Shrunk Slave 1 – LEGO Star Wars, Boba Fett’s Starship (75312)

In this consumerist world we live in I’m usually not bending over backwards to catch special promotions on those “special” days made up by the industry trying to sell you stuff, but then again I enjoy getting a good discount as much as the next guy and not just because of my budget constraints. The very least one can do is keep an eye peeled and hope to make a good catch. I got sort of half-lucky with Boba Fett’s Starship (75312) on this year’s May the 4th event, so let’s see how things turned out.

Pricing and Contents

I’ve had this set on my wishlist for a while, but regrettably it never entered a price range that I found acceptable. After all, I’m not a die-hard Star Wars fan who would pay anything and it really comes down to how much I like a certain vehicle from the show and how affordable it is.

The crux of course is that of course Boba Fett’s Spaceship or Slave 1 as it was known in the good old days (and I’ll keep calling it that because I honestly think it’s kinda stupid that they are trying to be overly correct here and avoiding the word slave entirely even if it doesn’t bear any relationship to current day politics) has always been a popular ship due to its unique and distinct appearance. Because it basically sold itself and everybody wanted it, anyway, retailers could ask for relatively high prices. That and of course the The Mandalorian and The Book of Boba Fett series have boosted that demand even further. In fact this really thwarted my plans to purchase the 20th Anniversary Edition Slave 1 (75243) because it was equally coveted by fans the world all over and prices never dropped to a level I would consider sensible (me missing out on a few special promotions I just didn’t catch notwithstanding). Arguably a case of bad timing, even if just coincidental.

With all that in mind I was actually glad I was able to obtain this package for 35 Euro down from a recommended price of 50 Euro. As mentioned already I consider myself only half-lucky because there was a slightly better price that day at only 32 Euro. I was just going back and forth way too long and my inner struggle prevented me from clicking that button. Come back an hour later and the price was higher again already. You really can’t flinch with Amazon‘s fluctuating prices and them adapting to competitor’s pricing almost in realtime.

Was it worth it? The answer may not surprise you: While I’m okay with those 35 Euro, I still feel the set is seriously overpriced. The model turns out tiny and one really has a hard time believing it actually uses the 593 pieces as advertised. From the exterior it feels more like there are only 250 elements, with the real point once again being that many other parts used are 1 x 1 and 1 x 2 items hidden underneath what’s actually visible. Not just that, but also many of the bits constituting the surface and the underside structure are equally small. With only a few exceptions you barely build any volume and just don’t get this satisfaction of working on what should be a relatively bulky model and making notable progress with each building step.

That being said, I can’t help but feel that this is a 30 Euro model, after all, even if you perhaps had to throw on a 5 Euro premium because it’s licensed Star Wars. The original 50 Euro are simply beyond any reason and LEGO just exploit the fans’ hunger for these products. If worse came to worse I’d really not have bothered and simply foregone buying it at all. It’s just not worth it.

The Minifigures

With the vessel being more or less exclusively inhabited by a single occupant it’s only natural that there wouldn’t be too many minifigures bar the occasional person hitching a ride when an opportunity presents itself. That is of course not counting the poor people travelling as frozen Carbonite blocks below decks. Not having seen the series due to not having a Disney+ subscription I have no idea if and when Boba Fett and Din Djarin (The Mandalorian) cross paths, I only know that it happens eventually.

The Mando figure is just the standard version with the cape you find in several other sets. Boba was an exclusive new version for this set when it came out last year but has since made a second appearance in Boba Fett’s Throne Room (75326). It’s considerably different from older versions not just because it uses a black torso as the base, but being ignorant of the actual story I can’t tell you much about the specific whys and hows. That said, both figures are overall pretty nice with lavish prints and certainly have some collector value as well.

The Model

The actual model is based on the simpler design of the Slave 1 from the ill-fated and ill-conceived Betrayal at Cloud City (75222) in the now deceased Master Builder Series. Back then I found the whole concept of a play-oriented yet expensive set in the vein of a dumbed-down and simplified UCS series more than a bit perplexing (or more to the point just another of those LEGO brain farts where you wonder what they were smoking when approving this), but the way this vehicle was built struck me as efficient and desirable as a separate affordable set. Of course things often take a while and I’d almost given up hope of ever seeing this come to fruition, but alas here we are. even better, they really took the time to refine and enhance the concept, including using a few newer and different parts. That way they also made sure that the one in the Cloud City retains its exclusivity and people who bought this expensive mess aren’t too upset.

An iconic shape such as this is of course immediately recognizable in any form and that is pretty much the case here as well. However, and this seems to be a general rule with this ship, the smaller the scale the less compact it looks. Where the original version in the movies was pretty smooth and the various surfaces blended, the smaller models tend to look more separated, not just because of the limitations of brick-built designs. This is also apparent here with the “handle” (upper hull) feeling plugged on to the bottom rather than transitioning elegantly. In particular the front section and the housings for the wing mechanisms feel a bit too small and not voluminous enough. It’s not the end of the world, but worth mentioning.

The tail/ aft boom overall appears just a bit too short and could have benefited from being extended one or two rows of studs. It’s not that the proportions aren’t correct or LEGO somehow got it wrong, it’s more a visual thing where the “scale effect” makes it look a bit too stubby. This is also owing to the overall small size that makes it look more like a toy than the imposing ship it otherwise is. Let’s not forget, that it just has around 24 studs overall length, not even fully covering a 32 x 32 base plate.

There are a handful of functional details like the cargo ramp under which you could actually place the “Carbonite” block as represented by a 1 x 2 x 6 brick and of course you can open the cockpit to place Boba inside, but neither does offer much details beyond that. The wings use a similar approach as their counterparts on the larger variants of this spacecraft, meaning they’re built from a bunch of balanced out round corner plates and wedge plates attached to a Technic axle so they swivel automatically and stay horizontal in every position. To represent the slightly rusty mechanism LEGO even produced this piece in Dark Orange exclusively for this set.

