Aanchir

I somewhat dislike that logic, because you can say "anyone can enjoy it" about most themes. Whether everyone will enjoy it is a different matter. That's the reason the Friends theme exists: to target the large portion of the female demographic which does not normally buy mainstream LEGO sets. Some licensed themes have done better than non-licensed themes with girls in the past, but in general I don't see many young girls (or any girls at all who are not either devoted LEGO fans or devoted LotR fans) being interested in the LotR theme. So with that in mind, LEGO Friends has a purpose that only another girl-oriented theme could really fulfill. Your comments about not appealing to older people are kind of confusing (there's no reason it shouldn't have the same appeal with older audiences as LEGO City), and your comment about Bricklink prices is irrelevant because Bricklink is relevant to very few people besides AFOLs and because aftermarket prices aren't a very good measure of actual demand. I don't think the Friends theme itself has guaranteed longevity, but the way your comment is phrased you make it sound like it will fail because it is a girl-oriented theme. Plenty of boy-oriented themes have been successful, and if we assume that LEGO has universal appeal, then there's no reason a girl-oriented theme can't achieve the same success.

I love the red and white stripes! They remind me of the stickers on the 2010 villain sets. I kind of wish villains still had those kind of details, but at the same time I recognize that patternless parts are often more versatile than patterned ones, whether printed or stickered. And there's a different sort of appeal to the smooth, clean designs of today's HF sets.

I think overall, as a theme, The Lord of the Rings has more potential for lasting success than LEGO Friends. There are a number of reasons for this, including that LEGO Friends is still to some extent an experiment in how building toys can be marketed to girls, and as such there aren't years of precedent pointing to its potential to success-- unlike The Lord of the Rings, which in some ways combines the proven potential of many years of LEGO Castle sets and the long-term relevance of the franchise itself.' But there's another important factor to keep in mind. The success of The Lord of the Rings is based almost entirely on the IP it's based on. This means that as long as the franchise remains relevant and popular, the theme has that same potential. The merits of LEGO Friends are based more strictly on its fundamental nature as a building toy. And since these merits are hardly exclusive to the LEGO Friends theme, it would be easy if things turned sour for TLG to replace it with a similar brand with a different name. Who knows? With the success LEGO Friends has seen, it's possible that more fantasy- or sci-fi oriented girl-oriented themes could emerge over time. So what's to stop one of these themes from outshining and eventually replacing the theme that inspired them? What I'm getting at is that if both LEGO Friends and The Lord of the Rings remain successful, then LEGO Friends would be the easier theme to "replace". After all, TLG built its success from the ground up, and could easily do so again with a new theme, just as seems likely to happen in the case of Ninjago, which has been wildly successful but which isn't planned to continue beyond 2013. On the other hand, if The Lord of the Rings shows any sort of staying power, then it would be a much bigger risk to replace it. It came to TLG with a certain amount of pre-established potential, and as precedent shows, licensed themes like that don't come along all that often. If either theme fails to show staying power, then all bets are off. Middle-Earth sets might very easily fail to outlive The Hobbit film franchise, if no other plans emerge to promote Tolkien's story universe in such a prominent medium. LEGO Friends could start suffering as competitors begin to follow in TLG's footsteps and introduce their own girl-oriented building toy brands. But since both themes seem to have proven popular so far I've got more confidence in the established IP that is The Lord of the Rings.

I'm not entirely sure how you see that in this theme, where almost all of the sets include vehicles and only about three feature buildings of any kind. True, that's more buildings than in some other recent action themes like Atlantis, Pharaoh's Quest, Dino or Power Miners, but rare is the theme these days that doesn't include at least one impressive building. I think the fact that there are more in this particular theme has more to do with it being a concept (monster hunting) where buildings play an important role than with a trend towards more and more location-based sets. Just look at this year's Ninjago, where besides tiny "shrines", there's only one set with a location-based structure (plus the spinner arena sets of course). Then compare that to last year when the flagship set for the year (the Fire Temple) was primarily location-based and there were at least three other major location-based sets (Garmadon's Dark Fortress, the Mountain Shrine, and the Spinjitzu Dojo). Even the spinner arenas like Skeleton Bowling or Ultimate Battle Arena were very complex architecturally. So all in all I don't see a shift towards more location-based sets in general. This particular theme has quite a few, just as Ninjago did last year, but that's no indication that this is part of a continuing trend.

