Lyichir

Oh my god, you can't just ask someone why they're yellow.

I've never understood why people see that as an inconsistency. Lego Batman in BOTH movies already could work in a team, albeit poorly (his membership in the Justice League suggests he has done so in the past in TLBM, even though they predictably chose not to invite a jerk like him to a party). The moral of the story wasn't about working as a team, but about forming meaningful emotional relationships and being part of a family (two skills that he showed absolutely no mastery of in TLM). The same abyss from the first movie being beneath Gotham (complete with file footage of the events of the first movie on the news segment) seems to be evidence enough that they're the same Batman.

Dorgs—Wargs, but more cuddly and they can fetch the paper for you.

Man, that'd be great! I'm not a huge Transformers fan but will be going to see that anyway since I'm working as an intern for Hasbro and will be attending a free screening for employees tomorrow. It'd be amazing to get to see a new trailer for this in front of it! Speaking of Hasbro, I've also noticed that the My Little Pony movie (due for a little later this fall) has yet to get anything more than a very brief teaser trailer. So for me that makes the situation with this movie (where we've at least gotten a full trailer with actual movie footage) seem a bit less worrying. Also, on the question of whether a trailer like that would be announced, it's possible that Lego wouldn't want to directly send fans to a movie based on a property owned by one of their biggest competitors...

Gosh, that reminds me of how I kind of wish there were a Nexo Knights themed game styled after the Fire Emblem series, as opposed to the simple action game we got. I feel like the theme's structure (a small selection of distinct knight characters with discrete weapon types up against hordes of diverse but nameless enemy soldiers) would fit well into that sort of game formula. Plus, I'd love to command cute sprites of the various knights. Of course, that sort of loops back into what I was saying before—I doubt a game like that would necessarily be as successful with kids as the simple, high-adrenaline action game we ended up getting.

You're kind of describing Lego Battles. Well, a third of it anyway. :P Though honestly that sounds like a terrible way to market a theme. Real-time strategy is hardly the biggest genre of video game, let alone the most popular or accessible within Lego's general target demographic of young kids. And I don't think video games generally have THAT much impact on driving sales in the first place. Sure, they can supplement it, as Nexo Knights and several other themes have proven. But if a certain type of theme just isn't testing well with kids, I doubt the expense of trying to MAKE it popular with a video game would be worth it compared to just sticking with the concepts that test better in the first place.

IIRC Bionicle's relaunch was not officially considered a "big bang" theme, since it was a relaunch of an older theme rather than a brand new IP. Also, Nexo Knights didn't officially launch until 2016 (though as with many January releases, many sets came out during the last month of the previous year). Bionicle launched in January of 2015, a full year before Nexo Knights.

For a minute I thought they could just use Wyldstyle's hood, but then I remembered her hair falls on the opposite side on that piece. Not sure how likely it is for us to see this, though, particularly considering we're already getting the same outfit with the hood down in one of the sets.

Ninjago has had a panel at SDCC for the past few years IIRC. If there's one again this year, it'll almost certainly include more info about the movie, probably including a new trailer.

I dunno, I think the latter of the two pictures you shared also looks a little like Silver Metallic (in that it seems a little lighter than Dark Stone Grey and darker than Medium Stone Grey). I suppose we'll see. As cool as a recolor would be, I'm far from certain that that's what we're seeing here.

From some of the other pictures those shoulder pads look like they might just be silver.

I think that if the sequel continues with the metanarrative of Finn and his family (and I hope it does, since that was one of the aspects of the original that elevated it to an all-time great), Finn's sister will probably have aged out of Duplo and into themes like Friends and Elves by that point. Those were sorely missing from the original, so I'm eager to see them. I'd also love to see greater representation of Bionicle, even if that theme has been cancelled. I would also hope that some of the characters introduced in The Lego Batman Movie and The Lego Ninjago Movie will get more time to shine, particularly Robin, since his dynamic with Batman is too good to not continue developing.

I doubt a mere cameo would make any substantial difference in a theme's sales or popularity. Which isn't to say that there can't be one; just that I doubt Lego's marketers have any interest in shoehorning in cameos for any sort of hypothetical sales boost.

I do think that fantasy makes more sense for a modern many-faction theme, simply because of how much easier it would make it for kids to differentiate them. Someone brought up a comparison to Chima's huge number of factions, and that's a perfect example—it'd be very hard for kids to mix up a lion vehicle and a wolf vehicle, or a raven fig and an eagle fig. Elves and KK2 are other examples, using bright colors to differentiate characters and their alignments. It'd be harder to achieve that with more nuanced distinctions between human factions—especially if you wanted "realistic" castles that limited color distinctions between factions to accent colors on largely grey or black buildings. Fantasy settings also allow for a wider range of architecture to be used for different factions, as opposed to many "realistic" medieval conflicts which tended to be between factions which largely had similar cultures and use of technology (the main exception being conflicts like the crusades that'd be touchy subjects from a modern perspective). I think Fantasy Castle's over-the-top sensibilities tended to make this work—Dwarves and human knights looked very different from one another, as did trolls and skeletons, and the sensibilities of their structures and vehicles differed greatly as well. It also helped that that theme's multiple factions still boiled down to two major "alliances", with the humans and dwarves working together against the undead and troll factions. I wouldn't mind seeing a new castle theme like that.

