TheUnusualBuilder

What angle is that?? Agreed. I think the ideal for a Sonic display model would be buildable characters similar to the large Mickey and Minnie from a few years ago - Sonic and friends were designed as rubberhose characters, so that style of figure would fit perfectly. Plus, there would already be a prefab piece they could use for the forehead and eyes rather than the... INTERESTING solution LEGO came up with for ol' Shads here. I imagine it's because SEGA is marketing 2024 as the "Fearless Year of Shadow", with the character getting a major role in the third movie, a major expansion to Sonic Generations, and an animated miniseries. SEGA probably asked for a Shadow-themed display piece, which led to the decapitated edgehog we can see. No. He's... THE ULTIMATE SO!!!

The Shadow the Hedgehog head set was just revealed and... I'm an optimist, but I'm also a realist. And this is REALly one of the worst display sets LEGO has ever made. The spikes look fine (not great, but fine), but everything about the face is just terrible, from the balloon cover center to the studded eyes to the barrel nose to the choppy muzzle. If LEGO couldn't come up with a remotely good design here, they shouldn't have wasted the set slot. On the bright side, this is a really accurate model of Shadow's head from that one Pakistan Happy Meal commercial.

Everytime somebody complains that LEGO hasn't done ENOUGH Clone sets in the last few years, an angel gets its wings clipped and deep fried in peanut oil.

Oh, I'd LOVE if LEGO Star Wars could start doing some cute $10-$13 playsets, especially since Microfighters are all but extinct. Not holding my breath for it to ever happen, though.

Can it really "continue" if it was impressively broken this very year?

Considering how much smaller he'll have to be for the set to also include the pram (and presumably scale well enough with R2-D2), I imagine they'll have to incorporate some prints for the face rather than fully brickbuilding him, so hopefully it'll be an improvement.

Buildable Grogu isn't that interesting, but I imagine he'll be smaller to fit into the new builable character scale with R2-D2 and C-3PO (hence also getting the pram this time around).

Acclamator sounds interesting, I'm surprised to get what will presumably be a very sizeable model for only $50, though I suppose it is very flat. I'm curious whether it'll be the all-gray Attack of the Clones version (which was done for the only previous LEGO Acclamator in an Advent Calendar) or the Clone Wars version in Venator livery (which would pair more nicely with the Invisible Hand).

According to Brick Clicker, the last two sets are a $50 18+ midi-scale Acclamator (prototype Star Destroyer) and a $100 Buildable Grogu in his pram.

$45 for Ahsoka's Interceptor is INSANE. I know that LEGO price-gouging is nothing new, but here it feels especially egregious since the ETA-2 is up there with the Millennium Falcon as one of those sets where LEGO's essentially been selling the same set with minimal changes for 20 years, just at an increasingly higher price. It would be nice to get a total overhaul with a new cockpit, but I'm not holding my breath - like with the Coruscant Gunship and Dark Falcon, doing a funky variant here feels like an excuse to NOT have to improve on past models. Hope the minifigures are nice, at least - I'd expect a new Ahsoka, R7, and some Glup Sh*tto clone to placate the whinging masses. Great to finally get a new ARC-170 after 15 years, hopefully it lives up to the hype and is a good size for the price. I have no particular interest in whatever clones they include, but a new Plo Koon would be pretty nice. Midi-scale Home One is amazing news, it's one of the ships that really came to mind as perfect for this Starship Collection, and I'm super excited for it - I think it'll pair exceedingly well with the Nebulon-B, and if it looks good enough it might push me to give in and also buy the midi-scale Tantive, to have a complete Rebellion fleet. I'd love if the unknown $50 midi was finally the Naboo Royal Starship, but I'm not holding my breath - I'll predict it's a Lambda shuttle. $30 4+ N-1 is interesting, but in a very uninteresting way. I'm expecting it to be based on Mandalorian, with a fairly bland figure selection (Mando, Grogu, Stormtrooper), but I'd love to be surprised. The real question is (and this will likely never be asked with a 4+ set again), will this end up looking better than the awful full-size model? Lord, I hope not. No way am I spending $240 on something with about 2.40 seconds of screentime (especially when there are so many cooler subjects in TPM).

