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Name: Hand Spinners
Distributor: LELE
Model: 39033
Pcs: 24-26
So, we went from one spinner to a line of four spinners, and now we're looking at the most extensive of these lines with EIGHT different spinners! ...Sort of. I'll explain in a minute.
These come to us from LELE, which is probably a familiar name to anyone with a passing interest in bootleg Lego.
LELE, along with BELA(who may/may not be the same company), is one of the most prolific bootleggers of Lego products, straight-up copying everything from Friends, Ninjago, Marvel, DC, Disney, Minecraft, Star Wars, and so on. If Lego's produced it, LELE has likely copied it.
They're so shameless with their blatant pirating, that they've even plastered their names on accessories produced by Lego, including this minifigure case!
But if you want the ultimate ego trip from them, then check out their line of figures from The Lego Movie*. ...Oh, I'm sorry, I meant The LELE Movie! Yes, they actually photoshopped their name over the title to one of the greatest movies about Lego ever made, as well as arguably one of the greatest animated movies ever made PERIOD! ...Now granted, I wouldn't mind seeing what a cheap cash-in of The Lego Movie would look like**, but maybe they should actually produce one instead of slapping their name over an already existing popular movie and saying "This movie was made by US! We're responsible for it!" There's shameless, and then there's... This.
*And we will. ...Eventually.
**Heck, I just might make it myself.
But with all that said, these "Hand Spinners" might actually be the most original line produced by LELE. I couldn't find any evidence these were stolen from another company, nor were they taken from the Lego Ideas website, so as far as I can tell, these are original builds! Kudos to you, LELE! ...I'm still not buying your knockoffs, but I will support your honest ventures.
...Though "honest" may be too strong a word here. I paid about $13 for this line of 8 sets. That's about $1.65 for each, which sounds like a good deal.
Especially since they arrived packaged in this store stand! ...Unfortunately, they cut to down to fit, so I can't set it up properly.
Then you realize that three of them are just blatant copies of three others, just with reversed color schemes... I guess that's still a good deal since you're still getting 8 sets, but it would have been nice if they bothered to think up three other designs instead of resorting to bootlegging their own product...
These are the only two sets that remain "original", as in, there's only one of each in this line. ...But I don't even know if that was intentional.
On the back, they display the entire line and what you're supposed to get. And you can see quite plainly that the two "single" models have also been copied, meaning only four original designs for this line.
But then we have these "claw" spinners, which don't appear on the other boxes, but do on their own, replacing one each of the other two spinners. I have no idea why this is the case. Maybe they originally came with the first line-up and what I got was the "Hand Spinners 2.0" line that they were just too lazy to change the box art for the first line for, or maybe they created the first few sets, realized that they missed a model, and quickly added them to the new model's boxes without bothering to fix the error on the others. ...Or maybe I'm just insane. That last one is probably the case.
Anyway, these fall under the imaginatively-named "Hand Spinners." ...That's a blatant lie, since you don't spin them with your hand, you balance them with your fingers. That technically means that the previous line was more accurately named than this one, so I guess that's another point we can give 818. ...They need all the points they can get.
The Chinese text on the right translates to "Hand Gyro", while the text underneath the title translates out to "Play the new fun of building blocks."
On the bottom, we're told this features "New Gameplay", while the symbols underneath tell us "New play. Building blocks and gyro collision." One of the first times I think the Chinese on these boxes more accurately describes the product than the English translation.
Speaking of 818, these boxes actually share several features with that line, including a photoshopped hand over each of the spinners. It's a drawn hand in this case, but it's the same idea.
And yes, each box shares the same model number. ...Why even have model numbers if you're not going to make a distinction between each set?
Oh, but they included the model number under the flap on the top. ...That helps...
The tops of these boxes are condensed versions of the front, sans hand
While one side features the model's instructions. A little easier to see while building this on video than the 818, but it was still a little awkward having to tilt my head around to see it.
The other side is just blank save for another example of the title
And the bottom contains all the usual warnings, including:
- Don't smack yourself in the eye with one of those coin vending machine sticky hands
- Don't knock out PAC-Man's top teeth with a brick, no matter where the arrow points.
Despite the front saying "6+".
Anyone who disregards this warning is spun right round, baby. Right round. Like a record, baby. Right round round round.
And here's the entire line, comprised of two original designs and three copies. That gives us 5 designs to critique. Though right away, you can tell these were given much more thought than the previous line.
These are probably the flashiest fidget spinners that will be featured here. While the last two lines stuck to monochrome color schemes, these have a varied array of colors that really stand out. Oranges, silvers, golds, grays, reds, blues, blacks, and some translucent reds and blues. This on its own would grab my attention.
On top of that, a lot of them include bricks that aren't commonly used, even by Lego. Just in this little group shot, you can see gears, wheels, those "eye" Technic pieces, and those tweezer-looking things used in the Lego Dimensions portal. The obscurity of these pieces and the flashy color scheme each are given help make these spinners REALLY stand out!
But can they spin? Yes, they can! And very well at that! They're not as fast or smooth as the Lego fidget spinner, but they're certainly much better than the 818 spinners.
