Public opinion of TriMet's decisions have been pretty mixed, mostly because TriMet's decisions are so convoluted that they can be a real challenge to understand. In reality, Metro and Portlanders need to have a bigger civic conversation about the future of TriMet, looking at the big picture. We have 3 looming existential crises of TriMet to be concerned about that are bigger than revenue dips, crime, or homeless people.
Civic leaders and the public are focused on a quick "fix" for TriMet revenue drops - even though we've seen this coming for a long time, it's very predictable that TriMet's Board of Directors acts at the last minute. Also, very predictably, TriMet's Board opted for a fare increase because over the previous 20 years that's been a go-to answer to every problem (except for that one time they killed Fareless Square). The politically appointed boards of TriMet and Metro lack the unique specialized knowledge of the issues I'll bring up here. If TriMet knows about these larger issues, they're obviously burring it from public view. In the short term, increasing fares is like putting fresh paint on a house that's on fire; in this situation, that paint is HIGHLY flammable.
First - fare hikes as a tactic is a brain-dead move. Just the most utterly stupid and self-sabotaging response to a looming budget shortfall. I'm dwelling on this because it illustrates their terrible decision-making, which is functional proof they have no idea what they're doing. Some of the core reasons for this:

• Increasing fares reduces utilization. Higher cost means fewer people ride, which will decrease the ridership revenue. It will also marginally increase the number of people who won't pay (funny story, some of those who don't pay actually can't afford to). TriMet isn't a monopoly or inelastic service, and plenty of other choices exist that didn't exist 20 years ago: an actual bike share, scooters, electric bikes, UbeLyft, shared vehicles, and more bike paths. Before the pandemic, it was common that I would bus into downtown for work and then take a Lyft home because it wasn't all that expensive, like $8 more than a bus ride - TriMet's price increases make a system that wasn't very competitive simply less compelling.
  
• Across Portland we need to go through a process of austerity and downsizing government. I absolutely support Wheeler putting a pause on rate increases, but for God's sake, we have far too much largesse in every layer of government. If you need to learn what I'm talking about, read my old article on Parks & Rec. So many divisions/agencies have doubled their staff while reducing service levels. It's bonkers. Cutting throats needs to be an imperative. This is because the great majority of public sector employees in Oregon and Portland are incompetent, redundant, and only exist because Oregon and Portland have been reluctant to use automation. And I don't mean the cutting-edge AI stuff, I'm talking about people who still handle business processes as if they're paper forms. I could tell so many stories from my professional experience - but you'll have to take my word for it for now: culling this bureaucracy is the right move, and until there's a significant downsizing, the political class is taking none of the financial crisis or cost of living situation seriously.
  
• TriMet's operating budget/revenue is primarily Payroll Taxes, not passenger revenue. About 20-30% of TriMet's budget comes from people buying fares, whereas the bulk of money TriMet needs comes from payroll taxes that businesses pay directly. Because of this, transit activists (including myself) have been proponents of increasing the payroll taxes marginally to make TriMet free for riders. Of course, fareless transit comes with a wide variety of new and different problems (that's an article for another time). Still, when you understand that only a sliver of revenue comes from fares, increasing the fare simply results in a marginal increase in revenue. The much bigger problem is going to businesses investing outside of Metro, and changing workforces that 1) won't pay payroll taxes reliably, 2) don't need people to go into the office. Think about the longer-term game here: is TriMet's board going to increase fares as utilization drops and payroll taxes continually diminish? (See my point above about how their default answer is "yes" because it's the only politically expedient answer.)
  

Reading comments about the fare hikes, most of the public thinks TriMet is dealing with a safety or utilization issue. Both of these are 100% true: soft-on-crime progressives have wholly obliterated the working class perception of TriMet safety - there are so many different ways this has happened, but we should thank so many people in the media and political class: Ana del Rocio's crying wolf about racism in fare inspections (and the media entertaining it), or Mike Schmidt deinstitutionalizing of the justice system, or Legislature's inability to act on the massive mental health crisis and drug addiction crisis in Oregon. No matter the underlying cause, we have a system where deranged violent mentally ill tweakers can be disruptive on the train, but working-class people face a $250 fine if they can't afford a $2.50 ($2.80) ticket. TriMet is less safe, especially the light rail and bus lines. We could hypothetically talk about various policy and infrastructure changes, such as turnstiles and security guards - but pragmatically, this won't do shit when our society has adopted a philosophy of transforming the urban core into an open-air insane asylum and opened the doors to the prisons. This safety issue is well beyond TriMet's scope, and even if there was consensus among TriMet and Metro to solve this, the entire justice system and Legislature is still broken.

Fare Hikes and Utilization is the Red Herring - Let's talk about TriMet's future

In reality, multiple design choices made decades ago set us up for failure. But we also have to thank brain-dead progressive lunatics and corrupt politicos who have steered our transit decision-making into the ground.
There are three specific issues I'm going to talk about, with each becoming more consequential and disastrous for TriMet:

• Hub and Spoke Design and the need for a redesign of the entire system to fit new commuting/transit patterns
  
• Portland Light Rail's short cars are a capacity problem not worth the price tag to fix
  
• Autonomous vehicles are here, and it's just going to get worse for TriMet
  

The strategic design of TriMet's system is broken, and it's been broken before.

If you looked at a map of TriMet's bus and rail system, you'd see a design pattern often referred to as a "Radial Design" or sometimes a "Hub And Spoke" design. The Hub and Spoke strategy is building our transit system around centralized locations to connect to other routes. For Portland the idea is to go downtown (or sometimes a Park and Ride) where you can connect to your next destination. This is why the majority of bus routes and all the max routes go downtown, to our Transit Mall and Pioneer Square.
Downtown planning was a smart idea in the 1960s when it was coupled with Main Street economic theory and prototype urban development zones - all of this wrapped up in the 1972 Downtown Plan policy. During these decades, the primary economic idea of urban revitalization was that downtown cores could provide better business climates and shopping districts that amplify economic activity synergistically. In other words, packing all the office jobs and luxury shopping in one area is good for workers, business, and civic planning.
All very smart ideas in yester-year, so TriMet became focused on serving the downtown business community myopically. This myopia became so paramount that it was considered illegitimate (actually taboo, borderline illegal) if you used a Park & Ride facility to park and NOT ride downtown. Amanda Fritz once explained that we couldn't expand Barbur Transit Center because that would result in students parking at Barbur Transit Center and riding the bus to PCC Sylvania. This view implies that TriMet exists only to service downtown workers, not the students, not the impoverished mom needing to go to a grocery store.
How does TriMet's hub and spoke design represent its purpose?
Portland's unspoken rule of transit philosophy is that jobs pay for the system (remember, business payroll taxes pay for most of it), so TriMet should be focused on serving people utilizing it for their job - employers pay for it, and they get value out of it. But this is both unspoken (never said aloud) and largely unobserved. The whole idea of TriMet as a social service to serve low-income people, to help impoverished people - well, those ideas were just lukewarm political rhetoric that is tossed out as soon as some Undesirable with tattered clothing reeking of cigarettes gets aboard - then Portlanders jump right back "this is for workers only!" Sadly, there hasn't ever been a public consensus of why TriMet exists because I could equally argue that TriMet's purpose isn't serving the working class; it's actually vehicle emissions reductions - but here, too, reality contradicts that this is the purpose for why we operate TriMet. TriMet's real purpose seems to be "Spend money on lofty capital projects" and if we want to be cynical about it, we can elaborate "…because large capital projects enable grift, embezzlement, and inflating property values for developers."
We haven't always depended upon a hub and spoke design. A great article from Jarrett Walker written in 2010 on his Human Transit blog explains in "The Power and Pleasure of Grids"

Why aren't all frequent networks grids? The competing impulse is the radial network impulse, which says: "We have one downtown. Everyone is going there, so just run everything to there." Most networks start out radial, but some later transition to more of a grid form, often with compromises in which a grid pattern of routes is distorted around downtown so that many parallel routes converge there. You can see this pattern in many cities, Portland for example. Many of the lines extending north and east out of the city center form elements of a grid, but converge on the downtown. Many other major routes (numbered in the 70s in Portland's system) do not go downtown, but instead complete the grid pattern. This balance between grid and radial patterns was carefully constructed in 1982, replacing an old network in which almost all routes went downtown.

Over the years the grid pattern was neglected in favor of a downtown-focused investment strategy. To a real degree it made practical sense: that's where the jobs were. But again, this is the presumption that TriMet and Mass Transit ought to service workers first, and there's not much consensus on that. But while we can't decide on TriMet's purpose, we can absolutely agree on one important thing: Downtown is dead.
No 5-star hotel is going to fix it. (As of writing, I'm not even convinced that this mafia-connected bamboozle of public fraud will open.) No "tough-on-crime" DA to replace Mike Schmidt, like Nathan Vasquez, will fix downtown. It's not JUST a crime problem: most of the problems we deal with today mirror the problems facing Portland in the 1960s, especially our inability to invest in good infrastructure people actually want to use. That's on top of crime, vandalism, and an unhealthy business ecosystem.
IF we want to maintain TriMet (and that's a big IF, for reasons I'll explain below), then it will be focused on something other than downtown. We need to move back to a grid-design transit system, as this is a much easier way to use transit to get around the city, no matter your destination. If TriMet continues to exist and operate fleets in 20-30 years, this is the only way it exists - because it will just be too inconvenient to ride downtown as a side quest to your destination, especially as we look at 10, 20, 30, 40 years from now.
Of course, we can only transform some parts of the transit infrastructure this way, and there are no uplifting and moving train tracks here. So light rail doesn't have a future in the grid system - but even without the grid system, light rail is doomed.

The fatal flaws of light rail in Portland.

I want to preface this by saying I like light rail as a strategy, it's not a bad system or bad civic investment. I could write another 5,000-word essay on why Seattle did an excellent job with light rail and the specific decisions Portland made wildly incorrectly. In transit advocacy the wacktavists inappropriately categorized skeptics of Portland's light rail as some soft bigotry - as if you're racist if you don't like Portland's light rail - even though, ironically, most light rail systems tend to be built for the preference of white culture and white workers, precisely what happened here in Portland and most cities (but this is all a story for another time).
Portland's light rail system has a capacity problem and has dealt with this capacity problem quietly for the last 20+ years. When you see the capacity problem, you can quickly understand this light rail system won't work in the future. All the other smart cities in the world that designed light rail realized they needed big long trains to move many people. Portland decided to limit the train car length to the size of our city blocks to save construction costs - and this has always been a fatal flaw.
Portland's highest capacity train car is our Type 5, according to Wikipedia it has a seating capacity of 72 and an overall capacity of 186 per train. Let's compare:

• Washington DC has 6-car trains capable of carrying 120 passengers per car, or 720 per train.
  
• Salt Lake City has a 4-car train capable of carrying 230 passengers per car, or 920 per train.
  
• Seattle's Link system has a 3 or 4-car train, each capable of carrying approximately 200 passengers per car, so 600 to 800 per train.
  

