Blacktron I

You may think that my blog has been converted into a LEGO® blog, but that's not true. I'm just termporarily really excited about them. Again. All of my hobbies tend to come and go in waves. LEGO is one that comes up less frequently than some (gaming being pretty much "always on" in comparison) but when it hits, it hits pretty hard. There's something about constructing your own world in tangible form via these standardized building bricks that just really appeals to the creative side of me. Plus, I like making the standardized models too, as an excercise in (easy) model-making.

Anyway, I'm going to do a small series of posts as a tribute to the various "bad guys" of LEGO Space, posting catalog images of all the sets in their lines, and then a handful of creations I find online that are really nifty. This means, of course, that I have to start with Blacktron. Blacktron are, as near as I can tell, the original bad guys of the entire Legoland universe, and they're still one of the most sinister and appealing in appearance. LEGO hasn't really topped them yet, which is a shame, although they've had some notable other successes too.

The first set I'm showing, 1875, is a bit of an anomaly, as it doesn't really highlight the classic Blacktron color scheme, and is perhaps a transitional set between Blacktron I and Blacktron II.

Anyway, Blacktron was also always noted for its interesting ground vehicles. The Alienator was a walker, no doubt inspired by the walkers that George Lucas had shown us just a few years earlier in The Empire Strikes Back and Return of the Jedi. The Battrax, on the other hand, was an ATV tank-like vehicle, with big, beefy wheels.

There wasn't really an extremely large space ship set; the Invader was nice, but rather smallish, and the larger Renegade was also at best only medium sized. The Renegade was also very notable for it's assymetric design.

The final official set was the Message Intercept Base, again with a title that hints at their nefarious goings-on.

Now, below are a few of the images I've found via Google Image Search of home-made LEGO creations of a Blacktron I theme. All of these are really cool, but I especially want to point out the final one, because it's a remake of another vehicle from another official set, redone in Blacktron I colors. The "prototype" of that set is actually in the new Space Police III line, where it's a criminal or pirate ship being chased by a police vehicle. Also, the third one down is very similar to a Blacktron II set... but you'll see that later when I get to Blacktron II.