Lord of the Rings Ongoing Discussion

[psh]

1 hour ago, sebastian666 said:

Just a reminder that the official LOTR theme page on LEGO.com makes specific mention of the Rings of Power show, so I think the chances that we will be getting sets based on this show are pretty high:

Build and recreate iconic moments from Middle-earth with LEGO® Lord of the Rings™ sets. Whether you’re a new fan, a super-fan, or somewhere in between, join the epic battle of good vs. evil. The fantasy world of Lord of the Rings™ is filled with legendary books, movies and the new The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power TV show.

Rings of Power has already been bankrolled for five seasons. It’s here to stay and, as others have already stated, it’s probably the reason that we are getting Rivendell (in my opinion the most beautiful LEGO set released to date), Barad Dur, and hopefully many more sets over the next five years. “And that is an encouraging thought.”

I signed up for an account just to respond to this...

That text comes from this link: https://www.lego.com/en-sa/themes/lord-of-the-rings

This is what it says at the bottom of the page:

© New Line Productions, Inc. All rights reserved. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RINGS, THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS, THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING and the names of the characters, items, events and places therein are ™ of Middle-earth Enterprises, LLC under license to New Line Productions, Inc.

There is no mention of Amazon/Amazon Studios. It could simply be because this Rivendell set is not based on Amazon's IP but that of New Line (licensed from Middle-earth Enterprises) and that future Rings of Power themed sets will instead refer to Amazon/Amazon Studioes (and not New Line). I am not confident however because the text you shared referring to "The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power TV show" does not include a trademark on the ROP name and this is almost certainly trademarked by Amazon. Either the Lego legal team made a mistake and didn't force the inclusion of a TM or the marketing team got ahead of itself and included a reference to Rings of Power even though The Lego Group may not permission to market its product with a reference to Amazon's IP.

I hope that your interpretation is correct and that there will be Rings of Power theme/subthemed sets and that a TM at the end of Rings of Power will fix this.

[RichardGoring]

It seems very likely that it's Rings of Power that has reignited the media interest in LOTR, giving us Rivendell, and I'm sure they wouldn't have mentioned ROP on the site if they hadn't discussed it with Amazon first. Although interestingly they haven't used a Copyright or Trademark symbol for Rings of Power (although Amazon doesn't in its own press releases either).

Despite the polarized reviews, there are still many, many people who really like it (I've not watched it (yet) so have no opinion on the content), and most of those are exactly the target market for LEGO adult sets.

Edited February 16, 2023 by RichardGoring

[MKJoshA]

13 hours ago, QuiggoldsPegLeg said:

Judging by the ridiculous amount of racism and misogyny the show was met with before it even released, I’d be extremely surprised if ROP wasn’t review bombed. 

Let's try to keep the conversation about Lego please. Everyone is welcome to share their opinions. But when we start to share opinions about topics outside of Lego the risk grows exponentially that offense will lead to ugly arguments on the forum. And that's not what EB is designed for. There are many comments in the past few days the stray over that line, I just picked yours as the most recent example.

[MAB]

1 hour ago, RichardGoring said:

Despite the polarized reviews, there are still many, many people who really like it (I've not watched it (yet) so have no opinion on the content), and most of those are exactly the target market for LEGO adult sets.

I thought it was fine for a TV show, nowhere near as good as the movies but nowhere near as bad as the 1 star reviewers on amazon were making out. I don't really get the view that things are either five stars or 1 star and nothing in between that seems to exist these days.

While watching it, I thought that there were numerous scenes that would make good sets, from smaller playsets such as Elrond and Durin in the rock breaking competition up to larger builds like the elf ship or a palace or building in Numenor. Then there are the harfoots and elf soldiers, that could make decent smaller sets too. 

Edited February 16, 2023 by MAB

[Altair1]

45 minutes ago, MAB said:

I thought it was fine for a TV show, nowhere near as good as the movies but nowhere near as bad as the 1 star reviewers on amazon were making out. I don't really get the view that things are either five stars or 1 star and nothing in between that seems to exist these days.

While watching it, I thought that there were numerous scenes that would make good sets, from smaller playsets such as Elrond and Durin in the rock breaking competition up to larger builds like the elf ship or a palace or building in Numenor. Then there are the harfoots and elf soldiers, that could make decent smaller sets too. 

