New 2019 Harry Potter sets – first impressions!

Sometimes you want rumours to be true, other times not. This time I really hoped the rumoured Harry Potter sets (as per earlier post) would be confirmed, and today finally, official photos of the 2019 Wizarding World of Harry Potter line-up was found on Amazon.it. The sets cover the 3rd and 4th books and includes a number of new minifigures and magical creatures. The Harry Potter sets of 2004 and 2005 covered the same books, but much as happened in quality of LEGO sets since, and the sets do seem absolutely amazing.

The sets are (sorted by size):

• 75945 Expecto Patronum
• 75946 The Tri-wizard Tournament
• 75947 Hagrid’s Hut: Buckbeak’s rescue
• 75948 Hogwarts Clock Tower

These are expectedly going on sale 1 July 2019. Below my immediate thoughts of the four sets.

75945 – Expecto Patronum

The smallest of the lot, this set includes Harry Potter, Sirius Black and two dementors.

Excellent selection of figures for the price and representing a scene not previously covered by any LEGO sets. It is only the second version of Sirius Black as minifig, a welcome return. The previous version came with the two 2004 sets Sirius Black’s escape (set 4753) and Shrieking Shack (set 4756), but is rather limited in detail compared to what you have come to expect today.

The dementor appears to be the same as in the 2018 Hogwarts express (set 75955).

Even considering the return of Sirius Black, the highlights of the set has to be Harry’s patronus, which is an amazing looking stag in trans light blue. the stag was also Harry’s father’s Aminagus form, when roaming with the gang “Moony, Wormtail, Padfoot, and Prongs”.

Two great looking trees and small piece of the lake front completes this set. This will have to be one of my favourite Harry Potter sets ever in terms of value for money.

75946 – Tri-wizard Tournament

Slightly bigger, the Tri-wizard Tournament set includes Harry Potter, Viktor Krum, Fleur Delacour and Cedric Diggory in their dresses for the first Tri-wizard Tournament task.

While the first Tri-wizard tournament task has been covered before in the Harry and the Hungarian Horntail (set 4767), that set is extremely hard to get, and a remake much appreciated and with a dragon, it surely will be popular (though in my opinion the 3rd task labyrinth could have been a nice touch as not previously covered).

In the set, the Harry Potter figure slightly updated from the previous set (better torso print, new head and hair piece). More important are the other figures though as they were not in the previous Hungarian Horntail set:

• Viktor Krum is making a welcome return, only seen in the Durmstrang ship (set 4768) in his Durmstrang uniform and the Rescue from the Merpeople (set 4762) in his half-shark form.
• Fleur Delacour – this is the first ever minifigure of Fleur. Some may want the set just for this.
• Cedric Diggory- 2nd version ever of Cedric (with the first released recently as part of the CMF series in 2018 – see my review here)

All figures are absolutely great representations of what they characters wore on the day of the first task in the movie.

The key player in task one is however the Hungarian Horntail dragon. The previous, while reasonably looking, was hard posing as not many ways to articulate the limbs. The new version moves away from using almost entirely moulded parts to mostly brick built body (only head and wings are special moulds). I think they could have done a better job though, with the dragon – at least not on the photos – looking that impressive. I had hoped for something more spiky, as we have seen from fan-made models like this.

The set also includes a small tent (for pre-task relaxation) and a small patch of rock, where the dragon is chained to, guarding a nest with the golden egg.

75947 – Hagrid’s Hut: Buckbeak’s rescue

For new Harry Potter fans, the return of Hagrid’s hut will be well received. For myself, with three previous versions of Hagrid’s Hut around, I hadn’t put up too high hopes for this one when rumoured yet another version would come.

All the previous had been a single octagon building though (similar to the early movies) where it in Prisoner of Azkaban is made up of two connected octagons.

Setting this aside from the previous, this set nicely represents the hut from that movie and is centered around the rescue of Buckbeak.

Another way to set this apart from previous versions is though the minifigure selection. Firstly, we have Harry, Ron and Hermoine (with time-turner). The printing here represents the clothes the had on the day they went back in time to save both buckbeak and Sirius.

In addition, we find figures for:

• Hagrid (of course, it’s his hut after all)
• Cornelius Fudge (Minister of Magic)
• Walden Macnair (the executioner)

The last two have not been seen as Minifigures before.

While the minifigures are really good, many may be most pleased to see the return of Buckbeak in a new moulded form and with printing. The previous version which came in both Draco’s Encounter with Buckbeak (set 4750) and Sirius Black’s escape (set 4753) was pretty good but lacked the printing you’ve come to expect from modern figures. So the inclusion of a much loved character like Buckbeak here will be a major selling point.

A nice small pumpkin patch sits next to the hut, where Buckbeak can be chained (till rescued). It would have been nice it the set had included a small patch of bush Harry, Ron and Hermoine could hide behind when Cornelius Fudge and Walden Macnair comes to the hut. 

Hogwarts Clock Tower

When first discussed as rumour, this was cryptically referred to as the watchtower. It had me puzzled, as I couldn’t quite understand what it referred to. But soon, I came to the realisation, that watch refers to “clock” rather than a tower to watch from.

As the biggest of the 2019 Harry Potter sets revealed to date, this set features the clock tower (but bot pendulum which was in the 2nd version of Hogwarts in 2004), a smaller tower and eight minifigures all dressed up for the yule ball (from the Goblet of Fire).

The minifigures look great. In terms of persons, there’s a bit of overlap with the tri-wizard tournament set, but as the outfits are all different, this doesn’t matter. It is great to get all these new characters in different outfits. Overall, this set include:

• Fleur Delacour
• Ron Weasley
• Harry Potter
• Hermione Granger,
• Olympe Maxime
• Albus Dumbledore
• Viktor Krum
• Cedric Diggory

We will also get wintery decorations to got with the yule ball theme.

As expected, a couple of pins allows it to connect with up with the Hogwarts Great Hall and Whomping Willow sets for a very substantial sized Hogwarts.

I had personally hoped that the set would have featured in the final scenes of the Prisoner of Azkaban with inclusion of the hospital (which is near the clock tower as you hear the clock) and prison tower (to rescue Sirius Black).

That could have introduced Madam Pomfrey, the matron at Hogwarts, as minifig. She’s looking after Harry and other unlucky Hogwarts students on multiple occasions. Hopefully, we’ll get her on another occasion.

But the set has the prefects bathroom, which is a nice addition. It is hear Harry finds out he needs to listen to the sounds from the egg under water. Mourning Myrtle tells him (surprising him in the bath). It would had been great – really, really great to have Myrtle in this set too. As with Pomfrey, hopefully we’ll get her in a future set.