What is a Catbus? Well, it’s a cat that’s a bus of course! This particular Catbus has been crafted by CK Tsang and is an excellent depiction of Catbus at this scale. Catbus is a character from the classic anime movie My Neighbor Totoro by legendary Japanese director Hayao Miyazaki. The wide grinning smile and bright ‘headlight’ eyes are perfectly captured in this build. Don’t worry about the lack of a door, as one of those windows will elongate should you want to climb aboard for a ride.
I hope you have kept February 2017 clear on your calendar. We got a new trailer today for The LEGO Batman Movie, and it does not disappoint. The LEGO Batman Movie stars Will Arnett as Batman, Ralph Fiennes as Alfred, and Michael Cera as Robin. You can catch it in theaters February 10, 2017.
In case you missed it, LEGO will be releasing sets along with the movie, many of which were revealed at New York Comicon.
[Update] LEGO has also announced two new LEGO Batman Movie sets this morning. They will be available in January.
70900 The Joker Balloon Escape, 124 pieces, $14.99 USD
70908 The Scuttler, 775 pieces, $79.99 USD
For any minifigs on the run after stealing $40,000 from their boss, there is finally some good news! The members of Brickstons Group (Pepi Blas, Emiliano Martinez, Jose Luis de la Fuente, and Alfonso Abeger) have created a LEGO Bates Motel from Alfred Hitchcock’s iconic film Psycho and it is open for business. What a perfect place to lay low and avoid the police.
The builders based the design of the house off of the original drawings used in the film. And the Brickstons Group even built furniture for each motel room and the office. I wonder if there are any taxidermied birds in there? Of course, the recreated shower scene in black and white looks great. Check out even more photos of this great build on Flickr.
We’ve seen many great LEGO renditions of ED-209 from RoboCop in a variety of scales, but none this small. Grantmasters has managed to make both the hulking robot as well as RoboCop himself using only a handful of pieces. We don’t have an official count but it looks to be under a dozen of LEGO’s smallest pieces.
If you’re still in the mood for microscale ‘bots, check out this equally small AT-ST.
LEGO’s crowd-sourced Ideas platform is on a roll this year, with sets and news coming in rapid succession. Early this year we reviewed the 21305 Maze, and learned that the Apollo 11 Saturn V and Adventure Time characters will become sets. At the beginning of this month, LEGO announced the Old Fishing Store, and we reviewed the 21307 Caterham Seven 620R at its launch a few weeks ago. Now, 21306 The Beatles Yellow Submarine is available on The LEGO Shop. The set will retail for $59.99 USD and contains 550 pieces.
UPDATE: 21306 LEGO Beatles Yellow Submarine is out now!
Click to read our full hands-on review
This Nightmare Before Christmas LEGO creation by Cesar Soares looks like it came straight out of Tim Burton’s head. Mimicking the opening of the movie, this vignette is done in mostly black and white and it packs a lot of detail into a seemingly simple design. It’s got Mjolnir cobblestones, an eerie lamppost, and even pumpkin heads impaled on the fence spikes!
But of course, the real stars of this build are the perfectly proportioned figures: Jack Skellington and the Mayor of Halloween Town (aka, the original good cop/bad cop). The Mayor even comes with his “Mayor-mobile.” The proportions on this hearse are spookily good. If you’ve seen the movie before you’ll remember the car’s Dr. Seuss-like loudspeaker and the black cat hood ornament (which lets out a yowl siren when you crank the tail).
Well, I think it is time to bust out my old VHS collection so I can watch this movie.
It’s about a week till the general release of the latest Marvel superhero movie Doctor Strange. The plot of the movie still is a mystery, so the LEGO set 76060 Doctor Strange’s Sanctum Sanctorum is a perfect chance to get a hint at what may unfold on the big screen. This medium-sized set was released in August and was marked as a limited offer both in the US and Canada. The set contains 358 pieces and 3 minifigures, for the price of $29.99.
While Tom Bombadil is an overlooked character in the Lord of the Ring films, this LEGO rendition of his home is too good to let slip by without mention. legostrator has given us a colorful woodland scene, with the character in question front and center. The house itself is quite wonderful and full of color.
The combination of finger hinges and minifig hands gives a nice texture to the roof, while the different methods for the siding on the house make it visually interesting. Barrels in the corners are easy to miss! I particularly love the spindly tree to the right of the house. The lady’s dress is lovely, too!
This LEGO portrait of Frankenstein’s monster by David Alexander Smith employs a nifty negative-space technique to create a classic movie-poster feel. The lurching lines lend an air of misshapen monstrosity to the face, and the monotone palette imitates the harsh lighting of ancient horror flicks.
A few weeks ago we featured a lovely, fully posable LEGO Judy Hopps from Zootopia by talented Russian builder Sheo. I was hoping he’d also build Nick Wilde and some of the other charming characters from the movie, and my wish has now been granted. Nick’s expression is excellent, and the subtle sculpting of Nick’s shirt — a combination of System pieces and Technic panels — is particularly marvelous.
Here are Nick and Judy together, showing their relative scale.
If you like this one, check out this other LEGO Nick Wilde by Jordan Schwartz.
The X-Wing has been the subject of several great LEGO builds and official sets over the years. Add to the line-up this minifigure-scaled version built by Inthert, which is not just highly detailed on the exterior paneling. Hiding underneath this paneling are various wires, hoses, and other detail bits throughout the fuselage, cockpit, and one engine and laser in a sectioned view.
Built in black and very, very dark grey, Haeundaddy, whose Kaneda’s bike from Akira we featured a couple days ago, has created a version of the UCS Batpod that will definitely please the Dark Knight. The Batpod is Batman’s escape vehicle integrated into the Tumbler — highly manoeuvrable, but leaves Batman somewhat exposed without the Tumbler’s armour.
Haeundaddy has included the important weaponry with dual front-mounted cannons, machine guns and grappling hooks. The Batpod is all about manoeuvrability so check out that steering mechanism, apparently all under the control of Batman’s broad shoulders. That’s real power steering!
