MAB

Here is the current 2019 list of sets by theme from Brickset, with the gear type sets removed, DUPLO removed, Books removed, CMF removed as they aren't really sets as such, and education, FORMA, promotional, seasonal, etc removed too. Do those licensed themes really outweigh in-house themes? Especially when you look at the number of sets in the themes.

Take a look at the Super Bowl TV ratings: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Bowl_television_ratings. Do you see any point in that continuing?

They'd be too busy buying Mega Construx Star Wars, Marvel, DC and Harry Potter sets to either notice or care about LEGO not doing them any more. They aren't random, they are chosen by LEGO quite carefully. This isn't unnecessary. They will need something to fill the gap for younger (4+) kids and this is a popular license. It may be unnecessary for many AFOLs, but that doesn't mean it is unnecessary. So keep the ones that AFOLs like, but no themes aimed at younger kids allowed? Minecraft is still popular. It may not be as popular as it once was, but kids still play it. And more importantly, kids still want the LEGO sets. No. Some people are demanding more in-house sets. Yet others are demanding more licensed sets. Just look around the internet. It would be cool if LEGO did ... Game of Thrones, Breaking Bad, Thundercats, Space 1999, Star Trek, Thunderbirds, How To Train Your Dragon, Calvin and Hobbes, ... none of those is any less random than Trolls. In fact, a fairly popular movie, with a sequel coming out, aimed at the younger demographic that LEGO will want to target once the Incredibles and similar sets are gone, Trolls isn't that random at all.

If done well, I think the theme could be a really good seller. I guess for AFOLs, a lot depends on how they do the hair. Although for kids, I doubt they'd mind if the heads are molded or traditional heads, or the hair is "hair" or rubber or plastic.

It's from Lester: from this polybag set 40308:

We know they are willing to do "real" space as seen in City (and the even more real Saturn V) against SW - the proof is that they do City sets like that. But we don't know whether doing SW stops them doing a space exploration theme. The fact they haven't (at least since Galaxy Squad, Alien Conquest, etc) could mean that they think Star Wars has their fantasy Space needs covered, or it could mean that they don't think themes like that are worth doing as much as the themes they bring out instead. Just because SW doesn't inhibit something doesn't mean it will be made. Similarly, just because something is not made, it doesn't mean SW is inhibiting it.

I imagine the reason is the same though. They aren't making them as they don't want to make them, for whatever reason. If they decide that a theme such as Star Wars is no longer popular enough, then I think that this would not be good for LEGO space. If spaceships don't sell, then they won't make more spaceships. Whether under the SW brand, another license or in-house. I imagine the reason for not having space exploration or moonbase type sets is that they overlap too much with other themes, not necessarily SW. For example, there is a lot coming in City: To me, this type of theme overlaps more with Classic Space, or Galaxy Squad, or any other possible in-house space theme more than Star Wars does.

I have no interest in them at all as sets. But it looks like there might be some nice parts. And they are using traditional parts for the bodies at least, and wait and see for heads/hair. So they are already better than Angry Birds.

But what would the sets contain? And more importantly who would buy them? I cannot remember the last time I saw Zorro products on the shelf of a toy store. Fancy dress, yes. But toys? Would they overlap Pulp type sets with the current Superheroes offerings, or drop the licenses for SH sets and do this instead. Another company would be sure to pick up DC and Marvel and compete with LEGO's in-house offerings if they dropped the licenses. I can see them doing that type of character in the CMF range, but not as a theme. In fact, we already have a decent head for Zorro. The musketeer hat is a bit big but not too bad, and there are plenty of black torsos and capes.

^ This. If you are bending official LEGO axles in your design, then don't both making your own from plastics used in 3D printers. Go for something metal. There are some supplied of lego compatible axles, although not cheap.

It isn't. The reason we are not getting Classic Space sets is that LEGO isn't making them, it's their decision. Whether it is because they consider that they overlap with SW, or they think they are not marketable these days, or there is no demand from kids, or that they prefer to do new in-house themes rather than going back to old, only they know.

