Mobile Strike Force: ready!

During the pandemic, a group of LEGO fans have begun playing a virtual military conquest game a bit like Risk, except each person’s army consists solely of the creations they build to populate it. Douglas Hughes has mobilized his military in a big way with this absolute unit of a transport plane, which he’s fittingly dubbed “Chubs.” The stylized aesthetics of both the plane and the dock equipment reminds me of the Micro Machines I had as a kid, and I can’t help but want to start playing with this epic transport.

CHU-85 "Chubs" Ekranoplan!

Interestingly, Doug’s sculpted the plane studs-out, which allowed him to get the complex curves the fuselage needs, while still leaving the interior mostly hollow. That would be a difficult balance to strike using other methods, such as stacked slopes.

Star Wars: Now serving Order 66!

The prequels are generally regarded as the least favorites of the Star Wars franchise for many fans. With that said, we can’t deny there were some iconic moments in the films. One such moment; Order 66. That’s when the Galactic Republic was secretly ordered to execute every Jedi they could find–and man that was some edge-of-your-seat stuff! Max Fudal replicates the scene nicely in LEGO and tells us this project took two years and 50,000 pieces to complete. I’d say this was well worth the time and effort. The terrain, from the planet’s liquid core to its craggy cliffs, is astounding. The man-made structures built into the cliffside offer up a change in textures and the minifigures denote plenty of action.

Order 66 on Utapau

I can get lost in all these great details. I just want to play with this scene all day and maybe execute Order 66 myself! Does that make me a bad person? While you’re mulling that over let’s rejoice in the fact that this seems to be the first time we’ve featured this builder here on The Brothers Brick. If this is any indicator, we readily look forward to seeing what else Max is capable of.

Tear it up with these hard suits

Do you like traditional Japanese folklore? Do you like hard suits? Then, by golly, you can set your squeal-holes to positively delighted with this LEGO trio by Louis of Nutwood. The desert hard suit, aka “The Camel” has a strategically placed saw I would not want to tangle with in an alley, dark, or otherwise. The R.A.M.B.O. jungle suit is just the thing to tear it up in the underbrush while the low-temperature suit, known as “The Snowflake”, has a rocket launcher. You know, for the cold. Which is your favorite?

Hard Suits (Shinrai-Do)

Go super fast with this super train

The coolest thing about this LEGO scene by General Sparkle (if that’s your real name!) is the blurred effects cluing us in that this is one fast train. However, the subject matter is well in focus. It’s just a really neat effect. In case the train went by too fast for you, the high ranking military official with the dubious name tells us the cars are as follows: engine, crew, tanker, passenger, passenger, ammunition, passenger, weapon and anti-aircraft gun, heavy equipment flatbed, and more passenger cars. Thank you, General! We’re not even sure if this is a render or an actual LEGO build with some neat photographic trickery. But we are pretty sure this is the first time we’ve featured this builder so let’s hope we see many more cool creations to come. It joins the ranks of so many trains we’ve featured here over the years.

Train

Double the tensegrity, triple the trouble

Over the past few months, LEGO tensegrity sculptures have been all the rage, with their gravity-defying stacking attracting builders of all stripes to try their hands. While most tensegrity structures consist of a single floating element, a few builders have managed to add another floating section to that, which makes the delicate balancing exponentially more difficult. David Roberts makes it look easy, though, with this tower of rings.

The Three RingsTensegrity sculptures stay aloft thanks to being held in tension with three tethers (chains in this case), but David’s model also adds tension to the rings themselves, which simply comprise Technic tread links joined inside out to make a tensioned circle. It all comes together to create a beautifully simple sculpture.

Now, who wants to try their hand at creating a tensegrity sculpture with three floating levels on top of the base? Any takers?

Want to see more tensegrity sculptures? Check out our LEGO Tensegrity archives for examples from tanks to dragons.

Frogger’s Revenge

Builder Cecilie Fritzvold is on a roll with dynamite-based creations lately, and this may be the best one yet. The Strawberry Poison Dynamite Frog dwells deep in the rainforests of IBlandia, or so it’s said. It’s possible that this is just a flight of fancy. It’s possible that adorable little frog isn’t a clever combination of LEGO rubber bands, dynamite, antenna bases, and cherries. Or that the lush greenery of the forest isn’t minifigure palets, capes, grill tiles, and even more dynamite. But I’m not about to venture into the jungle and find out. Better safe than sorry, these days.

Strawberry Poison Dynamite Frog

If you’ve haven’t seen Cecile’s other TNT-centric builds, be sure to check them out!