Checking one of my Bright Yellowish Green (Lime) bricks from the Fangpyre Wrecking Ball set, it's also somewhat translucent when lit from beneath. Mark Stafford (Nabii) mentioned in response to the Brickset news article that bricks have thinner walls today than they used to for more clutch power-- something I had noticed a while back but never connected to translucency in bricks. So perhaps this is not a dye problem after all. Compare the underside of a modern 2x4 brick with the underside of an older one and you can see that the modern ones, instead of having smooth insides to their walls, have somewhat thinner walls with little vertical "ridges" to clutch the bricks. I first noticed this in the Brick Calendar, which has most of its bricks in the newer style but 2x8 bricks in the older style. Some people have expressed concern that this will make bricks more fragile, but I hardly think that's a cause for worry. In fact, I dare say that since this change has never been complained about before, it probably doesn't affect most LEGO fans at all. Checking one of my Mars Mission sets just this minute (7645, from the year 2008), one of the curved slopes in it, 41748, has this style of wall, and yes, because of this it appears translucent when lit from directly beneath. A BIONICLE brick-based playset from 2007 (8927) has a 2x6 curved slope, 44126, with the same style wall. It does not appear semi-transparent, but in this case it is probably just because the part in question is black. Even our Wookie Catamaran set from 2005 has parts with these thinner walls, and that's a set from 2005! Clearly, by now, this characteristic of bricks has been present for many years. It's possible that the translucency also has to do with the dye changes that occurred many years ago (I can't find any light-colored curved slopes from pre-2006 sets to compare right now), but still this is hardly a recent issue and hardly a sign that anything has been getting progressively worse since these issues first began appearing.

Thanks for this review! I really like Stormer XL. His proportions are pretty great compared to the long-legged proportions of sets like Black Phantom, and his design is very creative in a number of ways. I agree with DOTM Shockwave that the shoulders sit a bit too low for my liking... if his shoulders were a bit higher, his arms could be made a bit longer without looking like they dangle unrealistically, which would also improve his proportions. Ideally, he'd be made somehow so that his shoulder joints could be lifted up and down, but that might require a more complex torso build. Overall, though, this set demonstrates that TLG no longer has to depend on an extremely complex build to create a sturdy, poseable large-scale figure, and so I hope to see some real diversity of sets at this price range in the future. XT4's new torso beam could be used on the back of a large-scale figure to create more of a Y-shaped torso rather than this somewhat unusual triangle-shaped torso. Different armor possibilities could be explored. The possibilities of the new building system just continue to expand, and I am happy to see TLG taking advantage of that.

Sorry, forgot it wouldn't be public immediately. Hotlinking the image would defeat the purpose since the reason I hosted them on Brickshelf was to demonstrate how they would appear on a colored background.

From my experience, they're great if you need to attach two pieces with Technic axle holes to one piece with a Technic pin hole. In that case they basically act like a longer version of this piece. In general they're just another all-around useful Technic element, and way better than many of the useless launcher/missile pieces we have had in the past. You should have no problem finding a use for at least some of them, and the rest can be kept in reserve for the next time you need something with those specific connection points.

Very nice! Bonesiii's a great guy; I know him from BZPower (a former BIONICLE fansite, now a general LEGO fansite with an emphasis on constraction themes). However, if I had seen these models before I certainly didn't remember them. The tuba is probably my favorite.

