Do you remember Galidor? I remember, and by the looks of this LEGO model, Care Creations does too! One of the sets in the infamous LEGO action figure line was the TDN Module; a large blue flying shuttle that could fit a figure inside, but was only made of nine parts! I think Care must have left their TDN out in the sun too long. This one has grown eyes, tentacles, and teeth! Spare a thought for the armored figure, and his electric chest plate, caught in the TDN’s grip. How’s he going to get out of this one?
Category Archives: LEGO
The Dutch Railways Class 1500 rides again
In this house, we love trains and that means we love this LEGO train model by Malik Geldermans. Malik has done a fantastic job capturing the details of a Dutch Railways NS Class 1500 in brick form. And let me tell you, there is not a brick out of place on this model: the circle – circle – square pattern on the bogies; the 1×2 round tile ribs under the sides; and the 1×1 curved slopes beside the doors are all perfect details! Malik has also proven his handiness with all minifig grippers on the pantographs and on the greebles along the chassis. Great building Malik, we can’t wait to see more!
Cat got your tongue? This lion mask might leave you speechless
I’ve written a lot of articles about spaceships, castles, and the occasional train, but I’ve never personally done anything like this jaw-dropping piece of LEGO art. Michael Kanemoto says he built this “Dandylion” mask for his son in 250-300 hours of building, making it a truly leonine labor of love. Look at all those gold accent pieces, from the leaves in the mane to the antenna pieces for whiskers.
Take a look from a few more angles!
LEGO fan blows us away with LEGO fan
We’re constantly inspired by the strange creatures, swooshable ships, and epic dioramas shared by LEGO builders each day that instantly grab your attention. Ironically, we nearly missed one of the most impressive builds of the week because it’s so lifelike and mundane that it doesn’t even register as LEGO at all! This retro electrical fan at 1:1 scale is a nearly studless masterpiece from builder ruby_lego that begs the question: “Is it LEGO?”
The seed parts are the rare trans blue doors from the Aquanauts Neptune Discovery Lab. Ruby built the cage out of flex tubes from the T-Rex Breakout. To minimize seams, the base is made from an IKEA Byylek lid. The dial utilizes a clock face from Big Ben. Even though the plug and pneumatic tubing power cord is purely cosmetic, the stand hides official LEGO Power Functions so the lifelike fan really works! It’s a powerful piece of nostalgia and NPU (nice parts usage) that made us instant fans of ruby_lego.
Rebellions are built in teal
How can a scrappy Rebellion possibly stand up against an Empire with massive fleets of grey, dark grey, sometimes black, but mostly grey ships? By using the one thing the Empire, in all of their power, could never imagine bringing to battle: teal. Teal, the color of hope, beloved by LEGO fans across the galaxy (except of course for designer Mark Stafford)! A band of rebels in the LEGO community have been slowly expanding on the Teal Squadron theme, and the latest addition is this brilliantly-shaped Teal Tower from Tim Goddard. As Tim explains, Rebels often repurpose existing buildings for their bases, and this tower’s weathered exterior certainly suggests a long history, with just small details to let the crafty Rebels lie low. Dark orange weathering looks great amongst the white masonry, and perfectly contrasts with the vital teal. The greebling (or sci-fi texturing) along the sides, rooftop antennae, and the decidedly low-tech awning perfectly capture the Star Wars aesthetic. And Tim’s teal-accented droidekas are maybe the best minifig scale versions of the droids I’ve seen.
For more teal-infused Star Wars creations, Mansur Soeleman’s Cerulean Phoenix, Alec Hole’s Capital E-Wing, Inthert’s Teal-4 Skylark, and Wami Delthorn’s Cobalt Thorn.
Stitch together your very own lovable LEGO alien [Instructions]
Season 1 LEGO Masters US winner Tyler Clites is nothing if not persistent. A few years ago, he uploaded a LEGO model of everyone’s favourite havoc-wreaking extraterrestrial, Stitch, to the crowd-sourcing Ideas platform. We covered the first iteration way back in 2016, and it was subsequently re-worked twice before hitting the magical 10,000 supporters mark. Neither model was approved, but Tyler is not content to let this little blue alien be a footnote in LEGO Ideas history! He’s now released instructions over on his website for you to download and build your own. And the best part? They’re free! All you need to do is source the bricks.
And why not get creative with it? Tyler has shown that Stitch can be rebuilt in a variety of forms, so have a go at customising one of your own! My personal favourite is this Elvis Stitch-ley. Look at that immaculate quiff.
The Windmills of Winter
While you’re waiting for the sixth Game of Thrones book to arrive, check out this LEGO build by /Sam\! For those of you looking for a new haircut, you might not need to look that far. The snowbanks on either side of the entrance to this cozy windmill are made from minifigure hairstyles! There’s also a couple helmets detailing the top of the chimneys. Don’t forget to take a closer look at all the work that went into shaping the windmill tower and the neat use of bars on the windmill blades!
This year’s TBB sponsored collaboration at BrickCon 2024 is all about growth! [News]
Once again, The Brothers Brick is hosting a collaboration of LEGO builds at this year’s BrickCon convention in Seattle. But in order to do this, we’re going to need a little bit of a rebrand. For BrickCon 2024, “TBB” is going to stand for “The Brothers Botany” as we host a garden of botanical builds on the convention floor.
If you’re interested in participating, our tilled plot of table space will be open to botanical creations of any scale, though we’re especially interested in real-world scale plants like those found in the LEGO Botanical Collection. Any creation where the plants are the focal point is welcome to join in. We have awards and prizes planned for the collab, with some additional surprises planted in the garden as well. To help fertilize any budding ideas you may have, I’ve got a few early MOCs of my own that’ll be making an appearance in the display.
