Wizarding World 2023 - Rumors & Discussion

[Bugbot20082]

On 9/20/2023 at 9:04 PM, JeanGreyForever said:

I'd still like to see minifigs dressed for Bill and Fleur's wedding. 

Yes agreed!

Perhaps the UCS Burrow could have all new figure prints for the wedding scene plus the tent side build. 
they can then reuse a few of them for a follow up Advent Calendar to give us a couple of missing figures:

UCS Burrow: Bill, Fleur, Molly, Arthur, Harry, Ron, Hermione, Aunt Muriel, Death Eater. 

Advent Calendar: Harry, Bill, Fleur, Luna, Xenophilous, Elphias Doge

[brickbride]

42 minutes ago, Bugbot20082 said:

Advent Calendar: Harry, Bill, Fleur, Luna, Xenophilous, Elphias Doge

Aren't the advent calendars supposed to be primarily for kids? I know that many adult minifig collectors buy them, but still they tend to be marketed towards kids. And I kind of doubt that kids would be excited about those last two ones. Or even Bill, who plays very little of a role in the books and movies.

Basically, I'd expect them to stick with easily recognisable figures for the advent calendars - mostly students with the odd well-known professor or other adult, like Aberforth, thrown in.

[BrickBob Studpants]

57 minutes ago, Bugbot20082 said:

Advent Calendar: Harry, Bill, Fleur, Luna, Xenophilous, Elphias Doge

Pardon my French, but an AC based on a wedding that gets ambushed by Death Eaters with some of the guests getting killed is a pretty strange concept

[brickbride]

Well, over at Star Wars they did have a 4+ set with an AT-ST on the Ewok Homeworld, so you don't know what goes on in their heads: "It's never too early to introduce kids to slaughter!", maybe?

Also, like I've pointed out before, the official description of 75951 wants YOU to be Grindelwald ("Flap the Thestral’s wings to make a flying escape!"), so yeah.

But on the whole, I agree that an AC based on the wedding, or anything DH really, is not that likely.

Edited September 22, 2023 by brickbride

[BrickBob Studpants]

14 minutes ago, brickbride said:

Well, over at Star Wars they did have a 4+ set with an AT-ST on the Ewok Homeworld, so you don't know what goes on in their heads: "It's never too early to introduce kids to slaughter!", maybe?

When you think about it, Star Wars ACs are also pretty strange. I mean, „war“ is in the title, not very X-mas-y  That‘s not a slant against them though, I look forward to them every year.

That said, HP certainly has more peaceful scenes that work as the subject for ACs

[brickbride]

1 hour ago, BrickBob Studpants said:

That said, HP certainly has more peaceful scenes that work as the subject for ACs

How about the camping trip in DH? It's apparently popular with AFOLs and you can't get any more boring peaceful than that. Most days' builds would be a tree. Paired with the occasional new minifig variant like Sulky Ron or Whiny Hermione. (Yes, DH is absolutely my favourite book of the series, just in case you couldn't tell.)

[Bugbot20082]

In my mind the AC would focus on the party itself, not the ambush. Builds for food and drink tables, the wedding cake, some of the furniture from the Burrow such as the clock, a couple of modular curtain sections, perhaps swap Elphias for Rufus Scrimgeour as his main scene is just before the wedding. 

[Lion King]

4 hours ago, BrickBob Studpants said:

Pardon my French, but an AC based on a wedding that gets ambushed by Death Eaters with some of the guests getting killed is a pretty strange concept

 

4 hours ago, BrickBob Studpants said:

When you think about it, Star Wars ACs are also pretty strange. I mean, „war“ is in the title, not very X-mas-y  That‘s not a slant against them though, I look forward to them every year.

That said, HP certainly has more peaceful scenes that work as the subject for ACs

I think you read too fast becuase Bugbot20082 didn’t say “Death Eater’ in his suggestion for AC. Clearly, the wedding sene is peaceful prior to the ambush. 

[BrickBob Studpants]

2 hours ago, Lion King said:

I think you read too fast becuase Bugbot20082 didn’t say “Death Eater’ in his suggestion for AC. Clearly, the wedding sene is peaceful prior to the ambush. 

