Lord Rahl of Clannad

I'm not listening to it right now, but last night I was at a live Kodaline concert in Birmingham. It was an amazing concert experience, and I'd love to go again (though probably not to Birmingham, as the venue took ages to actually find).

I had a feeling Ultron may have a thing for hacking Stark's armours. I suppose in the context of the film (from what we know so far) it seems to make sense to have Ultron hack into the Hulkbuster armour and fight the Avengers in it.

My favourite is the Green Arrow minifigure (it's a shame that this one is a SDCC exclusive, though I hope there will eventually be a non-exclusive version released). My least favourite is the horrendous Green Goblin bigfig. The figure itself isn't a bad representation of that interpretation of the character, but it's my least favourite as I despise this version of Green Goblin; it looks horrible and makes virtually no sense. Hopefully one day a normal Green Goblin is released. Until then, we have to endure this abomination.

Well I've just finished Clannad: After Story. As with the first series, this was absolutely brilliant, with a wide emotional range. But this time the emotional range became far, far wider. There were still moments of happiness and sadness and moments that were truly touching, but the happy and the sad moments were far more emotional than in the first series. This was especially the case with the sadness, as I'm pretty sure I cried for a while after the unbelievably sad endings of episodes 16 and 21. The happiness was also more emotional, but these moments weren't as common as the sadness. Episode 22 gave the series an ultimate plot twist which changed everything and made it truly happy. I've never been so happy after an anime episode before then, and I can't imagine there ever being another moment like that in anime; this will stand as my happiest and favourite episode of anime for a long time. As with the first series, the OVA episode was set in yet another alternate timeline. This OVA wasn't as good or as impacting as the first OVA, but it was a pretty good episode nonetheless. Overall, Clannad and Clannad: After Story are both simply amazing series, and the overall collection of Clannad is definitely one of my top 4 animes now (only 4th because Future Diary, Code Geass and Death Note are also such extremely high quality).

Well from the concept art I think a set with Hulk and the Hulkbuster Armour is pretty much inevitable, and it will be a good way for TLG to test how well a set with 2 bigfigs would do and if it would be financially viable (the price would likely be steeper than usual). Even with such concerns, I hope a set like that does happen. Other than that, I hope we see Scarlet Witch and Quicksilver in sets, even if Quicksilver is extremely bland. I'm liking this appearance of Scarlet Witch though; she'd be nice to have as a minifigure. Bring on 2015, and here's to hoping we get an Ant-Man set or two as well. *EDIT* ^ Where is that Deathstroke from? It looks excellent.

I don't mind the continuation of the Cars films (I personally have no issue with them). However, I can see why others would dislike having another sequel. After all, we could get an entirely original film instead. The fact of the matter is that Disney seem to love milking franchises for all they are worth (*cough* Pirates of the Caribbean *cough*), and Cars merchandising still makes Disney and Pixar a fair amount of money. As long as the merchandise continues to sell and the films continue to do well, it is likely Disney and Pixar will keep the series going, in one way or another.

I'm liking the look of this concept art. It's interesting that we are going to see the Hulkbuster Iron Man armour, but I really wonder how they're going to fit in a battle between Iron Man and Hulk when they're meant to be dealing with Ultron and his Ultron Sentinels (which seem like they're going to be in this based on the Quicksilver concept art). Speaking of Quicksilver, he is looking disappointingly bland and unremarkable. If we get a minifigure of him and give him a yellow head and hands, he will fit in perfectly with a LEGO City environment. I'm pleased to see that Scarlet Witch isn't equally bland; she doesn't look exactly as I had expected, but I like the direction they seem to be taking with her appearance. Hopefully we get concept art of other characters such as Vision and Ultron soon, possibly at SDCC. As for that theory about Black Ant, you may be over-analysing it (that may well just be Ant-Man in different lighting). However, we know so little about this film that nothing can really be ruled out at this stage. Is Black Ant a villain? If so, I would be happy if they chose someone like him to be a villain. He looks and sounds better than the entirety of Ant-Man's solo rogues gallery (Ultron asides) already.

I thought the non-movie sets weren't supposed to be coming out until May? Ah well, this is great news that they are available already, especially as they can be found over here first. I can't get any of these for a while, but I will be sure to get the Karai Bike Escape set eventually.

Thanks for that. Here's a brand new song from Passenger, which may end up being the title song of his next album.

Well if it was an one-off I'd choose either the 4th or 10th Doctor, as those seem to be the most popular. If they went with Doctor Who CMFs, they could easily introduce the rest of the Doctors through that. I wouldn't be too concerned which Doctor we got though.

