Red Five Standing By
There are few ships more recognizable in the Star Wars universe than Luke and R2’s X-Wing Starfighter during the Miracle of Yavin. This interpretation of the ship provides a beautiful display piece with adjustable wings. It can be displayed with the wings (stability foils or s-foils in in-universe speak) closed, or in the more iconic X-shaped attack configuration by turning a dial on the top of the model. At 1949 pieces this is the largest X-Wing LEGO set yet and features new printed details on Luke’s arms.
Lock S-foils in attack position
This build, because of the wing movement mechanism, is more complicated than other X-Wings. The build starts with a basic Technics frame that hold the wings together offset. The open and closed positions are achieved by stretching rubber bands when a lever is moved on its axle. The wings themselves are built separately and then attached with pegs to the frame.
This makes the build a bit complicated due to the weight being off while attaching them. We would recommend building all four of the wings and then attaching them all one after the other, instead of as you finish each one.
You’ve switched off your targeting computer, what’s wrong?
While building the model we noticed the panels were more delicate than we would like. This is not a problem if you’re only planning on displaying the set, but when playing with it or moving it, you’ll have to be careful.
The reason for this is that you are mostly attaching items to a Technics frame, not always to other fully brick-built parts. The nose cone, wings and fusial thrust engines are all attached with Technics pegs to the frame.
As mentioned before the positioning of the S-Foils is held together with rubber bands, which have done a less than stellar job at keeping the wings together for a long period of time. You really want to display this one in Attack configuration.
The build includes a base, which is attached to the model at an angle, so the model is always in “flight”. We have found this base to be very delicate. There is a curved plate in the front that comes off every time the model is disturbed.
Artoo, try and increase the power!
The set only contains two minifigures, Luke Skywalker, with a blue lightsaber, and R2-D2. This version of Luke includes new prints on his arm that are not available in any other set.
This is not a very long build, but it is entertaining, and more satisfying than the cheaper playscale model. It its a great display piece, but due to some of the compromises they had to make it is a bit too fragile to be played with.
This set is bigger than the other X-Wings, being a UCS after all, and the price reflects it at $240 dollars. It is twice the price of Poe Dameron’s X-Wing Fighter (black/orange) set which has 768 pieces including four characters (Poe Dameron, R2-D2, Jannah, and a Knight of Ren), and five times the price of the playscale model which comes with 474 pieces including 4 characters to play with (Luke, Leia, R2D2 and General Dodonna).
We believe this is fair value for the details in the model and the level of difficulty of the build.
If you are looking for a X-Wing model to display, this is the best you can do so far. If you are looking to play with an X-Wing take a look at the playscale model, which has more brick-built pieces and should be able to deal with space debris without problem. We would only consider Poe’s if you are a fan of Poe, his X-Wing or need the Jannah figure that is only available in that set.