Episode 664

Read the comic here.

Episode 663

Read the comic here.

I made a custom LEGO Italian Spiderman outfit months ago - I couldn't resist sneaking it into the strip somehow.

Makes you wonder why Tony had it in his Owlship, though....

Friday Fail: 1 Police Patrol

Every Friday at noon I showcase a real failure of a toy. And by "Failure" I mean "a cheap, crappy knockoff toy that should be destroyed before it infects humanity with some sort of degenerative disease".

But first: A reminder of some basic info. These posts are meant to showcase FAILURE, not to act as a catalog. I'm not selling these bootlegs, nor should you go out and look for them on your own. These are posts about what to AVOID buying. Go spend your money on real LEGO parts. You'll be glad you did.

--

I'm reaching the bottom of the pile of my first batch of LEGO knock-offs - that means it's time to venture into more of the "carded and boxed" Xin Qi Le bootlegs. I thought it best to finish this suicide run in sequential order, so we'll begin with stock number 101 - the 1 Police Patrol.

As usual, we'll take a look at the packaging first.

In a departure from the other knock-offs we've been looking at, the "1 Police Patrol" box features a drawing of the toy, rather than a doctored photo of a LEGO product. It's not even a particularly good drawing. (Not that a photo would have accurately represented the toy either, mind you.)

This set is part of the "Combinatorial Series" of "Intelligence Toys". Twenty-four pieces of crap to make you question the existence of God.

The back of the package has the old LEGO catch phrase of "Just Imagine." You have to imagine, because you're not going to get any fun out of this bootleg by itself.

The "combinations" are again drawings rather than photos. And what a combination they are! You can....ride the motocycle! Or.....ride the motorcycle! Or......push the motorcycle! Maybe you're supposed to imagine you ran out of gas.

The sides of the box re-use the images from the back. Notice that they must have thought the whole "out of gas" motif was much more exciting than driving along under your own power. Why else would they re-use that image twice?

Nothing too odd about the child safety warning on the bottom of the box. By now the mangled English of "Design is not stand for original product" fails to even be slightly amusing.

The contents of the box are standard, too - a baggie of parts and a folded bit of instructions.

As expected, the parts almost match the packaging in shape, but fail completely in color matching and design. They manage their 24 parts by completely dismembering the mini-figure.

The instructions are pretty straightforward and can actually be followed. Or, rather, they could have been except for these tires:

Notice all that gunk inside the rim? I had to take a pen knife and trim it away before I could insert the yellow hubs. A sad increase in difficulty - I didn't expect to have to use tools.

If you've looked closely at the illustrations above you might have noticed something odd about the vehicle: it's a two-wheeler. Why is that odd? Because the LEGO part that they're duplicating is for a three-wheeled trike! (The same 3-wheel motorcycle we saw in the aptly-named "3 Wheel Motorcycle" bootleg set in fact.)

The rear wheel mount is duplicated from the front handlebars, and the cowling is slightly modified to allow the rear wheel to turn.

Here's a side by side with the Bootleg (in black) and the LEGO version (in white).

From the rear you can see the modification to the cowling - the rear headlight clip has been removed. Otherwise the parts are identical.

The "Policeman" figure for this set had a slight problem - his left arm was so cracked that his hand won't stay attached. Maybe it's the weight of that strange green sidearm causing all the trouble.

The face we've seen before - a single color transfer of an official LEGO design. The printing is really sub-standard this time. The photo above is in focus - it's the printing that' s blurry.

The torso is a single-color reprint of a torso designed for the Viking theme.

Yes, that really says "officer of the law" to me.

And here's the full "1 Police Patrol" toy, ready to....well, fall apart, I suppose. It doesn't really roll, the pieces stuck on to the back are just posed there - they fall off with the slightest jolt - as does the headlight. And we've already talked about the problem with the figure's left hand.

Yes, "1 Police Patrol". For all your quality law enforcement needs.

----======-----
Once again, many thanks to Joe from The Undiscovered Playthings for sending me this set to review.

Episode 662

Read the comic here.

Mary Sue's outfit is my guess at the new "Tyrannical T-Men" costume design that's yet to be unveiled over at Adventures of the S-Team. I haven't seen Ian's design, but I thought it'd be funny if Mary Sue ended up looking like part of that team completely by accident. But will Ian have his characters cross-dressing as well?

Only time will tell.