The first opportunity might still not be next year, though. Keep in mind that the past several Castle themes (including Nexo Knights) have generally debuted three years after their predecessors, even though Castle 2013 and Kingdoms each only lasted for two full years. So even if Nexo Knights ends after this year, another Castle theme (traditional or otherwise) may not be ready to replace it until 2019.

I'm not even sure whether there WAS something planned there. From what I can tell Brickset added it and the rest of the internet followed their lead, but without knowledge of Brickset's source it could just as easily have been a misentry on THEIR part. Of course, I can't remember if we have a firm idea of all of this year's remaining D2C sets. There's always the chance that Lego could surprise us with an Elves set in that category. I mean, I don't think the summer 2015 Ninjago sets included any hints of the Temple of Airjitzu in their box or instructions.

^Saw that this morning! It gives the best look so far at how that set's function works.

I see people talking about a mask for Shocker, so I figured I'd pop in with a suggestion... how about this? It's not a perfect likeness, obviously, but might be the best purist solution for the time being.

There have been several movie-exclusive molds, actually... most notably the various expressive cowls for Batman in TLBM. I don't see Nightwing as unlikely in either a second CMF series or a third wave of sets, but just because a mold appears in the movie doesn't necessarily mean it's guaranteed to appear in real life.

Whether they could would depend largely on the terms of the license. However, even if they could, I don't think they would. Producing Thomas building toys concurrently with a competitor would mean that each would get a smaller piece of the pie, and could potentially lead to brand confusion, something Lego takes great pains to avoid.

I think part of it might hinge on when a second series of BrickHeadz drops. Your suggestions make a lot of sense if series 2 is a summer or autumn release. But if they are released next March (a full year after the first wave), some might be based on more recent movies (such as Black Panther, which comes out in February). A Black Panther BrickHeadz figure might be deemed more appropriate than Loki, considering I don't even know if Loki's role in Ragnarok will be as large as his role in the first two Thor movies. I also have to wonder whether Vulture would be able to fit in the same price point as other characters, considering I couldn't really see them offering him without his signature wing pack, which is massive in Homecoming. So perhaps that slot would be better filled by another Marvel character—perhaps Star Lord? There's also a lot of potential for BrickHeadz based on franchises that haven't been featured yet—chief among them being Star Wars.

It'd be weird of them to call Nelson a "new character", considering he's neither new to the show or to the sets. I would think that it'd be an actual character we hadn't seen before.

Did something get left out of your post? You said the rocket looks nice, and therefore doesn't appeal to you? As for why they're launching it, it got 10,000 supporters, and apparently had a strong enough business case to pass review. The overwhelmingly positive reception from reviewers and other press seems to indicate that that business case had merit...

I believe it's happened in the past (hence Bricklink and Brickset often identifying sets with a "-1" or "-2" after their number), but I'm pretty sure Lego generally tries to avoid it. Part of the reason why five-digit numbers were adopted across all themes as opposed to just for exclusives was to open up enough numbers so that Lego wouldn't need to repeat itself any time in the near future.

A little biased as someone who is primarily an Elves fan, but I can definitely see the use of Elves sets for fantasy builds. A lot of Castle MOCs tend to strike me as a little lacking in the color department, so the bright colors of Elves don't hurt in that respect. And like with Friends, even the use of bright, "girly" colors is often overstated—in many of the sets the majority of the parts still tend to be in more conventional colors like tans, browns, and greys. The Starlight Inn and Elves Treetop Hideaway are great choices for parts, but here are some other sets you might find useful: 41176 The Secret Market Place: This set is a decent source of tan and brown architectural parts, but also features all sorts of interesting detail elements. 41180 Ragana's Magic Shadow Castle: This set's purple and black color scheme is a great foundation for an evil castle, especially if you consider grey and black too mundane or red and black too overused. Other great details of note are an abundance of Trans. Bright Green crystals and ornate Chima flame elements. 41078 Skyra's Mysterious Sky Castle: The lavender roofs of this set might not be for everyone, but there are plenty of good tan and grey architectural parts to be had. As a two year old set, I've also seen some pretty steep discounts on this one, making for a great value. 41076 Farran and the Crystal Hollow: Like the treetop hideaway, this set is a great source of earth tones if you can still find it.