V-2929

Ah man, I'm going to risk going off topic here. Slave is a loaded term. It carries a lot of weight, and the extent of that weight will vary from person to person who hears it used. It's a term of racial oppression. Across North America and Europe companies (I can't speak for other parts of the world) companies are trawling through code to rename processes and remove references to slave systems and master systems in recognition of the burden the word carries, what it represents and what it may mean to people. We're still not that far from the abolition of slavery, the impacts of it are still felt throughout the world, and these companies, including Lego, have black and other POC employees who won't have to look too many generations back to find family members who were slaves. In a society striving to do better, removing the word slave from the lexicon is a simple step and one that should happen As other people have said, the name of the ship is barely mentioned in the movies and cartoons. Lego haven't renamed the ship; they've just, possibly for a variety of reasons, chosen to not use that name for this kit. That may continue in the future, and if it does it's a sign of progress. You want Lego, both for kids and AFOLs, to be an inclusive community you're going to have to stop using terms like slave. If you don't want it to be an inclusive community, then you're running counter to Lego's own stated aims Anyway, those new kits eh. I think I've gone off the Light Cruiser having seen more of it, though I am going to need Fennec Shand. I'll have to wait for video reviews of the Trexler to make a decision there, but I seem to find myself becoming less excited about the kits the more I see of them, though the figures remain outstanding

There would be a lot fewer argumemts on here if more people were less eager to have the last word. Any chance that someone who hasn't expressed an opinion either way on those figures can be allowed to close this out so no one feels like they were on the losing side? So what sets haven't we had a decent view of so far? Similar to the Light Cruiser, I'm curious to find out how much interior the Trexler has. I'd really like to be able to fit, like, five troopers and a driver in it but I suspect that may be asking a bit much

I'd been thinking that a Juggernaut would be a great Mandalorian set to come next as well, but with General Hess (the officer Mayield and Mando encounter in the base) as one of the extra figures

I'm all for multiple sets having the same version of a figure. Creating exclusivity just for the sake of it is a bad thing; the only reason for it is to encourage people to buy expensive sets, and it drives aftermarket prices up. The change to different face prints for troopers, for example, across different sets makes absolutely no difference to how the figure looks, but now we have three(?) different versions of the new Snowtrooper so the aftermarket price for Snowtroopers reflects this as a certain type of collector will want all three. Anyone who just wants more Snowtroopers, with no concern for which face print can't be seen under the helmet, ends up paying more for them So, yeah, thare are a lot of Beskar Mandos this year, and a lot of people on this forum will end up with at least a couple (and some of us have discovered we needlessly bought an otherwise fairly mediocre set, or bought one on the aftermarket earlier this year when we could have just waited and got one in a good set) but, hey, it happened. The Beskar Mando legs (with the hips switched to plain) will probably work quite well on the battle pack Mandalorian that didn't have a leg print, right? My bigger consideration now is which of the new kits to buy as boxed, and which to just pick up the builds or minfigs. Duel on Mandalore as boxed as it's cheap enough to buy for just Maul and Ahsoka, hold off on the Light Cruiser as boxed for a deal later in the year, just the build for the Trexler (as I can't get on with the dual-molded Stormtrooper helmets and I don't have a longing for a Greef Karga minifig), wait for the new Boba to show up in other sets (I have the 20th annivesary Slave I so don't need another), and whatever the cheaper way to get Gar Saxon, Bo-Katan and the Mandalorian Loyalist turns out to be (as the Mandalorian Starfighter doesn't appeal to me)?

X-WIngs and TIEs are iconic; people who barely know anything about Star Wars will likely recognise them as being from Star Wars if they see them out of context. Versions of these ships appear in eight of the eleven movies. The Ghost doesn't have that profile, and may not be so attractive to people who aren't such big fans (and, where it's parents buying kits for their kids, it could be that the parents own preferences become a factor). Lots of people who like Star Wars will never have even seen the Ghost. There's also always going to be kids getting into Lego and/or Star Wars who don't yet have those kits. They're never going to stop making X-Wings and TIEs every couple of years as it doesn't make commercial sense to stop making them. One thing that could be interesting is how Disney+ viewing figures could factor into what they may or may not consider is worth remaking. If you compare it to DVD/blu-ray sales while you'd know how many copies you've sold, you don't have quantifiable evidence of how popular a show is after that sale. Maybe loads of people were regularly rewatching Rebels on DVD, maybe they weren't. At least now they know how many people are watching and rewatching the shows on Disney+, they'll know if certain shows, or even certain seasons, are more popular than others, and this could ultimately start to factor into the merchandising decisions Obviously there would still be Lego's own take on top of that, as just because something is being watched a lot that doesn't mean that Lego would have any obligation to make kits for those shows again. It may make no difference whatsoever as the licensee rather than the licensor will be deciding what to make, but it's an additional, and potentially valuable, source of market research that could now give an extra level of insight into what could sell.should Lego chose to factor that into their product decisions

Can speak to the others, but the FO snowspeeder was going to appear more but the scene didn't make the cut. There's an unfinished deleted scene on the Force Awakens blu-ray with a speeder chase that features a couple of them, which would have justified it being made. Probably one where Lego went with the design before it was cut from the film (barring its blink and you miss it appearance in the background of one shot)

Thanks, that does look pretty awesome. NIce to see the Shadow Guard there as well; feels like that figure doesn't get the love it deserves. A shame as it looks really sweet with minor upgrades

I swtiched the hips on all of my standard Stormtroopers to use the hips from the First Order Stormtrooper. It's obviously comes with a certain acceptance that you're diverging from on-screen accuracy a little, but it looks a lot better than the black hips. Didn't work so well on Imperial Shock Troopers so I just switched to plain white hips on those, which at least means the hips on those no longer jar quite so much to look at

This is great; I really like the bunker and turret in particular. Any chance of a better look at the MTV-7?

