LEGO BrickHeadz Pets 40479 Dalmatian dog and 40480 Ginger Tabby cat [Review]

LEGO launched the Pets sub-theme for Brickheadz earlier this year. The sets are similar to a BrickHeadz buddy pack, in that there is one traditional-sized model and an accompanying buddy-size model. The difference is that the Pets line pairs an adult and child of the same species. They started with dogs and cats (40440 German Shepherd and 40441 Shorthair Cat) but quickly branched out to birds and fish (40442 Goldfish and 40443 Budgie). 40479 Dalmatian & Puppy, and 40480 Ginger Tabby & Kitten are the latest to join the German shepherd and Shorthair cat sets in the ongoing battle between dog people and cat people. 40479 includes 252 pieces and is available now for $14.99 US | $19.99 CA| £13.49 UK . 40480 includes 269 pieces and will be available starting August 1 for US $14.99 US | $19.99 CA | £13.49 UK.

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with early copies of these sets for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

The box and contents

The front of the boxes shows the parent and child pets angled toward each other. Dalmation (BrickHeadz number 131) and Puppy (132) sit in their blue dog bed while Ginger Tabby (133) and Kitten (134) sit in a light violet cat bed.

On the side of the box, the parent is shown fitting onto their base, which is a bit odd, as the bases for the Pets theme are built directly into the pet beds. The back of the box shows the two pets sitting side-by-side in their included pet beds. The boxes also have a subtle printed pattern similar to the stickers included with each set. The ginger tabby set, which was is available later than the Dalmatians also features a small row of the other 3 sets from this wave (covered in our previous reviews).

 

40479 comes with 4 unnumbered bags of various sizes, a single loose plate, an instruction booklet, and a small sticker sheet with two stickers to choose from that go on the front of the dog bed. 40480 also includes 4 bags of various sizes, an instruction booklet, and a small sticker sheet for the cat bed.

The build

Before we start building the two adorable Dalmatians, let’s talk about the printed elements for the spots. There are a bunch of them, in three sizes: 1×1 tiles, 2×2 curved slopes, and 1×2 bricks. This might well be the highest number of printed elements per set in the entire BrickHeadz theme.


Okay, now let’s get to building. 40479 starts with the adult dog, using a similar base technique as the previous German Shepherd set, putting the hind legs on hinge plates so they can be slightly posed. The adult is built on a standard 4×4 BrickHeadz footprint while the puppy is built on a standard buddy footprint of 3×3. This first part ends with a stack of red plates for the color, with a gold star tag attached in front.

 

The rest of the adult proceeds in standard BrickHeadz fashion with a stack of outward-facing studs, with the details of the face, ears, and tail.

 

The finished adult looks super-cute, but a little lonely without their pup, so let’s not keep this good boy or girl waiting.


There is not much to the puppy build, with non-posable hind legs and a tiny 1×1 pink plate for a brain. There are a few of those nifty 1×1 bricks with studs on 2 sides in white, though.

 

40480 starts out in much the same way, with the adult Ginger Tabby’s hind legs on hinge plates. This set includes some 1×1 upward-facing bracket plates in white. The lower part of the set ends with a teal scarf, which the cat happily wears, like no cat ever in the history of cats.

The adult cat continues much like the adult dog, with a stack of outward-facing stud bricks. Things start to get a bit interesting as we get near the top, where more bracket plates are used this time, in a variety of colors (since the finished model will cover these up) to set up the attachment points for the ears.

Next, we move on to finish the tabby with the face, ears and tail. The cat’s whiskers are made from claw elements, just like the previous gray shorthair cat.

With the adult finished, let’s get to work on the kitten. Like the puppy, the tabby kitten is built on a 3×3 base; the exception being the offset hind legs, which are 4 studs wide. The kitten has a teal collar to match the scarf worn by the adult.

We finish off the kitten with a similar but smaller stack as the adult, and add the face, ears, and tail.

The finished models

The completed models look really cute, both in their beds or arranged in a more organic scene, and it is clear that the designers included some great details to capture the features of their real-life inspirations, from the droopy ears of the Dalmatians and the alert ears of the tabbies to the shapes of the legs and the tails.

Conclusions and recommendations

No matter if you are a cat person or a dog person, the BrickHeadz Pets theme now has 2 more sets for you to choose from, and if this latest wave is any indication, there are likely to be even more breeds coming out in the years ahead. I fully recommend picking up one of these especially if you happen to own a Dalmatian or Tabby in real life. And if you are looking for a good parts pack, either one or both would be a good choice, but the Tabby set includes a lot more small brackets.

40479 Dalmatian & Puppy includes 252 pieces and is available now for $14.99 US | $19.99 CA| £13.49 UK . It may also be available via Amazon and eBay.

40480 Ginger Tabby & Kitten includes 269 pieces and will be available starting August 1 for US $14.99 US | $19.99 CA | £13.49 UK. It may also be available via Amazon and eBay.

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with early copies of these sets for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.


1 comment on “LEGO BrickHeadz Pets 40479 Dalmatian dog and 40480 Ginger Tabby cat [Review]

  1. Ed

    Now we have gray and orange Brickheadz kitty-cats so far, I hope they will add black cats some day, but I guess there’s only so many ways you can style a Brickheadz cat aside from color.

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