Handtruck Challenge: Winners Announced

The Handtruck Building Challenge '09 is over! I've posted the Judge's comments (where applicable) to the Entry Grid and posted the all new Winner's Grid page. (There were four judges: Myself, Nathan, and the infamous Players A and B.)

For those of you wondering what the "special prize pack" was for the builder who used the most handtrucks....it's a Baggie of Handtrucks! Because, obviously, that builder knows how to make use of them, and I sure don't need a huge pile of them.

The winners have email waiting for them on how to claim their prizes.

Thanks to everyone who played! Details for our next (BIG!) contest are being finalized now...look for details very soon!

Episode 661

Read the comic here.

Traveling like this is a well known practice.

Episode 660

Read the comic here.

Another exterior shot since the interior ones didn't work. Some of the humor is definitely lost this time - the 3rd panel (as written) had Mary Sue in a really wacky super hero outfit.

Oh well. You'll get to see the outfit in a few strips.

Friday Fail: Box-o-Badness

I was starting to worry - I was down to my last six bootleg LEGO sets. And then, without warning, I got a package in the mail...

Yes, that's another giant box of LEGO-like knockoffs from my good friend Joe (Be sure to check out his blog: The Undiscovered Playthings)

Amazingly, he'd managed to locate items that make the current batch of FAIL seem almost tame by comparison. LEGO crossed with Playmobil? Bootlegs OF bootlegs? They're in there. Just waiting for their Friday to arrive.

Oh, we're in for a bumpy ride.

Episode 659

Read the comic here.

I had planned to do this as interior shots, but I really didn't have "comic set" in mind when I built the Owlship. I wasn't able to find a workable angle.

I think the strip still works, though. Making the reader imagine Mary Sue's antics probably creates a more wacky image than I could have managed with LEGO parts.

Episode 658

Read the comic here.

For those of you haven't seen the Iron Man movie, the quote being referenced is:

William Ginter Riva: Mr. Stane. Sir, we've explored what you've asked us and it seems as though there's a little hiccup. Actually, um...
Obadiah Stane: A hiccup?
William Ginter Riva: Yes, see to power the suit... sir, the technology doesn't actually exist. So it...
Obadiah Stane: Wait, wait, the technology? Here is the technology. I've asked you to simply make it smaller.
William Ginter Riva: Sir, the technology doesn't exist. Honestly, it's impossible.
Obadiah Stane: [yelling] Tony Stark was able to build this in a cave! With a box of scraps!
William Ginter Riva: Well, I'm sorry. I'm not Tony Stark.

Friday Fail: Photo-Graph Car

Every Friday at noon I showcase a real failure of a toy. And by "Failure" I mean "a cheap, crappy knockoff toy that should be destroyed before it infects humanity with some sort of degenerative disease".

But first: A reminder of some basic info. These posts are meant to showcase FAILURE, not to act as a catalog. I'm not selling these bootlegs, nor should you go out and look for them on your own. These are posts about what to AVOID buying. Go spend your money on real LEGO parts. You'll be glad you did.

--

Friday again? Already?
Well, that means it's time to get ready to be shocked and horrified by yet another cheap LEGO knock off.

Today's scum? A little piece of crap identified as Photo-Graph Car.

Zephyr Knight is back with another "Almost a legit LEGO set buy not quite" offering. This time, they've taken LEGO STUDIO theme and made a mockery of it.

The front of the box shows the LEGO Director mini-figure sitting on a mobile camera rig - filming plastic army men. No, really.

Here's a closer look. That's a plastic army man and jeep! They didn't even bother to keep the bootleg confined to a single brand.

The back of the box continues the goofiness. A part of "Series Transformation", the Photo-Graph Car changes shape ever so slightly to take on the challenges of war (I guess - the photo backround is to blurry to make anything out), auto-racing and dirt bikes. Well, mabe not auto-racing - maybe RC car racing. Either that, or our Director figure is meant to be roughly fifteen feet tall.

The side of the box has a strange bit of graphic design - the blue background is peeling like bad paint...only to reveal another completely blurred and unrecognizable photo.

Speaking of "blurred and unrecognizable" check out that text. The bootlegers have chose a font that makes it nearly impossible to guess what they've written on the side of the box.

Here's a larger than life-size view. I even ran it through a sharpen filter. My guess at the wording?