Nice guide. One addition I'd like to make, though. While it's great to use screenshots with transparency (I almost always do), one disadvantage is that transparent parts will be extremely see-through, so much so that it can be hard to make out which color is being used. Also, I can't remember if this issue has been resolved, but it used to be that anything covered up by a transparent part would also have transparency in the screenshot. My solution for this has always been to copy the entire (cropped) screenshot and paste it on top of itself several times using Photoshop. This deepens the color of the transparent parts, although after a certain number of layers the transparency of those parts is lost. However, I still think this is preferable to transparent blue colors you can't tell apart, transparent green colors that are almost grayish-looking, etc. It also means the colors will be crisp on any color of background. Look at this image When viewed on Brickshelf's default blue backdrop, the transparent bright green and transparent blue parts look extremely faded and almost "ghostlike". Next view the same image with four duplicate layers pasted on top of the original image. The transparent colors are a lot brighter, with a bit of transparency remaining. Finally, here's the same image with eight duplicate layers on top of the original. The difference is negligible, but the clear parts' transparency has been completely removed. The number of duplicate layers you want will thus vary depending on how much transparency you want transparent-colored parts to have and what background you will be displaying them against.

I don't hate video reviews in general. True, in many cases I prefer a text review, and I almost never listen to the audio when watching a video review because in video the set's strong and weak points should usually be apparent without the reviewer having to describe them orally. Show, don't tell. But there are good video reviews, which show the sets in detail without hands getting in the way or the camera dwelling too long on any one thing. For instance, see . This is a guy who clearly has great experience in the field of video reviews. No shaky camera, no hands fumbling with the minifigures or pieces... just a well-edited review showing off all the minifigures from various angles along with the complete build. This is the type of video review that I think a photo review could never fully replace. If only he reviewed non-licensed constraction sets!--------- As for this XT4 review, I'm surprised to see that my initial suspicions about XT4's torso bone were right and there is a pin hole through the center ball joint. This is a good decision IMO-- true, it means that parts can't snap to the sides of the torso bone's center ball joint, but there are few situations where that is even necessary (especially on this small torso bone that doesn't even have much clearance for doing so), and in the meantime this will make attaching back armor a lot easier. XT4 is still an amazing set design even ignoring the new torso beam. He has a unique physique, a well-organized color scheme, and some striking yet well-balanced asymmetry. --------- Stringer still looks amazing for his price point. I actually kind of like the use of regular blue along with the transparent blue, as I feel the regular blue helps act as a "transition area" between the transparent blue and the solid black armor. With that said, transparent blue shells wouldn't have been a bad thing either. Stringer could use some kind of back armor, but these days that's an easy enough problem to solve. The weapon is of course awesome. --------- Stormer XL's box is thinner than I imagined. It's a shame that pic on the back of the box isn't on cache.LEGO.com. His sticker sheet is tasteful too. And he's a great parts pack for those wanting a bunch of friction joints. Of his new parts, I'm pleasantly surprised to find that the parts used to connect the armor to his shin bones have three pin holes each, including one through the ball joint! After XT4's torso it's not hugely groundbreaking, but I had worried that it would only have a small cavity to allow it to be placed up against a ball joint, similar to that in Waspix's extra-arm-connector. His feet are cool in design, and could be versatile, but they still seem weird to me with the two giant toes. More Matoran-like than Hero-like IMO. The drones are nice new details, and the stickers help add detail, although I'm not sure whether I prefer them in their current form or in the form featured in the Toy Fair press guide's (very) preliminary image, where they were blended like his sword rather than stickered. His chest piece remains very stylish, even more so with stickers. The usefulness of the 3M beam C (two ball cups) is self-evident. Stormer XL, when built, is very imposing and has pretty good proportions. His back could use a