20 years of Harry Potter minifigs
Posted by Huw,
LEGO is celebrating 20 years of Harry Potter minifigures on social media today by posting pictures showing the 2001 and 2021 versions of five of the characters side-by-side
It's not particularly newsworthy except that most of the photos of the 2001 figures were taken by me a few years ago for our database.
LEGO did reach out and asked for permission to do so, and of course I was happy for them to be used. It's surprising, and perhaps shocking, that the company does not have an archive of such images it can call upon, or indeed a collection of minifigs to photograph itself, but has to rely on the community for them instead!
You can view the images after the break.
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59 comments on this article
Oh, they have copies of all of those old minifigs...in the vault with all the other sealed sets.
Such a progress in 20 years! I have the feeling the biggest improvement in minifigure design came in 2011.
And indeed that's a fun fact about the LEGO image database. :)
The short legs for minifigs made a huge improvement.
Hadn’t noticed until now the Jack Stone feet on 2001 Hagrid. I think they are better though.
Perhaps they do have plenty of good photos of the 2001 Harry Potter MF's, but they want people from the AFOL community to have the opportunity to contribute to things seen by the public.
Would have been nice if the 2021 ones had been photos too.
@crazylegoman said:
"Perhaps they do have plenty of good photos of the 2001 Harry Potter MF's, but they want people from the AFOL community to have the opportunity to contribute to things seen by the public."
I didn't get that impression when they asked me!
Wow! The 2001 minifig of Ron is terrible.
Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow.
@Huw, I'm surprised LEGO doesn't have a record of everything it produces. It could need it to for legal reasons, specifically to defend its IP rights.
I kinda like how a lot of old LEGO stuff didn’t look perfect. The sets were blocky, the mini figures had some... interesting designs, but I think that added to a lot of the charm. It didnt have to be 100% screen accurate or perfect, and I think that helped encourage kids to be creative with the toys.
I still have most of these early ones, in a box in the attic, somewhere...... :)
I definitely prefer the 2010 ones
@Zander said:
" @Huw , I'm surprised LEGO doesn't have a record of everything it produces. It could need it to for legal reasons, specifically to defend its IP rights. "
It does have sealed copies of the sets in its various vaults in Denmark for that very reason but presumably not loose minifigs.
@Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow.
"
This is how I see it as well, I'd probably be more interested in Licensed themes if figures were still mostly yellow.
On the other hand, I can understand LEGO choosing skin tones so they have multiple options / realism for figs based on real people, as seen with the early NBA figures and Lando etc.
@Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow."
Should minifigures representing people of color also be yellow?
" @Huw, I'm surprised LEGO doesn't have a record of everything it produces. It could need it to for legal reasons, specifically to defend its IP rights. "
As someone whose job is litigating IP infringement cases against large brands, I can tell you that many large companies do not have ready access to older data. They accumulate new data at such a rate that they often need to warehouse older records at secure off-site locations that may be resource-intensive to access. I don't know if that's what happened here but I have come across similar situations dozens of times with well-known brands.
I forgot how the old mini-figs looked very City like, with the detail of the printing on the new mini-fig faces and bodies, and the improved plastic hair helping the figures look more unique. I would be interested in seeing comparisons of the other mini-figs.
TLG probably only have the original mini-figs in the sets that they came in so it would mean traveling and searching in the basements for the sets, then breaking the bags and building the mini-figs before photographing. Which is all far too messy and time consuming compared to asking permission from someone who has already done this. For the same reason the newer mini-figs are computer generated rather than photographed, probably just didn't have renders for 20 year old mini-figs.
I've linked to this article before - https://www.brickfanatics.com/lego-bought-retired-sets-develop-video-game/ - but it describes how LEGO once purchased old sets on the aftermarket in order to provide video game designers with reference materials.
