LegoFjotten

Probably gonna get this, but I must admit I'm a little less enthusiastic about it than the other Creator cars. The section between the headlights and the front wheels bother me a little, wish there was a fancy build that would give it a proper arch above the wheels and a little depth/texture.

That looks like a great set! Will probably pick it up even though Ninjago is not really my thing.

Finn looks nice, but not sure about that helmet... hopefully it will look better from another angle. The First Order must be very close to their silly-looking hat/helmet limit by now.

So... one local shop throws a 40% of all LEGO to make room for the new sets... and mixes it up by actually putting the new sets on the shelves during the sale... The downside is that their selection is pretty bad (usually no big sets), but I did pick up the Bounty Hunter BP, First Order BP and Dart Vader Transformation set. Over the last few weeks also picked up: 10 x 75165 - Imperial Trooper Battle Pack (at 70% off) another 10 x 75165 - Imperial Trooper Battle Pack (at about 40% off)

The head is from Boromir The goggles and helmet are both in a lot of sets in various colors.

I'm soooo jealous... wish I could have been there with you all! After tough negotiations with my wife, "we" decided to go a teddy-bear convention in Münster that weekend instead... Oh well, next year!

I think that is a pretty cool exclusive, just wish I could get my hands on one!

Sorry, that's not it. Even though printed parts are more expensive.

You should have read the whole conversation.

That is simply not true. If you have ever built any of the other LEGO "compatible" construction toy it is pretty clear who is cutting corners. Go watch one of the YouTube videos from one of the LEGO factories which covers the storage area and you will see that it is not so trivial to just add storage space. They did product testing with the target group (kids in the appropriate age range), and they wanted stickers. I think there was a bit about this in one of the LEGO documentaries, I don't recall which one. I agree, they did the same thing in the Hoth playset. I hate those pilot expressions, wish they would retire that head and replace it with one with at least one good neutral expression. I'm 100% sure that if the designers were allowed to all the relevant parts would be printed and each figure would have a unique face & torso. I'm sure most of us at one point or another have disagreed with rules & restrictions imposed by our bosses, but that's just the way it is.

It's the same reason why they reuse an existing head for the minifigures; Each unique printed part will need room in the storage system, and the storage system is already operating at capacity. To make room for new printed parts, new parts, or color changes (existing parts in new colors) they need to retire other parts. A single D2C set will not be allowed to introduce that many new parts. LEGO is well aware us AFOLs don't like the stickers, I bet they hear it every Q&A session they host with LEGO designers / Community managers. For regular sets it's a bit different since the stickers are considered a part of the experience, they probably wouldn't want to get rid of them even if storage capacity was not an issue.

I think the new UCS Snowspeeder looks great, it's been quite a while since the previous one so I don't mind that it's a remake. I have the old one, but will get this anyway.

As part of the national LUG I assisted at a local ToysRUs event in Norway last weekend ("LEGO building days"). One of the promos they had were the R3-M2 polybag. I would guess they had somewhere between 100-200 of them. I handed out quite a few of them over the weekend, but there was a still a fair amount left when the store closed on Saturday.

B&P is sometimes cheaper than PAB, you should check both to make sure. The low shipping cost and good selection of parts make B&P my first choice when shopping for parts as long as I don't need large quantities.

I think sometimes "Out of stock" means that whatever stock they have is reserved for their own use. The part may or may not be restocked / become available for purchase in the future. Sometimes you will be able to order parts listed as "Out of stock" if you call them. You often see that new parts are listed as out of stock. Parts in colors that are no longer being used in current sets will eventually sell out and not be produced again (unless they are reintroduced in new sets). They produce stock for PAB and B&P, it is not just leftover parts.

That was a rather disappointing review, nothing to say that hasn't been said already so moving on... *biting tongue* With regards to the Red Arrows Hawk, I think that some may be a bit optimistic about how popular it would be.

I could see LEGO doing Saw as a regular minifig with printed beard, regular legs, regular cape and one of the existing hairpieces. Perfectly accurate? No. Some would complain, some would be happy to have him as a fig - like with every SW minifig.

Snowspeeder looks good to me! Considering how long it's been since the first UCS version I don't mind that this is a remake. I have the old one, but I will buy this as well.

Here is a Villa I built for a competition at our LUG Brikkelauget.no. It was limited to 32x32 so I had to make some compromises. Olive green and dark tan looks great, but I soon realized that the range of parts I have in those colors were very limited so the facade ended up a bit simpler than planned. I'm happy with how the interior turned out even though I was in a bit of rush to get it finished in time so had to drop the final tweaks (and dusting apparently...) . As always, comments are most welcome! You can find larger versions on Flickr

Just saw it, liked it a lot!

You are right that there isn't much that wouldn't be a repeat, but a repeat from 10-12 years ago would be so much better than a repeat from a 2-3 years ago. Personally I would be happy to see any new set from Cloud City or Dagobah. For example a Twin-Pod Cloud Car, Luke & Vader duel, or a Cloud City Escape set. For Dagobah, Yoda's hut combined with the force tree could be a cool new set. I understand that Cloud City is a bit challenging to turn into small sets that appeal to children as well as AFOLs, but I think it can be done. Personally I would love a Cloud City Dinner set, but it it probably wouldn't fly of the shelves... In the end though, it's the minifigs I'm after (and I know many others are too), so if TLG could throw us a bone and give us: Cloud City Lando w/ cape, Luke in fatigues and Leia in a dress or jumpsuit I would be a happy camper. That's why the carbon chamber set was a bit of an anti-climax, first Cloud City set in ages, and only a single new fig (albeit a good one). If that set had been larger and included Lando & Leia, we would only be a Luke & Vader duel set away from the full lineup.

I seriously don't understand what is hard to understand about people complaining about receiving the same stuff over and over again as opposed to getting some new stuff. I do admit that the previous sentence can be hard to understand though. 3/3 OT sets are repeats... let me do the math... yeah that's about 100%.

To repeat myself: The main point though is that I want the minifigs we are missing instead of the same figures over and over again. In that regard the A-Wing set is the best of the bunch, while the land speeder and desert skiff (as expected) are disappointing. I am disappointed because I already have all the figures in those two set. Sure, Stacey has a new hat but that's about it. The builds themselves offer nothing new, I don't have any issues with them, but I already have pretty much those builds. I don't complain about missing arm printing & dual molding, etc like so many others, I just want something from the OT that hasn't been done multiple times already.

Ok... so in Norway the new A-Wing is €66. Did not see that coming to be honest. Same number of minifigures and less pieces than the Imperial hovertank, yet 50% more expensive.

Lando in an A-wing set doesn't make that much sense anyway IMO (and I'm fine with that). TLG have a track record of putting odd minifigs with some of their ship (like Leia in an Y-Wing, Han & Ackbar in the previous A-wing), and having some odd minifigures is a good choice compared to just including a single pilot for example. The main point though is that I want the minifigs we are missing instead of the same figures over and over again. In that regard the A-Wing set is the best of the bunch, while the land speeder and desert skiff (as expected) are disappointing. Having R2 in the speeder would mean that either the set costs $5 more, or they would probably cut the Tusken raider. As for Lando, Cloud City Lando was in a single set in 2003 and is long overdue for an updated version. Lando in the general outfit was in a 2009 set and is much easier to figbarf. So... Yay for Lando, bummer they didn't give us the version that would be the most useful.