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[You can click on the pictures to enlarge them] I had been planning to do this review for weeks, but the actual release of Rogue One : A Complicated Title A Star Wars Story forced me to stop procrastinating and actually write this review. General information : Set name : Imperial Death Trooper Set number : 75121 Number of parts : 106 Age range : 8-14 Price : 24.99€ / 24.99$ / 19,99£ Release date : September 30th 2016 Links : brickset / bricklink Packaging : The box of the Imperial Death Trooper has the same size as most of the "medium"-sized boxes (the other ones are thinner, and some, like Darth Vader and General Grievous' boxes are bigger). The front shows our Death Trooper on a beach, drinking a cocktail standing in front of flames and impact marks. It's probably (SPOILER ALERT) the planet Scarif. As usual, there are the Lego, Star Wars, Buildable Figures and Disney logos, as well as the recommended age range, and the set name and number (and that's all, since I have a European box). The back also shows the Lego, Star Wars, Buildable Figures and Disney logos and the set number, but more importantly gives us some information about the figure's size and its weapons : a missile-launcher blaster rifle, and, apparently, a SE-14 pistol. The side looks good too (at least one of the sides, since the other one shows mostly safety-related writings nobody reads), since it gives us a nice shot of the character (as well as, guess what, Star Wars and Lego logos). The boxes of the January 2016 wave already had these "character shots" on the side, and it looks like the 2017 sets will have them too. If you already own a Star Wars Buildable Figure, you won't be surprised to see the helmet of the Death Trooper shown at its actual size. And, again, the Lego, Star Wars and Disney logos. The content : Let's open the box, shall we ! Inside, we find Lego, Star Wars and Disney logos, Lego, Star Wars and Disney logos everywhere ! Okay, not really. There are three bags of parts (plus one separate bag for the helmet), a big CCBS body frame, the building instructions, and a transparent plastic sheet on which the pauldron is printed. I didn't know how Lego would do the pauldron, so I was surprised to see this plastic sheet. Fortunately, it was not damaged. The building instructions : The cover of the building instructions is basically the same artwork as the front of the box. There's then a warning page about the spring-loaded missile launcher, and a kid sorting his parts. Then come the actual building instructions, followed bar the parts list, and two pages showing the first three Rogue One Buildable Figures, including K-2SO who... dances ? The booklet ends with the traditional WIN page, this time sponsored by a Clockwork Robot minifig. The complete building instructions are available here. The parts : It's no surprise that you'll find a lot of black parts with the Death Trooper. There are, however, a few new ones : The helmet, the thigh shell (which he / she (hey, we don't know if our Death Trooper is a man or a woman, or if it's even a human) shares with the two other sets of the 2H2016 wave) and the pauldron are brand new parts. The torso shell, one of the two shoulderpads (the second is plain) and the 1x3 flat tiles have new printed decorations. Hooray for printing parts ! The round 1x1x1 bush appears in black for the first time. Here's a more detailed view of some of those parts : -Thigh shell Size-wise, it's close to some of the biggest CCBS shells, like the #8 shell, or the 2.0 torso armor. It's however much smoother and curved. We notice, though, that the position of the holes regarding the ball socket is different on these parts : there are three modules between the ball socket and the holes, VS only one module for the other parts. This part comes in black in each set of the 2016 Rogue One wave, but it will be available in more colors next year. - The torso shell : We have here the usual Star Wars torso armor, with a sand blue and silver pattern. However, although it's the third time we see this part in black, it's actually the first time it's used to represent an actual armor, and not a piece of cloth as in Luke Skywalker and Kylo Ren. The pattern is rather simple, which could make this part more useful for MOCcing. Unlike the currently available minifig version of the character (which you can see here), the armor doesn't have grenades attached near the stomach. It seems that there are two variants of the suits (perhaps depending on the rank of the soldier), one with the grenades and the pauldron, but without the "scope" on the side of the helmet, and another one without the grenades and the pauldron, but with the visor (the minifigs in the Imperial Trooper Battle Pack, for example, don't have the grenades nor the pauldron). This Death Trooper seems to be a blend of these two versions, unless a third one exists. Perhaps the designers of this set had to work with preliminary artwork, or perhaps did they take some freedom from the actual armor to make the set more interesting. - The shoulderpad : One of the two shoulderpad has a simple grey pattern printed on it. If you look closely, you'll see my reflection. - The helmet : To put it simply, the helmet of the Death Trooper is magnificent ; some details are printed, and some are molded. There is some kind of scope on the left side of the helmet. Again, this detail exists on some variants of the armor, but is absent from some other ones. It might sound surprising, but the helmet is actually made from (at least) three parts, two of which are dark green (one of them in particular is used for the visor). Because of that, the ball socket is dark green, and not black like the rest of the helmet. There are no sitckers in this Death Trooper ! Subsequently, the three 1x3 flat tiles (which represent here small pockets) are printed. The pattern seems to be faithful to the design seen in the movie. - The pauldron : In the movie, some Death Troopers ("Specialists", if I believe another toymaker) wear a wide pauldron that seems to be made from leather. We're more used to see fabric on Constraction Sets, but Lego chose to use here flexible plastic. At least you can't complain about the lack of opacity of the part. The pauldron is printed on a sheet of transparent plastic, then pre-cut. The build : If you have already built a Star Wars Constraction set (I think of sets such as Captain Phasma, but also Obi-Wan Kenobi, Luke Skywalker or Kylo Ren), of if you have seen the building pictures above, the building won't be much of a surprise. The only true originality can be seen in the way of attaching the pauldron (which could be difficult for the younger builders), which we first attach at the left shoulder, then at the neck with two holes. Some could find difficult to finish the building without leaving fingerprints everywhere. That's the problem with black Lego parts ! The complete set : The Death Trooper is tall, very tall. It's mostly due to his / her (too ?) long legs. As you can see here, removing the friction add-ons of the ankles partially solves the issue. In the future, some new kind of foot with a ballcup with rubber inserts could be useful. The new thigh shell help making the character smoother, but cause two problems : they limit the range of motion of the knee, and leave the inside of the thigh visible (I asked my brother, who's 11, and it's the first thing he noticed). The arms are also limited at the elbow. Even if it's not the first time it happens, it's a bit of a shame, because they can prevent making poses where the Death Trooper is holding the blaster rifle with two hands properly (added to the fact that the pockets add some thickness to the torso and limit the poses with the blaster even more). By the way, be careful if you want to make poses where the Trooper holds his blaster with two hands, you could unwillingly activate the mechanism and shoot yourself in the eye (or loose the missile, or scare your pet... yeah, one of those things happened to me). Getting back to the articulations, the pauldron follows the movement of the arm very well, and doesn't limit the movement of the shoulder at all. The pistol is designed to be able to be attached on the side of the leg, but the handle is slightly too long. Solve this would either require a new part, or completely remake the pistol (which I haven't been able to do, but I can't say I tried too hard). There's also a weapon on the left arm, since it's equipped with three small guns, cleverly made with claws for minifig. It's brilliant ! It's a simple, yet very effective solution. The back of the character is quite simple, with the usual cylinder near the bottom (I've never understood what they were used for), and a wide CCBS shell covering most of the back. Conclusion : The Death Trooper is an interesting set... if you stop at the waist. The legs are too long, poorly articulated (compared to the previous sets), and have been seen on many others sets before (new leg shell aside, of course). The helmet is splendid, and the character is very well armed, but in the end, the set seems bland. Its main flaw, I think, is that it belongs to the third wave of Star Wars constraction sets, and thus hardly brings novelty after the twelve sets based on the other movies released previously. Parts-wise, we don't get a lot of novelty either, although the quality of the new parts and prints makes up for their quantity. However, most of the parts are black, and with a similar inventory, we could prefer Kylo Ren, especially since he has a mechanism (like Jyn Erso and K-2SO, the two other sets of the first Rogue One wave). Now, here's a shot of my Imperial forces :

REVIEW - 42024 - CONTAINER TRUCK One of the first images of the 1H 2014 sets which appeared was the 42024 Container Truck. It's is what you'd call a skip truck. A skip is a large open-topped waste container designed for loading onto a special type of lorry. Instead of being emptied into a garbage truck on site, a skip is removed, or replaced by an empty skip, and then tipped at a landfill site or transfer station. As usual the first opinions where very divided, varying from great looking truck to looks unfinished and ranging from color vomit to I love the colors. My first thought was that the cab indeed looked a bit unfinished, but the color scheme, although having a lot of primary colors, did appeal to me. Luckily I had the opportunity of reviewing this set, so let's find out what it's all about! Note: Pictures where taken with a Canon EOS 600D (18-55mm kit lens). Every image can be clicked to show a high resolution version. 360 DEGREE VIEW For this review there is a 360 degree view available. Unfortunately I cannot embed it here on Eurobricks, so I've created a support page for this. Please note that this 360 view is experimental and not yet as I would like it to be. First I tried a big rotating home made turntable, but the results weren't fantastic. Then I came up with the idea to make a Technic PF stand, which works better. The bottom of the stand needs to be upgraded, probably using white studded Lego (with SNOT, studs not on top) to make it look better. And I am contemplating making an NXT version, so I can hook it up to a computer. When I manage to get my own software communicating with the camera, I can fully automate the process. There's even the possibility to do multi-row, so you can rotate up and down to change the vertical view angle. Anyway, check it out further in this review! Loading can take a while since it's 42 images, totalling 16MB of data. SET INFORMATION Set Number: 42024 Title of Set: Container Truck Theme: Technic Released: 1H 2014 Part Count: 948 Box Weight: 800 gr Set Price (MSRP): DE 69.99 EUR / UK 59.99 GBP / USA 79.99 USD Price per Part: DE 0.074 EUR / UK 0.063 GBP / USA 0.084 USD THE BOX The box measures 48cm x 28cm x 9cm. It's the same width and height as the 42023 Construction Crew box, but slightly thicker, 9cm instead of 7cm. The set does have more parts, so it makes sense. FRONT SIDE The front side shows the truck, loaded with the container and in the upper right corner it's shows some functions, like extending the outriggers and tipping the container to empty it. BACK SIDE The back side shows that the container can be emptied or it can be removed to replace it with an empty one. It also shows the optional Power Functions setup. B-MODEL ROAD GRADER The back side also shows a fairly detailed image of the B-model, a Road Grader. There's a 2-in-1 sign and a reference to the building instructions, which can be found online. CONTENTS OF THE BOX Opening the box reveals seven unnumbered bags, a sticker sheet and two booklets. The set doesn't contain a card board back for the instructions, like the flagship sets do. The booklets and sticker sheet are in near mint condition. The instructions are divided over two booklets. Opening the bags and collecting the liftarms provides the color vomit people have refered to. Luckily things where sorted out pretty quickly. This set contains a nice collection of liftarms, perfect for young or starting builders. HIGHLIGHTED PARTS The set contains some new 2014 parts and some existing parts in new colors. 49.5 x 20 TIRE Already mentioned in my Construction Crew review, which has these tires as well, and I quote: 2014 would be a year in which new tires would be released. Well, here they are. These tires are perfectly suited for smaller scale vehicles. They use the same rims as the Tire 43.2 x 22 ZR, but as you can see the diameter is 49.5mm instead of 43.2mm. This provides a more realistic proportion, especially suitable for trucks and construction vehicles. Basically they are small Unimog like tires. Big thumbs up for TLG! 5L Axle with Stop One of the new parts for 2014 is the 5L Axle with Stop (or Axle 5 With Stop), basically the same part as the 4L Axle with Stop only one unit longer and in dark tan (looks like normal tan in this picture) color. BIONICLE CHAIN LINK SECTION Not a new part, but never seen in a Technic set before, is this very nice looking Bionicle Chain Link. My guess is that these will sell a lot more on Bricklink, starting today. 1x6 THIN LIFTARM This is a very rare part since it has only be released in one set, the 8457 Power Puller from 2000. No more 3 to 6 bucks a pop for a new one on Bricklink. 1x5 THIN LIFTARM WITH AXLE HOLES Already present in some of the 2013 sets, but still this fairly new part is worth to mention. 5x11 PANEL PATE IN BLUE The 5x11 Panel Plate has been around for a while, but never in Blue! It seems blue is getting special attention this year, so here it is. Next to it is a picture of all the panels included in this set. PART LIST This set contains 948 parts and then some. THE BUILD The build starts with the front of the truck. A 1x7 Gear Rack is used for steering the front wheels, much like the 8109 Flatbed Truck. The front part of the truck, located below the cab, is starting to take shape. The axle for HoG steering is clearly visible. After the front section, the gear box will be built. This gear box is not used to drive a fake engine, but it's used for driving the two main functions (besides steering), and switching between them. The two functions are operating the boom and extending the outriggers. Here you can clearly see the two new 5L Axles with Stop which will be connected to the Linear Actuator in one of the next steps. The LA's are used to operate the boom, for raising/lowering and emptying the bucket. The Technic Cam is connected to the Technic Changeover Catch which will switch between operating the boom and operating the outriggers. Building the gearbox almost takes up every gear in this set. At the rear (which is on the left side in this picture) the Mini Linear Actuator is visible. This is used to operate the outriggers. Switching between functions is done at the front of the truck, near the cab. To transfer controls from the gearbox to the front, the mechanism shown below is used. Movement of the lever is limited by the 18x8mm wheels with fake bolts. This image shows the end of the first booklet. Stickers are applied on each side, to explain the functions and switching between them. The functions are activated by turning the Black 12T Double Bevel Gear at the right side of the truck. It's not the easiest way to operate, since turning the gear is quite cumbersome. And you need to turn it a lot to fully extend the boom. The second booklet starts with building the cab. The picture below shows the finished grill. It's your average joe truck grill, nothing out of the ordinary, but it looks okay. The license plate reads CU11014. As far as I know there aren't any designers with the initials CU, so it remains a mystery what this plate means. Some have suggested it might be the release date, See You in 2014 10th of January. If anyone knows the actual meaning, let me know! With the grill attached the cab, the truck is almost done. The seats are grey for a change, not the commonly used blue seats. The doors of the truck can be opened manually. This picture shows the steering wheel in a vertical position. Obviously it needs to be tilted a bit to have some angle. Otherwise, steering this truck would be quite a challenge. The next two pictures show the finished model, without the container. I must admit that the truck looks way better, than in the first box image. The cab doesn't look that unfinished anymore. It is a very simple can though. For starters, an extra liftarm could have been used to fill the gaps at the back sides of the truck, behind the doors, like in the 42008 Service Truck. So the cab is not bad, yet relatively simple. There is indeed a (yellow) 5x11 Panel Plate at the back of the cab, as some suggested. And there are two 4L Thin Liftarms which will be used to hold the battery box, when operated by Power Functions. MISCELLANEOUS BUILDING STEPS CONTAINER After finishing the truck, the skip (container) is left to build. Liftarm galore, if you will. The build is pretty straightforward, connecting pins to liftarms....and more liftarms. The back of the container shows two 3x3 L-Shape Thin Liftarms which are used to tilt the skip, when emptying. Here you can see the Bionicle Chain Links attached to the sides of the container. The chains are attached to an axle which is attached to the boom. That way the container can freely rotate when emptying or replacing it. The color combination of blue and grey, combined with the stickers, does make this container look very realistic. I like it!! PARTS LEFT I am still wondering whether I missed using two friction pins and two 3/4 pins. FINISHED MODEL Like most Technic models, this one looks better in real life than in pictures. The colors are very vibrant and having three different colors for the cab, loading bed and the skip is pretty common on a skip truck. The use of different primary colors actually improves this model. Otherwise it might look a bit dull. The yellow Axle Connector with Axle Hole is used to switch between operating the boom and operating the outriggers. The stickers show the corresponding action for the position of the lever. Looking at this picture, reminds me of a movie quote from Falling Down (1993) with Michael Douglas: "Can anybody tell me what's wrong with this picture?". Well, can you? Although being a simple compact cab, it does look good on this truck. At the back you can see the mechanism used to tilt the container when emptying it. The 4L axle between the two 3x3 L-Shape Thin Liftarms on the truck will be stuck behind the Perpendicular Double Split Axle and Pin Connector which will tilt the container when operating the boom. With the outriggers fully extented, the skip won't tilt when operating the boom. Instead the container can move freely and therefor be put on the ground behind the truck. Replacing the container takes a lot of manual turns. It's nice to have optional Power Functions, but I would almost say it's mandatory for having some playability in this set. This picture shows the bottom of the truck, where you can see most of the functionality in place, switch lever, operating gear, mini LA, part of the gear box and steering rack. Chck out this cool 360 degree view of this model. You can swipe from left to right to rotate. Loading can take a while since it's 42 images, totalling 16MB of data. MISCELLANEOUS PICTURES OF FINISHED MODEL SUMMARY So what do I think of this model. I am halted between two opinions. First of all this set does look great. It's vibrant colors do this model justice. Compared to the 8109 Flatbed Truck and the 42008 Service Truck the new tires are way better for building in this scale. Secondly, the new tires and some new parts are introduced. In my opinion these parts are not as interesting as the ones in the 42023 Construction Crew set. Unless your name is Conchas and you really need those blue panels for your Dunechaser. So it all depends on your needs. Besided opening the doors and HoG steering, this set offers two main functions: Operating the boom Extending the outriggers Operating both functions by hand is very cumbersome. It takes a lot of turning until the boom is fully extended and the container is on the ground. For having actual playability using Power Functions seems mandatory. I hate to start a Linear Actuator vs Pneumatics discussion again, but Pneumatics might have enhanced the playability. Obviously this would have been hard, since both functions use LA's but when emptying the container, the LA's aren't fully extended. So I do understand why LA's have been used. Somehow it feels that this set might have been better with pneumatics instead of LA's. So I do like this set, but it is missing a clever mechanism, like the 8109 Flatbed Truck to make it a great set. PROS Authentic looks New tires Lots of liftarms in different colors (great for starting builders) Power Functions optional (which reduces the price) CONS Operating the outriggers and boom is cumbersome without Power Functions Cab design is very simple New parts have very specific use No wow factor anywhere in the build SCORE Design 8: When fully built, it does look great. Build 7: Nothing spectacular. No wow factor. Functionality 7: Besides HoG steering, two main functions, which is okay. Playability 7: Operating the outriggers and boom needs Power Functions. Parts 7: Some new, yet very specific, parts. Does have new tires. Value for Money 7: Average value for money. Might be valuable, depending on your needs. 7,2 A Bit Too Average For Greatness Thank you for reading! And special thanks to Bonaparte and TLG for giving me the opportunity of reviewing this set Please rate this set at the top of this topic! All review images can be found on my Flickr page.

