#lego clone

I built iiiiiiiiiit (now trying to convince my husband that since Venators are typically deployed in trips I should get two more 🫣👀)

Also peep my convo w my dad after I texted him this video

So when I was a kid the only knockoff (sorry, “clone”) of Lego that was readily available was Mega Bloks micro, which I had a few of thanks to aunts and uncles getting them for holidays but I had my own annoyances at tolerances between the two brands so I never rly liked them. But other than the most basic of brick shapes they weren’t really just remaking Lego. Fast forward almost thirty years to this brand hitting the market and quite literally just remaking Lego’s pieces and me being an adult who can spend their own money now, curiosity got the better of me. I wasn’t aware of who BLDR’s parent brand was until after I opened the package so uh. Probably not buying any more of their stuff but in the meantime.

I was, other than the random neon green power crystals and two random neon orange ones primarily drawn to this by these four pieces that I’ve got modeled by my freebie* mix and match version of one of the Space anniversary collectible Minifigs:

Which as you can see in the side by side with the old school Ice Planet 2002 equipment and the modern CMF Ice Planet equipment, a big part of that draw to BLDR’s trans neon orange chainsaws and skis was specifically because of the combination of shade and translucency being an interesting middle ground between classic trans neon orange and modern trans bright orange.

So I did a UV fluorescence test. I figured the modern legit Lego piece wouldn’t glow, other times I’ve messed with trans bright orange and the UV light it’s varied from piece to piece but always weaker than any classic trans neon orange piece. I honestly think it’s more down to size and structure of a given piece for the modern shade than inherent property of the color as to whether or not it will glow. But I was pleasantly surprised to find the clone glows almost as brightly as the classic Lego pieces, saves a bit of money on bulking out scenes when I finally get around to doing Ice Planet stuff.