The LEGO Ninjago Movie Ninjago City (70620) Review

Traditionally, the largest LEGO sets in terms of piece counts have been taken over by LEGO Star Wars and LEGO Creator sets but there’s a new The LEGO Ninjago Movie set that has joined the list with Ninjago City (70620). Coming in at 4,867 pieces and retailing at $299.99, it has now currently become the third largest LEGO that LEGO has produced.

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Instruction Booklets

The instructions are separated into three booklets which represent the three levels of Ninjago City. The first book lets you build The Old World, while the second book creates The Street, and the last book assembles The High-Rise.

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Stickers

There are a whopping 56 stickers that are split into two medium sized sheets used for this set. There are actually 55 stickers as there is no sticker for #36. Nevertheless, I feel that each of them are somewhat essential and adds a lot more detail although printed pieces would be more optimal. There are lots of references to other LEGO themes with these stickers. Here’s a list of the stickers and what some of them mean.

1. Spells out ARSO (as well as upside down) in the Bionicle Okoto language
2. Dragon Power sign
3. JB Robotics
4. All City references LEGO City
5. Logo for LEGO Island Xtreme Stunts theme
6. Logo for Rocket Racer which was the final boss in the LEGO Racers video game series.
7. Trilobyte sign
8. Spells out Danger
9. Spells out Sushi
10. Sushi restaurant menu with prices
11. S sign
12. Squid Sushi
13. Spells out Hi Tech
14. Crab Sushi
15. Blueprint for Sweeps
16. Fish Sushi
17. Radio tower sign which is the aliens logo used in LEGO Alien Conquest
18. Spells out Play Well
19. Pattern on wall
20. Sale sign
21. Radio tower sign which is the Glatorian logo from LEGO Bionicle
22. Pattern on wall
23. Keypad
24. Borg Industries (LEGO Ninjago TV series)
25. Rice & Shine”
26. M-Tron logo
27. Unikitty card
28. LEGO Ninjago Head Spin card
29. LEGO Orient Expedition Trading card
30. LEGO Ninjago Panic Stations card
31. LEGO Ninjago Lloyd card
32. LEGO Rock Raiders card
33. LEGO Fabuland card
34. LEGO Legends of Chima card
35. Comics sign
36. No sticker
37. Return of the Brick Separator 2 movie poster. The first movie was in the Palace Cinema.
38. CR – Crab Restaurant
39. Good Day Ninjago TV screen
40. Shadow of Ronin Ninjago. References the rel LEGO Ninjago Shadow of Ronin video game.
41. LEGO Galidor movie poster
43. Believe! cat poster from The LEGO Movie
44. Garmadon family photo
45. Ed. He kind of resembles Bruce Lee.
46. Film sign
47. Spells Đorđe which is a Serbian name for George in English and is one of the names of the designer for this set.
48. Film sign
49. Bank sign
50. ATM screen
51. Tired of Walking? Cars 40,000 ad
52. Chic Geisha poster
53. Dity sign used on the bridge. There’s also a Makuta logo for the LEGO Bionicle Mata Nui Online Game.
54. MMAP sign
55. Dity sign used on the bridge. There’s also a Ussal Crab logo for the LEGO Bionicle Mata Nui Online Game.
56. Visting Bricksburg sign

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Minifigures

Technically, LEGO has included 16 minifigures but there’s also a sweep robot and couple of mannequins so I would add three more to the number. The minifigures are divided evenly among the levels of Ninjago City. The first level includes Kai, Jamanakai Villager, Sally, Ivy Walker, Sweep, Konrad. The second has Severin Black, Mother Doomsday, Tommy, Guy, and Juno while the final level has Lloyd Garmadon, the Green Ninja Suit, Misako, Jay, Officer Noonan, and the Shark Army Gunner.

Kai has a new red school outfit that would look good as a City outfit. The torso shows him with a jacket that goes over a white shirt. He has a double-sided head with a stern expression on one side and a smile on the other. The brown hairpiece is new that was introduced in TLNM sets. Kai’s accessory is a croissant.

The Jamanakai Villager is an older resident that wears a tan outfit with blue pants. He has a stern expression on his face which also shows him with mutton chops. He wears a pannier that goes between the head and torso which carries a frog. A tan straw hat and a cane finishes his look.

Sally is a young girl that wears a dark blue robe with some dirt spots all over. Her face is a simple smiling one with some freckles. Her accessory is a green frog that she got from the Jamanakai Villager.

