What Happened to LEGO Space?

I blame Star Wars for the decline of Lego space. While I like the movies Star Wars is not ideal for basing Lego sets on. Almost all the Star Wars spaceships are gray or black and very boring. Lego spaceships should be more like the ones from Spyrius or classic space to name a few examples. You should be able to use your imagination when building and/or playing with lego space sets.

Galaxy squad is the last space theme in general, but insectoids is the last of the OG space themes where each faction had their own entire line of sets within an overarching universe (example blacktron 1, space police 1, futuron) with some very minor exceptions like a figure from a different theme being included as a cameo ( Some space police 1 sets featured a blacktron figure as a prisoner, unitron monorail featured a spyrius droid for example) Unlike later space themes which combined the protagonists and antagonists entire armies/vehicles/bases into one single theme (galaxy squad, space police 3, alien conquest, mars mission, life on mars although both factions in that theme were friendly) Town/city space is it's own thing where it focuses on real world space travel or near future official concepts by NASA

I had no idea the Space theme kept going for so long. My era was more the Blacktron/Futuron sub-theme, circa 1987. So many great sets!

Star Wars. It reduces marketing and development cost to a minimum. Allows them to just pick a model and reliably sell it in huge quantities, often repeately in multiple iterations. Iam quite okay with Classic Space getting few models. Like quite recently the Galaxy Explorer, the Blacktron Ship and Astronaut with Baby. Would be nice to just have something like that on the horizon every couple of months.

You basically have to divide Space into two categories: realistic/near future and sci-fi. Realistic/near future encompasses the Town/City space sets and the astronauts side of Life on Mars, while sci-fi covers everything else. Unlicensed sci-fi... is currently dead, but only because Star Wars is active and has been active for quite some time. You'll notice that LEGO tends to bring out unlicensed sci-fi space themes whenever Star Wars as a franchise is inactive and not producing any major media. Of course, due to Disney constantly pumping out new Star Wars media, I don't see that happening again any time soon. Realistic space is alive and well, and I don't see it going anywhere. I'd say it's VERY hasty to blame Galaxy Squad for the apparent death of LEGO Space. Reason being that unlike a lot of companies, LEGO doesn't equate one single iteration of a theme flopping as the entire concept flopping. Galador was a total failure but it didn't prevent LEGO from experimenting with later action figure concepts, just using different systems (Technic for Bionicle, Brick-built for Knights Kingdom 2 buildable figures, CCBS for later Bionicle figures, Hero Factory and the various Constraction adaptations of Star Wars, Super Heroes and Chima). Your claim that space themes don't fit LEGO's new strategy is honestly illogical. LEGO's new strategy of "big bang" themes and licensed properties isn't genre-specific or genre-exclusive, it's just reliant on there being a need for a new "big bang" theme, and in this case, one that doesn't coincide with any major Star Wars activity. Right now there isn't really one, Ninjago continues to go strong even after its movie flopped. But if things were different, say, Ninjago got replaced after its third year by Chima, and then Chima was replaced after its third year, who's to say the next big bang theme wouldn't be space? Or pirates? Or for that matter, space pirates since LEGO likes crossing over genres these days? Nexo Knights is a good example of this, it was a Big Bang theme consisting of a mashup of the medieval fantasy and cyberpunk-lite genres that effectively acted like a Castle theme, just with high tech gear instead of swords and sorcery.

Don’t get me wrong, I love ninjago. It’s probably my favorite Lego theme of all time and 100% my favorite running theme, but in my opinion it ruined a lot of things I love about Lego. It was the pinnacle of early 2010’s Lego unlicensed themes, but it is what killed the era. I the bitsand bricks podcast Lego even stated that they are continually trying to intentionally replicate the success of Ninjago. That is what has led to in NEXO Knights. The market has changed for toys. Lego is loosing children to technology. This is why we see vidyo and hidden side. The reason we love The 2010’s era so much, is because it was the best Lego has been at understanding it’s audience. But Lego tried over and over to capture thier “big bang themes”. If yo is look at nexo knights and chima they both have a old timey atheistic overlayed with cars and mechs and other tech. This worked well for ninjago because it allowed for cars, mechs, and castles. Three of the coolest things for young boys. The problem is ninjago was too perfect. They caught lightning in a bottle. This probably won’t happen again. They see things like castle space or pirates as fruitless when they could make the next ninjago.

