MAB

Maybe go for a minfiigure in the same colour as the helmet, or just a plain light bluish grey one.

Helmet from this guy?

Maybe because they have enough long running licensed themes already. They have SW, Marvel, DC, HP. There is a difference between these and franchises like Despicable Me and Angry Birds in the age group they are marketted to. The current long running themes are aimed at older consumers (that have a longer attention span) and are known to be good themes for merchandise. Whereas themes aimed at younger kids rotate a lot more, whatever is at the cinema is popular and often soon forgotten. Thinking back, Minions seemed to be all the rage when Despicable Me was out, then died down quickly, then all the rage again for DM2 (but not Despicable Me merchandise, it had to be DM2), then died down just as quick. I imagine it is better for them to make three or four one-off flash-in-the-pan themes based on current movies than it is to make one long running theme over multiple years for properties like this. If you don't like one franchise, chances are there will be something else along soon. If you like more than one small theme, then they'll get your cash multiple times. Whereas if it is one long running theme, they might get boring after a while or you might feel you have enough if you just buy into one wave and not bother with later ones. If you didn't like the theme, then maybe they miss doing other franchises as they concentrate on the one they chose. Plus other companies will probably get rights to the themes LEGO didn't buy into and LEGO will lose sales to these competitors that do the current movies while LEGO continues in the longer themes based on older non-current themes.

I don't think so... US box: UK box:

I'd buy the proper old parts on bricklink.

There are many other techniques possible, but why not just tile a plate then angle it with hinges?

For me there are too many lion heads. A couple of them makes a statement and highlights the entrance or wherever they are placed. Having them on every bare section of wall is a bit over the top. Also floors 1 and 2 look identical, so increase part counts through repetitive building.

Yeah, so close now. I voted for that one quite a while ago. It doesn't look quite so novel since the kinetic model Chinese Dragon came out, but still cool. I loved the Star Wars version they did too.

Pizza suit guy = watermelon reprinted, which is fairly new in itself. As to others, butler - we already have the waiter. Could reuse the bowler hat which would make him slightly more interesting. Chef - we have loads already. Dentist - recent one in Assembly Square. So if true, that's a few I won't be looking for.

Isn't that exactly what they have, just without the name? Invent an umbrella theme called "Kids' Movies". Then in that umbrella theme put Angry Birds, Trolls, Minions, etc, as subthemes. Then remove the umbrella theme name. What do you have, a collection of smaller subthemes. Given how merchandise sales really tales off once a movie has gone from theatres, I cannot see Minions having the longevity to last three years, with new sets each year. These have to be short-lived themes with sets coming out only while the movie promotes merchandise sales. For Disney, they might get away with it, as at least some of those movies have the longevity and there is a whole range of movies to choose from. In a sense we already have a Disney umbrella theme in the Disney Princess line, which has been going for the past five years.

LEGOLAND has made quite an investment in this Castle (from Brickset). https://brickset.com/article/44164/inside-the-legoland-castle-hotel-in-billund

Yeah, although it depends how much you want to get involved with the backstory. I never watched any of the online media associated with it, I don't know if there was other stuff. I found that easy to ignore. Whereas if they did a Robin Hood set, I imagine most people are already swayed by the folklore. If they did a set with these two factions, I wonder how many would take the boars as baddies rather than just opposition to the other faction. The Evil Knight is one of my favourites (much more than the Heroic one) and with a change of head becomes far less evil.

That was pretty much spot on for the source material though!

What do you mean here? There are too many modular style buildings or not enough? There are a huge range of projects on Ideas. I don't know what this means. The ones in the recent 10 year vote all went through the standard system. They were not pre-selected by LEGO without a previous public vote to get to 10000. LEGO did not pre-select any possible sets that did not make it to 10000. How much time should LEGO devote to assessing each submission? Especially licensed ones, as these can take a long time with negotiations. Supporters' time is next to nothing. Designers have to put in the effort either way.

It hasn't though. LEGO have only picked from projects that have made it to 10,000, aside from blocking some IPs from the start. They do not pick projects from the outset. And that is the whole point of ideas, to see what people want. If they choose which projects could make it from the start and discount others, then after a few rounds they will end up with lots of similar submissions as people learn what will be allowed to be voted on and what will not. Plus it will be a huge amount of work deciding about licensing for every submission where a licensed property is involved, especially if it leads nowhere. There will still be people disappointed that their vote was not made. Think of all the people that voted for Stitch this time around.

They did a survey a while ago about what VIP members wanted. Personally, I'd like them to get rid of the discounts and instead have exclusive items that you can exchange points for (or have both). I'd prefer an exclusive poly or minifigures instead of £5 / $5 off.

Yeah, LEGO are doing sets for the new movie next year.

Who pre-selects the submissions? The point of ideas is that it is to highlight sets wanted by Joe Public rather than LEGO, so to pre-select the submissions they need to know what is wanted. So they could have a public vote for that ... which is the current Ideas.

Yes, it looks like a cut and paste error. Exactly the same text is on all three projects, just naming the designer and set near the top but not lower down.

I find it nice that they do short lived themes for 'smaller' licenses like this. If they did Minions, or Trolls, or Angry Birds, or ... for three years they get stale. I'd prefer they do three one year themes based on something of current interest (due to a Movie), rather than one that lasts three years. I would also imagine sales for three short themes are better than one longer theme, even if the total number of sets released are the same. Especially when they have longer running themes, Harry Potter, SW, Super Heroes, it is nice to have some other short lived licenses that change more often.

It is not only about licenses. Would LEGO want Scooby Doo sets on the shelves at the same time as Playmobil has Scooby Doo sets? It can lead to brand confusion, and also highlights the price difference between apparently large Playmobil sets and small LEGO sets. Of course, completely different products but not all consumers see that and just see LEGO as bad value compared to Playmobil.

In a way, it still is. For example, Monster Fighters was mean to be the monsters trying to get the moonstones so that they help Lord Vampyre unleash his evil monster army, and the humans were there to stop them. But for me, I preferred it with the monsters being the good guys and the evil humans were attacking them.

Imagine the complaints if the setting for the next Minions movie was some sort of huge, elaborate castle with printed heraldry... Minions keeping Classic Castle off the shelves.

Aren't they split between bags so that it is harder to steal all the minifigures by removing one bag and return to the store saying a bag is missing. Spreading them out means all bags have to be opened to remove all the figures, making it more obvious if a return has had the figures stolen from it.

It did with the Hobbit - the sets came out at similar times to the movies. And presumably the studios or LEGO thought that it would be a good idea to do LOTR as well - there were loads of LOTR MOCs at the time and I imagine LEGO was aware of this. IJ and POTC (at least for me) have much more longevity as a series than, for example, Despicable Me. In the same way as Star Wars is THE classic Space Opera, they are essentially THE historical action man and THE pirate franchise. People still buy merchandise for both franchises, and it is aimed at slightly older audiences. LEGO went all in to do them. Whereas with Trolls and Minions, I imagine they are just going for the short-lived movie tie-in and that's it. A lot of minions products got treated as essentially line clearance after the movies. If they do Gru and half a dozen minions connected with the new movie, I'm not sure what of the back catalogue they'd really want to do to make even more sales.