Gryphon Ink

I have to point out that a lot of the same accusations leveled against Anakin can be made against the supposedly "good" Luke Skywalker, who neglects his chores, lies to his guardians, whines about how unfair things are ALL THE TIME, endangers the Jedi Order and the last hope for the future of the galaxy by willfully ignoring Yoda's directives, constantly insists that he is ready for things when everyone around him can see that he isn't, and generally acts like a selfish prick for almost the entire original trilogy. So, basically, the story of Star Wars is that a selfish, unlikeable, nasty little twerp is tricked into betraying his friends and assisting in the murder of billions of people and the subjugation of countless worlds, throwing himself happily into the business of dominating the galaxy with an iron fist, but then he is redeemed for all his actions when he finally saves his almost equally unlikeable, selfish, whiny son from being murdered by the guy he originally betrayed the whole galaxy for.

WOW. I am in awe. I've made several stabs at building Lego Trek ships, and every time I have to give up because I can't get the kind of organic curve that is so typical of Star Trek designs. You have done that very thing wonderfully. And with one of the better-looking Federation ships, too - I love the Reliant. It looks much more businesslike than the Constitution Class, but recognisably part of the same family. Live long and prosper, dude.

Personally, I think they both have problems, but the Fantasy Era troll is far cuter. And I've always hated the Harry Potter movies' version of a troll. It looked incredibly ugly - and not ugly in a good way, like LOTR trolls, just stupid ugly - and not much better in Lego form. If anything, the Fantasy Era troll's big problem is that it's TOO cute. You don't want to kill it, you want to take it home and give it a saucer of milk.

The fact that we don't all agree on it is what makes it controversial. "Controversy" means "disagreement". There's usually not a lot of controversy about things that everybody agrees are bad. Yes, many changes are controversial at first and gradually become widely accepted, but it doesn't follow that every controversial thing is a thing of merit. Other things that are extremely controversial: racism (most of us agree that it sucks, but many disagree about what exactly constitutes racism, and it still happens all over the world), dogfighting (most of us hate it, but again, still widely practiced), circumcision (again) and Greedo shooting first. Would you say those are all things of merit? Racism is actually the best example for illustrating the controversy here, because it's an issue that has popped up in Lego form before and it's an issue that the "correct" answer to depends very strongly on who you're talking to. There is currently a very strong sentiment throughout the Western world that racism is bad - you will have a hard time finding someone who will publicly admit to being a racist. With this mindset, you might think that racism is quite, quite dead. And yet, institutional racism continues to divide our country, there are incidents of race-based hate crimes every day in every town, and there are dozens if not hundreds of blogs and websites dedicated to pointing out the many ways in which racism continues to infect our society. There are provable facts and statistics showing that racism is far from dead - but nobody approves of racism. How is this possible? Because the definition of racism depends on your point of view. To some of us, the fact that multiple studies have proven that two equally qualified job candidates will have different success rates in their job hunting based solely on whether they have a "white name" or a "black name" is clear evidence of systemic racism. Other people will bend over backwards to explain that there are many different reasons why this could happen. If all else fails, they will attack the validity of the studies. Any explanation, anything at all, will do, as long as it doesn't involve admitting that there is still quite a bit of racism in our society. Similarly, the controversy over Lego Friends exists because we do not all agree in our basic philosophies. To some of us, the fact that Lego is largely seen as a boys' toy that "doesn't sell" to girls, justifies their attempts to reach out to the female audience with gender-divisive marketing and a new kind of minifig. To some of us, it is obvious that a pioneering and idealistic company like TLG should have known better and should have tried harder to rise above the pink-vs-blue gender divide and market to boys and girls equally. Some of us think a company's first moral priority should be making money, while some of us think the first priority should be social responsibility. There isn't a right answer. It depends on your point of view. Personally, I see good things and bad things in Friends, and what I think is good and bad about it is not the same as what you think. It's not even the same as what other people who are largely "on my side" in the debate believe. For example, vexorian hates the minidolls and hopes they will die a quick death. I love the minidolls and think they make minifigs look clunky and old-fashioned, although I certainly agree that there are a few things that need to be improved in their design. Someone who basically agrees with me might say the tools in Olivia's Lab are awesome, I say they're frackin' PURPLE. And yet, I still like the Friends theme overall. I've bought two sets for my girls and one for myself, and if money wasn't so tight here I'd be considering several more of the sets. Olivia's house is seriously the most awesome non-exclusive Lego house in years, bringing design elements from the modulars into the standard retail sets for the first time ever. I love it even in those awful colors. What don't I like? I don't like the marketing. I don't like the purplishness of it all. I don't like the gender and racial stereotyping going on in these sets. I don't like the fact that there is a girls' theme in the first place. I want my Lego unisex, free of racism and open to all. And you (meaning you, hypothetical plural, not you personally) are free to disagree with me on all those points. But you are not free to deny my feelings on any of them. And you are not free to deny that there IS a controversy. Because if I say one thing and you say another thing, then by definition there is a controversy. Putting scare quotes around the word "controversy" doesn't magically resolve the disagreement between us.

