Something_Awesome

The Ghost remake is also an Ahsoka show set. LEGO also expected the Ahsoka show to do well. EDIT: Just saw that someone pointed this out.

We still don't know what kind of set it is going to be, Bad End or The Shire in general. Still early. I am GUESSING it will be Bag End, in which case it will have less pieces and be cheaper. Though was my speculation from the start, even when the initial rumor said it would be a Shire set.

You guys think LEGO will give us a Smaug again? Would be another mold, or a very big buildable form? I was looking at the Ninjago Source Dragon build, and it's quite sturdy. Got me to thinking, LEGO may never give us a molded form of him again. Perhaps release him as a standalone $200 set with some figures?

Been saying this for a while. Star Wars toys are not for kids anymore. Actually, only LEGO Star Wars toys do well. And the people that buy them are adults. And more and more, the sets are more for display than they are for play. It also does not help that the Star Wars content over the past several years has not been good. It does not resonate with kids. They think City and Ninjago is cooler. I was at the recent May the 4th release at one of the bigger LEGO stores in the country. Everyone waiting outside the store was adults. A very diverse group of adults. The only thing missing were kids. There were not even any teenagers.

I don't know of an X-Men movie in 2027. I know of upcoming marvel movies, but not an X-Men movie specifically.

I know this is going to sound stupid, but we will be getting a more classic looking magneto in 2027. We could very well get a more classic Magneto before then. Maybe even in multiple sets/releases. I just happen to have some info on 2027. I rather not divulge more to be honest. Obviously this is nothing to write home about. This information is not juicy given how far out in to the future it is. I mean, if we were deep in to 2026 and had not seen a classic Magneto yet, i'm sure this would be earth-shattering news. But like I said, we may get one next year even. I have no idea. I only know about 2027. EDIT: To be clear, we may be getting a classic Magneto in the Mansion. I hope so. My guess is we do because it features Professor X. Maybe I'm just being hopeful.

So according to... I guess toy insiders... Star Wars toys are doing terribly outside of LEGO. Black Series is only doing "decent" when it used to do very well. I live near three LEGO stores in Los Angeles. For about the past year and a half, the Star Wars section never has anyone browsing it at the LEGO store. But There are always young kids at the Ninjago section. This is interesting to me because, after taking note of the kids' ages (assumptively), it looks clear to me that Ninjago was around before a lot of these kids were even old enough to get in to it. It's possible they've picked it up from older siblings. I don't know. But even watching certain reviewers like Danibob, she said her nieces and nephews also much prefer Ninjago over Star Wars. Star Wars is not cool with Gen Alpha. And there is no reason for it to be. The franchise has not made anything compelling. And as for the content from Star Wars that the majority would consider great (episodes 1 - 6?), that stuff has not aged well. But let's say you think the Bad Batch show is good. What's the standard? Maybe it's good compared to cartoons that have come out in the last several years. But the industry used to pump out actual masterpieces, and it seems like the fandom has forgotten that. I don't know that the X-Men cartoon from the 90's will ever be topped at this point. As a side now, I was at the most recent May the 4th release at one of my LEGO stores (a big store). I was there before the store opened. A fairly sizable crowed. No kids. A lot of men and women that were easily 40+. This is who LEGO Star Wars is for. Adults with nostalgia from the franchise they loved for decades. A license cannot last with out new blood. Star Wars does not attract new blood anymore. EDIT: One thing I want to add, as much as I HATE Star Wars display sets, I still think overall LEGO is doing a great job with the theme. I mean, I don't blame them for catering to adults since that's where the money is. But they are still managing to make great stuff. The AT-TE is a 10/10 set. I loved the most recent playscale AT-AT. The Mos Eisley set is also 10/10. The Black Falcon, while not for me, looks AMAZING. Also, I don't mind the helmet holes on clones; however, cloth waistcapes need to come back and I have reason to believe they are coming back in 2025.

I agree that LEGO Star Wars is not for kids anymore. Which is a shame. Not a fan of LEGO stuff that is just meant for display. Hate the dioramas; hate the display-only UCS sets; hate the helmets; hate the midi-scale ships. LEGO will drop the Star Wars license eventually.

Star Wars has become more and more of an adult brand. Young kids don’t like Star Wars the way prior generations did. Aside from the content the past 7 or so years, on the whole, being very bad, the original six movies have not aged well and can be a tough watch.

