Review: 71492 Mateo's Fire Chameleon
Posted by benbacardi,
The LEGO Dreamzzz sets seem to focus either on the Dream Chasers themselves, with bright colourful sets and only a few "bad guys" to fight, or the reverse, with darker builds of more nefarious creatures and contraptions.
71492 Mateo's Fire Chameleon is one of the former, and sits in the middle of the size of sets at just under 450 pieces. Consisting of two minifigures, a bright and colourful chameleon, and a handful of other smaller builds, lets take a look at what it offers.
Summary
71492 Mateo's Fire Chameleon, 443 pieces.
£44.99 / $54.99 / €49.99 | 10.2p/12.4c/11.3c per piece.
Buy at LEGO.com »
An interesting chameleon build with a great head and eyes, but disappointing in its secondary accessory model.
- Great chameleon head
- Detailed minifigures
- Dull alternative build
The set was provided for review by LEGO. All opinions expressed are those of the author.
Minifigures
On the smaller side, the set contains only two minifigures—one hero, one antagonist. Mateo is much as he has appeared in previous sets, and identical to his version from 71491 Mateo and the Z-Blob Action Race Car earlier this year. This time, however, he does sport a red felt cape over his standard Dream Catchers jacket and utility belt. He is joined by Zero, the cyber villain dream world counterpart of Nero, a software developer in the real world. He is also available in just one other set, 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car, and looks excellent in his red, black, and white colour scheme. The jacket features various digital emblems such as ones and zeroes, and is flung open to reveal a black torso below printed with an upside down power symbol.
The detailed printing continues onto Zero's dual-moulded legs, with the markings "7.3RO", a series of seemingly random characters that looks at a glance to spell his name. His head is printed on both sides, with one red and one eye visible beneath the cyber helmet, shaped like lightning on one side and diamonds the other. The helmet is an impressive mould, seen before in white and grey, but looking excellent here with trans-red accents. Mateo sports both a confident grin and an equally confident smirk.
Two more smaller figures are included, a black Cyberling with another of the pixellated helmets (the white and grey version), and Logan, a small blue version of one of the Dream Chasers, wearing another impressive dual-moulded hat—this time a vibrant yellow baseball cap with large blue pointed ears. I haven't seen the in-show story for this, so I'm not sure what's happened to Logan to warrant this shape instead of a minifigure!
The Cyberling has the upside down power symbol on one side of his head, and lightning bolt eyes on the other. Logan's lopsided smile is replaced on the other with a painful grimace.
As a final accessory, a small four-legged Cyber creature with an evil-looking digital face is built. On top of the creature is a platform intended for Logan, with flexible pink cables attaching to supports either side of the Logan's head, presumably for some nefarious reason.
The Fire Chameleon
The main build of the set, as you may have guessed from the name, is Mateo's Fire Chameleon. This colourful creature stands on four rigid yellow and red legs, with blue toes splayed out on each foot, and a long curving red, orange, and yellow tail. As is common with articulated creatures, the grey ball joints at the hips and ankles are somewhat at odds with the rest of the colour scheme. The chameleon's arched body has a red underbelly, a teal black, and large orange spots. More detail is provided with large stickers on the 6x6 round corner wedges, which were slightly tricky to apply straight.
I enjoyed building the body, with the shape made from a satisfyingly dense internal construction, with the use of some hidden colourful bricks to aid the build.
The chameleon's head is perhaps the most impressive part of the creature. Attached by a large ball joint, it has a lot of movement in its neck, and has excellent bulbous eyes in the form of 3x3 dishes topped with a black 1x1 round tile. Thankfully the domes and tiles were printed rather stickers, and they are attached via a hidden ball joint, giving them realistic movement within their sockets.
A fiery crest sticks up from the top of the chameleon's head, and its hinged lower jaw can open and close beneath a very large, curved, and pixelated burst of flame protruding from its mouth. This is clearly a very specialised part that I would love to see creative builders make use of in other ways!
Blaster Turret
At this point, the builder's choice comes in, with two options presented. The first LEGO call a "blaster turret", but it looks more like a small jet to me—four stud shooters are attached either side of a slim body on which a minifigure can sit, with fins at the rear and a large air intake at the front. More stickers provide detailing for the contraption, and large trans-green exhaust fumes project from the end of each wing.
The vehicle can attach to the top of the chameleon's back via a Technic axle pin, that allows it to swivel and point in any direction.
Speedy Jet and Mini Z-Blob Mech
Alternatively, an even smaller jet can be built (labelled a "speedy jet" by LEGO)—still with room for a minifigure, but just one stud shooter on either side and a single exhaust outlet. The rest of the parts are repurposed into a mini mech driven by Mateo's constant companion, Z-Blob, who has another stud shooter for one arm.