@ambr said:
"I forgot how the old mini-figs looked very City like, with the detail of the printing on the new mini-fig faces and bodies, and the improved plastic hair helping the figures look more unique. I would be interested in seeing comparisons of the other mini-figs. "
City sometimes reused heads from licensed themes in its early days. Vernon Dursley's old head is used in a City set I own: 8401. It also appears in 7898, 4936, 7892, 7897, 7746 and the 2009 advent calender. Lucius Malfoy's head, torso and legs reappeared in 4778 (technically not City, but still...). Madame Hooch's head resurfaced in two Sports sets: 3537 and 3536. The heads from Mary Jane, Peter Parker and Harry Osborne from 4856 first appeared as fleshy heads but then became super common in city for quite a while. PP in 76 sets up to 2016 with 72 being yellow and most being either City or Creator sets. MJ in 21 sets with 20 being yellow, nearly all City. And HO in 69 sets with 67 being yellow ranging from City to Castle to Space up to 2013.
TL;DR: The early Harry Potter sets might remind you of City because in the early 2000s they tended to reuse heads whenever possible, and HP heads (Potterheads?) reappeared in City several times!
Hagrid really looks like a caveman in the 2001 edition. Definite upgrade to the flesh colors and advanced printing they have now. Original Hermione looks like she's in her 40's.
None of the hair or hat pieces are reused in the latter iterations. This shows how much these figures have improved over the past two decades but the old pieces are more-or-less obsolete now, with a few exceptions like them using Ron’s hair in black for Marcus Flint.
@Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow."
Says who? How do you distinguish between Harry Potter, Dean Thomas, and Cho Chang if everybody's yellow?
I might be in the minority, but as a non-White person, introducing different flesh tones is one of the best changes Lego ever made, and I only wish it expanded to beyond the licensed themes. The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status.
@Zander said:
"Minifigures should be yellow."
Genuinely fascinating to me that people will still comment on licensed minifigure skin tones. They're flesh colored so that they look like the real people. I mean, it's something of a catch-22. A yellow Lando figure doesn't look like Lando, but a realistically colored one in a set full of yellow figures recontextualizes every single yellow figure produed previously as white. That is, I think, a significant part of why LEGO changed to flesh-colored figures. I'd also argue that they look far better as representations of characters than yellow figures would- realism is a lot more important, in my opinion, if the aim is to depict a real person or a character portrayed by a real person, whereas in a theme like City or Ninjago the yellow, cartoony figure designs work perfectly fine in context.
Awesome, thanks for sharing! I saw the post when it was just posted on Facebook this morning.
@Pekingduckman said:
" @Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow."
Says who? How do you distinguish between Harry Potter, Dean Thomas, and Cho Chang if everybody's yellow?
I might be in the minority, but as a non-White person, introducing different flesh tones is one of the best changes Lego ever made, and I only wish it expanded to beyond the licensed themes. The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status."
Completely agree. When the change came in 2004 I was in the not happy group, took me a little time to realise my dislike of change was nostalgia. Now I wish all themes were fleshies and more diverse.
@Huw said:
" @crazylegoman said:
"Perhaps they do have plenty of good photos of the 2001 Harry Potter MF's, but they want people from the AFOL community to have the opportunity to contribute to things seen by the public."
I didn't get that impression when they asked me!"
It was the same in 2007 when DK approached me about the LEGO Star Wars Visual Dictionary. It was quickly discovered that LEGO didn't have any archival photographs, which is where I came in.
That said, DK did a Harry Potter Visual Dictionary and contacted a LEGO Harry Potter blog and worked with them to sort out new set and minifig photos. I wonder why LEGO didn't sort something out with DK to use those?
@Pekingduckman said:
"The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status."
I don't think it was so much an assumption of that; I read a long time ago that Lego did specific research, before they first launched yellow-skinned figures, to find a colour that wasn't perceived to represent any real life people group - explicitly to avoid tying minifigures to any one nationality. It wasn't meant to imply that everyone was the same; it was more meant to be taken that the skin tone wasn't *really* yellow because no-one has yellow skin, and it was instead a placeholder for whatever nationality the kid playing with them wanted to attribute.
