My God, it's full of squares.

June 25, 2012 12:00 PM

Minimalist Lego reconstructions of classic moments from sci-fi cinema.
posted by gauche (27 comments total)

There were definitely a few that I had to hover over and see the title of in order to recognize. The Futurama one, for example. Once I knew was it was, it was obvious, but I couldn't figure it out until I looked at the title.

Overall, though, it's cool to see how much can be conveyed with just a few simple Lego blocks.
posted by asnider at 12:04 PM on June 25, 2012

When I was a kid, I almost always ignored the scale suggested by the minifigs. You could build way cooler stuff at the scale these things are built to.

I think this is my favorite.
posted by gauche at 12:07 PM on June 25, 2012

An appropriately futurist reckoning of 'classic,' as it includes a movie released two-and-a-half weeks ago and another that will not be released until late July.

There are a few I am hard-pressed to identify, but I must allow that they are recreations of iconic scenes from Nine Minutes to Ordin, released in 2019.
posted by ricochet biscuit at 12:09 PM on June 25, 2012 [3 favorites]

This is kind of nerdy.
posted by Slarty Bartfast at 12:10 PM on June 25, 2012 [1 favorite]

Thanks for this. This is what Lego is supposed to be. I'm getting tired of the ever more complex custom bricks in my kids' sets. I miss the days when it was mostly square things and rounded things of various sizes and colors. I do like minifigs and I'm ok with a few odd shapes as long as they're general enough to be used in new models of different themes. Also get off my lawn.

I do wonder why the rules say you can't have digital models yet many of the pictures look very digital to me and where the damn TARDIS is in all this.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 12:12 PM on June 25, 2012 [2 favorites]

It seems like this one would be the easiest to make and, arguably, the minimalist-est.
posted by cog_nate at 12:21 PM on June 25, 2012

Heh. These are great.
posted by Artw at 12:33 PM on June 25, 2012

What are the textured panels on the side of the sand crawler here? I love these but my love would reduced if there are lots of moulded or custom bricks.
posted by cromagnon at 12:46 PM on June 25, 2012

Those are 1x2 bricks with a ridged texture on one side - pretty standard.
posted by Artw at 12:49 PM on June 25, 2012 [1 favorite]

I need to get out less. Thanks!
posted by cromagnon at 1:01 PM on June 25, 2012 [4 favorites]

This is what Lego is supposed to be. I'm getting tired of the ever more complex custom bricks in my kids' sets.

To me these creations are proof that Lego is as good, or better, as it ever was. Even though pieces are more and more specialized they can be used in any way you can imagine. You could go through all these pictures and figure out how all those special pieces were originally used, and in what model, and here they are being used in completely different ways.

I know those of us over a certain age love to claim that anything but a 2x4 brick is lame, or cheating, and that modern Lego has ruined kids imaginations forever, but stuff like this shows how that just isn't the case.

I totally admit to being a former member of the "Lego(s) suck now" camp until I actually started seeing what kids and adults can do with modern Lego.
posted by bondcliff at 1:08 PM on June 25, 2012 [2 favorites]

Tiny lego spaceships are the best thing ever! I used to use bunches of these.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 1:16 PM on June 25, 2012

You could go through all these pictures and figure out how all those special pieces were originally used, and in what model, and here they are being used in completely different ways.

What I was saying is when I looked through these pictures even the more complex pieces were still of the old generic type that can become so many other things and that's what I liked about it.

An example of my problem is sets like the Ninjago Mech sets my son has. Large sections of the set are molded into one piece. It would take a good imagination to make the neck, head, helmet, shield (wings?), and other protrusions that make up one piece into anything other than the shielded head of a futuristic something (not the top in the linked example, but I don't have the set I'm thinking of in front of me right now). That's pretty limited to me.
posted by Clinging to the Wreckage at 1:16 PM on June 25, 2012

Also, tiny Nebuchadnezzar might be my favorite of the ones shown here.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 1:17 PM on June 25, 2012

Those shoulder pads are totally cowcatchers. That's a pretty novel use, to me.
posted by Mister Moofoo at 1:19 PM on June 25, 2012 [1 favorite]

There is nothing about this that I do not love.
posted by Freen at 1:20 PM on June 25, 2012

I'm seeing some kind of Ninjago logo piece and what i assume are minifig weapons, but that mostly looks standard to me.
posted by Artw at 1:24 PM on June 25, 2012

Nice! My favorite is Planet of the Apes, although it doesn't look like they used the standard blocks I remember from my childhood. This one is also pretty cool, I like how simple it is.
posted by photo guy at 1:34 PM on June 25, 2012

Very cool, but sadly no 2001: Space Odyssey. Thinking about it, it would probably be pretty easy to recreate the scene where they excavate the monolith: a gray floor, a black monolith, and a couple of astronaut minifigs, maybe a few LEGO Klieg lights if you're really ambitious.

And I love the post title!
posted by slogger at 7:16 PM on June 25, 2012

I especially like the use of the torso in this one.
posted by stebulus at 8:22 PM on June 25, 2012 [1 favorite]

I especially like the use of the torso in this one.

Yeah, except that looks more like the 1701 or 1701-A. </nerd>
posted by MikeKD at 10:38 PM on June 25, 2012 [1 favorite]

yea, these are awesome...it'd be more awesome if they revealed their secrets
posted by MikeKD at 10:40 PM on June 25, 2012

The lack of a Monolith saddens my appreciation of the link.

1:4:fucking:9
posted by porpoise at 1:27 AM on June 26, 2012

Someone make that absurdly meat grinder-y drive room from Event Horizon, pls.
posted by Eideteker at 5:44 AM on June 26, 2012

We did have a Lego monolith in the related thread from April.

A monolith does seem like an obvious oversight, given how easily it could be done in this style.
posted by gauche at 6:06 AM on June 26, 2012

Given that Lego has a 5:6 w:h ratio you'd have to build your Monolith 2 studs wide, 8 studs long, and 15 bricks* high in order to give it the proper 1:4:9 ratio. You couldn't build it in this scale.

Though you'd probably want to use 14 bricks, 2 flats, and 1 smooth flat to make it smooth on top.

This may very well be the nerdiest thing I've ever written on the internet.
posted by bondcliff at 6:20 AM on June 26, 2012 [4 favorites]

Given that Lego has a 5:6 w:h ratio you'd have to build your Monolith 2 studs wide, 8 studs long, and 15 bricks* high in order to give it the proper 1:4:9 ratio. You couldn't build it in this scale.

You could approximate the scale with a single smooth flat 2x4 standing on its end. Certainly not perfect (and yes, the dimensions of the monolith are kind of key) but maybe close enough.
posted by gauche at 7:44 AM on June 26, 2012