bit more armor but his torso remains well-built. His sword is also still a great re-use of pieces, although I can think of a few ways the hilt could be improved (if the new 3x3 "gatling piece" of the Super Heroes constraction sets were available in black, it'd be preferable to that 3x2 cam piece, and a shorter axle connecting the sword to his hand would definitely be an improvement). --------- Bulk is pretty attractive, but he still has some odd design choices. His new boxy shell detail pieces are great, and his torso shell has a lovely print, but his color scheme has a few really odd (and IMO, somewhat detrimental) decisions like the choice to give him black feet rather than silver metallic or even titanium metallic ones. At the same time, the Technic-based attachment used to connect his shoulder-mounted blaster to his back looks a lot better than I had anticipated (especially since it can fold back so nicely), and the "bulky" shells surrounding his helmet still look incredible. --------- Speeda Demon is also a mixed bag for me. Box art is gorgeous, as is the case with most sets this wave. The figure himself looks pretty stellar. And the bike design is certainly expressive with its vivid purple and gold color scheme, its spiky detail pieces, and its lightning exhaust. At the same time, the bike feels somewhat mediocre compared to the solidly-built Furno Bike, and the lack of launchers leaves it with even fewer actual functions. As the video makes clear, it's also in desperate need of a kickstand, which the Furno Bike did well in including. The lightning pieces used for this set and Voltix look superb, and his helmet looks good in bright yellowish green. Also, the bike looks better than I had originally anticipated, though it's still not a work of art like the Furno Bike. It's rather shapely and has a unique aesthetic, which would make it great for chase scenes with the Furno Bike as was seen in the Breakout TV episode. I'm a little less pleased with how the lightning pieces on the handlebars are being treated as weapons for Speeda Demon rather than part of the bike. Granted, it's a necessity considering how the handlebars are built (if only it were more similar to Rockoh T3's gorgeous handlebars, though of course that's harder with the larger fist pieces), but they don't match Speeda Demon's aesthetic at all and they match the bike's aesthetic really well. --------- Nex looks nice. I love how one arm is heavily armored in titanium metallic, yet has a completely different aesthetic than Evo's tank arm. The antenna on his other arm using a System harpoon piece is great as well. And his color scheme is both unique and well-organized. Also, his new helmet and chest pattern are gorgeous. The black hand is an odd design choice, but not necesarily a bad one. It's this kind of set that really makes me wonder how TLG can top this line in 2013, since the character designs this year are so wonderfully well-suited to the characters. They have flaws, like any sets, but in terms of establishing the characters' identities I don't think they could be any better. --------- Core Hunter is pretty intriguing. While his color scheme feels a bit cliche, it also makes him feel wonderfully evil. And the rest of his set design goes towards the same objective. He has lots of great black parts too. I actually like the way his back armor is attached. The way it is tilted forward gives him a great hunched-looking posture, and I've never really cared about ball joints being left unused. His black torso shell is a great piece for those who aren't happy with Stringer's color scheme. --------- The combi models in general look great and, for me, hearken back to my favorite canister set combi models, the Brickmaster-exclusive ones of 2007 and 2008. Their color schemes may not be beautiful, but it's their unique builds that make them worth paying attention to. Certainly a bit more unique than the humanoid Hero combi models of 2011. Incidentally, I just noticed for the first time while watching these reviews that the recommended age range for these sets has changed since last year. The 3.0 series had the age range for all small Hero sets at 6-16 and the age range for all medium-sized villain sets at 7-16. In contrast, this year's small sets have an age range of 6-12 and the medium-sized sets have an age range of 7-14. It's extremely peculiar as the builds for the sets this year have become more complicated if anything (what with greater piece counts and the addition of more Technic-based building on various sets). So I suppose TLG's standards for what type of building older kids will enjoy has changed. The larger-scale sets still have the recommended age range capped at 16, but I find it peculiar as a 21-year-old Hero Factory fan to learn that 14-year-old fans are not expected to get the same enjoyment from a set like Thornraxx as from a set like Splitface.

