Review: 5009015 Cerebro
Posted by CapnRex101,5009015 Cerebro will accompany 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion when the set is released, akin to 5008076 Taxi with 76269 Avengers Tower from last year. Unlike the version in the mansion, this iteration of Cerebro recalls the device presented in the X-Men movies.
This model is relatively substantial and contains some unique printed pieces, but its relationship with the X-Mansion is slightly strange, given the pair cannot really be displayed cohesively.
Summary
5009015 Cerebro, 153 pieces.
Though not an ideal companion for the X-Mansion, this model represents Cerebro well
- Substantial for a promotional set
- Quite appealing on display
- Unique printed elements
- Does not really complement the X-Mansion
- Some details could be improved
The set was provided for review by LEGO. All opinions expressed are those of the author.
Box and Contents
This is another set packaged in a yellow box, with the instruction manual forming the cover. I wonder how LEGO decides which promotional sets have more conventional boxes and which do not, as I much prefer the standard boxes. Regardless, their contents are more important and this set contains 153 pieces, so they barely fit inside the box!
Minifigure
Charles Xavier debuts in 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion and another version of the professor is available here, also comprising existing pieces. While the head is extremely common, its re-use does not really bother me because I think the sharp eyebrows and cheekbones both suit Xavier. The light bluish grey wheelchair works well too, albeit lacking the iconic 'X' wheels, of course.
Similarly, the torso is a reasonable choice. This element was produced for LEGO City, but has appeared with flesh hands in two other Super Heroes sets. The dark blue and black striped tie looks nice, although I find it quite frustrating that both Charles Xavier minifigures, here and with the mansion, are completely generic.
The Completed Model
Cerebro's appearance had varied in comics, animated series and films, sometimes being little more than a computer in Charles' office, or occupying an entire room. This model is seemingly based primarily on the X-Men movies and captures its appearance well, between the X-shaped design on the door and the circular platform reaching into the chamber.
I like the medium azure accents along the edge of the platform, as well as the 4x4 curved tiles and dark blue pieces on the floor underneath. The trans-blue stripes on the walls are attractive too. However, I find the combination of smooth and studded surfaces awkward, particularly with the transition from the door threshold to the central platform.
The model is clearly not intended to be seen from behind, including some unsightly dark tan pieces, which could surely have been avoided. The functional door is effective though. Black skeleton arms form basic hinges and the whole door assembly nestles neatly into the doorway.
Of course, the most appealing feature for many is the printed screen, displaying Jubilee. This element looks superb, but further highlights the character's frustrating absence from 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion. Moreover, a printed 2x4 brick identifies Cerebro and that element looks fine, although I would rather the budget for these printed parts was assigned to a minifigure.
Overall
Gifts-with-purchase associated with specific sets are normally a tricky prospect. Ideally, they should complement the main set, in this case 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion, which 5009015 Cerebro does not really achieve. On the other hand, this model is thematically appropriate and looks reasonable on display.
Ultimately, this is probably not what I would choose as a promotional set to accompany the X-Mansion, but as an incentive to purchase the set as soon as it is released, it works. I certainly like the printed screen with Jubilee and I hope the character actually appears in minifigure form soon, given the many references to her in these sets.
Thanks to Huw for the photos in this review.
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34 comments on this article
To my eyes, as a casual X-Men “fan” (I’ve seen all the films once, liked a few of them), the figure pretty well captures the likeness of Patrick Stewart who is, to my mind, just a bald white dude in a suit and a wheelchair.
Other than a specialized mold for his chair and a headpiece that achieves just a modicum of additional detail, the figure looks good to me.
I seem to remember there was a helmet in the movie that connects with the device...
^ Agree, that seems like kind of a obvious omission. In other news, just finished watching X-Men '97--really well done. A bit dark, not the same Saturday morning kids' show from back in the day, but very good.
They're just going to keep teasing Jubilee to drive us nuts.
@WemWem said:
"They're just going to keep teasing Jubilee to drive us nuts."
Is she not the one sitting reading in the latest GWP?
Jubilee, the Chinese X-Man, whose superpowers is... making fireworks.
No, thanks. I can do without Discount Dazzler.
I'm glad Lego made this. Cerebro is probably the most iconic location in the whole of X-men. And i'm glad they based it off the movies too.
Even without having ever seen X-Men this looks like a pretty decent GWP. Even wouldn't have minded it with the Botanical Garden... that's crying out for a wheelchair or two!
