Harry Potter

Mandrake

The screaming little root from Herbology class, and it actually stretches its arms when you lift it.

Brick Rated Score

3.8/5

Set 76433 · 2024

Pieces579

Minifigsn/a

Year2024

Set number76433

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The verdict

What sold me on this one is that it does not just sit there looking like a plant.

You lift the Mandrake out of its pot and its legs unfold, and a switch on the body makes the mouth gape and the arms flail like it is mid-scream. It is a genuinely clever little figure and it displays beautifully at 27cm tall. The catch is the price, which asks a lot for what it is, and the leaves are stickered when they really should have been printed.

Best for: Harry Potter fans who want a characterful display piece with a bit of playable mechanism

The full review

What it is

This is the first time LEGO has done the Mandrake as a proper brick-built figure, and it is the version of the plant everyone remembers from Chamber of Secrets, the muddy little root with a screaming baby face that you repot in Herbology while wearing earmuffs. What got me is that it is not a static model. You lift it out of its terracotta pot and a pair of legs unfolds underneath, and there is a switch on the body that opens and closes the mouth and sends the arms flailing. It genuinely reads as a creature caught mid-scream, which is exactly the effect you want. At 27cm tall it has real presence on a shelf, and the pot itself is a charming little build with movable roots poking out.

The catch

I will be straight with you about the sticking points, because they are real. The price is the big one. At 69.99 dollars for 579 pieces, this asks noticeably more than the LEGO Botanical sets people tend to compare it against, and those usually feel like better value brick for brick. Then there are the leaves. They are stickered rather than printed, and on a set that is meant for display that is a genuine letdown, because stickers never sit quite as crisply and they date the model. The other small frustration builders keep raising is that lowering the Mandrake back into its pot takes two hands and a bit of care, or you will hear a toe click off. And there is no sound brick, so despite all that screaming animation, it stays completely silent.

Who it's for

If you love Harry Potter and you want a display piece with a bit of personality and a mechanism you can actually play with, this is an easy one to enjoy, especially once it is built and posed. It is also a lovely quick build, well under an hour, so it makes a satisfying evening project rather than a marathon. Where I would pause is if you are purely chasing value or you want botanical realism you can leave untouched. In that case the price and the stickers might nudge you toward the Botanical range instead. But as a characterful oddball for a Potter shelf, it earns its spot.

The parts story

What the build is actually like, and the pieces worth knowing about.

The build itself is a gentle, pleasant hour. It is small enough to never feel like a slog but has enough going on with the folding legs and the arm mechanism that it does not feel like padding either. The fiddliest moment is attaching the leaves, which can fight you the first time you seat them, but once they are in the shaping is lovely. There is a real satisfaction to watching that lumpy, asymmetrical body come together, because the designers deliberately made it uneven to sell the look of knotted wood, and it works.

The standout elements are the big 6x10x2 shell pieces used for the main leaves, which match the broad drooping shape from the film, while the smaller leaves use dark green and bright green windscreen parts to suggest new growth at different stages. Tucked into the face is a 1x1 heart-shaped tile doing duty as the nose, a nice bit of parts-usage cleverness. The whole thing leans on shaping and clever angles rather than rare printed parts, so it is more a lesson in sculpting with common elements than a haul for the parts drawer, which is part of why the price feels tall for what you get.

Fun facts

01This is the first LEGO Mandrake ever produced as a brick-built figure, rather than the small plant element seen in earlier Harry Potter sets.
02Lifting the finished model out of its pot unfolds a hidden pair of legs, and a switch on the body animates the mouth and arms as if it is screaming, though the set includes no sound brick so it stays silent.
03The finished figure stands about 27cm tall and the terracotta-style pot measures roughly 8cm by 8cm, with little roots that poke out and move.