Lego Blog: Illustrating Flash Pulp episode FP004

Getting Carried Away

I really enjoy making birthday cards for friends and family. Ya gotta have rules for who gets ’em, otherwise I’d never stop making them. Anyway, I almost always start with a nice simple idea, and through a process of imaginary 3D rules for how things fit together and a deeply unhelpful love of wild complications I spend hours and hours more than I really should have done. But – it usually turns out looking pretty!

And thus I found myself with FP004. I’m still very much enjoying this project. I really didn’t need to build this much…

Read and Listen To The Story

You have to do this now:

Here’s the full story: Mulligan Smith and the Standoff

Illustrating The Story

So – as the title suggests, it is indeed a standoff situation in a private residence between ace PI Mulligan Smith and the homeowner keen to defend his privacy (not necessarily how the story goes).

So that could have a been a super simple set up. I basically need this bit: two guys with guns and a couple of doorways. That’s the story right?

But that damned Jrd Skinner and all of his damn words.

… the plush white carpet of the home office to the burgundy pile of the hallway…  the white paneled house … the plush, dusty coral living room carpet. The PI was perched in the shadows at the edge of the hallway: a right would take him to the front door, the fake hardwood of the short front hall directly in the line of sight of the sunken living room. His other option was to move forward into the inky blackness ahead of him, where he knew the kitchen and dining area lay. The alternate route offered the conveniences of a patio door and an overlook into the living room.

A sprint to the sliding door tempted Mulligan, but the idea of silhouetting himself against the glow of the huge window kept him still. He was beginning to contemplate turning back into one of the alternate doors that branched off from the hallway …

Just look at all those words. Now I could not think of any good way to do plush carpeting (that’s gonna add to a future nightmare obsession) so I switched colours as needed. Plus I’m really bad at 3D mental rotation of images, and maps. And maths, come to that. I couldn’t figure the exact dimensions of the house so I laid out a simplish (buildable) ground floor and filled it with rooms.

I’m pretty pleased with the corner sofas. The bookcase is absurdly complicated.

There Is No Stop

But I wasn’t content (damn that Jrd, creating worlds and everything). I’d virtually forgotten the story, but I needed stairs. I needed another floor.  I realised I’d committed myself to making the whole house.

That’s cool though, because I wasn’t sure I had enough Lego to construct a whole building, even if just a little one. I had fun with the bathroom and bedroom.

So yeah, I got quite carried away.

Ah! the outside too… lookit the pretty flowaz! And a roof – I hate making roofs. One day I’ll be good at it…

Minifigging the Characters

I’ll confess the build overwhelmed the story for this one, but since I already had Mulligan the only decision I could make for him was whether to give him a hood up or keep the hood down. I went with ‘down’ because it looks so odd otherwise.

The old man doesn’t get any of the lush description that his house receives, but the standoff put me in a Western frame of mind. I think I’ve made Sam Elliott in Lego.

There are some more pictures of the details here, on Flickr: https://www.flickr.com/photos/eric_the_bewildered_weasel/albums/72157658419372579