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.

A King who’s not Kidding

LEGO recently introduced the Monkey Kid theme, bringing the legend of Sun Wukong, the Monkey King, to a wider audience. Builder Red has created a truly regal version of Sun Wukong that’s full of character and clever building. The gold accents in the crown are nice, and the cloth pants and dark blue armor are snazzy. But the real star of the show is those toes. How cute are they? Okay, maybe the really impressive thing is that cocky expression. A tilted bit of shoulder armor adds just the right touch of grumpiness to complement those deep-set eyes.

Sun Wukong, the Monkey King

If you’re curious as to how this creation came about, Red has an Instragram post that goes into the details of the build process. And when you’re done there, you can check out the other builds of theirs that we’ve featured in the past.

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LEGO 10277 Crocodile Locomotive designer takes us for a ride [News]

LEGO Designer Pierre Normandin is no stranger to trains–he grew up loving them and has designed many of the LEGO City trains available the past few years. He recently shifted within LEGO to the Creator Expert team and had the chance to flex some building muscles by designing the recent Fiat 500 and now an even more detailed train! In this designer video, Pierre talks about his love of trains, why the Crocodile Locomotive is so iconic, and how the set started off larger and eventually grew to be 7 studs wide to include more detail.

10277 Crocodile Locomotive set comes with 1,271 pieces used to create the brown electric locomotive, a buildable display base, an informational placard, and two conductor minifigures. It is now available from LEGO for US $99.99 | CAN $149.99 | UK £89.99. Make sure to read our interview with LEGO Design Lead Jamie Berard about the creation of this LEGO train and the design effort that went into it.

Click to watch the LEGO Crocodile Locomotive designer video

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The Trans-Am wins the drag race standing still

I’ve been a rather prolific LEGO car builder in my day and the Pontiac Trans-Am has been on my to-do list for quite some time. I’ve never scratched it of this said to-do list as I’ve been rather intimidated at the prospect of building this icon of American muscle. Well, leave it to my friend and master car builder Firas Abu-Jaber to really knock this one out of the park! He tells us it took about a month-and-a-half to complete and it came with some difficulty, even for his considerable skill.

LEGO Pontiac Trans Am Firebird

This alternate view shows off the opening doors, hood, and trunk as well as the seats and dashboard. The seats move forward, the armrest opens; it has all the niceties you could expect from a Firas original creation. The chrome tailpipes reflect nicely on that slick surface. And while we’re at it, let’s admire that gold steering wheel! I have just three words for this iconic classic American muscle car; alright, alright, alright!

LEGO Pontiac Trans Am Firebird

This is not the first time we’ve been enthralled with Firas’ style. Not by a long shot.

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Toa Helryx, the OG Bionicle

LEGO’s Bionicle lore runs deep, encompassing a complex world history from its inception to the heroes we all recognize as the various Toa. Even the theme’s origin story is fascinating, as David Robertson recounts in Brick by Brick the Bionicle theme was originally envisioned as a metaphor for battling cancer, with the bio-heroes (cancer-fighting drugs) being delivered to the world (body) in pill-like canisters. Builder Anthony Wilson is participating in a fan-run challenge to create the Toa Helryx, which the lore names as the first Toa in the Bionicle world.

Toa Helryx No sets or images were ever produced of this Toa, but Anthony has sculpted this regal figure from the few descriptions. The brick-built mask, so central to Bionicle characters, is crafted from multiple elements, most notably the silver Nexo Knights shield, whose ribbed edges look marvelously organic here. Another great detail is the giant mace Helryx wields, which is tipped with a Technic differential.

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This dragon works for scale

This elegant LEGO dragon by builder Mitch Phillips is inspired by the red dragons from East Asian mythology that are said to bring good luck and happiness. I think it’s working, as this build makes me happy indeed. I love the elegant curves and the fact that many of the dragon’s scales are made from minifigure flippers. The red fins are complemented by orange Technic teeth as a different texture of scaling. Blue colors in the robot arms fingers and large fins mirror the crown of three-leaf plates in the head.

龍

A closer look at that head reveals the intricate build in the eyes–highlighted by the use of the “One Ring” from the Lord of the Rings theme to add a touch of chromed bling. This dragon is fierce, but also a thing of beauty.

龍

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Fortress of solitude. Also goats.

LEGO builder Jonathan Snyder has built a little something he calls “Solitude.” It’s part of a fortress wall using only two shades of tan and olive green. It proves you don’t need a lot of colors to build something charming. Varied textures created by masonry bricks, hinge plates, jumper plates and door rail plates all help create visually interesting surfaces. Goats also help make things interesting. Whether you’re building cars, spaceships, architecture or airplanes always incorporate goats to make things more interesting. Goats are both the cause and the solution to all our problems. Goats are always the answer. Goats!

