Ardelon

Outstanding! Apart from the map and buildings, special mention has to go to the trees! As to the Eurocentrism, I think it would be tought to represent progress in other civilizations with the limited choice of parts we have in LEGO currently. LEGO itself is a western-centric toy, after all.

Still looking good!

Well, these sets aren't as good as I hoped - I was expecting a bit more compatibility with Castle. But as parts packs, they seem ok. By all the comments I expect the target audience at least will like them.

Hmm, he has a different face than the Collectable miniifg. Could it be from another set, or will the cop have a "bad cop" face and a "worse cop" face? I hope it's the former, and the cop will have a "good cop" alternate face...

Great work! It's always nice to see Star Trek getting some LEGO love.

Hmm, I did wonder about the trans-color being more like Futuron than SP, but didn't Futuron use blue as a secondary color instead of black? edit: just checked, my mistake, it's black...

No, but it would be Blacktron vs. Space Police...

True, though I myself prefer to keep my Pirates non-fantasy...

Hmm, why all the love for Abe Lincoln? I admire the real-life Lincoln as much as the next guy, but it doesn't seem to be a very useful fig. On another note, I wonder if any fig apart from Emmet will have the plain black eyes without white dots. The 80s spaceguy does, but it's not clear whether he'll be in any set. And Shakespeare's tile apparently says „to build or not to build“. Fitting. I wonder what Abe's will say... Now we have to wait for WhiteFang's review to come out...

Another bullseye, Artizan! (pun intended...)

Wow, that’s really exhaustive (and a bit exhausting to read...). Thanks for putting all this toghether!

So, no specifically pirate figs in CM Series 12. Though Shakespeare comes with a ruffled collar and a torso that could be used for Conquistador aristocrats. And if the Taco Tuseday guy comes with a cloth poncho like the previous Mexican, the poncho can be used for Spanish colonial MOCs, as I understand they were worn since before the Europeans arrived. And of course, Calamity Drone has a musket. So far, not looking too rosy for pirates next year... On that note, maybe TLM talk should go into a Pirates 2014 thread?

* Calamity Drone: Shame about the non-yellow torso, the designers could have saved the fig by making it a cyborg with yellow skin and a Zane-style split face. * Gail the Construction Worker: Nice to get a female blue-collar worker. Here's a woman who doesn't mind getting her face dirty! Special mention goes to the hat+hair combo. * Abraham Lincoln: Hm, unless you're into civil war MOCs or collecting historical personalities, I don't see the appeal fo this fig (apart from the generic suit torso). * Larry the Barista: Useful. Enough said. * Panda Guy: OK, but I'm not into the animal-costume figs. * Velma Staplebot: Useful apart from the face. I wonder what the clipboard says. * William Shakespeare: Great fig, with the hairpiece and the torso (which looks like a recolor of the actor torso, but still useful for making aristocrats). My 2nd favorite. * Taco Tuesday Guy: Great! I was hoping for this fig to appear since I saw it in the trailer. So far my favorite, since the whole fig can be used in a western setting, rather than just bits and pieces. I wonder if the torso will be printed this time – the legs are, at any rate. The plate is cool too. My one little gripe is that I'm still waiting for a plain sombrero... * “Where are my Pants?” Guy: Cool shirt! OK hair, though it could have come in a new color. * Wiley Fusebot: Interesting. I'll need a closer look to see if it's a great fig. Is that a hairpiece or a coonskin cap? * President Business: I guess the suit printing is good, and it's nice to get an Octan mug. * Wild West Wyldstyle: Could be useful for period or horror mocs. * Hard Hat Emmet: Again, nice to have the hat+hair combo. Is that a yellow smart phone? * Scribbe-Face Bad Cop: Great to have a black phone. Otherwise a detailed but uninteresting fig to me. * Mrs. Scratchen-Post: Good to get more hair in gray and a new cat print. * Marsha Queen of the Mermaids: Useful for fantasy settings, though I'm not a fan of that face. All in all, a better series than I expected (though my expectations were pretty low). Shame there are no castle or pirate figs, maybe they'll be in the sets. But, in contrast, there are plenty of wild west figs in the series, could that mean no wild west sets for the theme?

I always wondered why they didnt make the alternate torso from the Orc Forge available, since they already had it created. It would negate the complaints about having only one variant of Mordor Orc. I assume the designers have limits on the number of new prints, but this would mean the torso was dropped in favor of another new printed part? Still, they could have used it in other sets featuring Orcs. Well, lets hope for a new Orc print in the next (Gondor-centric?) wave...

Barracks looking good as well, Artizan! Brings back memories for me too...

I'll only get one, if any, since I'm not into army building. I didn't buy any UHA sets either, since it didn't seem worth it just to get the single Rohan soldier I was interested in. Maybe interest in the MEA set will grow after people see the movie.

Or the designers could make specialized moulds for beards+armor, though I don't think I'd be a fan of this solution. Anyway, it seems this would fit better in the Future LotR discussion...

Very well done and instantly recognizable. Keep 'em coming! Will all of the builds be from the Castle Age?

Well, I can see someone wanting plenty of the army men for a non-Toy-Story setting, so long as TLG's non-violence policy stands. And as for superheroes, I don't follow that theme closely, but I imagine people would want to army build the Chitauri army, and maybe Commissioner (or what rank is he) Gordon for the torso. The same might apply for Nick Fury, the Arkham guard, and maybe some henchmen for the villains. I wouldn't mind getting multiples of JJJ, for the hairpiece and civilian suit torso . So, the supply is there, and I imagine the demand is too.

