LOTR and the hobbit lego

[nikink]

Lego does love it's vehicles. Which does in turn make this line problematic. But they do like constructed beasts (as the old Vikings line shows) and buildings (the Castle lines) too. Bearing that in mind here's my thoughts on possible sets from the Hobbit and LotR trilogy.

Gandalf arriving in the Shire (Cart, Gandalf, Frodo)
Trolls on the road (three trolls, maybe turning to stone, Dwarf and Bilbo)
Rivendell (small building, Elrond, Bilbo)
Goblin King (Goblins, Bilbo and Gollum, some cavern interior)
Beorns House (Beorn, Bilbo, maybe a bear, a House)
Mirkwood Spiders (Spiders, Dwarf or two, Bilbo, trees)
Thranduil's Palace (Elf or two (maybe Thranduil and Legolas), Dwarf, Bilbo, architecture and tree, barrels)
Town on the Lake (Bilbo, Dale, Dwarf, Bridge, Boat)
Lonely Mountain (Bilbo (again, sigh), Smaug, some treasure and a cavern)
Tom Bombadil (Old Man Willow, Bombadil and Goldberry, Frodo and Sam, small house)
Wights (very unlikely, but Frodo, Sam, Barrow)
Bree (Frodo, Sam, Aragorn, Ringwraith, tavern)
Weathertop (Nazgul, F+S, Aragorn, ruins)
Rivendell (Elrond, Frodo, probably Arwen, Aragorn, buildings)
Watcher in the Lake (Tentacles, F+S, Gandalf, Door into moria)
Balin's Tomb (Frodo, Aragorn, Gimli, Gandalf, Orcs, Troll, Cavern tomb)
Bridge (Gandalf, Balrog, Bridge)
Lorien (Galadriel, Frodo, Gimli, Elves, TreeHouses, perhaps a boat)
Breaking the Fellowship (Boromir, Merry, Pippin, Orcs, Amon Hen and Boat)
Fangorn (Merry, Pippin, treebeard, Gandalf the White, tree and hut)
Orthanc (Saruman, Orcs, Orthanc entrance, waterwheel and forge)
Meeting Theoden (Theoden, Wormtongue, Eowyn, Gandalf, Greathall)
Helm's Deep (Theoden, Aragorn, Legolas, Gimli, Orcs, big wall with gates)
Faramir's choice (Faramir, F+S, Treehouse hideout)
Paths of the Dead (Aragorn, undead, cavernous interior)
Shelob's Lair (S+F, Spider, cave interior)
Cirith Ungol (F+S, Orcs, Tower room)
Minas Tirith (Merry, Pippin, Gandalf, White tree, gate, wall, courtyard)
Mount Doom (F+S, Gollum, lava pit, great eagle)
Siege of Minas Tirith (over a couple of sets: all the remaining Fellowship, Nazgul, Orcs, Trolls, Battering Ram, Oliphant, Catapult, Rohirrim, Siege engines, Boats, Undead)

You might get:
the Necromancer's tower in Mirkwood (Gandalf, Radagast, Spiders, Evil Tower)
Grey Havens (Frodo, Gandalf, Sam, Elves, Swan Boat)

Biggest issue with the line is the dependency on characters. It's hard to limit a set to a key fig or three. In the above I've assumed Lego will continue the trend from other lines of having the one key character in almost every darn set, but I'd personally hope and prefer they shared the love around the numerous characters.

[Bruce N H]

Can I put you at ease about this? ONLY license figs have flesh tones and will only ever have flesh tones. This includes the african tone and the several different shades of darker flesh. They have only ever been in license and will only ever be.

Just to be a little more precise, most of the non-minifig figs have been fleshies - DUPLO, Scala, Belville, and now Friends figs.

Bruce

[Left4bricks]

I'm happy with theese good news, awaiting for a LOTR theme for years. As said before, there are good and bad points. We will see later who is true, but i suppose that both will be correct, regarding previous licensed themes like POTC or Star Wars. My only one fear is that it could replace Castle Theme, i hope not, because it was going interesting with the "medieval life" look of last sets. I'm not really afraid about expensive price of future sets, because they are always expensive (juste look at Star Wars sets), so we can easily imagine that we will suffer to buy them.

