I’m still anything but a car fanatic, but no matter what, I thoroughly enjoy the LEGO Speed Champions series and always look forward to the new releases around this time of the year. This year is no different and for a particular reason the line-up got me even more excited than usual. More on that later. For now let’s see what the Lotus Evija (76907) is all about.
Contents and Pricing
Speed Champions sets are like sweets – if you’re not a car aficionado, you could probably do well without them, but they make for a wonderful snack of LEGO on their own merits. They’re affordable enough, relatively quick to build, yet interesting and in a way always rewarding because you end up with something recognizable. Throw in the occasional new/ exclusive piece and some very educational building techniques and there is little reason to pass on these sets unless you really couldn’t be bothered.
At 247 pieces this adheres quite well to the average parts count in this series in the usual mix of several larger elements for the cockpit, wheel wells and so on, but also a ton of small bits. Also an established standard at this point is the single minifigure in a racing/ mechanic suit matching the look & feel of the car (or for that matter the manufacturer’s official branding and design). Is any of that worth 20 Euro MSRP?
Like so often I don’t necessarily agree, but it’s not that bad, either, given that there are two pretty sizeable parts printed with multiple colors plus the ones for the headlights and the minifigure also being printed head to toe. that alone raises production cost and could be worth an extra buck. That said, the typical retail price will of course be around 15 Euro after discounts and with that there’s barely any excuse left not to buy this set.
The Model
The model is structurally more complex than its outsides let you think. A good chunk of the first steps in the instructions is actually spent extending the rear end of the chassis piece with some rather complex bracket and SNOT techniques. I’m always game for learning new tricks, but trust me, this one is pretty wild with multiple direction changes. It basically only begins to make sense toward the end once you understand how stuff aligns again for plugging on the outer pieces. Admittedly even I found myself thinking several times that it might have been simpler had they just designed a new custom piece to same effect.
Inspecting the car’s rear end once again reveals the biggest shortcoming these sets have: The limitations of the LEGO system do not allow to capture the complex curvatures of these hyper cars’ bodies. That is, of course, until they might create new parts for that one day. I already pointed that out when I reviewed the McLaren Elva (76901). In this case this is most apparent by the rear wheel wells being cut off perfectly perpendicularly and lacking any of the transitional zones, minor as those curved blends would be on this particular vehicle. Similarly, the gigantic air intake just doesn’t look right.
The faux exit apertures and rear lights aren’t half bad, but inevitably suffer from the same lack of rounding plus LEGO are clearly cheating here, exploiting that due to the dark colors and the “black hole” effect it would be heard to gauge the actual depth. Within reason this is absolutely fine, though. Unlike competitors such as Mega or COBI, LEGO simply doesn’t create one-off unique parts for a set and we have to live with that, as much as we may wish otherwise. At least they found a creative use for the snowboard piece and after years of it being in Lime Green in Friends sets it sure doesn’t hurt to have one more color option.
A big point of contention and heated debate is the curvature of the canopy piece and by extension thus the curvature of the yellow trim line and how it may be dictated by technical limitations of the printing process and LEGO‘s internal guidelines. The inevitable truth is that the shape is pretty much completely wrong in the first place and would have required a new mold that then may have been flat and rounded enough, that the line could have been printed continuously from the top direction instead of using three separate stamps. However, even then it would have ended up too high on the model, which is something anyone needs to consider here. Ultimately perhaps the problem is not really the line or the canopy shape, but rather the color scheme chosen by the designers…
The color scheme is also disadvantageous in that many the details are hard to see because they’re being gobbled up by the dark surroundings. With my shoddy camera and limited photographic equipment I can barely make it visible because there’s no good way to get light into all the crevices. The front view also reveals the new 2 x 3 wedge slopes with the headlights printed on. This is a completely new piece for 2022 and used in several of the Speed Champion sets. It’s reminiscent of some of the larger and steeper curved slopes you find in Mega and COBI sets and from here on should really make it easier to get nice smooth shapes.
Ironically I kind of resent that they are printed, as of course I would have loved to add them to my collection as regular pieces for custom builds. It’s also rather odd that LEGO printed those two large pieces, where sticker application would have been much easier, but at the same time there are several 1 x 2 slopes where you are supposed to apply some rather finicky small sticker bits. The logic here is hard to follow, but I guess that’s ultimately one of those “Can’t have it both ways!” situations where there just isn’t a perfect solution for everyone.
Ironically I kind of resent that they are printed, as of course I would have loved to add them to my collection as regular pieces for custom builds. It’s also rather odd that LEGO printed those two large pieces, where sticker application would have been much easier, but at the same time there are several 1 x 2 slopes where you are supposed to apply some rather finicky small sticker bits. The logic here is hard to follow, but I guess that’s ultimately one of those “Can’t have it both ways!” situations where there just isn’t a perfect solution for everyone.
The cockpit, like so often, is yet another very dark “black hole”, but given that it barely can seen through the tinted glass, anyway, sufficient.
Concluding Thoughts
The Speed Champions cars have gotten quite sophisticated overall, but with this one I’m a bit torn. Once more I find that if it wasn’t spelled out on the packaging, you’d have a hard time recognizing which car this is supposed to be. In this case the problem is two-fold: Not only does LEGO simply still not have enough specific elements to render the complex curvatures, but I also find the color less than ideal. I get that they wanted to honor the typical Lotus British Racing Green, but it’s not the best color here. Interestingly enough if you look it up, you can find many more versions with light grey or yellow bodies, which I think would have immensely helped.
Outside that this is still a nice set that’s a good way of killing an hour of time on a relaxed evening and if you genuinely collect them all, it will not look too shabby next to other such cars. On the other hand the limitations are very apparent and next to e.g. the Ferrari F8 Tributo (76895) the use of the same cockpit piece would be a tad too obvious for comfort. LEGO need to keep investing in new molds and pieces to make the cars more distinctive from each other.
Mylenium's Brick Corner 