VBBN

Figured out what the random Umarak mask with Ekimu works on. Reviews tomorrow.

As I've been messing around with the spare Toa masks that were included in the beasts and noticing how absolutely awful they actually look once they are placed on the Toa, I realized- I really wish we had gotten the Toa's main color blended with gold instead of trans neon green. It would have been a cool replacement for the standard color blended with silver masks that they came with, and since the masks belong to the three Toa with gold already on them, it would have been a sensible choice. (And, such a color combo would have worked on them, while the masks blended with silver would have worked for the other three toa as they already are, so it wouldn't have felt like we were getting an incomplete set of masks as we are right now.) Don't get me wrong, I do enjoy the masks we got as they are (I'm so used to having white mixed with trans light blue that it's nice to have a a change for once) but they don't make sense on the respective toa, and it is a shame that we don't get the other three masks with a similar blend.

For those curious.

Well I've built the three beasts so far- I won't give any initial thoughts on the sets yet (I prefer to have a bit more exposure and save my thoughts for the reviews) but one thing i'll say- I really, really dislike this jaw piece. It's like a less-fun, worse-looking, more-annoying version of the Barraki mandibles. Also, Storm beast and Quake beast have an annoying bit- The shadow traps. They are supposed to hold the masks, but I find them very incapable of doing so because the pins they use to connect the two halves offer little to no friction, and hence no grasping power for the masks (they can hardly even keep an open-jawed pose without a mask in them, either they are fully shut or flip all the way open) I haven't read anything from anyone elses reviews yet, so i don't know who else has noticed this, but it's an annoying quibble.

As these are not actual pictorial reviews, merging with sets discussion.

My review copies will be here next week so I'm avoiding looking at review text (want to have my own, unbiased opinion going into it) but Ekimu was one of the better looking sets to me this year and after looking at those review photos I stand by it, I do like him visually. The hammer is a bit, eh, not what I would have liked, but that's easily fixable. (Also this time around I actually still have all of the winter sets still constructed, so expect lots of comparisons!)

For now the links have been removed- the origin of the photos is unknown and leaked images of Star Wars sets have been strictly moderated in the past due to the important relationship between Disney and LEGO. WIth that said, I really hope we see that black piston piece appear in a larger quantity in next year's Bionicle, now that it's existence is here.

Thank you for the wide range of questions so far! Eurobricks was given a similar opportunity to Dorek (who I assume was invited on behalf of Biosector01). The questions compiled from this list will be asked on Eurobricks' behalf.

I'm not entirely sure why this needs to be a "tournament," a thread simply discussing favorite masks is sufficient enough.

Given the opportunity to ask questions to the LEGO Bionicle team, what questions would you ask? Of course, these questions should be within reason- asking "what sets are coming out next year" probably isn't going to be as fruitful nor give as satisfying of an answer as "what is the primary reason for the cost of a set?" for example.

I could definitely imagine the Death Trooper getting a figure. We haven't had a "black trooper" type yet and i'd love to have that headsculpt. It wouldn't add the most inspiring of parts to the selection (Given Luke, Vader, and Kylo) but still one I could imagine happening nonetheless. And if we got K250, that'd be two primarily black figures in one wave. (I don't mind the color, but I would rather get some unique stuff, Star Wars has really had the chance to bring in some interesting colors so far and I hate to see wasted opportunities.)

Merging similar threads. I started organizing based on size- large and obvious parts get organized first, then gradually work your way down until you are just sorting technic pins and whatnot. Grabbing larger pieces out also makes it easier to avoid having to dump everything out on a desk.

This argument is going nowhere productive. Please refrain from continuing it beyond this point- agree to disagree and move on. The truth is nothing is set in stone and the only way anyone here is going to have answers is to wait and see what happens.

