X-Men was absolutely my favorite as kid and I almost dumped in my pants when I saw this at the store. I am very biased so this was an easy 5 stars for me, but I will break it down a little more.

Awesomeness... I believe this is only the 2nd X-Men set ever (the first being the rare and expensive deadpool/wolverine chopper) and it may be the last for a while. I don't believe this set sold very well for lego, probably due to the price. Some sets will do that to you, but for me price didn't matter. This set is awesome and I had to have it. But with that, I don't think Lego will put out any more X-men sets for a while. Maybe for a wolverine reboot in many years. Oh, but there will be a Mighty Micro with Wolverine and Magneto if that counts.

The blackbird is the classic X-Men ship and this one looks great, seats a few figs, and has your basic jet play features like shooting missiles and movable wings. The Sentinel is not perfect, probably a bit on the small side for how big they should be, but come on! He looks cool and can hold a mini fig.

Mini-Figs... This classic look of Logan in his yellow and brown look great. His head piece is spot on and it also comes with hair for when he needs to take the mask off. Storm has cool purplish lightning bolts and a unique cape that attaches to her arms. Magneto is also in his classic gear and, like Logan, comes with hair for when the helmet is off. Cyclops is probably the least impressive but I think he still looks solid in his classic X-men uni.

Well... this set gets a lot of criticism for it's price and some have issues with the jet and sentinel, and I get it. I was just so excited to get an X-Men set and I thought everything was so cool and nostalgic. If you are looking to be impressed with the parts or the build aspect, then you may want to look at another set, but I think lots of dudes like me who grew up with the comics and the amazing 90's cartoon shouldn't have a problem with this set.

I purchased this set for below the 49.99$ MSRP, and I think a lot of people found this set on a pretty steep discount. It's actually a pretty good value if you found it for around 35$.

Minifigs: This is a dream team of key X-men characters, all in one set. The Magneto and Storm figures are especially good, and both feature a cape. Wolverine is also excellent, and Cyclops is okay - I feel like some sort of hat or molded eyewear would have improved it. (Now that the set is out of print, the minifigures command a pretty high price on the secondary market.)

Sentinel: The sentinel is a pretty basic build which uses the smaller ball and socket joints to make it poseable. The colors match the Magneto minifig well, although I don't think the sentinel is this brightly colored in the movies. It is easy to pose, and reasonable interesting to build, but not noteworthy.

Ship: I was not excited about the ship based on the box art. The front end of the ship is streamlined, but boring. Thankfully I did give the build a try, as it's better than I suspected. First of all, they didn't skimp on seating like these sets often do - there are four seats so all of you minifigs can take a ride at the same time. Secondly, the mechanical assembly that allows you to extend and retract the flick missiles is cleverly built and looks good. Finally, The wing assembly is pretty interesting to assemble, which is a good way to wrap up the build process.

Conclusion: It's still reasonably priced in secondary markets and has good minifigures. If you are interested in the ship or the characters, it's a good choice.

Review by Tom Alphin, Author of The LEGO Architect. Learn more at http://brickarchitect.com

P.S. Having recently re-watched all of the X-men movies, and being halfway through the LEGO Marvel game, I have to say that I'm still impressed with the official Minifigs. They capture the in-movie characters well, and have a convincing comic book style.

Set #76022 X-Men vs. The Sentinel: X-Men is the one Marvel property that rarely receives a LEGO set, so far we’ve only seen two sets based on Marvel’s X-Men and something tells me this is because Fox holds the film rights for them so Disney would prefer to limit how much profit they get from merchandise. It’s nice that we still get a few sets, and of the two released so far I think this one is a much better package compared to the original set from 2012.

Box/Instructions

Box: This box stands out as a great looking one, just like most Marvel Super Heroes boxes the design will attract your eye as it showcases the set and its features perfectly. The back shows all of the features quite well and overall it works at what it’s meant to be, great box for a great set.

Instructions: This set breaks up the numbered bags into two manuals, which in my opinion is completely unneeded, because Bag #1 and Manual #1 is fairly small and involves very few building steps. It does feature all of the cross promotion images in the back for the other sets in the wave though.

