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BacktoBricks

Eurobricks Ladies
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Everything posted by BacktoBricks

  1. I swear they literally changed the print from the Belle in the Magic of Disney set to this one to entice minifigure collectors. Don't tell me they didn't know they were doing this set when the first Belle came out. Not everybody will need to have the 'best' Belle obviously, but some people will only want Belle and now, even if they already bought the Magic of Disney set just to get Belle, they will have to get the castle to get the most detailed version of her. It's like Star Wars minifigures that are essentially the same, just with extra arm prints or dual moulded legs. If they had put village Belle in the castle that would have enticed a lot of people sure, but perhaps not as many as those looking for the signature yellow dress minifigure in it's most detailed form. Having two versions of her out in the same outfit in such a short time frame just doesn't make sense otherwise from a production standpoint to me and also, makes the design of the first Belle look lazy to be honest. Characters getting updated and more detailed prints makes sense when there is years between production, but this close it makes it look like the graphics of the first Belle were rushed and not done to the best capacity for the time.
  2. The Hobbits and Wizarding World residents seem to be shoppin at the same parts store when it comes to torsos and heads that's for sure.
  3. Good spot. Hiding in plain sight under all that hobbit hair.
  4. This deal is getting worse all the time ... Seriously though, I think it could go either way. Personally I'd rather the information was totally erroneous and the three minifigures are even more exciting than more clones.
  5. Only the standard closed wings Hedwig from what I can see I'm afraid.
  6. Ah okay thank you. Odd that they would choose the teal sign when basing the house on the movie look. Ooo thank you, so maybe the windows will look better after all.
  7. Haha yeah my bad, I forgot about that. You could be right about the advent calender thing though.
  8. That AT-RT looks like it belongs on a construction site, but will reserve judgement on the clones until the final images come out. Plo's new headpiece looks so much better than the old one which just always looked totally inaccurate to me. Great to see R7-D4's dome too although it would be nice to have the rest of him for that price as part of him isn't really that useful unless we're meant to be acting out the aftermath of Order 66.
  9. I'm liking most of what I see. Sure the roof is not as good as the last one, but the fact that it can become fully enclosed and has the conservatory is really nice. I also love the diamond pane stickers for the top windows as that feature has always stood out to me as part of the house's features and was noticeably absent on the last model. The fact that they didn't include the same for the lower bigger windows is awkward though as now there is an inconsistency between levels. If the top ones are 2x2 pane prints and not stickers and they didn't want to make 2x3 pane prints as well I would have taken clear backed stickers over nothing. Applying stickers is always a choice after all if you don't like the finish. Maybe the Privet Drive sign is teal to give that dusky glow feel seeing as the scene takes place in the evening? Harry is a Knight Bus reuse as expected and understandable and Ripper appears to be the same bulldog in 60258 City Tuning Workshop. I don't think Ripper's collar was blue, but the two toned nougat and white coluring is fairly accurate over all. Great to see Uncle Vernon with a unique torso at last and a mid leg and unique Dudley too. I would like Aunt Marge to also have a normal minifigure, which for set playability and acting out her blowing up you'd think would be necessary, but I'm guessing they will go with the play starting at her already blown up. That being said, her inflated version looks very nice with the prints on those parts. Petunia is a letdown though. I believe her torso will be the same outfit as her last figure just with a changed/updated print as although the last Privet Drive was based on Chamber of Secrets, Petunia's outfit was actually from Prisoner of Azkaban. I will have to wait for better pictures to see whether or not the torso will be better, but her using a reddish brown hairpiece which is blatantly inaccurate is annoying since the dark brown is still in production for the Lion Knight's Castle. I'm guessing they didn't want to keep the colour going after that set retires at the end of this year so easier to just use the reddish brown one. Thankfully an easy fix though. Overall though, a really good minifigure selection and set though. Can't wait for pictures of the other sets.