I wish I could find the source for that. I'm sure it was this little Lego Filefax thing I had as a kid, but I can't find any evidence of its existence on Bricklink or anywhere. I'm certain I remember reading about that being the reasoning at the time, though.
Those are nice pictures, Huw. Very crisp edges, I assume the gradient background was added by TLG for this set of comparisons. And they put the "Brickset . com" in there too, albeit quite small!
There’s something so charming about those early yellow figs, as inaccurate as they may be.
Feels like a meme template...
Wow, it’s always so mindblowing to see old vs new figures. :D
It’s hard for me to belive that such big company wouldn’t keep at least one of each product. But maybe it’s also time saving to ask for permission ;)
It might explain why there were so many mistakes in minifig photos in past picture collections like the DK books or the instructions of some 'classic' VIP promo sets.
There were all sorts of missing or wrong accessories, messed up color combos and so on, to create minifigs that never appeared like this in any set. Very common issues are Space Police II officers with neon green visors instead of dark green ones or pirates having plumes on their hats, that never had one in a set.
If they had to grab together what they could from external sources, that seemingly were not as careful about the details as Brickset does, it's easy to see they were either unable to find a complete and correct one or they didn't care much about it.
Before 2010 or so even Bricklink was full with mixed-up minifigs, that their database claimed to belong to official themes, despite not being listed in any set inventory,
@Pekingduckman said:
" @Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow."
Says who? How do you distinguish between Harry Potter, Dean Thomas, and Cho Chang if everybody's yellow?
I might be in the minority, but as a non-White person, introducing different flesh tones is one of the best changes Lego ever made, and I only wish it expanded to beyond the licensed themes. The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status."
Nothing to do with race. Everything to do with LEGO’s brand or as you put it ‘iconic status’. LEGO going to natural flesh tones was as much a betrayal of what LEGO is as would have been for Playmobil if it had switched all its figures to having bright yellow skin. Give a random sample of respondents across LEGO’s major markets some paper and coloured crayons and ask them to draw a ‘LEGO person’ and I’d be willing to bet good money that the majority (and probably large majority) would draw a minifigure with bright yellow skin.
@Zander said:
" @Pekingduckman said:
" @Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow."
Says who? How do you distinguish between Harry Potter, Dean Thomas, and Cho Chang if everybody's yellow?
I might be in the minority, but as a non-White person, introducing different flesh tones is one of the best changes Lego ever made, and I only wish it expanded to beyond the licensed themes. The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status."
Nothing to do with race. Everything to do with LEGO’s brand or as you put it ‘iconic status’. LEGO going to natural flesh tones was as much a betrayal of what LEGO is as would have been for Playmobil if it had switched all its figures to having bright yellow skin. Give a random sample of respondents across LEGO’s major markets some paper and coloured crayons and ask them to draw a ‘LEGO person’ and I’d be willing to bet good money that the majority (and probably large majority) would draw a minifigure with bright yellow skin."
They did it to better represent onscreen actors. I’m not sure why you’re so bent out of shape with this. Standard, non-specific figures are still yellow toned and likely always will be. I’m sure if asked to draw a lego figure, everyone would make them yellow. But if asked to draw Han Solo or mace windu, even in Lego form, I guarantee they would draw them with their respective skin colors. Lego isn’t betraying anything.
@Zander:
https://www.staples.com/Sharpie-Ultra-Fine-Point-Marker-Yellow-Pack-Of-24-24PK-37125/product_2132810
Works wonders. You probably don’t need quite that many. I’ve mostly bought extras so I don’t have to worry about not having one to hand in a pinch, and the only fleshie minifig I will put on our club display is Elvira. Maybe some corpses if they’re not fresh, or some zombies if they are.
