Review: Arctic Batman vs. Mr. Freeze: Aquaman on Ice

[Oky]

Hello Ladies and Gentlemen, and welcome to Aquaman on Ice!

No, it's not an ice-skating show. I'm talking about the latest set in the Batman and Friends Super Heroes theme, "Arctic Batman vs. Mr. Freeze: Aquaman on Ice." Is that the longest Lego set name ever? I guess they were trying to squeeze the names of all three characters into the title. Anyway, I was lucky enough to order this set (along with some other 2013 sets) when Amazon had them up for sale for a short time, so I am able to bring you an early review of this set!

Set Number: 76000

Name: Arctic Batman vs. Mr. Freeze: Aquaman on Ice

Theme: Super Heroes

Subtheme: DC Universe

Year of Release: 2013

Pieces: 198

Minifigs: 3

Price: $19.99 USD

S@H description:

Mr. Freeze has trapped Aquaman in a block of ice and only Batman can release him! Speed to the rescue in the powerful Batboat with exhaust flames, deploy the missiles and release the bombs to bust that block of ice. It's time to turn the heat up on Mr. Freeze! Includes 3 minifigures: white Arctic Batman, Mr. Freeze and Aquaman, all with assorted weapons.

Brickset Bricklink Brickshelf

The Box

The box is the same size as that of all sets of this price range this year and it's very blue, which fits the winter theme well. It has a nice illustration of Batman in his nifty new arctic suit in the top right corner. The boxart shows our two heroes battling Mr. Freeze on what is presumably a frozen Gotham City Bay. My copy of this set appears to have a typo in the set title as it says "Artic Batman". Hopefully they'll catch on to this before these are widely released as it is quite embarrassing to have a typo right on the front of the box.

The back of the box is mostly orange for some reason. It doesn't go very well with the winter theme, but it doesn't look bad. It shows an alternate action shot and all the play features.

Contents

Inside the box you'll find an instruction booklet, a relatively large sticker sheet, a comic book, and four bags. Surprisingly, none of them are numbered. The comic is about Batman's enemies escaping from Arkham and Batman, Robin, and Aquaman trying to stop them. There's also a short comic featuring the Tumbler and Bat, but it hardly has any story. The TDKR Bane on the cover looks a little out of place to me.

The instructions also have an orange background which doesn't suit this set at all and is a bit distracting, but other than that the instructions are pretty easy to follow. As usual, there's a slight image of three figs from this wave in the top right corner of some of the pages: Aquaman, TDKR Batman, and Arkham Asylum Joker. Quite a random group of characters. I think it would have made more sense if it were the three figs from this set, but oh well.

These are some of the notable pieces in this set. The long Ninjago blade appears for the first time in pearl silver and the rock piece comes in trans-light-blue for the first time. The colors of the big flame piece seemed different to me too, but it turns out they're the same. I think there was just a little more red mixed into it than usual.

Minifigs

The minifigures are the main selling point of this set as they are all new and exclusive. Batman comes in a new, mostly white suit that is supposed to keep him from freezing. I guess that makes him the Light Knight? He looks pretty cool, in every sense of the word, although this specific suit wont be very versatile.

Mr. Freeze gets a complete redesign from his previous incarnation. The biggest difference is that he now sports a sand-blue Atlantis diver helmet. It looks pretty good and I really wanted to like this fig since Freeze is one of my favorite Bat-villains, but the face just ruins it for me. He looks more like an angry zombie than Mr. Freeze. He is supposed to be emotionless, so why is he so angry? And where are his goggles? Only the worst interpretations of this character didn't have goggles, so I really don't like that he doesn't have them.

There are people who are fans of Aquaman, and then there are people who view him as a joke. Unfortunately, I am one of the latter. I can't believe that out of all the DC superheroes they could have put into this set, they chose Aquaman. I mean, he's just a guy who talks to fish! I would have much rather gotten Green Lantern, or the Flash, or Martian Manhunter, or anyone really. But I guess in the context of the set, it kinda makes sense for him to be included, and I find it pretty funny that TLG seems to think that he is a joke too since he merely plays the role of a damsel in distress in this set. It's even implied in the set name! I would probably feel warmer towards this minifig if it at least looked cool, but it doesn't. It looks like Aquaman, yes, but there's something about the face or the hair that makes him look too boyish. He looks more like Justin Bieber in pajamas than the king of Atlantis. I do like the printing on his torso though.

