Shannon Ocean portrays the process of letting go and the chaos that lies beyond death. If what Shannon shows in his vignette is true, then I’ll be going to a world with endless colorful LEGO bricks after I die, but I’m sure that’s not the case presented here.
With so much amazing stuff to blog, I sometimes feel like we don’t feature the smaller creations often enough. I really think small creations take a lot of talent to design well, which is one reason why I like Tim Zarki‘s dive suit so much:
This would be perfect for, you know, hunting underwater zombies. ;-)
Update: Zombie Apocafest 2008 is now over, and it was awesome. Don’t miss our full coverage here on The Brothers Brick:
BrickCon 2008 is less than a month away. The list of attendees is growing, and it’s starting to look like this will be the first 200-attendee BrickCon!
Today and tomorrow are your very last chance to register at the $50 price (registration goes up to $60 on Tuesday, September 8), and the last window of opportunity to guarantee your personalized brick badge engraved by Brick Engraver.
Plans for group projects at BrickCon 2008 are well underway, with lots of progress on the Zombie Apocafest and ChiefLUG Initiation.
To sweeten the deal, The Brothers Brick will be handing out some cool prizes and giveaways:
If you’re worried that you don’t have any LEGO zombies — don’t sweat it. We’ve got you covered with a horde of at least 80 zombies. :twisted:
And for those of you who can’t make it in person this year, there’s still the GO MINIMAN GO Photo Contest with even more prizes! The contest is open to everyone over 18 worldwide, and entries are already stacking up in the GO MINIMAN GO photo pool, so take a look at the rules and try your hand at a scene inspired by the 1970s, 1980s, 1990s, or 2000s.
Fedde (aka Cthulhu or Karf Oolhu) enters the Reasonably Clever Brick Science contest with “The lunatic’s lunar lair”:
“Deep in his heavily fortified lunar lair, the lunatic Doktor Frank N. Staines plays re-creator of life.” Click through to the Flickr photopage to read Fedde’s full description, and see the Brickshelf gallery for more pictures.
Andrew Lee was inspired to create this pair of miniland samurai by a T-shirt he saw at Comic-Con earlier this summer:
Peter summarizes my reaction to this scene rather nicely:
This reminds me of those awesome and cliche’d scenes in anime where they dash at each other with swords, run right by in silhouette and stand a minute, opposite each other… then one of the guys falls apart.
Note the excellent ponytail on the samurai on the right.
I was a strange little boy, with my LEGO and my stories and my classic black and white movies. One of my favorite films to this day is Charlie Chaplin’s The Great Dictator, from 1940.
Piglet recreates a famous scene in which Charlie Chaplin, as “Adenoid Hynkel,” parodies Adolf Hitler’s ridiculous (and ultimately terrifying) oratory style:
However, I like to think that this is the movie’s final scene, in which the Jewish barber (mistaken for the identical Hynkel) delivers a beautiful speech calling on humanity’s better nature. Here’s one of my favorite passages:
We all want to help one another. Human beings are like that. We want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another.
In this world there is room for everyone, and the good earth is rich and can provide for everyone. The way of life can be free and beautiful, but we have lost the way. Greed has poisoned men’s souls, has barricaded the world with hate, has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed. We have developed speed, but we have shut ourselves in. Machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical; our cleverness, hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little.
More than machinery, we need humanity. More than cleverness, we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.
Truer words couldn’t be said today, nearly seventy years later. Watch the full speech here:
Via VignetteBricks.
The darkness is coming to BrickCon, bringing with it a massive invasion of my signature Black Fantasy creature, the Cyclopean Virtue. There’s only less than one month left before the showdown, so register now before it’s too late. You can contribute to the invasion by making one or more of your own to add to the army (instructions).
Meanwhile, you can support my BrickCon projects by purchasing a custom model. I am selling a very limited quantity of the Tripod Droid and Andante (click on links for details).
Above art by Greg Hyland
Pirates and Ninja have been fighting it out for quite awhile. But now its time for the Final Round! Its all come down this: a competitive-eating competition, hosted by Anthony Sava. Get Ready, Get Set, Chow Down!
UPDATE (9/26/08): You can order your copy of the set by following the directions in How to get your 7979 Castle Advent Calendar, currently at the top of the front page.
UPDATE (9/25/08): Limited quantities of this set will be made available on September 26 in the US and Canada.
We’ve recently received news from The LEGO Group that the much-anticipated holiday set 7979 Castle Advent Calendar will not be available in the United States (with ambiguity around its availability in other markets).
Just look at this gorgeous set, full of unique minifigs — including a jester, new witch, peasant woman, goblin, and dwarf:
Naturally, the hue and cry from LEGO Castle fans was heard ’round the ‘net. I’m personally extremely disappointed, and and am therefore abusing my position as the Editor-in-Chief of this blog to rally the LEGO fan community and try to change LEGO’s mind.
Note: For those of you in continental Europe, 7979 Castle Advent Calendar has been confirmed for most of your markets. Elsewhere, there’s still some question about places like the UK, Australia, Canada, and Japan.
EDIT (TG): The set is presently available on Shop@Home for both the UK and Australia.
For those of you who’d like to let The LEGO Group know that you want this set, there are several ways you can communicate your wishes.
Just to be realistic for a moment, let’s not get our hopes up. It’s already very late in the year to be changing plans for a holiday set. Packaging requirements, for example, are different from market to market, and it may be too late to design, repackage, and ship this set to other markets.
Finally, for those of you on the fence about this, here’s the beautiful peasant woman:
Okay people, fan activism ON!
EDIT (AB): If you see an error when you try to vote, rest assured that your vote is still being counted. (For those who care, see my technical explanation in the comments below.)
[poll id=”13″]
EDIT (AB): Bumping this by a few hours so it stays on the front page a bit longer.
The Genius of Tiny Things, Michael Jasper recently posted a new minifig accessory — the shopping cart:
And for those who missed it, a very tiny motorcycle:
Karwik (Noddy), the guy with the bikes, is throwing a big party at his motorcycle clubhouse, and gosh is the scene lively. With so many people and bikes to check out and details aligning every corner, this is something you don’t want to miss. Oh, and the fun‘s just getting started, check out the details gallery ;)
The new fan-designed set from LEGO Factory, 10200 Custom Car Garage, is now available from the LEGO Shop online:
At $69.99, the set comes with three cars, three four minifigs, and a garage with a working forklift. I’m quite happy to see the Naboo pilot torso in this set. Does this mean it’ll be available from online Pick-a-Brick? Hmm…
