Aanchir

Because as I mentioned already, their clothing is not medieval. Real ninja never dressed like the ones in LEGO Ninjago. Plus, a lot of their costumes even already include more modern-looking characteristics to suit the tone/setting of a particular wave, like the more modern-looking belts/harnesses on the ones from the Tournament of Elements, Dragon Master, and Hands of Time sets, or the armor of Lloyd and Nya in the Hunted sets. Or, for that matter, many of Samurai X's designs (since she heavily specializes in mechs and other advanced technology). I just don't get why it's so far-fetched to think superpowered hero characters in a futuristic world wouldn't still wear cloth garments loosely inspired by traditional Japanese styles of clothing or armor, much like how the Nexo Knights characters wear outfits loosely inspired by traditional medieval armor. I mean, besides having access to advanced technology they're very different sorts of characters. The ninja do a lot of martial arts where armor that restricts their bodies could be inconvenient, whereas the Nexo Knights don't really do as many crazy flips and kicks and stuff. And the ninja typically have powers they channel through their bodies, whereas the Nexo Knights typically channel their powers through their tech (so having high-tech armor gives them access to more powers than they might have otherwise). And for what it's worth, the outfits the Nexo Knights wear in their battle suits are a lot LESS blatantly high-tech than their regular armor. They still have some futuristic, angular design cues and circuitry patterns just like the ordinary everyday clothing of many other Nexo Knights characters like King and Queen Halbert, but other than the helmets they appear to be a pretty ordinary, lightweight cloth material, not anything heavily armor plated.

Five years ago, before that ghostly trail element existed, I don't think AFOLs would have cared one way or the other about the idea of spooky ghost figures wearing regular pants. After all, that library ghost figure already has regular hair and a regular shirt. In fact, take away that ghostly trail element and the new "possessed" figures honestly look a lot MORE ghostly than the library ghost does, due to having transparent heads, glowing eyes, hair that waves and twists in an unnatural-looking way, and sometimes even additional monstrous accessories like wings or tentacles. And the fact that a ghostly trail element like that exists doesn't strike me as a reason to think that it should be expected on all ghost characters going forward. Even in its initial debut in the Ninjago Season 5: Possession sets from 2015, it only appeared on four of the ghost characters that year, and three of those characters also appeared in other sets from the same wave with more traditional leg pieces (albeit in the same transparent color as their faces). Furthermore, plenty of ghost minifigures and zombie minifigures from themes like Pirates of the Caribbean, Harry Potter, The Lord of the Rings, Ghostbusters, Minifigures, and Ninjago likewise just wear the same clothing as when they were alive, sometimes with no more than their head and/or hands conspicuously revealing their undead nature. If there had not been an app, the ghosts would have almost certainly NOT looked like that, since it is lacking in much distinguishing detail that would have been possible to achieve on a minifigure. Its main distinguishing trait other than having a ghostly face and no legs is that it's entirely transparent, something LEGO has not yet found a way to do in a way that meets their quality standards. The colors of the ghosts in the app and illustrations also seem to be chosen in accordance with gameplay mechanics, such as different colors of ghosts having different behavior (sort of like in the Luigi's Mansion games). So if there were no app, even the ghost colors in the sets might have simply stuck with the same uniform yellowish green as the possessed people/vehicles/buildings in the sets. As such, if LEGO were designing physical ghost minifigures for this theme, there's no telling WHAT the baddies. would have looked like — but one way or another they would have had designs optimized to exist as minifigures, not ones that whose most distinguishing characteristics were selected with the app in mind. It's possible that the headgear was used in as many sets as possible in order to offset their costs, since unlike the Nexo Knights headgear they're both printed and/or 2K molded. Not to mention to keep their otherwise ordinary outfits recognizable, since their outfits otherwise aren't emblazoned with the kind of unmistakable logos and color coding typical of characters like the Nexo Knights or Ninjago ninjas.

Yeah, a rundown of some of the most distinctive parts that have shown up so far, with new molds bolded: Spring Yellowish Green minifig weapons/utensils: pirate cutlass; butcher's knife; key; pickaxe; lantern; revolver; teddy bear Spring Yellowish Green minifig hair and neck accessories: Kai's hair from the LEGO Ninjago Movie; banshee hair; messy hair that sticks up and out to the sides; long messy hair that hangs down; messy ghost beard; Garmadon (2012) torso extension Tr. Fluorescent Green minifig neck wear: ghostly tentacles with suckers; ghostly wings with claws Other Spring Yellowish Green parts: 1x1 tile with ghost eye pattern; 8x10 bat/dragon wing; 2x7 Bionicle/Hero Factory talon Medium Stone Grey parts: 1x4x2 ornamental Elves fence, 3x6x5 ornate Belville arch; 4x4x2 quarter circle spindled fence Dark Red 3x3x6 corner wall panel Brick Yellow (Tan) crocodile Ghost Dog in a blend of Transparent and either White or White Glow (hard to tell in photos) Overall, though, I think the theme's fairly muted color palette could mean that the most useful parts for historic MOCs may be less obvious parts like recolored basic building elements that will become most apparent once the sets are inventoried on BrickLink or Brickset. As for other themes, at a glance Jurassic World has a recolor of the husky from LEGO City; in what I think is a blend of Dark Orange and Black. And, of course, several new dinosaur molds/prints/recolors. Queen Watevra's space palace from The LEGO Movie 2 has the 1x1 plate with triple leaves element in what I think is Dark Azur.

