LEGO® DREAMZzz™ review: 71457 Pegasus Flying Horse

Has LEGO® Elves come back? No, but the solemn sobbing of fans missing that theme were probably heard by some set designers. LEGO® DREAMZzz™ has more than one set reminiscent of that theme, although equipped with traditional minifigures instead of mini-dolls. 71457 Pegasus Flying Horse is the most obvious of these sets. Is this mammoth-sized winged equine a worthy successor?

Products in this article were provided by LEGO®; the author's opinions are their own.
LEGO® DREAMZzz™ 71457 Pegasus Flying Horse
US$49.99/ £49.99/ 52.99€/ AU$84.99
482 parts
1 August 2023
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The parts

New moulds

• 6 x Banana Leaf Smooth in Bright Bluish Green/ Dark Turquoise (6449584 | 3565)

Dark Turquoise is not the foremost colour for plant parts, but this might find a use in Mediterranean dry-summer-rainy-winter biomes. Or anything else really, because due to their smooth generic shape they feel rather universal. For closer technical analysis on this and other new moulds of the theme, check out our introduction article.

• 2 x Diddy Tails in White (6430887 | 1897)

White monkey tails can make neat trains of smoke, clouds, and magic effects.

Recolours

• 8 x Slope Curved 2 x 1 Inverted in Vibrant Coral/ Coral (6438408 | 24201)
• 8 x Technic Brick 1 x 2 with Axle Hole Type 1 [+ Opening] and Bottom Pin in Vibrant Coral/ Coral (6439447 |32064a)

It appears the Vibrant Coral cancellation rumours were a bit too early, which is nice because it means we get some key parts in this colour. Both axle hole bricks and inverted curved slopes are very useful in character building, and these quantities are generous.

• 2 x Creature Body Part, Dragon Wing 19 x 11 with Marbled Black Pattern in Bright Reddish Violet/ Magenta (6433445)

The large marbled and recoloured dragon wings were the first parts to catch my eye. This colour combination is strongly effective and instantly recalls the LEGO Elves theme. The part debuted in the LEGO® Vikings theme in 2005 and has remained ever-popular. In the LEGO DREAMZzz theme it's also available in 71469 Nightmare Shark Ship.

• 2 x Large Figure Limb Cover / Claw / Spike Large with Axle Hole in Bright Reddish Violet/ Magenta (6439445 | 15362)
• 8 x Plate Special 2 x 3 with Rocks in Bright Reddish Violet/ Magenta (6439446 | 27261)

This set certainly isn't shy with recolours. These great Magenta parts make up the horse's mane and tail and are ideal for hair. I'm especially happy to see the large claw piece sticking around since the cancellation of Constraction lines. It's a pleasant piece, and Magenta is an awesome colour.

• 8 x Animal Body Part, Barb / Claw / Tooth / Talon / Horn, Medium in Spring Yellowish Green/ Yellowish Green (6267417 | 87747)
• 4 x Animal Body Part, Bat Wing with Shaft [Chima Bat Wing] in Trans-Pink (6207783 | 15082)
• 1 x Equipment Hourglass with Pearl Gold Sand in Trans-Clear (6440804 | 23945pat0003)
• 1 x Weapon Bow and Arrow [Large] in Medium Lilac/ Dark Purple (6451947 | 4499)

As we get closer to minifigure scale we find the rest of the recolours, again vibrant and energetic. All of these pieces are found in other sets from the theme too.

Decorations

• 1 x Tile, Round 1 x 1 with Dreamcatchers logo in White (6434196) - with 1 extra
• 2 x Brick 1 x 1 with Yellow Eye Print in White (6434241)
• 2 x Tile Round 2 x 2 with Cat Eye and Eyelid Print in Black (6434233)

As usual in this theme, the prints consist of eyes and Dreamcatcher logos (that feature hourglasses instead of dreamcatchers). The brick eyes are unique to this set and I think they could be used on a human goth character with that pale skin and black eyeliner.

The sticker sheet is relatively small. The bird's eyes are essential so I applied them; the background colour matches Dark Turquoise fine. I didn't apply the other stickers as I think the Pegasus looks better without them thanks to the use of colour blocking in its design. Here's an official image with stickers applied:

 

©2023 The LEGO Group

Rare parts

• 2 x Brick Round Corner 5 x 5 x 1 with Bottom Cut Outs [No Studs Flat Top][1/4 Arch] in Black (6439516 | 3374) (6394785 | ) - also in 76211 Shuri's Sunbird
•  4 x Slope Curved 3 x 4 x 2/3 Triple Curved with 2 Sunk Studs in Titanium Metallic/ Pearl Dark Gray (6349622 | 93604) - also in 76190 Iron Man: Iron Monger Mayhem
• 2 x 76797 Brick Round Corner, Curved 3 x 3 x 1 Quarter Circle in Black (6385597 | 76797) - also in 76215 Black Panther
• 3 x Animal Body Part, Barb / Claw / Tooth / Talon / Horn, Large in Bright Reddish Violet/ Magenta (6133932 | 11089) - in 2 other sets

The rare parts are used to capture the organic shaping of the horse, making them useful for character builds.

