Posts by Jake Forbes (TBB Managing Editor)

This LEGO Monkey’s Gone to Heaven

Sun Wukong, aka the Monkey King, or just plain Monkey, is the most enduring mythological hero in the world, inspiring so many retellings, including LEGO’s own Monkey Kid franchise. Chinese Builder Jin Chen took on the legendary character at the height of his power, armed with the
Ruyi Jingu Bang staff and standing atop a fallen demon. Monkey’s white face markings are based on the traditional depiction seen in Chinese Opera.

Jin’s makes excellent use of the range of elements in pearl gold to sculpt Monkey’s ornate armor, tightly packing every surface with horns and shuriken. The tattered cape is especially dramatic with its mix of rounded tail elements and angular plates.

Take a peek at the making of Monkey after the break

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Celebrating Bionicle’s 25th Anniversary with Minifigures

“The tales tell of six great heroes who will come to aid us in our darkest hour. A powerful toa of fire. A wise toa of water. A strong toa of earth. A mighty toa of stone. A courageous toa of air, A brave toa of ice.” Has it really been 25 years since LEGO introduced us to the heroes of Mata Nui?

I created this series of minifigs for a collaboration with @majestyminifigs where we reboot a cancelled LEGO theme with custom minifigures. Of course I chose Bionicle. It took me a hot minute to figure out how I wanted to convert the toa mata into minifigure form, but I overall, I’m proud of the result!

Jacob’s figs and story follows

This purple pod racer is anything but poodoo

Pod racing is back! Last year, we rounded up a slew of new pod racing mocs from AFOLs and LEGO designers, but now a new competitor zooms in courtesy of Kyle Collard, aka Lord of Vador, and this one’s a stunner. (Of course, we wouldn’t expect anything less from Kyle, whose Mustafar moc was one of our favorite builds of 2025.) The engines roar with greeble detail thanks to the larger scale. I didn’t appreciate just how big this build is until I saw the cables connecting the cockpit. This racer is huge! The size also allows for beautiful color blocking and smooth curves in the fins.

Kyle based the design on a piece of concept art from Alexander “Minze” Thümler, but the LEGO version incorporates purple as the primary accent color. As the builder explains: “The color scheme stays dark and aggressive: dark purple, dark blue, and light gray, layered with pearl dark gray and flat silver to give the engines weight and metallic depth. The white accents are decals—kept clean to cut through the darkness.”

Kyle’s racer has me pushing Galactic Racer to the top of my most anticipated game releases:

These WALL-E x LEGO Space remixes are the nostalgia I need right now

WALL-E and LEGO Space will always share a special bond. After all, WALL-E’s lead animator Angus MacLane designed the winning Ideas set that became the first LEGO take on the character. There’s something about the big-eyed robot’s design that lends itself so well to bricks, and not just for screen-accurate interpretations. Curtis D Collins uses the basic WALL-E design as a springboard for a whole army of bots inspired by LEGO’s iconic space themes.

Of course, the series has to start with Classic Space colors. Curtis incorporates signature elements from each era into the WALL-E builds, like this fella’s positioning thrusters.

My favorite of the whole series is the M-Tron WALL-E, which might not incorporate actual magnet pieces, but does upgrade the bot’s hands with magnet-inspired manipulators. The design also incorporates theme-appropriate tires for retro authenticity.

The robot rollcall continues after the fold

Lumbering LEGO Sentinel mech is ready for action

While nimble humanoid mecha tend to steal the spotlight, I’ve always had a soft spot for clunky walkers, like this armored beast from Japanese LEGO builder Kattho. Built from a mix of sand green and gunmetal grey, the S05-A Sentinel is practically a one-vehicle army with its heavy complement of arms.

The builder makes great use of printed elements, like the forest design from last year’s Off Road Mountain Truck. Ingots, grilles, and turntable tops give the mostly studless build industrial texture.

While this mech is a quadruped for mobility, it also sports manipulator arms for precision jobs like defusing mines. The single stud lens also serves to give the mech a face so it’s not just a walking tank.

Kattho has shared many other equally impressive mecha of both the four and two-legged variety, that you can enjoy on their feed.

LEGO reveals first wave of Pokémon sets, eyeing adult collectors who’ve gotta build ’em all

Ever since LEGO first announced its multi-year partnership with The Pokémon Company, fans have been wondering how the beloved pocket monsters would stack up as official sets. Today we get a look at the first three sets debuting on February 27th.

While Pokémon is very much a kid-friendly brand, it’s also 30-years old with a massive adult fanbase, so this initial wave of sets is all branded for 18+ and priced accordingly. The smallest set, Eevee, contains 587 pieces and focuses on just the fan favorite Pokémon for $69.99. The 2050-piece Pikachu comes with a lightning bolt stand and Poké Ball for a dynamic display at $199.99. Clocking in at 6838 pieces, Venusaur, Charizard, and Blastoise celebrate the evolved form of the Kanto starters dramatically posed on a round base for a hefty $649.99.

During the first week of release, while supplies last, a 312-piece Kanto Region Badge Collection is included with purchase of the Kanto starters, letting fans show off their trainer mastery in brick form. While this free set looks wonderful, we’re a bit disappointed to see it locked behind such a hefty price threshold.