Because it’s not supposed to feel like an alternate history of our world where technology and culture developed differently, it’s supposed to be a different world entirely that never resembled ours. You seem to be bothered by the sense that Ninjago shows an anachronistic world full of stuff that never could have coexisted, when that is a big part of what makes the theme so appealing as otherworldly escapist fantasy. Probably not, no! Because it can be a lot more successful by having stuff that appeals to kids who like the more traditional, more modern, and more futuristic parts of the theme every year than by switching between those and alienating a sizable portion of the fan base every year by making them feel like Ninjago had entirely abandoned the particular types of sets or design cues that they happened to prefer. It elevates consistency within each particular wave at the expense of continuity. And for what purpose? To make it more appealing to adults with a taste for realism, who weren’t a major part of its intended audience anyhow? I mean, plenty of other successful toy and media IPs like He-Man, Thundercats, Ninja Turtles, Power Rangers, and even Star Wars have been played just as loose with their level of technology at any given point. After all, how plausible is it that Jabba’s palace guards can be effective at their jobs with ordinary metal axes and armor when several of the bounty hunters Jabba employs — even Boba Fett, who stands right beside Jabba in several scenes and doesn’t owe any obvious debts or loyalties to Jabba — routinely carry laser blasters? And as for the outfits… in real life we live in a world with all kinds of crazy technology, and yet the overall appearance of certain types of clothing men's suits hasn't changed in any particularly radical and lasting way in well over 100 years. So why act as though "ninja suits", which typically don't resemble the more ordinary types of clothing worn by actual ninja anyhow, couldn't be the standard uniform of magical elemental ninja in a world where mechs and robots happen to exist? You give examples of futuristic mech armor in Pacific Rim as what a mech pilot might more realistically wear… but why is it realistic? It's not as though the people who pilot real-world war machines like fighter planes or tanks wear weird, conspicuously metal-plated spacesuits as part of their job. And the very existence of giant humanoid mecha as a viable combat equipment is pretty much entirely implausible anyway no matter what the setting — there is not really any meaningful tactical advantage against any sort of opponent for an enormous battle vehicle to have human-like dexterity, let alone an unstable bipedal design that only has the proportions it does to satisfy the biological needs of normal-sized, non-robotic humans!

Yeah, last year LEGO didn't reveal most of their second half sets at Toy Fair — instead, they had their own "LEGO Goals" press event focused on those sorts of sets in May. I guess it worked out well for them if they're doing the same again. I don't know the exact reason for this new approach, but I can think of several possible ones, such as wanting to generate hype closer the sets' release instead of giving it months to diminish, and wanting to avoid all of their new product announcements having to compete with like a billion other new toy announcements competing for press attention. After all, while a lot of LEGO fansites might attend Toy Fair JUST to report on LEGO, the same can't be said for a lot of the more mainstream blogs and news sites.

Yeah. To be honest, I have long been hoping to see LEGO release a really classy looking train in LEGO Friends, since I've been really impressed with some of the boats and planes in that theme. Granted, when trying to MOC one I had typically been thinking about a more modern high-speed train, but an EMD F7 would certainly communicate the sense of classiness, comfort, and luxury that a lot of stuff in LEGO Friends exemplifies. It could even potentially take inspiration from the Atlantic Coast Line's livery of purple and silver with yellow trim, which practically feels like a LEGO Friends color scheme already! While it might be personal bias due to living on the United States' east coast most of my life, I got pretty serious Florida vibes from Heartlake City even before the sticker sheet in the Heartlake Grand Hotel set showed that it is apparently in the Eastern Time Zone, 3 hours ahead of Los Angeles and 14 hours behind Tokyo). So considering our country's embarrassing failure to offer any form of high speed rail on par with other countries, a diesel locomotive might in fact be more realistic to that part of the world than the sort of state-of-the-art electric locomotive I had in mind…

Nope. I'm just making a reasonable inference that LEGO isn't seeking out opportunities to convince kids to buy stuff they don't expect them to ordinarily like/care about. And this isn't something I'm only bringing up about stuff like trains and castles and other themes that are a big deal for "old-school" AFOLs. I see proposals all the time from my fellow Bionicle fans, including many my age or younger, about how LEGO could bring back Bionicle and make it a success like it was in the early 2000s, and I have to remind them that for LEGO, the goal isn't to make kids interested in Bionicle specifically, it's just to make stuff kids are interested in, whether Bionicle is a part of that category or not. So if a theme's core concept isn't resonating with kids like it used to, LEGO's not going to try to make kids interested in something they're not, they're going to focus their resources on stuff that kids are already showing more interest in. That shouldn't be an issue — if the AR technology could differentiate between details that minute,then it wouldn't need to use such conspicuous Bright Yellow/Medium Azur/Vibrant Coral parts to signal the in-game responses. The demo videos from Toy Fair also make it seem pretty user-friendly, since a lot of minor stuff in the scene like minifigures does appear to get moved around in between demonstrations and it doesn't appear to impact the performance. And anyhow, even with sets that don't have any digital component, there's sometimes the risk that if you make a mistake while building it can keep certain play features from working right. Ultimately it's just up to the building instruction designers to try to spell things out clearly enough to avoid places where a careless mistake is likely to completely throw off the play experience. For the most part the theme appears to be set in the modern day, just in an old and run-down setting. After all, a key part of the theme's premise is that the two protagonists are bloggers who use their smartphones to see ghosts that are invisible to the naked eye. An EMD F7 type locomotive would definitely be cool to see in a set again after so long, but IDK whether it would suit this theme since it's so elegant looking, rather than as austere and foreboding as most of the theme's other sets like the school and graveyard. Even the diner you bring up is not a hip and classy-looking eatery like the Downtown Diner from Creator Expert or the Drifting Diner from LEGO Friends, it's a pretty dingy-looking "greasy spoon" diner that even in its "non-haunted" mode conveys a sense of unease and has clearly seen better days. Whereas even if you stripped away the paint of an EMD F7, it'd still convey a strong sense of nostalgia, dignity, and class, not the grim and uninviting design language seen in the school, diner, station, etc.