Ivy Walker is another resident and she wears a nice looking outfit that looks like a qipao. It’s white with some green bird designs and a green and red stitching. The bottom part of the dress goes down to the legs as well. She has a double-sided head with a sincere look on one side and a scared look on the other. Her accessory is a diamond gem.

Konrad is a fisherman and he wears a generic blue robe outfit. He has a neck bracket piece that holds his straw hat. His face shows him with a beard and he has Luke’s hair piece. His accessories include a spear and a fish.

Severin Black is the head chef of the Crab Kitchen. He has a dark red robe that has a crab design on the front as well as more on the back. There’s also printing of a dirty apron that goes down to the legs. His face printing shows him with a handlebar moustache. Finally he wears a white chef’s hat.

Mother Doomsday runs Doomsday Comix and he has similarities to the Comic Book Guy from the Simpsons. He seems to be a Galidor fan as he wears a themed sand-blue shirt. He has a full beard on his face and has a little ponytail.

Tommy is a fan of the Green Ninja and he’s seen wearing a shirt featuring Lloyd. There’s also some letters that spell out Nemanja which is another Serbian name and is based of the designer’s son. He has a double-sided head which we’ve seen before in other sets. His hair is the long wavy one.

Guy is the rich executive who wears some high end clothing which is represented by the flamboyant pink designer shirt and silver shades. To flaunt a little more, his accessories include a couple of printed money tiles.

Juno is a fashion designer and she wears a purple floral blouse with a huge bow in the back. She has a double-sided head with one side having on sunglasses and the other side being a normal happy expression. Her accessory is an umbrella.

Lloyd Garmadon is the same minifigure as in the Ninjago City Chase (70607) in which he has a green hoodie with dark green pants. He has a double-sided head with green eyes and smiles on both sides.

The Green Ninja Suit we’ve also seen before in previous sets. The only thing different with this one is that it has a trans-black head piece to substitute with Lloyd’s head for when he changes into the suit.

Misako is Lloyd’s mom and she wears a green jacket over a light blue shirt and brown pants. She has a smiliing expression on one side of her head and a cute winking expression on the other. She has a new orange hair piece that has some red chopsticks going through it.

Jay also appears in this set and he’s in his blue ninja outfit. He has a double-sided head with a angry look on one side and a nervous smile on the other. His accessory is a kusarigama.

Officer Noonan is a public servant of Ninjago City. She has what appears to be a new police torso with printing of a radio. If you look closely, there’s also printing of the Super Secret Police insignia which is from The LEGO Movie. Her face printing shows her with some sunglasses and lipstick. Her accessory is a megaphone.

Finally, we have a Shark Army Gunner. He is the exact same minifigure as in the Manta Ray Bomber (70609) with the only difference is that he has a fish flame as an accessory.

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Build

Level 1 – The Old World

As I mentioned before, Ninjago City is and can be separated into three different levels with a lot of details in each. Book 1 starts on the Old City and the whole set sits on top of a dark gray 32×32 baseplate. The first set of bags lets you create a create a stable base of what’s to come. It makes a substantial use of wedge plates of give the layout.

The next set of bags is used mainly for the water and there are two bags that are just filled with trans-light blue 1×2 tiles. In total, there are 219 water tiles used which doesn’t look like it but they’re all there. This is a very tedious part of the build but is very satisfying once it is completed. We’ve only started with the set but I’m impressed with what I’m seeing already.

The third set of bags doesn’t really give any interesting details but after the fourth set of bags, we finally have our first structure. There’s a small storage and repair facility for the Sweep maintenance robot but the most detail is on the outside of the building. There are some new 2×2 half tile pieces used in combination with some cheese slopes that are used for the siding. In front of Sweep’s room is a small dock made from 1×1 beam cylinders and some Technic parts.

There’s also a bridge that goes over the canal which the build continues over to the fifth bags. There are some sloped pieces used to show a small rock formation that the bridge builds upon. The designers also used some gray neck brackets for some detailing on the front side of the bridge. Underneath the brigde in the canal, are a couple of new green artist palette pieces used as lily pads.

Also attached to the back side of the bridge is the start of the elevator that goes all the way to the top of Ninjago City. It uses some toothed bar pieces to hold it in place.

Between the bridge and Sweep’s room is a fish market. There’s an interesting use of some black crowbars that attaches to a Technic flex tube used for the market’s awning. On the back side is a box filled with some fish. The front of the building has a telephone as well as a sign on the left and on the side of the building. Above the market is a little place for a tea ceremony.

Finally, there’s a little boat that Konrad rides to catch some fish and crabs. It’s basically a wooden boat with a small cabin in the back.

