Harry Potter Legos – Hogwart’s Express Review
If your little muggles love Harry Potter, Legos Hogwart’s Express set will give them hours of fun. It is one of the first and absolute best Harry Potter Legos available, and you don’t need to have any of the other sets to have fun playing with it! If you’re just starting your collection, this kit is a great place to begin.
Hogwart’s Express is rated for children aged 8 and up, but younger kids can put it together fairly easily with a little help from mom or dad. It has 410 pieces, and a very detailed instruction book (48 pages long!), so make sure you set aside a couple of hours to get this thing together. Luckily, the building goes quite smoothly and is a whole lot of fun!
The set lets you build the Hogwart’s Express engine and one passenger car, and of course Hogsweade Station’s platform 9 3/4 for the students to board. The figures it includes are of course Harry, Ron and Hermione. Harry and Ron are in their muggle clothes, and Hermione is in her Hogwart’s uniform, but the set includes three cloaks and wands so they can work their magic. Hedwig the owl is also there, and so is Ron’s toad Trevor.
Other little details add to the overall Harry Potter experience, and make actual play time that much more fun. There’s lots of luggage and 2 trolleys for lugging it around, a wooden trunk, gold keys and a book of potions. The best little feature though is the holographic wizard card!
The station is by far the best part of the set. On one side (the muggle side)is King’s Cross, and to get to platform 9 3/4 you go through a ‘magical’ revolving door! The station itself has lots of authentic items, like a broomstick, lamp-posts, garbage bins and a station clock.
The train looks fantastic, and is easy to play with. The colors are exactly the same is the train in the movie. Inside the engine are three secret storage areas, great for hiding the keys and trunk. There is a switch that is supposed to shoot the trunk out of the engine, but it’s a bit tricky and doesn’t always work like it’s supposed to, though when it does work it is a very cool feature. The passenger train has tables and seats, and a removable roof, so little hands can get in there and play with Harry and the gang inside the train. The engine and passenger car attach to each other with a magnet.
The train is very durable too, and survives the inevitable derailment scenario that usually results from kids playing with trains! Even very young children won’t destroy it, no matter how hard they may try (and they will try!)
One thing the set does not include is tracks…but you don’t need them, so it’s not a problem. The train moves easily over the floor, even carpet. Apparently it does not work on Lego train tracks, but many people have been able to get it to do just that with wheels and a motor.
All in all, Hogwart’s Express is one of the best Harry Potter legos and a fun and easy way to start your collection…or to just play with on its own.
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