Review: 76049 Avenjet Space Mission
Posted by LostInTranslation,
Continuing with our reviews of upcoming sets, I am delighted to have received 76049 Avenjet Space Mission from the LEGO AFOL Relations and Programs (ARP) Team to review for you all. Apologies in advance for my lack of photography skills!
This Marvel Superheroes set, which includes a total of 523-pieces is, I believe, inspired by events from the Marvel Avengers Assemble cartoon, though there is no overt mention of this programme on the box, which merely features the general Avengers branding. The box art depicts an epic battle between three of the Avengers – ‘Space’ Iron Man, ‘Space’ Captain America and Captain Marvel, who is piloting the Avenjet – and the villains Thanos and Hyperion against a cosmic backdrop. The back of the box shows off the play features, such as the Avenjet’s weapons and detachable mini jet.
Contents and Build
The set includes one perfect-bound instruction book, a short comic and a small sticker sheet, plus four bags of parts. There are a few new or rare elements in this set, which I have pictured below. I was pleasantly surprised to find that the 6x6 dishes for the engines were printed rather than stickers and also that the blue 1x1 round tiles are printed with a star rather than merely using plain tiles.
The first build is to assemble the Thanos bigfig and construct his dark blue ‘hover boots’, which have accents of trans-pink and gold, as well as including a pair of the ubiquitous stud shooters. Thanos himself is also outfitted in dark blue and gold, which nicely complements his lavender skin and seems to be consistent with artwork that I have seen of the character online. I’m certainly very happy that we get a Thanos now without having to wait several more years until he makes a bigger appearance in the Marvel Cinematic Universe in the Infinity War films.
The next task is to build the mini jet that connects to the main body of the Avenjet, and this is built up from a base of a dark bluish grey 4x8 plate and 2x4 wedge plate and then various brackets and wedges are added to give the plane more shape. The wings layer red wedge plates on top of white ones to create a lovely stripe effect, and the wings are finished off with hinged red trapezoidal flags.
At the rear of the plane, modified 1x4 bricks with grooves are built in in order to provide the mechanism for connecting the mini jet onto the Avenjet – the main body comprises a modified 1x2 plate which has handles that slide into the grooves of the bricks and is mounted on a pivot so that the mini jet can be tilted into a take-off position.
The main body of the Avenjet is constructed using a Technic frame assembly and then once again a multitude of SNOT bricks and brackets are used to then enable greebling elements such as bows, cheese graters and double cheeses to be attached and produce a more interesting shape and texture on the model. The wings are also securely connected by means of Technic pins. Articulated Technic connectors are used at the front so that when the nose section is attached it can be angled downwards in a rigid manner.
The front cockpit is the last section to be built, and uses the same trans-black canopy as the mini jet. Two more red flags are attached at the rear in an attempt to conceal the connection to the main body. The majority of the stickers are applied to this section of the model – in my opinion they add interesting detail to the jet. Whilst on the subject of AFOLs’ favourite things, I should mention that flick-fire missiles and stud shooters are mounted on the jet to weaponise it.
Once everything has been joined together, I think the jet looks impressive. It also feels reassuringly solid, like it can be picked up and played with without sections coming loose too easily. The red and white colour scheme works very well and is faithful to images of the Avenjet that I came across during my research. The design overall in fact seems pretty accurate to the cartoon depiction, though the LEGO version seems too narrow in the body to me, and has no real interior other than the cockpit. In the box art, Iron Man is shown to be perched on a ledge in the cargo hold (which isn’t really even a hold, as it doesn’t have a floor), which seems a bit silly.
Minifigures
I’ve mentioned Thanos, but what about the other four figures in the set? First up we have ‘Space’ Captain America, who appears to have the same torso as in #76017, but has a new head print and new gear to go with his trusty vibranium shield. He has a new breathing apparatus part (which is obviously all that is needed to survive in space!) and a cool jetpack that is decorated with the 1x1 star-printed tiles that I mentioned earlier.
Iron Man has a completely new outfit in this set, with his white and gold space armour. From a quick search, I think this may be the MK 39 armour, but the images I found of that all seemed to include a triangular arc reactor on the chest and the LEGO version has a circular one – I am by no means a Marvel expert though so please let me know in the comments if I’ve got this wrong.
The third Avenger included here is making her debut in LEGO form: Captain Marvel, a.k.a. Carol Danvers. She too is scheduled to make an appearance in future MCU films but again, I’m pleased to get a minifigure of her well before that, especially one that seems to be very accurate to her comic book depiction.
