LEGO Star Wars 2021 Set Discussion - READ FIRST POST!!!

[McMurder_them_softly]

10 minutes ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

Realistically either one of the Mando sets or the mystery 75369. No-one has said it won't be the UCS AT-AT, but I doubt we would see that before the gunship based on the release schedule we have (and because UCS sets don't tend to get a reveal beyond a few weeks AFAIK). Personally my money is on the cruiser - wasn't last year's AT-AT revealed early, or am I making that up?

UCS AT-AT dark horse for the reveal! 

Yeah the AT-AT was revealed early from Amazon Japan I think on accident and LEGO just rolled with it, if I recall correctly. 

[hondohnaka]

46 minutes ago, TeddytheSpoon said:

Realistically either one of the Mando sets or the mystery 75369. No-one has said it won't be the UCS AT-AT, but I doubt we would see that before the gunship based on the release schedule we have (and because UCS sets don't tend to get a reveal beyond a few weeks AFAIK). Personally my money is on the cruiser - wasn't last year's AT-AT revealed early, or am I making that up?

Brickset have a review up of the Gauntlet starfighter as well, with some more pictures. It seems like another mod-heavy set - gaps around the cockpit, a few inaccuracies compared to the screen, and - inexplicably - no landing gear. Where has this sudden vendetta against retractable landing gear come from?!

It's dumb too because it's such an easy thing to add  two 1x1 studs, a ratchet clip and then whatever build you want for the actual foot. 

Edited June 23, 2021 by hondohnaka

[Kit Figsto]

15 hours ago, Mandalorianknight said:

First i'd say it's one rather large set, but they also have a limited number of total sets per wave. Since they wanted to do more CW sets and apparently more Mando sets, they had to balance it. I'd guess that they chose the clone wars and mando sets over more bad batch sets because

a: they're still cautious. I should have been more clear, I don't expect a wave filled with sets for an upcoming show before it releases. My guess is their plan is to do a couple sets before or during the show's run, then more sets a wave or two later planned.

b: clone wars and mando finished their series/seasons already, so if they were going to do more sets, they'd get the most money the soonest after they finished. Bad Batch season 1 won't even be done by the time this wave releases, so it still has a huge amount of "stock" left for, say, the January wave.

This seems to be the general pattern for TV shows.  Maybe there's still aversion because of how the Rebels wave was kinda botched, but it seems like one set with the launch of the show, then more after that if the show has a positive reception has been what they've done with Bad Batch, Mandalorian, and now Book of Boba Fett.  Honestly, I kind of like it, because it does seem like they're now more open to doing stuff based on TV shows, and this way we get a preview before the show comes out.  Part of the thing when the sequels were coming out is that I didn't really pay attention to the sets until after I'd seen the movie, since I wanted to avoid spoilers.  With this method of releasing, it's pretty spoiler-free.

[Kim-Kwang-Seok]

21 hours ago, Clone OPatra said:

It's more surprising to me that LEGO has put up images and info for the Clone Wars sets. It's not like they did a "reveal" for those, no big press release or splash about it - just put them up on the website basically. How often do they list sets over a month in advance unless they're something special for pre-order?

They might just pop the Mando sets onto the website quietly too, closer to August.

If there's one question I'd want a straight answer from TLG'people it would be about their weird way of advertisement and non-advertisement. Like, they literally give away a lot of money by letting youtubers, instagramers and others fill the void for news. As far as I understand there's people who make a living by making Lego videos. And also they can afford expensive equipement and Lego for this.

But I think there are good reasons. Absurd reasons maybe - but its a big company in a big market. I guess it has a lot to do with contracts. Probably any retailers won't like to have a lot of advertisement online for new products they can't sell for months. After all they hope to sell worse products and current products still.

What would be cool is to have products when the sets come out. Like can you imagine a similar release schedule for the current shows as we had for the sequel movies? Ahsoka vs. Maul would have been hotter last year. But as people pointed out; probably they need time to see if people care about the shows.

Edited June 23, 2021 by Kim-Kwang-Seok

[Meaf]

3 hours ago, Kim-Kwang-Seok said:

If there's one question I'd want a straight answer from TLG'people it would be about their weird way of advertisement and non-advertisement. Like, they literally give away a lot of money by letting youtubers, instagramers and others fill the void for news. As far as I understand there's people who make a living by making Lego videos. And also they can afford expensive equipement and Lego for this.

