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Set: 7680 - The Twilight
Theme: Star Wars
Year Released: 2008
Piece Count: 882
Price: $AUD149.99 (or $159.99 if you buy at TRU!), 99.99 Euro, $US99.99
Pity the Twilight. When rumours of the set name first circulated, speculation was swift: 'Twilight - that suggests something sleek, elegant and mysterious.' Anticipation mounted! Fan-frenzy grew! Finally a pic leaked! And the verdict was... 'clunk-a-dunk'
It appeared that in the Jedi off-season, Anakin was running something that looked like an intergalactic garbage scow, like Roger Wilco in the old Sierra Space Quest PC games. Blocky and bley seemed to sum it up. The set went from being one of the most anticipated to one of the least liked of 2008 pretty much instantly. It's a mark of that dislike that in the EB Clone Wars review feeding frenzy nobody has so far even bothered to post a few pics of this set even 2 weeks after it's official release! I'm here to redress that imbalance now and find out if 7680 is as horrendous as everyone originally thought 
Part 1: Box & Parts
Front of the box. It's quite big, same size as the 10144 Sandcrawler. Annoyingly, it's the old style with the perforated corners that you have to tear to flip open the lid.
Detail of the back, showing set functions:
Interior of the box - a lot of wasted space. The set comes with 2 instruction manuals, each 76 pages. And no DSS sheet!
Polybags! 13 of 'em. Like the other CW sets, these are unnumbered.
Parts ahoy! You can tell at a glance that this set is comparable to the AT-TE, although there a large proportion of the 800+ parts here are technic pins and bley plates.
Part 2: Minifigs and Build
The set comes with 4 figs (or 3.5, depending on how you look at Rotta
): Anakin, Ahsoka, R2-D2 and Rotta. Very disappointing that there's nothing new here for such a high-priced exclusive, although I guess it is maybe movie accurate. Anyway, to paraphrase the wise Patsy Stone, you can never have enough hats, shoes or new Anakin/ Ahsoka hairpieces so it's not too bad.Pics of the build in progress. A quarter of the way through we can already see that this is one of those 'convoluted technic frames with some plates affixed' type builds:
Half-way and the smaller wing is added:
At the three quarter mark the giant single wing is added:
And voila! Done! The final quarter is a race to attach all the exterior surfaces and details such as the engine and escape pod.
The build itself is a mixed blessing. It is VERY technic oriented. I'm not a Technic-ally minded person and don't really have much of a conceptual grasp of how everything functions until I see the final result, so I find these type of builds a little uninteresting. Pins, axles and beams? Give me bricks any day! I really liked the 7676 Gunship and the 7679 Fighter Tank although they do contain some technic framework, they are largely brick-built ships, especially the Fighter Tank which is solid, largely brick built and full of neat functions. The 7680 build is one of the most technicy builds I've ever undergone in a System set, akin to the experience of building the 10178 Motorised AT-AT. But whereas with that set you could understand the need for a technic framework (the thing walks!) a lot of this seemed excessive. Yes, the Twilight does some have nice functions, and it is so large and heavy it does need a strong skeleton, but to me it just seemed too much and aesthetics have been sacrificed for (in some cases limited) functionality. I will discuss in more detail what I mean as I look at different parts of the set.
On the upside, this is the only non-symmetric set in the CW range, so at least every page and new step brings something different!
Part 3: A Closer View
Close-up of the main body of the ship:
Front-on. It is well-designed how the figs appear in line of sight (unlike the 6211 where Jabba and Leia were photoshopped in to the box art). Don't ask what Rotta is doing out of the line of vision there. Some things are better left unsaid.
Side view, showing escape pod (smaller cylinder) and drive:
Top view:
Rear view, showing back door. The rear deck is huge.
Indeed, the whole ship is huge. Oddly so. I don't know if this is movie-scale or not, but I've seen people complain the fighter tank is too big (!) and that set is nothing compared to this baby! It's wider than the Gunship and in wingspan and length is almost bigger. Here's a few pics next to an MTT for comparison.
Pretty big, hey? Turning to the dark side must be good for business. Even if all you can buy is a rusty old beast like this, at least you could comfortably squash pretty much every vehicle in the opposing fleet just by landing on it. At least now you can see why it costs so much. The official pics make it look smaller, somehow, by truncating the rear and wing.