Hear, hear. I disagree with some of your points, but yes, there is a controversy. It's not all good, and belittling those who find the theme problematic isn't going to magically make it all good. Something is rotten in the kingdom of Denmark.

I hear ya. I'm also in a situation where I have to be very careful what I buy. I don't even think we're lower middle-class earners here, more like upper lower-class. So, yes, I do a lot of shopping at Walmart even though all my enlightened, better-earning friends say I should boycott Walmart, and I'll totally buy a Lego set on Amazon if their price beats Walmart's. Independent toy stores, however, are a breed of business that's on the verge of extinction, just like independent booksellers. Both are niche businesses that have a really, really hard time competing with big chains and online retailers. Both offer a more personal, individual experience, and both support their local communities instead of some corporate headquarters in who knows where. I try to give both of them some business on a semi-regular basis, even if I can't afford to do all my shopping there. As far as I know, there is not one independent toy store left in my area. There were two really nice ones fairly near, that both closed down in recent years. I loved shopping there. So I say, if they have sets that you want, give them the extra 5% for at least some of your purchases. You'll miss those guys when they're gone and all you have is TRU or the Swiss equivalent of TRU.

In the Hobbit, the Flies and Spiders chapter: "at the head of a long line of feasters sat a woodland king with a crown of leaves upon his golden hair."

Actually, that's a mystery that has never been solved conclusively. In the books, Legolas' eyes are only described as "bright" and "keen", the latter referring more to his vision than to the color. In the movies, his eyes were supposed to be brown, so Orlando Bloom (whose real eyes are very dark blue) wore brown contacts most of the time, but there are several scenes that were filmed without the contacts, so his eyes magically turn blue, and there is at least one scene where he has violet eyes because of something in the digital processing. Another interesting bit of Legolas trivia: in the books, there is no description that says he is blonde. He is only described as "fair". His father Thranduil IS blonde, but most of his race have brown or black hair. Yes, I know way too much about LOTR.

Regarding Anduril, I don't see any reason why they wouldn't make a new mold for a piece that figures prominently in the mythos of a high-profile theme that is supposedly planned to last for years. They made a freakin' Dagger of Time - with not only a new mold, but the more expensive two-tone plastic - for POP.

Actually, if I'm not mistaken, Andrea's beautiful skin color is the same as Sarah's in the Butterfly Beauty Shop. It's really hard to tell from the online pics, and I haven't seen the beauty shop in person, but it does look like they match. So, while the possibilities are still limited, there are SOME mix-and-match options for her. EDIT TO ADD: I just noticed your rating system. Celine Dion better than Alicia Keys? Not in my world.

It's definitely one of my favorites out of the sets that I own. Not only that, but it's the one set everybody from toddlers to twenty-somethings wants to play with when they visit me - and it's strong enough that my three-year-old can play with it and I don't have to fix it every five minutes while she's playing. Awesome value for money. The slewing mechanism really is the only disappointing part, but even that is not too bad.

