xboxtravis7992

Yes let's hope for more Defenders too. They made the animation model already, so it should be easy to reuse time after time.

Old yes? But they are tough as nails, and highly accurate. Not to mention the scrap yard scene in Rebels suggests the Empire was still fielding Y-Wings only a few years before the Galactic Civil War started; Plus: #Y-WingsKilledGalenErso #IfLukeFlewA Y-WingTheDeathStarWouldHave BeenBlownUpSooner

I haven't seen the episode yet, but from what I remember in Legends; the Tie Defender was a great ship. But it wasn't bullet proof. It was able to go one on one with an X-Wing, but it could probably be easily swarmed or defeated by either a larger force or a well played strategy. Everything I have heard about the episode suggests only one lone Tie Defender was deployed. Maybe as a test, or perhaps a demonstration to the rebels that the ship they feared was entering the war. Lets hope for later episodes this season or next where the Defender gets to flex its full muscle. Twenty Defenders cutting through a swarm of Rebel ships would be fitting... With that said, Y-Wings are my favorite Star Wars starfighter, so I think I might have a bias...

First of I have to thank you for the link you included; since it shows the ATSF/BNSF unit with the Norfolk Southern unit that 10129 was based on: Photo source: http://atsf.railfan.net/cowls/bnsf6976blackwell2.jpg As the status of 644; as of now it is not operating. It ran a bit in Portland leased to a local shortline for a few years. When the Brooklyn Roundhouse was demolished the units were evicted and were stored in an industrial park in Portland. In that park, several of the HEP cables were cut and stolen by copper wire thieves on the Daylight painted unit. Chris, who had moved to Ogden, Utah shortly before that happened; decided to have them relocated to Utah to find a temporary home. Chris is still trying to find a permanent home for his units, where he will restore them to Amtrak paint and be able to operate them when he wants to. Also seeing that picture of NS 3329 with a Maersk blue pilot makes me wish that Lego had given us that piece in Maersk blue! :P

Now this is going to be a bit of a funky post I think. To be honest only 15% of the content is Lego (and none of it are my own MOCs either!) but I feel the subject is far more befitting of the Train Tech forum than the Community forum, because in particular today I got to go inside the real life Maersk locomotive. Seeing how 10129 is one of the most beloved Lego sets of all time among train fans; getting to go inside the real thing is a special treat. To be technical,the engine I went into today Dynarail 644 is not the same locomotive type which set 10129 is based on, 644 having received its Maersk paint on the ATSF, and the Lego set being based on a Norfolk Southern SD40 unit. However, if you happen to be one of like the five lucky individuals with a stockpile of Maersk blue Lego bricks who is considering adding an additional Maersk locomotive to your Lego collection, 644 is a great prototype that is visually distinct from the original Maerks unit (its wide body would make Power Functions easy in even a six wide build). Also it is a bit of fantasy fulfillment, being able to climb into the cab of a Maersk unit like the minifigures on our Lego train sets get to do everyday. Also as part of the train show today I did get to stop by the ULUG group. As mentioned before, I am not a member of the ULUG as of now; but I like to see their displays. In particular, a large portion of today's display was significantly different from the last ULUG display I saw a few months back, so I gotta give them credit for constantly being able to mix things up with their work! My pictures in the ULUG display came out blurry, so I didn't take a lot of them, but I hope you guys will enjoy what you are able to see. Forgive the blurry photo quality. The ULUG train display as always was a hit with kids and families. Here we can see the Disney Castle set surrounded by a lot of the smaller Disney Princess sets, situated next to a classic space monorail display. Another blurry picture of the ULUG set up (I never have had good luck taking photos inside an event such as this.) The layout's railyards are in the distance, with a display of mosaics, Star Wars, Technic, and other stuff in the foreground. The ULUG had a good location, between the Sherman Hill HO Layout display and the Rio Grande Modeling and Historic Society display. Honestly due to the traffic flow in the event, the Lego layout was the first layout I saw during the trip. Now for the 644 the Maersk unit. This was one of several Maersk units which worked different US railroads, and the only one I know that is in preservation. The unit's owner, Chris Fussell is planning on restoring it to its original Amtrak paint; but for now it wears the Maersk heritage proudly. Unit owner Chris Fussell in his appropriate "Maersk Blue" shirt opening up the engine for us. Unlike the Norfolk Southern unit set 10129 is based on, 644 worked for the ATSF (Santa Fe) railroad. Hence why the paint patterns evoke the Warbonnet scheme used on the Superchief. This is what it looks like from the cab of a Maersk painted unit. If you have been wondering what your minifigures could see out of your 10129 set, it probably looks similar to this. The cab of the real thing is far more roomier though, with three seats, and standing room for six or so people. Chris in discussion about his Maersk unit and its sister Daylight unit coupled behind it. Eventually the two units will return to their proper Amtrak paint; but for now they still wear their more ostentatious colors. If I had more time and money I would love to MOC up these two units in Lego. YouTuber and fellow Blogger "SconeEmpire" taking in the view from the engineer's seat of the Maersk unit. I hope you enjoyed my little Maersk locomotive interlude. I had so much fun with 644 today, I am really tempted to start seeing if I can capture the unit in an LDD MOC sometime (who knows, if I start that maybe this will become a work in progress thread someday? ) Although seriously, if any of you guys want to beat me to the punch in bringing in some more Maersk power into Lego, I'd be happy to see it! Until next time.

