76042 UCS Helicarrier

AdeelZubair

http://www.wsj.com/articles/BL-SEB-86321

At next month’s Toy Fair in New York, LEGO will unveil the SHIELD Helicarrier set.

Pieces: 2,996
Release Date: March 2015
Price: $349.99.

In the 2012 film “The Avengers,” the Helicarrier is a gigantic aircraft carrier capable of flight that serves as a base for the defense and intelligence agency S.H.I.E.L.D. (The new Lego set isn’t tied to the upcoming sequel, “The Avengers: Age of Ultron.”)

The set features two runways, microscale Quinjets, fighter jets and ground support vehicles. It includes five minifigures — Nick Fury, Black Widow, Captain America, Hawkeye and, new for Spring 2015, Maria Hill.

Minifigures Hawkeye, Maria Hill, Captain America, Nick Fury, Black Widow.

The Helicarrier also comes with 12 microfigures to scatter around the carrier’s enormous deck and interior. (It’s that big.) The microfigures are Nick Fury, Hawkeye, Captain America, Iron Man and eight SHIELD agents.

The LEGO Helicarrier stands over 11 inches high, 31 inches long and 17 inches wide.

Control center is hidden underneath the runway in the middle of the Helicarrier.

Chubbles

I like the ship, figures are a letdown for me

Venunder

OMG! I want one.

TarDomo

It looks awesome!

LegoTT

Yep. That's a buy. Wasn't a fan of the calendar leaked image....but this is legit.

The $350 price tag is a bit high, though, this should be a $300 set.

LostInTranslation

No Coulson :-(
and no Shield logo printed on Hill anywhere, not arms or torso.
The minifigs are a bit disappointing for me too. I like the model but wanted the figs to wow me into justifying this as a must buy. They haven't.

epyon396

Hhnnnngggg.
Day 1.

johnhenz

LostInTranslation said:

No Coulson :-(

:'(

slyreptile

The microfigs should have been minifigs. There is just no reason to have skimped on that.

LegoTT

Ya know, I really like the micro figures. Has that been done before? It helps keep the ship closer to scale instead of having minifigure scale rooms in the hull of the ship. It's a great compromise and makes it feel more like a model than a toy (I.e Death Star II vs Death Star)

Chubbles

I understand the set needed a Cap, Fury, Black Widow and having Hill is nice but it should have been Coulson over Hawkeye.

AdeelZubair

^and Bruce Banner...

johnhenz

I'm genuinely devastated it doesn't have a Coulson. A Bruce Banner would've been cool as well. Never mind, I'll still be getting it.

aldredd

Not interested in the avengers - not seen the movie either - but as 'just another set', love this - would seriously consider it

lordzarak

LostInTranslation said:

No Coulson :-(
and no Shield logo printed on Hill anywhere, not arms or torso.
The minifigs are a bit disappointing for me too. I like the model but wanted the figs to wow me into justifying this as a must buy. They haven't.

Look again on the picture of the five figures. There appears to be a SHIELD logo on Hill's arm on that angle. Is that a new hair sculpt for Widow? I don't remember that one before. And I agree, Coulson would have been a welcome addition.

epyon396

Wait. Where am I going to put this...?
Good thing IKEA is 5 minutes from the LEGO Store.

Chubbles

Might try and get this without the figs, depends on how much of a price discrepancy there is

lordzarak

If one of those many tiny monitors has a Galiga game on the screen, they've won me over. ;-)

kor

No way I have room to build this thing but the minifigures are a must have for me. I'm really bummed that we didn't get a Bruce Banner though.

CCC

LegoTT said:

Ya know, I really like the micro figures. Has that been done before? It helps keep the ship closer to scale instead of having minifigure scale rooms in the hull of the ship. It's a great compromise and makes it feel more like a model than a toy (I.e Death Star II vs Death Star)

Me too. I think the little trophy figures are excellent for this.

Shib

The microfigs are cool but the minifigure choice is just baffling to me, when Hawkeye and Widow will be available in the AoU sets (looking at least very very similar if not the same) why not include characters or variants we wouldn't otherwise get. Unmasked Cap is nice, but could easily have been done by anyone with a spare fleshy head and hair piece. Fury, we already have a version of, a cinematic version is nice, but again nothing ground breaking. Hill should have a shield logo somewhere. Whoever made the decision to not include Coulson is really needs to spend some time talking to fans of the superhero genre.
The brick built shield logo on the stand is cool, but nothing groundbreaking.
One of the few sets that's way out of my price range that I don't really mind being really out of my price range.

CapnRex101

I have a lot to say about this, so watch out character limit...

Huw sent me this early this morning and I have since spent quite a while looking over the images. My first reaction was disappointment as there are some pretty glaring design flaws in my opinion.

Firstly, I was immediately struck by the colour of the deck. The black panels on the runway are fine (as long as they are printed, which I think they are) but the sections around the turbines look wrong to me. I would probably have preferred dark and light bluish grey all over to be honest. The studs are also a bit unsightly in areas and would b improved by tiling.

Also, the bridge section is odd as the trans-black canopy looks awful. There is nothing like that on the vehicle in the films and to me it looks out of place.

The turbines are probably my favourite part of the model, but they don't look terribly accurate to either the design in The Avengers or Captain America: The Winter Soldier. It is more like a mixture of the two which is inaccurate but I still think they look great.

I am not keen on the microfigures being used like that. I still don't think they are in scale with the vehicle and I was hoping to see an accurate exterior with a minifigure scale interior. Ultimately this is neither.

