700th Post Special - LSR - Death Star (10188)

OK I admit it. I think all my 100th posts are getting too predictable considering that most of them are all LEGO related. But I promise you that I will make it less predictable in the future when I've pretty much thought of everything LEGO related to do and will instead do something else. That being said, let's take a look at the most popular, well known and longest running Star Wars set to date, the Death Star. Now a lot of people have pointed out that despite its Ultimate Collector's Edition status, it doesn't resemble anything to do with that line and instead serves as more of a giant play set and in my opinion, I agree. It may be a very complicated and long build like the other sets in the UCE and most adults would go and pick this up for themselves more than children will, but ultimately, what defines a UCE set is for it to be a set that is used solely for displays and nothing else. That out of the way, let's look at this massive set:

So this is meant to be a set where fans of the original trilogy can re-imagine scenes in the Death Star I and II from Episodes IV and VI. You get a whopping set of 25 characters which is likely the most amount of characters in any other LEGO set to date and those characters are Luke Skywalker (Stormtrooper, Tatooine and Jedi Knight), Han Solo (Stormtrooper and main clothing), Princess Leia, Ben Kenobi, Darth Vader, Darth Sidious, R2-D2, C3-PO, Chewbacca, Grand Moff Tarkin, Assassin Droid (even though it looks like it, its not IG-88), R2-Q5, 2 Stromtroopers (minus the Stormtrooper disguises for Luke and Han), 2 Royal Guards, a mouse droid, IT-O, a black protocol droid, 2 Death Star Troopers and Dianoga. That's a lot of figures. We also get a TIE Fighter mini-build which you can fit any character in (but not with a cape as it's a paint to put one in with a cape) and that looks very nice. So you can think of every scene that takes place in both Death Stars and chances are that those scenes are in this set. The trash compactor is here, the holding cells are here, the room where the Death Star laser is shot from is here, the meeting room is here, the room that Luke and Leia swing from is here and pretty much any scene from the films are here, with the exception of the corridor scenes which would have made this set to not work at all (it would as a result, have to get several more pieces for such a thing and it already has 3803 pieces as it is right now). Its quite a long build that could last days to weeks if you have other things to do and it's easy for the right pieces to go missing so do be careful.

I like this set. I think its one of those sets that manages to represent Star Wars very well and it's one of those sets that a lot of people will want to get. It's big, shows the Death Star in the way it should be in LEGO, it manages to squeeze in not all, but most of the scenes that we remember from the films and I can see this set as one of those sets that can be extended with Star Wars characters that you already own and maybe a few mini sets as well. Is it the best LEGO set ever? Its got a lot of potential there is no question about that, but with the build being so long, the instruction book being just one big, thick book with a binder and the amount of pieces that can easily go missing as well as builders missing even the smallest of instructions, Its not the best set out there, but its certainly not the worst. A perfect gift for any Star Wars fan out there that has a lot of cash and time to spare. But after its built, its a question of where to put this beast of a set. 9/10

Now I am aware that there are rumours that this set might be retiring this year due to the release of a newer version of the Sandcrawler so if you want it, you'll have to get it sooner than later or otherwise, it will be out of the LEGO shop and you would have to pay a heck more than £300 to get it. Believe me, I know.