Under the Sea – LEGO Avatar, Ilu Discovery (75575) and Skimwing Adventure (75576)

I was really looking forward to Avatar – The Way of Water, but admittedly I haven’t managed to actually see it in cinemas. Things have been a bit too chaotic in the last few weeks for a multitude of reasons ranging from health issues to family stuff and it really killed my mood. So all my knowledge is still merely based on the trailers and the film snippets you can find on various sites. I feel that is enough to judge the subjects of this article, the Ilu Discovery (75575) and Skimwing Adventure (75576) sets, but of course I won’t make any claims to the accuracy of my observations and interpretations.

Pricing and Contents

As products based on licensed IP the sets inevitably are more expensive and thus the real question only becomes by how much and whether that is justified. To make a long story short the answer is “No!” for both sets, only to a varying degree. The Ilu Discovery (75575) comes in at a measly 179 pieces at 25 Euro suggested retail price which is a crooked price to begin with. This is only mitigated by retailers offering a discount, which brings it down to around 17 Euro, which is what I got my package for, but when you think about it, it is still 10 Cent a piece, making this anything but a steal. The Skimwing Adventure (75576) fares even worse. 259 pieces for 35 Euro is really nothing to write home about and the typical thirty percent discounts don’t change that. 25 Euro is still quite a bit for so little content in return, no matter how you spin it.

Ilu discovery (75575)

This set is literally the smallest set in the Avatar range, not just for this second wave but also overall. that applies to the piece count as well as the size of the model. The creature is in a very true sense some sort of “sea pony” used by the kids of the Metkayina tribe to move around faster underwater.

Those children are represented by minifigures depicting Tsireya and Tuk, her Na’vi friend. Them being kids also means that they come with the medium length movable legs introduced for the Harry Potter series three years ago and the non-movable even shorter “toddler” ones as opposed to the extra long versions used on the adults. The prints are again of excellent quality, though at this point the loin cloths and various trinkets made from natural materials feel a bit repetitive. But what can you do? They’re all running around pretty naked on Pandora…

Similar to the previous sets these ones come with smaller landscape side builds, in this case meaning all sorts of reef and sea floor stuff. The only distinct feature is that its extremely colorful, but at the end of the day it looks more like LEGO were just recycling random leftovers than having a genuine plan. There isn’t much in the way of actual structure and the rationale seems to be that as long as it looks flamboyant enough people won’t make too much of the absence of some real details. Unlike with the mountain pieces in the first wave there is also no provision to connect these little bits from different sets, further diminishing the usefulness. The point here really is that there should be some sort of large reef in one of those packages and then all the action happening around it.

The Ilu creature itself looks a bit like a cross between a dragon and a dinosaur and clearly took some inspiration from a Plesiosaurus. The model is rather small and the build is very minimalistic with the body being only slightly wider than two studs. The problem with that is of course that it also looks very blocky and rigid, in particular in the neck area. Ultimately it boils down to the fact that this model would have benefited from being at a larger scale, but of course I do get that they wanted to match the size of the minifigures. After all, it’s a film tie-in meant to re-play the scenes from the movie.

The beast itself is just fine, but doesn’t really offer much of a challenge in building nor any special revelations. For me the most interesting thing are the wedge pieces for the fins now also being available in Sand Blue and of course there’s a new custom mold for the head. Just too bad that the print quality is once more terrible and the yellow looks very faded. This is in stark contrast to the wings and some of the yellow elements. The wings are in their own way also problematic. While they look okay from the top, once you see the underside the massive Technic axles and connectors ruin everything. This issue will also come up for the second set.

Skimwing Adventure (75576)

The Skimwing is a larger creature used as sort of an attack/ infantry transport vessel similar to a horse by the adults in the movie. It’s name already hints at the fact that it more or less glides over the water instead of fully swimming in it. This is similar to those Foiling boards that have become the latest fashion in the last few years or if you want to go back further of course boats and ships, in particular ferries, that are built as hydrofoils for speed.

The minifigures represent Jake Sully and Tonowary, one of the Metkayina warriors. There’s not much more to say here that hasn’t been said in regards to the other figures. They’re executed well enough, but don’t offer much in the way of special features. It probably would not have been a bad idea to create at least some new weapons molds to make them more collectible.

