This creation is virtual. It features a cartoonish caricature. Oh, and a big bald meathead, who may or may not have LEGO arms.
But seeing as the movies from which it’s inspired are also pretty much virtual (no, physics does not do the things it appears to in the ‘Fast & Furious’ franchise), feature cars that too are cartoonish caricatures, and that also include the aforementioned big, bald meathead, we’re going to let it pass. In the name of “Family…”, or something.
Built for the ‘Iron Builder’ contest, in which participants must use a usually-obscure LEGO piece (in this case a Spike Prime Colour Sensor), Ivan Martynov’s homage to the most profitable (and worst) movie franchise of all time includes several of the chosen part hidden throughout it, including the Dodge Charger’s supercharger, the floodlights, hidden within the cityscape, and most cunningly as a meathead torso.
There’s more to see at Ivan’s photostream, and you can ignore physics whilst muttering “Family…” for little-to-no-reason via the link in the text above!
As if that old Dodge van parked down the street wasn’t creepy enough, Flickr’s 1saac W. has made it hover. Still don’t get into it kids. See more (from a distance) at 1saac’s photostream.
The seventies were weird. Inflation trebled, gas prices skyrocketed, everyone was on strike, and vans were adorned with murals for some reason.
The first three items on the list are making an inglorious resurgence in 2022, so we’re expecting the return of mural-adorned vans is imminent too. Flickr’s 1saac W. is one step ahead with this pair of wonderfully ’70s Dodge Street vans, each adorned with a celestial mural.
Head back to the 1970s via the link above, or just stick around for a bit, as the decade appears to returning for all of us.
The recently launched Speed Champions 76094 Dodge Charger R/T set continues LEGO’s welcome foray into real-world classic cars. Taking the purple Challenger from that set and upsizing it is Flickr’s Joey Klusnick, who has replicated the iconic 1970’s muscle car in ‘Miniland’ scale, making his model perfect for the streets of a Legoland theme park. It’d sure be a quality street** with Joey’s Challenger parked on it. Click the link above to rummage through the box for a taste.***
*Non UK readers; you’ll have no idea what we’re on about.
We love alternate builds here at The Lego Car Blog, as creating many things from one set is at the very heart of what LEGO is all about.
TLCB Master MOCer Firas Abu-Jaber demonstrates this perfectly today, having created this brilliant B-Model from the parts found within the excellent 10295 Porsche 911 Turbo set.
Following his incredible Ford GT40 10295 alternate comes another iconic American supercar, the Dodge Viper, complete with opening doors, a detailed engine under the raising hood, and working steering too.
America likes naming cars after animals. Thus this viper is borne of a horse, being constructed solely from the pieces found within the excellent Creator 10265 Ford Mustang set.
Besides a few mis-coloured clips you’d be hard pushed to tell that Marcin Majkowski’s Dodge Viper is a Mustang in disguise, plus the doors and hood open, there’s a detailed interior, and a lifelike V10 engine too.
Building instructions are available and there’s more to see of Marcin’s 10265 B-Model on Flickr – click the link above to swap one animal for another.
Dun dunu dun dun, dun dun – dun dunu dun dun, dun dun… and, er… whatever the music is from the Fast & Furious franchise. An explosion with Vin Diesel breathing the word ‘Family’ over it probably. Anyway, it’s new set time, and LEGO have introduced two iconic movie cars to the Speed Champions line-up!
76911 007 Aston Martin DB5
Think the Creator 10262 Aston Martin DB5 ‘Goldfinger’ set is a bit pricey? Well LEGO have revealed its smaller brother, the new 76911 Speed Champions 007 Aston Martin DB5, complete with a Daniel Craig-esque mini-figure!
Ultimately the same car as the one used in ‘Goldfinger’, Craig redeploys the DB5 in 2012’s excellent ‘Skyfall’, which raises all sorts of questions about Bond’s chronology. Anyway, let’s not dwell on Bond’s unfathomable age, but rather rejoice in the new Speed Champions arrival, which looks rather good.
A considerable portion of 76911’s realism is due to a myriad of stickers, which – placed as they are on curved pieces – will probably peel off immediately, but nevertheless it looks nice on the box. It’s disappointing to see the trademark Aston Martin grille is a sticker though – surely a brick-built version would’ve been possible?
We’re also a little disappointed that there are no gadgets, making 76911 more of a standard Aston Martin DB5 than 007’s Q-Branch version, but that’s still cool enough, and the decent printed rear canopy piece will be sure to crop up on all sorts of MOCs in time.