@TeriXeri:
They didn’t do it because of versatility. They did it because, back when the minifigs were first introduced, they didn’t want them to represent any race, so they chose yellow because it didn’t, but it still reads nice as a skintone (think smiley faces). Then Lando threw that out the window by being packed with yellow minifigs, and suddenly they were using a simplified Simpsons color scheme, where everyone is yellow except minorities (except where Simpsons has had multiple ethnic flesh tones for non-white characters, Lando is the only minifig that got a flesh-toned release in a yellow theme). If they didn’t create a flesh-tone palette for licensed minifigs, then they’d be defining _all_ yellow minifigs as representing shire people, which results in a solid two decades where there are no non-white human minifigs.
@Binnekamp:
Don’t forget they took the heads used for a couple Bespin guards and reused the print for nearly every minifig-based theme that preceded the first wave of Star Wars sets.
@Mr__Thrawn:
It becomes a problematic issue for people who customize minifigs for existing licensed themes using stock parts. I found the perfect face for Mad Hatter from B:TAS, but it only came in yellow. For a long time, it would have been the only yellow minifig in a sea of fleshie Batman characters, which would have been the only fleshie minifigs on our layouts. For me, it was an easy call.
Maybe because I’ve been seeing Simpsons characters for over 30 years, and playing with yellow minifigs for over 40, it seems normal to me. If other people want to swap yellow for fleshie, that’s their business, and I won’t rant at them about it. I might secretly head-canon their entire display as having caught a wicked case of the stomach flu...
@LEGOscum:
They could borrow Huw’s photos on a digital handshake agreement. If the DK photos were under contract, they may have been restricted in how they use them, or owe royalties for each time that they use them.
@ThatBionicleGuy:
Well, when minifigs were being developed, the entire System had been reduced to the Mondrian Five (black, white, red, yellow, blue, even excluding green, brown, and all shades of grey). White was basically the only other viable option, and that would make everyone look like the characters from Pixar’s Coco.
@Galaxy12_Import said:
"Those are nice pictures, Huw. Very crisp edges, I assume the gradient background was added by TLG for this set of comparisons. And they put the "Brickset . com" in there too, albeit quite small!"
They've done quite a lot of post-processing, I sent them the out-of-camera versions so they could do so.
I find this with all old sets, they are seen with rose coloured glasses, because in general, for me personally, Lego continues to improve their mini figures and the design of their sets.
@PurpleDave, Delighted to hear you only use yellowies in your displays! I already use yellow Sharpies to recolour LotR elf ears. I recommend a layer of Humbrol Satin Cote to make it permanent. I have tested to destruction yellow Sharpie + Satin Cote vs Sharpie alone vs LEGO print. Sharpie alone is least durable, while Sharpie + Satin Cote is most. Yes, the latter is more resilient than LEGO print.
@monkyby87 said:
" @Zander said:
" @Pekingduckman said:
" @Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow."
Says who? How do you distinguish between Harry Potter, Dean Thomas, and Cho Chang if everybody's yellow?
I might be in the minority, but as a non-White person, introducing different flesh tones is one of the best changes Lego ever made, and I only wish it expanded to beyond the licensed themes. The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status."
Nothing to do with race. Everything to do with LEGO’s brand or as you put it ‘iconic status’. LEGO going to natural flesh tones was as much a betrayal of what LEGO is as would have been for Playmobil if it had switched all its figures to having bright yellow skin. Give a random sample of respondents across LEGO’s major markets some paper and coloured crayons and ask them to draw a ‘LEGO person’ and I’d be willing to bet good money that the majority (and probably large majority) would draw a minifigure with bright yellow skin."
They did it to better represent onscreen actors. I’m not sure why you’re so bent out of shape with this. Standard, non-specific figures are still yellow toned and likely always will be. I’m sure if asked to draw a lego figure, everyone would make them yellow. But if asked to draw Han Solo or mace windu, even in Lego form, I guarantee they would draw them with their respective skin colors. Lego isn’t betraying anything. "
Yellow skin tone is part of what makes a minifigure a minifigure, just as C-shaped hands and faces without noses are (yes, I know there have been some with noses). If accurate representation is the goal, then what would Han Solo’s minifigure look like? Well, Harrison Ford and Alden Ehrenreich, the two actors to have portrayed the character on film, have five digits on each hand and a nose on their face. Maybe your ideal LEGO minifigure Han Solo would have those characteristics too. Not mine.