I agree that 1 star is a bit harsh, I would give ROP 3 stars out of 5 (average show). I found the casting quite bad for most characters, and was disappointed by several aspects of the plot and the lore, but I did enjoy as always the beautiful landscapes of New Zealand. 

I do not find the show inspiring enough to wish for the release of sets based on it. But as I may have already mentioned earlier in this thread, if they do make some I might buy them just as fodder for my LOTR MOCs :-)

Edited February 16, 2023 by Altair1

[Balrogofmorgoth]

57 minutes ago, MAB said:

I thought it was fine for a TV show, nowhere near as good as the movies but nowhere near as bad as the 1 star reviewers on amazon were making out. I don't really get the view that things are either five stars or 1 star and nothing in between that seems to exist these days.

While watching it, I thought that there were numerous scenes that would make good sets, from smaller playsets such as Elrond and Durin in the rock breaking competition up to larger builds like the elf ship or a palace or building in Numenor. Then there are the harfoots and elf soldiers, that could make decent smaller sets too. 

I agree with this completely. It always seems so black and white to people these days. Either something is amazing or it’s terrible. Why can’t something be just fine? I think the show had some really great aspects and some really bad aspects. But I think it is certainly worthy of the lego treatment either way. I think it’ll come down more to licensing than anything else. Merchandise for the show has been absent because of the transition and acquisition of merchandising rights but it’s coming

[Lucarex]

That TV series 1 finished a good 4 months ago now and yet it's still being discussed here? I'd be surprised if LEGO make any sets based on it anytime soon, especially before S2 is done, given the negative tsunami the show (rightfully) received.

I'm very far from a Tolkien/LOTR fanboy (indifferent at best) but painful price aside, there's no doubting that Rivendell set is a thing of beauty. The Brickheadz trio is also a fun introduction to the theme.

Edited February 16, 2023 by Lucarex

[mtrsteve]

The show now has a respectable 83% rotten tomatoes score, so the review bomb theory seems plausible. It would seem the majority enjoyed it well enough. Like others here, I think that despite its shortcomings, there is a lot there that Lego could work with that would be fun to see, especially at the play set price point. If there was one thing they did well for the most part it was the visuals, and those would translate well. As altair1 said, at least it would give more  elf/dwarf/orc/harfoot related pieces and figs to use in other builds. 

[Altair1]

2 hours ago, mtrsteve said:

The show now has a respectable 83% rotten tomatoes score

Well, 83% is the critics score (based on 475 critics). The audience score is 38% (based on 37828 users).

Edited February 16, 2023 by Altair1

[mtrsteve]

17 minutes ago, Altair1 said:

Well, 83% is the critics score (based on 475 critics). The audience score is 38% (based on 37828 users).

I stand corrected. Teach me to just look at the Google front page ;)

I also stand by my assessment of the Lego set potential ;);)

[Sneakguest]

On 2/15/2023 at 2:09 AM, kuzyabricks said:

Right I'm saying that Lego rarely does so many exclusive pieces for just one set. Smaug is an aberration just like the cave troll and troll king. Swords and hairpieces are a different case from a molded beast.

Ah so you mean pieces in the smaug set rather than smaug himself? In that case I wont argue since I have no idea. But I think lego are general a bit stingy when it comes to new molds. They could just lose a few penies more to actually give more satisfaction to the consumers in that regard. Even in a big set like the Mos Eisley cantina they could have given us 3-4 new aliens with ny molded parta easily and still make a hefty profit. At least in my case just increase the set price a few euros, wouldnt matter too much when its already pretty expensive. Hope thet continue the Rivendell set up and make it a trend.

4 hours ago, Altair1 said:

Well, 83% is the critics score (based on 475 critics). The audience score is 38% (based on 37828 users).

Im sorry to say but its silly or even childish to give RoP that low rating from the audience, I do admit the errors in terms of staying true to the original story and such but there are tons of worthless content out there that get highee rating than RoP.

[kuzyabricks]

2 hours ago, Sneakguest said:

Ah so you mean pieces in the smaug set rather than smaug himself? In that case I wont argue since I have no idea. But I think lego are general a bit stingy when it comes to new molds. They could just lose a few penies more to actually give more satisfaction to the consumers in that regard. Even in a big set like the Mos Eisley cantina they could have given us 3-4 new aliens with ny molded parta easily and still make a hefty profit. At least in my case just increase the set price a few euros, wouldnt matter too much when its already pretty expensive. Hope thet continue the Rivendell set up and make it a trend.

