The Stud

I love the look of that fighter! I'd really like to try and build that model at some point.

I haven't seen anyone post about that, not even the fake leakers, so we're probably safe. We'll almost certainly get a new Sabine figure based off her appearance in the Ahsoka show. It just won't match this Skywalker Saga design as it's based on Rebels season 3. A shame, especially because the new DLC also showed off an updated Ezra Bridger with the green lightsaber and a darker skin tone. I do think it's interesting that TT Games went out of their way to design these versions of the characters instead of just touching up the Season 1/2 designs they already had previously. It didn't occur to me until recently that the helmet in that set is the completely wrong color. I probably wouldn't have even noticed if it weren't for the fact that I've been looking at custom Sabine figures to possibly add to my collection recently. The Arealight helmets are amazing, but it's difficult to find quality customs of Sabine's torso, legs and arms. Yeah, it's kinda funny that with all the goofy decisions Lego has been making across the board recently, Star Wars has been doing fantastically in my eyes. I didn't think the sets prior to 2020 were bad by any means, but I definitely feel like, so far, this new decade has been a bit of a renaissance for Lego Star Wars.

I'm going to go out on a limb here and guess that most people here would agree with that sentiment. Yeah, getting figures exclusive to wide-release polybags is very uncommon, especially in recent years. That SDCC Captain Marvel polybag and a few video game promos is all that comes to mind recently. I remember people being disappointed that the Spider-Man Bridge Battle polybag didn't include Doc Ock for some reason when they should never have expected him to be released there in the first place. The Lego community, and most kids in general, are very minifig-crazy, so I don't think most people would have a problem if your idea panned out lol. This just occurred to me last night. I am a bit concerned that Lego having four Marvel D2Cs available going into next year (the Daily Bugle, Sanctum Sanctorum, Black Panther bust and Hulkbuster) means that whatever NWH stuff we get in the second half of next year, assuming we actually get stuff, won't include a D2C Statue of Liberty.

Ugh, why does Lego keep doing these Modular promos *after* release day when most of the hardcore Modular fans have already bought them? Granted, I wasn't planning on buying the 2023 Modular Building until later on after I get the Book Shop and Police Station sometime next year, but it's still an annoying trend. I agree with this part of your post. Yeah, price increases are annoying and I feel like most recent D2Cs have either been ridiculously overpriced or just really expensive. Creator sets seem to be the exception though, as they're still consistently great values. Would I be happier if the Modular Buildings remained in that $160-200 range they've mostly stuck at for the last eight or so years? Duh. But the Modular Buildings are fantastic sets regardless, so going from a great value to a really good value money-wise doesn't bother me nearly as much as most of Lego's other money-grabbing moves recently. The value is absolutely still there.

With a lot of sets retiring soon and selling out already, I've been buying up extras of the sets I want multiples of. -I ordered the 66708 Galactic Adventures pack from Walmart, which should be arriving tomorrow. I'll use the extra Trouble on Tatooine to improve the Tusken Raider tent and have an extra ballista and use the extra Duel on Mandalore to display on my dorm room desk. Not sure what I'll do with the extra Maruader Tank besides enjoying the extra Troopers though. I sorta thought about converting the extra one to a K79-S80 Imperial Troop Transport but we'll see. -I bought three more 75280 501st Legion Clone Troopers from Walmart, and used my $35 of gift cards to buy another two from Target. (All of the sets were 20% off btw.) This brings my total of the set to fifteen, though I'll probably keep these other five sealed for now. -Also at Target, I got a second 75342 Republic Fighter Tank and a fourth 75320 Snowtrooper Battle Pack. I decided that whenever I get the UCS AT-AT in the next year, I'll want to fill it up with snowtroopers so I'm going to start buying up more copies of the set to accomplish this. Those two sets aren't retiring soon but they were part of the promotion of "spending $50 to get a $10 gift card". (I planned on using this $10 gift card along with my other ones towards some of those 501st sets but accidentally scratched off the access code...) -Lastly, this was a big surprise for me today. Our Midwestern store chain Meijer has most Lego sets marked down by 30% and they also have a bunch of stackable coupons which I ended up using towards ordering two more 75316 Mandalorian Starfighters for just $30 each, which is half off their retail price. These are probably going to be some of my last Lego purchases for the year.

That looks absolutely fantastic! The exploding AT-ST looks especially stellar. I look forward to seeing more of your work.

