Lepin 07107: Infinity War Sanctum Sanctorum Showdown Review (Bonus: SY Cull Obsidian Review Comparison)

First previewed here!

My light box isn't big enough to cover the Sanctum, sadly, but I couldn't let that stop me from taking review pics.

I'll start off with some pictures without flash!

Always wanted a modular, but it's really pricey for me even the bootleg ones. Plus, I've always really been just a Marvel collector and I couldn't justify spending a lot on a modular that had nothing to do with Marvel, and space on where to display it is also an issue.. Maybe next time, but thankfully we have this Sanctum!!

It's smaller than usual modular sets, but the exterior looks just as good as many modulars, and the interiors also have a good amount of detail! Of course, credit goes to TLG for the design and specs, but Lepin did a good job of copying it too.


A view of the back, aka Peter's Apartment. It's actually a two-in-one build of some sort because the front is Strange's Sanctum while the back is this apartment, then you can open it up to make it seem like there are two buildings. It's really tempting to buy two sets so that Peter gets a full fledged apartment and Strange does as well. Doesn't make sense for a magical building to share space with a normal apartment.. Haha


Underneath Peter's apartment is a restaurant called Pepe's Pizza! While I don't think there's not much relation to Marvel stuff, it's still a welcome addition with some good interiors that I'll be showing below.


This is the front of the first floor of Doctor Strange's Sanctum and the print on the door is a sticker that I wish was more centered, but the door knob mold on the door piece wouldn't allow you to place it in the center..


The Sanctum's iconic window! As opposed to TLG's original Sanctum Sanctorum set from the Doctor Strange movie, the window design is now printed on a round transparent piece as opposed to being build by parts. (Reviewed Sheng Yuan's clone of that set here.) Printing quality? Great. Plastic quality? Great. Some months, maybe years ago, people complained about Lepin's clear parts being foggy, but I think they have improved already, and not just with that piece but with other transparent pieces in the set.


In addition to that, some, not all, of the transparent pieces came in these resealable plastic bags for further protection from scratches. Nice! The smaller clear parts didn't come in those anymore though.


Clear enough? Many of them still had minor scratches though, but nothing too noticeable or too annoying.


The side has this extra build with some trashcans and boxes, along with a special newspaper box that I'll be showing more of later.


That's a lot of printed parts! Well, actually the set came with a number of stickers too. Those are the ones included and I love them all! I have personal favorites which I'll show more of below! The ones on the right are the stickers with transparent backgrounds. I think these are the let downs of the set since when applied, they leave the sticker area a bit foggy as compared to the now-clearer transparent pieces of Lepin. (Or maybe I just suck at applying stickers, and yeah I am bad at it lol)


Though not all the prints were stickers. For example, these two parts are printed on. A cashier which could be useful to any MOCer, and a pizza that sadly has print that isn't centered too well.


Moving on to brick quality though, this is minor but there are some gaps sometimes in between the bricks when they're clutched together. The clutch remains strong, but that gap might be an issue for buildings that get bigger; this might matter more to MOCers who might wanna use the bricks for other builds.

Now don't get me wrong, the overall quality of the bricks were great. They felt great and didn't hurt my fingers; they clutched in together well too without needing too much or too few effort. Some bricks had some scratches right after opening their bags up, but I guess that's expected for the price we pay for.. TLG probably handles their bricks with much much much more care than how Lepin does when it comes to logistics and all that.


Another odd issue I encountered. If you've been building a number of brick sets, you might know that these bricks' backs have straight lines instead of what you see in the picture (brick wall design). Lepin's instructions even show us that the bricks are realy supposed to have straight lines on the mold and not the brick design, but for some reason the bricks don't have the straight lines at all.. What's odd is that Pepe's Pizza uses at least two bricks with that design and a straight line design at the back. I wonder what went wrong.. It's times like this though that I'm thankful for Lepin's numbered bags, because if they weren't numbered, I probably would've spent more time looking for them than actually building! (Assuming I didn't sort anymore, lol.)


Weird observation: the brick separator [with Lepin's iconic Giraffe design lol] is included in the 8th section, aka the last section of the build.. Would've been more useful if it were given to us in the beginning, but hey you can always open up the last bag anyway and leave it for a while.


Spidey comes with a new web string accessory as well. You have to know how to tie a knot to make it work, it doesn't come attached. Even Lepin's chains [included with Cull Obsidian below] didn't come pre-built and you had to attach them yourself (just the chain and stud part, not each chain link!).

In addition to the finished quality of the set, the building process was also simple and enjoyable. The bags were numbered and the instructions weren't confusing. Credits go to TLG for this of course. Though back then, Lepin didn't include numbered bags and thus big sets like this would be a pain.. It would also be harder to keep track of lost parts, and thankfully with this set, no parts were missing!

Number of bags: 3+2+4+3+2+3+4+3 = 24 bags. Each term in the equation corresponds to its section, meaning there are 8 sections in the build. All the parts based on the instructions will only come from one section at a time, but these sections' parts are spread throughout the section's bags. I'm having a hard time explaining it, but basically if the instructions says it'll be using bag 1, then that means get all the bags labeled 1 and open them up already!

Now for more pictures with flash, since the flash can make or break the look of the sets..



Better look at the glass pane of the Sanctum.


Side view. The Infinity Stone is placed in the second floor of the left portion. Poor hiding skills, Doc!


Side view. Oh Spidey, why do you have to mess up everywhere with your web??


View of the apartment.

Now for a look at each room in the building. Total of 6 rooms/areas in the build, since there are 3 floors and 2 halves.

Peter's bedroom, apartment 3rd floor.


Peter's work room, apartment 2nd floor.

