MAB

None. I just don't think we need a new hairpiece for such a minor character when existing ones work fine. How many people are out there thinking: We are getting a new LOTR version of Bag End but I'll skip it if they don't do a Lobelia minifigure, and she must have a new hairpiece. I imagine there are people (both AFOLs and fans of the movies) that have skipped Rivendell because of he price and size but would buy the smaller Bag End and so recognizable characters like Merry and Pippin ought to be in it ahead of minor characters that many wouldn't recognize if the character name wasn't on the box.

If everyone is doing it for the same reason though - to save it for the community - then it ends up with allies with a common goal out-bidding each other and increasing the price someone has to pay.

If they did Lobelia, there are plenty of female hair pieces already existing. I would hope they didn't use a new mould for a character that has so little screen time I doubt most people could describe how her hair is different to already existing parts without pausing the movie and taking a screenshot (as below). Her hair is not so different to the usual hobbit hair but of course this is used to represent the male hobbit shorter hair even though it is a but too volumous. I imagine they'd probably use a different one to distinguish male from female. The Dana/Rosmerta hair would be fine for me when you compare their on screen versions. It is too big, but then the existing hobbit hair is too big, in the same way that minifigure heads are too big a bit like bobble heads especiallywhen they use short legs.

Every person contacting them and asking about buying it is probably pushing the price up.

The post I responded to said acquire the domain, not the company. This would be different to twitter/X as there the company was sold. If the Brickshelf LLC becomes defunct and the domain is later acquired, that is not the same company.

Very different costume, and that is a movie series they are not currently making sets for. If they were to do another The Hobbit version of Bag End, then I imagine most people now would want all the dwarves before they do a Lobelia figure.

Whoever or whatever owned it would need to be careful if they are using submissions to the old site. Just about everything uploaded in the past was copyright the original designer / creator. They gave permission for the old brickshelf to display their work. A new brickshelf would be a new entity and the designers did not originally give permission for others to download their work, and upload it to a new site even if it has the same name. No doubt many designers won't care as it is alreafy out there but if one does, they should have a right not to have their work shared by a new entity. Especially if the new site earned anything through advertising or other means to be self-funding to future protect it, someone else making money of their work may swing creators' views.

Type lunar into bricklink. Many of the sets depict part of the surface of the moon.

Merry and Pippin parts already exist, they had screentime and people recognize them. They are two easy figures for LEGO to include again. LEGO could do all new parrs for Lobelia but then they can probably make a reasonable Lobelia figure from existing parts too, the brief time she was onscreen means they could get away with pretty much anything for her (just like Gloin re-using Owen Grady's torso).

Wasn't Lobelia only onscreen for a few seconds in the extended edition of FOTR? There were complaints when they did Mouth of Sauron in the Black Gate but at least he had a scene. Other hobbits had more significant roles at the party.

There are many parts, especially technic, where the old moulds did not have the lego logo whereas the more recent versions do. You have to be careful saying something is obviously fake when you are not comparing like with like, even more so when it came from a sealed lego bag inside a sealed lego box. And even more when it came from an established lego seller with a long history of selling genuine lego.

Yes, but many people use the number of minifigures as a metric and expect a decent number and LEGO have shown they are willing to reuse prints even though they are not really appropriate. Pippin's torso has already been used in HP and as Shackleton and has been available in PAB. Presumably adding existing minifig parts is minimal cost but high perceived value in the minifig count.

That is not my experience when selling on BL. Most of the sealed sets I have sold are from about 2008 onwards, but I have sold probably 25-30 sealed sets from before that. In a few cases, buyers have said that they wanted to build them since they were a kid. For some people, the price doesn’t matter too much and it gives them the joy of opening and building the set.

It wouldn't surprise me if they reused Merry and Pippin in their outfits from Rivendell, like they already did with Frodo and Sam in Barad-Dur.