Im sorry to say but its silly or even childish to give RoP that low rating from the audience, I do admit the errors in terms of staying true to the original story and such but there are tons of worthless content out there that get highee rating than RoP.

Yeah what I'm trying to say is that if it was one mold I wouldn't be sure more sets are to come but with so many moulds they're surely going to make mor sets. I was just bringing up the big molded figures since they're made for only one set while the sword, hair moulds surely aren't just for a single purpose :)

[JimBaggins]

Waiting and hoping for the reviews to come out 🥺

[Agent Kallus]

Character molds that are needed to realistically portray a character are different from things like weapon molds, where they already had plenty of swords and the axe heads they used before but chose to above and beyond. Like with Lego standard of design the elf hair with ears was a necessity for this set the swords weren't and I hope they didn't make them for just the 1 (2) set.

Though what would be awesome to see in the Barad-dûr set is a new daul mold sting with blue blade to compliment the Rivendell weapon pack version.

[Lordhelmet]

1 hour ago, JimBaggins said:

Waiting and hoping for the reviews to come out 🥺

I heard reviews come out on the 22nd

[MAB]

7 hours ago, Agent Kallus said:

Though what would be awesome to see in the Barad-dûr set is a new daul mold sting with blue blade to compliment the Rivendell weapon pack version.

I painted one for that reason.

[th0r1n]

I’m planning on purchasing the Rivendell set when it becomes available for VIP’s on March 5th. Does anyone know what time of day it’s likely to be available online? Just after midnight? Or some time later in the day? What’s the norm with early access?

On 2/17/2023 at 1:38 AM, Sneakguest said:

Im sorry to say but its silly or even childish to give RoP that low rating from the audience, I do admit the errors in terms of staying true to the original story and such but there are tons of worthless content out there that get highee rating than RoP.

Some people would argue that RoP *is* worthless content. That’s neither ‘silly’ nor ‘childish’. It’s simply a difference of opinion. 

[RichardGoring]

1 hour ago, th0r1n said:

I’m planning on purchasing the Rivendell set when it becomes available for VIP’s on March 5th. Does anyone know what time of day it’s likely to be available online? Just after midnight? Or some time later in the day? What’s the norm with early access?

It should be midnight of wherever you are. Except the US, where it is midnight east coast time. So 21:00 if you're in California, for example.

Edited February 19, 2023 by RichardGoring

[Balrogofmorgoth]

3 hours ago, th0r1n said:

I’m planning on purchasing the Rivendell set when it becomes available for VIP’s on March 5th. Does anyone know what time of day it’s likely to be available online? Just after midnight? Or some time later in the day? What’s the norm with early access?

Some people would argue that RoP *is* worthless content. That’s neither ‘silly’ nor ‘childish’. It’s simply a difference of opinion. 

I do feel that any Tolkien fan that is familiar enough with his work should be able to appreciate the great aspects of the show (there are plenty), regardless of the terrible aspects (there are also plenty of these). Just saying “the show is trash” is objectively untrue. I’m really not sure why so many people can only see things in black and white these days

[BrickBob Studpants]

30 minutes ago, Balrogofmorgoth said:

I do feel that any Tolkien fan that is familiar enough with his work should be able to appreciate the great aspects of the show (there are plenty), regardless of the terrible aspects (there are also plenty of these). Just saying “the show is trash” is objectively untrue. I’m really not sure why so many people can only see things in black and white these days

My feelings exactly. Not sure why everything has to be either fantastic or terrible nowadays. Sometimes, things are just decent or okay, which is fine too  I blame Youtube. Videos à la "[Show / movie] is the [best / worst] thing EVAR!$6774$" with lots of red circles and arrows and badly photoshopped faces are better clickbait than "[Show / movie] is decent but nothing groundbreaking"

I'm glad LOTR is back, but I don't need any sets based on anything other than the two trilogies. Of course I wouldn't say no to ROP sets, but I would also be fine if it's just a series of yearly D2C sets and a diorama or two.

[th0r1n]

2 hours ago, RichardGoring said:

It should be midnight of wherever you are. Except the US, where it is midnight east coast time. So 21:00 if you're in California, for example.

