In case you missed it, LEGO is moving it’s USA operations from Enfield, CT to Boston, MA. To learn more about the move, the reasoning behind it, and to hear some more about LEGO, check out this interview with Skip Kodak, head of LEGO Group’s Market Group Americas. It’s a little over half an hour long and it has some good tidbits like how Sammy Sullivan got a LEGO set after the Olympics. Enjoy!
I grew up building some of the Classic Space themes so I was excited to see a space like theme return in 2024’s CITY theme. I was able to catch a three pack on sale through LEGO Shop @ Home for $25 so I dove in. But let me back up… #60441-1: Space Explorers Pack was released on 1 May 2024 in the US for $31.99. It contains 426 pieces which works out to $0.075 per piece which isn’t too bad. The pack contains three of the space sets:
-#30663-1: Space Hoverbike polybag with 46 pieces which retails for $4.99
-#60428-1: Space Construction Mech with 140 pieces which retails for $10.99
-#60430-1: Interstellar Spaceship with 240 pieces which retails for $19.99
Here’s the box. The front shows all three sets with a SPACE logo and the CITY logo and it identifies it as a Super Pack. The back shows some of the play features with some graphics showing the minifigures doing their thing.
The set comes with four individually number parts bags, two instruction booklets, and a small sticker sheet.
The first bag starts building the spaceship. It also includes a minifigure which comes with a jet pack. For a CITY set, it includes some interesting build techniques, a new-to-me dark orange color that I haven’t seen before, and some other decent pieces.
The second bag finishes the space ship and I must say it looks pretty sleek. There are some cool play features like when you push in the power back on the top and it opens up the engine area. The cockpit opens up and the minifigure will fit inside (without the jet back and reclined slightly). The modified space logo looks pretty cool too. I like this one!
Bag three builds what would have been a polybag. This one is small with not much to it. For a small build, it’s not bad, but it isn’t my favorite. You get a little speeder type ship and then a section of the planet where the space minifigures are mining. If I understand it correctly, they mine the trans-clear purple sparkly crystals and turn them into power sources which they use to power their vehicles. You get another minifigure so that’s a good part of this polybag I guess.
Bag four builds a mech. I know there are some mech fans out there so be warned that this one is small and not one of those super huge, detailed mechs. For what it is, it’s not bad. The mech has an arm to grab and an arm that punches which I would assume is used to break apart rock to get to the crystals. Besides the mech, you also get a small section of the planet with crystals and then a small mining droid. The stickers are applied to this part of the build.
Here is the final set with all the components. If you can find this set on sale and you were looking to check out this theme, this is a good way to give it a shot. I enjoyed the build, you get some good pieces, it comes with three minifigures, and my kiddo who built it with me enjoyed playing with them too. I will be watching for more sales in this theme to check out some others.
What are your thoughts on this set and theme? Did it stray too far from the original space theme or is it in line with Classic Space?
Happy building!
I’ve been to this LEGO brand store before back in 2016 and ended up stopping by again 8 years later. I visited on a Friday afternoon and it was pretty busy with lots of families and adults alike. They were pretty well stocked with just about everything, but the majority of the stuff was at full price except for a few discounted Dreamzzz sets.
The front of the store had a few large scale minifigures from the Dreamzzz line shown here. They also had a large shark minifigure, but I couldn’t get a picture because there were either shoppers or workers in front the whole time.
All the large figures had a sign next to them with the total number of pieces used, it’s weight, and the amount of time that it took to build the large figure.
I was excited to see the new Technic McLaren P1. I hope to own it some day, but I’ll wait for a sale or enough Insider points to get it cheaper than the $450 retail price (before sales tax).
The store had a few new sets on display which were built to include #10368-1: Chrysanthemum and #10369-1: Plum Blossom from the Botanical subtheme as well as #10337-1: Lamborghini Countach 5000 Quattrovalvole (another set I hope to own if I can find it at a discount).
One Easter Egg from the store… they had #75371-1: Chewbacca™ holding one of the roses from the botanical theme. If you look closely, you’ll notice the minifigure version is holding a small bunch of red flowers too.
I wanted to try out the Pick and Build wall with the new boxes. The pricing was $9.99 for the smaller box and then $17.99 for the larger box. The taxes were pretty awful as well so it probably wasn’t worth it, but my kids and I had fun filling the boxes. Definitely can’t fit as much in them as you could in one of the cups, which was a disappointment. The store had a pretty good selection of parts though to include a lot of gold colored pieces. The theme they were running was to build a race car. They had wheels, steering wheels, some windscreens, and other parts you could use to build a car.
