If you’ve been waiting patiently to see beautiful, hi-res official photos of the winter 2016 LEGO Star Wars sets, well… you’re gonna have to be patient a while longer. But if you’re willing to settle for sort-of-grainy images scanned from a catalog that wasn’t meant to be out in the wild yet, then you’re in luck: images of the first eight LEGO Star Wars 2016 sets have now popped up online!
And thanks to the magic of the Internet, said catalog insert ended up being distributed all across the world in under a day. Bet the Emperor wishes he had technology like this, right?!
Of these eight sets, two are Battle Packs from the new Star Wars Battlefront game, two are from Star Wars The Force Awakens (Episode VII), one is from the prequels and three are from the original trilogy.
Anyway, the eight sets shown in the Finn Minifigure polybag are as follows:
Episode 7: The Force Awakens Heroes Battle Pack 75131
These basically seem to just be generic Rebels from The Force Awakens. Not a whole lot to talk about here…
Episode 7: The Force Awakens Villains Battle Pack 75132
It is very disheartening to see only one regular First Order Stormtrooper Minifigure in the 75132 Episode VII Villains battle pack–I can’t imagine army-building collectors will be happy having to buy a whole battle pack for each plain Stormtrooper they want.
Aliens!! Finally, a Rodian (like Greedo, but not!) and a Duros (like Cad Bane, but not!) join the Rebels to take on the Galactic Empire! While I’d dig it if these aliens were part of the Rebels in The Force Awakens, this set is actually based off of the Star Wars Battlefront video game coming out this month.
Galactic Empire Battle Pack 75134
This is another set from the new Star Wars Battlefront game, and as such, I don’t expect too many people to care about it. The new Shocktrooper minifig looks neat and I like the Imperial Officer, but I don’t like the weird look of those other Stromtroopers at all.
Obi-Wan’s Jedi Interceptor 75135
The one new prequel set is 75135 Obi-Wan’s Jedi Interceptor from Star Wars Revenge of the Sith. This ship was originally only available a decade ago in a Target exclusive two-pack that is hugely expensive on the aftermarket, so it’s tremendous to see Obi-Wan’s Jedi Starfighter from Episode III finally getting an upgrade!
And yes, it does come with a new Minifigure of my absolute favorite astromech droid in the whole saga: an R4-P17 Minifigure. Alas, poor, doomed R4-P17! “I don’t recall ever owning a droid.” What a jerk you are, Obi-Wan!
Meanwhile, 75136 Droid Escape Pod rehashes the Escape Pod set we got a few years ago, but this time it comes with two Jawa Minifigures! LEGO Jawas have never come in a cheap set before, so it’s finally, finally time to army-build Jawas Minifigures at last!!
I imagine the set most fans will be most stoked about is the new 75137 Carbon Freezing Chamber, as it’s been like forever since we got any kind of brick-built Bespin environment. The translucent orange bricks in this set look terrific, don’t though?
It’s a little weird to not get a Bespin Lando or Leia with this set (who’s gonna tell Han that they love him before he goes into his deep freeze?), but hey, you can’t go wrong with Boba Fett and Ugnaughts Minifigures, right?!
Finally, we’ve got 75138 Hoth Attack. This is… pretty weak, honestly. We’ve seen so many Hoth sets over the years that it’s challenging to get excited for another one, especially when we know there’s an infinitely cooler UCS Hoth Echo Base set due out next year (oh wait–we’re not supposed to know about that?).
The new Probot (Imperial Probe Droid) looks neat, but that’s genuinely the only thing about this set that’s really grabbing my attention. Maybe I’ll be impressed more when we see better images, but I sort of doubt it in this case. And speaking of better photos…
Based off our first good looks, which 2016 LEGO Star Wars sets will you be buying and/or army-building, Star Wars fans? Does it look like 2016 is off to a hit start to you?
R4-P17 was not “owned” by Obi-Wan. R4 was assigned to Obi-Wan by the Jedi Temple.
Will definitely be snatching up the Jawas, the carbon freezing chamber, and probably the Rodian/Duros set.
Thanks for the tip about the upcoming Echo base set!!
man i still have all the sw sets from this year to get still!! luckily these should be relatively cheap (4 being battle packs), so you can comb a bunch together for those monthly deals and get a bonus set in the bargain. i’m so pumped about the carbon freezing chamber set, and battle packs are a must-have for me. i have the previous versions of the escape pod, so why not get gen 3 and a couple of jawas as well? 🙂
I like the carbon freezing chamber and the droid escape pod.
I’m most stocked about the stormtroopers battle pack. Any variation of stormtrooper gives me wide eyes. Can’t wait!
I’m honestly more surprised there’s no VADER in the carbon freezing chamber set.
The carbon freezing chamber is teh PERFECT place 4 Lando! Plus now that they have the black guy hair, his figure would have been sooo good 2 put in there!