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This also confirms that you were correct; the UK editions weren't published under the Golden Sovereign title (which indicates that it was never actually used beyond the mockups.) But the good news is that the covers are different enough that it should still be relatively easy to identify the version based on the cover image. This should make it easier to track down. The hunt continues!

Eldiano! I didn't know there were other Eurobricks Pirates members in the area--we've got to do a meetup sometime! As Mr. Phes suggests, I do want to make a Discovery center specific topic later, but I wanted to address the Pirate reissue speculation before it gets out of hand: from what I overheard I believe these sets come from the collection of one of the employees of the Discovery Center, who has a large collection of vintage sets. Unfortunately the presence of Pirates in LEGOLANDs doesn't really say anything about the possibility of more pirate sets. I'd like to do a video on this subject at some point, but essentially Pirates have always had a huge presence in LEGOLAND parks (and now Discovery centers!) regardless of whether there were any sets in production at the time. (This can lead to a lot of weird things, like the 4+ Pirates stuff living on in theme park merchandise and ride vehicles years and years after the theme itself was forgotten, and some pirate merchandise not even having any overt ties to actual LEGO products.) So because the side of the company that runs the theme parks has invested heavily in the pirate iconography and experiences, it makes sense for them to do events like this even if there aren't sets to sell. (I really wish it would work the other way around, where LEGO would make LEGOLAND exclusive Pirate minifigure sets since the LEGO Group now owns the theme parks again, but aside from a small appearance in the 40346 LEGOLAND Park set this doesn't seem to have happened.)

Way ahead of you! Curious to see what the other Discovery Centers did too...I hope it becomes a regular event!

Thank you! I almost forgot, I was going to post the mini comic scans after the episode went up. (I was pleasantly surprised to find I already owned both of them; I thought I just had Kragg's!) Captain Redbeard Captain Kragg Bricklink calls them comics, which is a bit of a stretch since it's just two panoramic scenes per booklet. But I do love all the background action and the character designs. The 4+ stuff grows on me the more I look at it.

That's the very talented chap Davisonspeaking from Fiverr doing a dramatic reading of the text from the Ships and the Sea program in the intro. The rest is me doing my best, lol. Thank you so much! I'm excited to be able to share it.

Haven't you ever wondered why no one's made a biography video about Captain Redbeard and his history in the world of LEGO Pirates? No, just me? Well, I made one anyway. Hope you'll check it out here.

I'd imagine the moderators would have said something by now if posting about a magazine with a Space themed cover story in the sci-fi forum and an entirely separate magazine with a Castle magazine cover story in the Historic Themes forum was an issue, but I appreciate your concern anyway.

Ah, thank you for the heads up. I did post about two separate magazines from 1993, Space in the Sci-Fi forum and the Castle magazine here, so similar posts but not exactly the same thing. (Though there is Ice Planet stuff in both, I think.) Do you think that might still be an issue? You're welcome! 1993 was a cool year. You might also want to check out this Dragon Masters promotional comic.

Hear ye hear ye, I'm betting some of you enjoy retro LEGO magazines, I have gone on a quest to find and scan the Dragon Masters themed Summer 1993 issue of the UK LEGO Club Magazine Bricks n Pieces. I haven't seen this in full elsewhere online, but if it's already up somewhere, let me know. I'm looking to track down any of the remaining LEGO magazines from around the world that haven't already been archived in full somewhere online, and would like to encourage others to share theirs too to preserve a little bit of LEGO history! Let me know if you have a lead. A dragon sized thank you to anyone who's taken the time to do this over the years.

Hey all, For those of you who enjoy retro LEGO magazines, I have sought out and scanned this Ice Planet themed issue of the UK club magazine Bricks 'n Pieces from Spring 1993. I haven't seen this elsewhere online, but if it's already up somewhere, let me know. I'm looking to track down any of the remaining LEGO magazines from around the world that haven't already been archived somewhere, and would like to encourage others to do so too to preserve a little bit of LEGO history! Let me know if you have a lead. Big thank you to anyone who's taken the time to do this over the years.

Hey Eyrezer! I could be wrong, but I don't think there have actually been any major date related lore additions since the last version. I think there's been some additions to the lore rediscovered through the UFO and Insectoid photo comics in Klick magazine and to Classic Space and Blacktron through LEGO Legacy: Heroes Unboxed that haven't been added, but nothing that relates to the timeline (though if anyone has anything, be sure and chime in!)

I'm not the best at spotting fakes, but I do recall from having opened a bunch of sets over the years that the coins ranged in color from very yellow looking gold to an almost silver. Never paid as much attention to the embossing, though.

Pirateland in Billund is definitely an amazing place for classic pirate fans! I finally got to go in 2019, if you'd like to see the pictures we took I've uploaded them here too. Overall I was very impressed with how good it looks considering how old the ride is. There are a few elements that I'm sad to have missed--judging from older photos, they used to have full sized versions of the Sea Hawk and Dark Shark used as seating for the restaurants. There was even an animatronic Redbeard; there's a very good video here. They did manage to salvage most of the elements as wrecked ships, you can see them here and here. I'm not sure how long the Governor Broadside and Lieutenant De Martinent models have been there (a version of them was used in the 1993 Pirate touring show featured here), but they're still there too, now in the very modern Pirate Splash Battle ride. Great to see the classic characters still in the park! And for some vintage footage of the land and ride, check this video out (Pirateland footage from 15:43.) It would be great to get the ride dialogue translated one day.

