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Built with LEGO - TV Tropes

  • ️Thu Dec 15 2011

Built with LEGO (trope)

If there's one commercial children's toy that is far more iconic than others, it would be LEGO. They may go by different brands, but building blocks are pretty much always associated with the name LEGO. They're easy to use. They let our imaginations run rampant. They let us act out horrific acts of violence without consequences (besides breaking them, but the base parts are pretty damn indestructible, sans the ones smaller than one-fourth of a cubic centimeter). And there's also something just plain cool about seeing iconic characters in the LEGO-man look. Not to mention how adorable little LEGO stormtroopers are.

Therefore many people have started using LEGO as the literal building blocks of their medium so that everything gets built of LEGO. This ranges from webcomics with LEGO being photographed rather than drawings, through LEGO stop motion to people design video game worlds specifically to mimic the appearance of LEGO. They are taking the fun, characterful, innocent character of LEGO and building it right into their works.

The positive light LEGO blocks have been getting recently seems to indicate that LEGO may very well be the heir to the penguin throne. One of its clear advantages is its accessibility to amateurs- all you need is a bucket of LEGO blocks (although that may need a bucket of cash) and imagination to create full sets and characters.

Also, don't step on them while barefoot. It hurts like hell.

Not to be confused with LEGO Genetics. For examples of LEGO just popping up in fiction, see LEGO.

Compare Gem-Encrusted (everything's covered with jewelry).

Examples:

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Advertising 

Comics 

Films — Animation 

Films — Live-Action 

Literature 

  • Sophie's World calls LEGO "the most ingenious toy in the world," due to its ability to nigh-endlessly be built into something, destroyed, and then built again into something else much like the Greek philosopher Democritus thought with his version of atoms.
  • In I Knocked Up Satan's Daughter, Jonathan has lived with a mild obsession with legos for most of his life. He built a house out of legos, made all of his furniture out of them, even a lego girlfriend. He is even so good he can build a full-sized tyrannosaur out of legos in mere minutes. When Lici enchants the legos, anything he builds out of them becomes real (animals, motorbikes, etc).

Live-Action TV 

  • To promote The LEGO Batman Movie, the Arrowverse shows had LEGO versions of their Vanity Plates. And the Berlanti Productions vanity plate had Batman in place of the normal kid with the voice saying "Batman, move your head".
  • The Corner Gas episode Block Party featured Hank building a Lego version of the town. The episode included a fantasy segment with characters as mini figures.
  • James May (of Top Gear fame) wrote and presented a series in Autumn/Winter 2009 called Toy Stories, in which he makes the toys of his youth full-sized and awesome, to get today's kids involved in old-style entertainment. Among other things, this included making a full-sized, fully functional two-story house — including toilet, shower and (uncomfortable) bed — almost entirely out of LEGO. Sadly, it was on borrowed land in a vineyard, no buyer stepped forward and it was demolished. The bricks were on loan from LEGO and were returned, with the intent of putting them to use in a yearly charity build. Its name liveth forevermore.
  • An episode of Ultimate Cake Off had the teams building cakes for LEGOLAND California's 10th anniversary (in their usual Cooking Duel way, of course).
  • Mythbusters tested the veracity of a viral video in which some guys built an eight-foot diameter ball out of LEGO and successfully rolled it down a street in San Francisco. The myth was Busted; the LEGO ball collapsed halfway down the hill. So that means it must've been glued together or the same sequence was repeated in the video.
    • Also it couldn't have just been glued together for the video as the Mythbusters had to clear out the LEGO Group's North American supply and also borrow some from a private collector to have enough bricks to finish the build. Completely impossible for most people to have the required number of LEGO bricks for that video to be real.
      • The narration of the episode hypothesized that all they built was a hollow shell with the inside being made of something much lighter (possibly polystyrene).
  • Some scenes in Home Movie: The Princess Bride are recreated in stop-motion LEGO, mostly scenes from the original film that really can't be replicated with live actors in a home movie style. Some shots of the boat that Vizzini uses to kidnap Buttercup are in LEGO, as is their climb up the Cliffs of Insanity, and part of the ending, where the four leads ride out of the castle on the Prince's horses.

Magazines 

  • New Scientist ran a competition for readers to create a LEGO sculpture that reflected "science technology or nature". You can see the winning fetus, runner up virus and moon landing, and a couple of cool entries that were sadly disqualified here.

Music 

Tabletop Games 

  • Brik Wars, although it doesn't mention LEGO itself due to copyright issues.
  • Mobile Frame Zero is a nerd trifecta. Tiny Giant Robots, LEGO, and a tabletop war game. Frames are built entirely with LEGO or similar parts, and can get quite complex (and expensive). A 5cm tall model may contain upwards of 80 individual pieces.

