Faefrost

Oh yeah, it was one of the last great sets pre-numbered bags. Where you had to sort it all. But so worth it.

I like the way the Ancient Ones fans turned out. They are striking. The fine gold printing on Strange's spells is a little too fine. I absolutely love the set. I love all the room details. The book cases etc. Strange is the best figure. Mordo is probably the dullest or weakest. The set really could have used Wong as well. Does anyone know what the deal is with the odd cross hatching on the Ancient Ones head?

Toy's can be weird. Much like Star Wars succeeded mainly on those amazing 3 1/2" Action Figures back in the day, Cars is all about the Die Cast Hot Wheels sized cars. The Lego sets feel like pale imitations of what the kids want in this case or for this particular IP.

Someone correct me, but this new "Smaller Milano" looks to be almost the perfect size for Rocket's Ravager Warbird from the first movie. I can see that being an easy conversion. Also add Mantis to the list of "Characters I never ever expected to ever see in any form let alone a minifigure". I am overjoyed, I've always been fond of the character. The original Celestial Madonna Avengers storyline was the first full complete comic story I ever managed to collect from start to finish. Without having the new one in hand yet, I am leaning towards the original. Simple reason, it has an amazingly decent amount of interior room and detail. You can fit and secure all of the team in it at once except for Groot. The new one looks like it might really just be a one or two fig cockpit.

Yep. Jack Ma is planning on investing $100 million into a US business branch in the next few months. Which could explain his sudden interest in recognizing Copyrights and Trademarks.

I honestly think the next "Spce"ish theme is likely at least a year out. I think internally Lego sort of views Nexo Knights as a SciFi Action theme that is filling that role for the moment. So unless we get a "ninjago in Space" wave unexpectedly we probably have some time. Now this is pure wild assed speculation on my part. Largely based on what patterns we can legitimately discern from watching Lego in recent times. (Please note I speak of legitimate observable business and operational Trends. I am not talking about baseless fan theories such as "every other leap year we get..." or similar. No astrology. Just watching where Lego puts money and where they find success to guess what they might do next.) So just based on what we have seen in the past few years, and some reasonable assumptions based on market conditions, what might a new 'Space" theme look like. 1. It likely will not look like "Classic Space" at least as we know it. Yes Benny's ssS did great. And we will hopefully see some new classic style sets with the next TLM, but really without a movie backing them any new fully in house themes will probably be some sort of "Conflict Play". It will be Heroes in some way fighting some sort of bad guys. I think the days of a single side Space Theme who's purpose is launching satellites is long gone. Anything we get going further will be more akin to SP3, AC, GS, etc. 2. It will likely be a Hybrid Theme. Lego seems to be finding a certain sweet spot for the market space that Space would occupy, by doing some rather unexpected yet almost intuitive "Mix and Match" Hybrids of Classic Themes. Ninjago is a mix of Castle, Adventurers, with some SciFi concepts and designs layered on. Nexo Knights is obviously Space Meets Castle. Even Chima was a touch Castle meets Space meets Fabuland. The point is I can see a Lego new theme brainstorming session going something like, looking at all their Classic Properties and playing Mix and Match one from column A and One from Column B. Hmm what goes together? How about 'Space Pirates" or "Star Cowboys"? (and tell me after seeing just those two phrases you cannot already see how themes of them would go?) 3. Whatever we get will have named, easily identifiable main heroes and villains. The Sentai formula has brought them success. GS's biggest failing was they didn't steer quite far enough down that path. Whatever we get next it will follow down Ninjago and Nexo Knights well trodden path. 4. Given the current upswing in Star Wars, I don't think we will be seeing that much of a pure more classic Style Spaceship theme for a bit. They will be seeking a bit more separation. Either something more old school with more near future stuff like a City based Moonbase theme, or something completely different. I keep thinking Exotic SciFi Space Sailing Ships manned by Galactic Freebooters. 5. whatever we get will have a clearly mapped out Story, Characters, Locations and a deep multimedia tie in. It will be less freeform than old school Space stuff. As I type this out, I can't see anyway that we don't get some sort of Star Pirates theme at some point. It just feels a little too obvious.

Very nice. Where is that Silver Haz Mat suit from? I don't remember ever noticing that figure in a set?

I'm thinking mid year we will start to hear rumors of all these cool SciFi sounding set names. Really awesome stuff. When suddenly the images leak "StarFriends"!!! Complete with delightful Trans Neon Pink Canopies and cute fluffy Space Monsters to hug! "Emma's Intergalctic Ice Cream Truck".

