Karalora

Here are a few winter holiday characters I've put together from existing parts in the past couple of years. From left to right: Ebenezer Scrooge, a classic/"Old World" Santa Claus, Snowman, Snow Queen (devised before the CMF Ice Queen was announced), Baby New Year, and Krampus!

^^^ Okay, he needs to be a CMF like yesterday.

That chocolate fountain is superb! Even the notches in the dome brick enhance the design because they make it look like the chocolate is dripping.

I think that's okay. Not all the figures in the Monsters series were that exciting and some of them were obvious rehashes/variations of existing figures, but it was still a great series and a fun theme that didn't rely on a license. Even in the regular series, we often get rehashes of the types of figures included in City or Castle sets. Part of the point of this thread is to come up with unique ideas to make a Winter CMFs line as interesting as possible.

I look forward to seeing it!

This is very charming! I love visiting antique shops, especially when they have a unique specialty!

Bumping this now that it's more timely.

Copied from the other thread: Now that the Walt Disney World Castle set is out and a huge hit, I would like to reiterate my wish for an entire line of sets based on the Disney theme parks. The thing is, such a concept has the potential to fulfill almost everyone's wishes. You want pirates? They've got 'em. Fairy tales? In the bag. Jungle safari with lots of animals? Ever hear of the Jungle Cruise or Disney's Animal Kingdom? Architecture and world landmarks? World Showcase at Epcot. Old West? Frontierland. Classic-style Space? Tomorrowland. Vehicles? Disneyland alone has an iconic fire engine, double-decker bus, antique car, and famous train. Not to mention the infinite potential for crossover with Star Wars, Marvel, and Indiana Jones.

Now that the Walt Disney World Castle set is out and a huge hit, I would like to reiterate my wish for an entire line of sets based on the Disney theme parks. The thing is, such a concept has the potential to fulfill almost everyone's wishes. You want pirates? They've got 'em. Fairy tales? In the bag. Jungle safari with lots of animals? Ever hear of the Jungle Cruise or Disney's Animal Kingdom? Architecture and world landmarks? World Showcase at Epcot. Old West? Frontierland. Classic-style Space? Tomorrowland. Vehicles? Disneyland alone has an iconic fire engine, double-decker bus, antique car, and famous train. Not to mention the infinite potential for crossover with Star Wars, Marvel, and Indiana Jones.

And there are even greater physical differences between a human and a trapezoid, but we're all okay with plain trapezoids representing one half of humanity, but not the other half. Why is that? You didn't say that. You didn't have to--it's a society-wide assumption. Point out where I said that, please? What does this have to do with the design of minifigs? Not always very noticeable ones, especially when wearing clothes that tend to obscure them. If you like. But then why not be more even-handed about it? Most women have visible boobs and waistlines. Most men have shoulders noticeably broader than their waists and hips. Let's start seeing some negative space on male minifigs to reflect that! If that strikes you as ridiculous, you might do well to ask yourself why. Fella, if I want to talk about objectification, I will dang well use the word "objectification." I know some cancer survivors who would beg to differ. Extreme example, maybe, and probably one LEGO has no intentions of addressing, but let's watch the absolutist statements, hm? And just because a woman has breasts and a narrow waist doesn't mean they will always be noticeable. Here's a great example: You could Photoshop a dude's head in place of hers, and most people would believe it was a skinny guy. Because what she's wearing does not accentuate the shape of her body at all. All I'm saying is that minifigs in similarly baggy or obscuring clothing be handled similarly. Then you're not reading my entire posts. I addressed this in the last one.

Well, if you'll review my posts, you'll notice that I said I have no issue whatsoever with the cinched-in look on female minifigs who are depicted wearing tight or well-tailored clothing, Those are the sorts of outfits where the female figure is noticeable in real life, so it makes sense on minifigs as well. Where it gets odd is cases like this torso, which represents bulky Arctic survival gear but nonetheless has a visible waistline. As for differentiating female minifigs without an hourglass figure print, there's always the, you know, face. Adult female minifigs tend to have visible lips and eyelashes, even if their hair is short or obscured. I am completely okay with that; a glance at an adult's face is usually enough to tell whether they are presenting as male or female, and although the differences are subtler than obvious makeup, on something as simplified as a minifig they have to be more defined. Pick away, if you like.

Neither one, however, is trapezoidal. If that shape suffices for one it should suffice for the other. Let me try a different tack. How would you guys feel if, after years of the "neutral" appearance, every male minifig started to be depicted with noticeable pecs/sixpack, maybe a little chest hair peeking out of the collar area? Maybe you assume you'd be fine with it. And maybe you would--it's unlikely that this would ever be put to the test, since male is treated as the default, and female as the oddity that needs a special marking. But it might be worth keeping in mind that we women do not see ourselves as an oddity, and the fact that the makers of media and toys nearly always feel the need to highlight the femaleness of female characters sometimes makes us feel like we can't just be people. And honestly? The defensiveness of most of the commenters in this thread is a bit eyebrow-raising. From where I sit, coronaking and I have been nothing but reasonable, and folks are acting like we accused TLG of writing policy for the Taliban. Why the freakout, guys?

