Like a great many Star Wars fans, I ravenously devoured The Mandalorian, and it’s been so refreshing to have the feels of Star Wars back. There’s a certain intangibility to what makes something feel like Star Wars, but no small part of it is the roots on which it’s built, the inspiration that fueled it. It’s clear in the first minute of episode one that The Mandalorian is heavily inspired by the classic westerns, which were in turn heavily inspired by the classic samurai movies, and A New Hope drew much of inspiration from those as well. By the end of the first scene I was hooked, and so was everyone else. Builder Marcus19840432 is clearly a fan, having skillfully crafted one of the key early moments in season one, the showdown in the outpost on Arvala. For spoilers sake I will say no more and if you haven’t seen the...

John C. Lamarck , aircraft builder extraordinaire has once again found his way into our Nerdy hearts. He has built an excellent rendition of Lockheed’s F-104 . For those uninitiated into the world of aircraft geekery let me give you the quick tour. The F-104 was designed by Kelly Johnson’s design team in the 1950’s (Johnson is most known for working on the P-38 Lightning, U-2, and SR-71 Blackbird). Known as the “Missile with a Man in it” the 104 was design as a supersonic interceptor design to intercept and destroy soviet fighters and bombers. Starfighters were in service in the USAF, allied air forces and NASA from 1958 until late 2004 (USAF retirement was significantly early). The 104 set several aviation records mostly in climb to altitude speed. Seen here is an excellent rendition of the CF-104 built under license by Canadair for the Royal Canadian Air Force. John captures...

I’m still waiting for the comet, radioactive, lightning strike or chemical bath that will grant me super powers, but when it happens I just hope I can find someone like Edna here to help with my costume creation. Builder city son brings one of my favorite Pixar characters to brick form, and I dig her. Original linkOriginal author: Tommy

Semi-embarrassing Idiosyncrasy time. Whenever I speak the word “Pegasus” I am overwhelmingly compelled to do it in the theatrically heroic voice of Hercules. And not from the inexplicably spirally Disney movie, more like the terrible Trans Lux cartoon from the 60’s. And yes, I did it the first time I saw this magnificent sculpture by Grantmasters (and no, I’m not ashamed). Original linkOriginal author: Tommy

Monkey bread is in the oven, brunch is in the crock pot, Christmas carols are playing in the background and a cheery fire is burning. We’re going to start opening presents in a few minutes but I thought I’d take a quick moment to wish you all a very Merry Christmas! Santa (brilliantly built here by MinifigNick) came to our house last night, we’re very happy. Original linkOriginal author: Tommy