It will certainly be a real challenge to make interesting and complete sets because the LOTR theme (for both books and films) is extremely rich, so i think there's a big risk that we will be disappointed by sets never as good as we hope. But, for sure, there will be lots of new pieces like weapons, helmets, shields and minifigs, creating new possibilites for next MOCs.

[Blego7]

They are going to have a hard time topping Blake's Hobbit creations I think.

Pretty interesting news, there is good and bad to it: new sets/characters/elements, but at a higher price. Between this and the Super Heroes license, I'm going to be really broke this year.

Haha thanks mate.

[OverLoad]

I'm kind of on the fence about LEGO LOTR. I loved the books and films, and I think that there could be some great sets. However, I am very saddened to see Kingdoms go so quickly. I'm guessing we won't be seeing a BF-esque faction revival for Kingdoms since it is ending next year (or it's extremely likely that it will end next year).

That being said, LOTR could bring us new armor pieces (Riders of Rohan viking helmet anyone?) and possibly weapons which is always a good thing. Also, I'm looking forward to a LEGO Nazgûl very much.

[BTappel]

I understand the hesitation many have about LOTR LEGO. Higher prices and an end (probably) to kingdoms are both big downers Guess I will be stocking up on the Joust set.

However, if LEGO designs these sets right (I think they will since they know how much potential money is riding on this theme) it is a very exciting time. We can all agree the mini figs, weapons, and armor will be amazing, and I am just going to assume the theme will sell well. In a way this is like a SW version for castle! We will be getting multiple waves per year for a long time. That for me personally is very exciting as I hate waiting an entire year for new castle sets.

[Heir of Black Falcon]

I am excited about this in many ways. Biggest issue to me is the Fleshies as most of the others here. I just hope they make similar faces in the standard yellow as on the fleshies.

The set names could be potentially awesome.

After seeing what TLC could do with the minifig line I have high expectations of this. I have to admit that knowing they are fleshies lowers my desire to own them all but I will surely be watching the Lego site and aisles at my local TRU, Target and Walmart.


I am not sure with LOTR that Kingdoms is gone. Everyone thought this with PoP but it never happened. I do not know if TLC looks at licensed lines as the same as the 'evergreen' ones. We will just have to wait and see but this is a new occurrence either way. Looking forward to some cool new wizards, dwarves and especially bad guys.

Heir

[Sir Prog]

Not only do we most likely lose Kingdoms for a few years there is this deep rooted fear that I cannot get out of my mind that Fleashies will take over Castle after the reboot. LEGO has been trying to push fleashies into the mainstream figures for a while now. Even Fleashie elves are bad. As previous posters have said FOL's have been recreating LOTR with existing Castle minifigs for years, using creativity and imagination. Now LEGO is saying that's not needed now, here are the LOTR minifigs, right out of the box, no imagination or creative customizing required.


I like fantasy elements but this is not the way to get elves and dwarven sized hobbits(same legs). LEGO does not need more licenses. Is LEGO not making enough from Star Wars and POTC? Soon enough we will only have Star Wars for Space, LOTR for Castle, POTC for Pirates, and Comic heros for Town. Not just meh, bleh!

I love the orchestrated momentum of this slippery-slope argument! LOL

[Brickule]

I myself am quite excited about this, I love LotR and the Hobbit (my favorite books). I doubt it will replace the actual LEGO Castle Line, we have had LEGO space running alongside LEGO StarWars for years. LEGO PotC replacing LEGO Pirates didn't surprise me (I actually was expecting it), Pirates is not a main theme, Castle is. I am not worried one bit. but if LotR/Hobbit does replace the actual LEGO Castle Line, I wouldn't mind (actually I might, I dunno). I was not overly impressed with the recent Kingdoms line anyway.

[Kosh]

I am of two minds on this, the first is I expect (not desire mind you, just expect) that the Non-licensed Castle line goes on hiatus while the LOTR line is out. I find I VERY much like Kingdoms, and will miss having a 'pure' Castle line (opposed to a licensed line, licenses mean it's not JUST LEGO approving the designs). Also Lotr means Fleshies, they just don't mix well with my classic yellow 'figs in my opinion. Also the potential for paying more goes up with the share that goes to the licensor...
Secondly, there is potential for some neat new pieces and some new parts. If the designs are done 'right' it could be awesome.

