Flesh tone versus classic yellow faces

vwong19

I find all my yellow headed standard grin people in my modular street display to be disturbingly too happy and expressionless. They look like they're in a trance while the rest my citizens go about their business. I mix my super heroes, Marvel and DC, in the scene as well. My yellow population is probably the minority due to my preference for license themes.

Multiversal

I only use the yellow ones, but I keep the fleshies, and I do appreciate having them if they portray an actor I know.

Redbullgivesuwind

Im with @Madaboutlegos the yellows will always mean lego to me. And if they stop selling them I will be annoyed. However it has never really bothered me and I can take or leave either. I dont mind them even when mixed together it doesnt really feel like its wrong or anything.

Oldfan

I like flesh tone, I just wish they had a wider variety. Not everyone is the same skin tone.

That is probably one reason that yellow was originally picked in the first place, to avoid this kind of discussion...IIRC, there are 3-4 different "flesh" tone head colors available across all licensed themes (the variety of facial expressions for each may be limited, of course).

I'm OK with skin tones for licensed themes and yellow for the standard lines. Yellow represents classic LEGO for me, and the licensed themes seem to demand a certain level of faithfulness to the characterization (especially for the prices we pay!). Lando Calrissian portrayed with a yellow head would look...odd.

prevere

The never-ending gestures on the faces is what bothers me the most. And it's more from a sorting perspective. But I prefer the classic yellow vintage look.

TheBigLegoski

Mmmh......
OK, so this thread has been dead for a year and a half (started in April 2011 while it is now Oct. 12 2012), interesting to see if I can revive it!?!?

Why? I am a HUGE LOTR Lego fan, and I recently purchased ALL seven sets which are thus far available (not counting the promotional polybags as none of those seem to be EVER available in The Netherlands). And since LOTR is a licensed Lego theme all minifig's have (more or less) matching skin tones. When I started collecting Lego again (as an adult) in the second half of 2010 I focussed on the new Kingdoms line, since the castle theme which came out in 1984 with the Lion and Falcon knights was my favourite childhood Lego theme (although castle and classic space Lego were always a close call).

So seeing all those yellow-heads was a familiar sight. I was very very delighted to see that fortunately Lego had gotten rid of those boring zombie-like expressionless 'smiley' faces, and that now all Lego minifig head were adorned with a wide variety of of expressions and different coloured and style eyebrows, moustaches, beards, stubbles, wrinkles, crowfeet, pimples, freckles, warts, etcetera. I love all those animated somewhat cartoonish minifig heads! Then in the fall of 2010 I bought my first Prince of Persia set, and Dastan (the main character) made all my other beloved minifigs look as if they all suffered from Jaundice or Hepatitis with their awkward yellow heads and hands.

At first I felt that I absolutely could not mix the 'classic' yellow-heads with the fleshies, it just felt wrong. A mismatch, aesthetically displeasing! Now I have grown accustomed to them both, or so I thought, mixing in my PoP and Superheroes with all the other ones. But with my recent purchase of all the LOTR sets, and a couple of POTC sets I very much wish Lego would just abandon the yellow heads all together. As a matter of fact, I know wish TLG would have done this already somewhere in 2008 so that all my Kingdoms, castle, and collectable minifigs etcetera would have fleshy heads and hands instead of those antiquated obsolete last millennium colour yellow heads!

To all other minifigure enthusiasts, I am curious what your thoughts/opinions, if you care, on this issue are?

ps.
It seems that the majority of the opinions expressed on this thread thus far are rather conservative, i.e. in favour of yellow-heads.

CCC

^ I like both, and I can never mix them. Legolas and S3 elf are a classic example. They cannot be seen together even though they are similar characters. They also cannot be changed, since the ears are the wrong colour. I wish Lego would make a wider range of fleshie heads in non-licensed poses. Just the basic smiles and frowns, etc. I'd love to be able to buy 100 packs of heads and heads, so that you could just change them on the yellow heads if you wanted to. Obviously, torsos can be a problem if printed with yellow / flesh tones. So some pieces are never interchangeable.

