The newest LEGO Ideas to hit the store shelves is the Minifigure Vending Machine (21358). It has 1,343 pieces and retails for $179.99. The set combines a regular Collectible Minifigures series as well as a functional build.
Minifigures
Like the old regular Collectible Minifigures series, there are 16 minifigures in the set. A majority of the minifigures pay tribute to some of the classic LEGO themes such as Space, Fabuland, Castle, Pirates, and even Paradisa. A few of the minifigures chosen were part of a fan vote held last year.
The LEGO Ideas designer has an exclusive torso with the LEGO Ideas logo on both sides. Her accessories include some mini builds.
There’s also a minifigure of Rob Vangansewinkel (Goosestore) who is the fan designer of the set. He’s dressed in a red plaid shirt and includes a mini build of the vending machine.
For the Space theme, we have the pearl-gold and spacemen who carries a blaster and a radio.
There’s also the new teal spacemen who has coffee and donut and a wrench.
Fabuland is one of the themes that I wasn’t surprised to see but was excited for considering 2025 is the year of Fabuland. We now have costume characters of Elton Elephant and Bernard Bear with their unique head molds and exclusive Fabuland torsos.
Castle also gets in on the fun with some new factions introduced for this set. We have the Griffen Knights who are in some chainmail armor and carries a sword and shield.
The other new Castle faction are the Kraken Warriors. They have more of a teal and brown color scheme with the Kraken emblem on the chest. They also have the sword and shield combo with one of them having a whip.
For the Pirates theme, we have grown-up versions of Bo’sun Will and Camilla which are characters from the LEGO Pirates Comic (6255). Will is in the typical pirates outfit with the striped shirt and vest. Camilla now wears a naval officer outfit and her accessories include a map and a pistol.
Finally we have Paradisa represented with the Beach Bro and Beach Bae. The both have the same tank top torso showing the Paradisa logo and 92 on the back referencing the year 1992 which was the first year of the theme.
Build
The first few sets of bags give you most of the inner workings of the vending machine. The most hard part of the build is the turning mechanism when you twist the handle. It uses mostly Technic plates and pins along with a gear in the middle. It’s very ingenius since you can’t turn the handle all the way around unless you put the coin in, just like a real vending machine.
When you do put the coin in and turn the handle, there are plate sections that turn around the center pole. This pushes one of the capsules around the back right corner and its slides out the opening. When you do a full turn on the handle, it also drops out the coin to the slot on the left.
The capsules themselves are dome piece connected with some Technic pins. They come in blue and yellow with frosted tops. There’s enough room inside to fit the minifigures disassembled along with their accessories.
The final part of the build is the glass which uses some transparent straight and curved panels.
Results
Overall the LEGO Ideas Minifigure Vending Machine (21358) is one of the sets that I wanted to pick up when it was first announced. Not only because there was an unofficial whole minifigure series with it, but the vending machine is actually functional and looks good.
This also comes with some downsides, mainly the higher price point. To have 16 minifigures in a set isn’t cheap and to have most of them having new prints doesn’t help the cause either. The set also has some larger parts like the glass panels and the capsule halves that also contributed to the higher price.
Thank you to LEGO for sending in this set for me to review. The content above represents my own opinion and not the company. Review sets sent in does not guarantee a positive review.
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