“Yet across the gulf of space, minds that are to our minds as ours are to those of the beasts that perish, intellects vast and cool and unsympathetic, regarded this earth with envious eyes, and slowly and surely drew their plans against us.”
And so begins one of the all-time classic science fiction books by H.G.Wells “The War of the Worlds”. An alien race comes to Earth and starts to take over the world, using Tripod fighting machines and wiping out human civilisation with its heat ray, before tossing the bodies into a bag for consumption later.
This then, I believe, must be the premise for the latest in the Lego “Outer Space” range. Over the years we’ve gone to the moon – and beyond; we’ve travelled to far distant planets and mined there… and now the aliens have come to Earth.
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Tripod invader
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shoot when you see the whites of their eyes
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Run! it’s on the desk!
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BUURRRPPP!
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Run Forest!
I bought the Tripod Invader (Set number 7051) principally for one “mini figure accessory” that I will mention later. The build itself was pretty straightforward; connecting the tripod legs together to form the stand for the space ship was possibly the most confusing aspect – when you get to step 11 the 3D image is a bit of a challenge, but it is better described with an aerial shot over the page. I guess there is a lesson there in reading the manual before building, but heck I get keen when I start to build…
I love the base stand and its posable flexibility. The heat raygun, with its ball hinge, is not far off how I imagined the HG Wells tripod to look. The alien spaceship, which detaches from its base (one can only assume it’s so it can return to the motherships just outside the Earth’s atmosphere) is also a great build. I love the details on the stickers (especially the bumper sticker with the message “We’ve been to Earth”).
So the spaceship is all great? Well, it’s not bad, but I would have liked to have seen a sticker that gave the alien something to look at – a target for the ray gun perhaps. I’m being picky here for a toy, but from the alien’s perspective they can’t actually see what they’re aiming for, assuming that the ray gun isn’t fully automatic and sentient. The egg pod at the back of the ship is a nice touch too – big enough to fit a minifigure in it.
So as well as the space ship, let’s have a quick look at the minifigures. We have an alien, looking angry, mean and misunderstood (with a face only an alien mother could love!); we have a human, dressed in a formal suit with a briefcase and (yay!) a head that is printed on both sides – so can show being happy… and very, very scared. Then…. well, then there’s the alien clinger.
The alien clinger reminds me of Kang and Kodos, the aliens from the Simpsons! However unlike the face-sucking alien in Alien, this alien absorbs the human head into itself…
As I said before, I bought the Tripod Invader for one thing – the alien clinger (well, it’s just so cool!) as sadly this is the smallest set in the Alien Conquest range that has one. I’ve assumed that the clinger is some kind of pet that the aliens have, so I would have liked to see it in the battle pack at least. Hey ho. (Note: you can buy them from companies like Firestartoys, but I felt that the price they are going for on sites like that I might as well have the WOTW tripod and alien too. Just a personal opinion there).
So overall, I think it’s a great set and I’m sure that Thurg (the name I’ve given the alien), Clark (the businessman) and Ripley (the alien clinger), as well as the Tripod, will be appearing again on these webpages….