Portland's light rail lines have roughly the same people moving capacity as a single lane of a highway, maybe marginally more, maybe marginally less. These other cities have a light rail system that can move the same amount of people as an entire 3-lane highway.
You might suspect that Portland could simply run trains more frequently - but nah, that's impossible because the trains run through the central core of downtown Portland, and they're blocked by the real interfaces with road traffic and bottlenecks. TriMet/PBOT/Metro has offered rosy ideas that we could hypothetically run cars every 90 seconds, 2 minutes, 4 minutes, or 6 minutes (depending upon who you ask) - but these are garbage numbers invented out of thin air. For example, you could stand at Pioneer Courthouse Square at 4:50pm on a Wednesday in 2016 - there was a train opening doors to load passengers, and you could visibly see the next train at Pioneer Place Mall pulling into the station behind. Trains were running at approximately a 3 to 4 minute at peak - but on paper, TriMet will claim anything, as they don't give a shit about lying to the public. But the bigger problem is that trains were full. You might have to wait 90 minutes to find a train that offers a seat. And god forbid you had a bike.
I'm not making this very real capacity problem, Metro even acknowledges:

At the busiest hours of the day, 40 light rail trains must cross the river and traverse downtown – one train every 90 seconds. As the region grows and the demand for light rail increases, the region will need at least 64 MAX trains through downtown every hour, more than one train each minute. Our current system can't support that change.

Suppose you're silly enough to trust government propaganda. In that case, you can read the details of Metro study on this in 2019. If we assumed their numbers added up, it's just fucking impossible to run 62 trains per hour, because passenger loading and unloading can take a full minute (sometimes longer). So unless we want to apply substantial g-forces onto the passengers, the train isn't accelerating out of the stops fast enough. Not to mention how unreliable this whole system would be if a sole tweaker, bike rider, or person with a stroller held up the system for 2 minutes.
This is why the bottom line needs to be upfront about capacity - quoting Metro's study here:

Today MAX is limited to 2-car trains because of the length of downtown city blocks. A tunnel could allow for longer trains if the stations outside the downtown core are retrofitted. In the long-term, this could greatly increase MAX capacity.

Do you see that trick? Build a tunnel, yes - but the entire system has to be retrofitted. Literally every light rail station would need to be redesigned, the lines themselves recalculated for larger heavier trains - and extending platforms at Willow Creek might be simple enough, but how in the living fuck is Metro going to afford to expand the Zoo stop? Doubling the size of that platform would cost $500 million alone.
If the city weren't full of cheap dipshits, we would have elevated or buried our light rail lines in the 1980s or 90s, enabling longer train cars to run. Yes, we all knew back then that it was the best practice not to have light rail running on the street - it's less safe, less reliable, runs slower, and limits train car size. Oops.
Just to keep TriMet's own bullshit inflated utopian vision, it would mean spending another billion dollars just to unfuck downtown, bypass an aging bridge, and potentially allow a marginally higher volume of trains - which again is a band-aid on a mortal wound.
The real buried lede is that to add extra train cars means retrofitting all the stops in the system - that's tens of billions of dollars. You can argue costs, but Metro knows we need to do this. It means shutting down the system for a year or years while construction and retrofits happen. It's fucking outrageous. Is this system worth of people per line worth 20, 30, or 40 billion dollars? Fuck no, it ain't. Again, if we had a raging metropolis of industry and commerce downtown, we could reasonably entertain the idea for a moment - but we don't and never will again.
Some folks might argue that if we kill off the light rail system we'd lose out on all those lucrative Transit Oriented Developments. Originally the public was told that Transit Oriented Development strategy would cause a massive infusion of private investment because the light rail was so damn lucrative and desirable for Richard Florida's Creative Class. Turns out the Creative Class is now called today the Laptop Class, and they don't give a flying fuck about street cars, light rail, or walking scores - because most can't be bothered to put pants on during their "commute" from bed to desk. TOD was all a fantasy illusion from the beginning, as multiple studies about Portland commuters showed that college-educated white folks riding Max were equally comfortable riding their bike as a substitute for the same commute. All of these billions of dollars was to accommodate white fare-weather bikers. So here's my hot take on transit: pave over the rail lines and put in bike lanes, and boy, then you'd have a bike system to give folks like Maus a hardon. But of course, Bike Portland would complain because their focus isn't biking; they exist only to favor all poorly thought utopian transit ideas.
Another group of Max/TOD advocates would claim that TOD is better for disabled and impoverished people. And yeah, there's truth there, but see my entire argument above about the Hub & Spoke design of TriMet being the antithesis of transit as a social service. If you believe that TriMet should serve low-income people, you must advocate for a bus-centric grid design.
But even if you're a die-hard believer in light rail - there's another inevitable reality coming that is the nail in the coffin.

Autonomous vehicles will replace mass transit faster than the automobile replaced the horse.

I work in advanced technology, and the thing about tech is that the public and politicians deny that it's going to be there until the majority of the public finally experiences it. You could say this about personal computers, internet, cloud compute, electric cars, smartphones, distributed ledger (cryptocurrency), AI, and driverless vehicles.
Schrodinger's technology doesn't exist until it's measured in an Apple store or your mother asks you for tech support.
No one thought AI was really real until ChatGPT did their kid's homework, and today most people are coming to terms with the fact that ChatGPT 3.5 could do most people's jobs. And that's not even the most advanced AI, that's the freeware put out by Microsoft, they have paywalls to access the real deal.
In 2018 I rode in my colleague's Tesla in self-driving mode from downtown Portland to Top Golf in Hillsboro. We started our journey at the surface parking lot on the west side of the Morrison Bridge. He used his phone to tell the car to pull out of the parking spot and to pick us up. Then he gave the car the address, and it drove us the entire way without any human input necessary. The only time he provided feedback was to touch the turn signal to pass a slow car on the highway. People think self-driving isn't here - but it is - and it's gotten exponentially better and will continue to do so. People will complain and moan about idealized, utopian, pedantic "level 5" full self-driving, how none of it exists or could exist, as a Tesla passes them on the road and the driver is half asleep.
Of course, Portland and every major city have also thought deeply about self-driving technology, and a few places have implemented self-driving solutions - but so far, none of these are really at scale. Though it will be a short time before cost-conscious cities go all-in.
TriMet kicked around the idea of using an autonomous bus for a leg of the trip of the Southwest Corridor project, connecting a segment of the light rail route to the community college. It was bafflingly stupid and short-sighted to think they could use it in this niche application but that it wouldn't open the floodgates for a hundred different applications that eviscerate TriMet's labor model. The simplest example of autonomous operation would be to operate the light rail systems - because they don't make turns, all we need is an AI vision service to slam on the breaks if necessary - that technology has existed for 20+ years. We could retrofit the entire train system in about 3 to 6 months - replace every Max operator with a security guard, and maybe people would ride the Max again? But I digress.
Let's speculate about the far-future, some 5, 10, or 20 years from now: your transit options will expand significantly. The cost will decrease considerably for services using automated vehicles.
You'll look at your options as:

• Drive to work: fastest, takes $100+ worth of gas a month, but you also need $50+ for insurance and $500+ for the monthly car payment, plus those surprise maintenance and broken windows. Also, do you pay for parking? Pick a number for how much it costs to drive your personally owned and manually operated vehicle to work each month.
  
• Autonomous vehicle service: price TBA, but think of how much an Uber costs when you don't have to pay the driver, you don't have to pay for gas. An Uber that runs for $20 today would likely be $10 or less. So, to and from work 20 times a month, $200. $300? Ok, let's just say it's $400 a month. It's still all cheaper than owning a car and driving it to work. No parking fees, and it picks you up quickly enough that it's not a nuisance.
  
• Mass Transit: $150 per month, but ugghhh it's slow, it smells like piss, a guy jacked off in your hair, and you can't schedule a meeting for the first 30 minutes of your anticipated workday in case you miss a connection - and it breaks so often the government actively hides the reliability data from the public and media.
  

Just a few years into this future we'll see a brand new trend, one that already exists: a shared autonomous vehicle like a privately operated bus. For example, Uber Bus - it already exists as a commuter option in some cities, it's just not autonomous yet. The significant benefit of an autonomous bus is that these shared vehicles will utilize HOV lanes very commonly, and commuting in an autonomous vehicle will be as fast as driving to work in your manually operated car while also being less expensive.
Simultaneously automobile accidents in autonomous vehicles will be virtually non-existent, and insurance companies will start to increase prices on vehicles that lack AI/smart assisted safety driving features. Public leaders will see the value of creating lanes of traffic on highways dedicated explicitly to autonomous vehicles so that they can drive at much higher speeds than manually operated traffic. Oregon won't lead the way here, but wait until Texas or one of the Crazy States greenlights a speed limit differential, and self-driving vehicles have a speed limit of 90, 120, or 150 miles per hour. You might think "accidents would be terrible and deadly" but there will be fewer accidents in the autonomous lane than in manual lanes. At this point, it will be WAY faster to take an autonomous vehicle to your work.
Purchasing power of consumers will decrease while the cost of vehicles will increase (especially autonomous vehicles), making ownership of any vehicle less likely. Frankly, the great majority of people won't know how to drive and will never learn to - just like how young people today don't know how to use manual transmission. However, fleets of autonomous vehicles owned by companies like Tesla, Uber, and Lyft will benefit from scale and keep their autonomous bus fleets operating at low cost. This will lead to a trend where fewer and fewer people will own an automobile, and fewer people even bother learning how to drive or paying the enormous insurance cost.... while also depending upon automobiles more than we do today.
Eventually, in the distant future, manually driven vehicles will be prohibited in urban areas as some reckless relic from a bygone era.
Cities and public bodies don't have to be cut out of this system if they act responsibly. For example, cities could start a data brokering exchange where commuters provide their commuting data (i.e., pick-up point, destination, arrival time). The government uses either a privatized fleet or a publicly owned fleet of autonomous vehicles to move as many people as possible as often as possible. Sort of a publicly run car-pool list - or a hyper-responsive bus fleet that runs for the exact passengers going to exact locations. A big problem companies like Uber, Lyft, and Tesla will have is that they'll lack market saturation to optimize commuting routes - they'll be able to win unique rides, but the best way they can achieve the lowest cost service model is these super predictable and timely commuter riders. The more data points and riders, the more optimization they can achieve. These companies can look at the data for as many people as possible and bid for as many routes as possible - optimizing for convenience, time, energy usage, emissions, etc. The public will voluntarily participate if this is optimized to get the cheapest ride possible. If the government doesn't do this, the private sector will eventually.
As a parallel, no one today even considers how Metro runs garbage collection. No one cares. And if you didn't like Metro's trash service, if you needed a better service for unique needs, you go procure that on your own. Likewise, you wouldn't care about the quality of the commuting trip as long as it's up to some minimal standards of your class expectations, it's reliable, nearly as quick as driving your own vehicle, and it seems reasonably affordable.
If the public ran this data exchange, fees could subsidize lower-income riders. This is a theory on what a TriMet like system or mass transit system could look like in a primarily autonomous world where most people don't own their own or drive an automobile.
This system would be far from perfect, opening up all sorts of problems around mobility. However, it's hard to see how autonomous vehicles will not obliterate the value proposition of mass transit.

