Aanchir

It's so funny to me that the toys in 31139 Cosy House all seem to be microscale versions of older LEGO sets — Granite Grinder, Wolfpack Renegades, Gateway of the Squid (minus the gateway), etc. That set and all the new animal sets look really cute. The parrot in particular is a worthy successor to this year's Majestic Tiger!

This page says Gertrude is Olly's cat. It definitely could be a relative like a parent or younger sibling who hasn't been introduced yet. Or it could be something totally unrelated like the initials of one of the set designers/graphic designers. Too early to know for sure, I think.

Yeah, GWPs are usually available from LEGO.com (aside from specific ones celebrating stuff like a particular store's grand opening or anniversary). Pretty sure this one will be both online and in-store. Sometimes the dates of availability are different between countries, though, so be sure and double check before ordering!

I think at minimum you should probably try and find a place to add the station clock back — even a modern train station feels somewhat incomplete without one! EDIT: I realize after posting this that the station clock is probably just on the other side facing the tracks. Apologies! For my part, I think the upper floor improves the appearance of the model by helping to break up the composition so it isn't so flat-looking. Even if you don't keep it as a control tower, it could be converted into something else like a station manager's office. I also don't see any stairs/ramps to get to the station platform. Are those around the back, or is that just a detail you haven't gotten to yet? I know it's still in the WIP stage, so no judgment either way.

I'm pretty pleased with this design, to be honest! Both models are a good likeness of their respective characters. The omission of the original Tahu's ankle and left wrist joints is more than balanced out by the articulated elbows, knees, neck, and waist, allowing for more dynamic poses than the original set. And of course Takua's articulation is greatly improved compared to the original 2001 Matoran build! I can tell the designer was a big Bionicle fan themselves, especially since they included not only Takua (a character who is loved primarily for his story media appearances and not his sole set depiction), but also entirely non-set-based elements like the Amaja Circle. I do kind of wish the masks used a curved part with beveled edges like 1762 or 30602 so they'd look a little less "flat", but the graphics are nice and remind me of the old-school flash animations. It'd also be nice if the fire sword's hilt was red instead of black. But even with those slight misgivings, I feel this is a really great tribute to the Bionicle theme!

Nope, just turbans and keffiyehs. I agree, a hijab would be nice to see in the future, although it might be a bit tricky to make one that looks good on minifigs and mini-dolls alike, since the hijab is draped over the shoulders, and minifigs have different shoulder proportions from minidolls.

Ooh, looks lovely! The more I look at the pics of this set, the more I appreciate a lot of its details: the shaping of the hull, the yellow stripes and Tr. Red body panels along the sides, the upside-down build of the cargo hold's upper flap, etc. In spite of the diagonal cargo hold panels not being flush with the fuselage, the model as a whole ends up looking really sleek, aggressive, and stealthy. The droid build is also updated really tastefully. And the cockpit even appears to use the classic space seat like the original (albeit in black rather than grey). I've never really been bothered by stickers, so that's not an issue for me. And comparing these pics to pics of 6894, I realize they actually help improve the fidelity of the yellow patterns. Yellow printing on black parts has always been prone to looking washed-out compared to actual yellow bricks, even in the original LEGO Blacktron sets. I know that's not likely to make stickers any more palatable to those who would've preferred printing. But I feel it's an interesting trade-off compared to the original set. Still wish we had a pic that showed the back a little better so I could see how they changed the rear engines, but that's the only visual detail I'm having an especially hard time making out in these higher-quality images.

Just saw that LEGO posted some cute images on social media of the Lion Knights' Castle all decorated for Christmas! Even aside from the more whimsical holiday-themed elements like the reindeer cart, elves, and fairy lights, I am really impressed with how great the model looks covered with snow! Especially since a substantial percent of that just involves selectively recoloring parts to white and adding some additional white parts representing icicles and snowdrifts. I figured other folks here might appreciate this as inspiration for ways to personalize or customize your own copy of the castle!

Well, I think the M:Tron and Blacktron II torso patterns could be mostly left as-is, since they have a similar graphical quality — if you had to change anything, I suppose more colors could be added to the M:Tron logo to match the red/orange/yellow pattern the logo features on the box art and other print material, and perhaps the white octagonal border around the Blacktron 2 logo could be changed to another color like silver for the sake of contrast. You could also update the legs with dual molding for less of a Superman-style "underwear over tights" look, but that doesn't necessarily call for new printing The main torso patterns where I think updates are more clearly called for are those featuring discrete spacesuit components or gadgets like cables/hoses, utility belts, harnesses, zippers, etc. Oftentimes some of these details were represented in a very abstract way (like, say, a dotted line for the radio cables on the Space Police II torsos) that could be improved with the addition of thinner lines and more print colors.