Solitude

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Arcade action that’s just dynamite

These days any distraction is a good distraction, and Cecilie Fritzvold brings us a very good distraction, indeed. This awesome LEGO arcade features games that incorporate the dynamite bundle element. There are three of them in the video game, and several in the claw machine–most notably as part of the claw assembly itself. I also want to call out the quality setting for these arcade classics: the flooring has just the right “cheap linoleum” look, and the printed 2×2 tiles on the wall make for excellent posters. And that strawberry malt is just too cute. Man, I really want to try to win something out of that claw machine. It’s probably rigged, though.

Dynamite Arcade

If you love claw machines as much as I do, you’ll also want to check out this fully functional human-scale LEGO claw machine.

The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.

Build your own horse, Lucky Luke!

What’s even more difficult than creating just the perfect LEGO minifigure for your creation? Crafting the perfect character in a small scale without using minifigures. Well, ok, this build by Marion Weintraut actually uses a lot of minifigure pieces, just not how you’re “supposed” to. The long-running comic strip hero Lucky Luke and his horse Jolly Jumper are wonderfully gangly and full of cartoon whimsy. From the perfectly placed hollow studs for Jolly’s nostrils, to the small slope for Luke’s bandana and the minifigure pirate hook for his cigarette, there are so many techniques to love here.

Lucky Luke + Jolly Jumper

Although, while I’m always a fan of unorthodox techniques, I do detect a slight twitch in my eye at the way the minifigure arms are connected for Jolly’s tail. Let’s both pretend we didn’t see that, and enjoy the rest of this splendid creation.

The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.

This is what we’ve been training for, folks!

I’ve never been a huge train person. I mean, I like trains and all, and love watching them thunder by, and enjoy building elaborate tracks with my kids for those little wooden magnetic trains, but the LEGO train itch has passed me by completely. Perhaps someday I’ll construct a train if I ever get around to building a large-scale city diorama (after I win the lottery or suddenly come into money, to pay for all the bricks), but not until then. Not so for Josiah Durand, as he demonstrates with this superb military train scene. It’s got everything you could want, from a chunky engine to various types of cars, especially that anti-aircraft gun car, and the landscape is also eye-catching.

Deep State Espionage: Sukhai Mission E2

Unlike with most train dioramas, the tracks are completely brick-built, rather than using the standard track elements. Additionally, the wheels seem to be a combination of wagon wheels, dishes, steering wheels, and other round things, rather than the typical train wheels. The fill-in between the ties and rails is an odd assortment of small, textured dark bluish grey pieces, especially chains and stud shooter triggers (I love seeing those triggers pop up in builds!). The only thing that seems odd is that the ties are grey and the rails brown when usually it is the other way around unless it is such an old track that the wood has greyed and the metal rusted. It’s nothing to get steamed up about, since either way this is still one good looking train display.

Deep State Espionage: [Railway Gun]

Love trains more passionately than I do? Then check out the TBB train archives!

The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.

She carries a spare tire with her

A LEGO builder who goes by the name of -Disty- has built a totally rad lady on a futuristic bike. Her hair and outfit give her a cyberpunk feel that is so popular in post-apocalyptic movies. Both the bike and rider are fantastic builds on their own but together it’s a dose of perfection. But what happens if she were to blow a tire? Well, the builder cleverly used an inside-out rubber LEGO tire as her halter top, which presumably she could use in case of a blowout. According to my limited research just now she would thus completely break the law in Utah, Tennessee, Indiana, and parts of Mexico. Some states have ambiguous rules on the matter, some select US cities are OK but in free-thinking Ontario, Saskatchewan, and British Columbia she can totally rock out with the girls out! Way to go, Canada!

Untitled

The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.

LEGO Art revealed as mosaic sets of The Beatles, Marilyn Monroe, Star Wars Sith and Iron Man [News]

LEGO has revealed an entirely new product line of mosaic sets featuring pop culture portraits called LEGO Art. The four initial sets revealed include Iron Man, Marilyn Monroe, The Beatles, and Star Wars Sith. Each of the adult-targeted sets contains an average of 3,250 pieces, a new brick separator, several new elements, an exclusive signature tile, and instructions and extra parts to build 3 or 4 different designs per set. Each set comes with a curated building soundtrack, and as an added bonus, three copies of either the Iron Man or Star Wars sets can be combined to make an “ultimate piece” triple the size of a single portrait.

Each LEGO Art set comes in a box the size of a pizza and will retail for US $119.99 | CAN $149.99 | UK £114.99. The Iron Man portrait will be available globally (including the US) exclusively from LEGO on August 1st. The other three portraits will be available globally from LEGO and various retailers starting August 1st, except in the US which will have to wait a month until September 1st.

Get a close up look at each new LEGO Art portrait and see the ultimate versions from combining sets

The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.

Ninjago 71721: Skull Sorcerer’s Dragon [Review]

We’ve already shown you the ins and outs of Wu’s Battle Dragon from the summer 2020 Ninjago sets, but that’s not the only dragon in this series. No, there’s another, larger, offering to be had. 71721 Ninjago: Skull Sorcerer’s Dragon (US $79.99 | CAN $109.99 | UK £74.99) is just over three times the pieces…for four times the price. Is it worth it? Let’s take a detailed look and find out.

Click to read the full hands-on review

The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.