Category: LEGO Disney

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The final tally was…

• Star Wars: 11 Hits / 1 Misses UPDATE
• Disney: 20 Hits / 4 Misses
• Marvel: 7 Hits / 17 Misses

Ace: Star Wars and Disney Thoughts

This year’s Star Wars calendar was just stellar. Final score ended up being 16-8. If my memory is correct, in past year’s they were always right around the 50% mark. One of reasons it scored so high was the fact that there were no weapon racks, or builds that entirely depended on another day for context, functionality, or completeness. This is how calendars should be. Each day should be a treat on its own. I hold the opposite opinion of Eric in this regard but that’s okay. I can’t remember if the Harry Potter calendars he used to do had multi-day builds like Star Wars did.

There were five minifigs included in this year’s calendar, two of which are unique in the form of ugly Christmas sweater minifigs. They are bangers. The others I wasn’t too thrilled with as I don’t feel like I am the target audience for whatever piece of media they were sourced from but they were fine.

The ships and vehicles were mostly great. A few them I had a hard time recognizing but thanks our #lego discord channel they were easily identified. Again, that is just an unfortunate byproduct of not being in the target demographic and/or not consuming every piece of Star Wars media. I can’t really fault LEGO for wanting to include the more obscure models but if ever there was a choice between including something from the core set of movies or from a kids show on a streaming platform, I would think the choice would be obvious.

My favorite build of the Star Wars calendar has to be hands down the Millennium Falcon from day 9. I never get tired of this ship. I recently rewatched the original trilogy and seeing it in action is so satisfying. This micro model is pretty great and I am tempted to throw a binocular element or rollerskate on top for the gunner station.

It was a little difficult picking my least favorite build only because for this year’s calendar when it hit a lot it really hit a low. I’d have to give the honors to this thing. Apparently it’s the Crimson Firehawk from the Young Jedi Adventures cartoon. There is an official set that was a 4+ set but even that wasn’t pleasing to the eye either. It’s just atrocious all around.

Onto Disney…

The Disney calendar was an impulse buy for me at Costco. I wasn’t aware that Eric was planning on reviewing the Disney one until it was too late. Had I known I would have covered the Harry Potter one. One of my kids opted for the HP calendar this year so maybe I’ll just do a brief write up on that in the next couple of days. I didn’t keep an official tally for the Disney calendar, but going back and tallying the score, it ended up at 13 thumbs up and 11 thumbs down. I feel like I was being overly generous though as some of the castle builds i think I was being too kind.

This calendar was chock full of paired builds, with some themes going over three days. The paired builds mostly consisted of a princess baby minidoll and the environment from which they came. All of the environment builds were built similarly consisting of some design elements and an arch. If you place them next to each, you would understandably come to the conclusion that the princess should be placed under the arch.

But the baby minidoll was simply too large both in height, and depth, and sometimes even width. Mirabel above is a prime example. The above photo makes it look like she actually fits right in front but that is not really the case.

She is leaning forward slightly because her hair element is so large. Mirabel was the one princess that looked the most normal when trying to place her in her environment. I’ve had varying degrees of success with the other franchises.

Moana came second but because of the micro scale hut element, she had to be turned sideways in order to make contact with the stud for her feet.

Elsa and her ice castle also had to be placed sideways and is also slightly tilted.

Tiana couldn’t even be placed on the bottom floor.

Ariel was also turned and slightly angled.

One of the other main issues I had with these little castle builds is that even if the princess mini doll could fit under the arch, it wouldn’t have been centered because the arch width was two studs and the baby minidoll required just a single stud. So the princess placement would be off either slightly to the left or to the right. A jumper plate would have mitigated this and settled my OCD by correctly placing the minifig dead center between the two arch supports. But this is an entirely moot point since the princess couldn’t fit under the arch to begin with.

The last four days of the build ended up becoming Cinderella’s castle complete with not only an arch but two arches. And one of those arches has a balcony. Seems nice but again, the multi day nature of the build just sapped any enthusiasm out of me. And plus, and this might be the biggest knock against this castle, there was no Cinderella baby minidoll.

I was going to try and solo whatever basic game LEGO tried to shoehorn into the Disney calendar but decided against it. The negatives I outlined above has already left such a sour taste in my mouth that putting in the additional effort was just not worth my time. LEGO already got my money from me by buying this set, I don’t feel like any additional effort for this review is worth my time or yours.

