Vorahk1Panrahk2

 

...I think Azari is cute. There, I said it.

No arguments there!

 

Incidentally, there's been a minor update to the LEGO Elves site. The "Meet the Characters" and "Explore Elvendale" features on the front page are now working (previously, the headers were there, but not the content). There are some very interesting pictures and info to be seen there!

 

Also, who else has played the mobile app? It's not very story-intensive, but I definitely found it fun (nice to have a less action-oriented LEGO game), and it's got beautiful graphics.

 

Both of those were working for me at the initial launch, but only intermittently. Anyone think we'll be seeing more of the desert lands next year, assuming the line continues? Judging from what clips we've seen so far (and set designs) it doesn't seem like any deserts feature this year, so it seems like a strange thing to add.

All that is irrelevant though, of course, because in the book, the dwarves and the dragon never even come face-to-face and the scene they added in the movie was completely ridiculous and added only to give some 'action' and allow them to make a third film. Okay, rant over.

 

In fairness, they scene was added after the story was split into three movies. It didn't allow Jackson to do anything except give his film a climax. Or maybe that's what you meant but the wording was strange.

But that's neither here nor there- I'm not sure if film accuracy is something that licensed sets should be judged by. Still it's good that it was reviewed positively in spite of some initial negative reaction from the first pictures. I don't own the set personally, but it looks like it has a lot of nice display value and play functions... which seems like a win-win to me. If it wasn't for that price.

So is this going to be the same program that was accidently released on the Elves site a few weeks ago? And will presumably be uploaded to the site later on?

Bought Aira's Creative Workshop which also came with the Hero Pack and the Elves polybag for free! Total came out to about 16 dollars, which is a pretty good deal. It would have been a better deal if I lived near a LEGO store and didn't have to pay that abysmal five dollar shipping charge, but ah well you can't have everything. I missed out on a few exclusive masks during the G1 era of BIONICLE so I'm glad that I'll be able to add this one to my collection. And of cousre I'm looking forward to jump starting my Elves collection with those two smaller sets.

While I'm pretty sure this wasn't my first exposure to BIONICLE, my first memory of it is seeing a preorder for Tahu and Vakama back in one of the 2001 magazines. Prior to then I may have seen visual advertisements in the magazines and such, but nothing more specific comes to mind.

Almost every single BIONICLE set I own (minus seven or so) are sitting on a shelf that runs the perimeter of my room, in chronological order of year. The only two out of order of Ehlek and Onua (2015), and they're that way because I didn't feel like trying to make room in the shelf areas where they should be. Of the sets that are not on the shelf, they are off either because I'm using their pieces in MOCs, I think the sets are ugly, or they're missing pieces and as such don't want them displayed.

As for canisters, most of them are stored in a box in an attic. I'm sure by now the heat has deformed them and there's probably no real reason to keep them aside from my awful collector's mentality. Some canisters are stored in my closet, and those are holding pieces for sets not on the shelf.

Has a date been listed yet for the season 5 premier, or are we still in that non specific "2nd Quarter" world? And was there a reason for the delayed start?

Well, this puts my fears of a drastically weaker LEGO Movie 2 to rest.  I've watched a bit of Parks and Recreation before, and I found it quite hilarious.

Bear in mind that he's only credit with one episode ("Camping").

He may be a first time director for an animated feature... but that's not necessarily a bad thing. I wish him good luck on the project!

Go-go was the best character.

 

I'd be much more interested in a spin-off with her as the star.

I don't think there's much hope for a sequel or television spinoff, but I'd be very interested in a comic series. It could continue the story while providing opportunities to spotlight the supporting characters. I know that it's already based on a Marvel property, but the film and original comic are different enough that a completely new comic would be necessary.

I say it wouldn't be financially sound, but... in my latest spending spree, I did it anyway!

Hopefully it was the Blu-Ray so you avoid those pesky region code problems!

Spoilers, I guess, for the first 15-ish minutes of the movie.

And also I'm just not sure if the movie devoted enough time to that theme. It comes in the end, obvisouly, and some parts in the middle, but I'm not sure of it was enought to really differentiate it from all the other comic book movies we've been getting recently.

But I really liked how the movie glorified science by having all the characters' "powers" come from their lab experiments. And the lab scene itself is really wonderful even if the science itself is pretty wonky. If kids watche this movie and get inspired to pursue science related interests, then I think all other flaws can be forgiven.

