Disney Properties 2021 - Rumors & Discussion

[Jarreth2]

Only going off the rumours really .. I see what you mean about the one in the link you shared ..  and again the price of the supposed D2C I’m not sure would cost the same ? Hopefully something ( if anything ) will leak soon 🙂

[Smw]

https://jedijacpenguin.com/everythingweknowaboutLEGO2021.htm

this site has them listed separately

[Falconfan1414]

The d2c will have minidolls

[BrickBob Studpants]

1 hour ago, Falconfan1414 said:

The d2c will have minidolls

Well there goes my interest in the set 

[Soupperson1]

Yay I for one am super excited! We’ve never had a minidoll D2C before and this is an important step for those figures.

I am hopeful we’ll finally get at least Hans and Elsa’s Coronation dress now. :D

[ChrisW]

54 minutes ago, BrickBob Studpants said:

Well there goes my interest in the set 

Yeah, bit of a shame. I’m guessing the line of minifig scale Disneyland sets are pretty much dead then.

If it does have mindolls hopefully the scale is not too odd to accomodate minifigs, which is slightly smaller.

[Jarreth2]

I wonder how this will affect the sales .. my interest has already dipped on hearing this news / rumour. I get that some people love their minidolls, but I’m a minifigure guy. We do have Anna and Elsa in minifigure form that we could use, but dependant on what other characters they introduce with this set the only way to get them would be customisation.

Hopefully some set images may appear soon 🤞🏼 

[Smw]

Really pleased to hear about the mini dolls! Can't wait to see the pics come out

[TheMainBricker]

No minifigures, no interest.

I love the Disney Princesses that came with the CMF line, but always disappointed that Lego went down this route of minidolls to entice girls to Lego.

Can see the AFOL interest in this set fall of a cliff now. Suspect sales of this set will be disappointing for Lego, as the high price for children will limit its appeal.

[Smw]

I think anything that entices children to play with such a good toy as Lego is a great thing! 

[The Stud]

5 hours ago, ChrisW said:

Yeah, bit of a shame. I’m guessing the line of minifig scale Disneyland sets are pretty much dead then.

I wouldn’t say that. The Disney [Princess] theme has co-existed with the Disney [parks and CMF series] line since 2016, and the latter really only gets releases every three years anyway.

This Ice Castle wouldn’t even be part of this Disneyland/World theme anyhow, seeing as how there’s no Elsa Ice Castle you can visit at the parks.

[Captain Nemo]

 

Ugh! Really Lego? Wake me up when Disney CMF series 3 arrives I suppose.

[Clone OPatra]

I think it's fantastic that they perceive enough market appeal to create a large D2C tied to a minidoll theme. It signals that LEGO has well and truly dismantled the "boy toy" image that plagued it for so long.

I also don't totally get how everyone can pass judgement without seeing the thing. As the ice castle, there are hardly many characters that are even relevant to the scene, so it's not like they are going to be doing lots of new characters as minidolls and thus NOT doing them as minifigures. The build will surely be as magnificent as it's going to be regardless of the type of figure, because the scale is pretty much the same (and it's a fantastical ice palace, not something grounded in the real world where slight scale variations might make a difference).

The most valid criticism before any pictures have come out, in my opinion, is why another Ice Palace at all? They've done it several times now, and decently in the latest iteration, so did this need to get a big D2C no matter how good it ends up being? Something novel would've been more interesting.

[ChrisW]

Sadly though even if one wanted to substitute minifigs for minidolls, there’s Elsa, and Anna and…that’s it (Olaf can go either way I suppose).They’ve really had a wealth of Frozen characters in minidoll form.

All that said, I’m glad we’re at least getting Mickey & Friends this year with a nice variety of new figs.

[Clone OPatra]

24 minutes ago, ChrisW said:

They’ve really had a wealth of Frozen characters in minidoll form.

Wealth of outfits perhaps, but not characters. There have only ever been four human characters in the Frozen and Frozen II sets - Anna, Elsa, Kristof, and Lieutenant Matthias. That's it!

Olaf would work just fine against minifigs. Sven is a rounded Friends-style animals, but he's a cartoony reindeer to begin with.

[TheMainBricker]

I remember when I was young and Lego did sets like Paradisa which was sort-of aimed at girls, but fitted wonderfully with the city line because they were all minifigure sets. But Lego seem to be of the opinion that you need Barbie-like figures to appeal to girls (which has been successful with Friends). There's no room for cross-over with mini-dolls.

I doubt from a model POV the set won't be up to much as it will focus more on play factor then display factor. So it's strange doing an expensive D2C set aimed at children, when these sets need to be in as many toy shops as possible, not limited to Lego.com and Lego stores. Can't see it doing well.

[Rambo260]

I can’t wait for this! I’m glad lego is brave enough to do a minidoll d2c. Hopefully we get more in the future between the Disney and the friends lines

[Smw]

2 hours ago, TheMainBricker said:

I remember when I was young and Lego did sets like Paradisa which was sort-of aimed at girls, but fitted wonderfully with the city line because they were all minifigure sets. But Lego seem to be of the opinion that you need Barbie-like figures to appeal to girls (which has been successful with Friends). There's no room for cross-over with mini-dolls.

