Posts by Daniel

The bear necessities of life will come to you

Sometimes, when the hustle and bustle of city life wears you down, and you can’t bear the stress any longer, a trip to the great outdoors can be the perfect remedy. This scene by LEGO 7 with a father bear and his cub enjoying a camping and fishing trip tells a wonderful story. The jeep is packed with supplies, including a camp stove, lantern, fishing gear, and even a couple of folding chairs.

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Oh, and in case you were wondering if they fit inside the vehicle like I was… they do! The stickers on the vehicle are a nice touch, and seeing junior looking out the back passenger window at the wild world going by is super-cute.

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This microscale factory will blow your mind

Builder Eli Willsea uses the barrel of a cannon to great effect as smokestacks in this intricate microscale factory. The many little buildings with red roofs make me think of something straight from the mind of Dr. Seuss, looking a lot like a scene from The Lorax. Tiny tread pieces are used to make ladders. Watch your step on your way home from a long shift, as this factory has one thing in common with Imperial construction… no handrails.

The Spoon Factory

Miniature model of St. Andrew’s Church, Kyiv

This microscale model of St. Andrew’s Church in Kyiv, Ukraine, built by Christian Rau is instantly recognizable with its four angled towers topped by gold spires, and its colorful greenish-teal domes. I love the small details of light blue peeking out behind the white grills. The cheese sloped attached sideways gives the church front a visual interest. Cheese slopes are also used to form the curved central tower.

St. Andrew's Church, Kyiv - Let's Build Ukraine!

The model is a near-perfect replica of the actual building, which sits at the top of a hill in the middle of the city overlooking the Dnipro river.

Don’t let the shoulder pads fool you. This Samus Aran is all business!

Samus, the playable character from the platform game Metroid, first released in 1986 on the Nintendo Entertainment System, is instantly recognizable for the cannon arm and enormous shoulder pads… well, the game did come out in the 80’s after all. This model by Matt Goldberg depicts the heroine (Samus was one of the first female video game protagonists) in a later version of her power armor, the Phazon edition. The bulging shoulders are accented by a strip of red LEGO sticker, and the helmet features a nice part use, the minifig handcuffs. Stacked animal tail/claws and robot arms make excellent chest sculpting, and a common trick of turning tires inside-out is used as part of the shoulder assembly.

Phazon Suit Samus Aran

Tensions are rising on the once-peaceful streets of Jedha

The movie Rogue One; A Star Wars Story introduced fans to several new locations, including the holy city of Jedha, a site of Imperial oppression as precious resources were harvested to power the Death Star super-laser. In this impressively detailed LEGO scene by HazBazBricks, a patrol of stormtroopers confront citizens while rebels gather in doorways and on rooftops, preparing to unleash violence in defense of their home and in defiance of the Empire’s relentless cruelty. The worn details of the walls and archways, along with the uneven ground complete with cracked pavement reflect the separation of the civilians.

Jedha Uprising

Announcing our TBB sponsored BrickCon 2022 Collaboration [News]

While we try to organize a TBB-sponsored collaborative project for LEGO builders who travel to Seattle to attend BrickCon, the last two years have been a bit strange, to say the least. With the 2020 convention fully remote, and 2021 under restrictions for how many registered attendees were allowed, we’ve had to adjust. But this year, the 90th anniversary of the LEGO brand gave us an idea. We have already seen many builders from around the world creating tributes to their favorite sets or themes from throughout LEGO’s history. So we are very excited to announce this year’s TBB collab for BrickCon 2022: MOCing Memories.

The rules are simple. Build a MOC inspired by a favorite set or part of a set from any LEGO theme, past or present. That’s it. Modernize the classic space rover? Perfect! Microscale fire station? Awesome! Giant-sized minifigure? Oh yeah! Build the ultimate elemental dragon? It’s on! So if you are a registered attendee of BrickCon 2022, and you want to be part of this nostalgic display, then join in on the fun and happy building.

When registering your MOC, be sure to select “TBB Collaboration” as the theme, and we’ll see you in Seattle.

Mars needs tanks — we’re on a mission!

