Lyichir

Copper Metallic (the "pearl" copper from Hands of Time) is discontinued, but Copper Ink (the ink color used for printed/coated parts) is not—this is probably the latter. I never realized/thought of using the ninja scarf pieces with the Viking helmet before! Helps to give the Kraken knights an air of mystery.

Hm... with the official pics showing that the astronaut is more of a departure from the other space sets, I'm feeling less pressure to get this one. I do like the tower crane and the subway car build (including the graffiti stickers, they're a cute, realistic detail for an urban setting and aren't going to actually convince kids to pull out a can of spray paint and break the law any more than sets with bank robberies are going to convince them to rob a bank).

This is quite lovely! The solution you've come up with for the balloon construction is quite complex but the end result is beautifully seamless.

I feel like while more figs might've made the value proposition a little better for some collectors, I can't really see where other minifigures would "fit" without weakening the design composition as a whole. Keeping the whole thing focused on Gandalf in the foreground and the larger Balrog in the background makes for a much stronger, more interesting composition than if you'd had to find room for other baddies or members of the Fellowship in the limited space provided by the "book nook" format.

Oh yeah, in that sense Bricklink Designer program would definitely be more profitable for larger sets (at least as long as the limited quantity of each set continues to sell out consistently). Sorry for misinterpreting.

I'm not sure that first paragraph is fully accurate. Larger sets do cost more and have more profit per unit, but smaller sets are produced and sold in much higher quantities overall, and often through more retail channels, so it's not quite as simple as "full production run of large sets makes more profit than full production run of small sets." As far as promotion is concerned, it is true that big sets make a bigger impact when it comes to impressing people in store windows and shelves, drawing more customers in to buy big and small sets alike. Of course, another aspect of Lego's own promotion is that the largest sets are the ones that tend to be exclusive to Lego Brand Retail, making promoting those a big deal for those "official" channels—the sets promoted by other retailers or through mass-market avenues like TV advertising often favor mid-size sets more. Large projects getting more attention on Lego Ideas/Bricklink Designer Program is indeed something I'd consider a bit of an issue. It's not universal an issue for Lego Ideas, which gets plenty of projects past the review goal and lets Lego make the final call on what gets approved (which to this day includes a mix of larger and smaller builds, with the Pixar lamp being a recent example of a smaller project). But Bricklink Designer Program definitely seems to attract more support for large builds. I think a part of this is not just bigger builds impressing people more, but also the limited, individual approval process for these sorts of sets—if a set making it through the process only guarantees that one set, it can be tempting for fan creators to try to cram as many of the details they would want into one build. This is less of an issue for Lego's own designers, who can either get a whole theme order at once or can otherwise limit the size of sets in the hopes that strong sales will result in follow-ups. So the fierce competition of Ideas/BDP themselves contributes toward the trend toward larger builds.

I really like this! The color variation to simulate dramatic lighting is really cool, and helps keep the architecture from feeling as repetitive as it would if it was all grey. The Balrog itself has some really nice shaping and looks especially great with the much smaller Gandalf in the foreground. I've not gotten any Lord of the Rings sets in ages, and don't typically collect most licensed themes, but I DO have the books on my bookshelf, which makes a companion piece designed for shelves like this a little tempting...

Just was looking at the upcoming City set pictures and noticed that the dump truck that comes in the Tow Truck sets uses flat-topped treasure chests in black. First time for the flat lid to come in black, and the first time the treasure chest bottom has come in black in ten years.

Birdo or Koopa Troopa would work great (as would several other characters who are yet to appear in Mario Kart sets like Toadette or Dry Bones) but a character like Bowser Jr. could maybe be a bit of a challenge due to his three-stud-wide footprint not adapting as effortlessly to the four-stud-wide connection points necessary for the karts to be compatible with digi-figs. That's an issue that affects several other characters as well, like Shy Guy, Diddy Kong, or a few of the Koopalings. I expect Yoshi was chosen for the Bowser's Castle set in part to have a clear "good guy" character to challenge Bowser himself on his "home turf".

I disagree with you about the quality of the set (I personally love it), but I could easily see it being less popular if for no other reason than Blacktron being less iconic/recognizable than Classic Space (running for fewer years and not getting boosts in popularity from things like The Lego Movie that keep Lego's "first" Space theme recognizable to modern audiences. That said, I also reckon Lego would factor that into their projections for the set's sales—which may have also informed the decision to keep this a limited release unlike the Galaxy Explorer's wide release for Lego's 90th anniversary.

I could see creative uses of those lamp cover parts. If the bottom is open they'll probably be excellent as a funnel for a Great Ball Contraption module.