I may be wrong as I am by no means an advertising expert, but I believe the reason why companies are typically willing to let fans announce news a lot of the time is because it's just cheaper. All Lego has to do is send out sets and the occasional promotional material, whereas there is much more of a burden internally when a lot of stuff is handled by Lego. 

On the topic of LegoCon, I was really expecting the Gunship until recently, but at this point I have no expectations. Admittedly I'm probably in the microscopic minority that would rather see the Mando sets in better quality since I'm not getting the Gunship, but regardless of what they end up showing I'm not expecting much.

[Kim-Kwang-Seok]

42 minutes ago, Meadius said:

I may be wrong as I am by no means an advertising expert, but I believe the reason why companies are typically willing to let fans announce news a lot of the time is because it's just cheaper. All Lego has to do is send out sets and the occasional promotional material, whereas there is much more of a burden internally when a lot of stuff is handled by Lego. 

On the topic of LegoCon, I was really expecting the Gunship until recently, but at this point I have no expectations. Admittedly I'm probably in the microscopic minority that would rather see the Mando sets in better quality since I'm not getting the Gunship, but regardless of what they end up showing I'm not expecting much.

oh for sure even the negative stuff - it's all free ads for 'em.

..But the communication and relationships could be better. Like any company should have their own youtube channels by now - or at least some influencers they control better then the current ones. Im not saying this a good thing but that's how I learned PR (horrible business btw). It doesnt matter HOW far on the stick you are - there's a way to do it professionally. In TLG's case its just MESSY.

...so not to twist my words: like other brands they could create cheaper, more effective and more propagandistic advertisement slaves but they don't for some reason (for sure good reasons, I just don't know them).


About the set reveal: I repeat myself but yeah, I still don't get the Gunship. Why would you do such a set in no-fig scale? Brickvault version + some changes and 1-2 new molds; a small army and voila; perfect 200-250 bucks set. Who knows but I even wonder if there is a big enough market for super expensive non-minifigure prequel sets. Yes it was a vocal group demanding this and other sets but I'd guess they's prefer a minifig scale set with a proper figure line up.


...so no interest in that but I'd very much like to have clear pictures on the rest of the sets as this is the first SW wave that interests me.

[Prometheus87]

5 hours ago, Kim-Kwang-Seok said:

If there's one question I'd want a straight answer from TLG'people it would be about their weird way of advertisement and non-advertisement. Like, they literally give away a lot of money by letting youtubers, instagramers and others fill the void for news. As far as I understand there's people who make a living by making Lego videos. And also they can afford expensive equipement and Lego for this.

But I think there are good reasons. Absurd reasons maybe - but its a big company in a big market. I guess it has a lot to do with contracts. Probably any retailers won't like to have a lot of advertisement online for new products they can't sell for months. After all they hope to sell worse products and current products still.

What would be cool is to have products when the sets come out. Like can you imagine a similar release schedule for the current shows as we had for the sequel movies? Ahsoka vs. Maul would have been hotter last year. But as people pointed out; probably they need time to see if people care about the shows.

So many things i don't get. This and the baffling statement made recently that they don't like to look at aftermarket prices in decisions on future minifigures (and by inferrence, sets). Sometimes their marketing makes zero sense to me. 

I suppose for the purposely advertising point of view, I'd imagine it has to do with budget allocations and what sets they analyze either NEEDS marketing or could bring the greatest return on investment FROM advertisements. This probably shows they don't have as much interest in the cartoons when they are just starting than the live-action series for this wave. 

[Clone OPatra]

Despite its flaws rightly pointed out in Brickset's review, the Mandalorian Fighter still looks awesome to me and I'm very excited to get it. The wing shape and colouring look excellent from the top, and the wings can surely be swapped around to show the better side in landing position in a display.

I disagree with CapnRex on Brickset that it should've been bigger to be more accurate - it looks good as is and I'm glad I don't have to pay any more to get both it and the three stunning minifigs! Yes it's totally out of scale - or maybe it's the scale in-universe that's wrong, since it's ludicrous something would be both a ginormous freighter and a fighter. IMO it's the right size for what it is as a LEGO set.

