The latest wave of Star Wars LEGO unveiled sets featuring characters and vehicles from Star Wars: The Mandalorian TV series. The box art of the popular Star Wars Slave I (Slave One) vehicle belonging to the bounty hunter Boba Fett has now been officially renamed Boba Fett’s Starship. This is according to an interview conducted by Brickset and Jedinews with LEGO designers Jens Kronvold Frederiksen and Michael Lee Stockwell.
Jens has been with LEGO for more than 23 years and designing Star Wars LEGO sets from the very beginning of when LEGO first introduced Star Wars into its lineup in 1999.
Following is the conversation that took place during the interview according to Brickset.
Jens (LEGO): Then, the next one, also from The Mandalorian, is Boba Fett’s Starship.
Michael (LEGO): Yes, I built another*. We’re not calling it Slave I any more. This is Boba Fett’s Starship.
James (Jedi News): OK, why are we dropping the Slave I name?
Jens (LEGO): Everybody is. It’s probably not something which has been announced publicly but it is just something that Disney doesn’t want to use any more.
It’s likely we’ll never get any further official confirmation from Disney. The likely reasons for the change are the controversial negative connotations of the word and Disney on up-keeping a wholesome, family-friendly image.
We get to hear it being officially referenced as Boba Fett’s Starship in the LEGO CON 2021 reveal of the set by LEGO Desginer Michael Lee Stockwell.
The change has obviously met with controversial feedback with the Actor that played the role of Boba Fett in Star Wars: A New Hope (Special Edition), Mark Anthony Austin tweeting his loyalty to the former name of the ship.
My ship will forever be Slave1.
Nothing. Not even #disney can or will change that.
This is the way. pic.twitter.com/Qt99Yo8dEz
— Mark Anthony Austin (@BobaFettANHSE) June 28, 2021
The LEGO Star Wars 75312 Boba Fett’s Starship will be released on August 1st with 593 pieces and retail for US $49.99 | CAN $69.99 | UK £44.99. Boba Fett’s starship will be the 8th appearance in the LEGO lineup since 1999. A list of the various other iterations of the Slave 1 vehicle is showcased below. (The 75222 (2018) version is a bit unique since it’s actually a part of the Betrayal at Cloud City set. We did a part count ourselves of just the ship model)
Check out our other Star Wars LEGO and Slave 1 related articles:
Disney want to maintain a wholesome family image, you say?
[cough] Mulan [cough] Xinjang province [cough]
I agree with most Star Wars fans that this is super dumb, but it’s not new or unique to this set — the Soulless One, Night Buzzard, Havoc Marauder, and Fang Fighter have all gotten generic names on their latest LEGO sets. Also, this applies to merchandise, not the in-universe canon names. Let’s all cool our jets a bit.
Will they scrub all “slave” related dialogue from The Phantom Menace?
I think it’s pretty clever, if Disney doesn’t want to use the name, that they replaced it with no name at all. Re-naming the ship, (that has never actually had its name spoken in any Star Wars film or television property, remember,) would spark a new Forever War between new fans and old grognards about what the real name of the ship is. As it is, anyone well-versed in THE LORE can continue to call the ship whatever they want. This affects literally nothing but the name attached to merchandising.
If only there was more outrage over how small this set was. I was hoping that the Mandalorian version of the ship would feature a rotating passenger area like it appeared in the show itself.
Sigh…
For some reason I actually kind of like that it’s the scale of the original Lego Slave 1. And the X-Wing and Tie Fighters that came out recently were hints that this was going to be a smaller set. We’ll always have the UCS Slave 1, and all the variants before it that had simultaneously rotating cockpit-wing setups.
And good point, Sam.
Star Wars is offensive. If they change it to Space Stories I’m in.
Hypocrite woke always guarantees a good laugh :) I’m saying it again, this year I’ll keep my Lego budget for… Real plants and groceries.
Agreed this is dumb. I mean, the bounty hunter who works for a gangster and for a tyrannical empire and presumably has murdered many many people has a ship with a problematic name? Heaven forbid! BTW, I’d have to go back and watch the Special Edition, but IIRC Mark Anthony Austin’s Boba Fett just stood around in the background while Han talked to Jabba. It’s not like he really even had a ship of any name.