Topt Copt
I work in a large toy store. It is called Grim’s Toy Shopppe. Our owner, Mr. Grim, really wanted to have his name on the store. Grim Toys sounded a little desperate, or, even, ominous. So, he turned it into Grim’s Toy Shop. His wife suggested that using the old fashioned,” Shoppe” might make it look more inviting. Mr. Grim agreed, but decided to add a third letter P, for even more emphasis. Thus, Grim’s Toy Shopppe invited customers to shopppe until they droppped.
I love working in a toy store. It helps that I love everything about toys. I love the packages, the excitement of looking at them, of buying them, and of giving them, and of getting them. And, of course, I loved playing with them when I was a kid. Now, as an adult, I can both remember having fun playing with toys in years gone by, as well as continue to play with them, now.
One of my favorite parts about my job is to explain the features of a product to customers. When it comes to LEGO sets, the compatibility a set has with other LEGO sets, for more (!) creative building opportunities, is a distinctive advantage. What that means is that you can use other LEGO sets to combine together for more play. Or, you can break those sets down into LEGO elements, and then build something new.
But, did you ever wonder what might happen if LEGO sets decided to stop being compatible with one another? What if they stopped getting along together? Would that mean the end of creative building?
That sorry question ought never have to be asked. As a Grim’s Toy Shopppe employee, I was made to confront that very unlikely possibility. And I am sorry to be the one to tell of one time when a work stoppage broke that sturdy baseplate of compatibility which has always existed between different LEGO sets. Yes, this story is about a rare case of Lego incompatibility. The pieces still fit together; but the egos did not.
When you work in a toy store long enough, you get to know the toy sets, real well. Sometimes, maybe too well. You talk to ‘em, and you listen to them talking to each other. Inevitably, you learn things about sets that you wish you didn’t know. Like, the relative size of some of their egos, for instance.
We sell all kinds of toy vehicles. I am always impressed with the popularity of helicopters. I once counted thirty-four different LEGO helicopters in our store at the same time. Like I said, it’s a large toy store. And, helicopters are VERY well loved.
It would seem that all that popularity went to the heads-or cockpits- of some of the great LEGO helicopter sets. The more we sold, the more some sets became convinced that the unbuilt Lego Helicopter found within that box was the greatest of all the Lego helicopters, be it Current, or Retired.
So, when Avengers Hulk Helicopter Rescue with triple stud shooter and Hulk-dropping function arrived in the store, it couldn’t help but feel a little scorned by the sets already in the store, especially after it was chosen above many veteran helicopter sets to be featured on the toy store Play Table.
The next new copters to arrive, Spider-Man’s cute little copter in The Menace of Mysterio, and Taskmaster’s duo-bladed chopper from Black Widow’s Helicopter Chase, also spoke of being less than impressed with the greeting they received when they were introduced at the Monthly LEGO Helicopter Union Meeting ( local chapter 211 ).
Finally, things came to a head when the snappy little helicopter from City Ski Resort (a helicopter with opening cockpit, spinning rotors and a camera ) suggested a LEGO Helicopter popularity contest: Each helicopter would be required to fill out a little survey. Results would be compiled, and then a simple points system would be used to determine who was the greatest.
As it turned out the survey was 37 pages long, single spaced. It contained a complicated series of questions pertaining to individual features, colors, rescuing abilities, playability, talents, education, number of parts, place of manufacture, and LEGO designer. Each LEGO helicopter tried it’s best to make the case for why IT was the best of the best.
The surveys were dutifully handed out, forgotten, remembered, forgotten again, remembered again, but ultimately, forgotten again; the way surveys are. Approximately five minutes before the deadline, everyone started to fill out their surveys.
Eventually, the survey results were printed up, and handed out. And, dutifully read by each Copter set; and then ignored by same.
Then, at 11:55 pm on the eve of September 14, a final popularity vote, based on the survey results,was held. This date of September 14 was chosen to commemorate the anniversary of the first successful helicopter flight, ever. ( 9/14/39, at Stratford, Connecticut. Designed by Igor Sikorsky, as every helicopter knows. ) Only Lego helicopters in the store could vote. ( That meant that Volcano Heavy-Lift Helicopter’s absentee ballot was disqualified). The survey results were meant to help voters make a more objective choice as to which was the Greatest.
As it happened, each Lego helicopter voted for itself.
Naturally, this sort of Me-First Policy struck at the heart of the Lego Play Well philosophy. It was in danger of becoming more like, “ “Play Poorly “; or, maybe,” if I don’t feel like it, there will be no playing. At all ”. In the Lego Helicopter Community, Discord had raised it’s ugly head. Something had to be done.
