Featured set of the day: An Unexpected Gathering
Posted by Huw,
Is it really 8 years since the superb set TheRichrocker writes about today was released?
"Confusticate and bebother these dwarves!"
As a longtime fan of The Lord of the Rings and Tolkien's other works like The Hobbit and The Silmarillion, I remember too well the thrill I got when I heard the news that LEGO had acquired the licence to produce LOTR-related sets.
I received 79003 An Unexpected Gathering as a birthday present from my wife, which was special enough, because although she tolerates my LEGO hobby enough to let me set up a city layout in our bedroom and clutter up several shelves and cupboards with LEGO sets, she usually does not encourage it by buying the stuff for me. :-)
Bag End, Bilbo and later Frodo Baggins' Hobbit hole was my first building after a long time of solely buying and building Star Wars stuff - and what a nice building experience that was.
I don't know if green pieces were still quite rare at the time (2012) or if my eyes hungered for some colour after having built so many Star Wars sets, but I do remember that I really liked all those lovely pieces in different hues of green and brown. The building process was also very enjoyable with some nice techniques new to me at the time (the build of the large round window for example was quite ingenious).
Once completed, the hobbit hole is really, really nice to look at from every angle with many lovely details from the carrot patch in the garden to the interior. Of course one would have hoped for a larger interior - but that would have cranked up the price.
The minifigs in the LotR and Hobbit-line were the next highlight for me - they really were a leap in design quality and richness of detail. The minifigs in An Unexpected Gathering"were no exception: Six wonderful minifigs with abundant details even underneath beard and cloak pieces.
All in all: An almost perfect little set, that has been granted a singular honour by my wife: It is the one of very few sets that get to be prominently displayed all the time in our house. It has its own little shelf in a glass cabinet in our kitchen - very fitting for a hobbit hole.
Those are my thoughts concerning set 79003, I also enclose some pictures of its current look in my cabinet - I've put all of Thorin Oakenshield's company plus Gandalf around poor Bilbo's dinner table. ;-)
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43 comments on this article
"Pleeeeease, (re)release me!"
This one takes pride of place as one of my all-time favorite sets! Lord of the Rings was a big push in getting me out of my semi-dark ages and when I finally got this set I immediately fell in love with it. So much so that I ended up buying two additional copies and building a big expansion to the set. Fantastic write-up!
We need a new LOTR line! Please!
Amazing set always wanted it and still want - still dont have
I'm tempted to say, that this is my favorite set from the past decade.
A nice idyllic scene that is good for both display and play alike. And the best: no disjointed segments of loose sub-builds and no superfluous shooting gimmicks xD
Though I still haven't decided yet how to put on the sticker for Bilbo's book. That part is so confusing in terms of which side is the front and whhich one's the back...
I love this set!!! I too got it for birthday. It’s just an all around great set
This is one of the nicest sets Lego has ever made. The Flintstones set should have looked more like this
This really is one of the best single LEGO sets I have ever built. I love it. And @ggj said it...The Flinstones set should have been this good.
I was in my dark ages when this set released. Two years ago I bought one NIB, and can say it is still one of my favorite set in my collection. I think its held up really well, design-wise.
It makes me so sad that I didn't get this. Honestly I find the shade of green too bright, but it's unlikely that I would ever amass the parts to make my own in olive green or sand green so I wouldn't mind settling for the colour in this set.
The maps are a highlight for me as a big fan of the cartographic side of Tolkien's work.
One of my favorites too!
What a great little article! This set is in my all-time top 5 of best LEGO sets. I love it so much that I actually got a second one without the stickers applied as back-up. The only other sets I've bought duplicates of are the magnificent LOTR Tower of Orthanc and the HP Hogwarts Castle (2018).
For me, this charming little set is in that same league of greatness, along with some Modular Buildings, the Monster Fighters Haunted House, and the Star Wars UCS Slave I and Millennium Falcon (2017). If I ever come across another fairly priced sealed set of Bag End, I might buy it again...
Very nice. Very iconic
I just finally got around to watching the extended versions of the movies end-to-end last week. So, I got around to building the sets this weekend, including this one. I love the design of it, but there was one dark spot. Namely, most of the brown bricks cracked when used. Particularly bad with the headlight bricks. I've never had this much trouble with any other sets, even older ones. On the one hand, broken bricks make me sad, on the other hand, it does add a bit of a rustic touch to this particular build.
