Little Coloured Bricks

Look at the cowboy movies from the 60’s up to the 80’s. What do you see? Here’s a hint: you might see the same guy appearing in almost every one of them and that cowboy is none other than Clint Eastwood, the meanest gun-toting, boot-slinging native westerner who has ever walked the land of the rich and the famous but that’s not all he is. He’s an actor, producer, composer and director – and for a certain time, a balladeer bitten by the country blues, too.

Photo Courtesy of Solid Steperoth

Clint Eastwood is the man behind the lovable matinee idol cowboy; in fact, he put the “man” in “going commando”. It is therefore not at all surprising that many have idolized his notoriety, and that even more try to capture his utter look of machismo with the cowboy getup. Now what is surprising is the fact that LEGO minifig fans have been making a custom replica of him using Jedi parts and rogue adventurers. Is it that Clint Eastwood doesn’t deserve his own LEGO minifigure for no apparent reason, or that he’s just too much of a man that it’s necessary to join two other male minifig parts, Luke Skywalker’s torso with Indiana Jones’ legs, just to make a toy macho enough to represent him? Because aside from his bad-ass looks, Clint Eastwood has kick-ass talents that have made many a grown man  shamelessly and very openly weep with envy. He’s received countless awards throughout his career that spans across six decades, he’s made himself a living icon of male potency, and he achieved setting an unforgettable fashion trend that just won’t quit – so why doesn’t he have his very own LEGO minifig?

LEGO minifigs have been all the rage since 1978, but more so in 2003, when skin color was added to the fray, and the LEGO universe opened a new dimension: race. And it’s not just African-American and Caucasian…even green skinned Martian men could exist now, too. Space pirates and wizards were also birthed soon after, but sadly, there still wasn’t an authentic cowboy with proper boot in sight, much more an Eastwood minifig. In fact, as previously mentioned, the closest thing that LEGO had to his minifig was an Indian Jones-Luke Skywalker crossover.

But to be fair to LEGO, a lot of famous people have a minifig only because it’s easy for LEGO fans to customize their minifig counterparts – but it’s never easy to make a Clint Eastwood anything. Add the fact that it’s probably time-consuming, costly and difficult to mass-produce boots for these LEGO minifigs, and you’ve got a pretty decent grasp on why there’s no Eastwood minifig.

And on second thought, maybe not having a Clint Eastwood minifig is a good idea. After all, a playroom might not look so playful when you know that an Eastwood minifig is lurking somewhere within the shadows of the room, waiting in a dark corner, watching your every move… Like the words of the man himself, “be careful with what you wish for, punk.”