So says conventional wisdom, and somebody is bound to mention this every time we talk about gender in Lego. To counter, I have only anecdotes about boys who simply loved playing with dolls and girls who loved playing with trucks, until interfering parents or horrified uncles thought that the boys would catch TEH GAY from playing with Barbies, and firmly directed them towards more masculine pursuits. Yes, it's only anecdotes, and probably won't convince you, but I've seen the phenomenon often enough as a parent and a former daycare worker to be really, really sure that what boys and girls "like" to play with has more to do with social programming than with inherent differences between the sexes. And I seriously doubt that boys would suddenly stop wanting Lego because there were two female characters in Pharoah's Quest. The thing about conventional wisdom, especially regarding gender roles, is that in many cases, it's totally wrong thinking based on centuries-old paradigms that were simply never challenged because our whole society was based on them. For at least a couple thousand years, the conventional wisdom was that women would never make good soldiers, or doctors, or engineers, and that to even ask them to fill those roles would be an unnatural perversion that would insult their gender. Fast forward to the late twentieth century, and we suddenly discover that women are perfectly good at all those things, and many of them absolutely love doing them. And they don't even have to wear pink to like their jobs! I would not spend so much time on an AFOL site if I thought TLG was a stupid company. But market leaders in every branch of industry have made bad calls, despite the fact that they almost always do market research before launching a new product. TLG has foundered before, and they will founder again. They have made themes that hardly anybody liked before, and they will do it again. Every company makes mistakes. Disney once thought that Mars Needs Moms was a good idea, and before that they thought it was a good idea to fire Tim Burton and Chris Sanders because their ideas weren't in tune with Disney's corporate culture. Years later, Tim Burton is one of Disney's biggest moneymakers, and Chris Sanders' first non-Disney movie was How To Train Your Dragon (worldwide gross, $500,000,000). Research In Motion used to completely dominate the smartphone market. They had it tied up. They could do no wrong. Then they decided, based on conventional wisdom and market analysis, that the iPhone was just a toy and would never be a significant challenge to Blackberries with a dedicated keyboard and a solid business-ready infrastructure, so they kept on making pretty much the same phone with the same app store. If you had asked me about this situation two years ago, I would have told you RIM were a market dominator and would never make such a stupid mistake. But they did, and they lost their place as market leader. This reminds me of another case where a company defied conventional wisdom and launched products that most hardcore consumers predicted would never sell, and that the company had sealed its own fate: Nintendo. While Sony and Microsoft went all-out to capture gamers with state-of-the-art graphics processors and high-end multimedia drives, Nintendo launched a console and a handheld that couldn't compare in any way. And they followed the hardware launch with hundreds of titles that were decidedly "middle of the road". People said they would lose their audience, because no self-respecting gamer would even buy the Nintendo systems. But Nintendo is currently annihilating the competition in the console wars, because they marketed their weak systems and middle of the road games to audiences far beyond the traditional gaming market - audiences that, by the way, include millions of women and girls that would never think of buying a PS3. And they didn't even lose their traditional audience - most hardcore gamers eventually bought two systems, an X360 or a PS3 AND a Wii. Maybe they don't play the Wii as much as their prefered console - but the money is already in Nintendo's pocket. Lord, I do carry on. Long story short, you could be right, you could be wrong, Friends might be an awesome "gateway drug" for girls to get into Lego, or maybe putting more females in Ninjago and doing some gender-neutral marketing would have made it the toy of the decade - but it's not necessarily true that TLG must know what they're doing because they are professionals and they did some market testing. Remember Mars Needs Moms! (Production budget: $150M. Gross box-office: $40M. Market tested out the wazoo, like every Disney product.) Apologies for the tl;dr.

Is it really oversized? People build massive things on Unimogs. To me, this looks a lot like this: (A Global Expeditions vehicle built on an Unimog). Or this: (A Unicat Amerigo Unimog). It's hard to tell exact scale from the pictures, but it seems like the Command Centre is only off by a little bit compared to those babies. And they aren't even armored, as the Command Centre probably is, because they're just expedition vehicles for rich civilians. (And you thought Lego was an expensive hobby? A Unicat Amerigo will set you back $500,000.) I really think this is the coolest-looking vehicle in the new City lineup. Compared to last year's mobile command trailer which left me cold, I would totally buy this at the right price. The boat is awesome, too. Is it supposed to be a hovercraft? It definitely looks like one.

