Blocks explores the development of LEGO Ideas 21367 Tintin Moon Rocket, in which plucky reporter Tintin blasts off to discover the secrets of space with his trusty sidekick Snowy, with the LEGO Ideas design team.
The recently unveiled LEGO Ideas 21367 Tintin Moon Rocket is available to preorder now and will launch on April 4. The set is made up of 1,283 pieces and is priced at £139.99 / €159.99 / $159.99.
Shortly after returning from a thrilling adventure, young reporter Tintin and Captain Haddock are invited to Syldavia by Professor Calculus who has been working on a top secret project. He has been working on harnessing the power of atomic energy to create a new type of technology – a rocket that will let people explore the moon. But rival scientists don’t want him to succeed, so Tintin, Captain Haddock, and Snowy will have to investigate if the rocket is to safely blast into outer space.
That’s the premise for Tintin: Destination Moon, one of the most famous comics by Hergé, which was the inspiration for fan designer Alexis Dos Santos. He wanted to reimagine the brightly coloured rocket that had been one of his favourite vehicles growing up. “I grew up watching the TV shows and reading the comic books, so I thought it would be fun to try,” explains Alexis. “I made a model and I thought it looked beautiful. Then I made a bunch of other vehicles and almost everything from Tintin. I wanted to try it on LEGO Ideas and it went so well. Everybody was causing the numbers to fly so fast. Now, we’re here and I’m super excited to share it with the world.”
LEGO Ideas 21367 Tintin Moon Rocket easily blasted past the 10,000 votes required to be considered during the official review process, fuelled by the love that so many fans still have for the classic 1950s comic series. It was then up to LEGO Design Master Ellen Bowley to front up mission control, translating Alexis’s design into a set, as well as capturing the iconic comic art style.
“The original model had four sides. To keep it accurate to the source material, it needed six sides. So six layers of the chequered pattern,” says Ellen, referring to the cylindrical shape of the rocket. “That was something that needed to be as accurate as possible. One of the biggest challenges was making a six-sided shape that thin.”
It also led to one of the biggest changes compared to Alexis’ concept – the removal of the launchpad, which allowed Ellen to dedicate more pieces to the actual rocket, especially for its complex interior. “That’s when we made a [Technic] cage for the inside, to create something that we could build off. So the original model was simpler on the inside, but because we needed the internal support, it got more complicated.”
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Another reason for removing the launchpad was so that 21367 Tintin Moon Rocket could represent not only Destination Moon but also its sequel, Explorers On The Moon. “It can used for either comic. There’s one story where the rocket is on Earth with the launchpad and there’s one where they’re on the moon,” explains LEGO Ideas Creative Lead Jordan Scott. “And that’s why the spacesuits were also such a good choice because that way they can be in either location.
“We really wanted to just focus on the icon, which is the rocket itself. When you see it in pop culture stores and places like that, all you see is that rocket. It’s super iconic in various different sizes. Ellen has an inflatable one that’s about two meters tall in her house!
“Just focusing on that allowed us to have it at a much more reasonable size, so that more people can display it more easily. That tower added about another thousand pieces and it’s not as relevant as the rocket.”
Changing the scale of the rocket then presented another set of difficulties because there’s a huge difference between comic panels and what’s possible with LEGO bricks. “One of the main things about the rocket is, again, the six-sided shape. But it has this really fine curve from top to bottom and we had to represent Hergé’s work very accurately,” says Ellen. “That curve was one of the biggest hurdles to overcome. To create this shape and to have a smooth curve with no interruptions. The final technique with everything being attached to that central core with ball-joints was the solution after many different iterations. All to create that very subtle angle.”
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