The new Speed Champions 76911 007 Aston Martin DB5 will reach stores later this year, and is a welcome addition to the line-up, even if it has got more stickers than Bond has killed henchmen.
76912 Fast & Furious 1970 Dodge Charger R/T
From one infamous movie franchise to another, and also another movie car that has already appeared in LEGO form in a larger scale. We quite like the Technic 42111 Dom’s Dodge Charger set, but it is admittedly a bit out of reach for many ‘Fast & Furious’ fans, who are likely a bit young for its 10+ target age and price point.
A ‘Fast & Furious’ Speed Champions set is probably a far better match, and 76912 looks a fine way to bring the franchise to LEGO fans. LEGO have captured the modified 1970 Dodge Charger R/T rather well (and without relying on stickers), plus never has a hairless-mini-figure looked more appropriate than it does here.
The new 76912 Fast & Furious 1970 Dodge Charger R/T looks like a good effort to us, and with LEGO also now having a partnership with Toyota, perhaps – if all wish for it hard enough – that Supra could be next…
Is there anything more automotively dreary than an American full-size sedan?
OK, American mid-size SUVs, which have almost completely replaced the sedan market, are the new pinnacle of blandness, but we’re not sure that even they can eclipse a grey Ford Crown Victoria.
This Lego version of the wheeled white space comes from Flickr’s Ralph Savelsberg, who somehow managed to complete it without falling asleep during construction.
Ralph’s Ford Crown Vic joins some other tediously drab sedans in the corner of his garage, and there’s more to see of it and them at his photostream via the link above, all of which are perfect for something that’s coming soon here at The Lego Car Blog…
Early-’00s American cars are fat, badly built, inefficient, poor handling crap-boxes, and you’d have to be an idiot to like any of them.
This is an early-’00s Dodge Viper; a fat, badly built, inefficient, poor handling crap-box, and it’s one of our favourite cars ever.
Even more so in this configuration, the 2003 GTS-R endurance racer, as constructed to near-perfection in 1:14 scale by TLCB favourite SP_LINEUP.
SP has used over 1,300 pieces to recreate the iconic American racing car, including a beautifully detailed interior, engine bay, chassis bracing, brick-built drivetrain, and the spectacular GTS-R long-tail bodywork.
There’s more to see at SP’s photostream and you can make the jump to an early-’00s endurance race – and one of TLCB favourite cars ever (because we’re idiots) – via the link above.
Purple is an interesting colour. It’s the best sweet in a box of Quality Street (that reference might not translate very well), the hue of a popular children’s TV dinosaur that – frankly – should stop bloody singing and just eat the children, and – more nerdily – it means you’ve set the fastest sector in a motor race. Despite these associations however, purple is not a popular choice for cars.
In the late ’00s Dodge changed that somewhat, with the arrival of their reborn Challenger, that not only brought the iconic muscle car back, it returned the gloriously-named ‘Hellraisin Purple’ to forecourts after about forty years.
Recreating the reincarnated Challenger, and the only colour you should consider owning a Challenger in, is Michael217, who has constructed this ace fully RC Model Team version of Dodge’s 00’s muscle car.
Remote control drive and steering, front and rear suspension, opening doors, hood, trunk and sunroof, and a whole lot of purple bricks make this a model worth a closer look, and you can do just that at both Eurobricksand Bricksafe. Click the links to raise some hell.
The ‘Fast & Furious’ movies are – for the most part – total garbage. With characters coming back from the dead (twice), long lost family members loosely enabling plot continuation (twice), and bad guys turning good just to keep them in the franchise (three times by our count), the plots could have been written by TLCB Elves.
But, like the internet’s most popular video category, no one is watching a Fast & Furious movie for the plot. They’re watching for the cars. And maybe Vin Diesel’s giant shiny head. In doing so making ‘Fast & Furious’ the most profitable movie franchise ever.
Thus LEGO have joined the ‘Fast & Furious’ party, and have brought one of the franchise’s star cars to life in Technic form. This is the Technic 42111 Dom’s Dodge Charger set, supplied to us here at TLCB by online shop Zavvi, and it’s time for a review…
First a shout out to our suppliers Zavvi, whose delivery was prompt, communication good, and the 42111 box was massively well protected inside, well… a bigger box. If you’re the kind of person who likes to keep the boxes for your sets (ours just go in the recycling), that’s a bonus.
LEGO have realised this too, removing the sticky circles that hold the ends shut (but that rip the artwork when opened), and fitting a cereal-box style closable tab so it can stay closed.
