Random minifig of the day: pln004
Posted by Huwbot,
Today's random minifigure is pln004 Plain Red Torso with Red Arms, Red Legs, Red Hat, a Town figure that was first produced during 1981. It can be found in 2 sets.
Our members collectively own a total of 1,194 of them. If you'd like to buy one you should find it for sale at BrickLink, where new ones sell for around $10.20.
Image and minifig data courtesy of BrickLink.com
54 likes
22 comments on this article
Oh good. It's not the blue guy.
$10.20 for this?
"You've got red on you."
Huh. He had a beard the last time I saw him at Brickworld Chicago.
@Maxbricks14 said:
"$10.20 for this?"
It’s funny as each of its parts is available just for couple cents
Not very many new ones out there.
Ok, I like plain but this is just too much...
They put this cut-price bellhop looking guy in a race car?
"Red Four, standing by"
@Brickalili said:
"They put this cut-price bellhop looking guy in a race car? "
Look at the first comment on 1467's RSotD article for your answer. He put himself there to steal it.
So he’s in Basic Set 566 but, as far as I can tell, not on the box art or instructions manual cover. Who gets to decide that this combination of parts is the “official” minifigure for those sets?
@TheOtherMike said:
" @Brickalili said:
"They put this cut-price bellhop looking guy in a race car? "
Look at the first comment on 1467's RSotD article for your answer. He put himself there to steal it."
But he’s not wearing the Lego regulation striped shirt that all crooks have to wear! Egads what kind of villain is he!
@cm5878 said:
"So he’s in Basic Set 566 but, as far as I can tell, not on the box art or instructions manual cover. Who gets to decide that this combination of parts is the “official” minifigure for those sets? "
Hey, that *is* weird! I mean, the instruction pictures depict a few different arrangements of the included minifigure parts, but still, You'd think Bricklink would have used one of those when deciding what minifigures were in this set.
Looking good there, M. Bison.
He looks like an extra/guard from the movie/short "Rainbow War": https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0089878/
Either that, or something happened at the ketchup factory.:)
Better dead than red.
@cm5878 said:
"So he’s in Basic Set 566 but, as far as I can tell, not on the box art or instructions manual cover. Who gets to decide that this combination of parts is the “official” minifigure for those sets? "
Isn't he in the helicopter in 566?
I love seeing these kind of figures. They remind me of when my friends and I first got into Lego, and finding guy like this in my friend's older hand me down Lego.
The PLN catalogue number prefix is my favorite part of this.
@kdu2814 said:
" @cm5878 said:
"So he’s in Basic Set 566 but, as far as I can tell, not on the box art or instructions manual cover. Who gets to decide that this combination of parts is the “official” minifigure for those sets? "
Isn't he in the helicopter in 566?
I love seeing these kind of figures. They remind me of when my friends and I first got into Lego, and finding guy like this in my friend's older hand me down Lego."
I think that’s the females hair in the heli, doesn’t really matter though they’re still cool in a bland early 1980s way. See also many of the grey era passenger trains.
@TheOtherMike said:
" @cm5878 said:
"So he’s in Basic Set 566 but, as far as I can tell, not on the box art or instructions manual cover. Who gets to decide that this combination of parts is the “official” minifigure for those sets? "
Hey, that *is* weird! I mean, the instruction pictures depict a few different arrangements of the included minifigure parts, but still, You'd think Bricklink would have used one of those when deciding what minifigures were in this set."
There's a distinct hierarchy of sources. The first source is always the first instance of the minifig shown in the instructions, which is how we got https://brickset.com/minifigs/sh0939 from 76281, but the exact same minifig ended up as https://brickset.com/minifigs/sh0989 from 76294. The mansion instructions show you assembling him with the hair first, and then swapping it for the cowl. Other sources include the box art, the instructions art, how the minifig was displayed in the demo tray, and, you know, whatever sources they had to come up with just to figure out how _one_ minifig could be catalogued. I don't know what the full hierarchy is, but if they show multiple combinations in the instructions, it's only the first grouping that they'll go by.
@PurpleDave said:
" @TheOtherMike said:
" @cm5878 said:
"So he’s in Basic Set 566 but, as far as I can tell, not on the box art or instructions manual cover. Who gets to decide that this combination of parts is the “official” minifigure for those sets? "
Hey, that *is* weird! I mean, the instruction pictures depict a few different arrangements of the included minifigure parts, but still, You'd think Bricklink would have used one of those when deciding what minifigures were in this set."
There's a distinct hierarchy of sources. The first source is always the first instance of the minifig shown in the instructions, which is how we got https://brickset.com/minifigs/sh0939 from 76281, but the exact same minifig ended up as https://brickset.com/minifigs/sh0989 from 76294. The mansion instructions show you assembling him with the hair first, and then swapping it for the cowl. Other sources include the box art, the instructions art, how the minifig was displayed in the demo tray, and, you know, whatever sources they had to come up with just to figure out how _one_ minifig could be catalogued. I don't know what the full hierarchy is, but if they show multiple combinations in the instructions, it's only the first grouping that they'll go by."
The instructions only show one (1) minifig being assembled, and that uses blue legs, red torso, and the female hair. There's only one red torso in the set, so you the only minifig you can build after you've built that (assuming, of course, that you're limiting yourself to the pieces in this set) would use red legs, a black torso, and the red cap. Which does absolutely nothing to answer the question of where they got Bricklink got the minifigs they did.
@TheOtherMike:
Okay, yeah, that makes no sense. If any minifig appears in the instructions, it should have been inventoried to that set. And any parts it uses should be unavailable for other inventoried minifigs. There is one other issue that may factor in here, which is that this minifig is from 1981, and Bricklink wasn't founded until quite a bit later. Early set inventories wouldn't have had the same level of scrutiny as modern ones, and the hierarchy I mentioned may not have been in place from the very start. As I said, some of it was added on the fly, when one set or another didn't fit any of the existing rules, so they had to come up with a new rule to govern the addition of those minifigs. For a set like this, once the minifigs get established, they are likely to stay assigned that way until such time as someone raises the issue and convinces the catmins that the minifigs are incorrect. At that point, if the minifig exists in any other set, they'd simply disconnect it from that set inventory. If it's exclusive to that set, then they'd have to lock down the catalog listing and prevent new lots from being added, but the listing itself wouldn't go away until the last lot is either sold or removed from inventory.