Another narrative on the same story.

As the working class moves to autonomous vehicles, transit agencies will collect fewer and fewer fares - prices and taxes will rise, creating a cycle of failure. As a result, some cities will make buses self-driving to cut costs. It could start with Tokyo, Shanghai, Oslo, et al. Again, it's unlikely that Portland or Oregon will be the first movers on this, but when cities start laying off hundreds of mass transit operators and cutting fares to practically nothing, there will be substantial public pressure to mimic locally. It will be inhumane, it will be illiberal, to make those impoverished bus-riding single mothers pay premiums. As most of the fleet becomes autonomous, responsive, and disconnected from labor costs, the next question arises: why do we still operate bus routes? Why big buses instead of smaller and nimble vehicles?
This alternative story/perspective leads to the same outcome: we figure out where people are going and when they need to get there - then dispatch the appropriate amount of vehicles to move that exact number of people as efficiently as possible.
But our local government getting its act together on all this is outside the world of possibility.
In a practical sense, we're going to see history repeat itself. Portland's mass transit history is about private and public entities over-extending themselves, getting too deep in debt on a flawed and outdated idea. As a result, the system collapses into consolidation or liquidation. Following this historical pattern, TriMet/Metro won't respond to changing conditions fast enough, and laughably stupid ideas like cranking up taxes or increasing ridership fares will continue to be the only option until the media finally acknowledges these groups are insolvent. I just hope we don't spend tens of billions of dollars propping up this zombie system before we can soberly realize that we made some mistakes and these vanity-laden projects 20 and 30 years ago need to die.
You see, the biggest flaw with TriMet isn't the design, it needs to be outpaced by technology, it's that the people making decisions at TriMet and Metro are going to make the politically expedient decisions, not the right decisions. They won't redesign, and they won't leverage technology for cost savings, so this charade will just get going along until the media simply declares they're insolvent.
Back to fares for a second - the media happily reprints TriMet's horseshit take about "The higher fares will bring in an estimated $4.9 million in annual revenue starting next year, the report says." Just sort of amazing to me there's no skepticism about this number - but most spectacular is no media considerations about alternative solutions. For example, I could tell TriMet how to save $9,548,091 next year - a useless program primarily utilized by white middle-class folks who own alternative methods of transport - and this would inconvenience way less transit-dependent people than raising fares. But, that's off the table - we're not even developing a decision matrix for when we kill the blackhole of money known as WES.

Another month, another retirement update! A lot of sets changed dates this month, and even more new sets got added! Which reminds me, I'm considering making a /legoleak Discord server in order to expand more on leaks, answer questions, and provide daily retirement updates. If there's interest in that, I'll work on having it done before the next list!
As always, we owe a massive thanks to ZombieYeti from the BrickHound Discord for providing this valuable data. If you're looking for real-time in-stock/deal alerts for Lego.com and other sites, make sure to check out his server: https://discord.gg/BwezK2t5qf
This information is scraped directly from Lego's website, and all dates are subject to change. ZombieYeti is currently developing a website to host this data and offer real-time updates. In the meantime, here is a list of every set and their corresponding retirement date as per LEGO's system!
FULL LIST ON GOOGLE SHEETS HERE <--
If you have any questions, please don't hesitate to ask. Due to Reddit's character limits, we can't include everything here, but the full spreadsheet contains every set.
CHANGES IN JUNE:

Theme	Set #	Set Name	Old Date	New Date	Change
Avatar	75577	Mako Submarine	Dec 31, 2024	Dec 31, 2023	-1 year
Avatar	75578	Metkayina Reef Home	Dec 31, 2024	Dec 31, 2023	-1 year
Classic	11020	Build Together	Dec 31, 2024	Dec 31, 2023	-1 year
Duplo	10966	Bath Time Fun: Floating Animal Island	Dec 31, 2024	Dec 31, 2023	-1 year
City	60388	Gaming Tournament Truck	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Creator	31143	Birdhouse	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Friends	41735	Mobile Tiny House	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Harry Potter	75969	Hogwarts Astronomy Tower	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Icons	10306	Atari 2600	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Ideas	21331	Sonic the Hedgehog - Green Hill Zone	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Jurassic Park / World	76946	Blue & Beta Velociraptor Capture	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Jurassic Park / World	76951	Pyroraptor & Dilophosaurus Transport	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Marvel	76226	Spider-Man Figure	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Marvel	76241	Hulk Mech Armor	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Marvel	76243	Rocket Mech Armor	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Marvel	76245	Ghost Rider Mech & Bike	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Marvel	76256	Ant-Man Construction Figure	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Speed Champions	76906	1970 Ferrari 512 M	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Speed Champions	76907	Lotus Evija	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Star Wars	75333	Obi-Wan Kenobi's Jedi Starfighter	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Star Wars	75344	Boba Fett's Starship Microfighter	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year
Technic	42138	Ford Mustang Shelby GT500	Dec 31, 2023	Dec 31, 2024	+1 year

​
NEW SETS ADDED:

Theme	Set #	Set Name	Retirement Date
City	60381	City Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41758	Friends Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76418	Harry Potter Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76267	Marvel Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71777	Kai's Dragon Power Flip	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71778	Nya's Dragon Power Drift	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71779	Lloyd's Dragon Power Spin	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75366	Star Wars Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Batman	30653	Batman 1992 Polybag	Dec 31, 2024
Batman	76224	Batmobile: Batman vs. The Joker Chase	Dec 31, 2024
Batman	76252	Batcave – Shadow Box	Dec 31, 2024
Batman	76264	Batmobile Pursuit: Batman vs. The Joker (4+)	Dec 31, 2024
Batman	76265	Batwing: Batman vs. The Joker	Dec 31, 2024
City	60367	Passenger Airplane	Dec 31, 2024
City / 2K Drive	60395	Combo Race Pack	Dec 31, 2024
City / 2K Drive	60396	Modified Race Cars	Dec 31, 2024
City / 2K Drive	60397	Monster Truck Race	Dec 31, 2024
Creator	31144	Exotic Pink Parrot	Dec 31, 2024
DREAMZzz	40657	Dream Village	Dec 31, 2024
Friends	41756	Holiday Ski Slope and Café	Dec 31, 2024
Friends	41760	Igloo Holiday Adventure	Dec 31, 2024
Harry Potter	76419	Hogwarts Castle and Grounds	Dec 31, 2024
Harry Potter	76421	Dobby the House-Elf	Dec 31, 2024
Icons	40634	Icons of Play	Dec 31, 2024
Mario	71422	Picnic at Mario's House	Dec 31, 2024
Marvel	76249	Venomised Groot	Dec 31, 2024
Marvel	76261	Spider-Man Final Battle	Dec 31, 2024
Marvel	76262	Captain America's Shield	Dec 31, 2024
Marvel	76263	Iron Man Hulkbuster vs. Thanos (4+)	Dec 31, 2024
Marvel	76266	Endgame Final Battle	Dec 31, 2024
Minecraft	21247	The Axolotl House	Dec 31, 2024
Minecraft	21248	The Pumpkin Farm	Dec 31, 2024
Minecraft	21249	The Crafting Box 4.0	Dec 31, 2024
Minecraft	21250	The Iron Golem Fortress	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71789	Kai and Ras's Car and Bike Battle (4+)	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71790	Imperium Dragon Hunter Hound	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71791	Zane's Dragon Power Spinjitzu Race Car	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71792	Sora's Transforming Mech Bike Racer	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71793	Heatwave Transforming Lava Dragon	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71794	Lloyd and Arin's Ninja Team Mechs	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71795	Temple of the Dragon Energy Cores	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71796	Elemental Dragon vs. The Empress Mech	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71797	Destiny's Bounty - Race Against Time	Dec 31, 2024
Ninjago	71798	Nya and Arin's Baby Dragon Battle (4+)	Dec 31, 2024
Sonic	76993	Sonic vs. Dr. Eggman's Death Egg Robot	Dec 31, 2024
Star Wars	75359	332nd Ahsoka's Clone Trooper Battle Pack	Dec 31, 2024
Star Wars	75360	Yoda's Jedi Starfighter	Dec 31, 2024
Star Wars	75365	Yavin 4 Rebel Base	Dec 31, 2024
Star Wars	75368	Darth Vader Mech	Dec 31, 2024
Star Wars	75369	Boba Fett Mech	Dec 31, 2024
Star Wars	75370	Stormtrooper Mech	Dec 31, 2024
Duplo	10987	Recycling Truck	Dec 31, 2025
Duplo	10994	3-in-1 Family House	Dec 31, 2025
Duplo	10997	Camping Adventure	Dec 31, 2025
Ninjago	71799	NINJAGO City Markets	Dec 31, 2025
Technic	42161	Lamborghini Huracán Tecnica	Dec 31, 2025
Icons	10323	PAC-MAN Arcade	Dec 31, 2026
Technic	42160	Audi RS Q e-tron	Dec 31, 2026

​
SETS RETIRING IN 2023:

