Star Wars is kinda fading

[muhkuh]

On 1/2/2024 at 3:09 PM, baublitz said:

Maybe there are more factors at play, but compared to the release of the Millennium Falcon a few years ago, I was definitely "oh yeah I gotta keep the collection growing and grab every (UCS) set! To more of a "ugh, they really want another $800 for this and $500 for that, and they did what!? to the design??"

Maybe I was jaded, but now I'm definitely much more selective in my purchases.

Long time ucs collector,

i can say i have huge Lego Collection (25k+) early times i bought sets right away but i struggle because of prices and big 800+sets every year… its to much… beside of the prices the quality is a huge problem for me… its gettin worse and worse… and i feeling they dont wanna change something…

Since few month i have kind lost the grind for LEGO its getting boring because of lame sets.

[Japanbuilder]

For me it is pricing overall that makes me tepid on a lot of LEGO products not just Star Wars. Was stoked to get the new 30$ battlepack but here in Japan most places are charging 50$ for it. It feels like playing with fans' love of the series and not a way to make them happy. So I will be holding off on it just like I did with the 501st battlepack which did not come down to a 30$ equivalent for nearly 2 years until I was able to finally get a few them. Also quality overall is a bit hit or miss it feels. The commander Fox for, example is atrocious, considering the price of the set he comes in.

[Horation]

On 1/7/2024 at 3:36 PM, Flieger said:

 minifig quality: Seriously, this is puzzling. The minifigs, on which LSW depends 100%, are of low quality compared to what other themes get. Obviously this has not escaped attention but that is only because the gap between LSW and, say, Ninjago is insanely huge. The numbers of new moulds and luxurious prints over there is staggering. We did not even get a new visor piece for Cody and Fox so that their helmets look bad. Kamas, if they are printed, should be printed around the legs and not just on the front. Baylan Skoll, the main antagonist of Ahsoka, did not get an orange blade or should armour but an ill-fitting hair piece. R2-prints are notoriously wonky and more often than not ignore the back. And so on... I do not mind if Lego gets something wrong when based on prelimary artworks but LSW's minifigs appear increasingly low effort.

This is because each theme gets a limited number of new part slots (storage boxes) per year in the factory, so a pair of printed legs means : 1 part for the unprinted right leg, 1 for the unprinted left leg, 1 for the piece connecting them, 1 for the printed right leg, 1 for the printed left leg, and 1 for the whole assembly, that's 6(!) parts for one half of a figure, and even if I assume they already make the legs and connector in those colours, that's 3 slots.

If you want to print them on the front, back and sides (for printed kamas), you will need, as follows : 1 unprinted right leg, 1 unprinted left leg, 1 connector, and then you can print, but due to machine designs, you will need to turn the pieces between each print, so 1 left leg printed on the front, 1 left leg printed on front and side, 1 left leg printed on front, side and back, 1 right leg printed on the front, 1 right leg printed on front and side, 1 right leg printed on front, side and back, and 1 whole, counting just the prints and assembly, that's 7 slots, you could instead add 7 recolours, 7 new pieces, etc... And while in house themes get new customers, Star Wars sells well pretty much no matter what, and don't forget that a kid doesn't really care about the lack of new visor pieces, or orange blades, or bl**dy kamas(which make it impossible to make a figure sit down). Now YOU and I both care, but we are adult collectors, AKA NOT THE TARGET AUDIENCE, people seem to think AFOLs and TFOLs make up most sales, we don't, period.

And now you want them to invest dozens of part slots into these sets, so you (a minority of sales) can be a happy, in a theme that is seeing decreasing interest? From a userbase notorious for always being dissatisfied ("no one hates Star Wars as much as Star Wars fans"), now, if you truly believe that sir, well then you are crazier than me (and I'd like to think I am quite crazy sometimes).

[Flieger]

On 1/13/2024 at 10:59 PM, Horation said:

This is because each theme gets a limited number of new part slots (storage boxes) per year in the factory, so a pair of printed legs means : 1 part for the unprinted right leg, 1 for the unprinted left leg, 1 for the piece connecting them, 1 for the printed right leg, 1 for the printed left leg, and 1 for the whole assembly, that's 6(!) parts for one half of a figure, and even if I assume they already make the legs and connector in those colours, that's 3 slots.

