Weekly Set Review: Black Monarch's Ghost

[Horak the Great]

Thanks for clarifying that.

[jokkna]

this is great set it should be an must own for everyone even the silly people who don't like lego

it is one of the best sets ever 9.3/10

[Spongey]

Excellent small set. This is really what LEGO was all about in the Golden Era: small, inexpensive builder sets.

[Patron of the lego]

A simple minitower like design, that held 2 small doors that are to me rare. PLus the armored knight. 9/10
I am leniet to all lego sets gooday to all

[ericgizmo]

nice little set

[Ser Loktar]

Man what a great set. I got 2 back in the day and another off Ebay more recently and this is a must have for anyone with castle projects. The doors, while not super rare, are very useful and you can always use more while the wall corners help to make that black castle everyone's got even bigger. I don't even need to mention the kick butt knight as old dgrey breastplate and visor enrich anyone's collection.
C'mon Lego, bring back legends and start right here,
Ser Loktar

[Donut]

This was a good set indeed, cheap and efficient way to get a suited up knight. TLC has not had something like this for a long time until now.

[MarioDAlessio]

I was not collecting Lego Castle sets when this was released; I have never considered purchasing this set from the second hand market.

The set has the admirable quality of being both a standalone hideaway ghost set or it can be incorporated into other standard castle wall sets such as other earlier LEGOLAND Castle sets like 6040 Blacksmith Shop and 6041 Armor Shop.

http://www.classic-castle.com/sets/archives/6040.html
http://www.classic-castle.com/sets/archives/6041.html

Simply my bias to this set is I feel it contains too many simply and generic castle parts and lacks any unique desirability from a collectors perspective or as a possible army builder set. The mounted Dragon Knight has desirable amour and helmet but dates from the generic grinning minifig head period;

http://www.peeron.com/inv/parts/3626ap01

If you were to wait two years the more desirable set 6009 Black Knight at halve the price and piece count and with unique Dragon Knight minifig head appeared (I have eight of this set);

http://www.peeron.com/inv/parts/3626bpx120
http://www.classic-castle.com/sets/archives/6009.html

I feel the set is not desirable either complete as a village/town component as the earlier 6040 & 6041 sets or as an army builder set like 6009. When you compare what else was on offer in 1990 the set is a poorer cousin, I may not have even have considered purchasing it then;

http://www.classic-castle.com/sets/oop1990.html

Mario

[Chrislad77]

I got this for 8 dollers(includes shipping) from ebay two weeks ago. I thought it was a nice set. The Knight, horse, doors, even the two black wall corner pieces are useful. It's a nice little set. I see on CC that it retailed for 7.25? That seems high to me. Given that price the current Final Joust 7009 is a better value, 2 knights, extra weapons, and barding. I guess at the time you were paying for the sought after ghost.

[The Blue Knight]

Ah, the glory days! Though this was near the end, however, it was (and is) a set that belongs with the great Golden Age sets. These weekly reviews used to end with some variation of; "why can't they build them like that anymore? Looks like someone was reading them!

[albero78]

It was a good set.
Imagine that when i was a child i desperatly wanted a ghost and i wrote to LEGO a letter (i'm italian) like:
"dear LEGO, i am a 12 years old child (i lied on my age, i was 14 or something) and I bought the lego set number .... (the one which are we speaking about in this post). I opened it and i found out that the ghost was defected.
I'm very sad because i wanted that ghost and since i am a loyal customer and lego lover, would you be so kind to send me a new ghost?
This is my address: blabblala..."

You cannot believe me but LEGO send me in an envelope a new ghost!
And then I received that LEGO set in the real life! And now I have 2 ghosts!

About the set, I think it is great: my first helm that can be opened!

[LORD DOOM]

This was my first castley set.

AND THE FIRST TOY, I had ever paid for myself.

My neighbor paid me 1 cent a piece to pick Dandelions from his yard and I did all day long so I could buy this set, because I'd seen it at the ShopKo the day before.

I was 5 years old.

Not only is this a great, GREAT set, but it has a lot of sentimental value to me. I remember my Black Knight used to fend off my M-Tron and my speedboat racer because my mom made me throw away the ghost because she thought it would give me nightmares, and that little "shack" the ghost lives in, well when I was 5. That WAS a castle. To me anyway.

Ahh...to be 5.
The Black Monarch's ghost is a perfect 10 out of 10 to me. For it's price, at it's time it was everything it possibly could have been, I'll likely try to track an MISB copy of it one of these days just to have on my desk.

Just before I noticed this as a set reveiw, I created a MOC in honor of this set, here's a link, http://www.classic-castle.com/forum/vie ... hp?t=10903

Hope nobody minds that I promoted my MOC here.

MUCH LOVE FOR THE BLACK MONARCH'S GHOST!

[Donut]

My neighbor paid me 1 cent a piece to pick Dandelions from his yard and I did all day long so I could buy this set, because I'd seen it at the ShopKo the day before.

Thats a lot of Dandelions . Good to hear that from you because this reminds me of a similar situation in which my parents paid me 5 cents for everytime I brought an A from school (3rd grade). After a month, I still didn't have enough to buy a small set but at the end they chipped in a lot to help me get one of those bat lord sets. They just wanted to teach how hard it was to earn money.

[Athos]

I can't believe I haven't commented on this set yet. I was so excited when I first saw it. I remember calling several stores looking for it when it first came out, as, at that time, I lived about an hour drive from any store that carried a decent selection of Lego.

I agree the little shed thing isn't the greatest. It would make a nice weapons locker if it were taller and fit with the other black wall pieces. Standing alone, it looks a bit like the haunted outhouse...

Great to have a ghost and fully armored knight, plus an arch with doors. Not much more you can ask for.

Steve

[LORD DOOM]

Standing alone, it looks a bit like the haunted outhouse...
Steve

LOL

I realize this post is pointless, but I found this comment extremely entertaining considering I just mentioned how when I was a kid the little one room closet WAS my castle.

Maybe the toilet bowl was the Black Monarch's throne and the plunger was his scepter.

So who were his subjects? The poops?