TheBigLegoski

@CCC
Well you can change the elfs, if you change both head, hairpiece and hands, say if you have for instance 2 Mines of Moria sets and at least two S3 CMF elfs. Of course the yellow ears don't look good with the peachy/pink head and vice versa etc.

Ever since the introduction of the non-licensed Friends theme aimed at girls:

I am hoping that TLG will eventually have all regular minifig.'s that aren't part of licensed theme also done with peachy/pink, toffee/caramel/orange-brown, and chocolaty/brown skin tones, and whatever other colour are desirable, for instance in a new sci-fi theme with lots of bizare looking aliens etc. (which don't necessarily have to be assigned an 'evil role').

I hope that some day TLG group will realize that it just looks better, given the fact that there are today so many more colours available as well as used in Lego. It only seems like natural evolution in toy design to me. They introduced a newly molded horse after the cow, camel, pig, and new goat were introduced, which already looked much better then the old horse. they recently updated the lego dog. So why not do the same with colours for minifig heads and hands. Beyond that I think the minifig is perfect, they don't need to remold them.

I have read a while ago in a very long newspaper article (which I unfortunately am unable to find online) that Ole Kirk Christiansen, or perhaps his son actually, decided to have all Lego minifig.'s have yellow heads so as to cancel out any racial issues regarding minifig.'s and the play-world of a child. However since flesh coloured tones have already been introduced some seven or eight years ago in licensed themes as well as in the new friends theme of this year, they might as well fully embrace the idea of celebrating all the existing differences which naturally occur within the human race, and just get rid of the yellow heads all together.

Next to the fact that in the fantasy castle era one faction (the trolls) were all sand green, but in all other respects looked just like any other minifig. and yet another faction (the dwarfs) were all midgets with the short non-movable one piece legs (Duuuh! otherwise they wouldn't be very dwarfish of course).

In Tolkien's Lord of the Rings the conflict is ultimately about good versus evil. About power and the responsibibility that comes with it. In the book (and film adaptations) there are many conflicts and much distrust (and stereotypes) between the various races, yet with the fellowship, and prior to that in other points of time in the history of Middle Earth these differences are overcome and bridged by all these various peoples and races. So when TLG is gutsy enough to create LOTR Lego why not, be just as adventurous with all their other non-licensed themes?!

Off with all those yellow-heads! ; )

emilewski

^ I appreciate the argument made. I, however, hold to the yellow heads for unlicensed themes and flesh for licensed themes. It does cause issues with interchangeability, but not only are the yellows classic and timeless, but for me it is a LEGO city devoid of race, or rather LEGO minifigs are their own race of little yellow people. If I wanted humans living in my LEGO city then I would put non-LEGO humans in it. Kind of like how Smurfs are blue. They can start making fleshy Smurfs, but would they really still be Smurfs then? Same for me with the yellow minifigs.

CCC

TheBigLegoski said:

@CCC
Well you can change the elfs, if you change both head, hairpiece and hands, say if you have for instance 2 Mines of Moria sets and at least two S3 CMF elfs. Of course the yellow ears don't look good with the peachy/pink head and vice versa etc.

That's the problem. Yellow ears on flesh heads just look wrong. And it the headpieces and heads that cost a lot.

GothamConstructionCo

It is a hard one. I will never mix so I decided on running parallel Lego universes.

Lego world (yellow) City and
Lego licence (flesh tone) and that covers my SW and DC MOCs .

Plus the yellow heads offer more choice of facial expressions and then there's the problem of torso designs. The standard figures have a much flatter look over the licences torsos.

mesiro95

yellow heads all the way. I've always hated flesh and personally think that they ruin licensed products, and I think I will never get over it. wah.