Oof. Well, honestly, that kind of gives me hope that maybe the cargo hold flaps can also be lined up with the fuselage better than they were in the box pic. If not, I guess there's still the possibility you can smooth them out a bit with some modding, but in any case, that's my primary frustration with the design as of right now. I have mixed feelings about the minifigure also, to be honest (I just realized I didn't mention that in my earlier post). I'm not as bothered with new Classic Space sets reusing the original torso decoration as-is, because it's meant to represent a logo, and that sort of minimalism remains fairly timeless in that context. But the Blacktron torso decoration is meant to represent an actual flight harness rather than just a logo, and so it ends up feeling much more dated to leave it as a flat monochrome print without any color contrast or shading to give it a stronger sense of physicality or differentiate the components and materials that make up the harness. I am still a pretty big fan of the updated Blacktron torso used for Rench from Space Police 3. It adds some additional shades of grey and silver, more elaborate contours, and even some back printing to continue the belt pattern around the figure's waist. But it still adhered closely to the original graphic's simple, angular design rather than adding any elaborate textures or curved contours like those on many modern LEGO Space torso patterns. It also works great in conjunction with the Series 3 Space Villain torso to differentiate ordinary pilots and footsoldiers from higher-ranking members of the Blacktron fleet. I wouldn't expect LEGO to have brought back either of those patterns for a set like this, of course, but the former is a good example of the sort of updates I might've preferred over just leaving the torso pattern identical to the original Blacktron astronaut torso. The chosen torso decoration still makes plenty of sense since the point of the set is to be a throwback, and I can definitely appreciate it in that respect. But it's not my personal preference.

Since we're talking stickers, I should point out that some folks (like me) genuinely like them. Obviously that's a VERY unpopular opinion, at least among us AFOLs, but it's my genuine opinion regardless. As a kid my dad would apply stickers for me to ensure they were aligned well, but after I became confident enough in my teen years to start applying them myself, it became a greatly enjoyable part of the building experience for me. Of course, there ARE still a number of contexts where I prefer prints! Minifigs, molded animals, tiles used as minifig accessories, facial features on character/creature builds, complex curved surfaces (like domed windscreens), patterns on tiny surfaces like 1x1 tiles or the sides of plates, etc. But I also appreciate that there's a lot of stuff stickers are useful for that CAN'T be achieved with printed bricks, like mirrored or holographic patterns. And in some sets like the Ninjago City collection or Monkie Kid's City of Lanterns, stickers allow LEGO to include way more set-specific details and Easter eggs than we'd ever be likely to get with printed parts alone. Like, we can all speculate indefinitely on what LEGO could or couldn't actually afford to put in these sets, but I think we can all agree that they realistically wouldn't bother with the cost of 60+ additional printed parts on top of all the printed parts they already introduce in sets and themes like those! After all, even in the early 2000s when LEGO was introducing new elements with reckless abandon (at great cost to the company), sets rarely had more than a couple dozen printed parts, and minifigure parts often made up around half of those. I realize, of course, that there probably ARE a lot of AFOLs who'd love to have all sets sticker-free even if it meant far fewer decorations overall. I'm just not in that camp myself.

The Sand Yellow (Dark Tan) crown/eggshell pieces in that set could also be very useful for palm tree trunks! To say nothing of all the other good foliage pieces that set offers in substantial quantities. The Wildflower Bouquet set also has the same crown/eggshell piece in some shade of green, which would make good bromeliad leaves in a minifig-scale tropical setting!

For the most part I'm impressed with the new Blacktron Cruiser, but yeah, it does have some shortcomings. Unlike the updated Forest Hideout (which largely retained the original model's proportions) or Galaxy Explorer (which increased the overall height, width, and length by around 50%), this model increases the original set's length, but leaves its width and the proportions of specific details like the rear flaps/solar panels around the same. The resulting appearance still looks pretty great in my opinion — in fact, I quite like the new model's longer, sharper wings and larger tail stabilizer — but the likeness to the original model is diminished in the process. The graphics look nice to me, and some details like the forward laser cannons, the droid, and the customizable splitting function are updated very effectively. The HUD panel/holographic display panel inside the cockpit is a clever addition that helps the interior feel very futuristic. The use of the large 3x7 banner pieces for the cargo hold are likewise a great choice, but their angle bothers me since it doesn't match the 45-degree angles used for the rest of the fuselage. That said, the angles of the aft section of the fuselage (behind the cargo hold) are much nicer than the original, tapering gently towards the tail instead of ending abruptly in a flat surface. There are definitely portions of this set, such as the underside of the fuselage, that will be easier to judge in-hand than just in these box photos. None of the photos really show the rear engine clearly, either, so I'm eager to see what changes were made there compared to the simple grey 2x2 round brick used for the rocket engine of the original set. But as I said, my general impression so far is positive, and it's possible some of the aspects that bug me might be easy enough to remedy with a bit of modding. I suppose time will teell!

