Black Friday

It’s apparently Black Friday. It used generally just to be a thing in the US, though retailers seem very keen to make it just as big in the rest of the world. So my social media feeds have been spammed “Black Friday” notifications for days. But if you ask me what Black Friday should be about, I’d say: “Are you Sirius?” So let’s have a quick overview of Sirius Black in LEGO.

Background

Sirius Black was introduced in the Prisoner of Azkaban, initially as a villain shown on a wanted poster with ragged prisoner clothing and a crazy stare.

But his evilness was soon  brought into question and by the end of the book he was truly on the good side. He was a hope for a better future for Harry Potter – as his godfather both a connection to his lost parents, and a place he could live instead of the Dursleys at 4 Privet Drive.

He played a lesser role in the Goblet of Fire, mainly interacting with Harry through letters.

He could also talk to Harry using Floo powder to transport his head to the fireplace in the Gryffindor Common Room and did meet in person with Harry in the book – first in a cave near Hogsmeade – later after the final challenge of the Tri-wizard tournament, he was summoned by Dumbledore and allowed to stay in the Hospital Wing with Harry.

In the Order of the Phoenix, Sirius was ordered by Dumbledore to gather the “old crowd” and inform them of Voldemore’s return. Sirius allowed his home at 12 Grimmauld Place in London to be used as Order Headquarters. But as he was still wanted by the authorities, he could never leave the house and became quite depressed. He continued to be in contact with Harry at Hogwarts through letters and the Floo network.

His mood improved considerably when Harry and the Weasleys’ decided to spend Christmas with him at his 12 Grimmauld Place.

Unfortunately Sirius was killed in the battle of the Department of Mysteries and could never take up the fatherly role that Harry had dreamt of.

Appearance in LEGO sets

Before Sirius Black’s reappearance as minifigure in the marvelous Expecto Patronum set, I’d have considered him a very rare. He did feature in two 2004 sets, the somewhat accessible Sirius Black’s escape (set 4753) and the extremely hard to find Shrieking Shack (set 4756). The 2019 version was a huge improvement over the 2004 version.

But for completeness, I acknowledge that Sirius Black does feature in a number of other sets, though not as minifigure:

• He appeared in his animagus form as dog in both the Shrieking Shack set 4756 as well as the Knight bus set 4755.
• His face appeared printed on tiles in both the 2007 Hogwarts Castle set 5378 and the 2010 Hogwarts Castle set 4842 – representing his face talking to Harry from the fireplace.

• And talking about his face, this was on “Wanted” posters in both the 2011 Diagon Alley set 10217 and the 2018 Hogwarts Express set 75955.

Make your own model

Sirius played a key role in the Prisoner of Azkaban (both book and movie – dressed in his Azkaban prisoner robes), but while Harry got to see him again in the book version of the Goblet of Fire, he didn’t feature in the movie.

However, he was back again in the Order of the Phoenix – this time no longer dressed in prisoner robes, but in an elegant suit. This version of him is currently missing and we would hope to see him in a 2020 Harry Potter set or the rumoured Harry Potter CMF series 2.

But a reasonable version can be made by combining his head and hair from Expecto Patronum set with the torso and legs of Newt Scamander from the LEGO Dimensions starter set.

I’ve made a few suggestions now for how you can make your own custom minifigures. Check them out on the Minifigures page. More coming soon – I’ve got plenty of ideas.

Till then, Build the Magic!