Yearly Archives: 2019

LEGO Ideas 21318 Treehouse unleashes your childhood dreams [Review]

LEGO’s purpose for the LEGO Ideas program is to encourage and crowdsource new concepts from the LEGO building community that typically might not be produced as mainstream designs from LEGO’s in-house design teams. LEGO Ideas 21318 Treehouse is the 26th entry that has been mass-produced to date and is the largest Ideas set ever released, coming in at a whopping 3,036 elements. Based on the other sets that have been released this year so far, it will be the fourth-largest set for 2019. With such a high piece count and price, at US $199.99 | CAN $269.99 | UK £179.99, LEGO fans might think twice before deciding if this is something that they’re going to fit into their budget and collection, so we’ve got an in-depth review of the set to help you decide.

This original idea was conceived by adult fan of LEGO Kevin Feeser and then designed as a LEGO set by LEGO Designer César Soares. With many other LEGO Ideas finalists are tied to some kind of intellectual property like a nostalgic movie, the concept here is a rare original idea. Let’s dive in and evaluate if it makes the cut in its final form.

Check out our hands-on review of the new LEGO Ideas 21318 Treehouse

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A Road King crowned with chrome

We recently posted our review of LEGO Creator Expert 10269 Harley Davidson Fat Boy. It’s an amazing set, but that didn’t stop Bricksonwheels from taking to the road with a 1:10 scale Harley-Davidson Road King Lowrider. As you’ve surely noticed, this creation is awash in gleaming chrome, and this is no accident. Bricksonwheels has been advocating the use of custom chromed LEGO elements for over ten years. As the name suggests, their featured builds are trucks and other vehicles, all decked out with those shiny elements. (My favorite is the Kenworth K100 classic milk trailer combo.)

There’s a lot to admire about this creation beyond the mirror finish. The engine is crammed full of detail and real-world shaping. The blues of the bodywork provide a rich color contrast, gliding through some graceful curves. From the rear, you can see even more chromed elements, along with a better look at the instrument panel.

Bricksonwheels hopes that this creation will inspire others to incorporate more chrome into their own builds. You might even be driven to mod your Harley Fat Boy set…hint, hint!

You have 20 nanoseconds to comply

When these cops come to kick your door in, they don’t mess around. Armed to the teeth and itching for a fight, the squad’s tactical mech carries a faint whiff of ED-209 from Robocop. However, Tim Goddard‘s model is a throwback to an altogether different slice of retro cop sci-fi–LEGO’s Space Police theme of 1989. There’s a tonne of lovely mechanical detailing in amongst the black, and the blue panels and red cockpit give the model some striking standout. I love the guns and missile launcher this thing is carrying, but the smaller arms hanging beneath the cockpit are the killer detail, lending the model some goofy character along with its more obvious menace.

Scouting forward into landscapes of unknown terrain

Fascinating builder Kobalt brings his latest LEGO creation to the table, and it seems to jump straight from the cover of a 1960s sci-fi novel. The slim, lightly curved legs of the Atomic Bug support a large bulbous body constructed predominantly in olive green. This speaks to me of treading over rubble in some alternate universe’s cold war. Red highlights and pinstripes adorn this strider, while the touches of yellow bring out some rather clean greebling towards the rear. This craft has been well looked after. A series of snug searchlights are found under the cockpit canopy as well as some nifty aerials, made from a couple of varied lengths of flex cable. I couldn’t personally think of a better part for those large transmitter-receivers.

On turning this craft around, we are presented with what I can only assume is a power source. Built primarily in white, it stands out nicely from the rest of the body. The white 4×4 multifaceted cylinder hemisphere as the cap on the end allows the continuity to be smoothly ended. This reminds me of a futuristic energy core containment system, presumably for its atomic fuel. From this reversed angle we can also see more of the yellow hints, peeking out from the top. The girder piece gives such a great industrial feel and though it’s almost all hidden, the glimpses you get from the varied angles is all it needs.