Thanks to HispaBrick Magazine, I was given the opportunity to review the latest release from the Arvo Brothers: Alien Project. You may know the Arvo Brothers from their gorgeous MOCs, or from their previous book on the Kaneda's Bike from the manga/anime Akira. Obviously, this book is all about their model of the Alien, from the Alien's movies franchise. It is divided in four chapters: Estimations, Construction of the model, Instructions and Gallery. 1. The Book The book itself is a very nice object, with a hard cover and 220 full colors pages with lots of pictures and artwork. I'm sure it can appeal not only to the AFOLs, but also to Alien movies' fans (tested and confirmed). You can view more detailled shots of the book on the Arvo Brothers' Flickr album. 2. Estimations and Construction The first two chapters are my favorites. They show the efforts needed to plan and build such a model... while writing a book about it. From size and scale determination to choices of parts, there is a lot to learn on how a model of this size and quality is designed. There is a nice blueprint of the model that indicate all its sizes. 48cm tall and 20cm width, we can say that it's a relatively big creature, not as much as the real model from the movies, but still I wouldn't like to cross one of these in a dark corridor... Why use these parts and not these ones? All is explained in this quite interesting chapter. Each section of the model is also lengthly commented. It's always nice to read what a designer (or two) think of his own model. This is maybe my favorite page of the book. It's the chronology of the 20 months of the project. 3. Instructions This may be the only reason for people to buy this book: the instructions. Sadly I'm not able to build the stand or the creature, but I can still give my impressiosn on the instructions themselves! And I must say that they are amazing. Throughout the 24 pages for the base and 116 pages for the Alien, the steps are pretty easy to follow, and for the more complex ones, the builder is guided with visual indications like brick outlines, studs connections highlights, guiding dashed lines or combinations of them. There are also alternates builds for hard to find parts. The Alien is composed of 1526 bricks, and the base of 466. By my standards it's not a very high amount of bricks, and since most part aren't rare, it's not an important investment if you want to build the model. The catalogue is maybe the weakest point of the book. Not for its design or content, but because you'll have to manually convert it to something like a Bricklink wanted list. But this is perfectly understandable as you'll have to buy the book if you want to have a look at the part inventory Nevermind, Missing Brick confirmed that the book come with a part list in electonic form that can then be used on Bricklink! 4. Gallery The book ends with some beautiful pictures of the model. If you still weren't amazed by the creature when you reach page 197, I'm sure those shots will convince you! 5. Conclusion This book is a lot more than just instructions for a model. It's a journey from the genesis of a project to its completion, detailling every steps from the drawing board to the photography studio. It shows that what we AFOLs do is not just playing with children plastic toys, it is Art. If you want to learn more about the project, if you want to build this model, if you want to convince a friend or a relative that you're not just playing with toys, I encourage you to get a copy of this book while it's still available! You can grab a copy from the Arvo Brothers website. And don't forget to visit their Flickr or Facebook accounts. I'd like to thanks again HispaBrick Magazine for providing me a copy of the book, and I'd also like to sincerely apologize for all the time it took me to finally post that review.

In my ongoing quest for providing decent pictures and slightly more info on things I think others would like to buy, I present this topic where I'll spotlight Saber Scorpion's Minifigure Decals. *Just a heads up that this will be an on-going review. I ordered a little pile of decals and gear but haven't gotten all the body parts for them yet, so I'll post updates as things get done. Here's the TL;DR version for everyone who just wants to look at pictures and are happy just browsing SS's Flickr: Are the decals good? Yes! Should you buy?: Yes! In this order I got: 1 x Alien Invasion Colony Marine 1 x Brickarms M41A Pulse Rifle 1 x Brickarms Space Magnum Pistol (Black) 1 x Brickarms XRG Railgun (Gunmetal) 1 x BrickWarriors Android Armor (Steel) 1 x BrickWarriors Desert Vulture (Charcoal) 1 x BrickWarriors Galaxy Enforcer HELMET (Red) 1 x Decals AI NM Police Officers 1 x Decals AI Zero Grav Suit (Orange) 1 x Decals AI-S4 Heavy (Female) 1 x Decals AI-S41 Female AI 1 x Decals AI-S41 Officers 1 x Decals SE-S1 Female Medium Armor (DarkBlue) 1 x Decals SE-S3 Human Female (DarkRed) 1 x Decals SE-S3 Main Character (Commander Female) 1 x Decals SE-S3 Main Character (Engineer) So if you want pictures of any of that stuff just let me know. ========================================= Alrighty, first up is a Police dude from the Alien Invasion Series 4 section: Riot Police Dude by Henchmen4Hire, on Flickr TIP #1: Face decals may make it difficult to use helmets without ruining the decal! After applying the decal, the helmet wouldn't go on without completely scraping it off. You may have to grind away a little plastic from the inside of the helmet to get it to fit safely. Not being too experienced with applying decals to minifigures, I started off with the Police decals because there are 4 of them on a strip so it's not a total loss if I screwed it up. They're also pretty cheap costing roughly less than a dollar per chest/face/shoulders set. I love those shades. B-) Is it obvious that the figure has a decal? Believe it or not, this depends mostly on the lighting and viewing angle. The decals are printed on glossy sticker paper, there are angles at which the custom minifig looks official. You can usually tell there's a decal there when the decal isn't reflecting, it simply looks like a crisp paper decal. Hold the figure an inch from your face and you can tell there's a decal there, put it on your shelf a foot away and you'll never be able to tell. How durable are these decals? They're as durable as a regular paper sticker. I wouldn't recommend you give a decal'd figure to kids or throw them in a parts bin, anything with a hard edge that bumps into the decal will leave a permanent dent. How easy are they to apply? As simple as peel and stick, BUT, you have to be careful! I ran into a few speed bumps while practicing on the Police guy, but felt confident enough to work on the female Commander from the Star Explorers Series (pictured below right). The red decals are "Human Female" in Dark Red from the same series. Yes, for the most part you can choose what colors you want the decals to be! Human Female (Dark Red) & Female Commander by Henchmen4Hire, on Flickr These are some snazzy designs, I already cut out the Commander's arm, legs, and face at this point. You only need an X-acto blade or a small pair of really, really sharp scissors to get things moving. If you think your scissors are sharp enough, you're wrong, sharpen them more! Dull scissors will cause snags and kinks in the decals as you cut them out. Cutting them out neatly is the hardest part, not much advice I can give, just keep your hands steady and have good lighting so you can see the edges. Once you've neatly cut them out it's time to move on! Coloring Edges by Henchmen4Hire, on Flickr TIP #2: Paint the edges with whatever the appropriate color is. The edges of the decals will be white because they're printed on white paper, these white edges will be noticeable even after applied to the figure. To get rid of them, simply run a marker along the edge of the decal (while the backing is still on, for rigidity). Use a marker that releases a little bit of ink at a time, you just want to color the edge, not let it seep deep into the decal itself. I'm using an old inking pen you can find at any art store. Detaching Backing by Henchmen4Hire, on Flickr TIP #3: Use a dull knife to separate the decal from the backing, DON'T USE YOUR FINGERS! If you use your fat fingers to try to peel off the backing you're just going to accidentally dent or warp the decal. Instead, use a thin dull knife to wedge between the backing and decal, this has worked flawlessly for me so far. If you use a sharp knife you risk shredding the decal! Female Commander Arm Decals by Henchmen4Hire, on Flickr TIP #4: Use something round to press over the edges and get rid of creases. Sometimes you'll get little creases along the edge of shoulder decals because of the rounded shape, use something round to roll over the creases and flatten them. Also roll over the edges of the decal to firmly stick them down. Remember to ROLL, not RUB. Rubbing may rub off the printing. The decals look very good, take your time when cutting them to get clean sharp edges. Here's how our fearless leader is looking so far: Female Commander WIP by Henchmen4Hire, on Flickr TIP #5: Cut a little bit extra off the top and bottom of the face decals. You don't HAVE to, but cutting off an extra 1 mm seemed to reduce the chance that a helmet would scrape the face off. I guess it has less of a chance of snagging on the decal's edge this way. I have to paint the helmet (only red/blue available from Saber Scorpion's shop) and switch the torso, annoyingly this torso decided to crack while taking pictures. On the up side, the Galaxy Enforcer Helmet fit neatly over the face decal with no modding needed. Much praise to the designers if the inside was slightly enlarged specifically to fit over decals, if not, good on ya anyway. I'll use the remaining helmet decal for something else most likely. By the way, I totally applied the knee pieces upside-down the first time, I carefully peeled them off and fixed them with very little trouble and no damage! TIP #6: Don't pick your nose while working with decals! Don't let the decals get wet or greasy, they'll be ruined. Now I'm off to make some more curved torsos, will post updates.

Hello! What do you think about this set? Thanks for watching!

So, this is my, uh first MOC Review, here goes... Danil03's Technic Buggy MOC Review So to start, here is the original video of his MOC. Note it is tested mostly indoors, for later reference. Also note my version has minor changes based on the parts I have, but nothing that largely impacts it, except for changing the B-pillars form 2L connectors to 3L connectors. He released instructions shortly after I found this, so I knew I had to build it. I soon decided to turn it into a review as well. The build starts with front suspension: Then the middle: Engine and rear suspension: The chassis is completed: It is extremely strong and has barely any torsional flex. Beginning body: Totally completed: The instructions are very clear and easy to follow, apart from having to pause it every step, because it is a video. However sometimes you put a piece on and later it is on another spot, that connects to where it originally was, so that can be a bit confusing. There is a lot to be learned about chassis rigidity, however the suspension moves horizontally as well as vertically due to lots of slack. Suspension: Lots of travel but also moves horizontally, which is bad. When tested outdoors, the CV joints came out but we all know they do that, so I'm not blaming the model. But the top and bottom A-Arms can move away from each other because of the way they are attached, which is by a thin 5L liftarm with axle holes and frictionless axle pins. Drive: works well and fast despite gearing down. When outdoor testing the diffs (I believe it was the diffs) grinded and CV joints came out. Body: very cool styling, but uses a lot of connectors. I ran out so I had to borrow some from other sets. There are 3# connectors which are connected to axles at the back which I changed to these: I also changed the 2L connectors on the B-Pillars to 3L connectors. Offroad test: It didn't work well, but it was tough terrain and the battery was low, so it wasn't completely the model's fault. Power: 1 XL-Motor, 1 Servo Motor, 1 set of PF Lights, SBrick, Minizip cable for 9V battery. -FINAL VERDICT- A MOC that is easy to build, looks cool, works well, but not offroad. At the end of the day it is just a toy, so that is expected. Looks: 9/10 Performance: 8/10 Instructions: 9.5/10 Recommended? Yes, if you drive indoors.

So I bought these aircraft sets. Wange JX001, 002, 003. They're pretty neat. Quality is decent. They sort of lean toward model kit, a little, with those specialized parts. I bought them specifically for those, wanted to accessorize my MOCs with weird wings and stuff, and for that they're pretty much perfect. They're built at different scales, but the not-quite-minifigs are the same; clearly, the Chinese military is breeding a race of supersized supersoldiers. I wonder if the President knows about this. Anyways, first the jet, JX003, manual says it's a J20 heavy stealth fighter. I actually really like this. Solid, swooshable, I think it looks neat, especially those angled tailplanes. Landing gear is fixed - in fact all three use the same landing gear - and there's an opening missile bay with two missiles. Also a retractable taillight. In trans-neon-green, for reasons foreign and mysterious to me. Next, JX002, a WZ10 gunship. .....yeah Its action features include scaring small children with its face, spinning rotors and bits falling off. It's not a very good set. These things are not Lego quality, in general, and the construction of this one shows it: the layered plates add up to where parts show gaps, there are several weak connections, the cannon just sort of flops around on a turntable, and the wings are attached just by this 1x4 bit. Better design could have allowed full minifigs but noooooo. It is at least a very nice supply of unusual parts: The minifigs have little Lego Racers style bodies, the heads/helmets being slightly more narrow than Lego parts. All parts are printed, there are no stickers. Friction pins are light gray and frictionless, white. There're some interesting pieces here, I think, including 1x2 plates with studs on both sides. These are equal in thickness to Lego plates, each set comes with a bunch. JX003 bits: Also some useful junk. JX001 is some sort of license-built Sukhoi, a carrier-based fighter in the People's Liberation Army Navy Air Force. Heh. It has already been stripped for parts, here are its wings, I haven't bothered to wipe off the markings there, yet. We People's Classic Liberation Space Army now. Also it's an okay photo for showing off color differences. Here's another. Even bluer than bley.... I tend to mix old and new grays deliberately so I personally don't mind very much. Since I'm not posting 001, here's its parts inventory at least. And it's got these neat missiles: Both ends accept Lego parts, the 1x1 cones and trans-red bricks are Lego. The smaller missiles, meanwhile, only have an anti-stud on the back. Both attach to aircraft by this narrow slot, which can accept the edge of a flag piece, the vertical bit of a small 1x2 panel, that sort of thing. The intructions are of decent quality. Parts already placed are in colorless white to avoid drowning in a sea of gray. This isn't Lego quality, but good enough that I've tossed the standard plates and wedges in with Lego and use them interchangeably; the biggest problems are the slightly different color, the blank studs, and now and then the damn hideous injection mold marking whatever it's actually called. I wish I could say I haven't seen worse from Lego, though. Anyway, parts fit together decently, with tight clutch, the models hold together well, and tolerance issues only show up if there's say a bunch of them stacked together, or supporting something that's only hanging on by a 1x2 connection like the gunship's warty nose. Set design could be a lot better. 001 and 002 both have bits that fall off easily. 003 is nice and solid though, and the fit of parts like the 1x6 base of the vertical stabilizer is improved. Maybe that's a running theme? I plan on getting one more anyway - the JX006 Osprey - so I'll find out. That's about it. Thanks for taking a look. If anyone really really really wants those plates with studs on both sides, JX001 is the best purchase, it's got 25.

