Random set of the day: Ogel Mutant Killer Whale
Posted by Huwbot,
Today's random set is 4797 Ogel Mutant Killer Whale, released during 2002. It's one of 17 Alpha Team sets produced that year. It contains 57 pieces and 1 minifig, and its retail price was US$10/£7.99.
It's owned by 1,499 Brickset members. If you want to add it to your collection you might find it for sale at BrickLink or eBay.
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Fun fact:
"Ogel" is "Lego" spelled backwards!
Slap "Mutant" on anything and you can call it whatever animal you want. There's essence of whale, but I'm not sure if they mean the Orca, or that because it's a mutant, it's now a Whale that Kills. If it's the latter, that seems a little edgy for a LEGO set name, but there's not much Orca in it either than being black. Needs some representative markings to suggest more Orca.
Now for some Alpha Team lore:
Alpha Team were the good guys. Ogel and his henchmen were bad.
Hey, I have this one!
It... is not a good set. The dinosaur frame this was based on was quite flimsy, the whole thing has about as many pieces as your average LEGO go-kart (despite being substantially larger), and for the size of a set, a single skeleton drone--i.e. no named characters--is not much fig.
It still slides into the nostalgia zone, but it is very much a set of its time and not something transcendent.
There's a reason my dark age and Lego's dark age have a significant overlap.
Exchange that red for white, and this set would be improved greatly.
I wish Ogel would come back in some way. He is THE Lego Villain.
On topic of the set, it's hard to see the left arm at first, giving the impression the whale has one arm. That look kind of works given it is mutant, and Ogel lost his hand too.
I absolutely loved these sets, I can't even pretend otherwise.
The Alpha Team submarines were terrible. They were designed like aircraft, and were about as water-tight as fly-screen. I'm not a nautical engineer, but I'm fairly certain that's a bad thing, in a submarine.
But the range of Ogel's mutant animals? I loved them. LOVED them. They were very mid 00s, so I get it, but I thought they were so cool and interesting. I liked the range of dinosaurs, and using those pieces for these gigantic mutant creatures was a great idea, for me. I just thought the killer whale, here, was cool as hell. But both the whale and the mutant squid were day-one purchases, for me.
As far as I can remember, the third set (the stingray) was a Toys R Us exclusive (because I never saw it, anywhere else), but I picked that up as soon as I saw it, too.
@Zordboy:
When putting a screen door on a submarine, it’s important to make sure it hinges outward. That way the water pressure will hold the door shut against the jamb, and no critters will get in.
I have OGEL's modified command center from his subtheme on my shelf. I still need to build him either an evil version of the Beatles Yellow Submarine (in black and red, with a drill at the front) or a legless (and black) version of the Shark mech from The Lego Ninjago Movie.
That minifigure was my "bad guy" character growing up. I even did the whole "Chancellor to Emperor Palpatine" twist, where he posed as a good guy. Fun times.
My Alpha Team lore is rusty but if I remember right this year Ogel used the same mind control orbs/technology he used to create his Skeleton Drones to turn a bunch of sea creatures into evil cyborgs. Here we've got a whale with robot arms on his chest and propellers on his hips. Wild.
1999 to 2019 was my LEGO dark age (high-school age, college age, drinking age, dating age, grad school age, first-second-third job age, travel-the-world age, ...) so I totally missed this line-up. Had no idea that it existed until a minute ago. Learn something new, every day, here at Brickset!
@Zordboy said:
"I absolutely loved these sets, I can't even pretend otherwise.
The Alpha Team submarines were terrible. They were designed like aircraft, and were about as water-tight as fly-screen. I'm not a nautical engineer, but I'm fairly certain that's a bad thing, in a submarine.
But the range of Ogel's mutant animals? I loved them. LOVED them. They were very mid 00s, so I get it, but I thought they were so cool and interesting. I liked the range of dinosaurs, and using those pieces for these gigantic mutant creatures was a great idea, for me. I just thought the killer whale, here, was cool as hell. But both the whale and the mutant squid were day-one purchases, for me.
