Finally! The LCA Super Sea Monkeys 2026

Purchased: 10 Toro (6 X 54)
Price: $12.95 each
Store: Tranquilo Cigars
Buy Again: Yes
Box Worthy: Yes – if I could get a box, but most retailers wizened up and only sell singles.
Experience Rating: 94 (Down six points from the original, and I’ll explain that below)

I know, yet another LCA cigar review from me. If you read my upcoming review of the Purple People Eater on Katman’s blog (it will be published tomorrow), you’re reading this post now, and you saw my earlier mention of the Dead Stock and other LCA sticks, you might think I’m a shill for Privada/LCA. But I’m not. I’ve just been on a curiosity kick lately, because my local shop, an LCA reseller, has a big lineup of LCA cigars. So, I’ve been trying them out. Plus, after doing some research on LCA and noticing their trend towards blend stability and scaled-up production capacity by using major hitters in the industry, I wanted to see what was up.

I welcomed the move because using established blenders like AJ and Espinosa ensured quality and consistency in the blends. But at the same time, I was a little concerned because Privada/LCA had made its mark in the industry by flipping it off, contracting with small, boutique, and sometimes underground producers instead of establishing a centralized facility from which all its lines would be produced. The result of that was the production of some iconic blends, like the Super Sea Monkeys and the original Purple People Eater.

But every business move has a price, and hopefully, LCA didn’t sacrifice too much of the charm of its blends for stability and production capacity. Only time will tell.

But, luckily, in the case of the Super Sea Monkeys, LCA didn’t transfer production to one of the big guys. They probably couldn’t because the fermentation process used for the wrapper is proprietary to the blender, Raul Lanuza, who employs what he calls “ultra-fermentation” on the Cameroon Negro Maduro wrapper leaf that pushes the leaf’s sugars and oils to the surface, creating a Maduro profile with an unusual aromatic lift and a distinctly dark coloration. This is experimental fermentation at its best, and it’s the signature for the Super Sea Monkeys cigar.

I initially wasn’t going to write a review of the 2026 version. But I noticed that the ring gauge changed from 2025 to 2026. The original was 56, the new one is 54. And though it may seem like a minor change, experience demonstrates that it can have some serious implications on the flavor profile.

For instance, take the Curivari Reserva Limitada Cafe Noir line. It comes in three vitolas: 54 (5.5 X 54), 56 (5.5 X 56), and 62 (6 X 60). One would think that small changes in ring gauge wouldn’t make much of a difference. But in reality, they produce wildly different flavor profiles. My personal preference is the 62, but I’ve had a few boxes of all the vitolas over the years. The 54 and 56 are the closest together in ring gauge, but they couldn’t be more different from each other. The 54 actually burns cooler and has a more wood-forward profile. The 56, on the other hand, introduces more cocoa and earth.

With its smaller ring gauge, the Super Sea Monkey 2026 departs from the original in a significant way. It is more refined, with more wrapper influence, so I expected it to be even fruitier than the original. And while that chocolaty fruitiness is still present, it is now more a component of what seems to be a tighter, more structural foundation.

The original’s foundation was stone fruit and milk chocolate, akin to a sweet nectarine dipped in chocolate. On top of that danced a cornucopia of flavors: cedar, hickory, roasted cashew nuts, apricot fruit roll-up, grape jelly, cacao bean, coffee with cream, espresso, burnt oak, citrus notes, toffee, caramel, sweet cream, buttered toast, rich milk chocolate, and créme brûlée.

With the 2026 version, it’s still as complex, with a similar mix of the flavors mentioned above. But the foundation is completely different, favoring dark chocolate, espresso, and black pepper, which indicates to me that the guts changed enough to make this new version smoke more like a classic Nicaraguan with fruity notes.

Don’t get me wrong, it’s still a fantastic cigar. But there is a reason I gave the original an experience rating of 100. It was transformative. And I’m not relying on long-term memory when I mention this rating. I smoked an original just a few days ago in anticipation of writing this post, so the memory of the experience is still fresh.

I’m still giving the new version a high rating of 94. The quality and construction are still high; the surprise factor of starting with the shaggy foot, then transitioning into the wrapped section, and the dance of flavors are still there. But without the chocolaty-fruity foundation, it has fallen into the excellent range, as the experience is no longer transformative. It just feels like another excellent, complex Nicaraguan stick.

Admittedly, it was difficult to be objective about this stick and review it on its own merits. But this was a cigar I had waited a year for, and though it’s still a great cigar, it left me wanting. The experience of the original was entirely different. It was so different from anything I had smoked that it would literally stop me in my tracks because I couldn’t believe a cigar could taste like that.

With its new, more refined structure and profile, it follows LCA’s current trend of stabilizing its blends. But in the case of the 2026 version of the Super Sea Monkeys, it has lost the mojo that endeared me to it in the first place.

To be fair, I’ve only had the new sticks for a few weeks. I will let the rest of the 10-pack sit for longer to see if they become transformative. My fingers are crossed, but I’m not holding my breath.