REVIEW - 75144 - SNOWSPEEDER INTRODUCTION The year is 2005. I am in a toy store looking for the Mindstorms set, unaware of the fact that the average toy store only sells the mainstream retail sets. I go home with a large Technic crane to fullfill my needs, basically ending my dark ages. At that time, the 10129 - Rebel Snowspeeder had been on the market for about 3 years (release date 2003), retailing for around 130 euro. After my dark ages, my passion for LEGO mainly focused on Technic, although I was (and still am) a big fan of Star Wars. To make a long story, I didn't get the Snowspeeder. I even skipped the 10179 - Millennium Falcon, although I'd rather not talk about that. Hopefully I can correct my worst LEGO decision later this year. In the meantime I have been able to correct my Snowspeeder mistake. For me the Snowspeeder (or T-47 Airspeeder) is one of the iconic Star Wars vehicles, together with the beforementioned Millennium Falcon, AT-AT, X-Wing and Tie Fighter. Lots of other cool and well known vehicles can be added to that list, but these probably end up in the Star Wars Top-5. We haven't seen an official UCS AT-AT yet, but the X-Wing and Tie Fighter both have a very cool UCS model. For now, we will be focussing on the 75144 Snowspeeder. Lots of Snowspeeder models have been released over the year, but we're talking UCS here! PICTURES Pictures can be clicked to view hi-res versions. More pictures can be found in my Flickr album. DISCLAIMER This set has been provided by TLG. It's not my goal to promote this set. It's my goal to give you an honest opinion about it. Therefore, the opinion in this review is my own and is in no way linked to TLG. SET INFORMATION Number: 75144 Title: Snowspeeder Theme: Star Wars Released: 2017 Part Count: 1703 Box Weight: 2529 gr Box Dimensions: 57,5 cm x 37,5 cm x 8,0 Set Price (MSRP): £169.99 / $199.99 / €199,99 Price per Part: £0.100 / $0.117 / €0,117 Links: Brickset, Bricklink THE BOX The box is the same size as the box for the Tie Fighter and Slave 1, which seems logical, since these sets share more or less the same part count. The front of the box shows the Snowspeeder in actions, with some AT-AT's in the background. This is reminiscent of the iconic battle scene on the planet Hoth. The front of the box also shows a top-down view of the model. Looking at both images, I am really anxious to start building. BACKSIDE The backside is filled with lots of smaller images, showing all the functions. Apparently, the Snowspeeder has a lot of functionality. Hopefully this will result in some playability. SIDE One of the sides shows the dimensions of the finished model. It will be 30cm wide and 40 cm long, so it will more or less cover two A4 (or Letter) sheets. Unlike the previous UCS Snowspeeder, this set comes with two minifigures, designated Rebel Snowspeeder Pilot and Rebel Snowspeeder Gunner. CONTENTS OF THE BOX After turning over the box, you will find this heap of bags and parts. 1 x Bound book 1 x Sticker sheet 13 x Numbered bag 1 x Black tile 1 x Grey plate SEALED BOOK AND STICKER SHEET STICKER SHEET BOUND BOOK BAGS The box contains 13 bags, numbered from 1 to 13. This means each bag represents a separate step during the build. PLATE AND TILE The tile (16x8) for the UCS plaque and a light bluish grey plate (16x8) are provided loose in the box. HIGHLIGHTED PARTS This section describes the unique and/or highlighted parts. Other than that, this set doesn't contain a lot of special or new parts. WINDSHIELD Like the 10240 - Red Five X-Wing Starfighter, this model introduces a new unique Windshield part. PART LIST Here's the complete part list, consisting of 1703 parts. MINIFIGURES This set contains two minifigures, designated Rebel Snowspeeder Pilot and Rebel Snowspeeder Gunner. Each of the minifigs has two different faces, a grin and a somewhat scared face. Both torsos are identical. The only difference between the minifigs is the type of helmet. THE BUILD The build consists of 13 steps, corresponding to the 13 numbered bags. But before the build commences, there are several pages with lots of cool content about the design process. STEP 1: REAR COCKPIT SECTION The build starts with the rear section of the cockpit and fuselage, using the parts below. The end result of step 1 is shown in the image below. As usual with UCS models there is some color vomit comprising the innards of the model, although it seems to be less vomit than other UCS models. STEP 2: FRONT COCKPIT SECTION Next you will build the front section of the cockpit and fuselage. This is where the front and rear section team up. The hinge in the middle is where the front landing gear is connected. Although "landing gear" is a bit exaggerated. When the front and rear are connected, the cockpit and fuselage are taking shape. This is how the bottom of the fuselage looks. STEP 3: COMPLETING THE FUSELAGE In this step more parts will be added to the fuselage. Upon completion of this step, the cockpit with control panels is almost finished. The front of the cockpit contains two 2x1 slopes and a 2x2 slope. The 2x2 slope, like the ones in the rear, are printed, while the 2x1 slopes are using stickers. You'd expect a UCS model to have printed 2x1 slopes as well. In the rear you can see an axle protruding the fuselage. It's connected to the Hinge Cylinder in the back of the cockpit. This is the mechanism for the gunner to operate the rear mounted gun. STEP 4: COCKPIT INTERIOR AND NOSE You can already see some of the orange parts, used to build the nose of the vehicle. Here's the finished cockpit, where you can clearly see the slopes with and without stickers. The finished fuselage with cockpit and interior. Two seats, one facing forward and one facing rearward, for the pilot and gunner respectively. The front wing is attached to the fuselage using two ball joints. The little side wings need to be positioned when both main wings are finished. At the rear of the cockpit you can see the controls for the rear (harpoon) gun, consisting of a steer and a screen with aim assist. The video below shows the controls for the rear gun in action. STEP 5: UCS STAND Mostly black parts. This can only mean one thing. Yup, it's the stand commonly used for UCS models. STEP 6: BOTTOM WINGS AND AIR BRAKES The paper container is packing two elastic bands. The two bottom wings are attached with hinges, but they are kept in place using elastic bands. I am not a big fan of these bands. They tend to turn brittle after a couple of years. The flaps on the backside are used to manoeuvre the vehicle. STEP 7: RIGHT WING A collection of plates used to build the right wing. The complete wing is pretty big and it has a sturdy feel to it. STEP 8: RIGHT WING LASER AND ENGINE I Parts for building part of the laser and engine. At the rear you can already see the mechanism to operate the air brakes. STEP 9: RIGHT WING LASER AND ENGINE II These parts are used to finish the laser cannons and air brakes. Here you can see the complete right wing. It sure does look cool. The wing is attached using the hinges on the fuselage. STEP 10, 11 AND 12: LEFT WING The next three steps (10, 11 and 12) are (mirrored) duplicates of steps 7, 8 and 9. Except for the 4x2 slope, the left wing is an exact copy of the right wing. Attaching the left wing to the vehicle can be a bit tricky. You need to firmly grip the speeder to be able to attach the wing. This can result in some parts coming loose. When you do succeed, you will see an almost finished model. The video below shows how to operate the air brakes. STEP 13: CANOPY, GUN AND FINS These are the remaining parts to finish the model. They are used to build the Canopy, rear mounted gun and the heat radiator fins. From wookieepedia: Hoth's extreme cold temperatures were too severe for these craft; the power generators would lock up since they ran hot, requiring a large bank of heat radiator fins for essential cooling. Rebel technicians modified the T-47 airspeeder by insulating each radiator fin with side panels to decrease the heat exchange in order to better suit the new environment. The canopy is decorated with several stickers. Although, we obviously would love to see a printed canopy, I find this solution much more elegant than the one used for the X-wing. The rear mounted gun is operated from the cockpit. The canopy can be opened to reveal the interior of the cockpit. The sides of the canopy are made of two large windshields, also found in the Mini. COMPLETED MODEL After several hours of enjoyable building time the model is completed. I absolutely love the looks on this model. Granted, I am a pretty big fan of the T47 Airspeeder. Lots of stickers are used, which is always a point of debate. I'd rather see printed parts on UCS models, even if that means the price will increase. I simply adds value to the model. Here's the completed model placed on its stand. REAR The rear of the vehicle, showing the characteristic cooling fins. The vehicle also looks stunning when seen from the rear. FRONT Two big laser blaster cannons and the peculiar setup of the wings, give this vehicle its distinctive look. SIDE One of the Minifigs is left in the dark. I guess he needs to accept the fact that he is playing the second fiddle. BOTTOM The bottom view where you can clearly see the ice skating minifig accessories. I like this detail, but they tend to fall of easily. And a video: ADDITIONAL Here are some additional pictures for your enjoyment. FEATURES AND FUNCTIONS The Snowspeeder is part of the Ultimate Collector's Series, which mean that it's mostly a display model. This model does however pack a few functions. Canopy opens up, revealing the cockpit Rear set has controls to operate the rear mounted (harpoon) gun Turn laser cannon to operate the air brakes Manually adjustable flaps Manually operated front landing gear B-MODEL There's no B-model for this set, which is in line with the other UCS sets. SUMMARY So, what do I think of this model? Obviously, this version will be compared to the old UCS version and people will ask whether this version is better. I don't think it's really fair to compare both models, given the number of years in between. LEGO has evolved since the previous version, so yeah, this model looks better. Whether it's actually better...I don't know. And to be honest, I don't really care. What I do care about, is that this is a fantastic set! After the Hoth playset of last year, it was time for TLG to release a proper UCS set. This Snowspeeder definitely fits that bill. The build is enjoyable, even though it is somewhat repetitive. After all, three of the 13 steps are duplicates. This didn't botter me at all. If I had to mention something negative, it would be the rubber bands holding the lower part of the wings in place. Oh, and it includes two blaster pistols! PROS Awesome looking iconic model Several functions New canopy part Includes two blaster pistols CONS Attachments (wings etc) are a bit flimsy Elastic bands SCORE How do I rate this set? 9 DESIGN Stunning. 8 BUILDING EXPERIENCE Enjoyable build, although the bottom is somewhat flimsy. 7 FEATURES Acceptable for a UCS display model. 7 PLAYABILITY UCS sets hardly provide any playability, but this set still has some functions. 7 PARTS Contains a wide variety of (mostly) common parts. 9 VALUE FOR MONEY Must have for every fan. 7,8 WORTHY SUCCESSOR FINAL WORDS Below is the official designer video published by TLG.

So the new sets only seem to be available in Hong Kong thus far. I picked up a couple from Toys'R'Us, and have reviewed the first of them on my YouTube channel. I believe this is the first review of this set on YouTube. Not up to the professional standards of Jang and the like, but I hope it's useful for people. LEGO Star Wars 75166 Review - First Order Transport Speeder Battle Pack I'll build and upload videos of 75180 Rathtar Escape, 75182 Republic Fighter Tank and 75186 The Arrowhead over the next few days. Not picked up (and have no particular plans to pick up) any of the other sets.

1:21Lego Forbidden Island 6270 Timelapse Review by JackyWackySmacky 7 views19 hours ago Classic 1989 Forbidden Island review. Hope you enjoy, and I will gladly accept any suggestions/constructive criticism.

Introduction Hi fellow EB members! In this early spring, Lego takes us to a walk on the 5th avenue, New York. The Guggenheim Museum is worldwide known for its art collection as well as for its architecture. I'm not sure what LEGO thinks of art, but I'm sure they're very interested in architecture, and that's why they released the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum as their new set in the Architecture theme! Thanks to EB LUG Ambassador CopMike and the LEGO CEE Team and Designers for giving me the opportunity to review this set! Set information Name: 21035 Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum Theme: LEGO Model Making / Architecture Year: 2017 Pieces: 744 Price: USD 79.99, GBP 64.99, EURO 69.99 Resources: Brickset , BrickLink Packaging The box comes in the usual LEGO Architecture 's black livery, but in an odd almost square shape. It is also quite thick, as there's 744 parts to stuff in. The front shows the full set, proudly standing on blueprints against the black background. On the upper left corner is a rather big LEGO Architecture logo and just under is the name of the set and its location in the world and the set's sizes... Nothing fancy here, just the good old Architecture box! The back of the box has a front shot of the set and a picture of the real buildings and a short comment on the museum in a few languages. Size of the set is also indicated: 190mm wide and 125mm tall. Content of the box The box is almost full, with the instruction booklet and 6 unnumbered bags, one of which contains a brick separator for your collection. Instructions booklet The 167 pages instructions booklet is, as always with Architecture sets, very well done and good looking with the classic black background. There are a lot of nice pictures of the building and its interior, with lots of facts. The instructions are easy to follow and no color errors should be made. You can see here one the many pictures and facts that pop up in the corners of the booklet. You can also see that some steps need quite a bunch of parts, but I reassure you, many steps onl require a single plate! Build First steps passed. If you look closely, you may notice a big change compared to the other sets of the theme... The set makes a great use of the newly released rounded tiles to add details. The build uses lots of 1/2 studs offsets and snot techniques. Continuig with the building... The technique used to achieve the rounded sections is really nice and makes use of many new parts. The finished set in all his glory! My finger hurts of placing all those tan 1x1 tiles! As always there are some spare parts. Interesting parts The set comes with a nice selection of white curved slopes, and among them the rather new 3x2 white curved slope. Three 2x3 white tiles are also present. The set is also at the moment the best source for 1x1 quarter round tiles in light bluish gray. Parts in new or rare colors include the 6x6 round plate in white and black, the 10x10 inverted dish in sand green, the 2x4 wedge plate in sand green, a 3x3 cross plate in tan, a white 1x3x1 panel , and 4 of the new 1x1modified brick with 2 studs on adjacent sides in black! And of course two nice printed tile and curved slope with the museum's name on it. Conclusion Design: 9/10 - A really nice set in the Architecture theme! One of my favorite. Parts: 8/10 - Some very interesting parts in this set, and maybe more variety than other sets of the theme. Build: 8/10 - An interesting build, not too monotonous. Price: 7/10 - At 9.4 cent per part, this set is in the price average of the Architecture theme's sets. Overall: 32/40 (80%) - I really enjoyed building this set! I think it may be one of the best set of the recently released Architecture sets. If you're a fan of the theme, go grab it, you won't regret it.

Hello! :) There'll be a lot of reviews of new Elves sets soon, but I think it can't be too many of them anyway :) So I decided to make one again! I've build beautiful Aira's Airship of Elves 2017 and here's some pictures of it. Hope you like it too :) Overall impression reminds me split of two amazing sets from first wave - Naida's Adventure Ship and Pegasus Sleigh with all that fancy-styled details and pleasing color scheme. Ant that's great! Play features became less peaceful: while only weapon of team of Andventure ship was frying pan, heroes of new story have boomerang and disc shooter, and little goblin with flying backpack looks more menaceful than sea shell or little dragon's house :) Most intriguing part of the main building for me was wing mechanism. It have a lot intresting joints, even gear mechanism that keeps wings in raised position. Movement is enough tight, it's not very light and smooth, and needs a little effort. But anyway I really liked that it adds technic building expirience. Intresting parts: lots of gold makes happy my inner magpie! :D Book with air symbol is my favorite item here! I like Aira most of all characters, so I glad that here's new stuff with her symbols. Boomerang is also nice weapon for an intelligent character. Map is classical feature of this series. All theese pretty items may be storaged in pantry of the airship! Also there's box with ammo for disc-shooter. Goblin's fliyng box. I can't find out how this bolts shoot :( When I press them as shown in istruction, they just falls down, may be I make it wrong way. But I don't mind it, because I like boxes :) The goblin himself looks like an desperate person that can bring a lot of troubles for elves! :) And here's comparisions :) New amulet also fits good to regular lego minifig. There were two amulets on one mould, like golden keys from other sets. This old and respectable guy is honored to show it to you! :) (it's only minifig that saved from my former collection) Comparision with Naida's Adventure Ship from 2015. Three Airas! And last picture - Aira's airfleet, of Elvendale Airlines inc. =) Also here's my jetbike moc :) Thanks for watching! I hope this will attract more intrest for this beautilul series!