The landscape pieces are even more barren than those on the Ilu. However, they offer at least some interesting pieces. the 1 x 1 cone in Yellowish Green is a never before seen color for this element and the Dark Purple horns are also nice. Aside from serving as the stand for the big fish itself, the small extra island can be used to create the illusion of one of the characters floating. That is also featured in the Ilu set, by the way.

The Skimwing is an intriguing design featuring aspects of a Northern Pike/ Eel, Sturgeon, Crocodile and a Marlin mixed with a Flying Fish. That would offer lots of potential, but similar to the Ilu it falls a bit flat due to the limitations of LEGO in general and adhering to minifigure scale. The only consolation is that in the movie the creature appears to be in “stiff mode” most of the time, so its somewhat rigid appearance and limited articulation is not that far off. I just wish there wouldn’t be those ugly large gaps between the segments.

The wings are a bit of a disappointment, not only because of the once again very visible Technic underpinnings, but also the way they are executed. You see, on the real creature they can fold up like zig-zag blinds and conform to the body plus they appear very opaque and more in a Dark Red tone. That makes me think that this would have been better emulated with those starched cloth pieces you sometimes find for skirts in Friends sets or as sails and capes in Ninjago and Star Wars. In fact this could have been stable enough to completely eliminate the supporting structure and make this look more elegant.

The second major disappointment are the prints on the head. By now we’ve all gotten used to opacity of bright colors on dark backgrounds not being great, but the way it’s here is simply unacceptable. It’s not even close to looking reasonably like the Tan color on the jaw next to it. Moreover, the colored area has scratches, likely because it was not handled properly while the paint was still fresh. And finally to top it off, the replacement I ordered from LEGO shows the same issues. This is a big “No, no, no!” and they deserve to be called out for it.

The only other thing of note is the Sand Blue propeller blade used on the tail. After it had been available only in Dark Bluish Grey for a decade, it seems now one of the designers has discovered more creative uses for it and after the Red one in the Aston Martin themed Speed Champions set (76910) and the White ones in some Friends sets we’re now getting this version.

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Concluding Thoughts

Both the models are okay for what they represent, but the massive flaws and shortcomings cannot be overlooked. The most annoying of them is how crude the structural parts on the wings look on those small creatures and the overall very rigid-looking design. What was tolerable for the Toruk and the Ikrans really becomes a problem at this much smaller size. The proportions are just completely out of wack and the thick axles and connectors make the supports look like heavy wale bones. One really wishes LEGO hat at least found it in their hearts to make them transparent or come up with another solution entirely, possibly based on some new elements.

On top of that there are of course the massive quality issues with some of the prints. It’s simply incomprehensible how the company claiming to be the market leader in these kinds of toys doesn’t get a handle on the problem when even some cheap knock-off brands do it better. There is in fact a sense of deep irony here as for once they managed to print the blue minifigures decently, but can’t manage to do the same on the animals despite the base color being somewhat similar. Go, figure!

Outside that the sets really only appeal to Avatar fans or people with a love for slightly more exotic stuff and crazy colors. There’s not much to gain here. The builds are straightforward and in their simplicity a bit boring while the overall appearance of the creatures and the surroundings feels lacking. The reef parts are the bare minimum and nothing really comes to life. Wouldn’t it be fantastic if those beasts would be circling a larger reef? Wouldn’t it make sense to have them appear in groups/ swarms like in the movie?

With all that in mind I cannot seriously recommend either of these packages. The Ilu Discovery (75575) could still be a little snack if you’re looking for something different every now and then since it’s affordable enough, but things already get fishy (no pun intended) for the Skimwing. It’s simply too expensive and for the money you can get better Creator 3in1 sets or something else.

Six O’Clock Shadow – LEGO Avatar, Toruk Makto & Tree of Souls (75574)

Birthdays are always nice and being gifted a bunch of Amazon vouchers is even better, so the stars aligned and I was able to afford myself the LEGO Avatar Toruk Makto & Tree of Souls (75574) package despite it being way over my usual budget. As I explained in my previous article on the subject the movie is a bit of a guilty pleasure and as I also already mentioned there I simply like the colorful nature of the whole thing. So I couldn’t resist temptation and committed to it – not just for this review, but because I really wanted to have it.

