The dark side of the brick

My pace of posting has massively slowed down since the first half of the year... though taking Lego apart and putting it in plastic bags isn't anywhere near as exciting to talk about as building it is.  This week, however, I've gone back to building - not that I have anywhere to put my new build it turns out.  My house is in disarray as I have new windows fitted in most rooms and my nephews are coming to stay next week which will cause further havoc.  Hmm. Anyway, my build for the week was the much delayed UCS republic gunship ( 75309 ).  I've not rushed it but it has taken me 4 nights of building and turns out to be 3292 bricks of typical incredibleness.  I really like all of the proper UCS sets and this is no exception.     The set is massive - it certainly compares to the ISDs and Falcons in terms of sheer scale.  Here's another photo with the old minifig scale gunships for comparison: It's also nicely designed with a robust feel and large...

Most of my week has been spent cleaning and then building a second hand copy of the most recent Republic Gunship - the 2013 75021 .  Lots of lime and dark red! The historical records show that Lego has released three full-sized gunships and I now have this one and also the 2008 7676 , but not the original 2002 version ( 7163 ) which must have been an awesome set at the time.  On that release schedule, Lego is well overdue another release of this ship but, to be honest, I think they're going to struggle to better these. Both the 2008 and 2013 versions weigh in at over 1000 bricks and share a distinct design heritage with very similar overall sizes, side panels, wings and thrusters.  This one seems slightly fatter at the base and the cockpit area is more streamlined - in fact, I love the snug fit for the minifigs underneath the control panels in this set.  This one swaps fully closing sides for two moveable gunports that have a really nice seat design too - a definite ...