The closest to New Zealand getting any recognition by Lego, unless they make an architecture set?

Funny enough I was cleaning up my old Hobbit Erebor set last night. Funnier still, I forgot this set even existed.

Those shields are great, and I think they're unique to this set.

Nice collection of figures, with a Warg, too. I wish I were a Lord of the Rings fan when I see sets like this. The build is, meh. Maybe if you get three of these...

I got 4 of these back in the day to make a fortress! Not as easy as it looked from the box! I only got 1 set with figures, kind of regret that now! Can't wait for more Middle Earth sets, especially if there are some at this scale and price point.

Sure are!

I’m not sure even this minifig accurately captures Lee Pace’s incredible eyebrows

At one point, I was considering buying this alongside 9471 to have two, almost evenly matched mini-armies: the humans and elves with a forest wall and a horse against the uruk hai and goblin forces with a fortress wall and a warg. Both this and 9471 are lovely impulse sets with lots of goodies.

Personally I found Desolation of Smaug to be the best of the Hobbit movies, and the barrel scene, which this set is in part representing as it gives a bit more setting and characters to interact with in conjunction with 79004, was one I found to be quite fun and enjoyable even though I usually only hear disdain for it on the Internet. I never read the book, and the movies are overly long, and I want to say that the scene was mostly invented because the Dwarves just get in the barrels and escape, but what fun is that? What's wrong with a battle between all these Orcs and Elves? The movie kind of needed it. I don't know whose idea it was to split the movie into 3 instead of its initial 2, but if that meant having just a little bit more action, I'm okay with it, the sequence is fun.

Some armored elves with helmets would've been great...

Best! Battle! Pack! EVAAAAH!!!
No...?!

@CCC said:
" @WemWem said:
"Talk about a set that’s appreciated in value. "

Every original LOTR and Hobbit set..."

Except Sehlob, that one is being sold massively for small bucks (minus Hobbits, of course)

The colourway and printed shields of this are lovely and the hidden catapult feature is very nice. But like a lot of the later Hobbit sets, this felt too small for the setting it represented.

Somehow acquired Thranduil and an elf missing an arm and hands in a bin. Nothing else from it. Ah well, Lee Pace in minifig form is always fine by me.

9471 is crazy. Wish I'd picked up more than one for Helms Deep.

@PurpleDave said:
"Nothing like two named characters to ruin a good armybuilder."

*cough* - 71805 - *cough*

Yes! I have this one! It received a lot play back in the day :D

I really regret not picking this up back in the day. Not as much as I regret not getting 9474 Helm's Deep and 9471 along with it...

Now it is out of reach!

One thing I appreciate about the Tolkien sets is that in pretty small sets there are often large numbers of figures, like 6 here, compared to other themes which often top out at 4.

@SearchlightRG:
I own all of the original run (except the three convention minifigs), but I’ve only built a few. Yeah, thought that was Tauriel, between the hair and the knife. No lipstick, though. To be fair, all four elves have eyelashes, which is standard female-coding in minifigs.

@MCLegoboy:
Jackson explained that they made three movies because there’s zero character development in the original book (being that it was written for kids). Filmed exactly as written, it would have felt severely underdeveloped. Obviously, a lot of people feel he overcompensated, though.

@Freddy_Hodson said:
"I actually think this was probably the worst Middle-Earth set they made. Still good, for sure. But it's far too expensive for an army builder, and far too un-detailed for something better. I never liked the short-lived habit of releasing sets designed so you had to buy two for the complete model—and this one in particular just doesn't appear to *be* anything. Which considering how much amazing Elven architecture there is in the films, is really disappointing."

This was often the way with the mid-priced sets.

At the time, a lot of the parts for this set were quite sought after by castle builders, so much so that general builders were buying the sets (when discounted) for parts and selling on the figures. I bought 100s of LOTR and Hobbit figures and wargs that way, typically paying about £1.50 each figure on average.

Where is Dastan?

Unfortunately this was an 'exclusive' back in the day so it was barely sold anywhere over here.

@MCLegoboy said:
" I never read the book, and the movies are overly long, and I want to say that the scene was mostly invented because the Dwarves just get in the barrels and escape, but what fun is that?"

Certainly, a lot of things were invented to stretch out a kids' paperback into a full trilogy of movies, but the barrel escape is straight out of the book.

