Our friends over at Citizen Brick have cooked up another batch of cool stuff for this year’s Black Friday, along with a new holiday promotion tin.
The Negligent Parents “Abandoned Child / Home Invasion Holiday Fun” set of three minifigs lets you reenact all your favorite scenes from Home Alone.
See all of this year’s Citizen Brick special deals
The M:Tron range of LEGO Space sets released back in 1990 never made any bones about the utilitarian nature of its magnet-laden fleet. It was all about finding innovative ways of lifting and moving its precious equipment cases around the galaxy. Tim Goddard, whose space work has become a regular feature here on TBB, has really run with this idea of transportation. He asks, how do you deploy your beautifully built M:Tron mech to the planet surface? With the M:Tron Pod of course.
Having had a close-up look at this build at Bricktastic earlier this year, I was mightily impressed by the lengths Tim had gone to, to make his Pod hexagonal. Of course it also has a fully functional hatch mechanism. Like so much of his work, it’s a splendidly detailed homage to one the LEGO Group’s most-loved themes.
What makes a LEGO model special often comes down to an inspired design choice. In the case of En Zoo’s Laelariel Hall it’s all about the use of colour. The build is a solid medieval construction utilising many tried and tested stone wall and roof techniques. What lifts it above the average are the exquisite splashes of blue bricks throughout. The main walls are veined with light blue and 1×1 round tiled studs. Layered in sequence, they imbue the building with a sense of magic. Accents of dark blue in the roof echo the marbling elsewhere. It’s a clever choice that transports the scene into its own fantastical realm.
We recently reviewed the new Brickmania F-4C Phantom II fighter kit, but the Brickmania team has also just restocked the massive B-17G WWII Heavy Bomber custom kit, their largest LEGO aircraft kit produced to date. This custom kit of the legendary “Flying Fortress” is built from 3,074 LEGO pieces and includes 10 custom-printed minifigures.
Read our hands-on review of the Brickmania Flying Fortress
Pictures are finally available online for the LEGO Star Wars lineup of sets that are set to be released in the first half of 2019. These include themes from not only the classic trilogy but including the prequels and sequels. Check out the playsets below for now. You can be sure we’ll be reviewing most of these come 2019 to give you our independent view once they hit the shelves in January.
75225 Elite Praetorian Guard Battle Back, 109 Pieces
Click to see the rest of the Star Wars sets
Microscale LEGO building is not just about building things on a small scale as the term suggests. Context can help a creation take on epic proportions with the use of a part or parts to provide a size comparison. Take this celestial automaton by Brian Kescenovitz made from a relatively small collection of elements. The micro-figure in the foreground, as well as the minimalist background, give this golden mechanical angel an impressive stature.
The multi-jointed legs have an insect-like feel, and the lack of a recognizable head or face lends even more otherworldliness to this guardian of the afterlife.
The LEGO Shop’s Black Friday and Cyber Monday sales and deals are happening this week, with UK sales already underway and US & Canadian sales starting at midnight Eastern Time on Friday, November 23rd (that’s Thanksgiving night at 9 PM for our readers on the west coast). Various LEGO sets are 20-30% off or more, and the holiday promotion this year is a Buildable Holiday Present set with purchases over $99/£85. At the same time, the new 10268 Vestas Wind Turbine is now available.
LEGO sent us an early copy of the promotional set, and it’s a lovely little set with 301 pieces that opens up, reminding us of both 75952 Newt’s Case and 21315 Pop-up Book.
We’ll update this article with specific deals we find, but in the meantime, you can click through to the US sales and deals page from the images above.
Learn more about Black Friday & Cyber Monday deals from the LEGO Shop
There’s a new product in the increasingly crowded third-party custom brick world. Mbriks are a way to bring new life to your LEGO (and compatible brands) building bricks by adding additional dimension and display options. These custom magnetic bricks have shown a lot of promise in the professionally produced videos and other promotional material during the month-long Kickstarter campaign ending this week, but we wanted to weigh in ourselves.
Read our hands-on review of custom Mbriks magnetic bricks
There are a wealth of details worth checking out in Andreas Lenander‘s latest LEGO creation — a busy marketplace in a Middle-East-inspired fantasy city — not least its unusual inhabitants. The city walls feature some nice little touches to break up the expanse of tan, and the detailing around the arch is spot-on. The towers provide a nice backdrop to the action, and the white one has some lovely texturing which delivers the impression of mosaics or elaborate carved screens. Below, the market itself is brimming with people and animals, creating a sense of activity and movement. You can’t look at this without finding yourself waiting on a big fight breaking out!
There are a huge variety of minifigures amidst the hustle and bustle of the marketplace. The mixing of figures from different LEGO themes can sometimes jar, but here it simply adds to the sense of a wider fantasy world and the bazaar as a melting pot of cultures and races…
If you haven’t had your daily dose of vitamins yet, this creation by alego alego might satisfy your needs — provided you can digest ABS plastic, of course. There is anything you could wish for in this fruit and vegetable stand, from peppers to onions, eggplants and lettuce.
What is a street stand without a street? The background scene is detailed and realistic, with ingot tiles as bricks on the house and a kitty looking out the window. The hydrant and candelabra help the sidewalk avoid being plain or empty. Obviously the vegetable stand is the best part, with all sorts of unique parts uses, like joker’s hair as lettuce and frogs as peppers. Minifig arms are used all around as various fruits and vegetables in different colours – eggplants, chili peppers, bananas…
And I quote, “Stink. Stank. Stunk!” Dr. Seuss’s vile villain who stole Christmas, and his trusty dog, Max, come to us in LEGO form! This awful (lovely) model of Mr. Grinch by Miro Dudas is simply terrible (awesome)! In seriousness, this is one of my most favorite builds in recent history. Miro’s wonderfully expressive recreation is remarkably close to the latest version of the character in the new 2018 movie, The Grinch.
If your LEGO pirate ship crashes on the rocks, what do you do? Easy, rebuild! Travis Brickle has embraced this idea, skilfully repurposing the recognisable aspects of his vessel into a makeshift cottage on its own remote island. It’s a ramshackle affair with the hull doubling as roof replete with dormers; I love the turtle shell fix to one of these. The mast stands tall as a look out post, I assume to scour the horizon for rescue. A ship’s wheel hangs above the door, a reminder of past maritime glory. Yet, even when a pirate’s shipwrecked, you can’t take the buccaneer out of the man: there are sailors still to walk the plank, treasure to plunder, and rum aplenty to be swilled.