The singular side build in this set is a little push tractor/ servicing vehicle with a ladder and it also doubles as a stand to present the model in a upright position. I was hugely skeptical about this solution, mostly because the tractor is very lightweight but much to my surprise this works quite decently. Of course you still should not try to intentionally tip over the model, but it’s more than serviceable for presentation on the shelf and easy to handle for kids as well. It does not use any pins or such and rather just some simple slide-in trickery so you basically can’t do anything wrong. Also note the „Carbonite“ block – without stickers, of course.

The upright position looks a bit odd, mostly because it exposes the hollowness of the interior unfavorably. In this position also even the slightest misalignment of the guns, which are rather flimsily constructed from black light saber hilts and some other pieces, immediately becomes noticeable. You should be careful with them, anyway, as they use a less than ideal way of being attached. Instead of a proper axle or bar they’re plugged onto this “hook” style plate‘s bar element. While it kind of works it’s one of those things that I would try to avoid and look for other solutions.

The undersides have some nice texture and even some pieces to emulate thruster outlets, but once you look at it, you also see the most annoying problem of this whole set: The various small plates and how everything is pieced together. This isn’t so much of an issue once it’s finished, but it really tries your patience during assembly. There’s basically only a single layer of plates and the bricks for the shaping are almost immediately on top, however often in such a fashion that they often only connect by two or even single studs. I found this a massive source of frustration that only gets better once you have finished the red socket.

One final thing: The set is apparently (also) aimed at children and to that effect it has a handle based on an L-shaped Technic liftarm so the model can be swooshed around and held easily without risking breaking anything off when grabbing it elsewhere. The caveat here is that the handle tends to get stuck in the recess on occasion and is difficult to push out even when tipping on the opposite end as intended. You may want to have an eye on that and show your children how to do it right or else they may constantly bug you about it. If you are not interested in this functionality you could just leave it out and shim over the hole, but this would require some major changes (using larger/ different plates to close the gaps) early on in the construction process.

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Concluding Thoughts

The model isn’t bad by any means and in an odd way quite appealing. It hits the right balance between looking realistic enough, but also being playable. Still, the out-of-this-world pricing is really what puts me off. LEGO seem bent on deterring a certain part of their customers while raking in the big bucks from the other half of the Star Wars fan crowd with UCS sets and all that and that is on some level sad. Sets like this one clearly prove that the designers have the will and abilities to produce more than acceptable models, it just always seems they’re being sidelined by overriding managerial decisions in favor of squeezing out every last penny from customers.

This dichotomy also makes it hard to really recommend this set from the bottom of my heart. As already written, if there wouldn’t have been a good price I’d just passed on this. You can bet that due to the popularity there will be another Slave 1 in the not too distant future and it might even be an updated re-issue of the UCS version from 2015 or at least something more in line with the 20th anniversary version which will be more attractive to serious collectors and adults. You can save your money for the day when they come out. Completists on the other hand will no doubt want to add this to their line-up no matter what and it should also work well for children.

For me as so often it likely will end up being a short journey where soon enough I’ll dismantle the model and scalp the parts, of which it has quite a few unique ones and that’s just fine. At the same time I can think of other ways to spend those 35 Euro and unfortunate as it is, this set also has not done anything to change my mind about LEGO Star Wars being one big scam, so this will likely be my only such review for quite a while again until the next good opportunity may arise come Amazon‘s Prime Day in November…

Hothian Winter – LEGO Star Wars Magazine, January 2022

Wouldn’t you believe it? We actually had a bit of snow on Christmas this year! Really only a thin layer, but better than nothing. That makes it kind of fitting that the January 2022 issue of the LEGO Star Wars magazine takes us back to Hoth and its snow and ice covered regions.

The first comic starts out on the opposite side of the temperature spectrum, though, taking us to the jungle planet of Quatal after Luke crashes there. Naturally, as he tries to escape and get off the planet, the usual running away from imperial pursuers and dangerous animals ensues. The blue monster seen in the image is a bit funny and really looks to me like the artist had a bit of fun  exploring what a mutated Stitch (from the Lilo & Stitch movies, of course) might look like. The similarities are really striking and I can’t un-see them.

The second comic references the extra and is based around a group of Snowtroopers getting lost in the endless white void during the Battle of Hoth.

The posters are a bit of a misfire, unfortunately. The one depicted here with Darth Vader is simply too dark and the overly bright type and light saber completely distract from Vader himself. This clearly would have needed some work to enhance the contrast and balance out the overall appearance. The second with Han Solo and Chewbacca in the cockpit of the Millenium Falcon suffers from being doctored, i.e. the cockpit frame being just a 2D background artwork created after the fact instead of being integrally rendered in 3D with the figures.

The extra has been causing a bit of a stir and gotten a few people very tizzy due to it being being a female Snowtrooper/ Snowtrooperess minifigure. Not only is the latter an interesting tidbit, with all previous such characters having had the male generic “angry clone” face (or unprinted black heads), but also the fact that this lady otherwise could only be found in the huge UCS AT-AT (75313) only released in November. Considering that this big model has a full 40 seats and only a few of them are covered with minifigures, clearly there is a market to buy more – a lot more. People lucky enough to be able to afford this certainly should make it a point to buy this magazine once at least.