Between the two calendars, Star Wars was the clear winner. Complete builds, no multi-day nonsense, and a nice variety of vehicles and minifigs. Disney could have also had a great advent calendar if they removed the whole arch design requirement and made better micro castles that were akin to Vader’s Castle from the Star Wars castle. Kinda funny that the Star Wars calendar had a better castle build than anything from the Disney one.

Eric: Disney and Hot Sauces Thoughts

This is, I think, my sixth year doing these advent calendars for FBTB, and my first year branching off of Harry Potter. I chose the Disney calendar, though next year, I may not. Here are the pros and cons:

PROS:

• It’s not as predictable as Harry Potter.
• A wide range of colors and pieces: lime green, white, bright pink, etc.
• The castle vignettes are legitimately cool and pack a nice amount of detail into a handful of pieces.

CONS:

• The minidolls (or whatever they are) are extremely ugly.
• Some of the builds feel out-of-place or like fillers.
• LEGO is determined to include some dumb spinning game in all these calendars.
• We got a Christmas tree. Again. It’s terrible. Again.

My overall impressions, then? Well…it was fine. Looking at Nick’s and Ace’s calendars, I think mine was the only one that had ZERO to do with Christmas (save for the shoehorned Christmas tree). That’s not great. I am not into Disney, so it’s hard to justify a price tag that sits equal with Star Wars, Marvel, and Harry Potter. If you or your kid like Disney more than the other properties, go for it. If they just want to do ANY advent calendar, I’d go with the LEGO City or LEGO Friends calendars. Save $15. But expect a boring Christmas tree model. It always shows up, no matter the calendar.

As for the hot sauces…they sucked. I got two hot sauce calendars from World Market: 12 Days of Hot Sauce and Culinary Passport Hot Sauce Collection. I should have known better, because these calendars usually are extremely distilled and not spicy, and that sure is what I encountered. A real disappointment compared to the genuine pain from the hot sauces in 2022.

I am already working on next year’s hot sauces and, believe me, each and every one of them will be HOT.

FINAL SCORES:

LEGO Disney Advent Calendar: 20 Hits / 4 Misses

HOT SAUCES: ALL BAD

Nick: Marvel and Rocks and Dice Thoughts

The Marvel calendar has become a running joke around here, and the rumor mill has it that this will be its last year, with another theme taking over. Why can’t we get a good DC or Batman calendar on the rotation, LEGO? You could charge $100 for a minifigure heavy Batman calendar and I would happily lap it up.

We only got 5 full minifigures in the set, and only one of them is truly unique. And the one that was unique was just half-assed with those terrible gray legs.

So many of the builds were Spider-Man themed but… not great. Either two small, spread across multiple days, or worse… just boring. The stuff that wasn’t was fine, but again, so much of it was lazy or forgettable.

Even when this calendar tries, it so often misses, like putting Gwen in front of a toy drum set that doesn’t have enough parts. Or, it’s biggest sin…

… giving us a not-Santa with the Goblin. Just putting the regular goblin on this terrible glider, and not theming the bag or pumpkin is a great picture of the laziness of this calendar.

This is the sum-total of dice that you get in this calendar, which isn’t a terrible amount of dice, but it also shows how much Chessex has sort of stagnated in their dice as of late. I’ve got… a few (hundred, maybe thousand) dice around, and the older I’ve gotten, the less I like gimmicky dice and instead focus on things like how nice they look and how usable they are. Contrast between the number and dice is the most important to me.

The best of the sets we got spread out were the blue and white, and hit all of the spots I want in dice. These are going to go into the bag with other good sets to be used for D&D games and the like.

The second best set, probably won’t be in a regular rotation for me, but I’ll go into my loaner dice that I keep around for other players or give away to new people.

The worst of the three full size sets, I just don’t like the look of these. They’re too inconsistent in look, and not colors I’d normally use. They’ll go in the dice dungeon, which is a large bag of dice that I put in a storage box somewhere and forget about until I open the box and look for something else.

The rock calendar was a fun little idea, but I’ll be honest, the final output of it was fairly unimpressive. About a third of them were nice, pretty stones, but so many weren’t clear what they were or weren’t even on the list of rocks that were supposed to be with it.

I did have fun imagining what Rock Raiders 2026 would be like, though, so I guess the $15 I spent on this were worth it. And my kids will get a whole bunch of rocks to put into collections of other rocks.

