Aanchir

The Marvel sets are quite nice, even if some of them are a bit weird. With the DC superheroes, my favorite design was Batman since he looked the least "robotic" to me. In the case of the Marvel superheroes, Iron Man is my favorite, because although he's the most robotic-looking he's also a character for whom that makes sense. Hulk is probably my second-favorite, as I love his absurd proportions. Captain America is nice, but I can't for the life of me make sense of that armor he's got on his shoulders. It's a nice idea but it just ends up looking awkward however you slice it.

Since he does in fact work for LEGO (thanks for the confirmation, Haltamieli!), I think it's safe to say he probably had a leading hand in the design of this theme's figs. So I wouldn't be surprised if the final figs end up showing some inspiration from his portfolio drawings and renders. After all, Tim Ainley's Squidman was something he whipped up during the hiring process I believe, and yet it eventually (in a much-refined form) made it into the Space Police III theme. At the same time, the heroes of Monster Fighters changed considerably from the "Scooby Doo" type concept seen in Toth's portfolio sketches, so I'm sure there could easily have been similar changes in the monster designs depending on what the designers decided would appeal best to the target audience.

..Or they recognize that the two characters are one and the same and thus use whichever name the audience will most likely identify the character by, regardless of whether Anakin has gotten his Sith name by that point in the movie or not. It's true, Darth Vader would probably apply better, but that doesn't mean that the name Anakin no longer applies to the character by this point. And since people (especially kids) are likely to associate the name "Darth Vader" with the guy in the black suit, and won't necessarily understand that the two identities are more a matter of moral alignment than of appearance, TLG uses the name that buyers will be more likely to associate with the minifigure in the set.

With a portfolio like that, I certainly hope he got the job he was seeking! But even if he did, I don't think we can expect figs like the swamp creature in this theme to match his concept art. After all, we've seen concept art for Space Police III that was actually part of the theme's development, and it was still very different from the final fig designs for that theme in a lot of ways.

Even if they hurt one's eyes, can they cause lasting damage? If it's just painful to look at them then that could be enough of a deterrent so as not to need a warning label. I've never tried staring into a light brick so don't know what it's like.

Oh my gosh! The amount of detail packed into this MOC is unbelievable! How long did it take you to figure out how you'd get everything to fit together?

No, that's a custom minifigure design by Eurobricks's own Toth, as posted here. It is brilliantly designed, so it's easy to mistake for an official minifigure. But it's not from this theme.

I've done some sketches on graph paper and decided that Zib could probably be done somewhat simply with just four new pieces-- a new leg piece (around 5x2, with a built-in knee), a new torso shell, a new leg armor piece (like the 1.0 leg armor, but condensed, so as to fit the new leg piece), and a helmet (printed, preferably, since his wide goggle-eyes couldn't easily be done with just a helmet over an existing head piece). The set could be, in total, less than twenty pieces. Not sure what the play value is, though. If I ever get any better sketches done I can propose it through Cuusoo, although not sure what support it would get. Ironically, I noticed for the first time today that Zib's "lab coat" is based on the center front section of Barraki Kalmah's foot piece. It's stretched far out of proportion with his other pieces). Mr. Makuro could be done similarly to Zib, although his cloak could complicate things. A new leg armor piece, a new arm armor piece, and one or two pieces for his cloaked torso could be sufficient, again in a set at a reasonably low price point. The generic male worker (like Big Joe from the Mission: Von Nebula game) could be possibly the simplest of all. A reasonable approximation would only need a new helmet and torso shell, and possibly a new arm piece. Getting a generic female worker (like Lucy from the Mission: Von Nebula game) to look as she does in the TV series would be extremely hard, since that figure's legs are hugely complicated (take a look in Ordeal of Fire-- it's even more complicated than the legs on some BIONICLE titan sets like Roodaka), and many parts of the model are out of scale with one another. But I doubt TLG could manage to market a figure like that very well anyway.

