Marvel Superheroes 2022 - Rumors & Discussion

[Mandalorianknight]

2 hours ago, Scarilian said:

Seeing Falcon's Instagram asking for users to remark on if they would get the Black Panther Bust or Bowser really emphasised how much of a mistep this set actually is.

Also, for anyone wondering, I guess this potentially could mean the information about the $500 set we have is not accurate due to confusing contradictory information. This could imply the $500 set is unknown completely which might put options back on the table or the $500 set could include or feature the Hulkbuster MKII... I guess we'll have to wait till around mid October or later to discover the truth if the $500 set does indeed release in November.

I really don't understand why they did this. (On the bright side, maybe more people will buy it once it's inevitably 20% off!) The bowser is just better in every way. And same here about not buying those weird digi mario sets, but if I was given the option to get the BP bust or bowser, I'd get bowser easily.

If options are back on the table for the $500 set, my guesses are back to Avengers Tower or the 2012 quinjet. Though I'm still holding out a slim hope for the Liberty Parlance. I just saw the NWH re-release last night (with my friends and in costume), and that scene never gets old. I guarantee if released, it'd be the lego death star of marvel.

[eric_son_of_joseph]

1 hour ago, Mandalorianknight said:

I really don't understand why they did this.

I already posted this Mike Psiaki statement on the diversity of LEGO fans in the New Hogwarts Express thread, but it's relevant here as well.

 

Edited September 9, 2022 by eric_son_of_joseph
Update description

[Scarilian]

6 hours ago, eric_son_of_joseph said:

I already posted this Mike Psiaki statement on the diversity of LEGO fans in the New Hogwarts Express thread, but it's relevant here as well

Long post time (Don't worry, it's not directed at you, just thoughts on the concepts/remarks/conversation/suggestions :P)

This is not the designer of this product and I'm not going to make assumptions specifically about whether what was said was the intent of that individual or mispoken due to them being on a livestream at the time which can be awkward and result in flustered speak. The other individuals in that livestream do have moments of that, so I'm not holding specific terminology to account here such as the "Its not meant for you" which they clarified immediately. In terms of context, he's initially remarking on how people may have wanted a different coloured set, his response as spoken is regarding the nature of trying to appeal to a large group of people with varied interests which generally ends with the statement that they try to avoid defining their fanbase in specific ways because of the broad appeal of the brand. I feel this statement is fine, but it's not answering the implied question of what drove them to this colour other than the vague implication that a white car might encourage creativity akin to a blank slate on which an artist would create.

Designers are creative and will design a set to the best of their ability despite a number of factors that we'd probably never consider while also remaining within their creative vision. I fully view Mark Stafford as attempting to do this, I do not believe the flaws are related primarily to the design as opposed to a lot of unavoidable factors and likely requests from Lego, the only issue I take with the design is the neck and mouth being a similar building design and looking undetailed. In this case, the stated vision of said designer was simply to 'make a large helmet for Black Panther because the previous helmet sets they'd worked on such as the Iron Man helmet they felt were too small to accurately portray the Black Panther helmet' This notion in itself is fine, though would likely frustrate collectors of the smaller helmet range if we started getting variance. Personally a larger scale variation of helmet is definitely needed for some of these characters and it makes sense after the Iron Man Helmet to come to this decision because that helmet would likely have benefitted from a larger scale to allow for more smoothness on the mask. Though the increase in scale definitely did not need to be to this extent to achieve the stated goal and nowhere in the designers original goal of 'larger helmet' was to include the gloves or the upper torso so I feel those were aspects Lego may have enabled or encouraged via the higher piece/price count.