I will give an in depth spoiler review later. Here's a quick run down of my thoughts, spoiler free- I liked the movie. I agree with Krabby on mostly all accounts (however I disagree about your thoughts on Wonder Woman. From a marketing standpoint this made more sense, now more people will be interested to see who Wonder Woman is, where she came from, etc, and will want to see her solo movie. Many of those people may not have wanted to see it before, if they were only going to BvS for batman or superman. For me, the biggest issue I had with the movie was that parts of it felt rushed. There is no doubt that they packed a LOT into this film, and one thing you'll notice is very quick cuts. So you'll spend 5 minutes with batman, 4 with superman, a quick 1 minute jump to lex, 3 minutes of Lois, then to another 3 of batman, 4 of superman, etc etc. I don't necessarily mind this tactic in general, I know some movies such as Star Wars throw quite a few quick scenes in like that, but everything seemed oddly disjointed. I think the movie had a lot of plots and stories and characters to juggle, and sometimes it was hard to see how these storylines were coming together. And even though some action was "implied" to move the story along (like okay so we're are supposed to assume batman did this while superman was doing this) I felt like the ending of the film, or I should say the last 30 minutes, had a pretty quick buildup and I was confused at some of the motivations, and I felt that the way some characters discovered information about other characters was not well explained. Now with that said, I liked the actors more than I thought I would. Lex was one of the "lighter spirited" characters of the movies with his quirky attitude, but there was also some uneasiness about him and I really liked how he carried out some parts of his plan. I had no doubts about Batffleck and I enjoyed him in this, and I really cannot wait to see him in future movies. Cavil was about the same as he was in Man of Steel, though I must say I found all of batmans scenes far more interesting than supermans. (And to be honest I like the idea of a movie about the world hating superman and think that would have made a great MoS2, as opposed to throwing batman in) Wonder Woman was great as well, though she had one rather strange scene that I think messed up the flow of the movie, but she was great in the last 30 minutes or so. We also learned today that the ultimate cut (the R rated blu Ray) will be a full THIRTY minutes longer, and go a bit more into world building and include Jenna Malinda character, so some of my conplaints might be solved there.

We don't discuss banned members, but keep in mind we have site guidelines. If someone is removed from our site, it's a sure bet it's because they didn't follow one or more of them. And not all of Eurobricks' subforums record post counts- and depending on the content, not all posts are kept visible to the public eye. But this is not relevant to the 2016 set discussion. Please avoid off-topic comments such as this.

Thanks everyone! I have changed my opinion about one part of the set- the batpoles not being connected above and below the floor. The thing is, you can have Batman & Robin waiting on the yellow platforms. So you can have regular Bruce and Dick reveal the bookshelf, take them out of the scene and quickly drop Batman and Robin down the poles without having to set them up. Not really useful to me as someone who only displays sets, but it kinda goes along with the 'quick change" feature of the first Batcave set. Ah thanks for that info. I've never really gotten into the 60s series and haven't watched it in its entirety (I'm a college student right now, so I didn't exactly grow up watching it, and it's kinda hard to get into it if you didn't grow up with it I feel.) though I do love the designs of everything from it. So for some things I had to consult the Wiki and it wasn't as helpful as I thought it would be