Theme	Set #	Set Name	Retirement Date
Classic	11015	Around the World	Jul 31, 2023
Creator	31123	Off-Road Buggy	Jul 31, 2023
Disney	10780	Mickey and Friends Castle Defenders	Jul 31, 2023
Disney	43203	Aurora, Merida and Tiana's Enchanted Creations	Jul 31, 2023
Dots	41962	Unicorn Creative Family Pack	Jul 31, 2023
Mario	71404	Goomba's Shoe	Jul 31, 2023
Mario	71407	Cat Peach Suit and Frozen Tower	Jul 31, 2023
Mario	71409	Big Spike's Cloudtop Challenge	Jul 31, 2023
Mario	71412	Big Bad Island	Jul 31, 2023
Mindstorms	51515	Robot Inventor	Jul 31, 2023
Minecraft	21187	The Red Barn	Jul 31, 2023
Ninjago	71738	Zane's Titan Mech Battle	Jul 31, 2023
Ninjago	71754	Water Dragon	Jul 31, 2023
Ninjago	71756	Hydro Bounty	Jul 31, 2023
Ninjago	71759	Ninja Dragon Temple (4+)	Jul 31, 2023
Ninjago	71762	Kai's Fire Dragon EVO	Jul 31, 2023
Ninjago	71770	Zane's Golden Dragon Jet	Jul 31, 2023
Ninjago	71773	Kai's Golden Dragon Raider	Jul 31, 2023
Technic	42129	4x4 Mercedes-Benz Zetros Trial Truck	Jul 31, 2023
Minifigures	71038	LEGO® Minifigures Disney 100	Aug 31, 2023
Architecture	21054	The White House	Dec 31, 2023
Art	31203	World Map	Dec 31, 2023
Art	31205	Jim Lee Batman Collection	Dec 31, 2023
Art	31206	The Rolling Stones	Dec 31, 2023
Art	31207	Floral Art	Dec 31, 2023
Avatar	75571	Neytiri & Thanator vs. AMP Suit Quaritch	Dec 31, 2023
Avatar	75573	Floating Mountains: Site 26 & RDA Samson	Dec 31, 2023
Avatar	75577	Mako Submarine	Dec 31, 2023
Avatar	75578	Metkayina Reef Home	Dec 31, 2023
Batman	76181	Batmobile: The Penguin Chase	Dec 31, 2023
Batman	76220	Batman versus Harley Quinn (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Brickheadz	40540	Lion Dance Guy	Dec 31, 2023
Brickheadz	40541	Manchester United Go Brick Me	Dec 31, 2023
Brickheadz	40542	FC Barcelona Go Brick Me	Dec 31, 2023
Brickheadz / Avatar	40554	Jake Sully & his Avatar	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Disney	40377	Donald Duck	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Disney	40378	Goofy & Pluto	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Disney	40476	Daisy Duck	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Disney	40477	Scrooge McDuck, Huey, Dewey & Louie	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Disney	40550	Chip & Dale	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Disney	40553	Woody and Bo Peep	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Disney	40622	Disney 100th Celebration (Oswald, Mickey, Snow White, Tinker Bell)	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Harry Potter	40495	Harry, Hermione, Ron & Hagrid	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Harry Potter	40560	Professors of Hogwarts	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Minecraft	40624	Alex	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Minecraft	40625	Llama	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Minecraft	40626	Zombie	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Star Wars	40539	Ahsoka Tano	Dec 31, 2023
BrickHeadz / Star Wars	40623	Battle of Endor Heroes	Dec 31, 2023
City	30590	Farm Garden & Scarecrow Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
City	30638	Police Bike Training Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
City	30639	Dog Park and Scooter Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
City	41723	Donut Shop	Dec 31, 2023
City	41726	Holiday Camping Trip	Dec 31, 2023
City	60253	Ice-Cream Truck	Dec 31, 2023
City	60313	Space Ride Amusement Truck	Dec 31, 2023
City	60314	Ice Cream Truck Police Chase	Dec 31, 2023
City	60315	Police Mobile Command Truck	Dec 31, 2023
City	60317	Police Chase at the Bank	Dec 31, 2023
City	60318	Fire Helicopter	Dec 31, 2023
City	60319	Fire Rescue & Police Chase	Dec 31, 2023
City	60320	Fire Station	Dec 31, 2023
City	60321	Fire Brigade	Dec 31, 2023
City	60322	Race Car Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
City	60323	Stunt Plane	Dec 31, 2023
City	60324	Mobile Crane	Dec 31, 2023
City	60325	Cement Mixer Truck	Dec 31, 2023
City	60327	Horse Transporter	Dec 31, 2023
City	60330	Hospital	Dec 31, 2023
City	60332	Reckless Scorpion Stunt Bike	Dec 31, 2023
City	60333	Bathtub Stunt Bike	Dec 31, 2023
City	60335	Train Station	Dec 31, 2023
City	60338	Chimpanzee Smash Stunt Loop	Dec 31, 2023
City	60339	Double Loop Stunt Arena	Dec 31, 2023
City	60341	The Knockdown Stunt Challenge	Dec 31, 2023
City	60342	The Shark Attack Stunt Challenge	Dec 31, 2023
City	60343	Rescue Helicopter Transporter	Dec 31, 2023
City	60346	Barn & Farm Animals	Dec 31, 2023
City	60348	Lunar Roving Vehicle	Dec 31, 2023
City	60349	Lunar Space Station	Dec 31, 2023
City	60350	Lunar Research Base	Dec 31, 2023
City	60351	Rocket Launch Centre	Dec 31, 2023
City	60353	Wild Animal Rescue Missions	Dec 31, 2023
City	60354	Mars Spacecraft Exploration Missions	Dec 31, 2023
City	60355	Water Police Detective Missions	Dec 31, 2023
City	60356	Bear Stunt Bike	Dec 31, 2023
City	60357	Stunt Truck & Ring of Fire Challenge	Dec 31, 2023
City	60358	Cyber Stunt Bike	Dec 31, 2023
City	60359	Dunk Stunt Ramp Challenge	Dec 31, 2023
City	60360	Spinning Stunt Challenge	Dec 31, 2023
City	60361	Ultimate Stunt Riders Challenge	Dec 31, 2023
City	60371	Emergency Vehicles HQ	Dec 31, 2023
City	60381	City Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
City	60382	Vet Van Rescue	Dec 31, 2023
City	60385	Construction Digger	Dec 31, 2023
City	60390	Park Tractor	Dec 31, 2023
City	60393	4x4 Fire Truck Rescue	Dec 31, 2023
City	60394	ATV and Otter Habitat	Dec 31, 2023
City	60398	Family House and Electric Car	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	11014	Bricks and Wheels	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	11018	Creative Ocean Fun	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	11019	Bricks and Functions	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	11020	Build Together	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	11021	90 Years of Play	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	11022	Space Mission	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	11031	Creative Monkey Fun	Dec 31, 2023
Classic	30510	90 Years of Cars Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	30641	Panda Bear Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	30644	Vintage Car Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	31111	Cyber Drone	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	31118	Surfer Beach House	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	31127	Street Racer	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	31128	Dolphin and Turtle	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	31130	Sunken Treasure Mission	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	31131	Downtown Noodle Shop	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	31132	Viking Ship and the Midgard Serpent	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	40461	Tulips	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	40469	Tuk Tuk	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	40568	Paris Postcard	Dec 31, 2023
Creator	40646	Daffodils	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	10777	Mickey and Minnie's Camping Trip	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	30646	Moana's Dolphin Cove Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	40521	Mini Disney The Haunted Mansion	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	41168	Elsa's Jewellery Box	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43187	Rapunzel's Tower	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43189	Elsa and the Nokk Storybook Adventures	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43194	Anna and Elsa's Frozen Wonderland	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43196	Belle and the Beast's Castle	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43197	The Ice Castle	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43198	Anna's Castle Courtyard	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43199	Elsa's Castle Courtyard	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43202	The Madrigal House	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43204	Anna and Olaf's Castle Fun	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43207	Ariel's Underwater Palace	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43208	Jasmine and Mulan's Adventure	Dec 31, 2023
Disney	43209	Elsa and the Nokk's Ice Stable	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	30560	Pineapple Photo Holder & Mini Board Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41801	My Pets Bracelet	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41802	Unicorns Forever Bracelet	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41803	Extra Dots series 8	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41805	Creative Animal Drawer	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41806	Ultimate Party Kit	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41807	Bracelet Designer Mega Pack	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41947	Mickey and Friends Bracelets Mega Pack	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41948	Cute Banana Pen Holder	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41950	Lots of DOTS - Lettering	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41951	Message Board	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41957	Adhesive Patches Mega Pack	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41959	Cute Panda Tray	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41960	Big Box	Dec 31, 2023
Dots	41961	Designer Toolkit - Patterns	Dec 31, 2023
Dots / Disney	41963	Mickey Mouse & Minnie Mouse Stitch-on Patch	Dec 31, 2023
Dots / Disney	41964	Mickey Mouse & Minnie Mouse Back-to-School Project Box	Dec 31, 2023
Dots / Harry Potter	41808	Hogwarts Accessories Pack	Dec 31, 2023
Dots / Harry Potter	41809	Hedwig Pencil Holder	Dec 31, 2023
Dots / Harry Potter	41811	Hogwarts Desktop Kit	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10411	Learn About Chinese Culture	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10872	Train Bridge and Tracks	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10882	Train Tracks	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10930	Bulldozer	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10938	Dinosaur Nursery	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10944	Space Shuttle Mission	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10948	Parking Garage and Car Wash	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10949	Farm Animal Care	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10955	Animal Train	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10956	Amusement Park	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10964	Bath Time Fun: Floating Red Panda	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10966	Bath Time Fun: Floating Animal Island	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10968	Doctor Visit	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10972	Wild Animals of the Ocean	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10973	Wild Animals of South America	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10974	Wild Animals of Asia	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10977	My First Puppy & Kitten with Sounds	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10978	Creative Building Time	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	10979	Wild Animals of Europe	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo	30648	Whale Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo / Disney	10899	Frozen Ice Castle	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo / Disney	10960	Belle's Ballroom	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo / Disney	10962	Buzz Lightyear's Planetary Mission	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo / Holiday	10976	Santa's Gingerbread House	Dec 31, 2023
Duplo / Marvel	10963	Spider-Man & Friends: Funfair Adventure	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	30633	Skate Ramp	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	30634	Friendship Flowers Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41443	Olivia's Electric Car	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41677	Forest Waterfall	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41696	Pony-Washing Stable	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41697	Turtle Protection Vehicle	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41699	Pet Adoption Café	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41703	Friendship Tree House	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41704	Main Street Building	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41705	Heartlake City Pizzeria	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41707	Tree-Planting Vehicle	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41708	Roller Disco Arcade	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41711	Emma's Art School	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41712	Recycling Truck	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41713	Olivia's Space Academy	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41714	Andrea's Theatre School	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41715	Ice Cream Truck	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41716	Stephanie's Sailing Adventure	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41717	Mia's Wildlife Rescue	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41718	Pet Day-Care Center	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41719	Mobile Fashion Boutique	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41720	Water Park	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41721	Organic Farm	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41722	Horse Show Trailer	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41729	Organic Grocery Store	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41732	Downtown Flower and Design Stores	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41733	Mobile Bubble Tea Shop	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41741	Dog Rescue Van	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41742	Cat Hotel	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41743	Hair Salon	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41751	Skate Park	Dec 31, 2023
Friends	41758	Friends Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	30435	Build Your Own Hogwarts Castle Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	30651	Quidditch Practice Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	75968	4 Privet Drive	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	75979	Hedwig	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76386	Hogwarts: Polyjuice Potion Mistake	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76398	Hogwarts Hospital Wing	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76399	Hogwarts Magical Trunk	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76400	Hogwarts Carriage and Thestrals	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76401	Hogwarts Courtyard: Sirius's Rescue	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76403	The Ministry of Magic	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76406	Hungarian Horntail Dragon	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76408	12 Grimmauld Place	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76409	Gryffindor House Banner	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76410	Slytherin House Banner	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76411	Ravenclaw House Banner	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76412	Hufflepuff House Banner	Dec 31, 2023
Harry Potter	76418	Harry Potter Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday	40426	Christmas Wreath 2-in-1	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday	40522	Valentine Lovebirds	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday	40523	Easter Rabbits Display	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday	40570	Halloween Cat and Mouse	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday	40571	Wintertime Polar Bears	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday	80110	Lunar New Year Display	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday	80111	Lunar New Year Parade	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday / Creator	30584	Winter Holiday Train Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday / Creator	30642	Birthday Train Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday / Creator	30643	Easter Chickens Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Holiday / Icons	10293	Santa's Visit	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10265	Ford Mustang	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10266	NASA Apollo 11 Lunar Lander	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10273	Haunted House	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10276	Colosseum	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10289	Bird of Paradise	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10290	Pickup Truck	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10292	The Friends Apartments	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10299	Real Madrid - Santiago Bernabéu Stadium	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	10497	Galaxy Explorer	Dec 31, 2023
Icons	76989	Horizon Forbidden West: Tallneck	Dec 31, 2023
Icons / Modular	10255	Assembly Square	Dec 31, 2023
Icons / Modular	10270	Bookshop	Dec 31, 2023
Icons / Modular	10278	Police Station	Dec 31, 2023
Ideas	21325	Medieval Blacksmith	Dec 31, 2023
Ideas	21326	Winnie the Pooh	Dec 31, 2023
Ideas	21329	Fender Stratocaster	Dec 31, 2023
Ideas	21337	Table Football	Dec 31, 2023
Jurassic Park / World	76943	Pteranodon Chase (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Jurassic Park / World	76945	Atrociraptor Dinosaur: Bike Chase	Dec 31, 2023
Jurassic Park / World	76947	Quetzalcoatlus Plane Ambush	Dec 31, 2023
Jurassic Park / World	76948	T. rex & Atrociraptor Dinosaur Breakout	Dec 31, 2023
Jurassic Park / World	76950	Triceratops Pickup Truck Ambush	Dec 31, 2023
Jurassic Park / World	76956	T. rex Breakout	Dec 31, 2023
Lightyear	76830	Zyclops Chase (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Lightyear	76831	Zurg Battle	Dec 31, 2023
Lightyear	76832	XL-15 Spaceship	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	30509	Yellow Yoshi's Fruit Tree Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	71406	Yoshi's Gift House	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	71413	Character Packs Series 6	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	71414	Conkdor's Noggin Bopper	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	71415	Ice Mario Suit and Frozen World	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	71416	Lava Wave Ride	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	71417	Fliprus Snow Adventure	Dec 31, 2023
Mario	71418	Creativity Toolbox	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	10781	Spider-Man's Techno Trike (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	10784	Spider-Man Webquarters Hangout (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	10790	Team Spidey at Green Goblin's Lighthouse (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	30652	Doctor Strange's Interdimensional Portal Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76187	Venom	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76193	The Guardians' Ship	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76206	Iron Man Figure	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76207	Attack on New Asgard	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76208	The Goat Boat	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76209	Thor's Hammer	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76211	Shuri's Sunbird	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76212	Shuri's Lab (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76213	King Namor's Throne Room	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76214	Black Panther: War on the Water	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76215	Black Panther	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76216	Iron Man Armory	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76225	Miles Morales Figure	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76230	Venom Figure	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76242	Thanos Mech Armor	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76253	Guardians of the Galaxy Headquarters	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76255	The New Guardians' Ship	Dec 31, 2023
Marvel	76267	Marvel Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21164	The Coral Reef	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21170	The Pig House	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21172	The Ruined Portal	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21177	The Creeper Ambush	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21180	The Guardian Battle	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21181	The Rabbit Ranch	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21183	The Training Grounds	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21184	The Bakery	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21185	The Nether Bastion	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21186	The Ice Castle	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21188	The Llama Village	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	21190	The Abandoned Village	Dec 31, 2023
Minecraft	30647	The Dripstone Cavern/The Stalactite Cave Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Miscellaneous	40174	LEGO Chess	Dec 31, 2023
Miscellaneous	40382	Birthday Set	Dec 31, 2023
Miscellaneous	40393	LEGOLAND Fire Academy	Dec 31, 2023
Miscellaneous	40584	Birthday Diorama	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	30656	Monkey King Marketplace Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80008	Monkie Kid's Cloud Jet	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80030	Monkie Kid's Staff Creations	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80032	Chang'e Moon Cake Factory	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80033	Evil Macaque's Mech	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80034	Nezha's Fire Ring	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80035	Monkie Kid's Galactic Explorer	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80037	Dragon of the East	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80038	Monkie Kid's Team Van	Dec 31, 2023
Monkie Kid	80039	The Heavenly Realms	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	30649	Ice Dragon Creature Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71757	Lloyd's Ninja Mech (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71760	Jay's Thunder Dragon EVO	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71761	Zane's Power Up Mech EVO	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71763	Lloyd's Race Car EVO	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71765	Ninja Ultra Combo Mech	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71766	Lloyd's Legendary Dragon	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71767	Ninja Dojo Temple	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71768	Jay's Golden Dragon Motorbike	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71769	Cole's Dragon Cruiser	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71771	The Crystal King Temple	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71772	The Crystal King	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71774	Lloyd's Golden Ultra Dragon	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71775	Nya's Samurai X MECH	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71776	Jay and Nya's Race Car EVO	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71777	Kai's Dragon Power Flip	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71778	Nya's Dragon Power Drift	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71779	Lloyd's Dragon Power Spin	Dec 31, 2023
Ninjago	71781	Lloyd's Mech Battle EVO	Dec 31, 2023
Speed Champions	30657	McLaren Solus GT Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Speed Champions	76900	Koenigsegg Jesko	Dec 31, 2023
Speed Champions	76901	Toyota GR Supra	Dec 31, 2023
Speed Champions	76910	Aston Martin Valkyrie AMR Pro and Aston Martin Vantage GT3	Dec 31, 2023
Speed Champions	76911	007 Aston Martin DB5	Dec 31, 2023
Speed Champions	76912	Fast & Furious 1970 Dodge Charger T	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	30654	X-wing Starfighter Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75288	AT-AT	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75292	The Razor Crest	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75300	Imperial TIE Fighter	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75301	Luke Skywalker's X-wing Fighter	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75309	Republic Gunship (Ultimate Collector Series)	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75312	Boba Fett's Starship	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75317	The Mandalorian & The Child	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75318	The Child	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75320	Snowtrooper Battle Pack	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75322	Hoth AT-ST	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75323	The Justifier	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75324	Dark Trooper Attack	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75326	Boba Fett's Throne Room	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75327	Luke Skywalker (Red Five) Helmet	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75329	Death Star Trench Run Diorama	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75330	Dagobah Jedi Training Diorama	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75332	AT-ST (4+)	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75334	Obi-Wan Kenobi vs. Darth Vader	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75335	BD-1	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75336	Inquisitor Transport Scythe	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75338	Ambush on Ferrix	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75339	Death Star Trash Compactor Diorama	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75342	Republic Fighter Tank	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75343	Dark Trooper Helmet	Dec 31, 2023
Star Wars	75366	Star Wars Advent Calendar 2023	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	30655	Forklift with Pallet Polybag	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42096	Porsche 911 RSR	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42107	Ducati Panigale V4 R	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42111	Dom's Dodge Charger	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42117	Race Plane	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42118	Monster Jam Grave Digger	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42122	Jeep Wrangler	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42123	McLaren Senna GTR	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42125	Ferrari 488 GTE 'AF Corse #51'	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42127	The Batman - Batmobile	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42128	Heavy-Duty Tow Truck	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42131	Cat D11 Bulldozer	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42132	Chopper	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42133	Telehandler	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42134	Monster Jam Megalodon	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42135	Monster Jam El Toro Loco	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42137	Formula E Porsche 99x Electric	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42139	All-Terrain Vehicle	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42140	App-Controlled Transformation Vehicle	Dec 31, 2023
Technic	42144	Material Handler	Dec 31, 2023

