A dragon’s smile

A wide mouthful of sharp dragon teeth is probably the last thing any LEGO knight wants to see. But this dragon bust by Aaron Newman looks pretty cool all the same. Personally I love a good LEGO dragon, and this one delivers on all fronts. The “generic” dragon head shape is hard to achieve in bricks, but is created perfectly here. I’d normally advise builders to avoid giving their dragons teeth — it’s tough to get them looking good. But Aaron has pulled it off nicely. In addition, the colour scheme works well, with pastel shades complementing the main white, giving a “realistic” Frost Drake look.

Fyaska the Unladylike

The bust is a scaled-up version of Aaron’s older minifig scale dragon, Fyaska the Unladylike. Here’s a comparison between the minifig and large versions…

Fyaska or Bust

A grand day out with the bricks

Wallace and Gromit enjoy a lunar picnic in this LEGO scene by Patrick B. Whilst simple, the renditions of the inventor and his dog are nicely done, with Mixel eyes providing a bunch of character (however did we builders manage before those came along?!). The robot is perhaps a little small, but that’s made up for by the cool picnic equipment — don’t miss the thermos, the wicker basket, and the use of an upturned tricorn hat as a dog bowl. Eeh lad, that’s grand.

Wallace & Gromit: A Grand Day Out - ABS Builder Challenge Part 4

TBB Weekly Brick Report: LEGO news roundup for May 28, 2017 [News]

In addition to the best LEGO models created by builders all over the world, The Brothers Brick also brings you the best of LEGO news and reviews. This is our weekly Brick Report for the final week of May 2017.

TBB NEWS & REVIEWS: It was a quiet week in LEGO news, but we still have a review of the stunning Ultimate Batmobile and some custom kits that will blow you out of the water.

OTHER LEGO NEWS: This week had a few interesting nuggets of LEGO-related news beyond the new kits, so here are the best of the rest.

The LEGO Batman Movie’s The Ultimate Batmobile 70917 [Review]

Even though The LEGO Batman Movie has been in theaters since February, LEGO Batman is back this summer with a whole new wave of sets. Many of the sets this time around feature some of the more spoiler-ish elements of the movie, but nothing that will ruin the movie if you haven’t yet seen it. The flagship of this wave is 70917 The Ultimate Batmobile, which we got our first look at in February at the New York Toy Fair. It’s a massive creation from the film’s turning point that features a Batmobile, Bat-Tank, Batcycle, and Batwing all joined into a rolling fortress for Batman and his cohort. By far the largest of The LEGO Batman Movie sets, The Ultimate Batmobile has 1,456 pieces and will retail for $129.99 USD and should be available June 1.

70917 The Ultimate Batmobile

The set includes 8 minifigures, along with a light-up Batsignal.

70917 The Ultimate Batmobile
70917 The Ultimate Batmobile

Click to read the full review

Chrysalis emerges as a beautiful spaceship

It’s always great to see a first-timer in the online fan community introduce themselves with as sweet of a build as Michael Kanemoto has done with his Chrysalis spaceship.

Chrysalis Overview

The builder says he spent a few hundred hours over the past couple of months perfecting his design, and I’d say the effort was well worth it. This is a gorgeous and sleek spacecraft featuring all kinds of clever design details. The colors look great and the launch pad has a nice retro look to it. But the coolest touch may be that the builder has also replicated the ship in microscale.

Chrysalis: Micro build

Howl at this moving (dragon) castle

Two heads + two tails + a castle on its back = one excellent Oriental dragon. The Tokyo Tag Team brings us this cracking LEGO creation — all teeth and claws and roof shingles. The castle itself is a great little build, with the dark green roof providing a smart contrast to the orange scales on the dragon.

Talisman Dragon 御守龍

The twin heads are well-built, with some good angled brickwork to provide the shaping. I particularly like those dark grey whiskers up front — a nice touch which adds an appropriately Eastern mythological feel.

Talisman Dragon 御守龍

Fancy going Dutch at this pizza house?

The canal houses of Amsterdam are part of the United Nations World Heritage and are famous for their tall, slim stature and ornate façades and stylised gables. While Barrie Crossan has not given his building much of a gable, he has taken inspiration from those famous Dutch canal houses when designing his five-storey LEGO pizza house. If you look closely you will see some lovely decorative details on the façade and the back stairs on the bottom left, leading directly to the restaurant’s busy kitchen.

Amsterdam Pizza House - Custom Lego Modular Building

While the outside is attractive, it’s worth taking a look inside where Barry has made an effort to create a hugely detailed interior. The apartment on the upper floors has an impressive sitting room with a dining area behind the couch. The furniture is certainly not the average LEGO table and chairs: it looks like it has been supplied by an exclusive designer, with a price tag to match.

Amsterdam Pizza House - Floor 4 (2)

Take a closer look inside

Miss Muffet is in for another bad day

There’s only one spider in the world I’d actually want to have in my house: this giant LEGO spider by Grant Davis. Grant uses some great techniques in this build. For example, the cherry elements in between the hinges on the legs are used to achieve tiny bands of red, while minifig caps are used to capture the round articulating joints.

Pink Poison

However, the presentation is what really makes this build shine. The spider dangles in front of a green background, belying its large scale. Grant continues to put out killer builds for the Iron Builder competition, so be sure to check out the other three we’ve highlighted already: a fan, Whack-A-Mole machine, and lotus flower.

A timeless naval chase

I have a big soft spot for triremes, more so than for other historical ships. This microscale scene by Micah Beideman, despite its questionable historical and engineering implications, delivers on many levels. Both the ships are done well, with a good solution for the sails, and the trireme’s oars look quite convincing. While simple, the overall scene is very immersive, with the clouds adding a lot to the effect.

Sea Chase

What is M-Tron up to on Zosma 4?

Given the shared building blocks of matter and the uniformitarian geological processes likely occurring all over the universe, it seems fairly likely that future human explorers will encounter landscapes similar to our own on distant worlds. Mark Erickson has built an excellent gulch that would look right at home in the American southwest. But the builder says that this is the planet Zosma 4, with an M-Tron mining crew trundling along under the watchful eyes of a certain Captain Simon Lou. While the little M-Tron vehicles will probably evoke a certain nostalgia for LEGO Space fans who came of age in the early 90’s, I’m much more impressed by the realistically layered rocks — truly lovely.

Interstellar Surveillance

This piece of junk made the Kessel Run in less than twelve parsecs

Happy 40th anniversary, Star Wars! Sad Brick has created this wonderful microscale Millenium Falcon to help us celebrate. Despite being made out of only two or three bricks each, our much-loved heroes are instantly recognizable – and I just love the cupcake top for Chewie’s head! The scene is packed full of skillful little details, like the piping on the back wall, the sideways use of tan arch elements, and LEGO shooters used for the seam of the landing bay doors. The Corellian freighter itself is a fantastic representation of the most beloved ship in the galaxy. The guns, the dish, and the cockpit all look perfect and that subtle coil of LEGO string charging the Falcon is a masterstroke.

Millennium Falcon

We’re gonna need a bigger axe

Aaron Newman is continuing the long tradition of turning characters and creatures from Warhammer and 40K into LEGO builds. The creature getting the treatment today is the bird-like Lord of Change. There’s a lot to like here, but the small details that make up the avian face as well as the small gold details dotted around the build do it for me.

Sarthorael, Lord of Change