GoldenNinja3000

Got my Hoopty pre-order a day early! It's a good build with tons of interior space for its size. I really love the design of the ship overall. Minifigures are okay, but I think Kamala could've used a darker skin tone (medium brown) and I wish Carol and Monica had leg printing if not arm printing too. Comparing the Monica and Kamala figures to the originals, I think I prefer the previous versions because of the arm printing and skin tone, respectively.

I need more D2C Dark Knight Trilogy sets! I'd kill for a UCS-style Bat or (wide-release) Batpod. I built the Batpod from parts I bought on BrickLink in 2019 and it's one of my favorite LEGO builds ever. It looks great and when you zoom it along the floor the Tumbler tires make a whirring noise exactly like the bike does in the movies. I need more!

I don't love that there's no bag inside the box to protect the figure. A thin plastic bag inside would still be a major environmental difference to the outer packaging being plastic but I'm sure a little paper bag could've been put inside the box to protect the figure too. I'm a big fan of this series overall. The detail on these characters is insane and I love the new hair molds for characters who (IMO) don't really need them. Much like the first series I think the lineup could be a little better, but it's definitely better than the last series! Goliath is an awesome figure but since he's the only What If...? Series 2 character I would've skipped that show entirely and put Kamala in here. I know she's coming in the Hoopty set but that suit isn't a great design to begin with. Her standard MCU suit is excellent and with a CMF budget it would've been one of my favorite LEGO minifigures ever. I also think it's weird to skip Secret Invasion even though I don't like the series. Werewolf By Night's inclusion makes me think LEGO wants to represent every MCU Disney+ project in some way, which is a great thing! But Secret Invasion (and Ms. Marvel) are clearly being skipped on purpose since Echo and X-Men '97 were always meant to release after it and both are included in this series. From a pure sales standpoint, it's strange to see a random werewolf in this series instead of Nick Fury, who's an iconic and recognizable MCU character. I do think this is the better series when compared to the first. While I like the characters (and shows) in the first series more, several of those figures could've been better. I think every figure in this series is executed pretty perfectly and the lineup is better than the last. My favorites are Storm and Agatha but I also really love Moon Knight and She-Hulk!

Holy cow, this set is insane! It's everything I wanted from a D2C Gringotts so I'm pretty happy. I definitely agree that the bank could've been bigger, but I think it looks good next to the rest of Diagon Alley and I love that it's actually fully compatible. That's something I wasn't expecting since LEGO doesn't usually advertise full compatibility with a set from three years ago, but it must mean Diagon Alley isn't retiring anytime soon. The way it connects at an angle is really nice although I've got no clue how I'd display that. Putting such an extensive cart system below the bank is what really blows me away. It looks like a lot of MOCs and I never thought LEGO would make a Gringotts set in this style, especially considering it's still on a baseplate! It's a very striking display piece. I do wonder if doing two sets would've been better (like Jabba's Palace and the Rancor Pit, but with each being $200), but I don't think too many corners were cut by doing everything in a single set. The dragon looks a little small to me but is a pretty nice build - I love the folding wings and molded head. The Gringotts sticker is the worst part of the set by far and disappointing since it ruins the look a bit, but at least there aren't bigger issues. My only other gripe is that the area under the dome looks basic compared to the detailing on the rest of the building. The interior seemed cramped at first glance but looks pretty deep in the 360 video on Shop@Home. I'm waiting for reviews so we can get a better idea of the interior space but it seems cavernous and grand enough despite the building not being huge. My only big complaint about the actual build is that the track system should go right up to the edge of the baseplate. I don't like how it starts in mid-air several inches below the floor. I'm sure the designer tried to bring it higher and maybe the track simply became too delicate at those heights, but I want to try modifying that area. The minifigures are perfect. I'm happy to see so many, although we usually get a decent number in large Harry Potter sets anyway. Dress printing for Bellatrix! New face prints for the trio! Plenty of goblins! That Death Eater is amazing! The price seems okay for what you get. The building looks like it would be a $250 set on its own, the dragon would be a $40 set, and $140 for the cart system seems fair given the number of pieces and complexity put into it. I can't wait to get this set. I didn't think I'd love it this much!

I''m disappointed with the shield. I still think it's a great idea for one of these 18+ display sets but it's been executed poorly. The minifigure is an absolute joke - in a $200 collectors' set, we should be getting detailed exclusive figures instead of repeats from a $10 4+ set or a lazy torso reprint (Hulkbuster). I'm not saying I needed the Stealth Suit or Cap 1 outfit (although I would've liked one of them), but why can't we get arm printing and dual molded legs for the AoU variant? The build does look very boring although I still think it's a decent display piece. The real problem is the back. I definitely agree that it should've had a handle. Mjolnir is an awesome set because it's life-size and you can swing it around. You can't pick up the shield but even more disappointing is how you can't wall-mount it. LEGO's gone all in on wall-mounting between the Art sets and recent Batwings. Even the new $40 Batwing can be wall-mounted! Wall-mounting should have been an essential feature of this set from the start.

