Dorayaki

First of all, I wrote down three solutions but I think all of them can be put into practice. I didn't say only one of them can be chosen. I'm not sure what your idea is? If the target is girls, there could be some other original minidoll themes that aren't related to modern City (eg, Fantasy Era). But if you're going to replace minifigures for minidolls in old themes, they would hardly appeal the existed consumers or AFOLs who used to buy minifigures. It sounds like a reverse version of solution 3: making Friends minifigures and "City minidolls". It might help Firends/minidoll lovers who need some firefighter or policeofficer members in a Friends canon, if we don't encourage people to mix up minidolls with minifigures. But I'm not really sure whether the target consumers (younger girls) have enough demands for such kind of minidolls.

A newly molded head used for him or Yeti doesn't look useful in minidolls. So question again: would TLC invent more sizes of minidolls in order to make perfect licensed characters? Minifigures are easier to deal with, obviously. If our target is to make a not-so-simple building that could be as similar as the ones from the cartoon, compared with other castles in Lego franchise, the common castles of Castle are for ages 7-12, and the Vampyre Castle is for 9-14. 6-12 aged kids aren't very young, but it does take time to own a better castle. Honestly, I think the overall design of these sets look simpler than Friends. I don't think it makes sense to make it too simple and ignore the potential profits from AFOL and common consumers. Especially that TLC is making "Junior" sets which is a concept that can be used for this theme too. And if TLC claim to traget at girls, it's even worse to think that girls can only play "simplified" toys.

Yes, it's consumers' freedom to use minifigures/dolls. They can remove Wyldstyle from Movie sets and put her in Ninjago sets or add more citizens or army builders in playing. However, ruling minidolls out from minifigures is a different story, which is mostly caused by Lego's attitude toward this system. Even though there are some army builders (the generic girls beside the five protagonists) in Friends, it's still awkward to rule Olivia's family from "their" house and put a minifigure family instead. Minidolls have some defects that don't happen in minifigures, while the old Belville dolls are much more functional. TLC obviously want to put appearances in the first place. My wish is that minidolls have seperate legs so that they can walk more properly.

Well, people have their own choices and tastes. Some may just try to get specific minifigures or series, not even to say there are some discontinued licensed regular sets that are often regarded as "incomplete". I think it's true that the elements in special CMF series are different (Team GB include similar athletes that have appeared in previous series or regular sets, while Lego Movie mix up some protagonists, personalities with new original CMFs.) Those who like the originality of normal CMFs can just get normal series. Just don't say that special/licensed series should be forbidden for no reason.

That's one of the concern if TLC decided not to use minifigures (maybe they will in the future). They have to invent numerous parts for minidolls that didn't appear in Friends, same for the sizes of different characters. So far these problems haven't shown in the first wave. An educated guess would say no. John Reid will probably appear as a Disney princess so he didn't...... WHAT? I don't see there are any necessity of "education" since all of us can see that there are fights and adventures in Disney world, or TLC should simply make more sets of the non-violent Disney Junior instead (Would Mulan teach Sofia how to use dynamites?). You may "ignore", but it's just a self-deception. Since Disney want to use their brand to make kids watch their old classics, they would inevitably see how those brave heroines beat off scoundrels. For Mulan, she is the most controversial pick as a princess, since she isn't an actual one and her story is mostly about fights and politics instead of romance (well, the sequel is more "romantic" but it means TLC have to produce Ting-Ting, Su, Mei and their lovers). My speculation is that Disney chose her as an Asian representive in order to market, since there are no princess folks that really stand out in Asia.

It's my first time to be in this thread. I found that the request below didn't get any reply, and I'm curious about it too. (note: the picture is a sample, not actual designs) This include both faces and clothes prints. I guess it's not a pratically difficult request, though for now I don't know too much about making decals. If anyone thinks it works, just reply and tell me what to do. Thanks in advance.

Perhaps it's just that when rumors leaked out, the original source only told that special themes are coming, and some people integret it in the way they wish.

Maybe my statement isn't clear, but you miss the point. It's not that you're "forbidden" to put minidolls and minifigures together, but it's TLC who should play a more active role in how to market minidolls and improve the entire system. As I said, TLC indeed started to add more elements that can interest girl, though overall it's slow.

It's nice to see that they get rid of Elsa's hair and create a new one for Ariel. Her hair is the most difficult but uncomplainable (we all know the reason). Sadly TLC seem not to come up with a solution. (Maybe they can give a short brown one). Maybe they'll include more characters if future sets would be based on the same story. For now we can't judge that. We worry about it because many other princess-related products seldom include secondary characters who are not princesses or their lovers. For villains, I think those from Mulan and Brave should be made, because the heroines need a rival to (physically) fight against. However there are two problems of characters remain in the Cinderella's castle: 1, as a large set we could expect more than three characters included (the third one could be Godmother). 2, TLC still didn't add animals from Cinderella's own story, but add some weird collectible Friend animals there (A crossover? Maybe I can expect Andrea appears too). Pascal (Tangled) and Flounder (Little Mermaid) also appears in other sets.