They'll almost definitely be to scale with the 2021 TIE. I prefer the older scale but hey, at least we're finally getting remakes of these sets. I'm very hyped about these sets, and that's not just my love for The Mandalorian talking. The Pirate Snub Fighter seems interesting. No exciting details yet but it's cool to get a new ship design at a low price. Hopefully it comes with some cool figures, like maybe Greef Carga wearing his new Season 3 drip. The Fang Fighter vs. TIE Interceptor might have just beat out Jabba's Throne Room for my most anticipated 1HY 2023 Star Wars set. Amongst many of my disappointments with how Lego handled the Rebels sub-theme, one of them was how we didn't getting a Fang Fighter. It's a cool ship design so I'm glad to finally be getting it in Lego form. And of course, it's very exciting to finally be getting a new Imperial TIE Interceptor after so many years. It's crazy how after so many years of fans requesting for a new TIE Bomber and Interceptor, Lego just decides to drop them simultaneously. Especially since they'll be releasing around the same time as our SECOND 501st Battle Pack in three years. I would not have believed all this stuff to be coming if you'd told me three or four years ago. As for the minifigure selection, I'd guess around four or five figures, plus Grogu maybe. A TIE pilot is a no brainer and I'd be surprised if we didn't get a new Bo-Katan in this set. I also think this will be where we see Mando himself and I bet this will be the first set to feature Beskar Mando with updated helmet printing that matches the Durasteel Mando from the UCS Razor Crest. Maybe if we're really lucky, we'll get a new Darksaber mold here too. That would ideally leave us with one or two additional figures for this set, maybe some additional Mandalorians. Additionally, I'm glad to see Lego giving these "starfighter duel" sets another chance after the Vader TIE Advanced vs. A-Wing didn't seem to sell super well due to its price. I also think that with the release of these two TIE variants, that knocks off two of the noteworthy OT starfighters I still feel like I'm missing from my collection. I'll really only be missing the B-Wing and TIE Advanced now. I'm excited to see how these sets turn out!

I'm surprised that we'll be getting details about those May sets so early. I suppose it tracks though, we already know details about some of the Indiana Jones sets. (Though that probably is partially due to the film's delay.)

Assuming that they'd want it to be at the same scale as R2, it'd have to be super expensive and crazy large.

Same here honestly. It was a pretty enjoyable build experience, and I really like the figures that came with it.

We have a decent amount of new releases next year so I expect to see the same balance between sets based on new and old content that we've seen for the last two or three years. Expect a OT/saga-heavy first half of the year with the second half of the year being a bit more of a mixture but still predominately based on newer content. I have a gut feeling that for The Clone Wars, we could see a new play-scale Gunship to go with this year's AT-TE next summer. With how much the Disney+ shows shift around, and I fully expect Mando season 3 to start later than February, I would not be surprised if Skeleton Crew end ups coming out super late next year. My gut tells me that we probably won't get set(s) until 2024. Speaking of Mando season 3, I could see us getting more sets in the summer or fall next year. It ultimately depends on how much material they have to work with, but seeing as how they've already got two sets planned, we can certainly keep our fingers crossed. As for Ahsoka, I fully expect to see at least her T-6 Jedi Shuttle as a set next year (https://preview.redd.it/ubphh0epg2291.jpgwidth=640&crop=smart&auto=webp&s=8106175e5b13f6c1dd551bcf7cd93c1d353b3126) as that seems to be her main ship in the series. I could see us getting another set for the show too. The real wild card will be if and when Lego makes another Ghost, since that ship is all but confirmed to appear in the series. Depending on how much of a role it plays in the show, and whether or not Lucasfilm will try to keep it a secret, we could possibly see a new version next year or in 2024 as well. They could also just make it a Rebels-based set that happens to also tie-in with the Ahsoka series. As for non live-action content, we've got The Bad Batch season 2 coming out early next year. We'll probably get just one set based off of that sometime next year, but more than one would be preferable. (There's so much missing from season 1 as it is.) There's Jedi Survivor coming out in the spring too, and since I don't expect BD-1 to be the only set based off of that franchise, I think it's very likely we get at least one or two more sets next year. Ideally, we'll be getting the Mantis at some point. Last but not least, I think we could see 1-2 more sets from Andor.

Or what if they did both? (: I would love that. My wallet sure wouldn’t.

I find it funny how we're following up what I would consider to be the best year for Lego Marvel (2021 gave us the Daily Bugle, our first CMF series, our first Advent Calendar and the fantastic Infinity Saga wave) with one of the weakest years yet. The only especially interesting sets to me have been the two Doctor Strange ones, Goat Boat and the Wolverine mech for that figure alone. Some other sets, like the new Iron Man Armory and Baby Groot, have been decent but are either overpriced or unexciting, if not both. (I do still want to get those two sets from Costco though.)

