LEGO Ninjago 2019

[Dr.Cogg]

There's a new samurai helmet.

[benderisgreat]

Wow! New snake armor is dope, goes really well with new head. Also new weapon mold, yay! And Ice samurai helmet is awesome! Can’t wait to see full minifig of Emperor and his soldiers.

[Aanchir]

On 3/11/2019 at 8:23 AM, Digger of Bricks said:

Those people wouldn't be as grudgeful towards Ninjago if it weren't one of the only Action/Adventure theme in town currently (next to the upcoming Hidden Side line, that is). Some people just want something archetypical like Classic Castle, Pirates, Space, Adventurers, Agents, Aquazone, and the such, and it's hard to find much of that in a theme like Ninjago if you're not counting the bricks. 

I think for those concerns it's worth bearing in mind that "archetypical" is somewhat relative. All things considered, Ninjago is a pretty straightforward example of the sentai genre, which originated in Japanese series of the 70s with series like Gatchaman and Super Sentai (adapted for American audiences as Battle of the Planets and Power Rangers). Like most examples of that genre, Ninjago features a color-coded team of super-powered teenage masked heroes who protect the world from a huge variety of creepy sci-fi and fantasy monsters using cool vehicles, giant mecha, martial arts, and supernatural abilities. The sentai genre has had a profound and lasting impact on both Japanese and Western kids' media.

By contrast, Aquazone is not a theme that a whole lot of people outside of the LEGO community might think of as "archetypical". Certainly there is media that can be considered part of the same underwater sci-fi genre as Aquazone, like Attack from Atlantis, Stingray, Captain Nemo and the Underwater City, Sealab 2020, and SeaQuest DSV. But not only are these, like the sentai genre, overwhelmingly from the mid 20th century onward, but it is also not a genre that appears to have ever been as ubiquitous and influential as the superhero, medieval fantasy, space opera, pirate, western, or sentai genres, much less remained as ubiquitous and inflential as many of those have to this day. Also, a lot of media related to this underwater sci-fi genre is specifically centered around interactions between underwater civilizations and those of the surface world — something that was never a part of the premise presented in the Aquazone sets.

I also think that there needs to be some perspective around the fact that two action/adventure themes ended in just the past year and it's not realistic to expect both to get immediate replacements when so much of the LEGO Group's promotional emphasis this year is going towards a new LEGO Movie. And even Elves, to its credit, was a fairly archetypical example of the portal fantasy/isekai genre (e.g. Alice's Adventures in Wonderland, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, The Chronicles of Narnia, Labyrinth, etc)… but it still got a lot of flack from Castle fans both for using mini-dolls and not for being bog standard historical fiction/medieval fantasy.

Many of the same traditionalist-leaning AFOLs who are bothered by Ninjago today likewise looked down on it in 2011 when it was released alongside Kingdoms, Pharaoh's Quest, Atlantis, and Alien Conquest, and in 2013 when it was released alongside Castle and Galaxy Squad, or in 2015 when it was released alongside Pirates and Ultra Agents. So I'm not sure I really buy the idea that it would be more accepted by those parts of the AFOL community if they weren't lacking for the types of themes they prefer.

[crimsondeity]

I never paid attention to the similarities Ninjago shares with the sentai genre! I’m a fan of the theme, and the mix of aesthetics never bothered me. 

I’ve always been a Castle fan (my first set was Black Falcon’s Fortress); although I was always more drawn to the fantasy side of the theme. Before the Dragon Masters came out, I would pretend that the dragon/griffin plumes from some of the Black Knight sets were dragon totems that helped their wearers fight better. So the fantasy aspect of Ninjago appealed to me as an adult.

But now I can see how much it takes from stuff like Power Rangers (color coded outfits, the original animal totems, new upgraded uniforms that don’t really change all that much, etc). 

Edited March 12, 2019 by crimsondeity

[GarmaFan]

5 hours ago, Dr.Cogg said:

It looks like the new "WU" is actually TFSM, but someone put wu's beard on it, also there's new armor for the snakes.

