Review: 76057 Spider-Man – Web Warriors Ultimate Bridge Battle

When I started to review 76057 Spider-Man: Web Warriors Ultimate Bridge Battle, I was left wondering if this was the longest set name ever. That wonder was not strong enough to actually go look, so I’m going to do a very 2016 thing and just assume my opinion is right. If it’s not, I’ll set up a fake news post later that says it is.

I’m not exactly sure what the source for this set is. It’s not branded as an Ultimate Spider-Man set, even though that cartoon had their own version of the Web-Warriors… dimension hopping versions of spiders from alternate dimensions. The comics have had a version of the Web Warriors in a solo title, which was born out of a similar-titled Secret Wars II title, and that came out of a crossover event called Spider-Verse. None of those comic series, by themselves, were particularly all that good… but they gave us Spider-Gwen (awesome), Silk (not as awesome, but still cool), and a whole bunch of different variations of Spider-Man/Spider-Woman.

What’s even weirder in this 1092 part, $99.99 set that is frequently marked down, is that it ties into some Clone Conspiracy stuff. That’s the whole thing with the Scarlet Spider and a figure LEGO calls Spider-Girl, though the costume and look is Ultimate Spider-Woman (also called Black Widow). Both of those make sense in the clone spin, though connecting them in a story I know about is beyond me. Still, there was something to be said for a Super Heroes set that’s not a mech, a jet, or a car… and one that looks on its face to make a great battle / display piece.

I’m going to apologize for some of these pictures in here. I had to reshoot several of them after some drive failure adventures caused several of my images to get corrupted. I reshot what I could, but the color is a bit off in them, and part of the bridge had been claimed by a short little builder who wanted to make her own bridge. That’s part of the fun in LEGO, though.

This set gives us a whole lot of firsts. Spider-Man is a “well, here’s another one of these” figures. Green Goblin has been in a Juniors and Mighty Micros set (as well as a Bigfig version that’s very Ultimate Universe, and the old Spider-Man/Movies line that eight or perhaps nine people owned). Aunt May was also in those movie sets, but this is the first time she’s shown up the current theme. Kraven, Scorpion, Scarlet Spider, and Spider-Girl are all making their debuts.

Spider-Man is second only to Batman for the parade of weird characters that can be brought up to fight the wall-crawler (it’s a pretty distant second… there have been more Batman villains than probably all other characters combined). Scorpion has been around for a long time, and been a main antagonist that has never really managed to jump into the same realm as the Goblins, Venom (though he was Venom for awhile), or similar foes.

The figure is pretty good, though I really wish that the backpack would have been green instead of clear. That gap looks goofy with it in clear, while green would have looked just fine. Still, it begs the question… how is it that we’re getting Scorpion and haven’t gotten a Mysterio, Mephisto, or Lizard (or comic Electro, of Kingpin, or… this list could go on for awhile). He’s a good villain, and I’m glad to get him, but feels like there are better characters they could have gone to.

Kraven, on the other hand, gives us another member of the Sinister Six (Mysterio now being the only one that we haven’t gotten a minifig for). Recently, he’s been more of a foil/friend for Squirrel Girl (a figure that LEGO could put pretty much any price tag on and get me to buy the set), but he’s an one of the oldest villains.

It’s a great little figure, with an interesting fur collar that really makes this character shine… Kraven loves that collar in the comics. He should probably do a better job of not letting his dog jump up on his lap after coming in out of the rain, though, cause those pants really need to get some paw prints washed out.

Aunt May is the one that throws me a bit about the setting for this comic. In the cartoon, the Ultimate Universe, and now in the MCU… Aunt May is younger than the traditional “I babysat for Moses” version the 616 version usually is. This is clearly what most people who’ve read the regular comics probably think of Aunt May (that or have seen the movies), but it doesn’t fit in most of the inspiration for the other LEGO sets.

It’s not a bad figure, but I really wish they would have gone more for the cartoon version of the character. Or better yet, Marissa Tomei, so I could get some My Cousin Vinny / The Wrestler minifigs going.