Flex those green thumbs, builders, and be sure to select the “TBB Collaboration” when registering the theme of your botanical MOCs. We’ll see you all at the Meydenbauer in September!
Pigs! In! Briiiiiiiiiicks!
Perhaps it’s the mysterious Algorithm™ at work, but my social feeds lately have been on something of a Muppets revival, and I am so here for it. If you feel the same, I defy you to look at Jon-Paul Hansen, AKA j-p-30‘s, LEGO depiction of the Pigs in Space skit without saying the tagline. The set is very well recreated, with – among others – letter tiles used to represent some of the buttons and controls. The crew of Captain Link Hogthrob, First Mate Piggy and Dr Julius Strangepork look as good as their names sound ridiculous.
And if the interior wasn’t enough, j-p-30 has gone the whole hog (geddit? OK, I can hear Statler and Waldorf telling me to leave) and modelled the exterior of the USS Swinetrek too! If I’m not mistaken, this does make use of some light bluish grey paint on the big cone pieces, but the end result is a dead ringer for the show model.
This isn’t the first time we’ve seen this builder tackle Jim Henson’s lovable characters, either – have a look in our archives to see some of the others.
Lamborghini Countach, a dream car for a dream garage
In 2022 LEGO released their first official Lamborghini Countach, the LEGO Speed Champions 76908 Lamborghini Countach. Builder George Panteleon (who also goes by “ZetoVince”) brings us a larger-scale version of the same Lamborghini model. Taking inspiration from the official LEGO set’s headlight design and using some newly released elements, he was able to bring a build from the top of his wanted list to life.
Along with the overall iconic appeal of this car, he also brings to life the scissor doors, opening engine bay, and front trunk or “frunk”.
BrickCon 2024 tickets on sale today for the public exhibition [News]
Starting today, tickets for the BrickCon 2024 public exhibition are now on sale. With the public days of the convention on September 7th and 8th, nearly 500 LEGO builders (some of them TBB contributors) will convene at Bellevue, Washington’s Meydenbauer Center to show off their creations. This year promises to be a great show featuring the theme of “Foundations,” made to celebrate those sets and themes which have been the bedrock of so many people’s experiences in the hobby. As in past years, the tickets are for a specific entry time on the day of choice to help mitigate crowds, and will retail for $19 (with a $3 discount for the last entry time each day). After selling out last year, be sure to purchase your tickets well in advance! For more information on all the show has to offer, and pictures from past conventions, visit Brickcon.org.
The Brothers Brick is proud to be a sponsor of BrickCon 2024.
TBB Weekly Brick Report: LEGO news roundup for June 1, 2024 [News]
In addition to the amazing LEGO models created by builders all over the world, The Brothers Brick brings you the best LEGO news and reviews. This is our weekly Brick Report for the last week of May, 2024.
TBB NEWS AND REVIEWS With so many sets this week including altnernate models, it feels a bit like the multiverse has taken over. From Creator dinosaurs and modern houses, to iconic Zelda video games. But we also had reviews of two new sets from Disney — a classic from Sleeping Beauty and a magical musical house from Encanto. Last but not least, five new LEGO models designed by builders from around the world join the previous wave of models inspired by Ukrainian landmarks.
- [REVIEW] BrickLink Designer Program Series 2 – Logging Railway: A trial of timber! — The next wave of Bricklink Designer Program sets (Series 2) is set for pre-orders on June 6th, and LEGO sent us an advance copy of Logging Railway. Be sure to read our full review before queueing up for these five limited release sets.
- [NEWS] June LEGO sets available now — We’ve got some new LEGO sets about to hit store shelves. Check out our favorite sets coming June 1st.
- [REVIEW] LEGO Disney 43252 Moana’s Flowerpot – Botanical Collection meets vignette — Bre reviewed this unusual new set that is part play set, and part botanical.
- [REVIEW] LEGO Disney 43240 Maleficent’s Dragon Form – Is this Sleeping Beauty set a snooze-fest? — Bre finds out if this set is any more than just a cool dragon.
- [REVIEW] LEGO Creator 3-in-1 31151 T. rex: An apex predator outpaces the rest — Chuck digs deep to review this updated T-Rex set.
- [REVIEW] LEGO Disney 43245 The Magical Madrigal House – Family fun — Bre reviews the latest set from Disney’s Encanto… singing not included.
- [NEWS] LEGO unveils 2-in-1 Legend of Zelda set; pre-orders open now — Zelda fans finally have something to be excited about, 2 versions of the iconic tree.
- [REVIEW] LEGO Creator 3-in-1 31153 Modern House: Posh digs for the modern fig? — Chuck reviews this fancy modern house to rate how it stacks up.
- [NEWS] United24 launches five new custom LEGO models of Ukrainian landmarks to support reconstruction in Ukraine — 5 new LEGO models are a tribute to Ukrainian landmarks from builders around the world.
In other LEGO-related news:
- A large area has burned down in Legoland: – It is a sad day for all of us – [Jv.dk] — A part of Miniland burned down on the night of Wednesday. The employees are sad, and the coming days and weeks will tell if the area needs to be rebuilt.
- LEGO Minifigures take over Auckland Museum in new exhibition – [Mindfood.com] — Opening Wednesday 29 May, the exhibition showcases miniature civilisations created using LEGO, housed inside forgotten vintage treasures.