LEGO DREAMZzz 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car review

Are multi-builds better than one? LEGO DREAMZzz 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car has the answer.

The largest set from the upcoming LEGO DREAMZzz January 2025 wave offers a lot more than first meets the eye. 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car is made up of various modular parts that can be reconstructed with one another to create a variety of different vehicles and builds. They can even combine with other LEGO DREAMZzz sets from the wave for even more combinations.

Do more possibilities translate to a better LEGO set though? Read on for our honest thoughts on 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car ahead of its release.

Release: January 1, 2025 Price: £89.99 / $99.99 / €99.99 Pieces: 1,006 Minifigures: 3 (plus three more characters) LEGO: Order now

More modules, more problems

The instructions for 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car kick you off with the titular builds: a tiger mech and a hot rod car, both of which have a spot for the respective minifigures to sit in. The real fun begins when you start to pull those builds apart, however, and experiment with how they can all fit together.

There are some examples in the instruction booklet but it's pretty much left entirely up to you – which has its upsides and downsides. The various parts are sturdily assembled so you can build and rebuild without worrying about pieces falling off. They attach using modified plates, with corresponding plates in the same colour at the different possible connection points.

While that open concept means the possibilities are only limited by your imagination, it also means that achieving some of the examples of builds from the instructions is harder than it looks. There's no clear diagram of which parts you need, meaning there's a lot of guesswork involved. That certainly slows down the initial excitement. You end up stuck trying to work out whether the chest of the tiger mech can turn into the body of a spaceship, or if you need the chassis from a hot rod car instead, rather than exploring the many, many possibilities of 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car.

Still, once you can get your head around how the parts all work, it's one of the most diverse multi-build sets out there. It takes the core concept of LEGO DREAMZzz – building creatively – and maximises it to continue the play experience long after the initial build is done.

Play never ends

With that in mind, it's perhaps one of the best LEGO sets when it comes to bang for your buck. For many people, the drawback to sets with multiple build options is having to take them apart and rebuild them over and over again. 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car doesn't require any actual destruction, as the modular elements click smoothly together.

The impressive sturdiness means you can focus your whole attention on storytelling and creativity, without wondering whether the individual parts are going to break apart. What's more, the extra parts printed with tiger or robot features mean you can adapt the mech build from a tiger mech manned by Cooper to a dreamer robot designed to be controlled by Zero.

That leaves a wealth of story and play options available, pairing neatly with the lore that's already been built around LEGO DREAMZzz. Thanks to the TV show, the characters are fleshed out and ready for telling your own stories – and this set offers enough versatility to do so with ease.

No weak links

While the modular nature of the build could have fallen into the trap of being a gimmick and impacting the overall quality, there are truly no weak links in 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car. From the smallest vehicles made of just two or three elements to the towering mechs, each build packs in a ton of detail.

You can create multiple vehicles to showdown against one another, with minifigures for both sides of the conflict, or use every single part to construct a true monster of a mech. No matter what you're in the mood for, 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car delivers a quality build, whether you're using three sections or eight.

Although you can combine 71497 Cooper's Tiger Mech & Zero's Hot Rod Car with other LEGO DREAMZzz sets, it easily stands on its own two feet – or four, or wheels, depending on what you build – to deliver an impressive and play-centric LEGO set. You don't need anything more than this set to make colourful displays or dynamic interactive scenes, making it well worth the price tag.

Honest opinion: A versatile set that sums up the creative ethos LEGO DREAMZzz has been working towards.

This set was provided for review by the LEGO Group.

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