Nostalgia is big this year, with the 90th anniversary of LEGO inspiring lots of fans to build their own tributes to popular themes of yesteryear, and I am loving it. Shannon Sproule built an awesome homage to the Mars Mission theme that debuted in 2007. The signature color scheme of orange and white makes this tank instantly recognizable, and what a tank it is. With dual machine-gun toting manipulator arms, a missile launcher, and a high-powered laser, this bad boy is loaded for Martian bear, which probably has four arms and huge claws.

Mars Mission Klau Tank

Awww, what a cute little tower you have there Saruman

There are few towering structures more recognizable than the two towers featured in the Lord of the Rings novel of the same name. The obsidian-colored sharp-cornered Orthanc has more in common with its dark counterpart in the book, Barad-dur than it does with any of the man or Dwarf made structures of Middle-Earth, namely a lot of sharp pointy bits. Even in this microscale model by Jesse van den Oetelaar the tower at the center of Isengard looks quite ominous. One of my favorite details is the angled bars made by wedging the lever part in between grille plates. The round base was constructed with black clamps attached to flexible tubing, and it is a simple yet effective technique.

Tower of Orthanc

75337 LEGO Star Wars AT-TE Walker [Review]

Easily one of the most iconic Star Wars vehicles from the prequel trilogy, the All-Terrain Tactical Enforcer, or AT-TE first appeared in the dramatic conclusion of Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones, but fans of the Clone Wars animated series which premiered in 2008 with a theatrical movie pilot will remember the excitement of watching a group of AT-TE’s scaling a vertical cliff on cables, with Annakin’s Padawan Ahsoka Tano leaping from one to another. This vehicle is clearly also a fan of LEGO designers, with this version being the 5th set since 2003. Let’s find out how this latest set stacks up against its predecessors. 75337 LEGO® Star Wars™ AT-TE™ Walker includes 1,082 pieces and will be available August 1 for US $139.99 | CAN $179.99 | UK £119.99

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

Check out our full review

TBB Weekly Brick Report: LEGO news roundup for July 16, 2022 [News]

In addition to the amazing LEGO models created by builders all over the world, The Brothers Brick brings you the best LEGO news and reviews. This is our weekly Brick Report for the 2nd week of July 2022.

TBB NEWS AND REVIEWS Holy nostalgia Batman! This week was a big one for adult fans of LEGO — especially fans who started playing with LEGO in the ’70s — with reviews of two new sets inspired by some of the most popular themes of that classic era, space and castle. The castle set is so big we broke up the review into two parts! But the nostalgia continues with the big bad boss from the Mario Brothers franchise, Bowser. We round out the nostalgia with classic cars, classic sitcoms, and classic magic with news and reviews covering Harry Potter, LEGO Ideas, and the Camaro Z28 muscle car joining the LEGO Icons automobile line-up.

LEGO Harry Potter 40577: Hogwarts Grand Staircase [Review]

The LEGO Harry Potter modular style sets have been very popular since they were first introduced. Not only are they great for playing with but their modular nature lets you mix and match to create many unique combinations that fit very well on shallow display shelves. But with so many sets stacked on top of each other, Hogwarts students had a hard time moving between the floors. Well no longer. With the introduction of LEGO Harry Potter 40577: Hogwarts Grand Staircase gift with purchase, collectors, and fans will be able to give their Minifigs access to the second or even third floors in their scenes with a bit of creative stacking. Hogwarts Grand Staircase comes with 223 pieces and will be available from July 15th – July 31st with a qualifying purchase of $130 / €130 / £130 threshold, on Harry Potter.

The LEGO Group provided The Brothers Brick with an early copy of this set for review. Providing TBB with products for review guarantees neither coverage nor positive reviews.

Find out if this set will move you

Miniature Dungeon Master’s Castle is a perfect replica

With new LEGO castle and space sets coming out this year as part of the company’s 90th anniversary celebration, the nostalgia is hitting hard. And Koen Zwanenburg is here for it, with this microscale model inspired by another classic LEGO castle set, 6086 Dungeon Master’s Castle from 1992. This miniature scene taken straight from the box design pays homage to the castle, including a brilliant recreation of the molded green baseplate with rock printing. The yellow-orange color gradient was a common background for many castle sets from this period, and it even turned up in the recent Classic Castle remake of the Forest Hideout. I wonder which Classic Castle set will get the fan treatment next?

Mini Black Knight’s Castle