This product puts together to pack simple, the construction
is reasonable, the shape is novel, helps to educate to begin
to move the brain ability, expanding the visual field, not the is high school students friend the best to choose.

Clearly.

Here's the box top with the usual photos of other bootlegs in the series.

And the various warning labels on the bottom. Nothing we haven't seen before.

The contents of the box are also pretty standard...but check out those instructions!

They've just been wadded up and cramed into the box. "Neatness counts" has never been a bootlegger's motto, but this is just sad.

Here's the parts spread out. As usual the colors and decorations fail to match up with the illustrations. The wheels are again the single-piece hub and tire recast we've seen in other sets. The parts have "HELO" stamped on them in place of the LEGO brand name.

The instructions follow linear time for once - although they do show an extra brick in the camera assembly.

The parts went together okay - but the cheap plastic and casting resulted in the ugly (and sharp) crack in the camera mount shown here.

Here's the mini-figue. A big change from the STUDIO Director or Cameraman shown in the printed materials, eh? He looks like an albino terrorist to me. (Although why he'd want to terrorize albinos, I just don't know.)

Finally, a shot of the assembled Photo-Graph Car. Is it a simple documentary aide, or is it a weapon of mass destruction?

The answer is: C) None of the Above. This is a piece of crap bootleg.

But I bet you knew that by now.

----======-----
Once again, many thanks to Joe from The Undiscovered Playthings for sending me this set to review.

Space Skulls for $20

Don't know how long this will last, so you might want to act quickly...the "Space Skulls" factory set is on sale at the US LEGO.com for $20 - marked down from $100.


Click the pic to go to LEGO's page for the set.

I ordered a few just for parts, if nothing else.

Episode 657

Read the comic here.

No, that's not the same hatch Tony came out of. If you watch the previous strips, the cast walk around the front of the Owlship. Fox uses Tony's keys to open the passenger side door.

Although, now that I think about it, in both the movie and comic Nite Owl pilots the craft from the right hand seat. I wonder if that's due to the UK configuration of most cars - and the fact that both Alan Moore and Dave Gibbons are British. hmmmm.

Anyway, I'd already established that this is Tony Stark's take on the Owlship, so it's not too shocking he'd have adapted it for the more familiar "driver on the left" style of American vehicles.

Wow. I really am a geek, aren't I?

Episode 656

Read the comic here.

Episode 655

Read the comic here.

Staying true to the source material, Tony's a bit of a womanizer. Somehow I don't think Fox is going to put up with it, though.

Episode 654

Read the comic here.

Fan Art: Part Two

Another cool item in my mailbox this weekend:

Brian Wagner sent me a very Clever drawing....

What I like best about this one is that the cast looks very different from their LEGO incarnations, but are still clearly recognizable for who they are. Very cool!

A larger version is here.

Handtruck Challenge: Judging has begun!

The Handtruck Building Challenge '09 is over! I've posted the final batch of contestants to the Entry Grid.

We had a grand total of 36 models submitted - and now it's up to our judges to pick out the cream of the crop. Look for an announcement on that soon - along with news of our next big contest, which should also be starting soon!

Thanks to all who participated in this goofy little challenge.

Episode 653

Read the comic here.

Friday Fail: Ack-Ack

Every Friday at noon I showcase a real failure of a toy. And by "Failure" I mean "a cheap, crappy knockoff toy that should be destroyed before it infects humanity with some sort of degenerative disease".

But first: A reminder of some basic info. These posts are meant to showcase FAILURE, not to act as a catalog. I'm not selling these bootlegs, nor should you go out and look for them on your own. These are posts about what to AVOID buying. Go spend your money on real LEGO parts. You'll be glad you did.

--

Oh, this one is going to hurt.

LEGO has an established policy not to produce miltary-themed models. Sure, they come close with themes like "Dino Attack" and even "Agents", but so far they've avoided portraying actual military equipment.

Bootleggers aren't held to that standard of course. They can use their knock-off parts to build whatever they choose. Of course, being bootlegs, they're still going to fail. Case in point: Ack-Ack.

Yes. "Just imagine." Or read on, if you dare.


Ack-ack is part of the same bootleg company as Warrior - Xin Qi Le. Apparently a different assortment, though. Warrior has a "stock number" of 7138 - The Ack-Ack is a lowly 106.

