SirBlake

Man, that looks awesome! Love the orange too. I can't wait to widen it.

Slam dunk for the Elf in my opinion. First appearance of the longbow mold, elf ears on the hair piece and amazing printing on the torso/legs and new shield heraldry. Papoose is great, but without it I think the tribal woman wouldn't even be in the conversation.

The wizard vs clumsy guy face off is a wonderful dichotomy of a larger conversation. Specifically a great re-do or homage of a classic vs a very imaginative specialty character. I honestly don't think there's a wrong pick between the two.

Wizard for sure. Well-detailed take on a classic with great printing and a new hat mold.

Interesting. I remember that video (and how punchable that host was), but not that detail. Few different ways to interpret her answer.

This is a great idea for a thread. I can't wait to see the next batch.

In what way? Like S1 Forestman type of thing or something else?

I predict re-do's of classic figs. By classic, I'm talking late 70's-early-80's. For example, original space guy, but with modern CMF printing including on the arms and legs.

Daredevil!

Very interesting. I'm going to assume this means a historic themed series until proven otherwise. lol, wishful thinking more than anything, but wouldn't that be great? Edit: or maybe zombified versions of old classics. Like the zombie pirate. Zombie classic space guy, zombie knight, etc. I'd buy a bunch of those.

This is really cool. I particularly dig the grille solution . Nice work!

Could you please restate that in a way that drops more clues?

I see your point on this, but the rehash of set types is really only one factor. Simply put, there just wasn't anything special about these sets, including but not limited to rehashed selection. Specific to the 2015 pirate ship, I bought it and like it a lot. Anecdotally, I didn't see it sitting on shelves forever either, nor did I ever see it on sale. The rest of the sets for that theme were meh though.

Yes. Two words: Trojan Horse i cant speak for the U.K., but it seems a great percentage of school mascots are Trojans as well, so there's plenty of that in the zeitgeist.

Your point is well taken, especially on Ninjago, but 2013 Castle and 2015 pirates are in their own way an extreme example of templatized theme making that are considered to be uninspired and a whole new level of derivative. Most feel that is what limited their chances at great success more than their subject matter. Even so, by comparison, boring is better than completely absent. This years-long drought of castle has tought me that.

Yeah, but that piece from museum replicas is a non-licensed copy replicating Brotherhood of the Wolf, for cosplay, not an actual historical piece. I've been buying from MR since the 90's, and I remember when that was added after the movie. Edit: I'm not saying that coat isn't historically accurate, just that representation, especially with a bo staff is extremely referential to the film imagery.

Is "the Highwayman" in that form really a thing outside of a reasonably obscure French movie from 15+ years ago?

If only that were the case for me. I bet I haven't bought 6 or 8 sets in the last two years. Lots of us focus on 1 or 2 themes, and when there's nothing made for them, regular CMF series are the only chance to get a piece of that.

I know you have your sources, so I'm certainly not going to doubt your assertions. With that said, do you have any insight on the performance of Kingdoms? I managed to score a decent amount of the last wave at discount, but at that time, just about everything was discounted, regardless of theme, or so it seemed at the time. It would be interesting to know if TLG considered that one a flop as well. I love it very much, and feel that its only shortcoming was that it was killed off before we could get more than the usual castle-small fort-blacksmith-carriage assortment. (Mill Village Raid notwithstanding, which was great)

Good finds, thanks! It's also appreciated that you include the links.

Giggle

This is amazing! Beautiful work and some great photography too. I'm probably going to have to stare at these pics for a couple of hours, lol.

Hello Pot, meet Kettle... Pop Star c o said: Ideal layout: Jan - The LEGO Batman Movie 2 May - Disney 2 Aug/Sep/Okt - Series 18 Pop Star c o said: Oh, my gosh! What does that mean?!! I hope you're not true! We all need Disney 2 for 2018! Pop Star c o said: I have two wishes for 2018: TLBM 2 and Disney 2. Pop Star c o said: Disney would sell much better.

But what happens when there's nothing to like? I'm as vocal as anyone when there's something wonderful to talk about, but the simple fact is that there's kind of nothing, at least for the theme that I'm most passionate about. (you'll see plenty of cheerleading from me for Speed Champions, for instance). It's been discussed before, but the highlights are these: 1: I (and others here) subjectively hate the design of NK. I said subjectively because I don't hold it against anyone who likes the theme, but I ask or the same respect in return. I mainly hate it because it keeps things I would otherwise like off of the shelves, and that's ok too. Just because I hate it, doesn't mean that I troll the action themes forum. As soon as the speculation thread moved there, I backed off. The only place more traditional castle fans have to discuss the theme, or more accurately, the lack of anything that resembles the castle themes we love, is this one right here, and we're being lambasted for expressing opinions. I refuse to apologize for having these opinions, but I also respect others. That should be returned in kind. 2: Appreciation for other useful themes. I think it's great that there's a ginormous Disney castle and that there are some neat parts in Elves sets. Fantastic. The thing is, none of these are close enough to actual castle theme to qualify as a replacement and I sure can't afford to buy elves sets for cool window pieces or similar interesting parts. 3: Deal with it. You know what? Talking about my disappointment in what's available is dealing with it, and if a big western fan wants to start a thread talking about how they are underserved, more power to them. Someone mentioned how pirates doesn't get much love. You know who complains about it? Just about everyone in the pirates forum, and if there was some junky space-ified wiz bang action theme (my opinion, not an objective dissertation on all things in that forum) all about pirates, you can bet they would have discussions about how unfortunate it is that there isn't a proper pirates theme. I don't blame them one bit. In conclusion: You like NK? Great. I'm happy for you. Let the rest of us have our little crybaby thread without beating us up about it.

I have. It helps, depending on the car.