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I've been wanting to make a modernized Galactic Mediator for ages, I've just never found the time to do it :/

Personally, I count classic R2-D2 style astromechs as minifigs but I don't count battle droids or little single-piece droids like D-O as minifigs.

In this discussion about creativity and whether licensed or unlicensed themes, and remakes or new content within licensed themes are more creative, it doesn't come up a lot that there are different kinds of creativity. Unlicensed themes have great freedom of story, characters, looks, and designs, but they often have very pedestrian building techniques. When you have complete creative freedom to shape the build how you want to, there is little reason to adopt new building techniques or new parts to achieve a particular shape, angle, or detail. In contrast, licensed themes usually show great creativity in building techniques and parts design to achieve a particular result in comparison with real-world or fictional reference material. If you compare remakes of Hagrid's Hut, or the Great Hall, or the Millennium Falcon, over the years, you'll see a lot of creativity in how the subject has been approached in new and innovative ways. Speed Champions and Icons set designers have been particularly open about how their goals of accuracy and functionality have pushed them to adopt surprising techniques and have allowed them to request versatile new parts that have since been widely used in other themes. These two forms of creativity are fairly distinct, and in my opinion they're both indispensable. Lego as a company, and we as Lego fans, need both licensed and unlicensed sets in about a 50:50 ratio to promote both kinds of creativity: unlicensed sets for creativity of expression, and licensed sets for creativity of build.

To be fair, the dark Falcon only takes up one of three upper-mid slots this year. In 2022 the three slots for big playsets were the Scythe, the AT-TE, and the Justifier. In 2023, they were the Coruscant Guard Gunship, the Ghost, and the Yavin IV base. In 2024, they seem to be the Skeleton Crew ship, the ISD, and the Dark Falcon. Given the recent minifig leaks, I think we can expect that the Skeleton Crew ship is actually happening. It's rumored to have ~1325 pcs at $140, which is a pretty good price in LSW. Hopefully that'll be an interesting new design with fun features and good looks. That and the ISD count towards the "literally anything else" you would rather have than a Dark Falcon.

The best thing I can say for it is that the "exhaust trail" of the spaceship could be repurposed as a giant leaning cactus in a landscape build of an alien world. I appreciate the drum-lacquered gold Lightyear windscreen, but the spaceship is otherwise quite simplistic in concept and execution: it's a small, simple airplane built all in black, with a nose borrowed from the 2021 Creator 3-in-1 space shuttle. At least it includes three sets of airplane wheels. I always appreciate it when sets include landing gear, and I'm always disappointed when they don't. I might be interested in buying the spaceship separately, but I'd been hoping it would be interesting enough and large enough to pay maybe $50 for as its own build. Instead, I think I'd pay maybe $20 just for the spaceship.

The Pharrell Williams spaceship has leaked on Instagram.

Remember there used to be rumors of an Icons-style Knight Bus. That's still a plausible idea for a D2C, IMO.

Star Trek, Stargate, and Robocop.

My quick thoughts on your quick thoughts: 1 - I'd be happy to see steady releases of two or three midi-scale starships each year, but no more. 2 - It was a lot easier to release sets that go hand-in-hand when there was a lot less Star Wars content, and a lot fewer new releases. It's a lot easier for Harry Potter, since the source material for that is a single series of tightly-linked movies that returned to the same locations over and over and over. 3 - I've been collecting LSW since 1999, and I've only really ever wanted the iconic vehicles. I've usually not been very interested in obscure stuff I've never heard of, nor minifigures that don't belong with the rest of the set. But that's just my personal preference. 4 - I always thought sales were lower in January because kids and parents have spent their money before Christmas, and that's why the January wave is small. 5 - It's rare that a remake is better in every way than the previous version, or worse in every way. I personally think the Sith Infiltrator needed to be bigger, and the set as released really works a lot better with the Ron McPhatty rebuild if you pretend it's a midi-scale Starship Collection entry. I think the Star Destroyer looks a little bit small, but I don't mind because it still looks really good to my eyes. More generally, I don't quite understand what you mean by "blend small re-releases with large re-releases." Do you mean that some re-releases should be smaller than the previous versions and some should be larger? 6 - YES 7 - YES 8 - I've been collecting LSW since 1999. I've always wanted both more detail and accuracy, and more play functionality, but given the choice between the same vehicle with more detail and more functions I would always prefer more detail/accuracy, ever since I was a kid. Certainly a lot of sets from 2008-2015 had good detail and good functions, but a lot of them compromised accuracy for functions too heavily and ended up looking like crap - janky, fragile crap too, a lot of the time. I agree that LSW sets from the Disney era often focus on detail instead of play features, but not always. I mean, look at the new Sith Infiltrator. That trades looks for play with the big spine for the droid bay. The E-wing has nice retractable landing gear, which I always appreciated as a kid. The Yavin IV rebel base is all about play, not looks. There are the LSW mechs. The Justifier had this great big retractable landing gear mechanism, the Razor Crest is stuffed with play features. And there's only so much you can do to add surprising and unexpected functions to most SW starfighters and speeders.