AFFOL_Shellz_Bellz

No preference here, they each have their place in the world of Lego. I do find sorting through bulk for the correct head for a specific figure tedious, but I'm glad they are not all that very bland smile of the vintage minifig.

BobaFett2

I can't say that I love flesh. That said, yellow can get boring. I've always thought that yellow was fine. When I do use flesh and yellow, I generally have them be in a dystopic stratified society where one color has is far above the other.

chuxtoybox

bluemoose said:

Hmm, not something I can get particularly worked up about. Same with the grey/bley issue.

What is the grey/bley issue? Does it have something to do with the CMFs being made in China? I think the flesh colored heads are great! I think it's amazing how they can get a minifigure to look exactly like Johnny Depp, even in facepaint! I can't picture the CMFs done in flesh though. I agree that the two don't mix exactly well together but I think if you were making a really large city or town they wouldn't look too bad if they were all doing interesting things.

Legoboy

mesiro95 said:

yellow heads all the way. I've always hated flesh and personally think that they ruin licensed products, and I think I will never get over it. wah.

I'm not sure I can imagine Hulk in yellow! ;o)

Crooz

I know I hated flesh pieces when they first came out. Now it doesn't matter too much. I love that they made some great faces like the Frodo head in the Shelob set. In my LEGO room the two don't mix too often unless they are on the same shelf.

Amiko

I have worked out a great way to integrate the two styles into my (very grown up, mature and intellectual... ahem) play... I essentially justify the fleshtone as stage/screen makeup used to transform a yellow headed actor into fleshtoned film character... I therefore have set up displays with a film crew of yellow hued technicians (thanks to LEGO Studio!) 'behind the camera' and a whole range of fleshtoned artistes in front.

Being lucky enough to own a few yellowheaded Star Wars minifigures, I can also have a few actors living in my town - Liam Neeson's a huge fan of the local bakery for example.

It's a bit of fun that explains away the difference in my daft head but it also inspires some building and photography ideas too. I'm working on a few ideas for studio MOCS as 'half complete', partial playsets suddenly develop a sense of context when one places a few lights and a minifig cameraman or two in with them. I've also been inspired to create a cinema for my yellow headed townsfolk to come and watch all those actors in makeup... (as seen through a smart camera incorporated into the cinema screen).

In this respect, the change to fleshtone figures for films has inspired me to develop some great projects. I'm happy as a result.

SilentMode

I don't mind flesh heads at all. The only issue I've had with them is that my sigfig has been stuck with that one increasingly scarce head for three years...

vwong19

Instead of flesh vs yellow, how about beady eyes, zomie expression vs white pupil?

I personally prefer the latest versions of Star War minifigs because of the white pupil expressions. That theme seemed to hold out the longest in terms of converting while other licensed and non licensed thems (except modulars) went white pupil years earlier.

ISDAvenger

Since I only collect O/T Star Wars sets, I prefer the flesh heads since it adds realism. I do like the yellow heads for the more traditional Lego sets.

binaryeye

chuxtoybox said:

What is the grey/bley issue?

The color of gray was changed in the mid-2000s. Old grays are relatively neutral (though dark gray may have a bit of brown/yellow to it). New grays have a blue tint.

chuxtoybox

I don't feel that Lego was trying to introduce races into their system by making "fleshies" but just trying to make the minifigures look more like the actors they represent. It is my opinion that the "fleshy" SW figures and HP figures look better than their yellow counterparts and I can't imagine Indy in yellow or Jack Sparrow or Will Turner or Aragorn, etc. etc. As an aside: Is it really becoming politically incorrect to stereotype space aliens as evil?

Aanchir

chuxtoybox said:

I don't feel that Lego was trying to introduce races into their system by making "fleshies" but just trying to make the minifigures look more like the actors they represent. It is my opinion that the "fleshy" SW figures and HP figures look better than their yellow counterparts and I can't imagine Indy in yellow or Jack Sparrow or Will Turner or Aragorn, etc. etc. As an aside: Is it really becoming politically incorrect to stereotype space aliens as evil?