The official statement from the LKPD:
"Investigators with the Lawrence Kansas Police Department are actively searching for additional suspects in a kidnapping case that began Monday morning and led to one arrest last night. A 65-year-old man was found by police in a nearby city and reported he had been kidnapped from his home in the 4600 block of Nicklaus Drive in Lawrence. LKPD Investigators immediately began working to locate evidence and identify suspects. Patrol officers and investigators surrounded one suspect’s place of employment, where he attempted to flee on foot but was quickly and safely taken into custody. Officers booked 20-year-old Tahreon Lamont Allen into the Douglas County Correctional Facility. This investigation is still very active, and releasing additional details right now could significantly hamper our efforts. We intend to release more as we are able and encourage anyone with information to call LKPD's Investigations Unit. Thank you for your patience."
What do you think really happened?

I’m a veteran Tyranid player heading into the Kansas City Open Team Event this weekend. Feel free to ask me anything.

I won’t call Kevin again yet. He's the type to tell me he's busy if I need something from him, even though I go out of my way to help him and take care of him every single time he needs me. I stop at one of the red lights in (City name redacted). At least Kevin lives here too, just a few minutes away from Lucky’s mom’s house.
If Kevin isn’t home, I’m going to be enraged, depressed enough to cry, or both. Kevin doesn’t even really lock his door. He never locks it behind us when we walk inside – people like me can’t help but notice things like that. If he isn’t at his house, maybe I can just walk in, take his drugs, and leave.
I called him earlier in the day, so he will definitely suspect that I was the one who robbed him, but what is he going to do?
I’m homeless right now, and I’ll be back in treatment soon – and hopefully not in the cess pool of fraud, corruption, and death that addiction treatment in Orange County has become. I wonder what could possibly be in the little lockbox Kevin keeps in the closet. It is probably a treasure chest full of various drugs and opioids.
I arrive at Kevin’s house and pull into the driveway. I knock on his front door. No answer. I ring the doorbell. No answer. My heart starts to race. My head hurts, I’m nauseous, I’m sweaty. I’m full of anxiety. I can’t stop thinking about dope. I feel like I’m stuck in a cave that is collapsing all around me. I need to get out, right now.
I knock again, loudly, a few more times. I count to 10. Still nothing. I feel a flash of heat and near-panic. My stomach churns, as if threatening to cramp. I need opiates, right now.
Desperation overtakes me. I turn the doorknob. It opens. I walk in the house, my instinct telling me to creep in. I suppress my instinct and walk in casually.
“Kevin?” I yell, from the bottom of the stairs that are right by the front door. I listen for a second. All is quiet. It wouldn’t be good if I am caught sneaking around if he is here, and it isn’t going to matter if I yell a few times before I steal his drugs if he isn’t here.
Junkie feet carry me up the stairs. My ankle hurts with every step – worse since I am in withdrawal.
"Kevin?” I call out. If he isn't here, I’m robbing him. I can't stand this motherfucker, and while I'm not quite the thief I used to be, I'm still an opportunist, and this is a damn good opportunity. Maybe stealing all this kid’s fentanyl is exactly what he needs in order to be able to quit.
That’s right, Lonnie. You’d be doing him a favor by robbing him.
I peek in the first bedroom at the top of the stairs. It’s the guest bedroom I slept in 5 nights ago. It feels like it has been an eternity since I was last here. Time moves more slowly in the realm of opioid sickness. Nobody is in the guest bedroom.
I peek into the office that sits across the hall. I don’t see anybody there. I would search the office, since he might have the lockbox in here, for now, but he might be sleeping in the bedroom.
"Kevin? Marissa?" I call out. Saying her name reminds me of the fact that he is dating her. She is so young and innocent. I can’t believe he got her addicted to these powerful soul-stealing drugs. I would never associate with Kevin if he didn't have so many different uses. He is not a person to me: he is means to the various ends that I have in mind when I contact him. This isn’t Kevin’s house; it’s a house with fentanyl in it.
If I find that carfentanil, I’m going to have a decision to make. It might be so strong that using it would cause changes to my opioid receptors that I would never recover from. Injecting even one drop could kill me. Carfentanil is also identified as a biological weapon since even accidental inhalation of an almost imperceptible amount can be deadly - or so, the police say. The amount of carfentanil that Kevin has could keep me incapacitated and out of pain for at least a year. Finding that bottle would be a curse.
I find myself standing in front of the double doors to the master bedroom.
"Yo, Kevin!" I shout out. Last chance before I go on a little scavenger hunt. I put my ear close to the door. I hear the bed creaking. Somebody is in there.
“Who the fuck is in my house?” Kevin yells from behind the door.
“It’s Lonnie. I tried to call you 3 times,” I shout out the lie, with conviction in my voice.
“How’d you get in here?” he asks, as the double doors to the master bedroom swing inward and open. He is wearing an angry frown, basketball shorts, and no shirt. I try not to look at his pale, untoned stomach.
“Your front door was open. I need some of that furry, bad. I’ll give you (exorbitant price redacted) for half a gram, right now,” I say.
“Say no more. I’ll grab it,” he says, flashing a smile at me, and then running over to his closet. I am suddenly relieved that he is here, and that I do not have to steal from anybody today. Stealing always catches up to me.
“I’m going to go downstairs,” I say.
As I trot downstairs, my sickness starts to subside, since the gorilla in me knows that he will be fed soon. I go into his downstairs bathroom and get a Q-tip, and then run to my car to get a syringe. By the time I get back to Kevin’s couch, he is there.
“You got that hundred?” he asks.
“I’m sending you a Venmo right now,” I say, unlocking my phone, opening the Venmo payment app, and sending him the money, which takes 10 seconds.
“Check it,” I say, nodding at his phone. He watches his phone for a few seconds. A chunk of Furanylfentanyl sits on a scale on the coffee table between us. I eye it hungrily, waiting for Kevin to say the word.
“You’re good,” he says. I pick up the chunk of furanylfentanyl, which is enough to kill 20 opioid-naïve people twice over. I move to the kitchen table, prep the shot, and point the loaded syringe at my arm.
“You know I hate when you do that here,” Kevin says, from the couch.
“I know,” I say, injecting myself in the forearm, quickly.
“1,” I say, capping the syringe.
“2,” I say, putting it in my pocket.
“3,” I say, diving onto the floor.
“4,” I say, feeling a smile creep across my face.
“When does it hit?” he asks.
“5,” I say, laying down on the floor.
“Now,” I add, closing my eyes.
There is a moment of emptiness that is only perceptible if you’re looking for something and find nothing instead: the non-sensations of a barren organism that is completely devoid of any meaning, pleasure, will to live, or basic comfort.
My heart skips a beat – did I miss the vein?!
A weight crushes my chest, like a meteor of light just collided into it. I am unable to breathe as every ounce of pain becomes washed away by the tidal wave of raw pleasure that spreads instantly from my brain and into my spinal cord, transforming my entire body into light as the furanylfentanyl clings to the opioid receptors all over my body. I lay on the floor, mentally clinging to the tightness and pleasure in my chest, wanting it to stay forever.
The rush fades, and I find myself breathing again, unfortunately. I open my eyes and get up from the floor.
“How was that?” Kevin asks, a semi-curious look on his face.
“Awful. You should never do it,” I say, scratching my nose. Kevin laughs.
“I hate needles, anyway,” he says. I laugh twice as loud as he did and begin to pace.
“So did I. So did every IV drug addict. I’ve never met anybody that was like ‘I always loved needles! I just thought stabbing myself looked fun!’. No way. People always start with a habit of sniffing the drugs, just like you.
“They meet somebody who injects the drugs in front of them, just like I am. The person shooting up says: ‘don’t do it, it’s fucking awful’ as they stick the needle in their arm, just like I am. I can understand how this is hypocritical, but it’s truly something I wish I never tasted. You never, ever forget the rush. It becomes the climax and focal point of your life.
“It is a hyper-pleasurable experience that carves itself into the ridges of your memory-scape. It is a traumatic pleasure. You put the needle into your very bloodstream; the chemical you slam into yourself alters your genetic expression. The experience is more intimate than any other experience imaginable. It changes you forever. It haunts you in your dreams. If you give yourself to it for even a moment, The Needle will never let you go,” I say, moving back to the floor. I need to enjoy this shot, before my tolerance skyrockets again, and my body becomes immune to the euphoria.
“Why do you do it, then?” he asks.
“Because I’m hopelessly addicted,” I say, laying down flat on my back again.
“Didn’t you quit before? Weren’t you sober for a year right before we met?” he asks.
“I’ve spent plenty of time sober. I’ve spent more time off opioids than time I’ve spent addicted to them since I found them 10 years ago – but injecting makes it a whole different ballgame. You are injecting a disease into yourself,” I say.
“I don’t think that’s true,” he says.
“Yeah, that’s the fucking conundrum, right there. Did I get the disease when I shot it up, or did I have it before I injected the drugs? Was I born with the disease, or did the drugs cause the disease? We’re both doing the same drugs. How are you able to function and I’m not?” I ask. (author's note: I no longer believe in the disease model of addiction)
“That’s not a conundrum at all. You COULD function, but you’re not. You COULD get sober again, but you’re not,” he says. I start to laugh sarcastically.
“You must be Nancy Reagan’s son – I can just say no! If it’s that easy, why don’t you stop, then?” I ask.
“Why would I stop?” he asks.
“Why wouldn’t you want to stop?” I counter.
“Sounds like you’re projecting. You obviously want to stop. You should stop, then,” Kevin suggests. I laugh at him again.
“Yeah, I’m going to,” I say. He laughs again as well, but the laughter we are exchanging is not friendly and humorous – it is malicious and hateful; borne of the cruel misery that is the flipside of the Heavopioid experience.
“No, seriously, I’m going to stop. In fact, I’m going to call my boy Sean right now, to set up a naltrexone implant and get my opioid receptors blocked,” I say.
“You can’t get a naltrexone implant, that would kill you. You were sick as shit before you did that furry. Your skin was glistening with dope-sweat, your pupils were as big as dinner plates. I saw it myself,” he says.
“I can fake the drug test at the intake appointment and ask the doctor to prescribe me naltrexone pills to ensure a smooth transition and minimize side effects. He will prescribe me oral naltrexone pills gladly, thinking I am being a responsible patient that will take the pills and therefore be safely acclimated to the naltrexone by the time I get the implant.
