‘LEGO Masters’ Judges Preview the ‘Creative’ & Surprising Season 2 Finale
Q&A
Who will emerge victorious in LEGO Masters Season 2? We’ll find out on Wednesday, September 14, which pair of brothers —Mark and Steven, Zack and Wayne, or Caleb and Jacob — will take home the $100,000 prize, the LEGO trophy, and that coveted title.
“It’s super exciting,” judge Amy Corbett tells TV Insider of the final teams. “We always feel like LEGO brings families together, so it’s super cool that we have that on the show. They are very different sets of teams with very different strengths.”
Judge Jamie Berard agrees: “To have them with such different skill sets really makes for a wonderful finale because you’re going to see a wonderful mashup of talents, but really in very different spaces. You’ve got the creatives, you’ve got the engineers, and then you’ve got the aesthetics, all working against each other.”
As viewers have seen, the three teams have been very competitive with each other during the season (including measuring each other’s bridges during the castle challenge). “I think they kind of hoped that it would be each other they were against the finale because they love competing brother on brother,” Corbett admits.
The judges tell us what to expect from the final builds and look back on Season 2.
In the finale, they can build whatever they want, but it must present one way in light and then another in the dark. What can you tease about the builds?
Amy Corbett: We definitely haven’t made it easy for them. Building whatever you want can be really challenging. Some people have a clear plan, others, it takes quite a while to think about what they’re going to do. Adding that extra dimension with the light and the dark adds something really magical and special to the builds.
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Jamie Berard: It really requires you to think almost from the inside out. You’re not only displaying the visual of the outside, but you need to somehow illuminate it and make it come to life in another way. It is a challenge like we’ve never done before. That’s also what excited the teams. You’re going to really see the creative side of people come out, and there’s definitely some surprises along the way.
Did any of the teams surprise you?
Berard: One team definitely went in with a vision, and I think they followed it through. One of the other teams felt the pressure a little bit. It’s a really daunting task to have to think of the model that makes you win LEGO Masters. You really see the teams approach it in very different ways where one of the teams comes in quite confident, one of the teams is finding their way, and another team is trying to fall back on strengths while trying to push it a little bit. Some are almost celebrating the culmination of everything at the end. Others could feel the pressure. Some were just trying to relive some of those moments that they knew brought them here. It’s really a race to the end to find out which of those strategies works. But it was quite dynamic.
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Corbett: And they have 24 hours to build, so we’re not talking tiny little builds here. We definitely have scale like we haven’t seen maybe so much in the season. There are big builds, which is super cool and exciting, but also filled with details. That’s just what we love and what’s so exciting to see when you’re sitting at home as well: “Wow, it’s huge, but look at those tiny little details as you zoom in and move around.” Everyone brings their own personal touch and story to the builds as well. We get to know the builders even more in the finale.
With that 24 hours, they may feel like they have more time, but if they’re going for bigger builds, there’s more to do.
Corbett: I know. In the beginning, some of them are super chill and then towards the end absolutely frantic trying to get everything done. It seems like a long time, but then it means our expectations are so much higher. Do not underestimate the challenge of adding light into your builds. It is absolutely massive. And it’s something I don’t think any of the teams had really ever done it before. And also adding it in a meaningful way, not just throwing lights on it. We really wanted something magical to happen when we turned the lights out.
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Berard: It is a clever way to tell very different stories. It’s this hidden world that you can discover, but then how do you hide that world? You can’t necessarily see the story before the lights come on. It was really a different challenge for people to think through because the lights really had to bring out something special that you wouldn’t have seen in the daytime.
What was your favorite challenge this season?
Corbett: Mine’s an easy one. The fashion one was one that I’ve wanted to do since day one on LEGO Masters. I was really, really excited we made that happen and we just had so much fun filming it. The contestants had fun. We had fun, Will [Arnett] was having fun. All the crew were having fun. It was just such a nice vibe on set.
Berard: Yeah, that definitely was a celebration of all the teams coming together and just having a moment that just brought them even closer together as a unit. I agree, that was probably my favorite, but I’d say a close runner-up was last week’s castle challenge. It’s amazing how much fun that was. We got to dress up – I got to wear knight’s armor. I got to sing with Will. The builders were just having fun. You have Castle Bros versus the other Castle Guys. The teams just all knew each other at that point. They really enjoyed being in the room together.
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You also saw this week the emotional side of the competition. Zack and Wayne were hit by a personal challenge and it was felt by the room. It was just a nice balance of so many things that are wonderful about LEGO Masters coming together in a single episode that at the end, you just can’t help but say, I like this show. This is something fun.
Which challenge this season, would you have the most fun completing under the time constraints?
Corbett: Of course Jamie and I just wanted it to be strutting the catwalk with all those hates on, so that would have been a lot of fun.
Berard: I would also say that one, just because it’s a creative one. Anything goes. You can just make anything and put it on your head and it can be fun as long as it represents you as a team and you have a story to tell with it. My initial thought was probably going with the very first challenge, the parade. That was amazing, the way the teams introduced themselves. Now that you know the teams, if you think back to their parade floats, that really did sum up a lot of those teams perfectly. That was a nice combination of movement, personal storytelling, and just life, fun, energy. I just thought that was probably one that I would enjoy doing.
Is there anything you’d like to repeat in a third season?
Corbett: The energy around the fashion challenge. It made us realize that we can push LEGO in different directions to be something that you wouldn’t expect. And some of the strength challenges we’ve tried this year make us realize we can push the boundaries on that and try really very unexpected ways of showcasing strength. And there are ones that are just about imagination. I think the storybook challenge from Season 1 is one that Jamie and I would love to come back because having the kids in to tell a story and then the builders actually having to create that was just such an imaginative and fun challenge. That’s, for me, what really works so well and is so entertaining to watch and judge.
Berard: You might find us picking challenges just to give us an excuse to dress up because that was so much fun. As Amy said, it’s really that balance of creative challenges versus storytelling versus strength challenges. That’s where you really get the best mix of teams making it to the end. That’s where we’re probably more aware of is just not to go into all engineering because then you’re going to end up with just basically a couple of teams that are good at engineering potentially going there. But if you get that balance right, you see the full skills of all of our teams, and then I just think it makes it so much more fun and everybody learns from each other that way, too.
LEGO Masters, Season 2 Finale, Tuesday, September 14, 8/7c, FOX
