7779 - The Batman Dragster: Catwoman Pursuit

7779 - The Batman Dragster: Catwoman Pursuit

Year: 2006

Pieces: 92

Retail Price: $10.99 ($6.99)

Theme: Superheroes (DC Universe)

 

 

This is another small set and one that I had purchased when it was on sale at the BX in Kadena. This set comes in two parts -The batmobile dragster and the catwoman's motorcycle. As far as I can tell, this set was not modeled on any batman movie and instead is styled on the imagination of the creator solely.

 

The first part is the motorcycle. The motorcycle is the same body as the one in the Captain America set (last review) only this is in purple instead of red which is again, a unique color. That's about where the goodness ends with it though. Like the Captain America bike, it also is lacking in many departments. For one, the eye stickers on the front of the bike. They're just... weird.  The fire coming out of the back "could" be cool, but the way it is mounted makes it also look odd. It makes it look attached to the bike instead of coming from the bike. The catwoman model itself is not bad. Sure the pointy ears are there, but from my memory, the catwoman always had pointy ears. Weird in the movies too, but at least the set stays true to it.  I guess I have a thing against the newer motorcycle model as the model itself is just odd. It's bulky in front and skinny in the back, very unlike any motorcycle on the road.

 

 

 

The second part of the set is the Batmobile dragster. Yes, you heard me right - batmobile dragster. The vehicle itself is built pretty flimsily and falls apart pretty easy as well. it is a cheap set so it is what it is, but there are some major design flaws to it.

 

First off, the premise behind it. A batmobile dragster??? Someone had to have been on some sort of hallucinogen when they came up with that idea. Batman apparently enjoys going down to the local dragstrip and racing with the other racers and apparently the batmobile with it's jets just isn't "quite" fast enough so he had to make a dragster. And who knows, if someone does start pulling ahead at the track, he can just light them up with the Gatling gun mounted in the front (which only turns side to side when the dragster's front wheels turn side to side... a bit of a problem when pursuing someone at high speeds).

 

Secondly, the problems with the model itself. The Gatling gun is mounted to the front wheel 9as discussed in the paragraph above).  The window for the dragster also does not cover it's sides. Given that missiles launch and fly by him, batman may want to add a few dollars in to make the window inclusive so he doesn't have to get a new batsuit whenever he launches a missile. Batman also has no chair to sit in and in order to fit into the vehicle, he has to pretty much lay back as if he were on a luge.

 

 

All together this set does have some good pieces to build other things with. It is also playable for kids because they don't care about the horrible inaccuracies of the set. Daniel didn't have much problem building the set, but the front wheel of the dragster does come off pretty easily with any amount of decent play. It also does not roll too easy an requires two hands to do so since the front wheels are on a pivot and wobble and turn on whims. there are numerous problems with the set though that would make it unfun for children, and would not make a good display set for an adult fan.

 

6864 - The Batmobile and the Two-Face Chase

6864 - The Batmobile and the Two-Face Chase

Year: 2012
Pieces: 531
Retail Price: $49.99 (paid $25 at Wal-Mart)
Theme: Superheroes (DC Universe)

If you've been following this blog, then you should know that I haven't seen the last two Batman movies. Having said that, with this set I really didn't need to. This set doesn't seem to be copying or portraying anything from the movies. It is just a set that was built around the idea of Batman and is fun.

This set is a larger set. It's sure not the largest set we own (we have a few that number in the thousands), but surely isn't a small set either. The set comes in three parts - The Batmobile, Two-Face's truck, and finally the bank.

 

In the first part of this set is where we find Batman. The Batman in this set is nothing spectacular, but the two batarangs are a nice touch. The Batmobile itself is a fantastic looking Batmobile. If you're a LEGO aficionado, the finished quality of the Batmobile rivals those of the creator line of LEGO. A bulk of the 531 pieces of this set are a part of this vehicle. The car took some time to build but that's to be expected when it contains 200+ pieces. The car doesn't do much in the grans scheme of things - it rolls and shoots two flick fire missiles and that's about it. That's the only downfall I can see to this otherwise fantastic model. The Batmobile is chocked full of gadgets and gismos and I feel this one could have a few more as well.

 

The second part of this set is Two-Face's truck. In this bag is Two-face himself and two of his goons. I love the Two-Face minifig. I think they put a good amount of detail into him. He comes complete with his signature coin. It doesn't have two sides to it (couldn't hold onto it if it did) but it is cute and adds a good flavor to the model. His goons carry a crowbar and a stick of dynamite which is used for the bank robbery (below).

The truck is an odd assortment of things and to me, fits Two-Faces eclectic personality. The model is nicely built in that it continues the trend of Two-Face and has orange on one side and purple on the other. Both of those are rare colors in LEGO land, so it is very welcome to have several unique pieces come in this set. The truck comes with a rotating Gatling machine gun on one side, two flick fire missiles on the other, and a large crane on the back which is used to steal the safe from the bank. The only gripe I have about the truck is the front windshield. It is build two studs below the front hood. It looks a little off and if it were real life, you'd be looking under your hood while driving. A minor gripe, but a gripe nonetheless.

