Jorja Smith, Ninajirachi, Jim Legxacy, Slawn and Maverick Sabre walk into a bar… It might sound like the setup to a niche joke, but it’s literally what happens in the new web series Pick a Piece – a Lego stop-motion-slash-talk show featuring voice performances from all of the above, alongside podcast-style vignettes from hosts Zain and Ellis. Having previously cast fakemink as a demented chicken, Pa Salieu as a flight attendant, and Fimiguerrero on a hit-and-run rampage, the series is certainly unorthodox. Beneath the chaos, however, lies a profound shift in how net-native Gen Z audiences are consuming media today.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Zain and Ellis – who are both from London – met online. Ellis had purchased a spare PinkPantheress ticket that Zain was flogging on Twitter, and after attending the show together, the pair quickly became close friends. Speaking to Dazed over a video call, Zain explains that he originally conceived Pick a Piece as a Lego-themed talk show, where high-profile guests would be interviewed while building a bespoke Lego set. But after encountering difficulties getting the series off the ground, Pick a Piece evolved into its current form: movie-quality Lego stop-motion interspersed with his and Ellis’ ambling conversations on everything from live music to body image in the age of social media.

The success of the series reflects broader shifts within UK music. A decade ago, the underground rap scene was dominated by drill — a genre largely centred on gritty portrayals of London gang crime. Since then, a new wave of chronically online Gen Z artists, dubbed ‘UK Ug’, has emerged. fakemink once ran a Pokémon fan page, Oopsy weaves references to Super Mario goombas into lyrics about promiscuity, and many of these artists came of age during lockdown, in a period defined by URL-over-IRL connection. Zain is careful not to tie Pick a Piece too closely to the scene, stating that the series is about “showcasing unexpected themes, topics and guests”, including – but not limited to – UK Ug artists. Still, it’s easy to see how these generational shifts have shaped both artists’ willingness to collaborate with the project and the enthusiastic response from their audiences.

Deeper still is how the series oscillates between hyperactive stop-motion segments and slower conversations from its hosts, delivered with a gentleness reminiscent of a mental health check-in. “[It’s] two people connecting, sharing stories and disagreeing in a really soft and safe way,” Ellis explains. “We’re not arguing or begging for attention; we’re just talking like real people would.” In a world dominated by online clickbait and ephemeral short-form content, for Zain and Ellis, Lego emerges as an unlikely antidote: it stands for the reassertion of intentional, in-person connection. It takes two to Lego, as the old saying goes. 

Below, Pick a Piece hosts Zain, 25, and Ellis, 26, dive further into the making of the unlikely web series that they’ve built brick by brick. 

How did you first come up with Pick a Piece? 

Zain: I remember engaging with a game at the time called Elden Ring. It’s a very challenging game, but it also trusts the player to figure out how to defeat a boss. I was listening to an interview while I was playing and then I had the idea. I called my friend to spitball what you see in the show now – a Lego set serving as the centre of conversation between me and a co-host, and the conversation is all based on the contents of the set itself. 

What’s the link with Elden Ring? 

Zain: A lot of games have a really busy UI [user interface], whereas Elden Ring trusts the consumer to figure all that out, to figure out the product. It’s also about the universal nature of Lego – me and Ellis aren’t sitting on chairs, we’re sitting on the floor, and we’re engaged with each other. We can only hope that it evolves to having a physical guest involved. The whole objective of the show is to build a Lego ecosystem, like when people have a whole basement dedicated to Lego. Maybe we can build the [physical guest] too.

Did both of you grow up playing with Lego? 

Ellis: I played a bit, but I got more engaged with it as I got involved with this show. Jan and Zain said, ‘Before we film or do anything, we’ll buy your Lego set – just have a play around and see how it feels’. It really is a universal thing. I didn’t expect, as an adult, to be fully engaged with something like Lego, especially in a time when your mind is split all over the place and there are so many things demanding your attention. I found it so freeing and peaceful to build a set. I think that’s what we want to communicate with the show as well.  

Zain: When I was younger, I would buy Lego sets quite frequently, even the sets that weren’t [marketed] towards me. I remember buying a Star Destroyer, like a £300-400 set, when I was nine years old. I didn’t complete it, but it’s somewhere in the house. 

You mentioned that this was originally conceived as you and a guest. When did it morph into guests contributing voice acting? 

Zain: Well, having someone on camera for your first project is not really feasible. So, we thought about it and realised, ‘Oh, they’re in a studio, we could just have them record some lines’. Then, we’d provide them updates on the progress. It serves as a proof of concept to build the identity of the show, our audience, and then warrant having a physical guest.

Pick a Piece is pretty unconventional, but the artists all enjoyed it, they loved the animation and they wanted to participate in it.

Zain, Pick a Piece founder

Your guests are obviously quite high-profile artists. Was it difficult getting them to agree to the project?

Zain: Jim, like all of these people featured, really loved the idea. fakemink agreed to do it in January 2025, just before “Easter Pink” was released. He was pretty easy to convince. [Pick a Piece] is pretty unconventional, but [the artists] all enjoyed it, they loved the animation and wanted to participate in it.

Do you have a background in filmmaking? 

Zain: No… So, to give you an overview of everyone involved in the show, the only person that might come from a creative background is Mike, the animator. The animation is a one man machine, he’s the only one that does it. We procure the voices and work with him in terms of what assets we need to get for the animation.

I don’t come from a filmmaking background. In fact, I got kicked out [of school] for six months for punctuality. Now, I’m a network engineer. Jan, the producer, was in uni and now he works for Jim Legxacy. He was in uni studying maths, but left for financial reasons. Safa, another producer, works in events management. Another one is Omnia, whose background is in law, and Dominic, who’s currently working for a localisation company in Japan. Even Kane, he shoots the show and edits it, but his background is in finance. It’s nice to have people from different industries. And Ellis…

Ellis: I have a background in film journalism. What really attracted me to do Pick a Piece was that, when I was learning on the BFI Critic Mentorship program, I learned about interviewing and how to speak to a camera. 

How do you pick the topics you discuss on the show?

Zain: Firstly, I’ll select the set. The writing would be relevant to whether it was a brand-new set or if it was a modular set. In the first episode, we build a jazz club, right? So if we’re building an auditorium, we can talk about live shows. If you’re building a cafe, you can talk about hospitality, the food industry, and food insecurity.

Ellis: Yeah, a big part of these topics are brought up by the set. But me and Zain are also constantly having conversations when making the set, and we’re constantly putting our disagreements about things or our personal anecdotes in there. I think what’s engaging is if [our audience] sees two people connecting, sharing stories and disagreeing in a really soft and safe way. We’re not arguing or begging for attention; we’re just talking like real people would. We try to take that part of our relationship and put that into a script for you guys. 

What are you excited about in the new episode?

Zain: We have some pretty crazy wild cards, like Ninajirachi and Jorja Smith. We are blindsiding people with that and the juxtaposition between them. We also have Slawn, who’s someone from a different disciplinary background. We hope to expand that in the future as well. 

Pick a Piece Episode 3 is out now