If you want to print them on the front, back and sides (for printed kamas), you will need, as follows : 1 unprinted right leg, 1 unprinted left leg, 1 connector, and then you can print, but due to machine designs, you will need to turn the pieces between each print, so 1 left leg printed on the front, 1 left leg printed on front and side, 1 left leg printed on front, side and back, 1 right leg printed on the front, 1 right leg printed on front and side, 1 right leg printed on front, side and back, and 1 whole, counting just the prints and assembly, that's 7 slots, you could instead add 7 recolours, 7 new pieces, etc... And while in house themes get new customers, Star Wars sells well pretty much no matter what, and don't forget that a kid doesn't really care about the lack of new visor pieces, or orange blades, or bl**dy kamas(which make it impossible to make a figure sit down). Now YOU and I both care, but we are adult collectors, AKA NOT THE TARGET AUDIENCE, people seem to think AFOLs and TFOLs make up most sales, we don't, period.

And now you want them to invest dozens of part slots into these sets, so you (a minority of sales) can be a happy, in a theme that is seeing decreasing interest? From a userbase notorious for always being dissatisfied ("no one hates Star Wars as much as Star Wars fans"), now, if you truly believe that sir, well then you are crazier than me (and I'd like to think I am quite crazy sometimes).

 

I do not believe you have any sales figures or hard data on LSW demographics. I for one doubt very much all sets are meant for kids, much less all minifigs (UCS Venator Yularen...). Just as well, I doubt kids do not care about the minifig quality - I did care when I grew up with Lego. Back then in 1990 I was amazed and happy about finally getting proper plate armour for my knights. It might be that younger people may not focus as much on details as some adults, but they do care. Otherwise it is hard to explain why Lego would invest so much effort into Ninjago figs which are meant for children, and much more so than LSW minifigs. Frankly, the dividing line is not adult vs kids, it is indifferent vs attentive.

Lego is simply able and willing to produce much better figures on mass for other themes, just not for LSW. I am merely holding Lego to Lego's own standards, i.e. one which they rather admirably adhere to in some other themes.
And let us not pretend it is all economic decisions: misprinting Yularen’s belt is as expensive as is printing it correctly. And yes, in a set with a price tag equalling my apartment’s monthly rent, aimed for adults and collectors, marketed as super-high-end-premium product deluxe, I want those details done right.

I am aware that I might be a minority in that particular case, but as you said it yourself: LSW is (apparently) faced with decreasing popularity. And I think the relative lack of minifig quality, of which there are so many examples on so many levels, is a reason for that. Btw., if I am wrong, and you do have data on the LSW demographics, please share.

Edited January 29 by Flieger

[Mandalorianknight]

2 hours ago, Flieger said:

why Lego would invest so much effort into Ninjago figs which are meant for children, and much more so than LSW minifigs. Frankly, the dividing line is not adult vs kids, it is indifferent vs attentive.

It's been fairly well-documented that lego's able to put more detail into unlicensed themes than licensed ones- Star Wars may sell as well as Ninjago (I don't remember the exact sales details but IIRC the two of them, city, friends, and technic are the top 5), but because of the fee Lucasfilm takes for lego selling sets with their IP, lego themselves aren't making as much off it as they are ninjago. (I don't really follow Technic, but I imagine it's a similar situation- I do follow Transformers and I know they become heavily restricted when making their figures turn into licensed real-world vehicles. Volkswagen wouldn't even let them make bumblebee a Volkswagen beetle for a good chunk of time.) Hence Ninjago has a larger budget for new molds, prints, etc.

Now that said it doesn't excuse print inaccuracies (though it's important to point out those aren't unique to SW either- ninjago had a whole wave that spelled "master" wrong on all the ninjas' robes). 

Edited January 29 by Mandalorianknight

[Horation]

Redacted-see mods for reasoning

Edited Tuesday at 12:40 AM by Horation
pointer based redaction

[Flieger]

On 1/29/2024 at 4:04 AM, Horation said:

I do not have sales data, but I did read somewhere (can't remember where, sorry) that something like 3/4 of sales were being made to kids (or parents buying for kids), and I really, really doubt a majority of sales are being made to adults, but if you can prove me wrong...