[TeddytheSpoon]

3 hours ago, Prometheus87 said:

So many things i don't get. This and the baffling statement made recently that they don't like to look at aftermarket prices in decisions on future minifigures (and by inferrence, sets). Sometimes their marketing makes zero sense to me. 

I suppose for the purposely advertising point of view, I'd imagine it has to do with budget allocations and what sets they analyze either NEEDS marketing or could bring the greatest return on investment FROM advertisements. This probably shows they don't have as much interest in the cartoons when they are just starting than the live-action series for this wave. 

My reasoning for the aftermarket price argument is that generally, kids aren't looking for LEGO on places like Bricklink or eBay. Especially for the really expensive stuff (AT-OT, the latest gunship, the Ghost), the demand that inflates the prices so much is mainly coming from adult (presumably) collectors. In that sense, I can see how a product marketed at children wouldn't take aftermarket prices into account, at least not to a great degree.

Edited June 24, 2021 by TeddytheSpoon

[Kdapt-Preacher]

2 hours ago, Clone OPatra said:

I disagree with CapnRex on Brickset that it should've been bigger to be more accurate - it looks good as is and I'm glad I don't have to pay any more to get both it and the three stunning minifigs! Yes it's totally out of scale - or maybe it's the scale in-universe that's wrong, since it's ludicrous something would be both a ginormous freighter and a fighter. IMO it's the right size for what it is as a LEGO set.

Yeah, I thought that was a bit of a weird line in the review. For context here, a minifigure-scale model of this ship would be about 1.7 meters long (5'7") and almost as wide, so clearly it can't be anywhere near that. The ship to compare it to in The Mando is the Gozanti assault carrier, which LEGO quite rightly treated as a capital ship along the lines of the system-scale Venator or ISDs, where everybody understands that the scale is arbitrary and doesn't have any relationship to the figures (the review specifically calls out the seating in the cockpit being more like a starfighter, which is true of the Gozanti and every other large ship set as well). In-universe it's definitely too big to be a starfighter (or even a bomber, really--it's larger than any real-world military airplane), but the designation "fighter/transport" and the built-in infantry racks make me think it's meant primarily as a troop carrier or insertion vessel and is only armed as heavily as it is because that's how things are done on Mandalore.

[storskogen]

4 hours ago, Clone OPatra said:

The wing shape and colouring look excellent from the top, and the wings can surely be swapped around to show the better side in landing position in a display.

I had exactely the same thought. It seems the wings can be easily swapped, as they are connected with technic pins only. It would look excellent displayed in landing position with the wings showing the their nicest side rather than the antistuds. A simple mod to add the landing gear would also benefit the look.

[THELEGOBATMAN]

New pictures of Slave I are up on BrickFanatics and it's amazing 

I love that little stand, it's so functional. Another Carbonite print is also always welcome.

[BrickBob Studpants]

3 minutes ago, THELEGOBATMAN said:

New pictures of Slave I are up on BrickFanatics and it's amazing 

I love that little stand, it's so functional. Another Carbonite print is also always welcome.

It’s a sticker, but it’s still nice to get another bounty encased in carbonite  Agree on the stand, what a pleasant surprise 

[BigA_7]

The slave 1 looks amazing! It’s a shame there seems to be nothing new (apart from the stand) but it is like a small version of the ucs

[Clone OPatra]

Where is the article on their actual site? I see the photos reposted on Insta but nothing on Brick Fanatics itself.

The set looks like fun and it's cool it comes with a stand. It doesn't really look like $50 though.

[BigA_7]

3 minutes ago, Clone OPatra said:

It doesn't really look like $50 though.

I agree. This might be a hot take, but most sets this wave seem overpriced. The slave 1, bad batch shuttle, mandolore duel and mandalorian starfighter could all be a bit cheaper imo.

[THELEGOBATMAN]

This wave has some of the best PPP ratios we've seen in Lego Star Wars!

The Slave I has nearly 600 pieces for $50. I know some of you aren't PPP guys, but come on, last year that set would've been priced $70.

Edited June 24, 2021 by THELEGOBATMAN

[BigA_7]

2 minutes ago, THELEGOBATMAN said:

This wave has some of the best PPP ratios we've seen in Lego Star Wars!

The Slave I has nearly 600 pieces for $50. I know some of you aren't PPP guys, but come on, last year that set would've been priced $70.