Having said all that, I think this is a good place to start for modification. I like the general shape and size of the model, and the hull pieces used underneath are probably a necessary evil for stability. I like the minifigures although Agent Coulson and Bruce Banner would have been nice, and the mini models look superb to me.

I wonder whether the model is based on a redesign we have yet to see in Avengers: Age of Ultron. Clearly it is not based purely on either of the previous versions, so either LEGO have produced an interpretation of the Helicarrier, borrowing features from both, or they have recreated something we have not yet seen the source material for (as far as I know).

Overall, I like it, but was hoping for something more. There are many more images which will be live on the homepage at 2:00pm/9:00am EST, so I look forward to hearing some thoughts on those. I am surprised that the reaction so far has been as positive as it seems to be!

AdeelZubair

^Now we have to wait until 2:00pm...

cheshirecat

I thought microfigures were the scale found in the LEGO games - LoTR, SW Battle of Hoth etc. It was only after seeing @CCC post that I realised they were the CMF trophy sizes.

thenos

Yes it is!

(Couldn't help myself)

Shib

@cheshirecat -The arms were the giveaway on them to me. I think that the trophy piece could be more openly adopted for this sort of thing now, the game micro figures have a proper stud on the head so I think will be favoured where connectivity is needed (e.g architecture range)

Geddes

I am torn, we have all called for a big set. This is what we get? I feel I have to buy otherwise they wont make any other big sets.

SuperTramp

If its $349.99. what will the price be roughly in the UK?

Huw

All details and images now on the home page.

aldredd

I think, actually, it's technically cheaper in the UK once you take VAT off. (I'm making the assumption the US price is ex sales tax?)

$350 = £230
£230 + 20% VAT = £276, but RRP will be £270

can't really blame Lego for the VAT rate charged I guess.

WatfordScottyM

Underwhelmed!

Pitfall69

I was hoping for something close to the SSD. Another $50 USD wouldn't be out of the question. That may have gotten us at least a few more Minifigures.

alijoezac

^ I know what you mean, but it's so different from any other large model LEGO have produced I will probably give it a go

Bosstone100

Very disappointed and no Coulsen to boot? I doubt I'll pick it up anytime soon.

Chubbles

How much you think this'll go for without the figs?

Solarious

I like it but just don't see being able to justify the price tag. Still, I would love to take the challenge of gutting whatever it looks like inside and making some minifig size interior rooms (Directors office, Banner's lab, Loki's droppable prison Command bridge, ect)

I think I would want to make a micro version of Coulson's Bus Plane too (it's actually on my brick bucket list to do this at mini-scale but that's so much black I think I would go nuts)

tamamahm

I appreciate the set, and love that they included microfigs.
The set is simply not up our alley and interest area.

LostInTranslation

So they're actually nanofigures not microfigures!

Glad to see on closer inspection that Hill does have the logo on her right arm.
After seeing more pics and focusing on the model rather than the minifigs (I love the nanofigs!) I really really do think I have to build this.

Still upset about Coulson though. I hope he gets his own polybag or something.

Solarious

By the way, I just saw better pictures of the figs on Facebook.
It's what got me over here actuallu

Pitfall69

The micro figures (CMF Trophy Sized) are neat, but I would have liked less generic SHIELD agents and more Superheroes. I like the fact you can add Power Functions, which is pretty neat. I wasn't expecting a Minifig scale playset (could you imagine that?), but I was just expecting a tad bit more. I am definitely still going to grab it and I am already thinking about some modifications I would make.

lordzarak

How to make your own Agent Phil Coulson:
Start with http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItem.asp?M=sh012
Replace the head with http://www.bricklink.com/catalogItem.asp?P=3626bpb0563
Then top it off with http://www.bricklink.com/catalogPG.asp?P=99930&colorID=68

AdeelZubair

SithLord196

Should have had Coulson instead of Captain America I think.

I'll probably pass on this one. I'm just not that impressed with it.

FollowsClosely

A ship of that scale is hard to pull off in Lego form, for a reasonable price that is.

Once you see this, anything under 20K bricks looks like garbage.

Solarious

I do feel bad that the Ideas guy put so much effort in to designing this thing only to see the model that actually ended up coming out

monkey_roo

I like the video, I was sceptical of the model based on the first image, but the video does give it more depth (obviously) and shows it off much better.

Not sure about the micro-figures, but I guess we will see an Ant-Man in this scale later in the year as well.

The minifigures do disapoint, that isn't to say the ones there aren't nice, they are, but somehow they still seem light for a set like this, for three thousand pieces and £300 I expect more than five figures.

Still, I much happier with the model having seen he video, it does look well made and the hull section looks interesting. I imagine as a display set it will look very nice.

typocorrecto

Nice...
Just wish there was a Thor and Hulk minifig and microfig...

GallardoLU

So, I'm a Marvel fan, not hugely so, but a fan none the less, and the first look at this set left me with a "I MUST HAVE THAT" feeling. the figures I don't really care for, i'm one of those people that only enjoy figures when the model is the correct scale. so I quickly thought, well maybe I can pick this up used without figures in a few months for a savings. well, the truth is the more I look at this the less I enjoy how it looks. impressive as it is, after the beauty of the Slave I, which I just finished a few weeks ago, this is severely lacking for me. So, for me, this is a pick up used for a discount or let it fade away.

AdeelZubair

Death Star costs £275 and comes with over 20 minifigures and Helicarrier costs £270 this only has 5...

danstraindepot

Its a 'must-buy' for us. Love the nano-figures. I think it looks great!

Shib

LostInTranslation said:

Still upset about Coulson though. I hope he gets his own polybag or something.

Just opened a thread about a new marvel video game, I wonder if they might do a coulson polybag for that.