The 2022 HP Advent Calendar

[gingerwitch.livejournal.com]

Well we have more news about the 2022 Advent Calendar. Frankly it's a bit of a mixed bag... Spoilers follow, click through at your own risk. There are a few pix from the minifigs and a list of the builds.

For one thing we have better pictures (and some reverse sides) of the Tonks and Voldemort heads, and Myrtle has leaked as well. We now also have torsos from Tonks, Neville (in his Fair Isle sweater), Myrtle, and a fourth as yet unidentified torso. (It may well turn out not to belong to anyone in the HP line. Goodness knows, erexen and I have tried to place it in their wardrobes and come up empty.)







Torsos:





(No clue as to that one. Any ideas?)

I'd love to give credit for the pictures to the leaker, but they've been passed around so much, I can't honestly say who the source is anymore, and unfortunately my IG clone was dysfunctional for a while there so I had / have no way of checking. Hmm. legofulcrum tends to supply a lot of the pix, though, so I'll just do a random shoutout, shall I? Cheers. 😆


In addition to those pictures, thanks to promobricks we also have a list of the set's contents:

Exclusive Tonks
Exclusive Neville (from Deathly Hollows)
Exclusive Moaning Myrtle
Exclusive Horace Slughorn as Armchair
Exclusive Sirius Black
Exclusive Voldemort
Harry Potter with short legs
Severus Snape
Dice-Dreidel
Hogwarts Express with platform 9 3/4
Whomping Willow with Ford Anglia
Goblet of Fire with exclusive name tile
Hedwig (white owl)
Quidditch goals
Hagrid's motorcylce
Chamber of Secrets
Knight Bus
Pensieve
Hall of Prophecies
Atrium of the Ministry of Magic
Triwizard Cup
The Burrow
Gringotts Wizarding Bank with Dragon

If the list is complete, at least one of those entries needs to be split, and it's unlikely Hedwig appears on her own.

The biggest positive surprise is the fact we're getting eight minifigs, a whopping six of which are exclusive. That's truly impressive and leaves all other Advent Calendars in the dust. (Take that, you lesser themes!) And of course the inclusion of Professor Snape in the calendar is certainly very welcome (after he was so glaringly missing form the Shrieking Shack set), but unfortunately it looks like we're getting the same old mediocre Snape again. (Seriously lego??? hp100 ftw.) Armchair Sluggy at least is new, and while I don't need quite so many Slughorns when we're still missing so many other figs, this variant is welcome. Hands down the most frustrating inclusion would have to be another Sirius Black (our fourth this year, when no one other than the Trio has had more than two minifigs <- that's a genuine plus as far as character diversity goes, it's just puzzling that Black of all characters is getting this much attention in this short a period of time) and it's yet another exclusive Black at that. I sincerely can't believe the budget they've blown on that character alone this year, nor the fact that in about two years, he'll be off the shelves and unavailable except on the after market, nor the fact that we haven't seen poor Ginny at all this year. While I'm far from a Ginny stan, she's literally the only member on the OotP's side from the Battle at the Ministry of Magic who fails to make an appearance in an otherwise Weasley-rich year in which we'll even see a Percy. Where's the love? The series has always been a bit (ha!) heavy on the male characters, it seems a shame to not include some of the females when given a chance. They could easily have added an extra Tonks head and hairpiece in the 12 Grimmauld Place set to free up a slot for Harry's favourite ginger here. (Or is that second favourite? It's difficult to say... 😉 Nevertheless!)

The other point (ignoring my bafflement that this wasn't a "Christmas at Grimmauld" set; maybe next year? Or the fact it's a game. Again.) has to be the decision to otherwise move completely to the wretched nanobuilds. No words. Actually, scratch that, lots of words, starting with "what on earth were they thinking???" and the rest aren't fit to print. The HP calendar has always been far superior to the Star Wars calendar (for instance) for sticking to the Friends ACs tradition of giving us real builds that can help flesh out our sets. But sadly even the City ACs have drifted in the direction of useless nanobuilds chock full of tiny parts that serve little purpose elsewhere. Why??? Who wants another miniature Express? What am I supposed to do with them? (At least give us a few more Hogsmeade shops, and then we can repurpose one to a toy store.) And how about all the Pensieves? Or Goblets of Fire? At this rate, we'll need shops for those as well...

Bottom line, I definitely didn't need another game, but if they insist on going the game route, then doing it like they did last year with somewhat useful builds is the better choice (although that was already a step down from the Yule Ball's excellent extra tables and common room furnishings). So while I'll still be purchasing this year's AC (addiction, addiction!), I feel sorely tried by the line up, and if this is the direction they're taking can see myself shifting back to another less nanobuild laden theme next year, exclusive minifigs be hanged. The move away from useful world expanding builds relegates the AC from a "must have" to an "ebaying a used set eventually will do fine".

Comments

[erexen.livejournal.com]

Fabulous entry!!! All of this info is tremendously helpful!!!

I agree with everything, and further add how seriously disappointed I am that while they keep doing Sirius Blacks in different designs, they cannot seem to create a better Severus Snape design. Like gingerwitch, I cannot fathom any purpose to 4 Sirius Blacks in a year, especially for a character that was only truly involved for such a short bit in the series. Whereas Severus Snape was in All parts, and was a hero protecting Harry & trio the whole time, even though it isn't "revealed" until the end where Snape gave his very life to protect Harry. What did Black do, no really, he scares Harry as a Grim, convict escapee, causes Dementors to endanger Potter REPEATEDLY, encourages reckless behavior, and is direct cause for BoDM and his own death which further damages Harry. Not to mention his days as a Marauder where he attempts to murder Snape via werewolf, additionally putting his supposed friend Lupin at risk for death! Please someone explain what possible reason they have to promote / celebrate such an awful representation of a wizard?

Whew... soapbox tucked away back under the shelf.

I too will get the AC, but am unthrilled at micro builds. As a person with disabilities that affect my hands, these microbuilds are Far less fun that builds that can be incorporated in full builds & scenes.

Thanks for the shared info! 💖