Faefrost

New Line is expressly banned from using anything that is uniquely named or mentioned in the Silmarilion. Tolkien outright sold the movie rights to LotR and Hobbit before he died for a fixed fee. The Family is pissed because they got nothing directly from the movies (granted the movies doubled the total books sold in a span of a few years which was a huge windfall for them.). They still control the Silmarilion and aren't willing to talk. As an example the existance of 5 Wizards is mentioned in LotR, but the two blues are only named in the Silmarrilion. Hence in TUJ Gandalf can't remember their names. TLG's license is with New Line and WB not the Tolkien estate so they can only do things that more or less expressly appear on screen. So no Blue Wizards. No Tom Bombadil. No Glorfindel (or at least a named Glorfindel). etc.

Am I the only one that read the title as "Friends Drunk Tank"?

Isn't that the easiest custom fig ever made? Stick Banes head on a Clone body? I don't remember there being anything else distinctive?

He's fine. He isn't selling anything for commercial purposes. Even if it is a licensed subject he still has certain creator rights for his interpretations of the character or design. He can reasonably request that someone credit him if using portion of his fan art in their project for public display.

How about a Lovecraftian horror theme? Brick built Cthulu, and each set includes a special collectible artifact or book that will drive a child insane. (Madness and rampaging elder gods! That'll teach them kids for wanting to play with my Lego! And just think of the action.)

Basically everything you can find on Shop.lego.com in a store painted in bright yellows and reds. The selection is great. They will have all current product and all exclusives, store or otherwise (except store Polybags like Mirkwood elves etc). The full lines of accessories and a pick a brick wall.

What sort of tables do you use? Back when I was with a modular model railroad club we had a similar problem and worked out a rather effective solution. We turned the tables themselves into the stanchions. Basically each table or module had a mount point that accepted a 2' or 3' 1" PVC pipe with a loop on the end to accept the rope. So the stanchions were cross arms that stuck out from the tables like flagpoles. It meant that they really could not be pushed, moved or ignored. Ours were permanently mounted onto our modules. But the same thing could probably be rigged using clamps.

This might explain some of it

Because while vary good movie, breaking it into a Lego theme has some marketing issues. What is the target audience for the toys? The wreck it Ralph game and characters? (Seems a good general fit), Heroes Duty? (Kinda like Galaxy Squad), Sugar Rush? (A girly themed cart racing theme?). Plus using any of the more classic video game characters is unlikely because of multiple licences. So they are left with a theme that would be all over the place in terms of who it is targeted at. Not a good recipe for success.

That is probably a strong part of why TLG didn't go for a wir license at the time. It really is a confusing property to license and market.

How far are you from a Lego store? This sort of thing seems to have a certain radius around the store or just local zip codes.

Princess of Mars is public domain now. There were no issues of merchandising rights or naming rights. The property is also commonly known as "John Carter, Warlord of Mars", which honestly would have served the movie much better than simply John Carter. I think I remember reading somewhere that Lego did in fact do a little bit of development work on some ships and sets for John Carter, but were not happy with the results and were not convinced it would be a worthwhile path to go down. (I'm not sure where but I could swear I have seen a picture of a developers scratch model of a martian flyer.)

Center rear sitting on a wooden rolling cabinet with drawers. There are two ships one behind the other.

This looks to be a fantastic set for the MOC and customizing crowd. Assasins Creed fans rejoice! With Taskmaster we are pretty much guaranteed to be getting a white hood piece. (and most likely a new printed shield and a chain mail torso. So Castle people may like him.) I'm just confused about how they categorize MODOK as a minifig, and worry that he is packaged with an already known Maxifig, Hulk. Modok is a big giant head with tiny little arms and legs in a floating chair? Doesn't he pretty much have to be a custom piece of some sort?

I don't think so. If you zoom in on it the colors are all wrong. It seemed more a normal Pirate ship and not one of the more Stylized PotC fantasy ones.

Beta invites are definitely going out!

The Eagle is quite nice. and might even be an acceptable replacement for the undersized Eagles in LotR or Hobbit scenes. The wolf is still a bit boxy. It looks like an 8 bit video game boss. And high on the list of things I never expected to ever see in a Lego set surely must be "Rhinocerous wearing purple tube top"

I still think the absolutely perfect obscure fig for a book would be "Lando in Han's Clothing" from the end of ESB. As he and Chewie pilot the Falcon away in search of Han.

Heck! There's only 4 Hobbit sets. Go get yerself some Turtles too

Am I wrong in thinking that there seem to be only 3 new "<insert that tiresome argument>" pieces? And that they don't seem all that bad? I see a wall panel with window insert, a larger arched wall panel, and that new juniors car body. None of them seem overly specialized. They all seem a good mix between designed for a younger crowd, and reasonably useful parts for older folks to occasionally borrow.