Here, she has the short spiky ‘sleepyhead’ hair in a new bright light yellow colour and is wearing a dark blue outfit with a gold star on the chest, with red gloves and sash, which is completely spot-on. As a real treat, Captain Marvel also comes with a second head, where she is wearing a red mask. I think LEGO have done an excellent job with her.
The final minifigure is the villain Hyperion, who appeared in the Avengers Assemble cartoon as a kind of corrupt alien superhero, banished from his home world. His outfit is red and gold, with his arms being dual moulded in red and flesh. On his chest is an atom-like symbol in gold and I’m glad to see he has printed boots rather than plain red legs.
His cape is an interesting shape which looks more dynamic than the usual ones when he is wearing it, giving the impression of floating mid-flight. His head is double-sided, with a cocky grin on one side and scary red laser-beam eyes on the other. I must confess to never having heard of this character before I got the set, but he is another superb minifigure to add to my Superheroes collection.
Overall
This set will retail at £49.99, which I think compares favourably to similar sized Superheroes sets: for example Darkseid Invasion also included 4 minifigures, one bigfig and 545-parts, but retailed at £59.99, whilst Gorilla Grodd Goes Bananas was £49.99 and although it had 5 minifigures and a bigfig, it included only 347-parts and its build lacked quality IMO. I’m sure a lot of people will buy this set just for the minifigures and Thanos, and they are indeed excellent and almost worth the price tag on their own, but I would also recommend it on the merits of the jet too; I found it a satisfying build, and an interesting overall model (with a few flaws as mentioned above). The set would also make a great parts pack for anyone wanting to MOC some kind of aircraft in red and white owing to the large number of wedge-shaped bricks and plates.
Thanks again to the ARP team for providing the set. I wish everyone at Brickset a Marvel-lous Christmas!
JANGBRiCKS' Video Review
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21 comments on this article
This set and the new figs look fantastic. The price is so good--I'm in!
Nice review. This is a pretty nice set. Definitely a must buy.
There are no other Iron Man suits from the films that look like this, and this one seems to be only loosely based on the mark 39, which is a real shame, as TLG has passed up a chance to give us another suit from the Iron Legion :(
Hyperion, for those who don't know, is pretty much superman in a different costume and owned by DC.
Marvel! I meant marvel!
I made up my mind to own this set immediately after the Jangbricks video review, I love the minifigures but the ship itself has so many cool play-features as well as an overall classic-LEGO design, it's superb. :)
The original leaked images of this set made me sigh. "Do we seriously need more Avenjets?!" But this review did an excellent job in displaying the features of the set. I will most likely get it for the minifigs and Thanos, but I have changed my view on the jet. Thanks @LostInTranslation!
Nice looking set. I'm looking forward to getting this one.
The 1x1 blue round tiles with the star print are the same ones included in the up coming Ghostbuster's Firehouse. It will be interesting to see where else they pop up.
Cool overall. The Avenjet has a more...utilitarian look than most similar Lego models. I really like most of the figures, but that Captain American seems incredibly lame to me. Leather belt and SCUBA mask for a spacesuit? Not on the same level as this Iron Man suit, or Space Batman.
I was going to buy the Iron Sub but this seams a better buy than that.
I find the lack of 'Avengers Assemble' branding interesting, there is no mention of the cartoon in the instructions either?
I've been limiting myself to 'pure' Marvel sets that don't tie into a movie or cartoon, which means the only sets I have so far are the X-Men sets. I'm fine with that because it keeps my collection small. Not sure what happens when a set has generic branding but seems inspired by the cartoon...
Does Red Skull's submarine appear in the cartoon?
Shouldn't the video review from Jangbricks be at the bottom?
^Red Skull submarine does appear in the cartoon but it's much bigger (like big enough to carry like a 1000 troops to launch attacks against Washington DC).
Um. Yeah, I really like the minifigs, but the jet looks awful IMO. Pass.
Hyperion's face is the same as Superman's Dimensions figure.
I like the figures enough, but the DC version of this set, Darkseid Invasion was better.
The jet's hit and miss, but the figures make this set unskippable. Thanos, Hyperion and Captain Marvel? I'm sold.
Wow, I love the new Space Iron Man and of course Thanos. Must have for me!
Thanos...nice fig.
I don't have the money to buy another Quinjet, and that really annoys me as there are fantastic figures included in this set, especially Captain Marvel
Great review which convinced me to go ahead and buy the set. However, mine seems to have the same canopy problems as the recent Poe's X-Wing set did where they do not close all the way. Thankfully, the biggest draw of this set is the figures, so I'm just parting-out the jet a lot sooner than I had planned on.
The minifigs are awesome but the spaceship is too "angular" to me.
I'm sure we could have expected a better aerodynamism for a modern jet.
Anyway, I think I'm gonna buy it mainly for the figs of course.