Yeah, both Marvel and DC Superheroes are almost certainly lasting more than one year. The only thing your quote was describing was that there will not be a second wave of DC or a second wave of Marvel in 2012. And I think that's plenty reasonable-- a lot of people already have complained that TLG is flooding the market with licenses, and seeing as the "Super Heroes" theme covers both DC and Marvel, it's understandable that TLG might release just two waves, an early DC wave and a summer Marvel wave, with the Marvel wave scheduled to correspond with a major motion picture rather than in August when summer sets normally debut. Something else to keep in mind is that TLG doesn't have to keep themes running consecutively to keep them alive. Particularly in licensed themes, it's perfectly understandable that the highest demand for them will be in the time leading up to and immediately after a major movie premiere. While a lot of people have assumed LEGO Pirates of the Caribbean is gone for good, for instance, I think TLG is probably just waiting for demand to peak again in the advent of another Pirates of the Caribbean movie. Some licensed themes, like Star Wars or Cars, are powerful enough at selling merchandise that stores can have shelves stocked full of merchandise for these film franchises, including LEGO, whether or not there's a movie still in theaters. It doesn't exactly work the same way with all licenses though-- you rarely encounter Pirates of the Caribbean toys on store shelves when there's no recent or upcoming movie in theaters, but when there is one it all comes swarming back.

CGI minifigures with their arms outstretched like that are actually not uncommon. For example, see Lord Garmadon on this page. Since the CGI minifigures for the Monster Fighters theme have their legs posed unrealistically in that pic, there's no reason to think TLG wouldn't have been willing to do the same with the arms.

It's hard to say. I'm expecting two sets at the very most. It's certainly not going to be a huge licensed theme. A single set is probably a more realistic expectation than some of what I've been hearing. But I guess that's natural. This is the first Cuusoo proposal to make it internationally, so people really have very little idea what they can expect different between this set and those that got approved on the Japan-only Cuusoo.

I wouldn't necessarily trust that description, primarily because that sounds a lot like the typical descriptions I hear of any theme or set people will happily dismiss without giving much attention. For instance, I've often heard AFOLs complain about how "all BIONICLE sets look the same" or "all Hero Factory sets look the same" without paying the slightest attention to what makes them different. Actually, I just noticed something about Lasha's Bite Cycle. It's the first snake vehicle set to be piloted by a Venomari serpentine rather than a Fangpyre serpentine. I find that quite odd considering the Fangpyre are the ones who can create vehicles. I wonder if it will be styled similarly to the Fangpyre vehicles, or differently. I imagine it will be similarly-styled just so that the waves are consistent, though.

C'mon guys. I don't think it's fair to say people who don't like Ninjago shouldn't post here. They might have just as much to say about the future of Ninjago as anyone else. With that said, the discussion has kind of veered off topic from "talking about what you expect in the future of Ninjago" to "talking about what you like or dislike about Ninjago in the present".

Understandable. That explains why it was such a small update!

Nice modification of Evo! His lower legs now fit in with Breez, Furno, and Surge, which I like a great deal, and his tank arm has more posability. Your first picture with him posed really shows how much this improves things. However, I think a more basic back armor construction, like the 2.0 Hero foot that Splitface and Rocka have, would look a lot smoother than this complex design.

What do you mean "how TLG has been acting about gold"? Have you seen the Ninjago theme lately? It's hard to imagine gold being used more frequently in sets than it is these days, at least when it comes to minifigure accessories.

I disagree. I think there's plenty of creative building in the Ninjago sets. The dragons are definitely very creative, and use lots of basic parts. Maybe not as much as a Creator set would, but the head pieces are the only ones that are "<insert that tiresome argument>", whereas even the wings are built with relatively simple parts that can be used in numerous ways. Meanwhile, there's plenty creative about the skeleton and snake vehicles. The sculpted skulls in last year's sets and the sculpted snake heads in this year's sets almost entirely depend on basic parts for their overall shapes. The vehicles themselves are also almost completely devoid of juniorizaton, using lots of simple pieces like the old dinosaur tails in very creative ways. The Fire Temple set uses about as many basic parts as many Castle sets from the 80s and early 90s. The Ninja vehicle sets this year have imaginative functions that tend to rely on fairly basic hinge pieces. Now, I may not be a reliable authority on this as I think a lot of accusations of "juniorization" in today's sets are exaggerated, but I think that for the most part juniorization is a crime that the Ninjago sets are not guilty of. That's a common and understandable perspective, but I think if there were serious problems with kids reading books like Harry Potter and The Lord of the Rings we would have seen those problems lead to major changes in society by now. You claim that children today are more violent-minded and aggressive, but you don't offer any research to back up that claim. It's the same "moral panic" mentality that was proposed regarding everything from rock music to marbles in the past, and while it's easy to fall into that trap sometimes you need to step back and recognize that not much has actually changed as a result of these supposed risks. This thing about kids "all the time playing cruel games" is exactly the sort of moral-panic mentality I'm talking about. The truth is, there are a lot of kids who play video games designed for older gamers, but at the same time there are a lot of kids who don't. And the research has pretty consistently shown that playing violent video games doesn't change people's personality or behavior except perhaps in the half-hour after playing them. Instead, kids and adults who are aggressively-minded to begin with stay such whether or not they play violent video games, even if aggressively-minded individuals might be more likely to seek out such games in the first place. Before video games, people blamed television, music, or books for the moral decay they saw in children. But as far as I can tell this moral decay was not based on any of these things, and furthermore was never a firm reality.