YOU claimed, and still claim the vast majority of sales were to children. It falls on you to proof your own statement, not me to disprove it. I think you cannot do that, of course. There are no figures availble to the public still you claim certainties in all too apodictic fashion. It helps to remind you that you are simply not based on facts and figures. At all. 

 

On 1/29/2024 at 4:04 AM, Horation said:

 let us not pretend this is all economic reasons, but let us instead acknowledge that this is all economic reasons. I do not think misprints are a good example, because they are NEVER intentional, and they often get fixed after some time (which ADDS costs, doesn't make sense to think they would do it to save costs, but moving on).

Good then tell me the eeconomic reasons why Yularen got a stud printed on his belt that should not be there, because it is not a misprint. It is not a mistake, they intentionally printed the stud there. And it is still on all Yularens.

[Mandalorianknight]

32 minutes ago, Flieger said:

YOU claimed, and still claim the vast majority of sales were to children. It falls on you to proof your own statement, not me to disprove it. I think you cannot do that, of course. There are no figures availble to the public still you claim certainties in all too apodictic fashion. It helps to remind you that you are simply not based on facts and figures. At all. 

Are you really still trying to argue this? The proof is in the sets themselves. They are, say it with me now, children's toys. That's what they're marketed as, that's why they have play features, that's why the boxes say things like ages 6-12. If enough of the sales were adults, they'd assumably change the sets/packaging to do so, like they've already done for the 18+ sets. But the lego brand is, again, say it with me, a children's toy brand. These are plastic toys for kids. It doesn't mean there can't be quality issues that they should solve. It doesn't mean the amount of adults that buy them is completely insignificant- again, 18+ sets are a thing. But you can't pretend that lego isn't a children's toy brand because it quite literally is.

Also, this is a pretty easy one to just get some personal relative data on. I don't know about you, but just about every kid I interact with (family, friends' kids, students, etc) owns some lego sets. With adults, I'd say about 1 in 6 college students I know owns a couple sets, and maybe 1 in 20 or so actively collects. As the age goes up, the proportion that collect lego goes down. Now, this is just my personal experience, but being a lego collector myself I'd say it's biased in favor of lego collection in adults- I'm likely to be friends with people similar to me, hence the amount of people I know who collect lego is larger than average.

[Flieger]

I am a teacher in Germany, which is almost like Lego hometown; many generations have been enjoying Lego over here. And Lego Star Wars among kids, as opposed to Lego in general,... nope. Not a thing anymore. It was big during the original TCW run, you could hear the children debate endlessly about clones, droids and so, and you could reference SW in class and everyone got it immediately. Those days are gone.

Obviously my impression might be faulty, other indicators pointing in the same direction might be too. But then I am not claiming to speak the word of god, I am merely asking for proof. Just calling something true because you believe it is true is not my thing. Given that the SW merch sales are a highly politicized affair that I for one would like to have some reliable data rather than gut feelings, emotions, and anecdotes.

It also should be mentioned that I made a lot of other points here, including an inaccurate print on a minifig that clearly aims at adults due to its set's pricetag alone, which is not any more economically sensible than an accurate print.

Edited May 6 by Flieger

[Clone OPatra]

6 hours ago, Flieger said:

I am a teacher in Germany, which is almost like Lego hometown; many generations have been enjoying Lego over here. And Lego Star Wars among kids, as opposed to Lego in general,... nope. Not a thing anymore. It was big during the original TCW run, you could hear the children debate endlessly about clones, droids and so, and you could reference SW in class and everyone got it immediately. Those days are gone.

LEGO Star Wars never performed as well in Germany, where it is outperformed by City. This was made public in the published annual reports.

Star Wars as a brand has killed a lot of its own hype though, and it feels like LEGO Star Wars has more adult skewing sets than it once did, but there are still plenty of sets with kids being the target market. We've also seen with the wild success of the Harry Potter theme that there doesn't even need to be new media for children to engage with a property. Kids can watch all of Star Wars, including Clone Wars, on Disney+ after all.

