Clone OPatra

@Friscorays yeah of course, and I don't think anybody is taking Brick Fanatics' speculative article as gospel, but rather a springboard for our own discussions and speculation. It's fun to speculate about why LEGO cancels stuff, like with the Osprey (is it really the build issue?) and the city dynamite factory. Other ideas about the Santa set have been floated as well, like perhaps a bad batch of parts got into the set as has effected the Volkswagen bus in some regions.

Oh, I have no idea. I don't follow this franchise. The marketers always have their tactics.

Family films are what performed best during the height of the pandemic until recently, when still young-skewing movies generally out perform older skewing ones. The Croods 2 for instance did fantastically at the box office and stuck around for ages in the US. Plus animated films do really well on PVOD and streaming because parents are always looking for a fix. This is a bit tangential to Jurassic now though. They'll release a trailer when it's ready. Perhaps not enough effects are done.

Not necessarily a year for GWP sets, part of the LEGO Extended Line. I refer to this interview from New Elementary: https://www.newelementary.com/2021/10/lego-extended-line-interview.html?m=1 But yes in any case if the naughty list is the only reason, ridiculous for someone to have only decided that so late in the day. I agree with @Lyichir's take though. All of the brutal, violent stuff LEGO puts out is different to a list of real world names that could make a kid with one of those names feel deflated seeing it. That's not on-brand for LEGO to make any kid feel any sort of negativity about LEGO's product itself.

It looks like a gold stud with a printed clear 1x1 on top to me.

I think he did buy a box or got one legitimately. If he got it through LAN, LAN would be mad, so I don't think it came from LAN. What I meant is, classic that LEGO has revealed the series themselves and someone has obtained it, yet the review embargo is still a couple days away.

A couple days ahead of the review embargo, classic... Seeing all the details of this series, I have to say it really does have the high standard of quality that we've come to expect. When I saw the initial leaflet leak I wasn't sure, but these are wonderful, abounding in printed arms, dual moulding, dual expressions, etc. Most of the new moulds are pretty neat as well. Perhaps some of the choices could've been more inspired, but overall, great series. Now I really just wish we could get more than one non-licensed series per year.

The system of modular Hogwarts sets launched in 2021, as opposed to the style LEGO ran from 2018-2020.

Who cares are all the people that didn't buy the set, leading it to wallow in clearance everywhere for ages. One so-so minifigure of an important character, one good minifigure of an unimportant character, plus a nice but ultimately unimportant carriage, all from a film that didn't connect with a large part of its audience: a recipe for a set that doesn't interest enough people.

I agree with your assessment, but it can be difficult when all they have is concept art and some details to go on. Grindlewald's grand prison escape sounds like a scene worthy of a set, and has a vehicle associated, which LEGO loves to do. What could they have realistically done or known to do that would have been good? That lion creature thingy with a few minifigures on the side? The French Ministry of Magic somehow? I don't think these FB films lend themselves very well to exciting sets, and it'd be especially difficult to guess what material to cover if all you have is art and a story outline.

The Thestral set certainly sold horribly and warmed shelves on clearance. I don't think LEGO would take much risk making sets for a film in a series that's already had quite a bumpy time. This series of films is all over the place and the new one doesn't look like any sort of good course correction since the incomprehensible second one, in my opinion. If I were LEGO, I'd wait and see about the film's reception and then put out a set or two given that the Wizarding World line will be continuing anyway, but then again why bother at all when the Harry Potter-based stuff reliably sells. Another minifigure series would be a better place to stash some of the FB characters and be done. The only good thing about more FB sets is that the costuming is so dull and uninspired for a Wizarding World that it makes great minifigures for use in real world early 20th century stuff.

Perhaps they are going for an official reveal on the same day as the review embargo, like they sometimes do. That was the case for the Boutique Hotel, for instance.

For me the theme has transitioned from one where I'm truly excited about the sets to one where I'm just looking at the new Minifigures and/or parts included. It must be said that LEGO has been doing a commendable job covering new material despite "rebooting" the theme. Even the massive CoS set has barely any overlap with previous sets in the Minifigure and accessory department, and instead delivered awesome new stuff. Compare that to Star Wars which is also constantly retreading the same material, and still hasn't delivered characters like Aunt Beru after all these years. It's a bit of a bummer to not like the sets themselves, but I'm still pretty jazzed about certain aspects and it's great LEGO isn't merely lazily going over the exact same few key characters, and giving more tangential characters their due instead.