SET REVIEW: 10255 ASSEMBLY SQUARE Introduction To start the new year off, it is my pleasure to present to the EB community a review of the 10255 Assembly Square, celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Lego modular building series. This is the 12th and largest set in the series and it is packed full of interesting details both in the structures and the decorative elements, many of which reference past modular building sets. This set to me shows just how far set design has advanced within the space of 10 years, from the original 10182 Cafe Corner which was one of the first sets targeted at adult builders and was a stunning development at the time, to the present day where we are seeing more and more of these large expert sets. I hope you enjoy this review and I look forward to reading your comments. All images link to flickr where larger resolutions can be viewed if desired. My thanks to EB LUG Ambassador CopMike and the LEGO CEE Team and Designers for the opportunity to review this set for the EB community. Set information Name: Assembly Square Number: 10255 Theme: LEGO Creator Expert / Modular Building Theme Year: 2017 Release Date: 1 January 2017 Pieces: 4,002 Price: USD $279.99, GBP £179.99, EURO €239.99, CAD $339.99, NZD $449.99 Resources: Brickset Packaging I'll begin with some images of the packaging for this set. The box is quite large (580x480x168mm) and features lots of detail shots on the back, many of which were in the press release. Unfortunately the box was a bit battered in transit but the details are all still clear. One side of the box features all of the minifigures in the set while the back also has a layer-by-layer separation of the buildings to show the floor plan. I have included a size comparison with the box for the previous set in the series, 10251 Brick Bank, to demonstrate how much bigger this one is. Box Front Box Rear Box Sides Box Contents Despite the size of the box it is packed pretty full. There is one very thick instruction manual, a white internal box which has the numbered bags for sections 1 through 3, and then the numbered bags for sections 4 through 6 are loose in the main box. The box also contains two green baseplates (32x32 and 32x16) and a single 8x16 light grey plate. There are a lot of bags in this set for each section: Section 1: 3 numbered bags, a 32x32 green baseplate and a 16x32 green baseplate Section 2: 7 numbered bags Section 3: 5 numbered bags Section 4: 4 numbered bags Section 5: 7 numbered bags Section 6: 7 numbered bags and a 16x8 light grey plate Contents Overall Internal Box and Contents Instruction Booklet The instruction booklet is a single thick volume. Unfortunately, it does not come sealed in any sort of plastic like many other expert sized sets, so when I pulled mine out it was a little bent and had a tear on the front cover, which is unfortunate. Otherwise, it is a sturdy booklet with lots of helpful features such as the breakdown of which bags build which sections of the set and an extensive parts list at the back. As well as boxes for the parts used in each step, the parts are also outlined in yellow as they are added to the build. Booklet Cover Inside Sample Pages Minifigures This set comes with a wide variety of minifigures, 8 in total plus one of the relatively new baby minifigures. There are 4 male and 4 female minifigures filling a variety of roles themed to the types of stores and rooms within the set: a baker, florist, barista, dentist, photographer, music shop manager, ballerina and AFOL with her baby. All have the classic smiley face except for the baby, who also has white dots in his or her eyes. All of the minifigure torsos are printed on both sides with interesting designs and are complimented by an assortment of hairpieces and hats, including a beret and moustache for the photographer. The barista's apron is also printed down onto her legs. Barista, Florist, Baker, Music Shop Owner and Dentist - Front Barista, Florist, Baker, Music Shop Owner and Dentist - Back Photographer, Ballerina, AFOL and Baby - Front Photographer, Ballerina, AFOL and Baby - Back The Build Part 1: Floor Plan Now it is time to get building, and we're in for quite a lengthy one with 6 bagged sections to complete. This first section is pretty much all tiles; lots and lots of tiles. These take a while to lay out (and longer if you're a bit pedantic like me and want all of the dots left behind by the sprues to be pointing the same way). Speaking of those dots, I was a bit sad to see these on the sides of many of the 1x2, 1x3, 1x4 and even 1x6 tiles now, where they used to be on the underside either in the centre of at one end. I say most; really every tile in this set has the sprue dots on an edge, except for 4 of the 1x2 dark grey tiles in this section. Mostly these can be hidden, but not always, it was definitely better when they were on the underside. The footprint for the building is 48x32, as shown below. In reality, it is really 2 separate buildings, one taking up a 32x16 space on the left and the other occupying the standard 32x32 modular building size on the right. The right building is designed to look like 2 buildings but is built as one (as we shall see later). Baseplate Footprint We begin by laying out the tiles for the footpath and the building on the right, which will be a bakery. This is followed by the fountain in the centre and the tiles for the florist shop at the back (part of the right building), and we complete part 1 with the tiles for the coffee shop in the left building. There are lots of interesting tile colours and shapes, particularly around the fountain, including cut corners and the shield pieces. Tiles As the tiles are laid down, the size of the buildings becomes clear, including spaces left in the floor for furnishing later. In comparison to the original Cafe Corner set which had no interior at all, this is quite a different start! Footpath and Bakery The fountain base is a neat build so I have included a couple of construction shots to show how it comes together. The actual fountain won't be added until the second to last step of part 6 of the build, so we have the be patient for that, but we do get the base now. Fountain construction Note the turntable in the entry to the building on the left; this will be used to create a doorway similar to the Cafe Corner entry, a nice throwback to that set. There are lots of features of this build that reference all 11 of the past sets; I won't mention all of them so see how many you can spot! Fountain Base and Left Building Entry With part 1 of the build finished, we can see how large each building is eventually going to be, although not much other than the floor tiles have been laid down. Coffee Shop Floor Florist Floor Bakery Floor Part 1 also includes the baby's pram, which improves on the pram design that featured in the 10185 Green Grocer set. The baby is in part 6 of the build along with the street lights and fountain, so we don't get to see the baby in the pram just yet! Baby's Pram There are only a few spare parts left over at the end of this section, shown below. Spare Parts The Build Part 2: Bakery and Florist In part 2 of the build, we construct the bakery and (most of) the florist that occupy the right building. The florist is in the central section behind the fountain and connects to the bakery on the right. The florist shop isn't actually finished in this part; the last couple of layers are added in part 3. Before building this section, there are some interesting parts to point out, including the blue/yellow bird (which is a new take on the old parrot mould with slight differences such as in the shape of the beak). There is a variety of printed treats on 1x1 round tiles and some other interesting parts and colours, shown below. Interesting Parts We start by building the bakery and florist interiors and back walls. Immediately I am finding all sorts of exciting furnishings to make the building a little more interesting than just building up the walls. In the bakery, we have a built-in oven in the back which includes a large black door with a cast-iron look to it and a play feature for getting the pastries out, demonstrated below. In the florists shop, we have the counter with a till, money and plant inside a jar, a stand for the parrot and a display of flowers. The flower display has a nice variety of colours for the flower pieces and includes a six-pronged flower stem, which when placed next to the brown brick makes for quite a snug fit (almost too snug, but I got it to stay there). Bakery and Florist Interiors Florist Furniture Florist Interior The bakery oven features a technic pin at the back to push the tarts out; it's quite powerful so be wary, those tarts can go flying! Bakery Oven Next we build up the front of the florist, with pillars around the door and each window decorated with a SNOT technique. The arches above the door will be added in part 3, so for now we just build the white frames. Florist Door Frame Pillars Florist Door Frames To finish part 2 of the build, we complete the bakery. First there are a few furnishings to build, which include a large display cabinet built into the wall with lots of different cakes and pastries, a smaller glass cabinet in the counter, a table with pastries and a large wedding cake. Bakery Counter Bakery Wall Cabinet The wedding cake is a neat design, with angled tiles to make the tabletop and a miniature bride and groom on top. Bakery Furniture Bakery Interior with Furniture Next comes the front of the bakery, which has two large windows made with garage door pieces. The doorway uses an angled door-frame piece. We also add the canopies above the windows on the florist at this point. Bakery Entrance Bakery Windows The windows are topped with dark blue sloping roof tiles and above the doorway is an upside down dome, which is attached with 1x1 circular tiles with pins on them, which connect to the open holes in the bricks below. A staircase is added at the back for access to the next level and a few more details such as a clock, and then the bakery is complete! Bakery Window Lintels Bakery Staircase Bakery Doorway And there are our first two rooms complete, the bakery and florist. I'll conclude with a final picture of the front and back of part 2. Part 2 Front Part 2 Back There are a few more spare parts with this section, including spares of the three 1x1 round printed tiles. Spare Parts

