Set #79105 Baxter Robot Rampage: The only way to get April as a Minifigure from TMNT was through this Toys’-R-Us exclusive set, which makes for a difficult Minifigure collection and since she is a main character, that means that unless you have a TRU near you you’re out of luck owning April O’Neil from LEGO TMNT. Still this is a really awesome set, and we’re going to discuss all of the reasons why in this review.

Box/Instructions

Box: The last of the 2013 boxes to discuss, this is a TRU exclusive and yet doesn’t mention that on the box, probably because it’s also a LEGO Store exclusive and wouldn’t necessarily have that printed on all their boxes. The action scene on the front of the box is also extremely fun, showcasing everything about this set that makes it such a winner. The comic strip on the back is short and sweet too.

Instructions: This set is unnecessarily broken up between two manuals. The first is far too thin because it deals with the turtles’ side of the build, while manual number two is a bit thicker and deals with the robot mech. I honestly don’t think we needed two separate manuals for this. There are no Minifigure checklists in 2013, but you do get the comic reprinted on the back of the second manual. You also have your typical cross-promotional images, what I find odd is that the parts list is actually printed in the back of the first manual. This is strange to me because two thirds of the pieces aren’t even used in that manual.

Stickers: This set has stickers for details again. And again no protection, so be aware that you could have damaged stickers depending on how they were packaged.

Parts

I would have to say that there are really no truly unique parts in the set, there are a lot of them, but nothing too unique. I would say this set is a big draw since it’s the only one with April from the show compared to what kind of parts are found in it.

Minifigures

Donatello: The facial print is the only thing truly unique about this mini-figure, his body is all the same from what we’ve seen before, but you can only get this expression in this set. His accessories include his Bo and his unique skateboard, the purple skateboard is stickered, but looks impressive.

Raphael: There’s nothing unique about Raph, this is the exact same print we saw in Stealth Shell, which is unfortunate, however since you do wind up with three of him across the entire wave from this particular year seeing him doubled up isn’t that big of a deal breaker. His print is still fun and he includes two sai.

April O’Neil: Unique to this set, which was a Toy’s-R-Us exclusive, April includes a double-sided torso print, upper leg printing for her jeans shorts, a unique hair piece with printing for her hairband and a double-sided facial print with a normal expression and a more angry looking expression with gritted teeth.

Baxter Stockman: This Minifigure is very strange, he includes a double-sided torso print and a double-sided facial print with nervous and angry expressions. He’s wearing the LEGO Ninjago shoulder armour with circular back weapon scabbard and a helmet in matching silver/gunmetal grey colouring. He has no leg printing and no accessories, I would have liked to see an extra hair piece for him so he could have that hairdo from the actual show. Unfortunately it was not to be.

Mouser: This is a buildable little figure and it’s a fun little build. Using the LEGO sports helmet for the mouser head was a great idea and the coloring is very impressive. I kind of wish that there were more than one in the set, since multiple mousers for the turtles to fight makes sense. Unfortunately you’ll have to Bricklink the parts for more.

The build

Bag 1: This bag builds all of the Ninja Turtles and their vehicles from this set. The vehicles are pretty fun to build, short and sweet. Since the manual is only twenty-seven pages long counting the parts list, than that is to be expected.

Bag 2: This builds the entire upper portion of the robot, the arms and control chamber that Baxter sits in. It’s a very involved build with some parts during the build of the arms that might trip up some younger builders, especially the incorporation of the play gimmicks for the launching fist. The large sticker that is included in the set is part of the build too, the placement of which, can be irritating.

Bag 3: Completing the robot build with both legs and the waist piece that connects to the torso. It’s a much simpler build compared to the second bag and doesn’t have any issues. However it does have a bit of a problem, the feet connect to the legs via your typical ball jointed pieces. This can result in weak joints the longer the robot is left on display, because the entire upper body is fairly hefty in the brick count, meaning that the joint isn’t ideal in my opinion. Using the clicking joints that the waist uses for the hips might have been a better idea for the ankle joints here so that they wouldn’t suffer from lose joint issues over time.