  10. Thank you. Going to take it with a heavy pinch of salt for now. You make a very good point there. Her portrayal may be stereotypical and unprogressive, but she did include diversity in an era that from my own experience was nowhere near as openly diverse as it is now. So for the era, the representation is fairly accurate and changing it to make it more diverse could be seen as a similar approach to Disney updating The Little Mermaid or Snow White to make them more progressive; if you take the stories as products of their time, then it's unnecessary and so far it does not seem to be going down well for either Disney or Lego. The Little Mermaid set was not well received and everywhere I've seen comments discussing the Snow White cottage, people expressed the idea that if it turned out to be movie based they wouldn't buy it. The irony with Lego, is that they can change the skintones, but all the HP students look like clones anyway as they keep using the same facial expressions.
  11. Where has the Hogsmeade info come from?
  12. Exactly this. It's lazy at best and ironic (even a tad disrespectful to children really) in an era where they are trying to push diversity in other areas like skin tones and disabilities. My HP students have a couple of different skintones and yet they are all going the same way as the Rebel Pilot with their face prints. It's almost like they're trying to say we're all the same despite our different skintones. It's really boring to be honest. The Polyjuice Harry and Ron variants are some of my favourite because they actually have some different and quite animated expressions. I get what you're saying about one UCS minifigure getting extra at the cost of the other, but should it be like that? Absolutely not in my opinion. Not when the prices are going so high and not if you are a company that is going to underpin your product with the motto that only the best is good enough. The C-3PO with dual molded leg is a fantastic minifigure, but should that mean that Farmboy Luke in the UCS Landspeeder shouldn't have say come with a poncho? Not if you ask me. And if they absolutely had to cut costs or differentiate Young Boba for the later non-UCS set, then they could always not include dual molded legs for him then just like it sounds like Jango will lose his arm printing. Again, theoretically even that goes against the above motto, but it would at least mean that the figures in the UCS set actually feel like the 'ultimate' edition of these characters. Even the LAN reviewers couldn't help but call out threepio in the Sail Barge.
  13. Poor Filch has already lost his printed legs, now he'll be wondering where his torso's gone too.
  14. That's a good point and I know it does apply sometimes (I believe Sally in the Nightmare before Christmas set uses a different hairpiece to the CMF Sally according to designers because of such an issue), but the hairpiece used on the old Young Boba minifigures is still in production in black as it is currently used for Severus Snape, Winter Soldier and Morro in sets this year as well as a Friends minidoll, a Creator Town minifigure and a Speed Champions minifigure in sets released last year. In other words, it's being used for Harry Potter, Marvel, Ninjago, Friends, Creator and Speed Champions so its availability doesn't seem to be an issue. In fact, I don't believe the hairpiece in black has been out of production for a single year since it was introduced in 2010.
  15. Box for The Shire set with interior photos has leaked.
  16. I hear what you're saying about the arms colour matching to Jango. I don't agree personally and think it just highlights Jango's colour inaccuracies too if anything and I would have gone with a darker colour rather than matching the arms to Jango's body colour as I think that would have looked less jarring overall if we're going to have to make a compromise, but that's my subjective opinion and I respect your point. That being said, I think the majority of people are looking at the hair and wondering why on earth they chose it over several other options. I really don't think it can be said that they have a good grasp of audience reception there. Unless they know it will be disliked and simply don't care. Either way, it doesn't come off well. The new face expressions too are a downgrade and don't match well with the source material. Lego seems to think youngsters either have sideways smirks or sulky grimaces these days and all the younger characters are turning into, dare I say it, clones of each other. There seems to have been a distinct lack of effort in giving his character a unique expression, but you could I suppose write the expressions off as a design choice. However, I don't think you can really call the lack of dual molded legs anything but lazy or greedy. They can produce dual molded short legs so either they A) didn't want to spend the budget on them or B) they might not have the factory space to produce them. I can't see any other reason not to make the figure more accurate. It's not like the waistcape or legs or skirt argument when it comes to figures sitting down. And if it's A then that speaks for itself, but if it's B then when they are continually acquiring more licenses and making more sets, if that comes at the price of them cutting corners on design, then they can hardly say only the best is good enough. It's a simple case of quantity over quality then. Overall, with this figure, and I think the general consensus from comments I'm reading, is there is a lack of quality and effort with this minifigure. I will certainly be interesting to see how the LAN members react to the figure that's for sure.
