Ninja(go) Week for RSOTD? I'm okay with this.

This one’s actually very expensive on the secondary market because there are very few sealed copies out there, since it was targeted squarely at kids but the theme ended up being enduringly popular.

Rather fitting that the first Ninjago set on RSOTD is the actual first ever Ninjago set made.

Well, I know Ninjago has its dedicated fanbase just like Bionicle. Get ready everyone, someone's gonna infodump all you need to know about Kai.

Found the torso to the Kai from an early Ninjago polybag this evening doing my first real build in several years now. Hard to believe Ninjago is now so old, the first wave is considered classic LEGO. Hard to believe that a theme, I myself, as a TFOL then (I was 14 when they first started hitting my stores), thought would be another theme like Agents or Atlantis that would last a year or two, and a couple/three waves ended up being a smash hit, with ten years, dozens of sets and waves; a few animated TV series, and even a feature film.

While I never really cared for the theme, I felt Ninjago was one of the better TV series LEGO ever did.

Kai’s the red dude. He’s got spiky hair and a sword.

@Monopoly said:
"Rather fitting that the first Ninjago set on RSOTD is the actual first-ever Ninjago set made."

Incidentally, it's also the most expensive PPP AND the lowest set number used for 2011.

Though this is just a warmup for 2022, 352 days until it's Friendsageddon!

Ah. Took Huwbot a little time to get oriented to the right decade, but he was clearly working towards this with two Castle: Ninja sets leading the way. And he's still wearing the original cowl. I think I used the clip on the back to pose on of my original Ninja minifigs once...

Ooh, fun ninja story. A college friend of mine spent a few years teaching in Japan. He said that every other city in his prefecture had signs posted claiming they were famous for ninja. The city where he lived was famous for...pottery.

@magmafrost:
From yesterday, to be fair, the LEGO "katana" is more like a no-dachi to a minifig, which in no way could be sheathed at the hip. I don't know how historically accurate it was, but I've seen or read depictions where these were slung over the back somehow, which is really the only way you can stow it for transport on your person where it's not going to be dragging on the ground.

Of course, the ninja of legend didn't use no-dachi, but ninjato, which were like cheap katana with straight blades (that's redundant, if you know why katana have curved blades), and the sheathes were supposedly open at the tip so they could double as a blowgun or a snorkel.

@PurpleDave said:
"Of course, the ninja of legend didn't use no-dachi, but ninjato, which were like cheap katana with straight blades..."
Sure, the ninja of legend. It should be noted that the straight-bladed ninjato is a modern myth. There is no historical evidence that ninja ever used such a weapon. As infiltrators and spies - which is what they mostly were - it would not have made sense to have had a distinctive weapon they could not easily discard that could identify them if they got caught. More likely, when they used swords at all, they would have been wakizashi.

@MCLegoboy said:
"Well, I know Ninjago has its dedicated fanbase just like Bionicle. Get ready everyone, someone's gonna infodump all you need to know about Kai."

Main character in pilot season, Tournament of Elements, and shared Hands of Time with sister Nya. Last ninja to be recruited by Sensei Wu, last to find his Golden Weapon, last to tame his elemental dragon. He has a lot of vehicle sets, most of which are just incidentally shoved into one episode of the show. His parents were imprisoned by the Time Twins Krux and Acronix, until Kai and Nya freed them during the S7 Hands of Time arc. He’s the most common of the ninja, and the only one who had a dedicated hair piece created to represent his original TV series appearance in sets. The Sword of Fire that appears in this set is different than the second wave one, which was a specially molded element that’s in use to this day.

Fitting that we get this on the 10th Anniversary of the original pilot (it might be off by a tiny bit but it's close enough).

@Meadius said:
"Fitting that we get this on the 10th Anniversary of the original pilot (it might be off by a tiny bit but it's close enough). "

how about the EXACT SAME DAY! (for those in the UK, not sure when they first got it)

So many memories attached to this set, and there is no way this was random as it's the 10 anniversary of the theme today but I don't care!