Here are some reference images. Mr. Freeze seems to be based on his Arkham City design whereas Batman's Arctic suit originates from the The Batman cartoon. Aquaman is based on his usual comic appearance. They are all very accurate.

Looking at them from the back, you can see that Aquaman also has some nice printing on his back. Batman with his white cape and cowl blends into my white background like a ninja!

I have taken off his cape and cowl and Mr. Freeze's helmet so that you can see their back printing too. It's pretty detailed, and considering that they don't really need it, it's nice that TLG added it anyway.

Mr. Freeze also has some great printing on the front. Batman and Aquaman have double sided heads with angry expressions. Mr. Freeze, however, doesn't. He's just angry all the time for some reason. This is very disappointing since they could have easily given him a second face too, one with a calm expression and perhaps even goggles. I really don't understand why they didn't do this.

Here's a comparison with the old Mr. Freeze. I don't have the trans-clear helmet the old one is supposed to have, so I used the closest thing I had. The suit on the new one better, I think, and so does the freeze gun, although I kinda like the piece they used for the freeze beam on the old one better.

Of course, if you have the old Mr. Freeze, you can easily swap their heads, and this is what you get. I think this combo looks very good and makes me wonder why they didn't go for a similar face design on the new head.

Perhaps the new face could be explained like this:

Here's a lineup of all of Batman's different suits so far. The Arctic suit fits in well with the rest.

And here you can see Mr. Freeze next to the Atlantis divers. They look quite good together. One could almost think his suit is a left-over design from a scrapped wave of Atlantis sets.

The Build

The first thing you build is Mr. Freeze's freeze gun. It looks nice and retro. I like the energy cell attached to it, but I'm not too fond of the overall lance shape. Batman gets two of his usual black batarangs. This seems like a missed opportunity to make Batarangs in new colors like white or blue, but oh well. Aquaman fittingly comes with an Atlantis trident.

Next, you build Aquaman's ice prison. The base is comprised of slopes and tiles.

Then you put Aquaman in the middle and trap him inside the two rock pieces. See ya, fish whisperer. He fits inside easily, but it can be difficult to close the trap when he is carrying his trident. Overall, the ice block looks pretty good, but I think I prefer the marbled rock pieces from the old Batcave set.

In order to save him from becoming a fish-stick, you simply push down the white tab on the side. Since the rock pieces are only attached by one stud, it works fairly well.

Then comes the main part of the build, the Batboat. Here's a picture of it in mid-build. As usual, there several randomly colored pieces used during the build, but most of them become invisible in the finished model.

And here it is, the completed Batboat! I must say, it looks even better in person than on the official pictures!

It looks pretty good from the back too!

Like Aquaman, this batboat is almost identical to the one from the videogame Lego Batman 2: DC Superheroes which is pretty neat. The differences are only very minor.

Here's a shot of it from the front which has the obligatory Bat-logo sticker.

And here it is from the back. Don't get too close to that exhaust port!

It looks very sleek and streamlined from the side. There is a clip on each side for attaching the Batarangs which I really like. So far, none of the Batvehicles have had any place to store those things.

Much like the Batwing, the Batboat has the shape of a bat when looking at it from above. The "bat ears" are only attached by a hinge and tend to snap off when moved sideways, but they can just as easily be snapped back on.

Play Features

The Batboat has several features. The cockpit opens up and there is a steering wheel and two control panels inside. It's kind of a tight fit, though, and it's impossible to seat batman inside without wrinkling his cape.

Each side of the boat has a pin for shooting discs which I guess are supposed to be some kind of heat-batarangs. It works well and the discs shoot pretty far.

On the back, it has two bombs which can be deployed by simply pushing them off the stud they're attached to. It's pretty low-tech, but it works. You can also spin the engine flame.

The Complete Set

Here's the full set. I think it all fits together nicely. You get a cool vehicle, a nice piece of exploding scenery, and three exclusive figures. It's a worthy opponent to its Marvel counterpart, Spider-Man's Spider-Cycle Chase.