The instructions in the larger of the two manuals is for numbers 2 and 3 when it comes to the bags. There’s nothing much else in the book, there are no tricky steps, but the wings could be a tad repetitive.

Comic: The comic included with this set is for both the X-Men and the Guardians of the Galaxy, so there are no Minifigure checklists for this batch of Super Heroes sets because the comic is double-sided with one being printed on the reverse and upside down from the other.

Parts

You’ll find a lot of large specific parts in this set for flying vehicles, large wings and cockpit sections, there is also a printed piece for the Sentinel and a fair number of the ball joint pieces first introduced with the Legend Beasts in LEGO Legends of Chima.

Minifigures

Cyclops: This Minifigure is basically Captain America in design, Cyclops naturally has his own unique print, but he doesn’t come with a single accessory or a head piece, instead his head is printed with the mask and visor piece that he uses to fire his eye lasers. It works for Cyclops, but it might have been nice to see a head piece with the goggles so you could have him with his mask on one side and with his casual glasses on the other so he could do double-duty as battle ready Cyclops and instructor Cyclops.

The print is limited to his torso as well, there’s nothing on his legs, his hands are a very mustard looking yellow colour which is unique to him I think. Overall it’s nice to get Cyclops in Minifigure form, but he doesn’t stand out as well as the rest. He looks a lot like 90’s cartoon Cyclops though because of how accurate he is to the comic design.

Magneto: This version of Magneto has his purple costume with a red cape, he has a double-sided torso print and his head is I believe the same one as the previous figure. His helmet is red this time with purple print highlights around the eye guards. He includes a clear cylinder piece for storing his helmet so you can swap out to a white version of the new Joker’s hair piece and a small grey build to levitate him, which is much better than the circular plate that was used in the first set.

Storm: She is my all-time favorite from this set with one slight issue, her outfit is printed on a double-sided torso and carries down to her legs, the print just pops and really captures the look of her black costume from the comics. Her extra soft cloth piece for the billowing wing-like look works very well.

She includes a pair of electric bolt accessories to simulate lightning, and her facial expressions really look good, one side is for when she’s harnessing her powers with the wide glowing white eyes and the other is for when she’s just hanging out with her teammates.

What I do not like is the choice of hair pieces for her, it is the style used for Lois Lane and others before her in a new white colour, I don’t like this hair, it’s a decent sculpt, but it locks your character into looking only one direction when displaying them, you can’t have her turn her face to the right because the long piece of hair that hangs down over her chest will cover up that side of her face. I would have much preferred her Mohawk look here if possible.

Wolverine: This version of Wolverine comes with his mask as a new head piece, and is printed in the yellow and brown uniform. It’s a double-sided torso, there is no leg printing and he comes with his claws of course. His face has two expressions, one with white eyes for when he’s dressed in his mask, he comes with a spare hair piece so he can look normal expression wise.

The build

Bag 1: In this bag you’ll find Wolverine, Magneto and The Sentinel, which means you don’t find much of anything here, the predominant aspect of the build is The Sentinel itself which looks great and works well for what you’re building, compared to the other buildable character Groot this one has some issues, and improves upon others.

Bag 2: Here we get to the bulk of the parts use, we start in bag 2 with the fuselage of the X-Jet… Or is it meant to be the Blackbird? I’m not sure, let’s just say it is. It’s a very satisfying build and doesn’t stand out as too many difficult steps, you’ll also find Cyclops in this bag as pilot of the Blackbird.

Bag 3: Storm and the rest of the bulk of the Blackbird is built here and it goes quite well which bulks up the jet quickly. There are a few stickers for details in this set, not many though, which is a plus. It’s really difficult to quantify everything when you’re basically building a jet, you have a lot of smooth parts and typical flying vehicle elements such as large wings, the steps really aren’t that hard and it can be built with minimal supervision for younger builders.

The completed model

The Sentinel: As a buildable character this looks fairly impressive, especially as it has printed elements to enhance the look of the character. There are a few flaws with the design, mostly the use of a missile for an energy blast, it’s a bit too long where its attached and just feels like a bad idea. The model already has two flick-fire missiles on his shoulder, which is much better compared to the energy blast accessory used on the hand.