I mean, it's always had that stuff, despite being aimed at a preteen audience. This is because young kids tend to find that sort of "teen stuff" cool and aspirational. A lot of boy-oriented themes like LEGO Ninjago and LEGO Hidden Side likewise focus on teenage protagonists, despite being aimed at more of a preteen audience.

Honestly, modern (post-1950s) elements have been present in the Modular Buildings for longer than a lot of people seem to recognize. Namely, I don't think upright, glass-front refrigerated coolers like the ones in the Green Grocer existed until at least the 1970s. Electric drip coffee makers like in the Pet Shop likewise weren't invented until the mid-1950s (the earliest ones had two glass chambers, unlike the Pet Shop coffee machjine), and weren't popularized for home use until the 70s. So while the computer in the Town Hall is definitely the most overt post-1950s design feature in the early years of the Modular Buildings Collection, it was neither the only nor the first instance of such. That said, the Modular Buildings Collection as a whole has focused on pre-1950s architectural styles. Even the "Streamline Moderne" architecture featured in the Downtown Diner and Corner Garage sets was most popular in the 1930s and 1940s. I mean, "penny arcades" with coin-op amusements like pinball machines, fortune teller machines, strength tester/love tester machines, Skee-Ball alleys, target-shooting games, and so forth were around long before modern "video arcades". I think the former would make plenty of sense as part of a modular street, particularly since they'd be less reliant on printed or stickered "screens" than video arcade cabinets. But you'd have to figure out what to do with the upper floors of the building, since neither style of arcade would typically take up multiple floors.

It always surprises me when the accuracy of the City theme's name comes up in conversation — it's true, a lot of stuff in the theme is set outside of "city limits", but the same was true of many LEGO Town sets I grew up with in the 90s: Rocky River Retreat, Gator Landing, Outback Airstrip, Deep Reef Refuge, Moon Walker, etc. And in fact, the Town theme was ITSELF named City (or rather, the equivalent in the local language) in a number of countries: "Ciudad" in Spain, "Cidade" in Portugal, "Città" in Italy, "Město" in the Czech Republic, "Város" in Hungary, etc. In the grand scheme of things, I think theme names like "City" and "Town" are better thought of as brand names than descriptions of their contents — same as how the Castle theme includes lots of medieval/fantasy stuff other than castles (such as boats, ships, rural village scenes, and forest/wilderness scenes). Anyway, as for the relative QUALITY of the City theme… I'm of two minds. I definitely DO prefer LEGO Friends in a lot of respects, make no mistake about that, but I don't feel like that's an indication of "how far LEGO City has fallen" or anything like that. Rather, a lot of the things LEGO Friends succeeds at are things that I feel Town/City sets have ALWAYS struggled with (similar to some of the reasons I preferred LEGO Elves over pretty much all prior incarnations of LEGO Castle). I agree that the City theme is showing gradual improvement in many of those areas, even if it hasn't "caught up with" the Friends theme. I mean, until last year, no Town/City sets had EVER included a school, school bus, grocery store, or observatory! Hospitals, shops, restaurants, parks, and houses are also starting to show up more than in the City theme's past (though the theme will still need quite a few more houses to even begin to compare to the early years of the Town theme, let alone to the Friends theme). This image still impresses me quite a bit by showing just how robust a city layout can be created with just sets from the first half of this year! There are also a few areas where I think that the Friends theme still falls short of the City theme. Chief among these is the new road system, which helps in providing varied opportunities to combine sets into a unified layout. Frankly, I kind of wish LEGO would release road plate packs as part of a separate theme like Xtra, and market it as a supplement to ANY theme that you might want paved roads in. LEGO Friends is also not without its share of "blind spots" in terms of portraying the stuff you might find in a real city. At no point in its ten-year history has it had any construction, police, firefighting, bank, post office, or train sets — the closest it's had to any of those are the abandoned firehouse that the protagonists converted into the Friendship House, the elevated train from Heartlake City Resort, and the parcel service truck and shop from Heartlake Gift Delivery. Likewise, it took until this year for the Friends theme to get any sort of garbage/recycling truck. As far as I can recall, no Friends sets have even included traffic lights. All in all, if the contents of these themes were reversed, I'm sure City fans would have just as many gripes about these "blind spots" as they do about those the City theme currently has. Perhaps even more so, as I can't say I've ever heard many complaints about the City theme's lack of sets focused on some of the subjects the Friends theme has had in ample supply over the years, like swimming pools, hair salons, or veterinary clinics!

