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Set Review: 76025 Green Lantern vs Sinestro
 Tuesday, December 30th, 2014 at 5:10pm by Jason, BZPower ReporterOne of the most anticipated sets from the LEGO DC Super Heroes theme is 76025 Green Lantern vs. Sinestro. It includes Green Lantern and Space Batman against Sinestro, as well as a striking green ship. Is this set worth the hype? Read or watch BZPower Reporter Xccj's review to find out. First a quick bit of history. When the revival of the DC Batman / Super Heroes theme was announced at Comic Con in 2011, it was accompanied by the giveaway of a promotional Green Lantern fig. Since the other promotional fig was Batman, we all expected to see Green Lantern in an upcoming set. But while he appeared as a Constraction figure, there were no minifigure versions of him for the first few years. It was all the worse when fans were teased by Green Lantern's appearance in The LEGO Movie. But 2015 is starting off by giving us him as a mass-produced fig, so the long wait is finally over for many LEGO DC Collectors. Presentation
The front of the box shows off all the action. Batman and Green Lantern are flying through space to attack Sinestro and retrieve the Green Lantern power battery that he has captured. In addition to the set, the front also has some cool space artwork, plus an image of the Justice League members in the upper right corner. The bottom right shows off a couple of logos for the Justice League and DC Comics, as well as the three minifigures in the set. Space Batman also comes with a new Super Jumper. More on that later. The back features some of the action shots of the Super Jumper and shooters, as well as a scene where Sinestro is trapped within his own force cage. Inside the box are two bags of parts, an instruction booklet, and a comic book. The comic has a few short stories featuring most of the winter 2015 sets, as well as a minifigure checklist on the back for all the characters that are coming out. Building
The build is not anything amazing, but it's still a decent spaceship that you get to piece together. Personally, I was a little confused as to what the technic bar on the inside was supposed to do, but it does end up having an important function that, while simple, is still quite clever. Set DesignNow that the set is complete, we can critique how it looks from every angle. New or interesting pieces can also be examined here.
At 174 pieces, plus a few extras, this set isn't exactly a great value at $19.99. But many of the pieces come in new or rare color variations, plus the minifigures are awesome, so the price per piece ratio is forgivable, and honestly could be worse. I know I got mixed up a bit in the video review on the rarity of the parts, so now let me provide some more accurate details on em. There are a lot of green pieces in this set, which is fitting for a model made from Green Lantern energy. There are two shades of transparent green here: traditional trans neon green, which has been widely used, especially in Bionicle eyes, and trans bright / apple / Atlantis green, which is a more green-ish variation that was used widely in the Atlantis theme. There are a bunch of trans bright green pieces here that have only appeared in a few sets, like the 1x2 brick, 1x1 panel, 2x2 curved slope, and 2x2 dish, as well as the (more common than I thought) spring shooter dart. However, brand new in this color are the 1x6 curved slope and the tail files. Oddly enough, the round bubble canopy is in trans neon green, which is only the second time we've seen it in this color. I find this surprising because Atlantis has a lot of these pieces in trans bright green, but it's still cool. The 1x1 round studs, however, are the ultra common trans neon green shade. Some other pieces that are rare are the yellow bracket, trans clear half cylinders, and the trans yellow techno-blade from Ninjago. The 4 length bar is new in trans yellow, as are the 8x8 wedge plates in green. There's also a black wedge with the Green Lantern symbol printed on it, and a 4x4 dish with Sinestro Corps emblem printed on. Yes, this are printed parts; no stickers in this set. This set does come with a few brand new pieces. First, there are the stud launchers, which were previously available as hand held weapons in themes like Ultra Agents and Hero Factory last year. This time, the same flick device is attached to a 1x2 plate, making it easier to incorporate this style of weapon onto studded surfaces. You also get the new trans clear jumper piece, which has studs for a minifigure's legs to attach to. I'll speak more towards that later. Finally, you get a new neck bracket for Batman, which provides two studs on his back to attach his wings to, which is a neat new element that will undoubtedly have a ton of uses.
The highlights of the set are the minifigures, in which we get three unique ones. First is Green Lantern, and as I described earlier, it's great to finally get this Justice League member as a minifigure. This particular Green Lantern is Hal Jordan, and he comes with some detailed muscle printing on his torso, both front and back, complete with a Green Lantern logo on his chest. He has the now-fairly-standard hair piece in dark brown, and his head has two masked expressions: one with a smile and one with a slight frown. Unfortunately, he doesn't have a ring accessory to show where he gets his power from. I wish they would've recolored one of the One Ring pieces from Lord of the Rings to be green, but alas we just have to use our imaginations.
Next up is Space Batman. After all, what DC set wouldn't be complete without Batman? Still, this Batman is totally unique to the set, and has a suit that was prominently featured in the latest LEGO Batman video game. He has a very spacey torso printing, and the head also has a space mask printed on it, with no actual eyes but just a gold visor. The eyes are instead made by the helmet, which is new because it doesn't have a chin strap. (Luckily, a real Batman head is included in the set, so you can swap it out for the space mask head if you'd like.) He also has the aforementioned neck bracket piece, to which we can attach his space wings. The wings are made of a thin plastic, similar to the kind use in small sails in other sets. They're fairly flexible, and are great for a Batman who's flying around in space. If you don't like how wide they are, you can swap out the long wings for another plastic set that features folded up wings, which are great for social gatherings. If you're Batman, anyway.