Rather than a substantial second choice in its own right, these models disappointingly feel much more of an afterthought than they should. I'm never a fan of mechs, though, so perhaps I am being coloured by my biases.
Verdict
The main chameleon build has some excellent colours, and I particularly like the head and the large bulbous eyes with their slight movement. The legs are somewhat poseable, though there aren't many positions that make sense or leave the creature with any stability.
The minifigures are excellently detailed, as is standard fare for the theme, but I do wonder if Mateo turns up in a few too many sets. However, fans of the show get plenty of choice to obtain the main characters and take their pick of the whacky sets available to them, and they're certainly eye-catching on the shelf!
I appreciate the theme's effort to give the builder a choice, and the colourful artwork sections in the instructions are great, but I think the secondary build here is a little unimaginative. It must be difficult to come up with alternative concepts, particularly in the smaller sets.
71492 Mateo's Fire Chameleon is available at LEGO.com for £44.99 / $54.99 / €49.99.
74 likes
21 comments on this article
"Teal black" is certainly a color choice. ;)
55 dollars is insane!
@BrickClones said:
"55 dollars is insane! "
Yes, but around here I've picked up quite a bit of DreamZZZ at a 40-50% discount, I suspect that it will happen with this set as well...
@Cergorach said:
" @BrickClones said:
"55 dollars is insane! "
Yes, but around here I've picked up quite a bit of DreamZZZ at a 40-50% discount, I suspect that it will happen with this set as well..."
Around my part of the world they usually end up with alot on on heavy discount.
The part of this set I find most confusing is why this is Matteo's chameleon at all. I haven't watched the show, so I'm not sure if this is in reference to something that's so far unrepresented in the sets, but Logan seems to be far more in tune with animals in general, and really this set isn't in Matteo's color scheme at all. Not really sure what the idea was there, especially considering how many sets Matteo has compared to Logan, or any of the characters really.
The chameleon is super weird!
I love it!
All of this looks great! It's super colourful, creative, and tonnes of fun! Also, that Cyberling looks like Marvin the Martian.
I like this set more than I expected to. Chameleons are not a common animal subject for Lego, and they absolutely nailed features like the hunched back, pivoting eyes, and oddly splayed toes.
The new "pixel wave" piece looks intriguing as well. I first expected it to be a mostly flat piece like similar sword/energy effect pieces in themes like Hero Factory, Bionicle, and Ninjago, but the way it actually undulates in multiple dimensions makes it quite unique.
I don't know anything about the show, but this is IMHO a fantastic-looking set. The Chameleon is beautiful. I also like the little side builds - the larger option of the two small jets is a great speeder that could be adapted or used as-is in a lot of space displays and so on. And that Zero character is similarly just a great minifigure that could be used in all kinds of imaginative displays way beyond Dreamzzz. Price isn't great, especially considering it's got mostly stickers instead of prints. But at a 20% discount I think it would be a good value.
MORE COLOR!
If only LEGO put this kind of effort into some of its other themes. I’m tempted to get it even though I don’t collect this theme. Time to look up and follow another designer…
I do want to collect every Z-Blob set, but I think I might skip this one. I really only need the side builds for my collection, not the model, and it's rather overpriced too.
That Zero minifigure is insane. What an amazing minifigure!
I agree with all of the compliments and criticisms voiced thus far.
This is a nice model with good minifigs. I wish they didn't plop Mateo in everything like Harry Potter. I wish there was better articulation with the chameleon.
I will be getting this at 40% reduction. I love the "teal black."
Huh. Brickheadz eyes in a non-Brickheadz set.
Those helmets would make great Titan minifigs from Destiny!
I cannot see that trans-green cloud piece as anything other than flatulence.
@MisterBrickster said:
"I cannot see that trans-green cloud piece as anything other than flatulence. "
Oh god, finally, someone has the courage to say it. Yes, it really does look as though Mateo is powering his machines through aggressive lactose intolerance, and given that his other superpowers are 'owning and operating a sentient booger', I can't help but think that this was intentional.
@yellowcastle said:
"If only LEGO put this kind of effort into some of its other themes. I’m tempted to get it even though I don’t collect this theme. Time to look up and follow another designer…"
Not trying to pick a fight, but rather honestly asking: What themes do you feel don't get the expected effort?
I like it. Maybe the best of this wave next to maybe the shark sub (I have yet to look up a review of that one though).
Tiny Logan is ADORABLE!!!