Now of the above is really new to the debate about Licensed lines or how good (or bad) that the LOTR line will be, shrugs.

Only time will tell how it turns out.

[DaleDVM]

I am only writing to notify that some preliminary photos of the sets have been put up online. I will not link to them or even mention the site where it is being discussed. However, I just wanted my fellow castlers to know about this. I hope I am not being bad. With the glasses on am I less recognizable?

[Blego7]

Having just skimmed through here briefly at first, I now came back for a much more formal/official statement.

Alright, I will try to make this as concise and to the point as possible. First off, I am going to address the popular issues that I see arising, and then post my opinions as well as reply to a terrific post by Casey M..

Replacing Kingdoms:
Really? I for on have only bought... 2 kingdoms sets. I was not at all impressed with the line. The village raid was the main set in my opinion just because of its unique animals and gorgeous peasant figs. I totally understand that some of you guys love the line, (I respect that), but I for one will be very much okay with seeing that pass on, especially if it means gaining a whole new theme of LOTR. Still, I agree with some unnamed member, that having LEGO throw in some random castle creations, (like the Medieval Market Village almost 4? years ago) would be a great and refreshing change to the license.

Fleshies:
This one I thought had much humor in the posts. Like all castle lovers, having anything SW near our castle theme just makes us panic. The new valuable faces that all of us want, to be put on fleshies, which none of us use, is a very interesting conundrum. Kinda makes me think about the old days when SW still had yellow heads. sigh... But I digress. I believe that the main problem that all of us have with the fleshies, is that they are not yellow. Lets face it, never has there been a castle theme before that used fleshies. PoP was closeish but it didn't actually replace castle.

License:
First off is the expense. As we have seen with the other recent licenses, LEGO hikes the price up ever so slightly in effort to gain some revenue with some more popular themes. I can totally understand this. Building recognizable themes like LOTR/SW is very popular with the public. At Brickfair, it was interesting to see how many people reacted to seeing Amon Hen. Many didn't care about how well built it was, they were just there cause it was LOTR. That part I can understand. LEGO attaining a popular license is money in the bank for them. As I said, I can understand the price change, but naturally nobody likes it. Having anything disrupting our money flow will be unwelcome to be sure. Ultimately, though, I would love to pay a little extra if I can get some solid figs/bulk bricks out of the deal.


As I was browsing through the responses, I noticed a very well thought out post by Casey M. who was addressing some very good points. I thought it would be a great way to express some of my concerns with the line by responding to his.

- ...Any kind of FOL throughout the past decade ('00-Present), has figured out to recreate LOTR in their own way. The Balrog, elves, hobbits, hobbiton, etc. I've even created my own fellowship once. Lego has arlready provided us enough elements to make it ourselves. Bruce recreated LOTR in visual form, Blake has/is re-creating scenes like Amon Hen + others, a group of MOCpage users made an entire LOTR display at Brickworld 2011 (plus there was another builder there, unaffiliated with the group of MOCpage users, who still brought some awesome LOTR stuff), Brickforge has produced several LOTR items (and prints too, I think), The One Lug creating The Last of March of the Ents...

This is the section that I think I have more experience than the average builder in. Those of you who know my building record, know that I absolutely love to buildin LOTR theme. I am a huge fan of the movies and books, and love the LOTR medium because it gives me all my main interests.(Castle, landscape, water, architecture) For myself, who has managed without the license, I feel myself dreading the release date. One of the major reasons for me building in LOTR, is that it isn't a licensed theme! Honestly, if I wanted to build in a licensed unoriginal theme, I would go over to SW for crying out loud! This is my main and only nitpick with the license. Sorry, "nitpick" isn't fitting the bill too well here... "travesty" comes to mind. I can't really express the resentment I have at what could be interpreted as "My Precious" being stolen. I feel as though once the sets come out, LOTR LEGO will be losing what made it good, the original concepts and minifigs. Also, I expect the theme itself will grow exponentially. I have found my small little quiet niche in the castle world there, and I suddenly have the fear that the niche will be in the spotlight, and that it will be the next big "Star Wars" product. Part of it is my egotistical self saying "I dont want Amon Hen to be outdone!" but then another side is wanting "...to have my quaint theme back, untainted by the license." Needless to say, I feel quite bitter about this part of the license. A lot of my friends are totally pumped for this, while I am weeping in the corner.

