At the heart of every magical Disney story is an iconic cast of characters. From Mickey Mouse to Buzz Lightyear, these much-loved characters often have one thing in common – a villainous antagonist. For every good guy, there is a bad one waiting to thwart their plans or make their life a misery. As Disney celebrates 100 years of wonder, this special moment couldn’t really go by without mentioning some of the most iconic Disney Villains. Often these bad apples are almost as recognisable as the good guys and they have provided the inspiration for one of the most unique of the Disney 100 LEGO sets. Here’s an early peek at the Disney 100 Villain Icons set.
Product Details
Showcase your passion for all things related to Disney Villains with this LEGO® ǀ Disney Villain Icons (43227) set for adults. This detailed collectible set features 2 brick-built VHS cases referencing Disney’s Aladdin and Sleeping Beauty, a VHS ‘tape’ of The Little Mermaid, a book representing Beauty and the Beast, a Queen of Hearts playing card for Alice in Wonderland, a ‘poison’ apple for Snow White and a pocket watch representing Captain Hook from Peter Pan. The set also features several hidden features and functions and makes a nostalgic bookend on a shelf.
- Set Name: Villain Icons
- Set Number: 43227
- Theme: Disney
- Pieces: 1540
- RRP: £124.99/$129.99/139.99€
- Number of Bags: Bags x 10
- Stickers: Sheet x 2
- Minifigures: Maleficent, Evil Queen, Gaston and Jafar Genie
- Instructions: Booklet x 1
- Availability: LEGO Stores & LEGO Online from June 1st
The build is split across 13 bags and includes two sticker sheets, as well as a few printed elements. As a showpiece set, the instructions include a few pages dedicated to the designers of the set and a little history behind its creation. These are always a nice touch to have and help make the set feel a little more special even though the booklet’s cover is boringly plain.
The set is billed as a celebration of Disney Villains but it’s also a celebration of Disney fandom in general. The concept is a selection of brick-built items. They are all 1:1 recreations of the items they represent. It’s similar to the recent Hogwarts Icons set, so offers a unique display piece rather than a playset. Although you will find a few secrets built into the set, including some minifigures, more on those later.
The collections of items are connected to each of the stories the villains appear in. As many Disney stories are inspired by classic fairytales, three of those items are storybooks. Both the Aladdin and Sleeping Beauty books have similar designs. Each book features a brick-built design inspired by the story’s villain, these also happen to signify where you can open the books to locate hidden surprises. These two books are decorated with a mix of printed pieces and stickers. So there are two 2×4 printed tiles featuring the Disney 100 logo. Whereas the title and character plates are all stickers. Due to the Sleeping Beauty book having its full front cover on show, this also includes a larger oval plate but it’s printed.
Beauty and the Beast is also represented by a book, but it’s a different style to those mentioned above. It also uses a trio of stickers to add detail to the spine of the book, but it also hides two hidden surprises. One is a draw in the spine of the book and the other is the iconic red rose which is mounted to a flip-up section inside the top of the book.
One of the best and most interesting sections to build is based on more modern media. Before streaming and even DVDs, fans could enjoy their favourite Disney classics on video cassettes or VHS. The Little Mermaid became one of the most popular Disney VHS releases and it’s represented by a clever recreation of a video cassette tape. Just like the other aspects of the set, this features some really unique build techniques to truly capture the appearance of a VHS tape. It even includes the ‘reel’ of film tape shown through to windows on the front of the cassette and a flip-down strip which reveals six film cells showing scenes from the animated The Little Mermaid film. This is a cute little touch and adds to the overall charm of the set.
All of those elements shown above link together to create the bulk of the set, but it’s also adorned by extra items which are built separately and can be added to the pile of books. These are also 1:1 recreations of real items and they include a poisoned apple, which is a red apple, splashed with green poison. There’s a Queen of Hearts playing card to represent the same character from Alice in Wonderland and a Hook’s pocket watch from Peter Pan. This features a nice printed watch face and a DOTS-like hook hand on the back, with a DOTS bag tag ring connector for the watch’s bow.
Although the set celebrates various Disney villains and their respective franchises, there are only four characters featured in the set in minifigure-form. These include the disguised Evil Queen from Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Maleficent from Sleeping Beauty. Along with Jafar in his genie form from Aladdin and the one guy in town who’s got all of it down, Gaston from Beauty and the Beast. Apart from Maleficent, who was featured in the first series Disney minifigure series, the minifigures are all-new. With Maleficent featuring new print detail.
Each minifigure is hidden within the set, so the Evil Queen lurks within the poisoned apple. Gaston can be found flexing his ego inside a pull-out draw found in the spine of the Beauty and the Beast book. Genie Jafar is trapped within the cover of the Aladdin book and Maleficent is also found within the book. They are all easy to retrieve apart from Maleficent as there isn’t anything to grip onto in order to pull down the flap. I also advise making sure the Evil Queen’s arms are pushed back a little more so the ‘lid’ of the apple doesn’t sit flush with the rest of the apple.
Overall
It’s a deceptively complex build, with each section of the set packed with a surprising amount of elements. Sometimes it feels unnecessarily complex, but every element is required to help craft the items and achieve the level of detail they all contain, simple things like the tape on the video or the pages of the books. The minifigures are merely an added bonus, each hidden within different sections of the set instead of forming part of the display piece. I appreciate that all of them offer something new, including three completely new characters or variants of characters featured in the set. In fact, in almost a shame they are just hidden away and don’t have a little display stand to show them off on. But the main thing, ironically, is not to judge a book by its cover. It may seem like a simple set but there are plenty of interesting build techniques deployed throughout the set and it’s genuinely fun to build, especially as you see what your creating eventually becomes.
Coming Soon: UKIrelandUSCanadaGermanyDenmarkAustraliaNew Zealand
31st May 2023
Oh boy! Fabulous stuff