Posted May 30, 200915 yr I browsed a bit , tempted to buy Arkham Asylum , but I saw ~$200 starting prices. Then I checked the Batcave, which I bought a year ago for 80 Euro (including shipment, but probably the set was round 60). And it goes for round $200 too (MISB). Is this the fastest price rise or what? Same with the minifigs - Penguin starts at $5, Batman and Robin at 10 and Mr Freeze at 20 (and he is quite rare too) !!! My thoughts on this are: - The Dark Knight came out, and while this was certainly taken into account by LEGO, its success might have surpassed the expectations. - LEGO stopped their license for Batman. Your thoughts?
May 30, 200915 yr Yeah i know. Arkham was a very rare set. It's maked only once. I'm happy i have it, i'm happy i have all the batman sets. I don't know why the batcave is that expensive. Mr freeze and penguin and robin are reales again in 2008. Maby bruce and alfred?
May 30, 200915 yr Author Yeah i know. Arkham was a very rare set. It's maked only once. I'm happy i have it, i'm happy i have all the batman sets. I don't know why the batcave is that expensive. Mr freeze and penguin and robin are reales again in 2008. Maby bruce and alfred? Yeah, Mr. Freeze is a surprise, he was in a small set after all. I would understand if figs exclusive to the largest sets were expensive. Alfred starts at $15, Bruce at $10. I am not such a big Batman fan, though I wanted to have the Scarecrow. I remember contemplating getting the set with the batcopter, but it was overpriced back then. Compared to now however, that price seems quite low. I also want the Joker.
May 30, 200915 yr Discontinuing Batman wasn't even a gradual thing where the remainder of the stock was around for a long while after, like Exo-Force or Aquaraiders - it disappeared abruptly, and very few people expected it (especially with the tragically short run of the 2008 sets). I think that Batman becoming so impossible to find so quickly at any retailer contributed to the outrageous prices for sets and figs. He's still in demand, LEGO just isn't manufacturing him to meet it!
May 30, 200915 yr I feel very fortunate to have snatched up all of the villains and a few of the key sets (most of the sets are not "display-worthy" in my mind) while they were still fairly cheap. Just look at how much the tumbler set has shot up. Last time I checked, there were only 8 selling on BL for around $200US. I managed to snag 2 arkham sets MISB for less than $50US each last July; now they go for four times that price. What I did was I used the pieces from both sets to create one big openable asylum loosely based on LEGO's design (will post pics soon). Every time I look at my creation today, filled with every one of the villains, I am thankful for my timing, as it would cost me around $600US to build it today. Also, during this time I was working on a number of TDK MOCs and wound up with a bunch of Joker, Batman, and Two-Face figs from BL. I've sold a few of my extra villains recently for a pretty penny on BL. I never quite got all the appeal for the batcave set though. I could throw something together in no time that would look way better than that. Edited May 30, 200915 yr by Maegnus
May 30, 200915 yr They had quite a collection of Batman sets in LEGOland Günzburg, and those prices were lowered! Just depends where you look for them I guess.
June 4, 200915 yr I browsed a bit , tempted to buy Arkham Asylum , but I saw ~$200 starting prices. Then I checked the Batcave, which I bought a year ago for 80 Euro (including shipment, but probably the set was round 60). And it goes for round $200 too (MISB). Is this the fastest price rise or what? Same with the minifigs - Penguin starts at $5, Batman and Robin at 10 and Mr Freeze at 20 (and he is quite rare too) !!!My thoughts on this are: - The Dark Knight came out, and while this was certainly taken into account by LEGO, its success might have surpassed the expectations. - LEGO stopped their license for Batman. Your thoughts? Lego HAS stopped the Bat-license.
June 4, 200915 yr Wow, that's some heavy prices there, I'm really glad I snatched them up when I did, me being a huge DC fan and everything. Still, I would've liked to have bought another Arkham atleast... Batbrick Away!
July 2, 200915 yr Batman got discontinued because the movies were getting way too dark. Probally right.But still, the sets were based off the COMICS.And the comics are a bit dark, I mean look at Gotham City Limits, batman is fighting zombies versons of murder victims and his friends.
July 5, 200915 yr Batman was cancelled because it wasn't selling well at the time. I got dozens of Batman sets at 50% or more off. Prices are going up because collectors are either desperate or not so bright and sellers are getting greedy. Of course I think anybody looking to spend more than a few dollars per figure is a little off kilter. What makes it worse is that most of the sellers got those sets for $35 or less and are looking to make some good money off all the late comers.
July 5, 200915 yr I'm currently trying to buy minifigs to complete my Batman set, but wowsa have the prices jumped even on bricklink, I find Carboots can be a great source for rare LEGO, if you get there before the Ebay sellers! I only managed to get one set (Harliquin) before they went from LEGO. Its a shame, but it also means my figures are now worth a lot more than I paid for them.
July 5, 200915 yr same with me i cant find a real printed lego joker minifig anywere and evrywhere i look they r like over £60 and i bought a robins scuba jet attack of the penguin set for £15 tho which was cheap
July 10, 200915 yr Haha I went through a phase and loved batman so I bought tons now I just trade off the figures because I don't care about them anymore
July 17, 200915 yr Yeah, it's a shame that LEGO closed the license when it did...they did it just as The Dark Knight was hitting its stride, there's a new Batman cartoon on Cartoon Network for the kids, and, most egregiously, right when the Batman LEGO videogame was coming out. That makes zero marketing sense to me. Roll out this great game, and then kids can't find any of the toys that would have complemented it? That seems like a big misstep on LEGO's part. Blessed be their names. I'm glad I have my Batman LEGO sets--my sons and I play with them all the time. But I've had a lot of other parents of kids the same age ask if I know where they can find them, and I have to tell them eBay or Bricklink...which means someone somewhere is scoring lots of $$$, and it's not LEGO. Which is a shame.
July 27, 200915 yr Yeahi really liked batman.I am really stupid i forgot to get the harley quinn set! I have all the other ones. If my mom lets i order her off of the big toy hut or some website like that.Oh yeah btw i lost my joker's hair...Im mad its been eight months without that hair! And i agree they are over priced cause i checked amazon its crazy its like a ten dollar set now for $100.
July 27, 200915 yr The prices realy have sky rocketed, i saw the price for Mr. Freezes buggy or whatever it is (usualy 10.00) being solg for 64.00 on bricklink. Makes me happy i got so many set (Batcave batwing UCS batmobile archam asylam Mr freeze chase)
August 1, 200915 yr The prices are not normal anymore. I can't believe it! 400 dollars for Arkham, that's crazy! Am i glad that i have all the batman sets :).
August 1, 200915 yr The prices are not normal anymore. I can't believe it! 400 dollars for Arkham, that's crazy!Am i glad that i have all the batman sets :). Yea I am Glad that I have The Riddlers and Banes Hideout set,which sells now for like £160 on Ebay but I did want The Joker's Aerial Assault, but it's over £150 on Ebay and higher on Bricklink I think. Anyway I'm glad I have all the sets containing "The Riddler".
August 1, 200915 yr This is pretty much the case for any Lego regardless of theme. After a few years out of production, the prices go up. It's simple supply and demand.
August 1, 200915 yr This is pretty much the case for any Lego regardless of theme. After a few years out of production, the prices go up. It's simple supply and demand. Prices do tend to go up, but these extreme increases are not typical. Spider Man sets, for example, fetch a higher price, but not 4x higher price.
August 1, 200915 yr Licensed sets prices tend to rise more dramatically than other themes but Batman has especially risen quickly, If a store had any in a back room or something they could make a couple thousand dollars with these prices.
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