LEGO Disney Minifigures & D2Cs - Rumors and Discussion

[Digger of Bricks]

2 hours ago, Robert8 said:

I've added a poll to the thread 

Which Disney series is your favorite?

Definitely Series 1, merely because it was much more diverse.

[BigGuy4U]

You know, I think there would be a lot less disappointment with this series if Lego would actually, oh, I don't know, make non-minidoll Disney sets and we could get more than 18 Disney minifigs every few years. I don't understand why they're sitting on a goldmine like that.

[Accio Lego]

28 minutes ago, BigGuy4U said:

You know, I think there would be a lot less disappointment with this series if Lego would actually, oh, I don't know, make non-minidoll Disney sets and we could get more than 18 Disney minifigs every few years. I don't understand why they're sitting on a goldmine like that.

Probably has a little to do with what Disney is willing to license. Also, between the themes based on thier own movies and Hidden Side getting so many seats right in its first wave, it should be obvious that Lego want to give decent focus to their own properties, rather than becoming a slave to Disney (well, more than they already are - remember, Disney owns Marvel and Star Wars now)

[Chiaroscuro]

9 hours ago, x105Black said:

Thanks for the information!  I am a huge fan of Pluto, so I'll have to look out for that two-pack.

This series looks really good.  I'm going to end up collecting pretty much all of them...

He was joking that the two-pack will cost $350.

There is no information about the upcoming D2C Disney set except that it is coming. There should be an exclusive minifig on it so maybe Goofy is still a possibility.

[dvt]

40 minutes ago, BigGuy4U said:

You know, I think there would be a lot less disappointment with this series if Lego would actually, oh, I don't know, make non-minidoll Disney sets and we could get more than 18 Disney minifigs every few years. I don't understand why they're sitting on a goldmine like that.

I have time to kill at work so sure, I'll type some thoughts here. Not sure if you were being rhetorical or actually wanted to know some of the thought decision process behind minidolls, but I'll offer my experience on it regardless.  After 18 years of personal collecting LEGO its been interesting to watch it evolve.  Did anyone in the 90's ever think Star Wars sets let alone random figures from majority of every mainstream pop culture reference would be the standard and style for LEGO?

With regards to the minidolls: LEGO did a massive amount of research to decide how they best wanted to go after little girls market that would never seem to stick.  After 4+ years of extensive (multiple dedicated teams, they've written blogs and done video insights on their research as well) The "TLDR" version is that they found girls enjoyed playing with the end builds more than expected and after A/B testing, LEGO found that the dolls were preferred by the target market for their audience/goal (aka little girls).  There are a few forums on eurobricks as well about this topic if people are interested in more info.

Brands take time to test the waters.  Each studio operates independently to see what works for them.  Just because Star Wars (at the time, none of it was under Disney either) decides LEGO works well, doesn't mean Marvel, Disney and Pixar studios will adopt same practices. Each studio will test their own waters for their profitability long term and come up with their own conclusions. Also, Disney Princess which was the second minidoll theme to come to light (has since transferred to a broader "Disney" theme) was a big deal when it came out. LEGO had done DUPLO theme for characters around Mickey Mouse Club, but never LEGO.  They're slowly dipping their toes in.  Disney Princess, Disney Castle, Series 1, now Steamboat Willie and series 2 with a broader "Disney" line instead of the princess, etc.  I would guess that as long as things continue to go well "aka make money" that in 2-3 years time more sets (more than 1 every 3 years outside of the princess minidolls) will be likely.

I for one am thrilled about the quality of the characters.  I want more, but love what we have.  Today, we have ~60 unique minifigures from Disney/Pixar and ~40 minidoll characters. 3 years ago we had 10.  I'm grateful that others have helped to build the use case that it is profitable for a toy to invest in themes that I also enjoy. If they sell well, which I'm sure they will, the partnership will grow. Things take time, not my ideal time scale but at least its happening.

[Shahennian]

13 hours ago, Oky said:

DUCKTALES! WOO-OO!

Bless me bagpipes! At last, my childhood dream of a Scrooge McDuck minifig is coming true, and along with all the triplets no less! I can see how people are upset about three spots being taken up by recolors of the the same fig, but I don't care. I'm thrilled! If I had to nitpick, I'd say it's a bit disappointing that he doesn't have a real cane and that his hat looks strangely thin and plain, but it's close enough!

