Friendly neighborhood wall display

Brucewaynelego-Toyshansolo built this wall display for his Spider-Man figs.

4851, The origins

Okay, I do want to get the old Spider-Man and Batman lines reviewed before January, so I'd better get these out sooner rather than later. In 2003, LEGO discarded the idea of making Spider-Man a subtheme of Studios and made it into a stand-alone theme. The real bonus here was that this meant no more useless director minifigs, or camera elements, or other distractions from Spidey. In 2003 we got three sets, still based on the 2002 Spider-Man movie.

First up for us is set 4851, The origins. Now THIS is the set they should have started with in the previous year. With six figs you get all the key players--Peter Parker/Spider-Man, Mary Jane, and Norm Osborne/Green Goblin--and the extra fig, the scientist, actually has kind of a nice generically useful torso. There were also some nice little add on pieces, like the 2x2 tile with a DNA pattern and another 2x2 tile with a computer screen. The turntable action to transform Norman into the Goblin was a nice play feature. The only annoyance here for me was that they had tricked me into buying the much less useful Spider-Man action studio the previous year, when if I had waited for this set I would have had my Spidey fig and so much more. There was a STAMP (sticker across multiple pieces), but it was just over some basic bricks, so no great loss there. Oh, I forgot to note, they updated the Green Goblin mask from the previous year's iteration, making it look much nicer:

2002: 2003:

Buy it at BrickLink. See the inventory on Peeron and the instructions on Lego.com.

1375 - the set that wasn't

Okay, here's a different type of set review. Back when the first official Spider-Man sets were announced, there was supposed to be a third set, 1375 - Wrestling Scene. It showed up on early lists of upcoming sets, and photos were leaked that seemed to be authentic. Unfortunately, this set was later canceled.

The potential set would have focused on the scene where Peter Parker challenges a professional wrestler with his newly acquired powers. Of course this is a key scene in Spidey's history, because Peter's failure to stop a robbery of the wrestler's manager later led to the death of Uncle Ben, and Peter's vow to use his power to fight crime. The set itself was cute. In my opinion they could have removed the cameraman - remember the first Spidey sets were a sub-theme of Studios, so they were all supposed to be on movie sets. Anyway, we got that Spidey fig the next year in 4850, Spider-Man's First Chase, but we never did get the Macho-Man (er, Bonesaw McGraw) fig.



Interestingly the set was supposed to include a backdrop depicting the crowd at the wrestling match. This is the same backdrop card that was released in the Action-Pack expansion, as noted in my previous set review. So this set could be recreated easily from released elements, except for the Macho-Man torso (or maybe is that torso in some other LEGO set?).

Set 10075 - Spider-Man Action Pack

It's been forever since I've done a set review. I want to try and get through all of the old products from the previous official Spider-Man and Batman themes before the new LEGO Super Heroes sets come out in January, so I'll make a concerted effort to get these posted. Okay, I've already mentioned the first two Spidey sets, 1376 - Spider-Man Action Studio and 1374 - Green Goblin. Soon after these came out, LEGO advertised that you could buy the sets in a bundle through Shop At Home and would get an addition: 10075 - Spider-Man Action Pack.



The addition was simply another 25 pieces, a cardboard backdrop, and instructions to expand the building from set 1376 and add a balcony. This allowed you to recreate the Green Goblin's first public appearance from the 2002 Spider-Man movie. Mean Greenie flies in to this public festival on his glider, kills off several of Oscorp's board, and in the process destroys a balcony and almost kills Mary Jane. Spidey of course saves the day.

When this first came out it was a nice little addition. If you hadn't previously bought sets 1374 and 1376, you could get them together and get a few extra bricks in the process (I think in the original offer at no extra cost versus buying the sets individually). I'd already bout 1376, so it wasn't worth it to me. Later they offered the little expansion by itself for $7, which was really not worth it for a handful of bricks. You could easily modify set 1376 with your existing collection to make something comparable.

You can find the instructions on LEGO.com, the inventory on Peeron, or purchase it on Bricklink.

Quick question for you ComicBrick readers out there. I never bought this expansion, so I never actually held the cardboard backdrop in my hands. On both Peeron and Bricklink they show what I assume is the other side of the backdrop:

Could someone who owns this set confirm if this is really the other side? I'd actually not noticed that before, and, if so, that's related to our next set review ... (stay tuned Spidey-fans, same bat-time, same bat-channel, er, whatever).

Set 1374 - Green Goblin

Another of the first run of Spider-Man sets was 1374, the Green Goblin. As with 1376, this set was organized as a subtheme of Studios, rather than a separate them. One interesting result of this is that the Green Goblin/Norm Osborne face was not really patterned after Willem Dafoe, but was rather the same actor who had appeared in earlier Studios sets. The Green Goblin fig is nice, though they improved it in the subsequent series by painting the mask. Sometimes the mask doesn't stay on my fig all that well. The torso is double sided and fairly versatile - one side could be some sort of green monster, and the other side (if you flip the arms and switch out the hands) could easily be a green formal shirt. Patterns on the legs and the back of the head further highlight the attention to detail on this fig. The Mary Jane Watson fig is another really nice character. Again the head and hair repeat an actress from earlier Studios sets. I really like the wisps of hair detail, and the double sided face lets you switch from damsel in distress to woman in control. As to the glider, it was a pretty disappointing build - pretty flimsy and the pearl gray pieces were made of a cheaper feeling plastic. Who cares, though? Let's face it, you were paying $7 for two key figures, which was a lot better than paying $24 essentially for the Spider-Man fig in set 1374.



You can see the inventory on Peeron, the instructions on LEGO.com or buy a copy on BrickLink.

Friendly neighborhood official theme

In recent years, LEGO has released two lines of licensed comic book sets. From 2002 to 2004 they released a series of Spider-Man sets based on the first two movies starring Tobey Maguire. Then from 2006 to 2008 they released a number of sets based on Batman, with inspirations that seemed to come from comic book, TV and movie versions of the Caped Crusader. The first set that I got from these licensed themes was 1376, Spider-Man Action Studio



It was a little frustrating that I had to pay $24 essentially for just the Spider-Man and Peter Parker minifigs. The building and car were sort of uninspired, in my opinion. They included the movie director fig and a camera, which sort of ruined the suspension of disbelief. Rather than act as if this set were really taking you into the Marvel universe, it made clear that you were on a movie set. On the plus side, the Spidey fig was a really cool addition to my fig population.

You can see the set inventory on Peeron, the instructions on LEGO.com or buy a copy on Bricklink.