Ratings

Design: 5/5 - I love the Batboat. It's so sleek and swooshable. It looks like a bat and has several play features, including Batarang holders. I think it's my favorite Batvehicle so far. The block of ice looks good too.

Build: 4/5 - The build is varied, not repetitive, and overall quite satisfying. It's a bit of a pain to put on all those stickers though.

Minifigs: 4/5 - The minifigs are pretty good for the most part. Arctic Batman looks great and Aquaman looks decent too, although the choice of hair piece could have been better. Mr. Freeze looks pretty good in his Arkham City style suit, but they really screwed up on his head in my opinion.

Playability: 5/5 - Like I said before, the Batboat is very swooshable and has 2 disc shooters and 2 bombs. What more could you want? The exploding feature of the ice block is nice too.

Parts: 4/5 - You get a good variety of useful parts, some of them in rare colors.

Price: 4/5 - 198 pieces is a decent amount for a $20 set, especially a licensed one.

Overall: 4.5/5 - This set is a good value. It gives you one of Batman's signature vehicles from the videogame, an exploding piece of scenery, Batman in one of his special suits, a new Mr. Freeze (who will go nicely with the upcoming Arkham Asylum), and another hero to add to your Lego Justice League, as useless as he may be. It's a good buy for Batman fans of all ages and a very fitting set to build during the winter season. The only thing that keeps it from being great are Mr. Freeze's and Aquaman's terrible heads, but that's just my opinion.

I hope you enjoyed this review and that it was helpful to you. And to finish it off, here's one more Aquaman joke:

Are You Friggin Kidding Me? by Oky - Space Ranger, on Flickr

[just2good]

Phenomenal review, Oky!

This set is awesome, mostly because of the three awesome exclusive figures. The Bat-Boat itself is kind of crappy in my opinion, though.

[Oky]

Phenomenal review, Oky!

This set is awesome, mostly because of the three awesome exclusive figures. The Bat-Boat itself is kind of crappy in my opinion, though.

Thanks!

What do you not like about the boat?

[Lyichir]

I thought the big flame piece always had a trans red base... Are you sure that's new?

Anyway, good review.

[Oky]

I thought the big flame piece always had a trans red base... Are you sure that's new?

Hm... I guess you're right. Somehow it looked different to me. Thanks, I'll change my comment.

[prateek]

Very nice. I definitely want to pick this set up. The only thing I can see wrong with this is that instead of including 8 grey 1x1 slopes for the side of the boat's fuselage like in the game, they cheaped out and used tiles and stickers instead.

[TheLegoDr]

Thanks for the review. Always an entertaining read. I will definitely pick this up. I agree about Aquaman not being that cool, but I guess my main reference of him is from Family Guy/Robot Chicken, so maybe I am missing something. But I will gladly accept another superhero. I even bought the Spider-Man set for Iron Fist, even though I have never heard of him. However, Batman in white/light gray and a new Freeze are definitely welcome. I actually like the new Freeze. I don't have the original, so that may be part of it. But I actually don't care about the goggles. I prefer this face over bright red goggles. I like the ice blue colored eyes. But I agree they should have had an alternate face, even if similar to Doc Ock with one side having goggles and other no goggles. That would please everyone.

I do like the batboat. It has a nice shape and design. I'm glad it is in black to go with his other vehicles, but white would almost make more sense in this scenario.

And maybe Artic isn't a typo. Maybe that is what it is really called. Artic is short for articulated vehicle according to dictionary.com. Maybe that is referring to the boat or Batman's suit. OR Artic is also a link to the art institute of Chicago. Maybe Batman's suit is a work of art... Or maybe they just need a better proof-reader on their staff. You may be holding a rare box worth literally dozens of dollars..

[Luke Styer]

I looks like an awesome set. I voted 4 rather than 5 because I agree that they dropped the ball on Mr. Freeze's head, especially considering they already had a more appropriate design. That ice block would also be useful for reenacting the discovery of Captain America frozen in the North Atlantic from Avengers #4.

[Piranha]

Thanks for the review, it was good. I like this new Batboat design, it is sort of a fusion between the old Bat-blade and original Batboat.

Too bad about the ice crystal not having multiple colors fused into it like in the original Bat Cave.