Set Name: Batman™ Classic TV Series – Batcave Number: 76052 Parts: 2,526 Price: US $269.99 - CA $329.99 - DE 249.99€ - UK £229.99 - DK 2499.00 DKK *Euro pricing varies by country. Please visit shop.LEGO.com for regional pricing. Release Date: March 2016 LEGO Description: Hello and welcome to my review of the 60's Batcave! Before we begin I would like to give a huge thank you to The LEGO Company for providing this set to Eurobricks to be reviewed. I do want to stress that all of the opinions in this review are of course my own. When it was revealed that we were getting a $270 Batcave, my expectations were pretty high. We have already gotten a few larger-scale Batcaves, namely 7783 and 6860. This batcave not only brings in a larger amount of pieces, but also the theme of the 60's television show! Is $270 a steep price, or is it worth getting your nostalgia on? Let's find out. Box and Contents Front The front of the box of course shows the set information and a photo of the set itself. The minifigures are displayed at the bottom left, with their names appropriately placed in some action-bubbles. Also note that the classic TV series logo is present here. Back The back of the box shows some of the set details, and once again throws in the cheesy comic-style sound effects. Instructions There is quite a hefty sticker sheet here. To avoid mass amounts of pictures, if you would like to view the parts inventory, please visit here. You can also see which elements are brand new to this set. Minifigures Batman and Robin One of the strongest selling points of this set will undoubtedly be the minifigures. This set comes with a slew of 9 classic Batman characters; A Mr. Freeze figure was also designed, but is being released as a polybag instead of being thrown into this set. Now as with most modern day LEGO sets, the minifigures have been spread across various steps in the build, to prevent people from opening boxes in the store and stealing the bag containing all of the minifigure parts, however I will look at all of the minifigures first.To begin, let's look at none other than Batman and Robin. Both feature some excellent printed detail, even including side printing on the legs. They also feature two-sided heads, with the alternate choices being a determined Batman and a terrified Robin. I'll be honest, as a person who does not collect LEGO System sets often, I am not always up to date on what is new. The last minifigures that I have had in hand with capes were the Batman Begins Batman from the UCS Tumbler and Batgirl, and both had the standard "paper" cape. Batman and Robin here feature softer capes, much like the capes you would find on larger Constraction figures, which makes it easier to seat them in the batmobile. Bruce, Dick and Alfred The next round of figures we will look at are Bruce Wayne, Dick Grayson and Alfred Pennyworth. Of the figures in the set, Bruce and Dick are the least interesting in my opinion, though we do get back printing on all of the figures, and alternate expressions. Penguin, Joker, Riddler and Catwoman Next up we have the villains. Firstly we have Penguin. As far as I know, Penguin wasn't super short in the 60s show, so I don't know if the short legs were really needed. He doesn't have a dual sided face due to the hat, and really I just don't find him as interesting as the other figures since you could have pretty easily swapped in a different Penguin- I think I would rather have just gotten Mr Freeze here instead, and had Penguin as a random polybag. I think one of my biggest issues here is that Penguin feels a bit pointless in this set, I just don't really find that there is much for him to interact with in the overall set. Next is Joker, who is, appropriately enough, very bright. The Riddler was the first villain in the show, and the figure is based off of the look of Frank Gorshin, as opposed to John Astin, who only played the character for a few episodes. Catwoman is my favorite figure from the set, she looks stunning, with a great print and hairpiece. I assume she is based off of the Julie Newmar Catwoman. The other three villains come with alternate face prints, including a goofy Joker face and maskless Catwoman. Building Batmobile Build The Batmobile build is pretty simple, given the relatively boxy shape of the vehicle. Overall The 60s Batmobile is a great design, and I'm happy to finally get it at a minifigure scale. While I am still hoping for a UCS scale one to go along with the previous two models, this one will have to do for now. So is it good? Well, it's not great. It's a bit too boxy and loses a lot of the really cool angles of the real thing. The center rim caps are printed which is nice. Profile It's not an awful design as a toy, but it really seems a bit bland once you compare it to the real thing. The rear fins are pretty thick, though other than that the profile is alright. Front Here's where the design falls apart. There really isn't much at the front here that looks like the real thing. The headlights should be at the upper corners, and since they are so pushed in, the orange lights next to them are pushed even closer in. I understand that the vehicle was made narrower to make the garage smaller, but I think too much was compromised here. Also I would have liked for the red outlined intakes to be added on here, even if it were by stickers, since the lack of red on the front takes away a lot of the streamlined look. Rear The back is, again, quite simplified, but we get some of the important details. Please not that there should not be any "plate panel lines" along the red stripe there, it should be one solid piece. I was missing a 4x8 red plate that should have gone back here and had to compromise. Trunk Two pairs of handcuffs and three batarangs are thrown into the trunk. Joker Night on the town Wayne Manor Build As we begin the first module, we create the base and add on some pillar to give it height. Slap some plates on, and build 4 identical window segments. Inner workings of the facade While you might have gotten some hints of the popular Module Buildings line, by no means does this section follow a similar build. Instead, there is a lot of SNOT going on here, with the tan struts adding most of the support. I really can't say I like this approach, as it makes the set feel empty and flimsy instead of the very solid builds of the Modular Buildings or Ghostbusters HQ. Building Further We construct the face of the Manor and place it on. The yellow section builds one of the sets play features, that we will have a closer look at later. Then you construct a rock formation, something you are going to get very, very used to doing by the end of this build. Adding on We mount some fireman poles in gold and the floor of the wayne manor section to tie the build together. WALLPAPER We start off the Manor section with some woodwork and those lovely printed 1x4 bricks with a wallpaper design on them. Other Manor bits Next we construct the desk, bookshelf which uses 1x2 jumper plates as books, and the globe. The bookshelf is constructed with a handle to be used for the sliding function. Sliding mechanism Here we mount the bookshelf to the tower. The tan construct are added to the sides of the tower to flesh out the top a bit more. Also notice that the top portion of the