Did anyone say that though? I have doubts that they'd have FSM fully appear in the show and I'm not sure how he'd fit into any of the sets unless there's a flashback set. But that face doesn't look anything like Wu and it seems kind of late to redesign him. And the FSM looked more like how beardless Wu looked when his face was shown in pictures. It could be a totally new old person character.

Edited March 12, 2019 by GarmaFan

[Aanchir]

6 minutes ago, GarmaFan said:

Did anyone say that though? I have doubts that they'd have FSM fully appear in the show and I'm not sure how he'd fit into any of the sets unless there's a flashback set. But that face doesn't look anything like Wu and it seems kind of late to redesign him. And the FSM looked more like how beardless Wu looked when his face was shown in pictures. It could be a totally new old person character.

I was just seeing leaks of this figure myself. It's definitely not Wu because besides his printed braid on the back of his head, he also has a full printed beard. Seeing this it suddenly dawned on me where this figure is probably from — it's probably going to be the exclusive figure in the new edition of the LEGO Ninjago Visual Dictionary (much like the pre-digitized Merlok minifigure from LEGO Nexo Knights' Book of Knights)!

Promo figures like the ones that are packaged with DK reference guides, DVDs, etc are perfectly suited to character designs like this that are visually suited to representing the theme as a whole, but neither important enough to the current story arc to show up in other sets, nor reliant on any unique new molds.

Edited March 12, 2019 by Aanchir

[GarmaFan]

2 minutes ago, Aanchir said:

I was just seeing leaks of this figure myself. It's definitely not Wu because besides his printed braid on the back of his head, he also has a full printed beard. Seeing this it suddenly dawned on me where this figure is probably from — it's probably going to be the exclusive figure in the new edition of the LEGO Ninjago Visual Dictionary (much like the pre-digitized Merlok minifigure from LEGO Nexo Knights' Book of Knights)!

Makes sense, was also thinking it could be from something exclusive. Maybe FSM appears with that outfit in the season.

Edited March 12, 2019 by GarmaFan

[DuckBricks]

23 minutes ago, GarmaFan said:

Makes sense, was also thinking it could be from something exclusive. Maybe FSM appears with that outfit in the season.

That's definitely likely, but it's a shame it isn't something like casual Harumi. I get not including a missing EM as they aren't too relevant nowadays, but Harumi is still relevant enough to include here and would have been a more welcome inclusion that presumably the FSM, unless he gets an expanded role in S11.

Edited March 12, 2019 by legozebra

[Aanchir]

1 hour ago, legozebra said:

That's definitely likely, but it's a shame it isn't something like casual Harumi. I get not including a missing EM as they aren't too relevant nowadays, but Harumi is still relevant enough to include here and would have been a more welcome inclusion that presumably the FSM, unless he gets an expanded role in S11.

I think that's where the matter of representing the theme as a whole comes in… for a book like this I think they really want a figure that's clearly ninja-related even for people who don't know the theme, so somebody dressed like how kids expect a ninja or ninja master to look is a better fit than most Ninjago villains, supporting characters, or even casual designs for the main characters would be.

We probably stand a better chance of seeing casual Harumi in some other type of promotional release, like the Bricktober minifigure collections and battle packs we've seen in the past.

[Digger of Bricks]

7 hours ago, Aanchir said:

I think for those concerns it's worth bearing in mind that "archetypical" is somewhat relative. All things considered, Ninjago is a pretty straightforward example of the sentai genre, which originated in Japanese series of the 70s with series like Gatchaman and Super Sentai (adapted for American audiences as Battle of the Planets and Power Rangers). Like most examples of that genre, Ninjago features a color-coded team of super-powered teenage masked heroes who protect the world from a huge variety of creepy sci-fi and fantasy monsters using cool vehicles, giant mecha, martial arts, and supernatural abilities. The sentai genre has had a profound and lasting impact on both Japanese and Western kids' media.

