Faefrost

Do we know if one of the UCS or super large sets is being retired to make room for the Sandcrawler? I figure the Death Star or R2-D2 would be next up for retirement?

The root problem with the Friends Minidolls in the Lego Movie was their gross change in visual styles and proportions. Remember the Lego movie is presented to the viewer as a fully realized world, that just happens to be made of Lego, in much the same way that classic animated movies just happen to be pen and ink. The Lego is at least initially presented to the viewer as simply the medium through which the story is told. Much the same as animation claymation, etc. for anything animated consistency of art styling is subtle but critical. Little things can shatter the illusion, like a shift in tone or proportions. You can't mix classic Bugs Bunny style animation with Japanese anime unless you expect that contrast to be the gag that things are centered around. By mixing Minifigs and Minidolls in the movie they mess with the proportions and visual expectations. The result is instead of seeing a fully realized Lego world, the viewer instead immediately sees Toy Story. Where the medium and core gag becomes not a fully realized brick built world, but rather toys playing together. It's a subtle thing. But those same visual and tonal discrepancies that lead Dorayaki to forever bemoan "what is the place of Friends in the overall conjoined Lego universe?" Over the toys themselves, absolutely magnify when put up on screen. The Friends Minidolls are probably among the worst of Lego's properties for this visual discrepancy, because any such things are magnified if the subjects are meant to represent or look like normal people. Bionacle could be passed off as a fantasy robot. It clashes a little, but doesn't shatter the illusion. Fabuland same thing. Funny head anthropomorphic fantasy, but the proportions are close enough that they eye might be fooled to some degree. Mil house shows up because while the head is wrong the proportions are still right and the visual lines are maintained. But stuff like the Minidolls, the Jack Stone figs or the old Technic figs shatter the illusion of the Minifigs as characters other than toys. The eye can't square them together. It might be possible to use the Friends Minidolls in a future sequel, now that the full story of TLM has been told, but their presence would have destroyed much of the dramatic effect and big reveals of this movie. Personally I think TLG made a few initial design missteps with their now wildly successful friends line. The concept of the more girl focused Minidolls is sound and understandable. I just wish they could have kept the height and relative proportions a bit closer to the system Minifigs. That would have allowed for a less jarring or less segregated feeling of play between Friends and System. If the accessories and items and figs were sized well for both.

That's one of those rather unusual Spider-Man Juniors sets. Back from when Lego briefly had the Spider-man movie license from Sony. It would be viewed more as a collectable than as a regular set I would think?

The model shops used to be able to order direct from the factory any part in any color in bulk. The relationship changed a bit when they went to Merlin, so not sure if they can still do that. They will also clear out and sell off unused parts stocks from time to time, especially if they are retiring a model that uses a lot of something rare to maintain. They will either do a friends and family sale or sell some really nice grab bags at the park store. It's these that make their way to Bricklink from time to time.

The movies can be tough for Lego. Look at some of the mis steps with IM3. Further the more "realistic" looking charcter designs and vehicles tend not to do as well as the stuff that has a bit more of a traditional comic book feel to it. The Cap Hydra set both benefits from the winter Soldier movie for interest and it maintains a more classic look and feel/ Which is a good marketable way of splitting the baby if you will. Think of it this way, so far the closer the sets hew to the movie property the worse they tend to do. The Man of Steel sets being great examples, or the Batman Bain Tumbler set. A generic Spider Man set that makes you think of the movie, but isn't exactly tied to it is the most perfect thing as far as Lego is concerned.

We got one of her years ago

I think Arana has a better chance then most of appearing someplace like AoS or one of the new Netflix street level shows under development. Technically Sony only has movie rights for Spider-Man. TV and all merchandising reverted to Marvel. But I don't think Marvel will put out a conflicting TV version of Spider-Man so long as Sony is doing OK with their movies. A consistent Spider-Man in the public eye is more important to them than a TV show, just to avoid brand confusion. But a character like Anya would work well for their TV shows. She lets them play a bit with the Spider-Man world and branding, while steering clear of any conflicts of perception. They probably will not use Jessica Drew for that sort of thing as she is more desirable as an Avenger, or for use in the movies. The others are too situational or obscure to really use. The best of them would be Julia Carpenter. But there really is little functional difference between her and Anya beyond character age. Typical Hollywood thinking would have them going for the hispanic teenager over the white red headed single mom.

The only flaw with that is didn't we just have a theme of "Steampunk'ish Detectives" stopping classic Monsters? (Ok granted they were more "diesel punk")

I like that Cap suit. It's modern, but looks a little more real. Less cartoony or spandexy like the Avengers suit. It looks to be everything that I liked about the WW2 suit updated to modern tactical gear. And weirdly it looks to be a very good color match for that first retail Cap minifig from the 6865 Avenging Cycle set.