I'll be getting the DVD from the library soon so maybe a second watch will give me a different viewpoint on the movie (as a second viewing usually does).

It is a nice model, but yeah it's a tad on the large side. I wouldn't be opposed to it passing through (we need more non licensed Ideas sets), but I can't say I'd be willing to spend money on it.

If that's the exact same model Sawaya made for the Oscars, wouldn't it be against Ideas policy of submitting ideas that aren't your own?

Oh wait, unless he put it up there himself... he did link it from his Twitter account anyway. It's a cool little model, but I feel like this one is simple enough that a link to instructions would be enough. Not sure if it needs to be an official set.

Does anybody else feel like this theme is being overhyped? Like, the set designs look okay, but with the mini-doll figures instead of the minifigures it just doesn't feel like the action theme it was touted to be

Was it ever touted to be an action or conflict heavy theme? It was intended to be story based much like Ninjago or Chima, but you can have story without action.

Great to see the site updated with lots of new information on the characters. Much like the early BIONICLE site, though, it'd be nice if it wasn't all in a wall of text. I'll assume it will get edited later. And also it would be nice if it worked consistently. Has anyone else been having issues getting a blank white page when trying to look at the Elves page?

It's odd, certainly... but kind of cool, I guess? If anything I now have another excuse to google images of the White Cliffs of Dover. One day I'll visit them!

Ah, so that's where Emma Stone got her LEGO Oscar- I tuned in an hour late and couldn't figure out why she had one. When they briefly showed her later in the ceremony she was clutching it like it the most valuable thing in the world to her. I hope she got to keep it!

Loving the deep sea and space themes for city- I think I'll have to pick up at least one of each of those. I also really like how the Pirates sets harken back to the more classic style (or at least the style of the 2009 sets) as opposed to the Pirates of the Caribbean sets we got for a few years.

While I never met him, my coworkers told me of a guy who used to frequent our work who would ocassionally stop and talk to them about how the Illuminati where fixing the system and keeping us little people down. He reportedly cited Geroge W. Bush and the Queen as high ranking members. Apparently he doesn't show up anymore. I guess the Illuminati finally got him.

Those Scooby Doo sets are near perfection. I love how they feature the more iconic villains from Where Are You? and the settings are spot on. Were you able to tell if the minifigures had alternate expressions?

The middle Mixel in the purple wave says 'wine press' to me. After all he's holding (what could be imagined as) grapes and has a bucket around his neck. The first one has those large round pieces which look like stuffed cheeks to me. Maybe as a whole they're supposed to be juice makers? Or big eaters?

I love the macroscale bricks and hardware that come with the Ant-Man set! They're kind of cute! I do wonder, though, why someone would keep screws with their LEGO bricks?

I'm surprised at how many sets were based from The Phantom Menace, since a lot of Star Wars fans hated that movie. But that doesn't mean the sets were bad, because they looked great. 

The Phantom Menace gets a lot of flack, but personally I think there were a lot of great design elements for it. I'd even go so far as to say that some of the vehicles from that movie (mainly the Naboo Starfighter, MTT, and Droid Control Ship) can stand right beside other iconic original trilogy ships like the X-Wing, Millennium Falcon, and the Death Star. As much flack as I give LEGO for contiuing to churn out repeats, I can't exactly blame them. Those vehicles are cool, and probably more well known than ships strictly from the animated series and video games (like the Wookie Gunship).

My only memories of the Skyhopper are from the bonus Tatooine racing level from Star Wars: Rogue Squadron. Don't go too high!

Anyway, I just see these sets as an appetizer while we wait for The Force Awakens sets. Hopefully that movie provides us with a lot of new, memorable vehicles and locations that will translate well into LEGO. And hopefully they avoid the temptation to give us another Millenium Falcon, though the last large-scale model came out in 2011 so they'll probably think enough time has passed in order to give us another. Even so, Disney's plans for Star Wars should provide enough material to avoid too many repetitions in the future.

Hopefully.

Last I heard the Ninjago movie was schedule for 2016- a whole year from now. Did that change?

That Morro Dragon looks wonderful, but even if it wasn't I'd want it just for the transparent green chain. Sooo many good looking recolors in these sets!

Interesting to note is the backround on the Skull Warrior's box art. It seems the Toa are up against "swarms" of villains again!

For box art, also note the hands reaching out toward the masks. It looks as if the Skull things are stealing the masks from whoever those hands belong to, which I would assume are our Toa heroes.