Really? I guess they are just really densely packed because the model isn’t that big

[Falconfan1414]

36 minutes ago, Clone OPatra said:

Where is the article on their actual site? I see the photos reposted on Insta but nothing on Brick Fanatics itself.

The set looks like fun and it's cool it comes with a stand. It doesn't really look like $50 though.

They accidentally posted it a few days early and took it down 

[Clone OPatra]

17 minutes ago, THELEGOBATMAN said:

This wave has some of the best PPP ratios we've seen in Lego Star Wars!

The Slave I has nearly 600 pieces for $50. I know some of you aren't PPP guys, but come on, last year that set would've been priced $70.

Yeah, PPP isn't everything. It looks like a very small model, and even with the speeder/stand, I don't know where 592 parts are going.

13 minutes ago, Falconfan1414 said:

They accidentally posted it a few days early and took it down 

Ah, I suspected that might be the case. Hopefully that means other Mando set reviews are coming soon too! So much for a reveal for anyone expecting that.

42 minutes ago, BigA_7 said:

I agree. This might be a hot take, but most sets this wave seem overpriced. The slave 1, bad batch shuttle, mandolore duel and mandalorian starfighter could all be a bit cheaper imo.

Personally I don't think the Bad Batch Shuttle or Mandalorian Fighter feel overpriced. They're both substantial and have a substantial quantity of exclusive minifigures. The Slave I seems smaller than its piece count would suggest, and the Mandalore Duel is simply lacking - plus both of those sets have only one new figure, though the other ones are still desirable.

[oodan]

Like the TIE and the X-Wing, the new Slave One is a good looking and well priced model but it pales in comparison to the more expensive ones that released before. It looks great, but it still seems very small, kind of like the TIE. If I owned the 20th anniversary model I would skip it and wait for Book of Boba Fett sets to get the new Boba.

[PreVizsla]

Watched the mandalorian starfighter review and i like it a lot, i have no issues with price, size or figures, the only flaw the set has imo is the gap where the cockpit is. I know this will bother me a lot, so i am hoping i can somehow mod it. Slave 1 also looks really good and is decently priced,i would like it more if the carbonite piece was printed and not a sticker, but doesn't bother me as much. Mandalorian throne does seem too expensive even though it's only 20$ considering that the set has multiple stickers and doesn't feel like it offers that much except for the Maul figure, which looks amazing. If i put my bias towards Mandalore aside other duel sets feel 5 times better.

The only set i think is overpriced is bad batch shuttle, it looks too small from reviews, interior feels even smaller than i expected and we get a horrible, oversized and innacurate 501st speeder in darker color. I think pieces from the speeders should have been used on the shuttle itself. Shuttle is the only set that i am not sure if i want to get or not cause i mainly want figures.  I feel like i waste money if i buy figures separately, i waste money if i buy the set i don't like, but there is also this doubt in my mind because i don't know if we will get more sets from the show. 

[THELEGOBATMAN]

21 minutes ago, ood0 said:

Like the TIE and the X-Wing, the new Slave One is a good looking and well priced model but it pales in comparison to the more expensive ones that released before. It looks great, but it still seems very small, kind of like the TIE. If I owned the 20th anniversary model I would skip it and wait for Book of Boba Fett sets to get the new Boba.

I hope we get BoBF sets, that would be fantastic. 

[McMurder_them_softly]

I like the look of the new Slave One. It's not perfect, but the figures are good and I want to see how it will look with 75222 - Betrayal at Cloud City. 

Mando Boba green color match looks a little off...will wait to see more pics, looks like a bright studio setting makes it looks brighter than it is. Something I can live with. 

[Kim-Kwang-Seok]

From what we are used to and from sets that took my interest in SW this has a lot going on. I don't know if I prefer this or the Cloud City version - but both at least capture the shaping better then the other good versions. The 20th anniversary version had just the wrong cockpit to me and the UCS version - while having a perfect cockpit - was looking weird with the "red base parts", or whatever you can call that. It's just harder to capture roundness with many bricks together, compared to just using a combination of 2 specialised, newer round pieces.

I'll try to modify it but this is a must buy for me. Good PPP ratio, very high quality figures, good build. Yes Boba could have used a waist cape, and updated helmet + jetpack, Mando a face print - but that's not things we could have expected. We didn't even expect a new Boba. And then we didn't expect arm printing.