The spiders in the set are an interesting bunch. Spider-Man is Spider-Man, obviously. Scarlet Spider was a clone of Spider-Man in a comic storyline that is both loved and hated by most fans. Assuming we’re ignoring the Dead No More story currently going on (and believe me, you should), he’s also extremely dead. Like disintegrate in the hands of Peter dead, because that’s what clones do. They’re like vampires (which I guess means that Pam was right to want to stab Krieger).

Spider-Girl here looks to be Jessica Drew from the Ultimate Universe, who is a female clone of Spider-Man. And yes, Jessica Drew is the British Spider-Woman in the main universe, a minifigure we desperately need to get a real version of (I refuse to acknowledge the travesty that is SDCC exclusives). She wen’t by Spider-Girl originally, but is known more as Spider-Woman and Black Widow in the ultimate universe.

Spider-Girl was actually Mayday Parker, the “doesn’t really exist because Marvel has some weird rule about making Peter Parker suffer all of the time” daughter of Peter and Mary Jane. Her costume was a traditional Spider-Man garb, except on a woman, without the hair or venom logo. And has come back thanks to Web Warriors and the Spider-Verse saga, but in other universes… and still sports a Spider-Man costume. Unless, of course, we’re going to talk about the new “Renew Your Vows” miniseries that features Mayday… except has a 4th grader.

Spider-Man comics are weird, is what I’m saying.

I’m glad to see Green Goblin show up in a proper Super Heroes set. I could never bring myself to buy that Juniors set, and the figure in that particular set just looked like a guy trying to cosplay Green Goblin as one of Santa’s elves. The Mighty Micros one wasn’t bad, but those figures take a lot of work to turn into a proper minifig.

The Ultimates universe one wasn’t bad, but probably isn’t all that well-known unless people read those comics or watched the cartoons. This guy is very traditional in the look to the comics, and feels very throwback. I like it a whole lot, though it’s a shame that the pumpkin bombs have the fire stuck on them (much like Ghost Rider’s head… but that review is for another day). Between the glider and the general look, this is easily the best figure in the set.

An interesting thing that was introduced in this wave of Spider-Man sets is the wide webbing and the hand-held stud clips. I’m thinking these were more about people who thought “webs” and didn’t really know how Spider-Man’s web shooters worked. Still, I can see a whole bunch of potential uses for those minifigure parts.

We get some little bits to go with our bridge. I don’t quite get the ATV for a police officer that’s not in the set. Maybe if you would have given us some Spider-Gwen and her father, Captain Stacy, I can see  it (he shows up in a much weirder set that I will also be reviewing). Otherwise, I guess Aunt May is neighborhood watch or something now? We also get some fire spots, presumably for the goblin bombs, a trash can, because what’s a LEGO set without a random trash can, and a taxi. Because we have a bridge in New York, and if movies have taught me anything, it’s that New York bridges are filled with nothing but taxies and a single broken down truck.

I was most excited about this set because of the bridge. I keep trying to come up with good displays for my Super Hero figures, which at this point are numerous and need more than a few baseplates. The big weakness of the lineup thus far, with both Marvel and DC, really, is that the playsets, which usually only show up as one or two sets a year, are often just not nice enough to give shelf space to. Vehicles are great and all, but I stand by my statement that you only need so many Quinjets.  That was one of the big things that made the bridge here, a battle in comics so classic that it’s kind of shocking we hadn’t seen one yet, so attractive.

The set is loaded with play features. The pillars have sections under both of them, the walls of the upper section of the middle pillar has break-out walls on both sides, and a section of the side deck pull away to let you set up a vehicle to fall. There suspension cables are a good visual, but in practice, they don’t work out as well as you’d think, since there’s no vertical connection to them. Since this would be a New York bridge, I’m going to guess they’re going for more Brooklyn Bridge than George Washington, given the brickwork. Either way, though, there should be cables going vertically down the suspension element.