While the box claims this can be counted among the "Intelligence Toys"- I somehow doubt it. No, this is thirty pieces of military-inspired FAIL - I mean, really - who's going to mount the firing switch for a rocket two inches from the rocket's exhaust? That's a good way to burn off your hands and arms. Hardly "intelligence" at work.

Still - the box art looks good, doesn't it? All those amry-green bricks, a solider mini-figure - even some badly blurred fighter-jet imagery in the background. Sure, the art suggests that the missles may actually be some sort of ground-to-air cannon - I can't come up with any other reason rocket exhaust would be coming from the top of the cones. But I won't hold that against them much.

In addition to being "Intelligence Toys", the Ack-Ack is ALSO part of the "Combinatorial Series"! (Not to be confused with the Zephyr Knights "Series Transformation" line - even if the art is nearly identical.)

On the package backing (above), you can see three different takes on the Ack-Ack. I know it's supposed to be a gun, but wow, does it look like some mis-managed rocketry to me. Particularly that last "drive the platform into the ground" nightmare on the lower right...

They sure do like that alternate model, though. Here it is on the side of the package. Note the background art of things blowing up. Nifty!

You know, the more I type "Ack-Ack" the more I hear the martian voices from the "Mars Attacks!" movie....

More explosions and another alternate model shot on this side. I love how the mini-figure isn't actually touching the controls - just sort of raching for them.

Here's somethig new. "Design is not stand for orignal product." Your guess as to the meaning is as good as mine.

Inside the box is the standard mix - a poly bag of parts and a crumpled instruction sheet.

Yes, they found thirty pieces to use. They just had to fully dismember the mini-figure and break apart the rotaing plate. But, hey, they did find 30 parts. Too bad they couldn't find any GREEN ones.... Sort of takes away from the military theme a bit, doesn't it?

The bricks all have the YIHE stamp on them.

The instructions, for once, make use of linear time. Amazing.

Here's a couple of shots of the included "Soldier". The head and torso have designs lifted directly from LEGO, as seen in the following images lifted from Bricklink.

Be sure to notice how the quality drops when you go from LEGO to bootleg - a single color spray-op doesn't match the glory of the original product, does it?

And speaking of a lack of glory...

...here's the completed toy. Oh, but how it sucks.

Yes, remember kids, nothing says military might like a banana yellow cannon.

Go ask your Dad. He'll back me up on this.

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Once again, many thanks to Joe from The Undiscovered Playthings for sending me this set to review.

Handtruck Challenge Ends Today!

This is it, gang! The Handtruck Building Challenge '09 ends today! I've posted the latest batch of contestants to the Entry Grid, but you have a few more hours to get your own builds in.

For a goofy little idea, this contest sure has spawned some impressive creations. We'll have to do some more "odd piece challenges" in the future.

Episode 652

Read the comic here.

I thought it might be fun to try a "twist" that gets the story back on track for a change.

Episode 651

Read the comic here.

Fan Art!

While I do get the occasional email from fans, no one had sent me any original art before. Until today, that is!

Check out this bit of cool sent in by The Boy Griffin:

Thanks, dude!

Episode 650

Read the comic here.

For those of you who don't recognize it, that's Nite Owl's Owlship from the Watchmen comic/movie.

I went and saw the film last night, actually. I enjoyed it quite a bit, but it's certainly not a kid's superhero movie. It earned every bit of it's "R" rating.

Handtruck Challenge: Final Days!

The Handtruck Building Challenge '09 is nearly over! I've posted three more entires to the Entry Grid, bringing the total to 24 MOCs at this point.

Remember, the deadline for entries is Friday the 13th! If you've been putting off finishing that build, best get to it! And don't wait until the last moment to send, either - I'd hate to see anyone disqualified for missing the deadline, y'know?

Episode 649

Read the comic here.

Yes, Donut did use the chili to bring Luka to the Brick House (however briefly). However, that was a magic/chili hybrid - Donut has used that knowledge to spice up his basic Chili recipe.

So this is really an all new application. Honest.

Episode 648

Read the comic here.

I thought about using a different photo for the "security footage" but realized using the actual strip 640 would be a) funnier and b) easier. I did have to spend some time playing with the "playback special effect", but I think it turned out nicely.

In-strip Wash is referring, of course, to the fact that he's lifted directly from the Whedon-verse. Not to mention the past in-strip appearances of Batman, Robin, Spider-Man Zombie, the entire cast of S-Team....