We’re gonna need a bigger boat!

We all know how this ends. I believe Jaws was the first movie I saw in the theater. Since I was a small child at the time, that speaks of how relaxed they were about letting kids into the theater and…could also explain a lot about how I turned out. The 45th anniversary of this pivotal movie just passed and Arco Noide celebrates with this LEGO version of Quint’s boat. Although Quint is a tough as nails old salt with one of the most memorable intros in movie history, (spoiler alert!) things eventually don’t go well for Quint and his little boat. Still, this is a stunning tribute to the craft. I like how two sets of cattle horns create shark jaws just forward of the ship’s wheel. Judging by the four yellow barrels still present, we have about an hour before things go really sour for Quint. We’re gonna need a bigger boat indeed.

Lego Orca - Jaws' 45th anniversary

This is what you get when you stop sorting and start mixing

Couple weeks ago, we got the first look at this summer’s LEGO Technic sets including 42112 Concrete Mixer Truck set. One of the reasons we don’t see concrete mixers among official LEGO sets that often is that the vehicle like this one requires a special drum element — a very bulky single-purpose piece. But Kirill Mazurov proves that you don’t need big solid elements for awesome LEGO builds. Using a bunch of common and affordable panels, he managed to recreate the shape of the drum very precisely. With almost no holes, the structure looks as smooth as the one in the official set, and I love the mix of white and red colors. In case you’ve been following Kirill’s works, I believe you have already guessed that this mixer has a lot of functions. Make sure to check out the video under the cut.

P1040112

Click here to see the video…

Ninjago 71719 Zane’s Mino Creature [Review]

Here at The Brothers Brick, we’ve explored all the summer 2020 Ninjago sets…all but one, that is. There…lurking in the corner…it’s 71710 Ninjago: Zane’s Mino Creature. And, spoiler alert, this one is a little different from the rest of the wave. Part of the “Game Experience Inside” group, this set has odd build choices that make it feel like either an early version or a late addition to that sub-theme. Available now for US $49.99 | CAN $69.99 | UK £44.99, is this 616 piece set worth your time and money? Read on and see!

Click to read the full hands-on review

Tread VERY carefully

Okay, so lately Cecilie Fritzvold has been building cool LEGO stuff using the dynamite bundle element as a key part. We’ve already seen arcade games and undersea adventures, and today we head into the cold wastelands of an ice planet. The explosives take on a few new uses in the Spark BLOR-20, serving as part of the flexible drilling arm and as the center of a sensor array. Oh, and a whole bunch of them combine to form heavy-duty tank treads. It’s an innovative use, but it gets extra points from me because of the tracks left in the snow behind the vehicle. Rows of modified plates create the look; clever part usage indeed.

Spark BLOR-20

Eat your fruits and vegetables!

A major problem with the diets of many folks these days is that they do not eat enough fresh fruits and vegetables, instead deriving too many of their calories from highly processed wheat, corn, and soy. There’s nothing wrong with wheat, corn, or soy, per se, but they don’t provide many of the vitamins and minerals necessary for human health. So consider this LEGO build by Barbara Hoel to be a public service announcement: eat your fruits and veggies! Your gut will thank you. Now, back to our regularly scheduled programming.

Still Life with Fruit

This still life is awash with bright colors, with red apples, green, dark red, and purple grapes, orange oranges, yellow pears, and perhaps a dark red plum. Yummy! Organic curves are hard to do in LEGO, but Barbara has done a great job sculpting them. And then there is the tablecloth beneath them all, with every shade of blue imaginable featured. Someone must have invested in some LEGO DOTS sets! If only the background were black velvet, this would look great surrounded by a gilded frame and hanging on the wall of my dining room, reminding me to eat my fruits and vegetables.

New LEGO Jurassic World sets for summer 2020 now available in the Americas [News]

Calling all LEGO dinosaur lovers! The newest summer wave of LEGO Jurassic World sets is now available in the US and Canada. Several retailers have had these on the shelves already, but they are now directly available from LEGO and include dinos like an Ankylosaurus, Gallimimus, Pteranodon, Velociraptor and Indominus Rex as well as an adorable baby Triceratops and Ankylosaurus.

The sets have been available in the UK for a month, but are now available in the US and Canada. Of note, the huge buildable dino of 75936 Jurassic Park: T. rex Rampage and 21320 Dinosaur Fossils are also now back in stock. Take a look at each new Jurassic World set now available after the jump.

Which dinosaur do you most want to add to your collection? Click to see them all.