Doc Ock is probably one of the most well-known of Spider-Man’s vast catalogue of villains, thanks almost entirely to what most people still consider the web slinger’s best movie outing. A brilliant scientist turned bad, it’s a bit of a cliche in comics, but still, Otto Octavius has a rather unique look, perfect for those great designers at LEGO to exploit.
Pieces: 446
Set Number: 76059
Minifigures: Spider-Man, Doc Ock, Vulture, White Tiger, Captain Stacy
RRP: £44.99
Unsurprisingly, the character has shown up a number of times over the last few years in various forms, and yet each one has seemed just off the mark, not quite right. Whether the minifigure design was slightly off or the tentacles looked lazy, LEGO has never perfectly hit the mark with the character, in my opinion.
The latest wave of LEGO Marvel Super Heroes sets have hit the shelves, and with Spidey at the helm, Doc Ock has had the chance to return once more. Not content with simply using his mechanical arms anymore, the highly intelligent villain has brought along a beast of a machine to destroy the web-slinger once and for all. Enter, Super-sized Doc Ock…
Of the three Spider-Man themed sets released, Doc Ock’s tentacle trap sits in the middle, between the budget-friendly Ghost Rider set and the ‘pricey but amazing’ Ultimate Bridge Battle set. With Vulture, White Tiger, and Captain Stacy tagging along for the ride, could this Spidey vs. Doc Ock set be worth the price-tag? Yes, yes it is, and here’s why.
Minifigures
Minifigure debuts have come in legion with the latest LEGO Marvel releases, and the mid-range Spidey set is no exception. In addition to set regulars Spider-Man and Doc Ock, we get brand new minifigures of lesser known characters White Tiger, Vulture, and Captain Stacy. Much like the larger bridge set, there is an even split of heroes vs villains with a non-super mainstay thrown in for good measure – Aunt May makes her debut during the bridge battle.
The titular superhero is actually the least interesting of the minifigure cast, it’s the exact same figure which has shown up in all three of the latest sets and offers very little in the way of exciting and new. Based on the comic book version of the character, and not his recent MCU movie debut, the figures blue and red suit should be very familiar to LEGO fans, lighter colours with the webbing detail and modest spider emblem.
Captain Stacy was an interesting choice for the set, he’s not the most well-known character from the Spider-Man comics, though, the Andrew Garfield movies have certainly helped introduce non-comic readers to the Police Officer. Putting together the character, I couldn’t help but notice something very familiar about the minifigure… hang on, is that Doctor Who with a smile?
You have to admit, there is definitely something a bit Peter Capaldi about Captain Stacey. Aside from his potential Time Lord heritage, the minifigure is dressed in appropriate Police attire, though compared to what you get from a standard LEGO City Officer, the torso printing is somewhat impressive. The police jacket is remarkably detailed, with zipper, police badge and belt. The printing continues on to the back of the figure with a large “POLICE” printing and ammo pouches. For what could have a been a very generic police minifigure, Captain Stacy definitely stands out.
Another newbie to LEGO minifigures in White Tiger, a character which is slowly moving into the mainstream thanks to Spidey’s animated adventures on Disney XD. To look at the character, she’s basically a female Black Panther in white with a ponytail and unsurprisingly, the minfiigure replicates her costume in a very similar way to the Panther which showed up in the Civil War sets earlier this year.
Unlike Black Panther, White Tiger’s minifigure is somewhat spartan on detail, with the characters emblem being the only significant inclusion other than the black stripes on either side of the torso piece. Despite the minimal look, the headpiece is fantastic, the piercing yellow eyes look striking against the white and really make the character stand out.
As with Panther, there is an additional piece which sits on the top of the head and gives the character her cat-like upward pointing ears. Completing the figure’s look is a ponytail piece which sticks out of the top of the head. It’s not fantastic, if I’m honest, it’s actually my least favourite thing about the set. The piece is rubber rather than sturdy plastic and it doesn’t stay in place very well, easily knocked out and lost by a young LEGO fan. It does a great job of recreating an important part of the character, but it just isn’t designed well for rigorous use.
The last minifigure with wings I had the pleasure of constructing was the newly designed Civil War Falcon. While I enjoyed the look of the character, I was equally disappointed with the one-piece static wings creation. With all their amazing designs, you’d expect LEGO to come up with something a little less rudimentary. Sadly Vulture suffers the same fate. though his wings do at least have three-dimensional detail rather than a printed design, those feathers show on both front and back.
Aside from the wings, the minifigure itself is a little boring, if I’m honest. Yes, it goes a good job of recreating the comic book character but despite his bird-like appearance, Vulture is actually a very simplistic LEGO creation. The predominantly green figure is a little low on exciting detail, featuring the feathered neck, muscle definition, and addition detail lines for the suit. As the character is bald, there is no hair piece, so the head is heavily reliant on the face to give some life to the character, sadly the generic aged angry face doesn’t do a great job of that either. It’s not that this is badly designed, it’s a great replica, but is Vulture really a good enough character to deserve a LEGO minifigure? Probably not, hence why he only made evil sidekick here.
On to more positive things in the set, they did it, they FINALLY did it, a LEGO Doctor Octopus with the look and tentacles worthy of the name. The minifigure here is based on the Amazing Spider-Man, rather than the brief appearance of Ultimate Doc Ock we saw a few sets back and it looks like LEGO have ripped the character from the pages. The green and yellow suit screams silver age Doc Ock, the slightly camp 1960’s style supervillain costume. While mostly green, the minifigure features yellow hands and feet, with a torso design simulating the characters belt and the round neck of his costumes top. The back of the torso features the same but with the addition of the metal plate which attaches the tentacles to the main body – of course as you’ll see above, this printing is purely for show as we get LEGO parts to create this for real.