Sorry, yes, you're right. They're BigKidBrix, not Brickarms. The Cortosis staff rather than the force pike, as you can't add the blade to the pike

And, more of an actual update of figures that were otherwise quite lacking, Shadow Guard updated with Vader's legs (though with plain black hips still), Firestar custom Deathtrooper arms, the red head switched out for trans red, and BigKidBrix weapons, plus Shadow Troopers with black hips replaced with pearl dark gray, and the Firestar custom arms

Some really basic, though pretty satisfying, pilot mods Resistance pilots with head and helmet switches to bring them more in line with other rebel pilots. From L-R, the Battlefront rebel trooper helmet, the helmet from the R1-J5 astromech and a Firestar custom pilot head, the polybag A-Wing Pilot helmet from Rebels, and Barion Raner's helmet (those last two helmets with a little of the print erased to make them distinct), plus the Firestar custom Resistance pilot arms for the dark orange flightsuits Some surplus Snowspeeder pilot minifigs pressed back into service with clone pilot helmets and the Firestar custom Snowspeeder pilot arms

That canopy piece really neatly sidesteps the slightly clunky nature of the canopy official Snowspeeder builds (and the almost horizontal seating position of the pilot and gunner that comes with it)

The CMF jungle explorer torso is a reasonable shout as well https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=973pb3655c01

Pinterest works as well, and keeps you clear of the regularly changing subscription issues with flickr. Once you've uploaded the photo you just need to click on it in the pin, which will open the image in a new tab and copy the url from there.

The resistance pilots those arms are for have the dark orange flightsuits. It looks like Ponda Baba's jacket is bright orange?

Deep into the custom arm rabbit hole now, so here's an updated 501st clone pilot with the Firestar 501st custom arms and the new Lego 501st legs (plus the new 501st clones, minus the jetpack, with their respective Firestar arms)

Does anyone happen to have Firestar's custom 501st clone trooper and jet trooper arms and also the 501st clone pilot (sw0439, from the Z-95 Headhunter) who would be able to post a photo of how the pilot looks with those arms? I'm going to update my pilot with the new 501st legs and a set of Firestar arms and not sure which would look better. Thanks!

I tend to not make use of the sequel characters (though I am a fan of the resistance officer and trooper minifigs, which have effectively been retconned as just other rebel forces in my headcanon) but had ended up with a number of Poe and Finn minifigs so, after a bit of a play around to find complementary pieces, I now have a unit of what kind of looks like a resistance-styled update of a fleet trooper? (The lighting stops it from being immediately obvious but that's tan arms to match the shirt on the trooper with the Poe torso)

That's such a nice tank droid. It's a kit I'd like to see Lego redo, and this really nails it.

The Rogue One trooper legs (dark tan, reddish brown, or dark bluish grey) are a pretty good with anything look when they're in line with your colour scheme, and swapping the hips out if the torso already has a belt doesn't tend to spoil the look.

Finally worked out an Imperial Super Commando look that I'm happy with. I wasn't a big fan of the proper legs of the prototype Boba; the torso is so much more detailed that the legs just look a bit lacking in comparison. This is a mix of wanting the figures to look a bit more Stormtrooper-like, and a cost compromise as I didn't want to spend £15 per figure that seems to be the going rate in Europe now to build a squad of five (the default squad size I work to for troopers) when I only had two already. Turns out that, at least yesterday in the UK, the helmet, torso and jetpack can be picked up on bricklink for little more than a third of the cost of the complete figure. Anyway, helmet, torso and jetpack from sw0631, the standard Stormtrooper legs switched to white hips rather than black, Firestar's custom Snowtrooper arms, and the original white hands switched out for light bluish grey to continue the colour scheme from the torso and helmet prints.

Awesome, thanks. Maybe I was just unlucky with the particular backpacks that I bought (CAC ARC trooper pack and Snowtrooper backpack IIRC). I'll give them another shot.

How are the neck brackets on these? I've only ever ordered a couple of custom backpacks (have to say I forget if they were Arealight or CAC, or both) and I found the neck brackets too thick each time. It's obviously just personal taste but I didn't like how thick they were and how much higher the head/helmet sits on the figure as a result. It's the one thing putting me off from buying any more. Has anyone found any where the neck bracket is of similar thickness to the Lego pieces? Thanks for posting these pics. I've gone on a big arm upgrade mission for my Imperials recently. EclipseGrafx seem to hit a lot of the gaps that Firestar don't make, only I was reluctant to pay for postage to the UK without having seen them in action. These look great.

In lieu of anything more accurate, I'm using a Brickarms bolt-caster, without the bow or scope added, and with the stock and the piece of molding that sits in front of the bow trimmed off. It's clearly not that close but it gives it the open look in a more proportional body than the Lego weapon that comes with the figure. If anyone else has any good suggestions I'd be curious to hear them as well.