It took Pixar long enough to announce a sequel for The Incredibles. They left that film's ending very much open, and I'm hoping the sequel can expand upon that and not be a disappointment. As for Cars 3, I can't say that I'm surprised or impressed. I don't see how yet another Cars film is necessary but I will see it anyway when it eventually comes out. As for The Good Dinosaur, that poster doesn't look very promising, but I'll wait for a trailer (however long that takes) before I properly judge whether I will see the film or not.

As a Brit and avid fan of the series, I would love it if we got a Doctor Who theme. Heck, I'd be happy even if we got one set. After all, what more do you need than a TARDIS, the Doctor, a companion and an alien of some sort? If more was wanted, a Doctor Who CMF series would be nice to have as well.

I agree with that. That's been the most interesting part about phase 2 so far (the concept of a Guardians of the Galaxy film aside). It would have been an awful move if Marvel ignored the consequences - good and bad - from The Avengers. Hopefully this trend of following on from The Avengers continues with Captain America 2. After all, we still have yet to see what the consequences are of The Avengers within SHIELD itself. Showing this is essential, especially if SHIELD are going to continue to have such a major role in the overall MCU.

Keane - Somewhere Only We Know This song is a timeless masterpiece by one of the best bands I've ever had the pleasure of hearing. Even after 10 years this song doesn't get old (even if I was only 5 or 6 way back when it came out in 2004). *EDIT* That's odd. Usually the link comes up as the actual video rather than just a link. Oh well.

Even if we did get Deathstroke, I doubt we'd get any kind of helmet at all. Take this image for instance. Deathstroke's helmet isn't exactly thick and bears no resemblance to the Iron Man helmet from the movies at all (though oddly enough it looked fine on the custom figure). Based on what TLG have done with other characters, I would expect a Deathstroke figure to merely have a printed face. Naturally, this would be disappointing, but if we ended up getting that I'd accept it. After all, it couldn't look too bad. Not only that, but when would we get another Deathstroke anyway? I don't even think the odds of us getting one at all are very high, but I do hope it happens.

I suppose it would depend on where you are. From what I know of how polybags work over in USA, I would say it would likely show up in TRU or something along those lines. For the UK, we'd likely get it in a newspaper promotion (if at all). As for elsewhere, I honestly can't say as I'm no expert on the distribution of polybags.

The way I see it, now that all characters we have seen so far have moulded faces, this trend needs to extend to any future minifigures produced in this theme. After all, it would be very inconsistent to have some characters with moulded faces and some without. The non-moulded faces also probably wouldn't look right either.

True, but that contract only obligates him to fill out three films if Marvel ask him to. It's up to Marvel whether they give him another three films or not; they aren't technically obligated to do so. Even so, dealing with what will happen to him is probably going to be saved for Captain America 3 or Age of Ultron. It should be fun to see how it ends up playing out.

Another top quality song by The Fray. The chorus on this one is amazing.

Something like this would be perfect, though they would obviously use a different helmet and less detailed printing overall. Even so, if LEGO made a Deathstroke minifigure that was even close to that in terms of quality and accuracy I would be very satisfied.

I'm surprised that I haven't seen an up-close image of the Cyclops minifigure until now. He looks a bit plain, undeniably so, but I still think he's a pretty good minifigure. If I get that X-Men set, this Cyclops minifigure will make a good addition to my collection.

I see. Well that makes sense. Though that connection is there in the comics, there's no real guarantee that the MCU will follow the same route. Of course, nothing can be ruled out at this stage. After all, the film hasn't even come out yet.

I understand the relevance of Winter Soldier to this direction in which they're going, but can you explain how Crossbones hints at that as well? I'm entirely unfamiliar with the character so don't understand his role at all.

This news of Sebastian Stan signing a 9 movie deal with Marvel, combined with the news that Chris Evans has said he wants to take a break from acting for a while, has me almost convinced that this is the direction we will see the MCU take. I hope this is the case, because eventually we will get the chance for a LEGO Winter Soldier. Plus, it would feel like a waste to only see the guy in action properly once and then kill him off.

While that is true, it isn't usually online retailers who are able to sell new sets earlier than intended. More often than not, it's small shops that end up getting an early shipment of sets and putting them on shelves before they are allowed to. In the case of CMFs so far, it seems to be that a random country gets them a month or so earlier than everyone else, though I suppose that is less likely to happen with this series than the others.