The trouble is that someone in Lego failed to do proper market research on if such a set at a D2C scale would be viable and actually appeal to the demographics required. It's an easy mistake to make, for example one would likely see Captain Marvel's box office and think she is an incredibly popular character... however a film can be financially succesful for a lot of other reasons and any potential popularity might not be tied necessarily to the quality of the character, nor should that character's longevity automatically be assumed. An audience liking a character three/four years ago may not feel the same way after a passage of time, this is why the D2C's should normally strive to be based on aspects that have demonstrated longevity as opposed to relying primarily on the popularity of a solo movie - you can take such risks but those risks should be framed in a way that they'll cover themselves, appealing to a lot of people

Even with the designer doing a lot of good things the core concept of a D2C statue at this price of this character in this month of this year was flawed. This needed to either be a more popular and iconic character for the first version of this in order to sell collectors on the concept OR it needed to appeal more to the demographic via being at a lower scale, better price point or simply focusing on what the designer wanted initially to do - a helmet. Releasing it alongside Bowser is a mistake because people will compare and contrast it to other things that release with the same piece count, I have done so myself. The November release date may have helped giving it a month after Bowser and hopefully having an audience that is caught up in the hype of the new movie which will clearly focus at least partially around the death of Black Panther, rather than having time to digest the set prior. From how it's described by the designer the main motivating factor for why it recieved such a treatment from Lego was seemingly 'because Black Panther was the highest grossing solo superhero movie' which is concerning because if they are going solely off box office without an understanding of the context behind it or an analysis of the current interests of the age range they are targetting then they risk making a product that could appeal to many instead appeal to less and less people.

Brickset is not a perfect judge of set popularity, but a poll of if people would buy the Black Panther Bust which is now at 2552 votes gave us the following:

No, it doesn't interest me	40%
No, it's too expensive	33%
No, but I like it	16%
Maybe, I haven't made up my mind yet	4%
Yes, eventually	3%
Yes, as soon as it's released	4%

89% have stated they will not buy the set, it should not be understated that if this is reflected in actual sales of the set and Lego view it as a reflection of the interest in Marvel, it does risk the potential for future D2C's.

Edited September 10, 2022 by Scarilian

[PGBQW]

4 hours ago, Scarilian said:

89% have stated they will not buy the set, it should not be understated that if this is reflected in actual sales of the set and Lego view it as a reflection of the interest in Marvel, it does risk the potential for future D2C's.

Okay, to be totally fair.

Obviously the target of this set is not the average Eurobricks user, it's more focused to Black Panther fans rather than Lego Fans, so that poll is totally irrelevant.

It would be like making a poll in the Marvel forums asking if they'll watch the new Marvel movie: of course it will be extremely biased.

12 hours ago, Mandalorianknight said:

Though I'm still holding out a slim hope for the Liberty Parlance

Okay, I really don't want to come out as mean, but why do you all want that statue of liberty scene as a set so much?

Like I do agree that making the 500€ set the NWH one would be a genious move because people because it would sell based on minifigures alone.

But ignoring the minifigures would you like the scenery itself? Like it's just a construction site with an ugly statue showing from the top.

Is this a north-american thing that I don't get because I'm european? It's because its a national monument that you just happen to like or it's solely because of the movie?

 

Not trying to be inquisitive, just genuinely curious.

[THELEGOBATMAN]

3 hours ago, PGBQW said:

Okay, to be totally fair.

Obviously the target of this set is not the average Eurobricks user, it's more focused to Black Panther fans rather than Lego Fans, so that poll is totally irrelevant.

It would be like making a poll in the Marvel forums asking if they'll watch the new Marvel movie: of course it will be extremely biased.

What?

It's a poll about a LEGO set, on the most popular LEGO sets database. It's not biased in any way.

Where were they supposed to make it? On a Black Panther forum? 

[Agent Kallus]

3 hours ago, PGBQW said:

Like it's just a construction site with an ugly statue showing from the top.

Is this a north-american thing that I don't get because I'm european? 

I'm a European, and I wouldn't call the statute of liberty ugly. Is it my favourite statute? No but ugly it is not .

[squiz18]

12 minutes ago, THELEGOBATMAN said:

What?

