How about a theme based on Halloween/Horror?

[bsmith13]

My kids and I were playing with Lego the other day, just making whatever we wanted. We ended up making a haunted house.

I would love to see a Lego theme based around Halloween or classic horror movies. They could make a haunted house, vampire's castle, mad scientist's lab etc. Since they are doing a Christmas village, why not do a Halloween village?

[LandShark]

I think a set every Halloween could be really good, along the lines of the Christmas sets.

But I think it's a bit too 'seasonal' to be a full theme, and we are getting horror-based minifigures in the Collectible Minifigures theme (werewolf, zombie etc.).

EDIT: I'm all up for a Lego Studios remake, though. That could have some good horror-movie sets.

Edited September 22, 2011 by LandShark

[UsernameMDM]

I would love it if Lego made seasonal polybags. For monsters/horror, each polybag could be combined with other polybag sets to make scenes like one polybag has a mad scientist and lab while another would have a monster and an experiment table. Put them together, and you get a nice little lab scene. Heres a few I would suggest:

Mad Scientist with lab equipment

Monster with lab table

Hunchback with digging tools and coffin

Vampire with table and wine glasses

Werewolf with small tree

Zombie/Skeleton with tombstones

Witch with fire, cauldron and cat

Damsel in distress with small wall and chain/hand cuffs

Hero/Monster hunter with weapons and practice dummy

I know most of those have come out in the CMF series, but I would love a differnt take on them for the above scenario.

[Aanchir]

They actually had a horror-based subtheme of LEGO Studios in the early 2000s. See here (there are also some Spider-Man sets there; the sets I'm talking about are 1380-1383). There was also Fright Knights, which played with a lot of horror concepts in a medieval setting.

I think a Halloween-oriented theme would be very hard to sell, though. For one thing, Christmas is celebrated by people both secular and religious, and the generic "Christmas cheer" of the Winter Village subtheme can appeal to both-- it's up to people's imaginations whether the carolers in the Winter Toy Shop are singing Jingle Bells or O Come All Ye Faithful. Halloween is more of a mixed bag-- almost nobody celebrates it in the religious sense, at least here in the US, and many superstitious folks even consider it a Satanic or pagan holiday from start to finish. Others both secular and religious see it as a gimmicky holiday promoted just to sell things, similar to how some view Valentine's Day.

There's also the difference in the ways the two holidays are celebrated. Christmas and many other winter holidays involve gift-giving, making larger sets easier to sell. With Halloween, at least in the states, the traditional celebration is "Trick-Or-Treating", and for that smaller impulse sets like the bat, ghost, and pumpkin available last year. This year's Halloween sets are larger, so perhaps that's indicating a market for such things, but in general it might be a while before we see something as big as the Winter Village series for other holidays (or with the same sort of design budget).

Could a full-scale horror-based theme be successful if it weren't holiday-themed? Hard to say. It wouldn't be very cohesive compared to a lot of today's themes, which could cost it some sales... after all, there's not necessarily any reason a person would buy a mummy set to go with their vampire set. But it could still be very interesting.

[Oky]

I think it's a neat idea. A haunted house in the style of the Winter Village or the modular buildings could be a great set, and I think it would be much more popular with kids than the Xmas themed sets, if only for all the monster figs included. They could make use of all the monster figs and molds they created for the CMF series and maybe even introduce some new ones.

A well-executed Frankenstein lab would be great too.

But I think this should go in the town forum, unless you want this to be an action theme with a PQ-style gang of ghost/monster hunters or something.

Actually, that could make a pretty cool theme too.

[CMP]

But I think this should go in the town forum, unless you want this to be an action theme with a PQ-style gang of ghost/monster hunters or something.

Actually, that could make a pretty cool theme too.

Ghostbusters rip-off anybody?

[Oky]

Or maybe Scooby-Doo?

Lego-dooby-doo!

[Dr.Cogg]

I suggested in a different thread that they take Jake Raines and the gang from PQ and send them to Transylvania for Vlad Draculs Goblet.

[JasonV]

This would be my ultimate dream set

Just off the top of my head, sets could feature:

1) Vampires/Dracula

2) Werewolves

3) Frankenstein/Mad Scientist

4) Mummies

5) Headless Horseman

Most of these are instantly recognisable, in the public domain, and I would assume pretty popular since their all constantly in pop-culture.

[1980-Something-Space-Guy]

We're still missing a few classical horror characters in minifigure form. The invisible man (doesn't have to be completely transparent, because that has already been reported to be impossible, just its head with a few bandages), the creature from the black lagoon, and the headless horseman, to name a few. Lego could take advantage of all these making sets for each. If horror characters were so successful in CMFs, maybe they would be successful in small sets, like it was done with the Studios theme. Just some thoughts.

[lightningtiger]

Or maybe Scooby-Doo?

Lego-dooby-doo!

And why not Lego has the deal with Time Warner.....who's for a brick-built Mystery Machine and of course there is the new series on Cartoon Network....perfect !

Brick On Scare On Trap On !

[Nightshroud99]

It's a good idea imo.

[Ogre]

My kids and I were playing with Lego the other day, just making whatever we wanted. We ended up making a haunted house.

