The Lego Movie Bad Cop's Pursuit set review

This is...kind of new for me. I'm not reviewing a Transformers toy, or even a toy that happens to transform into anything aside from a pile of parts. I'm reviewing a Lego set. Perhaps some back story is in order?

Lego is manufactured by (who else) The Lego Group, starting in 1949, though the modern brick design we're all so familiar with came about in 1958. (and it took another five years to start making them out of ABS plastic) Since then, it has become one of the most popular construction toys of all time, with many, many imitators. This includes the Canadian based Mega Brands, Inc. Mega Bloks and more recently Hasbro/Oxford's Kre-O. They're all compatible with one another, just as one can take the pieces of any given Lego set and use them with pieces from older and/or newer sets to create whatever your heart desires.

Despite that, it's only recently that Lego has gotten a theatrical movie, called, fittingly enough, The Lego Movie. And of course there's a line of Lego sets tying into the movie, which is what I'm reviewing. Specifically, I'm reviewing the Bad Cop's Pursuit set.  The movie itself is awesome, and I highly recommend you go see it, so I'm going to avoid major spoilers as much as I can for this review.



As Lego sets start out disassembled in multiple bags that you open and assemble one at a time, I'll start with what comes in bag 1 first. Everything you see in the picture. There's roughly 88 pieces, including a pair of alligators complete with jaws and tails that need to be attached, and two mini figures. Let's take a closer look at them!



The one to the right in orange is Emmet. Emmet is the main hero of the movie, so he's included in several other sets. He's got two faces to choose from on his head: a confident smile, and a yelling in fright face. His hair hides the one you're not using at the moment. And on his back is the Piece of Resistance, which is a very unusual brick outside of its significance in the movie. It's got a hole in the front (to attach to the cape-like piece that fits over Emmet's neck before putting his head on) and is twice the height of a standard brick. The one on the left is Bad Cop. He's a cop, obviously. I have him stuck onto a Kre-O stand brick because he can't stand on his own while pointing his gun forward. The gun can actually shoot that translucent red piece, which is meant as a tracking beacon, at the end. No spring involved, just the trigger kicking the piece out the end when hit. He also has an alternate face on the other side of his head, which is his nicer half, Good Cop. The helmet hides the face not in use. All Lego mini figures have seven points of articulation: left and right at the head due to being pegged on, forward/back shoulders and hips, and wrist swivels also due to being pegged in. And of course, their heads have a stud, their hands can hold accessories, and they've got holes on the backs and bottoms of their legs to peg into Lego bricks. They don't really stand at all in any pose other than both legs straight on the ground without one foot plugged into another brick, unfortunately.

But enough about that, what do the remaining pieces make?



Well aside from adding police lights to the backs of the alligators, they make the end of an old western railway bridge that's been blasted apart. (complete with a little frog sitting on a rock underneath!) This is based on a scene from the movie, and while not terribly exciting, it does have a couple things that can be done with it. The first is that there's a bar at the end for a mini figure to grab onto, in this case Emmet. (who's also showing off his terrified face) For the other...



The end is connected by a loose hinge and held in place by a rod assembly running underneath the bridge. Pull the rod back, and the bridge collapses further. The part the rod fits into on the end is close enough that it can be reset simply by pushing the rod forward again. Clever. Another thoughtful part of this is the brown stud-less plate at the end, used to help keep the triangular piece of that railway tie from being easily popped off.

So that's bag 1 taken care of. Onto bag 2, and its contents.



Lots of black and white pieces in this bag. And some grey and silver. In case you haven't guessed, these 138 or so pieces will make Bad Cop's car. The first few steps have you set up the chassis, and then work on the rear thrusters, which is probably my favorite part of the build. Then the rest of the chassis comes together and you build up from there. I will mention that there is one thing that confuses me. You're asked to place a pair of silver single stud pieces next to a 6 x 2 grey plate, but they're never used for anything. The next step wants a white 2 x 1 plate to attach to the end of the 6 x 2 plate, leaving those single stud pieces without any real purpose. Why didn't they include an extra white or silver 4 x 1 plate to go there and use those aforementioned pieces instead of that 2 x 1 plate and leave the aforementioned pieces useless? Another thing is that green piece, but I guess they figured it didn't matter what color it was since it'll never really be seen when the build is complete...

When bag 2 is all used up, aside from a few spare tiny pieces in case they get lost, Bad Cop's car is...incomplete. To finish it, we need to explore the third and final bag included in this set...



This bag has roughly 88 pieces in it, the same as the first bag. That brings the total to 314 pieces, give or take a part or so, which is what the box advertises. I've also placed Good Cop in the picture near the results of bag 2 so you can see them. The set also comes with four stickers, which I applied when I first assembled this set. And man do these STICK! (as opposed to Arms Micron stickers which don't always adhere too well. Still, wouldn't test my luck by dunking these in water) It's best to wait until you've fully assembled each part before putting the stickers on, as once they're on they aren't coming off again. Well, the ones for the hood and roof can be put on at any time, as they only really go on in one direction. But once the parts are built, they can be snapped onto their appropriate places and complete the car.