The winning feature for my daughter, who demanded to do the video here, is the net drop that’s at the top of the pillar. It’s kind of hard to set up, since you have to fold it up and push it under the top, but she still liked it. The deck of the bridge is mostly made out of big panel plates, and there’s a sign/sticker emblazoned with “1962,” presumably for Spidey’s debut year.

There are several stickers in the set, but most of them are accents like you see on the bridge deck, posters, or that fabulous collection of street signs (which are designed to break apart in the battle). The street sign, and the highway marker especially, make me want to get more of the sticker sheets for this set. I don’t have a good way to set up a city block for my modulars (basements are pretty much unheard of in Texas), but that’s my someday dream when I finally take over enough room to make a big Lord Business-style display table.

The lower sections are set up as hideouts for… I’m honestly not sure who. I think Kraven, but he’s not known for his computer love. That’d be more of a Scarlet Spider thing… but some of the other things feel more Kraven. There’s a ton of play features tucked into this, but, honestly, most of them went unused when I turned my daughter on the set.

I think part of the issue is that there are just so many play features here, and sometimes, it feels like they made the build worse to make room for them. The breakout walls are fine, but adding that catapult at the end of the bridge just makes it feel… off. I like the sign, but making it break apart made it a lot harder to set up correctly. I think that taking just a couple of them off, and making things a bit more rigid, would have made a better, and more play-friendly, set.

The clone theme spread into the bridge stuff is what’s kind of odd. It’s Web-Warriors, which was more alternate dimensions than clones, but there are numerous references to it. Unless you know the comic lore, you wouldn’t even really know that any of these characters are clones… and I’m not sure how often kids read Spider-Man comics these days.

I kind of wish the stickers would have been split up more here, and the wanted posters / Daily Bugle cutouts made their own sticker, while the grafitti and the clone stuff put over brick stickers, like the spidey logo was. I liked the computer screen that’s tucked under the bridge, but they could have just given us a door or something better than a net here.

When I moved it to the display shelf, I locked it down more, because I wanted more space to put minifigs without them falling apart. Once on the shelf, it also highlighted how undersized the set feels. That’s no fault of the set, really… there are a lot of parts, but the bridge looks weird in the size. Even without considering the size (it should be two decks going through the pillar arches), the way it just cuts off on one size makes you want to get another bridge and stick them together to make it longer at the very least.

I got this set on a pretty good discount back in August, and it’s been on sale several times since… enough that it’s currently not available through Amazon directly (it’s a young set still, so it’ll come back, and likely go on sale again). Even with the overload of play features and the fact that it felt like I needed a second set to make it bigger… it was still a strong set. We get unique figures, a refreshingly different sort of playset, and what feels like a uniquely LEGO take on Spider-Man sets. I know we won’t get a LEGO Movie version of Spider-Man anytime soon… but I can dream that someday it’ll happen. I mean, Disney let’s LEGO and WB/Tt keep making Marvel and Star Wars games, so I can hope they’ll allow some magic crossover to happen. I’m going to call the set out four out of five… maybe a bit closer to the 3.5 side but I’m going to round up. It’s frequently on sale, and worth it at a discount, but has enough value to justify the sticker price too.

What I Liked

• Several unique or formerly hard-to-find characters
• A refreshingly different sort of build. It’s not a jet, a tank, or 1/10th of a lab/hideout
• Plenty of value in a big set, with a lot of general use parts that can be useful almost anywhere

What I Didn’t Like

• It doesn’t really tie into any existing stories, cartoon, or comics… this one seems to be made up by LEGO
• Aunt May version would have been better if it was the cartoon, Civil War, or Ultimate universe version; likewise, Spider-Girl should have been Spider-Woman / Black Widow, at least in costume
• So many play features make the set feel a bit flimsy where you can tell parts were pulled away; there was enough there, it could have lost a couple and still been solid

Verdict: 4 out of 5. You can buy 76057 Spider-Man: Web Warriors Ultimate Bridge Battle right now at Amazon.com.