I don't really anticipate LEGO doing that for the theme as a whole as it would pretty much just limit its versatility. The "half baked look" gives them the option of pretty much anything that falls under either of those categories, or anything outside or in between those categories, so long as it stays true to what kids expect from a Ninjago set. And since it's a fantasy theme one way or the other, kids aren't likely to get too hung up on the mashup of subject matter coexisting in one universe not being "realistic" any more than the idea of space aliens, Norse gods, super-soldiers, genetic mutants, spies, wizards, talking animals, and robots fighting together in a Marvel movie.

Considering that price is probably one of the bigger turn-offs keeping people from buying more train sets for KFOLs, I can't exactly blame LEGO for giving those sets smaller-than-average train cars. I mean, the one from the Hidden Side theme is $90, the Hogwarts Express is $80, the Constitution Train Chase was $100, the Monster Fighters ghost train was $80… and that's all without electronics, or sometimes even a full loop of track! Meanwhile, the Emerald Night ($100) and Horizon Express ($130), which DO contain more realistically proportioned cars, have been getting criticisms in this very thread for not having enough cars, not having a full train, and costing too much even before adding tracks + motors. So obviously some tough decisions have to be made one way or the other. I don't believe the Hobby Train set sold well, but if anybody wants to put together a set that works similar to that but with their own train builds, they could always put it on LEGO Ideas and see how it fares. I mean, with stuff like the Old Fishing Store, Voltron, the Saturn V, and probably however the final design for the Treehouse turns out, it seems like LEGO Ideas has proven its ability to turn out finished sets at a price as high or higher than any of the Creator Expert trains. And many of the Ideas sets have atered to more niche interests than stuff LEGO would typically release sets like that for on their own. Whoever wants to do that, though, you'd still have to make many of the same tough calls mentioned elsewhere in this thread (size of cars vs. number of cars vs. price, track vs. no track, RC train vs. push train, steam vs. diesel vs. electric, etc). Even though LEGO will be able to fine-tune and improve your project based on the feedback they get from supporters and their own understanding of their internal manufacturing costs and quality standards, you still have to do your best to create a model that train fans will be enthusiastic to support, and that they'd then be willing to buy as a set at a realistic price for the contents in question.

In 2017 it was because the sets were for the movie so were probably kept under wraps as part of the licensing agreement with Warner Bros. And last year LEGO pretty much entirely stopped showing second half year sets at NYTF except for a few teasers like Stormbringer and the Hogwarts Great Hall. Instead, they did most of their second half year set reveals at theIr OWN press event in May called LEGO Goals. The same will probably happen this year. It's nothing to worry about and nothing specific to Ninjago. Other themes like City, Friends, Super Heroes, and Creator didn't have any second half year set reveals at this year's NYTF either. I suspect it's a matter of LEGO feeling like revealing all their sets at once dilutes some of the media attention given to them, and also risks giving bootleggers a head start copying them. Also, they're in a strong enough position as a company that they CAN hold their own big press event and count on the media to attend, something that wasn't such a sure thing ten to fifteen years ago.

Well, the curved, straight, and switch track pieces for the Power Functions trains still work with the Powered Up system just fine, and several of them have been re-introduced pretty recently (with others potentially still available for use in future sets). So I can see why LEGO might put a higher priority on something like this that doesn't already exist in any form in the current track system than stuff like straight tracks in different lengths, curve tracks in different radii, etc. And while it might not be particularly useful for powered train layouts, I know that a lot of push train systems like the Brio wooden railway sets have had a ramp piece like this for YEARS, so I can see why it might be a desirable element in this (non-powered) train set, particularly since it doesn't appear to include a full circuit of track. It will be interesting to see how long before it shows up in other sets like a new City train set or new track supplement. ToyArk has more pics of this set BTW, including preliminary box art that more clearly illustrates the transformation function: https://news.toyark.com/2019/02/16/toy-fair-2019-lego-hidden-side-333586 Relevant images to this set are 049–051 and 061–066.

Yeah, like Nexo Knights or Ultra Agents, it's designed to be compatible with the app, but most of the sets seem to have plenty of playability even without it. For example, the "transformation" function between the daytime and nighttime modes of each set are all part of the physical play experience, though some things like the haunted tree in the graveyard are animated in the app to make them even spookier). The main thing you seem to miss out on with the app is the interactive ghost hunting game. The only parts of this build that seem specifically designed as part of this game and NOT as part of the physical play experience by itself are hinged or rotating sections that reveal differently colored tiles for the phone's camera to recognize. These are pretty unobtrusive, and since none of them seem to rely on specialized molds or printed elements, just generic tiles in vivid colors, they do not seem to add much more to the sets' price than ordinary parts around the same size would. It would also be easy to swap a lot of these for printed tiles with spooky patterns if you wanted to make them more meaningful as purely physical play features. To be honest I think that kind of suits the concept being explored here, since the idea is that the ghosts are invisible when they're not possessing physical people/buildings/vehicles. To be honest I think this is a really neat way of expressing something we rarely see in LEGO but that is a staple in the sci-fi and horror genres — the idea of invisible entities that can only be seen under special conditions. It reminds me a bit of how the Exploriens theme I enjoyed a lot as a kid (and many subsequent themes like Divers and Arctic) used red and blue transparent elements to make certain stickered or printed elements as an "X-Ray" that turned ambiguous patterns on stickered or printed elements into one of two different patterns. Except, of course, a little more high-tech, which helps it feel much more exciting compared to stuff that today's kids might have already seen in other toys. I suppose one day there might come a time that technology improves to the point that LEGO can put, like, literal hologram projectors in sets or something? But for now an app seems like a really clever way of creating this kind of effect, especially since LEGO typically releases apps for a lot of their most popular themes anyhow — this actually makes those apps a little more relevant to the physical product.