It's a poll about a LEGO set, on the most popular LEGO sets database. It's not biased in any way.

Where were they supposed to make it? On a Black Panther forum? 

I think he's saying you can't read too much into the results from brickset. 

What metrics do we have to judge whether the set is commercially successful? Presumably if it is discounted through the lego website , that wouldn't be a great sign. 

When it's retired, and if more in a similar style are released would be others. I can't think of much else though. 

[RedHoodPug]

5 hours ago, PGBQW said:

But ignoring the minifigures would you like the scenery itself? Like it's just a construction site with an ugly statue showing from the top.

Is this a north-american thing that I don't get because I'm european? It's because its a national monument that you just happen to like or it's solely because of the movie?

You know she’s French, right? Designed by one of the best sculptors in French history Bartholdi, and partly built by one of the most famous civil engineers in history Eiffel. She’s designed after the Roman goddess Libertas. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but it’s hard to deny the remarkable story of the statue’s inception, creation, and arrival in America. 

[PGBQW]

1 hour ago, RedHoodPug said:

You know she’s French, right?

Yes but that's not the point.

Sorry if the ugly statue thing was too harsh, I was only being hyperbolic.

 

3 hours ago, THELEGOBATMAN said:

What?

It's a poll about a LEGO set, on the most popular LEGO sets database. It's not biased in any way.

Where were they supposed to make it? On a Black Panther forum? 

Sure, but the kind of people that use Brickset is people who already collect legos, which doesn't seem to be the particular target of this specific set.

So yes, I'm fairly confident if you asked the same in a black panther forum the answer would be different.

Not that I think the set its going to ne a best seller or anything, but internet polls are usually not very reliable.

Edited September 10, 2022 by PGBQW

[RedHoodPug]

11 minutes ago, PGBQW said:

Yes but that's not the point.

It’s pertinent, you’ve claimed ignorance because of your ethnicity, but the statue shares that with you. The thing you might not share is what the statue represents to you, not the statue itself.

[The Stud]

43 minutes ago, PGBQW said:

Sure, but the kind of people that use Brickset is people who already collect legos, which doesn't seem to be the particular target of this specific set.

So yes, I'm fairly confident if you asked the same in a black panther forum the answer would be different.

Not that I think the set its going to ne a best seller or anything, but internet polls are usually not very reliable.

Yeah, but if the hardcore adult collectors who buy a ton of sets are mostly agreeing that the set is overpriced and not desirable to them, then I have to wonder what that would mean for the more casual adult collectors who buy these 18+ sets every once in a while and would probably be even more selective.

And from anecdotal experience, almost every reddit and social media comment I’ve read has been along the same lines, though that’s obviously far less reliable info to go off of than a poll. 

[eric_son_of_joseph]

12 hours ago, Scarilian said:

89% have stated they will not buy the set, it should not be understated that if this is reflected in actual sales of the set and Lego view it as a reflection of the interest in Marvel, it does risk the potential for future D2C's.

Failure to achieve mass market appeal could influence the potential for future large character busts, but I doubt it would decrease LEGO's enthusiasm toward Marvel D2Cs.  As for Mike Psiaki's statement, I view it as him offering guidance to a fan who questions LEGO's design choice.  LEGO is aware that a product will not appeal to everyone.  A fan should understand this, too. 

Carl Merriam's response could provide insight as to why LEGO went big this time:

"There is one thing that we know that LEGO fans love, and that is anything big.  They've told us that over and over and over again..." 

[Scarilian]

Quote

it's more focused to Black Panther fans rather than Lego Fans, so that poll is totally irrelevant.

2 hours ago, PGBQW said:

The kind of people that use Brickset is people who already collect legos, which doesn't seem to be the particular target of this specific set. 