Kinetic LEGO sculpture of the Luck Dragon from The Neverending Story [Video]

Stranger Things season 3 will undoubtedly have given Limahl’s royalties a boost with its use of the theme song from The Neverending Story. But if you’re a fan of the original movie, then Jason Allemann‘s latest creation will have you smiling and humming the song to yourself without a single reference to Hawkins, Indiana. He’s put together an excellent LEGO version of Falkor the Luck Dragon.

Jason is the undisputed master of LEGO kinetic sculpture, imbuing his creations with wonderful motion, and this model is a perfect example. Check out the video featuring the Luck Dragon in flight, and Jason talking through the design process.

A LEGO philosopher’s dream

Sometimes the best inspiration for a LEGO creation comes from someone else’s failure, or at least from their frustrated abandonment of a complex idea. Pau Padrós‘s brother attempted to build Raphael’s masterpiece “The School of Athens”, but was about to give up; Pau took the build, changed the scale, and ran with it to create this amazing digital model. The painting, and thus the plastic version, focuses on the two most important philosophers of the Greek world, and thus of Western civilization: Plato and Aristotle. Naturally, some details of the original painting have been lost—I don’t recall Euclid’s face being a hollow square in Raphael’s version—but it is still a masterwork in forms; Plato would be proud. (That’s a philosophy pun, if you missed it.) I love how Pau has kept the detail of the two philosophers’ hands, with Plato’s pointing to the sky (where the ideal forms of all things reside) and Aristotle’s flat over the ground (which is the natural world, the observation of which is the source of our knowledge).

Besides the philosophers shown, which is exciting enough, Pau has hidden all sorts of details in the build. Each of the figures of Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle are comprised of twenty-two pieces, which in numerology means that they are on the path to turn dreams to reality. Of the 41 solid colors of LEGO in production, 38 are used, which perhaps represents the broad range of ideas held by these different men (and woman). The sextant makes for an effective lyre in Apollo’s statue’s hand, and a droid body approximates Athena’s Aegis-shield well enough. Don’t miss the green barbed wire as Epicurus’ garland, either. With forty-seven philosophers here (everyone from Alexander to Zeno) there’s something for everyone to appreciate and emulate. Most importantly, perhaps, is the lost art of disagreeing amicably and discussing rationally.

Want to see more of the build? Check out the video here:

TBB Weekly Brick Report: LEGO news roundup for July 21, 2019 [News]

In addition to the amazing LEGO models created by builders all over the world, The Brothers Brick brings you the best of LEGO news and reviews. This is our weekly Brick Report for the third week of July 2019.

Toys ‘R’ Us returns to the U.S. in time for the 2019 holiday season. Keep reading our Brick Report to get all the details.

TBB NEWS AND REVIEWS: This week we learned that you can’t keep a good giraffe down, watched the making of a life-size LEGO model of Iron Man, and reviewed two sets: a Technic Car Transporter and Jurassic World T. Rex vs Dino-Mech Battle. Meanwhile, our mind flaying Stranger Things contest continues gathering strength and entries.

TBB’s Stranger Things building contest is flipping things upside down – Build your best Stranger Things creation and you could win big. Read about all the details in the article.
Toys ‘R’ Us is coming back to the US – The iconic toy store will be returning to select locations in late 2019, just in time for the holidays.
Life-size LEGO Iron Man model created for San Diego Comic-Con – San Diego Comic Con was the big news this weekend and we got a look at the making of an Iron Man model using 35,119 bricks.
LEGO Technic 42098 Car Transporter – We take a closer look at the upcoming 3 ft. long Technic Car Transporter [Review].
LEGO set 75938 Jurassic World T. Rex vs Dino-Mech Battle [Review] – We discover the latest Jurassic World set based on the LEGO TV series Jurassic World: Legend of Isla Nublar .

OTHER NEWS: There were quite a few other interesting LEGO news articles from around the web this week. Here are the best of the rest:

LEGO-Building Reality Competition LEGO Masters Ordered at Fox, TV Line – Already a hit in the UK and Australia, reality TV show LEGO Masters is coming to the US and they are looking for contestants.
A LEGO designer talks about designing spaceships and collaborating with NASA, The Verge – Designer Simon Kent launches into a discussion of his work on the LEGO Space theme.
LEGO SDCC Selfie Boxes for Minifigs Includes Star Wars, Batman, More, SuperHeroHype – Get a close up look at a series of special LEGO and artist built models at the LEGO Booth at San Diego Comic Con.
LEGO DC: BATMAN: Family Matters Enjoys Blocky World Premier at SDCC 2019, SyFy – The latest digital/DVD LEGO BATMAN feature premiers to excite fans.