pole are added. Roof The roof of the manor is a large plate with some tiles thrown on, and a makeshift gutter. It's effective, though I find this one-sided cutout of the manor very odd. Completed Manor It's not much, but I have to be honest that this is my favorite part of the build. It looks great, for what small portion there is. Building the Batpile The Batpile gets pretty repetitive. You build the gray segment with the sand green rail 8 times, and the central Batpile sides are also made in a similar fashion. We also build up mirrored sides with some tan BURPS. While most people usually despise BURPS, they are at least a nice change of pace from the tedious custom rock formations. Also, I'm not sure why LEGO chose to use tan pin/axles instead of black pins at the sides to connect the three modules together. Sure it "connects" them, but there is nothing that actually holds the Helipad or Manor to the middle section here. Falling in This actually brings me to another point about the Batpile- this main segment is only mounted by four studs, so it's a bit wobbly. I believe this is so the main central piece can be removed in case you drop something into the top that you can't retrive, like a small accessory or one of the three sticks of dynamite that Riddler includes. Computers Holy batmachines, Batman! We build a slew of retro looking machines. And a cabinet. Erm, well I find it a bit odd that the official LEGO description states that we get the Batcomputer, yet none of these are recognizable as the main unit, which is weird considering they are all specifically made stickers for the set. Gray boxes upon gray boxes Added to the Batpile You can place them all inside the Batpile segment, as shown in the instructions. This is pretty lame, considering there is really no place to put any of these machines other than in there (which makes them inaccessible for the figures.) Helipad build The final segment is the helipad and entrance for the Batmobile. After you are done sweating from the painstaking process of lining up the helipad stickers, you will disappoint yourself by trying to drive the Batmobile through the entrance. It doesn't work. The only points where the tires actually touch the gray pieces are at the very top points at each side, so basically the only thing the Batmobile does is scrape and bang against the base. I'm not sure if it's because the Batmobile is so low or the base is too high, but this is a really sad outcome regardless. I also want to point out the rock structures to each side of the pad- These are "modular" in the sense that they are attached by two pins, and you have to swap that large chunk on the right over to the other side if you want to connect this to the Batpile segment. The same must be done on the Manor segment. Batcycle This isn't the more advanced one with the white side panels, but rather the much older styled one. The side car isn't as streamlined as the real thing, but it's a small and simple build and works well enough. Batman the daredevil Lab equipment (The tape player and Lie Detector were pictured before with the bat equipment to show the complete picture, but you do not actually build them until this step.) The lab equipment is pretty neat, the 1x1 round tiles have a silver cap printing on them to make the bottles more interesting. Batcopter Build We don't get the Batboat, but we do get the Batcopter. It wasn't used in the Television series due to budgeting reasons, but was used during the film. The canopy has the upper half of the bat printed on it, and overall this looks pretty good. It is a little difficult to put the control sticks into a minifigure's hands, but that's a minor complaint. Completed Set Inside The biggest issue I have with this set in terms of it's overall layout is that there is hardly anywhere for anything to go. The machines, lab equipment, and other miscellaneous stuff just sit out and about, since the set wasn't build with any kind of large baseplates underneath it. Completed Set outside The outside of the Wayne manor is the only attractive thing here, and it looks quite out of place with the other batcave elements to the side of it. One Job Pole Mechanism If you want to send Batman and Robin (or in this case, a very dizzy Alfred) down the poles, you can set them on the yellow technic construct, and mount there hands to the gray handle. There's no fancy trigger here, you just pull down on the gray balljoint to move the platform down, and you must do it on both sides if you want to send both down at the same time. Sliding Bookshelf There isn't really a connected function, but rather you tilt the statue back to reveal a button, and can slide the bookshelf over to reveal the top of the poles. I'm a bit annoyed here- this segment of the cave was made extremely tall to accommodate the fireman poles, yet the function doesn't extend to this portion here. Granted, I don't know how the Bruce and Dick 1x2 tiles would have been able to be utilized then, but I'm sure LEGO could have gotten creative. (And yeah, I can already see a lot of laughs around the "Dick" sticker.) Also notice that the green sticker advertises the wanted file for Mr Freeze, making it all the more disappointing that he is a (possibly exclusive) polybag set. Overall I have very mixed opinions on this set. At $270, I would expect either a really great display piece, like the UCS Tumbler or Ghostbusters Firehouse HQ or SHIELD Helicarrier, or I would expect an action-packed playset. This set struggles to be either of those, it really doesn't know what it wants to be. It's not a great display piece; There's a lot of unfinished looking segments, no floor for the extras, and the manor section is quite tall. It's not really a great playset because the only "features" it has is the batpole/platform and a sliding bookcase, both of which require manual effort to achieve instead of any neat functions. (And, the batpole section is quite tall, leading back to the issue of that module being too tall) For $270 you aren't getting a fantastic deal on parts when compared to the Ghostbusters HQ, and most of the coolest looking textures here are created through stickers. The main draw to this set is undoubtedly the minifigures (And I have already seen quite a few of these Batcaves being sold on BL for $100-150 off sticker price without the minifigures.) The brick-build cave formations are neat, though the solid plate walls on the Manor module are quite off putting. I also really like the build of the Batpile and the Manor interior/facade. I know a lot of people have very split opinions here too. Many think that it would be better if it had been split up into 3-4 individual 60's themed sets instead of one larger one. Personally, I think the Batcave works as one full set, but I really there was something more to really "pull" the set together into something cohesive and make space for the extra stuff that's included. Would I recommend this set? I would really only jump on this if you are an absolute diehard fan for the 60s show, or you want to minifigures but don't want to pay aftermarket prices for them. Overall, however, I really find that this set has trouble figuring out what it wants to be, and it comes at a quite a high cost. Share your comments and be sure you leave your vote in the poll!

