TheLegoDr

As much as I think some of these sets would be great to MOD, I don't plan on buying doubles. Mostly because my money needs to go to many themes and not just Middle Earth..., but with that said I'd love to see another Rivendell MOC with the updated pieces. As far as pronunciations go, I'm sure I still mispronounce them. As long as it's close, I don't see the big deal in getting upset about it. Granted, when people mispronounce my name it does tend to be frustrating since I have a relatively normal name. "Seth"

Nice little build. I've considered doing the barrel trunk for a tree before, but didn't think it would look right. I think how you did it with the 2x2 round bricks helps break up the texturing so it doesn't look like a bunch of barrels stacked up. My qualm is that there is one really tall tree and then another short tree in this "forest." Yes, it gives the idea there is more, but I'd love to see more haha. Good foliage otherwise. Keep up the good work.

I guess I've never thought to put an order on hold. If I can avoid talking on the phone, I will. I'll just wait for double points or some other special. That's a lot of dough to put down on set. It won't affect me if I have it early or by Christmas. Thanks for the info though.

I love the landscaping. Very fitting. I really need to get some of the trans green plates/tiles. The tower looks great. The color scheme works, but I normally wouldn't go with it. But it works here. The set-up is great. The boulder rolling down the hill is very clever. Keep up the good work!

This definitely shows some differences from the official set. I do prefer the dark red coloring in the official set, very close to source material. This is a bit drab, but also very fitting. You seem to have recreated it nicely without rehashing the official set at all. And is that the new Obi-Wan pants? Keep up the good work.

I find it funny that people were saying the Mouth of Sauron was creepy without his helmet on... he is the MOUTH of Sauron. What did you expect??

You are ahead of your time. I do wonder how many Golds are released per state. Obviously, it is "random" so it wouldn't fall into any certain numbers, but it would be interested to know how many Golds are in your state to know if you should keep looking. Clearly that is the point of the chase figure, so you always HAVE to look and hopefully buy many more figures...sneaky people.

It seems this topic pops up every couple of months. Everyone that has missed out on the early Modulars constantly lust after them. They are great looking buildings, but I don't see the need to rehash everything just because some people missed out on them. That is including me. I don't own the first 3 that were released, but I'm not crying about it. I'm being proactive and bricklinking the pieces to build my own. It does save money compared to buying the aftermarket prices, plus you can add your own flair to it since that is what LEGO is all about. If you aren't the MOCing type, then you don't have to substitute any of the pieces and you'll still save money compared to the aftermarket price. Now on the other hand, TLG could redesign the sets and release them that way with modern pieces, but what is the point? As stated above, people who already own it more than likely won't buy it again with the redesign and the people who missed out on the original, might not like the new design and still want the original. Yes, TLG did release a new UCS X-Wing, but as stated it was a complete redesign. Just look at the review that was posted. It compares/contrasts the two versions and it definitely is different when viewed side by side. I personally prefer the redesign, but that is also because I don't own the original. So to capture the most money from the fans, TLG will continue to release new and exciting Modulars instead of redesigning/re-releasing older versions. That is how it will be. I don't know why people can't grasp that.

I can picture that scene in my head and I would say that the Yazneg head works rather well surprisingly. Nice little build. I think it captures the scene pretty well from memory. I'm sure in the future they will release him. They released Yazneg of all Orcs from Hobbit, so I can't see how they would skip over one of the few named Orcs in LOTR. Keep up the good work.

This looks great as a brick built monster. I really like the wings too, especially the outstretched pose. The tips flaring out really adds some spice to it all. Very inspiring, as all of your builds are. I really need to get to work on my own creature. I keep putting things in front of it. This may bring me out of my funk. Keep up the great work! Great SNOT use on the head.

Nice build. I really like the roofing and the side detail/depth of the builds. They are incorporated really well together. The crenelations are a nice touch, but I'd almost expect a tower to be even taller to help keep that bird's eye view of everything. Keep up the great work.

Interesting MOC. The wall does look ruined, so that is a plus. Otherwise I would expect the size to be larger of a real world example.

I think it was only a $70 set here in the US, but still at $15, it is quite a steal. One local wal-mart around me had all of them on clearance, but not at that price. I think the ghost train was still at $50, the castle was $70, and the rest were close to half off. I bought a second mummy set for my daughter, but I couldn't justify buying second copies of the entire theme for her, even with those good clearance prices. I went back not too long after and all of them were gone. I wonder if they will do another MF wave for next Halloween. They already covered a lot of the monsters, but they may have some tricks up their sleeves.

I personally love the Grand Emporium. Some people find it monotonous, but I liked the aesthetic of it. The tan and dark green combo worked really well. Plus, it is the oldest, so I think it is getting discontinued this year??

