One of the more popular LEGO reveals this year was for the announcement of the LEGO Ideas The Beatles Yellow Submarine (21306). The set is by Kevin Szeto’s project that hit 10,000 supporters almost one year to the day. The set is based on the 1968 musical animated film that featured a number of the songs from the Beatles. As we know by now, the Beatles were one of the most influential bands in music history.
The Yellow Submarine (21306) consists of 550 pieces and retails for $59.99/£49.99/€59.99 which is somewhat of a decent price point for a licensed set.
Box & Instructions
The first thing you’ll notice when looking at the set is the colorful box which is reminiscent of the psychedelic visuals from the film. The contents of the box include five numbered bags and the instruction booklet. Like with all previous LEGO Ideas sets, the instructions give some information about the movie as well as details about Kevin and the designer of the set, Justin Ramsden.
Minifigures
There are four minifigures which obviously are the four members of the Beatles as well as Jeremy Hillary Boob.
John Lennon has a mostly black torso with some flower pattern along the collar area and going down the chest. The legs are purple and lavendar with some red and yellow stripes on the sides. He has a double-sided head that shows of his glasses and moustache. The other side of his head shows off his two front teeth. His accessory is a pearl gold telescope.
Paul McCartney has a purple jacket with lavendar arms. The thing that stands out for Paul is the large red and yellow kipper tie. The legs have more of the printing for the jacket. The rest of the leg is tan and dark tan. Paul also has a double-sided head with a stoic look on one side and the other shows off his front teeth as well. His accessory is a printed 1×2 tile with the word “Love” on it.
George Harrison has a brown jacket with off-centered buttons with some green on the collar while the legs are plain black. For his head, I do like his full goatee. His hairpiece is actually the black version of the LEGO Star Wars Sabine Wren’s hair. His accessory according to Shop@Home’s description is a submarine motor and some other recreational object that people may think of.
Ringo Starr has on a red and blue striped jacket with a lavendar and orange kipper tie. The legs are gray with red and yellow stripes going down the sides. The hairpiece is in black for the first time as it was previously used for the older Ron Weasley minifigures in LEGO Harry Potter sets but in orange aka ginger. His accessory is a black round 2×2 tile representing “half a hole.”
Finally, we have the Jeremy Hillary Boob figure which uses the Scurrier body mold from the LEGO Nexo Knights theme. The printing on him is spot on with him having a blue face with red lips and pink ears. There’s also a pink light bulb to represent his tail.
Build
The first thing you build is the minifigure stand for The Beatles. It basicially uses the Collectible Minifigure stand plates in gray which is a fairly rare part. There’s also the printed Yellow Submarine tile in the center.
The Yellow Submarine build is pretty standard with you start creating the hull of the ship. There is a pretty good mixture of yellow and bright orange 1×2 inverted curved slopes to fill out the shape.
Continuing on with the build, there are plenty of printed parts used for the controls of the submarine. For those who dabble with steampunk-type builds, these parts may be of use for you including the 2×2 round tile of a clock and the 2×4 tiles with pipe and guage designs.
The last part of the submarine build is the removable upper area which is mostly white. The thing that stands out here is the 1x4x3 printed panels on each side of the ship. There are also four rotating periscopes which use the recently redesigned macaroni tubes that come in orange and yellow. There’s also a clever use of sausage pieces for the rails.
The interior is able to fit all four Beatles minifigures snugly while the back part of the sub can store their accessories even with the removable top on.
Finally, there is the stand for the Yellow Submarine which consists of mainly white circle and quarter-circle plates with some round 2×2 trans-clear bricks to prop up the sub.
Results
Overall, the LEGO Ideas The Beatles Yellow Submarine (21306) pretty much captures what was seen in the animated film and has brought it to physical form. The sub itself has a decent size to it along with the weight which makes it a great display piece. The colors are bright as it should be with the time period of the source material. The minifigures of the four Beatles as well as Jeremy are pretty accurate and are easily recognizable.
The actual build itself was very enjoyable and not as repetitive as I thought. The various colored bricks that are eventually covered up is part of what made the submarine fun to build. What’s even better is that there are only printed pieces and no stickers whatsoever.
The set itself was an interesting choice as one of the winners of the Third 2015 Review Stage as I didn’t think that the younger generation of LEGO fans would be interested in it. As evident of my visit to the LEGO Store this morning and chatting with the people waiting for the store to open, the set was actually a purchase for the adults themselves. The target audience is still questionable and only LEGO knows who they are marketing the set to.
Nevertheless, the LEGO Ideas The Beatles Yellow Submarine (21306) is now available for purchase on Shop@Home and on Amazon for $59.99. I have an inkling that it’ll be pretty popular especially with the holiday season just right around the corner. I’m already hearing that some stores have already sold out of their initial stock but will be getting more.
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