Gryphon Ink

I went to TRU and Target to see if they had any Burrows or Hagrid's Huts. Of course they didn't. Got 7947 Prison Tower Rescue instead. I like it a lot, but it annoys me no end to find that the Dragons are not just outnumbered, but also outclassed as the Lion Knight and Princess are by far the best minifigs in the set. Hopefully the Wizard that I ordered last week will come in soon and restore some balance. Also, hello pink armor!

My own two cents: we need more female minifigs, and not just athletes and entertainers. Amazon Gender: female Occupation: Amazon Headgear: long braid Facial Expression: two-sided, grim / alarmed Torso: leather or bronze armor Accessory: bow and sword Knitter Gender: female Occupation: knitter / crocheter Headgear: textured skullcap or short female hair (please don't make her a stereotypical granny) Facial Expression: concentrating / happy Torso: an Aran pullover or Fair Isle cardigan Accessory: knitting needles and/or crochet hook, ball of yarn, cat Veterinarian Gender: female Occupation: veterinarian Headgear: Molly Weasley hair or short ponytail Facial Expression: smiling, with glasses Torso: white lab coat Accessory: cat or rabbit and syringe Elf Maiden Gender: female Occupation: archer / healer Headgear: like Elf head with the ears, but longer hair pinned back Facial Expression: two-sided, kindly / one arched eyebrow Torso: blue or green with silver embroidery Accessory: bow (or sword, if you want to make her not be exactly like the existing Elf minifig) and shoulder pouch a la Indiana Jones. Bride of Frankenstein Gender: female Occupation: monster Headgear: um, Bride of Frankenstein hair? Towering black and white 'do that inspired a thousand copycats? Facial Expression: disgusted Torso / Legs: low-cut black gown Accessory: her hair Cat Burglar Gender: female Occupation: cat burglar Headgear: domino mask and short female hair or black skullcap Facial Expression: flirtacious / secretive smile Torso: black sweater Accessory: black backpack, money and gems (a necklace would be awesome!) Gardening Granny Gender: female Occupation: hobby gardener Headgear: wide-brimmed hat Facial Expression: smiling grandmother face, maybe with glasses Torso: colorful shirt Accessory: spade, watering can, flower Also, putting in another vote for Gill-Man AKA the Creature from the Black Lagoon.

I tip my hat to you. That is AMAZING! I love all the details that make this seem so lively and real. This is an inspiration. Enough fawning - I must remark that your guards leave much to be desired... I suggest you tighten up the discipline. Hanging one or two of the dice-players will do wonders for security in your magnificent castle.

Pirates of the Caribbean drinking game: you take a small sip of rum every time they show something that is historically or nautically inaccurate, or every time there is a completely ludicrous plot twist. Even a veteran drinker should be on the floor long before the first movie ends, and dead from alcohol poisoning by the end of the series. I have to admit it's kind of crazy that Disney really expect no one will notice that the QAR IS the Black Pearl.

I just read that Disney are "quietly telling cast and crew members of Pirates to keep their schedules free" because they plan to go ahead with POTC 5 and 6, so this theme could potentially be running for a very long time - long enough for us to get every ship and scene we've been wanting from the first three movies. Could be LEGO Star Wars all over again, unless people suddenly get very tired of pirates. Best stock up on your yellow pirates now, people. They might be taking another decade-long hiatus. Of course, it's always possible that things will change, especially if Johnny gets tired of being Captain Jack. And his schedule does make things tricky. But I bet Disney will make it happen. It's not like they don't have money to pay him. Link to article: Pirates 5 and 6 back-to-back?

Still need a Gill-Man (AKA Creature from the Black Lagoon). I really, really want him.

Chiming in with everyone else, this is the first series that I will actually buy. Why? Because not one of the stores in my area has ever carried the CMFs, I dislike paying scalper prices for a specific opened minifig online, and every other series had about half "meh" figures and half cool ones, making it a big risk to buy sealed figs online. This series is almost entirely coolness, and has a lot of figures I wouldn't mind getting multiples of. I can order a few of these online without worrying too much that I'm throwing money away on a quartet of crash test dummies. Even the skater boy looks way cooler than any LEGO skater boy I've ever seen. I think the horned Viking helmet is just an example of TLG opting for icons instead of historical accuracy. The "Tribal Chief" headdress is also historically inaccurate, and most artists don't actually wear berets. Anybody else thinking that mad scientist figure would be totally perfect for a Re-Animator MOC?

