Last year, The LEGO Group (TLG) burst onto the scene with the inaugural series of bizarre LEGO Marvel Mighty Micros sets featuring superheroes and villains battling it out… in race cars. Most of us crusty old folks agreed that the ludicrous line was destined to be a spectacular failure, crashing and burning as quickly as it came. So of course the line turned out to be a huge success, containing some of the best-selling LEGO Marvel sets ever. And now, the 2017 LEGO Marvel Mighty Micros are up for order, including Magneto, Wolverine, Scorpion, and… Thanos driving the Infinity Gauntlet Mobile?!

Wait a minute. TLG launches a new line of kid-aimed, low-priced, $9.99 sets containing two minifigures of almost across-the-board Marvel headliner characters driving wacky vehicles, and we somehow didn’t all know that this series was going to be a universal success? Yup… we are officially crotchety old-timers.

But while the jaded “adult” collectors like us may have counted this line out immediately, children did not, and it’s been a whopper of a success for The LEGO Group. Nice job, TLG.

So we come to the three new sets for 2017, and we’re getting a nice spread with one set each for X-Men, Spider-Man and Avengers.

LEGO Wolverine vs. Magneto 76073 is the first LEGO X-Men set released since 2014, believe it or not, so while not everyone will be thrilled about repeat characters, it is necessary to get the top X-Men hero and villain back on the market.

In this instance, I think both of the cars are pretty dumb (okay, Wolverine’s Blackbird Jet-inspired car is a little charming), but the set became a must-have for me because of the new LEGO Magneto Minifigure.

Not only does he have a cool magnetic effects piece, but he has an Onslaught/Age of Apocalypse-esque shadowed-in face! LOVE IT! (There’s a regular non-shadowed face on the other side of the reversible head, by the way.)

On the Spider-Man front, things are… less exciting. We just got a classic Scorpion Minifigure in the July 2016 wave of sets, so while it’s nice to see another version of him in a set that costs 10% of the last one, it’s sort of tough to get psyched about him.

That said, I’m sure the 76071 LEGO Mighty Micros Spider-Man vs. Scorpion set is still going to sell like gangbusters because, well… Spidey! Spider-Man Minifigure in a sub-$10 set? Yeah–this is gonna be a parent-approved set.

Finally, we’ve got the first LEGO Marvel Mighty Micros set that I really, truly fell in love with one of the vehicles from: Mighty Micros Iron Man vs. Thanos 76072!

If you have ever dreamed of building the Infinity Gauntlet into a car that Thanos can drive around in, then this is the set for you.

No, seriously–this Thanos Mighty Micros car rocks. The individual fingers on the car are even articulated! Brilliance!!

Iron Man’s race car is (way) less inspired, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t dig the snarky grinning Tony Stark head on the Minifigure.

The LEGO Marvel 2017 Mighty Micros sets are now available for order online, and should be stocked in most retail stores this month (though when may depend largely on the toy department reset schedules in your area). I swore off ever owning anything from the Mighty Micros range last year… but promptly went and picked up the Thanos and Magneto sets from The LEGO Store yesterday anyway. Alas.

Any thoughts on the continuing LEGO Superheroes Mighty Micros theme, Marvel collectors? Have you warmed up to this line at all since its inception, and/or are you planning on picking up any of this year’s wave of sets?