Here you go! I've been wanting to make that parrot for 30 years now; maybe one day I'll get around to it. The parrot instructions were featured in ads for the LEGO club, but I didn't see the full page instructions until I finally got a copy of the magazine off of eBay eight or so years ago.

I think I have this one at home; I should be able to scan it in the next week or so. In the meantime, I did scan all of the Brick Buildmore comics from the Brick Kicks I do have here a long time ago, if you're interested.

Ahoy there, For those lore hunters out there, I've come across a few tidbits from LEGOLAND Parks recently! First this from the LEGOLAND Discovery Center in San Antonio for an upcoming Pirate event: "Listen up shipmates, there’s treasure to be found! Captain Brickbeard is on the hunt for some very precious treasure so he can buy a new ship and show his archenemy Redbeard who is the best once and for all! He needs YOU on his crew to help search LEGOLAND Discovery Center Island for the golden haul before his new nemesis, Pirate Princess Argenta plunders the prize!" We haven't had much information on Brickbeard and Redbeard's relationship--turns out they're archenemies. Not too surprising. I think this is the first time we've seen Argenta's name used outside of the LEGO Legacy: Heroes Unboxed mobile game too. (She's the pirate lady included in the 70411 Treasure Island set, and the daughter of Redbeard according to LEGO Quest and Collect, so it makes sense that she'd be Brickbeard's enemy too.) Then there's the Treasure Behold show at LEGOLAND Florida, which includes a few elements inspired by the 1989 storyline: Popsy the Parrot makes an appearance, showing that she/he had other owners prior to Redbeard, and there's a psychic pirate named Sabatina after the Imperial island. Not a lot, but it's good to see the existing Pirate lore expanding while we wait for new sets to come out. :)

I grapped the 30570 polybag because it was a great affordable way to get the new monkey. He looks really cute perched on Barracuda Bay, but for playability you just can't beat the old monkey. I suspect it's a case of reducing the number of minifigures in a set--the new monkeys are basically elements, but the old monkeys require the size and parts of a minifigure. Ah well, variety is always good when it comes to animals...

Sorry for the double post, but I was looking at the 1990 UK catalog and noticed that the comic appears both with the original mockup "Golden sovereign" title and the "Golden Medallion" title we're all familiar with on two different pages. This seems to support your theory that there may never have been a published English version of the comic with the "Golden sovereign" title.

IMO during that time in his life Redbeard's beard was falling out due to his suppressed guilt at kicking his own son out of his crew because he couldn't grow a beard. I'd be interested to learn if it was always the intention to call the character "Redbeard"--the name first appears in the 1987 "Ships and the Sea" Word Show, and we know that by that time the line was pretty much finalized internally. But the early artwork for the characters and comics doesn't always feature a beard or a red beard, and this character design was used pretty frequently in the early years of the theme, even in LEGOLAND parks, and I don't think the character was even consistently called Redbeard internationally until well after the Pirate theme ended the first time.

Great topic! I've been wondering about this myself lately. I still haven't seen scans of the UK version of this comic, but I'm fairly sure that the US version must have been localized from the translation done for the UK market--they missed changing at least one instance of "Captain Roger" to "Captain Red Beard" on the last page. ("Captain Roger can have it for 300 sovereigns".) I think there may have been one or two other instances of this, but I don't remember right off the top of my head. The fact that it was changed to Red Beard for this comic is particularly funny since this is probably the least bearded the character has ever been.

Thank you for sharing these!

I see that LEGOLAND Florida has just announced a new Pirate themed ride coming to the park with a nifty little video. LEGOLAND as always is keeping the LEGO Pirate spirit alive between set releases.

lol, I think they can learn to share. And I think it's a pretty reasonable inference between the cover and the book description; it mentions Cecilia as the main character, the Pirate Girl from the Collectable Minifigures series (with a few minor differences) is on the cover, it mentions her joining her grandfather's pirates, the BSB is right there in the background. It's possible this is disconnected completely from the existing Pirate characters, but it seems like a reasonable assumption to make, especially given how connected Barracuda Bay is to the older storylines.

Thank you for pointing this out, Phes! I pre-ordered two copies, one for the niece and nephew and one for me. The illustrations look lovely. And some new pirate lore already! Looks like the latest Collectable Minifigures pirate is named Cecilia and her grandfather may be Captain Red Beard, since the new BSB is there in the background. IIRC the LEGO Legacy and other mobile games had already given Red Beard three children, so he has quite the family now! I'm 0/0 on new Pirate set speculation, but I can't help but note the timing of the release: summer of next year. Could we expect some new sets around that time? Or, given the constant rumors of Barracuda Bay being retired, maybe they'll retool and reissue the set to feature the ship model instead. I've never been this hyped for a Little Golden Book, lol.

I agree, although does the background/play area actually come with the set? It looks pretty awesome. The puns on the poster are great too. I think the ship will fit right in with the LEGOLAND-but-mostly-Pirateland theme park I've been accumulating. 40346,10273, 31084, and 41375.