Blakstone

I don't think he is in the Hobbit. None of the orcs in the Hobbit were named. Instead I think it comes from the Appendix in the Return of the King. There is a lot of detail there there is not in any of the books themselves. Peter Jackson was only able to use stuff that was found in the Hobbit or Lord of the Rings (including the Appendix). So I agree with you. These named orcs are not important in the novel, but for movie fans, they are.

Mapimi, I think they are close. Currently it is 1 US Dollar equals 1.16 Australian Dollar. However, the retail price is not just an exchange rate difference. LEGO determines what to sell their product for independently for each country. From what I read here, based on the size of the US market and also what US consumers are willing to spend, the supply / demand curve prices LEGO cheaper for the US than most other places.

LEGO brought Ninjago back due to consumer demand. I don't believe there is nearly the same amount of demand for Lord of the Rings and Ninjago doesn't require a license.

I don't think that is what Sir Gareth meant. I believe he thinks that there are untold legions of LEGO Lord of the Rings fans and if we just made our voice heard LEGO would make all the sets we want. I doubt that is the case. The petition only received less than 1700 signatures. Some of the sets on Ideas though are doing well but none have so far reached 10k. We should get one there but I would encourage everyone to see if the others that are popular this week merit your support.

Three of the four most supported projects on Ideas are all Lord of the Rings projects. There is also a Hobbit: Dale project further back in the pack. This feels really good. I hope we can help push more than just Minas Tirith to 10K. That project needs less than 400 more supporters and should get it before the end of the month.

I would agree that Scooby Doo would be a better fit for LEGO. I mean we could get the Ghostbusters headquarters from IDEAS but I don't see where we could go from there. It would be just large price point sets. Perhaps if Ghostbusters was planned as an entire wave instead so the main characters could be split up amongst smaller sets. I could see a $20, $30. $50, $100 Scooby sets with goofy, kid friendly bad guys that the Scooby gang could unmask. The highest price set could be another type of haunted house.

Except the 2015 retailers catalog has been leaked for sometime now. There is no Castle in it at all.

I just to join the Reviewers Academy. I have a few new in box sets put aside to practice reviewing on.

I agree that LEGO does creative purposing of new molds. I think Infearno's headcover would be reused as Ghost Rider or The Human Torch. We recently saw a new mold for CMF 13's goblin that looks like it was made for The Green Goblin. Soft molded pieces are obviously different, but the hard molded ABS plastic formed under tons of pressure. That is one reason such molds cost so much to make. In regards to Azog, the mold was made for the wave 2 set. Since they had it, they made preview minifigs for Comic Con with it. They did not make the mold for Comic Con. I could see a Azog with armor printing as a promotional fig for a Bluray or book, but I cannot see a new mold for it. Still I think they would do another version of Bilbo or Thorin instead.

I can also burn $100 bills but I choose not to. Molds cost a lot of money. Why spend that money on a promotional product. To my knowledge, LEGO has never done it. But yes, if they want to burn money, they MIGHT start.

This. Exactly.

My perfect Christmas gift would be a return visit to Venice, CA to ride bikes along the beach with my wife. These are our sigfigs and my wife even took the photos. During the Artic weather we are getting, this trip would be even more welcome.

Nice entry but you will want to reduce your image size to be eligible.

LEGO can choose to run additional production runs... if they want. They did that for both the Ghostbusters and Back to the Future. The original CUSSOO Minecraft set is still available. Though I doubt LEGO would actually make a Lord of the Rings IDEAS set. They didn't make the IDEAS UCS Tumbler or the UCS Sandcrawler. But they did come out with them in an existing line independent of IDEAS. I think the goal is that 10,000 supports means that LEGO has to have serious conversations about a project. From there, who knows?

The LEGO staff that manage the Ideas site are not the ones that get to make the final approval. I think the staff just likes to pick great looking sets. But the increased visibility really seems to help push projects. Earlier today we had the Minis Tirith, Battle of Osgiliath, and Hobbit: Dale in the 12 most popular projects this week. However, the Dale project dropped off recently in favor of a second International Space Station. Hopefully Lothlorien can make the most popular sets this week. It is a great way to draw interest from people who did not go to the site to look for Tolkien sets to support. I think that the Minis Tirith project benefited not only from being featured but that it was featured during the time that the results of the last review came in. There was likely a ton of people that logged in for that announcement and were presented with such a great project.

This is the new Staff pick today. I am already a supporter but perhaps it will see as big up a jump in support as Minas Tirith.

I doubt it has a bar. It might just be a pool hall but we generally expect a pool table in a bar. I don't think I have seen a pool hall in about 30 years.

That Osgiliath has a great balance between the grays that keep the build interesting. I particularly like the domed tower. However, I have too many brick separators so I cannot sup... Just kidding. I really like it AND I supported it on Ideas already.

The Witch-King minifig is a ghostly white minifig with a cape and glow in the dark head. He has a dark gray crown with four tall points that sits on his head. This is mostly how he appeared in the Fellowship of the Ring while Frodo was wearing the One Ring.

I recall that Goblin King is $25 off and DGA is $5 off. I never saw Mirkwood Elf Army on clearance.

I never watched Big Bang Theory. It just doesn't appeal to me. That said, if there are great prints in it I will get the set. However, I won't pay horrendous after-market prices for it. Hopefully it will have a much large run that the Research Institute or it will at least get multiple production runs.

I just saw some more of the Goblin King Battle on clearance at a local Walmart over the weekend. In fact, there were other wave 2 sets (Warg Attack and the DGA).. I prefer the pirate ship ambush though. Not only do I like LotR more than the Hobbit, but the build itself flows much better as you make a cohesive item. I hated Goblin King set and I think it is the only set that I abandoned before completing. Too much of it was just random though the collapsible bridge is nice. For me a lot of the fun of building following instructions is when you realize why certain pieces had to go in a certain place for either structure or design purposes. But when you are building ruins or rocky surfaces, too much of the time it is just random.

I would have supported this but I already too many Gandalfs. We might get to 10k for the Mina's Tirith by the end of the month.

I think LEGO handles their own distribution. I believe you mean to say become a retailer and we know that LEGO works with same toy shops. But I believe you would have to buy a significant volume in order to maintain being a retailer. If you live in the US, you would also have to get a tax ID number as you could purchase LEGO from a distributor without paying sales tax, but you would have to collect it from what you sell (at least in your local state). In the end, it seems to me like a poor idea to just feel a case or two of minifigs before anyone else gets a chance. However, if this is a passion to sell LEGO and you think you have a business plan that would make people want to buy from you instead of just Walmart, Amazon, Target, or Toys R Us, then I say go for it.

I think the groundwork for the new Castle line is already being laid with the new CMF molds. I doubt it will be 2015 though. My guess is that LEGO will alternate their Pirate and Castle lines.