LEGO Star Wars The Phantom (+ Grand Admiral Thrawn) Reveiw

I'll be honest. I was quite skeptical about buying this set when I first heard about it. The price seemed to be a bit high and the build did not appear to be too spectacular. But the inclusion of THE Grand Admiral Thrawn made this set a must buy for me. So let us see if this set is worth the thirty dollars it retails for.

The set comes with 269 pieces and has a price per part ratio of 11.11 cents. Two Minifigures and a droid are included. 

The Rebels in the set are Kanan Jarrus and Chopper. Kanan is sporting a new hair/helmet-piece in this set. It looks great. I believe his torso is new, but since I haven't been keeping up with Star Wars Rebels related items; I am unsure if it is exclusive to this set. The torso print transfers well into the legs; I simply love it when the prints on torsos line up with a specific pair of legs. I know it detracts from the reuse of the parts, but it makes a whole lot of difference. Kanan's new hair piece has the mask that covers his eyes after he had been blinded by Darth Maul. The head is two sided and that always makes me happy. Kanan has the typical lightsaber build which should not be anything new at this point. 

I'm going to be a bit biased in my thoughts on the Thrawn Minifigure. The Thrawn Trilogy is one of my favorite book series of all time; it is probably up there with The Lord of the Rings books.  Anyways, The figure has a recolor of the slicked back hairpiece in dark blue. His head has a new set of prints: one side of the face is calm and collected and the other is angry. The torso looks nice, but the rank insignia plaque is incorrect. In current Star Wars cannon, the grand admiral insignia is a six blue squares next to three gold over three red squares. The insignia on the figure is that of a plain admiral. I have looked at the images of the new Star Wars Rebels Thrawn, and he uses the Grand Admiral plate. I have literally no idea what happened when they designed the torso. LEGO creates a highly collectible figure, and then give him an incorrect print; I really think that this is below LEGO in this day in age. But mistakes happen.

Thrawn has plain white legs and the smallest style of blaster pistol. I think the look of the figure is great, and I love having it in my collection. It is a bummer that his print is incorrect.

Last, but not least is C1-10P, also known as Chopper. The design of the little droid is quite nice. The prints are quite accurate to the design of the character in the show.  The printing on the head is a bit off, but it kind of adds to the character of the figure.  Chopper has the shorter Astromech Droid legs and a round 2x2 cylinder with Technic pins for the body.

The Phantom is a Neimoidian Sheathipede-class transport. This is LEGO's second minifigure scale version of this ship. However, the two are quite different; the second Phantom is a mix of vibrant colors, and the the original shuttle is dark blue and grey.

This Phantom is relatively accurate to the in-universe ship. Through the use of many stickers, I think it pulls off the design quite well. Seriously, the only printed pieces in this set are the thermal detonators and the Minifigure parts.  The stickers are used in conjunction with colored parts to get the desired effect. The central fin is quite strong: it uses a Technic beam to hold it together. Along the sides are retractable legs that are quite nice to have, but they are a pain to get lined up correctly.

The center fin is well detailed. The large sticker is mirrored on each side. The light aqua color is quite nice to find in this set. 

The back of the ship has a door that leads to the hold in the center of the ship. The hold is quite small, but it does fit the small crate included in the set. The yellow Technic element is the actuator that fires the spring loaded shooters. I seriously think these will never go away. I have nothing against them, but  I do have a certain nostalgic feeling for the older flick missiles.

The missiles are well hidden, and one could leave them out if they had something against them and the overall build would not be affected. The mechanism is hidden in the ship, so there are no unsightly red buttons to push. You simply move the yellow piece left or right to fire a missile. 

The wing-like things can attribute their design to the stickers. The parts are also matched in color to the stickers. I think this was a well done process, most of the time stickers don't quite match up in color. 

The cockpit section of the set is well done, knowing the limited number of sloped pieces that are in LEGO's inventory. The clear section is one of the Speed Champions windscreens, and this comes off to allow access to the sparse interior. The two slopes on the sides have large stickers to add detail.

The interior of the ship is not the most exciting thing. There is a seat for Kanan to sit in as well as a small computer console. The fit of the seat is quite loose: Kanan will begin to tumble about the cockpit during play. 

The cockpit also detaches as an escape pod in case things go awry. The module that comes off is similar to most of the LEGO Star Wars escape pods. The front end attaches with Technic pins, and when detached, it leaves the droid behind. The point at which the ship detaches shows some of the odd colors that are used in the interior of the build, but with this particular ship design it kind of fits. 

The section in which Chopper resides accommodates him quite nicely. His head pops up just over the cockpit; so you can see just his head. The 1x2 jumpers hold him securely enough to prevent him from dropping out of the ship, but they are also loose enough that he does not become stuck. 

The last, and quite small thing, to be included in the set is an Imperial crate that has been presumably stolen by the rebels. It is quite a simple thing; it uses the large crate piece and a Minifigure base plate with an Imperial logo as the lid. Inside is a thermal detonator, but two are included in the set. 

On a whole, I think this is a good set. The price per part ratio is quite average for these days. The price of $30 is quite a good price for these days. The price tag is not as high as one would think. The Minifigure selection in the set is average for these days, and considering the exclusivity of two of the figures; it's not that bad. I like the design of the LEGO set better than the Phantom II in the Star Wars universe. Even though I was a bit skeptical at first; I like the ship. The color scheme is vibrant, but not too over the top. The design is practical, and there are features riddled throughout the vessel. The cargo hold seems to be asking to be used in play; I can just imagine all the uses younger kids could have for it. The spring loaded shooters are integrated incredibly well, and the actuator is well hidden. I also think the escape pod feature of the cockpit is great for play. I still a little upset about the inaccurate printing on Thrawn, but I am overjoyed to have a Minifigure of him at last. 

My recommendation? Little kids would love the ship's endless amount of play features and they would be able to play long and hard with this set. Adult collectors would be able to add the long-awaited Thrawn Minifig to their collections, as well as an exclusive version of Kanan. I would totally recommend this set; it is a great little set, and I hope LEGO does more of these types of sets in the future. 

As always, that's all I got for now. Thanks for reading!