“Once I have the naltrexone pills, all I need is a small handful of xanax. Take a small handful of xanax with the naltrexone and black out for a night. Wake up, no opioid withdrawal. Tada!” I exclaim, putting my hands out in wonder, still laying on the floor.
“You’re talking about doing an ultra-rapid opioid detox, which is a medical procedure that is done in a hospital, without the supervision of a medical doctor?” he asks, before laughing harshly.
“I’ve done it a bunch before. It’s awesome, actually. Well, one time, it was fucking hell. Twice, actually. It was legitimately the worst thing I’ve ever experienced – an 8-hour terror attack that makes a ‘panic attack’ feel like child’s play. But other than those two times, it’s been all gravy,” I say.
“You’re kidding me. You’re seriously talking about doing an ultra-rapid opioid detox at home with nothing but xanax and a naltrexone pill. That shit could kill you,” Kevin says.
“Not really. Xanax has a really high lethal dose limit by itself, you know that,” I say, referring to the facts that it takes a lot of xanax to kill a person when xanax is taken alone, and that Kevin is a drug nerd like me.
“Yeah, the median lethal dose of xanax alone might be high compared to other drugs, but if you’re blacked out while you’re in severe opiate withdrawal, you don’t even know what’s going on in your body. You could have a heart attack, a stroke. You could break the temperature regulation system of the hypothalamus-” I interrupt him with a laugh.
“I know exactly what’s going on: a bunch of awful, painful stuff that I don’t want to be any part of,” I say. I hear footsteps coming down the stairs.
“What are you guys talking about?” Marissa asks, walking into the living room. She looks worse every time I see her; her youth and beauty are being stolen by Kevin and the drugs he should not be providing her with.
“This kid thinks he’s a doctor. He’s going to wind up killing himself,” Kevin states.
“What?” she asks, walking to the couch to sit next to Kevin.
“It’s not that dangerous. Doctors do it all the time, it’s called ultra-rapid opioid detox. I do it a little bit differently, but it’s the same idea: anesthetize the patient-”
“Himself, he means, when he says ‘patient’,” Kevin interrupts, looking at Marissa.
“Yes, I am both the unlicensed medical provider and the patient in this case. I anesthetize myself with a small handful of xanax while taking a naltrexone pill at the same time. The xanax kicks in, and I black out.
“While I am asleep, the naltrexone clings to my opioid receptors and antagonizes them. This puts me into ‘precipitated withdrawal,’ which is essentially a condensed version of withdrawal from opioids that is triggered by the naltrexone – a hyper-withdrawal, if you will. The hyper-withdrawal reverses the effects of physical dependence on opioids: my natural opioid-producing system, the endorphin system, kicks into overdrive to offset the presence of the naltrexone and get me out of hyper-withdrawal. At the same time, the anti-endorphin system, which pumps out the pain-creating chemical, dynorphin, in response to continuous opioid use, shuts down.
“To put it simply, over the course of a blacked-out night, I go through the equivalent of 7-10 days of withdrawal. I wake up feeling like I’m 10 days clean. Then, I can take another naltrexone pill, which guarantees me another 36 hours clean. It ends the constant and overwhelming war with myself over whether or not I should use opioids. I make one decision to take one naltrexone pill in the morning, instead of having to re-commit to my decision not to use opioids every time I feel depressed or anxious, which is every second at the beginning,” I say, standing up now.
I want to quit again so badly. I want to be free again.
“You have to feel like absolute garbage from starting naltrexone in the middle of a serious habit like that,” Kevin says. I scoff.
“Of course, I feel like garbage! It’s almost unbearable. My brain and spine and gut are overwhelmed by some of the most basic pain-causing chemicals in the biological world. I am quite literally saturating my system with anti-endorphins. Despite the pain, the benefit is simple and incredible: naltrexone speeds the process of return to chemical balance, or homeostasis, in the brain. Opioid painkillers get us high, but they also depress our respiratory, cardiovascular, and nervous systems.
“Our bodies adapt to the constant presence of external opioids by producing chemicals like dynorphin that stimulate us in ways that have the net effect of pain-creation. These pain-creating chemical responses keep us awake and breathing when we’re nodding off – but they also keep us awake and restless when we try to quit opioids, since our brains don’t shut down their production right when we stop ingesting external opioids.
“For example, suppose I start sniffing oxy when I’m 15. My brain starts to notice a ton of painkilling chemicals floating around. It starts to produce these pain-creating chemicals, to offset the painkillers and keep us in equilibrium. Our brains are always seeking to keep us in homeostatic equilibrium – continual regulation of body temperature and blood pressure are two other examples of this equilibrium.
“I skip the oxy for a day. My brain still has the pain-creators floating around, because the human brain is a prediction and adaptation machine that has learned to anticipate an over-abundance of painkillers in my system, and so continues to over-produce the pain-creators as a proactive, predictive response.
“Naltrexone is an extremely powerful pain-creator. There is a huge spike in pain creation unleashed onto my brain by the naltrexone, on top of the already excessive amounts of pain-creators that are being pumped out constantly by my brain to offset the ever-present painkilling fentanyl. This is like a tidal wave of pain-creators hitting the brain.
“Taking naltrexone when you’re already saturated with pain-creators almost feels like swallowing electricity, or fire, or panic. It feels like your entire body is setting off red alarms. Your heart races, your stomach cramps, your guts scream and contract in agony, your skin singes itself with icy-hot sweat. Your brain is telling you to lay there and die but at the same time won’t let you get comfortable for even one second.
“This discomfort cannot be understated: the clouds of heaven would feel like plywood on the street in a Boston winter. Precipitated withdrawal feels like being surrounded by all your worst fears, memories, and nightmares made real and standing all around you, sticking you with cattle prods to get you to jolt,” I say, barely able to avoid a shudder.
“That sounds awful. Why would you do that?” Marissa asks.
“Well, that only happens when you’re conscious during the process. That’s where the small handful of xanax comes in,” I say.
“You’re doing some dangerous shit to your brain by doing that. Creating that much stress and pain in your nervous system has to be ridiculously stimulating to your body. Have you ever been active during the blackout?” Kevin asks.
“Yes, but those are long and frightening stories. The goal is to reach the point where I just barely black out instead of taking enough xanax to be blacked out for a whole day, going grocery shopping and throwing fruit around and making smoothies at 3:00 AM and insulting strangers and crashing cars and whatnot,” I say. Marissa and Kevin start to laugh – at me, not with me.
“Yo, this is funny. You’re wild. So how many extra xanax do you have to take to inhibit the excitatory signals being sent in your brain by the dynorphin and the naltrexone together? I haven’t ever really thought about precipitated withdrawal. It seems like it would be a whole different animal,” he says.
“I used to take 5 xanax bars, but I woke up in the middle of a panic attack despite 5 xanax bars during one of my previous procedures, so now I take 10 xanax bars. It knocks me out for about 8 hours. I wake up in dizzy, disconnected discomfort, but it gets easier as the day goes on. The second naltrexone after waking up is a different story, though. That brings on a fresh batch of symptoms, though nowhere near as intense. I like to take xanax the second night, too.
“I get vicious rebound anxiety from taking so many xanax in such a short period of time. I have to be very careful not to pick up a xanax habit after I induct onto the naltrexone,” I say.
“That sounds like a lot of pain and work,” Kevin says, raising his eyebrows at me.
“It’s worth it. When I come out on the other side, free from this hellish, soul-sucking poison, I feel great. Well, kinda. I don’t sleep for a while. But I do bounce back, and much sooner than I would otherwise.
“When I have 1 month clean on naltrexone, it feels like I have 10 months clean. This is crucial, because when you have only been clean for 1 month, you typically still feel like shit – if you had a serious habit, anyway,” I say.
“I can’t believe you actually do that. You’re a dumbass,” Kevin says.
“It’s actually pretty smart, in some ways. The shocks to the endorphin system of the brain keep it operating smoothly, which in turn keep the immune system and dopamine system operating smoothly. Did you know that William S Burroughs actually recommended going on and off of heroin for the sake of longevity?” I ask. Kevin laughs, loudly this time. He looks at Marissa, smiling.
“You hear that? Longevity. It’ll keep us alive longer,” he says.
“Naltrexone has the potential to be a miracle drug. If you take a low dose of it every day, you can prevent your opioid tolerance from building up. Combine 0.1 MG of naltrexone with 10MG of oxycodone and patent it, you’ve got a billion-dollar pill. That low dose of the artificial, pain-creating naltrexone will prevent your brain from ramping up its’ own pain-creating response to balance out the painkilling effects of the oxy.
“In essence, that would prevent opioid tolerance and therefore the need for increasing daily dosages. You might be able to prevent addiction entirely. I’ve experimented with using naltrexone to diminish tolerance and had some success. It does lessen the painkilling effect a bit, but I’m sure a seasoned pharmacologist could think of a decent opioid potentiator to add to the combination that would increase the painkilling effects of the medication without further side effects,” I say.
“Holy shit. It can prevent tolerance buildup? Can you get me some naltrexone?” Kevin asks.
“Perhaps, but you need to read into it, first,” I say.
“You’ve really piqued my curiosity. Thank you,” he says, pulling out his bag of furanylfentanyl.
“Ah, some hellish, soul-sucking poison. Great idea. I haven’t slept for days, and I need a nap,” I say. Marissa giggles.
“I don’t think you’re going to quit,” Kevin says.
“You’ll see,” I say. I pull the syringe out of my pocket and start walking to the kitchen, to get more water for my next shot. Another shot will knock me right out, and I won’t have to deal with any of this. For a little while, anyway.
“Seriously, I’m going to be free from this shit. Free from these goddamn pills and powders that handcuff my brain and put it in a straightjacket. No more turning my own body and mind into a prison. I hate living like this. I’m going to quit, and I’m going to be playing college basketball soon,” I say, though after I say it, I feel exactly how I feel after I tell a lie.
“Then quit. It isn’t that hard,” he says. I hear the unmistakable sound of somebody sniffing powder through a straw, and it sounds vaguely like weaselly laughter.