Keep in mind that from LEGO's perspective, this isn't "we're using this theme as a way to release a train". It's "we're using a train as a way to add variety to this theme". Unlike AFOLs, LEGO is interested primarily in making stuff kids will care about, not to find ways to change the things kids care about to include stuff with more sentimental value to adults. So if they thought that kids didn't like trains, they wouldn't be putting trains in kid-targeted themes that don't need to include them. They'd just have designed something else kids like more to take this set's place in the theme. This is the same thing I've tried to remind people of who think Nexo Knights was a sign that LEGO believed kids no longer liked knights and castles. If they really believed that, they wouldn't be trying to "fix" that by mashing knights and castles up with stuff kids enjoy more — they'd just focus on ideas kids still liked and combinations of those ideas. I mean, it's not as though LEGO made Legends of Chima because they thought kids no longer liked animals, or Ninjago because they thought kids no longer liked ninjas. The fact that LEGO keeps releasing trains at all — both "normal" ones in the City theme and more "themed" ones in themes like Hidden Side, Harry Potter, or Monster Fighters — is a pretty good sign that they recognize demand and sales for train sets hasn't up and evaporated. They just don't release as many train sets as often as they did back when toy trains were a much bigger craze among System-aged kids, because they don't want to oversaturate what's now a much smaller market for these sets. The idea of the theme is that these teenage bloggers/paranormal investigators are investigating hauntings and other ghostly activity in the town of Newbury. The ghosts are normally invisible to the naked eye and can only be seen using a smartphone app (which is why both the teenage protagonists carry those) but can become visible at night by possessing people, buildings, or vehicles and transforming them into eerie monstrous versions. Besides the standard physical ways of playing with the set by itself, there's also a free app that allows you to interact with the physical set while viewing it through your phone or tablet's camera to reveal and capture the hidden ghosts on your smartphone just like the heroes Jack and Parker do. IDK the name of the scientist character who appears in this set and some of the others but I think she's a friend to Jack and Parker and maybe the one who invented the tech that lets them use their phones to see and capture the ghosts. I hadn't even paid attention to that new track piece! Really cool and I'll bet we'll see it in City sets as well in the future. To an AFOL who is buying the train with expectations of it as an authentic model and not a playset, it might feel like "cheaping us out", but I think in sets like this and the Winter Holiday Train it's more about more smaller cars allowing for a more varied building and play experience than fewer larger ones. And as far as keeping train sets marketable to kids and families is concerned, I suspect it's a lot easier to sell large numbers of train sets when designers can pack as varied a building and play experience as possible into a considerably lower price point than the same number of full-size cars might entail. The tow ball piece is not new — it's originally a steering joint from LEGO Technic (https://brickset.com/sets/42021-1/Snowmobile), and has since been used together with the ball cups from the Mixels sets in a lot of mech-type builds like the Nexo Knights Battle Suits (https://brickset.com/sets/theme-Nexo-Knights/subtheme-Battle-Suits). Very useful though! My brother pointed that out to me earlier and I was curious to see what train fans might think of its use as a train coupling. All the Hidden Side sets have a normal daytime mode and a haunted nighttime mode. The lever is used to switch between them. In this case, that includes ghostly wings popping out of the sides and a ghostly jaw opening up in the front:

I'm not sure why people necessarily expected them to have a major role. After all, all the other LEGO movie series have included plenty of minor characters who had no major role in the movies, but whose designs were interesting/varied enough that some filmgoers might have wanted a chance to own them as minifigures.

True, but that was not a press event that allowed photos. I remember at last year's New York Toy Fair, LEGO primarily showed their first half year products (including a few coming out later in the spring), but only a few summer and fall products (like Stormbringer and the Hogwarts Great Hall). Then in May they had a separate event of their own for fansites and the press called LEGO Goals where they revealed more of their product line for the second half of the year.

I mean, couldn't you effectively do a lot of that same sort of thing with stickers, whether official or custom? I know stickers are generally not as popular as printing among AFOLs, but this would be a LOT of new printed elements to be specific to one set produced in fairly limited numbers, while a lot more sets can be produced and sold to much bigger audiences with that same number of new elements. And so since the number of new elements LEGO can afford to introduce per year is somewhat limited (not a fixed number, but the crisis in 2003 gave a good sense of how disastrous it can be if the number is allowed to grow out of control), it's tricky to justify such a trade-off. Pics were recently discovered of a sticker sheet with lots of useful Town-related stickers in the LEGO Xtra theme. In this way, over 150 decorations — including MANY throwbacks to themes like classic Town and Paradisa — can be released at the cost of just FIVE new elements. Each sticker sheet is a single element that becomes decorations for as many bricks as the stickers that fit on the sheet, whereas with printed bricks, each new element equals a decoration for that brick only. I feel like it'd be ideal (and much more realistic than what you describe) to see Xtra packs like this released for other non-Town themes, and for stuff that stickers might not be so suited to, like minifig decorations, to be seeded into collectible minifigures (or into sets as easter eggs, like the Futuron torso in the City Square set) much more gradually.

Ninjago as a whole is definitely going to continue. We have confirmation of about 4 more hours of animated content and rumors of 12 more sets in the second half of the year, after Season 10: March of the Oni and the Ninjago Legacy sets. Now, that said, the way that some of the teasers for Season 10 talk so much about endings does make me wonder whether the Ninjago: Masters of Spinjitzu TV series might be ending after 10 seasons and 100 episodes, and replaced with a sequel series… sort of like how other cartoons like Justice League, Ben 10, and Dragon Ball were immediately followed up by sequel series like Justice League Unlimited, Ben 10: Alien Force, and Dragon Ball Z. Relaunching Ninjago as a new TV series offers a few potential advantages. For one, it can provide a new starting point for viewers so they can watch the continued adventures of the characters without feeling a sense of pressure to catch up on ten seasons worth of backstory. Replacing a series with a sequel series can also be motivated by changes on the production side of things, like switching to a different production company or animation studio instead of renewing contracts with the current ones. It can also be an opportunity to revamp the visual style — not just in terms of updated character designs like we saw in Season 8 or gradual animation improvements like we've seen over the course of the series, but more extensive changes like if, for instance, LEGO wanted to switch to a cel-shaded look like the character stills from the Season 5: Possession opening titles or the Netflix series The Dragon Prince. I don't think this necessarily entails the theme as a whole being "revamped into something completely different", though. As you can tell from some of the other cartoon examples I cited, the continuity, cast, and so forth don't necessarily have to change from one series to the next. And a lot of the types of changes they could make to the sets and characters from a design standpoint if they DID want to make the new Ninjago sets stand out visually would be no more extreme than changes they've made in the past to keep the line fresh. The rumored set names we've heard, albeit still a little unclear since many have been inconsistent translations from other languages, at least seem to clearly indicate that characters like Kai, Zane, Jay, Cole, and Lloyd are still going to be present in the post-Season 10 sets and storyline, as are things like Spinjitzu and the Destiny's Bounty. One of the most surprising teasers about what might be to come is this tweet from Tommy Andreasen which implies… The fact that the series as a whole (sets AND TV show) have always been branded with LEGO Ninjago: Masters of Spinjitzu (aside from the movie sets, of course) even though both fans and official materials often just refer to the series as LEGO Ninjago would make it very easy to simply come up with a new subtitle to identify the new episodes as a sequel series, like LEGO Ninjago: Spinjitzu Heroes or LEGO Ninjago: The Power of Spinjitzu or what-have-you.