[Schneeds]

I think it depends on what your interests are.  For me personally, other than Andor and Rogue One, I absolutely despise all of Disney's content.  I build exclusively UCS models; either heavily modded Lego sets or custom ones from the talented designers here on the forum.  That doesn't leave me with much to collect at this point, outside of doing alternate versions of what I already have.  On the one hand it feels bad.  On the other, I only have so much space so maybe it's for the best.

Edited May 7 by Schneeds

[CloneCommando99]

A little late, I know. But on this topic…

I feel like that Star Wars may be fading unfortunately in some ways. If you look at earlier this year when it was revealed that there would be a Mandalorian and Grogu Movie, there was not much talk of it or even jubilation among the fan base. This is concerning as if new Star Wars content isn’t able to generate hype, Lego sets based on said new Star Wars content will not do well. And therefore make the theme seem less successful in Lego’s eyes.

Another example of this was Star Wars Celebration last year. Where not one, not two but three Star Wars movies were announced by Lucasfilm. Did the fan base celebrate. No, quite the opposite really. Many were outraged at the news that Rey would be getting a new movie. Others were concerned about how James Mangold could easily screw up the lore with his Prime Jedi Movie (Indiana Jones 5 was not looking promising at all to many at the time. And of course it turned out to be a disappointment.) And barely any talked about the Mandoverse movie as it was eclipsed by the worries and concerns for the two former films.

The new content frankly isn’t generating enough hype. Or they do but they end up being disappointing/ not meeting fan expectations. (Looking at you: Kenobi, TBOBF and Mando S3.) The fans leave the series disappointed and aren’t inclined to watch more Disney content in fear of disappointment. This results in the subsequent series, whether they are actually good like Andor (which casuals wouldn’t have been inclined to watch anyway) or not, receiving low viewership numbers. This makes Disney and toy companies think that, due to the seeming lack of interested consumers, the content will not be profitable enough to have more toys (in this case Lego sets) based off it. Thus meaning that whilst content that is good but relatively low in viewership barely gets any sets, the more high profile series like Ahsoka, Kenobi and Mando will get sets, but will end up not selling as well. Thus causing Lego to retreat back into making more movie sets and barely any based off new content. As seen this year.

I don’t think I’ve encountered a person so far that’s looking forward to obscure shows like Skeleton Crew. And seeing that Lego’s only planned release for that show is a £100+ set, Lego appears to be setting themselves up for failure.

Whilst the animation department of Star Wars has a lot of set potential that even casuals will buy. Lego and Disney look at the viewership numbers, which are unfortunately always fated to be lower than live action content, and decide not to make sets. (Aside from CW ones to appease the “Clone Bros”)

In short it’s a vicious cycle. New content gets released, Lego makes sets, fans dislike content because it supposedly “butchered” yet another fan favourite, Lego sets based on show don’t sell so well, less people watch subsequent content even if it’s good, this causes it to be ignored in the future by Lego and other toy companies, hype train is worn down. Resulting in less people watching the content that’s good. When there is good content some people come back, only to be disappointed by the next piece of content. After being let down so many times, some people will become antagonised against Disney and stop watching content and introducing their kids to it all together. Thus generation by generation, less and less kids will become enthralled in Star Wars. And when they do they join the hype and then eventual disappointment train.

If you’ve read this. I’m sorry if this sounded like I was rambling. And my apologies if i bored you. But thank you for reading. Personally my love for Star Wars will never die. I have been a Die Hard Star Wars fan since the age of 4 and always will be. But it’s the Casual Fans, who make up the majority of the Fanbase who are leaving, and that’s what we should be worried about. The less fans a franchise has the less relevant it becomes.

Edited May 31 by CloneCommando99

[TeddytheSpoon]

I don't know if Star Wars itself is fading, rather I think it's a product of Disney's attitude. I've thought about this a lot since watching that Jenny Nicholson video (which is incredible, by the way).

They seem/seemed to think that slapping a Star Wars label on something was a license to print money. That's evidenced partially by their initial plans to have a SW movie *every year*, which got scaled back, and the subsequent glut of D+ series, which now seems like it might get scaked back. IMO they've overestimated how easy it is for people to burn out on it. I think people still count themselves as Star Wars fans, but it's no longer possible to keep up with the new media - there's just too much, too fast, so you have to pick and choose what you consume. And that's not even considering the shorter attention span of kids, who are TLG's target audience.