REVIEW - 42054 - CLAAS XERION 5000 TRAC VC INTRODUCTION First of all my apologies. Sorry it took so long for this review to be published. Sometimes there are other things in life that need attention. Next year I will try to keep July free for LEGO reviews With all the news about the 42056 - Porsche GT3 RS and the 42055 - Bucket Wheel Excavator, you would almost forget there are two other great sets coming up during the second half of 2016. One of which is the 42053 - Volvo EW160E, while the other is the 42054 - Claas Xerion 5000 Trac VC. Today we will be reviewing the latter. Like LEGO it seems that CLAAS also likes its name spelled with capitals, so from now on I will happily oblige. While I live in an area which is flooded by tractors and farm equipment, the CLAAS doesn't seem to be very popular in Holland, while CLAAS is a brand which originated in Germany, not too far away. I have never been a real fan of LEGO Technic farm equipment models. To be honest; I have skipped all of them. They just didn't look interesting enough. How different the CLAAS is. I'll just throw it out there...this is love af first sight. Sometimes the real model looks even better than in the pictures. If this is the case with the CLAAS, it's definitely one of the best looking models ever made. Usually you don't draw conclusions in the introduction, but I simply felt the need to address the feeling that I have when I look at this model. CLAAS being one of the biggest (if not THE biggest) manufacturers of combine harvesters, we might be treated with another CLAAS model in the future. So, not having bought a single farm equipment set, combined with my limited knowledge of real farm equipment, I had to invest some time to get acquainted with the CLAAS XERION 5000 TRAC VC. In case you are wondering what VC stands for, it's the designation for Variable Cab, meaning the cab can be rotated backwards, to facilitate driving backwards....or is it forward?! At CLAAS, VC stands for Variable Cab. The rotating cab is the most convenient reverse-drive system imaginable. At the press of a button, the entire cab moves from its central position to the rear-facing position above the rear axle in seconds. The controls rotate automatically with the cab, so all functions remain the same when operating in the rear position. For high driving comfort on the road, the cab is centrally positioned between the axles. In the silage clamp, on the field, in the forest or in the mountains, the XERION with the cab rotated over the rear axle becomes a user-friendly self-propelled machine with a unique view of the job in hand. If you are looking for more information, here's the Brochure and Technical data. Funny fact about this set is that it's simply addressed as one of the 2H 2016 sets, while with almost 2000 parts, it would definitely have qualified as a flagship a couple of years ago. This is a clear indication that the Technic product line has been evolving rapidly. I start to wonder how big this model actually is. Let's open the box and find out. SET INFORMATION Number: 42054 Title: Claas Xerion 5000 Trac VC Theme: Technic Released: 2016 Part Count: 1977 Box Weight: 2834 gr Box Dimensions: 58,0 cm x 37,2 cm x 9,8 cm Set Price (MSRP): € 159 Price per Part: € 0,080 Links: Brickset, Bricklink THE BOX Having the Porsche and BWE around almost makes you forget that this isn't the Prima Donna of 2016. The box doesn't help either, since it's quite a big lady. A few years ago it could have easily passed as a flagship set. As usual, the front shows a nice picture of the model. The right side indicates that this is a PF powered set, where the M-motor and PF Battery Box are included. Bottom right tells us the crane arm and cabin are motorized. At this point it's not exactly clear what the motorization entails, but I bet the backside of the box will show us more details. BACK The back of the box (click to enlarge) shows us that the boom of the crane can be raised and lowered using Power Functions, as well as rotating the crane. Also, the cabin can be rotated using Power Functions, which is obviously super cool! I'm really anxious to find out how this works. The lower left corner shows us the three steering modes of the CLAAS XERION. Yes, you heard it right, three steering modes! Just like the Porsche should have had The lower right corner shows a picture of the B-model, which is actually the same tractor, with a different attachment. The crane has been transformed into a silage plow. As you can see, the cabin (and thus controls) are facing a different direction than in the picture of the A-model. Like the Unimog I expect lots of modifications and attachments for this model! CONTENTS OF THE BOX The box contains the following items: 1x Sealed instruction manual and sticker sheet 11x Bags for step 1 4x Bags for step 2 1x Unsealed PF battery box 1x Sealed PF M motor 4x Red rims 4x Awesome new tires This is how it looks when you throw everything on one big pile. INSTRUCTION MANUAL AND STICKERS The instructions are provided in a square bound book, sealed in a bag with the stickers. I really like this way of packing the manual and stickers. Keeps both the book and sticker sheet unharmed. Below are detailed pictures of the book and sticker sheet. The latter contains lots of little stickers for switches and controls. This means the model will have lots of functions....yay! PF COMPONENTS A PF Battery Box and a sealed PF M-motor. RIMS AND TIRES Without a doubt the single most eye-catching elements when opening the box are the new tires! 11 BAGS FOR STEP 1 4 BAGS FOR STEP 2 HIGHLIGHTED PARTS Back by popular demand is the Highlighted parts section. For this set it's quite elaborate. Not because it contains loads of new parts, but it does contain quite a few new-ish parts in large numbers. This indicates that the designer used some of the new building techniques in this set. And there's something funny going on with the axles, so let's start with those. AXLES Red and Yellow axles have been introduced in most of the 1H 2016 sets. What's striking though, is that this contains axles in both the regular black and grey color, as well as the latest yellow and red versions. Here you can see that we get both the grey and yellow 5L and 7L axles. I have included only a single grey version to make my point. Actually there are 11 yellow and 5 grey 5L axles and 6 yellow and 15 grey 7L axles. Same goes for the red 4L and 8L axles, which have a black counterpart (also a single one included in the picture). This set contains 9 red and 4 black 4L axles and 2 red and 2 black 8L axles. Makes sense, right?! At this point I am really starting to wonder what the strategy behind the axle color distribution is. Is TLG getting rid of their old stock or is there a better explanation? Hopefully we will discover some logic, but I highly doubt it. On the left you can see the new (2016) 3L Axle with Stop and on the right you see the 2012 4L Axle with Center Stop. Inclusion of the latter is not so special, if it weren't for the quantity. A total of 12 are included, which is more than in any other set. And even a single 11L axle in yellow, which completes the uneven yellow axle family (3L, 5L, 7L, 9L and 11L). Fun fact; the 3L axle in yellow has been introduced in 2015 (in the LEGO Ideas Wall-e set) and has been used in quite a few 2016 sets, but not in any of the Technic sets. Same goes for the 9L axle, which has been used in three non-Technic sets. Adds another layer to the axle mystery. Let's talk Pins and Pin Connectors. 3L PIN WITH 1L/2L AXLE This set includes 20 3L Pin with 2L Axle from 2015 and a whopping 31 3L Pin with 1L Axle from 2014. AXLE/PIN WITH PIN HOLE If you are in need of Pin with Pin Hole from 2014, look no further. This set contains 49 of 'em. Yes that's right, 49!! And 14 of its axle counterpart Axle with Pin Hole from 2016. AXLE AND PIN CONNECTOR HUB WITH 2 AXLES This set also comes with 12 Axle and Pin Connector Hub with 2 Axles. Already introduced in 2012, but relatively new in black. 1L PIN CONNECTOR Introduced in 2015, received with some surprise from the community. Why do we need this 1L Pin Connector?! Well, there's 54 in this set so we are bound to find out why it's useful. H-FRAME (DOG BONE) In my review of the 42023 Construction Crew (one of my two first reviews) I introduced this part. The Liftarm 3 X 5 Perpendicular H-Shape Thick a.k.a. Dog Bone Frame or H-Frame. A compact versatile frame which appeared in quite a few sets but never in such quantities. This set contains 10 of them. CURVED PANEL The 3 x 6 x 3 Curved Panel was already available in blue and yellow and now it's also available in black. You only get a single one in this set though. TURNTABLES This new turntable was introduced in 2015 and it's the first time it appears twice in a single set. It's comprised of two parts, The Top and The Base. STEERING WHEEL HUB Introduced in the Porsche (only because it was available first) and now also available in the CLAAS. Two of them in the Porsche but if you like to build 4W steering this is the set for you. It contains 4 Steering Wheel Hub Holder with 2 Pin Holes and 2 Axle Holes. LIME GREEN IS THE NEW YELLOW A reasonably large selection of lime green parts. Not sure if it's visible in this picture but apparently lime green is the new yellow, when it comes to parts being identically colored. Variation in lime green is significant. This picture shows a detailed view of the color difference. It's clearly visible near the 2x1 plate. The connectors and liftarm do differ as well. Good news is that there are some new parts available in lime green: 1x Panel Fairing # 5 Long Smooth, Side A 1x Panel Fairing # 6 Long Smooth, Side B 1x Panel Fairing # 1 Long Smooth, Side A 1x Panel Fairing # 2 Long Smooth, Side B 2x 16L Soft Axle (Flex Axle DISHES This 6x6 Inverted Rader Dish isn't new, but it's the first time we see it in red. This picture also shows the reflection of the light bounced off the ceiling. RIMS The rims are your run of the mill 56mm D. x 34mm Technic Racing Rims, with the unique feature that, like the 6x6 Inverted Dishes, these come in red for the first time. TIRES Four brand new 107 x 44R Tractor Tires! PART LIST Here's the complete list of 1977 parts. THE TRACTOR The build consists of two phases, the tractor and the crane. Obviously we will start with building the tractor. Get your #1 bags, rims, tires and PF components....we are about to begin! We start by building the chassis. The back side of the chassis to be specific. You can already see part of the steering mode selector mechanism taking shape. REAR MOUNT The manually operated rear mount which will later be used to attach the crane (or other attachments). Manual operations include raising and lowering the attachment. There's a PTO (Power take-off) which will be connected to the PF motor, so it's not operated manually. Here you can see the rear mount attached to the chassis. The bottom view shows the PTO drive shaft. STEERING Since this tractor has 4 wheel steering, the rear axle also needs to be steerable. To accomplish that, the new wheel hubs are used. No rack and pinion yet?! Or no rack and pinion at all?! I was wondering why the blue Axle Pin is used in favor of a Pin without friction. Normally my best guess is that these parts are used in the B-model, which isn't the case for this model. The only possible thing I can imagine is that the friction is needed to prevent wobbling, and the axle end makes sure the steering is smoothly. Best of both worlds kind of thing. The yellow 1/2 bush limits the steering angle. A limited steering angle is something that's bothering me frequently in Technic models. So I tried to remove the bushes and replace the 3L axles with 2L axles. This does improve the steering angle. However, as you can see in the pictures below, there's a reason the steering angle is limited. The left tire is touching the chassis. We will need to work with the default setup. Which actually isn't that bad in the end. The following picture clearly explains why we need red 4L axles, while there are also black 4L axles in this set. Or does it? Clearly no rack and pinion steering. Instead there's a cleaver mechanism transforming rotational movement into linear movement and back into rotational movement again. The linkage on the red axles can be moved into three different positions for the three different steering modes. Here's a short video demonstrating the mechanism: A manually operated lever on the back sets the linkage in one of three positions, selecting the steering mode. Stickers are used to indicate the different modes. Another short video of the steering mechanism: The pictures below show the different steering modes, respectively: Crab steering Front wheel steering Four wheel steering The video below shows a demonstration of the different steering modes: The bottom view of the chassis: The video below shows the bottom view of the steering mechanism: BARMAN Of course this mechanism is no surprise at all, since our good friend Barman already figured it out ages ago. Obviously a variation of the setup, but the basic are definitely the same. Well done Barman! PTO In the picture below you can clearly see that the PTO runs from the front to the back. Even though this model doesn't have a powered front attachment, it's prepared to have one. Kudos to the designer for this feature! GEARBOX This gearbox is used to power the different functions. As you can see there are two Clutch Gears. One is for the PTO and the other one is for the cab rotation. Here's how the gearbox will be attached to the chassis. Switching the change over catch results in changing direction of the function. This is confirmed by looking at the left side of the gearbox, the "differential like setup". MOTORIZATION A Power Functions M-motor is used to power all the functions. Since there's no driving or steering involved, the M-motor is just fine! CHASSIS Picture below shows the chassis without the battery box, but with both front and rear mounts Here you can see a video of how the battery box switch works. This is a rather ingenious mechanism. CONTROL PANEL In the images below you can see why we need 54 1L Connectors. They might not be necessary, but I do like 'em. They are aesthetically pleasing and avoids having gaps in the model. Otherwise bushes would be used, which definitely don't look as good as the 1L Connectors. Here's a detailed view of the control panel on the side of the vehicle. One switch will turn the battery box on and off, while the other rotates the cabin back and forth. Here's the control panel attached to the vehicle. This surely is one of the best looking control panels I have seen. HOOD The lime green hood, combined with the white roof and red rims, is one of the most recognizable sections of the CLAAS. Unlike other hoods this isn't just a couple of panels and done. It's actually quite a big build. The front of the hoods actually needs a CLAAS stickers, which I forgot before taking pictures. The hoods can be lifted and held up with a support axle. Usually you will see the fake engine, but now there's a battery box. To be clear; there's no fake engine at all. Which is perfectly fine given the fact that the battery box is well hidden inside the model. Closing the hood results in this pretty picture. I am already starting to like the looks of this model. The build also gets more interesting along the way. In the beginning there's much going on without really making sense. Seems like a bit here and a bit there. Some constructions seem rather flimsy. However, the further you progress, the better the builds get, to a point where it's actually a great building experience. CABIN Here you can see the base of the cabin, which actually has a nice feature. When the cabin rotates a little wheel underneath lifts the cabin a stud or two. This results in the cabin freely rotating around its axle. When it has turned 180 degrees, it falls in place again. Here you can see the up and down mode of the base of the cabin. The finished cabin looks stunning!! The back of the cabin has some intricate details, like the fire extinguisher and the 50 km/h sign. In the cabin there a computer display showing the field. I think you can even fit a minifig on the chair. Here's a sequence of images demonstrating the rotation of the cabin. You can clearly see the raising and lowering of the cabin when it rotates. FINISHED TRACTOR After finishing the cabin, you end stage 1 and the tractor is finished. I can only come to this conclusion: Yes, it looks great in real life too! And great is an understatement. This is one of the best looking Technic models ever! I wasn't a big fan of lime green, but it just went up a couple of notches on my ladder. Especially in combination with white and red! I can't think of a single thing I don't like about the tractor. Even the battery box is nicely hidden inside the model, while it still can be easily switched on and off. Cabin rotation is how it's supposed to be and there's a front and back PTO. Simply amazing! OOPS! I missed two of the headlights. Thanks to Charlesw for pointing this out THE CRANE After the 1st stage, you enter the 2nd stage...building the crane! I have included a picture of the crane on my work desktop, instead of my photography desktop. Looking at the pictures, it appears that I have no OCD when it comes to arranging parts before the build. On the left side of the crane (where I already applied the stickers) you can see the controls for the crane. Two levers, both with an up and down mode. One of them will rotate the crane, while the other will raise and lower the boom. For all you photography enthusiasts; these two pictures are taken with f14 instead of f20, resulting in a sharp picture but slightly blurred (out of focus) background. This draws attention to the model, while still being able to figure out what's going on in the background. I used to shoot everything with f20, which would have resulted in an entirely focused picture. Three more images of the base of the crane. This time without the unnecessary cluttering with extra parts. FINISHED CRANE Lo and behold, the crane! First of all, I am not the biggest fan of cranes. Why not? Because they have a tendency not to work properly, especially the Pneumatic ones (apologies to the Pneumatic fanboys). Therefor it's worth to mention that I actually like this one. A decent design with functions that actually work. Admittedly the manual functions are not that great and maybe a bit flimsy, but that will always be the case when building in this scale. Most important are the two motorized functions, which work like a charm. The mechanism to attach the crane to the tractor is nifty too, although it can be a bit of a struggle to attach it to the PTO. This takes some practice. FINISHED MODEL Meet the CLAAS XERION 5000 TRAC VC! I have said it before and I will say it again; this is one good looking model. The shapes, the design, combined with the CLAAS color scheme makes it really stand out. Admittedly, the crane doesn't improve the looks of the model. Being an attachment, I don't really mind. The nose of the CLAAS looks so cool. Especially with the weights on the front attachment and those new tires. I really love this picture. Another think I absolutely love is the cabin of the model. All kinds of small details and the overall look is stunning. The crane is....well.....a crane. It's not ugly, nor is it a beauty. Technically it's working properly, which is the most important thing. It does kind of bend over a bit, but it doesn't bend the chassis. It's caused by the way it's mounted to the rear attachment. Raising the attachment will straighten the crane a bit. The rear attachment is quite solid, which is good thing. The outriggers need to used for extra stability. This side view show what I mean by the crane leaning over. The rear view of the entire model. I love the fire extinguisher and the 50 km/h sign! Another front view of the model. LEFT OVER PARTS Quite a few 1L Connectors left. Makes you wonder whether I skipped a few. Or they are used in the B-model. FEATURES AND FUNCTIONS So the model looks good. Does it function properly?! And what exactly are the functions?! After the last building step, the manual shows four pages with functions! The first two pages concentrate on operating the crane and cabin, using the PF functions. The other two pages focus on the different steering modes. Let's take a look at the video to see these functions in action: The front attachment is manually operated and can be raised and lowered. Attaching to the chassis is easy, so it can be easily changed for another attachment. There's a front PTO, which leaves you with loads of options. I'm sure we will see some nice MODs being published in the future. Rotating the cab is quite fun to do. It works as expected and the automatic raising and lowering of the cabin adds coolness to the operation. Thumbs up for the rotating cab Then there's the three mode steering. Basically the steering modes work fine. The mechanism is very clever. So it all good? Well, there are some minor issues. Turning the steering gear needs quite a bit of force, which can result in accidentaly turning the cabin instead of steering. Another issue is the significant amount of slack in the steering mechanism. New wheel hubs were introduced this year, but they are no improvement in terms of slack. This model is best steering when driving it. This will reduce the amount of force on the steering linkage and it will also diminish the slack. All in all the steering modes work properly and the entire steering mechanism is awesome. This makes up for the lack of rear wheel steering in the Porsche! Like I said earlier; usually I am not a big fan of cranes. However, this one works properly. The motorized functions have been implemented very well. They are easy to operate, without confusion about which function does what. The manual functions work as expected, nothing special. I haven't paid much attention to the tires so far. I reckon they deserve a review of their own. Enough has been said about them already, so I will simply echo what other have been saying; they are awesome! Best tire since the Unimog tires. They have enough grip for Truck Trial. One thing I am not sure about though is how well they will stick to the rim. As you can see in the video, they detach pretty easily. Something which might happen when driving through rough terrain. I hope TLG will release a smaller version of these tires in the near future, for other tractors or even combine harvesters. Both the attachments can be mounted and dismounted easily and the mechanisms to do so are nifty. Attaching an axle to the PTO can be tricky, but it will get easier after some practice. B-MODEL When building the B-model the tractor remains intact. The crane turns into a silage plow, which actually looks quite good. I will leave this one for you to build SUMMARY To summarize how I feel about this set is pretty easy. I love it! This set has everything a proper Technic set should have. Stunning looks and lots of great functions. Not sure if this is the best Technic set ever, but it is the best Technic set I ever reviewed. PROS Looks amazing Lots of functions Super cool three mode steering Functions working properly Lots of playability Front and rear PTO Suitable for MODding Lots of new pins and connectors Cool new tires Some parts in new colors Battery box nicely tucked away inside the model CONS Slack in steering Steering needs some force and can result in turning the cabin instead Makes you want another one I'd like to stress that these cons are really minor cons! SCORE Okay, so how do I grade this set? 9 DESIGN CLAAS written all over it. Looks amazing. 9 BUILDING EXPERIENCE Starts a bit unstructured, but ends well. 10 FEATURES Can't do any better than this. 9 PLAYABILITY All the cool functions offer lots of playability 9 PARTS High quantities of new pins and connectors. Oh, and them tires! 9 VALUE FOR MONEY This is what to expect of a big Technic set. 9,2 PINNACLE OF LEGO TECHNIC FINAL WORDS This set will be modified heavily, utilizing the front and rear PTO. Can't wait to see what people come up with. It's only a matter of time before we see a double wheeled version: Well, that didn't take long (posted by ctx1769, see next page): And what to think of a potential new CLAAS Lexion Combine Harvester with new smaller versions of the CLAAS tires in the rear. Yes please! Thanks you for reading this review. All pictures can be found in my album.

Hello! I already happened to get first of new elves sets - it appeared in some shops in Russia. So I can't wait to share my impressions with you :) Hope you'll like it too! In my opinion this year designesrs really succeed to make a bit more gender-neutral buildings in this series - as I began to unpack the box, my husband grabbed bags and started to build, he said this will be his dragon :D (to mention, he is not intresed much in other dragons) So, here's what is inside the box: And what it become: It's look really dangerous because it's horns, claws and thorns, and I liked curved design and how posable it is. Leg joints is solid and move only in one dimension, it is made as Draqon Queen legs with "+" holes in it. Earlier I worried that new color combination is not very harmonic, but in real it looks better than on photos, so as most of Lego sets. Also bionicle ball joints and details makes it different from good dragons, and this is fresh but still keeps familiar style. View from the top: There are whole 5 horns on it's head! Also nice printed symbol of Goblin King. Comparision to Zonya, the fire dragon, thay are the same size. Wyvern may fold it's wings and stand on them like on front limbs. That's epic! Some intresting steps from instructions: And new illustration in the end of book: There is some images from new app, and characters are depicted in the old realistic style :) And this surprised me a lot! A piece of rocky enviroment has simple and elegant mechanism that tosses up the crystal plate. 1x1 crystals is nice new feature. And there's new little blue piece with rounded corner: All characters: Goblin hair and shirt are not printed, it's moulded from different colours of plastic like baby dragons. Also, King's crown made with same method. I liked textile used for coat, it's dense and hanging under its own weight. I just a little worried why King and wyvern don't have names :( Little bear and her baby will complement the zoo of cute animals! By the way, squirrel, fox, pigeon and others are favorite charachers of my young sister :) And at last, I have such diorama of dark elves! I rebuilded green pool to make it look as it is in movie. By the way, ninjago ghosts became castle guards :) And so, I glad that new set gives feeling of new turn of elves' story and adds depth to it - that is most important :)