@Zander said:
"Give a random sample of respondents across LEGO’s major markets some paper and coloured crayons and ask them to draw a ‘LEGO person’ and I’d be willing to bet good money that the majority (and probably large majority) would draw a minifigure with bright yellow skin."
I can second that. Most people I know who aren't AFOLs ask me, when they see my collection, "what brand those skin coloured figures are from? " For them, apparently everything non-yellow skinned must be from a different brand because LEGO of course is yellow skinned (to them).
@Montyh7:
I agree. And Sharpie continues to make a fine marker. And an ultra fine marker, which is better for outlining facial features.
@Zander:
Well, that gets a little complicated. One of the main infrastructure guys also prefers yellows, so when he provides minifigs to people the layout, there’s nearly no instances of fleshie parts (I’ve caught a few with yellow heads and fleshie hands). I don’t make _ALL_ of my minifigs yellow, but the fleshie ones get the Sharpie. Joker, Harley, and Freeze stay pure white. Manbat, Scarecrow, and Clayface stay various shades of tan or brown, and so on. They don’t generally appear outside of my Batman minifig lineup, but Lucius Fox and Batwing have reddish-brown skin.
But it’s a collaborative display, and hard rules are not imposed. One of the other infrastructure guys does mix yellows and fleshies all the time. He also throws minidolls in sometimes. Other members put licensed minifigs in sometimes, and I’m pretty sure I’m the only one who color-corrects them.
@Zander said:
" @monkyby87 said:
" @Zander said:
" @Pekingduckman said:
" @Zander said:
"Sure, the 2021 ones look better except that they're fleshy. Minifigures should be yellow."
Says who? How do you distinguish between Harry Potter, Dean Thomas, and Cho Chang if everybody's yellow?
I might be in the minority, but as a non-White person, introducing different flesh tones is one of the best changes Lego ever made, and I only wish it expanded to beyond the licensed themes. The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status."
Nothing to do with race. Everything to do with LEGO’s brand or as you put it ‘iconic status’. LEGO going to natural flesh tones was as much a betrayal of what LEGO is as would have been for Playmobil if it had switched all its figures to having bright yellow skin. Give a random sample of respondents across LEGO’s major markets some paper and coloured crayons and ask them to draw a ‘LEGO person’ and I’d be willing to bet good money that the majority (and probably large majority) would draw a minifigure with bright yellow skin."
They did it to better represent onscreen actors. I’m not sure why you’re so bent out of shape with this. Standard, non-specific figures are still yellow toned and likely always will be. I’m sure if asked to draw a lego figure, everyone would make them yellow. But if asked to draw Han Solo or mace windu, even in Lego form, I guarantee they would draw them with their respective skin colors. Lego isn’t betraying anything. "
Yellow skin tone is part of what makes a minifigure a minifigure, just as C-shaped hands and faces without noses are (yes, I know there have been some with noses). If accurate representation is the goal, then what would Han Solo’s minifigure look like? Well, Harrison Ford and Alden Ehrenreich, the two actors to have portrayed the character on film, have five digits on each hand and a nose on their face. Maybe your ideal LEGO minifigure Han Solo would have those characteristics too. Not mine.
"
You keep missing the point, but this is a dead end argument anyways.
From my viewpoint, I'm not too surprised that Lego doesn't have much minifigure-specific information from its early days. Minifigures as defined, collectable toys didn't really start to take off until the licensed themes were dominating the Lego catalogs (I figure it started with Star Wars, gained momentum with Harry Potter, and achieved critical mass with the first superhero (Spider-Man, Batman) sets in the 00's). Before then, minifigures were those generic figures that more or less set the scale for the brick-built toys and provided a sense of realism for the cars, castles, spaceships, and the like that were Lego's intended products for sale. We all loved our minifigures back then of course, but I never had the sense of "minifigures are the only reason I buy Lego" from my fellow AFOLs until well after these early HP sets were off the market.