But, it wasn’t. Instead, things were allowed to get worse. And then, a funny thing happened: The more the helicopters argued and struggled over who was the best, the less well their pieces held together. Their personal incompatibility with one another actually transferred over to the compatibility of their pieces. The envy and pride in their hearts was reflected into a mess of broken sets in the homes, after they were bought. Built sets just wouldn’t stay together. Plus, sometimes helicopters stopped cooperating in dire play situations. Winches wouldn’t winch. Propellers wouldn’t, er, propel. Then the solidarity work stoppage began. Storage boxes stopped storing. That just wasn’t any fun, at all. The children who were playing with these so very unLEGOish LEGO helicopters were walking away from them. Which wasn’t actually all that unusual, because they often did not pick up their stuff when they were done with it. But, now, they hesitated to come back. At all.You can imagine how many rescues and transports and adventurous missions just never happened. Floating minifigs in need of pick up, just kept floating in the briny deep. Criminals didn’t just get away: there were no helicopters to be gotten away from. It doesn’t take long for that to not be much fun.
What is more, parents were returning the sets of uncooperative helicopters to the store. These were opened boxes with unbagged pieces, which were unreturnable according to store policy. Desperate parents attempted to make wild deals involving trades for less desirable sets like Bubbles’ Playground Showdown, the Friends Hedgehog, or the Han Solo buildable figures. I am sorry to report that some of the store clerks relented and allowed such rash and unlawful deals to go down.
End Part One
Beginning Part Two
Enter the dark horse, the candidates least likely to help, and most likely to make things even worse. They were sets that were not even found in the store: the Technic Ultralight Helicopter, and his sidekicks, Technic Helicopter 9396, Technic Rescue Helicopter, and Technic Heavy Lift Helicopter. Yes, together they comprised that famous Technic Helicopter Gang, The Rotor Boys. The Rotor Boys were notorious. They took no grief from aged 4 - 6 sets. They were not known as piecemakers.
The reason that there was not much trouble with the Rotor Boys at our store, was that Technic sets were not often sold at Grim’s Toy Shopppe. Mr. Grim, our owner, had had a bad experience with a Technic set when he was a kid. [He had a Technic motorcycle that he just couldn’t get together right, when he was eight years old. Never really got over it. ] Let it suffice to say that The Rotor Boys were not included within the shelves of our upscale, opulent establishment. The RB’s operated out of a small independent toy store slash hobby shop over on the west side called Winkie’s.
Ironically, it was the Rotor Boys who provided the impetus for change in the attitudes of a few-well, actually 25, to be exact-LEGO Helicopter Sets from our store. This is how it happened.
The Rotor Boys were living out of a Modular Building down on Alone Terrace. It was no coincidence that it looked a lot like the Creator Pet Shop with a makeshift 8x8 grey baseplate rather sloppily attached to the roof. That was their helipad.
They terrorized the locals in that neighborhood. Young Iron Man, Captain America, and Spider-Man from the Duplo Super Heroes Lab Set often bore the brunt of their cruel pranks.
Every Weekend the Rotor Boys hung out at a local sports bar aptly called The Weak Ending. They used that joint as their base.
One such Saturday night they were loitering about at the Ending, mostly watching Golf and badminton college quarterfinals on most of the 20 big screen tv’s. Technic Ultralight was reading the Lego News Crawl on the bottom of the screen about the work stoppage at our store. “ In local LEGO news, parents stymied when Grim’s Toy Shopppe LEGO Helicopters refuse to play, well, with anyone…”
Technic Ultralight and his fellow gang members decided to make a little unscheduled visit in order to improve our store’s helicopters’ attitude. “ That’s bad for us as well as them, “ he proclaimed. “ I gots to have eight years olds who’s still wants to keep building!” So, choking on his bad grammar, The Boys finished their root beers, and off they went to pay Grim’s a little after hours unannounced visit.
They arrived just as Mr. Grim was locking up to go home.
“ Hi, boys. Good to see you. What brings you to the east side of town?”
Technic Heavy Lift Helicopter looked menacingly into Mr. Grim’s eyes. But what Mr. Grim saw was a LEGO Helicopter who wanted to be unbuilt, rebuilt, and played with. That was an Ahhh Moment for Mr. Grim. Looking into those blank, vacant eyes, he realized that he had been wrong to not give Technic Sets the time of day, for the past 34 years.
Mr. Grim brought all those Rotor Boys home with him that night. He carefully took each Copter apart, and rebuilt it, using digital instructions. And, Mr. Grim had another revelation, that night: TECHNIC WAS GREAT, AND HE LOVED IT!