 

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 16 Hits / 7 Misses
• Disney: 16 Hits / 4 Misses
• Marvel: 6 Hits / 17 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 24 (and Disney)

Things were looking a bit sketchy for a couple of days there but the past few builds have been remarkably brilliant. Here’s hoping Star Wars closes out with a banger! So without further ado, let’s see what we get?

What the hell is this?!? Some kind of a Santa ship? And why are there two exposed studs on the back? Is that for Santa to stand on? This thing is stupid and ugly. And if it’s from the Star Wars universe and recolored to make it look like a Santa style ship, it’s still stupid and ugly. Like what the heck.  An utter disappointment. After riding the high for the majority of the calendar, this is what we end with? Lame!

Well here’s the final piece for Cinderella’s castle. No Cinderella baby minidoll in sight though. Kinda disappointing. But is it better once you put it all together?

No, no it’s not. Especially since there’s no Cinderella to speak of. Had she been included it would have taken the sting out of what accumulated to what the kids say nowadays: it’s just mid.

I’ll have more thoughts on both calendars in our wrap up post tomorrow.

Eric: Disney Day 24 (and Hot Sauces)

I am doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

The Disney castle is complete! And it…is…great! Like I’ve said before, the multi-day builds really add an air of anticipation. I would like to see more of this in future calendars.

Today’s hot sauce – CHIPOTLE HOT SAUCE – is more of the same. Acidic, thin, and not spicy. A somewhat dull way to cap off a somewhat dull collection of hot sauces.

LEGO Day 24: 5/5

HOT SAUCE Day 24: 2/5

Nick: Marvel Day 24 (and Rocks and Dice)

I have no words to describe how this wet rolling dumpster full of old tires on fire of a calendar manages to hit the last couple of days, capping it all off with this absolute banger of a Christmas tree… in a calendar that didn’t include Electro. I love this build, and I’m going to give it a thumb’s up, but let’s take a moment to look at the best thing to come out of this calendar has no connection to the rest of it. Our “Santa” was the Green Goblin, and there are certainly builds that could have been done for it, but he was just the Goblin with nothing else. We could have gotten an Electro, but I’m pretty sure we got him in one of the past calendars and Loki-forbid we get something repeated that makes sense.

The final tally of 7 out of 24 is… sad. This was the worst calendar that I’ve ever done, full stop. And the worst that Marvel has ever offered. I’ll have more thoughts tomorrow in our wrap-up but I’m glad we got something decent in the end.

The best color dice give us the last two we need, rounding up that set. All of the sets ended up completed, but I won’t lie… this was a bit of a let down for the overall calendar. I paid $50 for it, which is considerably less than the one I was first looking at, but don’t think I got even that value from it.

It’s not a calendar without a silly gimmick, just like LEGO can’t make a set without putting in some silly conflict. So obviously we’re going to have rocks that get broken open to reveal a surprise. The old Rock Raiders had this, with the two-part rocks, but obviously we’re going to have to put a distopian-2024 spin on this…

So the surprise rocks are an included blind-bag that go into the box. A randomized part bag of one of the magic rock crystals that may or may not line up in the set. Obviously, we will have different tiers of these bags, one for the $15-35 set, another series for the $40-$80, and of course the most attractive one in our big money sets.

And because we’re going to think like LEGO, they’re going to cut the part count by 25% to include these, and jack the prices up by $5 or so too. Why dip once when you can dip twice? A small large price to pay for getting our Rock Raiders back…

This was one of those little plaster-y rocks that they put in garbage STEM toys you get at places like Michael’s or educational stores with a crap toy selection. It was meant to be chipped and brushed, but I just used water. These things make an awful mess and that let me keep it in the sink.

Sad thing about this calendar is that the rock was at the very top of that crystal, within a quarter of an inch of the outer layer. So I got it out right away and the rest was all wasted space. Fairly certain that this is some rose quartz, but it was a pretty small stone. Hard to tell in this picture, but it’s less than an inch wide.

 

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 15 Hits / 7 Misses
• Disney: 16 Hits / 4 Misses (waiting for the finished Disney castle)
• Marvel: 5 Hits / 17 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 23 (and Disney)

As micro Landspeeders go, this is probably as good as it’s going to get. And that’s not a bad thing at all. This model is outstanding. It definitely helps that a half circle tile piece now exists. The studs that represent Luke and C-3PO instantly replays the scene in your head where they are out searching for R2 in the Jundland Wastes. Just a fantastic little build.a clear plate or two on the bottom to give it the hover effect would have been awesome!