Sweet! But have you thought about adding a weapons system? No, really. Very nice. Instantly brings all kinds of old cartoons to mind.

I have exactly the same feeling about my Midi SD! I keep looking at it and thinking damn, I could do so much with those pieces, but it looks way too good to take apart.

I actually think the old van looks better. This one feels a bit sterile to me. And the dog is definitely cute, but odd. I get that they were going for "young German Shepherd", but it looks a bit kangaroo-mutanty IMO. Maybe this is the Space Police Kangarog unit. Definitely good to have two different dog molds, though. To those who are looking for them right now, I have seen these in TRU as of last Sunday. They had one or two each of most of the 2011 sets (including Pharaoh's Quest), although it looks like their shelves are constantly being ransacked. Good luck finding a Harry Potter set of any kind - they seem to last about ten minutes on the shelf....

I keep thinking about this set. The more I look at the pictures, the more I like the biplane. No, it's not realistically proportioned, and that threw me off at first. It looks like a little cartoon steampunk bird-styled aeroplane. And I find that I really like that. I can imagine it expanded to make the wings even more swoopy and add some brass pipes and fittings for extra steampunkitude. That's awesome. I agree that the set seems a few dollars overpriced for the number of parts that you get, but I want to buy it anyway. I think that many years down the road, people will be waxing nostalgic about the 7307 biplane.

To whoever says there's no playability or memorable characters in the Hobbit, you should really reread the book and think about how it will look on the silver screen. There are: A scene with wolves and goblins chasing the heroes down the mountainside, into a forest, surrounding them in a tall tree and setting the tree on fire right before giant eagles rescue the good guys. A lengthy fight and flight inside a labyrinthine goblin stronghold, which includes Gollum's underground lake lair somewhere inside it. A bit in a forest with three trolls sitting around a campfire, drinking beer and roasting sheep, then capturing the heroes. An off-screen scene (which I bet won't be offscreen in the movies) with a GIANT WEREBEAR beating the snot out of a bunch of goblins, and said werebear's beautiful house complete with animal servants. Rivendell, featuring one kind of elf. The enormous forest castle of the Wood-Elves (a different kind), complete with camouflaged door, dungeons and river access. Giant spiders attacking the heroes in the trees. A dragon incinerating a human town built on top of a lake and being shot down by a mighty warrior. The Lonely Mountain, which has at least three or four main areas that could be playsets. The Battle of Five Armies - humans, elves, dwarves, goblins+wolves, eagles. There are five or six different architectural styles, dozens of characters in about a dozen different main types, and three different kinds of oversized monsters including the mother of all dragons - and this is all without even thinking of madeup movie scenes and tie-ins with LOTR's larger world, which Jackson and del Toro both said that they were going to do. (For example, showing some of the wizards' fight with the Necromancer (Sauron) and bringing Radagast the Brown into the story). I seriously doubt that TLG are so poor in imagination that they can't think up a dozen or more totally amazing sets from all this.

The Burrows. I haven't bought it because I'm hoping I've dropped enough hints that I'll be getting it for Christmas. If the hints were not enough, or my wife chooses not to indulge my "children's toy fantasy", I have the money set aside for it.

I love the alternate history work, and your costuming is great. I have one minor nitpick about this, though: This could almost be true, but not quite. There have been a number of countries where slavery was outlawed at least temporarily before the "Pirates" timeframe: Cyrus the Great freed all slaves within his mandate around 600 BCE, Stephen I of Hungary did the same around 1000 CE, Iceland abolished slavery in 1117, Sweden started outlawing slavery in 1335, the Republic of Ragusa in 1416, Japan started in 1587, and the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1588. Some of these countries were guilty of backsliding later on (Sweden sticks out as a participant in the Transatlantic slave trade as late as 1813, and Japan kept a tradition of harsh servitude until the 1850s) but for a time at least, each one of them was technically a slavery-free zone. I feel almost trollish for mentioning this in the context of Lego Pirates, but I'm geeky like that, and it seems like you've put a lot of effort into your history.

