Lego Build 57 — Shadow Hawk

Few designs are as much of classic for the Real Robot sci-fi genre as the Dougram, from the eponymous anime show. When the design was “borrowed” by FASA Interactive for their incoming wargame, BattleTech, they used it for the Shadow Hawk battlemech, which immediately became iconic.

I already wrote at length about the origins of the original Battlemech designs for BattleTech in prior entries, so I’ll point you there for further details. But, in short, FASA got the rights for the mechanical designs of several anime shows, which brought them in conflict with Harmony Gold, the company that exported Macross as RoboTech. The resulting legal feud led to the elimination of the original designs from further products until these were remade by popular demand. But the Project Phoenix designs never really took off. More recently, the legal issues were purportedly resolved and new redesigns were issued, more in line with the originals.

The Shadow Hawk as it appeared initially wasn’t the most powerful machine, not even on its weight class, being conceived as a heavy scout. However, it was written as the ride of very popular characters in the original fiction, becoming a beloved machine as a result. An example that marked me especially, we Grayson Death Carlyle, one of the first protagonists of the franchise and a character that still influences my fiction writing.

Designed less than a hundred years after the advent of the BattleMech, the Shadow Hawk is a venerable, persistent design, which endured the passage of time. With the technological renaissance of the Clan Invasion, it would be adapted to many different roles, guaranteeing its survival in the new era.

The model I present you today has its colors based on the original machine, the Dougram from the anime Fang of the Sun Dougram. I thought it would be fair to do so. It takes 64 parts and I’d say it is moderately difficult to build.