The other side of the castle. It’s an exact mirror of day 21 so I’m giving it the exact same thumbs down score. I cannot wait for this calendar to end.

Eric: Disney Day 23 (and Hot Sauces)

I am doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

And here’s the right side of the castle. It is identical to Day 21’s build, except flipped. Not a lot to say about this one. It’s a necessity, but a boring one.

The hot sauce – AFRICAN CAYENNE HOT SAUCE – was, as per usual, not hot and very acidic. Pretty dull day.

LEGO Day 23: NO RANKING

HOT SAUCE Day 23: 2/5

Nick: Marvel Day 23 (and Rocks and Dice)

And lo, on the 23 day, he looked down upon us and said, “enough with this crap, give them something great.” And so it was. A Spider-Ham snowman is every great little thing that’s on there, including the extra nose detail. Would I have liked a more rounded center? Yes. But I won’t ding this as the best thing in the calendar so far. Not enough to make up for this garbage pile, but a nice penultimate day.

Our last little d4 for the ugly set, so we can wrap that one up too. I’ll go through all the sets on the last day, but it does feel vaguely threatening that they keep ending on the terror that is the d4.

Fairly certain this is moonstone, and it’s always a cool little rock to get. For our Rock Raiders reboot, this is the source of the Old Rocks, and every one of the new ships is powered by it. It’s vanishing from the universe, and so it’s always in demand.

 

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 14 Hits / 7 Misses
• Disney: 16 Hits / 4 Misses (waiting for the finished Disney castle)
• Marvel: 5 Hits / 16 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 22 (and Disney)

The Razor Crest is pretty recognizable, isn’t it? Nothing else in the Star Wars universe comes close. Not a fan of the American cheese slice tile on the side. I don’t think the pattern on the source material is really all that distinguishable to warrant the tile. It’s a shame Favreau decided to, spoiler alert, blow it up. I think Mando’s replacement ship, a repurposed Naboo N-1, is a huge downgrade. That aside, this micro model is the bee’s knees!

Yep. Multi day build for what is seemingly Cinderella’s castle. Since today is day 22, I’m guessing there are two more builds coming to complete this model, taking us to the end. I’d be very surprised if the last day included a baby minidoll of Cinderella herself. I read what Eric wrote about liking these multi day builds. I can see both the merit, but I’ve always complained about stuff like this. What if in the Star Wars calendar, we get one really nice wing from an X-Wing Starfighter for one day and the rest of the ship spread out for the next four days? I’d burn the calendar to the ground. There shouldn’t be an exception because this is a Disney calendar.

Eric: Disney Day 22 (and Hot Sauces)

I am doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

Here’s the middle bit of the Disney castle. I’m a big fan of the vignettes in this calendar – there’s a lot of detail captured (or implied) in just a handful of pieces. I’m still not going to rank them yet, but just know that I LOVE this part.

Today’s sauce is called ORIGINAL HOT SAUCE. It is not original, nor is it good. Therefore it is bad and honestly extremely acidic. Terrible.

LEGO Day 22: NO RANKING

HOT SAUCE Day 22: 1/5

Nick: Marvel Day 22 (and Rocks and Dice)

I know I asked for some real sized gifts earlier in this garbage calendar, but I don’t think it was this. The whole half-assedry of this calendar continues to amaze. We get… a Mysterio-themed gift, I guess? They just forgot that we had the Goblin, Miles, and Gwen in this? Or is this supposed to be the Green Goblin and he’s taken up fortune telling? I need a new word for the nature of missing in this calendar. With two days left, this is already far and away the worst calendar we’ve ever done on this site, so I have no idea how it could save anything.

Hey there, we can complete up this set… which will make a good gift for my daughter. She loves blue and colorful things.

Have you ever wondered what it’d be like to get to get the leftover bits of a geode after someone breaks it open to see the really good parts? That’s what we have here. We’re not going to put this into our wonderful Rock Raiders revival, because this is the stuff you get when you pull tools off the little sprue.