  17. The really annoying thing is, I really want to support an AOTC set so it sells well to give Lego the message we want more AOTC sets. Although granted they will probably just attribute sales to it being a clone or Boba Fett set rather than AOTC specifically. But I don't want to buy the set or the figure on the secondary market Lego owns and support such a terribly inaccurate and lazy minifigure. If you looked at such a poor representation of Boba as a toy from another block brand, you'd probably laugh and think of it as 'knock off' and inferior. So just being 'Lego' shouldn't mean it has the right to be widely inaccurate and yet Lego keeps doing it and getting away with sales because they are seen as the superior brand. It frankly shows a total lack of care for customers. And the irony is, theoretically if I did buy the set or just the minifigure, I would then have to go on BL and make an order for a different hairpiece and arms and earn Lego even more money through commission.
  18. The hair is totally wrong if it turns out to be the one used in the set and the colouring is all wrong on everything from the main colour being too vibrant to the the arm colour being too light and the belt having turned brown. Plus the sideways lip smirk looks nothing like his expressions which are either a closed lipped pout during Jango's talk with Obi-Wan or a full on open mouthed smile during Jango's dogfight with Obi-Wan. Hopefully the alternate face will capture a better expression. The belt printing is also far bigger than previous versions and too big in comparison to the source material. The last couple of versions got the hair more accurate, got the expressions closer and also used darker arms and smaller black belts. Even the original yellow tone minifigure was arguably closer in hair, colour and design if you ignore the yellow. The only thing this version has improved over others is the skintone, but other than that it's a big downgrade. I just don't get the graphic design choices. Also, seeing as this is a minifigure intended for a UCS set, dual molded short legs to represent his black boots would make the figure far more accurate.
  19. Honestly I have no idea, but something tells me that hair not matching might be the least of their appearance worries.
  20. The irony is, if there was no racebending with the new cast, Lego could essentially use the same minifigures for the characters whether the set was based off the movies or shows. The current minifigures look roughly faithful to how the books portray them, so if the new show stuck with how the books portrayed them appearance wise, it wouldn't really be an issue in terms of Lego. The only thing that would be different would be the costumes the characters were wearing, but the heads and hairpieces for the characters could be the same wether it's a movie or a show set. I don't think any of us would mind some variety in costumes or the extra locations and characters the show series could provide, such as the kitchens and Winky (long way off I know) as we would never get them with movie sets. The sets could appeal to both demographics then. The fact that it won't be possible is not Lego's fault. They might be facing a dilemma even they don't want to consider.
  21. Seconded. The two distinct things I notice when I look at young Boba's hair is a) it is roughly middle parted (distinctly middle parted in the Clone Wars animation version) and b) there is no fringe and it is quite tidy and symmetrical despite its length (even when he gets wet on the landing platform his hair stays off his forehead and doesn't get that messy). If that dishevelled hair piece with a choppy side swept fringe really is the one that is going to be used then it is widely innaccurate and really annoys me. The part is literally called Hair Tousled with Long Bangs on Bricklink. Sure it is a relatively easy fix to change it to the piece they used for the two previous versions which is not perfect, yet a better fit in general, but why should you have to go looking to change a minifigure when there is just no need for such inaccuracy, especially if it is included in a UCS set? I really hope the person taking the photo just gave him the wrong hair, but unfortunately I can see that not being the case.
  22. Lego hasn't given it away as a GWP yet. I'm guessing that will happen later this year. But it is available from sellers on Bricklink so they have obviously managed to get hold of them somehow, but I've yet to see it personally in a store in the UK. I hope you and your girls continue to enjoy the Harry Potter line. I remember my excitement when the theme was first brought back a few years ago and I was an adult, so it must be very exciting for children to be experiencing the sets for the first time. I'm looking forward to seeing the Herbology set too. It will be interesting to see if Lego brings back the hair/headphones piece they used for Neville or just go with the headphone piece that wraps around the neck they used in the Herbology book so they can use it for multiple characters. I'm guessing it will be the second option or they would have to create a couple of different hair/headphone moulds or recolours for different characters.
  23. It's been mid to late April the last couple of years.
  24. Is most of the review blurry for you too?
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