EDITOR’S NOTE: This post contains spoilers about the contents of the calendar.
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The day after Halloween, stores know exactly what to do (if they haven’t already done it): skip straight to Christmas. Decorations, clothing, and of course, Advent calendars. Aldi releases its fair share of Advent calendars every year, including chocolate, beer, wine, cheese, hot sauce, even puzzle calendars. The list goes on.
Of course, no calendar collection is complete without toy calendars. Through the years, Aldi’s toy Advent calendars have included well-known brands like LEGO, Little People, and Barbie. This year, slime Advent calendars are on the shelves along with a Bluey calendar and a variety of Mini Brands calendars. I’ve reviewed a few toy calendars over the years, but I’ve never touched the LEGO Advent calendars. Until this year.
The LEGO Marvel Advent Calendar is an Aldi Find, meaning it’s only in stores for a limited time, and once it’s gone, it’s gone. Aldi does not offer online ordering for products that are not in stock at your local store.
This LEGO Marvel calendar retails for $39.99.
This was sold alongside the LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar, also $39.99. Aldi also sold LEGO City and LEGO Friends Advent calendars for $29.99.
Regarding the LEGO Marvel Advent Calendar, Aldi is the cheapest compared to other sellers, but not by a whole lot. Amazon, Walmart, Target all sell it for $44.99 full price, although at the time of this post, they’re all on sale for around $39. It’s also $44.99 full price at the LEGO Store but was on sale for $40.49 at the time of writing.
The box folds down into a scene that can be used as a playset, with numbered doors at the back.
The Marvel calendar has 24 doors, and behind each door is either a minifigure or a mini build of some sort. The items you get are as follows (in the order in which they appear in the numbered doors):
- Iron Man figure
- Quinjet microbuild
- Spiderman figure
- Webs for Spiderman to hold
- Snowman
- Gift wrapping table
- Black Widow figure
- Mechanical reindeer with spiderweb trees
- Captain America figure
- Jetpack
- Fireplace with Thor’s Hammer
- Workbench
- Okoye figure
- Hockey gear and presents
- Weapons holder
- Loki-inspired chair
- Cloak of Levitation
- Doctor Strange figure
- Desk with lamp and apple
- HYDRA Train micro build
- Food table
- Wong with Tesseract
- Rug
- Christmas tree
Everything that comes in the calendar.
The box folds down into a scene looking out from the Avengers Tower, which means you can use it as a play space, and you aren’t throwing it away after the doors are all opened.
A closer look at some of the figures and mini builds.
Day one was a figure, as it should be. For the first few days, there’s a pattern of a minifigure, then a build. Except for Wong, all the minifigures come with a weapon of some sort to match their character (Captain America’s shield, Okoye’s staff, etc.). The variety of characters was one of my favorite parts, including getting unique characters like Doctor Strange, mixed in with multiple female characters. Spiderman and Black Widow come in Christmas sweaters, while the rest of the figures come in their normal outfits. Iron Man, Black Widow, Captain America, and Doctor Strange also have reversible heads with different facial expressions.
More figures and builds.
The instructions to build each set are printed on the door it comes in. Every step has to be crammed onto a tiny door, so they sometimes take a bit of time to understand, but it’s not impossible. One of my biggest complaints is that there aren’t any labels as to what each build is supposed to be. Some of them are obvious, but the weapons holder and Quinjet took a bit of Googling to identify.
Spare parts.
I also want to mention that some of the builds are references to Marvel movies, so it’s helpful to be knowledgeable about them, specifically the Avengers Quinjet and the HYDRA Train from the first Captain America movie.
In addition, some of the figures and builds are included in other LEGO sets, so if you already have a large Marvel LEGO collection, you may get stuff you already have.
The Verdict:
The LEGO Marvel Advent is an Aldi Find, and a solid one. This is probably one of my favorite Advent calendars I’ve reviewed. Any LEGO or Marvel fan would appreciate the movie references and the fun Christmas pieces. It isn’t perfect, but it’s a must-have for LEGO lovers.