 

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 14 Hits / 5 Misses
• Disney: 15 Hits / 4 Misses
• Marvel: 5 Hits / 14 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 20 (and Disney)

One of those guards from the stupidest Star Wars movie ever. Praetorian Guard? ::checks Google:: OMG I was right. I’m amazed I remembered the correct name. What’s hilarious is that in all of LEGO’s efforts to put faces on every Star Wars minifig, the Praetorian Guard has just a blank red minifig head. Lame.

At last, Mirabel makes her appearance capping off an eternity of Encanto builds. I absolutely love the hair piece. If there’s one thing that the past couple of years have given us LEGO fans that I truly appreciate, it’s the variety of hair elements. Thumbs up.

Eric: Disney Day 20 (and Hot Sauces)

I am doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

Again, let me reiterate: I have not seen Encanto. At this point, I doubt that I ever will see Encanto. So I can’t make any funny jokes about this lady, because I don’t know anything about this lady.

Still, I like her hair piece. That’s good enough for me.

Today’s sauce is a mainstay at my house: SRIRACHA. Yep. Just sriracha. It’s really good. I eat it on salmon often.

LEGO Day 20: 4/5

HOT SAUCE Day 20: 5/5

Nick: Marvel Day 20 (and Rocks and Dice)

Can I go back and retroactively make the Goblin even more of a negative after seeing that they did, sort of, put a holiday theme on the glider? I hate these multiple day builds, we get one every year, and they’re never good. This one is… just a bunch of parts mashed together. It’s better than most of the stuff, but still not good and it’s just ugly. More than that, it’s tough getting Goblin to stick on there well, and we’re not going to get his garbage bin holder until tomorrow. Still a miss, because despite it being themed, it wasn’t at all fun to build.

Another random d20 day and none of our bigger sets filled. It’s a very pretty color though, with excellent contrast. The arrow indicators are kind of odd, because I guess someone might assume they rolled a 91 or a L1 without the arrow. But not an OZ, because that’d just be silly.

This is the most Green Fluorite to have ever greened, and obviously, back to our rock raiders theme, this is the elemental force that powers all things. It’s in all of us, around us, and it moves through us.

 

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 14 Hits / 4 Misses
• Disney: 15 Hits / 3 Misses
• Marvel: 5 Hits / 13 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 19 (and Disney)

I think this is supposed to be a Jedi Starfighter, Yoda’s Jedi Starfighter to be exact if I’m remembering the color scheme correctly. Honestly, I thought Jedi Starfighters were such trash. One of the first and lasting impressions I have of the mystical nature of Jedi was when Obi-Wan gave his speech to Luke about how Jedi uses a lightsaber because, and I quote: “This is the weapon of a Jedi Knight. Not as clumsy or random as a blaster; an elegant weapon for a more civilized age.” And then in the prequels you have starfighters specifically made for the Jedi and they’re just blasting away with laser cannons. It was so jarring and inconsistent with that philosophy. I suppose it wouldn’t have made sense to have the starfighter whip out a robotic arm and then activate a giant lightsaber in space but this is science fiction. Lucasfilm couldn’t have made anything else up? This micro model desperately needs some wedge plates instead of the 1×3 plate, but even then it wouldn’t have saved it from being hot garbage. Hard pass on this one.

Another Encanto prop, no Mirabel. Lame model by itself and easily forgettable. If the candle didn’t play such a significant role in the movie, it would have felt out of place. So I guess it makes sense but still feels incomplete and out of context.

Two duds today. Bummer.

Eric: Disney Day 19 (and Hot Sauces)

I am doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

YEEHAW – the finish line is in sight! Today’s hot sauce is cowboy-themed: AMERICAN WILD WEST HOT SAUCE BUFFALO. Is it hot? No. Is it buffalo sauce? Not really, even. Pretty disappointing.

(I’m still out of sync on the days, btw. So this is day 17’s build. I’ll be back on track tomorrow.)

As is today’s build – the contractually-obligated LEGO Christmas tree. LEGO decided on a design a few years back and has religiously stuck with it. So every year, I get to build a little tree, and every year, I bemoan building a little tree. BORING!

LEGO Day 19: 2/5

HOT SAUCE Day 19: 1/5

Nick: Marvel Day 19 (and Rocks and Dice)

I just… I can’t… how… what…

Okay, honestly how hard would it have been to make this character special and do a red suit for the Green Goblin to make him look more Santa like. Based on the day and the garbage bag, this is our “Santa” figure for the calendar, and they just give us a stock Green Goblin figure.

