MAB

I agree. Minidolls and Belville, even Clikits, are just as much real LEGO as any constraction sets.

I keep seeing piles of them. I think the first ones (over Christmas) to hit the shelves sold out to people waiting for classic space, but since being restocked I regularly see them. I imagine sales will pick up once the movie is out at cinemas and more kids have seen it.

It would be interesting if they put classic space sets on the shelves at the same time as Star Wars and see which one theme sells the best. My money would be on Star Wars, even now after 20 years.

I'd like to see a child try to swoosh the UCS MF around a room.

Why not buy the parts you want, and ignore the ones you don't like? Surely most stores sell things that you don't like. For example, all supermarkets here sell newspapers that have their own often divisive political views. But I still buy food in those stores. If I didn't, I'd starve.

Theoden - excellent print and accurate face, with print underneath the armour too.

She didn't say that. She said didn't consider Bionicle "real LEGO". Bionicle parts and system parts don't always mix that well, and lots of AFOLs fail to understand how to build or MOC constructions using constraction type parts, or are not interested in buildable figures. If there weren't resellers, then it would be impossible to get hold of new sets on the secondary market. And were these sets actually scalped rather than just bought to be resold at a later date? That is, all stocks bought out when available at retail to stop the primary market sales then tried to sell on quickly at inflated prices. I don't recall them being hard to buy on the primary market.

It wasn't even the currently produced parts. BL only made a subsection of current parts available, as they buy these in bulk from LEGO then sell them at the ~10c per part price.

It depends what it is. And you shouldn't post IDEAS projects asking for votes, but post a MOC with a discreet link to the project. This is in the guidelines: LEGO Ideas: If you have a great MOC, that is also a LEGO Ideas project, you may present it on EB as you would any MOC, with a single link to the Ideas entry. Make the title about the MOC, not the Ideas business; don't be too shouty, and it is likely to be tolerated. You need to be thinking: 'I want people on EB to see my MOC and comment on it. If they like it, perhaps they'll support it on LEGO Ideas', rather than: 'I want Ideas support! If I post it on EB, perhaps more people will vote!.

Probably some girls in bikinis standing next to it, if you believe all the trashy movies...

I doubt the figures were ever going to be unique, as BL is not printing the parts. They are just getting a basic palette of parts from LEGO, then selling them on as these MOCs. LEGO isn't doing any special prints for them or anything like that. It looks like they've sold quite well though.

Very few have one. Going backwards... Y-wing: 1 minifig plus a droid Snowspeeder: 2 minifigs MF: 8 minifigs Slave 1: 4 minifigs plus carbonite piece Tie Fighter: 1 minifigure Sandcrawler: 14 minifigures X-wing: 0 minifigs (but 1 droid) B-wing: none SSD: 5 minifigs

I don't see your point. Those were the release dates. Sets were still available to purchase in 2012. Yes, good spot. A very bizarre post.

Atlantis finished in 2011/2012.

It does. But anyone in Europe will get hit with VAT plus other fees. For example, in the UK it currently translates to £153, but on top of that there will be another £30 VAT plus £8 for Royal Mail to collect the VAT. So about £190 all in. Compare that to the Corner Garage, £160 for 2500+ parts, and you can see that BL has probably overpriced them for EU buyers. Plus there was a fairly limited palette of parts that could be used, and the parts tend to be mainly quite basic ones.

Yep, my kids knew most Star Wars characters before they saw the movies. I regularly got Darth Vader cards for father's day, and Darth Vader PJs or T-shirts for presents, and so on. Similarly, they knew of Batman and Robin, the Joker, Superman, etc before seeing any of those movies. And I made sure the first movie they watched was the Adam West Batman. These characters are now, like it or not, part of western culture.

Because when they did exact re-releases, apparently sales volumes were poor, and also people complained that LEGO were just bringing out old stuff and not designing new sets. Which I imagine is partly why now they re-imagine sets or designs into new themes. That way, everything is new even if it is rehashing old ideas.

$200 for the castle. It looks like BL has gone with 10c per part across all builds.

