Here is the poster offered to Americans who pre-order at least one of the sets of the first Star Wars wave for 2012 on the LEGO Shop, as indicated in the catalog I was telling you about in this article.

A high definition visual has just been offered by grogall on EB. I already told you, I love the promotional posters of the Star Wars range and this one will soon have to join my collection, probably via eBay, this offer is not currently planned in France.

One regret with the visuals of the minifigs, I would have preferred real photos rather than these digital reproductions.

You can download a large format version by clicking on the links below (right click / save):

2012 LEGO Star Wars Poster - Front (647 KB)

LEGO Star Wars 2012 Poster - Back (615 KB)

If you are a fan of the LEGO Star Wars range, you surely should have bought yourself the set Star Wars Brick Master released in 2010 and which brings together in the form of a hardcover book 240 parts, two minifigs as well as the instructions for assembling different vehicles (8 different models in total). If you don't have it yet, run and buy it, you won't regret it (from 14 to 23 € on Amazon.fr).

Once the book and its parts are in your hands, go to Legostein's Brickshlef gallery aka Christopher Deck, the micro-ship specialist, to discover that it is possible to be creative with such a limited choice of parts. He offers us two ships from the Star Wars universe designed exclusively with the parts of this set: a Separatist Munificent-Class Star Frigate and Republic Venator-Class Attack Cruiser both very successful.

Obviously, we will be indulgent as to the colors of certain parts of the Venator, but we must recognize that the exercise of style is convincing. The pictorial instructions for assembling these two ships are available at Legostein's Brickshelf gallery.

If you don't yet know his work, visit his site dedicated to micro-creations: sw.deckdesigns.de. You will certainly spend a lot of time browsing among the hundreds of MOCs, classified by year or by film, offered by Christopher Deck, because they are all more successful than the others ....

Is the souffle slowly falling back? After the official announcements of the upcoming launch of a LEGO LOTR range, the publication of ultra-preliminary visuals that do not put this range to its advantage and a first idea of ​​the price range of these sets, it seems that the excitement give way to a certain weariness.

Fans of the Kingdoms range have already understood that they will have to pay a high price to get sets on their favorite theme and will have to accept the switch to light flesh, and the others have understood that this new range will cost them a lot of money ... More generally, 2012 is a year during which you will have to have the financial means to satisfy your passion. All licensed ranges are sold at a high price and patience will be required to find a promotion that will save some money.

Obviously, the publication of the preliminary visuals probably does not pay homage to the final result that LEGO will present for sale during the official release of the sets of this range, scheduled for mid 2012. But fans always react quickly to these blurry images, populated with provisional minifigs, hastily designed scenes and rough edits made by LEGO to get a dealer catalog out on time. Before the publication of these images, speculation was reaching its height, with some already believing in a Battle of Helm's Deep in UCS format ... The reality is quite different: A few sets vaguely reproducing key scenes from the LOTR trilogy that will not be left without doubt that a series of collectible minifigs.

This observation is not exclusive to this LEGO LOTR range, it also applies to many sets of other licensed ranges which prove to be disappointing or in any case far removed from the surreal expectations of the community. From the release of this first wave of sets, we will of course be ecstatic over the various minifigs offered by LEGO, which will be difficult to compare with the custom versions designed by AFOLs. LOTR has not benefited from as many successful customs as the Star Wars, DC or Marvel universe to name a few. The creations seen here and there have often been the result of assembling existing medieval pieces and the resemblance to any of the characters in the film is often very limited.

More and more often, AFOLs seem to ignore official sets in order to obtain only the minifigs concerned via the parallel market, thus saving money, but also space ... This second market, on Bricklink or eBay for example, takes on a larger scale each year and makes it possible to obtain in a few clicks all the characters of a range, which fit in an envelope neatly stored at the bottom of a drawer while waiting to come populate a MOC possible. Lovers of loose parts will also look to Bricklink, where the cost per unit is often lower than that of an official licensed set.

Will this new LOTR range be a commercial success? No doubt yes, even if I am still more reserved about the public touched by this universe. LOTR is not an easy world to understand for the youngest. The chronology is complex, the characters numerous, the history of events long and sometimes tedious ... The release of the first part of the adaptation of The Hobbit by Peter Jackson at the end of 2012 will undoubtedly influence the young customers of LEGO who do not has not read and will not read Tolkien's books. But when choosing a gift for their child, parents will probably prefer a police car or a crane to a box with Gandalf on a cart ... Only the set 9474 The Battle of Helm's Deep could possibly be likened to a playset. medieval battlefield by all those who do not or little know the universe of LOTR. The other sets are too precise references to Peter Jackson's films to interest a regular kid who hasn't spent half a dozen hours watching them.

Which ultimately makes me say that LEGO falls into the category Collector's Goodies with this range whose gameplay should not be the first selling point, and whose lifespan will not be that of the Star Wars license, no offense to the most fundamentalist fans of the universe of Tolkien.

Another interesting MOC with this Octuptarra Magna Tri-Droid designed by Iceman792 and which turns out to be really faithful to the model (on the left in the image). This battle droid, used by the Confederation of Independent Systems during the Clone Wars, makes an appearance in theEpisode III: Revenge of the Sith and in the animated series The Clone Wars.

The level of detail is impressive, the color scheme adhered to the letter and the overall structure retains the apparent lightness of the reference model. 

To get a close-up of this battle droid, go to the topic dedicated to this MOC at Eurobricks. Many photos will allow you to appreciate the finesse of the construction, and to discover the often ingenious use of certain parts to achieve this convincing result.

A nice MOC to start the week, and even if the MOCeur, yoshix, announces that it is only 95% complete, this Republic Frigate is already well advanced. 

The result is convincing for most of the machine, except for the rendering of theEscape Pod whose round shape struggles to be rendered with the technique used. the engines are more successful, with less vacuum between the assemblies of flat.

For the rest, nothing to say, it is a beautiful achievement that will be exhibited during the next BrickFair in Alabama (USA).

Like me, you will probably not be able to go there, so you have to contemplate the photos of this MOC on the MOCpages page of yoshix to form your opinion.