@PurpleDave said:
" @MCLegoboy:
Jackson explained that they made three movies because there’s zero character development in the original book (being that it was written for kids). Filmed exactly as written, it would have felt severely underdeveloped. Obviously, a lot of people feel he overcompensated, though."

This is both astonishing and entirely believable. The entire point of the book is the development of Bilbo's character, and the decline and final redemption of Thorin. But then this is from a director who thought that the dialogue between Gandalf and Saruman in Orthanc needed to be turned into a blaster pistol fight. Oh, and I don't remember any jokes about male genitals in The Hobbit. Jackson plainly felt that was a failing of the book.

@Maxbricks14 said:
"The closest to New Zealand getting any recognition by Lego, unless they make an architecture set?"

910017: Kakapo

@Maxbricks14 said:
"The closest to New Zealand getting any recognition by Lego, unless they make an architecture set?"

910017: Kakapo

I have this set which I modded by yellowing the elves, giving Thranduil a mount (https://brickshelf.com/gallery/AmperZand/Fantasy/thranduil_on_steed_small_1.jpg) and a few other changes.

@mediAFOL said:
" @PurpleDave said:
" @MCLegoboy:
Jackson explained that they made three movies because there’s zero character development in the original book (being that it was written for kids). Filmed exactly as written, it would have felt severely underdeveloped. Obviously, a lot of people feel he overcompensated, though."

This is both astonishing and entirely believable. The entire point of the book is the development of Bilbo's character, and the decline and final redemption of Thorin. But then this is from a director who thought that the dialogue between Gandalf and Saruman in Orthanc needed to be turned into a blaster pistol fight. Oh, and I don't remember any jokes about male genitals in The Hobbit. Jackson plainly felt that was a failing of the book."

It also doesn't really add much character development. I feel like, if anything, the dwarves are possibly even more shallow than they are in the book because of how much less they seem to have to do. At least the book focused around them instead of cutting away to Legolas doing improbable gymnastics in a gratuitous fight scene

@TheOtherMike said:
" @MCLegoboy said:
" I never read the book, and the movies are overly long, and I want to say that the scene was mostly invented because the Dwarves just get in the barrels and escape, but what fun is that?"

Certainly, a lot of things were invented to stretch out a kids' paperback into a full trilogy of movies, but the barrel escape is straight out of the book."

Well, except that in the book the dwarves were all fully enclosed in their barrels…and the elves didn’t realize they had escaped until long after the fact…and no orcs ever penetrated Mirkwood that were told of.

@Ridgeheart said:
" @Maxbricks14 said:
"The closest to New Zealand getting any recognition by Lego, unless they make an architecture set?"

https://brickset.com/sets/theme-Disney/subtheme-Moana

https://brickset.com/sets/theme-Bionicle "

Moana was based in the pacific islands and Bionicle only used Maori words not based off any NZ land. And Lego received a legal challenge from representatives of several Maori iwi, alleging that their use of certain words were disrespectful to Maori culture.

Love this set so much, I wish I would have gotten it. The figures are glorious.

@mediAFOL said:
" @PurpleDave said:
" @MCLegoboy:
Jackson explained that they made three movies because there’s zero character development in the original book (being that it was written for kids). Filmed exactly as written, it would have felt severely underdeveloped. Obviously, a lot of people feel he overcompensated, though."

This is both astonishing and entirely believable. The entire point of the book is the development of Bilbo's character, and the decline and final redemption of Thorin. But then this is from a director who thought that the dialogue between Gandalf and Saruman in Orthanc needed to be turned into a blaster pistol fight. Oh, and I don't remember any jokes about male genitals in The Hobbit. Jackson plainly felt that was a failing of the book."

It was a company of thirteen male dwarves. There were genetalia jokes aplenty. Bilbo just didn’t record any of them.

@PurpleDave said:

@MCLegoboy :
Jackson explained that they made three movies because there’s zero character development in the original book (being that it was written for kids). Filmed exactly as written, it would have felt severely underdeveloped. Obviously, a lot of people feel he overcompensated, though.]]

I always thought that the studio had him stretch it out to three movies because they wanted to match LotR and for more income. Maybe I am confusing that with the studio's interference in the production timeline.