Well, the introductions of CMFs also look like that they're independent identities with personalities. I really like the personalities and designs of the Friends characters, but it could be one reason why they become the issue. Licensed themes are different stories, though I personally think that Disney franchise have a wider range of stories rather than "princess" stereotype only. I could agree some of your saying about minidolls. However, we also treat Friends as an important current "theme", it's not just about the relationships between minifigures and minidolls, but more like what you said: treat them as characters. Having a complete and successful collection of products doesn't mean that TLC is done and have nothing more to do with the implementation of Friends in the Lego system, or there is nothing different from that minidolls or their characters are indeed "additional" to what the Lego world represent.

I don't know whether your saying is true or TLC would change their minds. Indeed series number is not the most important, but still somewhat important, when some new collectors and outsiders from flee market face problems classifying unknown minifigures. The most important thing is that we want our traditional CMF to be continued, designed and keep making. Not only there are still endless ideas, but there are some fans waiting for counterpart CMFs to make up a subtheme (maybe a Tribal Princess, a Keytar Player). If TLC ensure that they won't stop it, there is nothing to worry about. Meanwhile, I don't reject any special theme or licensed theme in CMF, I hope all of them can periodically return.

Uh... double juice bar competition? Though both are cute.... The inclusion of animals seem to be more variable and successful. Ironically City sets never actually made something like Zoo parks.