I'm talking about an actual 2012 release. I agree, a wave in December is indeed likely if the theme is continuing next year, but that's because that's when January 2013 sets start showing up. So it wouldn't be another wave of 2012 sets at all, and has no bearing on this particular discussion. If there was another wave of 2012 sets planned, then the retailers would need time to order the sets in advance. We know the official release for another wave won't be before September because TLG already revealed the September wave at Toy Fair. What incentive would they have to hide a full wave of sets that would come out before then? For that matter, why would they cram a full wave of sets into a brief pocket of time between the September wave and the 2013 wave? That would just flood store shelves and diminish the sales of the August and September sets. Diminished sales are not something TLG wants. A store-exclusive set would make more sense than a full new 2012 wave because a) it wouldn't have been revealed at Toy Fair except under very special circumstances and b) it wouldn't have the same debilitating effect on the sales of the rest of the Ninjago lineup as trying to throw a full new wave of sets onto the same shelves as sets that are still fairly new. I'm not saying another Ninjago wave this year is impossible, but it seems like terribly bad business and most of the evidence we have points against it.

No... just because it hasn't passed review yet doesn't mean it's been rejected.

Well, keep in mind that the person who sent that photo to Brickset in the first place (Chris McVeigh) makes a career out of photographing LEGO models. The interplay of LEGO and lighting effects thus plays a much bigger role for him than it would for the average LEGO fan or MOCist. I wish he had also provided a picture without the heavy backlight, though. This one is so bright you can hardly tell either brick is Medium Blue. And if the bricks were just as visibly different without a backlight, then the people up-in-arms against the offending brick's quality would be easier to sympathize with. As it is, I see no reason this particular incident should be the tipping point for anyone besides possibly Chris McVeigh himself, and I doubt he'll stop buying LEGO anytime soon.

I'm curious to see how it'll be used in future sets. Obviously it can be used as a structural element for larger figures like the Ultrabuild Super Heroes, or just as a torso bone for characters like XT4 who have non-humanoid proportions, but I'm also curious if we might see smaller-scale characters like the Matoran sets of BIONICLE begin to emerge. If we did, they could potentially include useful new bone and shell pieces. Stormer XL's 3M Beam C (double-ball cup) could also be useful for smaller-scale figures as well as for larger-scale figures like Stormer XL. And let's not forget the connector piece used on Stormer's ankles-- the versatility of that piece should be obvious! Overall the summer wave has several excellent bone and connector pieces that should prove useful to the Hero Factory building system for years to come.

I wish I knew a place where you could view old Mania Magazines in full... most of the ones from my childhood, including those covering childhood favorite themes, are either in extremely poor condition or missing entirely. Catalogs aren't such a problem for me since my dad was often wise enough to keep the catalogs from me when I was a kid, but I still like to look up online versions of catalogs from before my time as a LEGO fan, or from other countries which in some cases had different set names and story information for even the themes within my lifetime. Brickset has an archive of Bricks & Pieces magazines, the LEGO Club magazines from the UK in the '70s and '80s. LEGO.com has a brief archive of LEGO Club Magazine and LEGO Club Jr. Magazine interactive samples from the past couple years, although it's not really kept up-to-date so some of the most recent magazines are absent. You can find the most recent magazines in an abridged, interactive form at the LEGO Club website. A Google search at the host site for those interactive magazines (imc.ceros.com, imm-lite.ceros.com, or nxtbook.com) can bring up slightly less recent ones as well. Some of these, but not all of them, include an option to download PDF versions of the magazine samples, or even just specific pages. The LEGO Club website used to have a "Magazine Flashback" which included abridged versions of various magazines throughout the years. That is no longer on the live site, but it can be found here courtesy of the Wayback Machine. For catalogs, Peeron is a good source but I should offer a warning that it will kick you out after viewing a certain number of pages due to an automatic feature meant to bots and web crawlers from slowing down the site. Another source I often use for old catalogs is Brickfactory.info Hope some of these links help you!