To me it does make sense that the tires are a bit dirty. They are a couple of decades old and have been stored rubbing up against other tyres, parts, cardboard and paper. That dirt looks like a combination of paper and rubber bloom. The paper fibres are most obvious on the black tubing. That really looks like the tiny fibres of paper it would have picked up when it rubs against the edges of the manual and inside the cardboard box. Remember those manuals were probably cut with a guillotine style cutter that leaves lots of little fragments that will fall off when the contents of the box shift. Scratches occur when the box is moved and the rubber tires rub against the digger bucket. The dirt is on the edges and treads, whereas if used then the dirt would be on the treads and there would be proper wear of the rubber. Dirt on edges is consistent with rubbing against parts and bags as it shifts inside the box whereas wear on the tread would be consistent with use. For its age, I'd say that box was pretty decent condition. The tab looked genuine and there are no tears on the box near where it should be. It seems you are not that knowledgeable about vintage sets. You didn't know about the tape around the hoses, the way boxes with flap lids were sealed, the way that numbering for bags was only introduced later, perforated bags, you didn't know about the lego logo not being on all parts, ... You should prbably familiarise yourself with one of the bricklink rules about new and sealed sets: Sealed - Set is brand new, with unopened factory seals intact, all inner bags and contents presumably sealed, intact, complete and untampered with as shipped by the manufacturer. The seller cannot guarantee that a sealed set is complete. Note that the seller cannot guarantee contents of the set if it is sealed. To do so, they'd have to open it. Similarly, they cannot tell you the condition of the parts inside or the effect of aging if it is still as originally sealed and not tampered with (which this one appears to be). You are probably best off sticking to modern new sets from retailers or second hand sets rather than buying vintage new/sealed sets.

I cannot see hairs on them, but it may be that the photo is not showing what you see up close. The scratching and discolouring could be due to what they have been next to in the box. Similarly, the "hairs" could be paper or card dust from inside the box. The edges of instruction manuals when cut often have thin paper filaments that could stick to decades old rubber. I'm also not surprised that the different sets of wheels have aged differently. Different thicknesses, slightly different materials, they age differently but similar to the other ones the same. Remember that these were nto meant to be stored away for decades and rubber degrades even when kept in a sealed box. Just because someone doesn't agree with you does not mean that they are a shill. Again, just because someone doesn't agree with you doesn't mean that they are delusional. It means they have a different experience to you and may well have come across many similar parts in newly opened old sets. In the past I've opened sealed 1970s sets where the small tyres have looked like they have almost melted, being quite flat on one side, presumable from being in the position in the box and not moved for years or where the tyres have been quite sticky. But again, they were not meant to be stored for 40+ years before opening them. It is a risk you take when buynig new sealed sets.

That is very nice, especially the curl on the motion of the wings. It is also good to see the test models.

Like most things though, the hate comes from people used to the things that came before. No doubt the sequel trilogy will also be loved in 25 years time.

I think you are jumping to a lot of conclusions. The perforated bag looks genuine, as they were used at the time. For a 20+ year old set, rubber tyres can have some degradation whether used or not. They get a sort of white bloom on them in some cases. Some larger sets with flip open sides had a tape in the middle to stop the box opening. I don't have this set, so cannot check. A lot of their non-system product at the time was hand packed so errors of taping the tube are not that surprising. I'm not going to change your mind though. If you think bricklink is a scam, then don't use it.

LEGO's prices for really basic electronic devices such as this are truly terrible. But as to your claim ... you can always trust apple to gouge even more.

Ill received. Yet the trilogy took over $2.9 billion worldwide.

Which one do you think is too close to being British, as I wouldn't recognize any of the current vehicles as a British ambulance. This one, the wheel base looks a little like a British one based on the little checked type pattern but aside from that stripe it doesn't look like a UK ambulance. Here, white usually means it is patient transport rather than an emergency vehicle but mixing with the aqua colour doesn't make much sense. I think they have tried to take bits of different designs and stuck them all into one.