I think I like this thing less and less the more I look at it. The proportions look super off, especially in the chest area. The arc reactor and head look kinda shrunken down and obscured. It also does not look even close to being worth $550, good lord. I'd probably prefer the smaller $120 one from four years ago, and I wasn't even a huge fan of it to begin with. I have a feeling that Lego's going to have two poor sellers on their hands with this and the Black Panther bust, especially with them releasing so close to one another. It's just been way too much way too fast with that Thor's Hammer (though not technically a D2C), the Sanctum Sanctorum and both these sets releasing all within less than a year. Fortunately for me and my wallet, I only care about the Sanctum. I guess I'm glad that they didn't do an Avengers Tower, as that would be a set I'd actually be interested in.

I forget that this ship even exists in-universe a lot of the time, but wow, this MOC looks fantastic! The detailing, the angles and the size all blow me away. I'm curious if you could fit a Delta-7b Jedi Starfighter in the back like in the show.

That looks amazing! It feels like it stepped right out of Return of the Jedi.

Stellar work my man! This would make for a fantastic wave. I know I'd buy that AT-DP prototype and Fallen Order diorama without hesitation.

The Brickheadz seem cool. I'm excited for these ROTJ 40th Anniversary sets. And I wouldn't worry about Jabba's Throne Room. The usual credible sources have reported on its existence, Promobricks probably just hasn't gotten around to updating their site with it yet. It's my most anticipated Star Wars set for next year, mainly because I don't own a Jabba or Boushh, so I'm anxious to learn more about it.

I might have posted about some of these already but here’s my recent Lego Star Wars pickups. -I had my $40 Vader Meditation Chamber waiting for me when I came home for Fall Break today. -My three Clone Command Stations I’ve had backordered since August finally shipped, and I have an additional copy of Defense of Hoth and two more Clone Command Stations on the way. (Which brings my total of Hoth Accessory Sets to four and my total of Clone Accessory Sets to eight.) -I’m ordering the UCS Star Destroyer as soon as Double VIP starts tomorrow night. I’m also using an $80 voucher on it, which I should earn most of that amount back with this purchase.

Honestly, I think the May one could be anything. With the Landspeeder this year, I think Lego has really scraped the bottom of the barrel for OT $200-250 UCS sets they haven’t made before. Unless they remake something like Vader’s TIE Advanced or another X-Wing, I don’t see it being an OT set. At the same time, I’m not sure what PT or ST starfighters are iconic enough to do as a set at that price range. Maybe a Jedi Interceptor or a new Naboo Starfighter? My shot in the dark prediction (which I randomly predicted the UCS Razor Crest like a year ago and that came true) is a UCS U-Wing. Rogue One’s a pretty popular movie, it’s a ship they’ve never done in UCS scale (and only once at System scale) and you’ve got that Andor synergy. Throw in some updated versions of the main Rogue One cast and you’ve got yourself a hot seller. As for the fall D2C, I could definitely see a MBS Endor or, less interestingly, a Death Star remake. I’d love some sort of Jabba Palace, but I feel like the diorama set will already fill that niche. The Sail Barge would be fantastic as well but MBS Endor would be my preference.

These are all amazing ideas. I really want CM4SCI’s She Hulk set design to become a reality.

We still have Series 24 and the Disney 100 series that will have the normal packs we can hunt for. It’s the fall 2023 series that is reportedly changing to boxes.

I’m okay with this, it gives me more time to save up with some of the other purchases I’ll likely be making early next year.

I believe I heard someone say that all the current Modular Buildings are selling too well for Lego to retire any at the moment but don’t quote me on that. Works for me as I wasn’t planning on getting the Bookshop and Police Station until this spring. Those are two of the three Modular Buildings I’m missing from 2013 through now. (The other one being the Brick Bank…) I’d be shocked if we didn’t get a new Modular next year. Lego hasn’t ever skipped a year for this theme.

I know that hairpiece was designed in light of Season One, but based off his updated character models in Tales of the Jedi, I think it’s too long for a modern early Clone Wars Anakin minifigure. Maybe it’s just me but the hairpiece you’re talking about looks way shorter to me and it doesn’t part the same way. Anakin’s hair in ROTS is very wavy and I feel like the current hairpiece they’ve been using represents that far better than the Movie Lloyd hair. That’s just me though. That hair in dark brown is perfect for Syril Karn in my opinion. Also, has anyone hear come up with any good minifig-scale L0-LA MOCs? I made an OWK set display on one of my dorm room shelves and I wanted to add little Leia and her droid to it. A young Leia minifig should be relatively easy to make but the problem is that her droid is tiny and I don’t know how likely it is we’ll get a specific mold in the future. (Though we did just get TODO recently…) I found a custom mold for cheap on eBay but I do not have the expertise to paint it.