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PART III of our Character Study of Gorou Amamiya is an intermezzo chapter. We'll rehash some content from the previous parts and try to understand them on a basic structural level . This is more of an extra edition I allowed myself to write down since this was impossible to fit into the main study without unnecessary distractions . Last but not least some conversations that followed from the previous releases had been ever so fruitful for the creation of either new or advancing preexisted ideas .
This is an Analysis of the Good and the Evil, the Heroe's Journey, the Problem and the Solution.

For thosee who are new here and haven't read the previous parts: You still can just enjoy MYTHOLOGICAL LORE! Scroll down until you see all the Hyperlinks or better start a bit earlier at "3. Entertainment"

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SANATORIUM - DISEASES - TREATMENTS
In Part I we discussed Gorou's loner existence in a rural city that would mainly revolve around the mountain hospital he works at. Due to low patients frequency Gorou had lots of free time to hang around mostly in patient rooms. Besides of highlighting a selfish reason for his behaviour, the general assumption was that his arrangement was convenient. Just a doctor hanging around at his workplace, right?
Now I'd like to flesh this picture out for you. This previous one was actually pretty dull, it allows too many variables in a story that is actually very intentional. Since Aka Akasaka - as well known - had figured out the beginning and the ending of the story he wants to tell before the manga even started, it's obvious that the beginning scenery is thrilled with symbols, metaphors and meanings for both the Heroes but also the meta plot itself and is interconnected with the story's ending in which all those pre-established elements will meet a final resolution to its opposite: In principle this is what you all know as the "Hero's journey".
First lets talk about location location location, as real estate agents love to say. And indeed the location is essential to the plot. Our story begins in a rural hospital. Stop. Actually "hospital" is already too arbitrary of a word and misses the significance of the location. A more accurate word for a rural hospital on a mountain is the Sanatorium. A Sanatorium is an antiquated name for specialised hospitals, for the treatment of specific diseases, related ailments and convalescence. Sanatoriums are tradionally located in healthy climate, usually in the countryside. In the 19th and 20th century these were popular centers for tuberculosis suffers. Some of you might be familiar with Thomas Mann's "The Magic Mountain" (german: Der Zauberberg) which is the most prominent novel revolving around such an institution. Magic Mountain, huh? So we have our Sanatorium, we have our countryside Mountain and certainly we have our magic through the sanctuary of Ame-No-Uzume Goddess of Entertainment and the reincarnation on top of that mountain.
Now that we have established the location lets look at our most prominent patients. What's so special about their condition that they would need treatment in a specialised hospital? How are they all connected to each other? Our most prominent patients are Sarina Tendoji, Ai Hoshino and ... well ... Gorou Amamiya.
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1. Gorou Amamiya

The alert reader immediately knows why I include Gorou Amamiya in that list. I know, including Ai is actually the hot take here. But be patient, we'll get o her later.
Since we established Aqua's trauma to be inherited from Gorou and explored the tragic nature of his birth and the abuse he suffered during his childhood, his inclusion is reasonable. But this - only way later in C75 unvealed background - is already visible right from the beginning with intentional symbols, metaphors and hidden meanings. There are two levels for the representation of his illness.
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• The general representation of his life in this rural area and his habitual lurking around patient's rooms, like when Sarina was around and so on. Just sitting their while looking out the window at the beautiful landscapes. On the surface this is of course just a Doc with a qurik and a lot of free time. But no, the actual meaning is here that he's seeking a cure too. That he is sick. Patients are naturally bored in hospitals, they have a lot of free time because they are sick. They also enjoy the countryside's view. It's one of the main healing attractionto Sanatoriums and made them so popular in the 19th and 20th century. In this specific case the countryside he observes is sacret and related to entertainment. Keep this in the back of your head for now.

Thus we transformed the surface explanation that his free time as a doctor comes from low frequency to the meaningful symbolic depths that it's actually reflecting his status as a chronically ill patient. Moreso even his decision to move out of Tokyo to the countryside - what I called in part 1 the "self-imposed isolation" - turns out to be a meaningful representation of his trouble. We'll later explore another underlaying structure which is the very reason for his "existencial boredom". It's not directly trauma, but for now lets just say it's so fundamentally burned into him that as a consequence his stay at the Sanatorium is as permanently as befits his disease and eventually only ends with his death and reincarnation, or perhaps only then it actually is challenged. Stay tuned.
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• The second, now tangible representation of his diseases is what we already established in Part 1: his obsession with Ai, the inner void he tries to cure with his active measures of "medicine" in a patient's room. While technically he could've watched her literally elsewhere, he decided to hide away in a patient's room. This is a symbol. His first scene in the Manga ever starts exactly in such a room. The sister came in to check - metaphorically speaking - on the patient Gorou Amamiya. This illustration is completely intentional and meaningful to flesh out the double-sided irony of his employment at this particular hospital as a doctor and admission to the Sanatorium as a chronically ill patient.

It's the very first scene that exactly establishes that split personality. We witness a hard cut between the body language of the patient and the body language of the competent cross legged Doctor who explains to us the nature and reason he consumes this "medicine". In this scene he switches back to the doctor's role and while it's a funny cope towards the sister it's at the same time sounds like a serious prescription for himself. Absurdity meets underlaying seriousness and a real problem of the highest importance possible. A problem which is the very reason this story exsists, a problem that will embark our heroes on their journey and a problem that will ultimately be solved.
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https://preview.redd.it/ewasnfmvnd3b1.jpg?width=2571&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=3fed46b24063b90c79df20a7a1231eaca9208bc2
What actually shocked me was that EP 1 of the ANIME basically might have proven my Theory especially from PART II. The moment Gorou dies we get to see exactly two flashback frames. The Ai-Keychain Sarina gave him and a picture of his Grandmother and him... With the missing Grandfather. I feel pretty vindicated about the importance of this photo and as you know in my theory actually his Grandfather is on that photo kinda too... That irony!
https://preview.redd.it/fo97javmgg3b1.jpg?width=2575&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=2031410c5ab4e10faad18f4cb87ae9d52a48568d
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1. Sarina Tendoji

In contrast to Gorou's more subtle immaterial deciption of his disease, Sarina's situation is basically the exterior as the utmost visible form of it. She is the embodiment of the classic Sanatorium inhabit with the typicel physical characteristics: chronic disease, handicapped existence, very care-dependent*.* But these 3 characteristics will show themselves also for Sarina as mental barriers after she reincarnated in Ruby. Care-dependets in her seek for Ai's, a mother's and a father's love, the handicapped existence in her troulbe to move and dance how she''d like to and ultimately the expression of a chronic disease in form of the trauma she inherited from Sarina's soul. From the point of view of "plot related meaning" Ruby's inheritance of those 3 characteristics are more important then the physical showcase in Sarina's body, although we will later also unveal another layer of particulary Sarina Tendoji not Ruby Hoshino in this story. You see, I'm really bulding up here.
She has a symbolic double function as both a sick dying child but also as physical representation of Ruby's, Aqua's and Gorou's mental situation. To quote PART II for that matter:

In a sense the image of the handicapped Sarina living in the hospital is the quintessential metaphorical representation of Gorou himself. She shows upfront what was the psychological state of Gorou's soul. When he realized in C119 that Sarina's life must've been like hell he reflected his own experience too.

