Review: 41042 Tiger's Beautiful Temple
Posted by Huw,
The second Friends animals set from series 4 that I've opened is Tiger's Beautiful Temple. This is a really interesting set from a parts point of view, featuring two brand new designs:
1. The gold finials, although as I found out at caperberry's blog New Elementary, they are also feature in larger Friends sets where they are used as ice cream, and they do certainly look the part for that.
2. The green 'grass' looks great, and is a cause for celebration because we can't have enough different varieties of foliage, and new ones don't appear very often. I believe they will also appear in olive green, in 2014 Star Wars sets.
The tiger cub is also new and while not as useful as the other new parts is nevertheless adorable, too much so for it to be of much use in a minifig scenario, in my opinion.
It's odd that it's printed with stripes only on its back and face. Even odder is that LEGO has named it a lion according to the aforementioned New Elementary blog...
This is another great pocket-money set or stocking-filler perhaps, and also one with enough new parts that it will appeal to AFOLs.
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15 comments on this article
The grass pieces appear in olive green in the 2014 Star Wars sets, not dark tan Huw ;-) I am just looking at 75037 though, haven't noticed any other appearances in SW sets yet.
Nice looking set though. Love the new pieces.
That grass definitely looks useful, but I can't be seen picking up a Friends set.
I'm sorry if I'm a bit off topic but when I went to my local LEGO Store there was an advertisement up for a free friends bakery stall or something with the purchase of any friends set valid 27th December-some time in January (can't remember when)
As I mentioned in the comments to The New Elementary, I'll bet the reason it's called a lion in TLG's parts database is that the mold was intended to be used as a lion cub, and it just happened to appear as a tiger cub first. Sort of the same way that TLG refers to part 11258 as "Mini Painter Cap" even though it appeared in the Minifigures Series 9 Plumber before it appeared in the Minifigures Series 10 Painter. Without colors or decorations, there's nothing singling this animal mold out as a lion or tiger.
The limited printing of the stripes is probably just a consequence of how LEGO parts are printed. Typically the pad printing machines are only designed to print specific surfaces for any particular part. In this case, there are already at least two separate printing surfaces for the front and top of the tiger (maybe three or four if the ears, feet, and face are printed separately) Printing the sides would require at least two additional printing surfaces, which makes the printing process more complex.
The Star Wars sets with this new foliage piece actually seem to use it not in Sand Yellow (Dark Tan), but rather in Olive Green. Of course, either is useful!
Thanks for the correction.
@GreenNinjaCP - I know exactly what you mean! I bit the bullet and got the squirrel and turtle ones because I couldn't possibly pass up on a Lego squirrel, and the turtle didn't seem so bad at the same time. I'll be getting the penguin set too, though I think I'll actually try and swap out the pink pieces!!
Not sure why anyone would have a problem buying a Friends' set. Who cares who buys what for whom anyway? Friends has some wonderful designs, and some have very little pink. Substitute more lime green or some purple, and ta da, it is gender neutral if that bugs you.
These new sets are lovely! Have not seen this set in the store yet, but will buy them. The designs are outstanding, and this grass looks like a real addition to the plant kingdom. We definitely need more grass and plant options.
If those grass pieces come in white, they would make for great architecture pieces :)
Is the hole in the grass piece the right size for slotting in minifig accessories?
Yes
cool.. wonder what interesting things that could be used for... :p
Really looking forward to this set. The parts are excellent, and the tiger is very cute. I'll probably buy 4 or 5 of these!
Only problem I have with. The friends sets is the size of the figures. They have given us parts in new colors that I would not think lego would do in the city lineup.
This is a must have for me for the parts. Thanks for the review Huw!
The paint job on the tiger isn't the best when you zoom in