Speaking of the hands this is a pretty clever build element, the thumbs are click joint pieces sticking out and you use droid hand pieces from exo-force for the fingers. The design works well for hands, I find it better than Groot’s hands just a little bit.

The Blackbird: I love the design of this model, it’s been built to hold four Minifigures which is pretty great since most of these vehicles can barely hold more than three at least. And each seat has something to do, the front section has two seats, a pilot and a gunner section judging by the printed tiles on either side, the back has two seats with a scanner that has spotted The Sentinel and a tool chest type storage compartment which can be removed with a wrench, a hammer and a fire extinguisher for repairs and emergencies.

You get two flick-fire missiles and two of the pressure based launchers with energy projectiles to attack the Sentinel, that is the extent of the play features.

Overall opinion

This set has a lot more going for it compared to Wolverine’s Chopper as far as X-Men based sets, for one it has much more iconic builds/models and it gives us three members of the X-Men, even if one of them is just Wolverine again. You get a Sentinel, which is pretty good, honestly while Deadpool is only available in the other set, the huge Helicopter is just a bit of a waste after you get this set because you now have the Blackbird. I’d recommend tracking this one down if you are a fan of X-Men and want some X-Men characters, especially if you can get it on sale.

This set is a great start to your X-Men team. Now it's time for more. Love the swooshable X-Jet. Sentinel is good, but not great.

Box/Instructions

As with almost every set, the box is a bit too big, and the instructions do the job in 20 pages when it could be done in 15. The steps are at least clear and correct. No mistakes or contradictions.

Parts

Some great colours which could have been used a bit more, particularly on the X-Jet. I would have gone with more blues and black versus the dark grey.

Minifigures

The best part of the set is that you get four minifigures - two exclusive, and two exclusive variations.

It's great to see Wolverine both in his yellow-brown suit and with a mask. It's also nice that both he and Magneto come with optional hair.

While I think I prefer Magneto on a 2x2 round plate, this little winged mount is fine as well.

Cyclops is nothing spectacular, but at least now we have Cyclops.

It's great that we have Storm, too, and it's even better that she has alternate white eyes. I love that she comes with lightning bolts. I'm not crazy about her cape, but I like that it follows an established one from the comics.

The only other X-Men character out there, besides variations, is Deadpool (and one very expensive and hard-to-find Jean Gray/Dark Phoenix). I do so hope that there are more on the way.

The build

The build of the Sentinel is pretty simple, but it is nice to see what can be accomplished with the new Mixels' ball and socket plates. Mech builds can be a little more elegant and less bulky.

I like that the Sentinel is there. It offers playability right out of the box. Sure the X-Men can battle Magneto, but now you have the complicated interpersonal dynamics that a common enemy brings to your playtime.

The Sentinel is not as great as it could be, but I like to think of it as an early model. The printed chest piece could easily be incorporated into a larger more menacing version. Even the head cylinder could, too, with imagination. I guess I wouldn't be totally satisfied, however, until there is a Sentinel similar to the one in the Marvel Super Heroes video game available.

The X-Jet starts out rather boringly. Dark grey blocks, oh, an interesting blue thing at one end...
But, by the time you start to add the blue and dark blue pieces, the jet starts to look pretty good. The final product looks sleek and not just a bit sexy. The peek-a-boo features blend seamlessly, and open without coming off. It seats four, which is excellent. The tool cabinet comes out easily, which is good, because otherwise using it would be very difficult.

The completed model

The X-Jet looks nice, despite a lacklustre beginning. It seats four, and is highly swooshable.

The only things I would change are adding landing gear, and changing the dark grey elements for blue and dark blue. A bit more detailing inside would be welcome, too.

The Sentinel is a bit too small to be really menacing, but it has some great parts. It's a nice Mark I.

Three X-Men and Magneto. Yes!

Overall opinion

It's a very good set. Lots of X-Men to start your team. A good guys/bad guy/very bad guy dynamic for instant playability. A sharp looking X-Jet that seats four and makes good use of the new missiles and flick fires. This is a great start, I just hope it's not the last X-Men set we see.