Finally, we get Sinestro, the Yellow Lantern who's out to get all the Green Lanterns. He comes with a cool yellow and black printed suit (again, torso front and back) as well as a pink head with two expressions (frown with glowing yellow eyes, and sneer with glowing yellow eyes.) His weapon, a construct of his Yellow Lantern powers, is a reuse of the Ninjago techno-blade. It's great to see a non-Batman villain included here, and Sinestro makes for the perfect nemesis for Green Lantern.
The first brick built structure is Sinestro's force cage, which he uses to hold the Green Lantern power battery, an actual lantern that powers Green Lantern's ring which in return gives him his powers. The actual lantern is built around a SNOT (studs not on top) brick, with the bar handle cleverly holding the top dish on. The cage has a mechanism where if you strike the Sinestro dish, the front of the cage will fall over. This is a simple but crafty design, in that the front will fall over with just gravity, but the handle on the top provides just enough support to keep it from doing so until it's knocked back. Yes, it's basic, but it works quite well.
The bulk of the set is Green Lantern's spaceship. It is made from Hal's Green Lantern energy, and it's fitting that it's in the shape of a jet because Hal used to be a fighter pilot. However, since we've seen plenty of LEGO spaceships, it comes under a bit of scrutiny. It is a very flat design, and the wings merely the wedge plates with a few bits on the top. The bottom is also pretty bare. But the ship also is fairly wide, so it still has some good heft to it. I also like the rounded curve that they managed to pull off, especially where it transitions to SNOT slopes on the side of the cockpit. The interior has a nice, long, white chair for Green Lantern to lean back on while he's flying. Granted, there aren't any controls for him to use, but since the ship is supposed to be made from his Green Lantern energy, I guess that's an acceptable loss. I am also a fan of the angled fins at the back, which is achieved using clips. Playability
This set is great for role-playing, with three unique characters, and it also happens to tell a story. Hal and Batman need to go collect the Green Lantern power battery that Sinestro stole, giving them a clear mission that can be played out with the set. The spaceship is also plenty swooshable, as is Space Batman with his thin plastic wings.
Still, there are a few functions. The aforementioned force cage has an excellent mechanism to knock it open. The Sinestro dish is wide enough to act as a decent target that you could shoot at, and a strong enough hit will release the Green Lantern power battery. Then, after his defeat, you can shove Sinestro inside for safe keeping. (I don't know if that would quite work out since the cage is made from his Yellow Lantern energy, so he should be able to just alter it and escape, but it works for the set.)
Green Lantern's ship also has a few ways to shoot that target. First, we get the two stud shooters that are attached to the wings. They're small but they work just as well as the hand held versions, and are an excellent way for you to lose more stud pieces when you fire them. Conveniently, there are three more studs attached to each wing right next to the launcher, so I don't know if they're supposed to be part of the wing or merely extra ammunition, but you can always use them as the latter if you feel so inclined. The ship also has some spring loaded launchers, but at first look it seems they're built into the ship's body and impossible to launch yourself. However, this is where the technic bar in the back comes into play. There's a technic piece right behind the chair, and it can rotate to each side and hit the end of the spring shooter dart, which will thus launch it. You can control its rotation using the wheel piece on the back of the ship. Again, it's a simple idea, but it's executed very well.
Finally, let's have a look at the new Super Jumper. This piece can clip to Space Batman's legs (or really, any minifigure with legs) and launch him up into a high jump. It's not just the launch base; the piece actually stays with the fig as he bounds through the air. It's a neat design, but I wonder if the piece will hold up over time, or if it'll start to wear out on the curve that's used to make them jump. Regardless, this jumper seems to come in all the DC Comic Super Hero sets this winter, so you can send all your heroes (or villains) leaping into action. Specifically for this set, it appears that the slopes on the back of Green Lantern's jet are meant for Batman to stand on with the jumper, so he can leap directly off the space ship at Sinestro. However, in my experience the jumper piece is rather hard to remove from the minifigure's legs, which can be irksome. Final Thoughts
It's great that we finally get a Green Lantern minifigure, and it's even better that he's in a great set. Space Batman and Sinestro are also excellent figs, and the cage and ship are well designed with great functionality. At $19.99 USD, it is also affordable for the average collector, so there's nothing stopping you from adding it to your collection today. If you're a Super Heroes fan, I would recommend it. Thanks again for reading and / or watching this review. Stay tuned to BZPower for more LEGO and Bionicle news, as well as more set reviews, in 2015! And thanks to Swert for helping with some of the Green Lantern terminology. Did you know Sinestro is the name of the character and the organization he leads? Sure is confusing to follow, right, Makuta?
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