As fun a gimmick as glow-in-the-dark is, I think Spring Yellowish Green parts tend to look much spookier by default, whereas White Glow parts don't look particularly spooky EXCEPT in the dark. Demonic possession and spirit possession are both concepts that are well established in both modern fiction and religion/mythology going all the way back to ancient times. If they were demons and LEGO was only calling them ghosts to avoid controversy, then they would almost certainly have designed them to LOOK the way demons are typically depicted in pop culture, rather than ghost-like. After all, LEGO showed with Nexo Knights that they're not afraid of depicting demon-like creatures and calling them something more innocuous like monsters. For that matter, LEGO didn't hesitate at all in their set descriptions to refer to the Oni-mask-powered add-on in 70639 as a "demon torso", to the figs in 853866 as "Oni demon minifigures", to the ghost in 75828 as the "demon ghost Mayhem", and to the hobgoblin minifigure in 76058 as an "evil demon". I think a lot of AFOLs overestimate the lengths LEGO will go to to avoid upsetting people with fringe viewpoints like getting outraged by toy LGBTQ+ characters, toy mining and forestry machines, or fictional toy demons I think it's hard to tell at this point if this will be on the same sort of scale as those "big bang" themes or more along the lines of more short-lived stuff such as Agents and Ultra Agents, but launching in the summer with a wave of just eight sets (instead of at the beginning of the year with considerably more than that) makes me suspect the latter. Which would be nice in some respects, because I know people have been bummed at how few short-lived, experimental in-house themes there have been lately compared to bigger and more long-lived themes like Ninjago, Nexo Knights, City, Friends, and Elves. Considering LEGO has produced a lot of that type of stuff over the years even in themes like Bionicle, Knights' Kingdom, and Ninjago that didn't tie in with any sort of AR functionality, I wouldn't say that the AR feature here can be dismissed as a cash-in so easily. I see stuff like this or the Nexo Knights and Ultra Agents apps as more of a parallel to the way LEGO has been using digital content like online game points, unlockable video game characters/vehicles, and download codes in lots of their themes since the turn of the millennium so that kids can engage with the physical products and media in both physical and digital ways. I'm talking stuff like the mask codes in 2001 Bionicle sets, the Kanoka Club and B.I.O. codes from 2005–2010 Bionicle sets, the EXO Codes from 2007–2008 Exo-Force sets, the Hero Codes from the 2012–2014 Hero Factory sets, the club codes they had for many years in LEGO Club and LEGO BrickMaster magazines, the online challenges and rewards that tied in with each of the LEGO Master Builder Academy kits, etc. The reality is that most kids who play with LEGO and other physical toys are also going to have interests that involve apps, video games, or the web. Putting stuff like this in sets is a good way to boost their appeal by making the products satisfy both those categories of interests. And as for any of us adults who might not enjoy AR games quite as much, it doesn't look as though these sets are lacking in physical play value on their own, so we can mostly think of them like other play features we don't care much about (like, say, flick missiles) and choose to either enjoy the parts of the sets we do like and ignore the features we don't, or swap them out for features or details that we get more enjoyment out of. Personally, I'm always really impressed when LEGO can make the supplementary parts of their themes (whether they're physical stuff like magazines and trading cards or digital stuff like apps and online games) so neatly integrated with the physical product. An example: I loved how well the 2011–2012 Ninjago trading cards and spinners worked together to create a unified play experience, where the cards interacted with the physical play experience both as commands to play with the spinners in different ways (raise the spinner up a brick in height for one round, spin your spinner and character upside down for one round, give your character a second weapon, etc) and as physical objects (throw a card at your opponent's spinner like a ninja star this round, put the cards down as obstacles so the first spinner to touch them loses the round, etc). It bummed me out that subsequent LEGO card games haven't been as well integrated, though I suspect the main issue was the amount of reading they entailed, and thus the amount of translation required for that aspect of the products to resonate worldwide. Meanwhile, as far as apps go, I felt like LEGO Fusion was an interesting experiment, but the sets had little to no play value without the app. LEGO Ultra Agents and Nexo Knights were better in terms of the physical play experience, but the physical and digital play experiences were still entirely separate, and it was more or less just a new way of handling the kinds of digital unlock codes we'd seen in so many themes before. This seems a LOT more integrated in the way that I like, in that the physical product isn't just incidental to the in-app gameplay. The physical product IS the in-game level, and interacting with the product's physical play features is a big part of how you interact with the in-game world. This is maybe the best example I've seen yet of a true "augmented reality" toy, in that the real-life toy and its physical features are still the thing you're playing with, but the app gives you a separate, more "gamified" format in which to play with it.