In what sense?

Why would the mechs be in there when they're cancelled? Because when these catalogues are made, they don't always know what's going to happen or be revealed when.

That's a fair subjective decision based on what you want personally, but not what you said before implying the 2019 objectively sucked somehow. Don't know how the old one was bland to you anyway, with its arches and three-stepped columns. Looking at it in my display now and it still looks like a thing of beauty. The new one isn't even a clocktower. That said, the Dumbledore's office section of the 2019 one was pretty bad, especially the interior, and if Yule Ball isn't your interest then that's a lot of stuff to dislike about it too. The Clocktower itself though... There's just no comparison.

The clock "tower" is sad. The base floor looks fine, but the clock part just looks awkward. Will probably get it anyway for the Minifigures and parts, and maybe carry some of the interior across into other buildings I have on display. I'm glad the new owl comes in this set as well. Different parts of the castle have different looks I guess. They have been doing brown frames with black grills, and this has tan frames with white grills. I think it integrates better actually - the brown and black really stood out in a bad way in the CoS set. Where do you see the Boggart cabinet? I see a blackboard... My thoughts exactly. It not only doesn't look like the movie version, but doesn't look like anything appealing in its own right either. An imaginative, good looking non-movie Hogwarts is possible, but this isn't it.

So many mid-legs coming in those Spidey 4+ sets. Probably still expensive but YES!

If it got to the point that LEGO sets were released like AAA videogame titles, we'd be in BIG trouble. Many games are knowingly released unfinished just to meet a deadline. I don't get the framework of making excuses for the big profit-oriented company, even when it's LEGO which we all know and love and feel like it's a bit of family. They employ people to test things. Lots of people. And if they're not employing enough people for that, then it's a problem. A freak plastic issue which seems to be effecting some copies of the Volkswagen van is one thing, but not properly play testing a new design for mechs which didn't need to be changed in the first place is something else. Why did this get as far as production before it was caught? At the end of the day it doesn't effect the consumer too badly because we can't even buy them, but it's still a head scratcher.

Bought five of Series 2 directly from LEGO here in Australia. They suckered me with a Black Friday promotion to redeem less VIP points than usual, which just covered 75% of the shipping cost because, Australia.... (I don't buy directly from LEGO very often besides Bricks & Pieces). I did briefly see them available from one regular retailer, but only briefly. At least I got five different ones, including the Beat Box one and the Zombie, whose accessories are great. There are many I would've prefered over the other three, but oh well. Overall there are some pretty huge discounts on these sets available here. Big W has the Boombox for $55, down from the RRP of $140. Australian Kmart was selling Bandmates Series 1 for $1. LEGO did the whole thing backwards. The sets were much better than the overpriced BeatBoxes released initially, and Series 2 has much more universally useful Minifigures than Series 1 so probably would've done better too.

Gosh it's so dumb about the mechs. They'll have already produced them all too, so that's a lot of sets going in the grinder. Just goes to show how false the thought process is that a billion dollar company doesn't make mistakes. Surely they playtest the heck out of everything. Surely they catch obvious issues. Nope! Although what's ironic is that this is even a problem to them. My 2000 Millenium Falcon smashed if you squeezed it slightly too hard. Then you put it back together again, or make something else. That's how LEGO was.

What's this about the lead designer stepping down?

Personally there's next to nothing that would get me to buy a fire or police set under any circumstances, but these have to be some of the most creative "standard metropolitan" police sets in my opinion. Crooks dressed as ice cream mascots with an ice cream truck, crooks with an egg-shooting tractor, crooks with a proper garbage truck and not a random thing. There's a lot of fun stuff here for kids, with way more interesting scenarios provided off the bat than police sets of old that just came with some police vehicles and that was it. All that said, I still won't be buying any of them personally, and heck yeah for the new animals that should hopefully be available on B&P! That piece is already available from the Encanto set 43202. It's on Bricks & Pieces as well: part no. 79736.

Although early reviews of the big Monkie Kid city set are out, so those reviewers would have access to the ID in the instructions.

My oh my am I looking forward to January 1st or shortly thereafter when all of the new City and Friends sets are added to check what's available. Squirrels, kittens, ice cream costumes, chopsticks, new and recoloured hairpieces aplenty... This January has got to be one of the most exciting new release waves for parts for me in quite a while. Anyone else already drafting a list of what they want and which sets to check when the time comes?