80107 Spring Lantern Festival is a celebration of Chinese culture in a set that is beautiful and a great build. It also features a light brick placed inside an Ox statue in such a way that the button becomes the Ox’s butthole.
Now, I’ll get in to the rest of the set (spoilers – it’s great) but I really want to start with the butthole. Mostly because I’m immature.
Let’s take a minute and think about the internal approval processes the designer of this set – Justin Ramsden – probably had to go through. At each stage I wonder, did they miss the butthole? Were they all in on it?
Look at this!
Lately I have been trying to frame my reviews around the question “should you buy it?” and the answer here is yes. You should buy it. Why? Because the butthole light brick is genius. Genius deserves to be rewarded.
Alright, I’m guessing you probably also want to know about the rest of the set?
The Spring Lantern festival is built to modular standard sizing. By this I mean built on 16×32 or 32×32 baseplates with specifically placed technic bricks for connection. Here you get both a 16×32 and a 32×32 baseplate, making this overall footprint bigger than it might seem from pictures.
The larger plate features the majority of the park. Borrowing technique from Ninjago City the set features a beautifully done pond. The layered plates and tiles add depth and realism. I really like the border of brown around the outside of lake rather than going straight from the grass to the water.
The real standout of the pond is the printed koi tiles. They’re just pretty.
Over the lake there is a nicely designed bridge which is positioned diagonally. It’s always great to have things build at unique angles rather than just straight up and down.
In one corner of the park you’ll find the aforementioned ox placed on a raised platform.
Framing the park is some ornate fencing with lanterns hanging for decoration.
The star of the second baseplate is clearly the pavilion. Before getting in to the pavilion itself there is some great landscaping to be built, specifically a raised rocky area. Rock work can be tricky to pull of well but I think this looks good. I think it helps that the goal wasn’t a big mountain or rocky cliff-face, but just a little elevation for the pavilion.
The pavilion itself is an octagonal shape which makes the build a lot more interesting.
My only complaint with the pavilion would be that I found the roof a little bit flimsy. Between the 6 sections of roof there are beams that clip in to a central ring. I kept bumping them and they’d fall off.
You can’t celebrate Chinese New Year without people. This set features 8 minifigures, technically. One of the 8 is meant to represent a lantern rather than a person.
The 7 “people” minifigures that you do get are all extremely detailed. There are some great unique prints. Each of the 7 main minifigures also comes with an accessory to add to their personality. I love the guy stuffing his face with dumplings.
Overall this is an absolutely beautiful set that looks great on display. I told you to buy it just on the butthole light brick alone but if that didn’t convince you then the quality of the rest of the set should put this beyond any doubt as a must have.
This set is, at the time of publication, out of stock on LEGO’s online store but you can pick it up from Myer Online. Hopefully it’ll be on sale from Myer soon.
This set was provided to me by LEGO. Opinions are my own. They certainly didn’t tell me to focus on the butthole.
Full Gallery
I initially wasn’t going to bother with this set, but now I want to buy just because of that butthole. Immaturity is fun!
This is a good set this year with reasonable selling price!
Off topic, where did you get that cool font you used in the first picture to write “and the ox’s butthole” thx