After a hard day’s raiding and pillaging, a fearless warrior needs some time to kick back and relax. Scale the heights of the watch tower, leap from the pier, or take a nap in the cozy hall! Activities include fishing, swimming, stashing treasure, polishing weapons, herding goats, and standing guard. Brick Vader displays it all, on an incredibly tiny and detailed piece of real estate. Great trees and great rockwork, all using a cohesive earthy palette. Only thing missing is the longboat.
Here’s a pair of fantastic characters of the diabolical persuasion. Fresh from the brimstone lands, they’re sure to wreak havoc or worse upon anyone they meet. First up is the creepy hellspawn Lungorthin the Devil, by Leonid An. The shaping of the beast’s head is nothing short of brilliant, with so many intricate pieces flowing smoothly together to form a snarling visage.
And then we have chubbybots‘ Mazinkaiser, who hails from the anime of the same name and isn’t a hellion at all but rather a giant mech, though it does fight Dr. Hell.
Earlier this week LEGO announced a brand new 71040 Disney Castle set which immediately had LEGO and Disney fans jumping with excitement. Today LEGO has released the designer video with LEGO Designer Marcos Bessa, allowing us to get a great look at all the features and details. The 4,080 piece set includes 5 minifigures, and will retail for $349.99 USD starting on September 1st.
Today LEGO gives us the first look at the forthcoming LEGO Ideas set, 21308 Adventure Time, in advance of it being on display at San Diego Comic Con. The set, which is based on the popular Cartoon Network show, was first announced in March, and it will include eight brick-built characters. The 495 piece set will be available beginning January 1st, and it will retail for $49.99 USD. As we reported last month, an Adventure Time pack will also appear in LEGO Dimensions.
Sean Cassidy induces nostalgia for the often overlooked Halo 3: ODST with his diorama of the final stand at the entrance to Uplift Nature Reserve, New Mombasa. Having fought many campaign playthroughs and firefights on this particular area, it seems Sean’s layout is near perfect. His choice of colors and techniques for the entrance, overlook, and planters fit the New Mombasa style of a believable yet futuristic city.
There are all kinds of vignettes within the overall massive diorama to find, shown on Sean’s Flickr. My favorite is the face-off between gravity hammer wielding Brute Chieftain and rocket launcher wielding ODST. Yes, that much firepower is necessary against a Chieftain.
Announced just last month and out on August 1st, The Brothers Brick is pleased to bring you a full review of the new 10252 Volkswagen Beetle, thanks to a special delivery from LEGO headquarters in Denmark. This new Beetle in stunning dark azure joins the dark green 10242 Mini Cooper and classic 10220 Volkswagen Camper Van in what I’m hoping is a permanent fixture in LEGO Creator sets. The set includes 1,167 pieces, and will retail for $99.99.
We’ve come to expect some solid techniques and clever tricks in the “Expert” LEGO Creator series sets, many of which are very obviously designed by the numerous builders who have disappeared from the face of the Internet only to turn up in Billund. And that’s the case here — the set was designed by the very talented Mike Psiaki, whose LEGO creations we’ve featured many, many times here on The Brothers Brick over the years — most notably one of the best LEGO X-wings ever made.
Mike’s Beetle doesn’t disappoint. The 211 steps span an instruction booklet 124 pages thick. I recently also built the new LEGO Ghostbusters (2016) Ecto 1, and it had far more complicated techniques than this larger vehicle does, but the Beetle is still full of half-stud-offset, SNOT, complex headlight and bracket geometry, and other techniques you’ll rarely if ever see in a LEGO City set.
Click through for the complete review!
Having already delighted us last summer with his mosaic of everyone’s favorite holographic vocalist Hatsune Miku, Chris Rozek does it again with this cute minifigure version – well, Friends “minidoll” version to be precise. We’ve featured customized LEGO Friends before but it’s always nice to see more customizers using them to recreate well-known screen characters.
This was Chris’ first try at custom sculpting hair pieces. The hair is made from 6 pieces of carved and sculpted resin. The entire figure took around a week to complete.
Sometimes, life may be different than it appears, and comfort and fear may arise from the same space. Jonas depicts such a contradiction in the Middle Ages. His small but effective build is filled with many details and master craftmanship. The top level is occupied by a Medieval beauty enjoying her hot tub. She possesses some luxury items such as a mirror, perfumes and books which were rare for her time. She seems completely unaware of the horrifying truth happening far below. The middle floor seems to be furnished to brew homemade beers, and the arched ceiling makes the room dark and cramped. Even with the presence of mice, the room may be enjoyable for a certain type of person who wishes to craft a beverage in silence. But the big barrel hides a secret trap door which leads to misery in the lowest level. A poor man is tied to a big wheel and his screams only echo in his spinning head, which is filled with the laughter of this masochistic band. Considering the torture tools scattered around, he will suffer a lot.
Amazon Prime Day is one of Amazon’s big annual sales, and this year it includes a number of fantastic deals on LEGO. The deals expire once a certain number of people have claimed them, but they’re still active currently. The sales are open only to Amazon Prime members, but don’t forget that you can get a 30-day free Amazon Prime trial.
First up is the Star Wars 75095 UCS Tie Fighter, for $125.99, or nearly $75 off retail. This is an amazing deal for a Star Wars UCS set. At publishing, this deal is 55% claimed, so don’t hold off.
LEGO Architecture 21026 Venice is available for $21.95, or 27% off retail.
Also available is 60067 Helicopter Pursuit, which is 30% off at $27.99.
You can browse all of the Amazon Prime Day LEGO deals here, but most of the rest are LEGO gear. Don’t forget that Amazon also has some stellar deals on sale that aren’t part of the Prime Day sales, such as Legends of Chima Razcal’s Glider (70000) for 61% off, bringing it down to $4.68, and LEGO Dimensions Back to the Future Doc Brown Fun Pack for 67% off, bringing it to $4.98.
Since I first visited Walt Disney World 25 years ago, I’ve been a total Disney geek. As a result, I’m very excited about the recent announcement of the Cinderella’s Castle set. However, it’s not out for a while, and I needed to scratch my Disney castle-building itch…
I figure this one might work out a little cheaper than the official set!
Brick To The Past is a collective of UK builders who specialise in large-scale collaborative historical displays at LEGO shows. Their latest model is this thoroughly-impressive layout of the Battle Of Hastings, a key moment in British history…
I was lucky enough to see this display “in the brick” at Bricktastic in Manchester recently. The layout is a monster, with stark yet impressive terrain, and a wonderful collection of minifigs arrayed in battle formation ready to fight.
Brothers Brick got in touch with James Pegrum, one of Brick To The Past’s leading lights, to discuss this display and get more details on the challenges of collaborative building.
Click to read the interview and see more of Brick To The Past’s creations
This angry-looking bird isn’t the star of a mobile game or summer movie, but is actually an ingenious interpretation of one of nature’s bigger-billed birds, the African-native shoebill. The real bird stands a remarkable 4 feet tall with an enormous bill for catching fish. Builder Moko has done a great job using the shin guards from the large General Grievous figure to portray the bill, but my favorite part is the expressive eyes. Be sure to check out Moko’s blog for a cool breakdown of the construction techniques employed.