Here is the “Large” box. It was slightly overfilled as I did my best to stuff in as much as I could (unlike the lady next to me who stole a part by putting it in her pocket and then pulling out a tissue like she was putting her hand in her pocket to get a tissue… yeah I saw you!). The store worker didn’t seem to mind that my box was stuffed. He put a sticker on it to keep it closed and off we went after paying (and not stealing). My kiddos got boxes as well and we failed to label them before leaving he store. We figured it out later on though pretty easily.
Here is the full stash. I went for mostly small pieces, but I threw in a few larger bricks and plates. Lots of flower pieces including some of the larger ones. Also some clear windows and lamp posts. If I lived closer and was working on a particular build, it would have been good to stop with a list of items I was looking for. I don’t live near an official brand store so it was fun to stop by one and pick out some stuff. We’ll see when I visit another one. In the meantime, happy building!
Another Brickheadz set. This one is #40752-1: Carl, Russell & Kevin from the Disney Pixar movie “Up.” This set of three characters was released on 1 June 2024. It contains 308 pieces and retails for $19.99. This works out to $0.065 per piece which isn’t bad, but of note, there are a lot of small pieces.
The box is pretty standard for Brickheadz sets. The front shows a few of each figure with the Brickheadz logo, Up logo, and the names and number of each Brickheadz figure. The back shows the figures again along with a back view of Russell and it shows how he is attached to the base.
The set contains three instruction booklets and seven parts bags.
Bags one and two build Carl. Bag one builds most of his torso and his head without the details. They added in his bow tie and you get his grape soda bottle cap pin as a 1x1 round tile (along with an extra one in the bag). Bag two finishes him up with a lot of great details. I love the square glasses and how they used the lime green 1x1 round plates as the tennis balls at the bottom of his cane. They did a great job re-creating his hair and bushy eyebrows too.
Bags three and four build Russell. Bag three assembles most of his head and his torso which includes a printed brick for his shirt. Bag four finalizes Russell with this backpack, a flag, and a frying pan. This figure is only three studs wide versus the four studs wide of Carl. While he is smaller, I don’t recall him being that much thinner as he was kind of chunky. Either way, I think the figure is a good depiction of Russell.
Bags five, six, and seven build Kevin. Bag five is just the legs and the SNOT pieces that everything will connect to. Bag six builds the torso and the neck. Bag seven finishes it up. I like the big nose and the 2x2 round tiles for the eyes. It’s taller than the others like in the movie, but the figure itself is a little unstable. Otherwise, it’s alright. Personally, I would have rather had Dug than Kevin, but this works.
Here are some front and back shots of the three figures at the end. If you’re a Brickheadz fan, Pixar fan, or Up fan, definitely pick these up. Otherwise, I would avoid this one or hope that it goes on sale towards the end of it’s life.
Happy building!
Sorry for the wait, but I’m finally back open on Bricklink.com. You can visit the store here. I’m working on getting the eBay store back up and running. In the meantime, there are a few new sets I’ve accumulated from during the closure to include a few GWPs.
We’re still running the current campaign for the Brick Chalk Guy so 15% of the profits will go towards buying sets for kids who can’t afford them.
Thanks and happy building!
I have quite the backlog. So much to build and so little time. I can’t wait until I get to some of them too. I’ll try my best to get reviews out. This one is #10329-1: Tiny Plants. It’s another one from the Botanicals Collection and it was released on 1 December 2023. It retails for $49.99 and with 758 pieces, it works out to $0.066 per piece. I found this one for $39.99 and I’m sure if you look around, you can find it for this discount too.
The box is similar to others in the line with the full set shown on the front along with the Botanical’s logo, set name, and Icons and 18+ greebling. The back shows another view of the set and then the set displayed in a photography studio along with a drawing of the set showing the dimensions of one of the plants.
This set contains six parts bags and three instruction booklets. I built this one with my two kiddos. Each of us took an instruction booklet and two bags so it’s one that you can build together if you want.
The build is broken into groups of three plants each based on the type of plant. The first group is Rainforest Plants. Bag one builds two plants. The first one is a Jade Plant (forest green). It’s the first one in the build to use minifigure hats for the leaves. It also is your first build of a small pot which are repeated throughout the build, but isn’t so repetitive if you split the build up. The next one is the False Shamrock plant which is made up of Purple butterfly pieces. It’s a pretty good fit if you do an internet search for the plant to see what one actually looks like.
The second bag builds the Laceleaf. This is the tallest of the three and has the largest pot to build. You use a red shell piece, some red horns, and some yellow flowers to create the flower of the plant.
The next group of plants are the Carnivorous Plants. Bag three builds the first two of these. Again, they have the same sizes of pots as group one with the first two in the group being the smaller ones. The first build is a Venus Flytrap. It definitely looks like it could clamp down on an insect, but the pieces can’t actually close so you can’t build a brick insect dying inside without some modification. Next up is the Red Sundew plant which uses some brushes and pink epaulets to create the shape of the plant.
