There was a discussion that was going off topic in Sokoda’s thread regarding Chima, so I decided to create a special topic in here.
Legends of Chima was one of the first “Big Bang” themes, and it was originally intended to be Ninjago’s successor, but due to the fact that Ninjago continued past it’s planned three years, it resulted in both themes being released and competing against each other for sales and popularity. Of the two, Ninjago was obviously the winner, and Chima was left in the dust, being mostly disliked by most fans and even outright hated by some.
Personally, I loved the theme back when it was on shelves, and got quite a few of the sets… and I am a fan of it even to this day. This may piss off a lot of people, but in retrospect, I actually like Chima a lot more than Ninjago. I loved the world building, and the animal-inspired vehicle sets are in my opinion a lot more interesting than the generic good guy vehicles that Ninjago keeps making every year. Even the TV Show, which wasn’t very well received by most people, had the best looking 3D animation out of all of LEGO’s TV Shows, as stated by Tommy Anderson himself on Twitter. And although the writing wasn’t the best in the first year, the show did improve as time went on, and even managed to get a solid conclusion to the story, unlike something like say, Nexo Knights, which ended very abruptly and never got a proper ending.
It is also worth noting that unlike many other themes, it did manage to attract a small, yet still very active community. There actually is a surprisingly active Chima Discord server out there, with 400+ members.
So I do want to know… why do so many people hate Legends of Chima? Was it the fact that it supposedly tried to replace Ninjago? Was it the TV Show? Was it the sets? I really want to know, because I never understood why this theme was so hated.