There are two new pieces in the NWH set, a curved trans-clear bar for posing minifigures and a new flexible web. It's not much, but at least it's something!

I love Venomized Groot! I like it a lot more than last year's set. It's much more creative and striking on display, not to mention the awesome feature of rebuilding him to be fully Venomized. And it's better value for money than the original! Really pleased with that set. I also like the classic-style Iron Man minifigure in the 4+ Hulkbuster, although that price is too high. As for the two diorama sets, I do like how displayable they are. The NWH Final Battle looks great and I do love how the Statue of Liberty build is exactly like the one in Apocalypseburg. The minifigures look good but not fantastic. No complaints on the Spideys but Goblin could've used some leg printing. Doc Ock and Electro are perfect (especially Electro with all that yellow lightning) but I did expect Doc Ock to be green instead of grey. No Lizard is a miss and I expected a buildable Sandman head, not just a hand. The set isn't perfect but it's still a 9/10 for me. The new molds are amazing! I love that web piece and the curved transparent rods are perfect for more dynamic flying poses. The Endgame Final Battle concept is great, execution not so much. Yeah, it's a cool display piece with the tower of rubble, but it's not worth $100 at all. The build isn't and the figures certainly aren't. Thanos and his new face print are great, I didn't expect a new helmet mold so I'm not let down by that. The highlight of the set for me is definitely Scarlet Witch. After two years of mediocre minifigures I'm so happy that LEGO has finally knocked her out of the park. The CMF one was well-printed but I didn't like the face print or crown mold and the lack of a skirt let that figure down. The skirt finally returning is AMAZING and the face print is perfect!! I hated the smiling prints on the CMF Wanda figure because she's never that happy. The Sanctum face print is much more accurate to her personality. I'm happy to finally get a proper Endgame Valkyrie but the other figures are a major miss. I like the A-Force scene and love all these heroes, but the reuses don't impress me. This is a $100 set with only one new minifigure and two new prints outside of that figure. The build doesn't provide a lot of value and I know there's a bigfig which drives up the price, but why are the other figures so lacking? What about a proper Wasp or 2023 Nebula minifigure? What about 2014 Gamora? What about a new Rescue? Next to the NWH set, which has 4 non-exclusive minifigures with repeated prints, the lineup here is even more disappointing. This is our third Endgame Final Battle set in 4 years and we still don't have accurate versions of Nebula, Gamora, War Machine, Hawkeye, and Black Widow. I like the set but would like it a lot more if it had 5 new minifigures like the NWH one. We could've gotten all of A-Force at this price point with this build. Nebula would only need a new torso print and Gamora would only need a new face + torso. I do like the diorama idea and I think these are more successful and dynamic than the Star Wars dioramas, so I hope we get more of these displayable battle scenes with plenty of minifigures in the future.

I've got mixed feelings on this set but I'm leaning towards liking it. The figures are definitely a letdown but I've never seen the Burton movies so I'm not really in this for the figures anyway. I just think Catwoman needs more printing and a better cowl. I like the shadow box concept and I think the build looks great, but as others have said there's not enough contrast/light-up features to make the interior stand out when it's closed. And even though I like the shadow box, I still would've preferred a proper gigantic comic-based Batcave at this price point over this unique concept. I wanted this set to be something that reminded me of running through the Batcave in the LEGO video games, and this isn't anything close to that feeling. That being said, I really like the Batcave wall and what I've seen of the moving features. The Batmobile is an amazing build although I'm surprised to see it included here. The bat logos are designed pretty well, but no matter how good the big one looks it still feels like a waste of pieces. I wish LEGO would invest in new light brick designs because this set would be so much cooler if it included lights that could remain on to illuminate the interior when displayed.

I liked Guardians 3 a lot but still think the first movie is the best. The sets are decent but as everyone else is saying, the minifigure selection is lacking. No High Evolutionary across other toy companies explains his absence in the LEGO sets, but Gamora's absence is even more disappointing after seeing the movie. I wish we got both those characters. I already liked the build of the Bowie quite a bit since it's so fun to play with, but after seeing the ship on screen I'm truly obsessed with it. I didn't like the design at first and didn't care about it in the Holiday Special, but now I love it. I want a giant UCS version eventually. For now I want to design my own minifigure-scale Bowie, but I don't even know where to start. I just know I need a bigger one as soon as possible!