Celeste from The LEGO Movie 2 and Lashina from DC Super Hero Girls both did, so I certainly wouldn't rule it out! Arguably Kacey as well, but neither Vicky nor Kacey were really dyed-in-the-wool villains like Dr. Alvah and Carter. Vicky was more of a rival, while Kacey was manipulated into working against the LEGO Friends, as I mentioned above. I definitely agree, it would've been nice to get mini-dolls of more of those other antagonistic characters — there were even minidoll-style renders of them in the LEGO Friends Heartlake Rush app (with a unique body mold for Joey)! Additionally, some of the builds associated with them, like Dr. Alvah's futuristic self-driving car or Carter's seaplane, would've been very fun to see in sets. Sadly, I think the opportunity for that has passed now that the "Girls on a Mission" series has ended and the storyline has moved on to new protagonists following a time skip.

I assume they're referring to the "LEGO Friends: Girls on a Mission" series which ran from 2018–2021. This series features a villainous tech magnate named Dr. Alvah who, despite being one of Olivia's biggest role models, is a fairly amoral in her real-estate acquisitions and efforts to "upgrade" Heartlake City with her dazzling new inventions. She employs a pair of bumbling construction workers, Ricky and Joey, in a lot of less-than-legal parts of her gentrification schemes. In the second season, Dr. Alvah is joined by an investor/con artist going by the name Carter Greene, who turns out to be more interested in procuring wealth and power with the aid of Alvah's machines than in genuinely helping her to bring about her futurist vision. He's particularly obsessed with finding a legendary lost treasure that belonged to Heartlake City's founders. As the LEGO Friends investigate various problems around town (for example, power outages, environmental issues, and economic pressures on local business owners), they begin to trace these issues back to Dr. Alvah. In order to protect their community, they join forces with the city's "Shadow Group", a sort of secret society of concerned citizens who've been investigating the same issues: cupcake chef Dean, diner owner and former go-kart racing legend Dottie Rae, and Dottie's grandson Ethan (who moonlights as the vigilante street artist "Prankzy"). They are also assisted on occasion by Olivia's mom Laura, an officer of the Heartlake City Police, and her police horse Barney. However, Officer Laura and Barney never ended up appearing in sets, nor did Dr. Alvah and her accomplices. So pretty much the only aspects of this storyline that made it into any sets were mini-dolls of Dean, Dottie Rae, Ethan/"Prankzy", and Kacey, an impressionable teen who infiltrates the friend group as a "double agent" under orders from Carter Greene, in hopes that their boundless curiosity will lead him to the founders' treasure. In general, I don't see much indication of this new story arc revisiting these plot points, especially since Dr. Alvah was more or less disgraced over the course of the series (both due to her expensive pipe dreams cutting into her company's profits and her affiliations with Carter Greene damaging their reputation). However, I wouldn't be surprised if we do end up seeing more criminal elements in future storylines, since Nancy Drew style "kid detective" storylines are a great opportunity to add excitement and suspense to modern-day slice-of-life stories like this one. For now, Officer Isabella's tablet in set 41732 is displaying pictures of the two youngsters Peter and Victoria, which suggests to me she's in the midst of investigating some childish mischief rather than some more serious crime. In future sets, I could see police showing up to direct traffic, like you mentioned, or to investigate various nonviolent crimes like illegal graffiti or bike theft. Personally, I'd prefer if police didn't feature TOO prominently in the Friends theme (since I have mixed feelings about police sets in general), but I definitely see how they could open up new play and storytelling opportunities. Apologies for the lengthy post, but I hope I answered your question!