Hm... if it's retiring at the end of this year I might need to pick up a second copy for the alt build sooner rather than later. Which would feel easier if there weren't a bunch of other sets I want coming out in the next couple months, many of which will be more expensive than usual due to U.S. tariffs... On the bright side, this set retiring could make room for another retro space set in the next year or two.

Series 8 entries are live, including yet another amazing model by JonasKramm in his "Tiny World of Wonders" theme: https://www.bricklink.com/v3/designer-program/series-8/2840/Mushroom-Haven

It would be a great fit for a CMF, but there's no news or rumors of one so far. A CMF series would be a great opportunity for not just regular villagers but also maybe things like seasonal visitors, as well as potentially characters who have been left out of previous sets like Sable and Orville.

It originated with a cutesy print in the Knight of the Yellow Castle CMF, but recently appeared unprinted in white in the new Trevi Fountain Architecture set and will soon come in black. No other colors yet, but with it starting to appear in more decorative uses it's always possible.

Just today when walking through my historic downtown I noticed an iron horse hitching post with a decorative horse head on top. Stood out to me because I had just noticed a black recolor of the hobby horse head in the Friends pony stable set that would be perfect for that sort of application. Probably useful for other decorative ironwork as well, or for small chess sets.

I think the coral piece is also just magenta, and just looks darker through the trans light blue glass of the aquarium.

I do think it's a little bit of a shame that the Mario Kart starter pack is just him with the standard kart that already came in another set. I suppose it's good in the sense that I don't need another starter pack so it's good that there's nothing I miss out on by skipping it, but it also makes me feel like it would've been cool if one of the sets had been Luigi's standard kart or something like that instead.

Honestly i don't know where you'd even look—the foam darts from those sets are a somewhat specific shape which means that third-party darts (for example, NERF-compatible ones) would be unlikely to work. It wouldn't even be a case where 3D printed substitutions would be an option, since a soft, lightweight material like the foam used for these would probably not be an option for that. So the pricy aftermarket darts might be your only option.

I don't really see why MK's end would impact Ninjago negatively. Monkie Kid is presumably ending because its popularity was waning, but that doesn't really say anything about Ninjago's own popularity. If anything, it's one less theme that Ninjago is competing for attention from (granted, MK's status as a limited release theme outside of Asia means it was likely never very significant competition with Ninjago in most markets). As for Dreamzzz, current rumors suggest it will be ending after next year's first wave—which would amount to a three-year lifespan, about on par with past "Big Bang" themes like Chima and Nexo Knights that were successful but not as overwhelmingly so as Ninjago has proven to be. In any case, I don't think either theme ending makes Ninjago more likely to end suddenly. Nor does it mean that in-house themes as a whole are unsuccessful or going away—I'm sure Lego already has new themes in the works to replace those outgoing themes, much like they have when previous in-house themes have ended.

The scorpion is in a display case in the Animal Crossing museum set. At first I thought it was a new recolor (dark brown), but my sister pointed out to me that in the lifestyle photos with the set being played with it just looks dark red (in which case it's not new).

I'm loving the design of the Temple Bounty. I've started trying to reverse engineer it on Stud.io and while I certainly can't figure out everything from the provided pictures, I can tell that it's big, has a lot of interior space, and fits together quite elegantly. I'm always a sucker for great ship designs, especially ones with brick-built hulls, and this one does not seem to disappoint. Can't wait to see reviews so I can see some of the spaces that haven't been shown clearly. EDIT: You can get glimpses of areas under the forward and rear decks in the lifestyle videos, showing that it's not just empty space! Looks like a small dojo/training area in the front, and the rear has hammocks which are a very nice feature!

Snow would definitely be less harmful in real life, but in Lego it might be more likely for something to get stuck if it dropped small, solid parts onto the train and tracks instead of large hollow boulders that won't get stuck in any gaps and can easily be knocked out of the way.

Also possibly of interest to old-school builders... looks like the Minecraft sets are introducing 6x8 plates in trans blue and trans orange, the first time we've had large transparent plates like that in a while. Now the question is, how long until trans yellow ones make their grand return?

Friends set pictures are out! The unicorn in the pool set is indeed a pool float... but there is also a white horse with a pink mane in the costume party set ornamented with pegasus wings and a new unicorn horn piece (this one with an accessory pin instead of a 3.2mm bar). This allows it to fit on Friends hairpieces and animals (as here) as well as plushies (which it's used for in the comic shop). This new unicorn horn piece is also transparent (suggesting it'll be hard plastic, unlike the larger unicorn horn which uses a rubbery material). Other animals in the Friends sets include baby pandas and shetland ponies, as well as some new cats in the Cat Birthday Party set.