The 24th LEGO® Ideas set was released on 2 March 2019. It is “The Flintstones” and was made by fan designer Andrew Clark. The set has 748 pieces and retails in the US for $59.99. This works out to $0.08/piece which isn’t too bad. Amazon.com has had it on sale for 20% off at the time of this post for a few weeks now. I waited for this one to go on sale as it interested me, but not enough to buy it right away at full price. So let’s see if it was worth the wait.
Like most sets, the front shows the whole set built with the back showing some of the features to include the removal of the roof, the bowling set, the car and the rack of ribs, and some of the inside furniture.
The contents are 6 bags with an instruction book. There is a piece separator in bag one. Excitedly, there are no stickers! WOOHOO!!!!!
Here is the instruction book. It is not wrapped in a separate package like some of the more expensive sets. It does have a few pages about the set to include the fan designer and LEGO designers (as shown). There are also some pages on The Flintstones show itself.
Bag 1 builds the car, rack of ribs, and minifigures for Fred and Wilma. The car has the look of the Flintstones car, but I have 2 complaints. First is the roof is a bit flimsy. There isn’t much structure to it and it fell apart on me while I was building it. To be fair, I don’t have a better solution. The second is the wheels. They are held together by two round plates which is fine on one side where the studs face in, but on the side where the studs face out, they rub against the frame of the car. Not badly, but could a tile piece have been used there? On the plus side, I like the use of the 2x2 round tile that is printed to look like a cut log as the axle.
The second bag starts to build the house (sorry for the background change, I had to switch building areas). Nothing overly exciting here. The back of the house is attached with hinge pieces for access and play I assume.
The third bag finishes most of the wall structure. Outer detail is added later. Also, the windows are in place and space for the door.
The fourth bag adds some detail on the outer walls. From my picture you can see it better on the instruction sheet. The opposite side of the house has it as well as a chimney. I like the palm tree used in the set. It is reminiscent of the one used in Pirate themed sets back in the day.
Bag 5 adds some inner details to include curtains on the windows, a TV (with a printed tile brick for the screen), a couch, coffee table, lamp, a small cupboard, a door, and a container with the bowling set. Besides the TV tile, there is also a picture on the wall and the curtains are printed. YAY no stickers! I like the house details. Not over the top, but enough to look like the inside of the house from the cartoon.
This bag also completes the minifigures with Barney and Betty.
The sixth bag completes the set with a roof that is easily removable, some plants along the outside of the house, and a mailbox with a printed piece for the Flintstone name. I like how they made the roof angle versus making it flat.
Here are the minifigures. Betty and Wilma have two faces while Fred and Barney just have one expression. The response I saw from the fan media was not being impressed by these. They wanted molded heads versus the standard minifigure shape. I agree that the standard head doesn’t look as realistic, but I still think they captured the look of the Flintstones characters. I am also glad that the legs are printed versus having to add a cloth piece as the pants/dresses.
There has also been some debate about who to include. Where are Pebbles and Bam-Bam? What about Dino? My opinion is this set was not designed to capture the whole show or to be the start of a Flintstones line of sets. It is a one off that highlights the show and LEGO captured the main characters. I am good with just the four.
Overalll, it’s a good set. There are some decent pieces and it captures the theme well. The build is not overly challenging and there are no stickers (YES!). I’m glad I picked the set up at 20% off versus full price. It didn’t really seem like a $60 set to me. There is nothing that really jumps out at you other than the nostalgia for the theme. I’d put this set down as middle of the road.
What are your thoughts?
