The Red Death

Where to even begin… it’s not every day you find a build this organic, smooth, and… absolutely disgusting. VB has done a remarkable job creating the seamless tentacles/entrails that riddle this revolting creature, and has balanced those smooth, snaky tubes with a draping cloak and sharp, pointy meat hooks. The entire ensemble brings words like “pestilence” and “plague” to my mind. VB doesn’t tell us much about the nature of this creature, but I’m fairly certain it is not a visitor you would want to grace your front door.

DOOM Cacodemon

I was, unfortunately, a bit too young and sheltered to be exposed to the original DOOM games that helped usher in the age of the first-person-shooter. When DOOM 2016 was released, however, I was nothing short of obsessed with the game. The absolute monster hell of the DOOM universe was grotesque and fascinating, and Jerac’s rendition of the fearsome floating Cacodemon is instantly recognizable. This could be no easy feat; building complex spherical objects with LEGO bricks is a challenge to any builder.

The round and spiky Cacodemon is certainly the center of attention with its brilliant use of minifig arms, sausages, and disks, but everything about this scene is well done and deserves a good looking-over. The industrial, greebly door, the color scheme and texture of the walls, and the hexagonal floor design are all sleek as a SNOT (studs-not-on-top) dream. But the damage done to our heroic DOOM guy -an effective combination of a stuffed rubber band paired with red and maroon tiles- is the true eye candy of this scene. I’m sure our Cacodemon would agree.

The Nightmare Artist in LEGO

Ever heard of the Polish artist Zdzisław Beksiński? Brick builder Leonid An has, and boy are we glad for it. One of his paintings inspired this particular model. The sharp gear-grins paired with beady eyes is a chilling combination, and one wonders about the fate of the figure in the background. The combination of colors is effective as well, and sits in my mind as a “rusty apocalypse” palette. Let us hope for more builds inspired by paintings… especially when the paintings seem to be inspired by nightmares.