Minifigures

The minifigure selection is traditional: the villain, the villain's minion, the hero and the damsel in distress. However, it's a healthy sign of contemporary times to see a female hero rescuing the damsel in distress. 

The Nightmare King is a handsome minifigure - I think his father was the Witch-King of Agmar and his mother The Mummy. Susan is a little dude and hard to keep upright with those large wings, so the carrot acts as a counterweight. The horns and wings are useful pieces though, and the head is quite cool. Zoey is the best-equipped version sporting a Dark Turquoise cape unique to this set. Nova - as well as the Nightmare King - also appears in 71469 Nightmare Shark Ship. Her sloth pajama top is amazing.

For more photos and part codes for these minifigs check out our introduction article.

The Horse of the Nightmares

Zoey's bird of paradise looks surprisingly good, despite being clearly a side-model. The colour scheme is pleasant and the banana leaves make for good wing feathers, though the lack of legs made photographing a wings spread flying pose difficult. The alternative model - a feature in each LEGO DREAMZzz set - changes the bird into a butterfly glider, whereas Pegasus remains untouched.

The other side builds are a flying cage monster that has captured Nova and... a chair with rib legs and large bat wings? The former naturally connects into the unicorn, turning it into Pegasus. The flying cage monster brings up the play value, and is decent; the wings are humorously small, but I like the use of knob gear to connect the "legs".

According to the instructions the unicorn seems to be friendly, or neutral at first, but the embedded Nightmare King's throne turns it into an evil Pegasus. The colour scheme is nonetheless nightmarish and a mammoth-sized horse with a pointed end is rather frightening - but in a cute way? Surely the special love between a child and a horse can defeat the curse.

The shaping is mostly excellent and the colour blocking is good. Variety of rounded shapes, new and old, have been used to sculpt the horse. Maxaronis make for good legs, unusual but effective. The head design is wonderful and the vibrant Magenta tail looks bushy. 

I have some gripes, though. The Dark Bluish Grey area in the back legs would have looked better in black and the sides of the neck leave a lot to be desired. They don't quite flow.

Saddling up the horse with the throne monster turns it into the cursed steed of the nightmare king. This results an impressive beast of burden with large menacing wings. 

The design looks very, very good, but unfortunately has serious structural issues: The throne/wings part is only connected with two studs and that is not enough. The ribs squeeze the horse, but due to limited friction on the bar/clip connections they don't really help to secure the connection. It's easy to mod it into a 4-stud connection, but it still remains too feeble. Something like a Technic pin or ball joint connection would have worked better, but that would have required a more complex design.

This issue is a result of a compromise between the structure, look and playability. Due to play reasons the add-on needs to be easily removable: The Nightmare Kings corrupts the unicorn, then Zoey saves it by removing it, but this loose connection makes it hard to pose the horse, not to mention flying with it.

The neck has a ball joint that enables decent movement without ruining the looks, and the tail and the wings have good movement, though it's hard to pose the wings without removing the throne add-on monster. The legs have only one ratchet joint each, which make the poseability limited. The horse can also sit, though not much else.

Conclusion

With the pricing of US$49.99/ £49.99/ 52.99€/ AU$84.99 for 482 parts and 4 minifigures, 71457 Pegasus Flying Horse slightly underperforms in the old 0.10 brick-per-part value approach, but that's the age of inflation for you. For another comparison, many sets of the this theme have worse value - and far fewer interesting parts. The selection here is very good - probably the best on this theme. I really like the Vibrant Coral and Magenta recolours and the wings are a big plus. The figures are also great.

The finished model looks gorgeous but severely lacks in the playability department. This isn't a huge minus for a MOC builder mostly interested in the parts, but I feel that the customer testing crew should have aimed a bit higher. A toy shouldn't fall apart this easily. In short, 71457 Pegasus Flying Horse is a great parts pack, good-looking model and a flawed Pegasus specimen. I call it a decent successor of LEGO Elves.

READ MORE: What are the new LEGO® parts for September 2023 and which sets contain the most?

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