I don’t want to spoil. I think release day there is a two episode drop? You may overall be fine with the show until week two :/ Oh, and how I got to watch? I live in Los Angeles and know certain people LOL. I do not INTEND to finish the show. May watch a recap of the show or something just to see know for sure the direction Disney is going. Um…. It looks like some directions with story in Ahsoka were influenced by Acolyte. Like, Filoni definitely has taken Acolyte in to consideration :/ Oh and as for LotR, I don’t mean it’s easy to get in to because of the show. But as long as any kid has any fascination with fantasy, they will LOVE the six movies. My baby sister ADORES the six movies, as do my nieces and nephews. I have a niece with LotR prop replicas.

Ok so, it does seem like the Star Wars demographic is getting much older on average. This is largely due to the youngest generations not being in to Star Wars, and the exit of a lot of much older fans from the franchise who are NOT introducing the franchise to their kids. Star Wars these days is a difficult watch and difficult to pick up more organically compared to franchises like Harry Potter and Lord of the Rings. Maybe even, more recently, Dune. The average age of people that watched the Ahsoka show were older millennials. This is not promising as the show was hoping to appeal to a lot of kids that watched Rebels. The drop off of Ahsoka was also bigger than Mando S3's drop off. I think the only big show where a larger proportion of the viewership did not finish the show was the Lord of the Rings show. But it's not even that. Even the George Lucas stuff from 1977, while considered amazing cinema, is a tough watch for kids that are not nudged in to watching it. Star Wars is just hard to get in to. Also, it looks like display-only sets make up a lot more of the LEGO Star Wars release diet (this is regardless of what age is on the box). Kids want to play. Regarding Star Wars' future, you'd think with The Acolyte there is an opportunity for NEW fans because it takes place in a time period almost independent from every other Star Wars work. However, I've seen the first four episodes. And I am 100% certain that, on the balance, the franchise will end up loosing far more fans than it gains with this show based on how the showrunners have decided to impact Star Wars cannon

Posting this to sort of help me think while sharing LOL: I bought Yavin, the Gunship, and the Phase 2 Clone battlepack all on May the 4th and I structured the purchase of the three sets in a way so that I got two Troop Carriers promos. I am strongly considering returning my purchases and GWP's (even though I love the deal on the gunship I got). I been thinking, Ninjago is just too good, and LotR is going HARD, and I don't think I like the Star Wars franchise anymore. And this timing is weird because I have always wanted a Captain Rex and all these cool clones. Not a fan of LEGO's heavier focus of display-focused Star Wars sets the past few years, but otherwise, LEGO has been killing it with Star Wars. Watch me give up the theme and within like 3 years we get a Jango Slave-1, a Geonosis Arena, and Endor MBS set! LOOLLLLL! I'll totally regret it then!

Yeah, I don't know that the delay thing is true. Whispers of a delay do concern me slightly, but until Falconfan or Brick Clicker say otherwise, I am going to go with a June release.

I've heard that the set is being DELAYED. Not sure why or when it will release. But it would make sense for Rivendell and Barad-Dur to compete with each other. We need system scale sets. I don't remember when, but someone else and I did report that Falcon (extremely reliable) said that LotR is "returning" beyond Barad-Dur. I'd like to see a small wave of LotR ssystem scale sets by the end of the year. Maybe a couple small ones, a medium one, and a bigger one? Would be nice.

All great points. Some I had not considered. Also, Falconfan (who is maybe the most reliable LEGO leaker?) sort of revealed on a small livestream a month or so ago that more LotR is coming BEYOND Barad-Dur. I will say this though. I have a very strong bias towards Orcs, Trolls, and Goblins. This is something we are bound to get for LotR, so it has a huge advantage there for me. However.... if we ever see a return of the Castle Troll line in the form of a large set on the scale of the Castle, or Market or Eldorado, I WILL CRY! I actually got in to Ninjago for this very reason with the Master of the Mountain wave which featured skeletons, orcs, and goblins. That's a top two LEGO wave for me. You're not wrong about Star Wars. Tbh it is not something I have admitted to myself because nobody wants to feel like they are getting exploited. There was a marketing expert who said that it is a viable strategy for LEGO to not make the absolute best and most perfect version of a Star Wars figure so that they have room to make changes on future iterations so that the figure continues to sell sets. I am definitely dialing back my Star Wars collecting. I am hoping for an Endor MBS set. With that said, LEGO has done some pretty cool things with the theme. I think the Mos Eisley set is one of the best sets the theme has ever seen and looks great even though it's all tan LOL!

LOL all I been waiting for to fall in to my lap is a 6 bedroom house.

Yeah, it seems like a lot of people do what you do. You buy the sets that have a lot of the pieces you want. You can also build the set before dismantling it which perhaps introduce you to a build technique you did not think of. This is actually an important point. Not a GUARANTEE, but this anniversary set, which is meant to be a brand flagship set and is selling well for a big set, will probably be around for well over the 2 years we typically see for big sets. This gives me the opportunity to save and to use LEGO's wearhouse as temporary storage.

