Lord of the Rings Ongoing Discussion

[Lego David]

1 hour ago, Lyichir said:

The Hobbit movies weren't as popular as anticipated

Keep in mind though, all three of the movies still made 1 billion dollars at the box office each. While they may have not been as well received critically, the movies were still successful financially. 

The Hobbit movies are essentially the equivalent to the Star Wars prequels in terms of fan reception... Yet the Star Wars prequels still sell a lot of merchandise even to this day (including LEGO).

Given those factors, I do think the failure of those sets falls at least partially on LEGO.

Edited November 30, 2021 by Lego David

[HarryPotter27]

2 hours ago, Lego David said:

Keep in mind though, all three of the movies still made 1 billion dollars at the box office each. While they may have not been as well received critically, the movies were still successful financially. 

The Hobbit movies are essentially the equivalent to the Star Wars prequels in terms of fan reception... Yet the Star Wars prequels still sell a lot of merchandise even to this day (including LEGO).

Given those factors, I do think the failure of those sets falls at least partially on LEGO.

Yeah exactly, the movies were popular enough and the box office proves that but there was a major problem with the execution of the theme by the Lego designers. They were unsure about who their target audience was and some of the sets were designed poorly like the Attack on Weathertop. Many of the builds lacked character and didn't look magical and captivating which should be important for attracting customers. If (or when) LOTR returns, the first wave would be extremely important in order to attract a bigger fanbase. When the Harry Potter theme returned the first major set was the 2018 Great Hall which was nearly perfectly executed, it has a great selection of minifigures and it is the most iconic location in the series. It was suitable as a playset for children and a great display piece for nostalgic adults. All of the new Harry Potter sets have some play features but they are still good and complete display pieces unlike for example the Barrel Escape in the Hobbit line. Maybe the best thing about the LOTR and Hobbit lines were the minifigures and sets like the Uruk-Hai army and Helm's Deep which still have room for improvement especially with the newer building techniques. 

[MAB]

3 hours ago, Gorilla94 said:

Well... sets like 30-35€ for "Balrog vs. Gandalf" (including Gandalf and a brickbuild Balrog maybe with a special piece for the face and nothing else) and 50€ for "Witchking and Fellbeast vs. Eowyn" (including the Witchking with his mount and Eowyn Eowyn maybe a horse, too, because they appeal to children very much) would sell great. These would be beautifull display pieces for fans of the licence and still awesome "generic" monsters and characters for kids, who never watched the movies... Sets like the Uruk Hai forge for 50€ of course didn't sell that great... same for the terrible Dol Guldur Ambush with Beorn...

I think combining lotr and Lego is a challenging task. The characters work great as minifigs, if done with the required special moulds, but the locations are mostly very difficult. Most are huge in comparison to the characters, often plain and really need the lighting effects. The best location for a set is Bag end. It is quite small in size, colourfull with bright light and a joyfull scenery that fits Lego perfectly. Pretty much the worst is the Uruk hai forge. It is a boring pile of wooden planks in the movie and the scene gets the emotion from flames glowing in the darkness and music. Selling or better trying to sell children an overpriced model of a boring pile of wood sounds like a "great" idea.

I don't think Witch King vs Eowyn would sell that well (now), unless they were backed up by lots of other sets containing all the other characters again. And how to do that? Would they put 30 or so minifigs into one big set (just for LOTR, that is, not including the Hobbit)? Unlikely outside SW. Otherwise, they have to do a range of set sizes again, including sets like the Uruk-hai wall and Dol Guldur Ambush, to include those figures in context. I thought the Mines of Moria, Weathertop and Orc Forge sets were fine for what they were at their price points. They gave a bit of context without being overly large.  I agree it was a challenging task. So much of LOTR is either big landscape or big location, neither of which can be done with a small number of bricks. So instead they had to concentrate on small vignettes. The Uruk wall really got bad mouthed at the time, which was great as it meant it was sold off cheap. But how else to get Eomer and a Rohan soldier into a set and include bricks with it? They could have done a huge hall of Edoras (wouldn't sell well if expensive) or a small bit of wall at Edoras, or a rock in a field ... so the wall extension was probably not that bad an idea. 

A lot of people thought they should have done the Prancing Pony. But to do that would mean either repeating the four hobbits plus Aragorn or losing other sets they were in. And it wouldn't have been any bigger than Weathertop or Mines of Moria as the bigger price points were taken.