Knowing LEGO, next year's UCS sets will both be based on The Phantom Menace and we'll get a UCS Eta-2 in 2026

Yeah, I'm already worried the ARC-170 will be all we're getting, but I'll choose to have a bit of hope. I'm not expecting something amazing like a UCS of Anakin's ETA-2, or the all-ROTS summer wave that some people want, but if we can get either a large Mustafar playset or a "high ground" diorama I'll be pretty happy.

Jedi Bob's Starfighter revealed by thebrickreporter on Instagram Looks interesting, it basically looks like an early-2000s era Delta-7 but souped-up, with big blaster cannons and huge engines underneath

It's alright, but imo it pales in comparison to the 2006 and 2014 versions in terms of both size and interior, not to mention one of the most bland minifigure selections in LSW history. It does look very nicely detailed, but imo if they weren't going to focus on the aspects that make it a playset it should've just been a midi-scale ship, like the Executor from last year (which is a much better Imperial Flagship set for less than half the price). In my opinion the best set of the summer is the buildable C-3PO, but in terms of minifgure-compatible kits I'd cast my vote for the Skiff & Sarlacc - while the price is abominable and Boba is inaccurate, the rest of the minifigures and both builds look really fantastic. That said, I think it's almost inarguable that the summer waves were absolutely crushed in terms of quality by the March and May releases - based on those two waves I would've called 2024 one of the best years LSW has ever had, a sentiment which I unfortunately no longer hold.

Bricksie just uploaded a review of the Duel on Peridea set, confirming the Night Trooper gets a new zombie head underneath the helmet.

Welp, woke up to find two new reveals with some very... interesting revelations. Starting with Peridea, it should be noted that I haven't actually watched Ahsoka, so I'm mostly judging this as a LEGO set with some limited knowledge sprinkled in. The build is... fine? Obviously it's essentially just a base to display minifgures on, but I'd be lying if I said it wasn't an incredibly nice base. I'm a big fan of the shaping and angles - it's clearly a very smart build, which is what I mainly go for in LEGO sets. The minifigures are... a mixed bag. It's great that Ahsoka has arm printing again, but I think LEGO missed the memo that this I'd supposed to be Ahsoka the WHITE - when I first saw the picture, my immediate thought was that they'd just reused the 2023 version! Morgan looks good (I'm glad they switched to legs here, it works better for a fight scene), as does Thrawn. Ezra looks goof aside from the eyes (an issue which also plagues Ahsoka), and the Night Trooper is... very disappointing. Some dark gray printing would have gone a long way. $55 is way too much (it feels like you get so much more with the Tantive hallway at the same price), but I might pick this up if I can find it on sale, though it's one of the only August sets I can see selling well enough to avoid the clearance bins. Desert Skiff and Sarlacc Pit (much less fun name than the leak) is pretty good. The Skiff is about on par with previous versions (though the breakaway railing is a nice touch), but the Sarlacc is fantastic, not to mention massive - this is the first version that feels like a true Sarlacc Pit, not just a dinky sidebuild. I love that you can puppeteer the tentacles as well, a very nice feature. For the minifigures, it's time to play the GOOD, the BAD, and the UGLY! The Good: The new Luke looks incredible. Torso and legs are great (I was worried they'd reuse Luke's robes from The Mandalorian), and the new hairpiece feels more natural now that it's not awkwardly placed on a decade-old figure. Lando also looks good (though I do wish his head was in the newer medium brown color), and the updated Han is nice. Very glad to finally get Nien Nunb regardless of circumstances, though he could be better - his bottom face fold should be a darker color, and boots would've been a very nice premium touch. The Bad: Boba is a reused as rumored, and it doesn't work at all. Sand blue Boba looks bizarre alongside the Sarlacc Pit, and the lack of a cape might make this the worst Boba since before 2010. Massive disappointment. The Ugly: How has it been 10 years and Chewbacca is still the wrong shades of brown? His main fur color is the same shade as Han's hair (for which LEGO uses reddish brown), and his lighter color isn't nearly as contrasting as how he currently looks. Imo reddish brown and dark orange would look so much better on Chewie - and while we're at it, make a new mold to close his darn mouth. $80 is insane though, so this I'd a set I'll pick up the moment I can find it on sale. Now all that's left is the Bobfighter, which at this point may well end up being the highlight of the summer for most people. A walker is not a tank. A walker is OBVIOUSLY not a tank. Calling a walker a tank is the kind of nonsense I expect from a US presidential debate, not a Eurobricks forum.