I also received multiple Chi battles freebies for my multiple orders. It was very nice of TLG to send them out to garner interest. I had no expectation of getting anything other than what I ordered, but it was a very nice surprise. My daughter loved the ninjago spinners, if only to spin them around, so I wanted to pick up a speedorz set sometime for her. This saved me the money. I have no interest in the other sets though. I found that the speedorz are fun to zoom around, but they don't ramp too well. I'm sure the game was thought out, but I don't get it I guess. But I would agree on a lot of things that have been said here. It went really broad really quickly, so that didn't help matters. Plus, isn't the tv series just now starting up? I'd expect that hurt sales if people didn't know they should be interested in this theme. I'd assume after the series started airing more that the sets will sell better. Even though aren't there also summer wave sets coming out? How can the shelves justify this much space dedicated to Chima. The stores near me are very similar, in that they are collecting dust for the large range of Chima sets. Basically one side of the aisle is City, the other side is Star Wars, Chima and a small section for Super Heroes and the one largest LOTR and Hobbit sets. Not even Lone Ranger in a lot of stores I've seen. There just isn't shelf space for it.

Thanks for the review! This is one of the few sets I want, but only because of the figures. But at the price point, I will definitely wait for a sale. I only have Santa Yoda, so this new Yoda is more than welcome in my book. I don't own any CW Dooku, so I will take him also. The pieces may come in handy for MOCs later. The official set with play features are neat and it is nice to get away from a ship every now and then.

I agree with everyone here. It will happen, but the when is unknown. You would think they would wait to see how profitable the new UCS X-Wing release is before they consider doing anything. It does help people like me who only recently got into LEGO SW and could buy these lovely new UCS models. I will never buy the original UCS x-wing, but the new one is tempting for sure. Therefore, a new UCS MF in the future will be a good purchase for many people. It might even tip off other collectors/resellers to think they could make a lot of money on it (who knows if they would), but the interest would be there I'm sure. But with that said, I'm content with last year's TIE and X-Wing and 2011's MF. Those are all superb models to say the least.

Since they are all from re-sellers, the prices won't be pretty. Might as well wait until they officially come out to actually pay retail price. But at the same time, might as well wait for sales.

I agree. Most of the swords fit, other than the really broad swords. I have been using the long and short swords in it ever since the piece was released in the POTC theme. I don't think I've even used the pirates sword yet. I mostly only have medieval figures, and it works wonders for them. But I'm glad it was released for the pirates theme also. I would highly recommend buying them. They work really well.

Thanks for the review. I don't plan on buying any of these sets, but this might be a good starter set to get interested in the theme. The lion shield looks a lot better than I originally anticipated. I like the double sided heads, but I don't care for the dragon torsos as much. Either way, I'll be waiting for more reviews to see if they can change my mind.

Incredible scale. Incredible detail! Very impressive. I never think to build in that scale. I have enjoyed in building the official mini-modular scale, but that is still a large scale compared to this. Very interesting piece usage to achieve the intended look. Keep up the great work. I will definitely check back for inspiration and updates.

Medusa is really easy. Basically look for the bulkiest bag. It looks like it is about to explode. You don't even need to feel for her. Seriously, it's that bulging. She is a great figure. The hardest to find I've seen was Bumblebee girl, but luckily I found one for me and one for my daughter, so it works out. But I felt through 3 different stores to try to get that. No Mr Golds around here, but I haven't been looking for him so he might be in my town, who knows.

I looked at that site. Those look awesome. A bit of a shock looking at the price, but for having a specific LEGO related storage container that has room for name plates or up to 30ish figures is impressive. I may have to order some of those too. I like that you can hold Hulk in there. I wonder about the Cave troll/Goblin King. They are a little big bigger. And clearly the Rancor is too big for these..hmm. I wanted to make a custom one so I can accommodate all the weird sizes together, but that may end up being just right for the larger figures, but too large for all of the smaller figures. I really liked the line-up of the Avengers cast with name plates... Thanks for sharing. I would never have seen those otherwise.

I think you have enough depth. It looks very dominating from the front for sure. There are houses around here that look like that. Larger from the front, but they don't look incredibly deep front to back, but they are still a huge 3-4,000 square foot house. I think for play value, I would prefer the hinge opening effect. I love that on the original. But at that size, it would be difficult to incorporate. As weird as it may sound, would there be a way to hinge both sides and also the back, so it opens up into multiple sections instead of just down the middle like the official set? I'm thinking hinges in the middle on each side, then you have the seam on the back that opens up. Maybe even have hinges on each side (picture the back split into fourths. Use the furthest left and furthest right quarter mark as hinges, with the middle being the seam to open) with the seam in the middle of the back. Just an idea. I don't know how it would work in real brick. Having a modular building is very doable, but then you lose some access to the interior at that size. It works for modulars because they are smaller scale width/depth. Unless you had sections it might work okay. Otherwise, I think it looks great. I would not say it just looks like two official sets thrown together. It looks very unique compared to the official set. You can see the inspiration, but it is very different. Keep up the great work. I'd love to see more!

My problem with Brickset total value is it gives the MSRP of the sets. That isn't always real life numbers. Cafe Corner would come up with $140, but the actual market value is significantly higher. Just a thought. But it's good you did both and found an average value. I tried brickpicker a few times and it never worked for me. It always made me enter in my sets instead of transferring them over for me. I have about 3x as many sets as you do, so I'm not about to enter all of my sets on there again since I already have them entered on brickset. Safe travels. I couldn't imagine moving my entire LEGO collection anywhere, let alone across seas.