Of the new sets revealed today, here's some stuff that seems like it might have utility in historic themes: As far as animal molds go, set 60369 includes a new German Shepherd/Alsatian puppy mold, and set 60394 includes TWO otters! The latter could also probably be used to represent other mustelids like minks or weasels with a similar coat color. The hare from this year's Mission sets also appears in multiple new sets which might make it a little less expensive in the aftermarket. Minecraft has a funky new 2x2 container/frame piece in set 21246, and as soon as I saw it my first thought was what a great base it would make for furniture such as chairs, stools, and side tables if flipped over! Set 88004 from LEGO Monkie Kid has loads of great landscaping and architectural parts in subdued colors, much like the Temple of Airjitzu or The Legendary Flower Fruit Mountain before it. Some great weapons, animals, and accessories, too. EDIT: I just saw an image of the polybag set 30656 Monkey King Marketplace, and with it I noticed something else about both it and 88004: the market stalls in these sets are almost identical in design to the one from 10305 Lion Knights' Castle! I wonder if they're from the same designer or it's just meant to be an reference/homage to that build.

For what it's worth, the "Castle System" label is merely a recreation of how old-school "LEGOLAND" boxes were labeled in North America! Over here the corner banner would read "LEGOLAND Town System"/"Space System"/"Castle System" instead of just "LEGOLAND". The new sets replace the larger "LEGOLAND" text with the set name, but are otherwise a clear reference to the North American box layout from those classic sets.

The falconer looks great! I'm a little unsure how to feel about her having a bow but no quiver, but with a little imagination, I suppose she could be teaching her falcon to retrieve arrows for her as a training exercise. The bright red hair is certainly very vibrant, but to me it sorta echoes of all the 90s Castle figs with Bright Red printed facial hair. In that regard, I wouldn't mind seeing more red-haired and red-bearded Castle figs in the future! The torso and leg patterns are phenomenal, as we've come to expect in the blind bag series. And the falcon is a fantastic new mold with outstanding printing. I can imagine many new prints for it in the future to represent different raptor species. I definitely feel keen on getting her to accompany the Black Falcons from the Lion Knights' Castle and Medieval Blacksmith!

Brilliant! Thank you so much for sharing more pictures! You've done a phenomenal job through and through!

Lovely work! The throne room looks very nice (the large windows seem like a bit of a defensive liability compared to how heavily fortified the rest of the castle is, but they WOULD be practical for letting in a lot of light). The workshop for Majisto is a great use of the additional basement space. I know that "court magicians" were more of a renaissance thing than a medieval thing in real life, but I'm still fond of them as a concept. And especially since the designers went ahead and included Majisto in the set in the first place, I feel we owe it to him to give him a workspace! The "sword in the stone" is also a fun little detail that adds nice variety to the exterior. The large tile roof nicely echoes motifs from the set very nicely while employing them in a very different sort of context. And the ballista is REALLY cool way to add some artillery while still emphasizing uniqueness and complexity (compared to the wall-mounted catapults typical of KFOL-oriented Castle sets). Do you plan on eventually ordering the parts to build this in real life? If you do, I hope you'll share pictures of the result! Also, out of curiosity, does the tower with the ballista on it have any fun interior details of its own? Regardless, these pics alone show what a great job you did with this extension!

It's definitely possible to have autistic characters via narrative media like comics, movies, video games, or animated series, since storytelling in those formats can go into more detail with characterization than just what's visible in a character's physical design. Arguably, there have already been a number of LEGO in-house characters who exhibit various autistic traits, but it's usually unclear if they're written as autistic, and I feel like even many creators who DO consciously or subconsciously write these sorts of characters as autistic are reluctant to confirm it due to worries about whether they're being respectful to people's real-life experiences (especially if they aren't autistic themselves). That said, writing explicitly autistic characters is far impossible — some examples from popular media of the past decade include as Entrapta from She-Ra and the Princesses of Power, Billy Cranston (the Blue Ranger) from the 2017 Power Rangers film, Norma Khan from Dead End: Paranormal Park, and Symmetra from Overwatch. Much like LGBTQ+ representation, it's mostly a matter of whether creators/storytellers are willing to both commit to representing people in that category and take accountability for how well or poorly they manage to do so. From my experience, the best examples of this sort of representation tend to be those in which people from the demographic in question are involved in the creation process, and are supported in this effort by their fellow creators.

This is neat! I like that you opted for a different sort of extraterrestrial setting than the dusty, cratered landscape typical of most Space sets and MOCs. It genuinely does feel like a futuristic equivalent of an oil platform thanks to its vertically stacked design and heavy-duty industrial motifs. I love all the details you added like the handling crane, fuel transport rail system, and robots/droids. Your fighter design is also outstanding, with an aggressive shape and a modern, streamlined build, but still plenty of classic Blacktron flair. Even with a lot of smooth, studless details, you've definitely created a model that feels "set-quality" thanks to its numerous play features, accessible interior spaces, and balance between small detail pieces and larger structural components like panels and supports. Incredible work in general!