There is something in what you say here, but kids also like stories that emotionally resonate with them, and characters that they can identify with. The OT has those in spades. And the PT, although generally reviled by OT fans, has them as well. I have a nine-year-old girl who eats, drinks and breathes OT Star Wars. She likes the PT and CW, too. But there's no basis for saying that 21st-Century kids won't appreciate the assault on the Death Star just because it doesn't have five million ships in it and hyperkinetic editing. As to the original question: I'm a johnny-come-lately and maybe I haven't earned the right to speak about this yet, but I personally do appreciate the new OT and PT sets and re-releases quite a bit, because I haven't had the chance to build all the old ships yet. (We won't count the hideous abortion of a Lego X-Wing that I made when Star Wars was first released, okay?) At the same time, I recognize that the CW sets are Lego's current bread and butter. But personally, they don't appeal to me much. Most of the CW ship designs seem pretty cheap, like the designers couldn't afford to work on them as long as the original movie designers did - which is, of course, the case. That "cheapness" usually translates to Lego sets that aren't very inspiring.

Yes, if by "authentic-looking Legolas" you mean "Legolas with a silly little moustache and beard".

I went ahead and ordered Kraken Attackin', plus the Kingdoms Wizard. My first direct purchase from the Lego site!

It's too bad the plane isn't all it should be. The set isn't looking as good as I first thought. I still want those flying mummies, though. One point: there were a lot of early biplanes whose machine guns fired straight through the propellor. They used interrupters to synchronize the gun so it wouldn't shoot the propellor off. So that is authentic, even if the proprtions aren't right overall.

I play with my 9YO. That was what started me on Legos in the first place, looking for an activity that we could share because I felt she was not getting as much attention anymore since our second daughter was born. It's good for both of us, I think. Mind you, I just started with this, and my entire collection is maybe ten sets. I am completely staggered by those here who have entire rooms full of bricks and full-sized towns. I also build Duplo monstrosities with the 2YO, but those are her bricks, not mine.

Sooooo... this fourth movie does not have Will Turner, Elizabeth Swann, Davy Jones, Tia Dalma, Ragetti, Norrington or the Black Pearl in it. And the script shoehorns Jack Sparrow into a preexisting book with totally different characters and themes. This should be... interesting. At least Barbossa is in it.

I'm just disappointed that there are so few sets from the first three movies. I would have liked to see the duel in the smithy and something from Shanghai, not to mention Tia Dalma's shack. In my dreams there was a $10 set that included a tiny desert island with one hatch and one tree, Captain Jack, two bottles of rum and a pair of sea turtles. That said, I trust that Lego will do a proper job turning these scenes into exciting sets, even if the movie sucks. I will definitely buy that Isla de Muerta set. And I take the absence of the Pearl as a sign that they are planning to have more than one wave of POTC, since I really can't imagine the theme without it. As for the Flying Dutchman, I never really wanted it. The Dutchman is enormous, and I really doubt that it would have turned out decent in minifig scale unless it was four feet long and cost as much as the Death Star. Maybe the Dutchman could be the first POTC Midi set! (EDIT: after doing some reading, it turns out the Dutchman is not really that much bigger than the Pearl. It just seems like it.)

My favorite characters in the whole franchise! And his toys were so much cooler than the "real" toys! I always wished they would produce a line of "Sid toys".

Respectfully, as a new member here and a new Lego builder as well - yes! Throughout the books and movies, Hogwarts is depicted as a place that is loaded from dungeons to parapets with quirky magical "play features" including trap doors, secret passageways, moving stairs, transforming bathrooms, disappearing rooms, paintings that double as doors, poltergeists that like to fling things at students, and many other neat things. I would have expected Hogwarts to be the "Imperial Flagship" of the Harry Potter line, especially the Hogwarts set that is being released with the final movie(s), and I think it could have been designed with more of these oddities in place, even if it cost more money. Clone O'Patra mentioned several features that could have been improved. I agree with all those points and would have liked even more. The price for this set is already out of my reach, honestly - but if it had possessed more of these features and cost another $40 or so, it would have been something that I could justify saving up for. As it is, it's just not that interesting to me. Actually, seeing as Hogwarts is such an important (and huge) location, I would have really liked for TLG to do a modular Hogwarts, releasing it as three or four sets with serious detail and playability that combine to become the whole castle. I know this is not really how Lego works, but I think it would have produced a wonderful Hogwarts. And hey, they could have sold more minifigs that way, too. I would have liked a set that includes Moaning Myrtle's bathroom and a greenhouse.

I was just looking at this on Target's website, and according to them his name is Mac McLoud. Falls under the category of "things you can't unread."

.Batle of Naboo for me. I'm mostly an OT fan, not too interested in CW at all, and Pharoah's Quest and POTC will chew up most of my available cash.