- If the Eurobricks set list is true, virtually none of the sets seem to be There and Back Again related. Even with the LOTR liscense, and everything pretty much being done already in the LOTR realm, I was hoping for some really interesting Hobbit sets, but it looks like I'll have to wait for those. 2013 for Hobbit? Yes? No? Maybe?

Judging by the fact the The Hobbit movie isn't projected until December 14th, 2012, I expect we will have to wait around there

- From someone who actually likes fleshies, I don't mind them, but I completely agree with the torsos. The Indiana Jones "soldiers" (Nazis) had the patch of flesh on the chest, some of the PoP sets had some flesh on them, PotC is doing the same thing. I get where you're coming from.

Aha! Finally, someone who is expanding their range a little bit. Like Casey, I am also trying to use Fleshies, (My recent Hobbit creations) more and more. I currently only have... 20 heads right now. So it takes a good bit of changing around to get the figures done. But, I am very excited to have some new and familiar faces in fleshy, which IMO looks more realistic and better in plastic form, even if it isn't the cute classic yellow we all grew up with.

As I said before, I really dread the set releases that will destroy my "niche". However, this doesn't prevent me from looking forward to the new molds and lovely figure accessories/torsos. Having seen some of the new confidential photos, I was really pleased with the quality of the sets, which helped pacify my anger a little bit.

Well, that is my official statement here on CC. I got asked a lot of questions on flickr regarding this issue, cause of my deep connection with LOTR, and I finally summed up something of a trace of my feelings. I hope you all took the time to read this post. I hope it is worth your while.

Soli Deo Gloria!
-Blake

[andhe]

I wouldn't take it as a confirmation of Kingdoms continuing, but according to this Twitter chat
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/thebrick ... ng-in-2012
the castle line will continue at least, alongside LOTR (I know, its desperate times when one relies on Twitter for information).

I may be reading too much into it, but the reply about Lego Kingdoms said CASTLE would continue. Isn't that the generic name for the theme (space, city, castle being core themes) with Kingdoms being the specific name for this current run (to distinguish it from the previous fantasy stuff I guess).

But either way I could see a world where LOTR and castle sets are both being sold, similar to the Star Wars and Space Police situation. With a licensed theme for fans and collectors, and the lego line for the general consumer who just wants some lego.

[Bluesecrets]

I wouldn't take it as a confirmation of Kingdoms continuing, but according to this Twitter chat
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/thebrick ... ng-in-2012
the castle line will continue at least, alongside LOTR (I know, its desperate times when one relies on Twitter for information).

I may be reading too much into it, but the reply about Lego Kingdoms said CASTLE would continue. Isn't that the generic name for the theme (space, city, castle being core themes) with Kingdoms being the specific name for this current run (to distinguish it from the previous fantasy stuff I guess).

But either way I could see a world where LOTR and castle sets are both being sold, similar to the Star Wars and Space Police situation. With a licensed theme for fans and collectors, and the lego line for the general consumer who just wants some lego.

Take everything you hear and read with a grain of salt. Unless you are under an NDA from TLG, you are not privy to future sets and lines. And if you are indeed under an NDA, then they can not legally disclose that information. Not even the ambassadors (I am one) have access to future sets or lines. Speculate all you want, but I wouldn't take the word of anything I see online as 100% truthful until real proof exists. Real proof being pictures from a Toy Fair or press releases from TLG or what not.

[BTappel]

I wouldn't take it as a confirmation of Kingdoms continuing, but according to this Twitter chat
http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/thebrick ... ng-in-2012
the castle line will continue at least, alongside LOTR (I know, its desperate times when one relies on Twitter for information).

I may be reading too much into it, but the reply about Lego Kingdoms said CASTLE would continue. Isn't that the generic name for the theme (space, city, castle being core themes) with Kingdoms being the specific name for this current run (to distinguish it from the previous fantasy stuff I guess).

But either way I could see a world where LOTR and castle sets are both being sold, similar to the Star Wars and Space Police situation. With a licensed theme for fans and collectors, and the lego line for the general consumer who just wants some lego.

Um... wow! LOTR and castle?! LEGO is making it hard to save money