Big mood!

[Chiaroscuro]

2 hours ago, Digger of Bricks said:

Definitely Series 1, merely because it was much more diverse.

 

Sure. That is problem with series 2. I love that they included Ducktales (although I would prefer their updated look from the current cartoon) but if LEGO decided to include the nephews they should have bumped the number of minifigs in this series to 22 or 24. Same reason with Mickey and Minie, they are doubles. I see that Mickey has to be in a Disney series, but he could have been the sorcerer version.

 

Also, as much as I liked Frozone and Edna they should not be here on the series but rather on one of the three already released sets last year.

 

I liked the inclusion of Elsa and Anna. Good representation. But Jack looks off without long legs.

[Agent Kallus]

Series one feels like a better series overall but merely because of Hercules and Hades I voted for series 2. 

Edited March 21, 2019 by Agent Kallus

[BigGuy4U]

@dvt My comment basically boiled down to LEGO should actually make minifig-based Disney sets and maybe less variety in the CMF wouldn't be as much of a big deal in that case. I do hope you're right that it'll happen eventually, I'd love more opportunities to get different Disney characters instead of "you get 18 every 3 years, if we missed the ones you want you have to wait again".

[Accio Lego]

15 minutes ago, BigGuy4U said:

@dvt My comment basically boiled down to LEGO should actually make minifig-based Disney sets and maybe less variety in the CMF wouldn't be as much of a big deal in that case. I do hope you're right that it'll happen eventually, I'd love more opportunities to get different Disney characters instead of "you get 18 every 3 years, if we missed the ones you want you have to wait again".

Honestly, with an entire quartet of ducktales characters I’m wondering if Lego isn’t testing the waters for sets based of the currently running cartoon. 

As for the time between CMFs - if there is a series 3, I doubt it will take a whole 3 years to get it this time. If you look at the CMFs we got between series 1 and 2, half of them (4 out of 8) were based of Lego Movie properties. 3 more were the (apparently now annual) standard minifigure series, and the last was the Wizarding World series, intended to be released in conjunction with the long awaited Harry Potter reboot. The thing is, as far as I’ve heard, there isn’t a planned Lego Movie release within the next couple of years - so Lego will have to fill those licensed cmf slots with other things 

[MAB]

1 hour ago, Chiaroscuro said:

 

Sure. That is problem with series 2. I love that they included Ducktales (although I would prefer their updated look from the current cartoon) but if LEGO decided to include the nephews they should have bumped the number of minifigs in this series to 22 or 24. Same reason with Mickey and Minie, they are doubles. I see that Mickey has to be in a Disney series, but he could have been the sorcerer version.

 

1

If they did 22 or 24 characters in this series, there would be loads of complaints, as that would mean only two series per box, and loads of duplicates.

It may have been that there were other Mickey and Minnie variants planned for this series but that they were replaced by the vintage ones to allow the use of the new hat moulds in the Ideas set.

 

[dvt]

19 minutes ago, Accio Lego said:

Honestly, with an entire quartet of ducktales characters I’m wondering if Lego isn’t testing the waters for sets based of the currently running cartoon. 

As for the time between CMFs - if there is a series 3, I doubt it will take a whole 3 years to get it this time. If you look at the CMFs we got between series 1 and 2, half of them (4 out of 8) were based of Lego Movie properties. 3 more were the (apparently now annual) standard minifigure series, and the last was the Wizarding World series, intended to be released in conjunction with the long awaited Harry Potter reboot. The thing is, as far as I’ve heard, there isn’t a planned Lego Movie release within the next couple of years - so Lego will have to fill those licensed cmf slots with other things 

The trouble with testing waters for a specific brand with CMF is that they literally can’t key on which character is being purchased. I view it as Disney trying to reinforce current IP that are out. Speculation, but putting products behind certain IP (frozen is a no brained). There is no tracking to uniquely identify which character is bought from analytical standpoint though. 

[Digger of Bricks]

2 hours ago, BigGuy4U said:

You know, I think there would be a lot less disappointment with this series if Lego would actually, oh, I don't know, make non-minidoll Disney sets and we could get more than 18 Disney minifigs every few years. I don't understand why they're sitting on a goldmine like that.