But in order to apply these 3 characteristics to Gorou we first have to explore another symbolic layer to why all of our proganists revolve around this particular hospital. For this we have to step back and look at the most dominent theme of the story: Entertainment...
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3. Entertainment

... is our PATIENT ZERO. Entertainment itself in this Story is chronically ill. It's existence - the very nature of art - is handicapped and crippled by cold hearted and ultimately in opposition to the essence of entertainment standing particular business interests. Their practice of entertainment harms both artists and art enjoyers and thus the meaning of entertainment itself. Entertainment as a mass-produced industry is a disease to entertainment as the realm of the truth-seeking, philanthopic and graceful expression of the uttermost passionate creative minds who enjoy the blessing of the goddess and share her blessing with the community.
The true meaning of Entertainment is joyfull fullfillment and the exploration of new uplifting expressions of cultural life. It's a healing power in the most innocent and human-loving way, it's first and foremost an enrichtment of the soul, not of the pocket. The industry however inverted this relation: Now the money dictates the art. As a consequence talent get's blocked, content is cheap and underwhelming, instead of uplifting humanity, the mere consumer gets just as much exploited as the performer. The consumer is conditioned to waste his limited precious lifespawn with the consumption of the most primitive motives of entertainment. This is a form of exploitation through the industry and it has rotten everyone to the bone. The artist gets either drained or he himself corrupts and uses the same sort of schemes, trickes and deceptions to climb to the top. But the higher they climb the further they uproot from the essence of true entertainment ... And those who oppose and try tu succeed with honest and uplifting ideals will literally killed on the way.
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🚬
We have diagnozed the problem, the chronical disease. A disease which is the very reason for this story to exsist, a disease that will embark our heroes on their journey and a disease that will ultimately be cured. And indeed the location has proven to be essential to this plot. Our story begins with a Mountain Sanatorium in the heart and on top of the Goddesses of Entertainment's realm. A symbol for The Cure of Entertainment.
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1. Ai Hoshino

To understand why Ai seeks cure exactly at that hospital we have to expose the location she's fleeing from: Tokyo. Tokyo is the center of this plot's Entertainment industry. A metropolis is the absolute opposition to the countryside, this tension between Tokyo as the center of Business and Commerce and Takachiho as the center of the Goddess of Entertainment's true and opposing expressions of Art sets the dialectic. I was purposely holding back the name of Ame-No-Uzume's town until now because it only has a concrete meaning in this tight relation to the plot-stretching antagonist, which culminates in Tokyo. Ame-No-Uzume occupies the domain of Takachiho, but who occupies Tokyo the? It's a mix between the Japanese Mythology of the Seven Lucky Gods who are basically characterized as Gods of Business and Commerce and the Seven Deadly Demons from Christian Demonology.

1. Lucifer: pride
2. Beelzebub: envy
3. Satan: wrath
4. Abaddon: sloth
5. Mammon: greed
6. Belphegor: gluttony
7. Asmodeus: lust

It all leads to Hikaru Kamiki as our personified antagonist: If you write "Hikaru" in kanji, it will be like 光る or just 光, which literally means "to shine, to glitter, to be bright", which make a lot of sense being the name of man who got starry eyes. But, if we look a bit deeper, such name can be translated as "The Shining One" or "One who brings the Light"... In christian mythology this is - Lucifer the Morning Star himself. Double irony there in the fact that Ai often nicknamed and referenced as VENUS, Evening Star Reborn, as u/Raeliic4 pointed out to me. On top I also found a suitable association with Beelzebub which is another name for the Devil. Beelzebub is also called "The King of Flies" and in the Dictionnaire Infernal (1863) a Book on Demonology he's depicted as a Fly! So maybe he wasn't wearing only crow feathers but actually also Fly-hair?... Beelzebub is known in demonology as one of the seven deadly demons or seven princes of Hell, Beelzebub representing gluttony and envy. Gluttony = He appears as the best drinking buddy of Yura (and maybe Frill). Envy = He's envious towards the white-glooming Star-People.
Thus the antagonist is created: It's a demonic force of industrialized Entertainment that has rotten down Art to the bone and occupies Tokyo as it's center. Kamiki however is for now the most malicious and excessive release of this evilness. While the industry tries to just drain, corrupt and exploit stars, he literally kills stars out of personal envy. In order to cure Entertainment our protagonists have to be embarked on a journey to Tokyo. In this antagonistic relation Aqua and Ruby are ultimately Heroes blessed by the God of Entertainment to cast out the Devil that holds "Entertainment" in his death grip.
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Ai Hoshino's story begins with her escape from the Devil. She flees Tokyo and tries to find protection and cure in Takachiho in at least 3 meanings.
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1. AS AN IDOL : On the surface level it's because an Idol can't justify promiscurity towards her fans and because the Agency can't justify pregnancy of a Teenager, so she has to flee where nobody knows her. This is besides also a metaphor that indeed the Town of God is where nobody knows the filth of the rotten Tokyo-World. But this is just again the convenient explanation the characters verbalize towards us, as proven many times there is also a hidden symbolic dialectic to it. The IDOL as the Evening Star VENUS is an object of LUST (Asmodeus, one of the seven deadly demons). You might be familiar with the VENUSBERG) from european folklore. "In German folklore of the 16th century, the narrative becomes associated with the minnesinger Tannhäuser who becomes obsessed with worshipping the goddess Venus**.**" But what AI seeks is real love, somethinf that can be loved. And thus she steps down from the Venusberg ("Venus Mountain") in other words steps down as an Idol of Lust to become a Mother, It's a purification - "I am Maria" she sings in the OP song. There is a metaphorically similar transformation which starts Richard Wagner's "Tannhäuser" Opera. Tannhäuser: The world of Venus is dedicated exclusively to LUST. Tannhäuser found his way here as a mortal, but is increasingly weary of the enjoyment (“If a god can always enjoy, I am subject to change”). Trying to persuade her knights to stay, Venus prophesied that the people would never forgive Tannhäuser for dwelling with the pagan goddess of love: he would never find salvation there. However, Tannhäuser sticks to his decision: “My salvation rests in Maria!” When Mary is invoked, the world of Venus disappears and Tannhäuser sees himself transported to a lovely forest valley in Thuringia at the foot of the Wartburg. The Beginning of Wagner's Tannhäuser basically sums up AI'S ESCAPE from her VENUS-TRAMMEL to her MATERNAL HAPPINESS. Even that this purification situates Tannhäuser in a lovely forest valley at the foot of a mountain-castle fits the narrative. Our Sanatorium in the lovely rural japanese backwaters is a powerful castle which gives her ultimate protection to bear her children. Just like that Ai "spawns" into the our plot. A minute before that she was the worshipped VENUS obsessed over by Gorou on his TV, but became the MOTHER when she entered the Castle. Gorou became her KNIGHT. Gorou had a Tannhäuser-Transformation himself, when he realized that the IDOL Ai needs him as the future MOTHER Ai and therefore overcame his lewd interest and served her as the protector of her maternity.
2. AS A BRIDE: Lucifer's wife is also associated with the she-demon LILITH, the child murderer. Ai flees her relationship with Kamiki and therefore flees from the fate of a child murderer. She was pregnant with "soulless Children" which means: Stillbirths. In german we also say "Sternenkind" (Star Child) for stillbirth. So she metaphorically flees the "marriage" between Evening Star and Morning Star and eventually opposes her fate as the child murderer LILITH who carries Sternenkinder with the help of the Knight and Hero Tannhäuser-Gorou. As Takachibo is the realm of our blessing Goddess of Art and the Sanatorium her Castle on the Magic Mountain it's fair to assume that also soul migration is only possible there in the center of her purifying power. The Devil Kamiki maybe can't even enter the Castle himself because it shields itself from Evilness...
3. AS A SAVIOUR: Just as RUBY and AQUA our AI gets send back with a Mission: To Cure Art and Entertainment. There is a lot we can say about her involvement in this but I want to cut it down to one essential plot-line: Her association with Gotanda and the following shoots for a documentary with him. Gotanda for that matter is a very, very important figure. He is the man who only wants to hear the TRUTH, a man who is capable to see through LIES instantaneous, he who CAN'T BE DECEIVED. As long as he doesn't stop the recording it is a proof for the verisimilitude of the content. He is the "NOTARY" who witnessed her TESTIMONY but also her TESTAMENT (in german we also say "LETZTER WILLE" instead of Testament, which means LAST WILL or LAST WISH... Ai's Wish). She was killed but she archived everything she needed to archive: Found true Love and passed down her LEGACY through the recordings with Gotanda. Ruby and Aqua received everything they need to fight the Evil. Ai's KARMA as a result led for her soul to enter NIRVANA and break out of the cycle of rebirth which in Buddism is called "SAMSARA" - Thus "her soul collapsed and returned to the stars and the sea. It will never be reformed again. Death is Death. Ai Hoshino doesn't think of anything anymore, nothing is on her mind" -> NIRVANA. But as far as the content of the movie goes it's obviously a big exposure of the corruption and wrong doing that is happening in the Industry. She, Goatanda but als Aqua want to archive a social phenomenom with the movie. They want CHANGE. Thus she came to Takachiho to heal and left as a HEALER and MOTHER MARIA with her Twins as the SAVIOURS of ART. In PART I and PART II we identified in full extent her role as a saviour for Ruby and Aqua in the form of Ruby's muse and mother-figure and Aqua's unconditonally loving mother that reenacted his innocence in the tragic death of Gorou's mother.

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I promised to talk about another connecting layer, the very reason why it must be exactly SARINA and GOROU who are chosen to wield the sword against the devil. But we will delay this topic for another time. PART IV will get us to the THAT CORE. They are not chosen because they have Trauma, this would be absurdly dull. The Trauma or chronical disease they suffer are the result of a "crime" against the blessings of the Goddess of Arts. That's a small hint from my side.
Thank to the faithful readers and brave souls who dived back again into another of my essays and also thanks to every new face here as well.. Hopefully I'll see you all again for the next Part!
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