Not supposed to end, just rumors that Disney would cancel it early. Glad to hear we are getting Season 4, hopefully it is the time they need to connect it completely into Rogue One. I wonder if Rogue One helped boost interest in Rebels due to the cameos?

That is why when I made an LDD model years back of the Star Speeder from the Disneyland ride Star Tours I tried to include EVERY single seat in the actual ride vehicle. I don't know how stable the model would be in real life, but if I ever revisit it again (and make it into real bricks) I will still try and keep all the seats present in the model. Seats in Lego sets are so much fun in the simplest of ways.

I wonder how it would test out in stability. I do sometimes get frustrated myself how little seating is found in some newer sets these days. Even the 2012 Quinjet which was near perfect, lost a lot of seating capacity thanks to the overly complex and not very fun drone mechanism they built into the body. Some sets the only reason I can think they lack in seating is I figure that the hollow spaces create structural weaknesses which make it so the model can't withstand play. Either that, or Lego has forgotten that children and collectors like being able to seat figures inside vehicles.

Its boring, drab, overly realistic; and I'm in LOVE with it! To many "reactors" in Sci-Fi, media, models, and Lego are big colorful affairs that often ignore how the things actually work. You have it pretty spot on, with the collection of fuel rods (dark grey rods like the real thing and not Simpson's transparent green too!), to the automated rod retrieval crane, to the pool to store waste. It is very obvious you did your research, and it shows in the model.

The decals are spot on. I think it needs though the dynamic brake blister to be modified a bit to match the curves on the ends of a real SD40-2 unit. As for the "Sufferin' Pacific" thing I want to speculate it was a not so subtle comment on the unstable state of the SP at the time. The SP knew that the Union Pacific was courting the Western and Missouri Pacific for mergers. If the UP gained the WP-MP routes, it would extend their system into central California and down into the deep south such as Arkansas. These were areas that the SP had previously not had much competition, but the arrival of the UP would signal and end to their dominance. I recently heard anecdotal accounts that in Ogden, Utah; SP freight managers were routing their own traffic to the Western Pacific, in a desperate attempt to make the WP more profitable and convince the shareholders that the WP could continue as a solo road without having to merge into the growing UP family. Of course all the anti-merger things the SP did failed by 1982-83 when the WP and MP joined into the Union Pacific's fold. By the end of 1983 the SP, in a rough situation; was courting its own merger with its long time rival the Santa Fe, but the merger was denied by the federal government and the ATSF used the opportunity to strip the SP of its profitable non-rail assets. The SP was left in limbo only to be rescued by the Denver and Rio Grande in 1989, which briefly bolstered the SP. Yet the DRGW executives were still striping away the non-rail assets of the SP into their own interests, and by 1996 both the DRGW and SP systems were handed over into Union Pacific control. So yeah, "Sufferin' Pacific" indeed.

This is the first trailer that caught my interest out of the trailers we have gotten so far. The other ones felt like, "generic CGI effects pirate movie" while this one somehow felt a little closer to the best parts of Curse of the Black Pearl, and the sense of naive adventure I get from riding the original theme park ride in Disneyland. I like the idea this guy is out for revenge on Jack due to something Jack did as a very young boy.

Somebody bumped an old thread, quick report it to one of the mods! Oh wait...