The trailer basically showed the the Toa landing on the planet (Transformer protoform style) and then the announcer just went over all six, so he would say "Tahu Toa of Fire" and you would see tahu surfing on lava and doing s flip. No voices other than the announcer.

I don't see it as a 9 year long mistake. I also don't really judge G2 against it. LEGO is approaching G2 in it's own way, and it's certainly hard to judge 2 years of G2 vs 9-10 of G1. In a way it's like comparing old LEGO Town to City, or old Star Wars to the new Star Wars sets. Lego parts evolve over time, as do building styles. I can't say that G2 is what G1 should have been- it took 10 years and the evolution into Hero Factory to arrive at this building style, and again we are evolving still. But yes, I still like G1. Sure it has it's flaws, just as G2 does, but I like it for what it is, and I don't really compare it against what we've gotten this year. (I don't think I have mentioned Bionicle G1 at all in my reviews of G2 sets, other than maybe a few references to mask design or whatnot.)

The second time this has been necro'd, and just as cringeworthy as the first. I think I will get around to redoing this review entirely, I can't bare to look at this photography and text. Thank you, we appreciate the feedback!

Some discussion of 2016 vs Bionicle G1 is fine, but let's make sure we keep the focus of the discussion around the 2016 sets.

"Darkness is rising Toa, you cannot stop it" Great threat there Umarak, I'll bet you were thinking of that one all night. I'm not sure if the voices are over modulated or if the audio quality of that trailer was complete garbage, because even the sound effects sound choppy to me. I don't mind the starscream esque voice of Umarak, since I presume he will have a deeper voice as the Destroyer, but Lewa's is horribad. Not as bad as Berix's voice, but certainly nothing great.

Yeah, I had asked John Ho about this on Flickr (One of the designers who worked on Onua) and unfortunately all I got was; I'm gathering that there may have been technical issues with the mold here, or at least something more than just "clear would look better."

These sets look awful. -VBBN, 2016. In all seriousness, I think Ekimu and Umarak are alright but nothing outstanding, but honestly there isn't a single thing about these beasts that I find appealing other than some of the pieces. And while the functions might be interesting in theory, they look very out of place in execution.

Do keep in mind this is for discussion of 2016 sets, not a wishlist of what we want to see in future waves.