Toa Zaz

The nixel leader in the video is interesting, a set version would be kind of cool.

I don't think I've seen anything on this forum that's ever made me quite as angry as this. Art is art. You know, it's not like people spend decades of their life training and learning to do this stuff, art is art! Same dang thing if you draw a scribble or if you practiced everday since you were ten to do it! and shoot if it only takes you a few days whyzit cost so much goshdern it! Just cuz you spend yer life learning the skill ain't mean nothin'! ...talk about rudely dismissive of any other opinion. Whether or not you agree with it I think my opinion has some reasoning behind it and should be respected. I've expressed my opinion politely, could you all please be polite back? but ok, I've made my point and I'll stop. You all are right, D'anda should be able to charge as much as he wants and you should spend your money however you want.

I guess the price is realistic, but that just puts into question whether this commission would really be worth spending that kind of money. Art is art, whether it's by a professional or an amateur, and likely there wouldn't be much of a variation in quality either way. Like Aanchir said, it isn't like we don't know what these characters look like. I guess if D'Anda was producing an original and canon design of a character like Lariska who we do not have any official image of, then it might be a little more valuable, but paying that much still seems unnecessary.

A (good) Smaug set could be amazing. The question is how they could accurately depict a creature of that size. A constraction-oriented build, maybe? Preferably at least the size of the Invasion from Below Queen. Or I guess they could do something akin to the Ninjago dragons. Hopefully they don't do something like the Harry Potter dragon, or just make a really detailed head or something.

It's so weird that this Ninja Turtles movie is supposedly about to come out this year , but there's no official trailer or poster or anything. What gives? Maybe it'll be delayed ad they'll have to recall all their merchandise at the last minute like GI Joe Retaliation. Here's a leaked picture of the 2014 turtles: http://pmchollywoodlife.files.wordpress.com/2014/01/ninja-turtles-poster-lead.jpg?w=600 So, how did the turtle minifigures look, like, in relation to this picture? Did they have any of the accessories detailed or anything like that?

Ah. No wonder that ending sucked so much. The episode kind of seemed like it was leading to a peaceful resolution, actually, with Breez reading the glyphs and Furno getting captured after fighting and beating Splitter Beast. That's really a shame that it was ruined like that. I guess some of the set pieces, like the zero gravity chamber, or the crystal place, or the weird column-place, or the acid pools or whatever, could have been cool, but the episode was so rushed we never really got a chance to explore them. Again, working within a too-short running time (this could have made a good hour-long special), I guess it was impressive that they fit everything in but I would have just cut some stuff out to make time.

Yeah, there are definitely constraction sets this year which they displayed at Nuremberg, I don't know why they didn't have them in New York.

It's a relief to see that the Surge machine is $25, the same as Evo XL Machine (the Surge machine has one more piece-count). I was worried that it might be more expensive because it comes in a box, not a large bag.

So, there are a few other reviews that allude to a live-action third act. Basically, I suggest anyone who doesn't want the movie totally ruined, don't read any reviews unless they're from fan sites like BZPower where everyone is pretty spoiler-conscious.

Yeah, that critic should really edit the review and take that out (although it isn't really explained how much it pertains to the plot). Everyone out there who hasn't seen the movie, don't read the "rotten" review. It gives away a (presumably) really major spoiler.

97% on Rotten Tomatoes, dang it. Still , overall much better reception than I anticipated (and this demonstrates that Lego wasn't paying the critics off to give a 100% score)

Great to hear that you enjoyed it, and also the Bionicle reference. What I was worried about in this movie was all the pop-culture references, ie the justice league, Star Wars characters, Gandalf, etc were going to be detrimental to the film. Were these characters used sparingly enough, or did they bog down the movie? Also, what do you think of the possibility of future theatrical Lego-based movies?

Incidentally, the first wave of Ninjago almost had set up a dichotomy in which the protagonists are more traditional whereas the antagonists use modern technology such as big trucks, motorcycles, etc. I guess this could've been explored, but they quickly abandoned that in favor of giving everybody high-tech vehicles and such.

One person's opinion doesn't constitute everybody's.

You're right that inspirations from Eastern culture are few and far between, really stereotypical and crude, and demonstrate an inaccurate and politically incorrect view of Eastern culture that at least borders on racism. I would also add that the characters/settings typically appear to be European, marginalizing people of color whom the ninja theme took inspiration from. This is just as deeply problematic in Lego's other themes and their use of a non-neutral yellow as skin color. Yellow is obviously a stand-in for white, as in the Simpsons; this is more evident in the detailed modern minifigures with clearly all European features, and also the fact that in The Lego Movie the non-licensed character that Morgan Freeman plays is black and not yellow, because yellow=white. But I digress. I would also add that the marginalization of women in Ninjago is very problematic/offensive (Ninjago is better than other Lego themes, but not much). However, I enjoy the anachronistic inclusion of Western elements such as robots, high-tech vehicles like airplanes, etc. It makes little sense, but neither does Ninjago really, and it fits the universe well. The anachronism is unique, creative, and fun, and makes Ninjago well-defined. I think all the violence and action in the line is detrimental, however, and I think it should stray away from the violent, warlike quality. I would appreciate if it got back to the martial arts roots, though. Maybe the robots and stuff are a bit too much.