I wasn‘t suggesting that @Bugbot20082‘s idea included the ambush, my point was that it follows immediately after the wedding in the story  I just think it‘s weird to have an AC based on a scene like that. The Yule Ball for instance was just a ball, no ensuing violence

[krimimimi]

The wedding as an AC has the problem of not being Xmassy, which we're given to whinging about, particularly as they have plenty of canonical Xmas material to choose from. Ideally, if they really feel they have to stretch things out, I'd like to see them at least alternate the Christmases with other concepts that compliment sets on the shelves at the time, but in a perfect world the focus would be overwhelmingly wintery. I still can't believe they didn't do a Christmas at Grimmauld AC as long as they have the set on the shelves. In fact, it's weird when they skip Christmas, because other themes will forgo any attempt at an actual scene in their ACs in the interests of putting Palpatine or Spider-man in Christmas jumpers, so why do they then forgo Xmas / winter for HP two years running (2021-2022), particularly in light of the abundance of canonical Christmas knitwear? (To be clear, I don't object to something like the 2021 set which provided many items we weren't likely to get in other sets, or sets / scenes which would be too pricey and abstruse for all but the hardcore fans (eg cabin on the island in PS). Harry's birthday cake, for example, although CMFs might be part of the solution here.)

But let's say they tighten things up. So this year is Hogsmeade visit from 3rd year, which compliments the Shrieking Shack from 2022 2HY, maybe next summer we see a Hog's Head and Zonko's set (sort of like 2021's Hogsmeade Visit) to go with the 2023 AC, although the inverse order might have been better. Next year they could bump the 2024 HP AC's focus up to the signing up for the DA in OotP and expand the Hogsmeade scene again, but with different characters / ages. I can't help thinking they hurt their sales whenever they repeat the minifigs too heavily; I know that was often an objection to the otherwise excellent Yule Ball AC in 2020. If you keep the location from the set but change the scene you're recreating, you get more mileage, and there should be enough generic winter wear torsos out there to avoid having to make too many new prints.   

I'm not sure how I feel about the idea of tying the AC in to incredibly expensive D2C sets, though, especially if the AC was mostly third / fourth tier minifigs. That sounds like something for a CMF series or an Accessory Pack you'd only buy one of. (I'm curious how many regular fans can name Doge and Muriel, although Luna's dad made an impression in the video game, so I think there's a good chance to see him eventually. Krum would be another possibility as a well known character, despite the brevity of the exchange.) The only way it works for me is if they create enough of the scene in the AC that you can play it out without the set, but that's a big ask, and I'd probably want to see things like Kingsley's patronus to sweeten the deal, as I'm not going to have the D2C to complete the scene. I imagine that's true for most. 

Similarly, I don't really like the idea of tying scenes that can be done for far less, like the wedding or the visit to Gringotts, to such expensive sets either. If the 2023 WWW didn't signal we're likely to see an affordable Gringotts at some point in the not so very distant future, I'd be steamed that such a key part of DA is gated behind such a high price tag, especially because half of it is stuff I couldn't even display with DA if I wanted to. 

[Xenophilius]

In terms of future Advent calendars, a logical holiday-themed location would be the Burrow, since that’s where they spent Christmas in HBP. While I wouldn’t mind an Advent calendar based on Christmas at Grimmauld from OotP, Grimmauld is such a dark location that I’d be surprised if Lego chose it for a holiday set (not that I would mind a set with a bunch of mounted elf heads). In contrast, the Burrow feels more warm and holiday-ish (though admittedly the movie version ends with the attack on the Burrow). If Lego based its Advent calendar on the book version of the Burrow Christmas rather than the movie version, that could open up some exciting minifig opportunities to include Bill Weasley, Percy, Scrimgeour, or Fleur.

Edited September 22, 2023 by Xenophilius
misspelled

[Accio Lego]

So - since we’re discussing it here’s a list of all the Harry Potter movies’ Christmas scenes. 
 

1. SS - featuring Ron’s chess set, Weasley jumpers, and Harry getting the invisibility cloak and finding the Mirror of Erised

2. CoS - the polyjuice scene, featuring the transformed trio, Harry and Ron hiding behind the Architect’s statue to knock out Crabbe and Goyle, the Slytherin common room, and Myrtle in her bathroom 

3. PoA - the movie skips actual Christmas, but in the book Harry’s first visit to Hogsmeade coincides with holiday shopping and there are visual clues of this being the case in the movie as well

4. GoF - the Yule Ball

5. OotP - Christmas at Grimmauld Place

6. HBP - A. Slug Club Christmas Party

B. Christmas at the Burrow 

7. DH1 - Christmas in Godric’s Hollow 

(DH2 does not cover Christmastime)

Pretty much all but the OotP and DH1 scenes have been covered in some capacity - although only 1, 3, and 4 have had fully themed advent calendars. I don’t think #2 on this list will be made in advent calendar form anytime soon either, since it’s been pretty thoroughly covered piecemeal over a variety of forms, including parts of advent calendars and small sets. That leaves Christmas at Grimmauld, the Slug Club Christmas Party, Christmas at the Burrow (pre arson), and Christmas on the run in Godric’s Hollow (pre Nagini) for options in the near future. 

