Every year Breyer has a theme, and organizes a surprising number of their releases and events around it. 

For example, this year's theme was "Hollywood," which not only informed the events and decorations at BreyerFest, it also affected the models they released.  (Elvis Presley's palomino "Rising Sun" is still Product of the Week on the Breyer website, by the way.)

2011's theme, as announced by Breyer at this year's BreyerFest, is "FairyTails."  Get it?  Tails?  Like how horses have tails?  I know.  The puns: they hurt us.

At any rate, this means that an official Shadowfax model is probably a lock.  Shadowfax is awesome, but I fear for the parade of purple and pink (and worst of all purple-and-pink) models in 2011.  Sparkles!  Glitter!  Rainbows!  WHAT DOES IT MEAN.

Many have already dubbed 2011's theme "Pretty Pretty Princess," and I cringe proactively.  I prefer to think of Breyer as the antidote to sparkly pink princess crap, you know?  Like when you go to the toy store, there's the pink aisle - which you can avoid - and then there's the aisle with the Breyer horses.  With their soothing, non-gender-role-biased tan and brown boxes.

Now don't get me wrong, I understand that Breyer models still appeal mostly to young girls, age 8-16 or so.  And young girls age 8-16 are mad for fantasy horses like unicorns and pegagsususes (that's the plural, by the way) and dragons and Tolkein novels.  As long as we keep it square in the fantasy realm, that's one thing.  I just hope Breyer doesn't tip over into princess land, and start handing out pink frothy dresses and tiaras with every purchase of a new Rejoice or whatever.  

Shadowfax: awesome.  Princess pink, waiting for her prince to come rescue her: not awesome.

Just to be clear, it's not that I think Breyer should be catering to the older collectors.  Although I came up with a few theme ideas, just in case Reeves wants help brainstorming:

2012: Mortgage Rates  
Check your mortgage against Breyer's new calculator!  Can you get a better rate with a new company?  Don't miss new Breyer models like Adjustable Rate (on the Zippo Pine Bar mold) and 30 Year Fixed (on Goffert).

2013: Sensible Diet
Breyer hits the vegetable patch, with nutritious offerings like A Nice Refreshing Salad With Dressing On The Side (on the Lipizzaner mold) and a BreyerFest buffet consisting entirely of 100-calorie snack packs, egg white omelets, and bran muffins.

2014: It Used To Be So Much Better
New stuff is lame!  A return to the company's heyday, which is the year when you were ten, regardless of what age you are now.  It's a lot of different BreyerFests, sure, but each one is a perfect time machine to that best year when all the models were awesome, and none of them were crappy and cheap like they are now.  New models on vintage molds include You Kids Get Off My Lawn (a bay Running Stallion) and Music Today Is Just Awful (a palomino Lying Down Foal).