Video Games 

Webcomics 

Web Original 

Western Animation 

  • Robot Chicken occasionally has LEGO-based sketches. One involves an attempt to build a pyramid, and another makes fun of the licensed lines with "LEGO Babel."
  • In 1980, LEGO commissioned the "LEGO Sports Champions" which included topics like Gymnastics and F1 Racing.
  • Subverted in the LOGO channel's Rick & Steve: The Happiest Gay Couple in All the World. While the original pilot episode used LEGO, the rest of the series had to use Play Mobil because LEGO objected to the creators using their product on the show (which may look like a kiddie show that would air on Nick Jr. or PBS, but really isn't).
  • Blockoland from The Simpsons, which appears at the start of the season 12 episode "Hungry, Hungry Homer". Interestingly enough, an actual LEGOLAND appears in another episode which mentioned Mr. Burns dumping toxic waste there.
    • "Brick Like Me", in which Homer finds himself in a LEGO version of Springfield created when he goes into a coma after being hit by a giant LEGO statue at a builders' convention.
    • The Couch Gag for the episode "Midnight Towboy" had the Simpsons (and their living room) constructed out of LEGO blocks.
  • One of Ben's new aliens in Omniverse, Blox, is made of Lego. Unfortunately, this means he's Made of Plasticine, so whatever he tries to turn into is flimsy and breaks under the slightest force.
  • The Zig & Sharko episode, "Silly Builders" has Zig using LEGO (never identified by name) to get to Marina.
  • LEGO original properties that have been made into Western animation are BIONICLE, Ninjago, and Legends of Chima. Ironically, all three pretty quickly moved away from the LEGO theming aside from the minifigures (or buildable action figures in Bionicle's case), with even the places, vehicles, and creatures with sets looking more like real objects than toys built of LEGO.
  • To a lesser extent, Mixels. The spin-off app games play for the LEGO nature of the series heavier than the show, with animations of the characters breaking into LEGO bricks for loading screens.
  • The LEGO Star Wars franchise has been animated in LEGO Star Wars: The Yoda Chronicles .
  • Unikitty! plays for an interesting variant. Being a spin-off of the previously mentioned The LEGO Movie, the characters are blocky brick-designed, but in 2D animation. It's to the point that one of the characters, Richard, is just a floating 1x3 LEGO brick.
  • Pixar Bricktoons is a series of shorts featuring LEGO versions of Cars, Brave, The Incredibles, Finding Nemo, and Coco. They even have a Logo Joke where the Pixar logo is made of LEGO, and a LEGO Luxo Jr shatters the I into its component bricks.

Real Life 

  • Legoland, theme parks featuring extensive LEGO sculptures and displays. Anything that isn't built out of LEGO bricks (such as rides) uses a LEGO design motif.
  • There is LEGO CANDY.
    • On a similar note, Lego has also been selling Lego ice-cube trays. The ice-cubes, once frozen, are the same size and shape as a typical Lego minifig. And just as adorable.
  • However, subverted in some places where LEGO products aren't made with the iconic bricks. The LEGO Technic line uses construction based on things like pins, axles, and ball-joints instead, and their "constraction" figure lines ("construction" + "action") like BIONICLE and Hero Factory started out as a spin-off of Technic. Lego Znap was an attempt to compete with K'nex (failed), and Lego Galidor was an entry into the action figure market (failed horribly).
    • Also strangely averted with fast-food tie-ins. Many LEGO Happy Meal toys these days are your standard throwaways, with no interactivity with the LEGO system. LEGO Club Magazine editor (and BIONICLE's "Real Daddy") Greg Farshtey has mentioned that fast-food chains have started to shy away from building toys because they want no assembly required.
  • The Lego-Brucke (Lego Bridge) in Wuppertal, Germany is a concrete bridge that was repainted to look like it was made out of giant Lego bricks. The Lego Group was consulted and formally approved of the project to do so.
  • Say hello to EverBlock, a jumbo-sized LEGO-esque building block system designed for real-world prefab construction.
  • Nathan Sawaya is an artist from New York City who has chosen Lego blocks as his preferred medium.
  • The first Google server's case was partially built out of Lego bricks. Back then, it was their storage system for what would eventually become the Google search engine.

Waldorf: I used to build things with LEGO bricks.
Statler: Really? Were you able to make an artistic profession out of it?
Waldorf: No, sorry to say, my art career went all to pieces!
Both: Do-ho-ho-ho-hoh!