The value of this issue for adults hugely depends on how much you are after the minifigure, but on the bright side at least the comics are pretty decent and can give a bit of enjoyment. the rest isn’t really worth mentioning with a lot of bad Photoshop work hurting my eyes and the activities and puzzles being bland. I would predict, however, that the minifigure alone will be attractive to anyone owning an AT-AT model, big or small, and thus sell stacks and stacks of this issue…

Probing the Snow? – LEGO Star Wars, Imperial Probe Droid (75306)

I had hoped that this little beauty would arrive a bit earlier so I could have written my article on it last week instead of the one I actually did, but alas it wasn’t meant to be. The package got stuck in the warehouse and due to an unfortunate combination of circumstances suffered further delays when it was supposed to be delivered. So only now can I tell you about he LEGO Star Wars Imperial Probe Droid (75306).

Pricing and Contents

The set is part of LEGO‘s new line of collectible items. People have attributed it to fit in the various helmets/ masks/ cowls series found in Star Wars and Super Heroes, but that’s not really an official designation nor is there such a series explicitly named in such a manner. It’s more implied by similarities in building style, identical design solutions and techniques, number of pieces, packaging and price point. Even then this set is by all means an outlier simply because of its different structure and appearance.

The set officially retails for 70 Euro for 683 pieces, which is quite a chunk of change, especially once you consider that many parts are really just small 1 x 1 or 1 x 2 elements. It really shows that LEGO are betting on fans being willing to pay almost any price. It would not have hurt if they shaved off 10 Euro right from the start, be that just to bring it in line with the usual 60 Euro for the helmets. That in and of itself is of course still a hefty price tag, but let’s save this discussion for another time. However, in contrast to the helmets this model has much more volume and visible details, so at least you feel like you are getting a better deal in contrast to the other sets where many elements are used invisibly inside and are only shimmed over with relatively few other parts for the outward appearance.

Effectively I got this set for 48 Euro, which at the time of writing was/ is the best price, equaling around 33 percent discount. I actually sat down at 6 PM for an Internet-based live flash sale for the first time ever in my life on May the 4th to snatch up a copy. It’s an oddly exciting, but also exhausting and potentially frustrating way to buy stuff, because ultimately you never know if it really worked until you get the final confirmation and the goods are shipped. I had a bad gut feeling for a few days after that (in addition, but totally unrelated to my pre-existing intestinal issues caused by my chronic illness) and really only began to relax when the post mistress handed me over my parcel after all that kerfuffle.

The set has only been released in March and so far is proving to be very popular, so you should not expect any notable discounts beyond that until quite some time later this year. It will take a while before everyone who wanted is gets this set and LEGO‘s ongoing supply issues taper off. On average you can expect to pay around 55 Euro for this set, which is still not a great price-to-value ratio, but acceptable within the crazy world of LEGO Star Wars. Further discounts may of course be possible during special promos, but you should not expect too much.

From a different perspective one of the questions I can’t get out of my head is of course whether they could have added more content to justify the price and pretty obviously the answer to that would be a resounding “Yes!”. I mean there’s a rather elaborate snow bank already, so it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that in place of the plaque it just as well could hold a Tauntaun and/ or Luke and Han minifigures in their winter-y Hoth garments.

There hasn’t been a (molded) Tauntaun in years and even under worst conditions a lot of people would have rejoiced to get one with only minor refinements like a print perhaps. Ideally they would have done a new mold, admittedly, and I’m sure this alone would have amped up hype around this set to crazy levels. LEGO could of sold stacks of this set on that alone.

The Snow Bank

One of the pleasant surprises in this set is the stand. Unlike the helmets’ conventional plinth-like construction it is modeled after a snow bank as already mentioned a few times. It gently slopes from one side to the other. Because of its width it also doubles as a holder for the info plaque. As usual I did not use any stickers, so mine is blank, but I would not consider this an issue. The truth is that I would just leave of the large tile completely and also replace the ratcheted hinge plates it is affixed to, with the real point being that the assembly causes a bit of tension in the base and thus the right hand side bends slightly upwards. This reduces overall stability and simply does not look good.

The snow bank consists of around 100 elements, including a considerable number of 1 x 4 slopes and several rounded/ wedge slopes to shape the mound and also give the appearance of a wind-blown pile of snow with its incline indicating the direction. Personally I feel that the whole thing could  have been a bit larger and more parts covered with smooth elements, but of course it’s always easy to ask for more.

Still, one of the problems can’t be denied and that’s that the plaque gets in the way of the droid arms and vice versa. It should definitely be offset more to the left and leave a sufficient gap so the arms don’t touch it, no matter what position. To me this seems like an unnecessary shortcoming and oversight and I would extend the construction and insert some more elements. While at it I would also add another layer of plates or even bricks underneath the main “ice shelf”. Not only would this help to counter any potential bending issues, but also add more weight which is always helpful for stability.

An interesting detail is the mounting hole for the droid’s pole, which is actually not a plug connection, but really only an insert with the walls surrounding it ensuring it doesn’t topple over.

The Probe Droid

Interestingly enough, the droid barely makes an appearance in the Star Wars universe, yet it is one of those iconic designs that you immediately recognize. It can only be seen briefly in The Empire Strikes Back and even less in The Phantom Menace. Beyond that it seems to be in some games as a floating target that can be sliced with the light saber or shot at, but I don’t know much about that, since my gamer days are long over.

There are of course limitation to re-creating such a complex shape with LEGO, but overall this is a successful rendition of the original. It credibly replicates the multi-eyed spider/ insect look for the head and the dangly arms. From a distance it indeed conveys this feeling of a heavy medusa/ jellyfish  and looks the part. However, truth be told I think this model would have benefited from being built at an even larger scale. I haven’t mentioned this in a long time, but yes, this is a perfect example of where my 150% rule would apply.