I bought this set second hand only 2 years ago, when the Hobbit line was completely sold out. I must say it's still one of the nicest sets I ever bought, and ever built. It's the closest to perfect.
Makes this set one of the few to have the 5 stars from me. Wonderful choice as a featured set of the day!!! * * * * * ;)
This set brought me out of my dark age and I’ve rebuilt it more times than any other set.
One of my favorite movies as a child was the pre-studio Ghibli animated Hobbit film and that music runs through my head when I see this set.
Definitely a top 5 set for me.
I wasn’t interested in the Hobbit when the theme first came out but now that I’ve seen the films I really wish I got this set.
Inside my personal Top 10 LEGO Sets of All Time for sure.
I remember a well-respected AFOL saying at the time of release, "this might be the best Lego set of all time." I'm not much of a fan, but I did buy this set and a few other LOTR sets. For the price and size, this is a neat little build with lots of detail, and a good use of those then-new round plates.
I barely missed this set and had to buy it a year or two after it was discontinued--but wow, what a great set, easily one of my favorites and have it on display right now (we don't have a lot of display space, so only a half-dozen or so sets are on display at any one time).
J.R.R. Tolkien (1937)
"Not a nasty, dirty, wet hole, filled with the ends of worms and an oozy smell, nor yet a dry, bare, sandy hole with nothing in it to sit down on or to eat: it was a hobbit-hole, and that means comfort."
Lego absolutely captured the charm and spirit of those words with this set. It is one of the finest sets ever made.
Found it half price as the theme was not very popular when released. Should have bought a few as it's an awesome set.
Bag End and Weathertop were the two best sets from those movies. And Bag End is sitting in one of my kitchen cupboards.
@Atuin:
Look at the top and bottom of the inside of the book. One cover has tabs that nest inside the mating sections of the other cover. That's the back of the book. The inside is designed to be able to hold a 1x2 tile (not used in this set), and making the cover with the inner tabs the back of the book keeps the tile more centered. Flipping it around means that when you close the book you'll probably hook one end of the tile with the inner tabs.
@ggj:
Oh, I slapped a back on the Flintstones house. We do a ton of shows, and sometimes I like to slip that in the layout (especially if one of our other LUG members brings his dino park). It looks bad to have a building that's viewable from all sides on a layout and have an entire wall missing. Beyond that, I mean, the show's about to turn 60 years old later this year. The animation was high quality compared to the early seasons of The Simpsons, but the art design on everything was necessarily simplified. There's not a lot of detail to work with in terms of that house exterior (besides the fact that it should probably have a garage), and there's way too much interior to fit inside the tiny exterior.
Ah, easily the best Hobbit set, but I disn’t care for it back in the day. If LOTR is rereleased we basically need this, Mina Tirith, Osgiliath, Edoras, Lothlorien, another Helms Deep and so on.
Basically we need more LOTR.
This was the set that got me into Lego as an adult!
@PurpleDave :
By PurpleDave in United States, 29 Apr 2020 23:41
"Bag End and Weathertop were the two best sets from those movies. And Bag End is sitting in one of my kitchen cupboards.
@Atuin :
Look at the top and bottom of the inside of the book. One cover has tabs that nest inside the mating sections of the other cover. That's the back of the book. The inside is designed to be able to hold a 1x2 tile (not used in this set), and making the cover with the inner tabs the back of the book keeps the tile more centered. Flipping it around means that when you close the book you'll probably hook one end of the tile with the inner tabs."
Totally correct what you said. The 'problem' though is that LEGO used this inconsistently througout the part's lifespan (1997 till 2018). I know that this is like super-uber-mega pedantic and all sorts... but I also align the slots of all the pins on my Technic models, so.... :P
When the Harry Potter line launched in 2001, this part had several pre-printed variants. The few copies I have and all online photos I could find have the book oriented with the small moulding indentation as the front cover. The same orientation was used in all instructions I could find from 1997-1999 Scala and Belville sets that used stickers on the book (yes - this is originally a Scala piece^^)
After a period of absence of decorations on this part for quite some years, instructions began to depict it only with the dented side as the backcover... (ca. post 2011)
So will I keep in line with pre-printed parts or in line with the modern instructions....? :D
Oh! This is the set I wanted to write about for the "featured set" series. Good to see someone already did it. Lol. I love this set so much!
Please LEGO, more Castles, Dwarves, Elves, Wizards, and so on. We love the stuff! I missed out on this set the 1st time around, but would love to grab it. How about an all out D&D line LEGO style!