I mean that prior to that magazine I had not heard of any stories, names, or characters being attached to the 2024 City Space sets.

IIRC that case was laughed out of court.

Wait, how is Lego going after Cobi right now?

Look for web archive captures of FBTB between about 2002-2004.

Ok, now there's lore for CS'24!

FBTB is still around, but it's an infrequently updated blog. It's still run by its original owners from back in the day, but the forum and MOC archives are long gone. I think it was as far back as 2008 or 2009 that the owner redesigned the web site to emphasize what was then a slick new blog template, and in the process the moc archives were lost. You can still see some of them on the Web archive.

Gatekeeping and countering misinformation are entirely different things. Gatekeeping is saying that someone else isn't a "REAL Lego fan" or a "REAL LOTR fan" because of one petty reason or another. It's about deciding who can and can't participate in a group or culture. Countering misinformation is noting that something that someone has said is false (intentionally or not) and putting the truth out there. It's about availability of accurate and factual information, not about group membership or participation. If you're going to use the term "gatekeeping," please use it correctly so that I can understand what you really mean. I'm quite sure Lego doesn't give review sets to brand-new channels. If a YouTuber wants to post a lore-focused review of Barad-Dur, it may not be the first review out of the gate and get the most clicks, but I'm sure in the end it will get plenty of views from those persons who are looking for that kind of review.

The world, and Youtube, and the Lego community, are big enough to accomodate multiple types of reviews. They each have their purpose. Reviews of IP sets by casual fans of Lego without deep knowledge of the IP are valuable, because they show a casual fan what they can expect when appreciating a set simply for its own merits as a Lego build, as a parts pack, as a playset, or as a display set with aesthetic and tactile appeal. Reviews of IP sets by fans of the IP with deep knowledge of the IP are valuable, because they show fans with deep knowledge of the IP what accuracies and inaccuracies to expect relative to the source material, with commentary on how to improve the set for those objectives. Both types of reviews are entirely valid and useful in the commercial space. You, as a deeply invested LOTR fan with considerable knowledge of and passion for the lore, are not the audience for the Barad-Dur review by BrickYouTubeFan123 (just making up a name, so as not to single anybody out). I'm sure there will soon be a very detailed lore-focused review by BrickRingsFan789 (just making up a name, so as not to single anybody out). You don't have to disparage one type of review to promote the other. Depending on their personal interests, any reviewer may make either type of review for different IPs. A passionate LOTR fan like you may make a casual SW review. And that's fine. A passionate SW fan may make a casual LOTR review. And that's fine. Just - play well.

That's a very clean build with nice thin wings and excellent brick-built detailing. The AoTC Delta-7 is a very tricky subject and I think you've done a great job. My only suggestions would be that I prefer a more upright seating position, and I wish the white wedges on either side of the tail fin were curved.

It is a fact that there is a large section of the Lego fan base that absolutely cannot stand the LAN channels. It is NOT a fact that "REAL Lego fans don't like LAN channels." That is your opinion, and that is gatekeeping. I consider myself pretty knowledgeable about Lego themes, Lego building techniques, and Lego history. I've been following Lego releases pretty closely for about 25 years, through catalogs and the internet. I appreciate many LAN members and their content. I also appreciate many non-LAN Lego content creators and their content. I do NOT appreciate LAN and non-LAN content creators sniping at each other, putting each other down, and gatekeeping. Play well, everybody.

Lots of hasty generalizations there. Should Lego make every LAN Youtuber take a subject matter competency/knowledge test for each major IP set? Does Lego even distinguish LAN members by the themes they prefer? I don't think so. Please don't gate-keep like this. Saying that "REAL Lego fans don't like LAN channels" is false and unnecessarily negative.

Also, Endurance is a famous ship of Antarctic exploration. Exploration, polar exploration, (space exploration) are all very much aligned with Lego's brand values. Endurance is probably the most famous sailing ship of exploration that was entirely peaceful. Beagle would also be a good fit, but to a lesser degree, and they've already rejected a Beagle project on Ideas a couple of times.

That's definitely the smallest X-wing build I've ever seen.

It's just a very good render. It's not real.

Good thinking, that's definitely the most prominent vehicle that's had lots of playscale releases and no UCS. And like others have said, there's the Naboo fighter, with an asterisk because the chrome UCS version was no larger than a playscale fighter.

As in the post just above yours, the instructions are on Rebrickable.