Well, even if Lego reasons that minidolls are the best choice for at least the Princess subtheme, consider how they rebranded/re-headlined the "Disney Princesses" theme to merely "Disney" starting in 2017, with the Disney Princess/Film branding relegated to the bottom right-hand corner of the box art.

Point being, wouldn't you think branding like that could make the theme inclusive of other Disney properties (besides Disney's Princesses franchise)? 

[Modeltrainman]

Maybe LEGO thinks certain Disney movies fit, and others don't? I mean, Up isn't exactly on fire on Ideas, and nobody's made a Robin Hood idea.

Edited March 21, 2019 by Modeltrainman

[Chiaroscuro]

Well LEGO still did not make Toy Story and The Incredibles sets as minidolls. That can be say that it is mainly because those Disney properties are still targeting boys, while Princess are girls territory (despite the fact they renamed the Princess line). 

 

From where I would look back to both Disney minifig series. Why the inclusion of Princess in this line? I can see Aladdin as a boys thing too, but Ariel, Elza and Anna? Why to segment an IP like that? The whole boys vs girls point is silly nowadays. 

[Accio Lego]

45 minutes ago, dvt said:

The trouble with testing waters for a specific brand with CMF is that they literally can’t key on which character is being purchased. I view it as Disney trying to reinforce current IP that are out. Speculation, but putting products behind certain IP (frozen is a no brained). There is no tracking to uniquely identify which character is bought from analytical standpoint though. 

True, you can’t tell what people are buying, but we’ve moved on from the times when that was the only way you could get direct feedback from consumers. I can’t imagine Lego isn’t monitoring social media to see which figs are the most well received. 

[Digger of Bricks]

27 minutes ago, Chiaroscuro said:

Well LEGO still did not make Toy Story and The Incredibles sets as minidolls. That can be say that it is mainly because those Disney properties are still targeting boys, while Princess are girls territory (despite the fact they renamed the Princess line). 

In my opinion, rather than being branded under the name of each of their respective films, Lego should've brought both the Incredibles II and the Toy Story 4 lines under the same Disney banner that the minidoll-based Disney Princesses line sits under currently.

[MAB]

33 minutes ago, Chiaroscuro said:

From where I would look back to both Disney minifig series. Why the inclusion of Princess in this line? I can see Aladdin as a boys thing too, but Ariel, Elza and Anna? Why to segment an IP like that? The whole boys vs girls point is silly nowadays. 

2

Because they are incredibly popular characters and help drive sales. Having only characters that are of interest to boys in the CMF line would be crazy, as girls like to play with and collect minifigures too. It just so happens that some girls also prefer minidolls, which is why they exist - to target the girls that are not drawn in by minifigures.

 

[BigGuy4U]

2 hours ago, Digger of Bricks said:

Point being, wouldn't you think branding like that could make the theme inclusive of other Disney properties (besides Disney's Princesses franchise)? 

You'd think so, and that's what I was hoping for when they changed the name, but apparently not since they haven't done it yet.

[Chiaroscuro]

I don’t think minidolls are suitable to encompass all Disney properties. Minidolls design lacks short legs (and now minifigs have 3 different heights). If I remember right, minidolls cannot move each leg individually, right? It is not that minifigs do not have troubles to represent every character, but to me it seems that minidolls are more limiting to represent them, outside Princess and a bunch of girls.

[Accio Lego]

Does anyone know when blogs and other reviewers usually get previews of these? I’m interested in finding out how many of the characters have rubber hairpieces. I’m guessing Elsa and Anna almost certainly do, but I’m curious about Sally and Jasmine. 

[zoth33]

19 hours ago, Clone OPatra said:

To be honest it looks like the majority of people here are quite happy with this series, though maybe you are talking pure numbers and not percentage of people who are complaining.

This is all of our hobby, so it's totally fair to not be satisfied with everything LEGO does, and call it out when it looks like they haven't used an opportunity to its fullest potential. There have been a few times that LEGO hasn't made characters from certain licenses, and then let the license go. While we have no reason to suspect that LEGO's run with Disney will end any time soon, it's not like Disney CMF are pouring out in droves either.

To me personally, I have no idea what the most popular Disney franchises are with kids these days (besides Frozen), and I guess they know what they're doing with the triplets and Chip and Dale. I'm still solidly in the "Where's Goofy?" camp, and have no desire for any of the Disneytoon characters here.

