Building a brighter tomorrow with LEGO® bricks
For the 15th day of the 2013 Advent calendars, we get two minifigs, a park bench, and a boatload of spare parts.
The park bench in Friends is really simple, though anything that gives us parts in that shade of cyan (which is also the new Maersk Blue color) is worth having. The minifigs include a Star Wars Geonosian Pilot and an Octan mechanic from City. The mechanic includes some brick-built accessories (not sure what it represents) and more spare parts than the parts in the actual set!
The 2013 LEGO Advent Calendars give us three nice little models for Day 14. This time we get a water fountain, wrapped gifts, and another microscale spaceship.
Friends brings us a water fountain, built around a 4L Bar impaled through an assortment of hollow-stud parts facing various directions, and capped with a trans-light-blue rock crystal representing the water (I hadn’t realized you could stick one of those on a 3mm bar end, so that might prove useful in something). City brings us two wrapped gifts to go with the tree they gave us on day 12 (and with the wrapped gifts we got in Friends on that day). Star Wars has a Geonosian Fighter (whatever that is … I certainly don’t remember those in the original 3 movies).
Today is Friday the 13th and we get a weird trio of models…
Friends gives us a sled. It has the new 1×2 panel with the divider which is good for Friends minidolls’ feet, but then it has the stud right under where the doll’s butt would be, so that looks uncomfortable.
Star Wars gives us a battle droid, pretty basic, with two of each kind of arm so you have lots of options there.
But the really weird one is in City. We get a spaceman with a magic wand. Perhaps this is George Clooney’s character from the movie “Gravity”? And just in case we weren’t sure what it was, they included two extra magic wands and an extra helmet. Huh??
We’re halfway there! Here are the LEGO Advent Calendar entries for December 12th:
For once we have two entries that work together! In Friends, we have two Christmas presents, and in City we get a traditional Christmas tree. The Star Wars entry is a microscale Dropship.
Today we have a purse, barbecue, and another mini Star Wars vehicle.
The purse in Friends is a simple bag with a printed $100 money tile and a coin (pearl gold 1×1 round tile), with one extra coin included. Pretty sad in terms of parts count, and nothing really to build (again).
The other two calendars have decently complex builds. The BBQ in City has plenty of trans-orange fire bits and a sausage. The flame shooting out the side seems a little unsafe though… perhaps we need the firefighter to come put that out before the fire gets out of hand? The six-legged walker from Star Wars is a nice mini-model with tons of spare parts.
Today we get tons of loose elements in Friends and City, and two new minifigs.
In Friends we get just an assortment of hair accessories in purple, but nothing to build. City gives us a female firefighter with a sausage on a fork and a nearby fire extinguisher – but a plethora of bonus parts! They give us not one but two extras of the sausage, its holder, and the nozzle for the fire extinguisher, plus a bonus fire hat and yellow cylinder. Star Wars has a clone trooper who probably would like to some of that sausage.
Day 9 of the 2013 LEGO Advent Calendars.
Friends continues the retail kiosk theme with a sort of pink trough, presumably to hold some kind of merchandise, and a little stool. City gives us a bench to go with the table from the previous day, and Star Wars has a Republic spaceship.
For the 8th day of the LEGO Advent Calendars we get a bunch of food for our minifigs.
Friends has a 2×2 plate with two mugs, a carton of milk, and a stack of plates that I think represents a fried egg on toast. Also plenty of spare parts.
City gives us a bunch of loose parts – absolutely nothing to build! There are two wine glasses, two bottles, a pizza, some lime-colored cherries, and two drumsticks. They included two extra cherries beyond the one in the box diagram.
And for Star Wars, we get a birthday cake in the shape of a spaceship. Or maybe just a spaceship. It’s one of those Clone Wars things I think, so I don’t really recognize it, but I saw a big version in the LEGO store yesterday. (OK I looked it up and it’s a Republic Gunship.) I like the way that the hinge plate representing the cockpit lines up perfectly parallel with the angle of the slope piece. Great, if simple, use of LEGO geometry on this one.
(Sorry this entry is a day late – I had a busy weekend and didn’t get around to posting this Sunday as I had planned.)
For Day 7 we get three fairly decent builds to make up for the previous day. Friends continues the retail kiosk motif with another little booth, City gives us a nice table, and Star Wars has a gun rack. So much for LEGO being peaceful. (Sorry for posting this a little bit late. But I took and added a picture for Day 6 at least.)
Today we get minifigs in Star Wars and City, but the Friends contribution is really quite disappointing. Star Wars gives us a Rebel Commando figure, and City gives us the robber who I guess will be using the crowbar and axe (and handcuffs?) from Day 5. But Friends gives us just a handful of parts for making jars and bottles of merchandise to be sold at the vending stand we built yesterday – looks like girly stuff like makeup and perfume, but to my eye it just looks like a very small assortment of not very useful parts. Don’t get me wrong – I like that Friends is providing a product line that appeals to girls, but I’m personally not a fan of makeups and perfumes anyway, and reinforcing those gender stereotypes doesn’t sound to me like a step forward.
Edit: Pictures!
