This year, 2024, marks the 25th anniversary of LEGO Star Wars, and builder “2mpaired” has created this Mos Espa pod race scene from the 1999 film The Phantom Menace to commemorate the occasion. The scene, with sand and rock formations spilling over the edges of the diorama base, brings the motion and excitement of the pod race to life. The pod racer builds for Anakin and Sebulba, the scene’s main characters, are among the best minifigure-scale models I have seen. If you’re not impressed, take a look at LEGO’s microscale model “75380: Mos Espa Podrace Diorama” to fully appreciate the detail in both landscape, minimal yet telling, and the racers themselves.
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Say what you will about the prequels, the opening scenes of the Phantom Menace are extremely compelling. The red Jedi cruiser approaches a Lucrehulk battleship – depicted for us here in LEGO by Jonah – for some tense negotiations. Jonah has made use of a number of classic techniques to capture the smooth curved lines of the ship in the notably square medium of LEGO. The center part of the ship is made using the Lowell Sphere, and the wider curve of the arms is made using hinge plates. Jonah has also added plenty of trans-light-blue accents to increase the visual interest of this build! Unfortunately this LEGO model will probably be short lived, as I can see a certain prophesied child in military hardware approaching bring this battleship to an unfortunate end!
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Every AFOL has what I call their ‘white whale’ set. One that they longed for as a kid (and probably still do as a grown-up), but never owned. For me, that’s 7665 Republic Cruiser. In hindsight, it’s perhaps not the finest recreation of the Radiant VII. But when I was staring longingly at it in the pages of Argos catalogues, it looked as good as Fuku Saku‘s 1:250 scale model does! The subtle curves of the conical pod at the front look great; the way it meshes with the angles elsewhere is so satisfying. To be fair, the same could be said of the whole build. This ship did get a mostly grey militarised variant in the Clone Wars, but I much prefer its diplomatic livery from the opening scene of The Phantom Menace. It looks resplendent in red and white. You could even say it looks… Radiant!
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Evilkirk must have read about me being a sucker for the Phantom Menace, because he’s gone and built a truly epic ship from Star Wars: Episode I! This is the Scimitar, Darth Maul’s daily runabout. It’s a starship that just screams bad guy. Evilkirk’s has to be one of the best versions I’ve seen rendered in LEGO – not least because of its size. What a behemoth! There are over 4,000 pieces in this, and they haven’t all gone into the exterior either…
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I’m a big Star Wars: The Phantom Menace apologist. There, I said it! Come at me, readers. So too, it seems, is LEGO builder Alper Isler. Their photostream is peppered with Episode I builds, the latest of which is this fantastic Armoured Assault Tank (AAT). What good taste! I thought battle droids were really cool when they were first introduced. They’re basically the Galaxy’s most over-the-top collection of remote control toys. Sure, they were reduced to comic relief quite quickly, but cruising around in these things? You’d still better hope the droids run out of battery before they get to you.
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The Star Wars Prequel trilogy is old enough now that the original target audience’s nostalgia has begun a full-scale reevaluation of how those films are perceived in the culture. And Okay Yaramanoglu has taken full advantage of that to give us this microscale rendition of Otoh Gunga, the underwater city that is home to Jar Jar Binks and his fellow Gungans. While my own perception of Episode 1 hasn’t changed much in the last couple of decades, I’m in love with this build in part because it’s a refreshing change of pace for Star Wars builds. Don’t get us wrong, we here at The Brother’s Brick will never tire of Star Wars content. But, that said, sometimes all the shades of gray in the spaceships or the hues of tan in yet another desert landscape can start to feel a little monotonous. Here, Okay has broken that pattern to capture the unique bubble design of the city and even paired it with the departing Bongo sub, taking a couple of Jedi to Theed to see the queen.
