a few years we might all be reminiscencing about what a bargain the X-Men Jet and the Hoopty were.

I'm assuming those five include the two without a piece count, but that would still leave us with three sets at less than 400 pieces yet more than USD 100? Even for Marvel and even in 2025 (HP price-to-pieces ratios for the Summer wave are out and are awful across the board) that sounds like a lot.

Yikes to the lot of them, really. Except for the phoenix - that sounds like a plausible brick count for yet another buildable monstrosity (LEGO can do birds fairly well but not at this small a scale) with no minifigure. As for Aunt Marge's, for what it's worth the Flying Ford as a stand-alone set was 165 pieces so that theory sounds plausible. Though I'd imagine Aunt Marge to be brick-built in the inflated version, which would add a few pieces again. Otherwise they're ALL bad. The Book Nook is especially badly priced given the competition (like I've said, the Reobrix one has over 3.000 pieces and is in the same price range), plus the LEGO LOTR one is rumored to be USD 120 at around 1.200 pieces so the HP one would be worse value for money than the in-house competition, too. (And the LOTR one almost HAS to include at least one minifigure given the subject matter while the HP one might well have none.) The older Privet Drive set was only USD 80 but had about 150 pieces more than the new one, as @joeeehas pointed out. The playset Diagon Alley entry, too, might be even worse value for money than its already overpriced predecessors. And the Main Tower now officially has way fewer pieces than a modular building while costing more (2025 Tudor Corner: 3.266 pieces, EUR 230). In the last years, we've seen price-to-pieces ratios like those with the more badly priced outlier sets in the more expensive subthemes (like Marvel's X-Men Jet and Hoopty), but now LEGO seems to be jacking up prices across the board. Like I've said: I'm pretty sure we'll get stuff for the Main Tower. Which would point heavily towards CoS since half the Christmases you mention don't even take place at Hogwarts, the Slytherin common room might be included in the actual set, and the Tower is likely CoS-based. That said, I wouldn't expect them to adhere to the plots of specific scenes. This year we got the caroling ghost and the House statues, none of which were plot-relevant in the slightest, as well as random House students like Susan Bones and Cho Chang with no plot-relevance for PoS, either. For anything plot-relevant I'd therefore expect it to either get a specific, smaller set (like PPM) or for it to be included in a bigger set.

Didn't know that, thanks. In other news, Minecraft Advent Calendar has leaked. That should put the discussion as to whether or not LEGO are still doing ACs to rest. I'm absolutely expecting them to do one for HP in 2025, probably with stuff to fill the Main Tower.