What have they done though, they have put a lot of work into the backstory to make them meaningful. LEGO has done this in themes like Ninjago, creating their own story based IP. Could they do it for Super Heroes? Of course. But if they do caped and masked style superheroes, they will overlap with the licensed Super Heroes themes. So they either duplicate something they already have and so don't add much to their sales, or they cut out the popular licensed based Super Heroes and lose fans of those licenses. And put Batman next to in-house brand LEGOman, and I reckon most kids and their parents will go for Batman. LEGO might as well do something different - like Agents, Explorers, etc - and not overlap with the existing licensed style themes.

I'd prefer them to do something like Adventurers, without the superhero masks and so on. If you mask-up otherwise unknown characters, they look like bad copies of the licensed properties, while overlapping with those properties.

Why would Star Wars (or any major licensed theme) only get a figure here or there, or a single set per year? That is not how licenses work. LEGO makes money off the licenses by selling large volumes of sets. Why do you think Forma is niche and inherently silly? Is it acceptable for fans of Forma to call Pirates and Castle niche and silly?

I think all the LEGO movies have been made primarily to sell toys, so in my view there is no change.

No. If there are pictures on the internet, then they exist. You don't need to know how to recreate it for it to exist.

I'd prefer they didn't do their own Superheroes. Either they become generic meaningless toys that look like bad knock-offs of the licensed style SH they are copying - like these for example: OR they become what they were replacing - essentially a heavily license driven SH range. If LEGO came up with their own SH range backed by comics, TV shows, etc then it is not really that different to having another license. They already do that type of thing - Chima, Nexo Knights, Ninjago. Why overlap these with two of their (current) core offerings, Marvel and DC, losing fans of those franchises?

Thanks for posting that. It also debunks the idea that NK sets aren't even worth buying for parts packs.

The German and Polish sellers are well known legit bulk sellers. I've never bought from the HK one, but have no reason not to believe they are legit, given their feedback and other store contents. These sellers are able to buy huge quantities of parts direct from discount factories or other routes - not from sets.

It was shipped to LEGO employees. So they need to identify the store and sack the manager or get him/her to sack the member of staff that has breached their contract if this is the case. Saying that they shouldn't ship it early to someone in the same company is like saying they should reveal it before it is packaged, or artwork printed, or designed. All those employees seeing the product managed not to reveal it. It was presumably down to a shop worker or poor store manager that allowed this to happen.

There were some locations: Knighton Castle, Volcano Lair, Fortrex (OK, strictly this is moveable, but it is a castle). There were also some smaller locations, such as the library and this one: Which to me is somewhat similar to regular smaller Castle sets of the past, and repeated throughout many themes, along the lines of mainly action with a little bit of scenery. Such as:

Indeed, the same thing goes on about Star Wars sets, they are too big or too small, or too similar to past ones, or too different to past ones so now don't look like the source material. Or the minifigures are just the same as in the last set, or they changed the design and now they don't match the ones in the last set. It happened with LOTR as well. Weathertop was dismissed as being too small, the Mines of Moria wasn't a mine, it was just some walls. The Uruk-Hai army wasn't even that, it was just a piece of a wall to be added to Helm's Deep. And so on.

Before you buy in parts to sell, I'd check if people would be willing to pay a reasonable price for your MOCs. Do you ever post your MOCs online and get comments from users about them? When you consider your time designing them, you are likely to be working well below any minimum wage and more likely for free unless you can source your parts very cheaply.

The green on the hem line makes the skirt even better.

That's my thinking too. There are enough (new) modulars as it is, and more of them via an unofficial channel is probably not viable. If the designers want their designs to be out there, it is probably better to sell the instructions (or give them away) so that people can piece them together themselves or mod them depending on what bricks they have, rather than try to sell a reasonably large run of kits - even though numbers are limited, selling a thousand unofficial modulars at official modular prices is going to be a hard task.