MAB

I imagine they'd do something like a Frodo and Sam pack before Boromir and Faramir. Thinking from a players perspective, Boromir dies early and Faramir fails so bad his dad wants to kill him. It's not exactly upbeat about being successful in the game.

Either transparent parts, or the cord / string and hang them if you can attach it with a plate to the birds.

Nice build, but maybe pour a load of 1x1 round transparent blue tiles into the river to break up the uniformity and the water will look much better.

They do produce enough to meet demand. It is just that customers decide which ones should be removed from circulation to decrease the supply at retail price.

There are alternative routes for those - they don't necessarily get sold with newspapers. Presumably backhanders to store staff for a box, or delivery vans that lose a few. You often see whole boxes for sale in their sealed box on ebay.

You'll find that they offer the newer version instead of the older version in many sets that came out before the newer one even existed. They see it as having the same function, so offer it as a replacement part. It's a pain, isn't it!

You say The Simpsons is past its prime. And Angry Birds is unpopular. So what is LOTR? It may be popular here, but look at the toys, books, t shirts, bags, etc aimed at kids with The Simpsons and Angry Birds available in stores now. Those two brands are way bigger than LOTR. LOTR has its fans like everything does, but the fan base tends not to change so much and any fans into LOTR and Lego would have presumably bought into it already. Yet clearly the number if people buying in is not enough. Angry Birds has got a film coming out. It may be old hat to older people, but it will be huge amongst kids.

And that is why lego would need to slap lipstick on it, to make sure the point that she is female is well and truly made. It used to be that the Minotaur was a specific character, the half-bull of Minos. Yet reasonably modern fiction has turned it into a minotaur, any half-man half-bull (or maybe half-woman half-cow). Same with Medusa, she was a specific character but now seems to represent any snake woman / snake-haired woman. Who knows, in 1000 years time maybe a kardashian will be anyone with a large bum and an elsa will be any mythical creature that can create ice.

^ I imagine far less people buy Orthanc to part out the minifigs than Black Gate for three reasons. 1) price, 2) you don't need two Orthancs to build a more reasonable and 3) exclusives tend not to get discounted (so less likely to be bought for parting out).

The lipstick would give it away.

I reckon this one will be available for some time, given it is a licensed set. It will be interesting to see if it is available in stores other than Lego (like BTTF and Ghostbusters). If so, expect sales and long availability.

And there is also a LOTR thread already too.

I think it looks terrible. For the weathered look I prefer texture rather than slightly different colours.

They have missed a trick here. It should have been a historical zombie skater.

Although they split up Legolas and Gimli!

If they do any of them, I hope they don't waste a space on Denethor. A purist version is easy as he doesn't really need any specific prints or parts. + +++ with a change of the hands to flesh.

Maybe lego know that many people buy for the minifigs and so are not interested in the bricks so much - which means that the sets (minus minifigs) were available quite cheaply on ebay and bricklink. More likely that they didn't think a much smaller version of the gate looked right and they had to hit the right price point. They have done similar things with trains (Horizon Express). It gets the set at the right price point, but also allows people to go bigger if they want to. No Wizard Battle would mean no Saruman for many, without purchasing a very expensive set. No Elrond's Council set would have meant no third age Elrond at the time and no Arwen. Of course they could have filled the Wizard Battle slot with Eowyn and the Witch King (and called it Witch King Battle) but maybe they thought that it would clash with the Hobbit one that they had planned. Maybe they thought people wanted Saruman. Maybe they thought they needn't do it as Eowyn and the Witch King were coming in wave 3. It is quite easy to look back and say what they should have done, but we don't know what the plans were or what the sales data were and whether the distribution of the Hobbit film caused changes.

Or the people above the designers that approve what is going forward to retail. I think the designers did a good job, even in wave 2. Wizard Battle is a wonderful little play set, also giving a cheap Saruman. Elrond Council hits a cheap set spot, using some nice elements especially the arches and leaves. The Black Gate again hits a price point and is easily doubled in size to be more movie like - I'd prefer what they did and have to buy two, then to have a full gate at a much smaller scale. And even the ship is nicely designed and reasonably movie accurate.

There's nothing worse than Lego not doing a specific piece ... apart from them doing it and making it rare in an expensive set!

I hope not, as they will lose functionality. They don't really need such character accuracy. They are minifigs, not detailed action dolls / toys. Then consider the width / height ratio or the depth / width ratio, they are completely wrong. We don't need them changing these hings just to look like a real character, or else we will just end up with a whole range of Friends style minidolls. They have their place, but hopefully not in the majority of mainstream sets.

Not really. There is a distribution of heights in real life that get mapped onto the standard minifig, then characters that are necessarily smaller get the short legs. So Harry Potter is the same height as Voldemort in minifig form. If HP was shorter, then there would be a problem with Dobby. Plus she is not significantly shorter than Howard or Leonard.

I don't think we will see a Classic Castle figure next year. We might well see a Classic Castle set, but take a look at the pirates one. There is nothing classic about it. If we get a Classic Castle promo it will likely contain a modern castle figure and modern bricks to make a small build with modern techniques.

Especially if you don't open the windows while doing it.

Buy the torsos for the cavalry soldier, rather than as minifigs, especially if you want yellow skins instead of fleshies. You can pick legs up fairly cheaply too, especially if you want a range of colours. Also start buying the revolutionary soldier now, before he goes up too much.

1) people indicated they would buy it and because they think it will make money 2) you can move the figures around and role play them, etc, or just display it, like many sets.