I was pretty happy with the first two waves of LOTR. It was the missing third wave that screwed fans. No Witch King (or just his helmet), no fell beast (Smaug style) and no Gondor soldiers. I don't mind missing Eowyn and Denethor so much as they are easy to MOC.  Faramir's armour is a bit harder if you want the Gondor tree on it. Its a shame there was no Pelennor if it had come with a Smaug style mumakil. I don't really mind missing the locations though, as they would have been done small anyway. Although Black Gate is a nice (half) set, I still don't really understand doing the Mouth of Sauron and not doing the Witch King.

Of course, it would be great if they just did the figures without scenery but LEGO likes selling bricks!

If they do anything connected with Amazon's LOTR, it will be a different era so different looking characters. Plus unless they do another 12-15 sets outside of that, based on the movies, they won't be able to cover the subject like before and probably just repeat the Fellowship.

1 hour ago, HarryPotter27 said:

When the Harry Potter theme returned the first major set was the 2018 Great Hall which was nearly perfectly executed, it has a great selection of minifigures and it is the most iconic location in the series.

Remember it also has a large child age fan base,  even 6, 7 8 year olds. The LOTR movies do not have that range of fan ages. The new series is unlikely to have kid fans either. The Great Hall was great for adults and kids, and was backed up by many smaller kid sets too. The more recent adult focussed HP sets tend to be the statuette type sets and art pieces rather than minifig based. A microscale LOTR set like the big Hogwarts set might work, but I'm not sure how well LOTR mosaics would sell if they went that way for adult sets. Buy nine copies of this mosaic to make the Fellowship...!

[Lyichir]

4 hours ago, Lego David said:

Keep in mind though, all three of the movies still made 1 billion dollars at the box office each. While they may have not been as well received critically, the movies were still successful financially. 

The Hobbit movies are essentially the equivalent to the Star Wars prequels in terms of fan reception... Yet the Star Wars prequels still sell a lot of merchandise even to this day (including LEGO).

Given those factors, I do think the failure of those sets falls at least partially on LEGO.

Star Wars also sells a heck of a lot more non-Lego toys (yes, even for more critically panned entries in the series) than Lord of the Rings ever has. I think it's pretty easy to see that the toy/collector fanbase that is such a large market for Star Wars just isn't the same for LotR/The Hobbit. For better or for worse, the series is less inherently "toyetic"—is it any wonder that Lego was experimenting with proven product types like ships to try to congeal a viable audience for the theme in its waning years? I really think it's silly to insist that the theme failed because Lego didn't make this or that when the things Lego did make (including the ones beloved by fans, not just the ones they think didn't merit their inclusion) didn't sell well enough to justify the theme's continuation.

There's really no reason to assume a Minas Tirith set would be any more successful than the sets Lego did make, other than the fact that you, as an individual, would have been more interested in it.

[HarryPotter27]

45 minutes ago, MAB said:

Remember it also has a large child age fan base,  even 6, 7 8 year olds. The LOTR movies do not have that range of fan ages. The new series is unlikely to have kid fans either.

Children mostly like certain sets based on their initial reaction to them so if the sets are attractive they might like them because of the knights, dwarves, elves, goblins and other magic creatures which would also be a selling point for castle fans. Tolkien's universe is just so big and there are plenty of possibilities for sets. A big plus is that some figures like the knights are suitable for army building and they can place the same figure in 2-3 sets or have some sets similar to battle packs like Uruk-Hai army. I agree that the new series probably won't hav a kid fanbase but the same is valid for The Mandalorian and the sets are loved by people from all ages. I think the LOTR movies will be like the original trilogy for Lego and most of the big and expensive sets would be based on it and there would be a bit less sets based on the new show and the Hobbit movies. I think they will 100% do new versions of some classics the Shire and Helm's Deep and probably realize that the second movie is called "The Two Towers" for a reason and there is one (really iconic) which they are missing.

[Lego David]

5 hours ago, HarryPotter27 said:

or have some sets similar to battle packs like Uruk-Hai army

I have always thought the Uruk-Hai army set was ridiculously overpriced, and kind of failed as a battlepack. It costed a whomping 30$ at the time... Which may not be as much today considering the current battlepacks we get in Star Wars, but at the time, it was pretty insane (especially for me, I was interested in that set, but didn't get it because of the price).

I think they should have just done two separate Battlepacks, one for the Uruk-Hai and another one for the Rohirim, and sell them separate for 15$ each. They could also do two more ones with the Gondor soliders and the Sauron Orcs from the Battle of Pelenor from elds.  