Pricing and Contents

As the biggest set of the first Avatar wave of course this doesn’t come cheap and as usual LEGO are trying to milk the cow by adding a premium because it’s based on licensed IP. The original asking price for this is 150 Euro, which is way too much for 1212 pieces if you apply the conventional metric of 10 Cent per piece. Luckily you don’t have to let them get away with it as those sets are only mildly popular (people seem to want the unique minifigures and a few other things, but not necessarily the actual sets as a whole) and you can get decent discounts even from smaller retailers. I got mine for 111 Euro and currently with the Black Week/ Black Friday promos I’ve seen it drop below 100 Euro. This is reasonable, but nor perfect.

Realistically I feel this is more around the 80 Euro mark, with the point being that despite getting quite a bit of volume on the individual models, a lot of it has to do with the lofty nature of those builds. Yes, the tree is quite large (and so is the Toruk), but that’s mostly down to using some very large/ long elements enclosing/ circumscribing lots of open space. My “kitchen table photo studio” was almost to small to accommodate everything and I had to touch up a few spaces at the edges where I ran out of grey background, but individually each model feels pretty lightweight and like you’re not holding much in your hand. It’s really more that you have to be careful not to break off some dangle-y thing than the models being weighty.

Minifigures & Direhorse

As already mentioned, the minifigures for the Avatar series seem to be reasonably popular among collectors, a lot of which no doubt has to do with their unique appearance due to the blue skin and tall legs. With only for of them this package feels a bit understaffed not only because of the bigness of the set but also more generally based on what the set is supposed to represent. It could have done well with another three to five “generic Na’vi warrior” figures to deck out the scene. The characters in this line-up are Jake Sully again in a different warpaint, of course there’s also Neytiri and the two others are Tsu-Tey, the former’s ex-lover and Moat, the female chieftain of the tribe. The prints are distinct from those of the other sets and well-executed, which no doubt contributes why they are so coveted.

The animals of Pandora so far are seriously underrepresented aside from the big flying beasts and the Thanator, so it’s good to see that be expanded upon as well. I’m not saying that I’m a fan of the Direhorses, though. That whole Ant Eater like appearance and behavior with them licking honeydew from flowers just feels odd and of course the six legs just feel awkward and unnecessary. It has also always bugged me that conveniently these creatures have USB cables to connect with the Na’vi‘s minds. All of that is a bit hard to explain away and rationalize no matter how willing you are to suspend disbelief for the movie. The horse as such is just fine, but has zero posing options. It also looks a bit too uniformly colored for my taste and should have some more organic patterns, especially in the “mane” and the rear section as they can be seen in the film.

The Landscape Pieces

The landscapes of Pandora are their own character in the movie so it’s only appropriate that the corresponding LEGO sets also at least make some effort to render at least parts of it in brick-built form. I already mentioned the pros and cons of how well the translation into this miniature format works for me in my other review and this is no different here. While the landscapes are certainly colorful and other-worldly, they have very little to do with how this stuff is depicted in the movie. The building techniques are very restricted without any recognizable effort to actually re-create plants from the film and the color choices are not anywhere close to how most of this looks and feels. It’s all rather arbitrary and gives the impression of “As long as it looks different enough, it’s good enough.”.

This is still tolerable for the smaller pieces, but for me the wheels come of the cart on the big one. This is supposed to be the entry “gate” to the glade where the Tree of Souls resides and even if you’re only superficially familiar with the movie you will immediately recognize that it looks nothing like it does there. Many of the rock formations on Pandora clearly have the appearance of lava frozen along the magnetic field lines (due to the floating mountains and the Unobtanium) , which makes them look like actual arches. None of this is present here and one can’t help but feel that the designers didn’t even try. Yes, it would not have been easy, but there are enough curved/ arched elements in LEGO‘s portfolio to at least hint at this on some form.

On the bright side this large assembly is quite stable and thus easy to handle. You can literally just grab it in the middle and carry it around like a suitcase on its handle. This robustness is of course needed in order to perch the huge Toruk Makto on the short axle on the “floating” mountain piece.