Bag four builds the last of the carnivores. This one is the Pitcher Plant. To me, this one doesn’t quite look like the actual plant, but you get the idea. This one also uses minifigure hats which is a fun touch for this build.
The last grouping are the Cacti. Bag five builds two plants to include the first which is a small Succulent. I find the choice of a plant odd for this set as we had a whole set focused on Succulents in 2022. I guess this one comes in a little round pot versus a small little block so it’s different (slightly). The second build is a Prickly Pear cactus. This one has printed tiles which is way better than stickers and while small, gets the point across.
Bag six builds the Pincushion. It almost looks like it would hurt if you touched it with all of the tan flower holders as spikes. The pink flowers above the darker pink to make it look like it is flowering is a nice touch too. I like how they did this one. Again, it’s in the larger pot out of the three in this group.
Here is the final set. Much like the Succulents set, you get nine plants in total. $50 seems a bit steep to me even if it works out to $0.066 per piece. To be honest, I thought $40 seemed a bit much too considering the size of what you are getting. I realize there are unique pieces and some prints, but it still feels small. Maybe it’s just my head hasn’t adjusted to inflation yet. If you can find it for $40 or less, I did think it was a fun build with some unique plants. If you are a MOC builder, you do get your hands one some fun pieces whether they are hats, butterflies, or brushes. If you are a fan of the Botanicals, I’d add this one to your collection at the lower price point (or more if it goes there).
Happy building!
Another Brickheadz set. This one is Joy, Sadness & Anxiety from the Disney Pixar movie “Inside Out 2.” This set was released on 1 June 2024 and retails for $19.99. It contains 300 pieces and the price per piece works out to $0.067. The set contains three Brickheadz. Number 239 is Sadness, number 240 is Joy, and number 241 is Anxiety. The front of the box shows the characters with the Brickheadz and “Inside Out 2” logos. It also has the number of each character in the Brickheadz line. The back shows the characters in different views.
The set contains six parts bags and three instruction booklets. Interestingly, I didn’t see a spot to scan in the instructions to get Insiders points. I wonder why?
Bags one and two build Joy. Nothing too out of the ordinary here. The front and back have printed tiles for her dress. The hair is made up of blue and translucent blue plates and tiles. It is a slightly different color of yellow from the standard yellow so that part is good. Not much else to report.
Bags three and four assemble Sadness. Again, not a whole lot special here. She is only three studs wide versus the four studs in Joy. I do like that the eyes are 2x2 round tiles to show her glasses. That’s a nice touch.
Bags five and six assemble Anxiety. I haven’t seen the movie yet so I don’t know much about the character, but the printed teeth and big eyes are a fun touch. The hair assembly with the translucent pieces is a cool design too. Beyond that, it’s a fairly simple build.
Here are the final builds of the three characters. As mentioned, nothing super exciting here. Rumor has it, these will be retiring at the end of the 2024 so if you’re a Brickheadz collector or a fan of the movie, grab this one soon. Otherwise, I wouldn’t go nuts trying to find this one. I enjoyed the first movie and added this set in to grab a GWP so no complaints from me.
Happy building!
I’m a bit late, but tickets are available for Brickcon 2024 now! The event is being held on 7 and 8 September 2024 at the Meydenbauer Center in Bellevue, WA. You can learn more about attending with the public here. You can attend the AFOL convention and learn about that here.
This will be the 23rd Brickcon and like the past few years, the show will be hybrid. If you can’t make it to Washington state, you can tune in virtually for the convention. This gives you access to the presentations, allows you to buy merch, let’s you participate in the virtual only events, and opens you up for winning door prizes. Full disclosure, I’m on the virtual event team so I’m biased and want you to participate. It’s definitely worth it.
Rumor has it that this year a member of the LEGO Design team will be participating in person so that should be cool. If I get any more fun details, I’ll be sure to pass them along
Happy building!
We’re up to round 5 here. I think Bricklink needs to slow these down a bit. We haven’t shipped round 1 and we’re already voting on round 5. Maybe if they did fewer rounds we could keep up with these better? Or maybe Bricklink needs to do this many because it takes so long to develop the sets?
Either way, round 5 was released for voting. You can vote here until 14 June 2024. As with the past four rounds, I selected five that I liked. I will be honest and say that I wasn’t too impressed with this round. There were a lot of castle, pirate sets, and modular type buildings. I was hoping to see something different out there. Here are my thoughts (which include some repeats from past rounds):
Up first is Biplane 2.1 which contains 2,743 pieces by EmanueLego. This isn’t the first time I’m recommending a biplane by this builder. The design looks similar, but this one has some different colors with some flames. It also includes some smaller biplanes to go with it. I don’t have high hopes that we’ll see this one go through, but I think a biplane would go good with my Concorde.