The use of that wheelchair is an interesting one.
I added space for a wheelchair in my recent school bus design, and the newer wheelchair model (See set 60439 for an example) has the benefit of not being quite so wide, which helps with placement in a smaller area.
I was under the impression that one design was replacing the other. However, perhaps there is enough variety across real wheelchair designs to warrant both staying in the portfolio? I don't have enough knowledge on the topic to say.
"Of course, the most appealing feature for many is the printed screen, displaying Jubilee. This element looks superb, but further highlights the character's frustrating absence from 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion."
I imagine that's exactly why you see her on the screen. She's gone missing, so Xavier is using Cerebro to try to find her.
@TheNameWasTaken said:
""Of course, the most appealing feature for many is the printed screen, displaying Jubilee. This element looks superb, but further highlights the character's frustrating absence from 76294 X-Men: The X-Mansion."
I imagine that's exactly why you see her on the screen. She's gone missing, so Xavier is using Cerebro to try to find her."
Indeed and it will be a fun reference, as long as they actually follow it up by producing the minifigure. However, given the lack of X-Men sets released to date, that is not a guarantee.
I'll get it, because it's being offered with the Mansion which I very much want, but it will need some upgrades and alteration. Charles Xavier was never really the angry type, so the head doesn't quite fit, it is a shame they didn't offer the green suit option here, not to mention omitting the helmet. It's okay, Ai got one with the Ultra Agents that'll do.
I have no intention of getting 76294 (let alone getting it day one) or tracking this down on the aftermarket, but I like it. For one thing, since this would seem to be based off of the X-Men movies, this could be considered a Patrick Stewart minifigure, and as someone who's seen all of the X-Men movies (not counting Deadpool & Wolverine, since it isn't on Disney+ yet) and who loves Star Trek: The Next Generation, that very much appeals to me.
The link to the taxi is broken, I think it should be 6487483.
This just looks like something someone would have thrown together on LDD ten years ago. It doesn't do a great job of capturing the look of Cerebro in the movies. They could have made it more rounded and smoother and reduced the gaps. And the mixture of studded, smooth and transparent pieces looks bad in this case. And the base isn't consistent with other Lego display vignettes. And I could make a better Xavier myself.
Pity that Patrick Stewart didn't get a head that better captures his likeness. This looks (because it is of course) totally generic to me.
@B_Space_Man said:
"The use of that wheelchair is an interesting one.
I added space for a wheelchair in my recent school bus design, and the newer wheelchair model (See set 60439 for an example) has the benefit of not being quite so wide, which helps with placement in a smaller area.
I was under the impression that one design was replacing the other. However, perhaps there is enough variety across real wheelchair designs to warrant both staying in the portfolio? I don't have enough knowledge on the topic to say."
I hadn't noticed that myself until reading this comment, that is very strange! I'm curious if this is a result of Lego attempting to clear out stock of the old element. The old design is still available on Pick-a-Brick, which may explain why it appeared in a Yellow Box set... but it's odd that it's lingered two whole years after being retired (it's not even in any 2023 or 2024 educational sets like other semi-recently retired elements).
Talk about kicking us while we’re down. The most pivotal person to the show it’s based on(the 90’s one at least) isn’t in the minifig lineup but we get her on a sticker…
@Rimefang said:
"I'll get it, because it's being offered with the Mansion which I very much want, but it will need some upgrades and alteration. Charles Xavier was never really the angry type, so the head doesn't quite fit, it is a shame they didn't offer the green suit option here, not to mention omitting the helmet. It's okay, Ai got one with the Ultra Agents that'll do."
I borrowed a head from the generic Rebel figure that appears in the 20th anniversary Snowspeeder set. It reflects Professor X’s slightly more kindly disposition better than this head does, I think.
@Ridgeheart said:
"Jubilee, the Chinese X-Man, whose superpowers is... making fireworks.
No, thanks. I can do without Discount Dazzler."
Jubilee isn't Dazzler. She's Robin! No, seriously, her costume was the inspiration for Carrie Kelly's look in The Dark Knight Returns, because her original outfit was pretty clearly an intentional knockoff of the original Robin costume, as she was seen as filling a similar role to Wolverine.