Tree of Souls

The Tree of Souls is mostly a simple affair. It’s very obviously based on a Weeping Willow constructed from a bunch of arches, slopes and Technic connectors with the base being pieced together from different rounded and cropped corner plates. It’s really not too advanced or fancy and if you inspect the images closely you can see the simplicity of the build and the overall symmetry. It’s just disguised by the dangling boughs/ twigs and the cyan-green vines on the ground that represent the “magic” moss/ lichen used to transfer souls into a new body or revive someone.

Sadly it could have looked even better if LEGO had placed more emphasis on a consistent coloring. Especially the black parts on the tree trunk draw too much attention and overall there’s just a few too many different colors used with the real irony once more being that of course a lot of them were/ are available in Reddish Brown or could have been manufactured in this color. This is again this weird dichotomy with LEGO where somehow they seemingly cannot be bothered to consider these points even if sets like these would be more relevant to adult collectors that want things to look coherent than children who play with it.

The construction of the tree overall is rather tedious and after I was done with it, I didn’t feel like I wanted to finish the set that evening. It really helps to spread out the build process across multiple sittings on different days or else you get a bit aggravated. In particular the repetitive nature of plugging together the transparent antenna pieces is not very enjoyable and i even forgot some on the inner three petals. If you don’t know it, you won’t see it, though. Unfortunately it is nigh on impossible to make everything hang down perfectly straight. My gut feeling tells me that this would require treating the leave elements and the whip/ leash pieces with a hot air fan to relax them or bend them into place.

Toruk Makto

The Toruk Makto, which translates to The Last Shadow (because it’s the last thing you see before you die) is the evil big bad of the movie in terms of the animals. Unlike his scrawny distant cousins, the Banshees/ Ikrans, he’s a lot harder to catch and does not as easily bow to your will. That’s why anyone managing to do so is highly revered among the Na’vi. That of course is the only reason they are even willing to listen to him (or his remotely piloted Na’vi avatar clone, more precisely) after the big disaster of the Home Tree being destroyed by Quaritch and his goons.

The model of the indomitable creature is quite ginormous, not least of all due to the enormous wingspan. However, also the body has more “flesh” and is much more voluminous compared to the wiry Ikrans. This helps a lot to make it actually threatening and also presentable. It has real legs and the wingtips can be folded backwards. underneath it all is still an awful lot of Technic axles and connectors, though, which isn’t my favorite. It always reminds me that LEGO perhaps should have developed a Ribs & Spars system not just for this, but also for their Ninjago dragons and similar. You know, something that looks more like natural bones or bent swords, not ugly fat tubes.

There’s inevitably a dedicated new head piece and with the ones coming up in the second wave this shows that they invested quite a bit of design effort and money for the molds into this. The feet with the huge claws are quite a bit of building and feel massive. Interestingly enough, while absolutely not accurate to the film, this still feels natural. It only turns the logic of thee creature on its head a bit. Whereas in reality it would mostly use the claws to balance on rocks and trees or hang on walls, here it makes the Toruk look more like it would walk around on the ground as well similar to a dinosaur. Indeed a rare case of where the limitations of brick building still resulted in an accidental positive outcome.

While all this certainly sounds a lot more positive than the Ikrans, I’m still not convinced this is the best way to go about this. Somehow I can’t shake the feeling that if they had gone the full mile and created molds for the body and legs I would have liked it more and even perched the creature on my shelf. Sorry for the language, but this seems a bit half-assed and even more so given the price.

Pieces from another Planet

As you well know one of my considerations for buying a set is the potential harvest of pieces I can add to my own stock, in particular new ones and interesting recolored items, and in this regard the set offers quite a bit. The most visible new elements are inevitably the ones on the Tree of Souls such as the Trans Dark Pink antennas, the Lavender leashes/ vines and the Light Aqua clips and tail/ Bionicle spine pieces. Underneath it also has one of the newer 8 x 8 round plates in Reddish Brown. I also babbled on about the new column piece in my last article and it appears here in Trans Clear, which will be super useful for building nice presentation stands. Of course there’s also the new whip/ connector cable pieces in Black and Bright Light Blue. The Toruk has a few hidden surprises. One of them is the inverted rounded plate for the first time in Red plus there’s a completely new double-curved 4 x 6 slope piece.

