MELO Round 4 Barad-Dur bracket

Round 4 of the MELO challenged each pair to face off based on characters from the Two Towers. Here is the Barad-Dur bracket.

Captain Nemo went up against Graham Gidman to build MOCs based on Treebeard. Graham Gidman advanced to round 5.



Tim W went up against Dunedain98 to build MOCs based on Eowyn. Dunedain98 advanced to round 5.

MELO Round 3 Orthanc bracket

Continuing on with round 3 of the MELO. Here are the four pairings for the Orthanc bracket - again, with creations themed on characters from the Fellowship of the Ring.

Pieter Dennison faced off against Joseph Olson to build MOCs based on Aragorn. Joseph Olson advanced to round 4.



Andrew JN faced off against Professor B to build MOCs based on Frodo. Professor B defaulted, so Andrew JN automatically advanced to round 4, but given the quality of this build he probably would have gone on anyway.

ForlonEmpire faced off against Bane of Seagulls to build MOCs based on Gimli. Bane of Seaguls advanced to round 4.



Vladimir van Hoek faced off against Trevor Turco to build MOCs based on Merry. Vladimir van Hoek advanced to round 4. I cannot find Trevor's entry, but I don't think he defaulted.

MELO round 3 - Barad Dur bracket

In round 3 of the MELO, each pair had to build MOCs based on characters from the Fellowship of the Ring. Here are the four pairs from the Barad Dur bracket.

Captain Nemo faced off against Graeme Straughn to build creations based on Boromir. Captain Nemo advanced to round 4.



Finn Tegotash faced off against Tim W to build creations based on Sam. Tim W advanced to round 4.



Dunedain98 faced off against Dodge to build creations based on Legolas. Dunedain98 advanced to round 4.



Mark McPeek faced off against Graham Gidman to build creations based on Pippin. Graham Gidman advanced to round 4.

MELO Round 1 - The Last Goodbye

The Last Goodbye was another popular one, inspiring several MOCs.

Jacob Pennington showed Bilbo on his trip out of the Shire after his eleventy-first birthday party. He advanced.


Jared depicted Boromir's death. I'm surprised, but he just missed advancing to round 2.


Forlorn Empire advanced with Thorin's death scene from the movie.


As did John Smith.


Micah the Fire Breathing Hobbit did not go directly to a book or movie scene, but instead gave us an unnamed warrior and his fallen comrades after an orc-raid. He advanced.

MELO Round 1 - Edge of Night

The next song to inspire round 1 entries of MELO 2014-2015 was Edge of Night. This is a really interesting song, where context and melody really shape the tone. The original poem from Fellowship is all about going out for a walk before coming home to a nice warm fire. In the film, the lines about home and hearth have been removed, but still if you just read the lyrics, there is a lot of hope:

Home is behind, the world ahead
And there are many paths to tread
Through shadow to the edge of night
Until the stars are all alight
Mist and shadow cloud and shade
All shall fade, all shall fade

A straight-forward reading says that, yes, night is falling, but the stars are coming out, and night shall fade away come morning. But in the film this is sung with that haunting tune by Pippin while we see scenes of Faramir's forces being slaughtered, intercut with an uncaring Denethor, so the tone is completely different. Watching it on screen you get the feeling that everything is falling into darkness, and all that is good and noble in the world will fade away in the coming triumph of Sauron. It's that feeling of despair that drove most of the MELO entries. Here are a few of my favorites.

Mate Paton thought of the siege and near-fall of Minas Tirith and advanced to the next round.


Dominik the Builder also went to the RotK context, illustrating the charge of Faramir - a nice scene though it did not advance.


J-rod Smith went to a different context altogether, seeing Lake-town as being on the edge of disaster. His was the third-highest score of the round 1 entries and easily advanced.


Ian Diller left Tolkien's world altogether, simply keying off the song's tone of imminent disaster with his Last Stand in the Badlands. He advanced.