It's possible that PJ and co. will not make Bolg Azog's son, if they keep Bolg in the story. I personally can't imagine any father-son dynamic between them, and it would seem OOC for a ruthless Orc torturemaster like Bolg to come running to Sauron to bring back his daddy. But who knows, maybe the Orcs will finally be given some hidden depths after so long. And it will be interesting to see whether they will give a deeper meaning to the title "Necromancer"... I myself like the idea of there being independent sources of "evil", rather than one chessmaster behind every bad thing that happens - it just makes the world seem richer and deeper. That's one thing I enjoyed abouth the Hobbit - every group of antagonists was independent and had their own agenda (hungry Trolls, thieving Goblins with an old grudge, hungry spiders, suspicious Elves, and then the dragon). If Sauron was behind everything, it would look like hardly anyone has any free will, which Tolkien himself was pretty big on. Not to mention that Azog seems to be his own master, and I feel his standing as a dangerous Orc cheftain and top threat to Thorin's company would be diminished if he turns out to be just obeying orders.

Kudos to the designers for accuracy, in any case. From the minifigs to Dol Guldur, it seems that this time they had enough source material to work from. And it looks like they did a great job in this respect (as seen in the comparison pic of DGA posted by deskp on p236). I guess this time we won't be seeing any mess-ups like Yazneg in last year's wave (though I hope the Necromancer won't look as corporeal and well-defined)...

Well, several weeks late, I finally found the time and patience to type out my (not so) humble opinion on these figs. I don't actually have any yet, the store I usually go to actually had some series 3 boxes put out (picked through, though...). Anyway, if anyone wants to read yet another post full of opinions, here goes: 1) barbarian – Nice fig. If the designers came out with it earlier, it would have been a hit, but now that we've got a highlander, a Viking and a gladiator, it does seem to be missing a spark. But I think the dark-age swords suit him OK, though it would have been nice if he had come with Dastan's double scabbard, or a round shield. 2) scarecrow – Nice fig, not sure if the crow wouldn't be better with a stud like the seagull. Apart from the crow, I'm most excited about the hat. 3) bavarian girl – Nice versatile fig, a mug (brown or clear, not necessarily full of "beer", so the moral guardians wouldn't be upset) would make her even nicer, but the pretzel is rare enough to be a welcome accessory. Not a big fan of cloth skirts, but why not. 4) evil mech – OK fig. Another nice throwback to Blacktron, now if TLG actually gave us the whole theme... 5) tiki warrior – Great fig, my favorite of the series. Great printing, and the mask is cute and intimidating all at once. 6) gingerbread man – OK fig, not a big fan of his head. Shame we didn't get a candy cane. More funny/cute/interesting than useful. 7) christmas elf – Don't really like the face. Like many people the hat reminds me of Link of Zelda, you just need to turn the hat around – I wonder what effect this will have on a Zelda license the CUUSOOsphere is clamoring for. I find the torso interesting for historical MOCs, and of course the gift tiles are useful too. 8) yeti – His cuteness is inversely proportional to his usefulness to me. 9) mountain climber/rescue – Unappealing to me, shame the desingers didn't give him the ice pick from the arctic theme. 10) welder – Nice torso for historical workers, and interesting accessories. 11) scientist – Why not, but I'm still hoping for an Einstein-like scientist. 12) jazz saxophonist – I was imagining more of a New Orleans mardi gras or vaudelville feel for the fig, but still ok. This makes the fig more versatile. The sax is beautiful. 13) diner waitress – Interesting experiment with the yellow-on-yellow, but not too succesful IMO. I think some kind of light blue would have suited her better. Or at least the torso and pants could have been given a pattern, e.g. stripes, to make it look more like clothing. 14) grandma – Useful generic fig, if unexciting. Glad to see from White Fang's review that the cat fits in the basket – the basket seemed to small to me. Though I would have appreciated a new-colored pie more. 15) constable – Nice fig. Glad the designers didn't use the old pith helmet. Pleasantly surprised about the truncheon. I'm also surprised it took eleven series to get such an iconic fig, but better late than never. I assume the 1337 signifies a date as was suggested above, rather than "leet". 16) lady robot – Completely unapplealing to me, even more so than the original „male“ toy robot, and that's saying something. Overall a good, solid series, I didn't think going the way of licensed series was necessary, but oh, well.

So, I know it's rather risky to infer storylines from LEGO sets (*cough* – Yazneg – *cough*), but does anyone have any insights based on the sets? Will we see Azog at Dol Guldur (instead of Bolg as was expected, instead of none of them as in the book...), or will he stick to chasing the Dwarves and was his minifig thrown into the DGB set for other reasons? What I'm worried about is that we will see the Necromancer in a corporeal humanoid form with defined features (assuming the designers made the fig as accurately as they did Beorn), flying in the face of continuity and turning him from an uncertain evil presence in the background to basically a cape-flourishing dude in black...

Hear Hear! I at least find Castles on raised baseplates to be much more interesting and imposing. Maybe it's a cyclical thing - the 80s castles were modular, castles in the 90s and early 2000s generally used raised baseplates, and now we're back to modular again. Who knows, maybe in a few years, raised baseplates will be back. It's possible that this theme is just as popular with kids as Kingdoms, and it's only us AFOLs that appreciated Kingdoms more, so our perception of each theme's popularity might be skewed.

Your dwarves are awesome as always - looking forward to more!