My wife is a hardcore dinosaur freak (and I obviously mean that in the nicest possible way), so we had to have all of the LEGO Jurassic World sets on day one. While most of the Jurassic World sets are available on Amazon with no tax and free shipping, one set is a pesky exclusive. And so, I ended up questing over to the LEGO Store to nab the LEGO Raptor Escape 75920 set. Was it worth my effort? Read on for my review…

The Right:

Confession time: I am not now, nor have I ever been, a raptor lover. As part of the “Land Before Time” generation, I’ve always preferred peace-loving stegosaurus and sauropods to crazy carnivorous dinosaurs. But my wife loves her raptors, and so, we were definitely going to have each and every one of them. 

And that’s the first “Right” of this review: the fact that the LEGO Raptor Squad figures collection is complete! It would have been easy for LEGO to skip out on two of the four raptors (not to mention Chris Pratt’s coworker, Barry), but instead we’re getting all four raptors and both handlers right off the bat. Thanks TLG!

The LEGO Raptor Escape 75920 set consists of 394 pieces for a price-point of $39.99. That’s almost exactly my perfect value target of ten cents per piece, which is terrific for a licensed set from a theme like Jurassic World. I wouldn’t have been stunned to see this set overpriced at $49.99, but $39.99 is just right.

The set took me around an hour and a half to build, but I am a slow builder and always take my time when constructing. There was nothing overly challenging (or particularly innovative) about this build, and I don’t think most kids old enough to have this set would have any difficulties actually building it. 

The true selling point of this set is definitely the pair of unique LEGO raptors: Charlie and Echo. While the two dinosaurs share an identical mold (what with being the same animal and all), they have very distinct colorations which really differentiate them from each other. Charlie is the green raptor, while Echo is brown. 

Though I’m not a big raptor fan, these raptor figures are fun!! Six points of articulation may not sound like a ton, but it allows Charlie and Echo to take on a variety of poses, with loads of personality shining through. 

Each raptor has swivel arms, a swivel neck, swivel hips and a hinged jaw. The jaw opens and closes with a satisfying snap, and my wife can’t get enough of playing with the raptors and opening and closing their mouths! These are really, really fun LEGO raptor figures to play with!

On the minifigure front, two are included: another Vet minifigure and the exclusive Barry minifigure. The LEGO Barry minifigure has no reversible head (what with him being bald and all), but he does feature nice printing on both sides of his torso. He also features a two-piece tranquilizer gun, which is a really cool  and good-looking accessory. 

Meanwhile, the Vet minifig also features printing on the front and back of his torso, with the Jurassic Park logo on his back. I think the Vet minifigure’s haircut is rather dorky, but I like his reversible head with shocked expression. He has a three-piece shock stick accessory (which will unfortunately be rather futile against this set’s two clever girls)

A high-speed off-roader vehicle is also included, which is cute, but basic. I don’t care much for the flickfire missile attachment, but the little ATV is otherwise a striking and fun little polybag-sized inclusion. 

And oh yeah–there’s also a big raptor pen included, which is the main component of this set. The grey and blue color scheme matches the rest of the Jurassic World theme, and the translucent orange pieces really pop and draw the eye. 

The front gate can be raised and lowered to allow the off-road vehicle (or the raptors) easy access to entering and exiting the pen, and there are stickers on the front that add crucial details to the frontal view of the set. 

The main “action feature” of the set has to do with the searchlight platform–there’s a “trap” pole that the raptors can push on to make the platform tip over and send the hapless park worker to his death! I thought this would be silly, but the raptors make it really amusing. 

The Wrong:

There’s really only one main thing I dislike about this set, and it’s the height of the fence of the raptor pen. We’ve seen raptors do some pretty crazy things in the Jurassic Park movies, and it stretches my disbelief just a little bit that the handlers at the LEGO Jurassic World park seem to think that the raptors couldn’t jump a fence that barely goes up to their necks. 

I have a feeling that the LEGO design team wanted the raptors to be able to look over the fence for display purposes, but it looks ridiculous to me. The raptors we’ve seen in these movies are capable of much greater physical feats than hopping this puny electric fence, that’s for sure. 

In addition, I would have liked a few more printed bricks with this set. At least the Jurassic World logo could have been a printed brick instead of a sticker. It’s difficult to align the stickers just right symmetrically, and I always prefer a medium-priced set to have at least one unique printed brick instead of a whole sheet of decals. 

Overall: The 75920 Raptor Escape set turns out to be a solid value of right around 10 cents per piece, and includes two dinosaurs I imagine kids (and collectors) are going to be rabid for in another month. Though the fence of the pen could stand to be a bit taller and I’d have liked a few more printed bricks, this is a well-done set overall and almost certain to be one of the more in-demand shared exclusives  released in quite some time. Recommended. 

GRADE: A-