After Frodo and Aragorn, LEGO continues to distill information in small quantities and today unveils the highly anticipated minifigure of Legolas with the reproduction of a poster of the Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers movie from 2002.

Once again, the Orlando Bloom minifigure promises to be very successful with hair incorporating the ears of the son of the King of the Elves of the Black Forest and a serigraphy of the face perfectly reproducing the emaciated features of the actor.

The other little-known character from the next wave of Star Wars sets is Darth Malgus. This Sith Lord confronts Satele Shan on Aldeeran in the trailer Hope Game Star Wars The Old Republic will be delivered in the set 9500 Sith Fury Class Interceptor. 

Darth Malgus also makes his show in the very first and extremely excellent trailer for SWTOR: Disappointed. In this first trailer, he was not yet identified by name. He is also present in the third trailer of the game: Return.

Physically, we immediately think of Darth Vader and this is probably no coincidence. This video game character also seen in the paper comic Star Wars The Old Republic: Deceived, should gain momentum in the extended universe thanks to a certain charisma. He is everything a fan expects from a Sith Lord.

On the background side, it's complicated as usual with Star Wars ... Darth Malgus, formerly known as Veradun and whose wife, Eleena Daru, was a former Twi'lek slave, distinguished herself during the sack the Jedi Temple on Coruscant by killing Jedi Ven Zallow. Passed through the Sith Military Academy on his home planet Dromund Kaas, Darth Malgus also participated in the recapture of the planet Korriban. That's about it, from what we know about the character.

On the minifigure side, we can expect a nice silkscreen print on the face if LEGO retains the character seen in Disappointed. In the other two trailers they got rid of their mask / respirator / voice transformer, etc ... A dark outfit, a cape, a lightsaber and voila ....

The and 9500 Sith Fury Class Interceptor, despite belonging to the extended universe, should appeal to fans and collectors. The Sith hunter and Darth Malgus obviously remind us of Darth Vader and his Tie Advanced Starfighter. An emblematic villain, a beautiful vessel which respects the spirit of the machines of the saga and here is a set which should be a hit in 2012 ...

If you follow this blog, it has not escaped your notice that the set 9497 Republic Striker-Class Starfighter will contain the minifigure of a character almost unknown to even the most cultured fans of the Star Wars saga. And for good reason, it is a character created for the game Star Wars The Old Republic released in December 2011.

Created for the webcomic Threat of Peace (accessible here) Introducing the game Star Wars The Old Republic, the character of Satele Shan is a young woman descended from [Darth] Revan, a Jedi turned Sith and then turned back to Jedi (you follow?) and Bastila Shan, a Jedi woman seen in the game Star Wars Knights of the Old Republic released in 2003. In SWTOR, she is the Grand Master of the Jedi Order and fights against the Sith led by Darth Malgus, notably during the Battle of Aldeeran.

Visually the character has evolved a lot between the comic version and the one seen in the two trailers of the game: Hope et Return. Her physical appearance in the game is based on that of the second-class American actress's face. Sno E.Blac and the minifigure will therefore be inspired by this 3D version of the character. She is equipped with a double blue lightsaber and dressed in a sauce jumpsuit heroic fantasy which should appeal to fans.

This is therefore a key character in the Star Wars universe developed in this MMORPG and which will appeal to the most addicted players. The others will undoubtedly be delighted to have the right to an unprecedented character who, even if he is not from the canonical Star Wars universe, is always better than an umpteenth minifigure of Kenobi or Anakin.

Many people have questions about the official Iron Man minifigure (right in the photo). About his helmet obviously with those who appreciate this interpretation and those who find it oversized, but also about the source of energy which is on his chest and which sports an unusual triangular shape. Everyone can imagine themselves as Iron Man with the more classic round ARC Reactor, like that of the minifig prototype presented at Comic Con in San Diego in July 2011 (on the left in the photo).

During his long career between comics, cartoons and films Iron Man wore many armor, in very varied colors and dressings and powered in turn by electric batteries, solar cells and a radioactive source, Palladium.

Iron Man appears well in the movie Iron Man 2 with this Mark VI type armor with this triangle on the chest. He will also wear this armor in the movie The Avengers. The image above is taken from the movie trailer. This confirms, as LEGO had indicated, that the sets 6867 Loki's Cosmic Cube Escape, 6868 Hulk's Helicarrier Breakout et 6869 Quinjet Aerial Battle of the Marvel range will be directly based on the characters and events of the film.

This undoubtedly explains the absence of preliminary visuals of these sets, the content of which contains important scriptwriting information on certain scenes of the film. We can imagine that LEGO will keep these sets confidential as long as possible to reveal them to the public only when the film is released. In any case, they were not present in the reseller catalogs until now.

I've always had a very mixed opinion of LEGO board games. But we have to admit that this set 3866 Battle of Hoth has something to appeal to Star Wars fans like me: The microfigs provided are really successful and the new visual posted by grogall on Eurobricks confirms me in the idea that I need this box ... Will we see nice MOCs integrating these microfigs? No doubt yes in the coming months. special mention for Chewbacca and Boba Fett.

As a reminder, here is the official description of the game:

The Rebel Alliance is going through a dark period. Darth Vader has discovered Luke Skywalker's secret base on Hoth, the distant ice planet, and the Empire's ground troops are about to attack! The Battle of Hoth has begun. An exciting game of strategy and chance for 2 to 4 players.
Package content: 305 items
Game duration: 20 minutes