(reference picture from Star Wars Chronicles) This again, IMO, detracts from the displayability when showing the model in the landed configuration. They do have some swivel, but the mounting location and technique and combination of pieces used prevent them from rotating fully vertical in the landed position. While the look is very accurate to the film model, the articulation isn’t. It also might have freed up space to build in the passenger hold. I think using a hinge set up would have helped preserve look around the gears. Since I only intend to display this I would have preferred an attempt at a hinge-pin design. Given the limited room inside the fuselage I can see why they went this way instead. I think including this would have been much more desirable had they been able to design a gear box that could operate both wings off of one crank. However the wings are operated independently of each other. To be able to operate the wings is pretty much the lone playability feature. Wing articulation: I’m not really sure why Lego built this the way they did. Having built this design I will admit that it may have been difficult to raise the cockpit or include a boarding ramp, but to be able to have a mini-figure appear to come down the ramp would have really knocked this model out of the park from a displayability perspective. I went back to Chronicles and Sculpting the Galaxy to see if Lego made a design mistake in either the landing gear or the cockpit and it seams that the neck between the cockpit and the fuselage sits a bit lower on the Lego model than it does on the filming model. They included one on the Falcon even though it doesn’t lead to anything. And I’m curious why there isn’t a boarding ramp. This, along with the lack of a boarding ramp, ruins any attempt to recreate the arrival of Darth Vader or the Emperor. A Lego Minifigure cannot stand erect under the nose. The only major criticism I have to the overall design is that the cockpit sits to low in relation to the rest of the model. (Not that the passenger hold is built into this or represented in anyway). It’s a tight squeeze to get from the passenger hold to the pilot’s seat. I say this because the seating configuration inside the cockpit replicates ROTJ, but it’s pretty cramped in there both for head room and leg room. Scale: SO CLOSE! Without constructing this model from a ton of specialized pieces Lego came as close as they probably could in making this model scale in size to the mini-figures. I pulled out the Chronicles book to check, and sure enough they are perfectly recreated.Īs great as this model is there is some constructive criticism I would like to offer Lego. While building it I thought they were way to large and not accurately designed. One thing that really surprised me was the rear blaster cannons above the engines. The display stand is also surprisingly stable considering how few pieces it is comprised of compared to previous stands for smaller models. In the landed configuration the model does sit on two legs as seen in the films (now included in the ESB:SE) and balances very well. While necessary to operate the wing articulation, they can be removed, although the connection points are still bare interrupting the design of the engine assembly. The other concession is the cranks themselves. Here Lego had to make a concession to the aesthetics to accommodate the mechanics. While the original model has a gear look to the articulation points, the assemblies aren’t open like they are on the Lego model. Two places it comes up understandably short are the wing articulation points and the wing crank mechanisms. It looks great! It’s huge and the does an amazing job of capturing the look of the film model. On to the review!ĭimensions Landed: 18.5″ Tall, 18″ Long, 11″ wide.ĭimensions Flight Configuration: 28″ tall (incl. Seeing as the Lambda shuttle is still one of the cooler ships in the saga i decided to add it, at least temporarily, to the collection. Previously Lego had released a USC Millennium Falcon that at 5,000 pieces was advertised as to scale with the included mini-figures. While not explicitly stated by Lego, the inclusion of mini-figures strongly suggests that this model is “to scale” with the figures. Fortunately the UCS Death Star I sold went for 175% of the original purchase price so I was able to pick this baby up at better than a trade.Īs I had mentioned previously my plan was to stick to the fighters, and this is obviously not a fighter. This model rang up at $260.00 after tax and shipping, which is somewhat cheaper than previous models with similar piece counts. A price tag that goes way up after Lego stops selling a particular model. I continue to say that this series from Lego is wholly worth the awesome, even at a sometimes hefty price tag. I recently finished constructing the Lego UCS SW Imperial Shuttle, kit #10212.
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