Funny how plenty of other people voice opinions and don't get punished for it? Could it be there's a difference between harmless opinions and actual harmful prejudices like racism, sexism, homophobia, transphobia, religious intolerance, etc? Nah, it'd just be written off as how egregiously LEGO missed the point by thinking any of what we've been asking for amounts to an entire range of sets based specifically on the idea of LGBTQ+ rep, rather than just for more LGBTQ+ characters to show up in the sets and media of regular product lines. I mean, Arcee, one of Transformers' first ever and most well-known female characters, has been pretty clearly established as a transgender woman with a female love interest in the tie-in comics from IDW, and I haven't seen it result in any huge uproar against Hasbro in the Bible Belt or other places with puritanical views about gender and sexuality. And for what it's worth, I've seen you argue plenty of times that LEGO Castle sets should come back even after the last take on that you considered "real" Castle appeared not to sell well. It's interesting that in this case, an entirely hypothetical product line not selling well would be proof that the contents of that theme have no reason to exist, while real themes not selling well presumably just means LEGO didn't do them right. Why not? Plenty of LEGO characters wear clothes and accessories or have decorations in their homes that reflect aspects of their identity. So the idea that a LEGO set couldn't do that as a subtle indication of a character not being straight or cisgender seems pretty dubious. Never mind other possibilities like having a shirtless male swimmer minifigure with top surgery scars. I wasn't "waiting for your hand to be shown." I wanted to give you the benefit of the doubt and hope that you weren't outright transphobic, and just felt LGBTQ+ rep was unimportant for other reasons. But then you went ahead and just blurted out (multiple times now!) that LGBTQ+ identities are "made up stuff". It seems like telling a transgender lesbian that you think those parts of her identity are made up, on a public forum where a higher level of decorum is expected, would be a pretty embarrassing gaffe to most people with any tact or self-awareness. And I find it a little hard to believe that YOU were interested in civil discussion if you'd put a blatantly insulting, unnecessary comment like that in your post in the first place. So please spare me the pretense that you were somehow totally ready to have a friendly debate until I called you out on a prejudiced statement you voluntarily put out there for everyone to see, and that somehow that makes me the one going out of my way to make enemies. Then again, I suppose it should be telling that you took an offhand comment ACKNOWLEDGING the point you seem so intent on making, that some people think LGBTQ+ characters are not "kid appropriate", and started persistently challenging me for presenting it as something that anybody should reasonably disagree with it. Even though you claim not to care about LGBTQ+ characters showing up in sets, it doesn't seem like you've had much concern about the thread's main topic about forms of controversial content that already appear much more prominently in past or current sets. By comparison, it seems like you're extremely invested in making a case for why LGBTQ+ content should not under any circumstances make any appearance in non-licensed themes. It sounds like you care a lot about LGBTQ+ stuff, except only as a threat to your scientifically unsupported belief that they're "made up" rather than as a something that affirms a reality that has been increasingly scientifically supported and publicly accepted over the past several decades. I think it should go without saying that when I refer to people as transphobic or homophobic it's because those people say transphobic or homophobic things. It's amazing how easily people jump to the defense of unnamed people and groups of people if they're referred to only by their prejudices. It seems like these days calling anybody prejudiced in any way, whether it's historical figures whose prejudices are well documented or random people experienced in one's own lifetime, the legitimacy of that characterization gets questioned. It's like people who don't experience those types of prejudice firsthand are skeptical about whether they've ever even occurred in real life. And the idea that straight and cisgender characters are appropriate for kids' toys but LGBTQ+ characters are not rather blatantly communicates a judgement on the relative morality of those groups. I don't see what's so ambiguous about that.

I think we get a decent number of those, though it definitely varies a lot, particularly depending on the sets' target age. The Web Warriors Ultimate Bridge Battle and Jokerland sets are good examples of standout sets even compared to some more adult-targeted builds, since even without any TV or movie tie-in to strictly inform their content, they were the biggest non-D2C sets for the Marvel and DC Super Heroes themes at their time of release. Doc Ock's Tentacle Trap, Spider-Man's Spider Crawler, Ghost Rider Team-Up, Carnage's SHIELD Sky Attack, Doc Ock Truck Heist, and Daily Bugle Showdown also stand out to me as pretty strong designs in their own right. Same with Arkham Asylum Breakout, Scarecrow Harvest of Fear, Black Manta Deep Sea Strike, Batman Mech vs. Poison Ivy Mech (I mean, most of the criticism around it has had more to do with how many mechs there've been in so many themes lately, not faults of that set in particular), and Gorilla Grodd Goes Bananas. Not to mention the outstanding designs of many of the LEGO Batman Movie sets! Many of these sets and others also seemed to leverage Batman and Spider-Man's popularity to give us minifigures and builds for heroes and villains who might not make much of an impression with kids on their own in lieu of their own starring role in a new movie or TV cartoon. I mean, if it weren't for The LEGO Batman Movie, I can't imagine LEGO going out of their way to give us so many Super Friends characters. And even the non-movie-based Justice League sets that gave us the first non-convention-exclusive figures of characters like Green Lantern, Green Arrow, Darkseid, Hawkman, Brainiac, Black Manta, and The Flash seemed partly designed as tie-ins with the video game LEGO Batman 3: Beyond Gotham.

