The Brick Connection– A novice Lego fan explores the great brick world of LEGO

Hey everyone! 

Guess what? I built a LEGO set!!

My first real LEGO build since beginning my LEGO fandom four months ago.

Here is my review. An actual review. Not a review of someone else’s review…

Rey’s Speeder, a set from Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens

So the reviews I saw about this set before getting it were all pretty positive. Now allow me to add another positive review to the mix.

The build was fun. Granted I have nothing to compare this build to, but I never got bored, so that means it’s fun….right?

I'll talk about price first. I didn’t have to pay for this with my own money, so the price didn’t really matter to me. But, as someone who is very cautious with their money I think this is a good thing to talk about. Retailing for $19.99 with a total of 193 pieces, this set averages 10.4 cents per piece. Which is perfect because in this 2014 article I read about the cost of LEGO, it was determined that among all LEGO sets you will pay on average, 10.4 cents per piece. So Rey's Speeder appears to be selling at a price point that you would expect for a LEGO set this size.

When comparing it to the six other new Star Wars sets though, Rey’s Speeder is an even better deal. Five of the sets cost more than 11 cents per piece. The First Order Special Force TIE Fighter costs a whopping 13.5 cents per piece. The best bang for your buck of the new Star Wars sets though is the First Order Snowspeeder, which only costs 9 cents per piece.

So to sum up, if you can only afford one or two of the Star Wars sets, one of them should be Rey’s Speeder.

Price Rating: 5/5 stars

The build:

Like I said, the build was “fun.” Whatever that means. As a newbie, I appreciated the simplicity of it. I also appreciate that LEGO divided the pieces up into two different bags. You started building with pieces from bag one and once you were done with those you could open bag two. I’m guessing they separate pieces into multiple bags for all of their sets, particularly the really big ones. It means I didn’t have to spend much time finding each piece that I needed.

It only took me about 45 minutes to complete the build. I found that a little shocking. That’s the same amount of time that it took for some of the people that reviewed the set on LEGO’s website. There were also some people who claimed it took them 25 minutes and a couple people supposedly did it faster than that. So I guess 45 minutes seems about right for me.

The great thing is that I didn’t make any mistakes along the way that I had to go back and correct. The only incident I had was when building the doors. The instructions showed you how to build one door, but I missed the part where it showed a picture of the door and said “2x”, meaning you’re building two.

Hey, I’m new. My bad!

Of course I figured out that I was building two doors anyway, but I thought the doors would be symmetrical. So if a burnt orange piece was on the top part of the door, then it would be the same on the other door. But after closely examining the pictures in my instruction booklet, I figured out that that was not the case. The burnt orange piece was on the top of one door and the bottom of the other door.

Fascinating, right?

Other than that, the build went very smoothly. I don’t really have much else to add about it. The stickers weren’t too bad. I believe there about 8 of them and I didn’t have trouble applying them correctly. From my research about LEGO I know that no one likes stickers, but in this case I think they all look good and add cool detail to the set.

I will give props to LEGO for their perfectly detailed instruction booklet. Again, I have no other LEGO set instructions to compare it with, but it’s certainly better than following instructions for putting together a bookshelf you bought from Target. Plus, the nice thing about LEGO is that they don’t have to worry about different translations for the instructions. Because there are no words!

Build Rating: 5/5 Stars

The look/playability:

This set is really cool looking. Yes, I know I’m new to LEGO, so everything LEGO seems cool to me. But I’m glad I haven’t become cynical about LEGO yet. I like seeing everything through my LEGO transparent red-colored glasses. I like that I’m not complaining about weird BURPs, slight color changes, or silly play features. I’m still pure at heart when it comes to LEGO. I still think that their genius is something that can never be matched, by me or anyone else, especially those ridiculous clone companies.

If I can offer one piece of advice for LEGO fans it's this: Try to never lose that sense of innocence, that sense of infinite wonderment, that feeling of unbridled joy when you complete another LEGO build.

And if you think that sounds naïve and childish….well it is a children’s toy, jackass!

But anyway, my review. That’s what you’re here for…

I love the minifigures. Okay, really I just love Rey. Unkar’s Thug is alright I guess. But back to Rey. She is so cool. I love her headpiece, her hair, and her accessories. I’m also just really excited about the character Rey in general in the Star Wars universe, but I think LEGO did a good job capturing her awesomeness in this minifigure. She comes with many accessories including a staff, a buzzsaw, binoculars, and a blaster/gun thingy.

As for the vehicle itself, I like that there are not a lot of studs showing. Yes, this is LEGO, so seeing the legendary studs shouldn’t be a big deal, but I like that after all that building I did, it looks like one cohesive toy. Like the manufacturer built it as one piece and I just took it out of its box.

The engine is cool-looking with the transparent blue pieces on the back. 

The stud shooters look good on either side in the front. They’re there, but they’re not out of place. They blend in. I know LEGO just likes to add stud shooters to all these Star Wars sets even if they don’t actually exist on the vehicles in the films so I’m glad they made these shooters work with the rest of the speeder’s look.

The grills look really nice. They somehow make the set look more realistic. 

The three pieces on the bottom of the vehicle (sorry I don’t know the names of the pieces), give the vehicle a cool hover look when it’s sitting on a flat surface. This of course is good because the vehicle hovers above the ground in the film.

Rey has a nice little seat to pilot the vehicle with two controllers that will sit nicely in her minifigure hands. Inside the vehicle is a storage container that fits perfectly in the vehicle, but can’t really hold anything. I got 5 of the “shooters” or red studs to fit in there, but that’s it. Since the doors open on either side, the box can easily fall out, so make sure you only fly your vehicle with the doors shut.

I love the color of the vehicle, a maroon hue, with the little orange highlights. Obviously it’s based off the color of the vehicle in the movie, but I think it’s just a nice color in general. Potentially a good color to have handy if I ever end up using the pieces from this set to build my own creation some day.

And as for the playability; I give it a gazillion stars! Such a fun set to play with! Building a castle or house is nice and all, but they just sit there. Rey’s Speeder can be flown around and shoot at things, or just sit contently “hovering” when not being used. The set has been sitting next to me at my desk the last couple days since I built it and I can’t stop picking it up and messing with it. The doors can be opened when twisting the bottom engine to either side. For someone who probably has slight OCD and is probably ADD, this toy has been a horrible and wonderful distraction for me. I could twist that engine back and forth all day.

The Look/Playability rating: 5/5 stars

Overall Set rating: 5/5 stars

So in conclusion, buy this set! I don’t think anyone would regret it. It’s a great price and great fun.

BONUS Review!

Do you want to hear more about Rey’s Speeder? Check out the latest episode of my vlog, Behind the BrickWarriors Mask, in which you get to see me build the set and talk even more about my opinion of this awesome LEGO Star Wars set:

That's all from me this week. I hope you enjoyed my first LEGO review. I hope to do much more of this in the future. 

Until next time...go watch that new Star Wars trailer a hundred more times! 57 days to go!!

*Compliments, general feedback, and constructive criticism are welcome. Any haters that are gonna hate, hate, hate, hate, hate can go step on some Lego with their bare feet.*