If LEGO does decide to revisit the line at any point in the future, I think focusing more on giving us proper Battlepacks would be critical. 

[MAB]

22 hours ago, HarryPotter27 said:

Children mostly like certain sets based on their initial reaction to them so if the sets are attractive they might like them because of the knights, dwarves, elves, goblins and other magic creatures which would also be a selling point for castle fans.

If LEGO wanted to attract kids using knights, dwarves, elves, etc then they'd be better off doing kid friendly Castle rather than trying to tempt them with licensed sets from a movie franchise they probably haven't seen.

22 hours ago, HarryPotter27 said:

A big plus is that some figures like the knights are suitable for army building and they can place the same figure in 2-3 sets or have some sets similar to battle packs like Uruk-Hai army.

Yet that is not really what they did with LOTR and The Hobbit. They kept repeating Frodo, Gandalf, Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, Bard, instead of putting in generic no-name army builders. There are very few army builders in sets, compared to the number of named characters.

22 hours ago, HarryPotter27 said:

I agree that the new series probably won't hav a kid fanbase but the same is valid for The Mandalorian and the sets are loved by people from all ages. I think the LOTR movies will be like the original trilogy for Lego and most of the big and expensive sets would be based on it and there would be a bit less sets based on the new show and the Hobbit movies. 

Star Wars, like Batman, always did well with marketing toys aimed at kids under the ages the source material is aimed at.  I think it would be rare that under 10s would want LOTR sets, whereas SW is popular even at 4+. Similarly it is unlikely that parents would buy those kids LOTR based items, whereas buying SW is common. I don't really see the correlation between LOTR and Star Wars, they are so different in how they are marketed. 

Edited December 1, 2021 by MAB

[Gorilla94]

On 11/30/2021 at 11:52 PM, MAB said:

I don't think Witch King vs Eowyn would sell that well (now), unless they were backed up by lots of other sets containing all the other characters again. And how to do that? Would they put 30 or so minifigs into one big set (just for LOTR, that is, not including the Hobbit)? Unlikely outside SW. Otherwise, they have to do a range of set sizes again, including sets like the Uruk-hai wall and Dol Guldur Ambush, to include those figures in context. I thought the Mines of Moria, Weathertop and Orc Forge sets were fine for what they were at their price points. They gave a bit of context without being overly large.  I agree it was a challenging task. So much of LOTR is either big landscape or big location, neither of which can be done with a small number of bricks. So instead they had to concentrate on small vignettes. The Uruk wall really got bad mouthed at the time, which was great as it meant it was sold off cheap. But how else to get Eomer and a Rohan soldier into a set and include bricks with it? They could have done a huge hall of Edoras (wouldn't sell well if expensive) or a small bit of wall at Edoras, or a rock in a field ... so the wall extension was probably not that bad an idea. 

A lot of people thought they should have done the Prancing Pony. But to do that would mean either repeating the four hobbits plus Aragorn or losing other sets they were in. And it wouldn't have been any bigger than Weathertop or Mines of Moria as the bigger price points were taken.

I was pretty happy with the first two waves of LOTR. It was the missing third wave that screwed fans. No Witch King (or just his helmet), no fell beast (Smaug style) and no Gondor soldiers. I don't mind missing Eowyn and Denethor so much as they are easy to MOC.  Faramir's armour is a bit harder if you want the Gondor tree on it. Its a shame there was no Pelennor if it had come with a Smaug style mumakil. I don't really mind missing the locations though, as they would have been done small anyway. Although Black Gate is a nice (half) set, I still don't really understand doing the Mouth of Sauron and not doing the Witch King.

Of course, it would be great if they just did the figures without scenery but LEGO likes selling bricks!

If they do anything connected with Amazon's LOTR, it will be a different era so different looking characters. Plus unless they do another 12-15 sets outside of that, based on the movies, they won't be able to cover the subject like before and probably just repeat the Fellowship.

I don't think they need to do every character again. I am happy to have Galadriel and Grima, but it isn't like they are that necessary. If there really needs to be a Eomer Set it could for example be a Rohan Army set with tents, horses Camp fire and so on.

