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For anyone who’s a fan of the show the [easyazon_link identifier=”B00ZSJMQ6E” locale=”US” tag=”brickbrains-20″], LEGO Ideas The Big Bang Theory[/easyazon_link] ([easyazon_link identifier=”B00ZSJMQ6E” locale=”US” tag=”brickbrains-20″]21302[/easyazon_link]) is pretty appealing on many levels. If you’re not a fan, you might enjoy the set, but struggle with the overall price.
More of a “little bang” for a big buck
This set was created by two LEGO fan designers—Ellen Kooijman from Sweden and Glen Bricker from the USA and is a replica of the main living room of Sheldon & Leonard’s apartment. Most of the elements you’d expect are present including the couch, chair, bookshelves and the windows at the back with some nice little details showing how much the designers cared about getting it right. Of course you also get 7 minifigures representing each of the main characters.
I hesitated in buying this set even though I’m a fan of the show and have been since the beginning. The MSRP on the set is $69.99 CDN for only 484 pieces which comes to $0.144 per piece, well above the $0.11 “average” that I prefer. I’m guessing most of the extra cost comes from a low Canadian dollar and the licensing involved in this set but even the US price is about $0.124 per piece. I got the set on sale at a LEGO Brand store for 20% off, which helped offset the hit.
The Pieces
484 is a small number of pieces and there’s nothing too extraordinary here. Lots of light tan forming the main wall and some brick-colored brick pieces for the back wall. A few pieces surprised me as they came out of the bags – a gun, a sextant and the “sub-micro figures.” They all fall into place nicely forming a lamp, the base of a the telescope and various action figures on the bookshelf respectively.
There are 2 pre-printed whiteboards in the room, a pre-printed picture of a bridge and 2 Chinese take-out boxes. There’s also 2 stickers in the set, one for boxing ring photo on the closet door, and one for the marker rack on the pillar in the living room. To me, the oddest inclusion in the set was a big bag of yellow pieces, dishware I think, when all you really need is 2 forks.
There’s also a couple of whiteboard markers included which end up looking like lipstick or … something adult in nature.
The Build
The build is pretty straight forward. No real surprises, but I did really like how the books and bookshelves went together. The horizontal use of various plates & tiles to become books was quite clever. The telescope is a great use of pieces as well as is the gun becoming a lamp. The various globes and little figures used to decorate the bookshelf do a nice job of evoking the feel of the apartment.
This is probably the only set where you’ll brick-build a Green Lantern lantern.
Probably my favorite piece is the DNA model and the way it came together. Building a complex shape like a double helix is tricky to do in something relatively bulky like LEGO, but the designers have done an amazing job here.
The Minifigures
The minifigures are one of the better parts of the set. I think each version captures the character fairly well. The only exception might be Penny’s hair. It doesn’t strike me as quite right. Maybe it’s her shorter style in the newer episodes that’s throwing me off. What do you think?
Overall
Despite being a little disappointed in the set and the price, I do find myself liking it. It reminds me of the show, and can be used to set up certain memorable scenes from the series since you have the main set and any characters you might require.
The playability is fairly high since the scale is right, but there’s no real moving parts. The characters can sit and stand around the living room, but not much more.
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