There has been rumors circulating about LEGO picking up the Jurassic World license to coincide with the upcoming film by Universal Studios. It all started with Chris Pratt dropping a hint a couple of months ago that he will have another minifigure version of himself coming soon (he is also Emmet in The LEGO Movie and Star-Lord in Guardians of the Galaxy – both with a minifig version). A few days ago Universal Studios confirmed that they will indeed have a partnership with LEGO to coincide with the release of the Jurassic World film scheduled for June of 2015. 🙂
Jurassic World is the fourth installment in the Jurassic Park film-series than began back in 1993 – yeah, that’s over 20 years ago! The plot of Jurassic World takes the passing of time into consideration and continues 22 years after the events of Jurassic Park. Isla Nublar now features a fully functioning dinosaur theme park, Jurassic World, as originally envisioned by John Hammond. This new park is owned by the Masrani Corporation. Owen (Chris Pratt), a member of Jurassic World’s on-site staff, conducts behavioral research on the Velociraptors. After many years, Jurassic World’s attendance rates begin to decline and a new attraction – created to re-spark visitor interest – gravely backfires…
And from the perspective of LEGO fans, the Jurassic World license means that we will be getting more dinos! The last dino-related LEGO sets were released just a couple of years ago and included 7 really nice sets with a great color-scheme and nicely detailed dinos. One issue with the sets though was that they were pricier than normal (around 15 cents/piece versus the more usual 10 cents/piece) due to the new moulds for the dinos. Such a high price is unusual for non-licensed themes. If with the LEGO Jurassic Park sets there will be new moulds plus licensing fees, it is possible that they will be way over the top as far as price. I hope LEGO won’t resort to flimsy sets to try to stay under the budget – I’m really curious to see how they will handle this. Below is the official press-release from Universal Studios.
UNIVERSAL PARTNERSHIPS & LICENSING BUILDS GLOBAL PARTNERSHIP WITH THE LEGO GROUP AS MAJOR TOY LICENSEE ON JURASSIC WORLD
LOS ANGELES, CA, Oct. 7, 2014—Universal Partnerships & Licensing (UP&L) today announced that The LEGO Group will create original LEGO products in conjunction with the release of Jurassic World, the long-awaited next installment in Steven Spielberg’s groundbreaking film series that will be released on June 12, 2015. The LEGO Group’s participation rounds out an overall branded toy campaign designed to bring the action, adventure and excitement of the film to audiences around the world alongside global master toy licensee Hasbro. The toys will be available in May 2015. The announcement was made by UP&L President Stephanie Sperber and Jill Wilfert, vice president of global licensing and entertainment for The LEGO Group.
“Jurassic Park defined dinosaurs for an entire generation 20 years ago, and Jurassic World will do the same in 2015,” said Sperber. “Working with LEGO Group to bring this classic into the present in dynamic and exciting ways is truly thrilling.”
“We are thrilled to be a part of the groundbreaking Jurassic Park series,” said Wilfert. “The film’s imagery and branding are iconic, with a rich array of landscapes, vehicles and dinosaurs that are perfect for inspiring a line of building sets that will encourage hours of creative play.”
So what do you think? How do you like the idea of the LEGO Jurassic World sets? Are you interested in this theme? Are you a fan of the original movie Feel free to share and discuss in the comment section below! Would love to hear your opinion on this! Also if you are interested in the now retired LEGO Dino sets, they are still floating around in the secondary market, so you can check them out on eBay: LEGO DINO SETS ON EBAY
And you might also like to check out the following related post:
First! Anyways, I really look forward to the Jurassic World sets, seeing that I didn’t get any Dino sets 🙁 . I also haven’t watched any of the films, but I think getting these sets would be quite a delight for those who have. I might even try to get one! 😀
Oh, you need to watch 1 & 2… I might watch 2 today just because you mad eme remember how good it was. The beauty about 1 and 2 is that they used animatronics vs. CGI on most shots, so even today the movies don’t look outdated like all CGI movies look the following year.
You might want to see the new movie next year. That should bring you up to speed on the story.
Have the earlier Dino molds been discontinued, already? Maybe some costs could be cut be reusing them.
That’s a good question. I’m not sure if they will reuse thouse moulds or not. It would make a lot of sense. I don’t know how they handle these moulds that are only made for one theme. Do they keep them and try to re-use them later? Or do they discard them? But woudl definitely cut costs if they could re-use them.
I think the issue is that people will want to see dinos that look like they are directly from the film. It will also probably be a requirement for the license. So the question is do any of the generic LEGO dinos match the characters in the film? If yes, then they could probably get away with just a recolor. If not, they will have to make new ones.
I don’t know when the discussions started, but it’d make economic sense to avoid scrapping the old moulds while still in negotiaion.
I have always suspected that regular LEGO themes are an indication of what licenses they are planning to release in the future. I don’t know if this is true or not, but I have seen this happen several times. Perhaps they do this to test the market, or to see how fans respond, or both – again, this is just my speculation. I remember when Fantasy Era came out LOTR fans were going nuts. It really started the discussion and the hope that LEGO may in fact pick up the LOTR license and release elves, dwarves and other fantasy creatures. The Dino sets could have been the same way…
A low-odds bet; “Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them” for 2016, athough there’s really no similar theme in the meantime. (Elves, probably not…)
Concerning Elves, there’s been a lot of critique against the mini-dolls, but with the new moulds, it’d be easy to do a recoloring in yellow ears for a new minifig theme.