I built all the Guardians 3 sets last week, and I'm pretty happy! Star-Lord's Helmet is actually a great display piece, although the retail price is still unreasonable. Baby Rocket's ship is cute but needed the High Evolutionary, and I love the little HQ set just as much as I did in photos. The Bowie has absolutely blown me away, though. It's a much cooler build than I expected. It really pops on a shelf thanks to the unique design and color scheme. But more importantly, it's so much fun to fly around! I haven't loved swooshing a LEGO set this much in years. I'm obsessed with it! I was also surprised that 4 minifigures fit in the main ship, plus another 2 on the escape pods. That's twice as much as I was expecting! I just wish there was more investment in the minifigures. We needed Gamora and given the repeated uniform print for all the Guardians, Drax and Mantis could've gotten new face prints. The only issue I have with the build is that I wish the rings moved down so we could land the ship like in the trailer. I like this set so much I might actually try to modify the rings because that would make the build perfect.

The Marvels looks fantastic. Love all three main characters and the place-swapping concept is the best plot device the MCU's ever come up with to limit superheroes' powers. I'd be really happy if we get a set based on the SABER space station. I definitely want to see a minifigure of Dar-Benn too, her costume is understated but cool and I'm so happy to see the Accusers return.

Stan Lee would be an excellent choice! If it's a hero I think a Spidey or Iron Man variant are most likely though. Although a comic-based Kang would be awesome too.

I really liked Fury of the Gods and I'm disappointed we didn't get a set! The dragon is a pretty unique design and the costumes on the Daughters of Atlas were incredible. I also far prefer the new Shazamily costumes to the first movie's so I really would've loved any minifigures based on the movie. Oh well...

Unfortunately I had to compress most of my Rivendell build into two days, but it was still epic. I really love a lot of the techniques used. The roof is just gorgeous in person and definitely worth the effort! The only part of the build I don't like is the main tree in the Council area. The leaves and branches are always moving around and get knocked out of alignment way more easily than I expected. Don't think I have any other complaints, though. It's absolutely one of the best sets ever made, in my top 3 for sure. Orthanc looks surprisingly great next to it as well! A decade separates the builds but they still display together beautifully. I think the $500 price is justified, honestly. I do think the build's size alone doesn't feel totally worth it, but there's so much detail in every aspect of the set that I don't feel like it's overpriced. When I factor in the minifigures, several new molds, new prints, and over 6,000 pieces I think the $500 price is fine. It's not a steal like some D2Cs used to be, but I don't feel cheated or upset at the finished product when I think about the price (like I did for some 2022 D2C sets). My opinion may be slightly biased though because I used VIP points to knock off a significant amount of the cost.

The new cowl is interesting. It's awesome to get a new piece but it does seem comical and more fitting for a minifigure from the animated series. The cape is definitely an issue too. I hate the singe-hole capes LEGO has been doing recently because they don't lie flat against the minifigure's back and don't wrap around their shoulders as nicely. A standard double-hole cape would look better with this cowl for sure.

Ms. Marvel's show costume is one of the best in the entire MCU! The new one looks okay in the poster for The Marvels but it's just too much. I really hope we get a standard Ms. Marvel in the CMF series and then the space costume variant in The Marvels set.

I think it's laughable to call characters like Harrow a "far better choice" than Kahhori. Even just from a business standpoint - what kid would want a random guy with a cane over a cool new superhero? We've all got our own preferences, but her potential inclusion in the CMF honestly makes perfect sense. This is more of a personal taste thing, but I'd rather see new heroes over variants of ones we already know. I didn't like Zombie Cap's inclusion in the last series, for example. The figure was cool but the character appeared for approximately one minute. We could've gotten much more important and visually interesting What If characters instead, like Strange Supreme or Infinity Ultron. And I'd absolutely take Kahhori over characters like Talos, Mobius, Mr. Knight, Scarlet Scarab, etc. because they're all basically guaranteed to show up again in the future. This one episode is likely Kahhori's only appearance, so I'd rather we get a unique minifigure for her instead of wasting the slot on characters that are sticking around (and don't need CMF budgets). Honestly, I wish we'd just get sets for the Disney+ shows or more than 12 figures in the CMF so we could have all the main characters of the shows plus a nice selection of What If characters. I wish it wasn't an "either/or" situation.

This is a great point. Why wouldn't we want completely original superhero characters in the CMF that probably won't ever appear outside of a What If episode? I definitely want Infinity Ultron, but he's old news at this point. I don't think the CMF will revisit shows that were already covered in Series 1 and to the best of our knowledge, Infinity Ultron isn't in What If Season 2. If we're doomed to get another 5 What If figures I'd much rather see striking new characters like Kahhori over a third Captain Carter.

