A king piloting a mech. LEGO’s Nexo Knights line has launched, and it’s the best. Announced back in October of last year, LEGO’s new Nexo Knights line officially joined the animalistic warriors of Chima and the spinning ninjas of Ninjago on store shelves on January first. Slated to be one of the brick company’s tent-pole properties, the futuristic knights will be battling the minions of a dark magic-infused court jester everywhere this year, from lunch boxes to t-shirts to television screens. But first LEGO needs to build a strong foundation, and they’ve got just the bricks to do it. January first was a massive release day for LEGO., with the $350 Ghostbusters Firehouse HQ, a bunch of smaller sets based on Star Wars: The Force Awakens, a new wave of Bionicle and a bunch of LEGO Friends releases. But that’s not why I was at my local LEGO Store yesterday. I was there because the day before I picked up eight Nexo Knights sets from Toys’R’Us, and I needed more. A total of seventeen different sets make up the launch lineup for Nexo Knights.
Those include two sets we saw when the line was announced—Jestro’s mobile base and the knights’ rolling Fortrex. I stayed away from those two pricier sets, as I wanted to get a feel for the franchise first. Thankfully LEGO provided a perfect way to do this with a set of six “Ultimate” figures. Each $9.99 package includes a knight or enemy and a stand to hold various weapons and power-infused Nexo shields. Here’s Ultimate Macy, the female knight. She comes with her massive mace, a flaming axe and some whipping vines. The idea is that the weapons and shields on the stands can be swapped out, giving her several different configurations. The shields are a big part of the Nexo Knights branding. Each one can be scanned into the Nexo Knights mobile game, granting its powers to the player. It’s a simple beat-em up, but scanning things is always fun. Ultimate Aaron comes with an assortment of shooty weaponry, including bananas. I’m guessing he’s the goofy one of the bunch.
Ultimate Clay has whirling sword arms sprouting from his back. Also a shield and random flames, but whirling sword arms. I really don’t need an adjective for those. They speak for themselves. Ultimate Robin is tiny, but he has missile launchers on his back, so I wouldn’t mention that to his face. He also has chicken, so he’s the Leeroy Jenkins of the team. Ultimate Beast Master is a bad guy, who does not come with Ultimate Tanya Roberts so he doesn’t matter. Ultimate Lavaria, on the other robotic spider leg, matters a great deal. If she weren’t so obviously a villain, she’d be my hero. I picked up the $40 Rumble Blade but haven’t put it together yet. I am saving it for last, because it’s a vehicle that splits into several other vehicles, one of which is a giant flying sword. I have to build to that level of greatness. Instead, I put together the $20 Lance’s Mecha Horse set. It’s a mechanical horse, ridden by Lance. It’s a theme in the Nexo Knights.
A couple of sets come with much smaller mechanical horses. But you know how knights named Lance roll. They roll in giant mecha horses that have transformed into vehicle form. Note the robotic sidekick. So I bought all of those sets at Toys’R’Us the day before the official launch. Then I hit up the LEGO Store at North Point Mall in Georgia and picked up two more. One of these was the $25 Infernox Captures The Queen set. It came with the smaller hover horse above, as well as this fellow here. He’s big, he’s mean, and what’s that inside his mouth? Why hello, Queen Halbert. You’re looking quite fetching, and not even a bit digested. Good, good—we wouldn’t want to anger the king. Not when he’s piloting a mech. Not to mention rocking a killer beard. King Halbert comes in the $30 The King’s Mech set, which so far is my favorite piece. Why does he even need knights? He’s got a massive robot with a giant sword. One of its hands is a ship piloted by a smaller robot.