Funny; I just finished writing an article about Elves. I won’t be publishing it until later this week, but boy, I’m in love with the theme and the elves themselves! I’m planning to get the whole theme! I’m pretty sure that those who are complaining are doing so because they had a pre-concieved idea of what the theme is going to be about. That’s not LEGO’s fault. Expectation is pre-mediated resentment. Those who saw the pictures without any previous knowledge of the theme all seem to love it. Amazing accessories, lovely colors, cute elves, magic! What is there not to like? 😛
It always seemed to me that the last LEGO dinosaurs looked a lot like the Jurassic Park franchise dinos, hopefully they look the same this time around.
Old news, but still awesome 🙂
Looking forward to these, but I hope they don’t make completely new molds :/
As a side note, my website is back! If you like LEGO, check it out: http://starbricks.createaforum.com/index.php
Yes, as I have mentioned this has been rumored for quite some time. However it was only few days ago when it was finally confirmed. Can’t wait to see the sets! 😛
Would you believe that I don’t own a single dinosaur or any dragon form the Fantasy era til now??? yeah, me neither… I’m glad LEGO keeps giving me chances to get these, but with the new Pirate theme I think my funds will be tied up 🙁 … hopefully I can catch these on clearance.
I highly recommend that you get yourself at least one dragon. How can you be a Castle fan and not have a dragon? What will your knights in shining armor do? They will get bored out of their minds! I got one dragon (the black and red one from Fantasy Era), and love that beast! In fact, I like him more than Smaug from the new Hobbit set. Smaug has a really odd connection between the wings and the torso. Too skinny. The regular Castle dragon has a much more realisctic looking connection. So yeah, get one! Your Pirates will be happy too! 😛
Knights in shining armor can always fight evil wizards, or pirates, or something. But I agree, the Castle dragon from Dragon Mountain looks much better than Smaug.
It turns out that I don’t have any dragons, either, but then I don’t have any Castle sets. I do have two dinosaurs from the old Dino Attack theme, but those aren’t very realistic. 😕
Still nice to have ’em, specially if you can get ahold of a Trex in the different incarnations. I mean I love having my 90s dragons, but yeah, they don’t compare to Fantasy Era.
The only dragons I have are the Green Dragon Masters Dragon and a black Fright Knights Dragon with the Ice Age Orange colored translucent wings, but none of the new awesome dragons… I wanted to get a few dragon mountains on clearance but they flew off the shelves here 🙁 … what do you thing of Smaug’s retractable wings??? I like em!!!
Those dragons of yours are worth a fortune, if I remember correctly. Still, my dragon is bigger, and will swallow yours in one gulp! 😈
I do really like Smaug’s wings. I just don’t like the skinny connnection between the wings and the body. Looks unnatural.
HAHAHA!!! I surrender!!!… but yeah yours are a lot cooler!!!
Okay, dragon, calm down. Micho surrendered… it was a close call though. 😈
Whew! 🙂
I’d suggest getting the current castle dragon of you want one as the others are v. Expensive. I luckily have a hugarian horntail and they are like $150 on bricklink now 🙁
The viking ones are also expensive.
On topic dinos will make my son v. Happy his two favourite things right now are lego and dinosaurs!
I’d love the current red dragon, but I wanted to pay like 50% clearance price and I never saw it at that price.
BTW that hungarian horntail is a beauty!
what? you don’t? that’s hard to believe. 😉 I can’t wait for this to come out. I really want a dinosaur but for some reason didn’t purchase any dino sets. oh well these might be better! there’s probably going to be more detail on these since LEGO is getting into that now. 😀
Yup, I think they will be more detailed as well like Smaug
I’m looking forward to these, and the movie. Maybe LEGO will produce some decent dinosaur sets for once. But I wouldn’t be surprised if Lego created new moulds for the dinos, they seem to like doing that. Every dino theme to come out has had different moulds. 😕
Oh, and speaking of Star-Lord: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wy7lFghO6AE . C’mon, Han. 🙂
Yeah, that’s the next one I’m planning to post. There is also a great behind-the-scenes video that comes with it. 😉
This would be a cool series to collect. I hope the new movie is good. I only really liked the first one. But I have high hopes for this new one.
I know that this movie is going to be great. Why? Because Star-lord is going to star in it. Nuff’ said.
This may sound like a stupid question, but whats fantasy era?
Fantasy Era was a sub-theme of LEGO Castle. While traditional LEGO Castle sets only included good night, bad knights, and the occasional wizard, plus a dragon, Fantasy Era really branched out to other species like dwarves, trolls, living dead (skeletons), and there was also a plan for elves, but that was scraped, probably becuase of the LOTR license that followed shortly after.
So it’s the 2007 to 2009 Castle series
Thanks Admin, that’s my Lego definition learnt for the day.
Yeah, there is always so much to learn! 😛
Ok thanks for the definition admin, I know what you’re on about now.
I loved the sets when they were out, but hose to focus on Bionicle instead.
sorry chose, not hose