LEGO Legends of Chima Gorilla Legend Beast (70125) Review

This is another guest post by our new reviewer, Dave. Follow him at deviantART and on Flickr to see more of his work.

When I went to Toys R Us to get my LEGO Legends of Chima Legend Beast sets, I knew I could only afford two at the time. I knew I was getting the Lion regardless, so it was a toss up between this guy and the Wolf. I ultimately chose the Gorilla Legend Beast (70125) because I felt his brown parts would supplement those from the Lion well.

As with the Lion I won’t get too much into Gorzan’s figure as I understand all the figs here are the same printings. Watching the show definitely helps gain an appreciation for them though.

Pros

Parts

What I found to be this set’s strengths is the inclusion of both the standard constraction ball and socket elements and a couple of the new mini ball joint ones as well. As a constraction MOCer who loves to mix in system, more brick-to-ball-and-socket transition parts are always welcomed.

Recolors

I think MOCers who like to use these kinds of parts will be happy to now have some in brown, even if it is Dark Brown. I know I am. There’s also two colors of the same bracket part in this set, two in tan and two in light Gray. This perplexes me as why wouldn’t they just include four of the same color? I would think that it comes down to being a coloring issue as the two tan ones go on the gorilla’s chest to hold on the bows that make up his chest. But then they kind of mess up the coloring scheme by having a big black plate wedge piece holding things on. I suppose maybe that’s some kind of Gorilla riding saddle? Either way, the part in tan is a welcomed addition.

Brown

Like with the Lion, this set has a lot of brown to it, though his scheme is shifted way more to the dark brown shade. Almost an opposite to the Lion. We get a good helping of Dark Brown from the ball and socket parts and some bows, then there’s some tan bows and other bits throughout, 8 reddish brown cheese slopes(nine counting an extra) which is pretty good for such a small set as well as some other reddish brown parts, and only 4 dark tan tapered bricks. This I think makes it a great companion to the lion set and is why I chose it over the wolf.

Cons

The Build

I’m a little sad to be putting the build in the cons section because I did genuinely enjoy building the Gorilla. All things considered, it’s a bad build from a figure build stand point. The tiny (although adorable) legs don’t move in the right way for legs. They move out when they should move forward and backwards. This ultimately affects the poseability and therefore playability of this set. This would have required the cup pieces to be positioned a different way, but with all the brackets LEGO has It could have been managed. I think they sacrificed the positioning and posability for sturdiness which it doesn’t achieve either. The lower half of his torso will come loose causing the black wedge piece to bed a little bit. So while I thought there might be something gained in structure, there isn’t really. They probably could have found a better way to stick on the Gorilla’s hip sockets so he could move his legs the right way. Because he can’t move his legs much it makes him hard to balance if you want to pose him with one of his big arms raised it offsets the weight too much and he falls right over. This could be easily fixed if he could just move his legs forward a little. Another reason I think the build is bad enough to be put into the Cons section is my next Bullet point.

Minifig Even More Cumbersome

As I stated with Laval and the Lion Legend Beast, the minifig is difficult to get on the back with their shield and weapon. This is even worse for Gorzan and the Gorilla. The armor parts inhibit their arms from going backwards so the arm can’t go back to hold the shield in a way that makes more sense. Instead I had to move it forward and position the shield in a way so that now its poking the Gorilla in the back of his head. As if having a monkey on his back wasn’t bad enough, LOL.

Results

Even though I think the build has some problems. I still enjoyed the set for the parts I got from it, and I think that will be a reoccurring theme in this series. I highly recommend people pick up at least one of these sets based on which ever one looks most appealing to you. What I love about them so far is that they’re cheap sets made up of mostly small parts. This is exactly the kind of system set I enjoy as a constraction MOCer. I’m sure system fans will love them for all the bows and other greebles included in them.

[easyreview title=”The Brick Fan Scoring Summary” cat1title=”Design” cat1detail=” ” cat1rating=”2″ cat2title=”Playability” cat2detail=” ” cat2rating=”2.5″ cat3title=”Value” cat3detail=” ” cat3rating=”4″ summary=” “]