refactor: Move Object lit fix earlier in the function (#25713)

Co-authored-by: Orson Peters <orsonpeters@gmail.com>

Author: alexander-beedie

py-polars/src/polars/functions/lit.py

@@ -16,13 +16,12 @@
 )
 from polars._dependencies import numpy as np
 from polars._utils.wrap import wrap_expr
-from polars.datatypes import BaseExtension, Date, Datetime, Duration
+from polars.datatypes import BaseExtension, Date, Datetime, Duration, Object
 from polars.datatypes.convert import DataTypeMappings
 
 with contextlib.suppress(ImportError):  # Module not available when building docs
     import polars._plr as plr
 
-
 if TYPE_CHECKING:
     from polars import Expr
     from polars._typing import PolarsDataType, TimeUnit
@@ -84,7 +83,11 @@ def lit(
     elif isinstance(dtype, type) and issubclass(dtype, BaseExtension):
         msg = f"dtype '{dtype}' is a BaseExtension class, it should be an instance"
         raise TypeError(msg)
-    elif isinstance(value, datetime):
+    elif dtype == Object:
+        value_s = pl.Series("literal", [value], dtype=dtype)
+        return wrap_expr(plr.lit(value_s._s, allow_object, is_scalar=True))
+
+    if isinstance(value, datetime):
         if dtype == Date:
             return wrap_expr(plr.lit(value.date(), allow_object=False, is_scalar=True))
 
@@ -185,11 +188,7 @@ def lit(
         return lit(value.value, dtype=dtype)
 
     if dtype:
-        value_s = (
-            pl.Series("literal", [value], dtype=dtype)
-            if dtype.is_object()
-            else pl.Series("literal", [value]).cast(dtype)
-        )
+        value_s = pl.Series("literal", [value]).cast(dtype)
         return wrap_expr(plr.lit(value_s._s, allow_object, is_scalar=True))
 
     if _check_for_numpy(value) and isinstance(value, np.generic):

py-polars/tests/unit/functions/test_lit.py

@@ -3,7 +3,7 @@
 
 import enum
 import sys
-from datetime import date, datetime, timedelta
+from datetime import date, datetime, time, timedelta
 from decimal import Decimal
 from typing import TYPE_CHECKING, Any
 
@@ -272,3 +272,10 @@ def test_lit_structs(item: Any) -> None:
 def test_numpy_lit(value: Any, expected_dtype: PolarsDataType) -> None:
     result = pl.select(pl.lit(value)).get_column("literal")
     assert result.dtype == expected_dtype
+
+
+def test_lit_object_type_25713() -> None:
+    obj = time(hour=1)
+    out = pl.select(pl.lit(obj, dtype=pl.Object))
+    expected = pl.DataFrame({"literal": [obj]}, schema={"literal": pl.Object})
+    assert out.to_dict(as_series=False) == expected.to_dict(as_series=False)