This is exactly the kind of thing I want to see from What If...?, both story-wise and LEGO-wise. I did like the What If minifigures in Series 1 even if I thought there were too many of them, but they were basically just existing characters wearing the costume of another character. Kahhori is completely new and if we get What If figures in Series 2, I'd love to see a wholly original character like her get a slot!

I think this is the best option. Officially comic-based with tons of minifigs but Keaton-adjacent so it thematically matches with the Flash set and movie.

That's true. We don't usually see $450 playsets from LEGO. Aside from the Death Star, Diagon Alley, and Rivendell everything above $400 is usually just a big display piece with few to no minifigures. But at this price we should definitely be getting a ton. I don't want to believe we'll get 20 because I don't want to be disappointed, but that's kind of pessimistic. I keep comparing this set's figure count to $250-350 sets but LEGO has gone above and beyond with minifigs in the Bugle, Death Star, and Rivendell. In a $450 definitive Batcave set we should be getting every Batman character humanly possible. I really hope LEGO goes crazy with this set because DC's been kind of forgotten in the past few years. I'll save the skepticism for Marvel since that's where LEGO has actually disappointed us recently. I still want my Arkham D2C though. I'll take a giant Batcave but I'd much rather get an Arkham next year instead of a Wayne Manor to put on top, even though I'd also like that.

In interviews the designer said they look at how many new figures they can make in a year. Essentially, the same figures came in the Bugle and retail sets to spread out the minifig budget, and in the end the Bugle only had 9 unique prints. If we only have a Batman D2C coming this year and no regular retail sets, I think there's no way we get 20 brand new minifigures. Looking at other D2Cs, the only others with 15+ minifigs are Star Wars and Ninjago City sets that also repeat many characters from regular sets. But we also have Rivendell that's bursting at the seams with brand-new prints and molds with no sign (yet) of them being reused this summer. Also, Rivendell is relaunching a theme after a 10-year break and this Batcave is essentially relaunching the DC theme as well after a couple slow years. So maybe LEGO really will go all out to make up for 2022. Of course, it's a moot point if we do get summer playsets, since those figures can be repeated in the D2C or vice-versa. And as @spiderfan2000 pointed out we could see reuses from 2020-2022 if the prints are still in production. I'd also love to be wrong and see 20 exclusive figures in the Batcave with a bunch of new characters. I just think it's kind of an unrealistic expectation when the only comic-based DC products we've gotten in two years are 4+ Joker and Harley Quinn sets. And honestly with the way LEGO's done the Marvel D2Cs recently I'm just keeping my expectations low. The Bugle feels like a major anomaly to me, not the norm. But Rivendell is a great sign and hopefully it sets a new standard for licensed D2Cs. Ignoring Rivendell, I think we'll get repeats of Batman, Batgirl, Joker, Harley, and Penguin from 2021-2022. I'd rather see new versions of Joker and Harley but I'd also like LEGO to save money where they can and use the budget to give us new characters like Mad Hatter. And maybe finally a Clayface minifigure? I actually think it would be really awesome if this Batcave set was based off the LEGO video games. That would be a dream come true!

Definitely agree on the bats, but I think expecting even 20 minifigures is out of the question. The Bugle got to 25 by reusing existing prints for civilians and entire minifigures from sets that released a couple months earlier. With the lack of regular DC playsets, we don't have many minifigures that could be reused. We also won't get civilian characters that reuse parts. This is a point I made when the Sanctum was released, but that set had the same number of new minifig prints as the Bugle despite having 16 figures less. I'd expect more than 9-10 new prints in the Batcave but I'm not expecting 20. I just hope we get at least 10 decent figures. This set will take the place of the 1966 Batcave in my display. I was going to put Joker Manor there (haven't built it yet) but now I'll put the Manor on top of this new Batcave if possible.

I'm pretty excited for this but would've been even more excited if it was Arkham. The two things that worry me are the enclosed walls and low piece count for the price. Walls sound great but I don't want them at the expense of more interior detail. I'd like a space for minifigure-scale Batmobiles but I don't want too many vehicles in here. I really love the 1966 Batcave though so this one sounds great already. For minifigures, I hope we get new variants of some Bat-family members and maybe one or two new specialized Batsuits. For villains, I want Harley and the Joker, maybe some repeats, and hopefully a new character or two. The Daily Bugle included 5 new characters but only had 10 or so new prints. I'm hoping this set has more new prints and fewer minifigures than the Bugle. I'd be happy with 12-18, I don't think we need 25.

I would unironically love a UCS Quinjet. I've liked pretty much every build LEGO has done for one and a UCS one could finally fit every Avenger inside. This set is too expensive to be one IMO but a $200-250 UCS Quinjet and Milano are desperately needed in the future.