In my view the set needs to appeal to Lego fans and Marvel fans in order for an overlap to occur where a Lego Marvel Black Panther fan purchases the set. General Black Panther fans probably will either not be familiar with this OR will not have a vested interest in buying a Lego version as opposed to a static molded bust as at the end of the day the role it will have sitting on a shelf is the same. The main market presumably is adult fans of Lego who happen to be Marvel fans who happen to be Black Panther fans who also would desire a set entirely for display of a character that is not returning and at the same time view that as a justifiable purchase in a time of global economic recession. This is already limiting your audience. I brought Lego Doctor Who sets because it appealed to both of my interests, if I did not like Lego OR I did not like Doctor Who then I probably would have avoided the set. Just because someone likes a brand does not necessarily mean they will purchase everything associated with that brand regardless of manufacturer.

8 hours ago, PGBQW said:

Why do you all want that statue of liberty scene as a set so much?

Primarily because it's the only singular set that could encorporate almost every key character in the movie: Tobey, Andrew, Tom, Green Goblin, Electro, Sandman, Doc Ock, Lizard, Doctor Strange, MJ, Ned, J.J.Jameson (who was contacted while they were at the statue) - the only alternative would be Happy's appartment building which unlocks the figure potential for Aunt May & Happy Hogan but locks us into a less impressive build. While I do agree with the sentiment that the final battle underutilised the setting, it is the final battle location. The statue itself could also be displayed seperately, this could appeal to architecture fans. It's also the only location that is interesting enough to be adapted into a set as the alternative locations of key events are a generic bridge, an appartment building, the undercroft prison and a forest with pylons or a labratory. It's difficult to justify minifigure inclusion, particularly of the Spider-men, based on those.

25 minutes ago, eric_son_of_joseph said:

LEGO is aware that a product will not appeal to everyone.  A fan should understand this, too.

I view the general statement that Psiaki was trying to make to be true, but not directly related to the design choice of the colour of the vehicle. Reasons exist as for why the vehicle was made a specific colour, they had to be appealing intentionally to a specific or generalised demographic in mind otherwise it would just be making things and throwing them out there with no clear goal in mind of who would actually buy it. In my view the implication of the statement was that it was coloured white in order for it to be viewed as a 'blank canvas' that others could create with, inspiring imagination.

The set still needs to appeal to enough people in order to justify from a business perspective why the set was made, as a business you can't justify just making a set and expecting people to buy it regardless of it not being made to appeal to anyone in particular if said choices result in decreased profit. If the set is recieving a majority negative response then your target audience may either be non-existant or simply too niche to warrant the product you are trying to sell. I get the concept of not defining yourself into the idea of 'one product fits all markets' but that's different from 'lets create one product and expect it to be popular among enough demographics to be justified without designing it to appeal to any in particular'

25 minutes ago, eric_son_of_joseph said:

"There is one thing that we know that LEGO fans love, and that is anything big.  They've told us that over and over and over again..." 

In this statement they are generalising Lego fans in a way that they believe they should not be doing. Not every Lego fan wants a big set, the 4+ audience, those on a tight budget, etc... It depends on the audience. Large builds are nice, but they are not necessarily going to guarantee a sale just from being big. What they have heard over and over is that fans want bigger sets, but the question then becomes is that audience large enough and why do they want bigger sets. Is it for accuracy? is it for greebling? is it so it can fit larger scale figures? is it for display alone? is it to provide a longer more complicated building experience? etc... as a business they would need to investigate the reasoning and viability of larger sets along with understanding how much of an appeal that these sets have.

Edit: You'd also need to decide how 'big', is the set big enough? is it too big?

Edited September 10, 2022 by Scarilian

[Mandalorianknight]

11 hours ago, PGBQW said:

Okay, I really don't want to come out as mean, but why do you all want that statue of liberty scene as a set so much?

Like I do agree that making the 500€ set the NWH one would be a genious move because people because it would sell based on minifigures alone.

But ignoring the minifigures would you like the scenery itself? Like it's just a construction site with an ugly statue showing from the top.