Which gets all kinds of weird when you know that Batman and Wolverine got blended into Dark Claw, with Robin and Jubilee becoming Sparrow in the Amalgam universe, and Robin and Jubilee had a brief fling during a separate DC/Marvel crossover event. They're like the Skywalkers of the superhero multiverse.
@B_Space_Man:
I just participated in an Honor Flight, which had 75 veterans aged 70+. One of the stops we made was to Arlington Cemetary, where the organization requires all of the veterans being honored to be in wheelchairs (makes it easy to get them prime viewing for the changing of the guard ceremony at the Tomb of the Unknowns), plus they have to have a wheelchair available for every vet on the off chance that they _might_ need one. With 75 wheelchairs being hauled around, they had a mix of a few different designs. The one I ended up pushing my dad around in at that stop had ergonomic handles. Some of the others had rear wheels that were way too small for the rider to actually reach (meaning it could only be pushed by someone else). And others looked a bit more barebones, but still allowed the rider to use the hand rails on the wheels to move the wheelchair independently. And there was also the special wheelchair used to get people down the aisles on the plane, which looks very much like a regular chair with tiny wheels bolted on the feet. So, yeah, there's quite a bit of variety. In this case, it's even more complicated, because they use different connections for the big wheels. At least this wheel also sees use on the food-cart bicycle frame, otherwise they'd be keeping six molds in production just to make two different wheelchairs.
@CapnRex101:
Disney played dirty with Fox over licensing rights in an attempt to get them to give back the film rights, which is part of why there was such a lack of sets early in the theme. Now, interest in the Fox run has taken a hit because people are waiting to see what the MCU does with them. Until there's actually an MCU X-Men film (that's _NOT_ D&W, because zero chance of that getting a LEGO set), X-Men 97 is really the only viable production to tie the sets to, and it sounds like that's not the family-friendliest thing in the world either.
@TheOtherMike:
You're in for a treat, but I'd actually suggest trying to catch a discount screening while it's still in theaters. I'd rank it with Deadpool 1 and Logan as the three best Marvel films ever released.
@Nuclearxpotato:
If the last set a part is in retires, and nobody else puts it into a new set, the element will be delisted from OPAB within a year at most. Any remaining stock will be scrapped. It's just not worth the massive expense of keeping old parts in inventory if they're not being used, so it's never about "using up old stock" anymore. OPAB will also produce a constant drain on inventory, so that alone would run their remaining stock down to zero if they weren't constantly replenishing it.
Hmm not sure if this is Charles Xavier or Lex Luthor.
@Pekingduckman said:
"Hmm not sure if this is Charles Xavier or Lex Luthor."
Professor Lex.
@PurpleDave said:
" @Ridgeheart said:
"Jubilee, the Chinese X-Man, whose superpowers is... making fireworks.
No, thanks. I can do without Discount Dazzler."
Jubilee isn't Dazzler. She's Robin! No, seriously, her costume was the inspiration for Carrie Kelly's look in The Dark Knight Returns, because her original outfit was pretty clearly an intentional knockoff of the original Robin costume, as she was seen as filling a similar role to Wolverine.
Which gets all kinds of weird when you know that Batman and Wolverine got blended into Dark Claw, with Robin and Jubilee becoming Sparrow in the Amalgam universe, and Robin and Jubilee had a brief fling during a separate DC/Marvel crossover event. They're like the Skywalkers of the superhero multiverse."
This has just blown my mind - thanks for all the lore! Just sent me down a rabbit-hole looking up Dark Claw and Sparrow.
@Pekingduckman said:
"Hmm not sure if this is Charles Xavier or Lex Luthor."
Either way, it's someone with an X at one end of one of their names.
@classicstylecastle said:
" @Pekingduckman said:
"Hmm not sure if this is Charles Xavier or Lex Luthor."
Professor Lex."
Lexavier Lutharles.
I mean, it's the same face, but then - bald white guy with intense eyebrows, what else are you going to do? The main difference is that Luthor is secretly kind of decent, while Xavier is not so secretly, a jerk.
@Ridgeheart said:
" @classicstylecastle said:
" @Pekingduckman said:
"Hmm not sure if this is Charles Xavier or Lex Luthor."
Professor Lex."
Lexavier Lutharles.
I mean, it's the same face, but then - bald white guy with intense eyebrows, what else are you going to do? The main difference is that Luthor is secretly kind of decent, while Xavier is not so secretly, a jerk."
Preach it!