Pepe's Pizza, apartment 1st floor.


Sanctum Sanctorum 3rd floor.


Sanctum Sanctorum 2nd floor.

Sanctum Sanctorum 1st floor.

If you've read about the set before, then you know it also comes with a handful of play features! Great for kids, great for adults! I really love this set.


First up is the "secret" location of the Time Stone. If you turn the technic part on the left picture, the whole side wall of the Sanctum's second floor will fall off fully revealing the Time Stone. (Time Stone not in the picture. More on this below.)


Another is Pepe's Pizza's window being pushed out through pushing the red technic piece.



Maybe my favorite of the play features: if you pull the red technic piece on the upper right picture, a portion of the apartment's third floor's floor will open up and anything on it will drop to the second floor. This is trying to recreate Peter's hiding spot for his costume in his apartment as seen in Captain America Civil War. The last picture is basically showing the normal set up when the technic piece isn't pulled yet.


In this one, you can put a minifig on the black parts on the bottom left of the roof and when you push the red technic part, the fig will get pushed off the roof. This works well with the web play feature seen in the next images.


The web string is attached to the water tower, and the water tower can turn. When you turn the tower, it then pulls in and pulls out the web allowing your minifig [who's holding the web] to go up when you turn the water tower or even go down!

The huge web on the side also comes with a play feature. If you pull it down, it'll push out Peter's window allowing him to rush out as Spider-Man and save the day!


One thing I didn't like about the set were the presence of so many open studs on the outside that didn't add much to the aesthetic, though when my more positive mind kicked in, it told me that maybe it's for your Spider-Man to attach to! Additionally, you can always cover it up with flat tiles if you'd want.


Lastly, extra parts already pre-placed in this bag.

Overall, great build. Great job TLG for designing such a good set! I know they had limited parts to work with to keep the price right as opposed to going full modular, but I think they were able to make a lot out of what they had. This is certainly better than their Age of Ultron Avengers Tower! (Now I'm wondering if SY or other brands will make extended versions of this just like what SY did with the Extended Avengers Tower.)

Great job to Lepin too for the good quality clone!

Somewhat bonus part, my personal highlights from the set are: 
1) Peter's desk,


2) the sticker with Peter's Homemade Suit,


 and 3) the sticker on the newspaper box with Daredevil's picture!

Great easter eggs in my opinion! And great build for Peter's desk that might be useful in other builds, even outside Marvel!

Time for the figs.


A few months, maybe years back, people would often say: Get Lepin for the build, get POGO/SY/Decool for the figs. Now, well POGO has been crap lol, and Lepin's figs actually give out a fight when it comes to quality!


Before anything, these are the accessories that came with the figs. The time stone, like all of the Lepin Infinity Stones, are kinda foggy and not as clear unlike Lele's stones, but I think even TLG's stones are more similar to Lepin's. The blast pieces are for sure much clearer on TLG's though.


I guess this counts, but Iron Man's jet boots thing are assembled as such, and I actually like it.


Two decent figs that are sadly haunted by bad quality control. Though generally, the plastic felt great and looks great, and the print is clear and well-defined for the most part, but some parts don't look too good!


Iron Man's torso came with a scratch right out of the box. Not a big deal for me who has a lot of MK 50s already, but for those who'll only get this one, it's not a good sign. Additionally, you can see that some of the design elements aren't printed well with some paint overlaps, etc.


Another issue is this: Tony's HUD is horribly printed. I know Lepin can do better because I also have the Guardians' ship (review post soon) and the Tony included there had a decent HUD print.


Doctor Strange's cape came in two parts that were of different material. The main cape feels like real fabric while the collar was that usual, thin plastic-like material. Both weren't bad.


Side view. An issue with Strange: his white hair isn't aligned properly.. XINH has this problem too..


A view of the back. No issues here.


Uhhh I messed up twice with Spider-Man.. First, his torso is the other way around and second, I forgot his spider legs back accessory.. Though other than my mistakes, the quality for both are pretty good and really decent.


Even the arm prints are good enough.


Back view. Not a fan of the lack of dual molding or dual colors all around Spidey's legs, but that's TLG's decision too.


Two Cull Obsidian figs? NO. The one on the left is from Sheng Yuan and I actually made a separate review but haven't posted it yet.. So I guess this'll act as that review.


They actually have some notable differences, and they're mostly on the head mold. The head mold is arguably intricate and both companies probably didn't have an easy time copying them. While I think both did well, I think I prefer the mold details on SY's bigfig more. Though for the print, Lepin's orange accents are more accurate to TLG's as opposed to Sheng Yuan's yellow accents. Too bad we can't mix and match them.


Lepin.


Sheng Yuan.


Here you'll see how Sheng Yuan's details are more defined and somewhat pointier. In this part, it really comes to preference. Additionally, Lepin Cull Obsidian's hands seemed smaller than most bigfigs.. but it still fit well and held his hammers well. Though both are really good.

A good clone from Lepin. I'm surprised they invested in the Cull Obsidian mold, and that they actually made a decent job cloning him.

Sorry for the late review by the way. It took me a while to decide if I should get this because I didn't wanna spend too much, but I finally did. Glad to know that AngeloMarcus Greenhills had lots of stock of this, and its SY counterpart, when I got it a few days ago. Also, the Guardians' ship is also up for review, so stay tuned for that!

As an alternative, Sheng Yuan also has a Sanctum Sanctorum clone. Fun with Brick from Facebook also has pics of the Sheng Yuan version for those interested; the captions are not in English but Facebook has auto-translate and the pictures speak for themselves anyway! Though again, it's always better to get the original TLG version as much as possible!

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