The dark side of the brick

Another day, another X-wing... today was the Resistance X-wing from 2016 ( 75149 ).   The build felt very much like deja vu from Saturday... the dimensions are exactly the same as those from the 2020 X-wing and they share quite a bit of the structure.  Key differences are obviously the foils and "air intakes" (I've just looked it up in my Complete Star Wars Vehicles and apparently they are retro thrusters) and the colour scheme but they are really very similar.   I'd have given this one a 4 for being higly derivative of the black Poe X-wing but I'm going to upgrade to a 5 on the grounds that I like the sand blue detailing.  Oh and the foil opening mechanism is better than the 2020 version. 

My first Ebay purchase of 2021 was a big one... the original UCS set.  From all the way back in 2000 (I was somewhere between masters and doctorate at the time and therefore far too poor to contemplate such frivolities as Lego UCS), is the X-wing Fighter ( 7191 ).  Weighing in at 1298 parts, this, for the time, was a BIG set.   The copy I've managed to get my hands on (I'm not disclosing price, but it wasn't one of my better deals!) came with a slightly tatty box, pretty nicely kept instructions and (mostly) great quality pieces with absolutely no yellowing.  The stickers were all still attached and even better, only a few of the pieces were dusty.  Cleaning was therefore done during build, which took my two sessions.   Here's the finished beauty: A few things: It's very sturdy, apart from the wings which are not brilliantly attached The wings are mostly symmetrical but each of the four lasers is slightly different At rest, with the foils in fligh...