Actually, no there isn't. There's no stereotyping involved with a construction worker minifig, because "construction worker" isn't a stereotype, it's a job description. Those minifigs don't have shallow personalities, because we don't know anything about their personalities. We only see them on the job. Off duty, the Lego builder is free to imagine that the construction worker's hobbies are anything s/he can imagine, from hang gliding to singing German opera. We can picture them as straight or gay, white or black or Asian, rich or poor, image-obsessed or interested only in sports - whatever we want, they can be. Stereotype level = zero. With the Friends minidolls, on the other hand, we know EXACTLY what their interests are, because their interests are the focus of the sets and because the website tells us. And their interests are stereotypes. The Friends girls are clearly too young to have actual jobs, which is a whole different ball of wax, but I can live with it. All I want for them is a wider, less stereotypical range of interests. How about a couple of girls who like to play soccer? How about an artist, or a sculptor? How about one punk girl in the theme, or a mountain biker, or one who likes fishing or gaming? A girl who likes to cosplay, with steampunk goggles? While we're wishing, how about if the one black character wasn't a singing, dancing diva? You're right, and that is exactly the tactic I think TLG should have focused on for bringing more girls to play with Lego. The shortage of female minifigs in the classic themes is one of the biggest problems for girls. I see this constantly at home. My girls are perfectly happy to play with standard Lego, but they always want the female minifigs. I'm happy that TLG is addressing this issue, but at the same time I think it would have worked just fine without introducing a "girls' theme". Gender neutrality isn't having one special theme for girls with incompatible minidolls and a pastel color palette. Gender neutrality is making your existing themes more neutral. Make Nya a real ninja, for crying out loud. Let there be more than one female per action theme, and let them actually do something aside from being monster bait. Put some pastels in the standard City sets. Design a veterinary theme that doesn't have cutesy misshapen puppies, using the standard Lego animals - they've made plenty of them over the years. THAT would be gender neutrality. This is the opposite. It's gender polarization. Again, I have to state for the record that I don't hate Friends, although the more I post about it the more it sounds like I do. It's not a horrendous theme, and I think my girls might like it. I plan to buy one of the sets for my eldest today, in fact, as a reward for doing a fantastic job in school. (No, it won't be the beauty salon...) But there IS a sexist element to the theme, no matter how much AFOLs want to deny it. I hope that TLG are paying attention to comments that point out problems with the theme, and that they will attempt to fix them in future waves. They did listen to the complaints about not having enough female minifigs, after all. And then we can all be Friends again.

This set is definitely worth buying for the Kyoshi Warriors alone. Oh, wait... No, not on my list, for myself or my kids. The little one can't manage that build yet, and the big one would be be all, "does it come in black?"

Well, Arwen is a big draw, and if they follow the Star Wars pattern of releasing so-so sets with one iconic, must-have figure in them, that's a set right there. I hope they don't do that, though. But seriously, I would buy a smallish set with mounted Arwen, Frodo, two Nazgul, a tree or two and the river, which would have to include a play feature to smash the ringwraiths away. The problem with that is you can't get two minifigs on a horse, so I don't really know that they'd do it. And I agree that it's not exactly the most compelling set they could do - but they are bound to include Arwen at some point, and really she only has one action scene they can use. Which leads us to the next point... Rivendell can only logically include Nazgul if they include the riverside conclusion to that chase scene. Aside from that, the Nazgul never got anywhere near Rivendell. Rivendell's safety is one of its defining aspects. Agree on that. That is a set that MUST appear at some point.

That's an exam table with a movable light. As a vet tech, I can tell you that they don't usually come in pink outside of Heartlake City, but it's a decent model. Another great review, SilentMode, but I think this set isn't all that great. Part of it is undoubtedly due to my being a vet tech and unable to keep myself from snickering at how unrealistic it is, and that's not really fair to the set. But also, I just find it a bit blah. What is the space next to the horse's stall and why is it totally empty? Why didn't they put a hinge on the building so you could close it up? Why are there only two minifigs in a set this size? (Again, a combination of realism and play features - this practice clearly needs more than one doctor and one volunteer/intern, but more importantly I think there should be more people to play with. Sets at this price point in most other themes usually come with at least four minifigs, don't they?) I also really dislike the cartoony animals, and since this set has more of those than any other set, it goes straight to the bottom of my to-buy list. The minidolls I actually like and think they're very appropriate to the target market, although a little more variety would be nice.

No, but it IS fantastic. I especially like the snow-capped bushes! Not really in line with the Winter Village theme, but a superb MOC overall. Looks like it wants to sit next to the MMV.