Even at the time there was a lot of discussion about The Hobbit being three movies as the reason for not getting Gondor or a third LOTR wave. And for the love of ships by kids as the reason we got the Pirates of Umbar ship and not Gondor. Obviously, we didn't know The LEGO Movie would kick off the popularity of LEGO, or that LEGO would start appealing to adults outside of the traditional AFOL fanbase, or that LEGO LOTR would become so popular. I wish we had, as I would have stocked up even more than I did. There were discussions and reports about the sets being heavily discounted though. Orthanc was the only set I wasn't able to buy at a decent discount. Everything else I got at between 30-50% off, and even more off towards the end. Although those were the days that most non-exclusive sets were available at some stage at 30% off and even then did not sell out very fast. Even retailers knew something was wrong, as some were giving 50% discounts on the final The Hobbit wave about a month after release. It is crazy to think what prices were available for some of those sets, you'd never get close to that now from a retailer. I remember posting Lonely Mountain and Battle of Five Armies on a LEGO deals discussion and others saying The Lonely Mountain at £50 was just about right, but that BOFA was still well overpriced at £30 and that it would be a poor investment. The LOTR game (50011) also wasn't selling well. I only picked a couple up for £15 each as I didn't think I'd ever use the parts and didn't really have any use for the microfigs, especially as I had already purchased all the figures at 35p each on the old online PAB. Then a clearance type place must have bought out the remaining stocks as the game disappeared completely then came back a few months later but only on their website and they had 1000s of them at £20 each (retail price was £30), even when they had been selling on ebay for closer to £100 by that stage. I miss those days!

The original set found room to have a cooking area, just not a complete stand alone kitchen. And also had plenty of food and drink to suggest a feast. I'm really not sure how much they will do next time, as the original set was substantial enough in size to depict a hobbit house pretty well. I don't think the size is the problem with the old one now, it is more the detail in the design. As you say, it looks quite basic now compared to modern sets. It was mainly a studs up box with a few SNOT parts for attaching windows. I imagine the next one will have a lot more small detail rather than the large slopes used in the walls. And using more small parts would mean it is not all that much larger in scale. It is a bit like doing a City house in LEGO or a building in Modulars, they don't have to be done to realistic scale or number of rooms to look good. I'd prefer fewer large rooms than many that are too small (and parts intensive for the walls).

I guess we will never know if The Hobbit performed worse at the cinema because it was three movies rather than being two movies, or just one movie like previous Hobbit films. Personally, I enjoyed all three and I didn't find it too bloated. In fact for the Hobbit I prefer the extended editions over the theatrical ones. It was not LOTR good, but I still enjoyed it and I think it would have been lacking compared to what was the final product if it had been just two or one movie. Similarly, we will never know if being three movies rather than one or two impacted on the sales of LEGO sets. If there was just one wave, or two waves, overall sales would almost certainly be lower than the three waves we had but whether that would be better for LOTR LEGO fans of the time. I know a lot of people blamed the rumoured change from two to three movies as responsible for not getting a third wave of LOTR sets and instead getting the third wave of The Hobbit sets. But LOTR sales were also not particularly good at the time. If there were just two movies for The Hobbit and no third wave of The Hobbit sets, LEGO might have cut its losses and not done the third wave of LOTR if one was planned. It was that difficult stage when LEGO had not hit the popularity heights, it was pre-LEGO Movie, pre-adult friendly sets, yet aimed at older kids and probably had a narrow audience because of it. The target audience was all over the place, some were 8-14, some 9-14, some 10-14, Orthanc was 14+, polybags were 6-12. They seemed not to know who they were aiming at. Which in one way was good for adult buyers of the time as it meant you could pick up the sets at a very good price, and you could also buy extra figures very cheaply too as Castle fans deprived of Castle for a few years were buying the discounted sets for parts and needed to get rid of the licensed figures.