Review: Mickey and Minnie BrickHeadz
Posted by Huw,
BrickHeadz have provided us with a diverse range of characters from many of LEGO's licensed properties this year, and I believe that we will continue to see new and innovative ones in 2019, despite the uncorroborated rumours that some sites have recently published about the theme's demise.
41624 Mickey Mouse and 41625 Minnie Mouse have just been released as individual sets but I can't see anyone wanting to buy one without the other so I've reviewed them together.
As you might expect they are very similar in they way they are constructed, with really just Minnie's dress and bow responsible for the differences.
Mickey has just one custom printed element, a 1x4 brick with the buttons on his trousers, while Minnie has three types of printed slopes, two 1x4 bricks, all decorated with white polka dots, and a tan 1x4 tile with eyelashes. Consequently I think she looks wonderful!
The minifig whip element has been pressed into service to form their tails. It's not ideal but probably the best that's available right now.
Their ears are 3x3 minifig utensil dishes which were first used in the 1990s in Belville and Scala sets. This is the first time they've been produced in black. They are secured to the head using a 1x1 plate clip.
I seem to be saying this a lot in my BrickHeadz reviews lately, but these are among my favourites. The designer has done an excellent job of capturing their likeness in BrickHeadz form and I'm particularly fond of Minnie's polka-dot outfit.
They are not particularly elaborate or complex, like 41629 Boba Fett, but their charm and bright colours more than make up for that.
Thanks to LEGO for providing these sets for review. All opinions in it are my own.
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13 comments on this article
I love BrickHeadz .
Yay! you reviewed my favorites'
I’ve got Micky but when my dad was buying them ,while on a work trip to New York, at New York’s Flatiron District store they didn’t have Minnie, so i thought about ordering them from Shop.LEGO.co.uk but both where sold out :( Have to wait for Minny to be reunited with Micky :(
These look soulless. A bit like the corporation they represent, now that I think about it.
I hope those polka-dot pieces will eventually appear on Bricks and Pieces so I can build a rad little toadstool house.
Just... why those dead, cheerless eyes...?
Ooh, a giant toadstool! Good idea, @Gnac :D
The BrickHeadz proportions seem to better fit these characters than some of the other human builds. Personally, I like the extra details added to Minnie more than Mickey... I get that he's fitting his classic look, but his model still seems a bit plain and boring to me. Still not personally interested in these sets, but I'll admit they have some enticing pieces. Thanks for the review.
I like brickheads, but my one minor complaint is how many printed parts they use (although this isn't that big a deal, sometimes it's even a good thing), but Mickey only uses 1 which is a nice change. I personally would prefer stickers although this is a rare view so I can see why they did it this way.
I don't like the Brickheadz overall, but it works really well for these two - they're the only ones I've bought.
Never been a big fan of Mickey but I agree the Brickheadz treatment works well for him, and even better for Minnie (whom I usually dislike!). My only complaint is that I think Minnie has shoes with heels--black ones, IIRC--rather than the yellow loafers suggested by this model. Still, it's a simple thing to try and fix. And a Toadhouse would certainly be a fun rebuild for her! She may actually go onto my buying list; I only have a few Brickheadz, and am even skipping the fall seasonals this year because they really don't do much for me. Still debating over the Santas. Thank you for the review!
@Golem25+ @bananaworld: Surely no more soulless/dead/cheerless than a typical stuffed toy or teddy bear? Let alone other simple cartoon character designs like Hello Kitty, Miffy, Baymax, Wall-E, etc… or even many printed+molded LEGO animals like Dalmatians, German shepherds, huskies, horses, pigs, mice, rats, lobsters, chickens, and seagulls? I mean, honestly, it's bizarre to keep hearing this kind of statement about BrickHeadz when they're not really meant to be as cartoony or expressive as modern minifigures.
I guarantee that if these sets had more detailed decorated eyes, brick-built mouths, and varied proportions like the 2014 Seasonal sets, AFOLs would have had a wailing fit about those too. Even molded LEGO animals like many of those I mentioned above tend to get a fair amount of hate from old-school AFOLs if their redesigns or LEGO Friends/Elves equivalents wind up looking any more detailed and expressive than the dead-eyed versions from the 90s and early 2000s.
@LegoHobbitFan: Individual BrickHeadz can sometimes be really print-heavy, but usually they only average 3 or so new printed elements per set, which is average or even below average for most other themes, particularly those which include minifigures. And while some of the BrickHeadz sets can have very specific printing for their outfits, facial hair, and so on, the oval and polka dot patterns on these sets' clothing prints could have loads of uses in MOCs not related to this theme or these characters. I also feel as though in this set, the new prints are not taking the place of details which could have been effectively brick-built, except perhaps for Mickey's buttons.
Anyway, lots of fun and creative building techniques and part uses here! I like the choice to give them cartoonish oversized shoes compared to the simpler ones in other BrickHeadz sets… it really helps them stay accurate to the characters, not to mention shows how much more room for variation there can be in the BrickHeadz design language than what we've seen in previous models.
Our local Lego store doesn't have them at the moment, but I pre-ordered Minnie. Might get Mickey as well then, but really Minnie appears to be far more interesting, due to all those nice printed pieces.