Level 2 – The Streets

The next level for Ninjago City is the Streets where some of the affordable shops and restaurants are at. The first shop and largest shop that we see on this level is the Crab Kitchen. It sits promiently on the corner and its main color scheme is red and black. Above the door is a brick-built crab looks really nice as the restaurant logo. One of the more interesting techniques is putting some 1×1 trans-orange round tiles inside the 1x2x5 trans-clear column piece for some wall decoration. If you have OCD like me, you had to get them to go to the right angle in the right orientation of the tiles.

On the inside of the restaurant, the main play feature is the grill that you can turn using the crank on the outside. There are two crabs inside the grill, one tan one for uncooked and one a flame-orange one for the cooked one. This is actually a simple yet well done feature.

To the right of the Crab Kitchen is a working ATM that has 13 1×2 printed money tiles inside. You can push out some money using the lever on the back side that isn’t intrusive and it works great.

Next to the ATM is the comic store and one of my favorite stores of Ninjago City. The first thing you see is the large Comics sign that is intricately built using a combination of plates, tiles, and bricks. There are some 1×1 printed plates that are used for the i and the s. The result looks great and is actually legible considering how small the lettering is.

Inside the Comics store itself, there are a number of stickered tiles as trading cards on the racks. On the back wall is a few copies of the Starfarer which was first seen in the LEGO Ninjago Character Encyclopedia: Updated and Expanded. Finally on the last wall are a couple of microfigures that represent action figures. One funny thing in the store is the Believe! cat poster from The LEGO Movie that hangs on the wall.

On the opposite end of level is the second level of the elevator. On the front side is a spot for some movie posters that you can switch out with ease. The rest of the posters are able to slide behind the wall to keep them out of the way.

Above the Crab Kitchen is a high-end boutique shop that sells a variety of items including smartphones, hats, clothes, and hats. A couple of mannequins There’s also a little M-Tron sign there for some reason. The shop has a curved layout so there’s a new trans-clear window piece that is utilized.

Across the walkway from the boutique shop is a small enclosure where a cherry blossom tree grows out of. It uses a very simple but effective way to create the tree branch. It uses some white, pink, and dark pink pieces to make the cherry blossom look.

Level 3 – The High-Rise

For the third level, the main thing we see here is the rooftop sushi restaurant. It’s actually one of more popular gimmicky conveyor belt sushi restaurants. The conveyor is made up of 1×2 Technic beams and pins which works fairly well and can be turned using the dial in the middle. At the end of conveyor is a little station for the sushi chef. The restaurant is so exclusive that there’s only three tables and three counter seats for patrons. To advertise the restaurant, there is a brick-built puffer fish and squid at the side of the roof.

Next to the restaurant is Lloyd and his mom’s apartment. The room is rather small and it has some bunk beds. There are also shelves filled with a number of books and some toys on the top. One little secret that Lloyd has is the hidden space for his green ninja suit which can be attached to the top of the roof.

Finally, we have the center tower which includes a bathroom at the lower part. This area can be removed to reveal a secret area to hold a chef’s hat and moustache. I wonder who’s costume this could be.

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Results

The LEGO Ninjago Movie Ninjago City (70620) is absolutely huge. I don’t have any buildings to compare it to but I can confidently say this is easiest the largest building I have. It’s hard to scale the set as you have to see it in person to appreciate its size. What’s nice about Ninjago City is that it has some Technic pin connectors to attach to existing modular sets which is what I’ve heard rumors of even before the set was announced.

The three levels are jam packed with details and play features that both kids and adults can enjoy. When I first saw the images of the set, I immediately felt that it had a cyberpunk feel to it and it shows just that. Although this is a Ninjago set, you wouldn’t think that it is considering that there are only two ninja minifigures in the set and one of those two is just a suit.

If you think that the $299.99 price point may be a little expensive, the price per piece is only at $0.06 as it does have an astonishing 4,867 pieces. There is a plethora of new parts that are in Ninjago City that could be implemented in custom builds but I think they look just fine as is.

Design: 5
Playability: 5
Value: 5

Check out my reviews of some other The LEGO Ninjago Movie sets:

Ice Tank Polybag (30427)
Spinjitzu Training Dojo (70606)
Ninjago City Chase (70607)
Master Falls (70608)
Manta Ray Bomber (70609)
Green Ninja Mech Dragon (70612)
Garma Mecha Man (70613)
Ice Tank (70616)

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Thank you to LEGO AFOL Relations & Programs (ARP) team for sending in this set for me to review. The content above represents my own opinion and not the company. Review sets sent in does not guarantee a positive review.