Lego Ghostbusters ECTO - 1

From the moment this Lego Ideas set was announced at the beginning of 2014, I just KNEW I have to have it.

Ghostbusters where blockbuster comedies from my days of youth, and I loved (and still love) those flicks, they are a gigantic laugh.

The Lego Ideas (formerly CUSOO) fan program is a chance to build things out of the regular settings, and the set is a bot of a throw back to the good old days, as it doesn`t come with numbered bags for each `phase` of the build.

Like 20 years ago, you open the box, cut open the bags, toss `em all in there and start scrummaging and building.

And it has unique minifigures of course, each coming with the initials of the characters...

Another great thing is no decals.  The license plates, the power pack dials and the Ghostbusters logos are all printed onto the bricks, so no trying to center them as good as you can, and no fear of the decals coming off in a few years.


The first phase of the build is the characters and the special display stand for them.

But then we move on to the main attraction: Ecto 1 herself.  One of the most iconic cars from movie history, she is an old gravedigger car, panted over and equipped with a heap of ghostbusting materials, lights... and a very iconic siren!

The set even had a piece in it that I didn`t know existed, nor had in my collection...

Another great thing in the building instructions, is that it is riddled with movie quotes and pictures of the characters minifig equivalent.

After about an hour into the build, and time to go grab a sandwich, this is where I stood then:

Interlude

Tickled by his cousins building something themselves yesterday, and the `big guy` building ECTO - 1, the Smurf finally has made the `clique` in his head to try and build by himself and from his imagination.

When we where at the table, he called me over to show HIS big car model he has been building quietly in his room, at the same time I was building this set.

I did have to `teach` him the benefits of how to stabilize and soldify the builds using longer plates and interlocking parts left or right, but it is all his own doing, my only `input` was raising the window one stud so the roof could connect, and the connection between the pull car and the trailer.

I`m actually proud of his first effort, I don`t remember mine being that big all those years ago, i`d probably would have settled only on the front car.

Back to the Ecto

I really like the way they connected the sloped side windows in this car, something (probably as a medieval builder) I hadn`t ever though about to, for example, slope my walls or roofs in my builds.  I`m definitly taking this along in my arsenal of techniques.

The final phase of the build is the roofpart...

... and then it clicks onto the car, and we`re all set and done, one big nice shiny and NOISY car (yes, I alreadt `swooshed` it, going EEE UUU EEE UUU EEE UUU).  This is such an awesome build, and I can imagine it being a typical `lure back` for young dads and moms to come back out of their Dark Ages, especcially those of my generation when the car drove around on television.

Of course, no self respecting Lego set comes with some extra parts, for this one, it is a very nice haul:

This was a great and enjoyable build, taking about 2 hours to complete from opening to drooling, and I definitly keep hoping the Ideas range will keep expanding and some more icons of the past will appear.  Now to grab that Back to the Future DeLorean one day...