REVIEW: LEGO 76218 Sanctum Sanctorum

I really enjoyed the LEGO Daily Bugle Marvel set that was released last year so I was excited to get another large building from the theme, and this time a slightly more exciting one. The magic fuelled mysterious Sanctum Sanctorum. I bought it a few months after it came out and I’m reviewing it a few months after I built it. but better late than never right? If only I had a time stone…

The Sanctum contains 2708 pieces including 9 minifigures representing characters featured either in Avengers Infinity War or Doctor Strange and the Multiverse of Madness (MoM). The set retails for £214.99 but I paid about 40% less than that and I have seen steep discounts regularly on this. So shop around if you decide you want this.

We have had a couple of Sanctum sets previously, but this is the first one in the style of one of LEGO’s Modular buildings and its of course the first to use anywhere near this many parts.

The Sanctum is fairly iconic in both the Marvel movies and comics so if you are a Marvel fan it’s a cool LEGO build to finally get in this scale. For the most part LEGO have done the location justice. The outside of the building certainly looks the part with its green roof & large circular window.

It also works nicely as a generic building if you are building a LEGO city. As with most buildings at this scale, the interior space is a little hard to work with. Each floor can easily be removed which is fantastic for play, but for photos you need to be removing walls to get photos at minifigure eye level.

Fortunately the Sanctum also comes with several removable and interchangeable wall sections. Obviously this is a play feature rather than a consideration for photographers. But I’ll take it all the same. There are three of these sections.

LEGO love giving us variations of this Tentacle Monster (Shuma Gorath?) and this is probably the simplest yet. But it’s an entertaining idea to place him on a portal on one of the movable walls so you can position it where you want, maybe even inside the sanctum!

Of all the interior spaces my favourite is the top floor, where the large window sits. This has the most space for placing figures and has a few interesting items dotted around.

The middle level does not have much space for positioning figures since its mainly a balcony looking down to the floor below. But I did enjoy shooting Wong in the library on this floor. There’s also a pair of chairs by the window and a beer on the table which brings to mind another Marvel movie guest starring the good doctor.

There’s a large staircase going from that first floor balcony down to the ground floor where there is also some nice detailing, though its the most difficult space to shoot photos in without deconstructing the set since there’s no removable wall panel in this room.

The removable panel on the ground floor leads not to a room in the Sanctum, but rather back to a room at Kamar-Taj, the fictional place where Stephen Strange first learned the ways of the Mystic Arts. Its a tiny space and can be revealed by a portal wall panel, fun idea but limited in use. I tried to bring the portal to life with some light painting here. Oh and look, there’s that Time Stone I was looking for!

At the side of the building there is also another small space at ground level with a few little Easter eggs inside. But its hard to get in for photos so Spidey will have to venture in alone, sorry.

There are lots of nice little details placed around the build, mostly with stickers rather than prints but they still add a lot to the set.

Normally with a Marvel set I find the main draw to be the minifigures, but this time out they are a little lacklustre. Not bad, just nothing as exciting as the ones we got in the Daily Bugle set last year (Daredevil! Blade! Black Cat! Punisher! Firestar!). Lets have a quick look at what we get though.

Firstly I was happy to get this version of Wong. He has previously been released in harder to find sets or without his more traditional outfit. So its great to get him here. Strange himself is well done and comes with the blast pieces and the great rubber cape introduced last year.

The most interesting figures to me are the alternate Strange figures, Zombie and Sinister. Both have excellent, unique prints and facial expressions. I am really happy to add these spooky guys to my collection.

Wanda and Spidey are both downgrades from this years Marvel CMF entries, Wanda in particular lacking leg printing. Spidey and iron Man are well done but… how many of these guys do we need!

Last but not least we have an alternate Mordo from MoM and Squidward (Sorry, Ebony Maw) from Infinity War. Mordo is the more interesting here by way of being a version of that character we have not had, but both are a little underwhelming.

Final Thoughts

The Sanctum Sanctorum is a set that I really enjoyed putting together, the details on the inside of the building were fun even if I’ll rarely see them again. The set comes with a good number of figures and although some are a little bland its still a good selection and there are a few gems in there.

I had a lot of fun shooting this set and trying to use the the features of the set in those photos (see more photos after the end of the review).

But the real star here is the building itself. Its an excellent interpretation of the famous fictional Bleeker Street residence that looks great on display. You could argue the price is a little high, but in an age where many LEGO sets aimed at adults are £400 plus I was happy to bag this for around £160. Dare I say, if you can get it at that price, its actually a bargain.

Bonus Photos