LEGO SET REVIEW 21324 SESAME STREET

Following the press release announcement, we are happy to bring you our review of the set 21324 LEGO IDEAS 123 Sesame Street.

This set will be available for sale from 1 Nov 2020 at all LEGO stores for USD119.99

Box Experience

The box follows the recent black background colour scheme of sets targeted at adults though we are certain a big majority of kids will like this one as well. The playset which inclused two buildnigs and 6 minifigures are shown as viewed from the street with the residents of the neighbourhood around 123 Sesame Street going about their daily routine.

The back of the box shows of the play features and various details of the interior which we will get to in a little while

Contents of the box

1) A sticker sheet
2) One instruction manual
3) Bags numbered 1-6 (All numbers have two packs except number 4)
4) A loose pack of plates and long bricks

First impressions/Instruction Manual

We are more than happy that the team have managed to slot in some printed elements for this set especially the street sign

Here is a lineup more interesting printed pieces for this set (we think most of these are new and exclusive to this set especially the 123 on trans 1×2 brick, Sesame Street sign on 1×4 tile, 123 on 1×1 rounded edge tile, and Slimey print on the 1×1 heart tile.
The instruction manual is once again all in black, and unfortunately the background print on the building instruction phase also fully black, making it very hard to distinguish colours of some parts. We hope that they do go back to a grey-ish insert boxes for the building instructions soon.

The Build

The build will be of the two iconic buildings along Sesame Street including 123 Sesame Street and Hooper’s Store located at the bend of the road and the Arbor location between the two buildings. The buildings are open backed for ease of access to the details inside.

The first bag will allow the build  of the base of the build and gives us a glimpse of the total footprint of the set. It also builds the open basement of the main 123 Sesame Street 2 storey brownstone type building. There is a spider on cobwebs that will be closed up after the build is finished, but will be otherwise visible from the half window from the street. The basement used to be where Bert & Ernie lived so we guess they had an location upgrade in the past decade or two and all that remains is the spider.

The second bag builds up the first storey of the building (which houses Elmo’s room) and the second storey. The third bag builds up the interior of Bert and Ernie’s room as well as the rooftop which houses Bert’s pigeons as well as a curious UFO build . Sesame Street buffs will no doubt be able to link this easter egg to a certain episode as we have no clue! Elmo’s room is furnished with his toy ball, train, toy rocket and not forgetting his pet goldfish. His room is quite sparse, likely as there needs to be a big empty space to cater for the big in-swinging green doors. We wonder when did Elmo move into this building as we seem to remember he lived elsewhere at first.

Bert and Ernie’s room features their beds placed side by side, the classic mise-en-scene for bedtime conversations between them, which usually end up with Ernie laughing and going to sleep while Bert stays awake wide eyed with anger. Bert’s green chair and Ernie’s bathtub and rubber duckie are here too. There is also Bert’s proud bottle cap collection and paper clips which are curiously place on Ernie’s bed. We particularly like the table lamp where the shade is made of a white unprinted Minecraft minifig head! The beds and chairs can be easily detached from the room if you so wish.

The build continues by building Hooper’s Store and also Cookie’s apartment on top of it. Hooper’s store is very stocked up with provisions and has a very nice stickered store front, faithful to the set design and a quaint table and chair for you to enjoy the afternoon tea. Two strategically place 1×1 bricks with holes gives an option of extension if LEGO decides to extend the street next to Mr. Hooper’s store like the laundry or ice cream shop.

Cookie Monster’s apartment and surrounding environments including Big Bird’s Nest and also the interiors of all rooms and the lively exteriors are then built. The ejected VCR tape and Guy Smiley on the CRT TV brings back memories. The Count, while not included as a minifigure, is represented by a nicely framed picture and a bat right at the roof top placed strategically. Big Birds Nest seems to be less cramped than what we remember (missing some of the big fences) and it seems the Oscars trashcan has also moved from the right to the left of the house. Maybe there were some reshuffling and re-modelling in the past decade or so 🙂

The side of the house is nicely decorated with a green space for Abby. Very nice flower designs fill up the area along with giant posters of Abby and also Biff & Sully and a fire escape separating the two posters. Oscar looks downright miserable (the way he likes it) in front of the house together with Slimey.