There's a difference between reporting a major part defect to TLG through the proper channels and reporting it to a fan-site where it's bound to generate a disproportionate amount of hysteria. And I think Jargo might have been referring not to what Chris McVeigh (the extremely talented person who got the original part) should have done, but what the complainers and doomsayers responding to the Brickset news article (both on that site and elsewhere) should have done. There were a lot of comments on that Brickset news article that were truly embarrassing-- some people swearing off LEGO entirely because of one quality issue, seen on a picture on the Internet, that for all they know could have been a complete fluke! It's true quality control is not as good as it was many years ago, but a problem like this doesn't necessarily mean quality control is on a steady downward decline. Personally some of the worst quality issues I've ever experienced come from the 2005 Brickmaster Welcome Kit. In that set, quality issues were abundant, and around half the parts in several colors was visibly discolored. Since then any major color quality issues I've encountered have been few and far between-- usually one visibly discolored part to a set at most. I haven't been around for as long as some AFOLs, so I can't claim the same expertise regarding what quality meant back in the 70s and 80s-- all the 70s and 80s parts I've encountered were hand-me-downs or pre-owned parts, and as such weren't in a good enough condition to even judge their quality (worn prints, yellowing in white bricks, etc). But even in the time I've been a LEGO fan (since the mid-90s), TLG has shown enough care for the consumer and desire to improve that they've earned my trust. If I were to stop purchasing LEGO it would probably be due to changes in my lifestyle and not due to changes in how TLG operates as a business.

But both of those sets were at least mentioned at Toy Fair in February. Pre Viszla's fighter was even on display (Minifigures Series 8 just had a placeholder box). Some sets have been mostly kept under wraps, but I can't imagine any way it would be in TLG's best interest to keep a full wave of sets in a high-demand theme unknown not only to the fans, but also to the retailers who are supposed to stock them. If there is going to be another wave of Ninjago this year, I can't imagine when it would be, since Ninjago sets all the way through the September wave of spinners and booster packs were on display at Toy Fair. It would also risk cannibalizing the sales of the already-known waves. Even if the show will have enough airtime to promote another full wave of sets in 2012, there's no reason to assume the market can support that when the Ninjago theme for this year is already pretty huge. I asked Kevin Hinkle on Flickr to clarify whether there would be a new wave of products in 2013, and he replied as follows: However, since he wasn't able to give any kind of time-frame, I can't tell for sure if he is talking about a new wave of model sets or the already-known September wave of spinners and booster packs. I've asked him again (this time mentioning the September wave specifically) just to be sure.

This is a neat effect. I ought to mention that it has been used in a few official LEGO Hero Factory displays. See . It's really neat when the effect is used to blend LEGO models with non LEGO effects, but it's got to be even more of a challenge to create "ghosts" of physical figures or models inside another MOC! Best of luck to you!

Well it really depends what you call a "full season"-- a season for many shows is 26 episodes, 22 minutes in length each, whereas in Ninjago it's half that. Meanwhile, if people think two full years of sets and story equates to a theme not doing well, they're misguided-- unsuccessful themes don't last more than one year. The reason for ending Ninjago is almost certainly to preempt any stagnation in its current success and hope that success carries over to the next LEGO TV show/story-driven theme, whatever that is. Ending it so soon is a bit of a shame especially after we had been led to expect it to continue, but if it does end this soon we can probably agree it will have had a good run, even if it didn't last too long. Just like when BIONICLE ended, an end to a good story is not an end to good storytelling. It's nice to see a story theme that gets a strong run and then concludes on that note rather than being run into the ground like BIONICLE or sloppily and hastily wrapped up like Exo-Force. I'm not positive that Ninjago is ending after 2012, but we know there are no long-term plans for the theme so I'm trying to temper my optimism.