Review: 42063 BMW R 1200 GS Adventure Name: BMW R 1200 GS Adventure Number: 42063 Theme: Technic Year: 2017 Pieces: 603 Price: Euro 49.99€, AUD $89.99 Brickset: Extra Info Technic Early 2017 Review Series Welcome to the fifth in my batch of 2017 Technic reviews! I was offered all the small sets early 2017 for review late last year... but I ended up getting them all! Thus I have a lot to review. I've been doing them in parallel and changing my process as I go so hopefully the latter ones will end up being the best. On that angle I'll probably retcon some of the earlier reviews if I improve my process. Due to this remember that I'm happy to take extra photos or provide extra info on request, and anything especially good will be added to the main body of the review. Do note though that sometimes the model may no longer exist if I have have made an alternate. On the subject of alternates, I will be making the alt model, if I have the instructions, think the model is worth making, and I have the time. Also I'll show mid stage construction only if I think it's relevant. Thus don't ask for construction photos or alt models if they aren't part of the review.... I am prepared to extract parts for detail photos though. Photos will all be hosted on Flickr so larger versions are available, and relevant videos will be on YouTube and linked to from here. I don't edit photos much; very rarely I'll crop one and almost never will "correct" them so the photos should be as natural as possible. I will try to not be repetitive; thus it's worth reading my other reviews. For example I'm not going to complain too much about the digital instructions; I'll try to complain about new things, or maybe not complain at all! Here's all the other reviews of H1 2017 Technic... 42057 Ultralight Helicopter 42058 Stunt Bike 42059 Stunt Truck (and 45058/42059 Combiner) 42060 Roadwork Crew 42061 Telehandler 42062 Container Yard 42063 BMW R 1200 GS Adventure 42064 Ocean Explorer 42065 Tracked Racer Mucho multi thanks to the EB LUG Ambassador CopMike and the LEGO CEE Team and Designers for allowing me to review these sets for Eurobricks. So onto the review! Packaging Front.... ...back.... ...top. The combiner is interesting in this one so I did make it. Unboxing Standard punch box. Instructions and wheels were loose. Instructions are provided for both models, and the quality is excellent with thick bound covers. The build is not sectioned. Aside from the anniversary piece there isn't anything new here, but the panels used for the side and the windscreen are new colours, and more importantly the wheels are in black at last. Parts list. Random instruction page. Build This is the lower frame with the engine and driveshaft joined. This is the bottom of the bike; the anniversary piece and the central gear are viewable in the finished model. It's done! Spare parts. This 600 part set, vs the 250 part 42007 (orange bike), but obviously it's not that much bigger. ('cos it's got the same wheels.) All those parts are just to make the bike better! (Black bike is a MOC. Not being reviewed.) Ahhhgh! Someone dropped my bike! While it's down you can see the frame shown earlier. The gear is there partially so you can spin the drivetrain, although it is functional as well. (Be careful to pick it up with your legs not your arms; these things weigh around 250kg.) Unflattering cam. Even with the extra parts it still suffers the curse of most Technic bikes; near transparency. Doesn't bother me, but it's a common complaint. What does however bother me is the exhaust; it's on the rear swingarm and is thus suspended. This was probably a compromise due to the already complicated rear, but it's just weird. (And incorrect.) The front suspension is mostly correct; telelever or something close anyway. What am I on about? OK.... ..look here. Most motorcycles have a shock either side of the front wheel, but many (not all) BMW ones have what they call Telelever, which put simply is a variant of double wishbone suspension. It has many advantages on paper but this discussion is beyond the scope of this review. Now look here! I'm no expert (not modesty!) but it's in the ballpark. The first time in an official set I believe. OK, let's put the stickers on now... on a side note I find it funny how the designers needed to widen the cylinder head to give it the correct BMW look that causes so many debates about leanability... but I digress again. Each box gets branded, but the model doesn't use the stickers for shape or even panel blending. You can also see here how relatively compact the shaft drive is. (First time in a set also?) Lack of rear brakes is disappointing though. No controls this time. The Technic front fairing is simple but it works well IMHO; these kind of fairings are rather hard to do well. (I cheated and used system on my own MOC.) Going nowhere fast it seems. The boxes come off without too much damage... which highlights that the rear suspension needs better pre-load adjustment (haw, haw, haw) as it's really not strong enough for this model unless it's going luggage free. (I think it's OK in the front.) Maybe it's time LEGO made a really hard spring... To my surprise they open too, which took some creative pin usage. Functional video. Future Bike Concept (B Model) Well for a start, it gets full points for building something very different in a licensed model! To be honest I didn't want to make this, but.... ...I then saw how nice the presentation of it was in the instructions. So I ended up making this first. It uses most of the parts... ...and even gets it's own sticker! (The un-used one.) I didn't realise this until I finished the A model. On a related but negative note, it assumes you have not used the stickers yet, but I don't think it would look bad if you had already applied them The functions are a rotating and angling rear thruster, steering vanes and folding wings. It's best to watch a video. While I do think it's a cool model with decent functionality... I just don't get it. Internal combustion engine in a flying bike? That kinda negates the possibility of Star Trek style tech so how does it take off? The thruster is too far back.... Nor does it lift enough to be an effective force in forward flight. Looking at the art and the front I suspect they wanted to work in the second wheel, but ran out of parts. The steering vanes are pretty cool though. The landing function is good however. The stand makes heavy usage of the pannier parts, which leaves me wondering if the panniers were added to make the B Model better! (I'm out of stuff to say about the B model, but there's plenty more photos on Flickr.) Ratings Function: BMW bikes are a good choice for LEGO as they are very different and give a chance to make a different model. (I hope though that they'll do other licenses.) As bikes go this is an excellent set, adding panniers and an interesting B model pushes this set to top gear. 10/10 Parts: A good blend of parts, although the panniers are not terrible exciting. 9/10 Price: Yeah, it's more expensive than I'd like, but it's licensed and would have taken a lot of work. 8/10 Accuracy: Ignoring the B model, the only flaw is the exhaust placement. 9/10 Fudge: Motorbikes + Technic? What a winning combination. 10/10 Overall: Ride out and get one! 9/10

Number – 3269 Name – Barney Bear (Bruno Bear) Theme – FABULAND Year – 1981 Minifigs – 1 Pieces – 16 Price – Price paid unknown; original MSRP unknown. Currently £9.23-£10.26/ $14.00-$15.72/ €10.71-€12.02 for used sets on Bricklink or £39.49-£64.78/ $59.91-$98.26/ €45.81-€75.14 for MISB sets on Bricklink. Links: Brickset, Bricklink, Peeron. The Box The characteristic FABULAND background provides the setting to display Barney Bear and his car. There aren't that many green pieces in FABULAND, mostly keeping to red, yellow, blue, black and white, and as a result these colours stand out vibrantly against the light green FABULAND background. The back of the box has the characteristic 'catalogue' pose for Barney, as he clutches his wrench to advertise supplies for serial killers everywhere. And he looks so innocent! The other pictures show him zooming off into the distance, and pretending to have a flat tyre to lay in wait for another innocent victim, still clutching his weapon of choice. Noticeably absent, however, are any pictures of alternative builds. None. Nada. Not one. The sides of the box have identical pictures of Barney fixing an engine the only sensible way; by hitting it with a wrench. One side has unfortunately suffered a little damage from a long lost shop sticker, and the box is a little battered and bruised from the passage of time, but nothing too terrible. Even here on the bottom of the box, the last side to have pictures on it, there are no pictures of alternative builds. Instead we have a candid shot of Barney taking a comfort break and clearing up the age-old question of what bears do in the woods. Oh, and there's a nice picture of the car, too. The Box Contents The Instructions As always with a FABULAND set, the instruction booklet is a small piece of folded paper, with a charming hand drawn picture of the set and its figure on the front. FABULAND can be seen sitting on a hilltop in the distance. Barney looks innocent and adorable clutching his trusty wrench and positioned next to his getaway car. Another lovely feature is that the instructions for these early sets are given as a cartoon, showing Barney building his own car. Admittedly this is easy to do in a set with only a few parts, but it's such a lovely way to illustrate (quite literally) how to build the set. Another regular feature is the multilingual introduction to the main character of the set. This gives the Fabufig some personality and gives you an idea of how he or she fits in in the town. As ever here's a mish-mash translation of what's said: "This is Bruno bear. He is always friendly, helpful and reliable. Or genuine and sincere and always ready to give help." There is usually a hand drawn picture of FABULAND too, and this is actually different from the one seen in 329 Bernard Bear and his Lorry from just 2 years previously. For a start there are far more Fabulanders around, most notably a panda careering across the hilltop with a crazy monkey clinging onto the attached ladder. In addition to the instruction leaflet, there's a little advertising pamphlet too, again a usual thing in these sets. Like the other pictures, this front picture is also new, and shows much less odd behaviour than that seen in 329 Bernard Bear and his Lorry, except Bonnie Bunny looks like she's been caught in some bad act, though. And I have to wonder what the cat and the lamb are doing on the top of the hospital.. Inside this pamphlet there's another, different view of FABULAND displayed in sets, plus small pictures of the sets themselves, as no potential for advertising should be wasted (which is fair enough, really). If you looks carefully at the larger picture, you can see that many eyes are drawn by Chester Chimp's antics on top of the ladder. Those crazy chimps. On the other side of the pamphlet, in amongst all the other pictures of sets, is yet another sweet picture of a little boy and a little girl building FABULAND together. And they seem to be having fun together. Equally. The last little bit of this pamphlet is a small cartoon. For 329 Bernard Bear and his Lorry we had Charlie Crow in the rain, but here we can see Perry Panda getting annoyed with his lazy companion Chester Chimp, who's content to lounge on the job. I adore these little cartoons, although it's a little weird that the cartoons themselves don't relate to the actual set. The Parts There are only 16 parts here, so not much to choose from, really. The wrench is available in loads of sets (200 or so) and mostly it's basic bricks, however, if you want the printed FABULAND brick, then this is the only set you can find it in. Additionally the curved roof is only available once each in red, blue and yellow, and obviously therefore this is the only set containing this part in this colour. Furthermore, the yellow window frame is only available in this colour at all, and only in three sets; the same other sets as before, namely 3635 Bonnie Bunny's Camper, and 3634 Charlie Crow's Carry-All. So, out of 16 pieces, 3 of them are quite rare. Not bad, really. Minifigure Hello Barney Bear, who may be a psycho killer who draws innocent Fabulanders into the countryside with his fancy car and clubs them to death with his wrench. He looks so adorable and innocent, but we know what dangers lurk beneath. Barney Bear has conveniently found himself an alibi, by appearing also in 3670 Service Station. Clever, very clever. The Build I've recreated the building steps shown in the instructions (well, as best I can with real LEGO, the instructions were drawn and subject to artistic license). Barney carefully places his precious printed grille piece at the front of the chassis, with a couple of 2x4 bricks forming the bonnet and engine. Barney next places the FABULAND vehicle door pieces on either side, otherwise he won't be able to get in and out of his car. Time to build up the back of the car; the boot or trunk depending on where you live. It's easily comprised of 2x3 and 2x4 bricks. Next thing to do is to hoist the windscreen into position. It's a heavy part for a little bear, but Barney's been working out. Then all Barney has to to is pop the curved roof piece into place, grab his trusty wrench and he's good to go! Doesn't he look adorable? From the back you can see that the rear of the car is also decorated with a yellow 1x2 brick, which makes it look like Barney has packages stacked at the back of his car. That little yellow brick makes a lot of sense there, from a design perspective; it's clear that something is needed in that spot. Having recently reviewed 329 Bernard Bear and his Lorry, I thought it would be interesting to compare the two. In only a couple of years the boxy feel of 329 has evolved into a smoother and more rounded vehicle in this set. The main differences between the two are afforded by the addition of the curved (and printed) FABULAND grille piece, and the curved roof piece. You could argue that the moulded roof removed some building steps, but really it's just replacing putting together three 1x4 bricks and a 4x6 plate. So here's Barney with his pride and joy, posed as he is on the box front. It's a cute little car, brimming with the FABULAND aesthetic, which often seems to me to be based on vehicles from the 1920's. The set number, and the reappearance of the bear, suggest that this was a sort of update of 329, and although 329 is a fun model, when it comes down to it the shape of this vehicle appeals more. Conclusion Design: 9/10 As I've mentioned, this car is classic FABULAND style, and some people really love that, and some don't. It is a personal thing, but I am a fan of FABULAND, and this car is a beautiful representation of this style. The curved FABULAND pieces - the chassis, doors, grille and roof, form the entire design here really, but I like the 1920's aesthetic, playfully recreated with bright colours. Parts: 9/10 There aren't many pieces at all, so to find two specific FABULAND pieces only found in this set, is really quite remarkable. I'm surprised, given how early this was in FABULAND's overall release, that neither of these pieces were reused at any point. Aside from the FABULAND specific parts, the others are really just basic bricks in basic colours. Minifigs: 8/10 Barney's another bear, and he's cute; there's absolutely no denying that. He has the adorable first-generation eyes and brown bears are pretty limited in FABULAND. Although the mould itself is used often, Barney appears only here and in 3670 Service Station (with Peter Panda Bear, who looks more like a black bear than a panda). Barney's brown bear brother is Bernard bear who appears in 329 Bernard Bear and his Lorry (seen above, and he's not necessarily Barney's brother). Build: 8/10 There aren't many parts, and they don't take long to put together, but it's still fun, not least because the instructions themselves are adorably displayed. By adding character to the instructions, character is added to the build. There is also something exciting about building a 30 year old LEGO set for the first time, too. Playability: 8/10 As a car, this model provides full zoomability function, and the model is sturdy enough to withstand the fiercest zooming. Having doors that open and providing Barney with an accessory allows for more scene-setting. He can fix his car, club unsuspecting victims over the head and drag them into the passenger seat and drive away. Endless fun! Price: 7/10 Really the prices currently on Bricklink are pretty high. As always, it will depend on how much you want the set itself ano/or its pieces. There are a few rare pieces and it is a cute model with a lesser seen Fabufig, so the lower end of the used prices isn't unreasonable. You may see this set going cheap on e-bay (or a local equivalent) in which case it may well be available for much less. Overall 82% This is a charming car which is beautifully representative of the FABULAND theme. It's fun, with a cute little bear who even has an accessory (in fact there were two wrenches in the box) and the model is nicely curved and smooth, but still with studs visible. It's an enjoyable build, and the presence of rare parts makes it more desirable. If you're a FABULAND enthusiast then you'll enjoy this set. Thank you for reading, comments are always very welcome. High-Res pictures can be found on my flickr account.

Here we have the Robo-Guardian from the Spyrius subtheme of Lego Space. As a kid, this was my absolute favorite Lego set that I owned. I've always been a huge fan of giant robots, and this was easily the coolest of the era. Owing to their name, the Spyrius focused on interstellar espionage rather than combat. Many sets focused on collecting and transporting small "data pad" tiles. The Robo-Guardian is no exception to this, as we'll soon see. A rear shot of the Robo-Guardian reveals the presence of a small scout craft hidden in the upper torso and a Spyrius Droid in the lower torso. As the robot rolls along a flat surface, the top wheels make just enough contact with the set on the bottom to roll along with them (albiet in the opposite direction). It looks great in motion. While not exactly highly-articulated, the Robo-Guardian can emote a bit! The head can swivel a full 360 degrees on a turntable piece. In addition, one can clearly see the differences between the robot's arms. The right arm features a magnet, while the left arm is equipped with a claw. The gimmick for the shoulder movement is rather clever. An ingenious locking mechanism allows the shoulders to "ratchet" all the way up to an upright position. The arms can also bend inward at the elbow. it's important to note though that the arms can move up, but not down! The ratchet mechanism only works one way, and forcing the arms down could damage the parts. Opening the canopy reveals a couple of specially-printed 2x2 slope bricks, allowing the Spyrius Chief inside to perfectly control this awesome vehicle. At the front of the lower torso the Robo-Guardian possesses a container for the Spyrius data pads. The container is securely locked into place by a pair of hinged arms. Swinging the arms out in the direction of the arrow plates unlocks the container. Simply pull on the front of the container to slide it out of its slot. The panel on the front features a special printing. Perhaps in addition to storage, the container can decode and decrypt the information stored on the data pads. A magnet is fixed to the top of the container as well. Here the container has been opened, and the data pads removed. The special prints are delightfully sci-fi. One can insert the pads with the container open, but it's more fun to slip them through the tiny slots on the front and rear of the container instead. Here the Robo-Guardian is carrying the data pad container via its magnetic "hand". Unfortunately the arm isn't quite long enough for the robot to store the container by itself. As mentioned earlier, the Robo-Guardian has a unique one-way shoulder ratcheting lock for its arms. To release the lock without fully rotating the arms, simply lift up on the corresponding red antenna poking out of the back of the robot. This will unlock the shoulder joint and allow the arm to swing back down to a neutral position. Mentioned previously is a small scout craft that can be tucked away in the upper torso of the Robo-Guardian, accessed from the rear. A pair of small arms with clip hands keeps the craft secure. The easiest way to remove the scout craft is to simply pull it out by grasping the gray protrusions at the front. The arms will fold out to release the vehicle. Here is the scout craft itself. Piloted by a Spyrius Astronaut, it has a pleasant shape. A Spyrius data pad is used to control the vehicle. It seems they have a multitude of uses, beyond securely storing data. Could the trans-green cones be blasters, or simply headlights or sensors? The rear of the scout craft. Three trans-red dishes provide forward propulsion, while small trans-green round plates on the bottom provide vertical thrust. A Spyrius Droid sits safely in the bottom compartment of the Robo-Guardian. A bazooka-like blaster (or long-range camera?) can be stored close by. Flipping the ladder up allows access to the Droid within. In the UK, the Spyrius Droid is known as Major Kartofski, and is actually implied to be the leader of the Spyrius faction! Displaying a very interesting gimmick, the head and lower arms of the Robo-Guardian can be removed and reconfigured to form a medium-sized flight-capable craft. Perhaps this is an escape vehicle. The magnet arm would allow this craft to carry the data pad container to safety. As for defenses, the four backwards trans-green cones could be blasters. A rear view of the head flyer. The black rocket booster element provides forward thrust. Like the scout craft, the trans-green round plates provide vertical thrust. With the Head Flyer off on its own, the main body of the Robo-Guardian can still be controlled. The scout craft can function as a secondary head when attached. It even has a somewhat head-like appearance, with the trans-green cones serving as "eyes". it is however decidedly less intimidating without most of its arms. A rear shot of the "Scout-Guardian" configuration. Presented here are the three minifigures included with this set. In the center is the Spyrius Chief, presumed leader (UK fiction notwithstanding) of the crew, with a Spyrius Astronaut on the left and a Spyrius Droid (secret leader?!) on the right. The Chief and Astronaut are identical save for their face prints and a special print on the Chief's helmet. The Droid is quite awesome, and is the first robotic minifigure in all of Lego Space. And here are the Spyrius busy at work. The Droid scans a faraway target with the scope of his "bazooka". The Chief reads information stored on a Spyrius data pad, while the young Astronaut stores his data, pad in the nearby container. For me, the Robo-Guardian is the jewel of the Spyrius line. It is an excellent, towering, rock-solid robot build with an imposing look and fun gimmicks. A truly stellar "villain" set and one I'm glad to own again. Definitely recommended. I hope you've all enjoyed taking a look taking a look at it with me.