That sucks for LEGO, as they kinda need to follow what Disney do to piggyback on the marketing. I don't know if it will lead to the kind of vicious cycle that @CloneCommando99 mentions - after all, TLG has tried out a fair few new ideas or set concepts in the last few years that aren't linked to new material. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. But the burnout effect means that people are just less interested on the whole, which is a shame, as some of the sets are actually really good in their own right.

I've watched and liked pretty much everything SW that's been released recently, so this isn't a 'Disney Star Wars sucks' rant. More so a worry that Star Wars is not and will not be immune to mismanagement from the late-stage capitalist attitude that Disney seems to be embracing.

[Pedilego]

2 hours ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

Star Wars is not and will not be immune to mismanagement from the late-stage capitalist attitude that Disney seems to be embracing.

I had a fairly lengthy DM discussion some time back about Lego's approach to LSW & it felt like everything kept coming to "Yeah, but does it optimize short-term profits?" So many younger folks have heard that Q for so long they've become numb to anything else. Yes, that is how most corporations currently operate... is should it be? As religion has become less influential (it's not just capitalism 'maturing' into its later stages) & society's moral bearings have become self-directed, it's much more difficult to definitively say why profit shouldn't be the ultimate motive. Rather, upholding certain principals should be the primary motive, and profit should operate within that sphere: Does the profit-maximizing strategy align with our principals? Whereas now that's been reversed: Does acting on this principal align with profit? That's why we see examples of Lego "acting on their values" sometimes (when they align) but not universally.

 

This is the story about how Ole Kirk Kristiansen´s focus on quality is handed from farther to son in Godtfred Kirk Christiansen´s own words: One evening, when I came into the office, I said to my father: “It’s been a good day today, Dad. We’ve earned a little more.” “Oh,” says Dad, “what do you mean, lad?” “Well, I’ve just been to the station with two boxes of our toy ducks for the Danish Co-op. And normally they get three coats of varnish – clear varnish – but this time I only gave them two. I thought we could cut our costs because it was the Co‑op. So I saved the business a bit of money.” He looked at me: “Godtfred, don’t you know that’s wrong? I want you to drive up to the station and fetch those boxes back. Unpack them and give the ducks another coat of varnish. Then you’ll repack them and take them back to the station. You’re not going to bed until the work’s done – and you're getting no help. You’ll do it all on your own.” There was no arguing with Dad. And it was a lesson for me about what quality meant.

https://www.lego.com/en-in/history/articles/a-godtfred-kirk-christiansen

On one hand, the long-term implications should be obvious. I don't think it's acted on because (a. late-stage capitalism) the difficulty to push back against the corporate culture (especially for public companies with stockholders - Lego doesn't have as much of an excuse, other than that they hire people that've climbed the ladder in the culture of public companies) and (b. moral ambivalence) the individuals wanting to maximize profit performance in the short-term (over the company's long-term) for themselves (and deluding themselves into thinking what's good in the short- is good for the long- through cognitive dissonance because, of course, nobody wants to see themselves as selfish or working for/acting on behalf of selfishness).

On the other hand, it seems like maybe it's not so obvious since a lot of people in this thread, and in the Star Wars fandom in general, have a difficult time accepting the downward trajectory of Star Wars.

Edited May 31 by Pedilego

[TeddytheSpoon]

12 minutes ago, Pedilego said:

*snip*

I'm reminded of a meme that went "one of our core company values is: number go up. This aligns with our other, important core value: rate at which number go up".

Indeed, I think it's natural that most companies target profit. What's more problematic IMO is then chasing profit growth to satiate shareholders, which is achieved either by raising prices (which affects demand) or lowering costs (which affects quality), and neither is unsustainable in the long run as you say. The Nicholson video I mentioned above talked about Disney doing the latter to theme parks to the extent that the user experience is hollow compared to what it used to be, because so many corners have been cut to maintain rate at which number go up. It's similar to what happened with certain tech/subscription services, but now I'm getting way off topic.

I'm still enjoying my Star Wars, so I don't see it as being on a downward trajectory at least in terms of quality. But I can certainly see the corporate claws getting further into everything surrounding Star Wars, which is not nice to see.

