Today’s Lego Minifigures are as diverse as the design of the bricks themselves, and they keep on evolving into God-knows-what as the release of various themes and movie character franchises seem to spiral out of control.
Needless to say, today’s minifigures, with their heterogenous facial expressions, colors, and accessories, are indeed fun to play with, or stare at – depending on how one would like to collect them. They have become characters that represent so many entities. Emmet from The Lego Movie reflects the relatable everyday person, such as you and me, and the others such as those from the Collectible Minifigures Series Theme, launched in 2010, offer a more diverse set that range from Abraham Lincoln to aliens. These characters usually have alternate facial expressions printed on opposite sides, so they can look either happy, sad, afraid, or angry. Their hair also comes in various styles, and their skin tone has mostly evolved to resemble human skin. Some also have soft capes so you can dress them, too.
It’s interesting to note that in 1978, when the Minifigure was designed and launched, considered as Lego’s most important design second only to the interlocking brick itself, they all had the same yellow skin color and the same simple smiling face, regardless of their gender. In the late 80s and early 90s when the Pirates Theme was introduced, the homogenous face was forever altered when pirate features such as the beard and eye patch were added. But they all still had the same smiling expression. You got it, bad guys that had the same winsome smiles.
Then came the Paradisa theme that introduced elements that are attractive to young girls. The basic brick colors were diversified when pink, purple, and light green were added. Moreover, female Minifigures became more female when eyelashes and sexy lips were added unto them.
These themes were all original creations of Lego, until the new millenium came and ushered in the franchised themes from popular movies that gave us Darth Vader, Harry Potter, Superman, and the like, and with them came countless additions and alterations to the Minifigure design.
In the past when Minifigures were still very simple, their facial expressions and embellishments were only imagined by the kids that played them; ditto for the bricks that used to be fewer in design, color, and type. Imagination ran high back then. Characters and plots grew out from the kids’ minds, same with the architectural and engineering designs since they only had few choices to work with. It was fun in the sense that kids had more power and control over their sets.
Today, almost everything is given to you already. From the ultra-detailed Minifigures, countless types of bricks, and plots and characters from popular movies, little is now left to one’s imagination. Creativity on which Lego itself was built upon diminished dramatically.
Without doubt, the current themed sets look more attractive. There’s no argument on that. They’re a feast to the eyes, but not to one’s brain. They have became eye candies, not brain candies. You see what you want to see, not what you think you see.
It can be surmised that business sense dictated that in order for a product to survive, it has to evolve and adapt to the demands of the times. With the toy market now deluged with an unprecedented myriad of both offline and online entertainment choices and diversions, living a life of ultra fast-paced lifestyle that has forgone the value of contemplation, how should a product respond? Creativity can only be espoused only for so long. Creativity itself has to evolve, too. Sadly, it has evolved backwards. Or has it evolved into something completely new?
Hence, the Minifigure of today, compared to the docile-looking past, has to look fierce, and it has done that indeed – effectively attracting and holding your attention at all costs, because it has no other choice. Its survival is at stake.
So which one is more awesome, the Minifigure of yesterday or today? Either one can be more than the other. It may depend on the generation you were born, or how you value your imagination or lack thereof. But the one and only more awesome thing than anything is survival. When you remain in the toy shelves throughout the ages, ready to shed skin and grow different ones if you must in order to keep your relationship with your ever-changing buyers, the you are truly awesome. After all, toy manufacturing and collecting is not just a business and hobby, respectively. It’s a relationship.
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