That comparison has always been relevant to me, though Ninjago is a little too distinct from its "Sentai" forebearers for me to consider it a straightforward example of such. While I don't personally care for the genre, I'd still much rather see a more generic representation of the genre as a playtheme, much like in the same way various lines of RPG miniatures don't stray to far from the genre they aspire after. 

7 hours ago, Aanchir said:

By contrast, Aquazone is not a theme that a whole lot of people outside of the LEGO community might think of as "archetypical". Certainly there is media that can be considered part of the same underwater sci-fi genre as Aquazone, like Attack from Atlantis, Stingray, Captain Nemo and the Underwater City, Sealab 2020, and SeaQuest DSV. But not only are these, like the sentai genre, overwhelmingly from the mid 20th century onward, but it is also not a genre that appears to have ever been as ubiquitous and influential as the superhero, medieval fantasy, space opera, pirate, western, or sentai genres, much less remained as ubiquitous and inflential as many of those have to this day. Also, a lot of media related to this underwater sci-fi genre is specifically centered around interactions between underwater civilizations and those of the surface world — something that was never a part of the premise presented in the Aquazone sets.

For me, Aquazone also encompasses the Aqua Raiders and Atlantis themes, not just merely the various subthemes of the 1990's. Also, as for whether or not they can be considered archetypical, Aquazone to me simply denotes a collection of various Action/Adventure themes that all fall into the "fantastical ocean exploration" description, much like Jules Verne's 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, thereby falling into what I see to be a well seated trope.

[zoth33]

I really hope the ice zombie samurai torso's look awesome because I love the head and the helmet so far.  The snake armor looks great and the recolored LOTR elven weapon looks nice.  The new weapon with the fire snake sorcerer looks fantastic.  I really can't wait to see the builds too but I think this wave is really gonna put a dent in my wallet by the way the figs look so far.  

[Aanchir]

14 hours ago, Digger of Bricks said:

That comparison has always been relevant to me, though Ninjago is a little too distinct from its "Sentai" forebearers for me to consider it a straightforward example of such. While I don't personally care for the genre, I'd still much rather see a more generic representation of the genre as a playtheme, much like in the same way various lines of RPG miniatures don't stray to far from the genre they aspire after.

Really? Because when you bring up RPG miniatures, some examples that quickly spring to mind include:

• Warhammer 40K, which mashes up elements of Warhammer's original medieval fantasy genre with futuristic sci-fi in a lot of unconventional ways (at least, unconventional by the standards of when it first launched, though those twists on the usual sci-fi formula have since somewhat influenced subsequent examples of the genre).
• BrikWars, the LEGO-inspired wargame that purposely embraces madcap storytelling mashing up the various genres that exist within LEGO and other construction toy brands.
• Dungeons and Dragons, which while inspired by medieval fantasy RPGs, also pulls from lots of other genres like Lovecraftian horror, monster movies, global mythology and folklore, science fiction, paleobiology, and even its own invented creatures like the Gelatinous Cube that were not original to any established genre.

And this kind of playful approach to genre is honestly pretty common among all kinds of toy and game IPs. It's not as though toy and game designers are out there making a concerted effort to ensure their works are as derivative, formulaic, or by-the-book as possible. When you look at video games, you see the same thing — "The Legend of Zelda", for instance, has an overarching European medieval fantasy flavor with swordplay, dragons, magic, castles, and princesses, but it also has plenty of motifs not typical of that genre like zombies, slime creatures, lasers, robots, ninjas, genies, sandworms, carnivorous plants, teleportation, time travel, Shinto spirituality, etc. None of this stuff is intended to alienate fans of more conventional medieval fantasy media — but it does help the games maintain a sense of novelty in terms of both storytelling and the play experience.

Edited March 13, 2019 by Aanchir

[DarthLeapyous]

I would consider Ninjago as Science-Fantasy with lots of action

[Lego David]

On 3/12/2019 at 7:46 PM, GarmaFan said:

But that face doesn't look anything like Wu and it seems kind of late to redesign him.