$20 is a decent price, and I am sure this will be a popular seller, it is definitely one of my favorite Superhero sets so far.

I mean, he's just a guy who talks to fish!

Winner.

[CorneliusMurdock]

Aquaman's not just a guy who talks to fish, he um... can talk to crustaceans and sea mammals as well. So... yeah.

Well, I'm thrilled to be getting Aquaman. I'll probably replace the hair and head (what's with all the cheek bones lately?) but at least it's one more step to completing my Super Friends. Now I just have to finish up the Wonder Twins...

DC does need to branch out more with more non-Bat heroes. I'm disappointed that not only is Lego continuing to only give us Batman but now the Marvel line is starting to do the same thing with Spiderman. While they both may be bankable characters, I'm not going to buy every single version of them. But I did have to get every Avenger. See the difference there, TLG?

[TheLegoDr]

Exactly. I love Batman, but I don't need multiples of him. I am interested in the Spider-Man villains, but I don't want multiple Spider-Men either..I think next year we will get something different from both parties since we will have more Marvel related set ideas from other superheroes and DC won't be able to ride too much longer on the Batman coat-tail. Although I do want more Batman villains...

As for the ice crystal, I didn't think about it being used for Captain also, good idea. They gave us a Captain Avengers set, so maybe they will give us a more Captain origin set someday (although I am doubting it).

[Fikko3107]

I think that the Mr.freeze would look much more accurate to the Arkham incarnation if a CMF series 7 galaxy patrol blaster gun is used. Just an opinion...

[def]

I'm not thrilled with this set, but there's a 100% chance of me getting it.

Aquaman looks great. Mr. Freeze looks so-so. I prefer the old head. I like him with goggles. Mr. Freeze was never a well-designed character until he appeared in the Animated Series, so that's the one I've grown attracted to. The snow-patrol Batman is pretty silly, but I guess the company needs excuses to keep shipping out Batmen. Hopefully they'll try to expand things with the summer sets. At the very least, they could capitalise on the Man of Steel movie coming out.

Oh, and great review! Thanks! I'm glad to see some good pics!

[Purpearljellyblob]

Great review Oky! Nice pictures!

I guess the main attraction for this DC set is not in the structures but in the minifigures.

This is the first time I have seen a white batman and I am excited! I believe Aquaman and Freeze aren't too shabby either, they are newly designed minifigures after all

[Hoschiebaer]

great review! good to see a closeup fo the minifigures

for all those stickers - i guess they could at least put in a 2x1 cheese slope with a batman logo for the front (or some printed tilted ones for the cockipt)

i also dislike that batman got this white headband, to make his "eyes" white while wearing his cowl

(whats the point in having holes for his eyes in the cowl when u can only use batman's head for it - same problem with the starwars hoth-trooper helmets)

i quite like mr freeze and even aquaman more than the arctic batman (using a black cowl/hands/legs/cape might change that)

really diggin the printed torso on mr freeze

i just bought the superman/lexluthor set and the avengers pickup with hawkeye/loki/ironman, mainly because of the good pricing for licensed sets - so i might get this one and maybe the spiderman spidercycle aswell. (mostly cause of the minifigures)

[The Joker1]

I was planning a review on this but you covered everything perfectly. I agree the new freeze face really looks bad. Though this is still my second favorite 2013 superhero set after Arkham. Just out of interest what other 2013 sets did you manage to grab?

Cheers

[Darth Wayne]

Awesome review, was already sold on this set because of Arctic Batman and that sexy Batboat though...

The ONLY negative thing is that while you wrote 20$ as price point? Yeah right... it will probably go for 20 EURO or even 24,99 Euro on Amazon EU or whatever when it's all said and done >:O(

[Brickadiergerard]

A great review, thanks very much for it. It'll be a post-Christmas purchase I suspect. Mr Freeze will get his old goggled head, and I'm not too sure how much use we'll get from "Artic" Batman, but the boat is great, and comes in at a sensible price even in the UK.

[Bobstapwns]

Did they fix Batman's cowl problem? :3

[305Bats]

I'll be keeping Freeze and Aquaman,the rest will go to my 8 yr old Godson.