I have no idea how this calendar, which has been the worst in history thus far, managed to half-ass this so much. At the very least, make the pumpkin or bag Santa themed. Give the goblin a beard. SOMETHING.

Huge miss that somehow disappoints me more than I would have thought after we’d seen a slight uptick in quality.

Um… okaaaaaaay. I don’t know if this was just a problem in the packaging or someone who was working on this suddenly remembered how to count to 24 and realized they were going to come up way short. We get a couple of dark horse completions of sets, the transparent blue and the Christmas-color mini dice, all crammed in the same day.

I think this is supposed to be Obsidian but honestly, it just looks like gravel with a bit of a shine to me. Or more accurately granite… in fact, this is back to the countertop material, because this looks like my countertops. I should probably go check them and make sure something hasn’t gone catastrophically wrong in my kitchen.

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 13 Hits / 4 Misses
• Disney: 14 Hits / 3 Misses
• Marvel: 5 Hits / 12 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 18 (and Disney)

The U-Wing was one set from the Rogue One themed sets that I regret not picking up. I didn’t think too much of it when it was on the store shelf. It wasn’t until after I saw it in action that it grew on me. Oh well. At least I have this micro version of it, even if the forward wings don’t fold back. If they did, that would have just been insane and blown my mind. Now that I think about it, if they used those old hinge plates, it might be doable at this scale. But as it is, it’s still fun to swoosh around and pretty recognizable, even for an old fogey like me.

The house from Encanto is what I’m guessing. And that guess is purely based on a process of elimination: it doesn’t look like it belongs to any of the princesses we’ve already gotten, especially since they’ve already been matched up with their respective houses. And as far as the princesses we haven’t seen yet, Mirabel is a contender. We’ll see if we get a tiny version of her tomorrow. I guess I’m going to have to thumbs up this one.

Looking ahead at Eric’s post, he did what I did a few days ago and got the days mixed up. I apologize on his behalf if it spoils anything.

Eric: Disney Day 18 (and Hot Sauces)

I am also doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

Again, I have not seen Encanto, so I do not know anything about this table and this candle. But – I like it! I like the design the leaves add to it, I like the colors, I like it all.

I don’t hate today’s sauce – LOUISIANA HOT SAUCE. But I grew up hearing about how hot this sauce allegedly was. Now I am thinking that the people I grew up with never ate anything spicy, because this wasn’t even a blip on the radar. It was absolutely delicious, but not hot at all.

God, that’s so frustrating.

LEGO Day 18: 3/5

HOT SAUCE Day 18: 4/5

Nick: Marvel Day 18 (and Rocks and Dice)

Well, I guess the streak is done. I get that this is supposed to be a milk and cookies and… the traditional Christmas pizza. Honestly the biggest issue here is the table just being so lackluster, 3 whole parts that can’t even give us a big base. Pizza is very Spidey but this just all feels tossed together.

More orange and white, with more white than orange, so this one is easier to see than some of the others have been. We’re close on this set, five of them done so just waiting on the other two.

My camera hated trying to get a picture of this stone and I have absolutely no idea why. It’s apparently “Chevron Amethyst,” which is one of the apparently twelve variety of amethyst out there. Also, trying to search for gemstones or rocks is apparently just fifty pages of crystal healing nonsense. Or maybe AI responses for how many of these things that you can eat safely.

This doesn’t look like cheese though, so I don’t really need that answer.

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 13 Hits / 3 Misses
• Disney: 13 Hits / 3 Misses
• Marvel: 4 Hits / 12 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 17 (and Disney)

Let me start off today by saying this: Oops! I must have had a major brainfart, confusingly pulling today’s build, Day 17, yesterday. I didn’t realize my mistake until I went to go look for today’s little compartment and discovered it had already been pulled. And then seeing yesterday’s door still sealed shut. Oops, and I’m sorry. And with that out of the way, let’s review yesterday’s build of The Ghost:

This just doesn’t work. The idea is there, but the micro scale makes it nearly impossible to create the gently sloped panels. The colored jumper tiles feel completely out of place and the two exposed studs along the top makes the model seem like it is unfinished. Not a fan and it’s an unfortunate miss.

The good news is that I didn’t mix up the Disney advent days. The bad news is that we get this tree build. It’s not great. The way the tree topper is built makes it really only viewable from one side but I guess that’s how every tree in every home is. There’s only one good side and then there’s the other side that gets completely neglected. What a disappointing pair of builds for today.

