The box calls this a ”special edition” and I’m not sure what that means. A number of different retailers sell it online, but Walmart is the only store I’ve ever actually seen it in.  I’m sure someone more enlightened in the way of Lego can clear this up for me. The box is satisfyingly large for the size assortment and features some very enticing photos of the finished products. Inside you get an instruction booklet, two curious bendy tubes, and three unnumbered baggies. All told, you get 163 pieces, which build the Landspeeder vehicle, four minifigs and a little sentry droid. To the Minifigs!

Starting off, you get Luke Skywalker and Obi-Wan Kenobi. Both are solid minifigs, but nothing extraordinary. The printing on their torsos does a good job reproducing their Tattooine clothing, although I think Obi-Wan could have used a cape. They each only have one printed face, and while Obi-Wan’s hair piece looks fine, Luke’s seems a little off to me. I know he had long hair, but this piece looks more like a chick’s hair. Both minifigs come with the same lightsaber and I’m cool with that. You can never have enough lightsabers.

Next up, you have the Sandtrooper and his sentry droid. The Sandtrooper is a regular Stormtrooper with extra bits to make up his backpack and pauldron. I understand some people have taken issue with him not being more unique, but I like the fact that you can turn him into a regular Stormtrooper if you want, so I’m very happy with him. The helmet sculpt is excellent, the printing on the torso is great, It could have used some printed detail on the legs, but he still looks good without it. There’s no Clone head under the helmet, just a blank, black head to hold it on. The sentry droid isn’t really a minifig, as he’s built with just regular pieces and he comes with some clear pieces to make a “levitating” stand. He’s ok, but nothing special.

Last up are the droids: R2-D2 and C-3PO. 3PO is ok, although the matte gold plastic they used for him looks kind of cheap. R2, on the other hand, well I’m really on the fence over him. The lack of printing on his back pisses me off quite a bit, and I don’t think it would have killed Lego to toss in a third leg. I also wish they had constructed him so that his dome would rotate. The droids are passable, but considering how many times Lego could repaint and reuse an Astromech and Protocol Droid, it seems like they could have put a little more effort into this pair.

The Landspeeder itself was a fun and somewhat surprising build. There’s a lot about it that didn’t go the way I thought it would, and that made it interesting. The color pallet on the vehicle seems a bit off, as I think the chassis should have been darker, but the end result still gives it a cool animated vibe. One of my favorite things about the build was the clever use of the tubes to make up the recessed bumper under the hood. I had no idea what those were going to be used for and when I got to that point in the build, I didn’t think it was going to work all that well, but it did and it looks very cool and unique.

I’m not terribly keen on the engines. While it’s cool that Lego designed one to look like it was ripped apart by the Sandpeople, the other two should have had proper tan or brown casings. As it is, they all look like they’ve been taken apart and exposed. Even the one that’s ripped apart has a couple of pieces on the front that doesn’t match the other two. They don’t totally kill the vehicle for me, but I think these parts could have been much better executed.

The build allows for the middle engine to be removed and it reveals a little storage compartment. If you disassemble the lightsabers you can store them both in there. It’ll also fit some guns, other accessories, or a sack lunch if you want to pack for your Tattooine day trips.

At $24.99, I’m pretty happy with this set. The minifigs are all solid, if not spectacular, efforts and certainly help give a new Star Wars Lego collector like me a number of core characters. The Landspeeder is nice, but I think Lego might have taken a few too many liberties with the design. It’s a good placeholder, but I can’t see this being a definitive Lego treatment of the iconic vehicle. Still, it’s a huge improvement over the last Lego Landspeeder, and I’ll be interested to see how much the design improves when they decide to revisit it again in the years ahead.

And that’s this week in the bag. I’m taking tomorrow off to get caught up on some stuff around the house because work and the holidays are taking turns kicking my ass. So, no feature tomorrow, but I will drop in to quickly set up next week.