The overall view looks great from all angles and here we have all the minifigs comfortable at the iconic steps to the house with the big green doors with Oscar looking happily from his trashcan. The lamppost holding the street sign is also very well down with the opalescent lamp cover.

Minifigures

This is probably the biggest draw of the set. There are 6 Muppets Sesame Street minifigures included in this set (7 if you include Slimey the Worm).

Elmo, Cookie Monster, Oscar the Grouch, Big Bird, Bert and Ernie all make their bow in LEGO form, with 5 of them needing unique moulds to bring them to brick life.

Big Bird has been a perennial Sesame Street mainstay, having been introduced since Episode 1 and the head, torso and tail is beautifully represented in all its feathery form in the shape of a rubbery element. The “inner” torso with wings is probably new in this colour while the legs are printed on the front and the side. This is probably the best minifigure of the lot with great attention given to every part of him.

Cookie Monster is made possible with a new head mould compete with googly eyes. The torso and legs are unprinted (the legs are “teen” legs which can be articulated)
We would’ve liked it if black furry prints could have been added to the front and back of the torso to make him more “Monster” or “Muppet” like

Elmo is made possible with a new head mould. The torso and legs are unprinted (the legs are “kid” legs which cannot be articulated. As with Cookie, we would’ve liked it if black furry prints could have been added to the front and back of the torso to make lil’ Elmo more “Monster” or “Muppet” like.

Bert also has a special head mould which also includes his turtleneck sweater fold. His sweater is printed on the front and back while the legs are unprinted (the teen kind)
Very nice representation of him in LEGO form here,

Likewise with Ernie, he also receives a special head mold and sweater is also printed on the front and back with no prints on the leg (the kid kind that doesn’t articulate)

Oscar, who rarely ventures outside his trashcan in the original show, is represented with a face print on a ball element just placed in a LEGO trashcan with an unprinted 2×2 Dark Bluish Gray round tile representing his trashcan lid. Judging from the boxart alone, we thought he would be all “head” and no body but LEGO decided to give him a blank lime green minifigure head to represent his body.
Slimey is printed on a 1×1 heart tile. He’s so cute!

Building tips


1) There is at least one place with build that calls for 1 lesser element that is required. In this page 13, you use two 16×16 plates instead of 1
2) Take care that you place the side studs of those 1×1 bricks at the right orientation as those will serve to “hang” tiles at the correct place. Confirm and reconfirm before you build the buildings up 🙂
3) For placing stickers on round tiles (The Count’s portrait and the table in front of Hooper’s Store), please remember to build them up first to see how the element aligns itself to the anti-studs below, and then place your sticker.

Summary

For a kid that grew up in the 80’s and 90’s, this set brings back a lot of memories and all the many things learned from the wholesome world of Sesame Street. This is one LEGO set we would definitely purchase for myself or as a gift to my friends. Sesame Street was a big part of our childhood but there were plenty of references included in the set. The design team and fan designer must have had a blast creating this set as did we while building it. We give this set a 4.5 stars for bringing back the nostalgia as well as decent builds and details everywhere in this set.
Thank you fan designer Ivan Guerrero and the LEGO IDEAS team for bringing this set to life.

Other thoughts

The original IDEAS supported submitted was a rather big modular building and LEGO made some big changes to bring this set to life, while retaining a lot of the actual spirit
At a price point of US119.99, we think it’s an excellent entry point for LEGO lovers and casual fans alike although there may be many who will be disappointed at this big change.

The set used for the review was sent to us by The LEGO Group for the purpose of a review. Provision of sets do not in any way influence or guarantee a positive review.