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Concluding Thoughts

Compared to the two smaller Avatar sets I reviewed earlier this has been a much more satisfying experience overall. You’re actually getting a bit of volume of stuff and everything looks reasonably nice. The only thorn in my side is the price or else I’d give this a full recommendation. At 80 Euro or thereabouts this would be some nice fodder for multiple evenings during the winter, but at double the price this doesn’t really work out. It’s simply too costly for what it offers and in particular people who have no relation to the movies nor a love for weirdly colored parts won’t get much out of it.

That said, I still believe these sets would work better if LEGO had just made them as nice display sets for adults instead pretending they would be play sets for kids, most of which likely never even won’t get to see the movies due to their age rating. The models are a bit too fragile for serious play and the functions too limited to really make it worthwhile. The thought of a five year old running around with the monstrous Toruk is equally odd, though it would probably be funny. so for what it’s worth, LEGO missed the mark on both these fronts. Again, this is for fans of the movie, but won’t hold much appeal for the uninitiated while at the same time being unsuitable for kids.

Pandora’s Boxes – LEGO Avatar, Neytiri & Thanator vs. AMP Suit Quaritch (75571) and Jake & Neytiri First Banshee Flight (75572)

As you may have noticed, things have been a bit slow around here lately, which is not necessarily just to blame my laziness. Many sets I have on my list only came out in September and October and some others that have been out already for a while don’t have great availability, which means they sometimes are out of stock and if they are there are sold at high prices. All of that makes it more complicated for me to obtain stuff within my budget constraints and likely that’s going to remain this way for a while. So be apprised that the long gaps between reviews may be here to stay despite my best efforts to make things work. Now on to the article.

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We all have those “guilty pleasure” movies, that is films that we know aren’t actually that good, but we keep watching over and over again for a specific reason. One of mine is undeniably Avatar. The reason for this is pretty obvious – as a 3D artist myself I was simply enawed by the sheer amount of hyper-realistic rendered graphics on display, even more so since virtual plant and landscape creation was one of my secret obsessions and I just knew how hard it was to make a leave sway in the wind or some stalks interact with an animal touching them. Combined with the fact that in 2009 a lot of this was still a lot harder to do than it is nowadays and many of the technologies used were in their infancy, how could one not be impressed?

Then there’s the whole other side that triggers my inner film critic – the story is very run-off-the-mill and full of corny stereotypes, terribly written dialog and yes, even those awful names for locales like the Hallelujah Mountains (!) make me cringe. Why am I telling you all that? Naturally, the upcoming sequel movies have caused a bit of a renaissance and brought the original movie back into everyone’s mind and view. They even went so far as to bring back an enhanced version of the original to cinemas. While this seems a bit too much hype for my taste, of course I can’t evade all the buzz. Knowing that The Way of the Water will likely be the same mix of weird and terrible storytelling with eye-popping visuals will not deter from making it a point to watch it, regardless.

All of this is the perfect opportunity for LEGO to bring out a few sets. when I heard about this, I was quite giddy with anticipation, hoping they would bring out the Dragon Assault Ship (that big flying pancake thing), but as it turns out they had other plans. Instead we’re getting a bunch of scenes from the first movies for people to relive their memories. The first two I chose for my review are Neytiri & Thanator vs. AMP Suit Quaritch (75571) and Jake & Neytiri First Banshee Flight (75572).

Pricing and Contents

It seems to be one of those “unwritten rules” that licensed LEGO sets are considerably more expensive than others and this is unfortunately the case here just as well. Combined with the recent arbitrary price hikes they imposed on their costumers under the pretense of the overall situation in the world inflicting economic pressure this makes these sets a rather costly investment. The Thanator set comes in at 45 Euro, which on first glance isn’t all that terrible for 560 pieces. However, as is evident from the overview picture, many pieces are small and the individual models are also not the largest and most complex ones.

The Banshee set fares a lot worse at 55 Euro  for 572 pieces. The problem here really is that right out of the gate you know that you’re not getting much for your money’s worth with the Ikrans being super skinny and the wings inevitably gobbling up pieces plus the actual wing “skin” undoubtedly costing a premium since the foil pieces need to be printed and cut specifically just for this set (an observation that applies to similar Ninjago dragon sets as well).