Be careful in assuming patterns and policies where none exist. Remember the Modular Buildings absolutely positively never ever used stickers... until they did. What we see as patterns and rules are to TLG, simply production design decisions. We might get some nice big printed pieces. We might end up with stickers. It will all depend on the production resources and budget.

I don't think we will see a belt with a side clip or holster. I think one of the design restrictions is to not impede the arms, which swing below the waist line. But I love the idea of some sort of belt clip. The Darksaber puzzles me. They have the absolute perfect piece for the Darksaber over in the Ninjago line. This piece https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=11439pb03&idColor=19#T=C&C=19 in a trans purple with a Lightsaber hilt. As for parts I want? Anything to smooth out and add some flow to the undersides.

I confess I tend to split the middle on that story in terms of what I believe. I've been in industries involving licensed IP's. If both parties don't come to agreement they each take their work product and go home. Lego likely did do some preliminary work. Some of the design ideas involving organic animal shaped vehicles was likely recycled, without using the Tcats IP or design schemes, into some of Chima's stuff. It's just how it works. Designers do not completely abandon ideas. If they can't use them in one place, they will recycle them, alter them and use them elsewhere. I'm sure some of the stuff such as the brick built animal heads for vehicles and castles might have been likely played around with early on for a Thundercats presentation. There is no question in my mind on that, nor did lego do anything wrong or unethical. It was their work. When the parties agreed to not go forward with Thundercats, that was their property to take away and use. Design exclusivity does not accrue until the contracts are signed, excepting clear pre-existing IP and iconography. demo and preliminary stuff is the property of the designers. It's just how it works. It's just nobody ever talks about this in public, because you do not discuss the business end of licenses in public, ever!

Thundercats nearly came to be. We know from the ravings of the reboot showrunner that they were deep in discussions, and LEGO had produced quite a bit of preliminary design work. He was enraged because he felt, that when the deal fell through, LEGO rolled everything into creating Legends of Chima, and displaced his show on Cartoon Network. Word was Warner Brothers was not particularly pleased with his little tirade. (I.e. LEGO was worth far more to them than the cartoon running fool.) Top Gun will never happen. It involves modern Warcraft. Without an overlaying fantasy element such as comic books. I would not however be surprised to see Maga's COD team take a stab at a Top Gun F-14 at some point. D&D faces a number of hurdles. Problem one is that TSR got bought by a Wizards of the Coast that got bought by Hasbro. So the IP is owned by a competitor. Problem two is Hasbro released a D&D Kreo line not too long ago, and it bombed horribly. Total sales washout. Granted it was awful, but between it failing and Mega's World of Warcraft line tanking at the same time, nobody is going to touch it. Game of Thrones, way way too Adult for Lego. Star Trek, honestly, they have had plenty of chances for this one and always said no. Non competes in the Star Wars license might be part of it. But really at the end of the day Star Trek has long been a lousy toy license for some reason. It's a great property for model kits, but the toy aisles have rarely found wild success with it. At least not since Mego's days. (Playmates did ok largely via specialty shops, like Diamond does today.)

A lot of the Adventure stuff is sort of semi officially intertwined. Power Miners and Atlantis exist in the same world (shared characters in sets. Brains). Atlantis also takes place in the same world, but not necessarily the same time as Pharoah's Quest, Dino and Alien Conquest. With the AC Aliens being basically the same race or creators of the Atlantis sea creatures. Space Police III may also be in that shared universe. IIRC there is some reference tying Alpha Team to Agents. And Ultra Agents, Galaxy Squad and Monster Fighters have some linked story. Ninjago and Exo-Force seem to be almost a gimme given some of the thematic similarities. You could drop Exo-Force and Sentai Mountain into a small corner of the overall world of Ninjago without batting an eye or breaking theme.

They did re-release a few of the earliest figures as a VIP boxed set. With some seeing some minor changes, typically colors of accessories. It had the Elf, Evil Cyborg, Gorilla Suit Guy, Fisherman and Mummy. Of course that set was probably made from extra parts that they otherwise dump into the build a minifig bins. I'm betting we see a recolor of the Gimli beard for the Battle Dwarf. That would differentiate it from the Fantasy era Dwarves.

