LEGO’s 40334 Avengers Tower was offered as a gift with purchase (GWP) in 2019. For such a small model, it captures the iconic building from the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) perfectly. And, it included a mid-transformation Tony Stark/Iron Man minifigure and tiny Quinjet. It is like a little brother to my minifigure-scale Avengers Tower MOC.
I built this gargantuan three-level Stark Tower LEGO MOC (my own creation) to bring together three concept spaces: Iron Man’s Hall of Armor, Tony Stark’s Workshop, and an X-Men Danger Room-like testing area. Also, it was a model that didn’t take up too much desk space, so I got the enjoyment of seeing it while working without it monopolizing my desk. I wasn’t going for accuracy to something canon-established. Instead, I was mashing up some different ideas into a single model with a high degree of built-in playability. Eventually, I disassembled it and used many of its bricks to create the taller Avengers Tower MOC that I built and wrote about here.
The first iteration of the mode was only two-levels tall and focused on the Hall of Armor and Workshop.
Industrial Robot on Slider
But, I thought adding a high ceiling level for testing and training, kind of like The X-Men’s Danger Room, would be cool. So, the build grew in height to enclose the Hulkbuster Armor facing off against Loki, the Winter Soldier, the Mandarin, Ultron, and an Extremis soldier.
The knobs at the bottom center move the armatures forward and back for Ultron and one of his familiars.
Soon after the release of Avengers: Infinity War (2018), I designed and built a play-oriented Q-Ship LEGO MOC for Ebony Maw’s attack at the Sanctum Sanctorum to accompany a stock-built 76108 The Sanctum Sanctorum Showdown set as shown above and in more detail below.
While it would have certainly have been great to build a larger Q-Ship as others have done, I had to work within the constraints of the type and quantity of LEGO bricks and elements that I have on-hand.
I settled on a simple ring structure with interior red accents and a driving platform for Ebony Maw that included a display screen. In the southwest quadrant, I added bars for Iron Man and Spider-Man to grab onto, and I included the Q-Ship’s engines in the northeast quadrant above the driving platform.
Overall, it was a straight forward design that added a sense of drama to the Sanctum Sanctorum Showdown set by having danger approaching from above.
Continuing my recent post of past LEGO MOCs (my own creation), I wanted to share this minifig scale Hulkbuster armor for Iron Man that I built during the summer of 2019 as something more playable and scaled properly than 76105 The Hulkbuster: Ultron Edition pictured below.
Iron Man’s Mark 44 Hulkbuster Armor is meant to put him on par with The Hulk in terms of strength and size. Considering the minifigure at the heart of the 76105 set, it is gargantuan in comparison to The Hulk. Therefore, I set a goal to build Hulkbuster armor that matched the mini-figure scale as closely as possible, encapsulate an Iron Man minifigure, and have more points of articulation than the smaller Hulkbuster armor in 76031 The Hulk Buster Smash (having a swivel waist like the 76105 Hulkbuster in this small size was beyond my skill).
Igor in 76125 Iron Man Hall of Armor inspired the basic layout of Hulkbuster using the ball-joint connectors. The 5-stud wide chest piece with an arc reactor in the center and wrap-around elements is my favorite part of the build. Rotated views with a focus on key details are included below.
Given more specialized elements–especially in dark red and metallic gold–I think that I can continue to refine this model to pack as much detail as possible within its small size in comparison to its larger brethren.
Recently, I decided to rebuild LEGO set 76038 Attack on Avengers Tower from the Avengers 2: Age of Ultra line. The trouble was that the elements for the set were strewn throughout my boxes of bricks and sorted drawers. I used some of the bricks in an Iron Man Hall of Armor MOC, which had to be disassembled for this project. A 511 piece set like this might normally take me a couple of hours to complete. As I had to sort and find the bricks while looking at the downloaded PDF instructions on my computer screen, it took the better part of a day to complete the impressive playset. Then, I started thinking about how to make this good set even better. One aspect that bothered me about it is how short it is. While I understand that LEGO considers cost, playability, and profitability in designing their sets, I thought that Avengers Tower should stand above the Manhattan skyline, which according to the logic of minifigure playsets would put this two or three levels higher. I decided to add two floors, because where the bottom floor extends to–following the slope established in the original set–is about as far out as the edge of platform at the top of the tower. To my mind, this seemed to work out well for a taller and proportionate LEGO Avengers Tower.