The six-legged paleontologist

This bright blue Tachikoma-like mech by Blair Archer is affectionately known as the S.P.I.D.E.R. despite it having two fewer legs than members of the arachnid family. However, it makes more sense when you learn that stands for Solar-Powered Interstellar Drone for Extraterrestrial Research, which explains the multitude of solar panels, which Blair cleverly co-opted from Anakin’s Jedi Starfighter. But as incredible as the mech is, I might be even more interested in the buried fossil. Look closely, and you’ll see that it’s LEGO too, made of a variety of Bionicle and Hero Factory pieces!

Sit back, relax, and enjoy the gelato

Once you sample gelato, you won’t look at ice cream the same way anymore! It’s absolutely creamy and delightful, and a little bit goes a long way. Builder Sebastian-Z has taken the famous Italian dessert and given it a LEGO home. The architecture is iconically Italian, complete with an outdoor dining area and tall shuttered windows. Looking through the tall first-floor windows reveals a glimpse of the interior, though the exterior steals the limelight. The lighting in the central courtyard is a nice touch, as is the greenery alongside the building and crawling up its walls.

To be truly appreciated, the building is best viewed from multiple angles. I didn’t notice the sculpture in the courtyard until seeing this composite image. It’s a delicious looking build that will leave you exclaiming, “Buon appetito!”

Alpha squadron, do you read me? You bet I do.

In the depths of LEGO space and time, the amount of creative ways to build space craft has blossomed exponentially. Sometimes from the most complex of concepts and other times, from something as simple as a basic letter from the alphabet. Dave Kaleta has been working on his letter based starfighter series since the beginning of this year. Though what really impressed me, aside from his great creations, was that his three-year-old son, Elliot, sat predominantly at the head of the build team. Inspired by a Star Wars letter-based starfighter contest a few years back, they set some of their own rules to build by and opened up a newly inspired space.

Read on to see more of the series within Dave and Elliot’s collaboration.

Crawlin’ over craters with Chris

Back in 1988, the LEGO Group released set 6885 Crater Crawler as a part of its space theme’s Futuron faction. Inspired by this classic set, LEGO Designer Chris Perron has pieced together what he calls the Crater Crawler 3.0. This spacey vehicle sports the classic white and black Futuron color scheme, along with the iconic dark blue windscreens and trans red accents. With its four wheel independent suspension system, 3.0 looks ready to handle just about any intergalactic terrain. Practicalities aside, Chris’ vehicle looks particularly elegant with plenty of curves, smooth sides, and a dash of greebling.

“But for today, I guarantee it!”

“Hey, we were saving that!” Those were the words first uttered by Dr. Alan Grant when he and Ellie Sattler met “dinopreneur” John Hammond, who would take them on a wild ride through Jurassic Park. Thanks to Jonas Kramm, we now have a LEGO vignette of this iconic introductory scene, in which John Hammond invites himself into the scientists’ trailer (and to the bottle of champagne in their refrigerator). The little room is packed with plenty of detail, including a table cluttered with fossil hunting instruments like a miniature microscope and sifting tray. However, the star of the show is the open fridge and its lovable old benefactor. He has a kind of biological preserve that’s right up their alley, spared no expense!

Jonas continues the Jurassic Park fun with “Dodgson, Dodgson….we have Dodgson here! See, nobody cares.” Who cares? We care, because this is a another enjoyable build depicting the film’s introduction of Butterfinger-loving bad guy, Dennis Nedry. It also features Dodgson showing Nedry the embryo canister disguised as a shaving cream can. It’s the third in a line of Jurassic Park LEGO vignettes, the first of which was his splendid raptor dig site. Being a big Jurassic Park fan, I can’t wait to see what Jonas comes up with next!