Article revision: 2018 May Before the main topic, here is a simple showcase of how the issue looks like: This thought was hidden in my mind when The LEGO Movie was announced early in 2013. As a person who grew up ith Belville after by dark age, I was very glad that LEGO shed more light and eventually reintroduce a minifigure-scale theme for girls. However, everything begins to turn out and show that LEGO's plan might not be what we really expected. Introduction to the "Minidolls" So before the discussion, I'd like to go back to the origin of Friends and their minidolls. Sorry to quote Pandora's comments about the interview with the LEGO Friends designers. Most of the controversies pointed their fingers at how TLC tried to differentiate girls from boys in their toys because some of the AFOLs believe that Lego is still acceptable to girls. But Lego is somewhat correct in their viewpoint of market---- the current Lego products have a limited effect of appealing younger girls, so they must do something to make up. The ultimate result is the birth of minidolls. So, if minidolls didn't appear alnog with Friends, what would have happened? The answer is the difference between Friends and our traditional City/Town sets, which are both based on our daily modern life. Many elements from Friends are actually what City sets seem to lack of: distinctive and colorful female citizens, indispensable buildings (school, family house). However, due to the fact that both themes don't share the same figures, it results in difficulty of visually mixing the two themes together due to police officers mainly being minifigures and teenagers mainly being minidolls. We regard the rise of Friends and minidolls as "inevitable" in order to give younger girls a choice . But is this the end of story? Perhaps no, because what the controversies worry about still continue: a market segmentation by gender. Friends have brought about some potential side effects of thoughts: Friends are for girls only, so traditional consumers, AFOLs and boys can't touch them. On the other hand, since girls have their Friends sets, they don't have to be interested in traditional Lego sets that include minifigures. Oh, TLC didn't say anything direclty, but so far many commercials and shows still often hint that traditional Lego sets and minifigures are the truth to Lego, while Friends and minidolls are just some marginal products that were "particularly" made in order to meet those critical needs from girls. Now the contradiction between minifigures and minidolls is, the former is a historical, iconic figure of Lego franchise, while the latter is a successful pioneer to the market where TLC had been never actually made it to. Minidolls and minifigures seem to become "competitors" even though their creators want both of them to cover the whole toy market peacefully. It becomes more tragic when TLC just tend to keep the light on only one of them. The cover catalogues seem to be one of the rare peaceful zones that can put friends and other themes together (unless TLC plan to publish an independent catalogue that only include Friends). There is no standard answer, obviously, but it should be an issue that TLC consider. I like Friends and minidolls as independent products, but they would create a problem if TLC want to have longterm plan with them along with traditional sets (and especially licensed themes). The best result should be a win-win: let girls love what TLC had brought, and let old consumers love what TLC will bring. Don't just think about how to draw attention from a limited range of customers. Look into other LEGO media advertisings: The other main topic we focus is, do minidolls successfully strike into public's eyes? And, do LEGO actively bring minidolls into public's eyes? Here are some of the LEGO media tools we've seen so far and let's see how they work this thing The LEGO Movie The very first LEGO theatrical film features an original story with all LEGO themes making guest appearances...... well, only some of them. Friends is one of the obviously missing member, which is a difficult guess cause it could be a huge letdown to girls who enter the theater and want to give cheers to the Friends girls. Anyway, I don't really think it bothers to give a Master Builder seat to Olivia. Some of the discussion suggest that if Finn's sister appears in the future sequel TLM2, could she bring the girls' theme topic into the movie as well? It's a possibility, but the worst chance could be that LEGO just introduce more girly / pink character like Uni-Kitty to "represent" girls' voice. LEGO Dimensions The new crossover game title between multple LEGO franchises is currently the number one topic among LEGO fans this year. Although there are some other iconic LEGO themes absent so far, Friends' absense could also mean that LEGO Dimensions loses a huge advantage ---- introducing their original female cast in order to balance the gender ration of current Fun Pack characters lineup. Some discussions indicate that this game would cater more to videogamer market or licensed fans, but somehow, I think LEGO Dimensions fail to label itself as "best family game" since they're unable to include any license or character that represents major girls. (Disney Princess is unfortunately one of the conflcit license, though) Would future expansions do a better job? I'm not sure about it. How LEGO view the figure systems, officially? The LEGO Movie did trigger a series of discussion about minidolls and their characters--- how would they really look like if they officially appear in The LEGO Movie world? THEORY 1: Minifigures co-exist with Minidolls and other figures Some of the official videos show such examples: Coincidentally this series of fun video also use the stop-motion technique similiar with LEGO's theatrical film series. And also regarding to the story setting of The LEGO Movie where the LEGO toy collection exist as realworld materials, as there's no restriction to include any specific figure type such as Duplo bricks, this could be what reall happens in the The LEGO Movie canon. Some of the suspection tell that perhaps Finn's father or sister might already owns the minidolls, so if LEGO wants to stick to the real thing setting, that means, it's very possible for the co-existence of minidoll-minifigure to become the real canon. The major defect is, just as stated above, there's still very little official souce encouraging FOLs to play and mix minidoll themes with minifigures. And if TLM2 wouldn't focus on this point as well, then this theory still doesn't help too much for the minidoll-minifigure issue. THEORY 2: Based on user's viewpoint: This theory is simply derived from the real figures we have on hand, since Disney and DC comics both happen to have minidoll and minifigure toys lineup: As we can see, a character can simlutaneously show his/her minidoll and minifigure form. We can enlarge this to actually assume that every LEGO character is supposed to have both minifigure and minidoll form, even if the phsyical toy lineup doesn't show that. This theory can of course apply to other known figure types such as Duplo figures and BrickHeadz. And actually, this is also an officially-proven theory comes from LEGO News Show which really shows the "transformation" between minifigures and minidolls: This may have a very good explanation about why certain characters, like The Flash and Wonder Woman, only show up as minifigures in crossover media but not minidolls---- because the media has set the viewpoint in a minifigure-only world. This theory would help decreasing confusion between themes and figure types, especially to those FOLs who don't adore minidolls that much.. But regarding to The LEGO Movie again---- as it strictly based on the real-world viewpoint where only physically made and existed LEGO toys can be represnted, not quite sure if the current minidoll-only characters can show up as minifigures. Conclusion There some plans I can come up with, which can be achieved together: Solution 1: Keep Friends and minidolls, but add more elements that girls like to regular sets and City theme. Girls can have more choices just like most boys can choose between Ninjago and Chima. We see that many girls are also obsessed with collectible minifigures, Ninjago and maybe the upcoming Lego Movie, which proves that there are still some potential to please girls in traditional regular sets. Don't make them think "girls should just go play Friends and leave the others alone". Solution 2: Let minifigures share spotlights with Friends and minidolls, at least some appearances in some advertising, TV shows or films. When minifigures and minidolls are able to stand together, there is no need to attack each other. Solution 2.2: Or physically include both minidolls and minifigures in the same set? Uh, it could be an uncceptably terrible, and more controversial idea, I can imagine. Maybe they can consider it if there are some licensed characters fit in that idea. Solution 3: Endow the "characters" from minidolls with alternate minifigures: we might be unhappy with the minidolls, but not actually with the original / licensed characters which the minidolls represent, because they're not born to be blamed. If we produce minifigures and minidolls together, this could allow consumers to exchange between them or combine City and Friends sets, and the themes can compensate each other. Regarding to the upcoming The LEGO Movie 2: the second part We know it's close, and as long as Friends has actually become one of the most popular LEGO theme as well as the second long-running franchise, also LEGO Elves, the second original minidoll theme is also doing a good job, would The LEGO Movie 2 eventually cast a positive light and bring these girls-targeted themes into the theater? What do you think?

I'm not too sure about this question. If the topic is about "original action themes created by companies", licensed themes are another story. They are only based on how many female protagonists appear in that story. If the companies don't incluide female characters in products, the problem should be whether they decide to introduce figures of male characters' before female's. I don't see female characters in original action themes from other competitors very often. I can't come up with examples for now, but Kre-O of Hasbro would be one of them.