Many people in the Ninjago Community have speculated that that Minifigure might actually not be Wu, but rather The First Spinjutzu Master. I hope this proves true, the theme has been going for so long, and we never got him in Minifigure form, despite it's very important role story-wise.

[Digger of Bricks]

22 hours ago, Aanchir said:

Really? Because when you bring up RPG miniatures, some examples that quickly spring to mind include:

I guess using RPG miniatures wasn't the best example to use on my part, as my knowledge of that market as a whole is very limited. But, the specific examples of such I did have in mind I discovered Pinteresting about online. Particularly, Hydra Miniatures' Retro Raygun and War Rocket lines are based upon more archetypical notions of the Flash Gordon/Buck Rogers/Raypunk brand of early Twentieth Century Science Fiction:

[DuckBricks]

 Two new leaks with an Ice Samurai (complete with blue katana) and an alternate dual-molded hood for Zane with ice shooting out of the back... interested to see how this plays out.

[Nexogeek]

39 minutes ago, Digger of Bricks said:

I guess using RPG miniatures wasn't the best example to use on my part, as my knowledge of that market as a whole is very limited. But, the specific examples of such I did have in mind I discovered Pinteresting about online. Particularly, Hydra Miniatures' Retro Raygun and War Rocket lines are based upon more archetypical notions of the Flash Gordon/Buck Rogers/Raypunk brand of early Twentieth Century Science Fiction:

Oh what I would do for an entire theme like that, Retro Spaceman CMF just isn't enough I guess Sweet Mayhem's helmet kinda could be used for that style. A theme like this could fit the standard big bang theme format decently well. 

[Digger of Bricks]

26 minutes ago, Nexogeek said:

Oh what I would do for an entire theme like that, Retro Spaceman CMF just isn't enough I guess Sweet Mayhem's helmet kinda could be used for that style. A theme like this could fit the standard big bang theme format decently well. 

PREACH IT BROTHER!!!  

[Nexogeek]

8 minutes ago, Digger of Bricks said:

PREACH IT BROTHER!!!  

Is there a topic on the forum strictly for discussing what we would want from a theme like this? If not you and I would be perfect to start one given our love for this kinda stuff. 

[Digger of Bricks]

23 minutes ago, Nexogeek said:

Is there a topic on the forum strictly for discussing what we would want from a theme like this? If not you and I would be perfect to start one given our love for this kinda stuff. 

Generally, given that a Flash Gordon/Buck Rogers/Raypunk-type of theme is more in the vein of Sci-Fi/Space rather than Action/Adventure, this would be one such topic for discussion and idea-sharing:

For other pulpy genres that aren't set in Space, @Peppermint_M's Future Action and Adventure Themes, @Commander Keller's Next "Adventurers" Theme Ideas, and @Perry the Platypus's Ideas for New Action Themes topics are all great for such pontification! 

 

[Exetrius]

2 hours ago, legozebra said:

 Two new leaks with an Ice Samurai (complete with blue katana) and an alternate dual-molded hood for Zane with ice shooting out of the back... interested to see how this plays out.

I wonder if that type of hood is going to be exclusive to Zane, or if the other ninja will get theirs as well, as some kind of NRG form. 

[Boogly22238]

Is that blue katana a new color? 

The ice samurai looks very cool

 

Edited March 14, 2019 by Boogly22238

[benderisgreat]

Ice samurai looks dope! And new powered up version of Zane looks cool as well. I wonder with this Fire vs Ice theme this season will have Kai and Zane joining their respective factions?

[crimsondeity]

I love the ice zombie’s design! And I’m happy to see more of the rice hats/coolies. Zane’s ice flare hood is interesting as well, although I’m sort of hoping its not exclusive to him.

 

[Dr.Cogg]

I like how the Ice Zombies look like they were regular people that got frozen.