And on top of all of that, he doesn’t even need to be inside the machine for it to work. The set even came with an extra beard to the minion trying to take him out with a ballista can get in on the act. The Nexo Knight line is off to an amazing start, and my wallet certainly feels it. I’ll have the rest of the launch sets by the end of January, and I’ll be counting the days til more arrive after that. Where do they even go from here? I’m placing my bets on massive biomechanical LEGO dragon. or follow him on Twitter at @bunnyspatialLego bricks are generally awesome, and by all accounts The Lego Movie, opening this weekend, is as well. So we thought we'd make sure the folks at Lego didn't get too full of themselves by reminding the world of the worst toys, figures and building sets they've unleashed upon the world. JUST NO. I have no idea what possessed a single Lego engineer to create this cast-off from the Island of Dr. Moreau, let alone what made the
company release it on an unsuspecting world. Or why they thought the two white round bricks underneath the nose-piece would represent two buck teeth and not some kind of abnormal growth. All I know is that all of these decisions were made in hate and fury. I put this is in quotes, because as you can see, while Lego assures us that this 1997 set is of a fire truck, it clearly looks nothing likeOh, it's red, and it is a vehicle, but that's pretty much where And what good is a completely bizarre fire truck without an equally bizarre fire chief? Admittedly, this fire chief is too good to ride on the truck with his peons, and has his own mini-vehicle, without doors or even sides, to travel on. He also has his own little hose for… little fires? he's out fighting fires by himself? Because all the other Lego firemen think Call me crazy, but I think I'm got a pretty good idea how the robber could break into this bank. Or out, I guess.
they behind the bars or in front of them? Is this guy trying to break into to access an ATM, or is he trying to get the endless void on the other side? either case, this thing sucks. Back in 1979, Lego created Fabuland, a line full of anthropomorphic animals, as sort of an intermediary set between Duplos andThey're kind of terrifying, like if Hunter S. Thompson had designed a toddler's Lego line while high on mescaline. But nothing is more chilling that The Fabuland Big Band set, featuring Peter Pig and Gabriel Gorilla. monsters would listen to a band consisting of nothing but a drummer and tuba 6) Star Wars Final Duel IIYes, now you can recreate the thrilling action of Luke Skywalker's final duel with Darth Vader and the Emperor by… watching him walk down the hallway to his final duel with Darth Vader and the Emperor? long as he walks no more than four steps, because that's all the hallway In 1998, Lego introduced their K'nex-like building sets
called Znap, because Zs make everything cooler. Indeed, the line wasn't overall bad — most of the kits looked all right, an they had crazy things like a Dino-Jet a giant ant along with the hover-subs and other vehicles. this piece of crap — which Lego tried to pass off as a "Jet-Car" — even more 8) Jack Stone Red Flash StationOkay, Lego, now you're not even fucking trying. Remember back in the early '00s, when Lego started trying to make sports games out of Legos? One of the earliest catastrophes was the NHL Slammer Stadium, in which sentient giant head statues from Easter Island played a rousing game of hockey. But what's worse is the rink itself — a flimsy cardboard rink, surrounded by an even flimsier wall. If only Lego has some kind of more durable building material to work with! Horse and Clara Cow's Ice Cream Shoppe Another Fabuland set, obviously, begging a very disturbing question: Where does Clara get the milk
to make the ice cream? Well before Lego Friends, Lego tried to reach girls with Belville set, a 1994 series which focused more on figures and playsets moreThe problem was the figures were godawful and the sets were a weird mix of fairy tale stuff and standard, mundane doll activities. Lego exhausted the traditional beauty salons and stables, they threw together this — sure, an interior designer is a pretty progressive progression for a doll to have in the '90s, but it kind of undercuts the message when her design equipment consists of a stand-alone sink, a bathtub (the hell?) and a brush. can think of a sadder image than a girl trying to brush her ugly, tiny doll's plastic hair helmet, please let me know. I wasn't lying about the dolls. If Artoo had a skeleton, this is what it would look like. Lego couldn't be bothered to make a single piece that would prevent him fromFeel free to insert a C-3PO/Phantom Menace "I'm naked!" joke here, if you're a bad person.