A few of the entries looked more at the lyrics, suggesting setting out from home on an adventure. Saequis still stuck to movie inspiration, showing Pippin singing to Denethor, but he illustrated the line "Home is behind, the world ahead", but he did not advance, so faded from the MELO.


Jake Andrews took this line as reason to justify Bilbo setting out on his adventure, illustrating different scenes from the Hobbit. He advanced.


Kevin Moyer did much the same with Frodo's journey. He also advanced.


Graham Gidman also advanced with an unnamed figure leaving home to set off on adventures.

Chibi Grond

The Brothers-Brick Chibi Contest has inspired lots of cutesy-fied scaled down vehicles, but I really had to laugh at Vitreolum's Grond.

Micro Middle Earth

Barton Thinks has done a whole series of Tolkien micros: Bag End, Helm's Deep and Minas Tirith.

Crossing at Osgiliath

Sergeant Chipmunk made this version of the Crossing at Osgiliath for the recent Mini Castle Contest.

Amon Hen

Finally in the Arte em Peças display we get Luis Baixinho's Amon Hen. I hope these builders go on to build scenes from the Two Towers and Return of the King.

Across the Anduin

Following along the Arte em Peças display, I've already noted Luis Baixinho's Bridge of Khazad-dûm and Mirror of Galadriel, so next we have Sam and Frodo by ?.

Arte em Peças

Participants in the Arte em Peças gathering last month put together a great Tolkien display.

Middle Earth

Sharon Vance displayed this amazing Middle Earth at BrickWorld.

Citadel of Minas Tirith

Members of the Czech group Kotsky.org are putting on a massive display that will be up for the next couple of months. If you are anywhere in central Europe you should try to check it out. There are a ton of amazing castles and other MOCs, but the reason for being on this blog is this huge Citadel of Minas Tirith.

Argonath

Someone (who?)John Gondol displayed this MOC of the Argonath at BrickFiesta.

The Argonath of Liberty

I didn't see this a couple of days ago, but for the Fourth of July, Automaton Pictures posted The Argonath of Liberty .

What may yet be - Return of the Kings set ideas

I'm not sure how I missed blogging these when he posted them last fall. We've already seen a couple of sets based on the Return of the King, with the Pirate Ship Ambush and Battle at the Black Gate sets (and arguably the Shelob Attacks set - the movies break at a slightly different point than the books), but we'll surely get at least another wave. There's so much more action around Minas Tirith to be covered, and we'll probably get some 'Cracks of Doom' set with Frodo and Gollum. Anyway, last fall John Lennon/Nuju Metru posted a series of Return of the King set ideas.

First up is the Paths of the Dead. This would include Aragorn, Legolas and Gimli, and the ghostly king. He includes action features to throw the king off his platform, and also to launch skulls at the three heroes.


Next is the Witch King Demise, with Eowyn and Merry battling the Witch King. I think this is a pretty obvious set, though I think when LEGO does it they will include the Fell Beast (I realize that Nuju Metru already built a Fell Beast in one of his other set ideas, which is probably why he didn't do it here).


Finally there is Minas Tirith itself, which Nuju Metru proposes as a huge set with lots of heroes and villains (btw, he's also put this up as a Cuusoo project). I don't know if LEGO would build the set this big (but who knows? the Orthanc set is huge, and the Star Wars theme has huge sets like the Death Star and Imperial Star Destroyer). I'd suspect that instead they would do a series of sets that could all go together to depict the battle outside the walls. I'd do four sets - one of the main gate and Grond, one of a section of wall (that connects to the gatehouse on either side, so you could buy multiples) along with a catapult or siege tower, an Oliphant set, and the Witch King vs Eowyn set with the Fell Beast. Orcs, Haradrim, Gondorian soldiers, mounted Rohirrim, and principle characters would be spread through these sets so you have to buy them all. Of course, it was always my idea that LEGO would do different sections of the Death Star as separate sets that hook together, but instead they did one huge set, so they may well go that way with Minas Tirith.