I rather suspect that the Saturn V will have some stickers. The flags and USA markings at a minimum. Heck we will be lucky if it doesn't require the dreaded STAMPS.

From the one picture that leaked out it looks more like a "Pets" type thing. More akin to that Disney Pets line. Besides we already got Fabuland 2. It was called Legend of Chima. It was all about what happens when all the wolf and lion people figure out they can eat the fluffy bunny people, then get addicted to narcotics. It's kinda like the Fabuland version of that final scene from the Charlton Heston Planet of the Apes.

Heck I don't think Megabloksbrandscontruxwtf has done particularly well with their line of similar character builds. I think they were shelf warmers.

The biggest challenge Lego faces in China is sourcing the plastic. In Europe they are able to use a single source that is completely to their specifications (I want to say Bayer?). But due to a ton of carrying environmental and political regulations they must use local sources in China. Matching those plastics to Bayern formulations is the challenge.

I find much better luck with Bricklink for the completeness of used sets. Generally they just are missing the "extra" pieces. whereas on E-Bay you get whole missing sections, and a weird mix of non Lego parts.

There is also a new "friends" style animal theme coming. So it could be any number of things.

I like it. It's useful, not just for City. It also mixes and blends well with the Super Hero themes. Populate it out with Super villains. It makes a nice Raft or Bellereve or similar.

Did you buy it used? My first thought would be you lost or got a set with a mispacked or missing bag of small parts. But that doesn't make sense. The parts you describe as missing are across several numbered steps, meaning they would have to have been mispacked on 3-5 different assembly lines. That doesn't happen. The scales and measuring systems they use in production really are that precise and accurate. If you are ever missing parts in a Lego set it will 99.99999% of the time be from one single bag. if parts are missing from multiple bags in a set, start questioning where the set came from and how it reached you. Or start searching your floor and trash carefully.

Or Kai Mech. Although I remain skeptical of that list. It doesn't have the creatively horrible bad English translations that normally characterize early leaked set lists.

I doubt if Lego is currently paying much of anything to retain or extend the license. The only place they are using it is in the Lego Dimensions property, of which Warner Brothers is a co-owner. So using Warner Brothers properties in the game was likely a gimme. Which brings up something that few people grasp. The end of the LotR licensed sets was likely not simply Lego's decision. They have had a long term ongoing relationship with Warner Brothers for over a decade. Much like they have with Disney and Lucasfilms (now more Disney). Harry Potter -> LotR -> The Hobbit -> Scooby Doo -> The Lego Batman movie, etc. with D.C. superheroes/Batman running concurrently. It is not simply LEGO, but where WB wishes to put their marketing and merchandising focus for maximum synergy, at a given time. For WB Middle Earth is a largely fallow license. As much as they might have liked it to hit Star Wars type Evergreen status the way Marvel and D.C. subjects have, they will not cannibalizes exposure of other properties by keeping a line out there if it clearly isn't hitting that long term threshold. Lego just gave them a bunch more shelf space in new uncharted territory with Superheroes Girls sets. The Licensor will follow the money and use Lego sets to pimp their latest and greatest offerings.

Storm and Stass Allie are it so far for darker skin toned females. (Figure if they don't give us a Marvel Monica Rambeau/Spectrum or a Misty Knight fig someday soon we will almost certainly get a Liz Allen in a Spider-Man Homecoming set next year.) the other head you are showing is from Kordi, in the Star Wars Star Scavenger set. The only other female minifig head in that color is Starfire from the D.C. superheroes. Who unfortunately is yet another Alien with glowy eyes. I think most if not all of the male heads in that color are bearded or have some distinct facial markings such as Quinlan Vos. Most licensed female minifig heads use Light Flesh. Flesh, Medium Dark Flesh and Dark Flesh are a bit uncommon for system scale minifigs. Mostly showing up in things like Pirates of the Caribbean for the Zombie Pirate crews. I believe the new or soon to be released Barbara Gordon and Batgirl figures from the new Lego Batman movie sets also use either Flesh or Medium Dark Flesh. So that should be five different figures. I'm not sure if they have different face prints. http://brickset.com/sets/71017-6/Barbara-Gordon http://brickset.com/sets/71017-10/Pink-Power-Batgirl http://brickset.com/sets/70908-1/The-Scuttler The Bricklink color guide will help you figure out what color you are looking for and what parts have been made in that color. http://www.bricklink.com/catalogColors.asp?utm_content=subnav