Itsy Bitsy Armed Spider: A LEGO Think Tank for Marchikoma

Best of BrickNerd - Article originally published May 11, 2022.

What is shiny, red, fast and dangerous? Well, it’s a Fuchikoma! This one made by Ids looks as menacing as it should be. It has a very clean look to it, with smooth curves, neat angles and nice usage of pieces like the “shield” and plenty of appealing greebling. That said, let’s have a closer look at the model together with Ids himself!

Marco: You’ve mentioned having built this MOC for Marchikoma. Could you explain with this means and how you got inspired to build it?

Ids: Last year after Febrovery, a theme month to build a Space Rover, I saw Marchikoma on Flickr.

Here the goal is to make a small robot, that looks a bit like a spider. It needs to have at least four legs, two arms and a double-segmented body. The rules in the Flickr group describe it as follows:

Your Think Tank does not need to include weapons of any kind, so with that said use your creativity in regards to this one.

For your MOC to embody the iconic look of a Think Tank, it must adhere to this particular rule. Think arachnids, they all have a double-segmented body (head and abdomen), but the shape and size of these two segments vary between species.

Pretty straightforward, you must have at least four legs on your think tank. This means you can have 4, 6, 8, etc... but not 3, 2, 1, or none. Your legs can have feet, wheels, flotation devices, jet packs, treads, spikes, etc... on them, use your imagination.

You must include at least two manipulator arms (or guns). You may have more than 2 if you so choose.

I was already familiar with Ghost in the Shell, which it was based on, so it seemed fun to build for it (again)!

Marco: The Fuchikoma is an icon from the Ghost in the Shell series, and it’s always fun to see a different approach from builders. Can you tell me something about the process, how did you start, and which references did you use?

Ids: Since I already owned the Manga, which I bought second-hand, I didn’t have to look for pictures on the internet. I started building the sensors for the camera/eyes. After that, I started working to make the head. Which is quite difficult, it’s a sphere shape and adding stuff to that can be challenging. I took some parts and inspirations from the model I build the previous year to make the body and legs.

When that part was finished, I went on building the backside of the body. While I was working with some parts, it came to mind to use some old castle parts in red. After using these parts, the idea came to make it so a minifig would still fit inside. When that was done, I used some more inspiration from the previous model in combination with the new 4x4 dish.

After that, there were some finishing touches and it was a challenge to make to model stand on its legs because most of the weight was located at the back, even more with a minifig inside.

Marco: What do you like most about the MOC—the complete model or some parts in particular?

Ids: The scale might not be completely correct and some parts might be a bit out of proportion, but I like that eventually I got all the key elements in there. This resulted in a model which I think looks really good. I also like that I succeeded to leave some space to fit a minifig in there!

Marco: To make the model even more awesome you also gave the Section 9 members a makeover. How did you find the right combinations—do you look on BrickLink for the right torsos or do you use your own collection?

Ids: I do always look on BrickLink for nice minifigs and accessories/parts, but that doesn’t mean I already know what I’m going to do with it.

Like with these minifigures, I made them with parts I already had. It was just a case of looking in my different bins of what kind of stuff I had laying around that would fit the characters. Some were easy, some were difficult. Batou for example, finding a fitting head was a challenge. For that one I had to look on Bricklink, but eventually, I couldn’t find one that was completely to my liking so I just choose one from my collection that was close enough.

 Marco: Thank you for your time! I’m looking forward to seeing more fun stuff made by you!

Inspired to make your own Think Thank, smaller, bigger, or other stuff from the awesome Ghost in the Shell universe? Let us know in the comments below!

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