This entry for the ABS Builder Challenge by Brother Steven is simply prickle-licious. The dark red and bright yellow of the desert flower really make the creation leap out, contrasting beautifully against the green cactus. And those olive spines are so prickly they almost sting your eyes. This build is simple, elegant, and perfect. I love that it comes with a cheeky note from the builder: “A gift to my competition. Handle with care.” Brilliant!
The LEGO Batman Movie has been out for over a month and it’s still going strong in the weekend box office sales race. Last week, for example, it was the fifth highest grossing film of the weekend. Not too shabby for a kids movie featuring LEGO minifigures.
By now, most of you have probably picked up a few of the LEGO Batman Movie sets (or at least eye-balled the back of the boxes in the store). And while we here at the Brothers Brick have already reviewed many sets from this line, there are still a couple of LEGO Batman Movie sets that we haven’t looked at yet. Here’s a look at one of the entry-level sets…
Joker Balloon Escape [70900] retails for $14.99 and contains 124 pieces. At LEGO’s standard price of $0.10 per piece, this small set may be slightly overpriced. However, since it contains two minifigures and some new, useful parts, many Batman fans may choose to overlook that fact.
The main components are the two minifigures, a power plant console, a comically over-complicated bomb, and the Joker’s balloon pack. There’s also a play feature where the two halves of the tank break away from each other, simulating a bomb explosion. (You know, just in case Batman doesn’t make it in time.)
Interestingly, this set can combine with Mr. Freeze Ice Attack [70901] and Scarecrow Special Delivery Vehicle [70910] to form a mega-set: the Gotham power plant featured in the beginning of the movie.
Although often offering wise words to Simba, the wizened old Rafiki nevertheless delights in riddles and unorthodox tutelage. Channeling that spirit of unconventionality, builder SephiMoc FF7 uses quite an interesting assortment of LEGO pieces to bring life to this sage from Disney’s The Lion King. The eccentric mandrill is recognizable with his brightly colored face, which is framed with white fur made of feathered wings and various horn elements. Look closely and you’ll spot that Rafiki’s eyebrows are a handlebar, while the ball joints give this character plenty of poseability.
The bold choice of a purple background works splendidly, offsetting both the white face and the grey body, as well as complementing the orange logo nicely. There’s even a tiny Simba cub for Rafiki to gloriously hold aloft:
Nick Trotta’s series of detailed and unusually shaped starfighters continues with a vertical fighter named Volkite. The verticality combined with excellent color blocking and smooth transitions between sections of the craft make an eye-catching model.
On his YouTube, Nick shows a couple videos about Volkite. The video below shows how each chunk of the starfighter fits together (about 18 minutes long). It is a fascinating watch as you can see how the smooth transitions between components are achieved.
Residents of Birmingham, Alabama will surely recognize this creation by Wesley Higgins. It’s the McWane Science Center, a real-life building in Birmingham that’s been transformed into a place where minifig families can spend an afternoon learning about science.
The focal point of this LEGO creation is the Science Center’s iconic mosaic-like rotunda. But Wesley’s version includes the entire building including furnished interiors and even a parking garage. Wesley says it took 12 months to complete the LEGO McWane Science Center and he spent a lot of time working on it while simultaneously watching television with his family.
If you happen to be in the Birmingham area, you can see Wesley’s creation in real life! It’s currently on display at the McWane Science Center and there’s even a contest to guess the total number of bricks in the creation. Pretty neat, right?
Ever wonder what it might look like to wander the streets of New York at night, if you were a minifigure and the city was made of LEGO? Builder sponki25 has taken some incredible shots of his brick-built emergency vehicles, placing them in their urban environment, and it gives us exactly that experience.
We’ve highlighted some of Sponki’s amazing minifigure-scale emergency vehicles before, but he continues to grow his collection, recently adding a GMC 2500 FNDY support truck and an instantly recognizable FDNY EMS Ford Interceptor (the law enforcement version of the Ford Explorer).
Mecha builder Sam Cheng amazed us with his trio of Autobot Transformers, and he’s back again with another classic all-time favorite, the RX-78-2 Gundam. At an estimated 700 piece build weighing in at 0.66 pounds, Sam spent a period of 3 weeks with some amount of interruptions to build this detailed brick mecha including a good deal of time ensuring that he could capture a number of signature poses.
I was born within walking distance of Ogikubo Station in Tokyo, and by the age of ten or eleven, I was using the subway system to get around the city to take foreign tourists to see the sights, earning myself a bit of extra LEGO money. Australian LEGO Certified Professional Ryan McNaught and his team of builders spent more than two hundred hours building this complete Tokyo subway system map from 31,000 LEGO bricks, showing all thirteen lines in their distinctive colors (my favorite line is the Chuo line in orange). The mosaic measures 4.6 meters (over 15 feet) wide and 2.6 meters (8.5 feet) tall, dwarfing the rather tall bloke standing nearby.
Take a moment to peer past the speeders and interesting robots, under the beautiful roller door, to the black minifigs in the deep background and appreciate the epic scale of this model. Zach‘s build Team ADU’s Corporate Headquarters has a renovated warehouse feeling. I love how the older-looking brick walls adjoin the skylights and the hinged paneled ceiling. Hanging hoses, ducting and pipework add intricate details while the windows allow ample light into the hive of activity below.
Add more hoses, canisters and the brilliant iron girder in the foreground adding an amazing depth of field, combined with the great use of stickered and printed bricks and a fantastic strange wee red robot all equals a fascinating scene and a great photograph.
Is this encampment the last bastion of humanity in a world gone awry? Or are there other holdouts, lone refuges for the few who still know friend from foe. I suspect the inhabitants of this outpost created by Lego Master don’t know, but they’ll keep on fighting against the undead hoards no matter what.
Click to see more of this huge zombie apocalypse diorama
The Brothers Brick gives you the best of LEGO news and reviews. This is our Weekly Brick Report for the third week of March.
TBB NEWS & REVIEWS: Ahoy, me mateys! This week we have the skinny on all the new Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Men Tell No Tales sets, as well a tour from inside LEGO’s US headquarters.
TBB INTERVIEWS & INSTRUCTIONS: We’ve got double the building fun for you this week and two interviews with some amazing builders.
It’s early, the alarm has just gone off, and you wearily drag yourself out of bed, not exactly rising and shining. I know that I enjoy that first cup of coffee to clear the cobwebs and it seems that Brother Steven enjoys a cup too. What a great combination for fans of LEGO and coffee — a cup of coffee made with bricks. I love the pouring action from the milk carton and the splash into the coffee.
On second thoughts, there is a certain drawback to LEGO coffee… it doesn’t quite hit the mark on taste.