Category Archives: LEGO

You’d probably expect a lot of the posts on a LEGO website like The Brothers Brick to be about LEGO, and you’d be right. If you’re browsing this page, you might want to consider narrowing what you’re looking for by checking out categories like “Space” and “Castle.” We’re sure there’s something here that’ll fascinate and amaze you.

First contact

Bart de Dobbelaer never ceases to amaze me with his LEGO creations. Ever since his ‘The Life Aquatic With Clumsy Pete’ series, he has been making one astounding creation after another. First Contact is no exception to this. It features an out of this world landscape with a spaceship in a colour scheme that will send you on a trip down memory lane. The space crew is carefully conducting their work without noticing that their presence hasn’t gone unnoticed. Bart is a master at building alien creatures from obscure LEGO parts. He always manages to use the parts that I am never able to think of a good use for.

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I’ve got the blues real bad

You’ve got to hand it to this mech for its commitment to that blue outfit. Is that how it works with mechs? They wake up one morning and sift through their wardrobe of sassy ensembles and decide…blue it is! Well, even if that’s not the way it is with mechs, you have to admire the craftsmanship of this LEGO creation by nobu_tary. Gundam fans would recognize this as the MS-07B Gouf, which I was already well aware of and definitely didn’t learn it from looking it up three minutes ago so don’t get that idea in your heads. This builder is on a roll lately with cool mechs. It turns out this mech has hundreds of friends you may want to check out, each with their own fabulous outfits.

Danger in the Shadows

From the early days of the Empire comes Hugo‘s LEGO creation of what truly can be described as “dark times.” Here, two Imperial clone troopers patrol a run-down street while dangers lurk in the shadows. This whole creation looks dirty, and that’s probably just the way Hugo wanted it. From the different shades of grey, brown and tan, the colors flow together to show the grit of the Star Wars universe, as well as the same colors that are shoved into the crevices of the building. Each brick looks like it naturally exists there. I also really like the use of red capes as the awnings on the walls. That’s a technique we don’t see often enough.

The best part about this build is that it fills me with questions: what will happen next? Will the dark Duro figure get the jump on the troopers? Or will the Imperial assassin on the upper level strike first?

Mars: Bringer of War...and also color coordination

I think I’m not alone in assuming, as a child, that we’d have Mars colonization by the time I was grown. Well, we haven’t even sent manned missions out there yet. But when we get there we’ll inevitably need to shoot stuff. Bob DeQuatre shows us what that could look like with this impressive LEGO Mars Corporation Ares Long-Range Artillery Platform. As you may know, Ares is the Greek god of war and Bob tells us this is Mars Corporation’s deadliest vehicle. He could have called it by its Roman mythological name but that would have been…uh…redundant.

Proving he’s no slouch, Bob also built this Hermes Mobile Command Center in the same striking red and white color scheme. Designed for long-range missions, this vehicle can hold up to six passengers as well as the driver and gunner. This makes sense considering Hermes was the ancient Greek god of trade, wealth, luck, fertility, animal husbandry, sleep, language, thieves,…and travel. Phew, that’s a lot of jobs! We can only assume all those other things are going on onboard as well.

We’re kind of really into Bob’s stuff. Here’s the proof.

LEGO Holiday BrickHeadz 40425 Nutcracker [Review]

Here in the U.S. and around the world, the end of the year brings a number of holidays and festivities, and under normal circumstances, a trip to the ballet to see The Nutcracker is a major holiday tradition. Well, in the midst of a global pandemic you will be able to bring a little bit of the Nutcracker home for the holidays. LEGO’s holiday BrickHeadz this year is 40425 Nutcracker. Although LEGO was able to send us an early review copy, we still don’t have the price, but we presume it will be $9.99 like other standalone BrickHeadz. It will be available starting October 1 and has 180 pieces.

Click to read the full hands-on review

Black Family Tree Tapestry

The Black family had a tapestry depicting their family tree. Gayle Spiller managed to recreate the tapestry in LEGO and it is stunning! The magical artwork was made in the 13th century and contains family members from the Middle Ages all the way through to the present. It is located at 12 Grimmauld Place, which means it is currently owned by a certain mister Harry Potter who is not at all pictured on the tapestry. The Black family having been horrifyingly concerned with being purebloods, quite a few of the family members got disowned for various reasons; supporting Muggle rights or being a Squib. Walburga Black, Sirius Black’s mother, is presumably responsible for removing most of the disowned family members.

This incredible brick version really deserves a good zoom in. Gayle used the LEGO flag for the banners where the family members’ names are portrayed, and most of the hats are brick-built using all sorts of parts, from cones, to skirts to the ruff neckpiece. She even managed to include the Black family coat of arms. You can more find closeups on her Instagram.

An alternative to coarse sand and cold space

Most Star Wars sets and fan creations tend to take the form of ships or other types of vehicles, of course LEGO has welcomed more buildings recently but such builds are still a minority in the theme. Eloi Parizeau takes us to Naboo not in a starship but with his LEGO micro-build of the Theed Royal Palace.