[Yperio_Bricks]

Guess i must be dumb because did not get the memo I enjoy Star Wars and look forward to the new shows and movies and i can enjoy any of the old movies when they are on TV. Oh and SOLO is my favorite and i like Rey. I can enjoy a YT video of Kyle reading a SW comic or a LSW enthusiast unboxing a set, visting a park or talking about their collection. And as an adult i can choose to not watch videos of people who think that Kathleen is destroying the world 

And i think that this year was good year for Lego Star Wars and there are quite some good sets. And we will get good sets in the years to come. Of course not every set is for everyone, but i am optimistic 

And there are so many talented people building LSW mocs i can enjoy at YT, flickr, forums etc. 

Just my two cents

[Schneeds]

6 hours ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

I don't know if Star Wars itself is fading, rather I think it's a product of Disney's attitude. I've thought about this a lot since watching that Jenny Nicholson video (which is incredible, by the way).

They seem/seemed to think that slapping a Star Wars label on something was a license to print money. That's evidenced partially by their initial plans to have a SW movie *every year*, which got scaled back, and the subsequent glut of D+ series, which now seems like it might get scaked back. IMO they've overestimated how easy it is for people to burn out on it. I think people still count themselves as Star Wars fans, but it's no longer possible to keep up with the new media - there's just too much, too fast, so you have to pick and choose what you consume. And that's not even considering the shorter attention span of kids, who are TLG's target audience. 

That sucks for LEGO, as they kinda need to follow what Disney do to piggyback on the marketing. I don't know if it will lead to the kind of vicious cycle that @CloneCommando99 mentions - after all, TLG has tried out a fair few new ideas or set concepts in the last few years that aren't linked to new material. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don't. But the burnout effect means that people are just less interested on the whole, which is a shame, as some of the sets are actually really good in their own right.

I've watched and liked pretty much everything SW that's been released recently, so this isn't a 'Disney Star Wars sucks' rant. More so a worry that Star Wars is not and will not be immune to mismanagement from the late-stage capitalist attitude that Disney seems to be embracing. 

I'm pretty confident people don't get burned out on good, quality content. I'd watch shows like Andor every day if I could.  I know all my friends would too.  But shows like Obi wan and Ahsoka insult my intelligence and I can't even watch them, much less support them. 

I can't speak to whether or not Lego Star Wars is waning, but there is absolutely no denying that media franchise doesn't have anywhere near the power it did in 2015. 

[Pedilego]

2 hours ago, Yperio_Bricks said:

Guess i must be dumb because did not get the memo

This isn't about any one of us individually: There are clear markers that the popularity of Star Wars is in decline (many of them have been covered in this thread already); noticing it & hypothesizing why isn't intended to be a personal attack on anybody who still likes the franchise. The criticism I have is denying that the decline exists.

 

2 hours ago, Yperio_Bricks said:

I enjoy Star Wars and look forward to the new shows and movies and i can enjoy any of the old movies when they are on TV. Oh and SOLO is my favorite and i like Rey. I can enjoy a YT video of Kyle reading a SW comic or a LSW enthusiast unboxing a set, visting a park or talking about their collection. And as an adult i can choose to not watch videos of people who think that Kathleen is destroying the world 

 And i think that this year was good year for Lego Star Wars and there are quite some good sets. And we will get good sets in the years to come. Of course not every set is for everyone, but i am optimistic 

 And there are so many talented people building LSW mocs i can enjoy at YT, flickr, forums etc. 

Just my two cents

I do lots of the things you mentioned. My son's first theater movie was A New Hope last year. We saw RotJ just last weekend. Both my kids have now seen/been introduced to the entire OT in theaters. I'm eagerly anticipating RotS next May 4th and, in the interim, we'll watch the Disney+ Mando & Ahsoka shows and continue buying Lego sets. I don't think being realistic about the declining state of the franchise prevents (most) people from continuing to appreciate it.

 

4 hours ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

I'm reminded of a meme that went "one of our core company values is: number go up. This aligns with our other, important core value: rate at which number go up".