[JeanGreyForever]

1 hour ago, Accio Lego said:

 DH1 - Christmas in Godric’s Hollow 

There's no way this would ever get made into a set. If they won't do Malfoy's Manor, they definitely won't touch Godric's Hollow since the only significant events that occur here are Harry's parents being murdered and Nagini slithering out of Bathilda Bagshot's corpse.

[Accio Lego]

5 minutes ago, JeanGreyForever said:

There's no way this would ever get made into a set. If they won't do Malfoy's Manor, they definitely won't touch Godric's Hollow since the only significant events that occur here are Harry's parents being murdered and Nagini slithering out of Bathilda Bagshot's corpse.

Sure, but there’s a part before that where Harry and Hermione are visiting the Potters’ graves that’s fairly tame, and Lego has shown a willingness to skirt around these things before 

[Lion King]

As for OotP’s Christmas scene, we had seen Arthur being attacked by Nagini before that scene at Grimmauld Place. An injured Arthur minifigure, anyone (sarcastially)?

[Accio Lego]

4 hours ago, Lion King said:

As for OotP’s Christmas scene, we had seen Arthur being attacked by Nagini before that scene at Grimmauld Place. An injured Arthur minifigure, anyone (sarcastially)?

You joke, but Arthur’s injuries as shown in that scene are pretty mild, I don’t think they’re any more graphic then stuff lego has done before. 
 

The fact is that last year we got the ghost of a murdered child and her murderer in the same advent calendar - not to mention Hedwig representing DH1 despite that being the movie she was killed in. Lego’s proven they don’t have any qualms about general associations with the darker aspects of the series - so I’m not sure they’d have any problems making calendars based on OotP or DH1 (just without Nagini). 

[PsychoBuilder]

Anyone know the dimensions for the vaults part of Gringotts?

[Lion King]

1 hour ago, Accio Lego said:

You joke, but Arthur’s injuries as shown in that scene are pretty mild, I don’t think they’re any more graphic then stuff lego has done before. 

Oh I know… but Arthur being attacked by a snake prior to Christmas is dark. It would be strange to see a recovering Arthur minifigure in AC. 

[JeanGreyForever]

Does anyone think we'll ever get the Lovegood House or Shell Cottage?

[Accio Lego]

2 hours ago, Lion King said:

Oh I know… but Arthur being attacked by a snake prior to Christmas is dark. It would be strange to see a recovering Arthur minifigure in AC. 

True, but Arthur is also wearing a rather large paper crown in that scene as well, so I imagine the focus would be on Sirius and the kids anyway 

[Lion King]

1 hour ago, JeanGreyForever said:

Does anyone think we'll ever get the Lovegood House or Shell Cottage?

Sure hope so….

26 minutes ago, Accio Lego said:

True, but Arthur is also wearing a rather large paper crown in that scene as well, so I imagine the focus would be on Sirius and the kids anyway 

A paper crown piece won’t happen in AC becuase AC generally doen’t have new molds. However, paper crowns are fun!

Sirius and kid at a mini Christmas party would be perfect. 

[Accio Lego]

49 minutes ago, Lion King said:

A paper crown piece won’t happen in AC becuase AC generally doen’t have new molds. However, paper crowns are fun!

Sirius and kid at a mini Christmas party would be perfect. 

Exactly, which means any OotP themed advent calendar wouldn’t feature any references to the Nagini attack that immediately proceeded the holiday season, and therefore not dark at all. Which is how Funko got away with doing OotP themed Harry Potter Pop!s a couple years back (including mini versions for their own AC). 
It would also be a great place to have, say, Kreacher as a repeat minifig, and I can’t help but think it might be the best format to give us Mundungus Fletcher since we’re getting Aberforth this year. 

Edited September 23, 2023 by Accio Lego

[Axxe90]

Just finished building Gringotts, what a fun and interesting set!!

Not wondering if this has been discussed, but on one of the sticker sheets are apparently 4 set numbers written, 3 of sets that are known and one that does not match (to my understanding).

Could that be a hint to a future set? what do you think it could be that they mention it in this Gringotts set?

[Black Falcon]

9 minutes ago, Axxe90 said:

Just finished building Gringotts, what a fun and interesting set!!

Not wondering if this has been discussed, but on one of the sticker sheets are apparently 4 set numbers written, 3 of sets that are known and one that does not match (to my understanding).

Could that be a hint to a future set? what do you think it could be that they mention it in this Gringotts set?

Which Set numbers are written there?

[BrickBob Studpants]

36 minutes ago, Axxe90 said:

Could that be a hint to a future set? what do you think it could be that they mention it in this Gringotts set?

Nope, just a mistake. It's a reference to this set

26 minutes ago, Black Falcon said:

Which Set numbers are written there?

The numbers (Roman numerals) are references to all four Gringotts sets TLG have released