Will
The only one of the five new LEGO Speed Champions cars joining the garage on March 1 to be inspired by a road-ready vehicle,
Picking up a LEGO Speed Champions version is basically the next best thing for most of us pining after a dream car we’ll never get the chance to actually drive, but only if it’s a convincing adaptation. With its confident curves and aggressively low body, the Dark Horse is all about making a statement – so can the LEGO version do the same?
--- LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse set details ---
Theme: Speed Champions Set name:
Price: £20.99 / $26.99 / €26.99 Pieces: 344 Minifigures: 1
LEGO:
--- Where to buy LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse ---
LEGO Speed Champions
--- LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse build ---
At first glance,
To look at the real-life Mustang Dark Horse is not to look at a car you’d call ‘mundane’, but in a wave otherwise defined by unusual angles or boisterous paint jobs, 76920 flies in under the radar. And that’s partly also a consequence of the difficulty in translating the real thing’s subtle curves into LEGO bricks: the smoothly tapering lines are lost at this scale, replaced by harsh, rigid dimensions. It results in a chunky car that drills down into the essence of the Mustang – a bold and aggressive motor – without necessarily recreating its finer details.
The Dark Horse sits unique in Ford’s 2024 range as a souped-up version of the GT, and it’s beefier for it too. That gives the LEGO Speed Champions team some leeway in boosting the ride height of its brick-built version, making room for the all-important front grill and the depth around the doors, while still incorporating its low-slung base. (The 1x8 tiles affixed upside-down are maybe a touch too low.)
There are some nifty approaches squirrelled away under this mostly-robust exterior, too. The angles of the car’s rear are achieved using printed tiles clipped into place, while clips and bars also come in handy for slotting in the patchwork-grey bonnet design. The Dark Horse dives deep into LEGO geometry almost to a fault, closing every gap around the hood with a carefully-considered assembly of bricks, brackets and plates. The result is impressive if not especially attractive – using so many pieces creates a lot of lines.
You’ll spot one more fun – if less successful – technique when adding the front headlights, which combine stickered 1x2 tiles, trans-clear 1x2 semi-circle tiles, headlight bricks and the trans-clear minifigure stands included with (for example) 71039 Marvel Series 2. It’s a novel way to build in the 45-degree angles, but good luck never knocking them out of place. (Hence ‘mostly-robust’.)
Beyond those scattered highlights, this is a more straightforward build than you’d expect from LEGO Speed Champions, with plenty of brick stacking and simple studs-not-on-top construction. But it makes sense for a no-nonsense car like the Dark Horse, and even the most basic Speed Champions cars are still streets ahead of anything else you’d find at this price point.
--- LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse characters ---
--- LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse price ---
The LEGO Group has quietly raised the price of all its LEGO Speed Champions sets for 2024, pushing its single cars up from £19.99 / $24.99 / €24.99 to £20.99 / $26.99 / €26.99. That’s the second price hike since 2020, when the eight-wide cars originally retailed for £17.99 / $19.99 / €19.99. Given you’re not getting anything more substantial here than four years ago, the new price is increasingly difficult to swallow.
As mentioned in our 76919 2023 McLaren Formula 1 Car review, though, this theme hasn’t quite crossed the line just yet – the value from a build experience perspective is still unmatched. You could wait for a sale to save a couple of pounds, especially if you’re eyeing up the entire wave – those incremental increases add up – but if
--- LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse pictures ---
--- LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse pros and cons ---
| Surprisingly attractive finished model | Front headlights are a little flimsy |
| Imbued with all the character of the real thing | The curves haven’t translated perfectly |
| A sprinkling of inventive build techniques – and relatively few stickers | Generally more straightforward to assemble than other LEGO Speed Champions 2024 sets |
This set was provided for review by the LEGO Group.
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--- Alternatives to LEGO Speed Champions 76920 Ford Mustang Dark Horse ---
Whether you’re after other LEGO Speed Champions sets or other Fords, the LEGO Group has you covered at the moment. For a more detailed Speed Champions experience, there’s always
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