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What is worse than being trapped in a submersible with Jar Jar Binks? Being trapped on that same submersible while being chased by a huge hungry predator. This LEGO creation by al is depicts a scene from Star Wars: The Phantom Menace in which our heroes (and Jar Jar) are in their Gungan Bongo Sub being persued by a ravenous Opee Sea Killer. It also marks right about the first instance in which I started rooting for the bad guys. There were many others to come. Still, it’s pretty impressive that this builder can cram so much detail into such a small build. It just goes to show that you don’t need a lot of pieces to build something neat and well-detailed nor to wish to wring Jar Jar’s scrawny neck all over again. How wuud!
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Say what you want about the prequel trilogy, but it is hard to deny that the films came with more than a few iconic ships to give the Millenium Falcon some merchandising competition. Koen Zwanenburg was inspired to make a larger version of this ship having acquired a 4×4 Artoo head from a 2017 polybag. The entire ship was built to scale for this larger printed dome. Koen did a masterful job with the sleek lines and the delicate tail section. The engines are made from hollow tipper drums, which allow the thin wings to hold the weight without bending.
And check out this beautiful head-on view, which really shows off the delicate wings with the large engines that present one of the major challenges with building this ship, which Koen handled like a Jedi.
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Say what you will about the Star Wars prequels, Naboo is a planet that everyone agrees is beautiful. Inspired by its appearance in 2017’s Battlefront II videogame, Belgian LEGO Star Wars YouTuber Axidroid spent eight months building a Clone Wars battle scene in the streets of Theed. With 121 minifigures, with most of them being from the popular 501st Battlepack, there are also custom vehicles such as the Gunships, AAT tank, and AT-RT walker. While large Star Wars dioramas are not uncommon, the 140cm by 77cm size dwarfs the largest LEGO Star Wars set, the UCS Imperial Star Destroyer, which is 110cm by 66cm.
While the size of this build is impressive, the real kicker is at nighttime. Using Christmas LED lights inside the buildings and street lamps, Axidroid lights up the Theed plaza into a lovely atmospheric scene. The battle droids and clone troopers now look like they’re lined up for an evening festival, and bring the Mediterranean setting of Naboo even closer to home.
Axidroid even documented his 8-month long build process in a YouTube video series. In the finale below he shows off all the details in the expansive build.
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Have you ever seen podracing in 1/6th of normal gravity? Thanks to builder Rubblemaker, now you can! In real LEGO high definition!
With a silent roar, four engines take off through the Sea of Tranquility, blowing up dust clouds visible from Earth. What you can only see up close, however, is the excellent detail work on each podracer. For example, look at the way each Blacktron engine is a sandwich of filters and fins, expertly crafted using flat brick pieces. Also, check out the dirt being blown up behind each pod; it definitely gives you the idea that these pods are flying along the lunar surface!
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LEGO has revealed seven new Star Wars sets based on everything across the galaxy including the films, television shows, a visual dictionary, and even Disney’s theme park land, Galaxy’s Edge. The sets include two brand new ships, multiple desirable minifigures, a few refreshed models, and the 2020 LEGO Star Wars Advent Calendar. (Spoiler alert: we’ve included photos of the Advent behind the jump at the far end of this article.)
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With stiff acting, boring political lectures and that abomination known as Jar Jar Binks, there was plenty wrong with the Star Wars prequels. Even as an adult I found myself glazing over when the senators and all the other grown-ups were talking about trade route tariff disputes but then perked up when there were explosions and laser battles. One thing that went well — in my opinion anyway, though yours may vary — is the films’ spaceship and vehicle design. I was not overly disappointed with the look and feel of everything and was in the camp that was impressed by the imposing Federation MTT (Multi Troop Transport). A builder by the name of Just Bricking seems to agree. Reminiscent of a charging bison, this creation expertly captures the complex angles of this unique design.
While the builder didn’t provide a video of this in action or even an interior photo, we’re told that this creation comprises 3,250 pieces and took two years to build. It is a massive 72 studs long, 32 high, and 22 wide. I can only imagine that this has a feature that would unfurl some complex rotisserie to deploy a battalion of battle droids into action like a hi-tech Trojan Horse.
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The Brothers Brick is funded by our readers and the community. Articles may include affiliate links, and when you purchase products from those links, TBB may earn a commission that helps support the site.