@Sparky_Ham said:
" @PurpleDave said:
" @Ridgeheart said:
"Jubilee, the Chinese X-Man, whose superpowers is... making fireworks.
No, thanks. I can do without Discount Dazzler."
Jubilee isn't Dazzler. She's Robin! No, seriously, her costume was the inspiration for Carrie Kelly's look in The Dark Knight Returns, because her original outfit was pretty clearly an intentional knockoff of the original Robin costume, as she was seen as filling a similar role to Wolverine.
Which gets all kinds of weird when you know that Batman and Wolverine got blended into Dark Claw, with Robin and Jubilee becoming Sparrow in the Amalgam universe, and Robin and Jubilee had a brief fling during a separate DC/Marvel crossover event. They're like the Skywalkers of the superhero multiverse."
This has just blown my mind - thanks for all the lore! Just sent me down a rabbit-hole looking up Dark Claw and Sparrow."
Purple Dave is just wrong here. The Dark Knight Returns has a 1 cover date June 1986 (published April 1986). Carrie first appeared in that issue, although she didn't become Robin until issue 2 , cover date July 1986.
Jubilee didn't appear until 1989.
There was also nothing to inspire: Carrie Kelly literally just put on the classic Robin costume. Now, it's likely that the Robin look inspired Jubilee since her color scheme, particularly the yellow coat, resembles Robin's cape.
Jubilee was initially a "mallrat" just wearing nondescript street clothes. There was a very brief early period where she made an outfit of spare pieces of the X-Men's costumes. The settled upon yellow coat look came a little later.
Last I checked, Jubilee is currently a vampire. They may have gotten rid of that, I dunno.
@classicstylecastle:
Luncanny Lex-Men?
@Ridgeheart:
I mean, you could use the head from https://brickset.com/minifigs/poc013
If that’s not to your taste, you could use the head from https://brickset.com/minifigs/hp127
I do feel the generic Lex head is too angry for the more stoic Charles Xavier.
The GWP overall is fine. It isn't something I have to have and it is nice to be able to rebuild it on my own if necessary. I wouldn't need the printed brick, and the printed Jubilee is neat, but not necessary if you didn't need it to be.
The overall design works pretty well. I would like to see the helmet like in the movies, but the troll helmet is long retired. So not sure if any other pieces would work currently.
I do think it is a bit silly since this wouldn't be able to actually work with the building due to scale (I guess they should have made the building bigger...)
So generous from the LEGO designers to include another desirable, never before done character as a 2D reference instead of an actual minifigure in the mansion. And that exclusive Michael Charles Creed Luthor blows my mind. Fan service at its best!
@Sparky_Ham
What ResIpsaHumorless isn’t aware of is that I learned about the connection between Robin and Jubilee in a forward that was added to a later compilation of TDKR. Can’t recall if it was written by Miller, someone else involved in the original run, or someone who just got tapped to do a new forward, but it definitely mentioned Jubilee being the writer’s favorite Robin costume. Also, Carrie Kelly never wore the actual Robin costume. She bought one with lunch money, and wore sunglasses that looked a lot more like Jubilee than Robin. Then, there’s Jubilation Lee’s original appearance:
https://www.reddit.com/r/xmen/comments/sh90vf/marvel_unlimited_app_has_early_jubilee_in_the/
Clearly in Robin’s color scheme, and apparently only changed to create some distance going into the 1997 animated series.
And finally, Jubilation Lee may not have been created until 1989, but _Jubilee_ first appeared in 1986. The first version was a character named Darla, whose mind got messed with, called herself Jubilee, talked like Jubilee, and had Jubilee’s powers…until the end of the issue when she got reset back to normal. I don’t know if she wore a variant of the Robin costume as well, but Chris Claremont wrote that annual, and later co-created Jubilation Lee, so it’s pretty likely that the Darla version was the direct inspiration for the one that followed.
It wouldnt have taken much to have a new face print and give him his trademark pointy eyebrows. At least then the set would be a little more desirable.
@smu01mhw said:
"It wouldnt have taken much to have a new face print and give him his trademark pointy eyebrows. At least then the set would be a little more desirable."
He has pointy eyebrows?
@PurpleDave said:
" @smu01mhw said:
"It wouldnt have taken much to have a new face print and give him his trademark pointy eyebrows. At least then the set would be a little more desirable."
He has pointy eyebrows?"
Classic comic book and x-men 97 versions do. Appreciate live action versions do not.