Awesomesauce! Definitely further reinforces the Gravity Falls vibes I got from the initial teaser image, but it's also reminding me of other stuff I've seen that I can't quite put a name to at the moment. It definitely manages to stand out really nicely from past spooky/paranormal themes like Monster-Fighters, Scooby-Doo, and the Studios Monsters series, but also incorporate a lot of similar sorts of appeal to themes like those as well as some of the "magic school" vibes of the Harry Potter theme and the level of detail I would typically associate with Friends sets. On that note, part of me DOES wish it were a mini-doll theme to take the place of Elves, since it definitely seems like a theme with some parallels to series that are popular with girls like Harry Potter, Monster High, and Lumberjanes (which i read the first volume of this week — really good stuff!) I also suspect this will be popular with parents since some of the academic and science-y aspects of the school and science lab sets align well with the current popularity of brands that encourage an interest in STEAM fields (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Math). And even more fantasy or sci-fi sorts of series like this one can really help cultivate such interests. The school set is really cool and it sort of looks like some of the monstery elements like the claws might fold up inside for a more inconspicuous look, which is a really rad feature if so! I hope the AR game is more engaging to me than the Nexo Knights app was, though I would probably be able to enjoy the theme even without it, as would many kids. Wonder what other supporting media might be in store. @Kevii23 I think that's just Spring Yellowish Green, which is very frequently mistaken for glow-in-the-dark. Unless LEGO intends to replace their current glow in the dark color (Glow White), since that tends to appear much more white than green in the level of light seen in that photo. Also, if I had to guess, I'd say the eyes probably fold in behind the center tower — note the Technic axles with studs behind the balcony which could be a hinge point connected to the eyebrows, and the clock on the center tower which might drive the transformation mechanism (turning the school into its monster form at midnight, perhaps!) @Guyon2002 I think the school is separate from the graveyard. From the description in the press release the setting of this theme will encompass a whole town and not just the school in particular.

This also isn't a LEGO-specific trend by a longshot. Manufacturers of licensed DC and Marvel superhero merchandise in general, as with the companies actually publishing the comics and producing the movies, have long found that Batman and Spider-Man are some of their most popular characters/series/brands, especially among the younger segments of their audience. I don't think it's any accident that LEGO's first superhero licenses were Spider-Man and Batman, nor that they're some of the only superheroes who have so many sets devoted to them on a routine basis whether or not there's a current or recent theatrical movie that those sets are specifically based on or branded with. Like, I am for sure with a lot of y'all in wishing that more superheroes and supervillains got more of a chance in the spotlight, but I also fully understand that usually no matter how cool they are as characters, Batman and Spider-Man are pretty much unshakably cemented in the pop culture consciousness in a way that hardly any other superheroes, even other well-known and popular ones like Superman or Iron Man, can hope to compete with.

There are also some other differences that can help boost the sense of realism in sets and MOCs using mini-dolls: Mini-doll height varies more between sitting and standing than minifigure height, since this height difference depends on the vertical measurement from the crotch to the base of the feet rather than the entire legs assembly. This means a traditional minifigure sitting on a seat higher than two and a half plates off the ground will look taller than a minifigure the same height standing beside them, whereas a mini-doll can sit on a seat up to four plates off the ground without being taller than another mini-doll standing beside them. Mini-dolls with hair longer than shoulder length can often turn their heads more to the left and right than minifigures with the same length hair due to having smaller shoulders and less blocky torsos. The top of mini-doll feet is larger and allows for more printed detail, such as buckles, laces, etc. Even if the top of minifigure shoes were printable, the lack of surface space on the top of the foot would make it hard to clearly differentiate between many styles of shoe or sandal (look at the elaborate and varied detail on some of the LEGO Elves sandal straps for some examples). Neck accessories like capes, life jackets, or armor do not change the mini-doll's height, whereas they do change the height of minifigures. As far as facial features go, the default mini-doll design language includes human-like skin tones, noses, and much more detailed eyes (with different colors for the sclerae, irises, and pupils), while minifigures with these features are rarer and usually specific to particular themes or subthemes. It also means colored eyes on a minifigure often look unusual or anomalous even if it'd be a relatively common eye color or unremarkable eye color for humans like Lloyd Garmadon's green eyes or Marion Ravenwood's blue eyes. The mini-doll's more human-like skin tones and facial features also mean themes like Exo-Force or Knights' Kingdom II had a much greater dissonance between the more lifelike human characters in some of their marketing materials and the minifigures in the sets than in themes like Friends and Elves.