The arms could and should be longer and would still look more elegant and slim and the head could have more details and better approximations of some curves. Most importantly this would also have fixed the single most critical issue I have with this model: The central ring/ body. It is a bit too thick here and the gaps a bit too wide. Increasing the overall radius and inserting more slopes would have mitigated this problem. It would also improve the model in that it would be harder to see some of the colored pieces on the inside. Those are used for spacial orientation and distinguishing the different sides. Substituting them for consistently grey parts would be easy, though.

Admittedly, when talking about a larger scale we are almost talking UCS levels here and the parts count might easily have increased by 200 or 300 pieces, bringing the price up further. Therefore take this as my personal opinion, not so much a general flaw with the model. I just don’t know. That’s likely one of those compromises you have to live with on a commercial set…

The robotic arms/ tentacles do the trick from afar, but technically are still way too crude once you get up close. It really matters from which angle you are looking at the model or for that matter how everything is posed. Some positions look interesting, others not so much and a commonly shared issue is that just misaligning a single element like one of the prongs of a claw can make a huge difference. Again, the amount of detail is limited by the scale and in addition I found the actual building process a bit tedious and challenging. You have to be extra careful to align things or else things will look like crap.

This also goes for the elements from  the Super Heroes weapons pack which are extensively used in this set to get some effects that otherwise would be nearly impossible like changing angles or attaching symmetrical elements from both sides. one would hope that they used this more often even in regular sets, as it really allows some interesting stuff.

The drone’s head is mounted on a turntable and can rotate a full 360 degrees just like the original so it can point its sensors and sensor arrays in every direction (though funny enough one of them gets easily taken down by Han Solo). Since I bought the model only after the NASA Space Shuttle Discovery (10283) came out, I was immediately reminded that this droid, too, could have made excellent use of the new “pancake” pieces, the 3 x 3 quarter dishes above the cockpit. Mega Construx has had them for years and they really solve so many problems with smooth, gently curved rounded surfaces. It’s about time LEGO finally have them as well.

Parts Galore!

As you well know, obsessing about new and rare parts is a bit of a thing for me, and this model scratches that itch just as well. Aside from the already mentioned weapons pack in Pearl Dark Grey this model provides a plethora of Dark Bluish Grey and Black parts for your pleasure. This is of course out of sheer necessity because everything safe for some structural parts on the inside is pretty much visible. I’m pretty certain LEGO would have loved to throw a colorful mess of their surplus parts stock at us if only there was a way. Well, let’s be grateful for small things and not least because of this set we now get this robot head cone and the rounded corner brick in a new color.

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Concluding Thoughts

Overall this is a pretty nice model once it’s finished. getting there is another story, as the build process drags on quite a bit. you have to invest the time to align and orient some elements so they look correct and you also mustn’t underestimate how time-consuming assembly of the arms and other tiny bits is. The result is rewarding and makes up for this trial in patience, though. This is pretty much as good as it gets and until LEGO may come out with a reissue of this set in a few years which uses newer parts this sets an example of what’s possible. The level of detail is really astounding.

That said, there are a few caveats. It’s perfectly clear that this is a display model and therefore some things are a bit flimsy. I in particular really don’t like how loosely the arms dangle around. They don’t fall off or anything, it’s just hard to get them in a stable position that looks nice. There’s also a slight imbalance due to the uneven weight distribution, causing the model to tilt to the side depending on the arm configuration. These are all tiny details that need to be handled carefully or you genuinely fix them with some re-engineering of certain areas.

On the whole, though, I would recommend this model despite it’s high price to anyone who like me likes “visible functions” and technical-looking models with exposed hydraulics,  pneumatics and all sorts of nuts and bolts.

V is Victory? – LEGO Star Wars Magazine, April 2021

WordPress are driving me crazy with their forced transition to the Blocks editor, so bear with me if some things look a bit wonky. As an old school WP user I’m still too much used to working within a theme’s design rules and this new-fangled stuff takes some getting used to. Anyway, here we go again with the LEGO Star Wars magazine, this time for April 2021.

Unlike the wildly fictional concoctions in the last few issues, the comic is a bit more relatable again this time, depicting several encounters Yoda had/ has while roaming the forests of Dagobah. This is very akin to Luke‘s training in The Empire Strikes Back with all sorts of dangerous creatures and a force representation of Darth Vader also making an appearance. Of course there are some liberties here, but at least I like to believe that’s how it could have happened. I’m not an advocate of strict canon, but familiarity and adherence to existing the lore and rules of the Star Wars universe is always a bonus.

The posters deserve praise this month. Not only are they stylistically similar to the Storm Trooper chart from last month, but also both of them are actually good. To top it off, they even tell a story with Luke and Vader facing each other as exploded minifigures. Of course the downside to that is that you will actually have to buy two magazines if you want to put up both posters in the way depicted here.

The extra is a V-Wing fighter. Don’t ask me too much, as I have yet to manage to actually consistently watch The Clone Wars and catch up with its story and details, but apparently these fighters appear quite a lot there and are kind of important. Otherwise LEGO might have glossed over them and not done several models, obviously. as far as I know this is the first time it has been done as such a mini-model, though, so it’s something new.

The build is not particularly elaborate, but seems to capture the shapes well enough. The highlight are of course the Dark Red shield tiles, which so far only have appeared in the UCS A-Wing Starfighter (75275) and the smaller LEGO Super Heroes Hulkbuster (76164) set, making them a bit of a rarity item. The same goes for the curved slope, though it isn’t quite as scarce. On top of it you get five (!) full left/ right pairs of the 2 x 4 wedge tiles in Light Bluish Grey. Not a bad yield for such a small model!

On a funny side note, I was immediately reminded of Nintendo‘s Starfox games when I accidentally whacked the vertical air foils out of alignment. The details would need some refinement, naturally, but it’s surprising how similar the fighters look.

