Set Review - Brown Bear's River 41046

Brown bear, brown bear, what do you see?  I see a blogger looking at me.  Today's last post of the year also wraps up the Series 5 Friends Animals.  These are neat little vignettes that highlight a particular animal and are an entry level set into the Friends subtheme.  They start at US$3.99, sometimes you'll find them for US$4.99.  The sets average around 40 pieces plus a few extras here and there.

Brown Bear's River was one of my favorite vignettes.  The bear cub is a nice unique mold which also shows up in Sand Blue in the Jungle Bridge Rescue set.  I was drawn to the simple yet effective design, the square base, and the animation!

The fish is connected to a bar via a droid arm.  You can make him jump the falls with a flick of a finger.  Nature purists may note that he is rather high above the water, almost as if he is flying.  Hey, it's the thought that counts, right?

The base of the build is created by stitching three different colored and size plates together.  A 4x6 medium azure plate for the water, a green 2x6 plate behind for grass, and a lime 1x6 plate to the side.  Since the front is the view side, I think the lime plate would have been better replaced with another medium azure one.  The build up for the roiling falls is nicely done with some curved bricks and trans blue and white pieces to give the impression of froth.



The tree is a nice touch but simple.  While a few more leaves would have been nice, if anything, I've learned that TLG just includes a token set up and lets your imagination fill in the rest.  Perhaps that's the problem with us critical AFOLs; we've lost our imagination and expect real life perfection.  New year's resolution perhaps?

The only critique I might have is a small gap that appears behind the falls.  Thankfully with the extra pieces you can fill out the falls a little more.  And the extra droid arm?  Maybe a bone outside of the bear's cave.


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