Frustratingly, in certain circles, it is. And of course some of this is justified, since many early stories of invaders from outer space were intended to capitalize on and act as allegories for anti-foreigner sentiment. Really, that's just part of a much larger tradition: a popular interpretation of Bram Stoker's Dracula is as an allegory warning of how licentious foreigners might corrupt good English women.

I'm fine with the trend in media portraying aliens as equal or superior to humans on a moral level. Media has a strong ability to get people to think. It has room for plenty of nuance and sentiment in the message it tries to send. But as far as toy design is concerned, it's very understandable that the protagonists of your world should be characters kids can instantly relate to, whereas with the antagonists it's more important that they look scary — and one of the quintessential types of fear is, of course, fear of the unfamiliar. Whether that's by making your antagonists bug-eyed aliens, by replacing your antagonists' body parts with robot parts (which is itself mildly controversial — I've seen some people claim LEGO Agents was teaching kids to be prejudiced against people with prosthetics!), or giving your antagonists supernatural characteristics like glowing red eyes depends on the theme.

chuxtoybox

I've seen some people claim LEGO Agents was teaching kids to be prejudiced against people with prosthetics!) So is that why Lego invented protagonists with prosthetics for MF? I'm joking but someones probably going to say its true. And if we were going to go against stereotypes, are the monsters indeed the antagonists or the heroes?

CCC

Aliens can be made easy to relate to if there is a strong story. ET was pretty ugly looking yet kids relate to him, lost and trying to get home.

Spicy

I saw the first Harry Potter Lego sets during my Dark Age and was surprised to see that they had flesh tones as opposed to being classic yellow. But the initial surprise aside, it doesn't bother me. I own a Harry Potter polybag set and his figure stands right along with the rest of my minifigs. He fits in just fine. And with Chima we now have a spectrum of flesh tones! Or I guess it would be fur, feather, and scale tones in their case.

Picopirate

Does anyone refuse to mix classic smiley yellows with modern yellows that have lips, facial hair, glasses, etc.?

Aanchir

CCC said:

Aliens can be made easy to relate to if there is a strong story. ET was pretty ugly looking yet kids relate to him, lost and trying to get home.

Yes, that's true, but that's part of why it doesn't work as well in the marketing of toys. but with an in-house theme it helps for kids to understand the basics of the product and story immediately when they pull it off the shelf. That's part of why BIONICLE tended to lock out newer fans, particularly in its later years: kids couldn't become passionate about the product if it required an extraordinary amount of effort to even understand the product.

It's kind of like the web design/software design principle WYSIWYG (What You See Is What You Get). As far as toy design and marketing is concerned, often the best story is the story kids are most likely to act out on their own when they play with the product. It's simple, it's intuitive, and it ensures that there's not a huge learning curve to understanding the characters and their motivations.

Now, this doesn't apply as much to movie tie-in merchandise, in part because the budget for promoting the more nuanced story doesn't have to come entirely out of the revenue from toy sales. Licensed themes are especially easy because in exchange for any up-front licensing fees and a share of the toy sales revenue, you have media companies that will promote the background story for you simply in the interest of self-preservation. But with an in-house merchandise-driven franchise, it's a real risk to gamble kids' ability to understand the product on the success of your marketing techniques.

ludzik

Vimin... what about the Vimin ;) err I mean women.... this is where my dillema lies. I originally hated fleshies... I considered them the "necessarily" evil as while I understood why Lego came out with them, I really didn't care for them. Days, weeks, months passed and now I got to the point that I wanted some of my main characters to be flesh colored.... but then I hit a stumbling block..... I am short on fleshie women! OK, I have the heads but the bodies I have come with yellow cleavage... ugh....

khmellymel

I prefer flesh tones for licensed themes and yellow for others. dunno why, I grew up with yellow minifigs.