I would love to see a Lego theme based around Halloween or classic horror movies. They could make a haunted house, vampire's castle, mad scientist's lab etc. Since they are doing a Christmas village, why not do a Halloween village?

Might be a bit much to hope for an entire theme based on halloween/horror but, a few seasonal sets would be nice.

I've been tossing that out there every year for quite some time now. TLG could release a really KICKIN' "Haunted House" set, especially with their current crop of 'monster' figs. Of course, they don't have the cool "glow in the dark" ghost anymore but, the other figs are (IMO) much better versions than the old 'Studios' monsters.

[IAmWillGibson]

I would be SO into this if it happened. Heck, it's the vague promise of this that pulled me back into LEGO: the Zombie and Vampire minifigs. One of the first things I did last year when the cobwebs were clearing was order myself a [ludicrously expensive, in retrospect] cemetery through DesignByMe.

I mean... I would love it. I doubt enough others would in order to make it something you'd see LEGO put into stores. But the last two years they've had the mini seasonal sets, so they're aware of the holiday, and there is [or at least was] a fairly steady presence in the CMFs.

I'd love an exclusive Haunted House built to the Modular level, though. That would be really very cool.

[Hiawatha]

This would be a good idea ! They already have Halloween figures, so why not make a set?

[Bricknave]

I think they have somewhat made horror-themed sets, apart from the LEGO Studios line of sets. The Alien Conquest line, the skeletons in NinjaGo, the mummies in Pharaoh's Quest and a few of the collectible minifigures channel the horror theme well.

One thing they could do to replicate horror even further is to make an exclusive "Mansion" set, which would be grim-looking but without monsters included, so it would serve as both a template for a mystery scene or a horror scene depending on the minifigures present.

I personally think a child-friendly Zombie theme would do well as far as horror goes, and maybe even attract fans of the zombie genre, although I'm sure it has been suggested many times before.

If there was ever a Zombie line, the zombies would have to be of the virus infected kind, and survivors would have to carry non-violent medicine-launchers.

[Sid Sidious]

I was just thinking earlier that LEGO should make seasonal haunted houses. I'm going to start an MOC of one, hopefully it will be good.

[Ardelon]

Seeing as the main draw of these sets would be the minifigs, and as we already have the these minifigs in the CMF line, I don't see this idea happening for some years to come, maybe until a new generation of kids grows up. The almost decade-long gap between the studios line and the CMF ine might be a reference.

[kotaco]

Seeing as the main draw of these sets would be the minifigs, and as we already have the these minifigs in the CMF line, I don't see this idea happening for some years to come, maybe until a new generation of kids grows up. The almost decade-long gap between the studios line and the CMF ine might be a reference.

They'd make a bunch more with more zombie minifigs though with all the zombie apoc hype. Have you seen how much the CMF Series 1 zombies are going for? It's crazy.

[Nightshroud99]

They'd make a bunch more with more zombie minifigs though with all the zombie apoc hype. Have you seen how much the CMF Series 1 zombies are going for? It's crazy.

If LEGO made some zombie apocalypse type sets, as an action theme. Those would sell like hotcakes!

[Ardelon]

If LEGO made some zombie apocalypse type sets, as an action theme. Those would sell like hotcakes!

Then again, why not? Just take the current dino theme, replace the dinos with zombies, and we're all set!

Or maybe a theme similar to the Van Helsing movies, with some adventurers hunting supernatural creatures?

Edited October 28, 2011 by Ardelon

[kotaco]

If LEGO made some zombie apocalypse type sets, as an action theme. Those would sell like hotcakes!

Heck yeah, I'd waste a paycheck on that no problem

[Jareth]

I'm pretty sure the Lego Studio Line was the result of the creators wanting monsters and the legal department saying "no, that's too violent"

Given how much the non-violence has slipped recently, I don't think remaking it as monster theme is out of the question. I don't think it should be called "horror" though. To me horror also includes slasher film series like Friday the 13th, nightmare on elm street, halloween etc.

I think "Monster Hunters" would be a better way of approaching it.

I also think a Haunted house in Modular scale would be awesome. One of my long term goals is to remake cafe corner with darker colors and populated by monsters, vampires, werewolves and witches from the collectible minifigures line.

Hmm....now my brain is running away with me....why not make other official lego sets into haunted versions, and then combining them at a convention....the marina and docks in the 2011 line would make a great lego scooby doo setting, especially if you add a ghost pirate ship

[Angeli]

This would be my ultimate dream set

Just off the top of my head, sets could feature:

1) Vampires/Dracula

2) Werewolves

3) Frankenstein/Mad Scientist

4) Mummies

5) Headless Horseman

Most of these are instantly recognisable, in the public domain, and I would assume pretty popular since their all constantly in pop-culture.

but most of this minifigs, if not all, you can find in other sets :)

[KnightSnap]

I think "Monster Hunters" would be a better way of approaching it.

I also think a Haunted house in Modular scale would be awesome. One of my long term goals is to remake cafe corner with darker colors and populated by monsters, vampires, werewolves and witches from the collectible minifigures line.

Well done, you almost picked the name of the new series called "Monster Fighters". If you search on YouTube for "LegoPictureHQ" you should see the video of the upcoming sets, with a large haunted castle/mansion with Dracula and his Bride.