Wow, these newer ones are SO MUCH better.
To me, it's a true, deserved, and branded official recognition, valorisation (I don't know the exact translation for our French "reconnaissance) of Huw's (+Brickset members) hard work and years dedicated to our passion.
@Brick_t_ , acknowledgement
@ThatBionicleGuy said:
"I wish I could find the source for that. I'm sure it was this little Lego Filefax thing I had as a kid, but I can't find any evidence of its existence on Bricklink or anywhere. I'm certain I remember reading about that being the reasoning at the time, though."
Found it! I was using the wrong search term... but this is the one I was thinking of as the source for my last post. I don't have it anymore to check for certain, but I'm pretty sure it was mentioned somewhere in here about the reasoning behind choosing yellow for the standard minifigure skin tone.
https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?G=701804
@mkrey said:
"The short legs for minifigs made a huge improvement."
but I will never get why the movable ones were only available within the first minifgure series for Harry Potter.
This is really goes to show how little LEGO actually cares about preserving their older products. They just expect everything to sell out within a year, then they pretend they never even happened.
@monkyby87:
It should be, but anytime someone even mentions yellow licensed minifigs, it’s, “ER MER GERD WHY DO YOU MAKE A MAKE SUCH A FUSS OVER THIS ITS A DEAD SUBJECT GIVE IT A REST ALREADY!!!”
@oldfan:
Minifigs may not have been the primary reason to collect, but since I was a little kid I have always sought out specific sets to get specific minifigs. One of the first I can recall was getting 6824 to get a blue spaceman. And then I got 6809 to get another. They actually kinda pushed the issue with themes like Forestmen, Pirates, and Ninja, where certain minifigs were exclusive to one set (often the most expensive, especially in the case of female minifigs from genre themes). When it really became an issue was about ten years ago, as that’s when _they_ realized minifigs sell sets (and repeated minifigs make sets non-essential), and started making sure as many SW sets as possible had one exclusive minifig.
@schlaftier:
Short legs were introduced right after HP launched, to make Yoda and Ewoks shorter than human minifigs. Since they were growing older as the movie series progressed, it wouldn’t make sense for them to grow shorter. For the 2018 relaunch, they had a clean slate and it wouldn’t make sense to not fix it.
Why are all the hands of the original minifigs upside down?
The design language of LEGO faces has evolved to the point of perfection. Today’s faces are perfect examples of simplicity being the ultimate sophistication.
The approach to torso, arm, and leg designs has also advanced to the point of perfection, though I think advancements in printing technology (not quite perfect but getting there) were a greater factor here than with faces.
Combined with dual-molding and a wider variety of hairpieces, the design and printing enhancements have resulted in what might be considered the gold standard of minifigures. After this, they will only need to continue improving the printing technology to fix things like skin tone printing that isn’t opaque enough.
Frankly, if the 2021 minifigs were yellow, I don’t think many people would bat an eyelash because they’d still look attractive; especially Hagrid, who also benefits from improved torso design. Really, on first blush 2001 Hagrid looks like a Playmobile figure. 2021 Hagrid is better in every way.
I wouldn’t even care if all the Super Hero minifigs ever made had been yellow, as long as the designs remained the same.
@ThatBionicleGuy said:
" @Pekingduckman said:
"The assumption that everybody on earth share the same yellow skin tone might have made sense in the 1970s, but in the 2020s as the earth is becoming more multicultural it looks more and more out of date, and only persist because of its iconic status."
I don't think it was so much an assumption of that; I read a long time ago that Lego did specific research, before they first launched yellow-skinned figures, to find a colour that wasn't perceived to represent any real life people group - explicitly to avoid tying minifigures to any one nationality. It wasn't meant to imply that everyone was the same; it was more meant to be taken that the skin tone wasn't *really* yellow because no-one has yellow skin, and it was instead a placeholder for whatever nationality the kid playing with them wanted to attribute.