The nicest thing about working in micro-scale is that a builder is able to use small parts that are actually pretty common or easy to obtain, Parizeau’s structural build of the palace consists of some pretty standard parts in varying shapes and sizes such as dishes, cones, tiles, and slopes. The colors he utilizes for this creation as a whole are a little uncommon including pieces in forest green, tan, and sand green. The one part that seems rather unique to me is the rock panel in dark grey.

Using these small pieces Parizeau not only recreates the structure of the Theed Palace, but also the beautiful and lush environment of Naboo, his use of the forest green slopes and bricks along with the trans-clear blue elements brings back scenes from the Star Wars prequel films which portrayed Naboo as a blue planet filled with green vegetation. All things considered, Parizeau’s LEGO rendition of this Star Wars universe building is quite unique. It will definitely be great to see more fictional architecture brought to us by the brick in the future.

LEGO Adidas ZX 8000 sneakers will retail for US $130 [News]

According to SneakerBarDetroit.com, the new Adidas ZX 8000 designed in collaboration with LEGO, will go on sale next Friday, September 25. The retail price is expected to be USD 130. The new sneakers will be available at select retailers, but it seems that the easiest way to grab a pair will be via adidas.com. The full set of official product pictures was published today, too, so feel free to jump under spoiler to take a closer look.

Click here to see more pictures

Maybe the Amazon will save itself

Brick built plants can help make bring a LEGO scene to life. And when the plants are the focus of a diorama, that scene is full of life, such as this collaboration between Emil Lidé and Bartu. This diorama shows four different sections of the amazon jungle that work together as one scene or as the same scene through time.

Through the series, these builders display a dried riverbed, which is overtaken by a fully grown jungle, then destroyed so someone can mine for gold before the jungle finally begins to retake the land. The vegetation throughout the build is fantastic, so much so that it is difficult to call out any one part! The colour choices are also on point, from the vibrant mixture of greens in the thriving jungle to the more drab dark tan and olive in the mining scene. Not to be overlooked is the subtle landscaping, from the smooth sides of the bricks making up the wet river bed to the slope made up of wedge plates showing how the miners have dug into the earth.

LEGO Star Wars 75290 Mos Eisley Cantina – largest Master Builder Series set ever at 3,000 pieces & 20 minifigs [Review]

If you watched Star Wars beginning with Episode IV: A New Hope as many of us born in the decades before the Prequel Trilogy did, the first planet in a “Galaxy Far, Far Away” you ever saw on screen was Tatooine. But the enormous universe that Luke Skywalker and Ben Kenobi lived in truly came alive only when they first stepped into the cantina in the Mos Eisley Spaceport — “This place can be a little rough,” Old Ben warned Luke. LEGO’s latest set in its Master Builder Series takes us deep into that “wretched hive of scum and villainy” with 75290 Mos Eisley Cantina. It’s rare that I acknowledge up front in a review how excited I was personally about a forthcoming LEGO set. But I am, because my favorite planet in the Star Wars universe is still Tatooine, and my favorite place on the planet is Chalmun’s Cantina. Does it live up to my nearly life-long expectations? How does it compare to previous incarnations of this iconic watering hole?

75290 Mos Eisley Cantina is built from 3,187 LEGO pieces, and the product description states that it includes 21 minifigures “plus” R2-D2 the droid (a point we’ll return to later in this review). The set retails from the LEGO Shop for US $349.99 | CAN $449.99 | UK £319.99 and is available to LEGO VIP Program members beginning on September 16, with general availability on October 1st.

Let’s strap a blaster to our hip, leave the droids to park the landspeeder, and step inside…

Read our hands-on review of LEGO Star Wars 75290 Mos Eisley Cantina

LEGO 75978 Harry Potter Diagon Alley [Review]

Today, there is no LEGO theme as special as Star Wars. Not only is it one of the fundamental LEGO universes, but it is also presented in almost every category of LEGO products: regular sets, junior sets, action figures, keychains, stationery, video games, and many more including, of course, more expensive exclusive sets. Apart from the Star Wars and Creator Expert / 18+ advanced building sets, there are not that many themes that have earned an exclusive product release. Thankfully, the LEGO Harry Potter joined the club in 2018 with the release of 71043 Hogwarts Castle. And just two years later comes another massive exclusive set, 75978 Diagon Alley. Despite being 500 pieces smaller than the gigantic Hogwarts castle, with its 5,544 pieces, it’s big enough to be the fourth in the list of the biggest LEGO sets released so far. Remarkably, both sets have the same price tag of US $399.99 | CAN $499.99 | UK £369.99, so let’s build the new one and find out whether it has more value for the same money.

Click here to continue reading…

Something to do before you croak

In these dark times, I’m all about seeking out wisdom to brighten the world. Jake Hansen has presented us with an interesting option: The Frog Council. Perched atop graceful columns, these three wise amphibians invite the viewer to ask questions. Questions like “How did Jake come up with the idea of using baseball caps for egg cups?” Or maybe “Are those minifigure hands adding details to LEGO vines?” Oh sure, you could ask them something important like “How can we improve the world?” Or even “Why did LEGO get rid of the classic grey color?” But, c’mon. They’re frogs. There’s probably an upper limit to what they’re willing to share.

Where did these frogs gain their secret wisdom? Maybe it was from perusing our frog archives. But probably not.