How does LEGO try to make you believe they are accurate? And of course they are not accurate. These ones are toys, much smaller than the original cars, made of plastic building blocks. They also don't have engines. Anywhere that a minifigure is involved, the scale is off. Minifigures are not humans, their proportions are all wrong. This is true across all non-licensed ranges too. Have you ever seen passenger train carriages that take about 6-8 people, or houses or buildings that look like the modulars inside? Non-licensed cars are also inaccurate, to fit two people side by side, the cars have to be very wide compared to their length. It does happen with original themes. For example: 2018 2014 Both are even named the same: Arctic Supply Plane It happens very frequently in City, a fire truck goes and another comes. In Castle: 2010 2013 Both called King's Castle. And this one led to loads of complaints here about rehashes in Castle and how this shouldn't be done. And guess what happens when LEGO stops doing it, people complain they no longer do Castle. The set you complain about, Thunder Driller: It has also be done again, in non-licensed sets, such as: Of course, you will probably argue they are not the same, as they are not Power Miners, but Power Miners is dead. However, what was a popular vehicle in a non-licensed theme is reimagined in other non-licensed themes such as Ninjago and City. While in SW and other licenses, when they bring back vehicles, they tend to look very similar it is because they are following the same source material. For in-house themes, there is not that restriction so even though they may bring back a style to something that worked in a past theme, it can be reimagined in another theme. In fact, they took it to another level in NK: although really this was just a re-imagined vehicle from Ulta Agents: To a kid, these are all essentially the same set: a big drilling machine. Different themes, but the same set re-imagined to fit in with the current theme. That is why they don't redo the exact Power Miners set, they don't need to. If kids want a big drilling machine, they can have one in the current theme of the day.

Normally all the CMF torsos have the 88585 number, but it seems the WoO scarecrow one (6255817) is under the normal 76382 number and usually these torsos come in regular sets. So I wonder if that torso is going to appear elsewhere.

And what if the zoo had lots of marketing data and this showed that the majority of their possible customers wanted to see a rhino, but some wanted to see the hippo as it reminded them of the days they used to come to the zoo as kids, back in the days before the zoo had a rhino. And then if it was still available. LEGO dropping Star Wars would be huge news and a massive snub to Disney. If LEGO decided to drop a major license from Disney, chances are Disney would hit back and stop licensing all their brands with LEGO and move to another building block company, whose product quality is significantly better than they used to be. You would then have LEGO's attempt at in-house space up against an alternative brand's official Star Wars. LEGO would look like the cheap imposter and an alternative brand's SW may well keep LEGO's space off the shelves.

I doubt they set a price then translate it, but instead price the sets based on the market they are going to. For example, that 60240 set won't sell well for £10 in the UK. No doubt some people will buy it at that price, but that is a typical supermarket shelf set that will sell OK when it hits 33% off. It is likely to be discounted by about 20% for most of its life on amazon and in supermarkets. People want discounts so they over-inflate the RRP so when it is discounted they still make their money. Whereas the larger sets are not stocked by supermarkets but are stocked by some department stores and toy stores. They will sell OK at RRP but some people will wait for the typical 33% discounts that occur a few times per year. These don't need to be shifted quite as fast as supermarkets clearing the cheap sets. But as for the Shuttle set, space is not as popular here as in the US. The Mars Rover IDEAS set, for example, was very short lived in the US, but lasted about 3-4 months in the UK. So presumably they think they can charge a premium on things like the shuttle in the US, as it will still sell at that price.

The family room is great, but I think I like the little details best such as the trapdoor in Burns' office.

In this case it isn't just for the minifigures. It is for the scenery too. If you don't want that type of set, then don't buy it. As already noted, that type of set is not at all unique to Star Wars, or to licensed sets in general. There are plenty of non-licensed sets that are essentially scenery plus some characters that come with it that look a bit odd if displayed without minifigures and conversely there are many Star Wars sets that look great when displayed without minifigures. Star Wars at least has the benefit of a lot of vehicles and spaceships, compared to other themes such as Lord of the Rings, Marvel and DC, most Disney, where characters are the key parts of many sets.

Yes, that looks very effective. Much better than using a quiver on a neck bracket. That tiny bit of paint on the arrow tip looks great too.