The ship is in fact so big you can't really pose it with wings open - only hold it that way. I was too lazy to build a giant trans-clear support strut so propped it up on a shoebox instead. The wing opens very neatly - you push a technic lever and a pin holding the bottom wing pops out quite smoothly. The little top turret can move up and down as well to get the full cross-shaped effect.
Part 4: Features and Functions
The front cockpit folds down very neatly, although I find the build here a little weak.
Whee! It goes all the way down to the floor. The mechanism is cool, but it takes up an awful lot of space. Basically the whole front is cockpit and all Lego could manage for controls is 2 printed 1x2 tiles as well
(not pictured here, but they're attached to the part that folds up and down). There's also no way for anyone to get in or out of the cockpit. And an invisible windscreen! Technology has come a long way.
Side view, looking from wing. R2D2 is here as well as some tools. You can also glimpse here one of the main problems with the set. Despite being a huge boxy ship, there's no interior! None! The Twilight doesn't even have an internal floor. All the room inside is taken up by the landing gear which folds up - again, a clever function but it really gets in the way of the set as a whole. Kudos to the designer for coming up with stable, working landing gear, but too clever by half if it means that this giant ship ends up basically being one tiny cockpit and a rear door at the back that doesn't lead to any interior!
Underside showing landing gear when open:
And closed - when the wing is folded down, the gear is locked in place, which is pretty neat. Space-consuming, but neat.
The rear section. The door, when opened, reveals an orange cupboard and a tow-line, as Ahsoka uses in the box art. The door clicks into place when open and can be released by pressing the technic bit at the top. Again, clever, but pointless as you can't get inside!
Ahsoka can indulge in a little recreational bungee-jumping if she so wishes:
The rear deck is so large that it is wasted just being used so Ahsoka can bungee-jump. I came up with a much better use for it.
Outdoor garden!
Despite having one roboticised hand, Anakin was still quite the green thumb. And his light-saber was very useful as a hedge trimmer. So much so that he set up a side business between Rotta-rescue missions. Here's a promotional postcard:
A few other bits and pieces. The gun turret on the enormous mega-wing can only hold one flick fire missile at a time (you do get two, though
)
Rear engine detail:
The escape pod sits neatly on the side and is basically built the same way as the Gunship bacta tank:
The pod sits on these tehcnic pins and is held in place by the light bley parts:
Part 5: In conclusion
The Twilight is a huge ship, with a huge amount of great functions - folding wing, folding cockpit, rear door, escape pod, retractable landing gear! But this functionality comes at a price - a very complex technic build and zip interior. Compared with the Gunship, for example, which is stuffed with nooks and crannies, the Twilight suffers in this respect. I also think it is just too large - it doesn't really fit with the other craft and vehicles released with the Clone Wars line. I may be wrong and it is movie-accurate, but when you have all the CW sets laid out it does stick out like a poor thumb. Part selection is OK, with the only interesting things being a few dark orange plates, the orange cupboard and the big trans-neon green radar dish.
Don't get me wrong, I don't think this is a bad set at all. It's just the other CW sets are so sweet!
I would say it's an above average set in a field crammed with excellent ones. If you're a completist, buy it, but if for example you'd rather invest in another AT-TE to upgrade your Republic Army, then I couldn't really disagree with you either And to finish on a light note, I'd like to remind you that you do get another Ahsoka hairpiece, which can be used for all sorts of things.
Ugha warrior upgrade:
Dr Inferno hair transplant:
And finally, attack of the deadly blue-ringed octopus, native to Australia's beaches and oceans!
Thanks for reading!
). I can just ask for something, can you post a pic of all your clone wars sets together with this one (all the sets in one pic, not many pics with this an each set 
Anakin has gone over to the green side of the force! 
And you did a good job at it, svelte corps! 
And Ahsoka looks even hotter with Inferno's hair! 
Wookieepedia says so, and you can see it in one of the trailers. So, I guess the Twilight will stay mostly unbought. Poor Clunkadunk. 
I really have no need for a retractable front or functioning landing gear. What I need is a kick-ass ship with neat design and cool interior. The Twilight does not offer that.