I wish I could find the source for that. I'm sure it was this little Lego Filefax thing I had as a kid, but I can't find any evidence of its existence on Bricklink or anywhere. I'm certain I remember reading about that being the reasoning at the time, though."
I remember reading that too. The yellow wasn't supposed to be any race, but a non-race so that all kids could relate to it. Much like the Sesame Street muppets aren't black, white, asian people but sort of "everyman" in multi-colors. I think a neat diversity would be to make orange, blue, purple minifigures in city, so that they could retain the "no race/all race" feature.
But you're right. Once they made Lando in brown, by comparison it made the yellows look like "white people," or at least non-black people. Then suddenly, there was a lack of representation.
I understand why they went to fleshies. But I also feel like that sort of "everyman" brotherhood was lost when that happened too.
Re: Skin Tone
...I don't like having yellow and flesh at the same time, that's my only problem.. it bugs me a lot that parts from yellow minifigs and flesh minifigs can't be mixed up. I do like that LEGO is multicultural so I would never say all minifigs should be yellow, but sometimes it's frustrating to see a yellow face that looks perfect but I can't find a flesh face that fits... and similarly, trying to find a face of color for a custom that didn't exist in that color! Switching only licensed themes but not LEGO original themes, imo, was a half-step that reduced customization without really improving minifigure design, given a lot of early fleshies had the same prints that existed in yellow. I value versatility with my LEGO and I wish they'd committed to one side.
Anyhow, I love the 2001 HP minfigs a lot, they represent childhood for me more than many. I miss the hairpieces more than anything else though; some of the new hairs don't feel quite right to me, almost too precise... but overall I like the new figs.
For those wondering why the 2001 figures look the way they do, it's because they were based on this official style guide issued by Warner Brothers: https://www.behance.net/gallery/12766123/Harry-Potter-Style-Guide
I was thinking more along the lines of constipated rather than drunk.
@ThatBionicleGuy said:
" @ThatBionicleGuy said:
"I wish I could find the source for that. I'm sure it was this little Lego Filefax thing I had as a kid, but I can't find any evidence of its existence on Bricklink or anywhere. I'm certain I remember reading about that being the reasoning at the time, though."
Found it! I was using the wrong search term... but this is the one I was thinking of as the source for my last post. I don't have it anymore to check for certain, but I'm pretty sure it was mentioned somewhere in here about the reasoning behind choosing yellow for the standard minifigure skin tone.
https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?G=701804"
That’s just modern marketing guff. When LEGO started making figs, maxifigs, they only had five colours to chose from. They chose yellow. Blue and black wouldn’t work, white was an option but likely not visually appealing as many buildings and vehicles were white. They did use red to represent Native Americans in some sets, so pretty clear that yellow was Caucasian.
When they moved to Minifigs they stick with yellow and it became their brand. Nothing to do with being neutral, all to do with what they made at the time and choosing the best fit for white skin.
@Ladondorf said:
"For those wondering why the 2001 figures look the way they do, it's because they were based on this official style guide issued by Warner Brothers: https://www.behance.net/gallery/12766123/Harry-Potter-Style-Guide"
Finally a reasonable explanation for those face prints! Thanks for sharing this
@PurpleDave said:
"Oh, they have copies of all of those old minifigs...in the vault with all the other sealed sets."
what is their plan with all of those
@lawieske:
Nothing? It’s part of their archives. Last I heard it was located under Ole Kirk’s old house, but that may have changed if the building was repurposed since then. Mostly it’s limited to employees only, but a few incredibly lucky individuals have been granted tours.
The dark not-so-secret is that some of these archived sets have gone missing over the years, most likely having been stolen. When that has happened, they seem to clamp down extra hard on tours for non-employees. It always bugged me how someone could actually slip a rattly box of plastic parts into their clothing without the ever-present tour guide noticing, but now I’m wondering how restrictive they are of employee access. Do they get constant accompaniment by archivists, or do any of them get a few minutes of alone time?