Green and gold, favourite national colours in Australia, but I think my appreciation for this set has little to do with that. 71508 Fox Guardian Mech is the second smallest set released in the new Dreamzzz wave, coming in at 883 pieces for AU$129.99/£69.99/US$79.99/€79.99. As I mentioned before, these sets are not small or cheap, but they are good!
The official name of this set it ‘Fox Guardian Mech’ and I typically associate the word ‘Mech’ with a large robot occupied by a pilot (like a Jaeger in Pacific Rim, or powered armor like in Avatar). LEGO is partially to blame for this, with so many sets labelled ‘Mech’ containing piloted robots. Ninjago in particular has been releasing mechs with someone driving them. Coming back to this set; this fox does NOT contain a set for someone to drive it so it almost deserves a different qualification. Also, the alternative build could equaly qualify as a Fox Guardian, so should the name perhaps just be Fox Guardian?
LEGO gifted one of these guardians for use to review, so join me as we present our own opinion on this set, and explore what it has to offer.
Box and contents
The review set we received came in a collapsible box that can be opened and stored without damaging. Only this set and the Tiger Shark Tank came in such a box. We found 5 bags and an envelope with manual and stickers. The instructions have nice cartoon artwork on the front displaying the primary build in action.
Minifigs
Bag 1 and 3 contain the two main protagonists in this set, Izzie and Mateo, and bag 6 contains the antagonist, Nightmare Emperor and two Grimspawn. These figures are fundamentally the same as in other sets, but Mateo wears a glove in this rendition that makes him resemble the main build coming later.
This suggests to me that the fox we will build later is remote controlled by Mateo, or teleoperated. This is quite a common practice with humanoid robots at the moment, but should come with a warning, as demonstrated in a viral video here. Again, grammatically this still makes the robot a ‘mech’, but in context of LEGO it doesn’t feel right for me.
Common part
Looking at the instruction manual pages we can see almost half of the manual is coloured yellow, indicating a significant common portion. There is only a tiny purple sliver which is pretty much already covered in the photo above of the Nightmare Emperor.
First we imprison the green Crystal Creature (oh dear) to then quickly move on to it’s crystal form. From the instructions is has become apparent to me that the large animals we are building are manifestations of the crystal creatures we encounter in the sets. This is why the green creature turns into a green fox.
The first part of the build immediately shows golden and brown accents and some stickers showing saddlebags, giving off a steam-punk aesthetic. The chest of the fox contains an interesting crest to be covered with crystal.
Next a saddle is added to the back of the fox, and the way it is mounted allow it to be easily removed if so desired. So where this ‘mech’ may not have a seat on-board, it does come with a saddle. To me this hints more and more at a large animal rather than a machine. Which brings me to the next bag giving us a head. Look at that adorable snout, and tell me that’s a machine!
We then come to building some legs for our foxy, rear followed by front. Some stickers are used to add some nice texture.
And because we are not in the business of creating a rolling animal we add some claws/feet to finish things off.
Yes you heard me, finish. If we were done here I would already be quite satisfied. The fox looks cool, and imposing with a great colour scheme. Pack it up, we’re done. Oh, but wait, there is more!
Option 1: Mech (?)
The first path of ‘more’ goes towards the main build, turning the fox into a two legged robot (mech if you will). Ripping the fox in half and assembling the top and bottom at a different angle already allows the fox to stand on its hind legs but adding a pair of chunky boots adds stability which causes some fox-citement.
Next we broaden the shoulders, because if you’re not walking on your front legs you need them to be stronger to… eh… well, they need to be bigger.
We have a small number of pieces left at this stage, which again confused me for a minute until I realised there is an alternative build that needs those.
The next section builds a sword, belt and shield to arm our fox guardian and make him resemble Mateo’s outfit with a clawed shield. The belt uses a sticker to add a cool crest of a three eyed fox, and the shield shows an hourglass. There is a story here, I’m sure but we don’t have access to the show yet so we can make up our own story for this.
Here we have the fox guardian mech, an imposing yet elegant creature with pretty good balance and posing capabilities.
Option 2: Flying Fox (!)
The leftover pieces after building the fox turn our attention to an alternate build. A flying fox! We need to bring back the fox alllll the way back to, pretty much what it is. We just take off the pieces of armour and put it back on 4 feet and we’re good to go. This is what the large ‘common’ part means, the customisation for option 1 or 2 really isn’t that drastic. Let’s have a look, while Mateo takes the helm on the saddle.
Different shoulder covers are added and then two wings are created, bearing the crest we saw on the belt and shield previously.
As Izzy was having a play with the Fox we noticed an omission in the build. The foxhole was not finished in the same was as the case with the Majestic Tiger, so we’ve fixed it. If you want to do the same for your set and are struggling, please let us know; we might be able to provide instructions.
This flying fox is a bit unusual. We have flying foxes here in Australia, which are bats. There is something comforting about seeing them take to the skies as the sun begins to set. These real flying foxes have faces very similar to the Guardian Flying Fox, but there is a very distinct difference. The wings of a flying fox are collected to it’s arms (or front legs). The Guardian Flying Fox has four legs AND two wings.
Some of you may be aware of a similar difference between dragons (4 legs and 2 wings) and wyverns (2 legs and 2 wings like bats). Would this imply that our Guardian Flying Fox is, in fact, more closely related to dragons than to foxes? Unfortunately these are questions I cannot answer so I can only leave you with this open question to ponder as you purchase this set.
Buy this set
Indeed, buy this set. I think this is my favourite set out of the Dreamzzz range from January 2026. Some readers may have noticed I gave 71515 Tiger Shark Tank a perfect score because I think it could not embody LEGO much better in any significant way. This does not imply that this should get a better score! I really like this set for what it represents, the style, the pose, the colours and the associations I have with it. As a LEGO set it does fall a little bit short of the Tiger Shark. The two alternate builds in this set are not that different, more like different outfits. The build process is just good, but nothing exceptional, and rebuilding it doesn’t offer much more. It also doesn’t quite melt my inner child’s heart as the Tiger Shark did, it just appeals to me as a person liking a good looking set on display.
I give this set 4 out of 5 arbitrary praise units; it is a great set, and I highly recommend it, but it’s a a little pricey, and it’s no Tiger Shark.
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Until Next Time,
Play Well!
If you have enjoyed this post, please feel free to share it with your friends, families and communities. You can also keep up to date with us by following The Rambling Brick on our socials: Facebook, Threads, Bluesky, Tumblr (or just sign up for our mailing list) and find some extra content on Instagram and TikTok.
We really value your feedback: please let us know what you think about the sets we review, and the articles we post. And if you wish to support the Rambling Brick, consider clicking on our affiliate links before going shopping at LEGO.com. The Rambling Brick receives a small commission, and it costs you nothing extra.
Until Next Time,
Play Well!