The completed model

Raph’s Glider: This is an interesting looking little flying vehicle, it includes two flick-fire missiles for a play feature and has the standard yellow coloring of the rest of the turtle vehicles. It’s a fun little vehicle to fly around and it can seat one turtle, his weapons clip into the side so he can hold the steering stick and that about covers everything for this little model.

Donny’s Vehicle: I’m not sure what to call this exactly, so I’m going to consider it to be the sewer slider. It’s a small little four-wheeled ATV kind of vehicle which only has the ability to hold his weapon and his skateboard as play features. It’s a fine little model, with nothing much else to discuss about it because it’s really just an extra to help battle against the main model from this set.

Baxter’s Robot: I haven’t seen every episode of the new series, so I’m not sure if this is the exact thing that was used on the show. That being said it’s an interesting looking robot, like other’s we’ve seen in Super Hero based themes this is a massive marvel of evil scientific menace… Heh. The model does have a few problems though, first the front of the model has three extra armour pieces attached by a few pieces. And the one on the waist likes to pop off whenever you pick the robot up by the waist.

The one’s on either side of the upper body don’t fall off by grabbing them, but they do move a lot because of the technic pins that they’re on, these are designed to be angled any direction as extra protection for Baxter inside his control chamber.

The play features for this model include poseability, it can be posed in certain ways, though these are limited in order to maintain the balance of the figure. The feet are very limited in their posing and because of how they’re built they also suffer a bit of stability issues. The left hand has a missile launching gimmick, push on the technic pin in the back and you will launch a flick-fire missile with energy print on the round dish to attack the turtles.

The right hand includes a fist launching gimmick, this is to capture April, attached to a cable stud, the technic pin in the back can be pushed to fire the entire fist. Then you have to close the four fingers around the April Minifigure and pull it back with the cable to reattach it to the robot with April a prisoner. There are also two flick-fire missiles on the head of the robot, the back folds open to let Baxter in and out and the entire upper torso can rotate. Overall a very impressive looking model loaded with a lot of play features and suffering from a few flaws due to the nature of the build.

Overall opinion

I recommend tracking this one down if you missed it, while it does have a few flaws and things however it does include some rare and hard to find Minifigures, if you want an April to go with your Nickelodeon Turtles you’ll need this set. Mega Blocks is bringing us Turtles now, as LEGO unfortunately no longer holds the license, which is a real shame because we haven’t gotten many of the villains in these sets. I think they were sold quite well and haven’t lingered too long, that being said most of these sets will only be found on the secondary market, so it’s really up to you if you want the full set, or just the Minifigures.

This was the final set to complete my collection (not counting comicon figs =C) and I honestly think it's pretty ok.

The minifigs; First off is the star of this set baxter stockman. He has two faces one is scared the other is kinda grr you turtles are dead! He is wearing his armor which he only wore in one episode unfortunately. They reused the armor from last year's ninjago set's. Donatello has a growling sort of face. His stick has a spike at the end to make it more deadly. April O'neal has two faces one is a normal smile the other is angry looking. She is wearing a yellow T shirt with a number five on it and jeans with black boots. Raphael is the same as in stealth shell pursuit.

The build; You start with a cute little mouser which I have made a way better MOC creation of mousers that actually look like them. Then you build the go cart which in the show could fit all four turtles and had four escape pods. This one only fits one and then Donnies skate board. Next is the air plane which isn't in the show. It has two weapon holders and four guns (two are flick fire). This air plane can fit all four turtles and April. After this there is the Stockman pod which makes up for all the in accurate vehicles. It is giant and has a back door for entering and escaping. It also has a giant actually working flick fire missile and a shooting hand with string to pull it back.

Pros; awesome minifigures, Giant mech with play ability, Cool air plane.

Cons; In accurate vehicles, Simple and ugly mouser, Raphael is the same as in another set.

Over all; It's cool almost every thing is in accurate though but the mech and minifigures make up for it though.