On the whole this is a fantastic issue providing some good value. A decent comic, some superb posters and a model that despite its simplicity looks cool. what more can you ask for? The only thing where it falls short is the activities/ puzzles, which are few and far inbetween…

2020 – A Space Tragedy – LEGO Star Wars, Nebulon-B Frigate (77904)

Today we are going to have a look at a set that most of us actually never will get their hands on as a real, packaged set in a nice printed box. This is of course due to the specifics how the LEGO Star Wars Nebulon-B Frigate (77904) came into existence and the circumstances surrounding its limited availability. So without further ado, let’s have a look at what brought us here.

The Haves and the Have-Nots

When it comes to this set there is a huge divide between those that were lucky enough to get an original package, those who didn’t and the large rest of the community, whose only option is to rebrick it from scratch. I belong to the latter, pretty obviously, but I wanted to share my thoughts on the matter, regardless.

Originally intended as an exclusive only sold on-site at what was supposed to be this year’s San Diego Comic Con, inevitably there were ever only going to be limited numbers of this set out there. This has been the case with other sets in the past years as well, and while it always has rubbed me the wrong way not having access to them, I was mostly fine with that, given that they were small sets that would, though fun to rebrick, not necessarily be something I would go crazy about. that and of course that without the equally exclusive minifigures just rebuilding them would not have the same value. I may not like it, but I do get the mechanics of a “collectors” market, if you get my meaning. However, with the Nebulon-B Frigate things were a bit different and perhaps that why things went sour so quickly when due to the Corona pandemic things changed.

With Comic Con being cancelled, but the sets already produced (due to the long-ish lead-in times required for manufacturing and logistics), LEGO had to look for a different way of distribution and wouldn’t you know it – sadly all too predictably they did so in the most stupid and moronic fashion possible. They only distributed it through their own web shop and Amazon – both times only in the US, apparently. So far, so good. However, what then aggravated many American fans even was the way it was handled: There were no clear dates of availability announced, so people never knew if and when they could actually order their copy, yet somehow scalpers managed to order sets in bulk off Amazon long before. Similar things happened on the LEGO online store, where the set appeared out of nowhere for one day and was quickly sold out.

See where this is going? Yes, many fans ended up empty-handed and even YouTubers like Jangbricks rightfully criticized how this was handled, as even he struggled to get a box for his reviews. As a result, this ended up being a situation of those who have an d those who haven’t and everyone was jealous of their neighbor who was lucky enough to snatch a package. This situation could probably not have been entirely avoided, given what the product was originally intended for, but it certainly could have been mitigated with better planning and communication, leaving a lot more potential buyers a whole lot less frustrated. In fact one wonders why LEGO themselves didn’t deal with this better, given that it caused quite a shitstorm of bad PR for them.

To rebrick or not to rebrick, that is the question!

Things being what they are, most would-be customers that might have bought the set were faced with the question of either buying it for a whole lot of money from them scalpers or rebricking it from scratch using their own parts. This is usually a tough decision, as rebricking a set can be many times more costly than the original package. This in particular happens when a set contains specific minifigures, rare parts or rare color variants of a piece and you have to scrape things together from multiple sources, including expensive additional purchases from Bricklink and similar sites.

However, fret not! Surprisingly, rebricking this set is quite affordable. German site Stonewars.de did the math using LEGO‘s official Bricks & Pieces service and arrived at a total cost of around 55 Euro. This may change a bit depending on where you live and what exchange rates are for your own country’s currency, but all things considered this is not bad and a far cry from the insane amounts of money I feared this would cost. This is perfectly manageable even on a limited budget and even I might have considered it, despite my reluctance to ever even rebrick official sets or build other people’s MOCs. Also the set does not contain any minifigure at all, so you don’t have to go out there and buy expensive old figures just to kit-bash/ fig-barf together that Rebel officer that might have been included.

However, what really won me over despite my usual reluctance to rebrick official sets or build other people’s MOCs, is the fact that I knew that I had a considerable number of pieces already in my repository, including some more elusive ones like e.g. the new binoculars/ droid head and the single (!) grey skeleton foot I had. Funny enough, after those last few years my buying weird Friends sets and LEGO magazines seems to have paid off at least a little. Knowing that I could get about  70 percent of the way soothed my nerves and made the whole operation viable.

Going through my boxes and picking out sometimes tiny parts was still a pain in the butt, though. It costs a lot of time to sort this stuff into their little partitions and then just as long to fish them out using tweezers when they hide in that corner you can’t get your fingers in. In addition I still had to order some elements, most notably a bunch of those brackets in Dark Bluish Gray. I have tons of them in other colors, but LEGO only did the darker grey version in some sets last year, none of which I had bought. I also threw in some other items such as a bunch of studs and the Fez cones for the engine exhausts (had a few from the Hidden Side Ghost Firetruck 3000 [70436], apparently, but not enough), but nothing too dramatic.

For other items I decided right out of the gate to substitute colors or not bother about any of that, because they either wouldn’t be visible at all or the different colors would not affect the overall appearance. I did so after carefully studying the digital instructions and in fact later during the build realized that I could have taken this even further. For instance many of the Dark Tan 1 x 2 plates are merely used as fill elements underneath other pieces and you can basically use any color your have at hand. You only need to go with the original suggestion for a handful of locations where they are genuinely visible and help to convey that rusty, slightly rugged look.

Some elements I would have liked to replace, but things didn’t coalesce in a favorable way, meaning mostly I would have had to waste another 10 Euro on shipping costs on buying a few tiny pieces from another Bricklink seller, so I didn’t. One such piece are the many 1 x 1 teeth elements used to hint at streamlined coverings, hatches and protrusions. I used the Pearl Silver ones I had in many places instead of the Light Bluish Grey version, the latter of which – you guessed it – is kind of rare and thus not readily available in sufficient quantities with every of my favorite parts dealers. I might fix this at a later point, though.