 

 

The last part of this set is the bank. It comes with a generic police officer but does include handcuffs which we didn't have before. The bank is nice in that it never specifies "Gotham City", so it could easily be placed in a Legopolis without looking off. It looks pretty nice too, all things considered. If placed in a city, you'd have to build off of it though to make it look the best it could.

 

The bank comes with a safe and money inside. The safe manufacturer apparently thought it was a good idea to leave the hoist hooks in the safe though, and Two-Face is seizing on that opportunity with the crane/hoist on the back of his truck. The bank has a lever on the side of it which, when turned and a good places his explosives, knocks out the two front windows which allows them to have access to the safe.

All in all this is a great set. There are a few minor flaws, but these flaws won't be relevant to the age group that plays with LEGO. For the most part, the models look great and is worth the price of the set (especially when its on a discount).

 

76009 - Superman: Black Zero Escape

76009 - Superman: Black Zero Escape

Year: 2013
Pieces: 168
Retail Price: $19.99 (paid $10 at Wal-Mart)
Theme: Superheroes (DC Universe)

At this point It's fair to say that I have not seen the new superman movie.  I know - it's wrong of me and I should be beaten but to be fair, I also haven't seen the last two Batman movies either, despite owning them now (due to a wonderful Christmas present from my sister). So having said that, I can't really compare the accuracy of the model to the movie itself. I don't even know what to look for when searching Google for a movie representation as the term "Superman black zero" only turns up this LEGO set.

Anyways, this set has some good things going for it. It appears that at some point in the movie, Lois Lane gets placed in a spacecraft of Lord Zod. Assuming that point to be correct, this is a LEGO representation of that scene. Includes in the set is the spacecraft itself as well as a base of operations for Lord Zod himself. First up, the base of operations.

 

 

Includes in the bag for this set is Lord Zod and Superman. Both have eyes that glow red and Lord Zod has a helmet that come son and off and is attached to his armor. Lord Zod also has a weapon (what bad guy doesn't after all). Superman has a darker shade of superman suit than the one used in the previously reviewed superman set but accurately reflects the darker shade used in the new movie as well.

 

The base of operations is interesting. Not having seen the movie, it seemed a bit archaistic with no rhyme or reason to it. It has a wall that moves back and forth, presumably so that Lord Zod can make a grand entrance. It also has a walkway that leads to the spacecraft.  The missile launchers on this set are fantastic though. Most LEGO missile launchers use a flick fire missile. Flick fire missiles fit snugly into their base and are launched when someone "flicks" their finger on the back of the missile which releases it from it's holder and launches it. Instead of that, this set has a rubber component that is pulled back and released. When released, it springs forward, launching the missile. To me, this is a much better process than the flick fire missiles but also is only one that can be done to a missile launcher that is securely affixed to something, such as this base. I don't think it would work well on something like an aircraft (such as the quinjet just reviewed) as one hand is holding the aircraft and the other hand would need to be trying to launch the missile.  The base was an easy build and Daniel had no problems getting it up and running.

 

 

The second half of the set is the spacecraft.  To me, the craft looks fantastic. It has guns and some hefty engines which give it some power. It has a seat in it for one person. Lois Lane comes packages with this bag but her face looks a little bit weird to me. It looks like she could very well be a clown if she had different hair on. I don't have much to say about the craft itself - it works for what it is supposed to do. We did have a few issues with the stickers, mainly because we had to figure out which ones went where. Both sides of the craft have stickers and when outing them on, you need to put them on opposite sides of the pieces and then place them on the appropriate side of the craft. For a five year old boy, this was a confusing process but then again, the set isn't listed for 5 year olds, so I can't fault LEGO for that.

 

All together, this is a very playable set. My only fault with the set is more with the series itself for the Superman Movie. There really isn't much heft to it. There are three sets to the series and all of them have Superman and Lord Zod in them. It makes sense, but when you get all three sets, there really isn't much of a need for all of those Supermen. furthermore, the sets are all kind of, "eh" when put together. It really requires the builder to have a decent LEGO city to make playing with the LEGOs as fun as they should be. None of the sets contain civilians or even a building, for example, making the series (with the exception of Lois in this set) easily played in space, on another planet... wherever because the boundaries don't exist with the series. The only thing tying these to Earth is a military vehicle in the battle of Smallville and a building antenna in the Metroplis showdown. I guess I just expect more from a series of LEGO superheroes.

To see what I'm talking about, the Batman series (also DC universe) has a bank, batcave, the asylum, and funhouse as buildings, which makes playing with a full series much more fun. It grounds it to Earth and isn't just spaceships flying around booming each other. From what I remember of Superman, 95% of it takes place on Earth and the series should have more ground things to play with.