Most themes don't have sets released in December, though December is when January sets from the next year tend to start showing up. The main official release months are January and August, but it's slightly different for licensed themes (which may be timed according to a movie release) and staggered releases like the Ninjago spinners and Collectible Minifigures. The only full wave of sets which we know is due for release later this year but which we haven't seen any sign of is sets based on The Hobbit, which are coming out this fall. They've been kept under wraps as is often the case with major licensed themes. There is no similar justification in the case of Ninjago, especially if the sets are supposed to tie in with a season that's beginning as early as next month. EDIT: Just found some decent-quality images of 9574 Lloyd ZX: Package Contents Assembly Versus 9573 Slithraa (this one's been seen before) Customized with 9557 Lizaru Spinning

There's no way there's going to be another full wave we haven't heard about, since we know about the sets through December. At most we'll see a store exclusive set or D2C set since those don't tend to be revealed at Toy Fair or other events. TLG would have no justification for keeping a full wave of sets hidden for this long since it wouldn't allow much time for retailers to even order them. Chances are this season will tie in with the sets on store shelves from this year's January and August waves, as well as characters from all 2012 sets (besides Pythor, who we might not be seeing again).

Saw this this morning, and I have to say the comments thread on that news article is just sad. So many people are going on about how it likely is related to Chinese production or some "trend" towards lower quality, while nobody's asking any meaningful questions. If the parts are made in China, they'll have the same Design ID as all Chinese-made 2x4 bricks. If they're made elsewhere, then they'll be numbered 3001. At least, that's how it is if China has manufactured 2x4 basic bricks in the past, and I'm assuming they have (since the activity books which often include minifigures and basic bricks have their contents manufactured in China as far as I know). All people are doing by speculating wildly is making sweeping judgments about TLG's quality over what could easily be an isolated incident-- probably not isolated to one person, but easily isolated to a certain batch of that particular part. As it is, the likelihood that this part was manufactured in China is extremely low, and there's no reason to think that TLG made any deliberate decision to ease up on their quality control for this theme.

Well, since this is going to be premiering in July, it's basically timed to coincide with most stores' release of this year's summer sets, as well as (since it's presumably one episode a week for 13 weeks, give or take a few) the September sets. So I don't think it's quite accurate to say there aren't actual models to go with the season. The difference with this season, though, is that most of the sets it's based on will have already been featured in the previous season. Still, as AFOLs we should be aware of the obvious advantage this could lend. Fewer new sets to feature might mean we'll see a greater number of vehicles, background designs, and even characters who don't appear as sets, letting MOCists and customizers work to fill in the gaps. The scenes of some roguish characters aboard the Destiny's Bounty suggest to me that yes, the episode names featured on IMDB (including the by now well-known "Ninjas vs. Pirates") could very well be legitimate. On the other hand, scenes taking place in Ninjago City suggest that the episode descriptions listed with them could very easily be bogus. None but the first so much as suggest the possibility of scenes set in familiar locations. Also, the fact that the supposed "pirate characters" are neither undead or half-fish as described on IMDB (geez, Pirates of the Caribbean much?) suggests that some poser just took the episode titles already listed and ran with them.

If it is eliminated like Ninjago, then like Ninjago it will be replaced with something similar from a market standpoint. As long as Friends isn't terribly unsuccessful then there should continue to be girl-oriented LEGO themes even after the Friends theme itself comes to an end. It should be considered that part of the reason TLG is ending Ninjago might not have to do with the sets as much as with the story media. In BIONICLE, sales of the books were on a steady decline even when sales of the sets remained relatively stable, and the original series of movies didn't continue past 2005. With Ninjago, TLG wants to preempt the decline in success that was seen in BIONICLE. So a big part of that decision might be "can the TV show's success remain at its current level?" Since another LEGO TV show is planned for 2013, who knows? It may be that TLG anticipates that a new TV show (and consequently, a new theme to tie in with it) is preferable to sticking to their existing themes until their success stagnates. Friends is not as heavily story-driven as Ninjago, so this reason for cutting themes short might not even factor into the equation. There's a story to Friends (some basic characters and a loose concept connecting them), but from what's been seen so far story media isn't nearly as important to the theme as in Ninjago or even Hero Factory, which as far as we know is continuing in 2013.