The Model

After my long-winded ponderings let’s have a look at the actual model for a change. What can I say? I think it’s beautiful in every way and manages to hit the right balance between looking like an adequate representation of the original, capturing the scale and proportions and yet still recognizably looking like a LEGO model. Hard to say what exactly it is, but it simply looks very elegant with its long center beam section and the greebly surface.

Some of the elegance of course has to do with color choices. The original, while not exactly flamboyant and mostly a flat grey, has a few colorful areas, but the model designers instead opted to give it a classic “paper” look and pretty much keep everything in Light Bluish Grey, with a few Dark Bluish Grey and Dark Tan highlights peeking out here and there. This no doubt has to do with a) LEGO not having all the correct colors in their portfolio, anyway and b) the so-called “scale effect” where colors despite technically being exact matches look different on differently sized objects. More to the point it seems they realized that going with those greens, yellows and browns sprinkled in that you can find on the original movie models things would have gotten too noisy and distracting. I’m also pretty sure they even tried this out on their prototypes and it looked kind of wrong.

With that in mind, it’s clear that the appearance is defined by the surface structure much more than actual colors and to that effect they essentially throw every small part (and the kitchen sink) into the ring. There’s a ton of 1 x 1 studs and modified plates, similar 1 x 2 plates and tiles, including the ingot piece as well as some of the weirder stuff I already mentioned. Additionally, there is a considerable number of tiles, slopes and jumper plates and some of them have only come out in the last two years, so no matter how you skin it, this model couldn’t even have been done in this way, shape and form until recently. I guess one could say they had all the pieces in place (no pun intended) just at the right time.

The model itself is around 30 cm long and about 20 cm tall. In terms of scale it fits what in the model ship building sphere would be the 1/350th or 1/400th scales, meaning every detail would be pretty tiny and thus simplifications and creating the illusion of geometry with light and shadow are common techniques. Thankfully this set does not have any prints or special stickers to take this even further, or else rebricking it would have been even more of a pain. Could have been cool, though, to have some numbers, badges and squadron insignia as well as perhaps some tiny dots for the windows on some elements.

Despite the model looking relatively straightforward, building it isn’t always that simple. The most obvious limitation is that you are often dealing with very long, but also very thin parts just one stud wide. This means that handling is delicate and things are not always as stable as you would like. This is in particular the case with the forward section, which uses a lot of 1 x 1 bricks with studs on the sides that are stacked into small towers and then only stabilize once you add the plates on the sides. It’s not a big deal, given that this is a display model and some fragility has to be expected, but some attention and care is required. I had some of these bits fall off a number of times.

With regards to the many smaller elements it pays off if you spend a little time orienting the pieces so they have uniform and straight gaps and run in parallel or perpendicular to the edges and surface they are aligned to. I’m sure I still missed quite a few, but it really helps or else your model can look pretty crooked. On the other hand there some limits to this with many elements literally only hanging on on stud and thus remaining movable later. I also was particularly irked by the slope pieces used to shape the upper deck of the rear section not fitting as close together as I would have liked. That’s one of the areas I might have constructed differently if this were my own MOC. Of course that’s always easy to say and other options like using for instance this brick instead may have other disadvantages. you never know until you try, obviously.

There are a few other slightly annoying things like the frontmost upper antennae always falling off easily due to the binoculars piece they are plugged into not even having a full depth anti stud to connect to the jumper plate that holds it, but overall everything is where it needs to be and you’d be hard-pressed to find alternate solutions to some design problems.

The Stand

As you already may have noticed, I constructed a slightly different stand for my model than the one proposed in the original instructions. This came about for a number of reasons. For one I didn’t have the curved slopes they used in their version just as I didn’t have a sticker or a printed tile to use for the plaque. Therefore the forward protrusion with the hinge mounts would be redundant.

Second I also think the original design is simply slightly too large for what is necessary plus that weird construction at the top with the curved slope standing out so much just looks ugly to my eyes. I’m not claiming my solution is the ultimate achievement, but it feels better to me. You can of course come up with a million other designs just as well as long as you keep the general positioning and structure intact. The model is very front-heavy and thus in order to balance things out the stand’s pivot also has to be very close to the front section.

At the same time you don’t need a super large pedestal as long as it has enough surface area and is reasonably heavy so the model doesn’t tip over because the center of gravity is too high. I would even wager you could construct something pretty small from a bunch of 6 x 6 plates and Macaroni round pieces, if you add some fishing lead inside. Well, whatever floats your boat will do in a pinch.

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Concluding Thoughts: Everything wrong with LEGO Star Wars

In my headline I called this a tragedy and sadly it is – just not in the way you may think at first. The point here is that this set on so many levels illustrates what is wrong with LEGO Star Wars by getting so much right. It’s a well thought-out model that looks amazing, is reasonably enjoyable to build and at 40 Euro is very reasonably priced. Most importantly it brings something entirely fresh to the whole line by representing a vessel that previously hadn’t officially been done and to boot, it does so in a very collectible scale. This would have sold like crazy as a regular retail set!

Now compare that to the umpteenth X-Wing or TIE Fighter, half-baked “Battle Packs” models of iconic scenes and locales that are barely recognizable because they have been reduced to a mere shadow of the original. Need I go on? To me, the Nebulon-B Frigate is a perfect example of how things could/ should be vs. the crappy reality of what we actually get. The model shows that it’s absolutely not the fault of the designers – if they can come up with this, they sure could crank out a whole armada of vessels in this scale – but rather that the decision making further up the chain is to blame, be that LEGO or Disney/ Lucasfilm.