As for the rest, they're all well done, but most don't interest me despite me liking the properties and I'm trying to put my finger on why. It might be that the Disney animated movies and their particular styles are so stuck in my head that characters like Jasmine and Jafar will just never look right as minifigs. They're wearing the right outfits, but I still don't see the characters. They look to me more like humans in costumes, because I'm used to minifigs representing flesh and blood people, not animated characters with their own distinct style. I had the same issue with the first Disney CMF series.

A secondary stylistic choice that I haven't loved since the first series is the fairly simple detailing style that LEGO has gone with, probably since the animated films themselves don't have too much detail or texture on the characters. On minifigs, it just comes across looking rather plain.

Out of all of these, my top favourite would be Hercules since he has a lot of detail and good accessories (and I don't even like the animated film), and Elsa and Anna since I like the hairpieces and interesting capes, and they have usable parts for customising.

I get what everyone is saying and I'm not saying you can't be unsatisfied with what lego is doing.  I get the arguement about dual molding, printing on legs and arms, some builds don't seem up to par with others etc.  We don't know the designers personally and why they make the choices they do.  There are a lot of factors that go into creating and designing sets like budget, size, licensed material used for concepts of sets, time constraints, pieces available, etc.  We don't know what pressure a designer is under to get their product out.  I'm old school born in 1978 and used to the old smiley face lego figs and the limited parts and colors we used to have and seeing what Lego has grown into is amazing.  I would never have dreamed to see the type of sets we have now.  I have well over a thousand figs and I don't even know how many pieces I have but I have several bins worth and it's just fun creating new figs and MOC's.  That's why I love Lego and still build things.  I also build things with my boys and make castles and have battles.  I know there are some sets and figs that just don't look good.  I also get the that people want what they want like Pluto and others but sometimes it's taxing just reading through pages of people saying where's Pluto and why Huey Dewey and Louie are there instead of Goofy or Pluto.  But we can't get everything we want that's life and sometimes you just have to roll with it.  There is plenty of time to get Pluto.  If the designers job was easy all of us here at Eurobricks would be designers but that's not the case.  This a hobby for most us some people here do work for Lego.  Like I've said before it's a toy made for and targeted towards kids for the most part.  I just don't see what the attraction in complaining about a toy, there are just to many other things in this world that need to be addressed than wether or not Lego makes your favorite Disney character.  I grew up watching Disney and love alot of the characters too, but it doesn't bother me that bad wether we get Pluto or Goofy.  All I'm saying is there is a lot of negativity here and  I come here to get away from the crap this world has become lately but sometimes it just seems to much.  

[snoozle]

I love them all! Glad we’re getting them. I think they’ll sell like hotcakes and think there’s no reason not to expect a series 3. Don’t know why they waited so long with this series, perhaps they wanted a go at the Disney minidoll sets first. Like many I’m surprised they went for the b/w Mickey and Minnie, but I actually prefer this plain grey version to the ideas silver edition, as it looks more accurate. Been waiting for Nightmare before Christmas minifigs for years, and I’m SO happy!!! Though it puzzles me why Sally didn’t get plain black eyes OR big white ones, like Donald and the Cheshire cat for instance also got larger eyes than the standard lego eyes. But no biggie. The side and leg printing is so amazing for this series, hope they’ll keep it up :-). Predicting Goofy and Pluto will come in the next wave, as well as Lilo and Sleeping Beauty for continuity’s sake, Beauty and the Beast, Moana and Winnie the Pooh, to mention a few. First though, can’t wait to get hold of series 2!!! :-D

[Robert8]

3 hours ago, Accio Lego said:

Does anyone know when blogs and other reviewers usually get previews of these? I’m interested in finding out how many of the characters have rubber hairpieces. I’m guessing Elsa and Anna almost certainly do, but I’m curious about Sally and Jasmine. 

Reviewers usually get the CMFs around a month before the official release date

There are for May 1st, so the first reviews could be out next week

[Huigberts Builds]

11 hours ago, Accio Lego said:

Honestly, with an entire quartet of ducktales characters I’m wondering if Lego isn’t testing the waters for sets based of the currently running cartoon.

I hope so. A set of the Money Bin will be a lifelong dream come true (not even exaggerating) but sadly I doubt it. Then again I never would've believed we would get scrooge and the triplets as figures either so who knows.