I just got a very small LDD update when I started the program. I can't see any new bricks, but the brick version is now listed as 604.1 rather than just 604 (like one of my friends' LDD brick version is still listed as). Anyone know what the contents of this update were?

His point is that he would have preferred if he could still see which parts were buyable via Pick-A-Brick, which is still running and currently offers the same parts as Design byME did. As it is, the only way to effectively "buy" the parts for an LDD model anymore, other than counting the parts individually, is to use LDD Manager and put together a Bricklink wanted list, which adds a level of complexity since you might not be able to get all your model's parts from the same source. I agree a tool to check what bricks are buyable via the online Pick-A-Brick would be cool. I wonder if perhaps the reason there is no such feature is so that the LDD team is freed from having to adhere to the custom ordering department's update schedule. But it would still be an excellent feature for a future version. In the very least a "Pick-A-Brick" sub-category could be added to LDD mode, just like the Hero Factory sub-category that is currently still listed under "Filter Bricks By Box".

Well, aesthetically, Hero Factory works better with System than a lot of BIONICLE stuff did. But functionally, it's very difficult for many System builders to figure out how best to use it. Ball-joint-based connections, from what I've seen, are not immensely popular in System outside the mecha genre. Couple that with the fact that the high-detail designs of BIONICLE made them more suitable for greebling, which is the place where the AFOL community in general tends to welcome the use of such "obscure" parts. There have been some instances of Hero Factory parts being used well in System, but they don't really boost the appeal of the theme for the typical System builder better than any other instance of NPU would. A few parts might end up being considered desirable, but the same is true for themes like Belville, and that doesn't really matter much for how the sets as a whole are viewed. I wish TLG would resume putting Hero Factory parts in LEGO stores' Pick-A-Brick bins. I was very happy to hear that announcement last year, as it seems like an ideal way for Hero Factory builders to get parts they need and for System and Technic builders to investigate the usefulness of the new building system's parts at little cost to themselves. But it seems that was just a short-term promotion to advertise Hero Recon Team, as I have never been able to find Hero Factory parts in Pick-A-Brick bins no matter what LEGO stores I've been to.

There's also the fact that a lot of kids would surely associate the name Darth Vader with the fully armored Darth Vader from the original trilogy, rather than with the still human-looking Anakin, even after he joins Palpatine and receives his Sith name. If a kid (even one who had seen the prequel trilogy) were shown the new Anakin Skywalker minifigure, I think they would identify it as Anakin rather than Darth Vader.

Great review. I'm not sure what your photo setup is, but your photos are remarkably high-quality. They give me a much more authentic feel for what the minifigures look like in real life than any of the pics I'd previously seen in this set. In particular C-3PO looks wonderful in this new depiction, as the contours of his detailed face mold seem to fit much better with the newer, subtler torso printing. The new trooper faces look excellent and not as washed-out as some of the photos we've seen of them. On the other hand, the detail of the Sandtrooper torsos feels a bit excessive, although I'm sure they'll fit in quite well with the new Stormtrooper torso print from the Endor battle pack. I just feel that, like in C-3PO's case, subtler contour printing better matches the style of intricate molds like the helmets. In the pictures other than the comparison pic with the older Sandtrooper, the torsos look fine, so I suppose it's just the stark contrast that makes me yearn for the older style. The escape pod is extremely stylish, even without the stickers applied, although I'm sure it also looks as good with stickers as without. It's certainly far better than the old Droid Escape set which I have in my collection. The speeder bike does feel a bit unnecessary, but it's still nice-looking and you can never have too many brown parts. Thanks so much for this review!