With all that in mind one would hope LEGO have learned some lessons from this little debacle and are working hard on it. Re-issuing this set as a regular one would be a start and I would even buy it, despite already having rebricked it and then from there they could move on to all those other big crafts like alternate Nebulon variants such as the Y-shaped C version or the Empire‘s armored one, a Tantive, a Hammerhead and yes, of course all the Star Destroyers you could want.

I certainly wouldn’t mind having a line-up of approximately equally sized models on the shelf in the 30 cm range even if it means different actual scale, not dissimilar to what Eaglemoss did with their collectible Star Trek vessels. Am I hoping for too much?

Ol’ Black Eye is here – LEGO Star Wars Magazine, November 2020

The November issue of the LEGO Star Wars magazine has been awaited by many fans with a mixture of child-like giddiness and at the same time almost unhealthy obsessiveness. the reason? Of course the minifigure! So lets see what the fuss is all about.

As someone who doesn’t proactively collect minifigs I’m always half surprised, half glad that this insanity passes me by. I may occasionally get lucky and have a rare figure from a set whose value I only find out after the fact, but otherwise I don’t care much. One thing I did notice, however, is that the Betrayal at Cloud City (75222) was quite rubbish, yet contained a bunch of the little dudes and dudettes that people were keen on. One of them is what people simply call “Bespin Luke”, a.k.a. a slightly beaten up Luke Skywalker ready to face off with Darth Vader. As you might have guessed, the combination of a shitty, but expensive set and few people actually buying it made this figure a scarce and costly, yet highly coveted thing.

Now suddenly none of this matters anymore, as indeed the exact same minifigure is what you get with the magazine. A move to screw over collectors who had previously bought it for a lot of money? Likely not, as the figure is also included in the exclusive Bespin Duel (75294) set specifically made for Star Wars Celebration. After that went only virtual due to this year’s pandemic, said package was shortly available through Amazon US only. That caused a lot of people from other regions to go into a frenzy to at least re-brick this set if they couldn’t import an original one from the limited edition (good luck with sourcing the grey fork, though).

See how everything comes full circle? Clearly LEGO have recently producing a ton of those little Lukes. To some this will be tragic, devaluing their collection, for others, and I dare say the majority of fans, this is and extremely lucky thing. Of course inevitably some people have already been overdoing it, buying up whole stacks of the magazine and hoarding it, but that’s part of the insanity. In any case the figure is done well enough and even I was surprised how much of a difference it makes among the other versions I have with blond hair and white clothes.

The rest of the magazine doesn’t offer anything extraordinary, though. The Han-Solo-centric comic is okay, but otherwise this is one of those issues that feel oddly “light” in the content department. the puzzles are ridiculously simple and they kinda ruined the one poster that would have been acceptable, the one with the Mandalorian and The Child, with too fat and ugly type work. So really not much to see and it’s indeed all about the minifigure, after all…

July Walker

Look who’s back! Yes, as hinted last month, Boba is indeed smiling (?) from the cover of the July LEGO Star Wars magazine. The reason? He’s in one of the comics, of course!

Said comic also features the Slave 1 in its full UCS glory and re-imagines parts of the meteorite chase from The Empire Strikes Back mixed with the similarly structured stealth hunt from Attack of the Clones as some sort of space race between the Millennium Falcon, Boba‘s craft and several other vehicles. Talk about everything and the kitchen sink! And because naturally there has to be some relation to the included mini model, there’s another comic with an AT-AT at the heart of it.

The model itself is unfortunately a “Been there, done that.” affair. True, there’s only so many ways to skin a cat or build a walker, respectively, but in my short time of buying these magazines I feel like I’ve already seen way too many of the ever almost identical builds using spindly hinge-based legs and some other parts. Maybe the should consider stretching out one of these builds across two or three mags to build a larger AT-AT to reinvigorate this. So as it is, there’s not much to gain here beyond the generic nature of the Light Bluish Grey parts making them universally usable for many projects, including the four 3 on 2 jumper plates.

The rest of the magazine is your average fare. Not much in the way of activities stuff and of the posters I only find the one with the dirty sand trooper/ mud trooper breaking through the wall acceptable. Next month is going to be bring some suspense. Likely not because the magazine is going to be particularly outstanding, but rather because it will have a Stormtrooper minifigure (new type) and some people already have threatened to buy up some newsstands’ entire stock to complete their squadrons. 😉 If one is not quick enough, this issue could become tough to track down later…

Snow Dino!

The Christmas holidays have jumbled up the release schedule of the various LEGO magazines quite a bit, so the next few weeks will be a bit of a race to keep up with those costly trips to the newsstand until the cycle is in sync again.

The Star Wars mag comes with a rather unspectacular Snowspeeder model. Not that there would be anything wrong with Snowspeeder, it’s just that it doesn’t have that much to offer in terms of interesting details in the first place and shrinking it down won’t improve upon this, understandably. Most annoyingly the model looks very stumpy with no provision having been made for the short rectangular aft area and everything having been chopped off immediately behind the wedge section. For a freebie it’s okay, but it just would have been nice to get a more accurate model.

Since the price has gone up again and is now at 4.99 Euro, a bonus extra has been thrown in to console users and to preempt a larger uproar. Depending on which packaging you manage to get you either get a Snow Trooper or a young Luke Skywalker with blond hair minifigure. That’s okay for the time being, but regardless, asking so much for a few printed pages and some lightweight extras is pushing it…

The content of the pages is the usual mix of an acceptable comic, some very limited games and the usual adverts for other publications from Blue Ocean. The poster provides a facepalm moment in that it depicts the UCS Snowspeeder (75144) set from last year that you can no longer buy. Kinda stupid to whet people’s appetites and then leave them disappointed, should they decide to investigate the details.