@Zander:
Hence the "of legend" part. But maybe you missed the part about the curved katana blade. Nobody forges a curved katana (or, if they do, it's garbage). They forge straight katana, and the curve is created by the way they are quenched combined with the materials used to make the blade. This is an incredibly complicated and expensive process, which could take up to a year to complete. NOVA ran an episode a few years back that covered the last swordsmith in Japan who forges katana by traditional means only, and it was pretty insane.

The claim regarding the ninjato was that it was like a dollar-store version of the katana. Made cheaply, it would never form the graceful curve of a katana, nor would it last long in a fair fight against someone wielding a katana, but it could still be lethal to someone who's looking in the wrong direction when you sneak up behind them. Since katana (including wakizashi) were reserved for the samurai caste on pain of death, a garbage sword was better than no sword (hence why _so_many_ Japanese weapons evolved from farming equipment, because you couldn't forbid an ashigaru from owning farm equipment).

@Mr__Thrawn:
It should be noted that the only reason Kai got the only newly molded hair element is because he was the only character whose hairstyle in the TV series was not directly based on an existing LEGO hair element (something which always bugged me until they finally did create that element). Except that's not strictly true. Wu also had a special beard sculpted for him, based on the stereotypical "Asian master" look (I'm mostly reminded of Pai Mei from Kill Bill: Volume 2, or Bobby Lee's "Blind Kung-Fu Master" from Mad TV).

Hey look, it's my childhood!

wow, I feel old.

@cody6268 said:
"Hard to believe Ninjago is now so old, the first wave is considered classic LEGO. "
Uh... No, not really.

Huwbot's warming up for the real (if less enduring...) star of 2011:

ALIEN CONQUEST!

I really wanted to get this set back in 2011, because Kai was my favorite Ninja, but they seemed to be sold out everywhere I went. So I ended up getting Zane and Bonezai instead. Happy 10th anniversary, Ninjago!

I can't wait for the real star theme of 2011 to show up on RSotD though, Pharaoh's Quest!!!

This actually makes me feel so nostalgic, I remember as a child spending hours looking at the Ninjago sets with all those new colourful skeletons-fighting ninjas in the catalogue 10 years ago

ah yes random......

@Huw said:
"OK, I admit, on this occasion I did help Huwbot choose a Ninjago set today...

CapnRex101 made me do it :-)
"

Oh, you sneaky son of a brick! I started having this weird feeling of disbelief about today’s RSotD after I saw the 10th anniversary article just now, and I was just about to post a comment on this article that this might’ve been not-so-random after all! But I guess the truth got there before my suspicions did. Well played Brickset!

@bananaworld said:
"
Huwbot's warming up for the real (if less enduring...) star of 2011:

ALIEN CONQUEST!"

I see you are a man of culture just like me.

@PurpleDave said:
" @Zander :
Hence the "of legend" part. But maybe you missed the part about the curved katana blade. Nobody forges a curved katana (or, if they do, it's garbage). They forge straight katana, and the curve is created by the way they are quenched combined with the materials used to make the blade. This is an incredibly complicated and expensive process, which could take up to a year to complete. NOVA ran an episode a few years back that covered the last swordsmith in Japan who forges katana by traditional means only, and it was pretty insane.

The claim regarding the ninjato was that it was like a dollar-store version of the katana. Made cheaply, it would never form the graceful curve of a katana, nor would it last long in a fair fight against someone wielding a katana, but it could still be lethal to someone who's looking in the wrong direction when you sneak up behind them. Since katana (including wakizashi) were reserved for the samurai caste on pain of death, a garbage sword was better than no sword (hence why _so_many_ Japanese weapons evolved from farming equipment, because you couldn't forbid an ashigaru from owning farm equipment)."

During the Sengoku Period (late 15th to early 17th c. AD) when ninja were most active, there were no known straight edge swords made in Japan, 'garbage' or otherwise. It was certainly not a capital offence to have or carry a wakizashi until the mid-to-late 16th c. when there were a couple of edicts banning swords for non-samurai. Prior to the bans, townsfolk and peasants carried them routinely for self-defence. So the weapon of choice for a ninja wishing to blend in and pass for a peasant or city dweller up until the mid-16th c. was a wakizashi, a weapon with a curved blade. If you have a peer reviewed scholarly reference to straight edge swords in the Sengoku Period, please provide full details, i.e. journal, volume number, page numbers and year.