[halomaster96]

Great review as always Oky! I just got this and the Spidercycle set at my local lego store, so it was great seeing some out of box pics before I can build it on christmas! I too wish could have gotten a better Superhero instead of Aquaman, because now we'll have to wait until at least 2014 because next it's probably going to be all Man of Steel/ Iron Man 3 sets next year. Maybe Lego can take some creative license and have GL or Flash help Supes defeat General Zod? Hey I can dream, can't I? Also, I don't mind the terrible Mr. Freeze face as much since I have two of the original face.

P.S. You still make the best single pane funnies, Oky .

[ZO6]

Great review, Oky! Thanks for sharing!

I really like this set! It's nice to see 3 unique (for now) figs come in a small kit. Like some other members, I'm not a huge fan of the Mr. Freeze figure (I prefer the old one), as the new one just seems too much like an Atlantis figure in a different colour with a ridiculously ugly white face.

The little ice trap looks cool, and the Batboat is even better. It's got a great shape and looks nicely detailed but thankfully doesn't go overboard. Sometimes vehicles of this size have all sorts of weird parts slapped on at all sorts of angles and it makes the final product look cheap. I couldn't be happier to see flick-fire missiles replaced with those disks - and hearing that they actually shoot a decent distance is great. I kind of wish the bombs had some sort of mechanism to drop them, but considering the size of the vehicles, such an omission is acceptable.

I look forward to picking up this set!

[Oky]

Thanks everyone. I'm glad you liked it.

Very nice. I definitely want to pick this set up. The only thing I can see wrong with this is that instead of including 8 grey 1x1 slopes for the side of the boat's fuselage like in the game, they cheaped out and used tiles and stickers instead.

Yes, that's the most noticeable change, but I think they did this to make more space for the discs to shoot out. There are other more minor differences too. For example, they used a regular yellow 2x2 brick instead of a textured 1x2 on the nose and they used this boat hull underneath instead of this one.

I do like the batboat. It has a nice shape and design. I'm glad it is in black to go with his other vehicles, but white would almost make more sense in this scenario.

And maybe Artic isn't a typo.

I was thinking that too, but in the The Batman episode "The Big Chill" which this set is based on, he didn't have a white vehicle either because he didn't have much time to prepare to face Mr. Freeze, so it kinda makes sense this way.

And Artic is most definitely a typo since the official images of the box say "Arctic".

Mr. Freeze looks so-so. I prefer the old head. I like him with goggles. Mr. Freeze was never a well-designed character until he appeared in the Animated Series, so that's the one I've grown attracted to. The snow-patrol Batman is pretty silly, but I guess the company needs excuses to keep shipping out Batmen. Hopefully they'll try to expand things with the summer sets. At the very least, they could capitalise on the Man of Steel movie coming out.

Yeah, I think everyone likes the B:TAS Mr. Freeze the best. And yes, Albino Batman is a bit silly, and I think that's one of the main issues people had with The Batman, that they introduced too many gimmicks such as this suit just to sell toys. But it makes for a pretty cool looking minifig and I prefer getting a variation like this rather than yet another regular Batman.

And I think it has already been confirmed that they are making Man of Steel sets, but I'm not too excited for those because they will probably only have Superman, one or two of his enemies, and maybe some supporting characters in them.

I was planning a review on this but you covered everything perfectly. I agree the new freeze face really looks bad. Though this is still my second favorite 2013 superhero set after Arkham. Just out of interest what other 2013 sets did you manage to grab?

Cheers

We can always use a second opinion. I also bought the Spider-Cycle Chase, Kraang Lab Escape, AT-RT, and the two SW battle packs. I might review those too, so stay tuned!

Did they fix Batman's cowl problem? :3

Yes, I guess I forgot to mention that. His cowl is the new design, but they fixed the issue of it not aligning with the head.

[Piranha]

Aquaman's not just a guy who talks to fish, he um... can talk to crustaceans and sea mammals as well. So... yeah.

And that is exactly why he is a winner.

Seriously, I think he is a great fig and a welcome addition to the DC Superheros theme.

Not liking the cheekbones very much though on all the new figs.

Always been a fan of aquatic inspired LEGO.

[Kez]

Thanks for the great review, I'm definitely getting this set as soon as I see one