The LEGO Jurassic World magazine was a bit of a surprise release. There had of course been rumours and even confirmed info that there would be new issues coming out for 2020, but no actual dates were ever mentioned. If you remember, I wasn’t necessarily that satisfied with the older ones as were likely many other buyers (they basically always appeared to be dumps of surplus Owen figures and such), but it seems this is headed in a new direction and more effort is made to make them attractive. Let’s see how long that will last.

The first mag in the new series comes with a nice little T. Rex model, which with its 65 pieces even provides some longer-lasting building fun than the usual models lumped together from half that number of parts. The result is indeed reminiscent of the large T. Rex from set 75936, which I now thankfully had an opportunity to build, in terms of colors and also features some very useful parts like 1×1 brackets or the 1×2 curved slope wedges in Black that are also used for the toes on the giant version. After assembly it really looks the part and in a way is cute. My only small gripe is that there are a few too many black and dark grey parts that would have benefited from having been done in one of the brown colors as well.

A stand-out item this time is the poster with the T. Rex breaking through the wall, which is really something I could see myself actually putting up somewhere. The framing could be a bit better with a bit more visible wall, but let’s be thankful for small things. The comic is okay and funny enough there are more puzzles than in the Star Wars mag to be found here. It’s just odd how inconsistent this is at times. The best part for me is the preview of the next issue hinting at an equally complex Triceratops model, so there is definitely something to look forward to.

The German version here also comes with a free album and a sample pack for the new collectible stickers, but I can’t tell you much on that, being that aside from the free extras no actual stickers were sold at my news agent’s yet. I’ll probably just give the album to one of the neighbors kids and drip-feed them the leftover stickers I surely will get more of when buying other LEGO magazines…

November TIE-Up

Nobody likes price hikes, so the November issue of the LEGO Star Wars magazine now costing 4.20 Euro instead of the previous 3.99 was not a pleasant surprise at the newsstand. As long as there is some good value attached that 5 percent increase would acceptable, though, so let’s see if that does add up.

For me this is determined primarily by the parts included in the mini build and I have to say it’s pretty good this time around. There of course have been any number of small scale TIE Fighters already and one would think that this subject has been done to death, but the one included with the mag surprises with yet another novel approach. That is in particular how the large cooling panels (a.k.a. wings) are attached inverted by ways of the new T-style brackets. Logically then on a symmetrical model you get two of those. To somewhat cover up the now exposed undersides of the plates you also get four inverted tiles and it never hurts to have those, either, be it just to make your model undersides scratch-proof to prevent damage while the are standing on your table. all nice stuff to have from a builder’s perspective.

The comics don’t tie in with a specific story line from the movies and thus function independently, with clear references to The Force Awakens and The Empire Strike Back, however. They’re both drawn in the new, more dynamic style and here’s hoping that this will be the new norm. The posters are also pretty good and I’m almost tempted to put up the first order pilots one just for giggles. If you care remember there is a commercial, quite similar poster out there and it could be funny to have them side by side. The games and puzzles feel a bit light in this issue. I admittedly have no idea how long a simplistic dice-based strategy game with only a handful of planets to conquer can keep your kids distracted, though…

A non-UCS Cloud City

Remember when a few weeks ago I wrote that LEGO Star Wars is in deep shit? That same pile of manure just got even deeper with the official announcement of the Betrayal at Cloud City (75222) set. Everybody expected it, everybody wanted it and now everybody is disappointed by it. Yupp, that’s pretty much the unanymous reaction of 90 percent of users.

Aside from the fact that 350 Euros is just plain crazy for a 2800 pieces set, when just a week ago they released a 6000 pieces set for 400 Euros (Harry Potter Hogwarts Castle (71043)), the major letdown is the toyish quality. Similar to the Death Star (75159) it’s a puppet house style arrangement of rooms, featuring little vignettes that depict scenes from The Empire Strikes Back. That would be terrible for an Ultimate Collectors Series (UCS) model to begin with, but the people at Promobricks have corrected and commented their post, citing it as the first set of a new Master Builder series – as if this changes anything. It still is pretty lame and terrible. Many others feel the same, but I’ll leave it to you and your favorite YouTube channels and news sites to make up your mind based on more info.

Since LEGO seems to be subscribed to irony these days, it isn’t missing from this release either. Many of the details would make wonderful sets people would buy on their own because they’d exactly be what they want – reasonably priced sets with an acceptable number of parts resulting in a good rendition of the scenes and vehicles. I myself could totally get behind the Slave I for instance und would be willing to spend 30 Euros on it or something like that. However, with these items now being part of this large set this isn’t going to happen and both parties lose in the process. LEGO isn’t going to see any cash from this crowd.

It will of course sell to other people like desperate parents and relatives looking for an expensive Christmas present for their kids once a year. Perhaps you might even come across some younglings who bug their caregivers about it, though perhaps not for reasons one may think. To them it will be just one huge play set independent of all this Star Wars stuff. Whether or not this even will get them hooked and turn them into genuine fans is anyone’s guess.

Overall I think this is another big miss for LEGO. I just don’t see who this is supposed to address other than people with too much money who buy every set, anyway, or the aforementioned special cases. Most critically it spectacularly fails at reconnecting people with the original Star Wars saga and it won’t do much to rekindle the enthusiasm for those old movies, which by all means it could have and should have done at least.

It could have been the perfect gateway drug to get people enthused for more sets, if you want to put it that way and take this cheap attitude towards the whole affair. Still, even that is now called into question and instead people will be even more careful in what sets they invest their money. Total marketing disaster? I surely think so, but that’s just me, of course…