I think 20,000 is pretty close to the smallest runs they do. Special Limited edition things and CuuSoo sets. Regular retail set production runs go into hundreds of thousands if not a million per. There is probably a great deal of variety in numbers based on size and cost of sets, predictive data etc. the larger Technik sets have always been hard to judge for numbers. I assume lower production numbers than most System sets, but probably a high margin on them? Edit, one way to sort of eyeball guesstimate some of the numbers is to work backwards looking at new tooling and molds. We know new tooling can easily fall somewhere in the $80,000 up to $350,000 range. If we assume they justify or amortize the costs of new tooling at the time they approve it (by using the part in specific planned sets, so assume 2 full release cycles, say Summer and Winter), and further assume that excluding unusual things like maxi figs and motors, they want the cost of a new part to be less than 5% of the sets retail price! you can start to get a feel for how big the runs need to be to justify the new parts.

I think the Police Gunship has become my favorite set of this wave. It looks gorgeous. The only thing that would improve it would be an Asajj Ventriss fig in a Bounty Hunter helmet. Or an evil Bariss Offee minifig instead of yet another Anakin.

Licensing is not always a major pitfall. It depends on the license. How much and how broad of a license the license holder is looking to receive for it, etc. I don't think in this case that the lack of a license will give the Japanese set an edge. It seems a bit broad and a bit large for a niche audience. I don't know how far they could trim it before they begin compromising the core of the proposed project, even with just one building. Looking at the 4 in review for this period, I suspect there is a good chance none will pass. - Japanese buildings. A really great MOC, but how much worldwide market for a Japanese Onsen? The house and the Onsen seem kind of large for such a niche. The shrine would be perfect but it gets vetoed as a religious subject. - Zelda set. Same issue as the previous 2. Requires new molds for Link. Plus Nintendo may be reluctant to sell just a small 1 shot Zelda license if it conflicts with the potential to sell a broader full series license to a more video game friendly licensee such as K'nex. - Sherlock. No way no how, under no circumstances. It fails brand fit first day of review. The show mostly delves into the darker edges of mental illness. High functioning brilliant sociopath squaring off against violent twisted psychopaths alongside a PTSD suffering combat vet. Brilliant television, but not for the 6-12 crowd, ever. Even if it makes it past that, why would Lego pay to license a core subject, that is already in the public domain? They could just do a classic Victorian Sherlock Holmes with no licensing needed. - Adventure Time. This one probably has the best chance, depending on license requirements and the need for new molds. But those are big ifs. Back to the Future was an easy license to get in a size appropriate for CuuSoo, as it was an older property. Adventure Time is a new and current kids show. The license holder may not wish to tie it up with a small 1 shot type toy deal, and might prefer a larger commitment from a toy licensor. It is doubtful that TLG would enter into any broader licences or pay for a multi year full retail theme over a CuuSoo project proposal. Given how long theme planning takes, if TLG were to do a full Adventure Time theme, then negotiations would probably already be well underway from some time in the past year. This is one of the major potential gotcha's and problematic conflicts that can arise between CuuSoo and TLG's regular business process with current active media properties. This is also an example of why they are no longer defining a reason for project rejection. If TLG was even talking to Cartoon Network about Adventure Time at any point in recent history, then chances are this project would pretty much have to fail review as they would have pre existing licensing discussions ongoing. (And garner much fan gnashing of teeth about TLG stealing ideas, etc.) Looking at all the complexity makes one wonder what joyfully optimistic maniac at TLG managed to sneak the entire concept of CuuSoo past the legal department?

Another Zelda project.

A roughly paraphrased quote from one of David Robertson's presentations might help explain it. " in the early 2000's Lego was in trouble. They found that only 3 lines were making a profit. City, Star Wars and Harry Potter. And Harry Potter was only profitable in the given years that a corresponding movie was out." So you can see why the HP line stopped with the movies. Given that LotR and The Hobbit are pretty much Lego's replacement for HP, and that like HP that license has already been extended by one more unexpected movie, it's a reasonable thought that the Middle Earth themes may quickly fade a few months after TABA releases. Which would give us 3 waves each of LotR and The Hobbit. Overall a very robust theme by Lego standards. You never know. We may get lucky and TLG may view it as another Star Wars type line and continue it. But I am doubtful. Star Wars has been a stand alone merchandising juggernaut from 35 years. LotR's mostly sells books when the movies aren't prominent. I am real curious what if anything TLG would find to replace LotR's in that slightly older skewing Literary Fantasy niche that they seem to have done well with? (I assume we can rule out Game of Thrones?) Maybe something like ABC Disney's Once Upon a Time?