Indeed, I think it's natural that most companies target profit. What's more problematic IMO is then chasing profit growth to satiate shareholders, which is achieved either by raising prices (which affects demand) or lowering costs (which affects quality), and neither is unsustainable in the long run as you say. The Nicholson video I mentioned above talked about Disney doing the latter to theme parks to the extent that the user experience is hollow compared to what it used to be, because so many corners have been cut to maintain rate at which number go up. It's similar to what happened with certain tech/subscription services, but now I'm getting way off topic.

I'm still enjoying my Star Wars, so I don't see it as being on a downward trajectory at least in terms of quality. But I can certainly see the corporate claws getting further into everything surrounding Star Wars, which is not nice to see.

Lol

Yep, raise prices, lower costs, or increase volume - which is a way of lowering cost per unit since incremental units only create additional variable costs & not additional fixed costs. Kind of difficult for theme parks to increase volume but Disney seems to think it's obtainable for TV/toys and breath of TV/toy consumers.

IMO Disney does a good job of continuing to give us the things that we love about Star Wars (e.g. action/adventure, sci-fi/fantasy world-building, consistent yet expanding lore, immersive story-telling, etc.) but it's seldom all (or even most) at once and, when you're missing something like an adequate level of coherent story-telling, it doesn't matter how much action/adventure they give us (e.g. Book of Boba Fett); some people just aren't going to stay tuned in.

[Kit Figsto]

11 hours ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

That's evidenced partially by their initial plans to have a SW movie *every year*, which got scaled back, and the subsequent glut of D+ series, which now seems like it might get scaked back. IMO they've overestimated how easy it is for people to burn out on it. 

I agree, I don't think the brand itself is struggling, I think it's just that oversaturation is a thing that probably was underestimated.  I don't follow Marvel as closely, but it seems like this was sort of the case there too.  Marvel was getting tons of hype when the MCU was coming to a close, with Infinity War and Endgame, and then people were excited for some of the D+ shows, but it seems like the attention to that franchise has been hit and miss in the years since.

Star Wars seems to have been similar.  The sequels objectively performed well at the box office, regardless of controversial opinions on them, Rogue One generally seemed to have been received well, Solo didn't do as well at the box office but I've yet to really meet anyone that disliked the movie, Andor seems to have been received really well, and Mandalorian was obviously a smash hit.  I think the issue is that there's so much other stuff, it's hard to keep track of and pay attention to it all. 

I feel like a lot of the shows that I didn't list are ones that seem to have mixed reviews.  Some people liked them, others didn't, which is fine, but I think when you have a property as large as Star Wars (or Marvel, or DC), there's a certain expectation that everything is going to appeal to all fans of that franchise.  Is that entirely realistic?  No, not really, but that's how people will treat the franchises.  I also think it's important to keep in mind that a lot of these new shows are going to appeal to certain people more than others.  Mandalorian was more of a Western, and I think channeled more of the spirit of ANH.  Andor was more of a political drama.  Book of Boba Fett was more of a crime/gangster show.  So on and so forth.

I consider myself a SW fan, and there aren't many SW movies or shows that I actually disliked, but in the past year, I haven't watched Ahsoka, Tales of the Empire, Visions, Tales of the Jedi, and I'm just now starting BB S3.  This is a mixture of two things.  First, my free time during parts of the year being limited, preventing me from watching, but also, it's just a bit overwhelming to keep up with all of these shows.  I plan to watch all of them eventually, except maybe Visions, but I just didn't have the time.  It wasn't a matter of me not liking the D+ shows - as a matter of fact, the worst opinion I've held towards one of the D+ shows was "it was fine."

Edited May 31 by Kit Figsto

[Lbu68]

I have >70 Star Wars set, starting from 2003. I don’t buy all sets. Just what I like. The Disney path has milked the cow so much that some shows are just painful to watch. But some of them were amazing.  Watch and build what you like, is it fading…for me not but as most adult fans of lego starwars I have lost my hair, and when filling out a questionnaire. My age category is usually in the last two boxes …. Fading maybe together….

[Something_Awesome]

Ok so, it does seem like the Star Wars demographic is getting much older on average. This is largely due to the youngest generations not being in to Star Wars, and the exit of a lot of much older fans from the franchise who are NOT introducing the franchise to their kids.