A brief update on all the new Star Wars content this month from YouTube:

Tram I hope

Ewok's are Shi-Tzu's that EAT people. If that ain't nightmare fuel for you all, then I don't know what is. I think the Darth Jar Jar theories are ridiculous fan theories meant to generate clickbait on YouTube video titles. I doubt Lucas was EVER really considering Jar Jar as a sith lord, only desperate fans struggling to find meaning in his antics. As for his antics... When I saw the Phantom Menace as a kid I loved the film, and everything about it. My parents have a picture they took a few months later of us in a super market posing with a plastic display statue of Jar Jar Binks. I remember them going out of their way to take me to the market to get a picture with Jar Jar. Now they actually hated the film, but it wasn't until I was older and my palette refined a bit that I started to see the flaws in the film. By the time Revenge of the Sith came out I could see the flaws of the Phantom Menace rather well. However, to be honest Jar Jar had a few decent moments in The Clone Wars series. Although I am still creeped out by the episode where it is revealed Jar Jar had a girlfriend... it was a little to weird for me. I actually do feel sorry for him though knowing what happened to him after the wars finished. I think Disney chose a conclusion to his story that sums up how the character was received by fans, giving him some in universe tragedy.

Yes please. Those look awesome, considering how many military style jets Lego has done recently in bright colors (Captain America's F-14 thing for example, or the bright blue F-35 also from the Avengers sets, or the recent stunt show set) I could see Lego releasing some of those as real sets. Still, although the F-16's and F-18's in those photos are de-armed and basically glorified stunt planes, Lego might hesitate given their connection to two active military units.

To quote what I already mentioned in the Brickset comment section: I just really feel upset that Lego is trying to repeat the Research Institute again. And yes it is a public relations stunt again, just Google News search "Lego" right now and you will see dozens of Tech and other news sites reporting it. HALF of them also linking to the point "hey the woman from that new film that came out is IN THIS SET." Lego is playing the press like a fiddle with this, as I said "brownie points." Not quite as bad as when Lego disavowed Shell due to Greenpeace (despite the fact I am sure Shell is probably still producing a large chunk of oil which becomes plastic in Lego sets...); but this is still pretty pandering. Not to mention, it is not that cool of a set. Now imagine with me that the project, rather than being "Minifigures on plate" had some actual cool stuff on it? I haven't seen Hidden Figures yet or read much on the history, but from the trailers I have seen, lets imagine a set were we get our Katherine figure, but we also get with it a miniature science lab AND a midi-scale Mercury-Atlas rocket, with a side build featuring the Mercury capsule. It would have honored those who worked on the program, we would have got a good set, and it would still be a STEM inspiring build. Instead though we are getting what looks like a baseplate with some figures. Now this isn't meant to say I want to see less female minifigures in sets. Quite the opposite, Lego still hasn't hit the golden %50-%50 male to female fig set ratio in their production (although City and Creator sets seem to be doing that). Lego has been making great strides to balance it out, and I don't want to see them stop until it happens. But doing it this way seems pandering and like a quick way to gain press attention. Also I should mention, out of the sets in the review; I was hoping for Little House to win because I have a family member who absolutely loves that series, and has just began collecting Lego for herself. I thought she would have enjoyed it.

I haven't read it, but I have seen a few YouTube video reviews. Apparently it reveals the fate of... Jar Jar Binks?

Well I finally did catch up to the latest Agents episode. That was very satisfying. A bit of a horror story type vibe going on to conclude the arc. Also, remember all my gripes about Daisy I said in my last post? I didn't have any gripes like that with her in this episode, it felt a lot more like the classic SHIELD episode dynamic.

I haven't seen the finale of the LMD arc yet, but so far it has been one of my least favorite arcs in the series. Very convoluted, I grew sicking of trying to guess "Who is a robot now?" every episode. It made me wish he had more Ghost Rider or classic SHIELD v. Hydra stuff instead of all the crazy robot nonsense. Of course it had some cool moments along the way, but not my favorite story on the show so far. Another growing complaint I have; I know Daisy Johnson is the show's lead Inhuman (basically I'd dare say she is the most important character second only to Coulson) but she has REALLY been getting on my nerves this whole season. Her abandoning SHIELD after Lincoln died in Season 3, her constant spouting of "INHUMAN RIGHTS MATTER" for nearly every single line of dialogue she says. She has just become annoying, and every minute we spend on her in the show is a minute I wish I could be seeing what Fitz, Simmons, Ghost Rider, Mack, Jeffery Mace, May, Coulson, etc. where up to instead. I'm sorry, but that is how Daisy feels this season. Which is a pity since I thought her story arcs in Season 1 and 2 were great, but now I feel she is just standing around doing nothing for the show other than being the "superhero muscle" of the group. It is also weird having her act as the "spokesperson" and "quasi-leader" of the Inhumans right now, especially since we know that the Royal Family is coming to the MCU. I don't know much about Inhuman lore from the comics, but to me it sounds like any group called the ROYAL FAMILY would have more control and influence over the Inhumans than Daisy acts like she has. Honestly after having watched four seasons of Agents, I am starting to feel the show is running a bit low on steam. Either it needs a new breath of life (such as a cool tie into a new film like Winter Soldier did to the show); or the writers need to prepare for a good finale arc to conclude it in a coming season. I hear rumors the show is sitting on "the bubble" right now, meaning ABC is debating to renew it or cancel it. For being such a costly show to produce, it has low ratings; while at the same time it is one of their only shows which brings in a young male demographic. Agents also rates very high on DVR viewings, suggesting a streaming service might be a better fit for it than prime time TV is (my family watches it all on DVR ourselves). I am hoping they renew it for a final season, and that the show writers use that opportunity to conclude the series and set the stage for Infinity War. Then they should focus their efforts on the new projects for Marvel TV, such as Inhumans, Cloak and Dagger, New Warriors, etc.