I think you're exactly on the money, though if I had to guess the more likely reason for it is that Disney isn't certain whether Giancarlo Esposito is willing to return for the movie, so they've written Mando s3 so that whether he does or doesn't return it would make sense narratively either way. Leaving fates ambiguous for that reason is fairly common - the immediate case that comes to my mind is Jim Carrey in the last Sonic movie, but a more relevant example to this forum would probably be Han Solo being frozen in carbonite at the end of Empire, because nobody knew if Harrison Ford would come back for Return of the Jedi. Oh please, this wouldn't even be in the top 35 most nonsensical Star Wars plot developments.

I believe the current rumored selection is Luke (new hairpiece), Han, Chewie, Disguised Lando, Boba Fett (ESB version), and Nien Nunb. (There were rumors about Weequay, but I believe it came out that leakers were mistaking Nien Nunb for him.) Okay but that was a joke. You're aware that that was a joke she made, right? (Hence everyone in the room laughing at it?) Fair enough, I suppose. If we could get the Azure Angel in 2015, 12 years after it had last been relevant, it's never impossible they could do other Legends sets. Honestly I think the main thing working against Mara (particularly as an Anniversary figure) is that, again, while the character herself might be pretty cool, her actual design is fairly generic and easy to make with existing pieces. I know you could argue that Mara Jade isn't any less bland than Young Leia, but to that I begrudgingly borrow a point from MandR (a broken clock is right twice a day and all that): The set is clearly designed to have stereotypical young girl appeal, so they included the only prominent young girl in Star Wars that doesn't already have a minifigure. (Thinking about it now knowing what the set is, I wouldn't be surprised to learn that's the entire reason they chose Young Leia as part of the lineup.) I think the best hope of there ever being an official Mara Jade minifigure is if, when the Mando & Grogu/Heir to the Empire movie comes out, LEGO does an 18+ set based on the original version that includes a figure of Mara Jade. It's unlikely, but LEGO regularly does crazier things.

Yep. I'd already decided not to collect all the anniversary sets after how seeing how mediocre the Star Destroyer was, but this set is just a further nail in that coffin. It's a good thing that I'm mostly just a fan of the nine saga films, I don't mind missing out on obscure fan-requested characters

Same to be honest. Reading Legends material with Luke having a wife and kid reminds me of the 90s Doctor Who TV movie, when Paul McGann started swapping spit with some woman who had just murdered him. ANYWAY back to LEGO, the thing I don't get is that (to me) Mara Jade sounds about as uninteresting as a minifigure as Young Leia did. She's just a ginger woman in a black jumpsuit - swap a Black Widow minifigure's arms for light nougat, and you have a LEGO Mara Jade.

Oh, that Young Leia figure looks BAD. I know we'd already seen it in that animation months ago, but I was really hoping that wasn't a final design. As-is, the hairpiece is inaccurate and looks terrible (a new mold would have been ideal but the Arendelle Anna hair from Disney would have worked very well), and the outfit is completely the wrong color (should be sand green and dark red, the colors they went with are terribly inaccurate and look so boring). Face print is cute, but this figure is absolutely a miss.

Imo what really kills the Droid Factory set is the size and price. If it was just two droids (probably R2 and Chopper, maybe with a few extra pieces to swap R2 into KT or R4-P17) and some accessories for like $40, I could see this being a fun toy for kids. As-is, I can't imagine any kid choosing these tiny droids with goofy accessories over the large R2-D2 for the same price, much less an actual playset.

I mean, it is a very special brick, it's only included in like 36 other sets. Definitely a better inclusion than a special minifigure (/j, getting the UCS 3PO figure more than makes up for it in my eyes) Looking closely, it seems like all of the gold pieces with decoration (mouth, chest, stomach dot) are printed while all of the black pieces (wires, hands) are stickered. Color scheme is pearl gold and dark tan (no metallic gold), and the silver leg is metallic silver and light bluish gray.

Honestly, my money's on the First Order Trooper helmet. It appeared as recently as 2020 (and I highly doubt LEGO threw out the mold, considering that last year we got Rey's hairpiece which hadn't been seen in just as long), and it's essentially a Stormtrooper shape with a completely smooth surface to print on.

Lot of speculation about Enoch's helmet, is it possible they'd use the Phase II Clone Pilot helmet (from the 2010 ARC 170 and a few other sets)? It wouldn't look particularly accurate, but it has a cutout for a minifigure face that I could see LEGO using as an alternative for printing a face onto the helmet.