REVIEW: 80113 Family Reunion Celebration

[Pchan1983]

Here is my review on the latest LEGO Chinese New Year set 80113 Family Reunion Celebration:

 

THE GOOD:

• Looks stunning!  It has more depth and height than you see in the pictures!
• Really capture the typical chinese restaurant look.
• I love the dim sum cart!
• Exciting ways to build the exterior.
• Very lively store front.
• Excellent selection of minifigures as usual.

THE NOT SO GOOD:

• For a fully enclosed MOC, it will cost you some money =P
• A few decorated tiles could have been printed.
• The small stem for the pink flower doesn't connect well so the flower pops out easily when you about to put the flower stands in the corner.

This probably be in the top 5 of my ranking on Chinese New Year set.  I'm pretty sure this set has been designed as a full modular in mind.  You can see how a fully enclosed would look while building it.  The exterior looks absolutely stunning with various interesting new ways to create the oriental look. It also stand quite high and have much depth that you won't notice in the product images.  In fact, this kinda like the Diagon Alley, even great to display without the other half.  The store front is very lively.  The interior also great, it really captures most of the essentials in a Chinese restaurant.  From the counter, gold fish tank to the kitchen with a huge cutting board.  Although the roast chicken is kinda big in scale =P.  The dinning table is a nice call back to the first ever CNY set, and I believe it's the same family.  Having a working lazy susan in smaller table is also great.  With a unique stair case and somewhat clean but uncomfortable toilet seat, it;s nearly perfect.  The minifigures are excellent too.  I love the staff member with very realistic design of their torso.  of course the dragon costume guy is good but I did wish he wears a red based outfit rather than a gold one.  It will look awkard when you have all 12 lined up with some in red, and a few odd ones stand out.  There aren't much to dislike about this set to be honest, the only slight improvement I can think of is probably some of the tiles could have been printed instead of sticker.  One more thing though, the pink flower can be a bit lose and easily pops out when trying to put the flower shop into the corner of the store.  While building a full modular MOC is tempting, this can be super expensive given buying 2 sets will leave you short in the green ingots unless you just want to mirror the same set up at the back.  Having said that, this set already selling with 30% from KMART in New Zealand, tempted but I have other priorities.  Anyway, this is definitely a set I would recommend.  And now we have half of the zodiac signs, only 6 more to go but clearly LEGO is running out of ideas as the actual event celebrating CNY has been rehashed in this just a different settings.  So I'm actually very curious on what may come out in the next 6 years on the sets in minifigure scale!

[TeriXeri]

I do like they went back to locations and also even somewhat went back to the first Family Dinner set from 2019 as well (which was not sold in Europe or US as far as I know)

I think this is a great set , at that price as well.

Edited January 1, 2024 by TeriXeri

[Lion King]

I do wish this Family Reunion could be a modular builidng to fit into Modular Buildings. It does look amazing! I guess MOCing it will cost money after all. 

20 hours ago, TeriXeri said:

I do like they went back to locations and also even somewhat went back to the first Family Dinner set from 2020 as well (which was not sold in Europe or US as far as I know)

I think this is a great set , at that price as well.

2019, not 2020. I reember there were Templre Fair and Lion Dance sets in 2020. 

[hikouki]

5 hours ago, Lion King said:

I do wish this Family Reunion could be a modular builidng to fit into Modular Buildings. It does look amazing! I guess MOCing it will cost money after all. 

2019, not 2020. I reember there were Templre Fair and Lion Dance sets in 2020. 

Perhaps they will consider doing another temple fair, this time a modular?

[Pchan1983]

9 hours ago, Lion King said:

I do wish this Family Reunion could be a modular builidng to fit into Modular Buildings. It does look amazing! I guess MOCing it will cost money after all. 

yes, if try to MOC now would be expensive.  Wait for the set be like 30~40% off then won't be as costly.

3 hours ago, hikouki said:

Perhaps they will consider doing another temple fair, this time a modular?

it will be difficult for temple fair to be modular.  I guess they can do something like the Lantern festival one but a temple fair requires much more food stalls to fit the theme which may drive up the cost.