Excellent. Thanks for confirming. I'm in the UK so hopefully midnight GMT. I'm currently in the process of dismantling my Hogwarts Castle so I can free up some space. I'll need to purchase a display case for the Rivendell set too. Which will not doubt cost me at least a couple of hundred quid. Please god this is the only LOTR set on this scale for the foreseeable future. Because this one is breaking the bank.

30 minutes ago, Balrogofmorgoth said:

I do feel that any Tolkien fan that is familiar enough with his work should be able to appreciate the great aspects of the show (there are plenty), regardless of the terrible aspects (there are also plenty of these). Just saying “the show is trash” is objectively untrue. I’m really not sure why so many people can only see things in black and white these days

I've been a Tolkien fan for 30yrs+. I can objectively state that I think the show is abysmal. There are no aspects that render it remotely redeemable. This is a personal opinion.

I acknowledge and respect that others may disagree.

[RichardGoring]

11 minutes ago, th0r1n said:

Excellent. Thanks for confirming. I'm in the UK so hopefully midnight GMT. I'm currently in the process of dismantling my Hogwarts Castle so I can free up some space. I'll need to purchase a display case for the Rivendell set too. Which will not doubt cost me at least a couple of hundred quid. Please god this is the only LOTR set on this scale for the foreseeable future. Because this one is breaking the bank.

It may be worth checking at 23:00 then, as they sometimes put things out at midnight European time. Not that I think this will sell out immediately, as has been the case for some things over peak pandemic. They've got much better with inventory management, so if you tried first thing in the morning you'll likely be fine.

[BrickBob Studpants]

28 minutes ago, th0r1n said:

I've been a Tolkien fan for 30yrs+. I can objectively state that I think the show is abysmal. There are no aspects that render it remotely redeemable. This is a personal opinion.

Not even Durin and Elrond? Even people that hate this show's guts usually at least like that part

29 minutes ago, th0r1n said:

Please god this is the only LOTR set on this scale for the foreseeable future. Because this one is breaking the bank.

*Distant Barad-dûr noises*

Agreed though. After Barad-dûr, I hope they shift their focus towards dioramas. I don't have space for a yearly set of THAT size 

[sahidko]

If Barad-dur is 83cm high i think i won't have space already for set number 2. :D Barely made one for Rivendell, hope the 39cm height is accurate.

4 hours ago, BrickBob Studpants said:

Not even Durin and Elrond? Even people that hate this show's guts usually at least like that part

Nope because they were part of that stupid mithril story line which didn't make any sense.

[hikouki]

On 2/15/2023 at 9:15 PM, psh said:

I signed up for an account just to respond to this...

That text comes from this link: https://www.lego.com/en-sa/themes/lord-of-the-rings

This is what it says at the bottom of the page:

© New Line Productions, Inc. All rights reserved. THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE FELLOWSHIP OF THE RINGS, THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE TWO TOWERS, THE LORD OF THE RINGS: THE RETURN OF THE KING and the names of the characters, items, events and places therein are ™ of Middle-earth Enterprises, LLC under license to New Line Productions, Inc.

There is no mention of Amazon/Amazon Studios. It could simply be because this Rivendell set is not based on Amazon's IP but that of New Line (licensed from Middle-earth Enterprises) and that future Rings of Power themed sets will instead refer to Amazon/Amazon Studioes (and not New Line). I am not confident however because the text you shared referring to "The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power TV show" does not include a trademark on the ROP name and this is almost certainly trademarked by Amazon. Either the Lego legal team made a mistake and didn't force the inclusion of a TM or the marketing team got ahead of itself and included a reference to Rings of Power even though The Lego Group may not permission to market its product with a reference to Amazon's IP.

I hope that your interpretation is correct and that there will be Rings of Power theme/subthemed sets and that a TM at the end of Rings of Power will fix this.

It could simply be because Lego is riding on the wave of RoP, to sell sets from whatever license they currently have. I think whether Lego makes any sets from RoP would depend on a lot of things. Perhaps they have good relations with Amazon, the fact that they have their own store there. Would the other stake holders be onboard granting Lego license? Are there scenes from RoP worth turning into sets?

I just finished binge-watching the whole of series one. It is not that bad. However, if you got used to watching the original trilogy, this one could be a bit slow at times.