Eric: Disney Day 17 (and Hot Sauces)

I am also doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

(I opened the wrong day here. Oops.)

I have not seen Encanto but even I, uneducated I, know what the Encanto house looks like. It’s a decently complicated build for this little advent calendar, what with the individual roofing tiles and the leaves everywhere. But you get a really solid build out of it. I’m a fan.

I am not a fan of today’s hot sauce – WASABI HOT SAUCE. It sure doesn’t taste like Wasabi, and it sure doesn’t taste like hot sauce. All it really did was make my chicken wing wet and worse.

LEGO Day 17: 5/5

HOT SAUCE Day 17: 0/5

Nick: Marvel Day 17 (and Rocks and Dice)

Wait, is the Marvel calendar giving us two good builds in a row? Did they fire the original guy and remind someones that kids are supposed to like this calendar? If I have a knock on this, it’s that there are two stockings when there should be three. Gwen gets left out, which feels kind of par for the course with LEGO stuff. It’s still a solid little build, especially given how terrible these little fireplaces usually are.

This has got to be the last in this set, right? Someone go and look at all the old ones and see if it adds up to seven because I can’t be bothered. Okay, I suppose I could go look at the images… and no, looks like we haven’t gotten the d8 yet.

We’re into our wisened old hero rock, turquoise… wait, no, according to the legend this is Turquenite. Which is a crappy knock off that’s just dyed howlite. Turns out that almost all of the “turquoise” on the market is fake junk. That being said, I would have expected an advent calendar for stones to, you know, not give us fake junk. Then again, this is a Nat Geo calendar, and if you know much about the modern NatGeo… fake is sort of par for the course.

So this isn’t even a Rock Raider. This is the MEGO line that will show up after the TV show gets big and Boulder Bros. hits the market.

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 12 Hits / 3 Misses
• Disney: 12 Hits / 3 Misses
• Marvel: 3 Hits / 12 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 16 (and Disney)

Oh my. This might just be my favorite holiday ugly sweater minifig to date. ROTJ Luke decided to go old school and wear a sweater with his homestead on Tatooine prominently displayed on the front complete with the twin suns and a moisture vaporator. When I pulled the bag out of its little compartment, I noticed the back of the sweater first:

What else could be depicted other than the Sandcrawler making a special delivery of droids? This prompted me to look at at the back of Leia’s torso from day 1. As a reminder here’s the front:

The assault on Hoth scene. And what else could be on the back except for:

The shield generators? Simply awesome. Now I wonder what was on the back of all the previous years’ minifigs.

More Tiana stuff? I guess so? We got Tiana yesterday so it makes sense we get her castle representation today. Plus the light green profile brick element is the same color as Tiana’s dress so that ties it in nicely. I thought matching your shirt to your kicks was one thing. Matching your castle to your dress is on a whole other level.

Eric: Disney Day 16 (and Hot Sauces)

I am also doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

NOW we’re talking. Today’s sauce is TUNISIA EXTRA HOT HOT SAUCE, and it is…not extra hot, or even regular hot, but it is a little spicy. Relative to these sauces, though, that’s like eating a raw Carolina Reaper. And – bonus – it tasted pretty good, too.

The build is also fantastic! Tiana’s Palace, once again from the Princess and the Frog, and by far the most complicated build in this calendar so far. What a wonderful day.

LEGO Day 16: 5/5

HOT SAUCE Day 16: 5/5

Nick: Marvel Day 16 (and Rocks and Dice)

A little bit of coincidence in the Marvel and Disney calendars being perfect inversions of each other quality wise, but it’s not going to last. Okay, so it’s not a holiday theme, unless you’re me and then spend your entire holiday vacation at your desk being as unproductive as possible playing games and painting miniatures. Like most other days.

The chair here is rubbish, but the little computer is just fantastic in the stupidest ways possible. I love that the computer here is modeled on something so old that it’s likely older than both Gwen and Miles, or that they went so far on the tile (which I’m sure is from another set but I’m not looking it up) that it looks like a ugly Windows XP clone. Of course, only a monster sets their keyboard up on the right of the machine – or someone that’s left handed, maybe, but I repeat myself. I like the build a lot, so calling it a hit.

Okay, so we’re not going to complete a set and just give a completely random color d20? Okay then. It’s… fine. I’m not a big fan of black dice, but the pink and white pattern is cool. Blue on black doesn’t work at all, but they couldn’t use white either.