As far as I can remember, the third set (the stingray) was a Toys R Us exclusive (because I never saw it, anywhere else), but I picked that up as soon as I saw it, too. "
Come to think of it, the 2007 BIONICLE playsets have a similar aesthetic to Ogel's minions in this wave. The LEGO Atlantis sea life sometimes had similar color schemes. You could create a wild undersea set up if you slapped a bunch of those sets on a shelf together!
Dinner fact Lego is Ogel spelled backwards.
Sighed: not Ogel
Ogel: "Sharks? With 'Lasers'?!?...HOLD MY MAGMA!!!":D
Little before my 'return'/coming back from my 'Dark Age', but stuff like this reeeeeally helped things like "Agents", "Ultra Agents", and I'd even argue "Ninjago" and aaaaaall its iterations...kinda' humbling:)
LOVED the Dinosaur sets that some of the parts from this set come from.
I wish they’d return, but I’m guessing the Jurassic licence prevents them from releasing generic dinosaurs now.
My brother mixed and matched the parts of this with 6721 and our parts collection to create quite the monstrosity even more than what is seen here.
Man, while LEGO is a kids toy, their designers really do come up with some twisted stuff....
For if anyone is wondering why it doesn't have white markings... all of ogels mutant sea creatures are entirely black with tr neon yellow eyes. There's octopi, this creature, a giant squid, a giant manta ray and even a regular sized sawtooth shark.
The sets came with comics in the instructions. The machinery on them was added by Ogel's undewater base, which is a factory capable of augmenting creatures and deploying Ogel orbs.
The orbs this season were the 2.0 version btw. They can now turn both humans into skeleton drones (this minifig) or animals into evil mutants. They now feature the evil skull design instead of the classic skull. And the tr neon orange stud is gone.
@MCLegoboy said:
"Slap "Mutant" on anything and you can call it whatever animal you want. There's essence of whale, but I'm not sure if they mean the Orca, or that because it's a mutant, it's now a Whale that Kills. If it's the latter, that seems a little edgy for a LEGO set name, but there's not much Orca in it either than being black. Needs some representative markings to suggest more Orca."
The little comics that come in the instructions show the Ogel orbs being used on what appear to be humpback whales to turn them into this; so it’s not an orca, just a whale that has been made a killer
A transyellow spear? I never knew those existed, very cool!
So, it is not a whale that kills oleg mutants.
@Norikins said: "I wish Ogel would come back in some way. He is THE Lego Villain."
The greatest thing about Ogel, and the thing that made the character (and his mutant cyborg sea-life pets) so appealing to me, back in the day, was that Ogel was one of the first specific Lego super-villains.
Lego went there with the Adventurers line (which was great, in terms of villains and monsters), and also dipped their toes into the idea with various Castle themes in the early 00s (I remember Cedric the Bull Knight, and of course, Vladek the scorpion knight) ... and as much as I hope we see those characters again, at some point (because Lego can still use them, any time it wants), Ogel was one of the first stand-out specific bad guys.
And I think that's why I enjoyed this line so much, despite the obvious 00s-era failings of the sets. I'd always wanted actual Lego super-villains for my Lego heroes to fight, but until this era, I'd just been using random pirates, castle and space minifigs (and I'd build monsters and robots for them to attack my Lego city with). Ogel (who, in this second season, had a hook for a hand, like the Aquasharks of old, which added to the coolness factor) had an army of giant cybernetic creatures to attack with. And I really liked that.
So is it a mutated killer whale or is it a whale to kill mutants? I presume it's the first one, but how would you properly name a set with the latter?
Some great re-use of parts in this, like insectoid helm, a red dragon/croc jaw, a spear in trans-neon green , a Bionicle claw.
And also the introduction of the Turbine piece that year : https://brickset.com/parts/design-41531
@Darth_TNT said:
"A transyellow spear? I never knew those existed, very cool!"
It's trans. neon green. They were in this subtheme and in one KKII set, the Citadel of Orlan
@Brickalili:
Next thing you know, they’re going to start smoking cigarettes.
@jkb said:
"So is it a mutated killer whale or is it a whale to kill mutants? I presume it's the first one, but how would you properly name a set with the latter?"
Sentinel Whale