Once again, this is probably thanks to how aerodynamically they're designed and how they're made of smooth bricks with little weight to them. Most of the pieces once again come from Technic sets, but they do incorporate smoother Lego cylinders and domes, among others. These are very "porous", being made with a lot of holes air can pass through. Plus the center is mostly hollow, with most of the bricks on the sides, allowing for a good amount of inertia once spun.
Even the ones that use plates in the middle incorporate ones with multiple holes, not only allowing the rods to pass through, but also contributing to how wind resistant they are.
The best spinners are obviously the ones with the most weight on the ends, including the one with the wheels on each end shown previously, and this one with what looks like three old-timey six-shooter chambers.
These have the most potential for inertia and will spin for a good amount of time as long as you don't move them from side to side.
They're also much easier to hold onto. Instead of the nubs we saw with the previous two lines, most of these incorporate little dome bricks to hold onto, with also have little studs that can be grasped much more easily. They're still not ideal, since they are still slippery, but they're much easier to hold onto than the smooth domes most of the previous ones had.
Unfortunately, these have a problem with being pushed too hard, which can cause the pieces on either side to press against the middle and prevent it from spinning. So if you're trying to get a firm grip on the spinners, you can easily press the sides too hard and you'll have to spend a little time separating them again, only to once again push them together...
A few of the sets incorporate different methods for holding onto the spinners, such as this one, where you grasp gear pieces on either side, which are MUCH easier to hold onto. Not only that, but it's much easier to line up the ends of the rod with the tops of the gears, meaning that if you hold them correctly and press in the right spot, they can't slide against each other and you'll never have the problem the last method presented!
But the best format they give us is with this model, where the sides have two flat pieces with nubs. Not only are they the easiest to hold onto, but it's impossible for the rod to slide through and push the sides together, so you'll NEVER have the problem the previous methods had! So spin away and never fear!
Now if you think I'm giving these way too much credit, they do still suffer from inconsistent quality control. While not as bad as the 818 line, a few of these pieces can be too loose to make a connection. These "claw" spinners especially have a habit of having their claws fall off the rods on either end, so spin with caution.
And while the rods do fit snugly in most cases, it is still possible to press so hard in one spot that certain parts can fly off while spinning. You basically have to intentionally aim for that spot while starting it off to make it happen, but it can.
But if those are the major problems with this line, then overall, I think we have a winner. An overlooked must have of brick sets. ...As long as you weren't expecting full fidget potential.
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Quality: The quality is surprisingly high for a cheap knockoff. The plastic quality is high, there's no clouding with the translucent bricks, the colors are nice, and nothing was a chore to put together. ...However, as with most third-party sets, the quality control is inconsistent, and while it's not as common here as most other cheap sets I've come across, there are bricks that fit too loosely to stay attached. Overall though, I think the majortity of the pieces are of high enough quality to be mistaken for Lego. Or at least Mega Bloks.
Design: If you were to make fidget spinners out of building bricks, you couldn't do much better than what they did here. The pieces are light and incorporate a lot of holes for air to pass through and the ends of most are weighed down enough to give each a good amount of spin. Also, I LOVE the color schemes they chose, with a good mixture of blues, reds, golds, silvers, and a few others. However, the fact that you can accidentally push the sides together hard enough to prevent some of them from spinning is a severe flaw, and the fact the dome bricks can still easily slip through your fingers is frustrating. It makes me wonder why they didn't all incorporate the flat plate or gears into each model and eliminate this possibility? Still, these designs are a lot of fun and really show that they put a lot of thought into each spinner's functionality.
Creativity: Most of the spinners are given their own unique shapes, and the fact that these were produced by a company that doesn't normally incorporate originality is impressive. The lesser-used bricks used for most of the spinners really help them stand out and give them an edge, plus the translucent bricks make them shinier and more fun to look at. That alone would get my attention if I was to pass by these in a store or see them used in a video. However, I'm knocking off one or two points for resorting to copying their own designs in the same line and not even being consistent about it, with two original designs and three copied.
Readability: The instructions are once again printed on the side of the box and aren't that hard to follow along with, given the small number of parts. Can't complain.
Packaging: The quality of the boxes is really nice, once again using thin cardboard, high res pictures, and some lamination to resist damage and splotching. It's amazing how closely it resembles what 818 gave us, but it's a little more interesting. The blue backgrounds have a nice, calming feeling to them, and a cartoon hand to hold the spinners was a nice touch. The Chinese text also convinced me to break out Google Translate and see what it said, even if it wasn't the Engrish I was looking for. However, it was interesting that the translated Chinese text did a better job of describing this line than the simplified English on the boxes. And the fact that the same model number is used on every box is hilariously lazy. Overall, the boxes for the most part do their job, but there are a few things about them that grabbed my attention.
Compatibility: Each one is made out of a nice mixture of regular building bricks and Technic pieces, allowing additional pieces from either line to be used with these. In fact, I strongly encourage you to dig out your own building bricks and see how well you can customize these spinners to your preferences.
Overall:
I'm VERY impressed with how nice these spinners look and how well they function. The colors are nice, the creativity is apparent, and the choices they made for what to stick on the ends of each really help keep them spinning. Unfortunately, they do have the same problems as most other brick spinners, including parts easily falling off and slow down when moved around. Still, if you're curious about customizable, buildable spinners, this is a great place to start. Try them yourself, have fun trying each out, and give the spares to a child or loved one.
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