I think there are 2 ways to make successfull lotr sets:

The first option is to do very few and only focus on the material that makes great play sets leaving big gaps for new collectors that do not have the old sets or Koruit/Xinh figures. It would only be sets like Brickbuild Fellbeast+Witchking vs. Eowyn and Balrog vs. Gandalf. A Pranching Pony would be about as good as the Laketown sets so it should stay untouched... to make this successfully work there needs to be a cmf filling the worst gaps. Many of the main characters are outdated anyways. Especially Boromir needs printed arms. The Hobbits need dual moulded legs... and the standard witch hat looks like a bad joke on Gandalf. So they do not have to make a set like Weathertop just to have something where the Hobbits can be included but still have the whole fellowship. On top of it it would help to get rid of the Idea to have to squeeze the licence into a wave of certain price points before even taking a look at what sets could be produced. If there are only 3 very small sets, one 30, one 50 and a big one ~100€ all well executed that is fine. Making a set bigger than it needs to be or reducing an otherwise popular model to a degree that makes it really bad just to have a set for the 70€ price point is pointless.

The second option would be to take really big artistic freedom with the material. It would be basically be a generic castle theme with lotr-characters. This could for example bring a battle at the Black gate sceene with Smaug-like Fellbeast and Witch-King instead of the Mouth of Souron.

Another thing that bothers me: The fantasy trolls, Nexo knight monsters and goblins in the Ninjago D&D wave show how evil monsters can be done with still quite cute cartoonish faces... In the lotr-line the Uruks looked good with their helmets on but the orc faces with these small mouths look just terrible.

 

[Mr No]

I do not see the theme returning to be based on the Amazon show (we don't even know the rating, rumours say it's R which is awful for this IP), but I can see them make sets based on the trilogy if the show is a hit, though I can see a full return with the War of the Rohirrim anime film which will be a theatrical release and it's coming from Warner Bros.

[Gorilla94]

We already know there will be nudity and stuff, don't we?

[Mr No]

7 hours ago, Gorilla94 said:

We already know there will be nudity and stuff, don't we?

It's not confirmed at the moment, that call might have been for another Amazon show, I hope so. R rating just doesn't work with Tolkien. 

[MAB]

On 12/14/2021 at 11:23 AM, Gorilla94 said:

The first option is to do very few and only focus on the material that makes great play sets leaving big gaps for new collectors that do not have the old sets or Koruit/Xinh figures. It would only be sets like Brickbuild Fellbeast+Witchking vs. Eowyn and Balrog vs. Gandalf. A Pranching Pony would be about as good as the Laketown sets so it should stay untouched... to make this successfully work there needs to be a cmf filling the worst gaps. Many of the main characters are outdated anyways. Especially Boromir needs printed arms. The Hobbits need dual moulded legs... and the standard witch hat looks like a bad joke on Gandalf. So they do not have to make a set like Weathertop just to have something where the Hobbits can be included but still have the whole fellowship. On top of it it would help to get rid of the Idea to have to squeeze the licence into a wave of certain price points before even taking a look at what sets could be produced. If there are only 3 very small sets, one 30, one 50 and a big one ~100€ all well executed that is fine. Making a set bigger than it needs to be or reducing an otherwise popular model to a degree that makes it really bad just to have a set for the 70€ price point is pointless.

 

 

I don't see how that would work. What is the point of bringing a license back and doing just a very small range with Eowyn, Witch King, Gandalf and a Balrog, if you do not have a full Fellowship? Or are you saying put the Fellowship, orcs, uruks, Saruman, into the "big" 100 Euro set (hardly big these days) because those small sets would be Frodo based. To me, this would be a worse job than what they did before. Eowyn is relatively minor compared to many other characters and in any new range, they would be putting in the more popular characters first, ignoring what they did a decade before. They wouldn't care about stuff they made 10 years ago, they would care what would sell to consumers now.

[Gorilla94]

On 12/18/2021 at 10:51 PM, MAB said:

I don't see how that would work. What is the point of bringing a license back and doing just a very small range with Eowyn, Witch King, Gandalf and a Balrog, if you do not have a full Fellowship? Or are you saying put the Fellowship, orcs, uruks, Saruman, into the "big" 100 Euro set (hardly big these days) because those small sets would be Frodo based. To me, this would be a worse job than what they did before. Eowyn is relatively minor compared to many other characters and in any new range, they would be putting in the more popular characters first, ignoring what they did a decade before. They wouldn't care about stuff they made 10 years ago, they would care what would sell to consumers now.

I'd say one of the problems were terrible sets that needed to be done to include certain characters. Weathertop is bad to a degree that hurts. If they put for example Merry, Pippin and Ringwraiths into a cmf and focus on sets that are good playsets in general, it would be certainly more successfull.