Gandalf Arrives is indeed a set that impresses me. I love the creative solutions for Gandalf's fireworks-- based on the prelim pics, one of them is one of the new Ninjago snake pieces in bright red, which I think works excellently for this purpose. Overall I think this theme looks very well-designed based on Huw's photo. I look forward to clearer pics in which we can see more detail, but at the moment I think there's a lot to be said for models like Helm's Deep, Weathertop, and the Mines of Moria, all of which almost perfectly match what I remember of those scenes from the movies, and with lots of stylish building techniques to ensure that they are far from looking like generic castle sets (one criticism I have heard of LEGO Star Wars sets that depict locations rather than vehicles, particularly the Echo Base set which I admire a great deal, is that without the minifigures there would be no way of knowing that they were Star Wars sets and not generic Space sets).

Lots of good points. Violence can be a really subjective issue, though. A lot of people might argue that the Western theme is inappropriate for children because of all the real-world violence associated with Westward Expansion and "Manifest Destiny" here in the United States. A person is welcome to play with their "Cowboy and Indian" figs and pretend that they are good friends, but in fact there was a lot of cruel violence and discrimination against the Native Americans during this period of American history. One other thing to consider is that TLG has understood for years that kids will want to play violently with LEGO toys. The classic LEGO Space sets were designed with things like "sensor arrays" that resembled laser guns, which TLG's designers knew that kids would play with as such. The Adventurers, Western, and Castle sets all included weapons, as well as at least two groups of adversaries. The former two themes included guns, which are mostly absent from the Ninjago theme (with the exception of the cannon on the Destiny's Bounty). TLG's designers aren't fools-- they are perfectly aware that kids will act out violent scenes with these weapons, and that the toys will facilitate this sort of mock-violence in the kids' imaginative play. Even before TV and video games exposed kids to very realistic violence, kids played games like "Cowboys and Indians" that involved imagining violent scenes. And toy soldiers are among the oldest types of toys. So I don't think that it's fair to say that kids who grow up with toys like the LEGO Castle and Western themes will grow up with healthier and less violent imaginations. In my opinion, the "scary monsters" of Ninjago don't inherently make it more violent or aggressive than these more traditional themes, especially as most of these "monsters" (the snakes and skeletons in particular) are treated as more comical than scary. Meanwhile, the Ninjago story's violence is quite minor compared to some television shows and movies that kids are exposed to. Enemies in Ninjago are never killed-- the closest thing is Lord Garmadon being banished to the underworld when he fought Sensei Wu, which was not done in a particularly violent fashion. Rather, he was struck by lightning and fell into a crevasse without Sensei Wu having to deliver any harmful attacks against him. The only characters who have died in the series, those being Sensei Wu's father and Kai's father, both are implied to have died of natural causes. I would also personally take issue with the idea that violent stories promote violent and aggressive children. I read The Lord of the Rings as a child and enjoyed it a great deal, but it didn't give me any especially violent tendencies. More recently one of my favorite TV shows has been Avatar: The Last Airbender, which despite being a cartoon aimed at kids deals quite maturely with extremely heavy topics, up to and including genocide. I do not think this show is any more unhealthy for kids than a LEGO theme that includes weapons like guns and swords. In fact, I think it could be a useful tool for helping kids to understand the seriousness of these sorts of topics.

From this post: Lasha's Bite Cycle includes Lasha and Cole ZX. Samurai Mech includes Samurai X, Snike, and Bytar. Ultra Sonic Raider includes Kai ZX, Zane ZX, Jay ZX, Cole ZX, Pythor, and Spitta. Epic Dragon Battle includes Lloyd ZX, Jay ZX, Sensei Wu, Lord Garmadon, Acidicus, Skalidor, and Chokun. Overall, it will be expensive this year for anyone intending to get a full collection of figures (by my count, 35 different figs). Even getting all of the Serpentine generals requires buying the two largest summer sets (Ultra Sonic Raider and Epic Dragon Battle). I'm personally curious if there will be any set with a fang blade or staff for the Anacondrai. None of the sets' descriptions mention one.