With all that in mind, it’s once more time for retail discounts to save the day and make this work. Lucky for us the original movie has dropped from most people’s memory and at this point the new film isn’t even out, so demand for these sets isn’t that high and there is some wriggle room, so I got the Thanator set for 32 Euro and the one with the Banshees for 37 Euro. If you’re patient and wait for upcoming special promos in the pre-Christmas season or Black Friday in particular, you may be able to get even more discount. On the other hand popularity could grow once the new movie hits and people flock to theaters, so you can’t hesitate too much and have to trust your gut feeling.

Minifigures

A standout feature of these sets are of course the tall minifigures for the Na’vi, the oversized blue smurfs that roam Pandora‘s forests. This is achieved in two ways: One are the very obvious long legs. Instead of having two stud holes they are three holes long and at this scale this makes quite a difference. Those leg pieces are not the same as the one specifically used on Woody from the Toy Story sets a few years ago, by the way, meaning they’re a new mold. The second trick to gain some height are the elongated heads with an actual chin area. Again, a minimal change, but noticeably contributing to the overall perception of those creatures being 2.5 meter tall. This can be easily seen with angry Colonel Quaritch next to Neytiri, both from the Thanator vs. AMP Suit set.

Since the Na’vi are basically butt-naked bar a loin cloth and some of their tribal garbs and trinkets, the whole body is Medium Blue. All the details are printed on, including their blue skin stripes and the aforementioned decorative items. the designs are very nice and each character is immediately recognizable.

The Landscape Pieces

As stated in my lengthy opening paragraph, the landscapes of Pandora play a major part in the appeal of the whole movie. They lend to the credibility and even if in the first movie we only ever get to see sub-tropical regions, there’s already a lot of variation and diversity there which will only expand once we get to know other areas in the new movies. That said, of course re-creating those landscapes in the real world and especially in LEGO is a whole different exercise. Since most plants and creatures were specifically designed for the movie, there are no exact matches for them in our environment.

That can mean that a plant doesn’t exist at all in this form on our planet or that the designers drew inspiration from existing species, but changed their appearance. That can be anything from simply changing the scale (unless you’re into it, very few of us really know how weird some microscopic fungae or small herbs look up close), changing the color or blending features of different plants into a new one. Very experimental genetics, if you will. Apparently this means that LEGO would have to create a ton of new molds and recolored elements and as we all know this would not be realistic or reasonable in terms of manufacturing cost and in turn price. So they had to get creative and look at what they already had and could easily use.

A very obvious candidate are the palm leaf elements. The Magenta ones were in a few The LEGO Movie 2 sets along with the super rare Bright Light Orange variant and I for one am glad that we’re getting them back and from what it seems in notable numbers, given that they appear in more than one of the sets. Regrettably this is also where LEGO stopped being “nice to us” and giving us new colors with most other elements being pulled in from existing sets such as the small leaves in Magenta and Bright Light Orange having appeared in various Disney sets or the Sunflowers (40524). The only highlight other than that for me were the two Dark Red flower stems hidden in the green capsules. Those were only introduced last year in Minecraft and are still relatively rare.

Mind you, I’m not saying that this is bad and the designers didn’t try, it just doesn’t feel very Pandora-ish. A particular beef of mine is that many of the scenes with the Thanator (pictures at the top) for instance play out in the shadow of the forest and at dawn, so everything has slightly bluish tint. This surely could have represented better by using colors like Dark Turquoise, Dark Blue, Sand Green, Sand Blue and so on. Also the overall density of the jungle could have been better with “simply more stuff”. And with that we are also getting to the point of the glow-in-the-dark elements: The crowns (top) and upside-down carrots (below) would make so much more sense in a dark environment.

In the Banshees set there’s also a completely new element. Since it’s not yet listed on Bricklink I can’t provide you with a proper name and description, but it is basically the counterpart to this also rather rarely used support beam, only that instead of a flat surface it is a half-cylinder. Here it is used to create the illusion of a waterfall down the floating rocks and thus included in Trans Light Blue, in other Avatar sets it is used in Trans Clear to similar effect, only without the illusion of water. It’s actually a nice new element and I would predict that especially in the clear color it would also make for a nice support on other models that are being displayed mid-air.

On a final note: As you can see when studying the pictures closely they have clips and “hook” bar elements at their ends. This is meant to allow you to connect the individual pieces into a bigger ensemble. While it’s a nice touch, it doesn’t exactly make sense. The landscapes each have a different feel and appearance down to the color of the “grass” being different greens and there’s no real transition between the zones.