The following Monday, the protesting helicopters from Grim’s Toy Shopppe had a life- redefining moment when Mr. Grim made room for Technic Helicopters on the shelves, and on the Play Table. It didn’t take long for them to realize that it was just possible that all Lego Helicopters were relatively equally great. And, that who was greatest really didn’t matter. Especially in light of possibly being replaced by The Rotor Boys. Anyway, they hated not being compatible with other Legos, It just wasn’t written in their ABS. The message of LEGO Reconciliation was sent out on Legonet, and things got better in a hurry. Those minifigs who needed rescuing were once again dramatically lifted out of the Carpet Sea. Diamond thieves were chased down by low-flying City Police choppers. Storage bins no longer suddenly had, “holes” . Local Chapter 211 of the United Association of LEGO Helicopters and Bricklayers added Technic members to it’s roles.
And, Mr. Grim, owner of the amazzzing Grim’s Toy Shopppe, brought home the Technic Liebherr R9800 Excavator to build.
Featuring:
TECHNIC Set 42057: Ultralight Helicopter.
TECHNIC Set 9396: Rescue Helicopter.
TECHNIC Set 42092: Rescue Helicopter.
TECHNIC Set 42052: Heavy Lift Helicopter.
And Featuring:
1.LEGO Set 60193: Arctic Air Transport- Quadrocopter
2.LEGO Set 60248: Fire Helicopter Response
3.LEGO Set 60161: Jungle Exploration Site- Amphibious Helicopter
4.LEGO Set 60204: Lego City Hospital- Helicopter with spinning rotors and storage box
5.LEGO Set 60243: Police Helicopter Chase: Helicopter with powerful magnet
6.LEGO Set 60209: Sky Police Diamond Heist: Crook’s Helicopter with Plastic Climbing Rope to Steal the Safe.
7.LEGO Set 60140: Bulldozer Breakin- Police Helicopter with searchlights
8.LEGO Set 60166: Heavy Duty Rescue Helicopter with a lot of features.
9.LEGO Set 60131: Crooks Island: Police helicopter with Surveillance Camera
10.LEGO Set 60138: High Speed Case- Police Helicopter
11LEGO Set 60183: .Heavy Cargo Transport: Helicopter
12.LEGO Set 60179: Ambulance Helicopter: Room for a Stretcher Inside.
13.LEGO Set 60158: Jungle Cargo Helicopter
14.LEGO Set 10751: Mountain Police Chase Helicopter: chain with hook.
15.LEGO Set 60125: Volcano Heavy-Lift Helicopter
16.LEGO Set 10759: Elastigirl’a Rooftop Pursuit: Helicopter with Starter-Brick chassis, spinning Hypno- Propeller, and opening cockpit
17.LEGO Set 75928: Blue’s Helicopter Pursuit: an open-door Helicopter with rotating blades, belly hook, 6- stud shooter, dual searchlights and space for storage chest, plus a cage with folding sides and frame with attachment for helicopter cable
18.LEGO Set 10756: Juniors Pteranodon Escape: Helicopter with starter brick chassis/spinning rotor
19.LEGO Set 30196: Twin-Rotor Helicopter: Synchronized Rotors.
20.LEGO Set 31092: Helicopter Adventure: tinted cockpit, adjustable landing gear.
21.LEGO Set 60203 : City Ski Resort: Helicopter with camera.
22.LEGO Set 76144 :Avengers Hulk Helicopter Rescue: Hulk dropping function plus triple stud shooter.
23.LEGO Set 76149 :The Menace of Mysterio: Spider-Man’s Copter with claws.
24.LEGO Set 76120: Batman Batwing and The Riddler Heist: The Riddler’s Copter with chain and hook.
25.LEGO Set 76138:Batman and The Joker Escape: a small helicopter.
26LEGO Set 70673: .Ninjago ShuriCopter: Helicopter with 2 spinning shuriken slicers, rotor-spinning function and a 6-stud rapid shooter on each wing.
27.LEGO Set 60244 : Police Helicopter Transport: Ripcord Helicopter.
28.LEGO Set 60207: Sky Police Drone Chase: Helicopter with Searchlight and a Firing Net Shooter.
29.LEGO Set 60067: Helicopter Pursuit: Police Helicopter with Rope.
30.LEGO Set 41287: Bubbles’ Playground Showdown
31.LEGO 40171: Set Hedgehog
32. LEGO Set 75535: Han Solo Buildable Figure
33. LEGO Set 76162: Black Widow’s Helicopter Chase
34. LEGO Set 76131: Avengers Compound Battle
35. LEGO Set 60093: Deep Sea Helicopter.
36.LEGO Set 11007: Creative Green Bricks: Green Helicopter
37. LEGO Set 31049: Twin Spin Helicopter: Landing Skis and Elevated Rear Landing Gear.
38. LEGO Set 60216: Downtown Fire Brigade: with a Multi-Shooter.