30th is Thursday.

The polls will be up on BZPower soon. Okay, thanks.

So, where do I vote for the Flickr contest?

Again, that much money for a drawing is totally ridiculous. Some great fan artists would happily draw one of the characters like that for free.

I think any of the few positive qualities of Hero Factory (story, the sets are good. Definitely a lot more solidly consistent that Bionicle was, although I really don't like the look of the summer IfB wave) were totally thrown out of the window by a. their awful habit of ending on a cliffhanger and then never going back to that ever again as if it never happened b. their reduction of the yearly story to "some mindless creature things invade the city, the heroes fight them. That's it." c. throwing everything that they had ever established and replacing it with the unrecognizable garbage that constituted the recent episode, which made the cheesy, campy, kiddy-oriented previous episodes seem utterly enjoyable in comparison. Bionicle, most of the time (not all of it), but mostly they seemed to be genuinely trying to come up with a creative, interesting, dramatic, engaging story. And even when they really weren't (the first couple years prior to Mask of Light), the setup, characters, and world-building was infinitely superior to Hero Factory. Now they're not even trying. I mean, at first it seemed like they were interested in some sort of story (albeit stupid, unoriginal, overly simplistic and boring), but by Brain Attack they were just sleep-walking. They barely even really marketed it or anything, either. With Bionicle we got books (not really near the end), canon comics, online games and videos, and a couple of movies. And, aside from the games, they all had to do with the story. Now, they don't even tell you when the episode is going to air on TV, because Lego doesn't care about Hero Factory at all. Hopefully the new constraction figure line will be better.

Awesome news. The one thing is, plus commercial four hour-long specials probably translate to eight episodes (1 hour= 40 minutes without commercials). The game sounds interesting, too.

^and at the end, it's treated as cause for celebration, not a tragedy. If it had been treated differently, maybe it would've worked better.

The full episode was disturbing, I'll leave it at that for now.

First, this website is miles better than the Brain Attack one, thank God. Second, I haven't seen the full episode yet, I just watched the 5-minute recap. Um... it was solid, I guess. Not great, but not the worst. Pros: Lots of action, something severely lacking in some previous episodes. And actually the action is pretty good.Pretty good animationPretty much no stupid humor for kids, actually. This is a big plus.New voices mean Surge sounds less annoyingNew, very unique looking heads Cons: New voices sound bored and lifeless. Like the voice actors were practically sleepwalking.No continuity with old episodesEven less actual story than Brain Attack. In fact, this demonstrates more than ever that Hero Factory is nothing more than a toy commercial, they're not even really pretending anymore.The heads look weirdAnimation is mostly limited by reusing old elements.From what I understand, this episode ends on yet another cliffhanger that will never be resolved.This is a matter of opinion, I guess, but the Beasts/Mechs are kind of poorly animated, they don't seem as large or heavy as they should. They move basically like regular heroes do, they should have more weight to them.They still talk about their weapons all the time, that's it. The dialogue is pretty bare-bones in this one. Even in Brain Attack, we get some human-like interaction between them (Stormer and Breez' thing about animals, etc). Again, obviously just a toy commercial.But I'm afraid I'm making it sound worse than it was. It wasn't that bad, it was pretty underwhelming.

Well, in terms of a lack of innovation and a stagnant design for sets which signaled the end for Bionicle, I would say that Hero Factory has kind of gotten into a rut with the 2.0 system. And also, based of the Invasion from Below videos the 2014 summer wave looks very, very unexciting and has almost no new parts or anything like that. But, I would counter the comparison to the Inika by saying 1. The 2.0 system is much more versatile, creative, interesting, and overall superior to the Inika builds. More complex designsMore ability for customization (which Lego unfortunately hasn't reached its full potential with)Aside from the empty backs and annoyingly large feet, pretty much human proportions. My biggest problem with the Inika were the long arms and wide, flat torsos.2. The Invasion from Below wave marks some significant innovation by Lego to include mini-figures and make the scale of the action larger. However, the new Hero Factory sets also have some of the problems of Bionicle in its late years 1. Getting more expensive. I think ten dollars for the equivalent of an impulse set, and one as puny and pitifully devoid of substance (even feet) as Evo Walker is totally unreasonable. 2. Story is dissatisfying. For Bionicle it was too convoluted and the 2008-2010 story wasn't as interesting as before (who really liked Bara Magna?) For Hero Factory Lego has basically given up on any story at all and is just cranking out the laziest premises ever.