It's sexism in that it's treating the sexes differently when it's not necessarily warranted. Not all sexism is as severe as "get back in the kitchen" rhetoric.

There is a slightly sexist ramification of the hourglass figure printing, in that it effectively designates the "standard" LEGO torso as male. Before the advent of this printing trick, any LEGO body could be equally considered male or female, and if anything it was hairstyle that marked the difference. Now female torsos are designated with a particular image, but male ones remain the standard trapezoid. It's an example of "male as default," which gets up the hackles of feminists such as myself (and presumably the OP). It's not that the cinched-in look for minifigs exists, it's that all female minifigs are given the cinched-in look, even if the print otherwise suggests bulky clothing or a unisex uniform that would not accent a woman's figure. At the same time, it reduces the versatility of torsos--I remember people being annoyed that the Zookeeper CMF was given a noticeable waistline because they liked the design of her uniform but felt weird re-using it for male minifigs. And she is actually a fairly subtle example. So yeah...in my perfect world, unless a female minifig was wearing skintight or very tailored clothing, she would get the same trapezoid as the guys. In the world we live in, it's only a minor annoyance, but I can see where the OP is coming from.

Thank you for pointing that out, Boromir. I'm a stickler for correct names myself.

Kind of. We went over this a while back--the set is called "Cinderella's Castle" because it's a simplified version of the castle at Walt Disney World in Florida, which goes by that name. It's not the Disney castle because there is no the Disney castle--the one in the current movie logo is a hybrid design with elements of both Cinderella's Castle (Walt Disney World) and Sleeping Beauty Castle (Disneyland). Neither castle really resembles the one in the associated animated movie, and neither one is the best place in the theme park to meet its associated Princess--the Princesses are more commonly found at meet-and-greet spots elsewhere. The names are more symbolic than anything--labeling this as a magical fairy tale castle and the gateway to Fantasyland.

Yes please to all three! I really do hope the success of this set leads to more Disney park LEGO sets in general. I made a couple of posts on my Disneyland blog with my ideas.

Katara. The animated character has a dusky complexion (she comes from an Inuit-like ethnic group) and wears her (dark brown) hair in a braid tied at her nape. The minifig uses the light flesh skin tone and a wholly generic reddish-brown ponytail hairpiece.

AW HELL YES!!! That's probably my favorite extant ride in Disneyland. And I don't throw the word "favorite" around lightly. Wouldn't it be awesome to have a Technic-infused build of the facade so we could turn a crank to make the gears spin and the doors open for the doll parade?

I don't think the interior builds are meant to "recreate scenes" from Disney movies. More likely, they are supposed to be collections of props that remind you of Disney movies. Hence why the candelabra has no face--it's not Lumiere the character, but a normal candelabra with the same shape. They do this kind of thing in the Disney parks all the time--a shop in Disneyland Anaheim has a shelf behind the cash registers covered with props that reference some of the movies without exactly replicating anything.

I am really hoping we get more stuff based on the parks. In the meantime, the MOCs people are coming up with are fantastic! Thank you for these, TJJohn12!

The exciting thought for me is that with the Cinderella's Castle set coming out, they might actually make the jump to Pirates of the Caribbean, the ride.

Honestly, if someone drops $350 on a LEGO set based on the assumption that it includes a particular minifig, doesn't verify this assumption via the pictures on the front and side of the box, and then is disappointed to find it doesn't include said minifig...frankly they deserve their disappointment.

Cinderella's Castle is the name of the structure. Just like Walt Disney World is the name of the resort complex even though Walt Disney died long before any of it was built.

I hope I'm not being an megablocks by nitpicking this point, but this set is based on the castle in Walt Disney World (in Orlando, Florida), not Disneyland (in Anaheim, California). In Disneyland, our castle is called Sleeping Beauty Castle and is shorter and cozier looking. But since it comes up...in both parks, the castle is named after a Princess character but the face character doesn't necessarily hang out there. The names are more cosmetic/rhetorical than literal, identifying the castle as a fairy tale castle more so than specifying who supposedly lives there. As others have pointed out, Tinker Bell flies over the castle and sets off the fireworks each night, so it's just as fitting to associate her with the set than Cinderella, if not more so. Disney theme parks take a lot of inspiration from Disney movies, but they are not interchangeable! There is so much more to the parks than just the movie tie-ins!