Though I made a project for that, so far I haven't seen such custom figures.

I thought it's determined by their appearances in regular sets (uh, don't tell me about th Simpsons). If Mr. Burns will have a factory set, he doesn't neeed to be a CMF I guess. Same for other characters in speculation. I think that's quite a pity, since there are many iconic hairstyles and parts in this show. I'm not sure how big their heads would be, but can't they keep their stud on top that allow them to change appearances?

Yes. Some of them obviously don't play any important role in this story. Panda Suit Guy is just one of the new mascot members, and they're included to fill vacancies (if this series should only include "extraordinary" characters). The series do include some protagonists who have exclusive appearances different from those in regular sets. We don't know how many secondary main characters this movie would introduce, so we can only make accurate comments after premiere. Suppose that Gail and Larry won't be allied with the protagonists, they still look too ordinary to be a CMF. Maybe they can be part of the City-themed army builders (same for Emmet if giving him a different face).

I'm not his fan, but a redesign still makes difference. Why not? But rather than that, I'd honestly love to see other old characters who even had no physical minifigures.

Back to the reason why TLC introduced minidolls: "to respond girls’ requests for a more realistic, relatable and stylized figure" (did we?). I thought it looks like a self-defeating for TLC, at least in licensed themes, which contains lots of characters in different kinds of shapes. Even though Olivia has a father who hasn't grown since teenages, that's still acceptable. But for those who are a bit more muscline and burly, they would look dumb in that figure, not even speaking of monster-like characters and children. We all know there is a prince with one of the most notable oversizes (though Mattel played it well). There are two advantages in traditional licensed minifigures: one is that their standardization can simplify some minor differences (waistlines and weights, heights). Two, they provide many other different kinds of sizes (from child to normal, taller, newly molded large figures). So far we haven't seen TLC introduce more kinds of minidolls, but according to the definition of minidolls, minidolls should have more kinds than minifigures. Or the only thing TLC can do is avoiding--- not to make any other character and ends up not fulfilling expectation from fans. Of course I hope they won't.

I think it's determined by which kind of toy company take the license, because each of their production line has different purposes and capabilities. For some minor companies that make figures or castles, they wouldn't produce other non-princess toys because they have to purposely create new molds and focus on another market they're not familiar with, which is not a wise move for them. Another example from Mattel who produce Disney dolls, they ocasionally add some different characters like Ursula from Little Mermaid or Queen Elinor from Brave, not to count Enchanted and High School Musical. "Disney Princess" is simply a term for mainstream, but it doesn't restrict companies from more of the franchise. Lego have more freedom than many other competitors, because the brick system covers a vast range of markets (from girls' interest to space and actions) which is already proved by previous Lego Disney licenses. So I don't see why they can't do more with it (they're able to, but unwilling to?) . I don't think a little girl cares about buying theses Lego sets just because Lightning McQueen is one of their predecessors.

Not to say the past, I don't think Lego will stop producing any new Disney set that is not based on a non-princess story in the future. If Disney and TLC have longterm cooperation plan, TLC have no reason to reject any license that doesn't have a princess there. So that's nothing to do with the so-called strategy unless Diseny stop to make any non-princess stories (an expensive arm, huh?). Main article: Making it more clear, it's that whether this minidoll series would extend its range of stories and characters or not (if TLC won't introduce Princess minifigures in a short time).

The conclusion is obvious, there have been many Disney characters not relating to any princess in Lego. Whatever, if TLC and DIsney are able and willing to do more, more is always better than less.

Uh, I think we should stick to the official product title, not the logical meaning in order to make correct discussion. I don't think my taste is determined by whether it's a special theme or not. The major concern would be what direction TLC would decide to follow, and it's very natural for fans to feel disturbed (What if no more CMF appears? Something like this, though impossible). No matter what, I hope that TLC won't make wrong decisions.

Nope, she's not considered a Disney Princess, at least not for the Disney Princesses franchise. Are you trying to ask whether she's an official member (answer: no), or would she appear in future sets (maybe yes)? As said, not only her identity is a spoiler, but her story is innovative and original, not a traditional fairy tale. So it's difficult to include such kind of character. Besides adding an underage princess is also a difficulty. That's a very good thought, I agree. However, even though the Merida set looks okay, we still wonder if the sets would be restriceted by not only the "Disney Princess" stereotype but the use of physical minidolls, where we're not sure TLC is able to create big-bad villains in minidoll scales. Among the official Princess members, Mulan, Merida and Rapunzel had done the most fights which have big potential as regular sets ---- if they were minifigures.

I don't know if you got it, TLC has already introduced many Disney characters who are not even princess "members" so that's not the problem.