Inside 42111’s box are five numbered bags, bagged instructions and stickers (which helps to keep them protected too), and 1,077 parts. Many of these are weird and new, at least to this reviewer (if not the set), and continue LEGO’s approach of using every colour ever. However, like numerous ‘Fast & Furious’ characters, we’re going to do a complete 180 and say that it, well… works.
Building 42111 is fun and straight-forward, with the multitude of colours making it easy to find the parts required. The colours are thoughtfully chosen too, enabling quick identification and actually changing in some cases as the build progresses depending upon which similar pieces they shared a bag with. They’re all fairly well hidden by the end too, so there’s no ‘rainbow’ misery here.
The build can also be commended for creating a fully working rolling chassis by the mid-point, which makes it much more interesting than only adding the wheels at the end.
As has been the case for a while now though, the instructions can be very simple, at times adding just one piece per step. That said, there are a lot of orientation changes, which you have to watch out for so you don’t install something upside down. Not that this Reviewer did that. He’s a professional.
After a few hours of happy parts selection and spot-the-difference, you’ll have a nicely sized Technic recreation of the early ’70s Dodge Charger – modified ‘Fast & Furious’ style with a giant supercharger and NO2 tanks – complete with a working V8 engine, steering, all-wheel suspension, opening doors, hood and trunk, and a bizarre party trick. Continue reading →
It’s summer here at TLCB and it’s HOT. Elves are scattered everywhere panting, and the office ‘air conditioner’ (a fan gaffa-taped to a window ledge) is just moving hot air about like the one in the back of an oven, ensuring everything is equally cooked.
Those of you reading this in sunnier climes than the UK (that’s all of you) will be wondering what all the fuss is about, but this TLCB Writer is well-travelled and no-where gets hot like the UK. Thank the high humidity, limited air conditioning, and buildings designed to keep in, not out, for that.
It also might explain why the British buy more convertibles than the French, Germans, Italians, and Spanish. Put together. Thus we have two here today, and they’re both… um, a bit crap.
The Dodge Viper was basically a truck engine shoved in a kids’ plastic toy, and was predictably rubbish as a result. But on the other hand, it was a truck engine shoved in a kids’ plastic toy, and it was therefore excellent. This superb Speed Champions scale Dodge Viper convertible was suggested by a reader, and it comes from previous bloggee RGB900 who has nailed the 1990s American icon in 6-wide form.
Equally iconic (and rubbish) was the modern Volkswagen Beetle convertible; a bubble-shaped Golf with a pram roof stuck on the back that predictably became the must-have accessory for people that knew nothing about cars.
Fashion is fickle though, and without any substance whatsoever the modern Beetle is now dead, and its customers have all moved on to Mini convertibles. SP_LINEUP hasn’t forgotten it though, creating this excellent brick-built version that was also suggested by a reader.
There’s more to see of each convertible on Flickr via the links, and if you’re wondering why we haven’t featured good drop-tops instead of a kids’ toy and VW pram, just be thankful we didn’t find one of these to post. See, the British do stupid things when it gets hot.
These days the second generation Dodge Charger seems to only come in black. However we’re assured that other colours were available, and – if Tony Bovkoon‘s stunning red Dodge Charger is accurate – we’d like to see more of them.
Tony’s Charger features a detailed engine bay, interior, and trunk inside the brilliant red bodywork, which Tony has presented superbly in an extensive album on Flickr. Click the link to take a look.
Produced for just two years between 1968 and 1970, the second generation Dodge Charger was a roaring success. Almost 100,000 second-gen Chargers were built, versus a planned production run of just 35,000, with seven different engine options ranging from a 3.7 litre slant-6 to a 7.2 litre V8. The R/T (road/track) was top of the tree, and over 17,000 were built (one of which featured in probably the most famous movie car chase of all time). This excellent 8-wide Speed Champions scale Charger R/T comes from Jonathan Elliott of Flickr, who has captured the iconic Chrysler Corporation muscle car superbly in brick form. Click here to take a closer look, or the the link above to see the real thing lose more hubcaps than it has wheels on the streets of San Francisco…
This startlingly well-constructed classic camper is a 1977 Dodge B100-based Winnebago, or ‘Minnie Winnie’, and it comes from 1saac W. who is on an absolute roll at the moment.
1saac’s creation captures the aesthetic of the real deal brilliantly, including a brick-built take on the classic Winnebago livery, and a subtle shift from six to seven wide from the cabin to the camper.
It might not be fast, nor beautiful, but it’s nevertheless one of our favourite small-scale creations of the year so far. Head to an American campsite in the late ’70s via 1saac’s photostream above.