To answer the last question Potentially Lego ninjago space bound Well on a slightly more serious note space has the best chance at actually coming back because creating a sci-fy sci-fi theme is quite possible with out compromising the identity of space, like nexo Knights

I wish I was into LEGO when I was younger. So many cool Space Sets! Great information shared. Thank you .

I do remember seeing Galaxy Squad sets warming shelves as late as February 2015, only some getting discounted at ToysRUs. I myself only picked up a handful of sets at the time, mostly from the lower side of the range, and the Swarm Interceptor is still one of my favorite Space sets of all time. But I do agree there was an oversaturation of Space in a 4-year period, so transitioning from one to the other was difficult for fans. Without a gap in between for a breather, the themes didn't have a chance to resonate. The fact that Space themes became about "Humans vs Aliens" even stretches further back, with the likes of Mars Mission (2007-2008), LEGO Factory sets Star Justice and Space Skulls (2008) and the 3 themes mentioned above. In 2002, Life on Mars had Human and Alien encounters, but never came off as hostile or aggressive; rather, the Martians were HELPING the humans repair their ships and vehicles, gather resources and return home. It was less conflict and more exploration, which is what we see in City Space lines nowadays. Another excellent video Richie!

So long as movie franchise sets are available then original unlicensed themes are going to play second fiddle. There are only so many play set designs and those are going to be skewed towards a licenced theme rather than Space or Castle

ahhhhh my childhood. Early classic space (yes I am an old fart 😆) I was so excited when they finally made a black suit classic space fig. They only made it 2 or 3 times. As a kid I loved that fig. Classic Space is technically only classic space not blacktron, not space police etc. I see why people call those themes space but technically they aren’t classic space. Great vid man. 👍

Video would be much better without all the flashing words.

Great video Richie! Very well said and edited! Love all the analysis you did, and your deeper look on why all three of those classic themes most likely won't return (at least not on their own), and why it might've been intentional. Very insightful stuff! Can't wait for the next video! You're on a roll man!

4:54 to be honest, atlantis also had technical cool stuff, not multiplayer game, but few simple games+AR in flash. AR. In flash player. That's something. And also there was 3d short film.

Richie, your script writing is just phenomenal.

I really want the og classic space theme back

I wish Lego would return to classic generic themes such as Castle, Space, and Pirates. Instead of just releasing sets under those themes as massive expensive adult collectors items.

I comment on last vid about space XD awesome! ^_^ In my opinion, I think space themes were declining late 90's to early '00s. Then they dive into Star Wars license and Bionicle. Then its like they forgot how to space.

To me there were several distinct eras: There is the totally OG Classic Space era with blue ships and stations, yellow windows and grey utility vehicles, which lasted only two years. But that's just for kids like me who lived through this time and were as captivated by it as the kids who experienced the first OG year of Transformers. Then there is the general Classic Space era with the Classic Space figure (in different colors), which lasted until 1987 when they changed the astronauts' outfits for the first time, with Futuron. From then on they launched a new Space team every year: Blacktron I, Space Police I, M-Tron, Blacktron II, Space Police II, Ice Planet, Spyrius and Unitron, Exploriens, Roboforce, UFO and Insectoids. And by 1998 Space was done, as far as most older AFOLs are concerned. Space Police III, Alien Conquest and Galaxy Squad, while great, are "just" retro themes. And now we get the retro-retro themes. Small wonder after the success of 10497, the comeback of the OG OG OG set of them all: the Galaxy Explorer. As far as I'm concerned they can bring back one retro set every year from now on. I'd pay serious buck for an updated version of legendary sets like 6929. 6280, 6989, 6987, 6984, 6986, 6973 or 6975. Bring it on!

Aaaaaand is back in 2024!