Is this a north-american thing that I don't get because I'm european? It's because its a national monument that you just happen to like or it's solely because of the movie?

Not trying to be inquisitive, just genuinely curious.

Well, before you called the statue ugly, I would have said "It's a famous statue and being able to display one of my favorite movie scenes of all time would be amazing" or something like that.

But now you've insulted lady liberty, and that means war. 

But actually, aside from her being French... "ugly"? Really? The only part of that I could see is the greenish color (Which I think is fine but I could understand how one could see it as a bit odd), and NWH even made it copper-colored again! As for the reason I like the statue of liberty so much (which isn't the main reason I'd want that to be the $500 set. My favorite marvel sets are ones like the bridge battle and daily bugle, where there's very nice architecture, but they function as scenery/background for the heroes), it A: looks cool and B: It's a symbol of America and the founding values in the constitution, which I'm a pretty big fan of as an American. 

4 hours ago, The Stud said:

Yeah, but if the hardcore adult collectors who buy a ton of sets are mostly agreeing that the set is overpriced and not desirable to them, then I have to wonder what that would mean for the more casual adult collectors who buy these 18+ sets every once in a while and would probably be even more selective.

And from anecdotal experience, almost every reddit and social media comment I’ve read has been along the same lines, though that’s obviously far less reliable info to go off of than a poll. 

Exactly. If you're not even specifically a lego fan, you'd probably look pretty hard at other busts and BP merchandise.

[Vindicare]

12 hours ago, PGBQW said:

Okay, to be totally fair.

Obviously the target of this set is not the average Eurobricks user, it's more focused to Black Panther fans rather than Lego Fans, so that poll is totally irrelevant.

It would be like making a poll in the Marvel forums asking if they'll watch the new Marvel movie: of course it will be extremely biased.

Huh? That set is directly targeted towards the average Eurobricks user. Unless you mean that the average user isn’t into Marvel sets. But using Brickset, where the poll was cited, your example of polling MCU fans doesn’t match up, because Beickset(much like here) is a site for all LEGO fans. And they have a wide variety in most cases of themes they collect. I love the Marvel theme but I have zero interest in this. The helmet sets don’t interest me at all...and a bugger version is no different. And it’s price is insulting & just them trying to capitalize on the character. 

I’m not so sure that the average non LEGO buyer that loves BP would even throw that amount of money at this set. They could buy some amazing statues for a lot less. 

Edited September 10, 2022 by Vindicare

[Legocentrico]

When they announced Thunderbolts, after returning to She Hulk, I thought it was finally time to see a big figure of Abomination ... 💔

[NXS7]

19 minutes ago, Legocentrico said:

When they announced Thunderbolts, after returning to She Hulk, I thought it was finally time to see a big figure of Abomination ... 💔

Abomination might be a bit of a sad stretch, but the Leader is on the table...

[Mandalorianknight]

4 minutes ago, Quicksilver838 said:

Abomination might be a bit of a sad stretch, but the Leader is on the table...

Hell yeah he is! Though not for a couple years.

24 minutes ago, Legocentrico said:

When they announced Thunderbolts, after returning to She Hulk, I thought it was finally time to see a big figure of Abomination ... 💔

I think they just didn't want to spoil she-hulk's ending. (I don't have any leaks or info on that, I haven't even watched more than ep1, I'm just saying he totally is gonna end up in the thunderbolts)

And if so, a bigfig's on the table.

[NXS7]

18 minutes ago, Mandalorianknight said:

 

I think they just didn't want to spoil she-hulk's ending. (I don't have any leaks or info on that, I haven't even watched more than ep1, I'm just saying he totally is gonna end up in the thunderbolts)

And if so, a bigfig's on the table.

