About Chris

Chris Malloy (porschecm2) has been a LEGO fan nearly all his life, having started with System bricks at age 3. He is the co-author of Ultimate LEGO Star Wars, and his creations have been featured in several books and The LEGO Movie. He also helped develop the first LEGO Minecraft set, 21102 Minecraft Micro World: The Forest, which has gone on to inspire a whole theme of sets. He's been active in the online community since 2002, and regularly attends LEGO fan conventions such as BrickCon and BrickCan. He enjoys building in a wide range of themes, but keeps returning to Castle, Space, and Pirates. Check out his LEGO creations and photography here.

Posts by Chris

A LEGO Star Wars creation that’s nicely Tie’D up

I still recall getting my first LEGO Star Wars sets in 1999, and I think back to how simple Darth Vader’s TIE Advanced was in 7150 TIE Fighter & Y-wing with just 409 pieces between the two ships. So I’m in awe when I see incredible versions like this TIE-D by Sy Lyphics, which packs a whopping 1,573 pieces into a minifigure-scale recreation of one of the more awesome TIE variants. The sculpting on the bubble fuselage is particularly adept, with those triangular grey roadsigns looking purpose-made for the job.

This one isn’t just a looker on the outside, though. Sy has created a fully functional cockpit, an incredible achievement considering the difficulty of creating a brick-built sphere that’s hollow.

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This build’s a grind

Castles are nice, but there’s something I love about a tranquil domestic scene of medieval life, and what encapsulates that better than a stone mill and miller’s cottage? This lovely little diorama is the work of ZCerberus, and although the stonework is nice, and the round mill is great, some of favorite techniques here are more subtle. First, there’s the mixing of brown and dark red for the roof tiles, a subtle swap that helps give a lived-in nature. Similarly, the mixed olive green and dark tan for the ground makes a wonderfully earthy tone. And secondly is something so foundational it took me a minute to even realize it: this diorama has two bases, thanks to a black slab beneath the sculpted landscape. Usually, LEGO dioramas have one or the other, but I really love the presentation here.

LEGO 40634 Icons of Play revealed featuring female soccer superstars [News]

Thanks to retailer Rakuten.jp, a new LEGO set featuring female soccer superstars has been revealed. 40634 Icons of Play includes 15 minifigures and a variety of soccer stadium elements and features famed footballers Megan Rapinoe, Yuki Nagasato, Asisat Oshoala, and Sam Kerr. According to the retailer, the set has 899 pieces and will be available June 6. The pricing has yet to be confirmed but it is expected to retail for US $99.99 | CAN $TBD | UK £89.99.

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LEGO Technic 42158 NASA Mars Rover Perseverance officially revealed as latest real-life space set [News]

Today LEGO has officially revealed the latest set based on real-life spacecraft with the LEGO Technic 42158 NASA Mars Rover Perseverance, a 1,132-piece model of the NASA Jet Propulsion Lab’s newest red planet vehicle, including its flying companion, the Ingenuity Helicopter. The 12.5-inch long model (32cm) features all-new wheel elements with working steering and articulated suspension, as well as with a moveable arm. Although the model is not motorized, there is a companion augmented reality (AR) app that can show the model on a Mars-like surface and allow users to check the weather on Mars or learn other facts about the fourth planet from the sun. The set will be available starting June 1 for US $99.99 | CAN $129.99 | UK £84.99.

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LEGO Icons reveals 10323 Pac-Man Arcade [News]

LEGO has been leaning hard into video game nostalgia with the brick-built NES and Super Mario Mighty Bowser, but Nintendo isn’t the only 80s video game getting the brick treatment. Today marks the 43rd anniversary of Pac-Man’s very first reveal, and so LEGO is also revealing 10323 Pac-Man Arcade as the latest Icons set. The 12.5 inch tall (32cm) arcade cabinet mimics the original machine and is made of 2,650 pieces and features a light-up coin slot. The set includes a pedestal with larger-scale versions of Pac-Man, Blinky, and Clyde that can be displayed separately or on top of the cabinet. There’s also a minifigure-scale arcade vignette that slides into the back of the arcade. Pac-Man and the ghosts move around the maze thanks to a hand-crank on the side. The set will retail for US $269.99 | CAN $349.99 | UK £229.99 when it’s available starting June 1 for VIP members, with general availability following June 4.

Read the full press release

We’ve gotta build a bigger Batcave!

If you’ve been eyeballing the new 4,000-piece LEGO Batcave but don’t have a spare $400 to drop on a superhero shadowbox, you could take a cue from Ids de Jong and go small. This awesome microscale recreation riffs on one of LEGO’s official lifestyle images of the Batcave displayed on a mantle, but this tiny version is 100% brick-built, including the background. The whole Batcave is only a handful of pieces but still has an instantly recognizable bat emblem.

SNOT to the rescue!

I’ve built a lot of LEGO creations over the years, but I rarely build recreations of contemporary, real-world vehicles. However, I have tremendous respect for those who do, because it’s a daunting task, especially if you want to get all the little details right, like this amazing minifigure-scale New York City Fire Department firetruck by Oshi. There are no stickers used to create the stripes and numbers on the truck’s livery, just clever engineering via SNOT. Check out that half-plate white stripe, or the way the number 2 is made with a pair of white brackets!

Someone drained the pool of color!

Usually, black and white images are just a camera effect, but this LEGO billiards table by euphonica is photographed in full color, but the build itself is grayscale. That’s a neat way to dodge the lack of voodoo balls (the official name of those Bionicle ball joint elements) in all the necessary colors for a proper pool table. Color aside, though, this pool table looks just about good enough to play.

Winter is summoned

In this imaginative LEGO scene by Malin Kylinger, a group of mages have summoned a portal to the winter realm. The whole diorama is loaded with great builds, from the trees with their densely packed foliage, to the picnic of magical equipment beside the house. The whole build rewards closer scrutiny with lots of great details lurking.

But the real standout is the magic circle at the center, a fantastic use of cheese-slope mosaic-making to craft a pattern that’s almost quilt-like, and at the center is a perfect use for the rare Belville crown element.

A ray of inspiration

If you told me that TBB regular Moko had made a LEGO stingray mech suit, I’d think it was a suit in the shape of the flat fish. But never one to conform to expectations, Moko’s mech is actually piloted by a stingray, who looks right at home inside the blue suit, even sporting a HUD over one eye. As usual there are lots of great techniques and interesting pieces that make it worth your while to spend some time picking this one apart, but the best are the Hero Factory jumper shells used for the toes.

A castle chained to the sky

I’m not familiar with the Deepgate Codex fantasy series, but after seeing this captivating floating castle built of LEGO by Gino Lohse I think I might have to check it out, because this microscale structure has my imagination running. It’s a simple build but no less effective at evoking the feeling of precarious city perched atop a magic rock and chained in place. A few carefully placed studs make for great windows on the buildings, while the rock-texture slope gets put to good use giving added dimension to the chunk of earth without looking forced.

Storming the gates

So often in LEGO castle creations, the focus is on the large keep in the middle. But in a refreshing change of pace, Oshi has–literally, as well as figuratively–shifted the focus away from the big structures and to an often overlooked one by centering their build on the gate, with the rest of the castle in the background. It’s not immediately obvious, but Oshi has also employed forced perspective, as the back buildings are not quite minifigure scale.

About Chris

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