TalonCard

I'd love to be patient enough to wait for the GWPs, but...I waited on Barracuda Bay and hated the wait for it to come back in stock so I could actually get it. Life's too short, and Pirate sets only come around once in a blue moon. I'm gonna order it at midnight and enjoy the nostalgic building feels.

I found the reminder of the "ignore" option a few pages back to be helpful, just putting that out there.

I've had this happen with Metalbeard's ship and the new Imperial Flagship. :( Both about 3-5 years after original assembly.

Like Metalbeard's hat from the LEGO Movie? Always would have loved to see that one used more widely.

I liked that detail too! The next step for Will's character should have been to reclaim his father's ship Barracuda from Captain Foul, as heard in the Secret of Skeleton Island audio drama; it'd be a shame if that wasn't something he did sometime in the intervening 20 years. But I'd argue that Will showed up as recently as the 3-in-1 set, even if he wasn't named there, so we have had him relatively recently.

Re: Broadside, if we're assuming that this Eldorado Fortress is from the same point in time as the Barracuda Bay set, it's been about 20 years since the last time we saw Broadside, and he was Governor for 15 years before that according to the Secret of Skeleton Island. So it makes sense that he'd have been replaced by now. (Let's not forget that he was nearly replaced in both The Royal Visit storybook and Bo'sun Will Rescues the Governor audio drama, with only Will and Redbeard's efforts saving him both times.)

Alright, I get this set isn't universally popular, but is it really necessary to insult those of us who plan to buy the set? It's the only pirate set we've had in years, most of the reviews are positive, the price to piece ratio is good, and it has sails and minifigure parts that will be expensive and hard to get after it retires. For those who like the classic aesthetic and didn't get the Eldorado Fortress or Imperial Trading Post the first time around, this is a good opportunity to experience parts of those at a reasonable price. Not everyone is going to like it, absolutely, but no one is a sucker for buying it.

Keep it! The governor's hat is pretty cool and the big flag is a sweet update. I also like the green torso pirate torso in that set; never miss a chance to pick one of those up.

I really love the little escape hatch in the prison, that looks great and I'm a big fan of secret passageways and trap doors. I did raise my eyebrow a bit at the assertion in the instructions that the Eldorado Fortress came packed with the Golden Medallion comic--that's the first I've heard of it; anybody remember this? There were lots of similar promotions that I had no idea existed like the treasure island game, so it's not impossible. Eldorado Fortress was off the shelves in my area by the time I got into Pirates.

Off topic entirely, but I completely missed that the dragon is a figurehead that is also a complete seperate construction that can come out to play. That is freaking adorable.

This...seems like an overreaction? I'm deeply invested in the Pirate lore, but as others have pointed out the vast majority of it is incredibly obscure and very nearly all of it outside the original comic was exclusive to certain regions: The detailed storyline from the set boxes was (to my knowledge) exclusively a US and later North American thing. Boxes for the European and Asian markets did not have similar text printed on them that I'm aware of. And outside of character names, this storyline didn't have a lot to do with the events of the more widely available comic book. The audio books were only ever produced in German, and to my knowledge the main source of knowledge about them for the wider non-German speaking internet has been the translations by Runamuck on this very forum. The storybooks were made for a UK audience and don't seem to have been widely available outside of that market either. Even the original comic book, while widely distributed, was only around for about as long as the original wave of sets. If you came into the theme in 1992, it's possible you missed it entirely. It is pretty cool that even though all the storylines are widely distributed throughout the world, there is a remarkable degree of consistency there. But it's a consistency that has had to be teased out after the fact, and I don't think it's an overstatement to say that this forum has been ground zero for much of it. It's very very niche. But we don't even know that there's any kind of attempt to "ignore" the rediscovered amalgamation that is the original lore with this set. We haven't seen the instruction manual. All we know is that there's an "admiral" included. Maybe the website text is incorrect in assuming the figure is an admiral. Maybe the admiral is an older De Martinet. Maybe one of the new soldiers is Camilla, all grown up. Maybe the figure is supposed to be Broadside--the Imperial leader with a fancy hat and coat from 1992 (in the US) and 2009 (in LEGO Battles) were also said to be Broadside in order to continue the story even though in the latter case it resemble him much. If anything the indication is that it's a continuation of the Barracuda Bay storyline 20 years later, which is loosly tied back to the original lore.