The D23 convention isn't new, it has been running for several years since 2009. It is just recent that Marvel is included now too, since the previous conventions focused on Disney Films, TV, and Theme Parks (Theme Park news is still the biggest draw of the D23 convention, especially since it is held in Anaheim across the street from Disneyland). Considering that Disneyland is going to get a theme park ride based on the Guardians of the Galaxy in May, and already has meet and greet opportunities with Captain America and Spider-Man; it seems D23 will be an easy fit for Marvel. Since D23 is held though only every other year, bet a full Marvel presence in SDCC 2018. I really am disliking the SDCC exclusive policy too. The only people who get a hold of them are AFOL's in SoCal, scalpers, and AFOL's with money to travel to SDCC to get it themselves, or pay a scalper to get it. In relative terms, I don't live to far away from California, but it is still a nine to eleven hour road trip to reach San Diego, not a fun endeavor; nor a cheap one at that. That is part of why I have never been down to the SDCC, and probably why it isn't going to happen anytime soon for me. Speaking of which there are a few characters that if Lego releases as an SDCC exclusive I will be royally pissed. Like if Spider-Gwen or Squirrel Girl are released as SDCC figs and not regular retail figs. It would be awful! Anyways, a bit back on the topic of set discussion. I bought the Iron Man vs. Detroit Steel and Ayesha's Revenge last week on my birthday. Detroit Steel surprised me in that the basic frame build is actually the exact same as the Hulkbuster from 2015, putting the two almost to the same height. The figs were great, but finally getting a Coulson and Lola too were the highlight. Ayesha's Revenge was fun. I don't quite know what to do with the yellow "bathysphere" space ship thing but all the figs were awesome too. Especially Groot. I am a bit disappointed though that it didn't include Star Lord's helmet. I missed out on the original Guardians of the Galaxy wave, so I am glad to have a chance to collect the new sets.

By old fashioned issues do you mean the Cold War parables of TOS? Yep rather out of date now. I still feel like Discovery is setting itself up for disaster. The streaming only method, the disrespectful comments from CBS officials, the fact so many older Trek fans just can't get hyped for it, etc. I won't be watching it probably. What I want to see from Star Trek on TV is something akin to the Next Generation. Mature enough to tackle some philosophical issues (as long as it doesn't feel preachy like TNG did sometimes); light-hearted enough it could be a TV series the family could enjoy, special effects with a modern polish, interesting characters, and some great exploration. I want to see the Star Trek prime reality post the destruction of Romulus; with a new sense of instability, and new places to explore (sort of like what Star Trek Online was trying to do). I want the color palette to be colorful, but not quite as "out there" as the TOS or the reboot films were. In short I basically want a Star Trek TV series that is STAR TREK and not Walking Space Dead Streaming Service of Thrones 'Trek' that all the rumors seem to indicate Discovery is shaping up to be.

Beware the Vulture looks really good! New Iron Man, return of MCU Spidey, and a cool looking vehicle. The Vulture's wings look HUGE, but that is easy to forgive. Is the Iron Man supposed to be his suit from Civil War, just now more detailed than the original fig from last year was? If so, it makes me glad I haven't bought the airport battle set yet if it is supposed to represent the same armor. The bank heist has the cool robber figures, but it is kind of 'meh.' Reminds me of the Spider Man 2 wave from all those years back with the very thin facade of a building. If it is cheap, might be worth the purchase.

I haven't been collecting to many of the Star Wars buildable figures (I was into Bionicle during both of its production runs, but those sets were a lot cheaper than the Star Wars ones are); but when I see a good deal I pick up the Star Wars ones. $8 Was an absolute steal! The only other Star Wars figure I own is General Grievous who as a mechanical character also looks great in the medium. From what I have seen the troopers and masked figures don't look half bad either. In particular the Speeder Bike set coming out later this year looks to be the highlight of the Star Wars Buildable Figure line.

K2SO build-able figure for only $8 USD! Great bargain!