Obviously, as people that collect LEGO, we are limited by money, space, or both (both for me). Castle themes were what got me in to LEGO when I was a kid, and I love them. However, Lord of the Rings is my favorite franchise. The sets currently available for these themes are amazing, and more amazing sets for these themes are around the corner. I can't afford, and don't have room for, both themes. And more LotR sets are around the corner BEYOND Barad-Dur, and I fully expect more castle and castle-tangent sets to come out after the Market set this year. Any of you in my same predicament? Rivendell and Barad-Dur sets; the idea of that is WILD. But The Lion Knights Castle set is epic and now it's going to have a market expansion? The medieval CMF's we keep getting are also awesome. Don't really know what to do here. The other themes I currently collect: Pirates (luckily, LEGO isn't going "all out" on this theme for the time being) Ninjago (Aside from modulars, Airjitzu-like temple sets, or remakes, I decided to not collect anything from this theme anymore from Dragons Rising and onward) Star Wars (I needed to reduce my collecting here, so I don't but anything that is not George Lucas era anymore) So as you can see, I have made huge cuts to how I collect the above three themes. George Lucas era Star Wars stuff is still a broad timeline, but luckily I have zero interest in large UCS sets like the Falcon, AT-AT, Gunship and X-Wing etc even though they are all from episodes 1 - 6. Still, given the overlap between LotR and Castle, I feel like I can only pick one. The only way I could see myself collecting both is if I sold off all the Ninjago stuff or Star Wars stuff. But I don't really want to do that. Oh, and the viking village set is awesome, too Not sure I am expecting advice here, though it is welcome. I think my main goal here was to write and discuss this issue to help think through it.

LEGO did hint at the return of Wolfpack.

Episode 4. Picture of Freddie Prinze Jr as Kanan Jarrus when Syndulla is in the Ghost. It's essentially canon now that Kanan looks like Freddie in live live-action. I have A LOT of juicy information. I only provide what is inconsequential. Again, Star Wars merch is very much under performing. LEGO Star Wars is killing it though, carried by a grown generation with a lot of disposable income. The big problem right now is that internal research shows that the incoming generation does not care about Star Wars. Hence the "fade." I also misspoke when I said "met expectations." I should have said "did not necessarily lose money." But if you can imagine, there is an opportunity cost to everything. Especially when talking about store shelves. What you really want is for the merch to fly off the shelves. I will say that toy/merch manufacturers were actually at odds with Disney not too long ago over what should be produced. I can't get too detailed, but Disney got its way, and sales were down.

Could be. But not believable. I mean where it’s just one big set and more brickheadz. Money talks. I think the real decision for LEGO is if the cheaper entries should be playsets and battlepacks, or dioramas.

Oh nice, just saw your post above mine. Yep. My interpretation is a full theme. Not saying this to wish in to existence. I'm actually just here waiting on the sidelines to see if LOTR or Castle comes back before I decide to collect one of the themes. I'm a fan of the castle themes, but LOTR is my favorite IP. I can afford to collect one, not both. If LOTR becomes a theme, then I can just collect that and buy Rivendell instead of the 90th anniversary castle.

Selling "well" is relative. I probably should have been more careful with my words. I have inside information on stuff of this sort. What I should have said was the sales figures for Star Wars merch for EVERY brand besides LEGO (I mean this in the strictest sense) has met sales expectations. In other words, even where the license was still profitable, it does not mean the brands are happy with performance.

LOTR Leak information: I was in live stream that featured FalconFan, a reliable leaker of LEGO information. My interest was Ninjago, but he dropped a nice side piece of information. He said "there are plans for Lord of the Rings." Whether this means a full-fledged theme, or more high-priced sets BEYOND Barad Dur is unknown to me. But, essentially, if not a whole theme, you can expect at least another set BEYOND the Barad Dur in 2024. This is a good sign for those of us wanting a playscale theme. The stream was already winding down as this got revealed, but my personal interpretation of this bit of information is that we will be getting a LOTR theme.

From the reliable Falcon Fan in a live stream. I asked about the next rumored Ninjago temple set coming out in 2024. I asked if this temple will be as "grand" as the Temple of Airjitzu set. He said it would be beautiful, and while not branded as an 18+ set, it will look as good as one. "It will be as close to an 18+ set as we will get for Ninjago." So essentially, expect it to be very good looking and for it to be detailed. As for the theme of the temple, no firm confirmation. But he seemed to describe it as a sort of stone temple. But take this last part with a grain of salt. The January-March Ninjago sets should be revealed tomorrow. Whether this temple set is part of the January-March waves is unknown to me. Potential big leaks for Ninjago less than 24 hours away.