Someone left this cheese rock out a bit too long, and it’s started to go all sideways. I don’t see barfstone anywhere on the list, but I’m going to go with that. I think about half the rocks haven’t been easily identifiable, but this one is clearly of the genre “countertop material for someone with no taste.” I can’t even figure out how to jam this into a rock raiders theme, so clearly this is random thing thrown in with a bigger set to inflate part count and price.

This has been a quiet year for the site… for some documented reasons for some that will probably be documented later on in this whole thing. But we’ve all been looking forward to doing the Advents, our yearly tradition that still happens to be a thing despite the fact that the internet is dead and it’s just bots talking to bots now. Beep boop.

Originally, we were going to mix it up this year but… things didn’t work out. Scalpers went hard in Dallas and the Star Wars Advent disappeared within a few days and never came back in stock, so Nick’s plan to do the Star Wars calendar fell through. We’re going to go with it just being the universe punishing him by making him do the Marvel Advent yet again. Something that just might finish him off this time.

We’re also going to do the newer tradition of going with non-LEGO calendars, because Advents are the new socks are the new ugly sweaters are the new yearly ornaments. Okay, that joke got away, but the point is that everything has an advent now.

Even Rocks.

That’s a hint, LEGO… bring back Rock Raiders. The world needs them now more than ever.

The scores so far:

• Star Wars: 11 Hits / 3 Misses
• Disney: 11 Hits / 3 Misses
• Marvel: 2 Hits / 12 Misses

Ace: Star Wars Day 15 (and Disney)

I’m torn about this one. It feels lazy right? Just getting a minifig is great sometimes. Maybe it’s the kind of minifig you get. I tend to give these a thumbs up and I’ll just hate on token Battle Droid inclusion all the live long year but still feels kind of lazy. I’m fairly certain it’s a member of the 501st just based on the coloring. Could be Captain Rex. I don’t know for certain because it’s not targeted to my age group. But I’ll acquiesce and tilt it to the positive. The first half of the calendar was going great but the past couple of days had me worried. This may be the beginning of a comeback.

Tiana? I never saw the movie but I do recognize the green dress and the fact that Tiana is still the only black Disney Princess to exist. Thumbs up.

Eric: Disney Day 15 (and Hot Sauces)

I am also doing the LEGO Disney Advent Calendar this year. I am not in the target demographic for this advent calendar, and that is okay. I am also eating a hot wing every day, tossed in one of 24 random hot sauces. Enjoy my pain.

WATCH ME EAT AND BUILD THIS ON TIKTOK

I love The Princess and the Frog. It makes me a little sad to watch, knowing that it’s Disney’s last 2D animated film, and that what’s come out since has increasingly been bland. It’s so fun, and I was reminded of that just by seeing little tiny Tiana in the Advent Calendar. Great build, great memory, great movie.

What is LIME HOT SAUCE BRAZIL, you ask? It’s not spicy. In fact, it does not have any peppers in it at all, just some chili paste. And for that alone, for putting hot sauce that does not have peppers in it in a HOT SAUCE ADVENT CALENDAR, it sucks. Not the worst I’ve had this month, but still bad.

LEGO Day 15: 5/5

HOT SAUCE Day 15: 2/5

Nick: Marvel Day 15 (and Rocks and Dice)

Our second car and third micro-build… I’m going to be more lenient on this one than I am on the other car – mostly because Peter Parker as Spider-Man has a long and unglamorous history of shoehorning dumb vehicles into things. The Spider-Buggy is real and I believe. Only way to make this better would be to have turned the Spider-Buggy into a sleigh. But I guess they have bigger plans?

I’m going to make this a hit, mostly because it feels like it belongs. Something that none of the others have.

I think we’re close to having this particular set finished, but I can’t be bothered to go look. Nothing has changed on it, outside of the fact that the d4 is the most dangerous dice. This is basically a caltrop.

More food rocks – DO NOT EAT FOOD ROCKS – this one is clearly a dessert of some lovely dark chocolate and coconut mash, like those little candies that I don’t think they make anymore. There isn’t anything marginally close to this on the legend… but I think it’s Black Stripe Jasper? So maybe our ninja hero for Rock Raiders… every story needs a ninja hero, even though he’s mysterious and you don’t know which side he’s actually on.