Farm Life contains 2,877 Pieces by builder FNeuwald. We have had CITY farm sets in the past, but this is a bit of a larger set. It’s not a giant farm, but it’s a good start if you’re looking to build a larger farm MOC. Plus you’d get some additional animals which is cool. It’s a bit compact and the farm house is a little small, but it works.
Harbor contains 2,642 pieces and is by user Anast55. This one is cool with some trucks, trains, and boats to move cargo. The crane looks interesting, but I’ll be curious to see how it works. Also the cargo ship is rather small. Maybe the upcoming CITY cargo set will go along with this set? We’ll have to see if this gets voted in and how the final design would end up.
Inverted Corner Building contains 2,496 pieces and is by user Rexkeks. I think the design could use some additional work, but I like the concept of an inverted corner. It could be a cool addition to the modular building line and to a lot of LEGO cities.
Last up is the Popcorn Wagon with 577 pieces by user Mictur. This is a fun smaller set to go in a city and at 577 pieces it hopefully won’t strain our wallets too bad. I’d like to see this one get into the mix.
SPACE!!!!!!!!! May 1, 2024 saw the release of Series 26 of the Collectible Minifigure series. Much like the previous sets, these minifigures are $4.99 each. There are 12 minifigures in this series and unlike some of the random minifigures in previous series sets, this one is all space themed. Some are original designs, but others are related to retro space themes which is awesome to see their return to the LEGO world.
In the past, I’ve purchased the boxes of six. Series 26 is no different with #66764 containing the boxes of six. I had a 10% off deal at Target so I picked up some of the individual minifigures in the store. I used the Figure Finder web based tool from falconbricks.com to scan the individual boxes to find each one of the 12. Thankfully it worked and the store I went to had enough in stock so I was able to get all 12. The site isn’t instantaneous so you have to give it a few minutes to find what you’re looking for. One fellow shopper noticed what I was doing and joined in as he was looking for a specific minifigure. He ended up finding what he was looking for too. While I understand the concept of the random bags and that LEGO likes to keep us guessing (and purchasing), I’m glad they’ve allowed the creation of these apps to find what we’re looking for. So thank you to LEGO and the fan community for making this happen.
Onto the review of the minifigures…
Spacewalking Astronaut: This one is in line with the new Space subtheme tied to the CITY theme with similar logos. This minifigure has the most gear to include a space jet pack with controls and a printed tile on the back. You’ll also note that the black base plates are printed with a star pattern which is a nice touch.
Imposter: The head on this one is dual printed with the print in this picture and then a standard minifigure face on the other side. Besides the antenna on its head, it also comes with three small alien microfigures.
Alien Tourist: This one is a fun one with a cool looking hat to go with the alien face. The Hawaiian shirt he has on covers up a white shirt underneath with a red heart and then a picture of Earth. He also has a back pack along with the camera he’s holding.
Retro Space Heroine: This one seems to resemble the Retro Space Guy from Series 17. The difference on this one comes with a dog to go with it.
M-Tron Powerlifter: I was a big fan of the M-Tron theme as a kid and was excited to see this one come back. The torso is the same, but that’s about it. The legs are cool with printing on the front and the sides. The claw is a cool touch. The helmet is different and doesn’t have a visor like back in the day, but it’s good to see the sub-theme return
Nurse Android: Let’s be honest here. No one cares about this minifigure. It’s all about the pink space baby to go with the other ones. We couldn’t get enough of the different colored Classic Space minifigures and now we can collect different colored space babies.
Flying Saucer Costume Fan: I don’t think we’ve ever seen one like this before. The legs and torso have the star pattern and blend in with the base plate quite nicely. Then it looks like it’s just a head in a flying saucer flying through space which is fun.
Ice Planet Explorer: I had a few of these sets as a kid too. The minifigure is similar to the originals, but with a few differences. No translucent orange skis and the helmet doesn’t have the translucent orange visor. The translucent orange chain saw is in line though. Also, the robotic penguin is a nice touch.
Robot Butler: I don’t know where they got the idea for this one, but I think it’s fun. This one has a different base instead of legs, but the torso and head are similar. The translucent green head covering is interesting.
Alien Bettlezoid: The head on this one is interesting. It’s nothing like the normal head. Also, the legs are molded differently from regular minifigure legs so they have a different form.
Orion: Have they made one with translucent parts like this one? I like the references to the constellation and how this one has silver and then the sparkling purple.
Blacktron Mutant: Last one is this Blacktron minifigure. I was excited to hear there would be a return of this sub-theme, but I’m not a big fan of the minifigure. It has the second generation Blacktron logo, but I’m not excited about the mutant aspects. It’s creative, but I was hoping for a minifigure that would go with my old collection of minifigures. I can’t complain too much I guess.