LEGO 76038 Attack on Avengers Tower Unmodified
Barring the additional minifigures (and four Iron Legion instead of the stock two), the photo above is of the unmodified LEGO 76038 Attack on Avengers Tower. On the lower level, it has the Iron Legion docking area and medical bay. The middle level has the Iron Legion repair bay/Ultron’s first embodiment and the diagnostic bay with scanner for studying Loki’s scepter. The top level features the platform, entertaining space, and computer station. The tower’s pinnacle is a drone deployment system.
I like the design work that went into the overall design of LEGO 76038. The angular front of the tower and the curve flowing down the side from the platform is spot-on with the design from the film. Of course, LEGO’s designers embellished the design for playability, but the thought that went into what elements should be included such as the Iron Legion bays and the scepter scanner reveal how dedicated their designers are to creating a model that balances play with realism.
Planning Additional Levels
To begin my modification to Avengers Tower, I had to plan out how to extend the slope of the front part of the tower. Following the slope provided in the original model, I saw that the next level–if it were the same height as the previous level–would need to extend two studs past the previous level. This allowed me to plan how much area in studs I would have to work with for the new first or bottom most level, and the new second level. The rear part of each level–with curved, translucent windows would remain the same for the new fourth and fifth levels. The new first level features an interactive Arc Reactor and Computer Server Room. The new second level features Tony Stark’s workshop and the Iron Man Hall of Armor.
Arc Reactor
I started building my addition to Avengers Tower on the bottom most, or new first level. Thinking back to the first Avengers film, I wanted the tower to have its own Arc Reactor. The first challenge was to think about what that would look like as it is only seen in the film as a 3D schematic on Pepper Potts’ computer monitor, and the second challenge was to integrate some interactivity into this part of the model. While the Arc Reactor doesn’t spin (just the plasma within its torus moves within its magnetic confinement rings), I thought a geared spinning mechanism might be fun to engineer. Due to the placement of the window, I added a series of three gears to move the work where it was needed to spin the reactor. A small knob on the right side of the tower is used to spin the reactor. I added gauges, pipes, valves, and supports to frame the Arc Reactor within its space.
Computer Server Room
Opposite the Arc Reactor on the first level is the computer server room. I built the 19″ computer racks four bricks high, but I might make these higher later. I staggered their placement to imply depth to the space. In the back corner, Ant-Man is hiding out to see what Stark might be up to.
Tony’s Workshop
I focused the new second level on Iron Man. In the front, sloped space, I created Tony Stark’s workshop. It has a desk with computer, parts, coffee mug. Next to the desk is a set of drawers with tools, and on top are two containers and Stark’s Mark V or Suitcase Armor from 76007 Iron Man: Malibu Mansion Attack. In the foreground, Tony Stark has a wrench, and a set of Iron Man armor is on the rotating work platform. Below are some false starts that I made while trying out different designs for this space, including a movable robot arm, which looked very nice but overcrowded the small area available.
Hall of Armor
On the rear side of the second level is Tony Stark’s Iron Man Hall of Armor. I was able to fit six different Iron Man armors in this tight space by building two tiers for the armor–one lower and in the foreground, and one higher and in the background.
New Avengers Tower Assembled!
After completing the new first and second levels, I connected them to the bottom of the original Avengers Tower model. This took some time and massaging to get full clutch without accidentally breaking the model. I’m happy with the new, taller version of Avengers Tower. I wonder what role, if any, it might play in the upcoming Avengers 4 film.
The Avengers are down, but not out.
Avengers Assemble!