An additional piece slips over the neck to provide a technics connection used for the tentacles. The head and hair pieces are perfect for the character, again keeping with the 60’s comic style. The head features two faces in opposing emotional states, both sporting his signature glasses and a mouth. The hair has a hint of The Beatles about it, you know, the bowl cut style they had in their early days, it gives the minifigure a slightly more nerdy look, let’s not forget, he was a brilliant scientist before going all evil.
The tentacles are fantastic, they’re actually part of the main Octo-Bot which can be taken off and connected to the minifigure via a four-pin connector which clips into place using the neck piece I mentioned earlier. The main arms are created using a series of technics hinges and can with rotated to pretty much any position. The same goes for the individual ‘fingers’ which are actually connected to the arm via ball joints, giving them complete freedom to move to wherever you see fit.
Overall, the minifigure collection is varied, to say the least, the standard hero and his new feline companion, the police officer, the B-lister evil sidekick and the main attraction. There’s a little something for every Spider-Man fan to enjoy here.
Police Boat & Surf Board
It’s safe to say that this set has only one primary focus, Doctor Octopus and his uber-robot, but with five minifigures, LEGO surely has to offer a little more for your money. This is where Captain Stacy comes in as the secondary model in this set is a police boat piloted by the Captain. The design isn’t too dissimilar from LEGO City boats which have shown up over the years, with a purpose-built piece making up the majority of the hull. The primary colours in use are designed to make this look much more like a police vehicle, the blue, white and red really standing out – we really don’t need the less than subtle ‘POLICE 77’ stickers to tell us this is a police boat.
The inside of the boat is fairly simplistic, a stickered dual-stud triangular piece and standard red steering wheel provide the only detail. Where this boat does different from other sets, is the larger white stud-shooter on the front which rotates easily into position, a nice added bonus play feature. The front also comes equipped with a search light on either side. In addition to a basic speedboat engine design, the rear of the craft also has a pole clipped into place running from one side to the other with a white single-stud clip piece attached. This is so that one of Spidey’s LEGO webbing ropes can be attached with the web-slinger or his White Tiger friend riding a surfboard on the back. The board is very simple, a one piece with two exposed studs to connect a single minfiigure, Spidey branding has been adding thanks to a couple of stickers which feature a webbing design and the character’s logo.
Doc Ock’s Octo-Bot
Move over LEGO Hulkbuster because Mike has a new favourite robot beast, it’s incredible. The star of the set, Doc Ock’s Octo-Bot looks like it’s taken inspiration from more than just the LEGO Marvel franchise, there’s hints of LEGO Star Wars in this build, as well as Technics and even a smidgen of Ninjago, it’s stunning.
Unsurprisingly, this is where the large majority of your build time will go with this set, making up the huge majority of the 450 pieces. It’s a good hour or two’s build, if you take your time, and it’s such an interesting and somewhat ingenious design that you’re never going to get bored in the process. Just throwing this out there now though, there are quite a few stickers to apply here, I’m not a fan usually, but I will make an exception in this case because they only add to the awesome.
It’s a tale of two halves, as you first construct the main body before independently constructing the legs and arms and putting the whole thing together. During the build, you’ll notice a number of interesting additions which don’t make a whole lot of sense until the model is complete and you see that this robo has an impressive array of interactive elements that will keep the kids happy for some time. The obvious attraction straight away is the two huge multi-stud shooters which sit on the shoulders of the beast, they can each fire six studs in quick succession thanks to a brilliant rotating mechanism on the back.
Less obvious is the cone-shaped piece on the very top, this can actually be rotated, kicking off a set of hidden cogs which turns the arms in opposite directions – seriously, have I said how awesome this thing is? Doc Ock can be placed front and center, though he slides into place and is never actually clipped into studs. This is both a pro and a con as it makes it a lot easier to both place and remove the character from the robot, but rigorous play may lead the character to tumble out.
In addition to the versatile arms, the legs are made up of a number of hinged pieces meaning they too can be angled to a number of poses. The legs and main body are actually connected by a large rotating dial which makes it possible to spin the legs around at 360 degrees, the options are endless.
In all seriousness, this is one of the stand-out builds of 2016, so many things to do with this one model and it looks fantastic, both adult collectors and kids are going to love it.
The Set Overall
Overall, the Doc Ock’s Tentacle Trap set is the LEGO set that fans of the tentacled bad guy have been waiting for. Not only do we get a minifigure ripped straight from the pages of the silver age of comics, but the tentacle design finally does the character’s unique look some justice.
Spidey is on top form as usual and his new sidekick White Tiger is a fantastic addition to the LEGO Marvel cast, despite the slight issues with the hair piece. Captain Stacy is the addition that nobody really asked for, but with the inclusion of a secondary police boat build, it makes a lot of sense and you have to admire the fact that the set designers chose a named character rather than a generic policeman.
The only real let down with the set is Vulture, not because the minifigure is sub-standard, it’s a great representation of the character, it’s just a little dull. Maybe a new wing design made up of multiple pieces would liven up the character in future sets.
Overall, though, it’s difficult to say anything bad about the set, the Octo-bot is now one of the highlights of my LEGO collection as far as I’m concerned.
THE GOOD
- A great selection of varied minifigures
- The Octo-Bot steals the show, with a brilliantly fun build and plethora of interactive features
- Doc Ock’s tentacles look fantastic, made better by the silver-age style minifigure
THE BAD
- Vulture is a fairly boring minifigure, though it doesn’t bring down the standard of the set as a whole.
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