I haven't read many reports from comic con, so I don't know if the team we've seen is the official line up, or just a safe handful of characters they're willing to confirm for the time being, but it kinda feels a little lackluster. Three super soldiers, two assassins and Ghost. So I hope Abomination and maybe some more (ideally powered) characters we meet next year will join the team. I also hope we maybe get some of the classic characters like Songbird and Mach V

[Legocentrico]

33 minutes ago, Mandalorianknight said:I think they just didn't want to spoil she-hulk's ending. (I don't have any leaks or info on that, I haven't even watched more than ep1, I'm just saying he totally is gonna end up in the thunderbolts)

And if so, a bigfig's on the table.

I hadn't thought about it 😯

[Mandalorianknight]

2 hours ago, Quicksilver838 said:

I haven't read many reports from comic con, so I don't know if the team we've seen is the official line up, or just a safe handful of characters they're willing to confirm for the time being, but it kinda feels a little lackluster. Three super soldiers, two assassins and Ghost. So I hope Abomination and maybe some more (ideally powered) characters we meet next year will join the team. I also hope we maybe get some of the classic characters like Songbird and Mach V

Almost the entire announced cast is from either BW or TFATWS (Aside from ghost). I don't want a huuuuge team, but at the very least, Abomination would be nice. I'm hoping it's got around 10 members:

The 7 announced members, Abomination, Zemo, and around 2 new guys. TBH, it's possible the only reason they didn't introduce the new ones is because they haven't been cast yet. (Though there really wasn't a reason for them not to announce Zemo...he probably isn't part of the team)

1 hour ago, Legocentrico said:

I hadn't thought about it 😯

Glad to respark some hope. Abomination is long overdue and if ThunderBolts is a team-up movie, it'll hopefully get 3-5 sets, more than enough room to get all the members.

[RichardGoring]

On the Porsche interview, yes, everyone is different, but also, the 911 looks amazing in white. In real life too.

I don't really follow Star Wars, but was the Darth Maul bust popular? That was a similar kind of size, wasn't it? And it has the same parallel of not being the obvious choice from the franchise. Are they being inspired by that?

[Meaf]

1 hour ago, RichardGoring said:

On the Porsche interview, yes, everyone is different, but also, the 911 looks amazing in white. In real life too.

I don't really follow Star Wars, but was the Darth Maul bust popular? That was a similar kind of size, wasn't it? And it has the same parallel of not being the obvious choice from the franchise. Are they being inspired by that?

I don't know if there was ever any sort of official confirmation, but I've always assumed it didn't do very well since that line was so short lived (I believe they only made him and Yoda). To be fair though, any sales data from back then is completely irrelevant to a modern set's potential, given how different the Lego landscape is these days. My guess is that Lego is just in the mood to try a whole bunch of different things now that they've pulled in some new fans (from the pandemic), with the hope being that some of them will end up being popular.

[Mandalorianknight]

12 hours ago, RichardGoring said:

I don't really follow Star Wars, but was the Darth Maul bust popular? That was a similar kind of size, wasn't it? And it has the same parallel of not being the obvious choice from the franchise. Are they being inspired by that?

Aside from @Meadius's excellent point about the vastly different landscape for lego, that was right around the time TPM released. Maul was THE villain back then, so it definately wasn't as weird of a choice as a maul bust would be today. A Thanos bust would be more akin to the maul one.

[NXS7]

13 hours ago, Mandalorianknight said:

Though there really wasn't a reason for them not to announce Zemo...he probably isn't part of the team

Glad to respark some hope. Abomination is long overdue and if ThunderBolts is a team-up movie, it'll hopefully get 3-5 sets, more than enough room to get all the members.

I know in the comics Zemo is the founder of the Thunderbolts, but in the MCU his goal of ending all super soldiers wouldn't make him a good fit for the team when there's like 5 of them. He also couldn't offer much that anyone else could, except his strategist mindset and his butler. He'd make for a good villain in the film, or maybe even a twist that Val's working for/with him

But when it comes to sets, I'll be very happy to get Red Guardian in common public release, as well as of course USAgent, who really should've had Monica's spot in the CMF (or Zemo)