Star Wars sets

Just a heads up for you Star Wars fans out there -

First, the Twilight is on sale at shop.lego.com for 50% off in the US - not a bad deal, but still sort of pricey. (I ordered one anyway, though.)

Second, and perhaps cooler, I was at Target this morning as they were starting to set up their Easter displays. Look at what I found in the "random easter basket filler toys" section for about $3.75 each:

(click for larger view)

Pretty nifty.

Friday Fail: Thunder Charger

Every Friday at noon I showcase a real failure of a toy. And by "Failure" I mean "a cheap, crappy knockoff toy that should be destroyed before it infects humanity with some sort of degenerative disease".

But first: A reminder of some basic info. These posts are meant to showcase FAILURE, not to act as a catalog. I'm not selling these bootlegs, nor should you go out and look for them on your own. These are posts about what to AVOID buying. Go spend your money on real LEGO parts. You'll be glad you did.

--

After last week's fun with multiple mini-figures, I thought it best to remind you of the sets that don't even bother to add any sort of play value at all. Today we return to the BRICK line of fail. Yes, it's time to "sit and spin" - this time with the THUNDER CHARGER!

The front of the packaging reveals the usual details on this impulse-sized mini-set. A blurry background photo, lookalike logo, and low part count. I went looking for a LEGO brand mini-set that used the same helicopter build, but I couldn't find one that matched the sytlings of the Thunder Charger exactly. The use of the non-LEGO windshield may be a tip that we're looking at a Clone-of-a-Clone knockoff today. You know, sort of like a six year old trying to sell a crayon drawing of the Mona Lisa that he traced out of an art book as the original painting.

Yeah, that level of crappy.

Here's the back of the packaging. Remember when the "andgreat" typo was new and funny? Yeah, me neither.

Here's the side of the box - with the usual BRICK "side of the box" poorly translated English.

chariots without rival
many colr a lot,
selected freely by you

Here's a puzzler for you. What does the red arrow in the picture above represent? ]

On the other LEGO bootlegs we've looked at on the Friday Fail, we've seen the arrow point out a "transformation" or some kind - a small rebuild to an alternate model if we're lucky. But here...what are we supposed to notice? That the Thunder Charger has flown over to another bit of crappy, out of focus clip art?

Color me amazed.

For the sake of completeness (and for those of you who haven't checked the archives for the other BRICK bootlegs yet, here's the text from the top of the packaging...

Most New Catena
Completly New To Come In To The Market
More New Items Available

It just occured to me that the strange light-blue dots in the background are supposed to be the studs on top of the bricks. Wow. That's creative.

Finally, here's the warnings printed on the bottom of the box. Shocking, I know.

Looking inside, we see the expected items - a poly bag of parts and a small instruction sheet.

Once again, the BRICK people have created an instruction sheet that managed to avoid the whole concept of "linear time". Or maybe they're just using an alternate number system where the order goes 1 - 4 - 2 - (3 and 5 at the same time) - 6

Here's an unexpected twist. The colors of the bricks match the colors on the package. This is a first for the BRICK line. The bricks themselves are tagged with "HOLI" and "YIHE" stamps.

The front of the package promised 19 parts - I'm only counting 18. Of course, the black rotator-brick came assembled instead of as the two component parts - that's probably where the extra part got to.

And here it is - the completed "Thunder Charger". It's not a bad model, but neither is it a particuarly good one.

No, I take that back. It is a bad model. A naughty, evil, and bankrupt model.

A thing to be destroyed, or at the very least tossed into the trash as soon as possible. That's my plan, anyway.

---======-----
As always, many thanks to Joe from The Undiscovered Playthings for sending me this set to review.

Episode 647

Read the comic here.

I'm traveling for work again, and away from my computers at the moment.

So, as a warning, the strip is only half-published. You can read it direct from here, but it won't be linked in the archives (or as the "latest strip") until later tonight.

Episode 646

Read the comic here.

Handtruck Challenge: Entry Grid Update

The Handtruck Building Challenge '09 is in that slow stretch between the early builders and those who are waiting to surprise everyone in the last couple of days. Still, we had two more amazing entries - go check them out on the Entry Grid!

Episode 645

Read the comic here.

Episode 644

Read the comic here.

Episode 643

Read the comic here.

Episode 642

Read the comic here.

Hope you enjoyed your weekend strips- we go back to a M-F schedule again now that Ive caught up.