I doubt from a model POV the set won't be up to much as it will focus more on play factor then display factor. So it's strange doing an expensive D2C set aimed at children, when these sets need to be in as many toy shops as possible, not limited to Lego.com and Lego stores. Can't see it doing well.

They did a lot of market research to come to that opinion, and the sales figures certainly bore it out. 10 years later for Friends (near enough), I think we can assume the mini doll was a successful adaptation of "the system" to open up the market for them to children who weren't building with them before. 

They did do cross over in The LEGO Movie 2 theme, which is something I personally loved. If they released City sets with mini figs and mini dolls in them, though, I think the press would hound them. They wouldn't try it for Friends (hope!) as there is clearly a huge, and equally dedicated market at this point. 

 

[TheMainBricker]

30 minutes ago, Smw said:

They did a lot of market research to come to that opinion, and the sales figures certainly bore it out. 10 years later for Friends (near enough), I think we can assume the mini doll was a successful adaptation of "the system" to open up the market for them to children who weren't building with them before. 

They did do cross over in The LEGO Movie 2 theme, which is something I personally loved. If they released City sets with mini figs and mini dolls in them, though, I think the press would hound them. They wouldn't try it for Friends (hope!) as there is clearly a huge, and equally dedicated market at this point. 

 

Yes I understand market research and the popularity of the product (Lego have done dolls before with Scala and Belville), it's disappointing to think that Lego don't think minifigures are suitable for girls, and technically they're making the gender divide bigger, basically saying minifigures are for boys, minidolls are for girls.

But regardless of that debate, I wonder how popular a D2C minidolls set would be. They're missing out on the pester power by not being normal toy shops, and D2C are typically AFOL aimed sets. I would've thought that this would be better placed as a standard set for sale everywhere. I think Lego's marketing department can't do anything right at the moment, and perhaps they're getting a bit deluded over AFOL purchasing?

[Just_a_brick]

I think this is a test to see if D2C sets with minidoll is profitable. It’s why they chose to do ice castle since Frozen is a popular franchise. If this set succeeds then we could expect to see even more Disney Princess/friends D2C sets in the future. 

[Soupperson1]

4 hours ago, ChrisW said:

Sadly though even if one wanted to substitute minifigs for minidolls, there’s Elsa, and Anna and…that’s it (Olaf can go either way I suppose).They’ve really had a wealth of Frozen characters in minidoll form.

All that said, I’m glad we’re at least getting Mickey & Friends this year with a nice variety of new figs.

We only have Anna, Elsa, Kristoff and Matthias in minidoll form. That’s only double the amount of minifigure characters. XP Then Bruni is a sticker, Gale, Marshmellow and the Earth giant are brick built. The Nokk, Sven, baby Reindeer, Olaf and snowgies are all pretty dead on for the animation they’re based off. I doubt they’d redo them with regular horse, reindeer moulds etc. So I really think the only characters minifigure fans are missing out on are Kristoff and Matthias + whoever potentially could appear in this set.

14 minutes ago, TheMainBricker said:

But regardless of that debate, I wonder how popular a D2C minidolls set would be. They're missing out on the pester power by not being normal toy shops, and D2C are typically AFOL aimed sets. I would've thought that this would be better placed as a standard set for sale everywhere. I think Lego's marketing department can't do anything right at the moment, and perhaps they're getting a bit deluded over AFOL purchasing?

I don’t understand why there’s a myth that AFOLs don’t like minidolls, there’s a vocal minority of us who love them! :P But indeed I imagine this set is also designed with rich little girls in mind.

[Smw]

Exactly. I am an adult. I now own a range of sets. But the FIRST one I bought "just for me" was a Lego Friends set..... 

[TeriXeri]

Once I got my first minidoll set , I got a lot less negative perspective on them, and for a theme like Disney Princess (Frozen is part of that), it 100% makes sense to have minidolls.

What I'm more disliking is the different style in more then just dolls, like how Friends gets so many horses compared to minifig sets.

Many people might be nostalgic about the Paradisa days, and I agree those sets show what Friends might've been with minifigs, however I'd still have to say that the current way of minidolls is still way better then having weird products like Belville/Scala.

On the positive side , Friends basicly brought a whole City theme that can co-exist with City, and even has it's own Subthemes.

As for Disney, while I don't have particular interest in most of those 4+ builds, the higher age builds are pretty good, the set prices however often aren't great.

Edited May 10, 2021 by TeriXeri

[Modal]

I have no opinion on this D2C but definitely of the idea that Minifig > minidoll. What about minifig's are "boyish", genuinely curious? I think Minifigs are as much as a LEGO staple as the brick system, minidolls to me reek of Mega Blocks quality.

[TeriXeri]

12 minutes ago, Modal said:

I have no opinion on this D2C but definitely of the idea that Minifig > minidoll. 

I'll agree here, I prefer minifigs for sure, and there are certainly downsides to minidolls, like incompatibility with torso/leg swaps, no rotating hands, longer legs (so they cant sit in a 2x2 "minifig" vehicle) etc.

But I'll still take the option of minidoll sets over no sets (and minidoll sets are still infinitely better then the Belville/Scala scale times.

Minidoll sets/themes might be the less reviewed sets, but if there weren't a customer base, LEGO wouldn't make them for nearly 10 years already (next year is 10 year of Friends theme).

Edited May 10, 2021 by TeriXeri