And this is what it looks like fully completed. It's surprisingly sleek, with lots of angles and curves. This is helped by the fact that the roof doesn't peg onto the windshield but rather merely sits on top of it, and by the hood using hinge plates to attach to the body so it sits at a slight angle as opposed to just straight out. (the green plate from before sits underneath the hinge plates to keep them from moving too far) There's also surprisingly few studs sticking up on top, only about 22, which further helps the sleek appearance. But what can this thing do once it's put together?



Just a couple of things. The spoiler can be tilted down forward if you want, and the lights underneath the hood can be swung down into clearer view if you'd like, but the instructions make no mention of them. The roof can swing open to allow Bad Cop to get in or out, (or any mini figure including Kre-O Kreons provided they don't have anything on their backs) the sides can swing up, and the blasters can be deployed. What's really neat is that the blasters utilize a pair of plastic ratchet joints each. They have a total range of 180 degrees in 22.5 degree intervals, which while not really important for this set, could prove very useful for other things you may want to use the parts for. I was honestly very surprised by these, as I've never experienced them before on a Lego set. Granted, the last time I even touched anything Lego before now was a small set and a big Lego pail in the 90's when I was a kid, so there's obviously going to have been a number of elements I've never known about and this could easily be one of those...

But one thing I've definitely noticed with this is something that hasn't changed. And that is the quality. With Transformers, you get your ups and downs in quality, even from figure to figure. Some things are common with that specific figure, such as Generations Blitzwing's shoulders locking in for robot mode poorly if at all, others are limited to just that one copy being unlucky. (for example, I've owned a Transmetals Terrorsaur whose shoulders were extremely loose, yet the one I currently have in my collection's shoulders are just fine) Even third party toys for all the things they're often lauded for by fans aren't necessarily immune to this. I'm very pleased to say that while the pieces in this set were made only recently, they feel exactly the same as the Lego pieces I still have kicking around from the '90's. Everything holds together easily as it should, and is just as easily taken apart again. The clips have had parts snapped in and pulled back out again multiple times now, with not a stress mark to be found and the parts holding together just as well as the first time I put it together. The instructions are very easy to follow and perfectly colored to distinguish each piece they're calling for in each step. (granted, I'm not sure how helpful this is for those who are color blind, but this set doesn't use very many similarly colored pieces of the same shape)

So, Bad Cop's Pursuit. Do I recommend it? Yes, yes I do. $40 may seem a bit much, (granted that's at Walmart, and it may be different at a Lego Store for better or for worse) but it's a fun build. And the more sets you buy, the more pieces you have to build whatever you can think of. But if you've never really been into Lego...I'd try one of the smaller, cheaper sets first if at all. This set doesn't go out of its way to try and change the opinions of those already set against it. It doesn't really need to, because... Everything is Awesome!

...I'm never getting that song out of my head, am I?

I have no clue about the song, hell, I don't even know what song you got stuck in your head! As for Lego, I got bit by the bug recently and ended up buying all of the sets to the Castle theme including the one from the movie! That the first time in years that I actually bought lego, I got a large box full of the stuff in my bedroom, up until last night, my Generations Metroplex was stood on it, but he now moved over, sat down and let the King's castle taken the spot! Anyway, lego is awesome on many levels because of the fact the sky is the limit, I mean for your imagination when it comes to building stuff from Lego! Of course, some of the best video games on the market are the lego ones, thou personally I think the Lego Star Wars are the best games, the later ones, well their getting to much going on and interest kind of, well fades after a while, for me at least!

Anyway, the thing with Lego is, that they almost use the same design blocks, since the 80s at least and something Top Gear Presenter James May did once, was build a house from Lego, not a toy house but a full scale house, granted that they put a wooden frame up for Health and safety reasons, but that's testimony to the strength of the Lego design, which kind of makes me wonder, why aren't today's houses adopting the Lego design of blocks to build homes, wouldn't it be easier to build then?

is that a friggin lego-gater with friggin siren lights on his friggin head?

Galvatron wrote:is that a friggin lego-gater with friggin siren lights on his friggin head?

I say yeah! Clearly, that's what happens when you been bad, you meet the police-agaters! 

Galvatron wrote:is that a friggin lego-gater with friggin siren lights on his friggin head?

No. It's a friggin' Lego-gater with friggin' siren lights on its friggin' back. There's a world of difference. And it's a pair of them!

The movie did, however, infer something about sharks with lasers on their backs/heads...

A Shark that points to the object it desires, via laser, interesting!