[wesker]

There needs to be a middle ground between filling in the missing gaps for older collectors while still being accessible for newcomers. A LOTR revival can't just pick up where the line left 10 years ago. It will need to start over and cover all the essentials such as the complete Fellowship, Gollum, Saruman, Helms Deep, Bag End etc.

At the same time there's no reason why a revival couldn't prioritize Eowyn and Faramir over the rest of the secondary cast. Do we really need C-listers like Eomer and Haldir in the first wave again when they are much less significant characters with minimal screentime? Do we really need another Shelob set when the Balrog and Fell Beast can fill the same niche? Is there any reason why a Uruk-Hai Army remake couldn't be Gondor themed instead of Rohan? Its examples here where a revival can divert from the original wave and cover new material without taking away from the more important stuff.

Finding that balance is key.

[Mr No]

If we get a LotR revival then it will most likely happen with the anime theatrical film. 

[Mr No]

You know, I, don't think we knew thanks to leakers that Super Mario would be a thing or Harry Potter would return in 2018. I think that took everyone by surprise, do I won't be surprised if we don't kbow about a LotR return until Lego announces it, they got good at keeping leaks. 

[Blazej_Holen]

On 12/22/2021 at 2:15 PM, Gorilla94 said:

I'd say one of the problems were terrible sets that needed to be done to include certain characters. Weathertop is bad to a degree that hurts. If they put for example Merry, Pippin and Ringwraiths into a cmf and focus on sets that are good playsets in general, it would be certainly more successfull.

I cant agree. Wheathertop was one of the strongest ones at leadt to me and my social bubble :) 

[Mr No]

Indiana Jones is back this summer, so LotR returning isn't that crazy

[BrickBob Studpants]

My wallet can't take this, and neither can my room 

[Mr No]

Of course, I have no idea if LotR is actually back. I only knew about Indy and speculated that Avatar 2 will get sets, which turns out to be true. If we don't hear these weeks about LotR sets for 2nd half of the year, I guess the theme will return when WB and New Line will release that theatrical anime film, Lord of the Rings:War of the Rohirrim. But yeah, this year is crazy, in a good sense. 

[THELEGOBATMAN]

On 12/28/2021 at 4:10 PM, Mr No said:

You know, I, don't think we knew thanks to leakers that Super Mario would be a thing or Harry Potter would return in 2018. I think that took everyone by surprise, do I won't be surprised if we don't kbow about a LotR return until Lego announces it, they got good at keeping leaks. 

We did know about Harry Potter.

Can't remember Super Mario, I think it also was rumoured.

[Mr No]

1 minute ago, THELEGOBATMAN said:

We did know about Harry Potter.

Can't remember Super Mario, I think it also was rumoured.

I think Super Mario wasn't rumoured, people thought the Mario codes were for Monkie Kid. Leaf

[BrickBob Studpants]

1 hour ago, Mr No said:

I think Super Mario wasn't rumoured, people thought the Mario codes were for Monkie Kid. Leaf

Correct, there were zero rumours, which is why the announcement hit us like a ton of bricks  Everyone was 100% convinced that “Leaf” had to be Monkie Kid. Has to be my second-favourite theme announcement ever, with the number one spot going to PotC, which was announced via sneaking a Jack Sparrow prototype minifig into a Prince of Persia display at a convention  They should do that more often, way more exciting than a regular press release

[Llewop]

If they were to reintroduce this line. i would hope they would take inspiration from Harry Potter and hopefully do a CMF series to go along with it, but i think it does depend on if the Amazon series is more R rated than PG. It is the 20th anniversary of the films so it might be an excuse to resurrect the line

[Mr No]

On 1/7/2022 at 9:49 PM, Llewop said:

It is the 20th anniversary of the films so it might be an excuse to resurrect the line

Well, yeah. They got HP, back in 2018 with the new FB release, of course they only made two Fantastic Beasts sets since then and I don't think Secrets of Dumbledore will get any, with thst excuse of a comeback HP proved to be a successful theme and got evergreen status. I do hope HP won't affect LotR from coming back (because fantasy genre) but I don't think it will because both IPs are very different. The most logical moment for a come back is with the Amazon show, in which Lego will make a new deal with WB to release sets based on the 6 movies and when the anime film comes out, that way they will use the hype produced by the new show. I think that's another reason why WB greenlit the anime film, because of the hype for the Amazon show. And they only had film rights. 

Edited January 10, 2022 by Mr No