BrickHeadz is an exciting new Lego theme that depicts our favorite characters from movies, TV shows, games, and comics into fun and stylized collectible forms. Each set contains a brick built figure with a build-able base, that includes a printed tile piece denoting the figure's wave number. Wave one consists of twelve unique and colorful characters based on The Lego Batman Movie, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Disney's Beauty and the Beast and Pirates of the Caribbean. BrickHeadz is an exclusive theme from Lego, which means that you can only find the BrickHeadz sets at Lego brand retail stores and online from Lego Shop. Before I begin this review, I would like to give my sincerest thanks to The LEGO Group (TLG) who have provided this set, and other wave one BrickHeadz sets, to Eurobricks making this review possible. The opinions expressed in this review are my own. Introduction While being one of the only female Avengers, Black Widow has shown her own in the kicking and pain inflicting department, for which she's been rewarded with a top spot among the first four Mavel BrickHeadz. Lego's 41591 Black Widow also manages to capture the likeness of it's film inspiration--that of Scarlett Johansson--very well, which only adds to the appeal of the figure. But if you're not convinced she's a useful Avenger BrickHeadz yet, read on and let's see if we can change your opinion... Set Stats Name: 41591 Black Widow Theme: Licensed / BrickHeadz Year: 2017 Pieces: 143 Minifigs: N/A Price: USD $9.99, CA $12.99, DE 9.99€, UK £9.99 Resources: Brickset, Bricklink, Lego Shop Packaging As with all BrickHeadz, 41591 Black Widow comes in the standard BrickHeadz box--one that includes a thumb open tap, large BrickHeadz logos, and that wall of ugly text. Still, the blue of the Captain America: Civil War backdrop allows the black and orange figure to pop nicely, as does the image of Scarlett Johansson as Black Widow, for which the figure is inspired by. Inside the box you'll find one instruction booklet, two bags--one big and one small--as well as a loose 4x6 black plate which will be used for the figure's base. Interesting Parts 41591 Black Widow is one of the most part heavy BrickHeadz and she also manages to come with numerous desirable pieces in Dark Orange. Most of these dark orange pieces are various slopes, such as 1x2 slopes, 2x2 slopes, and 1x2 arch slopes. Aside from all the standard inclusions (modified bricks in light bley, BrickHeadz eye tiles, and of course the 2x4 wave tile), Black Widow comes with two uniquely printed pieces. The first is a 1x2 brick which depicts her torso and belt design, and the second being two 1x2 tiles in dark blueish grey that are printed with a depiction of her electrified gauntlets. While still being accurate to the character, the gauntlet tiles are generic enough to find numerous uses elsewhere--which is a plus. Build As with all BrickHeadz, the bulk of the building is focused on the head construction--or rather in the case of 41591 Black Widow, the hair. Using a massive number of slopes, tiles and plates Lego has managed to very accurately depict the hairstyle of the character from the Avengers films. Surprisingly, despite the bulk of the hair, I've not experienced the tendency for the figure to tip over backwards, which is unfortunately the case of other large headed figures like 41588 Joker and 41586 Batgirl. In addition to the hair, I found the belt/waist design to be particularity notable, in that Black Widow does not use a 4x4 plate for her main waist piece, as is the case with most BrickHeadz. Instead, she utilizes four black modified 2x2 plates, which allow for the attachment of a rather low riding belt. I'll also note that I found the transition from the main 1x2 printed brick to the adjacent bricks to be very well done. The black and dark bley colors flow really nicely into the print, creating a very streamlined look. And yes, you also build that base too, with only four pieces. Completed Figure First impression--lots of hair! But in a good way. It's been meticulously sculpted and as a result it has turned out to be very reminiscent of Scarlett Johansson's Black Widow. As I just noted, the streamlined feel to the figure is very nice, and her torso print and pieces are used very well. I also particularly like her leg pouches, which add to the character's armed feel. In that regard, Black Widow also comes with two rather generic accessories, 4 length bars in standard black, for her stun batons. Conclusion 41591 Black Widow is a detailed BrickHeadz with gorgeous dark orange hair and great graphic design. She'll be a welcome addition to any BrickHeadz collection. Score Design: 5/5 - Lots of work went into the hair, and it was worth the effort. Parts: 5/5 - Tons of Dark Orange? What's not to love?! Build: 5/5 - Black Widow utilizes different techniques than other BrickHeadz making her build uniquely interesting. Value for Price: 5/5 - One of the most part heavy BrickHeadz, you get the most for your money. My Score: (20/20) A Eurobricks BrickHeadz Reviews: 41585 Batman, 41586 Batgirl, 41587 Robin, 41588 The Joker, 41595 Belle, 41596 Beast, 41589 Captain America, 41590 Iron Man, 41591 Black Widow, 41592 The Hulk

BrickHeadz is an exciting new Lego theme that depicts our favorite characters from movies, TV shows, games, and comics into fun and stylized collectible forms. Each set contains a brick built figure with a build-able base, that includes a printed tile piece denoting the figure's wave number. Wave one consists of twelve unique and colorful characters based on The Lego Batman Movie, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Disney's Beauty and the Beast and Pirates of the Caribbean. BrickHeadz is an exclusive theme from Lego, which means that you can only find the BrickHeadz sets at Lego brand retail stores and online from Lego Shop. Before I begin this review, I would like to give my sincerest thanks to The LEGO Group (TLG) who have provided this set, and other wave one BrickHeadz sets, to Eurobricks making this review possible. The opinions expressed in this review are my own. Introduction Iron Man is arguably one of the most popular Marvel characters now, due in large part to his appearance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe. With that in mind, it's no surprise that 41590 Iron Man is one of the first Marvel BrickHeadz (second only to 41589 Captain America, make of that what you will), and for good logistical reasons too--he just looks great. Iron Man, due to his bulky armor, expressionless face, and hot rod color scheme translates to the BrickHeadz style far better than most. 41590 Iron Man is one of the best BrickHeadz, period. But I guess I do have to say a bit more, so read on... Set Stats Name: 41590 Iron Man Theme: Licensed / BrickHeadz Year: 2017 Pieces: 96 Minifigs: N/A Price: USD $9.99, CA $12.99, DE 9.99€, UK £9.99 Resources: Brickset, Bricklink, Lego Shop Packaging As with all BrickHeadz sets, 41590 Iron Man comes in the standard box with all the appropriate logos and walls of texts. Included is also an image of the inspiration, that of Iron Man mark whatever (I lost count, and I don't care to know anymore!) from Captain America: Civil War. Inside the box you'll find one instruction booklet, two bags--one big and one small--as well as a loose 4x6 black plate which will be used for the figure's base. Interesting Parts With a great color scheme, 41590 Iron Man also comes with numerous intersting pieces, both standard and printed. On the standard side, he come with the Brickheadz cornerstones such as the wave tile and fourteen of those modified bricks in light bley. But unlike others, instead of the round BrickHeadz eyes, Iron Man comes with two 1x1 trans-light blue tiles which are actually printed with a simple white square on top of them. This subtle print creates the illusion that they are actually lit by lights, which is very cool. Standard part wise, Iron man also comes with six headlight bricks in Bright Light Orange and eight in Dark Red. Additionally, various Dark Red modified plates are included, which are nice to have. Build Like all BrickHeadz, 41590 Iron Man features a standardized build structure, although he does feature some unique deviations to depict his bulky armor. The numerous headlight bricks also add an added twist on the BrickHeadz mold, which makes constructing Iron Man more interesting than some other figures. Of course, you also construct the standard BrickHeadz base. Completed Figure Overall very nice figure. 41590 Iron Man fits very well in the BrickHeadz template, and that's largely due to the bulky armor which looks nice when dropped into a rather square mold. The level of detail is just right, and the Bright Light Orange pops expertly well against the dark red. Lego could have used Pearl Gold instead, but I appreciate that they went with a brighter, if slightly less accurate, shade instead. Now unlike his SDCC counterpart, this Iron Man unfortunately does not come with repuslor blasts as an accessory. I would have appreciated those being included, but thankfully their absence is not as egregious as Captain America missing his shield or anything. Conclusion Disputed leader of the Avengers, 41590 Iron Man is both a necessary inclusion in any respectable Marvel BrickHeadz collection, but also a very well done figure in his own right. Score Design: 5/5 - The Iron Man armor translated very well to the blocky style of BrickHeadz. Parts: 5/5 - Dark Red and Bright Light Orange? Sign me up! Build: 5/5 - Despite on the surface reading mostly as just tiles, there's lots of nice interesting bits just under the surface. Value for Price: 5/5 - A good number of parts in uncommon colors and a great figure to boot means this is worth the cost. My Score: (20/20) A Eurobricks BrickHeadz Reviews: 41585 Batman, 41586 Batgirl, 41587 Robin, 41588 The Joker, 41595 Belle, 41596 Beast, 41589 Captain America, 41590 Iron Man, 41591 Black Widow, 41592 The Hulk

Introduction Hi fellow EB members! After the release of #21028 New York, #21027 Berlin and #21026 Venice, the Lego Architecture skylines series will expand in January with three new set: #21032 Sydney, #21033 Chicago and #21034 London. I was given the chance to review the later, so let's take a tour in London! Thanks to EB LUG Ambassador CopMike and the LEGO CEE Team and Designers for giving me the opportunity to review this set! Set information Name: 21034 London Theme: LEGO Model Making / Architecture Year: 2017 (Available now only at the Leicester's Square London Lego Store) Pieces: 468 Price: USD NA, GBP NA, EURO NA Resources: Brickset, BrickLink Packaging The box comes in the usual LEGO Architecture 's black livery. The front shows the full set, proudly standing on blueprints against the black background. On the upper left corner is a rather big LEGO Architecture logo and just under is the name of set and its location in the world... Nothing fancy here, just the good old Architecture box! The back of the box has a front shot of the set with pictures of each of the real buildings and a short comment on London in a few languages. Size of the set is also indicated: 285mm wide and 150mm tall. Content of the box The box contains the instructions booklet, 4 unnumbered bags but no brick separator. There are also 4 lose white 24L rigid hoses. Instructions booklet The 119 pages instructions booklet is, as always with Architecture sets, very well done and good looking with the classic black background. Of course about the monuments you're about to build. The instructions are easy to follow and thanks to the black background, it's very unlikely that you'll mistake a color for another. Build I'll skip lots of steps to reach the point where the base is completely done. You can clearly see that the buildings aren't all aligned, but the London Eye (and the National Gallery) will be positioned behind the others monuments. Lego choose the trans-clear color for the river Thames, which may or may not be very accurate! Now let's add some buildings on it! (Note that I'll review each monuments in an order that is not the building order) Let's start building with the Tower Bridge, the biggest and most complex build in this set. It is nicely created, with a good amount of details. One thing that bothers me is that it seems distorted, taller than it should... If the use of tan color is discutable, the medium blue is spot on! The London Eye is next! The build is really well thought, using flex tubes for the wheel and new white wishbones for the center structure. I'm not fond of the two gray technic pins used to join the flex tubes, but I can't think of a better part to use, except if we had white technic pins! The base of the wheel could have used a few less white parts to be more accurate. The National Gallery and Nelson"s column may be the tiniest builds of the set, together they make a really nice Trafalgar Square. The last building in this set is Big Ben, along with a part of the Palace of Westminster. First let's just talk about the look of the monument. It's pretty nicely designed, the textures are nice (ok, I turned Big Ben sideway, my bad) and proportions look good. A nice detail is the printed 2x2 brick with a printed clock pattern, too bad it's only printed on one side. Now let's see why I'm disappointed in this building... It may be the 5th or 6th rendition of Big Ben in Lego form, so I'm assuming Lego designer know pretty well the structure of the Palace of Westminster! When looking at the back of the box, we clearly see that the Lego build is almost exactly what we see in the picture of the real building: Now take a look at Westminster's plan and try to find what part of the Palace is represented by the Lego build... Big Ben is the "clock tower" on the far right, and the tower present in the build is the one over the "library", at the bottom right of the plan... To resume, the small build should be the #10253 Big Ben Creator set scaled down, so there's a big proportions problem! Going back to the review with the completed set. I must say it looks nice, despite being a bit too crowded on the left side, with the Eye keeping falling on the National Gallery! The boat on the Thames is a simple but nice detail! As always there is some spare parts. Interesting parts The set comes with a handful of 1x2 trans-clear tiles and 1x2 tan log bricks. There are also some of the new 1x1 quarter round tiles in light bluish gray and two white trophy statuettes. Exclusive parts include the printed London 1x8 black tile and the clock 2x2 tan brick, but also two white Technic wishbone suspension arm, the four 24L hose in white, the four medium blue 32580 hose 7M, and the new 23443 Bar Holder with Handle in medium blue. Conclusion Design: 7/10 - Nice, but some innacuracies that bother me... I hope it's only me! Parts: 8/10 - There are some great parts in this set, and a nice variety for an Architecture set. Build: 7/10 - Nice builds but with no advanced techniques. Price: --/10 - The retail prices aren't published as I write this review. I'll update that score when they are. Overall: 22/30 (73%) - A nice LEGO Architecture set, continuing an interesting sub-theme. Some minor flaws that won't decourage the Architecture's fans to get this set!

BrickHeadz is an exciting new Lego theme that depicts our favorite characters from movies, TV shows, games, and comics into fun and stylized collectible forms. Each set contains a brick built figure with a build-able base, that includes a printed tile piece denoting the figure's wave number. Wave one consists of twelve unique and colorful characters based on The Lego Batman Movie, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Disney's Beauty and the Beast and Pirates of the Caribbean. BrickHeadz is an exclusive theme from Lego, which means that you can only find the BrickHeadz sets at Lego brand retail stores and online from Lego Shop. Before I begin this review, I would like to give my sincerest thanks to The LEGO Group (TLG) who have provided this set, and other wave one BrickHeadz sets, to Eurobricks making this review possible. The opinions expressed in this review are my own. Introduction Yes, Hulk smash. Its a catchy catchphrase and decorum requires I write it here at least once, so I'm getting it out of the way now. Anyways, Hulk is a cornerstone member of the Avengers from the Marvel Cinematic Universe, and so it's no surprise that he's one of the first four characters to make the leap the film screen to Lego BrickHeadz, in the form of 41592 The Hulk. But while his straightforward dialogue and poppin purple pants have made him a crowd pleaser, in my opinion, they don't seem to have made the transition to BrickHeadz particularly well. Why should you ask? Well read on... Also quick aside, do note I apparently inaccurately placed Hulk's thumbs in my images...whoops... Set Stats Name: 41592 The Hulk Theme: Licensed / BrickHeadz Year: 2017 Pieces: 93 Minifigs: N/A Price: USD $9.99, CA $12.99, DE 9.99€, UK £9.99 Resources: Brickset, Bricklink, Lego Shop Packaging Color. The reason is color. Cutting to the chase, 41592 The Hulk is intended to represent the film version, specifically the one from Avengers: Age of Ultron (and as such has a unique red colored box), but he just doesn't cut it color wise. This is most evident on the box art itself, which while showing all the standard staples such as the BrickHeadz logo and that ugly wall of text, importantly shows the character inspiration image--one which is clearly depicts an olive green Hulk as opposed to the Lego green Hulk. It's a subtle but significant difference. Lego Marvel Superheroes learned this lesson after their first Avengers set wave in 2012--in which the first Lego bigfig of Hulk was inaccurately molded in bright green--only to soon be switched over to the correct olive green shade for the next film sets. Now you may be saying, "well so what, he's still green". True, that is a valid point. But in my view the fact that he is not the right green is a significant issue as the figure is billed as, and is meant to accompany other figures being billed as, versions from the Avengers/MCU films. This is not a film Hulk, this is comic Hulk. But I digress. In the meantime on the actual subject of packaging, inside the box you'll find one instruction booklet, two bags--one big and one small--as well as a loose 4x6 black plate which will be used for the figure's base. Interesting Parts Considering that he's basically just green skin and purple pants, one doesn't go into 41592 The Hulk expecting the greatest new pieces ever. And I'm not going to try and dispute that. Hulk comes with the standards, such as the wave plate, BrickHeadz eyes, and those modified bricks (fourteen of them). He does have two nice hinge pieces in green, but that's about it. Printed parts: just two 1x4 bricks that depict his muscular torso. What you see is what you get with this guy. Build 41592 The Hulk is perhaps one of the simplest BrickHeadz to construct, which is not surprising considering he's basically just giant-sized normal person, well with green skin. There's no interesting new techniques, although he does feature some abnormally large arms and hands for a BrickHeadz, which I think work well as they give the impression of a bulky person without actually changing the standardized scale itself. Completed Figure I mean, does it look like Hulk? Absolutely. But I cannot shake the feeling that he should have been in olive green. Consitancy wise, all the other Marvel figures are based on their popular film appearance looks, and Hulk just stands out because he's too bright--he has not been appropriately muted down to match the film. Does he make a good figure himself--yes. Does he fit in with the movie specific figures? That's a tough question and frankly one that's up for everyone to individually decide. Conclusion 41592 The Hulk may have smashed expectations with his recent appearances in the Avengers films, but I don't think he's the breakout start of the Marvel BrickHeadz wave. Score Design: 5/5 - Overall, it's hard to get the Hulk's shape wrong, really. Parts: 2/5 - Green? Wrong--Olive Green is right! Build: 5/5 - Simple, but that's expected for a character like Hulk. Value for Price: 3/5 - Is it worth adding to your collection, when he doesn't fit in stylistically? My Score: (15/20) C Eurobricks BrickHeadz Reviews: 41585 Batman, 41586 Batgirl, 41587 Robin, 41588 The Joker, 41595 Belle, 41596 Beast, 41589 Captain America, 41590 Iron Man, 41591 Black Widow, 41592 The Hulk

Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 T-rex Year of release: 2017 (according to BrickLink and me, 2016 according to lego.com) Number of bricks: 174 + 8 spares Target age: 7-12 years Price: €17,99 (in Lego online shop; I found a set in Hamburg's Saturn for €12,99) A word in advance: I'm not sure if this is the right forum for this set, but to me it seems the best place since there are dinosaurs here. Soon after I rebooted my Lego hobby, I fell in love with the Red Dragon from the Red Creatures (31032) set. When I saw the Mighty Dinosaurs in the first 2017 catalogue, I knew I had to get my hands on that one too. Not to my disappointment. A somewhat better layout-ed version of this review can be found here on my website. The box Let’s get the box over and done with. The front side of the box (see above) looks neat with a volcano in the background and the remains of a dead dino at the feet of the T-rex. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 box front The backside gives no additional surprises. The same models but with a more equal space distribution, so you can have a good look at the other two of this 3in1 box. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 box back Then the side, well the only interesting one. More of the same and a 1:1 picture of a 1×2 plate with the white pointy things that do well as teeth but also as fingers on the wings of the flying dinosaur. Is it a Pteranodon? Let’s stick with that. Thirdly, the part is also used as the serrated edges at the head shield of the triceratops. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 box long side One side also advertises Lego Life which turns out to be an app for your tablet but I am going to ignore it here since I bought the box to build Lego not to tap a screen. The contents Then, what’s in the box? Three booklets for the three models and three bags of bricks. One for the biggest parts, one bag for the smallest parts and one for the mid-sized parts. No surprise, no mystery. What is a nice surprise is that this is actually a 4in1 box. The fourth model is a Brontosaurus. You can download the building instructions from www.lego.com. I checked it. It is there. The parts What I like about the Creator theme is that it finds a good middle ground between detailed modelling with large amounts of special bricks on the one hand and the type of building of the pre-1980s. These are sliding scales, of course, but still. The Creator theme gets you decent-looking, highly playable, sturdy and yet very recognizable models. True to this middle ground, this box contains many basic and close-to-basic bricks and some special ones. According to the manual, the box contains 174 bricks divided over 68 different shape/color combinations. This is not counting the eight spare parts (shown below). Overviewing all these, what stands out is the collection of hinges. There are about 45 parts that perform a role in some form of hinge. The picture shows all the varieties used in this set. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 hinge parts Next, here is something familiar to most Lego fans, but since I have just come out of my dark years, these are new to me. So, it is time to pay my homage to Lego’s greatest invention after the studs-on-top: studs-on-the-side. The Mighty Dinosaurs set has three types of them. The 1×1 tan brick has two side studs on adjacent sides, which is new for 2017 according to BrickLink. The 1×1 brick with studs on 4 sides was introduced in 1985, so I wonder, why wait 30 years with the adjacent-sides version? Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 side-studs bricks Also new in this set are some parts that are new because they are available in dark green: a 2×2 brick with ball receptacle (and axle holder), a 4×3 open wedge that forms the eyebrows of the T-rex, and the left and right 2×3 wedge plates. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 new parts Apparently not that new, but a very puzzling part to me when I saw it the first time is this one. Technically speaking it is a pneumatic hose connector with an axle holder attached to it. It makes for an excellent nail holder as I’ll explain below. Hose connector with axle holder Spare parts after building the T-rex. None of the other 3 models use any of these spare parts, so they are really extra. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 spare parts Building instructions The set is part of the Creator theme and advertised for ages 7 to 12, so to me it does not seem a difficult model. It could be different for a 7-year old builder. I am really curious, because compared to the 1970s building instructions, the current ones are a giant leap ahead. However I feel Lego has overshot it’s target here, which is why I wonder what a 7-year old thinks of it. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 T-rex instruction page Recently, I rebuilt my Technic fork lift (852). In some places, it needs a bit of three-dimensional insight to figure out which brick goes where. Those days are over, fortunately. But to spend an entire image to show where one single brick goes after an image where three bricks are placed in a row leaving a conspicuously empty spot? I count about 10 such overly clear steps in the 52-step manual, which makes me wonder what the reasoning is behind the design of the building instructions? Design If anything, I find the design elegant, perhaps with the exception of how some of the hinges are used. When it comes to the overall shape: I like it a lot. It really looks like a T-rex and it stands firmly. If I have to point out a flaw, I’ll say that the front paws seem too long. One stud too long to be precise, and their claws are one stud to wide. In defense of the design, the mistake is of course with the T-rex itself. It looks hideous and unreal, even for a dinosaur, with those ridiculously small front paws. Technically speaking, the design is quite similar to that of the dragon from the Red Creatures set, so the basics have been tried and tested. Moreover, there is a cousin T-rex as one of the additional models in the Roaring Power (31024) set. I haven’t built that one, but having checked its building instructions, I think one could make an interesting comparison of the building techniques that are used in these two T-rex models and the Red Dragon. Possible topics could be the use of hinges, the design of the legs and feet and differences in the construction of the heads. I’m not sure whether it is a flaw or a smart solution, but the T-rex’s head is too long and/or heavy for the small ball-hinge that connects it to the neck. On static display, the hinge is strong enough to keep the head steady in any position, but a small movement of the entire model will make the head nod downwards. A green 1×2 plate prevents it from dropping completely and holds it in a natural position. So, the hinge is not strong enough, but there’s a good work-around. T-rex neck and head hinges T-rex with hinge blocks T-rex without neck hinge block Upon further inspection, the hinges between the neck and the body also don’t allow the neck to bend downwards. And at the back-side of the body, the first tail-part also has a block. Here it is a round 2×2 plate so that the tail can still move left and right. The overall result is that the T-rex can hardly bend forward, but it can bend backwards to the extent that it can almost kiss the tip of its tail. T-rex tail hinge with block T-rex fully curled downwards T-rex fully curled backwards To finish the technicalities, there is an interesting technique to put the middle toenail of the hind legs a bit higher than the outer ones. This is where the pneumatic hose connector gets a creative application. The pin of the nail fits in the centre of the axle holder and two clips hold the two sides of the connector. The box’s illustrations nor the building instructions advertise it, but this construction allows the nail to hinge downwards. It could be a nice technique to make retractable cat nails. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 T-rex claws with hinging nail Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 T-rex claw with hinging nail Below a few pictures of the major building stages of the T-rex. Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 T-rex skeleton Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 T-rex body Mighty Dinosaurs 31058 T-rex building stage Color scheme The color scheme is well-chosen. The basics of it have also been tried and tested. Just like the Red Dragon, the T-rex has tan at the bottom. This goes all the way from the chin to the neck to the belly to the tail. The top side is green. No-one knows what colors dinosaurs had, I believe, and they may as well have been green-ish. Mixing in some dark-green parts adds a lot, and since it’s a children’s set, the brightest of the two was wisely chosen as the main color. The scheme is broken by some highlights. I’m not sure if the grey color of the hinge parts is good. In favor: it breaks the green. Against: it is not green and makes the model look like robosaurus. The fiery orange eyes beneath the dark green eyebrows give the T-rex its dangerous looks. The big rows of teeth may have something to do with that as well… The Pteranodon, the triceratops and the Brontosaurus Unfortunately, I don’t have time to discuss the other three models. Hopefully the pictures will do. In terms of color scheme they are all the same. In terms of shape, the four are markedly different and do equally well. The T-rex, which has the largest number of parts, probably serves as the selling point of the set. But in the end however, I’m tempted to buy three more sets, so I can display the four at the same time. The Pteranodon Pteranodon body Pteranodon body plus limb parts Pteranodon divided in modules Pteranodon The Triceratops Triceratops’ head halfway Triceratops’ head Triceratops’ body without top shield Triceratops divided in modules Triceratops The Brontosaurus Brontosaurus body halfway Brontosaurus body almost finished Brontosaurus body Brontosaurus divided in modules Brontosaurus (Notice the mistake?) Playability I’m more into building than into playing with the resulting creations, but I am guessing the T-rex and its cousins have a high playability. There is the attraction of the dangerous animals packaged in a bright color scheme that makes them good toys. They are also loaded with different kinds of hinges which makes them ideal study objects for children who are not familiar with the concept. Moreover, the hinges allow for endless variations of positions which must be a lot of fun when playing. The Pteranodon has great wooshability, provided you keep the head straight. Otherwise the head works like rudder and since it is at the front side it makes flying characteristics a bit unstable. Also, the Red Dragon and the Pteranodon make a great flying team. Finally, do note that the models are on minifigure scale, in particular the T-rex. Conclusion Great set! Talking value for money, at €17,99 in the on-line store I find it over-priced by 3 €.

Hi LEGO fans, I'm from Kraze Magazine! We've recently recorded a fun un box and review video of the awesome new LEGO City Police station set! Check it out on the Kraze YouTube page by clicking HERE - it would be great to hear what you think! We're also giving away three LEGO City Police Stations! So make sure you go and buy Kraze Magazine Issue 65 which is in shops in the UK on 29th March 2017!

BrickHeadz is an exciting new Lego theme that depicts our favorite characters from movies, TV shows, games, and comics into fun and stylized collectible forms. Each set contains a brick built figure with a build-able base, that includes a printed tile piece denoting the figure's wave number. Wave one consists of twelve unique and colorful characters based on The Lego Batman Movie, the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Disney's Beauty and the Beast and Pirates of the Caribbean. BrickHeadz is an exclusive theme from Lego, which means that you can only find the BrickHeadz sets at Lego brand retail stores and online from Lego Shop. Before I begin this review, I would like to give my sincerest thanks to The LEGO Group (TLG) who have provided this set, and other wave one BrickHeadz sets, to Eurobricks making this review possible. The opinions expressed in this review are my own. Introduction Beauty and the Beast is without a doubt one of Disney's greatest films, so it shouldn't be surprising that when Lego tackles said property head on, good results soon follow. 41596 Beast should be of particular interest to BrickHeadz fans because he's has the most non-human form of all the figures we've seen from the first wave. No doubt later down the line we'll end up with some equally challenging shapes being squeezed into the BrickHeadz mold but the fact that Beast has turned out so well (and frankly so cute), can only mean good things to come. But for now, let's take a deeper look at the Beast within... Set Stats Name: 41596 Beast Theme: Licensed / BrickHeadz Year: 2017 Pieces: 116 Minifigs: N/A Price: USD $9.99, CA $12.99, DE 9.99€, UK £9.99 Resources: Brickset, Bricklink, Lego Shop Packaging The BrickHeadz sets all come in the same sized box (3.6 x 4.8 x 3.1), and 41596 Beast is no exception. Unlike the box style used for the Lego Batman Movie BrickHeadz, such as that on 41585 Batman, the color scheme used by 41596 Beast is far more pleasing to the eye. Bright pink is used which contrasts very nicely with the blue and yellow coat worn by Beast as well as all of his Dark Orange fur. The white brick border on the bottom of the box is also of particular note, as it gives the whole set a very clean and premium feel. The front and right hand side features the BrickHeadz logo as well as an image of the Beast himself, including image of the figure's 1991 animated inspiration. Both 41595 Belle and the Beast are inspired by their animated appearance rather than their upcoming live action forms, I suspect this was done by Lego to reach the widest possible buying audience and beef up the nostalgia factor. While live action Belle may not have changed much visually, the upcoming live action Beast is certainly darker overall and would likely have created a more animalistic and possibly unfamiliar figure for the public. So in my opinion it was wise to go with the animated form. Unlike the Lego Batman Movie BrickHeadz, the Disney based ones use an ugly white wall of text, as opposed to a black one. Somewhat better? The back of the 41596 Beast box features images of 41595 Belle, as well as the two upcoming Pirates of the Caribbean BrickHeadz: 41593 Captain Jack Sparrow and 41594 Captain Armando Salazar. And as with all BrickHeadz boxes, this one is opened by a thumb tab rather than tape. Inside the box you'll find one instruction booklet, two bags--one big and one small--as well as a loose 4x6 black plate which will be used for the figure's base. Interesting Parts Being brightly colored and furry, 41596 Beast comes with a number of desirable parts, many of which coming the uncommon color of Dark Orange. These include eight 2x2 slopes, one 1x2 slope, two modified 1x2 plates with side clip, two dark orange jumper plates, and two dark orange 1x2 tooth plates. Additionally, Beast comes with two white quarter melon tiles, which are used for his fangs. As with all BrickHeadz, Beast features a number of (1x2x1 2/3) modified brick with side studs (in this case fourteen), as well as the standardized BrickHeadz eye tiles and wave indication 2x4 plate. 41596 Beast only comes with one uniquely printed piece, which is his vest print on a 1x1x2 yellow brick. Build As with all BrickHeadz the underlying structure of the figure is more or less the same--it's only when one reaches the head to things really start to change technique wise. In this regard, 41596 Beast features a number of smart choices that not only make the figure fun to build, but spot on accurate after the face. The use of quarter melon tiles for the fangs, the semblance of a lower lip with a goatee, and even bushy eyebrows really sell the look of the animated character. Also of note this is the only BrickHeadz thus far that has a tail! Completed Figure He's so cute! The little bow, the fangs, even the standardized BrickHeadz eyes giving the puppy dog look! Now why wouldn't Belle love him? Ignoring the kidnapping and servitude bits of course. Still, 41596 Beast is a truly stunning figure--not only does he look like his animated counterpart, but he simply pops on a shelf. The colors are bold and the design is new and unique. What's more to ask for? Conclusion An absolute must have for Disney fans, I'm sure we'll find even marginal BrickHeadz fans will be considering adding 41596 Beast to their collection. Score Design: 5/5 - Oh how a beast could be so beautiful, and not just on the inside! Lego has captured the Beast's face very well. Parts: 5/5 - Despite having only one unique print, the large amount of Dark Orange pieces more than make up for it. Build: 5/5 - The most animal-like of the Wave 1 BrickHeadz, Beast is interesting to build simply because his face is so different and detailed. Value for Price: 5/5 - Dark Orange, cute cuddly Beast? What's not to love at this price point? My Score: (20/20) A Eurobricks BrickHeadz Reviews: 41585 Batman, 41586 Batgirl, 41587 Robin, 41588 The Joker, 41595 Belle, 41596 Beast, 41589 Captain America, 41590 Iron Man, 41591 Black Widow, 41592 The Hulk