LEGO promises many more Pokémon sets to follow for a range of ages. As excited as we are to see this partnership come to life, the high prices of these first sets have tempered our enthusiasm. Much of Pokémon’s appeal is around collecting a broad range of monsters, and with over 1,000 to choose from in the franchise, one hopes that LEGO will make collecting accessible to kids and adults alike. What are your thoughts on the first wave of Pokémon sets? Will you be catching them all next month?

See the new sets below

Take a seat! The 2026 Iron Forge heats up

If you follow TBB regularly, you’ve no doubt encountered many articles spotlighting the Iron Builder competition, like our interview last month with the participants in the most recent battle. You might be wondering, how does one get to challenge Iron Builder? One path is to prove your skills in the Iron Forge, a January tradition now in its 7th year. As with the Iron Builder contests, a seed part is chosen that must be used in multiple builds. Only for the Forge, builders only have one week per part before a new seed element is chosen. There is no prize for winning beyond the chance to compete against an Iron Builder, but several Iron Forge champions went on to become LEGO set designers, including Maxx Davidson and last year’s winner Dominique Boeynaems. Glory aside, it’s an amazing showcase of creativity and inspired parts use.

The first round, open to all, just concluded, which featured the minifig chair as the seed part. Here are the to-scoring creations from the 20 builders advancing to the next round.

Grant Davis integrates the seed part in multiple ways into this elegant cafe scene. The obvious spot is for the diner stools that flip the chairs on their back, but chairs are also used for the espresso machine and door panel. The biggest flex of all, however, is the sign which uses LEGO rubber bands and string to form the lettering and lines.

See the top-scoring builds from the other 18 advancing builders below

Jumpei Mitsui pushes artistic boundaries with bricks

The life of a LEGO Certified Professional is a glamorous one – at least when you’re Jumpei Mitsui and your latest client is gaming auteur Hideo Kojima. But as impressed as we are by the builder’s life-size Ludens model, it’s the builder’s latest non-commercial work that I find most exciting.

Last year, we reported that Jumpei was returning to higher education to study artistic expression at Tokyo University of the Arts. It turns out that where Jumpei goes, LEGO follows, as the artist’s first academic project is all about the brick.

See Jumpei’s first academic LEGO project after the break

Making mecha the Mischief way

The aptly-named builder mischiefmecha has a knack for creating playful bots from surprising pieces. After a brief building hiatus, Mischief is back with a pair of fresh mechs with personality and NPU to spare. First up is Gahlok Stiil, looking good in light bright blue plating and grey greebles. Galidor limbs blend with car hoods to make a Transformers-adjacent bot who’s ready for action.

Next comes TOUNG, a bot with a dumpy body who looks like a very good boy with that lolling tongue and three wagging tails. Mischief deploys brilliant parts usage again, especially with those Bionicle masks as knees.

NPU’s better down where it’s wetter, take it from this Tidepool Princess

From jellyfish to deep sea monsters, underwater settings have long been a favorite subject for NPU flexes. LEGO’s recent Tropical Aquarium boasts one of the most colorful and eclectic mix of parts ever found in an official set, but this Tidepool Princess from nu_montag says “Hold my Beerracuda.” Some of the amazingly diverse elements on display – a DUPLO skirt, a Bionicle Barraki headpiece, and, most impressively, a gaggle of legs from a McDonald’s Galidor Happy Meal toy.

More Galidor and Bionicle elements are visible on the back side of the moc. These weird and organic-looking elements feel alien and out of place in today’s LEGO lineup of parts, so it’s always a treat to see them integrated into modern builds.

LEGO Skeksis extracts essence from Galidor parts

I’ll always be partial to Labyrinth when it comes to Jim Henson fantasy worlds, but the creatures of The Dark Crystal, especially the deliciously wicked Skeksis, are undeniably rad. Margit (one of the talented builders to make our shortlist for Builder of the Year) consulted her LEGO orrery and found a great conjunction of elements to make this spot-on take on the simpering Chamberlain. The head comes from the unhinged Nepol and Shimmel set and perfectly captures the Chamberlain’s totally trustworthy smile. He’s just here to help! The staff was snatched from Euripides and complements the Skeksis aesthetic like a dream.

Construction comes alive with these epic CityCore bots

Creating a badass mech in LEGO takes skill. Instilling that build with personality is the work of a master builder. Doing so while working in DUPLO elements, now that is next level! Redverse first introduced the “CityCore” theme, blending kid-friendly construction with sophisticated mechh design, with the orange MK series. Now the builder is back with the RW series:

Before any road is paved, before any path is cleared, the CityCore RW-Series is on the job… Whether it’s pushing debris, digging deep, or hauling heavy loads, these machines know the value of getting things right the first time – no shortcuts, no hesitation.

First up is Rumblejack, a Quattroid on the smaller side who pounds the ground flat before paving. Not only does Redverse brilliantly employ oversized Quateo blocks for the tamping tool, Fabuland arches also make an appearance in the bot’s feet.

Next we have Duplon bruiser PushWell, an anthropomorphic dozer. The expressive face clinches this bot as a winner, thanks in large part to the DUPLO antennae element used for the grille mouth and nose.

Finally, there’s Grubjaw, a gruff and hard-working digger. The jutting dozer jaw and sunken eyes sell the bot’s silent resolve in such a fun way.

Redverse’s bots seem like they rolled straight out of a cartoon and leave me wondering what other DUPLO parts are waiting for new purpose in tomorrow’s mechs?