Also the landscape models are not very robust, being that they are only built on a two plate thick base with not much structural reinforcement and the risk of pulling stuff apart is rather high. Did I mention that he bar and clip elements being different colors is also kind of annoying? There’s some good intentions here, but the execution leaves a lot to be desired. it would probably have been better to focus more on making each segment as detailed as they possibly could or in the opposite direction harmonize everything so that the individual sections could be plugged together with pins and form a solid piece of landscape.

The Thanator

The Thanator (simply “death bringer” derived from the ancient Greek word thanatos) is one of the first large creatures we get to see in the movie and it also plays a vital role in the grand finale. That latter scene where this creature is turned into an ally is what the set is about. Personally I never found it to be all to terrifying contrary to what the film wants to make you believe, which perhaps is already saying something. To me it’s just not the most interesting beast to begin with.

One of the factors that contributes to this feeling is the decision to have six legs, which makes the movements look awkward. It’s one of those sub-conscious things that you cannot put a finger on at first, but it becomes more and more clear the more you think about it. The second thing is the odd coloration. Yes, it makes sense for a creature that moves through the shadowy underbrush of the forest to have a dark skin to blend in, it’s just not visually attractive. The third and final reason why this fails to impress me is the odd sense of “He’s wearing a mask.” with the leaf-shaped skin appendages and the extremely protruding teeth. Yes, that no doubt is the intention – to create the feeling of the creature wearing a skull mask like a shaman or tribal warrior – it just doesn’t really work for me.

Based on my limited enthusiasm for the actual film creature I wasn’t expecting too much, yet LEGO managed to make things even worse. Just looking at the box art made me go “RLY?”. Everything about Palulukan (as the Na’vi call him) looks wrong and at no point do you believe that this is a slick predator stalking other animals in the jungle. The most obvious shortcoming is of course the extremely blocky appearance. You can see that to some degree the curved appearance of the body was captured, but everything else feels like rigid limbs hanging from a marionette.

The stiffness not only affects the look, but also the play value in that it is nigh on impossible to pose this creature other than the most basic stances. You can forget about that typical attack pose because the trunk doesn’t have a joint and at the same time the leg joints are way to weak to e.g. allow the thing to stand on its hind legs and rear up. In reverse, it is equally difficult to even get all six feet on the ground at the same time. When you manage to get it working it still feels wrong due to the claws just hovering above the actual ground plane due to how they are constructed. This just feels so wrong!

The other thing that rubs me the wrong way is the head. I mean what is the point of creating custom molds, if you can’t get it right? I may be critical of the skull mask design, but smoothing things over extremely can’t be the answer, either, don’t you think?! To me this looks like they are planning on re-using the mold on some Ninjago dragon with a bird-like head. In other words: It looks very generic. As it stands, I consider the Thanator a complete failure.

The AMP Suit

The second model in the package is the AMP (Armored Mobility Platform) “suit”, of course just a mech. Unlike many Ninjago mechs this is more reminiscent of the original Mechwarrior bots with the bulked-up, gorilla like chest and raised shoulders. From a mechanical engineering standpoint that would make a lot more sense. Compared to those overly tall mechs you have a much lower center of gravity and wouldn’t have to deal with some of the instabilities that long limbs bring. Naturally this doesn’t mean that this is “realistic” and could exist as a functioning vehicle in the real world. It’s just more logical and plausible, something the movie designers made a big point of and an established quality of James Cameron‘s movies that lends them that extra believability.

The AMP depicted in the set is not Cl. Quaritch‘s personal machine, which due to lots of repairs and usage has many parts in their natural dark grey “metal” color that never got a coat of fresh paint, but rather a stock model that was stored on the Dragon Assault Ship and with which he escapes as the vessel crashes down. The exact color appears to be more of a pale green similar to RAL 6028 Sea Green, but I guess Sand Green is a good enough match. The good news that brings about is that it required a number of pieces to be specifically recolored like the ingot piece or the rounded 1 x 2 plate. For me it also gives access to some other pieces in this color that have been around already, but in sets I never bought. This helps to bolster my parts stock.