Star Wars these days is a difficult watch and difficult to pick up more organically compared to franchises like Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. Maybe even, more recently, Dune.

The average age of people that watched the Ahsoka show were older millennials. This is not promising as the show was hoping to appeal to a lot of kids that watched Rebels. The drop off of Ahsoka was also bigger than Mando S3's drop off. I think the only big show where a larger proportion of the viewership did not finish the show was the Lord of the Rings show. 

But it's not even that. Even the George Lucas stuff from 1977, while considered amazing cinema, is a tough watch for kids that are not nudged in to watching it. Star Wars is just hard to get in to.

Also, it looks like display-only sets make up a lot more of the LEGO Star Wars release diet (this is regardless of what age is on the box). Kids want to play.

Regarding Star Wars' future, you'd think with The Acolyte there is an opportunity for NEW fans because it takes place in a time period almost independent from every other Star Wars work. However, I've seen the first four episodes. And I am 100% certain that, on the balance, the franchise will end up loosing far more fans than it gains with this show based on how the showrunners have decided to impact Star Wars cannon 

Edited June 3 by Something_Awesome

[CloneCommando99]

18 minutes ago, Something_Awesome said:

Ok so, it does seem like the Star Wars demographic is getting much older on average. This is largely due to the youngest generations not being in to Star Wars, and the exit of a lot of much older fans from the franchise who are NOT introducing the franchise to their kids.

The average age of people that watched the Ahsoka show were older millennials. This is not promising as the show was hoping to appeal to a lot of kids that watched Rebels. The drop off of Ahsoka was also bigger than Mando S3's drop off. I think the only big show where a larger proportion of the viewership did not finish the show was the Lord of the Rings show. 

But it's not even that. Even the George Lucas stuff from 1977, while considered amazing cinema, is a tough watch for kids that are not nudged in to watching it. Star Wars is just hard to get in to.

 

I totally agree with this statement. When I have kids I’m going to make it my personal duty to indoctrinate them into Star Wars as soon as they can understand it. We as current fans have a duty to ensure that the fanbase survives into the next generation. But for now there are thankfully still many kids who are into Star Wars thanks to the first 2 seasons of The Mandalorian, Clone Wars and Bad Batch.

18 minutes ago, Something_Awesome said:

Star Wars these days is a difficult watch and difficult to pick up more organically compared to franchises like Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. Maybe even, more recently, Dune.

What LOTR show are you talking about? There is no LOTR on Amazon Prime. Only a mediocre fan fiction. (TBH jokes aside ROP had some excellent music)

18 minutes ago, Something_Awesome said:

Regarding Star Wars' future, you'd think with The Acolyte there is an opportunity for NEW fans because it takes place in a time period almost independent from every other Star Wars work. However, I've seen the first four episodes. And I am 100% certain that, on the balance, the franchise will end up loosing far more fans than it gains with this show based on how the showrunners have decided to impact Star Wars cannon 

Firstly, how the Jar Jar Binks did you watch the first four episodes? Secondly, is it really that bad?! I had my worries after some of the Star Wars Celebration interviews with the cast last year. (The guy who said there’s no good or evil in Star Wars specifically) And I am heavily concerned on whether they’ll try and alter the Chosen One prophecy so that it wasn’t actually Anakin.

Was it at least entertaining? Please tell me without spoilers.

[Something_Awesome]

32 minutes ago, CloneCommando99 said:

Was it at least entertaining? Please tell me without spoilers.

I don’t want to spoil. I think release day there is a two episode drop? You may overall be fine with the show until week two :/

Oh, and how I got to watch? I live in Los Angeles and know certain people LOL. I do not INTEND to finish the show. May watch a recap of the show or something just to see know for sure the direction Disney is going.

Um…. It looks like some directions with story in Ahsoka were influenced by Acolyte. Like, Filoni definitely has taken Acolyte in to consideration :/

Oh and as for LotR, I don’t mean it’s easy to get in to because of the show. But as long as any kid has any fascination with fantasy, they will LOVE the six movies. My baby sister ADORES the six movies, as do my nieces and nephews. I have a niece with LotR prop replicas.

Edited June 3 by Something_Awesome