Today LEGO announced a new set in the DC Super Heroes lineup, featuring Batman duking it out with Poison Ivy and a new-to-LEGO supervillain, Firefly. 76117 Batman Mech vs. Poison Ivy Mech is slated to be on display at next month’s San Diego Comic-Con. However, the set won’t be available to purchase for another 6 months, going on sale Jan. 1, 2019.
Click here to check out all the high-resolution images of the set
Builder Perterz doesn’t give a backstory for this weathered cottage surrounded by nature, but it makes me think of Sondheim’s musical Into the Woods with its lonely and slightly exaggerated look. The wide-ranging color palette encompasses pretty much every earth tone in LEGO’s catalog, and the multitude of flowers make the setting teem with life.
While none of the major techniques on display here are new, Perterz employs them excellently, from the highly textured roof to the tall tree made with olive green cheese slopes. I particularly love the detailed wooden door, with black minifigure hands as iron bands.
With the second film based on J.K. Rowling’s Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Them coming later this year, LEGO is diving back into the Wizarding World, including circling back to Harry Potter. We recently looked at one of the minifigure-scale sets, 75956 Quidditch Match, but the new sets aren’t relegated to minifigs. Today we’re looking at the first of three announced Harry Potter-themed BrickHeadz sets, 41615 Harry Potter & Hedwig. With 180 pieces, the set will retail for $14.99, and it will be available July 1. They’re numbered 49 and 50 in the BrickHeadz series.
Click to read the full review of Harry Potter and Hedwig
A striking turn-of-the-century style dreadnought, the CWS Bannanaville is outfitted with more armaments than you could hope to face if she decides to give you a broadside. Designed by Thomas of Tortuga, this fictional fleet-leader is one of the best examples of microscale warship building I’ve seen, with lots of perfect little details. Because of how perfectly it fits, the one I like best is the use of the “cheese grater” 1×2 slopes for ladders between the decks. It’s a remarkably good render, to boot.
Now that the film is out, LEGO is delving deeper into the plot of Solo: A Star Wars Story, revealing three new sets on Amazon UK. All three are part of a key action scene in the movie where smugglers attempt to pull off an epic heist, but for those who haven’t yet seen the film, they’re mostly spoiler-free, as they don’t reveal much more than the trailers did.
See the new Solo movie LEGO sets
The dragon is a common fantasy trope, but they’re hard to tire of because they come in so many wonderful varieties. This dragon, by Henjin_Quilones, is named Kijani the Earth Dragon. With a sand green color scheme similar to the Ninjago Green Ninja Mech Dragon, this beast has a totally different look. It even uses that set’s sculpted snout piece, but moves the eyes forward a bit, giving it a cute, stubby face befitting a dragon used to nosing about the earth.
Henjin says the dragon is fully articulated, from the toes to the wings. The double base is also a great effect here, with a big of earthy terrain and a more polished-looking smooth black rectangle beneath.
Predating Monk by a few decades, this gripping TV detective show featured a pair of chipmunks ready to solve any crime, no matter how or small. Chip & Dale: Rescue Rangers was a staple of kids’ cartoons in the 90s, and now this dynamic duo has been brought to the brick by an equally talented pair of builders, with Chip built by Leonid An and Dale by Vlad Lisin.
Click to see more of Chip & Dale
Today we’re getting a first look at another of the upcoming Star Wars line. LEGO Star Wars set 75221 Imperial Landing Craft features the troop carrier landing on Tatooine. It’s a scene not pictured in the films, as Obi-Wan Kenobi and R2-D2 fend off the Imperial Sandtroopers. This is the second LEGO Imperial Land Craft, following a similarly scaled but less accurate version in 2007, 7659 Imperial Landing Craft. The set includes 5 minifigures: a Sandtrooper Squad Leader, Sandtrooper, Imperial Shuttle Pilot, Obi-Wan Kenobi, and R2-D2.
Click to see more images of the Imperial Landing Craft
A long time ago, in this galaxy far, far away, you won’t find lightsabers and droids, but you’ll certainly spot princesses and knights. Built by Koen, this precariously perched castle has a wonderfully Disney-like aesthetic with some clever techniques mixed in, if you take some time to study it. Note, for instance, the second-tallest turret, which has windows made of pulley wheels and Technic pins.
Personally, I’d like to think this is where the Little Prince lives after he grows up.
Get your quarters and tokens prepped, because it’s time to hang out at the arcade! This impressive collection of minifigure-scale machines by Kale Frost has everything a LEGO gamer could want, from classics like Pac-Man and Kong to Street Fighter and air hockey. See if you can identify all of the machines!
A closer look at the skeeball machine shows just how perfectly they fit with minifigures. These machines would look great in an expanded version of the arcade in Ninjago City Docks, which featured official LEGO-designed minifigure-scale arcade cabinets. Or if something bigger is more your style, check out this 1/2-scale working arcade cabinet.
LEGO builder Helen Sham is a huge Nintendo fan, so she decided to combine her loves by building an incredible arcade cabinet completely out of LEGO. Standing more than 5 feet tall, the cabinet features brick-built graphics from the game Mario vs Donkey Kong 2. TBB spoke with Helen, and she’s given TBB an exclusive early look at this amazing machine.
Click to see more of the Nintendo Arcade Cabinet
A contrarian caterpillar makes for a fine bit of building, as seen in this lovely setting by Markus Rollbühler. Alice in Wonderland is a common subject for LEGO creations, no doubt because its whimsical caricatures allow builders to flex their muscles a bit and try out lots of fascinating new techniques. The two techniques I’m most drawn to in Markus’ version are in the flowering plant at the center, with yawning leaves made of upturned dragon heads, and a bright light orange flower made of hand mixers and shoulders.