The design of the model is reasonable for its small scale, but not particularly correct when you look closer at the details. For instance the shoulders would need to stand up and out more. It would also have been nice if they had put more effort in making the canopy airtight or create a dedicated new mold for it. After all, the point of this is that you could sit in the cockpit without requiring an extra breather mask. in an odd way this also reinforces my points about the Thanator: A more detailed and slightly larger AMP would have been preferable over so many pieces being wasted on a unrealistic creature. This would also have allowed for a more realistic chainsaw blade, which I consider the weak point of this otherwise neat little model. In the end they could have sold this alone for around 15 Euro and people might have jumped at it.

Jake’s Ikran

Moving on to the second set, we get Jake and Neytiri‘s iconic Ikrans/ Banshees. Jake’s is the bluish one as for whatever reason those creatures come in a million shades of different colors, allegedly having to do with how strong and dominant they are. This kind of diversity within the same (sub-)species is usually only found with lizards or some birds. Other kinds of animals often need multiple generations to develop these variations. That’s why I’m a bit torn on this, as technically these creatures are too large to spontaneously develop such drastically different skin patterns and is kind of a crutches used for visual distinction in the movie.

As you can see from the images, there’s really not much to say about the model as there ‘s just isn’t much volume. The body is more or less just a block of different two stud wide elements and some brackets and to this block a few hinges are attached to hold the wings. Those wings are just large pieces of printed transparent vinyl, a method used on Ninjago dragons as well. In contrast to those fictional creatures here they are extremely large and the wingspan could be sufficient to actually lift the creature and someone riding it. It is kind of realistic in aerodynamic terms.

The wings can be folded up, but not folded within themselves. That’s why these creatures have no feet, as actually they would “walk” on one of their “finger” bones from the wing like a bat or Pteranodon. That makes them look like they’re sitting and hatching when you don’t have them attached to the landscape piece. as you can see, LEGO created yet another new mold for the head, which perhaps is the best part about the whole thing.

Neytiri’s Ikran

Neytiris version of the Ikran is 100 % identical to Jake‘s, only with alternate colors. This makes for a very tedious and repetitive build and would be my main criticism of this set. Similar to the AMP I would have settled on just getting a single model, but a bit more elaborate. I strongly believe that a slightly larger scale also would have allowed for more rounding/ smoothing of the body as well because you would have had room for more slopes. This also would have opened up the opportunity to present a different scene with the wings folded up properly like when Neytiri first calls her “girl” on the big tree or when Jake earns his stripes when catching his one up high on the rock precipice in the floating mountains. An incidental side effect of this would have been that they could have re-created those locations as well instead of just including a generic Pandora-ish looking  looking lansdscape.

The underside shot once more illustrates the huge wingspan and the “bone” structure built from Technic elements. The funny thing here is that in fact the wings are robust enough, but the attachment with the hinges doesn’t live up to that. it can barely hold the weight and moving the wings into other positions makes them come off quite bit. At least for the large wings they probably should have added a second hinge or at least some clip/ bar combo to make it more stable.

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Concluding Thoughts

I regret having to say that both sets are quite disappointing. The irony here is that you can see the seeds of what could have been, but the result is a letdown. In particular the creatures, which should be the highlight, leave a lot to be desired. The new custom molds for the heads can’t disguise the fact that their bodies are severely lacking in details and the proportions are weird. It’s not even that more realism was sacrificed in favor of more playability, because that isn’t the case, either. A six-legged creature that doesn’t get its feet on the ground certainly doesn’t count and neither do some “flying wire frames” whose wings come off.

As it is, I cannot really recommend either of the two packages. The parts that are interesting (landscapes, AMP suit) are not elaborate and refined enough whereas the rest makes you feel like a lot of pieces are wasted on mediocre models that in no way manage to capture the magic of the movie. This really feels like someone was trying to “ride the wave” with the original movie having been re-released in cinemas in a spiced up version and the immanent release of the first of the new films for which LEGO sets have already been hinted at. In other words: This comes across as a cash grab preying on peoples love and nostalgia, but the substance of the sets is as lacking as the story of the movie itself.

Once more these are sets based on a licensed IP (intellectual property) that make you wonder who is signing off on those deals and whether the products are being reviewed thoroughly enough before being declared ready for release. I really have a hard time believing that the people making those decisions even care…