Anya is her own license, mainly as Arana. While she has on occasion guest starred in Spider-Mans books she is not a regular member if his supporting cast, villains or sidekicks. Sony would probably need to go back to Marvel to get permi$$ion to use her. She would not be a clear embedded part of the Spider-Man license. Even the black and white Spider-Girl/Arachne outfit she wears these days predates Spider-mans black suit and was more closely tied to the Secret Wars stuff. The way the licenses work, Jessica Drew Spider-Woman, Julia Carpernter Spider-Girl/Arachne, Anya Corazon Arana/Spider-Woman are all almost definitely outside of SONY's license. The Ultimate Jessica Drew Spider-Girl is borderline. And the Mattie Franklin Spider-Woman and future May Parker Spider-Girl could probably be used by Sony as direct Spider-Man properties.

Now that is nice! I wish we would get an actual set of the Red Skulls car.

They show up in strange places. Exo-Force was the last time we saw a broad spectrum of odd hair colors. But you see some others in other themes and in the CMF's.

Didn't we just see that Shredder armor in the Wolverine movie? I'm glad that much like the Lone Ranger movie, the Lego sets based on this look really really good. Because my expectations of this movie currently could not get any worse. Those faces are the stuff of nightmares. Just dead, lifeless creepy, with strange dead eyes, weird unatural noses and lips that don't seem right in an organic life form. Oh and the turtles faces are pretty horrible too!

The Lego movie falls into a very very strange area for something like CuuSoo. It is essentially a licensed property that happens to be owned by Lego. It's not like a normal internal theme property like Castle or City. It has clearly defined IP and more closely resembles a licensed property for how it behaves and the rules that probably surround it. Things like no licensed property will ever allow fan creation of new original subjects and characters, etc.

But tellingly, the one exception they gave to Hasbro regarding EU characters were for a couple of TOR figs. So Old Republic stuff does not seem to be covered by the moratorium. It's probably because they have on going games surrounding it in the public eye. This is great if it gets us the Revan figure. Sadly it probably still means that we will never see a TOR Bounty Hunter or Smuggler ship.

We typically don't know until it releases. Unless the merchant reveals it in their online catalog. It's normally either TRU, Target or Walmart in the US.

If it doesn't appear in catalogs and isn't shown at toy fairs then 99% of the time it is a merchant exclusive set.

That's just beautiful. I love the worn feel to the front you achieved with the random masonry bricks, and those violet awnings!

5 movie sequence, almost the same as last time. IM3 Thor2 Cap2 GotG Avengers2 I think phase 1 had one extra movie before they settled in to where they were going.

If it makes you feel any better, Given how business and manufacturing works, it isn't a direct "one or the other" relationship between tooling for something like the Simpsons OR new construction parts. Tooling is a capital expense, and I would bet with almost 100% certainty happens on the back of business financing. Essentially they take out a mortgage for each new mold or theme to support the tooling. And each theme is a separate business case and evaluation. The licenses for things like Star Wars or the Simpsons are offered to the banks as part of the business case for the loans, etc. When it comes to tooling and parts think of Lego as a construction company that builds houses. The construction for each house is financed individually from the bank based on its expected value and returns. And one has little to no impact on the other up until the point where the company is exceeding its viable ratios of loans to income. Given Lego's current growth curve they are nowhere near that. What I am trying to say is new tooling isn't a zero sum game.

The Simpsons has a history of retiring characters when the voice actor passes, rather than seeking to recast them. They can create new characters using new voice actors. I think they just find it more respectful of the actors work. Especially for those that have been with them for so long now. Don't forget they retired several popular male characters when Phil Hartman was killed.

I suspect it all comes down to their expected production capacity vs their expected returns. I know they always seem to say that review projects are not directly competing with each other, but given that they have only assigned 3 production slots / year for new CuuSoo sets, there is no way they can avoid competing to some degree on the basis of expected returns. And that may sway the business case towards projects that are more expected to be hits. BUT that does not necessarily mean that they will avoid quirkier stuff. Take note that they made Curiosity and they are making the Exosuit. But they probably will be giving some increased weight to how big a market they expect for a given item. And honestly they are probably a lot better at predicting such markets than we are. (As an example there is probably a higher customer base for something like the Birds project than we internet nerds would typically think at a glance, and it most likely even surpasses some video game properties.)

I hope this is real. Great character. I'm more surprised that Disney / Lucasfilms would go for it? Granted the TOR stuff seems to be the only point of the "EU" that they do not currently have a toy making moratorium on.

Actually looking at that supposed "Ultron" head. Is it just me, or does it seem to have more than a touch of Anihilus about it? At least in how it is shaped, the eyes, and way the mouth looks hinged?

I think the point is more everything that appears in the movie was specifically created as Lego designs. It's not like creating a Lego interpretation of the Batmobile or the BttF DeLorean. Lego already has created the design and plans for every single thing. Regardless of whether or not they produce them as sets. I'm thinking that gets problematic when proposing a design as an outside third party. They will not pay outside royalties for designs they already have on file in house.