Wow. Ok, I missed a lot. I had a dark age for nearly 25 years, until early 2018. Missed all the LOTR sets, and didn’t even know they existed! I’m dyin!! I would go on BrickLink right now, but my wife is now well aware and watching like a hawk! lol ... This one is going on my want list for sure, gotta have it.
A color photo of this set in the Wall Street Journal (of all places) is what sealed my recovery from the Dark Ages. Yet, oddly enough, although I've bought a copy of the sticker sheet and many of the printed/stickered parts via Bricklink, I've never bought the set itself!
I don't know why I didn't buy it back then; I bitterly regret it…
I own all of the LOTR and several of the Hobbit sets, and this is one of the best!
Yes! I absolutely love this set! Excellent choice.
One of my fave sets ever, and lines in general. LotR is just beautiful all round.
Hopefully with the new series coming out they will kickstart it again like they have with the new Harry Potter sets. We still need so many more characters and settings... Sauron, Faramir, Eowyn, Haradrim, and dare I say.... a Mumakil? I would die happy if they made a UCS Barad Dur.
Lego should create UCS version of this house with 4-5k pieces. It could be LOTR variant. It's quite surprising the UCS model hasn't been created yet.
Definitely one of my favorite sets that I own. They got the overall shape of the hobbit hole so perfectly. Lotr/hobbit really was such a fantastic line of sets
I remember getting this one for Christmas when I was 14, and it's still one of my favorites! It's currently in pieces in storage right now but I feel like this article is a sign to rebuild it today lol :D
@TroyFitz said:
"Please LEGO, more Castles, Dwarves, Elves, Wizards, and so on. We love the stuff! I missed out on this set the 1st time around, but would love to grab it. How about an all out D&D line LEGO style!"
The forthcoming wave of Ninjago sets has a European fantasy flavour.
With regards to LEGO ever doing a D&D line, that is not currently possible. D&D is owned by Hasbro which also owns/markets Kre-O, a LEGO competitor. As long as the Hasbro/Kre-O relationship lasts, we won't see official LEGO D&D. Unofficially, it could be a different story. We did have Fantasy Era after all.
This also is in the running for my favorite set of all time. My only complaint was the baseplates came loose too easily / there could have been better subfloor support. But as I've cleared some clutter during lockdown, I think I will rebuild and restore its place on the shelf. Thank you Huw!!!
They've pillaged the pantry! I'm not even going to tell you what they've done to the bathroom; they all but destroyed the plumbing!
I have enjoyed building a lot of different Lego sets from many different themes but 79003 is the one that I have enjoyed building the most. The vibrant color and just overall feel good/happy look to it makes it my favorite set of all time.
The only major weakness was the interior look of the door.
Great set, thoroughly enjoyed building it. It is still on display in the Lego room. Nice to have a set with so much green.
They didn't sell that well in Oz it seemed, they were on clearance for awhile along with the rest of that Hobbit line. I picked up a second one but should have bought more.
@Atuin:
Technic pins, LEGO logos on studs, LEGO logos on the underside of tiles...
So I dug up my print instructions (the online PDFs are fine for building the set, but aren't hi-res enough to make out details like this). On p17 of 2/2, you see the book laid out flat with the cover facing up, then with the stickers applied, and finally closed before showing its placement in the set. If you examine it very closely, you can see the tabs that nest at top and bottom of the book peeking out underneath the cover. The smaller tab with the angled end is visible on the left, while the larger, square-cut tab is on the right. The right side (large tabs) gets the front cover (BB at the bottom, elven star at the top), and the left side (small tabs) gets the blank cover. So, that's the official sticker placement according to the instructions, which matches the intended front/back design of the book. Short of asking the set designer for a personal recommendation, I think that's about the best you can expect to work with.
@yuffie:
Nope. I just bought everything. I don't have many duplicates, but I have every LotR set ever released, and every Hobbit set (including SDCC Bag End) with the only exceptions I'm aware of being the board game and any weird minifig giveaways they've done. There was an unannounced blister carded version of Azog that was handed out at SDCC (one sold for $2000 before any sets featuring that character had been announced). There was also an activity promo at a previous SDCC where you could collect the parts to build either Frodo or Bilbo (can't remember if it was LotR or Hobbit) and a cloth pouch to put him in. Now, I haven't _built_ all of the other Hobbit sets, but unless I'm missing parts, I should have a complete set of Hobbit dwarves whenever I do.