They *can* be whatever you want them to be. :) The bluecoats were based more on the French and the redcoats more on the British, but according to the lore both are from the same intentionally unidentified fictional European empire that has elements of both armies/navies. The blue coats are the colonial military that serve the governors, while the redcoats are the Imperial Guard who explore and protect in the name of the King. They are often used interchangeably too, blurring the lines somewhat.

The original raised baseplates were actually one of the most expensive parts of the set; Niels Milan Pedersen (the designer of the original Eldorado Fortress) said in this interview "...the raised baseplate, that is probably one of the worst things I ever worked on." "Also, they cost so much to make that if we put a baseplate in a box, it didn't leave much money left for other bricks. I am not sure, but I have to think that the LEGO Group lost money on all the boxes that those baseplates were in." It is basically a lot like the original set in the default model form, but one of the things I like about it was that they managed to break it down into individual components that can be rearranged, so not only do you have the form of the original model; it's also a lot more versitile than the original. Not quite as neat a trick as the base-to-ship transformation of Barracuda Bay, but it's pretty cool.

I suspect this set is, like Barracuda Bay, picking up 20 years after the original theme ended, so maybe that's Admiral De Martinet and not Governor Broadside? He did manage to strike a pretty big blow against the pirates in this comic posted here...

Do it, it's fun! I didn't get a really good look at the alternate configuration until just now, but that's actually pretty awesome too. I wonder if they considered having that be the main model and the classic Eldorado as the alternate, ala Barracuda Bay.

We do know from the LEGO lore that the 18th century Imperial militaries were more inclusive than in real life history: there's Miranda Valentina in the LEGOLAND Florida stunt show, lady Armada officers in LEGO Chess, and Cadet Rita LaQuay from LEGO Legacy: Heroes Unboxed. I like this set a lot--cheers to those bold enough to speculate that the Imperial Trading Post ship would be included, I'm shocked but delighted; I didn't think they'd really do it!

You're right; "turkey" as an insult is pretty old fashioned. Izzie's dialogue is actually filled with oddly anachronistic phrases; I'd like to think it's a character choice and not the writers struggling to do convincing dialog for kids in the 2020s, but we'll see... According to the Dreamzzz cover story in Blocks Magazine 103 and IMDB we'll be getting 10 more episodes for a total of 20.

On that note, I gotta put in my usual appreciation for the Metalbeard pirate hat--they went full minifig on it and I actually prefer it to the 2009/2020 hats.

Added the Spring 1990 Brick Kicks.

There was a reference to Galaxy Squad, oddly enough, though possibly in the context of it being an in-universe franchise. (The kids retrieve what the characters initially believe to be a holographic star map, and someone says "Oooh, are we doing Galaxy Squad?") I think that Izzie's alarm/ringtone is possiby a remixed-to-the-point-of-almost-being-unrecognizable version of "The Loud Song", a recurring in-universe pop hit from LEGO City Adventures. I think that there's probably another batch of episodes to be released as "season 2", if not "season 1.5"--in addition to the dangling Castle Nocturna, Zoey's backstory, and Nighthunter's origin plot threads, there's a mysterious lady dream chaser mentioned frequently that I suspect is Mrs. Castillo. Overall, the series isn't nearly as funny as LEGO City Adventures and doesn't have the atmosphere of Hidden Side. I'm interested in the deeper Dream Chaser lore, though, so I'm hoping the show will go on for a couple more seasons at least.

Added the Winter 1989 Brick Kicks.

I've scanned the Pirate articles from Brick Fanatics Issues 3 and 9 here, as the magazine is currently unavailable. :) Hope this is helpful, enjoy!

Added the Fall 1989 Brick Kicks.

Dang, that's a cool sticker. I'll have to pick up that sticker sheet from Bricklink. Are we sure about the translation? Looks more like Redbeard than Brickbeard to me.