But the sets are focused on "girls getting their hair done" and other stereotypical "girly" activities. There's a beauty salon, a splash pool, a dance stage, a dog show, a fashion design studio and a "cool convertible" in lilac. It's all pretty stereotypical stuff. Yes, there is some good stuff in the theme, like the veterinary practice, the excellent house and Olivia's lab. But overall, the focus is on looking cute and hanging out. If you look at the Friends section of the Lego website, the characters all have introductions where they tell us what kind of things they love. Emma's is "I love drawing, fashion and giving my friends makeovers!" Andrea says "I love music, singing and dancing with my friends!" Stephanie loves... planning parties! Tell me these girls don't sound shallow and image-obsessed. Mia loves sports and being green, according to her intro. But it's hard to see it, since there's not a single sports set or green-themed set in Friends as yet. She does have the Pet Rescue, so I have to give her points for that. And maybe there will be more Mia-centric sets in future waves. So they're not as shallow or sexist as Barbie or Bratz. That's not exactly setting the bar high, is it? It's really, really not hard to make a product that's not as shallow or sexist as Barbie or Bratz. And for the record, Barbie has had veterinarian playsets since at least the 1980s. It doesn't change who Barbie basically is. She's also served in every branch of the US military and been an astronaut. But the focus of Barbie is still bikini beach parties, pink Jeeps, nights out on the town and hanging out with Ken. The "Friends" sets send a similar message - a couple of sets about inventing and doing worthwhile things for animals, and a bunch of sets about hanging out and being attractive. I don't hate the Friends theme. As an AFOL, I think Emma's house is totally awesome, and as the father of two girls I think Olivia is a neat character. There is a lot of nice building in these sets, some very cool new pieces, and real depth, and I'm happy that TLG took on the challenge of attracting girls to Lego without making the sets as ridiculously pink and "<insert that tiresome argument>" (loaded word, I know) as Belville. As toys for girls, these sets are indeed better than Barbie or Polly Pocket. But they're not perfect. They send a very mixed message to girls, and I think the protestors are justified in pointing out the problematic aspects of that message. If nobody ever pointed out the negative sides of things, things would never get better. "Friends" is not as bad as some of these women are making it sound - but it's also not as shiny and problem-free as most AFOLs, who as a group are predisposed to approve of new Lego products, seem to think. Being a fashion designer, singer, or beauty salon owner is not progressive and liberating. It's the same set of stereotypes we've been seeing in girls' toys since the Sixties. Being an inventor is pretty cool, but the name of the theme is Friends, not Inventors.

That would be my guess, too. I doubt TLG would make a horse that can only be posed rearing since most horses don't spend very long rearing, and articulated legs would be unexpected on a piece that size. I think they decided that with all the horse riding action in LOTR they needed a running horse, and made it so it could rear as well. I like that it doesn't look too different from the existing horse except for its pose. This piece is also telling me that there will be a set for Arwen's rescue of Frodo further down the road. It would be a crime to make running/rearing horses and not do that scene.

My ten-year-old is less than thrilled with the Friends line. Her first response was "why do they need a special theme for girls?", followed quickly by "why is it all pink?" She's not too impressed with the "minidolls", either. Lightning Dragon Battle is still the set she wants. I think the Friends theme has come out much, much better than Belville, with a really nice building experience that actually integrates with standard themes, and less overly pink stuff than I had feared. But I still wonder what the real need for a "girls' theme" was - aside from the fact that TLG want to divert cash flow from Polly Pocket to their pockets, of course.

This was the very first thing I thought of when I saw the first pics of this set. The SECOND thing was "wow, purple tools? That's not sexist at all, is it?" However, despite my issues with the purple-and-pinkness of it all, this is a neat little set with some cool parts and inventive building - that vise is a great idea.

Um, people have complained. In these forums, actually. I remember a couple of cases of parents saying they didn't want their kids playing with all the guns. I remember one who said they never bought any kind of conflict-based toys, and that if they bought a set that had guns or knives in it they took them out. My parents were a lot like this. As a kid, I never had toy guns or anything that resembled realistic modern weapons. Fantasy and science fiction weaponry was okay, but not encouraged. When people with this kind of opinion speak up here, the inevitable response is complete, brutal mockery. Because we have been conditioned to believe that guns are normal things for boys to play with.

At the NY Lego Store, bought one big PAB cup, the Winter Village Post Office and new Catwoman Catcycle City Chase. There was next to nothing on discount, no more Earth Defense HQ sets, and no Pharoah's Quest except for those silly coin banks. I was annoyed, since I had expected some clearance sales, but I know it's my own fault for not checking.

My wife bought me Queen Anne's Revenge for Christmas. My first pirate ship! Although my daughter points out that I do have a rowboat from the Isle de Muerta set.