it's true that sets are often enjoyable without the context of the media, but likewise the media is often enjoyable without the context of the sets. But both are a big part of the theme's overall strategy: the sets and characters are designed with the intent of fitting into the larger narrative, and the narrative is written with the intent of utilizing and promoting those sets and characters. It's a whole give-and-take, and each side of that equation heavily informs the development process on the other side. So the fact that some kids might make up their own identities for the characters doesn't mean that they don't have identities of their own. Plus, if you really think the supporting media is that irrelevant to the minifigures' identities in the sets themselves and the way many kids play with them, then why would it be a problem to have LGBTQ+ characters in the media? Couldn't people who want all LEGO characters to be straight and cisgender just continue to imagine that they are? One of the first LEGO Ninjago chapter books established that Kai and Nya's parents were married, and that their marriage was a big part of why they retired from fighting alongside Wu… but that said, this was before a lot of care was taken to ensure that the books and the TV show maintained a consistent canon, and some elements of those books have indeed been declared non-canon, so you make a good point that it may not still hold true. That said, it's established clearly in the series and heavily implied in the Dragon Forge set that they remained a devoted couple, married or not. Quit putting words in my mouth. All I was stating there is that it's ignorant to act as though caricature and stereotypes are the ONLY way for characters — or real people — to visually communicate these aspects of their identity. Personally, I often wear barrettes in the colors of the transgender flag (pink+white+light blue) or paint my nails in rainbow colors, and I know many other LGBTQ+ people who communicate their identity in similar ways. That doesn't mean you can reliably tell if somebody's LGBTQ+ by looking at how they look or dress or decorate their space… sometimes these symbols can be coincidence, and other times people can pretend they're coincidence even if they aren't, whether in reference to a fictional character or a real person — but that's the nature of all sorts of symbols, and it doesn't negate their power to communicate meaning. Oh, guess you showed your hand, then. Yikes, that's embarrassing. None of the discussion we've been having about LGBTQ+ representation has to do with "made up genders", at least no more made up than the entire socially constructed concept of "gender"… all the way back to its origins as a grammatical mechanism to classify nouns, adjectives, pronouns, and articles. And by the way, even in that usage, many languages like Latin have words with a "neuter" gender and others with both "masculine" and "feminine" genders! I don't see what's so strange about it. Thinking that heterosexual and cisgender people are more moral, more kid-appropriate, more natural, or more deserving of rights and positive representation than gay or transgender people pretty neatly falls under the categories of homophobia and transphobia by definition, same as how thinking that one race or sex is more moral, intelligent, emotionally stable, or deserving of rights pretty neatly falls under the categories of racism and sexism. And while it's kind of disgraceful that people hold any of those perspectives, it's just as much a "political stance" to agree with them as to disagree with them. Kind of a silly question. There are plenty of examples of fictional wizards, witches, ghosts, and vampires who look and dress pretty much the same way as ordinary people, and just happen to have supernatural abilities, limitations, and/or origins. I mean, it's a part of a person's identity. Just because it doesn't define them in their entirety doesn't mean it's not a part of them that matters. As for "putting them in boxes", we do that because the alternative is leaving the playroom a mess because like all language, it makes it easier to talk about the world and about ourselves. I would think LEGO fans of all people would understand the value of having ways to identify and categorize characteristics, considering how many ways we categorize LEGO sets, themes, parts, minifigures, and even fans or how heavily invested some people are in how they define those categories. Most of us don't identify in part as fans of particular LEGO themes because we want to isolate ourselves from people who don't identify as fans of those themes, but because it allows us to identify people we relate to on those levels, and communicate that aspect of ourselves. LGBTQ+ identities, national identities, racial identities, ethnic identities, etc. serve a similar purpose. It means that even though all people (real and fictional alike) have their own unique and individual life experiences, they can put a name to some of the similarities and differences between their experiences and others', which makes it that much easier to talk about the many things that make us who we are. I agree this would be a good thing to see, and I agree that worries about hurting the company's sales and reputation in places that view LGBTQ+ people in a negative light are probably a bigger part of LEGO's hesitation to embrace that kind of representation in their original themes than The LEGO Group's decision makers actually being homophobic or transphobic themselves. After all, their VP of design in the Play Themes 1 department, Matthew Ashton, is openly gay. That said, I think there will come a point at which LEGO can be a little more open to that type of representation in their products and media, and I'd like to see them continue moving towards that point… whether that means risk-taking on LEGO's part or just keeping a finger on the pulse of how the world is becoming steadily more accepting of LGBTQ+ people. I think that's quite a bit to generalize about kids… now, it has been conventional wisdom for a long time that BOYS tend to be disinterested or even grossed out by the idea of romance, but I feel like on some levels even that can be something of a misleading stereotype, especially considering how much cultural norms surrounding romance vary around the world. And when you bring girls into the equation, it's easy to see how many stories and toys related to romance (many Disney Princess movies and toys, for example) have become very popular even with kids so young that they may not have even experienced their first crush. I've also certainly noticed that some of the kids at the LEGO Ninjago Q&A sessions at past Comic-Con events have expressed considerable interest in which characters happen to be in love or whether other characters will fall in love in the future. Plus, regardless of their personal feelings on romance, a lot of kids DO relate to stories involving familieis, and as you noted, the relationship between parents is a part of how many families live and interact. So as you noted earlier, couples could certainly appear in those contexts. That may be your feeling, but I think on a wider scale it depends on the discretion of the parents, the maturity of the kid, and the norms and taboos of the culture. Specifically, Revenge of the Sith has a U (all ages) rating in Malaysia and France; an "All" (all ages) rating in South Korea; a G (all ages) rating in Japan, the Philippines, and Quebec; a PG (all ages, but parental discretion advised) rating in the rest of Canada and Singapore; an M/6 (ages 6 and up) in Portugal; a 7 (ages 7 and up) rating in Spain; a PG (ages 8 and up, with parental discretion advised) rating in Ireland; a 10 (ages 10 and up) rating in Austria, Brazil, Iceland, and South Africa; etc. As you can see, a lot of countries' perceptions vary in how much violence kids can handle and how much of that decision ought to be at the parents' discretion. And usually even for more intermediate level media ratings like PG-13, T, FSK-12, etc, parents are granted a lot of leeway when it comes to deciding whether their kid can handle a movie that the ratings board thinks is more suited to older viewers. Same as how many parents might allow their kids to build LEGO sets aimed at teen or adult builders (Star Wars Ultimate Collector Series, Creator Expert, Ninjago City, bigger Technic sets, etc) if they think the kid's demonstrated enough building proficiency to handle them. After all, even among us adults, there are many of us who might find movies with a lot of sexual content, gore, profanity, etc. extremely upsetting or even traumatic, and others of us who are hardly fazed by such content. It depends a lot on our upbringing, our personal experiences, our skill at managing unpleasant emotions, etc. So I don't think it makes sense to assume kids have some kind of universal benchmarks of when they're prepared to see or hear about such content without it negatively impacting their development. On a side note, I also think that the idea of different media presenting the same stories in different ways applies here. Several of the LEGO video games and animated specials have used cartoonish graphics and tongue-in-cheek humor to tone down the gravity of some movies' darker or more mature content. And there are plenty of other examples of Star Wars media aimed at making the story more palatable to a younger audience… much like how many of LEGO's original themes like City, Friends, and Ninjago have also been released as 4+/Juniors builds, allowing younger builders than the typical target audience of those themes to experience them in a more age-appropriate level.

Many City sets still do! I think in that case it serves two purposes: it makes them seem slightly tinted and helps make them more closely resemble how real windows and windshields often look when reflecting a blue sky. Honestly, I feel like it used to be much more common to see regular Transparent/Trans-Clear windows in Town sets than it is in today's City sets. Taking a look at last year's sets, windscreens in that color only appeared on three models (a hotel, an ice cream van, and a cargo train) — others typically used Transparent Brown/Trans-Black or Transparent Light Blue/Trans-Light Blue.